第114章

The shores of Station Island were completely fringed with bushes, and great care had been taken to preserve them, as they answered as a screen to conceal the persons and things collected within their circle.Favored by this shelter, as well as by that of several thickets of trees and different copses, some six or eight low huts bad been erected to be used as quarters for the officer and his men, to con-tain stores, and to serve the purposes of kitchen, hospital, etc.These huts were built of logs in the usual manner, had been roofed by bark brought from a distance, lest the signs of labor should attract attention, and, as they had now been inhabited some months, were as comfortable as dwellings of that description usually ever get to be.

At the eastern extremity of the island, however, was a small, densely-wooded peninsula, with a thicket of under-brush so closely matted as nearly to prevent the possibility of seeing across it, so long as the leaves remained on the branches.Near the narrow neck that connected this acre with the rest of the island, a small blockhouse had been erected, with some attention to its means of resistance.

The logs were bullet-proof, squared and jointed with a care to leave no defenceless points; the windows were loop-holes, the door massive and small, and the roof, like the rest of the structure, was framed of hewn timber, covered properly with bark to exclude the rain.The lower apart-ment as usual contained stores and provisions; here indeed the party kept all their supplies; the second story was in-tended for a dwelling, as well as for the citadel, and a low garret was subdivided into two or three rooms, and could hold the pallets of some ten or fifteen persons.All the arrangements were exceedingly simple and cheap, but they were sufficient to protect the soldiers against the effects of a surprise.As the whole building was considerably less than forty feet high, its summit was concealed by the tops of the trees, except from the eyes of those who had reached the interior of the island.On that side the view was open from the upper loops, though bushes even there, more or less, concealed the base of the wooden tower.

The object being purely defence, care had been taken to place the blockhouse so near an opening in the limestone rock that formed the base of the island as to admit of a bucket being dropped into the water, in order to obtain that great essential in the event of a siege.In order to facilitate this operation, and to enfilade the base of the building, the upper stories projected several feet beyond the lower in the manner usual to blockhouses, and pieces of wood filled the apertures cut in the log flooring, which were intended as loops and traps.The communications between the different stories were by means of ladders.If we add that these blockhouses were intended as citadels for garrisons or settlements to retreat to, in the cases of attacks, the general reader will obtain a sufficiently correct idea of the arrangements it is our wish to explain.

But the situation of the island itself formed its principal merit as a military position.Lying in the midst of twenty others, it was not an easy matter to find it; since boats might pass quite near, and, by glimpses caught through the openings, this particular island would be taken for a part of some other.Indeed, the channels between the islands which lay around the one we have been describing were so narrow that it was even difficult to say which por-tions of the land were connected, or which separated, even as one stood in the centre, with the express desire of ascer-taining the truth.The little bay in particular, which Jasper used as a harbor, was so embowered with bushes and shut in with islands, that, the sails of the cutter being lowered, her own people on one occasion had searched for hours before they could find the _Scud_, in their return from a short excursion among the adjacent channels in quest of fish.In short, the place was admirably adapted to its present objects, and its natural advantages had been as in-geniously improved as economy and the limited means of a frontier post would very well allow.

The hour which succeeded the arrival of the _Scud_ was one of hurried excitement.The party in possession had done nothing worthy of being mentioned, and, wearied with their seclusion, they were all eager to return to Os-wego.The Sergeant and the officer he came to relieve had no sooner gone through the little ceremonies of transfer-ring the command, than the latter hurried on board the _Scud_ with his whole party; and Jasper, who would gladly have passed the day on the island, was required to get under way forthwith, the wind promising a quick passage up the river and across the lake.Before separating, how-ever, Lieutenant Muir, Cap, and the Sergeant had a private conference with the ensign who had been relieved, in which the last was made acquainted with the suspicions that existed against the fidelity of the young sailor.

Promising due caution, the officer embarked, and in less than three hours from the time when she had arrived the cutter was again in motion.