Food for the men would last indefinitely, but a time might
arrive when none would be left for the horses.
"If the pinch comes," said Willet, "we know how to relieve it."
"How?" asked Colden.
"We'll eat the horses."
Colden made a wry face.
"It's often been done in Europe," said the hunter. "At the famous
sieges of Leyden and Haarlem, when the Dutch held out so long against
the Spanish, they'd have been glad enough to have had horseflesh."
"I look ahead again," said Robert, hiding a humorous gleam in his eyes
from Colden, "and I see a number of young men behind a palisade which
they have held gallantly for months. They come mostly from
Philadelphia and they call themselves Quakers. They are thin, awfully
thin, terribly thin, so thin that there is scarcely enough to make a
circle for their belts. They have not eaten for four days, and they
are about to kill their last horse. When he is gone they will have to
live on fresh air and scenery."
"Now I know Lennox that you're drawing on your imagination and that
you're a false prophet," said Colden.
"I hope my prediction won't come true, and I don't believe it will,"
said Robert cheerfully.
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