Publisher's Synopsis
On the sultry third of July, 1778, Fred Godfrey, a sturdy youth of eighteen years, was riding at a breakneck speed down the Wyoming Valley, in the direction of the settlement, from which he saw columns of smoke rolling upward, and whence, during the few pauses of his steed, he heard the rattling discharge of firearms and the shouts of combatants. "I wonder whether I am too late," he asked himself more than once, and he urged his splendid horse to a greater pace; "the road never seemed so long." Ah, there was good cause for the anxiety of the lad, for in that lovely Wyoming Valley lived those who were dearer to him than all the world beside, and whatever fate overtook the settlers must be shared by him as well. He had ridden his horse hard, and his flanks glistened with wet and foam, but though every foot of the winding road was familiar to him, it appeared in his torturing impatience to be double its usual length.
