Now he was free and victorious. Exultantly he hummed:
You've heard, I s'pose, of New Orleans,
It's famed for youth and beauty;
There are girls of every hue, it seems,
From snowy white to sooty.
Now Packenham has made his brags,
If he that day was lucky,
He'd have the girls and cotton bags
In spite of Old Kentucky.
But Jackson, he was wide awake,
And was not scared at trifles,
For well he knew Kentucky's boys,
With their death-dealing rifles.
He led them down to cypress swamp,
The ground was low and mucky;
There stood John Bull in martial pomp,
And here stood old Kentucky.
"Pretty good song, that of yours," said the Panther approvingly. "Where
did you get it?"
"From my father," replied Fields. "He's a Kentuckian, an' he fit at New
Orleans. He was always hummin' that song, an' it come back to me after
we drove off the Mexicans. Struck me that it was right timely."
Ned and Will, on their own initiative, had been drawing all the fallen
logs that they could find and move to the edge of the wood, and having
finished the task they came back to the bed of the creek. Roylston, the
rifle across his knees, was sitting with his eyes closed, but he opened
them as they approached.
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