The instant they did so, the midshipman crawled in under the flap, rushed to the table on which the general had thrown the piece of paper, seized it, and then darted out again, and stole quietly away in the darkness.

He had not gone twenty yards, when a volley of angry exclamations told him that the French general had discovered that the tent was empty.
The night was a dark one, and to prevent himself from falling over tent ropes, the midshipman threw himself down and crawled along on his hands and knees, but he paused, before he had gone many yards, and listened intently.

The general was returning to his tent.
"It is no use doing anything tonight," he said.

"Even an Indian could not follow the track of a waggon.

At daybreak, Major Dorsay, let the redskins know that the prisoners have escaped, and offer a reward of fifty crowns for their recapture, dead or alive--I care not which.