No one ever conceived the idea of firing these engines of
war; and, indeed, it is highly probable that such an attempt would
have been attended with consequences much more dreadful to those
_behind_ than to those who might chance to be in front of the guns.
Nevertheless they were imposing, and harmonised well with the flag-
staff, which was the only other military symptom about the place.
This latter was used on particular occasions, such as the arrival or
departure of a brigade of boats, for the purpose of displaying the
folds of a red flag on which were the letters H. B. C.
The fort stood, as we have said, on the banks of the Assiniboine
River, on the opposite side of which the land was somewhat wooded,
though not heavily, with oak, maple, poplar, aspens, and willows;
while at the back of the fort the great prairie rolled out like a
green sea to the horizon, and far beyond that again to the base of
the Rocky mountains. The plains at this time, however, were a sheet
of unbroken snow, and the river a mass of solid ice.
It was noon on the day following that on which our friend Charley had
threatened rebellion, when a tall elderly man might have been seen
standing at the back gate of Fort Garry, gazing wistfully out into
the prairie in the direction of the lower part of the settlement. He
was watching a small speck which moved rapidly over the snow in the
direction of the fort.
"It's very like our friend Frank Kennedy," said he to himself (at
least we presume so, for there was no one else within earshot to whom
he could have said it, except the door-post, which every one knows is
proverbially a deaf subject).
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