ROBINSON. No fear of that!

BROCK. I trust there is not; yet I speak of it
As what is to be feared more than the odds.
For like to forests are communities -
Fair at a distance, entering you find
The rubbish and the underbrush of states,
'Tis ever the mean soul that counts the odds,
And, where you find this spirit, pluck it up -
'Tis full of mischief.

MACDONELL. It is almost dead.
England's vast war, our weakness, and the eagle
Whetting his beak at Sandwich, with one claw
Already in our side, put thought to steep
In cold conjecture for a time, and gave
A text to alien tongues. But, since you came,
Depression turns to smiling, and men see
That dangers well-opposed may be subdued
Which shunned would overwhelm us.

BROCK. Hold to this!
For since the storm has struck us we must face it.
What is our present count of volunteers?

NICHOL. More than you called for have assembled, Sir -
The flower of York and Lincoln.

BROCK. Some will go
To guard our frontier at Niagara.
Which must be strengthened even at the cost
Of York itself. The rest to the Detroit,
Where, with Tecumseh's force, our regulars,
And Kent and Essex loyal volunteers,
We'll give this Hull a taste of steel so cold
His teeth will chatter at it, and his scheme
Of easy conquest vanish into air.

[Enter a COMPANY of_ MILITIA with
their OFFICERS, unarmed. They salute, march
across the stage, and make their exit_.]

What men are those? Their faces are familiar.

ROBINSON. Some farmers whom you furloughed at Fort
George,
To tend their fields, which still they leave half-
reaped
To meet invasion.

BROCK. I remember it!
The jarring needs of harvest-time and war,
Twixt whose necessities grave hazards lay.

ROBINSON. They only thought to save their children's
bread,
And then return to battle with light hearts.
For, though their hard necessities o'erpoised
Their duty for the moment, these are men.
Who draw their pith from loyal roots, their sires,
Dug up by revolution, and cast out
To hovel in the bitter wilderness,
And wring, with many a tussle, from the wolf
Those very fields which cry for harvesters.

BROCK. O I observed them closely at Fort George -
Red-hot for action in their summer-sleeves,
And others drilling in their naked feet -
Our poor equipment (which disgraced us there)
Too scanty to go round. See they get arms,
An ample outfit and good quarters too.

NICHOL. They shall be well provided for in all.

[Enter COLONELS BABY [Footnote: Pronounced Baw-
bee.] and ELLIOTT.]

BROCK. Good morning both; what news from home, Baby?

BABY. None, none your Excellency - whereat we fear
This Hull is in our rear at Amherstburg.

BROCK. Not yet; what I unsealed last night reports
Tecumseh to have foiled the enemy
In two encounters at the Canard bridge.
A noble fellow; as I hear, humane,
Lofty and bold and rooted in our cause.

BABY. I know him well; a chief of matchless force.
If Mackinaw should fall - that triple key
To inland seas and teeming wilderness -
The bravest in the west will flock to him.