Sometimes I thought if digging a hole under the place where they made their fire, and putting in five or six pounds of gunpowder, which, when they kindled their fire, would consequently take fire, and blow up all that was near it: but as, in the first place, I should be unwilling to waste so much powder upon them, my store being now within the quantity of one barrel, so neither could I be sure of its going off at any certain time, when it might surprise them; and, at best, that it would do little more than just blow the fire about their ears and fright them, but not sufficient to make them forsake the place: so I laid it aside; and then proposed that I would place myself in ambush in some convenient place, with my three guns all double-loaded, and in the middle of their bloody ceremony let fly at them, when I should be sure to kill or wound perhaps two or three at every shot; and then falling in upon them with my three pistols and my sword, I made no doubt but that, if there were twenty, I should kill them all.
Mais il me fâchait de prodiguer tant de poudre, ma provision n'étant plus alors que d'un baril, sans avoir la certitude que l'explosion se ferait en temps donné pour les surprendre: elle pouvait fort bien ne leur griller que les oreilles et les effrayer, ce qui n'eût pas été suffisant pour leur faire évacuer la place. Je renonçai donc à ce projet, et je me proposai alors de me poster en embuscade, en un lieu convenable, avec mes trois mousquets chargés à deux balles, et de faire feu au beau milieu de leur sanglante cérémonie quand je serais sûr d'en tuer ou d'en blesser deux ou trois peut-être à chaque coup.