On the margin of a bright blue western stream stood a small fort,
surrounding the dwellings of some hunters who had penetrated thus far
into the vast wilderness to pursue their calling. The huts they raised
were rude and lowly, and yet the walls surrounding them were high and
lofty. Piles of arms filled their block house, and a constant guard was
kept. These precautions were taken to protect them from the Indians,
whose ancient hunting grounds they had intruded on, and whose camp was
not far distant. Deadly dealings had passed between them, but the
whites, strong in number and in arms, heeded little the settled malice
of their foes, and after taking the usual precautions of defence,
carried on their hunting, shooting an Indian, or ought else that came
across them, while the others, savage and unrelenting, kept on their
trail in hope of vengeance.
Strange was it, that in an atmosphere dark as this, the light of love
should beam. Leemah, a beautiful Indian girl, met in the forest a young
white hunter. She loved, and was beloved in return. The roses of the few
summers she had lived glowed warm upon her cheek, and truth flashed in
the guileless light of her deep dark eyes--but Leemah was already a
bride, betrothed in childhood to a chieftain of her tribe; he had now
summoned her to his dwelling, and her business in the forest was
collecting materials for her bridal store of box and basket. Her
sylph-like form of arrowy grace was arrayed in his wedding gifts of
costly furs, and glittering bright with bead and shell. But few were the
stores that Leemah gathered for her Indian chief. The burning noon was
passed with her white love in the leafy shade--there she brought for him
summer berries, and gathered for him the water cup flower, with its
cooling draught of fragrant dew. Her time of marriage came, and at
midnight it was to be celebrated with torch light and dance. The other
hunters knew the love of Silas for the gem of the wilderness, and
readily offered their assistance in his project of gaining her. To them,
carrying off an Indian girl was an affair of light moment, and at dark
of night, with their boat and loaded rifles, they proceeded up the
stream towards the Indian village. As they drew near, the wild chaunt of
the bridal song was heard, and as all silently they approached the
shore, the red torch light gleamed out upon the scene of mystic
splendour. The chieftains of the tribe in stately silence stood around.
The crimson beams lit up the plumes upon their brow, and showed in more
awful hues the fearful lines of their painted faces, terrible at the
festival as on the field of battle. The squaws, in their gayest garb,
with mirrors flashing on their breasts, and beads all shining as they
moved, danced round the betrothed; and there she stood, the love-lorn
Leemah, her black hair all unbraided, and her dark eyes piercing the far
depths of night, as if looking for her lover. Nor looked she long in
vain, for suddenly and fearlessly Silas sprung upon the shore, dashed
through the circle, and bore off the Indian bride to his bark. Then rose
the war-shout of her people, while pealed among them the rifles of the
hunters. Again came the war-whoop, mingled with the death shriek of the
wounded. A hunter stood up and echoed them in mockery, but an arrow
quivered through his brain and he was silent, while the stream grew
covered with shadowy canoes, filled with dark forms shouting for
revenge. On came they with lightning's speed, and on sped the hunters
knowing now that their only safety was in flight. On dashed they through
the waters which now began to bear them forward with wondrous haste. A
thought of horror struck them: they were in the rapids, while before
them the white foam of the falls flashed through the darkness. The tide
had ebbed in their absence, and the river, smooth and level when full,
showed all across it, at the flood, a dark abyss of fearful rocks and
boiling surf. This they knew, but it was now too late to recede; the
dark stream bore them onward, and now even the Indians dare not follow,
but landed and ran along the shore shouting with delight at their
inevitable destruction. It was a moment of dread, unutterable horror to
Silas and his comrades. Their bark whirled round in the giddy
waves--then was there a wild plunge--a fearful shock--a shriek of death,
and the flashing foam gathered over them, while loudly rang the voices
from the shore. But suddenly, by some mighty effort, the boat was flung
clear of the rocks and uninjured into the smooth current of the lower
stream. A few strokes of the oar brought them to the fort, which they
entered; and heard the Indians howling behind them like wolves baffled
of their prey. But they and the dangers they had so lately passed were
alike forgotten in the night's carousal; and, when the season was ended,
they returned to their homes in the settlements, enriched with the
spoils they had gained in hunting, and Silas with his treasured pearl of
the prairie.
But here, some months after they returned, and while, his heart was yet
brightened with her smiles, a dark shade passed over her sunny brow, and
she vanished from his home. An Indian of her tribe was said to have been
lingering near the village, and she no doubt had joined him and returned
to her kindred. Other tidings of her fate Silas heard not. Alas! she
knew the undying vengeance of her people, and by giving herself up to
them thought to shield him from their hatred.
Again the time of hunting came, and the same party occupied the fort in
the wilderness. As yet they had been unmolested by the Indians: they
even knew not of their being in the neighbourhood, yet still a form of
guarding was kept up, and Silas and a comrade held the night-watch in
the block house. The others had fallen asleep, and Silas, as he sat with
half-closed eyes, fancied he saw before him his lost love, Leemah; he
started as he thought from a dream, but 'twas real, and 'twas her own
cool fingers pressed his brow--by the clear fire light he saw her cheek
was deadly pale, but her eyes were flashing like sepulchral lamps, and a
white-browed babe slept upon her bosom. In a deep thrilling whisper she
bade him rise and follow her. Wondering how she had found entrance, he
obeyed, and she led him outside the walls of the fort; a murmuring
sound as of leaves stirred by the wind was heard.
'Tis the coming of the Red Eagle, said Leemah, his beak is whetted for
the blood draughts; here enter, and if your own life or Leemah's be
dear, keep still;--as she spoke she parted aside the young shoots which
had sprung tip from the root of a tree, and twined like an arbour about
it. Her deep earnestness left no time for speculation; he entered the
recess, and hardly had the flexile boughs sprung back to their places,
when the fleet footsteps of the Indians came nearer, and the fort was
surrounded by them; the building was fired, and then their deadly yell
burst forth, while the unfortunate inmates started from sleep at the
sound of horror. Mercy for them there was none; the relentless savage
knew it not; but the shout of delight rose louder as they saw the flames
dance higher o'er their victims; and Silas looked on all--but Leemah's
eye was on his--he knew his slightest movement was death to her as well
as to himself. Like a demon through the flame leaped the ghastly form of
the Red Eagle, (he to whom Leemah had been espoused) and with searching
glance glared on his victims, but saw not there the one he sought with
deeper vengeance than the others--'twas Silas he looked for; and, with
the speed of a winged fiend, he bounded to where Leemah stood, and
accused her of having aided in his escape. She acknowledged she had, and
pointed to the far-off forest as his hiding place. In an instant his
glittering tomahawk cleft the hand she raised off at the wrist. Silas
knew no more. Leemah's hot blood fell upon his brow, and he fainted
through excess of agony, but like Mazeppa, he lived to repay the Red
Eagle in after-years for that night of horror--when his eyes had been
blasted with the burning fort, his ears stunned with the shrieks of his
murdered friends, and his brain scorched through with Leemah's life
blood.
Long years after, when he had forsaken the hunter's path, and fought as
a loyalist in the British ranks, among their Indian allies who smoked
with them the pipe of peace and called them brothers, was one, in whose
wild and withered features he recalled the stern Red Eagle; blood called
for blood; he beguiled the Indian now with copious draughts of the white
man's fire-water, and he and another (brother of one of the murdered
hunters) killed him, and placing him in his own canoe with the paddle in
his hand, sent the fearful corpse down the rapid stream, bearing him
unto his home. The wild dog and wolf howled on the banks as it floated
past, and the raven and eagle hovered over it claiming it as their prey.
The tribe, at the death of their Sagamore, withdrew from their allies,
and, following the track of the setting sun, waged war indiscriminately
with all.
And long after, though more than half a century had elapsed since the
death of the Red Eagle, and when the snows of eighty winters had
whitened the dark tresses of the young hunter, and bowed the tall form
of the loyalist soldier; when he who had trod the flowery paths of the
prairie, and slept in the orchard bowers by the blue stream of the
Hudson, had, for love of England's laws, become a refugee from his
native land; and when here, in New Brunswick, he beheld raised around
him a happy and comfortable home--his house, which had always been
freely opened to religious worship, and in which had been held the
prayer-meetings of the baptists and love-feasts of the methodists,
became one day transformed into a catholic chapel.
A bishop of the Romish church was passing through the province, and his
presence in this sequestered spot was an event of unwonted interest;
many who had forgotten the creed of their fathers returned to the faith
of their earlier days, and among the most fervent of those assembled,
there was a small group of Milicete Indians from the woods hard by. With
the idolatrous devotion of their half savage nature they fell prostrate
before the priest. Among them was an ancient woman, but not of their
tribe, who, while raising her head in prayer, or in crossing herself,
Silas observed she used but one hand--the other was gone. This
circumstance recalled to light the faded love-dream of his youth. He
questioned her and found her to be Leemah, his once beautiful Indian
bride, who had wandered here to escape the dark tyranny of her savage
kindred. She died soon after, and "she sleeps there," said the old man,
pointing to where a white cross marked a low grassy mound before us, and
time had not so dried up his heart springs but I saw a tear drop to her
memory.
* * * * *
I turned my eyes from Leemah's grave to see what effect the tale had
made on the old lady, but she was so engaged in contemplating the golden
curls of her doughnuts, and feathery lightness of her pound cake, she
had heard it not; and even if she had, it had all happened such a long
time ago, that her impressions respecting it must all have worn out by
now. After having partaken of the luxurious feast she set before us, and
hearing some more of the old man's legends, we proceeded forward.
The evening, with one of those sudden changes of New Brunswick, had
become cold and chilly. The sun looked red and lurid through the heavy
masses of fog clouds drifting through the sky; this fog, which comes all
the way from the Banks of Newfoundland, and which is particularly
disagreeable sometimes along the Bay shore and in St. John, in
opposition to the general clearness of the American atmosphere is but
little known in the interior of the country. Numerous summer fallows are
burning around, and the breeze flings over us showers of blackened
leaves and blossoms. As we approached home, we were accosted by one Mr.
Isaac Hanselpecker, a neighbour of ours; he was leaning over the bars,
apparently wanting a lounge excessively. He had just finished milking,
and had handed the pails to Miss Hanselpecker, as he called his wife. If
there be a trait of American character peculiar to itself, displayed
more fully than another by contrast with Europeans, it is in the
treatment of the gentler sex, differing as it does materially from the
picture of the Englishman, standing with his back to the fire, while the
ladies freeze around him; or the glittering politeness of the Frenchman,
hovering like a butterfly by the music stand; it has in it more of
intellect and real tenderness than either, although tending as it does
to the advancement of national character, some of their own talented
ones begin to complain that in the refined circles of the States they
are becoming almost too civilised in this respect: the ladies requiring
rather more than is due to them. Yet among the working classes it has a
sweet and wholesome influence, softening as it does the asperities of
labour, and lightening the burthen to each. Here woman's empire is
within, and here she shines the household star of the poor man's hearth;
not in idleness, for in America, of all countries in the world,
prosperity depends on female industry. Here "she looketh well to the
ways of her household, and eateth not the bread of idleness," and for
this reason, perhaps, it is, that their husbands arise and call them
blessed. Now Mr. Hanselpecker had all the respect for his lady natural
to his country, and assisted her domestic toils by milking the cows,
making fires, and fetching wood and water. Yet there was one material
point in which he failed: she was often "scant of bread," he being one
who, even in this land of toil, got along, somehow or other, with
wondrous little bodily labour; professing to be a farmer, he held one of
the finest pieces of land in the settlement, but his agricultural
operations, for the most part, consisted in hoeing a few sickly stems of
corn, while others were reaping buckwheat, or sowing a patch of flax,
"'cause the old woman wanted loom gears;" shooting cranes, spearing
salmon, or trapping musquash on the lake, he prefers to raising fowl or
sheep, as cranes find their own provisions, and fish require no fences
to keep them from the fields. His wife's skill, however, in managing the
dairy department, is, when butter rates well in the market, their chief
dependence; and he, when he chooses to work, which he would much rather
do for another than himself, can earn enough in one day, if he take
truck, to keep him three, and but that he prefers fixing cucumbers to
thrashing, and making moccasins to clearing land, he might do well
enough. Though poor, he is none the least inclined to grovel, but, with
the spirit of his land, feels quite at ease in company with any judge or
general in the country.
Having declined his invitation to enter the log erection,--which in
another country would hardly be styled a house, he having still delayed
to enclose the gigantic frame, whose skeleton form was reared hard
by--he gave his opinion of the weather at present, with some shrewd
guesses as to what it would be in future; regarding the smoke wreaths
from the fires around (there were none on his land however), he said, it
reminded him of the fire in Miramichi. "How long is it, old woman," said
he, turning to his wife, who had now joined us, "since that ere
burning?" "Well," said she, "I aint exactly availed to tell you right
off how many years it is since, but I guess our Jake was a week old when
it happened."
Now, as the burning of Miramichi was one of the most interesting
historical events in the province records, we gave him the date, which
was some twenty years since; this also gave us the sum of Jacob's
lustres--rather few considering he had planted a tater patch on shares,
and laid out to marry in the fall.
"Well," said he, "You may depend that was a fire--my hair curls yet when
I think of it--it was the same summer we got married, and Washington
Welford having been out a timber-hunting with me the fall afore, we
discovered a most elegant growth of pine--I never see'd before nor since
the equal on it--regular sixty footers, every log on 'em--the trees
stood on the banks of the river, as if growing there on purpose to be
handy for rafting, and we having got a first-rate supply from our
merchants in town, toted our things with some of the old woman's house
trumpery to the spot--we soon had up a shanty, and went to work in right
airnest. There was no mistake in Wash; he was as clever a fellow as ever
I knowed, and as handsome a one--seven feet without his shoes--eyes like
diamonds, and hair slick as silk; when he swung his axe among the
timber, you may depend he looked as if he had a mind to do it--our
felling and hewing went on great, and with the old woman for cook we
made out grand--she, however, being rather delicate, we hired a help, a
daughter of a neighbour about thirty miles off. Ellen Ross was as smart
a gal as ever was raised in these clearings--her parents were old
country folks, and she had most grand larning, and was out and out a
regular first-rater. Washington and her didn't feel at all small
together--they took a liking to each other right away, and a prettier
span was never geared. Well, our Jake was born, and the old woman got
smart, and about house again. Wash took one of our team horses, and he
and Ellen went off to the squire's to get yoked. It was a most beautiful
morning when they started, but the weather soon began to change--there
had been a most uncommon dry spell--not a drop of rain for many weeks,
nor hardly a breath of air in the woods, but now there came a most
fearful wind and storm, and awful black clouds gathering through the
sky--the sun grew blood red, and looked most terrible through the smoke.
I had heard of such things as 'clipses, but neither the almanac, nor the
old woman's universal, said a word about it. Altho' there was such a
wind, there was the most burning heat--one could hardly breathe, and the
baby lay pale and gasping--we thought it was a dying. The cattle grew
oneasy, and all at once a herd of moose bounded into our chopping, and a
lot of bears after them, all running as if for dear life. I got down the
rifle, and was just a going to let fly at them, when a scream from the
old woman made me look about. The woods were on fire all round us, and
the smoke parting before us, showed the flames crackling and roaring
like mad, 'till the very sky seemed on fire over our heads. I did'nt
know what to do, and, in fact, there was no time to calculate about it.
The blaze glared hotly on our faces, and all the wild critturs of the
woods began to carry on most ridiculous, and shout and holler like all
nature I caught up my axe, and the old woman the baby, and took the only
open space left for us, where the stream was running, and the fire
couldn't catch. Just as we were going, a horse came galloping most awful
fast right through the fire--it was poor Washington; his clothes all
burnt, and his black hair turned white as snow, and oh! the fearful
burden he carried in his arms. Ellen Ross, the beautiful bright-eyed
girl, who had left us so smilingly in the morning, lay now before us a
scorched and blackened corpse--the scared horse fell dead on the ground.
I hollered to Washington to follow us to the water, but he heard me
not; and the flames closed fast o'er him and his dead bride--poor
fellow, that was the last on him--and creation might be biled down, ere
you could ditto him any how. By chance our timber was lying near in the
stream, and I got the old woman and the baby on a log, and stood beside
them up to the neck in water, which now grew hot, and actilly began to
hiss around me. The trees on the other side of the river had caught, and
there was an arch of flame right above us. My stars! what a time we had
of it! Lucifees and minks, carraboo and all came close about us, and an
Indian devil got upon the log beside my wife; poor critturs, they were
all as tame as possible, and half frightened to death. I thought the end
of the world was come for sartain. I tried to pray, but I was got so
awful hungry, that grace before meat was all I could think off. How long
we had been there I couldn't tell, but it seemed tome a 'tarnity--fire,
howsomever, cannot burn always--that's a fact; so at the end of what we
afterwards found to be the third day, we saw the sun shine down on the
still smoking woods. The old woman was weak, I tell you; and for me, I
felt considerably used up--howsomever I got to the shore, and hewed out
a canoe from one of our own timber sticks--there was no need of lucifers
to strike a light--lots of brands were burning about. I laid some on to
it and burnt it out, and soon had a capital craft, and away we went down
the stream. Dead bodies of animals were floating about, and there were
some living ones, looking as if they had got out of their latitude, and
didn't think they would find it. I reckon we weren't the only sufferers
by that ere conflagration. As we came down to the settlements folks took
us for ghosts, we looked so miserable like--howsomever, with good
tendin, we soon came round again; but, to tell you the truth, it makes
me feel kind a narvous, when I see a fallow burning ever since. Tho'
folks could'nt tell how that ere fire happened, and say it was a
judgment on lumber men and sich like, I think it came from some
settlers' improvements, who, wishing to raise lots of taters, destroyed
the finest block of timber land in the province, besides the ships in
Miramichi harbour, folks' buildings, and many a clever feller, whose
latter end was never known."
"And so I suppose Mr. H.," said his wife, "that is the reason you make
such slim clearings." "I estimate your right," said he; and we, not
expecting the spice of sentiment which flavored Mr. H.'s story, left
him, and reached home, where we closed the evening by putting into the
following shape one of Silas Marvin's legends, not written with a
perryian pen and azure fluid, but with a quill from the wing of a wild
goose, shot by our friend Hanselpecker, (who by the way was fond of such
game,) as last fall it took its flight from our cold land to the sunny
south, and with home-made ink prepared from a decoction of white maple
bark.