“A land of streams! some, like a downward smoke,
Slow-dropping veils of thinnest lawn, did go;
And some through wavering lights and shadows broke,
Rolling a slumb’rous sheet of foam below.
They saw the gleaming river seaward flow
From the inner land. Far off three mountain-tops
Stood sunset-flushed.”
“Alice,” says Sylvia, as she stands before the mirror arranging her
hat, “I shall ride with Mr. Dupont this afternoon.”
[Illustration: Preparing for the Ride.]
“Very well,” I answer indifferently, being engaged just then in fitting
on my gloves and gazing out of the window. “There seem to be a great
many people here,” I remark, “and such a number of ox-carts!”
“And I want _you_ to go with Charley,” she proceeds.
“Indeed!” I say, roused to interest by this. “How kind of you to think
of me! But there is one slight objection to my going with Charley—he
has not asked me to do so.”
“But you can ask him to go with you,” she says persuasively. “You can
take him in the phaeton, and make Eric go on horseback with Adèle.”
“If he and Eric were puppets, and if I had any desire for Charley’s
society, I might—perhaps. As it is, such a thing is impossible. Why do
you suggest it?”
“Because I don’t want Adèle to have the pleasure of flirting with him,”
is the candid reply. “She is a dreadful flirt, and has a particular
knack of making fools of men. Of course, I am not afraid of her making
a fool of Charley in any _serious_ manner, but still I should like her
to be disappointed—and you know she could do nothing with Eric.”
“I know that I have occasionally heard of such a thing as Satan
reproving sin. If you want Charley looked after, why don’t you do it
yourself?”
“How can I, with Mr. Dupont on my hands?”
“Turn Mr. Dupont over to me. I will take charge of _him_.”
I make this suggestion in a spirit of malice which Sylvia understands.
She takes up her gloves as she quietly replies:
“Mr. Dupont asked me if I would not ride with him. It is impossible,
therefore, for me to turn him over to anyone else.”
“I am afraid Charley will become a hopeless victim to Miss Dupont’s
fascinations, then,” I say coolly.
Events verify this prediction. When we go down-stairs, we find the
horses standing before the door, and Charley in the act of assisting
Miss Dupont to her saddle. This feat is accomplished very well on both
sides. The lady puts one dainty foot—all creole women have pretty
feet—into the gentleman’s hand, he lifts her, she springs, and presto!
the thing is done. Mr. Kenyon swings himself into his own saddle as
quickly, then turns and waves his hand to us—
“‘She is won! we are off, over bush, bank, and scaur—
They’ll have fleet steeds that follow,’”
he says, as they ride away.
“Their steeds were not particularly fleet the last time they rode, were
they, Mr. Dupont?” says Sylvia, looking after them. “Adèle, you know,
said her horse wouldn’t go; but he seems to go now very well. I hope
they will miss the road for their hypocrisy!”
“Charley has probably taken care to make inquiries,” says Eric, handing
me into the small phaeton.
[Illustration: The Swannanoa.]
Few rivers have been more praised and rhymed than the Swannanoa, toward
which we take our way. To those who have not penetrated far into
the mountains and seen wilder and lovelier streams, it is certainly
a thing of beauty. The stream itself is clear as crystal and flows
with glancing swiftness between its vine-draped banks, while it is
scarcely possible to imagine a more charming picture of fertility than
the valley presents. We follow the river for several miles—every turn
opening fresh scenes of loveliness—and finally pause at a ford where
Sylvia and Mr. Dupont ride into the stream. Lances of sunlight dart
through the lace-work of shade, touch the sparkling current, and dapple
the glossy coats of the horses. The rippling river makes a background
in long perspective for the two riders, and on the opposite side the
road leads up between high, picturesque banks.
“Is not this delightful?” cries Sylvia. “One might expect to see Diana
and all her nymphs. Instead, I see an ox-cart coming in one direction,
and two horsemen in another.”
The ox-cart is lumbering directly down upon the phaeton in which I
am seated, so I cry out to Eric for rescue. He comes and drives into
the river just as the two horsemen ride down between the sloping,
shade-arched banks.
[Illustration: Ox-Cart.]
At this double invasion of the ford, Sylvia and her escort turn their
horses to ride out, and in doing so face the last-comers. One of them
stops and lifts his hat.
“Miss Norwood!” he cries. “What an unexpected pleasure!”
Sylvia checks her horse and holds out her hand with a laugh.
“Is it possible this is you, Mr. Lanier?” she says.
Eric and I glance at each other. We both think of Charley. Of all
Sylvia’s suitors— and she has not a few—Ralph Lanier is the most
devoted, the most persevering, and the most wealthy. Consequently,
he is the one whom all her friends and acquaintances have long since
decided to be destined by Providence for her.
Mr. Lanier is plainly delighted at the encounter. “To think that
I should meet you here!” he says rapturously. “My uncle has a
country-seat near Flat Rock, and I have been spending a week or two
with him. We only came to Asheville this morning, and I was thinking of
leaving the mountains to-morrow.”
“Leaving!—so early in the season?” says Sylvia. “What a strange idea!”
“I find this country very dull,” says Mr. Lanier, shrugging his
shoulders. “I am no great admirer of Nature. I prefer civilization and
society. I was thinking of going to the White Sulphur and Saratoga, and
hoped very much to meet _you_.”
“You would have been disappointed,” she says coolly. “I have become
an Arcadian, and abjured all resorts of that kind. We are just
beginning an extensive tour through this country which bores you so
much.—By-the-by, here are Alice and Eric—and let me present Mr. Dupont.”
Hands are shaken and proper speeches made—the Swannanoa, the while,
rippling gently round us, the sunbeams slanting, the vines drooping,
the setting of the whole scene idyllic enough for a pastoral poem. We
learn that Mr. Lanier is accompanying his uncle to pay a visit to a
friend who lives near by.
“Nonsense!” says Eric. “A man does not come to Arcadia to pay or
receive visits. _We_ are going to McDowell’s Hill for the sunset.
You had better come with us.”
“Probably Mr. Lanier is no admirer of sunsets,” says Sylvia, with a
slight touch of scorn in her tone.
Mr. Lanier is quick enough to hear this. “On the contrary, I admire
them exceedingly,” he says. “If my uncle will excuse me, I will
accompany you with pleasure.”
The uncle readily excuses him, so he turns his horse and rides by
Sylvia’s side up the road down which he came. As Eric and I follow, we
exchange a few remarks about the pleasure in store for Charley.
“Poor fellow!” I say. “An evil fate seems to war against him. I could
not help hoping that on this expedition he might have a fair field for
once; yet see!—first Mr. Dupont appeared, and now Ralph Lanier, his
most formidable rival.”
“Charley is his own worst rival,” says Eric, touching the horse
sharply. “If Sylvia ends by marrying somebody else, it will be his
fault, and I shall not pity him. A man should be ready to fight for
every thing—fortune, fame, and the woman he loves.”
When we reach McDowell’s Hill we find all the equestrians assembled,
Sylvia attended by her two cavaliers, Charley standing with an air of
great nonchalance by Adèle’s horse. Only the very best actors do not
overact a part, however, and there is a trifle too much nonchalance
in this young gentleman’s bearing for perfect unconcern. The manner
in which his hat is pushed back as he looks up into Adèle’s eyes is
significant of irritated defiance. As soon as we draw up, he turns
abruptly and comes to the side of the phaeton.
“Where did you pick up that fellow?” he asks.
“He is a fish caught in the Swannanoa,” says Eric. “I think you may
find him a kindred spirit; he is nearly as fond of Nature, and of the
exertion which a liking of that kind entails, as you are.”
“I should not judge so from his appearance,” says Charley, with a sneer.
Now, it must be stated that there is nothing in Mr. Lanier’s appearance
to draw forth a sneer. He is dressed as men in cities dress, but that
is, to say the least, not a heinous crime, and he would be called by
most people a very handsome man. Charley is _not_ handsome, though his
frank, pleasant face is infinitely more agreeable than Ralph Lanier’s
well-cut features. His blue eyes look into mine with an odd kind of
appeal, and I say hurriedly, “Don’t be disconsolate, Charley—he talks
of going to-morrow!” Then Eric claims my attention for the view.
It is certainly fine, though not so extensive as that from Beaucatcher.
At our feet the hill shelves down abruptly, and two hundred feet below
lies a green expanse—the valleys of the French Broad and Swannanoa at
their junction. Here the Swannanoa, making a graceful curve on the
verdant plain, empties its waters into the channel of the beautiful
stream which has come from the far heights of the Balsam to seek it.
It is only possible to mark the winding course of its current by the
trees that fringe its banks, but the French Broad spreads out in full
view—its splendid “breast of waters” shining in the glow of sunset.
Bounding the cultivated valley, green hills roll softly up, while
beyond stretches the blue-waving mountain line, with the majestic
outlines of Pisgah and the Cold Mountain overtopping their lower
brethren. Far and faint in the west the trending heights that overlook
Tennessee stand, their violet crests outlined against a bed of glory
into which the sun is sinking with great pomp.
This portion of the view is like that which Beaucatcher commands,
but turning northward we have a prospect which no other point near
Asheville possesses. There, dark and massive, rise the great peaks
of Craggy, and the stately pinnacle of the Black. As usual, these
mountains are cloud-topped, and even at this distance—eighteen or
twenty miles—wear the deep shade of color which has given a name to
the range. Spurs running down from them form a chain of hills around
the entire northeastern horizon, and at their base lies Asheville,
scattered over its picturesque slopes.
“I am converted,” says Mr. Lanier, breaking the silence. “The country
which contains such views as this is worth seeing.—Miss Norwood, will
you accept a recruit for your party?”
“I must refer you to Eric,” says Sylvia. “I am not the leader of the
party, nor qualified to judge of your fitness for the service. I am
afraid, however, that if you like society and civilization, you will be
disgusted with the wilds to which we are going.”
“But we shall take the best of society and civilization with us,” he
remarks gallantly.
“We’ll show you at least what a mountain view is before we get back,”
says Charley. “Only hopeless ignorance could excuse anybody for
thinking this worth any special admiration.”
There is a chorus of indignant dissent, in which only Sylvia fails to
join. She says quietly: “We are both hopelessly ignorant then, Mr.
Lanier, for I think this the most beautiful view I have seen in the
mountains.”
“You have not yet seen any thing at all,” says Charley. “Beaucatcher
in itself is very little, but it is finer than this, which proves that
your taste needs cultivation. Mr. Lanier, no doubt, will be able to
assist you in cultivating it.”
What reply the young lady makes is not audible to the rest of the
party, but there is a flash in her eye and a flush on her cheek that do
not bode well for Master Charley.
After this, hostilities are suspended while we watch the sun go
down behind the last chain of western heights. For several minutes
after his disk has disappeared, the mountains behind which he sank
are transformed into dazzling, translucent gold. The effect is
indescribable.
“They cannot be mountains; they _must_ be clouds,” some one says; but
they are mountains, though they lie like clouds on the distant horizon.
Meanwhile a haze of luminous color spreads over the blue chain
encircling the southern sky, and the wide breast of the French Broad is
painted by the magical splendor.
It is so beautiful that we linger until the fires of sunset have nearly
burned out, and Venus is shining in serene state. Then we return to
Asheville by a road which leads through woods full of dusk shadows and
sweet odors. Arching shade droops over us; the air is inexpressibly
fresh and pure; we cross a bridge with the ripple of flowing water
underneath; every sound seems “but an echo of tranquillity” in the soft
hush of the summer twilight.
When we reach the hotel, we find Aunt Markham on the piazza. The
carriages and horses have arrived, she tells us, and have made the trip
very well.
“John” (the coachman) “assures me that the road over Hickory-Nut Gap is
excellent,” she says. “We will certainly return that way.”
Rupert makes the same report.
“I saw no bad road at all,” he says. “We crossed the Gap and came on to
Asheville to-day easily.”
Eric and Charley go to look after John and the horses, while Mr. Lanier
again expresses an intention of joining our party.
“The only way to travel through such a country as this is in the manner
you propose,” he says. “I can easily obtain a horse from my uncle if I
may be allowed to join you.”
“We shall be happy to have you do so,” says Aunt Markham graciously.
She glances at Sylvia, and I know as well what she is thinking as if
her thoughts were expressed in words. As I turn and go up-stairs, I
think again, “Poor Charley!”
Two hours later the moon is rising, when we leave the hotel and take
our way to an elevated point in the western part of the town known as
“Battery Porter.” We are advised against visiting this at night, and
warned of fences to be climbed and terrible dogs to be braved, but such
trifles do not weigh with tourists in search of a view.
Aunt Markham declines to accompany us, but Rupert volunteers to do so.
To raise our spirits he draws from his pocket, and opens, an enormous
knife.
“I could cut a dog’s throat with that,” he says.
I am amused at the order into which the procession falls. Miss Dupont
slips her hand with an air of proprietorship into Charley’s arm.
“You’ll take care of me, I’m sure,” she says, in a tone of confident
trust.
“I’ll defy all the dogs in Asheville, if need be,” he answers—but I see
him glance at Sylvia.
This young lady has in some intangible manner made it understood that
she prefers Mr. Lanier’s attendance, therefore I find Mr. Dupont at my
side. He is courteous and attentive, but a little melancholy. No doubt
it is trying to be coolly laid on the shelf when a new admirer appears
on the scene. An Anglo-Saxon man under such circumstances sulks, or
else (like Charley) diverts his mind by flirting with some one else.
This young creole is merely pensive, and we stroll along, talking of
music—of Schumann, and Wagner, and Thomas’s orchestra—while Sylvia’s
gay laugh floats back to us, and Eric and Rupert discuss the horses and
the roads behind.
Before attempting the dangers of the narrow road which leads to Battery
Porter, we decide to wait until the moon rises sufficiently to show us
the enemy’s movements. We pause, therefore, in a street bounded on one
side by a low stone wall, beyond which is a sloping field, and on the
other by a row of houses set on the side of a hill, which rises in the
rear to the elevation we desire to ascend. Here, on the stone wall, we
sit down in a row and watch the moon rise.
It is very beautiful. There is an alabaster glow all over the eastern
sky, against which the trees on the distant hilltops stand distinctly
defined, and the great cross on Beaucatcher is thrown into relief by
the broad, yellow shield of the moon herself. The circle of mountains
all around the horizon are bathed in radiance, while Asheville— which
we partly overlook—still lies in shadow. Lights gleam here and there
from the houses, foliage is darkly massed in every direction, overhead
the stars shine in the dark-blue sky with a brilliance which almost
seems to equal the advancing moonlight. From the field below us rises a
dewy odor of sweet, fresh grass.
“Come out and hear the waters shoot, the owlet
hoot, the owlet hoot;
Yon crescent moon—a golden boat—hangs dim
behind the tree, O!
The dropping thorn makes white the grass, O
sweetest lass and sweetest lass,
Come out and smell the ricks of hay adown the
croft with me, O!”
It is Ralph Lanier who repeats this as he stands by Sylvia, and we
think the application, despite a few trifling inaccuracies, very good.
The “sweetest lass” looks up with her brightest smile. “How charming!”
she says. “What a picture those four lines paint!”
“Not any prettier picture than this,” says Rupert. He is standing erect
on the wall, despite a suggestion from Charley that people may fancy
the Cardiff giant has arrived in their midst.
“Or perhaps they will think that some imprudent person has found and
opened one of King Solomon’s bottles,” says Sylvia. “Rupert always
reminds me of those remarkable genii in the ‘Arabian Nights.’ He is so
very long in proportion to his width— just as if he had shot up out of
a bottle suddenly—and he can double himself into such a small compass,
that I think he could go back again, if necessary.”
“I’m slim—that’s the reason I look so tall,” says Rupert. “But I
shouldn’t think any thing in the way of height could astonish people
here, after some of the men I’ve seen. There! now she’s over the
trees!” (This remark applies to the moon.) “Let us go on to Battery
Porter.—Brother Eric, hadn’t we better open our knives?”
These weapons prove unnecessary. The dogs rush out and bark at us,
making night hideous with their uproar, but, deterred probably by the
imposing appearance of our phalanx, they make no attack. We pass the
point of danger and reach the open summit of the hill in safety.
Then what a picture is spread around us! North, south, east, and west,
the eye sweeps over an apparently limitless prospect, bounded only by
far, faint mountain-lines, and bathed in a flood of enchantment. It is
not night, but sublimated day—white, lustrous, magical—and so still
that we hear the refrain which the French Broad is chanting as it takes
its way between the hills that overshadow it.
“How distinctly one hears that river!” says Lanier. “It can’t be far
away.”
“Not more than half a mile, I suppose,” answers Victor Dupont.
“How beautiful it must be in this light!” cries Sylvia, addressing the
company. “Let us go down there. It will be better than staying here.”
“And returning to the hotel better than either,” says Charley.
“Then do _you_ return,” she says. “But I don’t think one can possibly
have too much of this divine beauty. All who are in favor of adjourning
to the French Broad please hold up their hands.”
Three pairs of hands are immediately lifted—to wit, Mr. Dupont’s, Mr.
Lanier’s, and Rupert’s. “I shall be well protected, at any rate,” says
Sylvia, coolly. “Will nobody else come?”
“I’ve no doubt everybody else will come,” says Mr. Lanier. “How can
they resist such an invitation?—Miss Dupont, you don’t really mean to
stay behind?”
No, Adèle does not mean to stay behind. The French Broad by moonlight
is too tempting for her powers of resistance, even though the
reluctance of her attendant is patent to the dullest observation.
Carried away by the contagion of example, and feeling, in a measure,
bound to look after the others, Eric and I bring up the rear, and so we
stroll, in straggling procession, down the winding, moonlit road toward
the French Broad.
The least romantic of us feel repaid for our walk when we stand, at
length, on the bridge, and see the river flowing underneath, all silver
light and dark shadows. This bridge seems to mark the boundary of
the change which awaits the stream. Up to this point it is swift but
placid, impetuous yet not tumultuous, and flows through the loveliest
of fertile valleys—first in Transylvania, then in Buncombe. Looking
up the stream we see, lying white in the moonlight, the broad fields
of the last; but, turning our gaze down the current, a very different
picture greets us. Sheer and bold rise the hills among which the river
enters here, and which it will not leave again until it has cut its
stormy way through to Tennessee.
“It seems to invite us to follow it,” says Sylvia, watching the
sweeping current. “Listen! does it not say ‘Come and follow me?’ Why
should we not do so?”
“Why not?” says Charley. “Yonder is a canoe. Let us embark and attempt
the through passage of the French Broad.”
“We can at least get into the canoe and take a row,” says Adèle. “What
is the good of water if one cannot go on it?”
“A row!—a pole, you mean,” says Charley. “That is a mere dug-out, with
half a foot of water in the bottom.”
“I know all about poling,” says Rupert cheerfully. “_I’ll_ take you,
Miss Dupont.”
But Miss Dupont thinks of her pretty boots, her dainty skirts, and
declines. “Dug-outs _are_ muddy things,” she says. “Now, at the Warm
Springs there are excellent boats.”
“The Warm Springs!” says Sylvia. “That is what I mean—that is where the
river is inviting us. Why should we not go there at once?”
“There is no reason why we should not—if you like,” says Eric.
“O mademoiselle,” says Victor, reproachfully, “how can you be so cruel?
You promised that you would join our party. And now to talk of turning
in the opposite direction—”
“I don’t think I promised, Mr. Dupont,” says the young lady calmly. “I
had no right to promise for the rest, you know. Of course, we can’t
decide any thing without Aunt Markham’s consent; but I am inclined to
think that this might be the best time to go down to the Warm Springs.
A little gayety, now and then, is relished by the wisest men—and women.
Asheville is not very gay.”
“But Nature!” says the young man, rather aghast. “I thought you were so
enthusiastic. I thought gayety would only annoy you!”
“Not at all,” says Sylvia. “On the contrary, I like it—taken with
Nature. And then this magnificent river! I _must_ see it before I go
anywhere else. I shall propose the Warm Springs to Aunt Markham
to-morrow. Meanwhile, I am going to get into the canoe, despite the
half a foot of water, and whoever likes may come and pole me.”