RALLYING VIRGINIA'S MINUTE MEN
The evening after Rodney returned to Charlottesville, Angus rode over
on a raw-boned steed that evidently had outlived his day for leaping
fences and following the hounds.
"What d'ye think of him, Rod?"
"Why, he's some horse, looks like a blooded one," replied Rodney,
speaking as favourably as he could, for he liked Angus and knew the
boy had been a little envious of late. "Where did you get him?"
"He's one Squire Herndon got down on the Pamunkey. Reckon I made a
good trade, fer I found he was blind in one eye an' the squire took
him fer a bad debt an' already had more hosses than he could feed."
"You ought to trade him off and make a good thing."
"Don't reckon I want to trade right away. I 'low after plantin' I'm
goin' to ride round a bit. Thar's a heap o' things a feller can learn
by travellin' around. You know that."
"I suppose so. Tell you what, Angus; I've got to go to Williamsburg
next week. Let's go together. I've never been there. It's the capital
of the Old Dominion and, when the Burgesses are in session, one can
see more of the aristocracy in Williamsburg than in any other place.
Besides, the famous William and Mary College is there. You know many
of our greatest men went there, the Byrds, the Lees and Randolphs, and
Thomas Jefferson, he was a student there. I've heard that he would
like to have a college right here in Charlottesville run according to
a plan of his own. I'll wager if he wants it he'll get it if he lives.
Yes, we'll ride down there and have a fine time."
"That we will fer sure, if we go. Reckon I can fix it. Think we can
see Patrick Henry? I want to see him. They do say he can talk the
birds right out o' the trees."
"You never heard anything like it. He isn't much to look at, but when
he speaks he can make the hair in the back of your neck stand out
straight like the ruff of a cockerel in a fight."
"I hear the fellers talkin'. They'd march right to Joppa if he'd lead
'em."
"Don't believe he's much of a soldier, but he surely is an orator."
Angus rode home whistling.
That evening Mrs. Allison received the following letter in which the
reader may be interested, as was Rodney:
"PRYNDALE, Va., March 28th, 1775.
"DEAR AUNT HARRIET:--I threw away my crutches this morning, and tried
to celebrate by dancing a jig. I'm sure I should have succeeded to my
later sorrow but for Aunt Betty's horrified look, whereupon I sat down
to write you instead.
"Lawrence Enderwood thought Pryndale prosy and I had begun to believe
him when lo, two highwaymen set upon us; a knight errant mounted on a
splendid steed rides to the rescue; Firefly takes fright and runs away
with a helpless maiden hanging by one foot to the stirrup, and both
hands in the mane, expecting every moment to be dashed in pieces and
actually thinking of every wicked thing she ever did; my, but it was
an awful panorama! A snorting steed is heard in pursuit, the knight
errant spurs him on and seizes the bridle of the running horse,
rescues the hapless maiden, who has discovered that she is so wicked
she wants to live, and then, _mirabile dictu!_ the knight errant is
discovered to be no less a personage than one Rodney Allison. Excuse
me, Auntie, if I express the opinion that you've not brought him up
right; he's too shy and actually had to be urged to call on his old
playmate. Seriously, I would have seen him before he fled, had I known
he was there. Aunt Betty didn't tell me. You don't know what a shock
it was to papa and me, the news Rodney brought of the death of Uncle
David. I turned my face to the wall and cried, which as you may know
I'm not in the habit of doing. Not till after he had left Pryndale did
I realize what I owed to him. He was much superior to any teacher I
had in London and he was so patient and kindly with us, imps that we
were.
"Since you left Pryndale things seem much changed and for the worse.
Papa is all out of sorts with what he terms the disloyalty of the
people. He insists we are being driven into a wicked war by a few
hot-headed men together with those who are so ambitious they would
sacrifice their country. I wish I knew the right of it. People who
used to be friendly now look the other way. Only the other day
Gobber's urchins were playing by the road when I rode past their cabin
and the dirty imps made faces and cried out, 'Tory, I hate Tories.'
"Next month papa and I are going to Philadelphia and he may later sail
for London. Somehow, it seems to me as if I weren't coming back. I
suppose being shut up in the house with my sprained ankle makes me
spleeny. Write me in the Quaker city, won't you, and address care of
my uncle, Jacob Derwent. Now don't forget.
"But I know I have tired you already, so here's good-bye and my
regards to Rodney, not forgetting Nat, splendid fellow.
"Your affectionate niece,
"ELIZABETH DANESFORD."
Rodney and Angus arrived at Williamsburg April 19th, the very day the
Massachusetts minute men were hanging on the flanks of the running
British like so many angry hornets. The following day, the minute men
of that part of Virginia were to be aroused by a similar cause, the
attempt of the representatives of England to get possession of the
colony's powder.
It will be remembered that it was in the night that the British troops
sneaked out of Boston to go after the powder stored at Concord. It was
also in the night that the royal governor, Lord Dunmore, secretly
removed the powder from the old arsenal in Williamsburg and put it
aboard the British vessel _Magdalen_ in the York River. The British in
Boston didn't get the powder, but Dunmore's men did, only there were
but fifteen half-barrels of it.
The population of Williamsburg at the time was only about two
thousand, and it must be remembered that the country round about was
not so thickly settled as Massachusetts, consequently the minute men
couldn't assemble so quickly; but there was buzzing enough in the
morning when it was discovered what Lord Dunmore had done. The minute
men of the town were for marching to Dunmore's house and seizing him,
but cooler heads prevailed.
The two boys had spent the previous day looking over the capital and
visiting the college at the other end of the one long street, three
quarters of a mile distant. They lodged at the famous Raleigh Tavern,
which had sheltered the most prominent men of the day, and so were
right in the midst of the hubbub when the excitement began. Out in the
street they watched the people assemble and listened to the talk.
When some one proposed marching on the "palace," a tipsy fellow cried
out, "You jes' th' feller t' go."
Then when another bystander interfered and tried to take him away, he
began to struggle, and was being roughly handled when a fat, pompous
man bristled up, saying, "Treat him kindly."
At that moment the drunken man, swinging his arms about wildly, struck
the pompous man on the head, knocking his old three-cornered hat into
the dust.
The change in the fat philanthropist was marvellous, for he jumped up
and down crying, "Kill him, kill him."
The crowd laughed. A man came running toward them saying, "They've
sent for Patrick Henry."
"I'll see him, after all," exclaimed Angus.
"I've got a message for him, so we had better ride to his home in New
Castle. We may meet him," Rodney replied.
"I want to see him and I want to see the fun."
"Want to keep your cake and eat it too," replied Rodney.
Just then a report spread through the crowd that Dunmore had seized
the powder for the purpose of sending it to another county where he
feared there would be an uprising of the blacks.
"We're likely to have one of our own," exclaimed a bystander.
An old woman, somewhat deaf, cried, "The blacks are risin'! I knowed
it. I didn't dream of snakes fer nothin'."
"If I had your imagination, Granny Snodgrass, I'd make molasses taffy
out o' moonshine," remarked a pert miss.
"Looks to me, Angus, as though these people were going to do their
fighting with their tongues," said Rodney. "So let's get away to New
Castle."
When they reached New Castle, late the next day, they found Mr. Henry
busy assembling the volunteers for a march on Williamsburg to demand
return of the powder, also to see to it that Dunmore did not take the
money in the colonial treasury. These men were called "gentlemen
independents of Hanover," and they were manly looking, resolute men,
and well armed. By the time they had reached Doncaster's, within
sixteen miles of Williamsburg, their number was increased to one
hundred and fifty.
"Dunmore will wish he hadn't when he's seen 'em," remarked Angus.
Dunmore was frightened before he saw them and sent Corbin, the
receiver general, to meet them and make terms with them, which he did,
paying three hundred and thirty pounds for the powder, surely all it
was worth.
"I've concluded, Angus," said Rodney, "from what I can see and hear,
that Mr. Henry hasn't cared so much about the powder as he does for an
excuse to rouse the country, get the men together and encourage them
by backing Lord Dunmore down," all of which indicated that the lad had
become a shrewd observer.
After the powder was paid for, Patrick Henry, who was a delegate to
the Colonial Congress, set out for Philadelphia. Lord Dunmore,
however, had been badly frightened, and he issued a proclamation
against him, and declared that if the people didn't behave he would
offer freedom to the negroes and burn the town; he also had cannon
placed around his house, proceedings which, it is easy to understand,
made the citizens very angry.
The boys returned to Charlottesville and Angus immediately joined a
company of volunteers, declaring if there was to be a war he was
going.
By this time they had heard the news of the battle of Lexington,
brought all the way from Boston by mounted messengers riding by
relays.
"That means war," Rodney remarked to his mother. How he wanted to go,
to do as Angus had done and join the volunteers! But he hadn't the
heart to propose it after seeing the look which came into his mother's
face. It sometimes happens, however, that war comes to those who do
not go to war, and so it happened to Rodney Allison.