A JOURNEY THROUGH THE WILDERNESS.
Two days after the arrival of Mr. Norton at the Dubois House, on the
banks of the Miramichi, John Lansdowne, on a brilliant September
morning, started on his memorable journey to that region.
He was up betimes, and made his appearance at the stables just as
James, the stout little coachman, was completing Cæsar's elaborate
toilet.
Cæsar was a noble-looking, black animal, whose strength and capacity
for endurance had been well tested. This morning he was in high
spirits and looked good for months of rough-and-tumble service.
"Here's yer rifle, Mister John. I put it in trim for ye yesterday. I
s'pose ye'll be a squintin' reound sharp for bears and wolves and
other livin' wild beasts when ye git inter the woods".
"Certainly, James. I expect to set the savage old monsters scattering
in every direction".
"Well, but lookeout, Mister John and keep number one eout o' fire and
water and sech".
"Trust me for doing that, James".
After many affectionate counsels and adieus from his parents, John,
mounted on the gallant Cæsar, with his rifle and portmanteau, posted
on at a rapid rate, soon leaving the city far behind.
The position of one who sits confidently upon the back of a brave and
spirited horse, is surely enviable. The mastery of a creature of such
strength and capacity--whose neck is clothed with thunder--the glory
of whose nostrils is terrible, gives to the rider a sense of freedom
and power not often felt amidst the common conditions of life. No
wonder that the Bedouin of the desert, crafty, cringing, abject in
cities, when he mounts his Arab steed and is off to the burning sands,
becomes dignified and courteous. Liberty and power are his. They
elevate him for the time in the scale of existence.
John was a superb rider. From his first trial, he had sat on
horseback, firm and kingly.
He and Cæsar apparently indulged in common emotions on this morning of
their departure from home. They did not it is true "smell the battle
afar off, the thunder of the captains and the shouting," but they
smelt the wilderness, the wild, the fresh, the free, and they said ha!
ha! And so they sped on their long journey.
The young man made a partial acquaintance with lumbering operations at
Bangor; had his sublime ideas of the nobility of the aborigines of the
country somewhat discomposed by the experience of a day spent in the
Indian settlement at Oldtown; found a decent shelter at Mattawamkeag
Point, and, at last, with an exultant bound of heart, struck into the
forest.
The only road through this solitary domain was the rough path made by
lumbermen, in hauling supplies to the various camps, scattered at
intervals through the dense wilderness, extending seventy-five miles,
from Mattawamkeag Point to the British boundary.
Here Nature was found in magnificent wildness and disarray, her hair
quite unkempt. Great pines, shooting up immense distances in the sky
skirted the path and flung their green-gray, trailing mosses abroad on
the breeze; crowds of fir, spruce, hemlock, and cedar trees stood
waving aloft their rich, dark banners; clusters of tall, white
birches, scattered here and there, relieved and brightened the sombre
evergreen depths, and the maple with its affluent foliage crowned each
swell of the densely covered land. Here and there, a scarlet tree or
bush shot out its sanguine hue, betokening the maturity of the season
and the near approach of autumn's latest splendor. Big boulders of
granite, overlaid with lichens, were profusely ornamented with crimson
creepers. Everything appeared in splendid and wasteful confusion.
There were huge trees with branches partially torn away; others, with
split trunks leaning in slow death against their fellows; others,
prostrate on the ground; and around and among all, grew brakes and
ferns and parasitic vines; and nodded purple, red, and golden berries.
The brown squirrels ran up and down the trees and over the tangled
rubbish, chirping merrily; a few late lingering birds sang little
jerky notes of music, and the woodpecker made loud tapping sounds
which echoed like the strokes of the woodman's axe. The air was rich
and balmy,--spiced with cedar, pine, and hemlock, and a thousand
unknown odors.
The path through this wild of forest was rude and difficult, but the
travellers held on their way unflinchingly,--the horse with
unfaltering courage and patience, and his rider with unceasing wonder
and delight.
At noon they came to a halt, just where the sun looked down golden and
cheery on a little dancing rivulet that babbled by the wayside. Here
Cæsar received his oats, for which his master had made room in his
portmanteau, at the expense, somewhat, of his own convenience. The
young man partook of a hearty lunch and resigned himself to dreams of
life under the greenwood tree.
After an hour's rest, again in the saddle and on--on, through
recurring scenes of wildness, waste, and beauty. Just as the stars
began to glint forth and the traveller and horse felt willing perhaps
to confess to a little weariness, they saw the light of the expected
cabin fire in the distance. Cæsar gave a low whinny of approval and
hastened on.
Two or three red-shirted, long-bearded men gave them a rude welcome.
They blanketed and fed Cæsar, and picketed him under a low shed built
of logs.
John, as hungry as a famished bear, drank a deep draught of a black
concoction called tea, which his friends here presented to him, ate a
powerful piece of dark bread, interlarded with fried pork, drew up
with the others around the fire, and, in reply to their curious
questionings, gave them the latest news from the outside world.
For this information he was rewarded by the strange and stirring
adventures of wilderness life they related during the quickly flitting
evening hours.
They told of the scores who went into the forest in the early part of
winter, not to return until late in the spring; of snow-storms and
packs of wolves; of herds of deer and moose; they related thrilling
stories of men crushed by falling trees, or jammed between logs in the
streams, together with incidents of the long winter evenings, usually
spent by them in story telling and card playing. Thus he became
acquainted with the routine of camp life.
Wearied at last with the unaccustomed fatigues of the day, he wrapped
himself in his cloak, placed his portmanteau under his head for a
pillow and floated off to dreamland, under the impression that this
gypsying sort of life, was just the one of all others he should most
like to live.
The following morning, the path of our traveller struck through a
broad reach of the melancholy, weird desolation, called a burnt
district. He rode out, suddenly, from the dewy greenness and
balm-breathing atmosphere of the unblighted forest, into sunshine that
poured down in torrents from the sky, falling on charred, shining
shafts and stumps of trees, and a brilliant carpet of fireweed.
It is nearly impossible to give one who has not seen something of the
kind, an adequate impression of the peculiar appearance of such a
region. The strange, grotesque-looking stems, of every imaginable
shape, left standing like a company of black dwarfs and giants
scattered over the land, some of them surmounted with ebony crowns;
some, with heads covered like olden warriors, with jetty helmets;
some with brawny, long arms stretched over the pathway as if to seize
the passer by, and all with feet planted, seemingly in deep and
flaming fire. How quickly nature goes about repairing her desolations!
So great in this case is her haste to cover up the black, unseemly
surface of the earth, that, from the strange resemblance of the weed
with which she clothes it to the fiery elements, it would seem as if
she had not yet been able to thrust the raging glow out of her fancy,
and so its type has crept again over the blighted spot.
John rode on over the glowing ground, the black monsters grimacing and
scowling at him as he passed. What a nice eerie place this would be
thought he for witches, wizards, and all Satan's gentry, of every
shape and hue, to hold their high revels in. And he actually began to
shout the witches song--
"Black spirits and white,
Red spirits and gray".
At which adjuration, Cæsar, doubtless knowing who were called upon,
pricked up his ears and started on a full run, probably not wishing to
find himself in such company just at that time.
An establishment similar to the one that had sheltered him the night
previous, proffered its entertainment at the close of our adventurer's
second day. The third day in the wilderness was signalized by an
incident, which excited such triumphant emotions as to cause it to be
long remembered. About an hour subsequent to his noon halt, as he and
Cæsar were proceeding along at a moderate pace, he heard a rustling,
crackling noise on the right side of the path and suddenly a deer,
frightened and panting, flew across the road, turned for a moment an
almost human, despairing look toward him, plunged into the tangled
under-growth on the left and was gone from sight. John drew his reins
instantly, bringing his horse to a dead stand, loosened his rifle from
his shoulder and after examining it closely, remained quiet. His
patience was not taxed by long waiting. Within the space of two
minutes, there was another sharp crunching and crackling of dry
boughs, when a wolf, large, gray, and fierce, sprang into the path
from the same opening, following on the trail of the deer. He had
nearly crossed the narrow road in hot pursuit and was about springing
into the thicket beyond, when an accidental turn of his head brought
our hero suddenly to his attention. He stopped, as if struck by a
spell of enchantment.
Whiz! the ball flew. The very instant it struck, the bloodthirsty
monster fell dead. When John reached the spot, there was scarcely the
quiver of a limb, so well had the work of death been accomplished. Yet
the wolfish face grinned still a savage, horrible defiance.
"Here, Cæsar", he exclaimed, in a boastful tone, "do you know that
this old fellow lying here, won't get the drink out of the veins of
that dainty creature he was so thirsty for? No! nor ever cheat any
sweet little Red Riding Hood into thinking him her grandmother? This
is the last of him. Didn't I do the neat thing, Cæsar?"
Cæsar threw his head on one side, with an air of admiration and gave a
low whinny, that betokened a state of intense satisfaction at the
whole transaction.
It may appear frivolous to those who have read with unwavering
credulity the olden tales of the prowess and achievements of knights
errant in the days of chivalry, that one should stop to relate such a
commonplace incident as the shooting of a wolf, and above all, that
the hero of this narrative, should betray, even to his horse, such a
decided emotion of self admiration for having performed the feat. Such
a trifle would not indeed be worth mentioning in company with the
marvellous deeds and mysterious sorceries of the old romaunt, but this
being a true story, the hero young, and this the first game of the
kind he has yet brought down, it must be excused.
After a critical examination of his victim, our traveller mounted his
horse and proceeded on his journey, much gratified at his afternoon's
work, and inwardly resolving how he would make the eyes of James and
Aunt Esther stand out, while listening to the account of it he should
give them, on his return home.
In about seventeen days after his departure from P., John safely
accomplished his journey. Amidst the subsequent hardships, rough fare
and toils of that journey, which, in truth, thirty-five years ago,
were things not to be laughed at, he had a constant satisfaction in
the recollection of having, with one keen shot, killed a large,
fierce, gray wolf.