Transcriber's note:
Text enclosed by underscores is in italics (_italics_).
Small capital text has been replaced with all capitals.
* * * * *
THE
Knickerbocker,
OR
[Illustration: writer sitting]
NEW-YORK MONTHLY MAGAZINE.
VOLUME XXII.
NEW-YORK:
PUBLISHED BY JOHN ALLEN, NASSAU-STREET.
1843.
Entered according to the Act of Congress, in the year eighteen
hundred and forty-three.
BY JOHN ALLEN,
In the Clerk's office of the District Court of the Southern District
of New-York.
INDEX.
A.
An Epitaph. By JAMES ALDRICH, Esq., 44
A Contrasted Picture, 60
A Night on Lake Erie, By PETER VON GEIST, 241
A New Version of an Old Fable, 244
An Old Man's Reminiscence, 298
A Dream of Childhood. By Mrs. J. WEBB, 342
Anecdote of a Bottle of Wine. By JOHN WATERS, 343
Anacreontic. From the Irish, 360
An Evening Hymn. By Miss H. J. WOODMAN, 402
An Aspiration: 'This, to Thee, LUCY,' 466
Abbottsford Edition of the Waverley Novels, 479
A Lover's Recollections, 575
B.
Byzantium. By the 'American Opium-Eater,' 516
C.
Ca et La. By the FLANEUR, 45, 143, 261
Commentary on Proverbs. By 'POLYGON,' 119
Classical Studies: Ancient Literature, etc., 174
Change for the American Notes, 267
Chronicles of the Past. By an American Antiquary, 291, 428
D.
Donna Florida. By W. G. SIMMS, Esq., 265
Death, or Medorus' Dream. By ROBERT TYLER, Esq., 375
E.
EDITOR'S TABLE, 69, 176, 270, 378, 480, 587
Early Writings of the late R. C. SANDS, 69, 176
Epigram from the Greek of PLATO, 259
Exercises at the Albany Female Academy, 377
Elements of a Religious Character. By Rev. GEORGE E. ELLIS, 440
F.
Forget-Me-Not. By F. G. HALLECK, Esq., 48
Forest Walks in the West, 222
Fiorello's Fiddle-Stick, or the Musical Amateur, 329
G.
Gossip from an American Lady in Paris, 76
GOSSIP WITH READERS AND CORRESPONDENTS, 81, 182, 280, 384, 492, 592
Greek Epitaphs and Inscriptions, By H. C. LEA, Esq., 97
Great-Britain and America. Thoughts at Niagara, 194
Green Spots in the City. By Mrs. M. E. HEWITT, 341
Gleanings from the German. By WILLIAM PITT PALMER, Esq., 347
GEORGE WASHINGTON, the Father of his Country, 445
Grave Thoughts on Punch. By JOHN WATERS, 467
H.
Harp of the Vale: a Collection of Poems, 268
Hope. From the German, 297
Her Name. From the French of VICTOR HUGO, 469
Heart Compensations, 567
I.
Impromptu on receiving a Rose-bud from a Lady, 142
International Copy-right. By 'HARRY FRANCO,' 360
Imaginary Conversations. By PETER VON GEIST, 530
J.
JEFFREY and GIFFORD _vs._ SHAKSPEARE and MILTON, 270
L.
Lines to Pleasure. From the German, 5
LITERARY NOTICES, 66, 168, 265, 580
Lays of my Home, and other Poems. By J. G. WHITTIER, 68
Lines to New-England. By E. B. GREENE, Esq., 107
Lines to a Canary-Bird. By JOHN WATERS, 158
Lines on the Death of a Classmate, 346
Lines to FITZ-GREENE HALLECK, Esq., 364
Letters from New-York. By L. MARIA CHILD, 372
Lines to October. By H. W. ROCKWELL, Esq., 421
Lines to a Fayre Personne, etc. By JOHN WATERS, 452
Lines to a Humming-Bird. By H. W. ROCKWELL, Esq., 472
Life and Times of the late WILLIAM ABBOTT, Esq., 480, 590
M.
Mohawk: a Cluster of Sonnets, 25, 197
Memorials: a Fragment, 65
Memoir of the Croton Aqueduct, 67
Miseries of Human Life, 79
Mens Conscia Recti: a Tale of Idleberg, 108
Meadow-Farm: a Tale of Association, 159, 228
Mrs. ELLIS'S 'Poetry of Life,' 181
Memoirs of Count ROSTOPTCHIN: Written in Ten Minutes, 357
Manifestation of Mind in Animals, 414, 507
Memoirs of the Court of England, 487
N.
No'th-East by East. By G. W. MANSFIELD, 146
New-York City and State in the Olden Time, 371
Nature's Monitions: a Fragment, 467
Notes on the Drama, 488
Nemah and Numan. From the Turkish, 519
O.
OLIN's Travels in Egypt and Arabia, 66
Ode to Beauty. By a New Contributor, 226
P.
Poetical Epistle to THOMAS CARLYLE, 62
Portuguese JOE. By Mrs. M. S. B. DANA, 118
Poetical Epistle to EDWARD MOXON, London, 246
Poetical Epistle to WALTER SAVAGE LANDOR, Florence, 367
Poems: by JAMES G. PERCIVAL, Esq., 381
Prose and Poetical 'Writings' of CORNELIUS MATHEWS, 473
Poets of Connecticut. By Rev. CHAS. W. EVEREST, 479
R.
Rev. JOHN NEWLAND MAFFITT: Letter from Boston, 380
S.
Sketches of South Carolina, 1
Sabbath in the Country. By PETER VON GEIST, 26
Sonnet to June. By HANS VON SPIEGEL, 45
Stanzas to Woman, 128
Song: The Self-Condemned, 167
Stanzas to a Young Lady. By W. H. HERBERT, Esq., 196
Sketches of Florida: Officer of the Night, 323
Sketches of Last Night on Guard, 446
Sketches of St. Augustine: The First Look, 560
Sunset: The Dying Christian. By T. W. STOCKTON, Esq., 332
Song of the Western Steamboat Men. By F. W. THOMAS, Esq., 333
Sunday at Plymouth, Massachusetts, 436
Seed of Contentment. From the German, 451
Sonnet to the 'Buds of the Saranac,' 528
Stanzas to Winter. By D. H BARLOW, 529
Sonnet to the Rev. H. W. BELLOWS. By MARY E. HEWITT, 576
T.
The Trysting-Hour. By Mrs. R. S. NICHOLS, 7
The Quod Correspondence, 8, 129, 250, 348, 453, 569
The Fountain of Helicon: a Philosophical Research, 31
The Devil-Tavern: a Tale of Tinnecum, 32
The Mail-Robber, 61, 245, 365
The Illustrated Common-Prayer, 68
The Irish Sketch-Book, 78
Thales of Paris. From the French, 151
The Spanish Student. By H. W. LONGFELLOW, 173
The Inferno of Dante. By T. W. PARSONS, 175
The Washington Monument, 180
The Innocence of a Galley-Slave, 198, 299
The Lost Heart. By Mrs. J. WEBB, 219
The Death of a Gentle Maiden: a Fantasy, 220
The Maiden's Burial. By Mrs. H. J. WOODMAN, 240
The Printer: a Sketch from Life, 260
The Dying Student. By E. B. GREENE, 264
The Count of Paris: a Sketch, 322
The Lessons of Autumn, 329
The 'Empire State' of New-York, 335
The Season of Death, 356
The Crowning-Hour. By CHARLES JAMES CANNON, 377
The Mysteries of Paris, 378
The Attaché. By SAM SLICK, 382
Thoughts on Immortality, 395
The Rich-Poor Man: or, the Secret of Contentment, 401
The Doomed Ship. By ROBERT L. WADE, 403
The DEITY. By Miss MARY GARDINER, 412
The Influential Man: a Sketch of Tinnecum, 422
The Broken Vow. By JAS. T. FIELDS, Esq., 427
The Top of New-York, 437
The Birth-Day. By R. S. CHILTON, Esq., 439
The Exile's Song, 440
The Story of ABUL CASSIM'S Shoes. From the Turkish, 470
The Dial, for the October Quarter, 486
Thoughts at Trenton-Falls. By R. S. CHILTON, Esq., 535
The Midnight Dream. By Mrs. R. S. NICHOLS, 536
The Venus of Ille. From the French, 537
The Old Man. A Ballad, 559
The Meeting at Sea. By A. C. AINSWORTH, 568
W.
WINES, on the Civil Government of the Hebrews, 168
WASHINGTON, a National Poem, 192
Widows, 576
THE KNICKERBOCKER.
VOL. XXII. JULY, 1843. No. 1.
SKETCHES OF SOUTH-CAROLINA.
NUMBER FIVE.
IT was as beautiful an evening as a lover could ask, the second day
of April, 1842, that I bade my friend Dana good-bye, and started
in my sulky for a tour over the land of Nullification. I left
Charleston in the evening, that the wearisome task of crossing the
river might be over, and the earlier start upon my journey be made
the following morning. Tarrying at the house of a fine old planter
during the night, who amused me until nearly cock-crowing with his
long stories of revolutionary days, I arose, after a very slight
refreshment from sleep, and was on my way toward Georgetown an hour
before sunrise. It was a toilsome way enough, the road running
parallel with the sea-shore the whole distance of sixty miles, just
far enough inland never to catch a glimpse of the water, and leading
you over a dreary pine barren, where neither house, cultivated
field, nor flowing streamlet occurred to divert your attention for
the whole day. It was pleasant enough at first to feel one's self
alone in those boundless forests of pine; and for an hour or two of
the early morning I was sufficiently amused by the novel sight of
some young alligator splashing into the water from the road-side,
as the noise of my wheels awoke him from his siesta, or of a huge
moccasin darting away beneath the dense reeds and lily-pads of the
swamp, or of the ever-varying, myriad-toned music of the mocking
birds who filled the air with their melody. But by degrees, as the
sun began to rise above the trees, and the heavens to assume that
brazen face which characterizes a southern sky, the never-changing
scenery about me grew dull and wearisome, and I found myself looking
forward in the hope of finding some place by the roadside where my
horse might slake his thirst. No such place, however, appeared; on
and onward we jogged over that apparently unending level of creaking
sand, without one sign of human industry or human life. As matters
began to grow serious, and my weary steed to manifest symptoms of
dissatisfaction which could not be mistaken, a kind Providence sent
a fellow-being along my path, in the shape of the most hideous,
tattered, and wo-begone negro I had ever seen--my first specimen of
a plantation servant. The poor fellow's face and garments, however,
sadly belied him; for upon my salutation of 'Boy, good morning; can
you tell me where I can find water for my horse?' he touched his
rimless hat and most civilly replied:
'Oh, yes, Massa! dere is fine water just back ob you!'
'Back of me?' I replied. 'Strange I did not see it!' and turning my
horse to retrace the path, the negro discovered my greenness, and
laughing, said:
'Why, Massa, you 'ab no bucket to water de horse!'
'Bucket?' I inquired in astonishment! 'Bucket? What do you mean,
boy? What _do_ you mean?'
The poor fellow could scarcely contain his gravity, while he
replied, pointing to the bottom of the sulky: 'Sure, Massa 'ab no
bucket! Massa no bin long in Carolina to tink water he horse widout
bucket! Every body hab bucket on he carriage in Carolina!'
Here was indeed a perplexity of which I had never dreamed, and to
extricate myself from which more than surpassed my share of even
Yankee shrewdness. I could not think of driving fourteen long miles
back to my morning resting-place in the heat of that torrid sun,
nor of going forward the twelve miles to my first stopping place on
the Georgetown road; and yet, from all the information I could gain
from the negro, these seemed the only conditions upon which horse
or driver were ever again to meet with the proprieties of civilized
existence. In utter despair I looked up to my informer, with a
respect I had never bestowed upon tattered garments before, and
asked: 'Boy, what _am_ I to do?'
'Don' know, Massa! Neber see a carriage wid'out bucket afore! Don'
know, Massa!'
Though my informant had hitherto evidently been greatly amused at
my perplexity, the despair of my countenance, or his pity for the
jaded beast, now awakened his sympathies; and after scratching his
head--a manipulation which the negro invariably performs when he is
in trouble--he suddenly rolled the whites of his great eyes up to
me and said with quickness, 'Me tink now, Massa! Me tink how Massa
water he horse!' and plunging into the woods, presently returned
with his _hat_ filled with water. It was a capital thought, and the
promptitude of its execution would have done honor to a Connecticut
pedler. My dilemma was over; the negro's hat of water was a goblet
of ambrosia to my steed; and the tattered son of Ham became in my
eyes fair as a messenger of the gods.
Between the Ashly and Santee rivers, a distance of more than
thirty miles, there are upon the main thoroughfare but three
dwelling-houses. Upon the banks of the latter, one begins first to
see something of the wealth of the Carolina rice-plantations. For
many miles up and down the North and South Santee rivers, which
are here separated but a single mile, are cultivated those deep,
rich bottoms, annually flowed and inexhaustible in resource, which
are the glory of the State. The lordly owners of these manors pass
the winter months in superintending the affairs of the homesteads,
gathering about them all those luxuries which minister to ease and
pleasure, of which none better understand the value, or select with
more taste, than do these descendants of king Charles's cavaliers,
and entering with a zeal and alacrity into those rural sports which
are the zest and glory of a southern country life. Finer horsemen,
more skilled marksmen, on the plain or in the forest, hardier frames
for pugilistic feats, or a quicker eye and prompter hand for a game
at fence, the world cannot produce. They are generally men also of
liberal learning and generous dispositions; frank, hospitable, and
courteous; and, bating a tithe of that hot-blood chivalry upon which
they are too apt to pride themselves, noble and humane in all their
impulses.
One marks every where at the South the eminently kind relations
which exist between master and servant. To every man born and bred
upon the plantation, the negro seems essential, in a thousand
respects with which a northerner can have no sympathy. I saw nothing
of what we call prejudice against color in all my travels. In
infancy the same nurse gives food and rest to her own child and to
her master's; in childhood the same eye watches and the same hand
alternately caresses and corrects them; they mingle their sports in
boyhood; and through youth up to manhood there are ties which link
them to each other by an affinity that no time or circumstances
can destroy. An illiterate, rough planter, who was by no means
remarkable for the kindness he showed his servants, said to me one
day: 'I travelled last summer all over Iowa territory, and I didn't
see a nigger in two months. To be sure I felt kind o' badly, but it
couldn't be helped; so I made the best of it, thinking all the time
I should be home again bye and bye. Well, Sir, I got back again as
far as Zanesville in 'Hio, where there was a gineral muster and a
heap of people; and pretty soon I heard a banjo; thinks I, there's
some of _our folks_, I know; and sure enough there was two niggers
and a wench going it powerful; and the way I went up to 'em and got
hold of their hands, and says I, 'How are you, my good fellows? how
are you, girl?' and the way I shook and they shook, was a caution to
abolitionists, I tell you?'
Georgetown _District_ is the wealthiest portion of the State; but
a more miserable collection of decayed wood domicils and filthy
beer shops than are clustered together to make up the _town_, it
would be difficult to find. Indeed, unlike the free States, the
wealth of the South lies almost entirely in the country; the towns,
unless Charleston form an exception, being made up of artizans and
traders. The historical associations of Georgetown District are of
great interest; and many of the localities, rendered famous by feats
of valor during the war of our Revolution, are still pointed out.
An old soldier, whom I met by accident at the ferry-house on the
banks of the Pedee, conducted me to the spot where General Marion
invited the British officer to dinner--a scene immortalized by
the pencil of White. Marion had long contended against the enemies
of his country at fearful odds, and though the poverty and daily
diminution of his troops were not known to the British, yet to
himself, through the whole of the first campaign in South Carolina,
they were sources of great disquietude and alarm. He managed,
however, by celerity of movement and a perfect knowledge of the
country to keep the enemy's forces in constant fear, and now and
then to obtain over detached bodies of troops a signal victory. It
was after one of these sudden dashes upon a foraging party whom
the British colonel had sent into the country, in which Marion had
been even more successful than usual, that an officer was sent to
his camp with a flag of truce to propose an exchange of prisoners.
Marion received him in the woods, negotiated the terms upon which
the exchange should be made, passed the writings necessary for the
purpose, and, after concluding all the preliminaries, invited the
officer to dine with him. The invitation was accepted, and Marion,
leading the way still farther into the forest, took his seat upon a
log near which a watch-fire was burning, and invited the officer to
do the same. Presently a negro appeared, and, raking open the ashes,
uncovered a batch of roasted potatoes, which he presented upon a
board, first to the stranger, and then to his master. No apologies
were offered for the meagre fare, and after the dinner was over, the
officer departed with his flag. It is said that upon regaining his
own lines, he forthwith threw up his commission, on the ground that
it was hopeless to contend with an enemy who required no shelter but
that of the forest trees, and no food but roasted potatoes.
As you advance inland from Georgetown, and begin to enter the
cotton country, the scenery is completely changed. The huge live
oaks, draperied with moss, the peculiar characteristic of the
sickly lowlands, all disappear, and with them depart nearly all the
evidences of wealth or taste or refinement. Instead of princely
mansions surrounded by old parks and highly cultivated plantations,
one sees nothing but low, piazza'd domicils, in fields bare of
vegetation, and the appendage of miserable hovels scattered at short
distances here and there for the field-hands. In the low country
the rank growth upon the marshes affords some compensation for the
want of green fields of grass; but in the up country every shade of
greenness is lost in the interminable red clay-fields which spread
out every where around you. It was new to me that the upland grasses
could not be cultivated below Virginia, but so it is. Every where,
by the road side, in the court-yard, over the fenced fields, and in
the forest, the bosom of mother earth is bared before you; and to
one accustomed to the green mantle with which she robes herself in
New England, the sight is almost shocking. Equally so was another
sight, with which, however, I soon became familiar, but which at
the outset startled my sense of decency to a degree; I refer to the
nudity of the young negroes. Up to ten and eleven years of age,
the colored children of both sexes run about entirely naked; and
in the more secluded plantations they may be seen at even a later
age, without a fig-leaf of covering to their jetty limbs. I beg my
friends, the abolitionists, will not set this down as a new instance
of the cruelty of the masters, as I had repeated and indubitable
evidence of its being a habit of such determinate choice upon the
part of the children, as to defy every effort to break it up. That
it manifests the state of utter degradation to which the slaves are
reduced, I do not deny; for every where, in lowland and highland,
country and city, nothing is more evident than the mental and moral
degradation of the negro.
As the value of the lands and the wealth of the inhabitants
decrease, while you journey toward the back country, so also does
the intelligence of the people. I never met in my whole life with
so many white persons who could neither read nor write, who had
never taken a newspaper, who had never travelled fifty miles from
home, or who had never been to the house of God, or heard a sentence
read from his Holy Word, as I found in a single season in South
Carolina. Like the inhabitants of Nineveh, many of them could not
discern between the right hand and the left. What wonder then that
the hosts of Yankee pedlers, until driven out by the sumptuary
laws, fattened upon the land! 'What do you think I gave for that?'
asked an ignorant planter in Sumpter district, while pointing to a
Connecticut wooden clock which stood upon a shelf in the corner of
the room. 'I don't know,' was my answer; 'twenty dollars, or very
likely twenty-five!' '_Twenty-five dollars_, stranger!' replied the
planter; 'why, what do you mean? Come, guess fair, and I'll tell
you _true_!' I answered again, that twenty-five dollars was a high
price for such a clock, as I had often seen them sold for a quarter
of that sum. The man was astonished. 'Stranger,' said he, 'I gave
one hundred and forty-four dollars for that clock, and thought I got
it cheap at that! Let me tell you how it was. We had always used
sundials hereabout, till twelve or fourteen years ago, when a man
came along with clocks to sell. I thought at first I wouldn't buy
one, but after haggling about the price for a while, he agreed to
take sixteen dollars less than what he asked, for his selling price
was one hundred and sixty dollars; and as I had just sold my cotton
at thirty-four cents, I concluded to strike the bargain. It's a
powerful clock, but I reckon I gave a heap of money for it!'
In fact, during those years when the staples of Carolina sold
for nearly thrice their intrinsic value, and wealth flowed in
an uninterrupted stream through every channel of industry, the
plantations of the South became the legitimate plunder of Yankee
shrewdness. It was no meeting of Greek with Greek in the contest
of wits, but a perfect inrush of shrewd, disciplined tacticians
in the art of knavery, upon a stupid and ignorant population. The
whole country was flooded with itinerant hawkers. There is scarcely
an article in the whole range of home manufactures upon which
fortunes were not made during those times of inflated prices of the
southern staple products. Through the mountain passes of Buncombe
county there flowed a stream of pedlers' carts, wagons, carry-alls,
and arks, which inundated the land. Indeed, so great at length
became the evil, and so overmatched in the contest of wits were the
planters of the uplands, that the legislature passed laws forbidding
a Yankee pedler to enter the State.
It is this deplorable ignorance, which is prevalent over a large
portion of South Carolina, that constitutes the most insuperable
obstacle to the removal of slavery. Among the more wealthy and
intelligent of the population, juster sentiments prevail in regard
to that great evil; but their opinions and wishes are greatly
overbalanced by the masses of the middling classes. They, wedded
to the customs of their fathers beyond all hope of improvement;
vegetators upon the soil cleared and prepared by their ancestors;
ignorant, idle, and overbearing; driven by thriftless modes of
agriculture, and the impoverishing system of slave-labor, to
penurious economy, and scouting every suggestion of manual toil as
servile and degrading; _they_ compose the great barrier around the
institution of negro servitude, which the tide of public sentiment
never reaches, and which the advancing intelligence of other
portions of the world cannot soon affect. To them, hedged in by the
antiquated prejudices of a barbarous age, alike unfitted to know
and unwilling to receive the new truths of humanity and religion,
the negro seems the connecting link between man and the brute. Of
their own origin and destiny they know and care little; of him who
toils for them, less; and it is vain to hope, until the States
between them and the free people of the North shall have broken
down the system which curses alike the owner and his soil, that the
intelligence of an independent and virtuous people can ever reach
them.
In these Sketches, which are now brought to a close, I have
endeavored to represent the condition of South Carolina as I saw it.
Of slavery I have said what I believe, and of its white population
what I know to be true. There, as elsewhere in a world tainted by
evil, injustice too often embitters the cup of life. But it is not
the slave only, bending to his irksome task, nor he who toils under
the heat of a southern sky alone, who drains it to its dregs. The
chalice is commended to the lips every where. And deeply has the
writer drank, from the hands of those who profess to be guided
by the divine precepts of Christ, banded as they were to subvert
oppression and wrong in southern institutions, a draft of injustice
more poisonous than the bitterest potion of slavery.
TO PLEASURE.
LIST a mortal's guest, sweet Pleasure!
Why so fleeting, answer, pray?
Lost as soon as found, thy treasure!
None can thy dear presence stay.
Thank thou Fate, she cried, whose minions,
All the gods, love me alone;
Were I fashioned without pinions,
They would keep me for their own!
W. P. P.
THE TRYSTING HOUR.
BY MRS. R. S. NICHOLS.
I.
BESIDE my casement's trailing vines,
By meditation led,
I sit, when Sleep his pinion waves
Above each drooping head:
When all the shadowy forms that haunt
The bright abodes on high,
Steal softly forth, in silvery troops
From chambers of the sky.
II.
As down the midnight air they float
Upon celestial cars,
I turn me to a steady light
That gleams among the stars;
A prophet-light it is to me,
And shadows forth the hour
That calls my spirit there to meet
A seraph in its bower.
III.
Beside my casement still _I_ sit,
When goes my _spirit_ forth,
With waving plume, and rustling wing,
Up toward the blazing North:
While solemnly the stars look down,
And solemnly they seem
To shed a fair and brilliant light
On this, my waking dream.
IV.
And high each everlasting hill
Lifts up its crownéd head,
Like some tall, stately cenotaph
For nations of the dead!
The broad, blue river rolls as free
As waters in that clime
Which bends above these waves, that flow
Like some subduing rhyme.
V.
Beside my casement's trailing vines
The zephyr finds me still,
When matin-hymns are gushing forth
From bird, and bee, and rill;
For not until the morning star,
That herald of the dawn,
Has flashed upon the eastern skies,
Are my sad eyes withdrawn.
VI.
I weary of the brilliant day,
The warm, sunshiny air.
And cling unto the solemn night,
When nature kneels at prayer;
For then my spirit wanders forth,
With a resistless power,
And, with its kindred spirit, holds
The midnight Trysting-Hour.
THE QUOD CORRESPONDENCE.
Harry Harson.
CHAPTER NINTH.
IN the same room which has been already described, in Harry
Harson's dwelling, and in one of the stout, plethoric chairs before
mentioned as constituting a part of its furniture, and beneath the
superintendence of the busy clock, and under the watchful eye of
that respectable dog Spite, sat Jacob Rhoneland, with his elbow
resting on the table, his cheek leaning on the palm of his hand, and
his eyes half shaded by his long blanched locks, listening with deep
anxiety to Harson, who occupied a chair opposite, and was speaking
with an earnestness which showed that the subject on which he
discoursed was one in which he felt no slight interest.
The manner of old Rhoneland would have attracted the notice of even
a casual observer. He seemed restless and nervous; and at times even
frightened. Occasionally he smiled faintly, and shaking his head,
half rose from his seat, but sat down, scarcely conscious of what
he did; and leaning his forehead on the palm of his hand, seemed
to listen with breathless attention, as if dreading to lose a word
of Harson's remarks, which were occasionally strengthened by his
pressing his hand gently on Rhoneland's, as it rested on the table.
At last, Harson, in conclusion, said in an earnest tone: 'Now tell
me, Jacob, on your honor, do you love her?'
'Do I love her?' repeated Rhoneland; 'do I love my own little Kate,
who slept in my arms when a child, and who, now that she has become
quite a woman, and I am gray, and feeble, and broken down, still
clings to me? Others found me a querulous, troublesome old man,
and fell away from me; but she never did. Don't ask me if I love
her, Harry, don't ask _that_ again,' said he, shaking his head, and
looking reproachfully at Harson. 'Do I think of any one else, or
care for any one else? Dead and frosty as this old heart is, she has
the whole of it; and she deserves it; God bless her! God bless her!
It's not a little matter that would make me forget Kate.'
The old man raised his head; and his eye lighted up with an
expression of pride, as he thought of his child. It was transient,
and as it passed off he seemed to be absorbed in deep thought; and
sat for some time with his eye resting on a small speck of blue sky
which looked cheerily in at the open window. What strange things
peopled those few moments of thought; for each moment in the memory
of the old is teeming with phantoms of hopes and dreams, which once
crowded about them; familiar things, part of themselves, of their
very being, but now melted into air; faded and gone, they cannot
tell when or whither; and of faces and forms long since shrouded
in the tomb. And in the dim fancy of age, in faint whispers,
speak voices whose tones are never to be heard again; awakening
old affections for those at rest, subdued indeed by time, but yet
unextinguished, and slumbering in hidden corners of memory, and
appealing to the heart of the living, and begging still to be
cherished there. Rhoneland sighed as he turned his eyes from the
window, and looked down at his withered hands. 'They were not so
when Kate was a child. He was far from young, even then, but not
so old and shattered as now. Kate's mother was living too; she was
much younger than he was; and he had hoped that she would have
outlived him; but he had followed her to the grave, and he was left
alone with his little girl.' His lip quivered; for he remembered
her watchful kindness; her patience; the many marks of affection
which had escaped her, showing that he was always uppermost in her
thoughts; and that amid all other occupations, she never forgot
him. They were trifling indeed; perhaps unnoticed at the time; but
he missed them when she was in her grave, and they came no more.
She had begged him to cherish and guard their child when she should
be gone, and there would be none to love her but him. Had he done
so? Ay! with heart and soul; with heart and soul,' muttered he,
rising and walking across the room, to conceal the working of his
countenance, and the tears which started in his eyes.
'Oh Harry!' said he, turning to Harson, 'if you knew all, you
wouldn't ask if I love Kate. She's every thing to me now. All are
gone but her; all--all!'
He returned, and seated himself, with a deep sigh. His lips moved
as if he were speaking, though no sound escaped them; but after a
moment he said: 'It's all that I can do for one who's dead.'
'I _do_ believe that your child is dear to you, Jacob; I never
doubted it,' said Harson; but there is another question which I must
ask. 'Have you observed her of late? Have you noticed her drooping
eye, her want of spirits, and failing strength?'
Rhoneland moved restlessly in his chair, and then answered: 'No, no,
Harry, you're jesting. Kate's eye is bright, and her cheek full and
round; her step elastic and firm. I watch _that_, Harson. Oh! Harry,
you don't dream how anxiously I watch her. Her life is mine; her
heart's blood is _my_ heart's blood. She's in no danger, no danger,
Harry,' said he, taking Harson's hand between his, and looking
appealingly in his face. 'Is she in any danger? Don't deceive me. Is
any thing the matter with her?'
'No, not just now,' replied Harson. 'But suppose you should see her
becoming thin, and her looks and health failing; and even though she
should not die, suppose her young heart was heavy, and her happiness
destroyed--and by you?'
The old man looked at Harson with a troubled, wistful eye, as he
said: 'Well, Harry, well; I 'm old--very old; don't trifle with me,
I can't bear it. What do you mean? Is Kate ill?'
'No, not exactly _ill_,' replied Harson, much at a loss how to
introduce his subject. 'Suppose, in short, that she should fall in
love, some day--for young girls _will_ do these things--and suppose
that the young fellow was a noble, frank-hearted boy, like--like Ned
Somers, for instance--would you thwart her? I only say _suppose_ it
to be Somers.'
'Kate doesn't think of these things,' said the old man, in a
querulous tone. 'She's a child; a mere child. It will be time enough
to talk of them years hence. God help me!' muttered he, pressing
his hands together, 'Can it be that _she_, my own little Kate, will
desert me? I'll not believe it! She's but a child, Harry; _only_ a
child.'
'Kate is nearly eighteen, Jacob,' replied Harson, 'and quite a woman
for her years. She's beautiful, too. I pretend to no knowledge of
women's hearts, nor of the precise age at which they think of other
things than their dolls; but were I a young fellow, and were such a
girl as Kate Rhoneland in my neighborhood, I should have been over
head and ears in love, months ago.'
Jacob Rhoneland folded his hands on the table, and leaned his head
upon them, without speaking, until Harson said, after the lapse of
some minutes, 'Come, Jacob, what ails you?'
Without making any reply to this question, Rhoneland sat up, and
looking him full in the face, asked, in a sad tone: 'Do you think,
Harry, that Kate, my own child, has turned her back upon me, and
given her heart to a stranger? And do you think that she will desert
her father in his old age, and leave him to die alone?'
'Come, come, Rhoneland, this is too bad,' said Harson; 'this is mere
nonsense. If the girl _should_ happen to cast a kind glance at Ned,
Ned's a fine fellow; and if Ned should happen to think that Kate had
not her equal among all whom he knew, he would be perfectly right.
And then if, in the course of time, they should happen to carry
matters farther, and get married, I don't see why you should take it
to heart, or should talk of desertion, and dying alone. I'll warrant
you Ned is not the man to induce a girl to abandon her friends. No,
no; he's too true-hearted for that.'
'Well, well,' said the old man, rising and gazing anxiously about
him, 'God grant that it may never happen. It will be a sad day for
me when it does. I'd rather be in my grave. I cannot tell you all;
but if you knew what _I_ do, perhaps you'd think so too. Indeed you
would, Harry. There's one who knows more about Somers than either
you or I; much that's bad, _very_ bad. I can't tell his name.'
'I know it already,' replied Harson: 'Michael Rust.'
'Ha!' ejaculated Rhoneland, in a faint voice, his cheek growing
ghastly pale; 'You know Michael Rust, do you?'
'I know something of him, and but little in his favor. What he says
against Somers is not worth thinking of. Let him clear his own name.
Perhaps he may be called on to do it some day, and may find it no
easy matter. And now, my old friend,' said he, taking Rhoneland by
the hand, 'since we have spoken of this Rust, let me caution you
against him. Listen to no tales of his respecting Kate, or Ned, or
any one else. Beware of all connection with him. Above all, give him
no hold on yourself; for if you _do_, depend on it, you'll rue it.
I've made inquiries about him; and you may rest assured that I do
not speak unadvisedly.'
Rhoneland had risen to go; but as Harson spoke he sank feebly in his
chair, and buried his face in his hands, his long hair falling over
them, and shrouding them and it from view; but no sound of emotion
escaped him; although Harson could see that he trembled violently,
and that there was a great internal struggle going on. At last he
said: 'It's very hard, Harry, to feel, that you are in the power
of a man who would not hesitate to sacrifice even your life to his
own ends; and yet to know that it must be so; that, hate and loathe
as you may, your fate is linked with his, and that he and you must
sink or swim together. But so it is, God help me! a poor, bewildered
old man! Oh! Harry, could I but die; with none to molest me, or see
me, but my own dear child; with no one to haunt my death-bed, and
torture me; and threaten me and _her_; and could I but know that
when I am gone she at least will be happy, I'd _do_ it, Harry, I'd
do it! Life is not to me what it once was. It's dull enough, now.'
'And who is this who has such power over you?' inquired Harson,
placing his hand on his shoulder; 'Come, be frank with me, Jacob;
who is it? Is it Michael Rust?'
Rhoneland started up, looked suspiciously about the room, and said
in a quick, husky voice: 'Did I say it was Rust? I'm sure I did
_not_, Harry. Oh! no, not Rust. He's a noble, generous fellow; so
frank, and free, and bold. Oh! no, _not_ Rust; he's my best friend.
I wouldn't offend Rust, nor thwart him, nor cross his path, nor even
look coldly on him. Oh! no, no, no! Don't speak of him. I don't
like to talk of him. Let's speak of something else; of yourself, or
Ned, or Kate--of Kate, my own dear little Kate. She's a noble girl,
Harry, is she not? Ha! ha! _that_ she is!' and the old man laughed
faintly, drew a deep sigh, and turned abruptly away.
'Harry,' said he, after a pause, 'Will you make me a promise?'
'If it is one which a man may honestly keep, I will,' replied Harson.
'When I am dead will you be a father to Kate?--love her as I have
loved her--no, no that you cannot--but _love_ her you _can_, and
will; and above all,' said he, sinking his voice, 'let no evil tales
respecting her father be whispered in her ear; let her believe that
he was all that was virtuous and good. It's an honest fraud, Harry,
a deceit without sin in it, and I know you'll do it; for when I'm
in my grave, her heart will be the last hold I shall have on earth.
When the dead are swept from memory, too, the earth is lost to them
indeed. Will you promise, Harry?'
'I will,' said Harson; 'as my own child, will I guard her from all
harm.'
'That's all; and now, God bless you! I've lingered here too long.
Don't forget your promise. I feel happier for it, even now.'
Jacob Rhoneland, however, was not doomed to reach his home in the
same frame of mind in which he then was; for he had not gone a great
distance from Harson's house, when a voice whose tones sent the
blood rushing to his heart, exclaimed: 'Ha, Jacob! my old friend
Jacob! It makes my heart dance to see you walking so briskly, as if
old age and the cares of life left no mark upon you. You're a happy
man, Jacob.'
Rhoneland started; for in front of him, bowing, and smirking, and
rubbing his hands together, stood Michael Rust, his eyes glowing
and glittering, with a glee that was perfectly startling. Rhoneland
muttered something of its being a fine day, and of the pleasant
weather, which had tempted him abroad, and then stopped abruptly.
'You acted unwisely, my friend, very unwisely, in being from home
at such a moment,' said Rust, 'for I just came from there; and
such doings, Jacob! such plots! such contrivances! such intrigues,
and love-making, and billing, and cooing, and whispering! and such
conspiracies against old dad! Not that I believe little Kate has any
thing to do with it. Oh, no! but she's young, and Ned Somers is--no
matter what. _I_ know what he is; and others know too. But I never
make mischief, nor meddle. _I_ say nothing against him. No! he's a
noble fellow--very noble; so open and candid! Ha! ha! ha! I hope
you won't go to your house some day and find your daughter flown,
and with _him_; and I hope if it _is_ with him, that it will be to
the church; that's all--that's all. Good-bye, Jacob; I'm in a vast
hurry,' said he, bustling off, as if recollecting some important
engagement. 'Dear me! I've lost a world of time. Good-bye, good-bye.
If you should happen to get home soon, you'll surprise them both.'
As he went off, he turned back, and muttered to himself: 'I've sown
the seeds of suspicion in his heart against his own child. _Let_ him
hate her, if needs be; and let him think her the vilest of the vile.
It will favor my ends.'
The old man stood for a long time where Rust had left him, with his
hands clasped, looking about him with a bewildered air. He seemed
like one stunned by some heavy and overpowering blow. He took one
or two steps, tottering as he went, and then leaned feebly against
a house. The words 'my child! my child!' once or twice escaped him,
in a low, moaning tone; he passed his fingers over the buttons
of his coat, unconsciously twitching and jerking them; he looked
on the pavement, and seemed endeavoring to regain some train of
thought which had passed through his mind; and then shaking his
head, as if disappointed at his want of success, scarcely knowing
what he did, he commenced counting the cracks in the bricks. A
few small stones were lying on the sidewalk, and he went to them,
and idly kicked them off, one by one: his thoughts wandered from
one subject to another, until he began to watch the smoke, as it
escaped from the chimneys of the houses opposite. Some was dark and
brown, and some blue and bright, and circled upward, until it and
the sky became one; while the other floated off, a dark lowering
mass, as long as he could see it. People were passing in various
directions; and he wondered whither they were going, and how many
there were; he commenced counting them; he made a mistake; he had
got to twenty, when three or four passed together; so he wiped the
score from his memory, and commenced afresh. At last a man jostled
him, as he stood, and told him to get out of the way, and not to
occupy the whole walk. This recalled him to himself; and he set out
for home. As he went on, the recollection of what Rust had told
him again crossed his mind; and his feeling of indifference gave
place to one of fierce excitement. With his teeth hard set, his
eyes flashing fire, his long hair streaming in the wind, his step
rapid, yet tottering and irregular, and with an expression of bitter
anger mingled with intense mental anguish on every line of his
face, he bent his steps toward his own house. It was a bright day,
and the warm sunshine was sleeping on roof and wall; on cellar and
house-top, warming many a sad heart; lighting up many a heavy eye,
and calling forth all that is happy and joyous in earth and man.
Strange was it! that under such a sky, with such a glad world about
him, an old man, hanging over the grave, should dare to utter curses
and imprecations against his fellow man. Yet such was the tenor of
his words:
'Curses on them! curses on them!' muttered he; 'the false ones!
When I was striving like a very beast of burden, yielding body and
soul to torments, for her sake, to play me false! It was bitter,
but it was human. Whenever troubles thicken about a man; when he
is blighted and crushed to the earth; when his heart is bruised
and bleeding, and yearns for the love and sympathy of those about
him; when a mild word, a kind look, are of more worth than gold or
jewels, _then_ friends drop off. Suffering and trouble drive off
friends, like a pestilence. I was in drivelling dotage, to think
that _she_ would be aught else than the rest of them. What though I
did give her life, and fondle her on my knee in infancy; and hang
over her when she slept; and pray, come what might to me, that she
might be happy? What though I did cherish and protect her, and love
her, when this old heart was warped against all the rest of the
world, until every fibre of it was entwined with hers; until every
thought was for her; and how I should plot, and plan, and contrive
to preserve the accumulations of a hard life, so that when the earth
covered me, she might live luxuriously, and think kindly of me?
What though I did all this? I became in her way; for I had gold,
and she wanted it! That's it! Oh! what a fool I was,' continued he,
bitterly, 'to imagine that she would prove true, when all others
have proved false; and that gratitude would bind her to me, so that
when I should become decrepid, and so that I could not totter about,
but must mope out the remnant of my life, like a chained prisoner,
that she would be near me, with her bright face and cheerful voice;
and would cheer me up; and would tell me that I had watched over her
childhood; and that she loved me for it. Happy dreams they were!'
said he, mournfully; 'happy dreams! Ah, Kate! my own little child!
you should not have forgotten your old father; indeed you should
not. But no, no!' he added, checking himself, 'it could not have
been _her_; I'll not believe it. It was not her--poor child; she
never did harm in her life. She was always good tempered, and kind,
and patient. I have tried her patience sadly. As my faculties desert
me, and my mind becomes feebler, I grow more and more peevish, and
I want her more and more. Oh, no! she must not leave me--she must
not. I'll go to her, and kneel to her, and pray to her not to turn
me off. I am too old now to find a new friend. I'll beg her to stay
with me until I die. I'll not live long, now, to trouble her; and
perhaps she will bear with me till then; she must not go; oh, no!
she must not. _Go_,' muttered he, his mood changing, and his eyes
beginning to flash; 'go where? with Somers? with Somers! Can it
be that he has been all this while scheming to rob me of her? Go
with Somers? with Ned Somers? _He_ said he hoped it would be to the
church. What _did_ he mean? what could he mean? But I'll soon know,'
said he, hurrying on; 'I'll soon know!'
Impetuous the old man had always been, though age had in a great
measure subdued his spirit; but now the recollection of Rust's words
lashed him into fury; and when he reached his house, he dashed into
it without pausing to reflect what he should say, or how he should
act. He flung the door open; and, as if to justify the very tale of
Michael Rust, there stood Kate, with her hand in Ned's, and her head
resting against his shoulder.
'Ha! ha! taken! taken!' shouted the old man, with a kind of frenzied
glee; 'taken in the very act! Plotting treason! plotting treason! It
was a glorious conspiracy, was it not, Ned Somers? to steal into a
man's house, and, under the garb of friendship, to endeavor to wean
away his child, and to carry her off? Oh! how some men can fawn!
what open, frank faces they can have! how they can talk of love,
and honor, and generosity! what friendly smiles they can wear! And
yet, Ned, these very men are lying, and all the while the Devil is
throned in their hearts, and sits grinning there!'
Somers stared at him in undisguised astonishment; for he was fully
convinced that the old man had lost his reason; and under that
impression he placed himself between him and Kate, lest in his fury
he should injure her.
This movement did not escape Rhoneland. 'Good God!' said he, raising
his clasped hands to heaven, 'he already keeps me from my child!
Shall this be? Out of my house! out of my house!' shouted he,
advancing toward him, and shaking his fist.
'Never,' returned Somers, 'until I am convinced that you will not
harm your daughter.'
'_I_ harm her! _I_ harm her!' repeated Rhoneland. 'God of heaven!
what black-hearted villains there are! The very man who would by
false oaths and protestations decoy her from her own hearth, and
when she had deserted all for him, would cast her off, a branded
thing, without name or fame, he, _he_ talks of protecting her from
her own father! No, no, Ned Somers,' he said, in a voice of bitter
calmness, 'you may go; I'll not harm her.'
His words had given Somers a clue to the cause of his conduct; and
pale as death, but with a calm face, he said, 'Will you hear me, Mr.
Rhoneland?'
'Hear you! Have I not heard you and believed you? Ay, I _have_. I
was in my dotage; and you too, Kate, you listened and believed, did
you not? Ah! girl, girl! a serpent charmed in Eden! But it's past
now. I'll love you, Kate, though he do not. They said that gold was
my God. They said that for gold I would barter everything; but they
didn't know me. _He_ told you so too, Kate, did he not?--he told you
that I'd sell you for _that_. He whispered tales of your father in
your ear, until you became a renegade at heart; and _you_, my own
child, plotted with a stranger to desert your home. _He_ told you
that he loved you; and would make you his wife; did he not? Poor
child! poor child! God help her! she knows no better! Ned Somers,'
said he, turning to the young man, 'you must leave this house, and
come here no more. My daughter is all I have to bind me to life, and
I cannot spare her. You must go elsewhere to spread your web. For
your vile designs upon her, may God forgive you--I never will!'
'Jacob Rhoneland,' said Somers, 'I have borne more from you than I
would have taken from any other man. You are not now in a state to
listen to reason, nor perhaps am I able just now to offer it; but
you have said _that_ of me which I should be false to myself not to
answer; and which I declare to be utterly untrue. I _do_ love your
daughter; and love her well and honestly; and I would like to see
the man, excepting yourself, who dare say otherwise. Some one has
been lying to you; and can I but find him out, he shall pay for it.
_You_, Kate, don't believe it?' said he, turning to the girl, who
stood by, with blanched cheek, and the tears in her eyes.
'No, no, Ned; I do not; nor will father, when he's calm,' said she,
taking the old man's hand. 'Some person has been slandering you to
him; but he'll get over it soon.'
Rhoneland drew his hand hastily from her, and turning to Ned, said:
'Leave the house! I have already told you to do so. Will you wait
until you are thrust from it? Begone, I say!'
'Go, go, Ned, for _my_ sake!' exclaimed Kate, pushing him toward the
door. 'He'll never be right while you are here. Go, _dear_ Ned, go.'
'I can't go before I've told your father how matters stand.'