Signed also by Simon Detogkom, King Hary, Sam Linis, Mr. Jorge
Rodunnonukgus, John Owamosimmin, and nine other Indians, with their
marks against their names.
But now, one hundred and fifty-four years having elapsed since the date
of this letter, we went unalarmed on our way without “brecking” our
“conow,” reading the New England Gazetteer, and seeing no traces of
“Mohogs” on the banks.
The Souhegan, though a rapid river, seemed to-day to have borrowed its
character from the noon.
Where gleaming fields of haze
Meet the voyageur’s gaze,
And above, the heated air
Seems to make a river there,
The pines stand up with pride
By the Souhegan’s side,
And the hemlock and the larch
With their triumphal arch
Are waving o’er its march
To the sea.
No wind stirs its waves,
But the spirits of the braves
Hov’ring o’er,
Whose antiquated graves
Its still water laves
On the shore.
With an Indian’s stealthy tread
It goes sleeping in its bed,
Without joy or grief,
Or the rustle of a leaf,
Without a ripple or a billow,
Or the sigh of a willow,
From the Lyndeboro’ hills
To the Merrimack mills.
With a louder din
Did its current begin,
When melted the snow
On the far mountain’s brow,
And the drops came together
In that rainy weather.
Experienced river,
Hast thou flowed forever?
Souhegan soundeth old,
But the half is not told,
What names hast thou borne,
In the ages far gone,
When the Xanthus and Meander
Commenced to wander,
Ere the black bear haunted
Thy red forest-floor,
Or Nature had planted
The pines by thy shore?
During the heat of the day, we rested on a large island a mile above
the mouth of this river, pastured by a herd of cattle, with steep banks
and scattered elms and oaks, and a sufficient channel for canal-boats
on each side. When we made a fire to boil some rice for our dinner, the
flames spreading amid the dry grass, and the smoke curling silently
upward and casting grotesque shadows on the ground, seemed phenomena of
the noon, and we fancied that we progressed up the stream without
effort, and as naturally as the wind and tide went down, not outraging
the calm days by unworthy bustle or impatience. The woods on the
neighboring shore were alive with pigeons, which were moving south,
looking for mast, but now, like ourselves, spending their noon in the
shade. We could hear the slight, wiry, winnowing sound of their wings
as they changed their roosts from time to time, and their gentle and
tremulous cooing. They sojourned with us during the noontide, greater
travellers far than we. You may frequently discover a single pair
sitting upon the lower branches of the white-pine in the depths of the
wood, at this hour of the day, so silent and solitary, and with such a
hermit-like appearance, as if they had never strayed beyond its skirts,
while the acorn which was gathered in the forests of Maine is still
undigested in their crops. We obtained one of these handsome birds,
which lingered too long upon its perch, and plucked and broiled it here
with some other game, to be carried along for our supper; for, beside
the provisions which we carried with us, we depended mainly on the
river and forest for our supply. It is true, it did not seem to be
putting this bird to its right use to pluck off its feathers, and
extract its entrails, and broil its carcass on the coals; but we
heroically persevered, nevertheless, waiting for further information.
The same regard for Nature which excited our sympathy for her creatures
nerved our hands to carry through what we had begun. For we would be
honorable to the party we deserted; we would fulfil fate, and so at
length, perhaps, detect the secret innocence of these incessant
tragedies which Heaven allows.
“Too quick resolves do resolution wrong,
What, part so soon to be divorced so long?
Things to be done are long to be debated;
Heaven is not day’d, Repentance is not dated.”
We are double-edged blades, and every time we whet our virtue the
return stroke straps our vice. Where is the skilful swordsman who can
give clean wounds, and not rip up his work with the other edge?
Nature herself has not provided the most graceful end for her
creatures. What becomes of all these birds that people the air and
forest for our solacement? The sparrows seem always _chipper_, never
infirm. We do not see their bodies lie about. Yet there is a tragedy at
the end of each one of their lives. They must perish miserably; not one
of them is translated. True, “not a sparrow falleth to the ground
without our Heavenly Father’s knowledge,” but they do fall,
nevertheless.
The carcasses of some poor squirrels, however, the same that frisked so
merrily in the morning, which we had skinned and embowelled for our
dinner, we abandoned in disgust, with tardy humanity, as too wretched a
resource for any but starving men. It was to perpetuate the practice of
a barbarous era. If they had been larger, our crime had been less.
Their small red bodies, little bundles of red tissue, mere gobbets of
venison, would not have “fattened fire.” With a sudden impulse we threw
them away, and washed our hands, and boiled some rice for our dinner.
“Behold the difference between the one who eateth flesh, and him to
whom it belonged! The first hath a momentary enjoyment, whilst the
latter is deprived of existence!” “Who would commit so great a crime
against a poor animal, who is fed only by the herbs which grow wild in
the woods, and whose belly is burnt up with hunger?” We remembered a
picture of mankind in the hunter age, chasing hares down the mountains;
O me miserable! Yet sheep and oxen are but larger squirrels, whose
hides are saved and meat is salted, whose souls perchance are not so
large in proportion to their bodies.
There should always be some flowering and maturing of the fruits of
nature in the cooking process. Some simple dishes recommend themselves
to our imaginations as well as palates. In parched corn, for instance,
there is a manifest sympathy between the bursting seed and the more
perfect developments of vegetable life. It is a perfect flower with its
petals, like the houstonia or anemone. On my warm hearth these
cerealian blossoms expanded; here is the bank whereon they grew.
Perhaps some such visible blessing would always attend the simple and
wholesome repast.
Here was that “pleasant harbor” which we had sighed for, where the
weary voyageur could read the journal of some other sailor, whose bark
had ploughed, perchance, more famous and classic seas. At the tables of
the gods, after feasting follow music and song; we will recline now
under these island trees, and for our minstrel call on