"Awake on your hills, on your islands awake,
Brave sons of the mountain, the frith, and the lake.
Be the brand of each chieftain like Fin's in his ire.
May the blood through his veins flow like currents of fire.
Burst the base foreign yoke as your sires did of yore,
Or die like your sires, and endure it no more."
--"Battle Song," Scott.
With the courage born of the desperateness of the situation the citizens
of Williamsburg set about repairing the devastation wrought by the
invader. Wrecked homes and desolated families followed fast in the wake
of the British army. From field and hills the militia assembled to repel
their approach, leaving the crops to the care of the men too old for
service, the women who bravely shouldered tasks too heavy for delicate
frames, and the few negroes who remained faithful to their owners.
Patiently demolished gardens were replanted, poultry yards restocked,
depleted larders replenished in order that want, stark and gaunt, might
not be added to other foes.
And the sunny days of April became the brighter ones of May, and the
forests about the city blossomed into riotous greens, starred by the
white of dogwood, or the purplish-pink mist of the Judas-tree. The
mulberries and sycamores were haunts of song. Out of the cerulean sky
the sun shone brilliantly upon the leaf-strewn earth. All Nature
rejoiced, and sent forth a profusion of bloom and verdure as though to
compensate the land for the bloody war waged throughout its length and
breadth. For that great game, whose moves and counter-moves were to
terminate so soon in the cul-de-sac of Yorktown, had begun. From the
seacoast where Greene had sent him Cornwallis, recovered at last from
the dearly bought victory of Guilford Court House, was moving rapidly
across North Carolina for a junction with the forces in Virginia. There
was no longer a doubt but that the subjugation of the state was the aim
of the British.
An empty treasury, a scarcity of arms, a formidable combination to
oppose in the West, a continual demand upon her resources to answer for
the army in the North, with all these contingencies to face Virginia had
now to prepare to meet this new foe advancing from the South.
Late one afternoon in the latter part of May Peggy and her cousin sat in
the palace grounds under the shade of a large oak tree. The girl had
been reading aloud, but now the book lay closed upon the grass beside
her, and she sat regarding the youth who lay sprawled full length upon
the grass.
"And so thee is going back to the army?" she asked. "Is thee sure that
thee is strong enough?"
"Yes; I tire of inaction. I told General Phillips when he passed through
two weeks ago on his way to Petersburg that I would join him when the
combined army reached Richmond. I would have gone with him then but that
I hoped Harriet might still come here. I do not understand why I have
not heard from her, if she is, as you say, in New York."
"I wish thee could hear, my cousin," said Peggy patiently. "I would that
thee might hear from her for my own sake as well as thine. It vexes me
for thee to doubt my word, and thee will never believe that I have
spoken truth until thee hears from her."
"But consider," he said. "It hath been more than a month since you came.
When you first came you said that she was in New York. If so, why hath
she not written? Ships pass to and from there with supplies and messages
for the forces here. 'Twould have been easy to hear."
"I am sorry that I cannot relieve thy uneasiness," Peggy made answer.
"It is not in my power to do so, Clifford."
"I am uneasy," he admitted, sitting upright. "Sometimes I am minded to
set forth to see what hath become of her."
Peggy looked at him with quick eagerness.
"Why not?" she asked. "My cousin, why should we two not go to
Philadelphia? Then thee could go on from there to New York to thy
sister. Why not, Clifford? My mother----" Her voice broke.
"You want to go home?" he asserted.
"Yes; oh, yes!" she answered yearningly. "Thee is well now. There is
naught to do but to amuse thee by reading or by conversation. The troops
are now all on the south side of the James River with thy general, Lord
Cornwallis. 'Twould be a most excellent time, Clifford, for a start
toward Philadelphia. We would have none but our own soldiers to meet."
"'Our own soldiers' mean my foes, Mistress Peggy," he rejoined with a
half smile. "You forget that I am an Englishman. We would never reach
your home were we to start. I am not going to risk my new-found freedom
by venturing among the rebels."
"But I am a patriot, and thou art a Britisher, as thou say'st. Why not
depend upon me when we are among the Americans, and upon thee when with
thy forces?" asked the maiden ingenuously.
The lad laughed.
"Nay," he returned. "We should need a flag that would show that we were
non-combatants. No; 'twill not do. I shall go back to the army, and
you----"
"Yes?" she questioned. "And I, my cousin? What shall I do? Twice already
in the past month thy army hath visited this city. How often it will
come from now on none can tell. All tide-water Virginia seems swept by
them as by a pestilence. Get me a flag and let me pass to my home."
"'Tis not to be thought of for a moment," he answered quickly. "I will
not even consider the thing. I have deliberated the matter, and, as I
feel to some extent responsible for your well-being, I have finally
decided what were best to be done. Know then, Mistress Peggy, that I
shall in a few days conduct you to Portsmouth, where the frigate 'Iris'
lies preparing to return to New York. I shall send you on her to that
port."
Peggy was too astonished for a moment to speak. The youth spoke with the
quiet assurance of one who expects no opposition to his decision. The
girl chafed under his manner.
"Thee takes my submission to thy authority too much for granted, Cousin
Clifford," she remarked presently, and her voice trembled slightly. "I
am not going to New York. I spent a year there among the British, and
'tis an experience that I do not care to repeat. Thee does not choose to
be a prisoner, my cousin; neither do I."
"If you were ever a prisoner there I know naught concerning it," he
answered. "Surely if Harriet is there, as you would have me believe,
'tis the place for you. If you are the friends you seem to be what would
be more natural than for you to go to her, since to return to your own
home is out of the question? The vessel sails the first of June. I shall
put you on her. There is naught else to do."
"I go not to New York," was all the girl said. She had not told Clifford
any of the unpleasant incidents connected with his father, or sister.
She had been taught to speak only good, forgetting the evil. Now,
however, she wondered if it would not have been better to have
enlightened him concerning some of the events.
"We will not discuss the matter further for the present," he said
stiffly. "I know best what to do in the matter, and you will have to
abide by it. I see naught else for you to do."
Peggy's experience with boy cousins had been limited to this one, so she
was ignorant of the fact that they often arrogate to themselves as a
right the privilege of ordering their girl relatives' affairs. She did
not know that these same masculine relatives often assumed more
authority than father and brother rolled into one. She was ignorant of
these things and so sat, a wave of indignant protest surging to her
lips. Fearing to give utterance to the feeling that overwhelmed her she
rose abruptly, and left the grounds.
"I will walk as far as the college and back," she concluded. "I must be
by myself to think this over. What shall be done? Go to New York I will
not. And how determinedly my cousin speaks! Doth he think that I have no
spirit that I will submit to him?"
And so musing she walked slowly down Palace Street, under the shade of
the double row of catalpa trees which cast cooling shadows over the
narrow green. At length just as she turned to enter Duke of Gloucester
Street there came the sound of bugles. This was followed by the noise of
countless hoof beats; then came the sharp tones of military command: all
denoting the approach of a body of mounted men.
The people began running hither and thither, and soon the street was so
filled with them that Peggy could not see what was coming. As quickly as
possible she made her way to the steps of the Capitol, and ascended its
steps that she might have a good view of the approaching force. From the
Yorktown road another detachment of British filed into town. The
citizens of the little city viewed their entrance with feelings in which
alarm predominated. What could they want in Williamsburg, they asked
themselves. Had they not been stripped of almost everything in the shape
of food that they should be compelled to support a third visit from the
enemy? A flutter of skirts in the rear division of the cavalry drew
attention to the fact that a girl rode among them and, surprised by this
unusual incident, Peggy leaned forward for a keener glance.
A cry of amazement broke from her lips as the girl drew near. For the
maiden was Harriet Owen on her horse, Fleetwood.
Harriet herself, blooming and beautiful! Harriet, in joseph of green,
with a gay plume of the same color nodding from her hat, smiling and
debonair, as though riding in the midst of cavalry were the most
enjoyable thing in the world. Peggy rubbed her eyes, and looked again.
No; she was not dreaming. She saw aright. The vision on horseback was in
very truth her cousin Harriet. With a little cry Peggy ran down the
steps, and pushed her way through the gaping crowd.
"Harriet," she called.
Harriet Owen turned, saw her, then drew rein and spoke to the officer
who rode by her side. He smiled, saluted her courteously as she
dismounted lightly, and gave Fleetwood's bridle into the hand of an
orderly. Quickly the English girl advanced to her cousin's side.
"Well, Peggy?" she said smilingly.