history. Orphanage presents, in the brightest relief, one of the
saddest sights that our weeping eyes behold; and hers was especially
sad. Her father, mother and two sisters were all carried off to the
grave in the space of one week, which she was spending abroad with a
poor relative; and she was left without the comfort of a parting word
or kiss, and cast upon the world at a tender and almost helpless age,
with no provision for her welfare. Her poor sobbing heart came well
nigh breaking, and though her pitiful condition, and her sweet and
attracting manners, ensured her much sympathy, and many friends; yet
none could think to offer her a home, and take the place of her family,
but the Masons, of whom we speak. They took her home at last, and gave
her shelter from the storms. They engaged to rear her to womanhood,
and shield her from harm and need. They were always kind to her, and
she never received a harsh word or look from them. They cultured her
fine sense, and gave her a knowledge of books and things. They trained
her against deceptions. They gave her entire person, the reason, the
will, affections and form, as finished an education, as one often found
at that day among intelligent farmers.
And yet they did not do right by Julia. She was large of her age, and
all the more tender for being large; and they tasked her too severely,
and exacted too much of her. She performed boy's work too often; she
was dropping potatoes or pulling weeds, or spreading hay in the field,
when she ought to have been sewing or doing house-work; she milked too
many cows; she carried too many pails of sap in the sugar bush; she
gleaned too much wheat; she sewed on hard sewing too long at a time;
she spun too much wool and flax, and turned too many cheeses. The
consequence was, that while she retained much of a superabundant
cheerfulness, she was stoop-shouldered, and looked narrow over the
chest; her form was less elastic, and her hands were hard and homely.
But if Matthew Fabens had searched the wide world over, he would not
have found a better bride than she. He had known her from a child, and
could well appreciate her intelligence and worth. He chose her in a
love, whose affiance was sanctioned in heaven; and after three years'
absence in the Lake Country, he and Julia met again at his father's
house.
The joy of that home, at that meeting, you may well imagine, was hearty
and high. The young people feared it was too much to enjoy long. The
old people wept and smiled, and pressed and fondled their son in
childish delight, and asked if it could be he, or did they not dream?
and how he had been, and if he still set his heart on his western home.
They rejoiced till midnight, and hurried each other with questions, and
wearied each other with talk.
"It looks pleasant as ever in Cloverdale," said Matthew. "Home is
home, after all. The old hills looked so good, I wanted to kiss 'em,
when they hove in sight. Nothing appears altered; the old church looks
good as ever; and the old elm-tree seemed to know me, and welcome me
back with its waving limbs; and the house here--every room is just as I
left it; and the water from the well tastes as cold and sweet; and I
cannot see but you all look about as you did, when I went away. I knew
father would hold his age; but I expected mother would look a little
older. Julia, if she's altered at all, her hair is more of a chestnut,
her cheeks are rounder, and a little more ruddy, and she is straighter
than she was. But none of you can tell how I feel to see you all once
more, and sit down under this old roof again. Home is home, after all!"
"You'll hate to go back again, won't you, Matthew?" asked Major Fabens.
"I shall grieve to leave you and mother again, but I am not quite ready
to have you go on with me this time. I want to do more to my farm; I
want to build an addition to my log-house for you, and prepare a little
more to make you comfortable. Yes, I shall always feel sad to leave
Cloverdale, though I like the Waldron Settlement quite as well."
"Think you can get a living, and build up a manhood there then, do you?"
"A good living, I am sure I can get; I hope I may build up a manhood.
I like the country well; it is a rich soil, and very easy to cultivate.
My cornfield is as mellow as a bed of ashes this year; I had a fine
field of red-chaff wheat, with full heads, a plump berry, and straw as
bright as a dollar; and I wish I could have brought down some of my big
pumpkins and melons."
"I think I shall like it pretty well, if I live to get there; I love a
new country; it gives you more space to breathe in. The air is
sweeter, the woods are grander, the grass is greener, crops are more
perfect, neighbors are freer-hearted, and a man prospers faster there.
You have good neighbors, and I hear that you have some good times in
the settlement. Think you will like a home in the wild, wild woods,
Julia?"
"I think I shall. Cousin John lives where it is quite new, and I am
delighted to go there. I know I shall like it on the Cayuga. I will
be in my joy, setting my table for a hunting party, or a harvest feast."
"I know you will all like it, and when we all get there, if Heaven
smiles, my joy will be complete."
They retired, and attempted to sleep; the morning came, and Matthew
rose and completed the circuit of his calls and visits. A week flew
away, and his visiting was done, and Julia Wilmer was Julia Fabens, and
with the blessings of fond parents, they departed for their far forest
home.
The journey was long and difficult for Julia to undertake. They could
not then journey as now, on the rapid railway, winding green valleys,
ascending great hills, and gliding through cities and towns, with as
gentle a whirl, and as jocund a clack as if spinning skeins of silk.
They mounted the tardy wagon, and rattled and jounced along behind a
loitering team. But Julia had fortitude and spirit, to meet fatigues
and discouragements bravely. Her early experience now furnished the
fruits that could most refresh her heart; the fruits of courage, hope,
and self-assistance. She expected the journey of life would not always
be smooth, and she hoped it would not have more to buffet her joy, or
jostle, or weary, than the road to the Waldron Settlement.
They came to the land of lakes. Emerging from a dense forest, on the
last morning of the journey, they welcomed the light of an opening, and
the sweet Skaneateles glowed upon their eyes. They were moving along
its foot, and it glimmered and waved like a lake of quicksilver, in
reply to the smiles of a splendid sky.
"Is this your Cayuga? How lovely!--What! are we in the settlement so
soon?" asked Julia, with joy flashing from her eyes, and hope
rekindling on her cheeks.
"No, we are near the settlement," said Matthew. "This is the
Skaneateles. Have courage, my dear. I have brought you over a long,
rough way. You are weary, I know, but have courage now. We shall
reach home to-night."
They refreshed themselves with luncheon from their basket, and cool,
sweet water from the lake, and rode on a few hours longer, and another
lake saluted them with a bright smile of welcome.
"Then, this is your Cayuga?"
"No, this is the Owasco; but we have not far to go. Cheer up, Julia,
cheer up, now, and prepare your dainty eyes for a peep at the loveliest
Eden."
They rode awhile longer, and another lake burst in beauty on their
gaze. "I know that is it, and here we come to the settlement. I
declare it is a lovely spot, worth coming to see! What waters, and
woods, and fields! I shall love this place, I know I shall. Ho! there
comes Uncle Walter to meet us now!"
And Uncle Walter was followed by Aunt Huldah, and Matthew and Julia
were heartily shaken, questioned and kissed, and led into the house,
and served to hospitalities, that would flatter and refresh the
proudest mortal's heart.
VI.
THE NEW HOME AND SETTLEMENT.
Matthew and Julia rose in the morning and went into their new home. It
was a great change for Julia, and nothing but contrasts reminded her of
her home at Mr. Mason's. But somehow it suited her heart the moment
she entered its doorway, and she took charge of its interests with
pride and joy; and hours, and days, and weeks, and months, and years
passed by with a much more rapid flight than before she was a bride.
And following the steps of Time through a few more rounds of his race,
and omitting to note the common events that rise up on the way, we will
now pause at a new stage of action, and attempt to recall the scenes.
The house remains yet before us, the same as when Julia first saw it,
except that a small addition has been built and furnished; a partition
takes off a bedroom from one end, and another window has been cut and
set in the chamber. It is a handsome log house as one would find in
all the Waldron Settlement. It is long and wide. The logs are hewn on
the inside; it has a white maple floor below, and a white basswood
floor above; it has a large open fireplace, and a stick chimney,
through which, as through a telescope, the stars may be counted at
night; and, whitewashed above and around, it presents a neat and
pleasant appearance.
The house stands on an eminence which overlooks nearly every field on
the farm, and admits you to sights as distant as the blue mountain
fringes lifted away beyond Ithaca in the south. There are maples,
ashes, and elms in the door-yard; there is a beautiful garden on the
east, and a cool and delightful spring of water on the west. There is
a log barn, thatched with straw, on the right; and barracks for wheat
and hay, and cribs for corn, on the left. There is already a fine
meadow of timothy, with white-ash shade trees, waving on the north; a
pasture beyond the garden on the east, and a wheat-field on the south.
Then a cornfield greets you west, and your eyes enjoy the scene.
Around this lovely spot, the distance of a field on either side of the
house, the woods still wave their crowns of majesty, and hide the
Owasco, and most of the Cayuga from view.
As master of this little rural domain, you behold Matthew Fabens, now
grown to ample manhood; and he would make a fine bust for Powers to cut
in marble. He stands six feet one without his shoes; he is straight as
the white-ash shade tree that honors the north meadow; and his body,
and arms, and legs, are round, and hard, and clean. He has a fine
turned head, deficient most in caution; high in benevolence,
veneration, and conscientiousness; and full in the regions that show he
can construct his own implements and comforts; arrange his farm with
order and taste; estimate values at a glance, and cast up accounts
without a slate and pencil. He has a fine turned Roman nose of the
cleanest and fairest skin; he has a well-shaped ear, rounded, and
separate at the bottom from the head; he has brown hair, and dark gray
eyes; he has a noble face and brilliant countenance; he has teeth
standing straight, and square and separate, and though they never were
brushed, they glisten with the cleanest and smoothest ivory polish; he
has a good-sized mouth, not too compressed, like a skin-flint's, nor
too open or lax like a fool's. He has a chin, throat, and chest,
showing energy of soul and body combined; and if twenty years older, he
would do fine honors to a president's chair.
Yonder, in the garden, arranging beds for winter vegetables, and
tending a few simple flowers, you behold Julia Fabens, and she has
quite outgrown the bend in her good form, which hard work brought on at
Mason's, and looks more mature, and hardy; and she is diligent as a
parent robin, and rosy and glad as the sweet summer morn.
Wiping the sweat from their frank foreheads and faces, there in the
cool, fresh current of air, sit Major Fabens and his venerable wife,
come on to this new country to draw freer breath, taste fairer fruit,
see greener thrift, and make a good son happy; and they are just
returned from a ramble by the lake.
Out near the well curb, toward the green maple on the right, plays our
loved little Clinton, the plump and laughing idol of the place; tossing
his ball out of sight into that cluster of golden mullens, and then
scampering full tilt after the broods of young chickens and turkeys
that peep about the door. Clinton is a promising boy, and the worst of
it is, he begins to find it out. But everybody likes him. He has most
of his father's look, with his mother's force and caution added, he
laughs all over his cunning little face; his yellow locks crinkle all
over his head; and his hands are so soft, and his neck so fat and
clean, you love to catch him to your heart, and hug him, and chuckle
beneath his chin, and carry away his sweetest strawberry kisses.
And stretched on the grass-plat before the door, sleeps the good dog
Jowler; shaggy and rough as a wolf; yet faithful and kind; resting from
a range in the woods, and dreaming of squirrels and coons.
Look around you a little, and tell us where is a handsomer spot! True,
it has not the ornament and regularity of an old estate. Handsome
buildings, and the smoothest meadow-lands are nowhere to be seen. The
stir and strife of a village are not here, nor the signs of ancient
opulence, except what Nature boasts; nor the voice of cultivated music.
But walk about, and view the scene.
The woods are arrayed in all their pomp and splendor; the fields have
the warmest and richest light to kindle their royal verdures; along the
trails, and in every little tract of sunshine, the flowers of the
forest hold forth their sweet and modest blooms; and while birds of
every wing and song, continue their full concert from twilight to
twilight, you may hear, if you listen, the chime of the cheering
cowbell, made mellow by the distance, wakening the music of contentment
in the heart, tolling the steps of the tripping hours, and sounding the
notes of rural bliss.
We set out in company to visit the settlers, and the birds salute us on
our way, and the air comes cool and fragrant to our lips. We pause and
survey the sugar camp, and a herd of fleet deer caper by, leading a
troop of frolicking fawns, and seeming to send back the word, "see our
darlings." Casting your eyes aloft to the top of that tall maple, you
discover a bee tree, and behold numberless diligent little beings going
and coming on the business of a miniature state. Then you hear the
chip-squirrels chirrup, and the red squirrels mock; then the hen-hawks
chatter and shriek in the air, and the crows caw and clamor; the
thrushes and swamp robins bandy their boasts in challenges of music;
the blue jay gossips, and the cuckoo cries.
"Whose cabin is this?" do you inquire? Tilly Troffater's. A
swaggering, boisterous little body too, is he, and his legs are short
and bandy, as you have seen a creeper cockerel's: he has one eye black
and one eye blue, and both are glazed and dull as the knobs on earthen
tea-pot covers. His ears are round, and stick forward like a weasel's;
his form is square and supple, and he stands more than perpendicular.
Ready and sharp is he for a joke, cold and unfeeling in manner, and
troublesome as the varlet blackbirds that sit on a tree and gabble and
moot, while other birds give you music.
There sits his wife, milking the late-found cow. She has a ludicrous
look. An old rag of linsey-woolsey hugs her spindle form; her teeth
are shovels, and cleave down her nether lip; her eyes catch every point
of the compass across each other's glance; her forehead is low, her
hair, a smoky white, and her voice, now flat, now treble, and now
sharp. But a kinder, or more guileless heart never warmed a human
breast, than that which lies in Dinah Troffater's; and whoever were in
fault regarding her strange looks, they cannot criminate her as
accessary. She milks the cow, and yonder come leaping like vagrant
foxes, her half-wild children, with a few dry sticks for the cabin fire.
Going on two miles farther, we come to Mr. Waldron's, and find him
nestled quietly under a hill in his double log-house, with a view of
the lake on the west, and with comforts all around him. We find Aunt
Polly too, and she lays down her distaff, welcomes us in, tells us a
story of the backwoods, and gives us a taste of her new metheglin.
Then we come to Uncle Walter Mowry's, and hear he is off on a hunt in
the woods, while Aunt Huldah excuses the soap and sand on her hands,
and welcomes us in with joy.
Then we give Teezle a visit; then we see Wilson, and enter the shop on
the stream, where he makes chairs, shoes, and carpenter-work on a rainy
day; and he reminds us of the bear hunt. Then we see Flaxman, and hear
him and Phoebe sing the same old nasal song, and observe their thrift
and comfort. Then we visit Colwell, and the wives and children of all
greet us with kindness, and a frank good-will in all their words and
looks. Upon every heart among them, excepting the heart of Troffater,
fraternity, courage and hope, luxuriate in harvests as rank and rich,
as the woods and fields around; and through their clear eyes, we can
see the honest thoughts of their free and guileless souls, as we see
the shells and pebbles through the waters of the lake.
We find it a goodly settlement, and you can picture in your mind the
happiness Fabens enjoys, as he brings each new acre to the harrow, and
reaps the rewards of his manly toils. You remain a whole month in his
hospitable home.
You miss many comforts and luxuries, found in country and town, at the
present day. You remark the absence of all outward polish and
ornament, which get names for refinement in established society. There
are no capacious parlors, or splendid lamps to attract you; no sofas
but moss-cushioned logs in the woods; no ottomans unless a green bank
of wood-grass will serve you, and neither harp nor piano but the
distaff and wheel. All is simple; all is arranged for convenience and
comfort, as new homes in the backwoods ever are found; and to you it
may seem odd enough to live so.
You may fancy how simple a lad from this region would appear as he
might pass your city streets, with his long arms and loping gait;
reading signs and staring at all the city wonders. You may fancy the
backwoods maiden would look verdant and soft in her rustic frock and
clumsy calf-skin shoes, leaning well to her way as she walked, and
seeming to devour all city sights and sounds. But think you, they have
not drank great spirit and beautiful sense from the breasts of Nature?
Is it nothing that the backwoods boy lies down in clover meadows, and
rambles in maple woods, and hears the bobolink and swamp robin sing;
starts at the sound of Logan's cuckoo, and imitates her lay?
And is it less that the backwoods maiden spins flax and wool; makes the
fields and woods her flower garden; washes the freckles from her face
in Aurora's rosiest dew; romps like a wild doe in the valleys; brings
apples from the orchard, and berries from the hills; and like Lavinia,
gleans Palemon's fields?
But your heart imbibes the lovely simplicity; your voice falls into
tune with voices around you; and more and more do you love that rural
little home, and all its verdant views.
Happier and purer are you made by the wise words of Major Fabens and
his wife. Kindly and more free-hearted you grow in the sphere of Julia
Fabens, whose innocent, womanly nature breathes in unison with all that
is joyful and pure; whose presence is the life and smile of the place.
If you have in your soul one sympathy that takes to children, you must
also love that rosy miniature Fabens, the idolized Clinton, as he vies
in his sports with the birds and squirrels; gives chase to butterflies
and bees; and races around the house drawing smiles on his antics;
darting from sight now and then like a spirit, and making house, and
fields and woods resound with his merry warble and glee.
A month goes away so pleasantly, you conclude to spend the summer with
them; and a bright and blissful summer it is as your young heart has
ever enjoyed. You cannot stand idle, despising labor. You catch the
impulse of the place and people, and none are more ready than you for
tasks that test courage and strength, and make the warm sweat flood the
glowing face. You are up and away in the morning before the
whippoorwill closes her song; and are breathing the fragrant air, and
enjoying the brisk exercise that gives the best sauce for breakfast.
You would hunt the stray cow, but you fear being lost, or devoured by
wild beasts. You are out on the fallow as they prepare to burn it; and
you carry fire to a dozen brush heaps, while Fabens and his father fire
the rest; and behold, the flames meet together in a curtain, and run
and roar like the waves of a burning sea.
You count the ages of the trees by the rings on the stumps, and say,
here is a walnut that flourished with Washington; there is a maple of
Milton's age; and this old oak was a brave young tree when Columbus was
born. This ring records a dry season, and that a wet season; this a
warm one, and that a cold. What made this elm so stocky and firm and
high, and gave it such mighty roots and massive limbs? It grew quite
alone on the hill, took the storm with the sunshine, and battled the
blast while others slept in peace. What made this poplar so weakly?
It grew in the thicket, and was sheltered from sun and storm. You see
in the trees fine types of human life.
You lead rosy Clinton on many a glad ramble. Your strength increases,
and you assist in the labors of the field. You plant corn and weed it;
and in that act you sow the seeds of energy and hope in your soul, and
weed it of vices and weakly shoots. You cut down fireweeds and
thistles; and still dress your soul withal, more and more. You set
deadfalls for corn-pulling squirrels; and entrap with the squirrels
your follies and fears. You watch with a watering mouth the growing
melons and blackening berries; and find sweeter than all, the melons of
health, arid berries of rural bliss.
Through wood and through opening you wander free; are now on the lake
in a birchen canoe, and again on the shore in an Indian wigwam. Your
time runs out at last, and you return to society with a lagging heart,
preferring the hale and cheery comforts of backwoods life, hard and
homely as are its labors, to a life where the multitude gather, and
Pride and Luxury rule, and Self seeks all honors, and Fashion stands a
god. Your memory remains pictorial with the waters, fields and woods
of the Waldron Settlement; your dreams are illuminated with its lights
and verdures; and its pleasant times and seasons roll their rounds in
music through your mind.
VII.
A CAPTIVE.
Another year passes over our little wood-bordered world, and summer
again smiles on the settlement. The achievements of labor are
exhibited in the progress of each new plantation, in the thrift,
comfort, and hope of each pleasant estate. A few more families have
joined the neighborhood; a few more clearings are given to the area of
civilization; a few more homes and joys. A new pledge of love is added
to the Fabens family, and a troop of blissful and tender interests
succeed.
The hanging woods flourish in full foliage. Cowslips and pond-lilies
star the green marshes. Wild strawberries, large, fragrant, and sweet,
redden all the knolls, crimson the horses' fetlocks, and cluster in the
corners of the fences. Herd's grass and clover struggle into bloom
along the trails and wagon roads in the forest; and the native grasses
grow scattering and small. Young orchards have shed their snowy
blossoms. Corn is past its first hoeing; wheat approaches the ear;
flax holds up to the light and dew the bowls of its clear blue blooms.
Silver suckers and ruby mullets still linger in the inlets and
valley-streams. The horns of the deer are in the velvet. Fallows look
clean and mellow, as if ready now for the seed. Signs of promise wave;
symbols of blessing bloom on all that gladdens the eye; and Fabens
thanks God both morning and night for the bounties of his love.
A morning of June tinges the reddening east with its first delicate
blushes, while the cold pale moon still rides on her lonely way.
Whippoorwills leave the neighboring boughs and retire to the heart of
the woodlands; and robins and bluebirds, and thrushes and sparrows, in
a grand hallelujah chorus, salute the sun on his flaming way. The howl
of the wolf ceases; the voice of the water-fowl swells softly and sadly
from the lake; and the cowbell's chime, and house-dog's bark, make
harmony in the general song of Nature. Foxes are home from their felon
excursions; squirrels are astir; deer are on the upland, feeding.
Mother Fabens abandons her pillow, and is out from the door, enjoying
her usual draught of sweet morning air. The home of her son looks good
to her as any that the round world can show; and her heart warms with
joy as she gazes on all the signs of thrift around.
But what object is that which attracts her attention, just bursting
from the distant thicket? The meadow is between them, enclosed on
three sides. It moves toward her. It enters the meadow from the
woods. It is lithe as a fox; and the sun, just peering above the
tree-tops, reveals more and more of its beauty. A felon fox it cannot
be, out at this bold hour in quest of poultry; nor a panther, nor a
wolf. O! We see now; it is a fairy fawn, looking innocent as a baby;
and its round sides are dappled as the trout and pickerel in the lake.
What a sight of the lovely!