"_Gon_. Here is everything advantageous to life.
_Ant_. True; save means to live."
TEMPEST.
Fleda's fatigue did not prevent her being up before sunrise
the next day. Fatigue was forgotten, for the light of a fair
spring morning was shining in at her windows, and she meant to
see aunt Miriam before breakfast. She ran out to find Hugh,
and her merry shout reached him before she did, and brought
him to meet her.
"Come, Hugh! I'm going off up to aunt Miriam's, and I want
you. Come! Isn't this delicious?"
"Hush!" said Hugh. " Father's just here in the barn. I can't
go, Fleda."
Fleda's countenance clouded.
"Can't go! what's the matter? can't you go, Hugh?"
He shook his head, and went off into the barn.
A chill came upon Fleda. She turned away with a very sober
step. What if her uncle was in the barn, why should she hush?
He never had been a check upon her merriment never; what was
coming now? Hugh, too, looked disturbed. It was a spring
morning no longer. Fleda forgot the glittering wet grass that
had set her own eyes a-sparkling but a minute ago; she walked
along, cogitating, swinging her bonnet by the strings in
thoughtful vibration, till, by the help of sunlight and sweet
air, and the loved scenes, her spirits again made head and
swept over the sudden hindrance they had met. There were the
blessed old sugar maples, seven in number, that fringed the
side of the road how well Fleda knew them! Only skeletons
now, but she remembered how beautiful they looked after the
October frosts; and presently they would be putting out their
new green leaves, and be beautiful in another way. How
different in their free-born luxuriance from the dusty and
city-prisoned elms and willows she had left! She came to the
bridge then, and stopped with a thrill of pleasure and pain to
look and listen. Unchanged! all but herself. The mill was
not going; the little brook went by quietly chattering to
itself, just as it had done the last time she saw it, when she
rode past on Mr. Carleton's horse. Four and a half years ago!
And now how strange that she had come to live there again.
Drawing a long breath, and swinging her bonnet again, Fleda
softly went on up the hill, past the saw-mill, the ponds, the
factories, the houses of the settlement. The same, and not the
same! Bright with the morning sun, and yet, somehow, a little
browner and homelier than of old they used to be. Fleda did
not care for that she would hardly acknowledge it to herself
her affection never made any discount for infirmity. Leaving
the little settlement behind her thoughts as behind her back,
she ran on now towards aunt Miriam's, breathlessly, till field
after field was passed, and her eye caught a bit of the smooth
lake, and the old farm-house in its old place. Very brown it
looked, but Fleda dashed on, through the garden, and in at the
front door.
Nobody at all was in the entrance-room, the common sitting-
room of the family. With trembling delight, Fleda opened the
well-known door, and stole noiselessly through the little
passage-way to the kitchen. The door of that was only on the
latch, and a gentle movement of it gave to Fleda's eye the
tall figure of aunt Miriam, just before her, stooping down to
look in at the open mouth of the oven, which she was at that
moment engaged in supplying with more work to do. It was a
huge one, and, beyond her aunt's head, Fleda could see in the
far end the great loaves of bread, half baked, and more near a
perfect squad of pies and pans of gingerbread just going in to
take the benefit of the oven's milder mood. Fleda saw all
this, as it were, without seeing it; she stood still as a
mouse and breathless, till her aunt turned, and then a
spring and a half shout of joy, and she had clasped her in her
arms, and was crying with her whole heart. Aunt Miriam was
taken all aback she could do nothing but sit down and cry
too, and forgot her oven-door."
"Aint breakfast ready yet, mother?" said a manly voice coming
in. "I must be off to see after them ploughs. Hollo why,
mother!"
The first exclamation was uttered as the speaker put the door
to the oven's mouth; the second as he turned in quest of the
hand that should have done it. He stood wondering, while his
mother and Fleda, between laughing and crying, tried to rouse
themselves and look up.
"What is all this?"
"Don't you see, Seth?"
"I see somebody that had like to have spoiled your whole
baking I don't know who it is yet."
"Don't you now, cousin Seth?" said Fleda, shaking away her
tears and getting up.
"I ha'n't quite lost my recollection. Cousin, you must give me
a kiss. How do you do! You ha'n't forgot how to colour, I see,
for all you've been so long among the pale city folks."
"I hav'n't forgotten anything, cousin Seth," said Fleda,
blushing indeed, but laughing and shaking his hand with as
hearty good-will.
"I don't believe you have anything that is good," said he.
"Where have you been all this while?"
"Oh, part of the time in New York, and part of the time in
Paris, and some other places."
"Well, you ha'n't seen anything better than Queechy, or
Queechy bread and butter, have you?"
"No, indeed!"
"Come, you shall give me another kiss for that," said he,
suiting the action to the word; "and now sit down and eat as
much bread and butter as you can. It's just as good as it used
to be. Come, mother, I guess breakfast is ready by the looks
of that coffee-pot."
"Breakfast ready!" said Fleda.
"Ay indeed; it's a good half-hour since it ought to ha' been
ready. If it aint, I can't stop for it. Them boys will be
running their furrows like sarpents if I aint there to start
them."
"Which like sarpents," said Fleda, "the furrows or the men?"
"Well, I was thinking of the furrows," said he, glancing at
her. "I guess there aint cunning enough in the others to
trouble them. Come, sit down, and let me see whether you have
forgot a Queechy appetite."
"I don't know," said Fleda, doubtfully; "they will expect me
at home."
"I don't care who expects you sit down! you aint going to
eat any bread and butter this morning but my mother's you
haven't got any like it at your house. Mother, give her a cup
of coffee, will you, and set her to work."
Fleda was too willing to comply with the invitation, were it
only for the charm of old times. She had not seen such a table
for years, and little as the conventionalities of delicate
taste were known there, it was not without a comeliness of its
own in its air of wholesome abundance and the extreme purity
of all its arrangements. If but a piece of cold pork were on
aunt Miriam's table, it was served with a nicety that would
not have offended the most fastidious; and amid irregularities
that the fastidious would scorn, there was a sound excellence
of material and preparation that they very often fail to know.
Fleda made up her mind she would be wanted at home; all the
rather, perhaps, for Hugh's mysterious "hush;" and there was
something in the hearty kindness and truth of these friends
that she felt particularly genial. And if there was a lack of
silver at the board, its place was more than filled with the
pure gold of association. They sat down to table, but aunt
Miriam's eyes devoured Fleda. Mr. Plumfield set about his more
material breakfast with all despatch.
"So Mr. Rossitur has left the city for good?" said aunt
Miriam. "How does he like it?"
"He hasn't been here but a day, you know, aunt Miriam," said
Fleda evasively.
"Is he anything of a farmer?" asked her cousin.
"Not much," said Fleda.
"Is he going to work the farm himself?"
"How do you mean?"
"I mean, is he going to work the farm himself, or hire it out,
or let somebody else work it on shares?"
"I don't know," said Fleda "I think he is going to have a
farmer, and oversee things himself."
"He'll get sick o' that," said Seth; "unless he's the luck to
get hold of just the right hand."
"Has he hired anybody yet?" said aunt Miriam, after a little
interval of supplying Fleda with "bread and butter."
"Yes, Ma'am, I believe so."
"What's his name?"
"Donohan an Irishman, I believe; uncle Rolf hired him in New
York."
"For his head man?" said Seth, with a sufficiently
intelligible look.
"Yes," said Fleda. "Why?"
But he did not immediately answer her.
"The land's in poor heart now," said he, "a good deal of it;
it has been wasted; it wants first-rate management to bring it
in order, and make much of it for two or three years to come.
I never see an Irishman's head yet that was worth more than a
joke. Their hands are all of 'em that's good for anything."
"I believe uncle Rolf wants to have an American to go with
this man," said Fleda.
Seth said nothing; but Fleda understood the shake of his head
as he reached over after a pickle.
"Are you going to keep a dairy, Fleda?" said her aunt.
"I don't know, Ma'am I haven't heard anything about it."
"Does Mrs. Rossitur know anything about country affairs?"
"No nothing," Fleda said, her heart sinking perceptibly with
every new question.
"She hasn't any cows yet?"
She? any cows! But Fleda only said they had not come; she
believed they were coming.
"What help has she got?"
"Two women Irishwomen," said Fleda.
"Mother, you'll have to take hold and learn her," said Mr.
Plumfield.
"Teach her?" cried Fleda, repelling the idea "aunt Lucy? she
cannot do anything she isn't strong enough; not anything of
that kind."
"What did she come here for?" said Seth.
"You know," said his mother, "that Mr. Rossitur's
circumstances obliged him to quit New York."
"Ay, but that aint my question. A man had better keep his
fingers off anything he can't live by. A farm's one thing or
t'other, just as it's worked. The land wont grow specie it
must be fetched out of it. Is Mr. Rossitur a smart man?"
"Very," Fleda said, "about everything but farming."
"Well, if he'll put himself to school, maybe he'll learn,"
Seth concluded, as he finished his breakfast and went off.
Fleda rose too, and was standing thoughtfully by the fire,
when aunt Miriam came up and put her arms round her. Fleda's
eyes sparkled again.
"You're not changed you're the same little Fleda," she said.
"Not quite so little," said Fleda, smiling.
"Not quite so little, but my own darling. The world hasn't
spoiled thee yet."
"I hope not, aunt Miriam."
"You have remembered your mother's prayer, Fleda?"
"Always!"
How tenderly aunt Miriam's hand was passed over the bowed head
how fondly she pressed her! And Fleda's answer was as fond.
"I wanted to bring Hugh up to see you, aunt Miriam, with me,
but he couldn't come. You will like Hugh. He is so good!"
"I will come down and see him," said aunt Miriam; and then she
went to look after her oven's doings. Fleda stood by, amused
to see the quantities of nice things that were rummaged out of
it. They did not look like Mrs. Renney's work, but she knew
from old experience that they were good.
"How early you must have been up to put these things in," said
Fleda.
"Put them in! yes, and make them. These were all made this
morning, Fleda."
"This morning! before breakfast! Why, the sun was only just
rising when I set out to come up the hill, and I wasn't long
coming, aunt Miriam."
"To be sure; that's the way to get things done. Before
breakfast! What time do you breakfast, Fleda?"
"Not till eight or nine o'clock."
"Eight or nine! Here?"
"There hasn't been any change made yet, and I don't suppose
there will be. Uncle Rolf is always up early, but he can't
bear to have breakfast early."
Aunt Miriam's face showed what she thought; and Fleda went
away with all its gravity and doubt settled like lead upon her
heart. Though she had one of the identical apple pies in her
hands, which aunt Miriam had quietly said was for "her and
Hugh," and though a pleasant savour of old times was about it,
Fleda could not get up again the bright feeling with which she
had come up the hill. There was a miserable misgiving at
heart. It would work off in time.
It had begun to work off, when, at the foot of the hill, she
met her uncle. He was coming after her to ask Mr. Plumfield
about the desideratum of a Yankee. Fleda put her pie in safety
behind a rock, and turned back with him, and aunt Miriam told
them the way to Seth's ploughing ground.
A pleasant word or two had set Fleda's spirits a-bounding
again, and the walk was delightful. Truly the leaves were not
on the trees, but it was April, and they soon would be; there
was promise in the light, and hope in the air, and everything
smelt of the country and spring-time. The soft tread of the
sod, that her foot had not felt for so long, the fresh look of
the newly-turned earth; here and there the brilliance of a
field of winter grain, and that nameless beauty of the budding
trees, that the full luxuriance of summer can never equal
Fleda's heart was springing for sympathy. And to her, with
whom association was everywhere so strong, there was in it all
a shadowy presence of her grandfather, with whom she had so
often seen the spring-time bless those same hills and fields
long ago. She walked on in silence, as her manner commonly was
when deeply pleased; there were hardly two persons to whom she
would speak her mind freely then. Mr. Rossitur had his own
thoughts.
"Can anything equal the spring-time?" she burst forth at
length.
Her uncle looked at her and smiled. "Perhaps not; but it is
one thing," said he, sighing, "for taste to enjoy, and another
thing for calculation to improve."
"But one can do both, can't one?" said Fleda, brightly.
"I don't know," said he, sighing again. "Hardly."
Fleda knew he was mistaken, and thought the sighs out of
place. But they reached her; and she had hardly condemned them
before they set her off upon a long train of excuses for him,
and she had wrought herself into quite a fit of tenderness by
the time they reached her cousin.
They found him on a gentle side-hill, with two other men and
teams, both of whom were stepping away in different parts of
the field. Mr. Plumfield was just about setting off to work
his way to the other side of the lot, when they came up with
him.
Fleda was not ashamed of her aunt Miriam's son, even before
such critical eyes as those of her uncle. Farmer-like as were
his dress and air, they showed him, nevertheless, a well-
built, fine-looking man, with the independent bearing of one
who has never recognised any but mental or moral superiority.
His face might have been called handsome; there was at least
manliness in every line of it; and his excellent dark eye
showed an equal mingling of kindness and acute common sense.
Let Mr. Plumfield wear what clothes he would, one felt obliged
to follow Burns' notable example, and pay respect to the man
that was in them.
"A fine day, Sir," he remarked to Mr. Rossitur, after they had
shaken hands.
"Yes, and I will not interrupt you but a minute. Mr.
Plumfield, I am in want of hands hands for this very
business you are about, ploughing and Fleda says you know
everybody; so I have come to ask if you can direct me."
" Heads or hands, do you want?" said Seth, clearing his boot-
sole from some superfluous soil upon the share of his plough.
"Why both, to tell you the truth. I want bands and teams, for
that matter, for I have only two, and I suppose there is no
time to be lost. And I want very much to get a person
thoroughly acquainted with the business to go along with my
man. He is an Irishman, and I am afraid not very well
accustomed to the ways of doing things here."
"Like enough," said Seth; " and the worst of 'em is, you can't
learn 'em."
"Well! can you help me?"
"Mr. Douglass!" said Seth, raising his voice to speak to one
of his assistants who was approaching them "Mr. Douglass!
you're holding that 'ere plough a little too obleekly for my
grounds."
"Very good, Mr. Plumfield!" said the person called upon, with
a quick accent that intimated, "If you don't know what is
best, it is not my affair!" the voice very peculiar, seeming
to come from no lower than the top of his throat, with a
guttural roll of the words.
"Is that Earl Douglass?" said Fleda.
"You remember him?" said her cousin, smiling. "He's just where
he was, and his wife too. Well, Mr. Rossitur, 'tain't very
easy to find what you want just at this season, when most
folks have their hands full, and help is all taken up. I'll
see if I can't come down and give you a lift myself with the
ploughing, for a day or two, as I'm pretty beforehand with the
spring, but you'll want more than that. I ain't sure I
haven't more hands than I'll want myself, but I think it is
possible Squire Springer may spare you one of his'n. He aint
taking in any new land this year, and he's got things pretty
snug; I guess he don't care to do any more than common,
anyhow, you might try. You know where uncle Joshua lives,
Fleda? Well, Philetus what now?"
They had been slowly walking along the fence towards the
furthest of Mr. Plumfield's coadjutors, upon whom his eye had
been curiously fixed as he was speaking a young man who was
an excellent sample of what is called "the raw material." He
had just come to a sudden stop in the midst of the furrow when
his employer called to him; and he answered, somewhat lack-a-
daisically
"Why, I've broke this here clavis: I ha'n't touched anything
nor nothing, and it broke right in teu!"
"What do you 'spose 'll be done now?" said Mr. Plumfield,
gravely, going up to examine the fracture.
"Well, 't wa'n't none of my doings," said the young man. "I
ha'n't touched anything nor nothing, and the mean thing broke
right in teu. 'Tain't so handy as the old kind o' plough, by a
long jump."
"You go 'long down to the house and ask my mother for a new
clavis; and talk about ploughs when you know how to hold 'em,"
said Mr. Plumfield.
"It don't look so difficult a matter," said Mr. Rossitur,
"but I am a novice myself. What is the principal thing to be
attended to in ploughing, Mr. Plumfield?"
There was a twinkle in Seth's eye, as he looked down upon a
piece of straw he was breaking to bits, which Fleda, who could
see, interpreted thoroughly.
"Well," said he, looking up "the breadth of the stitches and
the width and depth of the furrow must be regulated according
to the nature of the soil and the lay of the ground, and what
you're ploughing for. There's stubble-ploughing, and breaking
up old leys, and ploughing for fallow crops, and ribbing,
where the land has been some years in grass, and so on; and
the plough must be geared accordingly, and so as not to take
too much land nor go out of the land; and after that the best
part of the work is to guide the plough right, and run the
furrows straight and even."
He spoke with the most impenetrable gravity, while Mr.
Rossitur looked blank and puzzled. Fleda could hardly keep her
countenance.
"That row of poles," said Mr. Rossitur, presently, "are they
to guide you in running the furrow straight?"
"Yes, Sir, they are to mark out the crown of the stitch. I
keep 'em right between the horses, and plough 'em down one
after another. It's a kind of way country-folks play at nine-
pins," said Seth, with a glance half inquisitive, half sly, at
his questioner.
Mr. Rossitur asked no more. Fleda felt a little uneasy again.
It was rather a longish walk to uncle Joshua's, and hardly a
word spoken on either side.
The old gentleman was "to hum;" and while Fleda went back into
some remote part of the house to see "aunt Syra," Mr. Rossitur
set forth his errand.
"Well, and so you're looking for help eh?" said uncle
Joshua, when he had heard him through.
"Yes, Sir I want help."
"And a team too?"
"So I have said, Sir," Mr. Rossitur answered rather shortly.
"Can you supply me?"
"Well, I don't know as I can," said the old man, rubbing his
hands slowly over his knees. "You ha'n't got much done yet, I
s'pose?"
"Nothing. I came the day before yesterday."
"Land's in rather poor condition in some parts, aint it?"
"I really am not able to say, Sir, till I have seen it."
"It ought to be," said the old gentleman, shaking his head,
"the fellow that was there last didn't do right by it. He
worked the land too hard, and didn't put on it anywhere near
what he had ought to; I guess you'll find it pretty poor in
some places. He was trying to get all he could out of it, I
s'pose. There's a good deal of fencing to be done too, aint
there?"
"All that there was, Sir, I have done none since I came."
"Seth Plumfield got through ploughing yet?"
"We found him at it."
"Ay, he's a smart man. What are you going to do, Mr. Rossitur,
with that piece of marsh land that lies off to the south east
of the barn, beyond the meadow, between the hills? I had just
sich another, and I "
"Before I do anything with the wet land, Mr. I am so unhappy
as to have forgotten your name "
"Springer, Sir," said the old gentleman, "Springer Joshua
Springer. That is my name, Sir."
"Mr. Springer, before I do anything with the wet land, I
should like to have something growing on the dry; and as that
is the present matter in hand, will you be so good as to let
me know whether I can have your assistance."
"Well, I don't know," said the old gentleman; "there aint
anybody to send but my boy Lucas, and I don't know whether he
would make up his mind to go or not."
"Well, Sir!" said Mr. Rossitur, rising, "in that case, I will
bid you good morning. I am sorry to have given you the
trouble."
"Stop," said the old man, "stop a bit. Just sit down. I'll go
in and see about it."
Mr. Rossitur sat down, and uncle Joshua left him to go into
the kitchen and consult his wife, without whose counsel, of
late years especially, he rarely did anything. They never
varied in opinion, but aunt Syra's wits supplied the steel
edge to his heavy metal.
"I don't know but Lucas would as lieve go as not," the old
gentleman remarked on coming back from this sharpening
process, "and I can make out to spare him, I guess. You
calculate to keep him, I s'pose?"
"Until this press is over; and perhaps longer, if I find he
can do what I want."
"You'll find him pretty handy at a'most anything, but I mean
I s'pose he'll get his victuals with you?"
"I have made no arrangement of the kind," said Mr. Rossitur,
controlling with some effort his rebelling muscles. "Donohan
is boarded somewhere else, and for the present it will be best
for all in my employ to follow the same plan."
"Very good," said uncle Joshua; "it makes no difference
only, of course, in that case it is worth more, when a man has
to find himself and his team."
"Whatever it is worth, I am quite ready to pay, Sir."
"Very good. You and Lucas can agree about that. He'll be along
in the morning."
So they parted; and Fleda understood the impatient quick step
with which her uncle got over the ground.
"Is that man a brother of your grandfather?"
"No, Sir Oh no! only his brother-in-law. My grandmother was
his sister, but they weren't in the least like each other."
"I should think they could not," said Mr. Rossitur.
"Oh, they were not!" Fleda repeated. "I have always heard
that."
After paying her respects to aunt Syra in the kitchen, she had
come back time enough to hear the end of the discourse in the
parlour, and had felt its full teaching. Doubts returned, and
her spirits were sobered again. Not another word was spoken
till they reached home; when Fleda seized upon Hugh, and went
off to the rock after her forsaken pie.
"Have you succeeded?" asked Mrs. Rossitur, while they were
gone.
"Yes that is, a cousin has kindly consented to come and help
me."
"A cousin!" said Mrs. Rossitur.
"Ay we're in a nest of cousins."
"In a what, Mr. Rossitur?"
"In a nest of cousins; and I had rather be in a nest of rooks.
I wonder if I shall be expected to ask my ploughmen to dinner!
Every second man is a cousin, and the rest are uncles."