Effingham and Elizabeth were surprized at the manner of the
Leather-Stocking, which was unusually impressive and solemn; but,
attributing it to the scene, the young man turned to the monument, and
read aloud:
"Sacred to the memory of Oliver Effingham, Esquire, formerly a major
in his B. Majesty's 60th Foot; a soldier of tried valor; a subject of
chivalrous loyalty; and a man of honesty. To these virtues he added
the graces of a Christian. The morning of his life was spent in
honor, wealth, and power; but its evening was obscured by poverty,
neglect, and disease, which were alleviated only by the tender care of
his old, faithful, and upright friend and attendant, Nathaniel Bumppo.
His descendants rear this stone to the virtues of the master, and to
the enduring gratitude of the servant."
[Footnote 65: From Chapter XLI of "The Pioneers." Leather-Stocking was
a name given by Cooper to his character Natty Bumppo, who, also, in
various works, bore the name of Hawkeye, Pathfinder and Deerslayer.
Leather-Stocking appears in five of Cooper's books, which are commonly
and collectively known as "the Leather-Stocking Tales." He has
generally been accepted as a type of the hardy frontiersman who, in
the years following the Revolution, carried civilization westward.]
The Leather-Stocking stared at the sound of his own name, and a smile
of joy illumined his wrinkled features as he said:
"And did ye say it, lad? have you then got the old man's name cut in
the stone by the side of his master's? God bless ye, children! 'twas a
kind thought, and kindness goes to the heart as life shortens."
Elizabeth turned her back to the speakers. Effingham made a fruitless
effort before he succeeded in saying:
"It is there cut in plain marble; but it should have been written in
letters of gold!"
"Show me the name, boy," said Natty, with simple eagerness; "let me
see my own name placed in such honor. 'Tis a gin'rous gift to a man
who leaves none of his name and family behind him, in a country where
he has tarried so long."
Effingham guided his finger to the spot, and Natty followed the
windings of the letters to the end with deep interest, when he raised
himself from the tomb, and said:
"I suppose it's all right; and it's kindly thought, and kindly done!
But what have ye put over the redskin?"
"You shall hear:
"'This stone is raised to the memory of an Indian chief, of the
Delaware tribe, who was known by the several names of John Mohegan;
Mohican'"--
"Mo-hee-can, lad, they call theirselves! 'he-can."
"Mohican; 'and Chingagook'"--
"'Gach, boy; 'gach-gook; Chingachgook, which, intarpreted, means Big
Sarpent. The name should be set down right, for an Indian's name has
always some meaning in it."
"I will see it altered. 'He was the last of his people who continued
to inhabit this country; and it may be said of him that his faults
were those of an Indian, and his virtues those of a man.'"
"You never said truer word, Mr. Oliver; ah's me! if you had knowed him
as I did, in his prime, in that very battle where the old gentleman,
who sleeps by his side, saved his life, when them thieves, the
Iroquois, had him at the stake, you'd have said all that, and more
too. I cut the thongs with this very hand, and gave him my own
tomahawk and knife, seeing that the rifle was always my fav'rite
weapon. He did lay about him like a man! I met him as I was coming
home from the trail, with eleven Mingo scalps on his pole. You needn't
shudder, Madam Effingham, for they was all from shaved heads and
warriors. When I look about me, at these hills, where I used to count
sometimes twenty smokes, curling over the tree-tops, from the Delaware
camps, it raises mournful thoughts, to think that not a redskin is
left of them all; unless it be a drunken vagabond from the Oneidas, or
them Yankee Indians, who, they say, be moving up from the sea-shore;
and who belong to none of God's creatures, to my seeming, being, as it
were, neither fish nor flesh--neither white man nor savage. Well,
well! the time has come at last, and I must go"--
"Go!" echoed Edwards, "whither do you go?"
The Leather-Stocking, who had imbibed, unconsciously, many of the
Indian qualities, tho he always thought of himself as of a civilized
being, compared with even the Delawares, averted his face to conceal
the workings of his muscles, as he stooped to lift a large pack from
behind the tomb, which he placed deliberately on his shoulders.
"Go!" exclaimed Elizabeth, approaching him with a hurried step; "you
should not venture so far in the woods alone, at your time of life,
Natty; indeed, it is imprudent. He is bent, Effingham, on some distant
hunting."
"What Mrs. Effingham tells you is true, Leather-Stocking," said
Edwards; "there can be no necessity for your submitting to such
hardships now! So throw aside your pack, and confine your hunt to the
mountains near us, if you will go."
"Hardship! 'tis a pleasure, children, and the greatest that is left me
on this side the grave."
"No, no; you shall not go to such a distance," cried Elizabeth, laying
her white hand on his deerskin pack; "I am right! I feel his
camp-kettle, and a canister of powder! he must not be suffered to
wander so far from us, Oliver; remember how suddenly Mohegan dropt
away."
"I knowed the parting would come hard, children; I knowed it would!"
said Natty, "and so I got aside to look at the graves by myself, and
thought if I left ye the keepsake which the Major gave me, when we
first parted in the woods, ye wouldn't take it unkind, but would know
that, let the old man's body go where it might, his feeling stayed
behind him."
"This means something more than common!" exclaimed the youth; "where
is it, Natty, that you purpose going?"
The hunter drew nigh him with a confident, reasoning air, as if what
he had to say would silence all objections, and replied:
"Why, lad, they tell me that on the Big Lakes there's the best of
hunting, and a great range, without a white man on it, unless it may
be one like myself. I'm weary of living in clearings, and where the
hammer is sounding in my ears from sunrise to sundown. And tho I'm
much bound to ye both, children--I wouldn't say it if it was not
true--I crave to go into the woods ag'in, I do."
"Woods!" echoed Elizabeth, trembling with her feelings; "do you not
call these endless forests woods?"
"Ah! child, these be nothing to a man that's used to the wilderness. I
have took but little comfort sin' your father come on with his
settlers; but I wouldn't go far, while the life was in the body that
lies under the sod there. But now he's gone, and Chingachgook is gone;
and you be both young and happy. Yes! the big house has rung with
merriment this month past! And now, I thought, was the time to try to
get a little comfort in the close of my days. Woods! indeed! I
doesn't call these woods, Madam Effingham, where I lose myself every
day of my life in the clearings."
"If there be anything wanting to your comfort, name it,
Leather-Stocking; if it be attainable it is yours."
"You mean all for the best, lad; I know it; and so does Madam, too:
but your ways isn't my ways. 'Tis like the dead there, who thought,
when the breath was in them, that one went east, and one went west to
find their heavens; but they'll meet at last; and so shall we,
children. Yes, ind as you've begun, and we shall meet in the land of
the just at last."
"This is so new! so unexpected!" said Elizabeth, in almost breathless
excitement; "I had thought you meant to live with us and die with us,
Natty."
"Words are of no avail," exclaimed her husband; "the habits of forty
years are not to be dispossest by the ties of a day. I know you too
well to urge you further, Natty; unless you will let me build you a
hut on one of the distant hills, where we can sometimes see you, and
know that you are comfortable."
"Don't fear for the Leather-Stocking, children; God will see that his
days be provided for, and his ind happy. I know you mean all for the
best, but our ways doesn't agree. I love the woods, and ye relish the
face of man; I eat when hungry, and drink when a-dry; and ye keep
stated hours and rules: nay, nay, you even overfeed the dogs, lad,
from pure kindness; and hounds should be gaunty to run well. The
meanest of God's creatures be made for some use, and I'm formed for
the wilderness; if ye love me, let me go where my soul craves to be
ag'in!"
The appeal was decisive; and not another word of entreaty for him to
remain was then uttered; but Elizabeth bent her head to her bosom and
wept, while her husband dashed away the tears from his eyes; and, with
hands that almost refused to perform their office, he produced his
pocket-book, and extended a parcel of banknotes to the hunter.
"Take these," he said, "at least take these; secure them about your
person, and in the hour of need they will do you good service."
The old man took the notes, and examined them with a curious eye.
"This, then, is some of the new-fashioned money that they've been
making at Albany, out of paper! It can't be worth much to they that
hasn't l'arning! No, no, lad--take back the stuff; it will do me no
sarvice. I took kear to get all the Frenchman's powder afore he broke
up, and they say lead grows where I'm going. It isn't even fit for
wads, seeing that I use none but leather! Madam Effingham, let an old
man kiss your hand, and wish God's choicest blessings on you and
your'n."
"Once more let me beseech you, stay!" cried Elizabeth. "Do not,
Leather-Stocking, leave me to grieve for the man who has twice rescued
me from death, and who has served those I love so faithfully. For my
sake, if not for your own, stay. I shall see you in those frightful
dreams that still haunt my nights, dying in poverty and age, by the
side of those terrific beasts you slew. There will be no evil that
sickness, want, and solitude can inflict that my fancy will not
conjure as your fate. Stay with us, old man, if not for your own sake,
at least for ours."
"Such thoughts and bitter dreams, Madam Effingham," returned the
hunter, solemnly, "will never haunt an innocent parson long. They'll
pass away with God's pleasure. And if the catamounts be yet brought to
your eyes in sleep, 'tis not for my sake, but to show you the power of
Him that led me there to save you. Trust in God, madam, and your
honorable husband, and the thoughts for an old man like me can never
be long nor bitter. I pray that the Lord will keep you in mind--the
Lord that lives in clearings as well as in the wilderness--and bless
you, and all that belong to you, from this time till the great day
when the whites shall meet the redskins in judgment, and justice shall
be the law, and not power."
Elizabeth raised her head, and offered her colorless cheek to his
salute, when he lifted his cap and touched it respectfully. His hand
was grasped with convulsive fervor by the youth, who continued silent.
The hunter prepared himself for his journey, drawing his belt tighter,
and wasting his moments in the little reluctant movements of a
sorrowful departure. Once or twice he essayed to speak, but a rising
in his throat prevented it. At length he shouldered his rifle, and
cried with a clear huntsman's call that echoed through the woods:
"He-e-e-re, he-e-e-re, pups--away, dogs, away; ye'll be footsore afore
ye see the ind of the journey!"
The hounds leapt from the earth at this cry, and scenting around the
graves and the silent pair, as if conscious of their own destination,
they followed humbly at the heels of their master. A short pause
succeeded, during which even the youth concealed his face on his
grandfather's tomb. When the pride of manhood, however, had supprest
the feelings of nature, he turned to renew his entreaties, but saw
that the cemetery was occupied only by himself and his wife.
"He is gone!" cried Effingham.
Elizabeth raised her face, and saw the old hunter standing, looking
back for a moment, on the verge of the wood. As he caught their
glances, he drew his hard hand hastily across his eyes again, waved it
on high for an adieu, and uttering a forced cry to his dogs, who were
crouching at his feet, he entered the forest.
This was the last that they ever saw of the Leather-Stocking, whose
rapid movements preceded the pursuit which Judge Temple both ordered
and conducted. He had gone far toward the setting sun--the foremost in
that band of pioneers who are opening the way for the march of the
nation across the continent.