little Baptiste, and drew up his last hook. It came full baited, and
the line was out of the water clear away to his outer buoy!
He let go the rope and drifted down the river, crying as though his
heart would break. All the good hooks useless! all the labor thrown
away! all his self-confidence come to naught!
Up rose the great sun; from around the kneeling boy drifted the last
of the morning mists; bright beams touched his bowed head tenderly. He
lifted his face and looked up the rapid. Then he jumped to his feet
with sudden wonder; a great joy lit up his countenance.
Far up the river a low, broad, white patch appeared on the sharp
sky-line made by the level dark summit of the long slope of tumbling
water. On this white patch stood many figures of swaying men black
against the clear morning sky, and little Baptiste saw instantly that
an attempt was being made to "run" a "band" of deals, or many cribs
lashed together, instead of single cribs as had been done the day
before.
The broad strip of white changed its form slowly, dipped over the
slope, drew out like a wide ribbon, and soon showed a distinct slant
across the mighty volume of the deep raft-channel. When little
Baptiste, acquainted as he was with every current, eddy, and shoal in
the rapid, saw that slant, he knew that his first impression of what
was about to happen had been correct. The pilot of the band _had_
allowed it to drift too far north before reaching the rapid's head.
Now the front cribs, instead of following the curve of the channel,
had taken slower water, while the rear cribs, impelled by the rush
under them, swung the band slowly across the current. All along the
front the standing men swayed back and forth, plying sweeps full forty
feet long, attempting to swing into channel again, with their strokes
dashing the dark rollers before the band into wide splashes of white.
On the rear cribs another crew pulled in the contrary direction; about
the middle of the band stood the pilot, urging his gangs with gestures
to greater efforts.
Suddenly he made a new motion; the gang behind drew in their oars and
ran hastily forward to double the force in front. But they came too
late! Hardly had the doubled bow crew taken a stroke when all drew in
their oars and ran back to be out of danger. Next moment the front
cribs struck the "hog's-back" shoal.
Then the long broad band curved downward in the centre, the rear cribs
swung into the shallows on the opposite side of the raft-channel,
there was a great straining and crashing, the men in front huddled
together, watching the wreck anxiously, and the band went speedily to
pieces. Soon a fringe of single planks came down stream, then cribs
and pieces of cribs; half the band was drifting with the currents, and
half was "hung up" on the rocks among the breakers.
Launching the big red flat-bottomed bow boat, twenty of the raftsmen
came with wild speed down the river, and as there had been no rush to
get aboard, little Baptiste knew that the cribs on which the men
stood were so hard aground that no lives were in danger. It meant much
to him; it meant that he was instantly at liberty to gather in
_money_! money, in sums that loomed to gigantic figures before his
imagination.
He knew that there was an important reason for hurrying the deals to
Quebec, else the great risk of running a band at that season would not
have been undertaken; and he knew that hard cash would be paid down as
salvage for all planks brought ashore, and thus secured from drifting
far and wide over the lake-like expanse below the rapid's foot. Little
Baptiste plunged his oars in and made for a clump of deals floating in
the eddy near his own shore. As he rushed along, the raftsmen's boat
crossed his bows, going to the main raft below for ropes and material
to secure the cribs coming down intact.
"Good boy!" shouted the foreman to Baptiste. "Ten cents for every deal
you fetch ashore above the raft!" Ten cents! he had expected but
five! What a harvest!
Striking his pike-pole into the clump of deals,--"fifty at least,"
said joyful Baptiste,--he soon secured them to his boat, and then
pulled, pulled, pulled, till the blood rushed to his head, and his
arms ached, before he landed his wealth.
"Father!" cried he, bursting breathlessly into the sleeping household.
"Come quick! I can't get it up without you."
"Big sturgeon?" cried the shantyman, jumping into his trousers.
"Oh, but we shall have a good fish breakfast!" cried Delima.
"Did I not say the blessed _le bon Dieu_ would send plenty fish?"
observed _Memere_.
"Not a fish!" cried little Baptiste, with recovered breath. "But look!
look!" and he flung open the door. The eddy was now white with planks.
"Ten cents for each!" cried the boy. "The foreman told me."
"Ten cents!" shouted his father. "_Baptême!_ it's my winter's wages!"
And the old grandmother! And Delima? Why, they just put their arms
round each other and cried for joy.
"And yet there's no breakfast," said Delima, starting up. "And they
will work hard, hard."
At that instant who should reach the door but Monsieur Conolly! He was
a man who respected cash wherever he found it, and already the two
Baptistes had a fine show ashore.
"Ma'ame Larocque," said Conolly, politely, putting in his head, "of
course you know I was only joking yesterday. You can get anything you
want at the store."
What a breakfast they did have, to be sure! the Baptistes eating while
they worked. Back and forward they dashed till late afternoon, driving
ringed spikes into the deals, running light ropes through the rings,
and, when a good string had thus been made, going ashore to haul in.
At that hauling Delima and _Memere_, even little André and Odillon
gave a hand.
Everybody in the little hamlet made money that day, but the Larocques
twice as much as any other family, because they had an eddy and a low
shore. With the help of the people "the big _Bourgeois_" who owned the
broken raft got it away that evening, and saved his fat contract after
all.
"Did I not say so?" said "_Memere_," at night, for the hundredth time.
"Did I not say so? Yes, indeed, _le bon Dieu_ watches over us all."
"Yes, indeed, grandmother," echoed little Baptiste, thinking of his
failure on the night-line. "We may take as much trouble as we like,
but it's no use unless _le bon Dieu_ helps us. Only--I don' know what
de big Bourgeois say about that--his raft was all broke up so bad."
"Ah, _oui_," said _Memere_, looking puzzled for but a moment. "But he
didn't put his trust in _le bon Dieu_; that's it, for sure. Besides,
maybe _le bon Dieu_ want to teach him a lesson; he'll not try for run
a whole band of deals next time. You see that was a tempting of
Providence; and then--the big Bourgeois is a Protestant."
THE RIDE BY NIGHT.
Mr. Adam Baines is a little Gray about the temples, but still looks so
young that few could suppose him to have served in the Civil War.
Indeed, he was in the army less than a year. How he went out of it he
told me in some such words as these:--
An orderly from the direction of Meade's headquarters galloped into
our parade ground, and straight for the man on guard before the
colonel's tent. That was pretty late in the afternoon of a bright
March day in 1865, but the parade ground was all red mud with shallow
pools. I remember well how the hind hoofs of the orderly's galloper
threw away great chunks of earth as he splashed diagonally across the
open.
His rider never slowed till he brought his horse to its haunches
before the sentry. There he flung himself off instantly, caught up his
sabre, and ran through the middle opening of the high screen of
sapling pines stuck on end, side by side, all around the acre or so
occupied by the officers' quarters.
The day, though sunny, was not warm, and nearly all the men of my
regiment were in their huts when that galloping was heard. Then they
hurried out like bees from rows of hives, ran up the lanes between the
lines of huts, and collected, each company separately, on the edge of
the parade ground opposite the officers' quarters.
You see we had a notion that the orderly had brought the word to break
camp. For five months the Army of the Potomac had been in winter
quarters, and for weeks nothing more exciting than vidette duty had
broken the monotony of our brigade. We understood that Sheridan had
received command of all Grant's cavalry, but did not know but the
orderly had rushed from Sheridan himself. Yet we awaited the man's
re-appearance with intense curiosity.
Soon, instead of the orderly, out ran our first lieutenant, a small,
wiry, long-haired man named Miller. He was in undress uniform,--just a
blouse and trousers,--and bare-headed. Though he wore low shoes, he
dashed through mud and water toward us, plainly in a great hurry.
"Sergeant Kennedy, I want ten men at once--mounted," Miller said.
"Choose the ten best able for a long ride, and give them the best
horses in the company. You understand,--no matter whose the ten best
horses are, give 'em to the ten best riders."
"I understand, sir," said Kennedy.
By this time half the company had started for the stables, for fully
half considered themselves among the best riders. The lieutenant
laughed at their eagerness.
"Halt, boys!" he cried. "Sergeant, I'll pick out four myself. Come
yourself, and bring Corporal Crowfoot, Private Bader, and Private
Absalom Gray."
Crowfoot, Bader, and Gray had been running for the stables with the
rest. Now these three old soldiers grinned and walked, as much as to
say, "We needn't hurry; we're picked anyhow;" while the others hurried
on. I remained near Kennedy, for I was so young and green a soldier
that I supposed I had no chance to go.
"Hurry up! parade as soon as possible. One day's rations; light
marching order--no blankets--fetch over-coats and ponchos," said
Miller, turning; "and in choosing your men, favor light weights."
That was, no doubt, the remark which brought me in. I was lanky,
light, bred among horses, and one of the best in the regiment had
fallen to my lot. Kennedy wheeled, and his eye fell on me.
"Saddle up, Adam, boy," said he; "I guess you'll do."
Lieutenant Miller ran back to his quarters, his long hair flying wide.
When he reappeared fifteen minutes later, we were trotting across the
parade ground to meet him. He was mounted, not on his own charger, but
on the colonel's famous thorough-bred bay. Then we knew a hard ride
must be in prospect.
"What! one of the boys?" cried Miller, as he saw me. "He's too young."
"He's very light, sir; tough as hickory. I guess he'll do," said
Kennedy.
"Well, no time to change now. Follow me! But, hang it, you've got your
carbines! Oh, I forgot! Keep pistols only! throw down your sabres and
carbines--anywhere--never mind the mud!"
As we still hesitated to throw down our clean guns, he shouted: "Down
with them--anywhere! Now, boys, after me, by twos! Trot--gallop!"
Away we went, not a man jack of us knew for where or what. The colonel
and officers, standing grouped before regimental headquarters,
volleyed a cheer at us. It was taken up by the whole regiment; it was
taken up by the brigade; it was repeated by regiment after regiment of
infantry as we galloped through the great camp toward the left front
of the army. The speed at which Miller led over a rough corduroy road
was extraordinary, and all the men suspected some desperate enterprise
afoot.
Red and brazen was the set of the sun. I remember it well, after we
got clear of the forts, clear of the breastworks, clear of the
reserves, down the long slope and across the wide ford of Grimthorpe's
Creek, never drawing rein.
The lieutenant led by ten yards or so. He had ordered each two to take
as much distance from the other two in advance; but we rode so fast
that the water from the heels of his horse and from the heels of each
two splashed into the faces of the following men.
From the ford we loped up a hill, and passed the most advanced
infantry pickets, who laughed and chaffed us, asking us for locks of
our hair, and if our mothers knew we were out, and promising to report
our last words faithfully to the folks at home.
Soon we turned to the left again, swept close by several cavalry
videttes, and knew then that we were bound for a ride through a
country that might or might not be within Lee's outer lines, at that
time extended so thinly in many places that his pickets were far out
of touch with one another. To this day I do not know precisely where
we went, nor precisely what for. Soldiers are seldom informed of the
meaning of their movements.
What I do know is what we did while I was in the ride. As we were
approaching dense pine woods the lieutenant turned in his saddle,
slacked pace a little, and shouted, "Boys, bunch up near me!"
He screwed round in his saddle so far that we could all see and hear,
and said:--
"Boys, the order is to follow this road as fast as we can till our
horses drop, or else the Johnnies drop us, or else we drop upon three
brigades of our own infantry. I guess they've got astray somehow; but
I don't know myself what the trouble is. Our orders are plain. The
brigades are supposed to be somewhere on this road. I guess we shall
do a big thing if we reach those men to-night. All we've got to do is
to ride and deliver this despatch to the general in command. You all
understand?"
"Yes, sir! Yes, sir! Yes, sir!"
"It's necessary you all should. Hark, now! We are not likely to strike
the enemy in force, but we are likely to run up against small parties.
Now, Kennedy, if they down me, you are to stop just long enough to
grab the despatch from my breast; then away you go,--always on the
main road. If they down you after you've got the paper, the man who
can grab it first is to take it and hurry forward. So on right to the
last man. If they down him, and he's got his senses when he falls,
he's to tear the paper up, and scatter it as widely as he can. You all
understand?"
"Yes, sir! Yes, sir!"
"All right, then. String out again!"
He touched the big bay with the spur, and shot quickly ahead.
With the long rest of the winter our horses were in prime spirits,
though mostly a little too fleshy for perfect condition. I had cared
well for my horse; he was fast and sound in wind and limb. I was
certainly the lightest rider of the eleven.
I was still thinking of the probability that I should get further on
the way than any comrade except the lieutenant, or perhaps Crowfoot
and Bader, whose horses were in great shape; I was thinking myself
likely to win promotion before morning, when a cry came out of the
darkness ahead. The words of the challenge I was not able to catch,
but I heard Miller shout, "Forward, boys!"
We shook out more speed just as a rifle spat its long flash at us from
about a hundred yards ahead. For one moment I plainly saw the
Southerner's figure. Kennedy reeled beside me, flung up his hands with
a scream, and fell. His horse stopped at once. In a moment the
lieutenant had ridden the sentry down.
Then from the right side of the road a party, who must have been lying
round the camp-fire that we faintly saw in among the pines, let fly at
us. They had surely been surprised in their sleep. I clearly saw them
as their guns flashed.
"Forward! Don't shoot! Ride on," shouted Miller. "Bushwhackers! Thank
God, not mounted! Any of you make out horses with them?"
"No, sir! No, sir!"
"Who yelled? who went down?"
"Kennedy, sir," I cried.
"Too bad! Any one else?"
"No, sir."
"All safe?"
"I'm touched in my right arm; but it's nothing," I said. The twinge
was slight, and in the fleshy place in front of my shoulder. I could
not make out that I was losing blood, and the pain from the hurt was
scarcely perceptible.
"Good boy! Keep up, Adam!" called the lieutenant with a kind tone. I
remember my delight that he spoke my front name. On we flew.
Possibly the shots had been heard by the party half a mile further on,
for they greeted us with a volley. A horse coughed hard and pitched
down behind me. His rider yelled as he fell. Then two more shots came:
Crowfoot reeled in front of me, and somehow checked his horse. I saw
him no more. Next moment we were upon the group with our pistols.
"Forward, men! Don't stop to fight!" roared Miller, as he got clear. A
rifle was fired so close to my head that the flame burned my back
hair, and my ears rang for half an hour or more. My bay leaped high
and dashed down a man. In a few seconds I was fairly out of the
scrimmage.
How many of my comrades had gone down I knew not, nor beside whom I
was riding. Suddenly our horses plunged into a hole; his stumbled, the
man pitched forward, and was left behind. Then I heard a shot, the
clatter of another falling horse, the angry yell of another thrown
rider.
On we went,--the relics of us. Now we rushed out of the pine forest
into broad moonlight, and I saw two riders between me and the
lieutenant,--one man almost at my shoulder and another galloping ten
yards behind. Very gradually this man dropped to the rear. We had lost
five men already, and still the night was young.
Bader and Absalom Gray were nearest me. Neither spoke a word till we
struck upon a space of sandy road. Then I could hear, far behind the
rear man, a sound of galloping on the hard highway.
"They're after us, lieutenant!" shouted Bader.
"Many?" He slacked speed, and we listened attentively.
"Only one," cried Miller. "He's coming fast."
The pursuer gained so rapidly that we looked to our pistols again.
Then Absalom Gray cried:
"It's only a horse!"
In a few moments the great gray of fallen Corporal Crowfoot overtook
us, went ahead, and slacked speed by the lieutenant.
"Good! He'll be fresh when the rest go down!" shouted Miller. "Let the
last man mount the gray!"
By this time we had begun to think ourselves clear of the enemy, and
doomed to race on till the horses should fall.
Suddenly the hoofs of Crowfoot's gray and the lieutenant's bay
thundered upon a plank road whose hollow noise, when we all reached
it, should have been heard far. It took us through wide orchard lands
into a low-lying mist by the banks of a great marsh, till we passed
through that fog, strode heavily up a slope, and saw the shimmer of
roofs under the moon. Straight, through the main street we pounded
along.
Whether it was wholly deserted I know not, but not a human being was
in the streets, nor any face visible at the black windows. Not even a
dog barked. I noticed no living thing except some turkeys roosting on
a fence, and a white cat that sprang upon the pillar of a gateway and
thence to a tree.
Some of the houses seemed to have been ruined by a cannonade. I
suppose it was one of the places almost destroyed in Willoughby's
recent raid. Here we thundered, expecting ambush and conflict every
moment, while the loneliness of the street imposed on me such a sense
as might come of galloping through a long cemetery of the dead.
Out of the village we went off the planks again upon sand. I began to
suspect that I was losing a good deal of blood. My brain was on fire
with whirling thoughts and wonder where all was to end. Out of this
daze I came, in amazement to find that we were quickly overtaking our
lieutenant's thoroughbred.
Had he been hit in the fray, and bled to weakness? I only know that,
still galloping while we gained, the famous horse lurched forward,
almost turned a somersault, and fell on his rider.
"Stop--the paper!" shouted Bader.
We drew rein, turned, dismounted, and found Miller's left leg under
the big bay's shoulder. The horse was quite dead, the rider's long
hair lay on the sand, his face was white under the moon!
We stopped long enough to extricate him, and he came to his senses
just as we made out that his left leg was broken.
"Forward!" he groaned. "What in thunder are you stopped for? Oh, the
despatch! Here! away you go! Good-bye."
In attending to Miller we had forgotten the rider who had been long
gradually dropping behind. Now as we galloped away,--Bader, Absalom
Gray, myself, and Crowfoot's riderless horse,--I looked behind for
that comrade; but he was not to be seen or heard. We three were left
of the eleven.
From the loss of so many comrades the importance of our mission seemed
huge. With the speed, the noise, the deaths, the strangeness of the
gallop through that forsaken village, the wonder how all would end,
the increasing belief that thousands of lives depended on our success,
and the longing to win, my brain was wild. A raging desire to be first
held me, and I galloped as if in a dream.
Bader led; the riderless gray thundered beside him; Absalom rode
stirrup to stirrup with me. He was a veteran of the whole war. Where
it was that his sorrel rolled over I do not remember at all, though I
perfectly remember how Absalom sprang up, staggered, shouted, "My
foot is sprained!" and fell as I turned to look at him and went racing
on.
Then I heard above the sound of our hoofs the voice of the veteran of
the war. Down as he was, his spirit was unbroken. In the favorite song
of the army his voice rose clear and gay and piercing:--
"Hurrah for the Union!
Hurrah, boys, hurrah!
Shouting the battle-cry of freedom!"
We turned our heads and cheered him as we flew, for there was
something indescribably inspiriting in the gallant and cheerful lilt
of the fallen man. It was as if he flung us, from the grief of utter
defeat, a soul unconquerable; and I felt the life in me strengthened
by the tone.
Old Bader and I for it! He led by a hundred yards, and Crowfoot's gray
kept his stride. Was I gaining on them? How was it that I could see
his figure outlined more clearly against the horizon? Surely dawn was
not coming on!
No; I looked round on a world of naked peach-orchards, and corn-fields
ragged with last year's stalks, all dimly lit by a moon that showed
far from midnight; and that faint light on the horizon was not in the
east, but in the west. The truth flashed on me,--I was looking at such
an illumination of the sky as would be caused by the camp-fires of an
army.
"The missing brigade!" I shouted.
"Or a Southern division!" Bader cried. "Come on!"
"Come on!" I was certainly gaining on him, but very slowly. Before the
nose of my bay was beyond the tail of his roan, the wide illuminations
had become more distinct; and still not a vidette, not a picket, not a
sound of the proximity of an army.
Bader and I now rode side by side, and Crowfoot's gray easily kept the
pace. My horse was in plain distress, but Bader's was nearly done.
"Take the paper, Adam," he said; "my roan won't go much further.
Good-bye, youngster. Away you go!" and I drew now quickly ahead.
Still Bader rode on behind me. In a few minutes he was considerably
behind. Perhaps the sense of being alone increased my feeling of
weakness. Was I going to reel out of the saddle? Had I lost so much
blood as that? Still I could hear Bader riding on. I turned to look at
him. Already he was scarcely visible. Soon he dropped out of sight;
but still I heard the laborious pounding of his desperate horse.
My bay was gasping horribly. How far was that faintly yellow sky
ahead? It might be two, it might be five miles. Were Union or Southern
soldiers beneath it? Could it be conceived that no troops of the enemy
were between me and it?
Never mind; my orders were clear. I rode straight on, and I was still
riding straight on, marking no increase in the distress of my bay,
when he stopped as if shot, staggered, fell on his knees, tried to
rise, rolled to his side, groaned and lay.
I was so weak I could not clear myself. I remember my right spur
catching in my saddle-cloth as I tried to free my foot; then I pitched
forward and fell. Not yet senseless, I clutched at my breast for the
despatch, meaning to tear it to pieces; but there my brain failed, and
in full view of the goal of the night I lay unconscious.
When I came to, I rose on my left elbow, and looked around. Near my
feet my poor bay lay, stone dead. Crowfoot's gray!--where was
Crowfoot's gray? It flashed on me that I might mount the fresh horse
and ride on. But where was the gray? As I peered round I heard faintly
the sound of a galloper. Was he coming my way? No; faintly and more
faintly I heard the hoofs.
Had the gray gone on then, without the despatch? I clutched at my
breast. My coat was unbuttoned--the paper was gone!
Well, sir, I cheered. My God! but it was comforting to hear those
far-away hoofs, and know that Bader must have come up, taken the
papers, and mounted Crowfoot's gray, still good for a ten-mile ride!
The despatch was gone forward; we had not all fallen in vain; maybe
the brigades would be saved!