"I see thee still,
Remembrance, faithful to her trust,
Calls thee in beauty from the dust;
Thou comest in the morning light,
Thou'rt with me through the gloomy night;
In dreams I meet thee as of old:
Then thy soft arms my neck enfold,
And thy sweet voice is in my ear:
In every sense to memory dear
I see thee still."--SPRAGUE.
It was just ten in the morning of the succeeding day when my uncle Ro
and myself came in sight of the old house at the Nest. I call it _old_,
for a dwelling that has stood more than half a century acquires a touch
of the venerable, in a country like America. To me it was truly old, the
building having stood there, where I then saw it, for a period more than
twice as long as that of my own existence, and was associated with all
my early ideas. From childhood I had regarded that place as my future
home, as it had been the home of my parents and grandparents, and, in
one sense, of those who had gone before them for two generations more.
The whole of the land in sight--the rich bottoms, then waving with
grass--the side-hills, the woods, the distant mountains--the orchards,
dwellings, barns, and all the other accessories of rural life that
appertained to the soil, were mine, and had thus become without a single
act of injustice to any human being, so far as I knew and believed. Even
the red man had been fairly bought by Herman Mordaunt, the patentee, and
so Susquesus, the Redskin of Ravensnest, as our old Onondago was often
called, had ever admitted the fact to be. It was natural that I should
love an estate thus inherited and thus situated. NO CIVILIZED MAN, NO
MAN, INDEED, SAVAGE OR NOT, HAD EVER BEEN THE OWNER OF THOSE BROAD
ACRES, BUT THOSE WHO WERE OF MY OWN BLOOD. This is what few besides
Americans _can_ say; and when it can be said truly, in parts of the
country where the arts of life have spread, and amid the blessings of
civilization, it becomes the foundation of a sentiment so profound, that
I do not wonder those adventurers-errant who are flying about the face
of the country, thrusting their hands into every man's mess, have not
been able to find it among their other superficial discoveries. Nothing
can be less like the ordinary cravings of avarice than the feeling that
is thus engendered; and I am certain that the general tendency of such
an influence is to elevate the feelings of him who experiences it.
And there were men among us, high in political station--high as such men
ever can get, for the consequence of having such men in power is to draw
down station itself nearer to their own natural level--but men in power
had actually laid down propositions in political economy which, if
carried out, would cause me to sell all that estate, reserving, perhaps,
a single farm for my own use, and reinvest the money in such a way as
that the interest I obtained might equal my present income! It is true,
this theory was not directly applied to me, as my farms were to fall in
by the covenants of their leases, but it had been directly applied to
Stephen and William Van Rensselaer, and, by implication, to others; and
my turn might come next. What business had the Rensselaers, or the
Livingstons, or the Hunters, or the Littlepages, or the Morgans, or the
Verplancks, or the Wadsworths, or five hundred others similarly placed,
to entertain "sentiments" that interfered with "business," or that
interfered with the wishes of any straggling Yankee who had found his
way out of New England, and wanted a particular farm on his own terms?
It is aristocratic to put sentiment in opposition to trade; and TRADE
ITSELF IS NOT TO BE TRADE ANY LONGER THAN ALL THE PROFIT IS TO BE FOUND
ON THE SIDE OF NUMBERS. Even the principles of holy trade are to be
governed by majorities!
Even my uncle Ro, who never owned a foot of the property, could not look
at it without emotion. He too had been born there--had passed his
childhood there--and loved the spot without a particle of the grovelling
feeling of avarice. He took pleasure in remembering that our race had
been the only owners of the soil on which he stood, and had that very
justifiable pride which belongs to enduring respectability and social
station.
"Well, Hugh," he cried, after both of us had stood gazing at the gray
walls of the good and substantial, but certainly not very beautiful
dwelling, "here we are, and we now may determine on what is next to be
done. Shall we march down to the village, which is four miles distant,
you will remember, and get our breakfasts there? shall we try one of
your tenants? or shall we plunge at once _in medias res_, and ask
hospitality of my mother and your sister?"
"The last might excite suspicion, I fear, sir. Tar and feathers would be
our mildest fate did we fall into the hands of the Injins."
"Injins! Why not go at once to the wigwam of Susquesus, and get out of
him and Yop the history of the state of things. I heard them speaking of
the Onondago at our tavern last night, and while they said he was
generally thought to be much more than a hundred, that he was still like
a man of eighty. That Indian is full of observation, and may let us into
some of the secrets of his brethren."
"They can at least give us the news from the family; and though it might
seem in the course of things for pedlers to visit the Nest house, it
will be just as much so for them to halt at the wigwam."
This consideration decided the matter, and away we went toward the
ravine or glen, on the side of which stood the primitive-looking hut
that went by the name of the "wigwam." The house was a small cabin of
logs, neat and warm, or cool, as the season demanded. As it was kept up,
and was whitewashed, and occasionally furnished anew by the
landlord--the odious creature! he who paid for so many similar things in
the neighborhood--it was never unfit to be seen, though never of a very
alluring, cottage-like character. There was a garden, and it had been
properly made that very season, the negro picking and pecking about it,
during the summer, in a way to coax the vegetables and fruits on a
little, though I well knew that the regular weedings came from an
assistant at the Nest, who was ordered to give it an eye and an
occasional half-day. On one side of the hut there was a hog-pen and a
small stable for a cow; but on the other the trees of the virgin forest,
which had never been disturbed in that glen, overshadowed the roof. This
somewhat poetical arrangement was actually the consequence of a
compromise between the tenants of the cabin, the negro insisting on the
accessories of his rude civilization, while the Indian required the
shades of the woods to reconcile him to his position. Here had these two
singularly associated beings--the one deriving his descent from the
debased races of Africa, and the other from the fierce but lofty-minded
aboriginal inhabitant of this continent--dwelt for nearly the whole
period of an ordinary human life. The cabin itself began to look really
ancient, while those who dwelt in it had little altered within the
memory of man! Such instances of longevity, whatever theorists may say
on the subject, are not unfrequent among either the blacks or the
"natives," though probably less so among the last than among the first,
and still less so among the first of the northern than of the southern
sections of the republic. It is common to say that the great age so
often attributed to the people of these two races is owing to ignorance
of the periods of their births, and that they do not live longer than
the whites. This may be true, in the main, for a white man is known to
have died at no great distance from Ravensnest, within the last
five-and-twenty years, who numbered more than his six-score of years;
but aged negroes and aged Indians are nevertheless so common, when the
smallness of their whole numbers is remembered, as to render the fact
apparent to most of those who have seen much of their respective people.
There was no highway in the vicinity of the wigwam, for so the cabin was
generally called, though wigwam, in the strict meaning of the word, it
was not. As the little building stood in the grounds of the Nest house,
which contain two hundred acres, a bit of virgin forest included, and
exclusively of the fields that belonged to the adjacent farm, it was
approached only by foot-paths, of which several led to and from it, and
by one narrow, winding carriage-road, which, in passing for miles
through the grounds, had been led near the hut, in order to enable my
grandmother and sister, and, I dare say, my dear departed mother, while
she lived, to make their calls in their frequent airings. By this
sweeping road we approached the cabin.
"There are the two old fellows, sunning themselves this fine day!"
exclaimed my uncle, with something like a tremor in his voice, as we
drew near enough to the hut to distinguish objects. "Hugh, I never see
these men without a feeling of awe, as well as of affection. They were
the friends, and one was the slave of my grandfather; and as long as I
can remember, have they been aged men! They seem to be set up here as
monuments of the past, to connect the generations that are gone with
those that are to come."
"If so, sir, they will soon be all there is of their sort. It really
seems to me that, if things continue much longer in their present
direction, men will begin to grow jealous and envious of history itself,
because its actors have left descendants to participate in any little
credit they may have gained."
"Beyond all contradiction, boy, there is a strange perversion of the old
and natural sentiments on this head among us. But you must bear in mind
the fact, that of the two millions and a half the State contains, not
half a million, probably, possess any of the true York blood, and can
consequently feel any of the sentiments connected with the birthplace
and the older traditions of the very society in which they live. A great
deal must be attributed to the facts of our condition; though I admit
those facts need not, and ought not to unsettle principles. But look at
those two old fellows! There they are, true to the feelings and habits
of their races, even after passing so long a time together in this hut.
There squats Susquesus on a stone, idle and disdaining work, with his
rifle leaning against the apple-tree; while Jaaf--or Yop, as I believe
it is better to call him--is pecking about in the garden, still a slave
at his work, in fancy at least."
"And which is the happiest, sir--the industrious old man or the idler?"
"Probably each finds most happiness in indulging his own early habits.
The Onondago never _would_ work, however, and I have heard my father
say, great was his happiness when he found he was to pass the remainder
of his day in _otium cum dignitate_, and without the necessity of making
baskets."
"Yop is looking at us; had we not better go up at once and speak to
them?"
"Yop may stare the most openly, but my life on it the Indian _sees_
twice as much. His faculties are the best, to begin with; and he is a
man of extraordinary and characteristic observation. In his best days
nothing ever escaped him. As you say, we will approach."
My uncle and myself then consulted on the expediency of using broken
English with these two old men, of which, at first, we saw no necessity;
but when we remembered that others might join us, and that our
communication with the two might be frequent for the next few days, we
changed our minds, and determined rigidly to observe our incognitos.
As we came up to the door of the hut, Jaaf slowly left his little garden
and joined the Indian, who remained immovable and unmoved on the stone
which served him for a seat. We could see but little change in either
during the five years of our absence, each being a perfect picture, in
his way, of extreme but not decrepit old age in the men of his race. Of
the two, the black--if black he could now be called, his color being a
muddy gray--was the most altered, though that seemed scarcely possible
when I saw him last. As for the Trackless, or Susquesus, as he was
commonly called, his temperance throughout a long life did him good
service, and his half-naked limbs and skeleton-like body, for he wore
the summer-dress of his people, appeared to be made of a leather long
steeped in a tannin of the purest quality. His sinews, too, though much
stiffened, seemed yet to be of whipcord, and his whole frame a species
of indurated mummy that retained its vitality. The color of the skin was
less red than formerly, and more closely approached to that of the
negro, as the latter now was, though perceptibly different.
"Sago--sago," cried my uncle, as we came quite near, seeing no risk in
using that familiar semi-Indian salutation.[22] "Sago, sago, dis
charmin' mornin'; in my tongue, dat might be _guten tag_."
[Footnote 22: The editor has often had occasion to explain the meaning
of terms of this nature. The colonists caught a great many words from
the Indians they first knew, and used them to all other Indians, though
not belonging to their language; and these other tribes using them as
English, a sort of limited _lingua franca_ has grown up in the country
that everybody understands. It is believed that "moccason," "squaw,"
"pappoose," "sago," "tomahawk," "wigwam," etc., etc., all belong to this
class of words. There can be little doubt that the _sobriquet_ of
"Yankees" is derived from "Yengees," the manner in which the tribes
nearest to New England pronounced the word "English." It is to this hour
a provincialism of that part of the country to pronounce this word
"_Eng_-lish" instead of "_Ing_-lish," its conventional sound. The change
from "_Eng_-lish" to "_Yen_gees" is very trifling.--EDITOR.]
"Sago," returned the Trackless, in his deep, guttural voice, while old
Yop brought two lips together that resembled thick pieces of overdone
beefsteak, fastened his red-encircled gummy eyes on each of us in turn,
pouted once more, working his jaws as if proud of the excellent teeth
they still held, and said nothing. As the slave of a Littlepage, he held
pedlers as inferior beings; for the ancient negroes of New York ever
identified themselves, more or less, with the families to which they
belonged, and in which they so often were born. "Sago," repeated the
Indian slowly, courteously, and with emphasis, after he had looked a
moment longer at my uncle, as if he saw something about him to command
respect.
"Dis ist charmin' day, frients," said uncle Ro, placing himself coolly
on a log of wood that had been hauled for the stove, and wiping his
brow. "Vat might you calls dis coontry?"
"Dis here?" answered Yop, not without a little contempt. "Dis is York
colony; where you come from to ask sich a question?"
"Charmany. Dat ist far off, but a goot country; ant dis ist goot
country, too."
"Why you leab him, den, if he be good country, eh?"
"Vhy you leaf Africa, canst you dell me dat?" retorted uncle Ro,
somewhat coolly.
"Nebber was dere," growled old Yop, bringing his blubber lips together
somewhat in the manner the boar works his jaws when it is prudent to get
out of his way. "I'm York-nigger born, and nebber seen no Africa; and
nebber want to see him, nudder."
It is scarcely necessary to say that Jaaf belonged to a school by which
the term of "colored gentleman" was never used. The men of his time and
stamp called themselves "niggers;" and ladies and gentlemen of that age
took them at their word, and called them "niggers," too; a word that no
one of the race ever uses now, except in the way of reproach, and which,
by one of the singular workings of our very wayward and common nature,
he is more apt to use than any other, when reproach is intended.
My uncle paused a moment to reflect before he continued a discourse that
had not appeared to commence under very flattering auspices.
"Who might lif in dat big stone house?" asked uncle Ro, as soon as he
thought the negro had had time to cool a little.
"Anybody can see you no Yorker, by dat werry speech," answered Yop, not
at all mollified by such a question. "Who _should_ lib dere but Gin'ral
Littlepage!"
"Vell, I dought he wast dead, long ago."
"What if he be? It is his house, and he lib in it; and ole _young_
missus lib dere too."
Now, there had been three generations of generals among the Littlepages,
counting from father to son. First, there had been Brigadier-General
Evans Littlepage, who held that rank in the militia, and died in service
during the revolution. The next was Brigadier-General Cornelius
Littlepage, who got his rank by brevet, at the close of the same war, in
which he had actually figured as a colonel of the New York line. Third,
and last, was my own grandfather, Major-General Mordaunt Littlepage: he
had been a captain in his father's regiment at the close of the same
struggle, got the brevet of major at its termination, and rose to be a
major-general of the militia, the station he held for many years before
he died. As soon as the privates had the power to elect their own
officers, the position of a major-general in the militia ceased to be
respectable, and few gentlemen could be induced to serve. As might have
been foreseen, the militia itself fell into general contempt, where it
now is, and where it will ever remain until a different class of
officers shall be chosen. The people can do a great deal, no doubt, but
they cannot make a "silk purse out of a sow's ear." As soon as officers
from the old classes shall be appointed, the militia will come up; for
in no interest in life is it so material to have men of certain habits,
and notions, and education, in authority, as in those connected with the
military service. A great many fine speeches may be made, and much
patriotic eulogy expended on the intrinsic virtue and intelligence of
the people, and divers projects entertained to make "citizen-soldiers,"
as they are called; but citizens never can be, and never will be turned
into soldiers at all, good or bad, until proper officers are placed over
them. To return to Yop--
"Bray vhat might be de age of das laty dat you callet _olt_ young
missus?" asked my uncle.
"Gosh! she nutten but gal--born some time just a'ter old French war.
Remember her well 'nough when she Miss Dus Malbone. Young masser
Mordaunt take fancy to her, and make her he wife."
"Vell, I hopes you hafn't any objection to der match?"
"Not I; she clebber young lady den, and she werry clebber young lady
now."
And this of my venerable grandmother, who had fairly seen her fourscore
years!
"Who might be der master of das big house now?"
"Gin'ral Littlepage, doesn't I tell ye! Masser Mordaunt's name, _my_
young master. Sus, dere, only Injin; he nebber so lucky as hab a good
master. Niggers gettin' scarce, dey tells me, nowadays, in dis world!"
"Injins, too, I dinks; dere ist no more redskins might be blenty."
The manner in which the Onondago raised his figure, and the look he
fastened on my uncle, were both fine and startling. As yet he had said
nothing beyond the salutation; but I could see he now intended to speak.
"New tribe," he said, after regarding us for half a minute intently:
"what you call him--where he come from?"
"Ja, ja--das ist der anti-rent redskins. Haf you seen 'em, Trackless?"
"Sartain; come to see me--face in bag--behave like squaw; poor
Injin--poor warrior!"
"Yees, I believe dat ist true enough. I can't bear soch Injin--might not
be soch Injin in the world. Vhat you call 'em, eh?"
Susquesus shook his head slowly, and with dignity. Then he gazed
intently at my uncle; after which he fastened his eyes in a similar
manner on me. In this manner his looks turned from one to the other for
some little time, when he again dropped them to the earth, calmly and in
silence. I took out the hurdy-gurdy, and began to play a lively air--one
that was very popular among the American blacks, and which, I am sorry
to say, is getting to be not less so among the whites. No visible effect
was produced on Susquesus, unless a slight shade of contempt was visible
on his dark features. With Jaaf, however, it was very different. Old as
he was, I could see a certain nervous twitching of the lower limbs,
which indicated that the old fellow actually felt some disposition to
dance. It soon passed away, though his grim, hard, wrinkled, dusky-gray
countenance continued to gleam with a sort of dull pleasure for some
time. There was nothing surprising in this, the indifference of the
Indian to melody being almost as marked as the negro's sensitiveness to
its power.
It was not to be expected that men so aged would be disposed to talk
much. The Onondago had ever been a silent man: dignity and gravity of
character uniting with prudence to render him so. But Jaaf was
constitutionally garrulous, though length of days had necessarily much
diminished the propensity. At that moment a fit of thoughtful and
melancholy silence came over my uncle, too, and all four of us continued
brooding on our own reflections for two or three minutes after I had
ceased to play. Presently the even, smooth approach of carriage-wheels
was heard, and a light summer vehicle that was an old acquaintance, came
whirling round the stable, and drew up within ten feet of the spot where
we were all seated.
My heart was in my mouth at this unexpected interruption, and I could
perceive that my uncle was scarcely less affected. Amid the flowing and
pretty drapery of summer shawls, and the other ornaments of the female
toilet, were four youthful and sunny faces, and one venerable with
years. In a word, my grandmother, my sister, and my uncle's two other
wards, and Mary Warren were in the carriage; yes, the pretty, gentle,
timid, yet spirited and intelligent daughter of the rector was of the
party, and seemingly quite at home and at her ease, as one among
friends. She was the first to speak even, though it was in a low, quiet
voice, addressed to my sister, and in words that appeared extorted by
surprise.
"There are the very two pedlers of whom I told you, Martha," she said,
"and now you may hear the flute well played."
"I doubt if he can play better than Hugh," was my dear sister's answer.
"But we'll have some of his music, if it be only to remind us of him who
is so far away."
"The music we can and will have, my child," cried my grandmother,
cheerfully; "though _that_ is not wanted to remind us of our absent boy.
Good-morrow, Susquesus; I hope this fine day agrees with you."
"Sago," returned the Indian, making a dignified and even graceful
forward gesture with one arm, though he did not rise. "Weadder
good--Great Spirit good, dat reason. How squaws do?"
"We are all well, I thank you, Trackless. Good-morrow, Jaaf; how do
_you_ do, this fine morning?"
Yop, or Jaap, or Jaaf, rose tottering, made a low obeisance, and then
answered in the semi-respectful, semi-familiar manner of an old,
confidential family servant, as the last existed among our fathers:
"Tank 'ee, Miss Dus, wid all my heart," he answered. "Pretty well
to-day; but old Sus, he fail, and grow ol'er and ol'er desp'ate fast!"
Now, of the two, the Indian was much the finest relic of human powers,
though he was less uneasy and more stationary than the black. But the
propensity to see the mote in the eye of his friend, while he forgot the
beam in his own, was a long-established and well-known weakness of Jaaf,
and its present exhibition caused everybody to smile. I was delighted
with the beaming, laughing eyes of Mary Warren in particular, though she
said nothing.
"I cannot say I agree with you, Jaaf," returned my smiling grandmother.
"The Trackless bears his years surprisingly; and I think I have not seem
him look better this many a day than he is looking this morning. We are
none of us as young as we were when we first became acquainted,
Jaaf--which is now near, if not quite, threescore of years ago."
"You nuthin' but gal, nudder," growled the negro. "Ole Sus be raal ole
fellow; but Miss Dus and Masser Mordaunt, dey get married only tudder
day. Why _dat_ was a'ter the revylooshen!"
"It was, indeed," replied the venerable woman, with a touch of
melancholy in her tones; "but the revolution took place many, many a
long year since!"
"Well, now, I be surprise, Miss Dus! How you call _dat_ so long, when he
only be tudder day?" retorted the pertinacious negro, who began to grow
crusty, and to speak in a short, spiteful way, as if displeased by
hearing that to which he could not assent. "Masser Corny was little ole,
p'r'aps, if he lib, but all de rest ob you nuttin' but children. Tell me
one t'ing, Miss Dus, be it true dey's got a town at Satanstoe?"
"An attempt was made, a few years since, to turn the whole country into
towns, and, among other places, the Neck; but I believe it will never be
anything more than a capital farm."
"So besser. _Dat_ good land, I tell you! One acre down der wort' more
than twenty acre up here."
"My grandson would not be pleased to hear you say that, Jaaf."
"Who your grandson, Miss Dus. Remember you had little baby tudder day;
but baby can't hab baby."
"Ah, Jaaf, my old friend, my babies have long since been men and women,
and are drawing on to old age. One, and he was my first-born, is gone
before us to a better world, and _his_ boy is now your young master.
This young lady, that is seated opposite to me, is the sister of that
young master, and she would be grieved to think you had forgotten her."
Jaaf labored under the difficulty so common to old age, he was forgetful
of things of more recent date, while he remembered those which had
occurred a century ago! The memory is a tablet that partakes of the
peculiarity of all our opinions and habits. In youth it is easily
impressed, and the images then engraved on it are distinct, deep, and
lasting, while those that succeed become crowded, and take less root,
from the circumstance of finding the ground already occupied. In the
present instance, the age was so great that the change was really
startling, the old negro's recollections occasionally coming on the mind
like a voice from the grave. As for the Indian, as I afterward
ascertained, he was better preserved in all respects than the black; his
great temperance in youth, freedom from labor, exercise in the open air,
united to the comforts and abundance of semi-civilized habits, that had
now lasted for nearly a century, contributed to preserve both mind and
body. As I now looked at him, I remembered what I had heard in my
boyhood of his history.
There had ever been a mystery about the life of the Onondago. If any one
of our set had ever been acquainted with the facts, it was Andries
Coejemans, a half-uncle of my dear grandmother, a person who has been
known among us by the _sobriquet_ of the Chainbearer. My grandmother had
told me that "uncle Chainbearer," as we all called the old relative,
_did_ know about Susquesus, in his time--the reason why he had left his
tribe, and become a hunter, and warrior, and runner among the
pale-faces--and that he had always said the particulars did his red
friend great credit, but that he would reveal it no further. So great,
however, was uncle Chainbearer's reputation for integrity, that such an
opinion was sufficient to procure for the Onondago the fullest
confidence of the whole connection, and the experience of fourscore
years and ten had proved that this confidence was well placed. Some
imputed the sort of exile in which the old man had so long lived to
love, others to war, and others, again, to the consequences of those
fierce personal feuds that are known to occur among men in the savage
state. But all was just as much a mystery and matter of conjecture, now
we were drawing near the middle of the nineteenth century, as it had
been when our forefathers were receding from the middle of the
eighteenth! To return to the negro.
Although Jaaf had momentarily forgotten me, and quite forgotten my
parents, he remembered my sister, who was in the habit of seeing him so
often. In what manner he connected her with the family, it is not easy
to say; but he knew her not only by sight, but by name, and, as one
might say, by blood.
"Yes, yes," cried the old fellow, a little eagerly, "_champing_" his
thick lips together, somewhat as an alligator snaps his jaws, "yes, I
knows Miss Patty, of course. Miss Patty is werry han'some, and grows
han'somer and han'somer ebbery time I sees her--yah, yah, yah!" The
laugh of that old negro sounded startling and unnatural, yet there was
something of the joyous in it, after all, like every negro's laugh.
"Yah, yah, yah! Yes, Miss Patty won'erful han'some, and werry like Miss
Dus. I s'pose, now, Miss Patty was born about 'e time dat Gin'ral
Washington die."
As this was a good deal more than doubling my sister's age, it produced
a common laugh among the light-hearted girls in the carriage. A gleam of
intelligence that almost amounted to a smile also shot athwart the
countenance of the Onondago, while the muscles of his face worked, but
he said nothing. I had reason to know afterward that the tablet of his
memory retained its records better.
"What friends have you with you to-day, Jaaf?" inquired my grandmother,
inclining her head toward us pedlers graciously, at the same time; a
salutation that my uncle Ro and myself rose hastily to acknowledge.
As for myself, I own honestly that I could have jumped into the vehicle
and kissed my dear grandmother's still good-looking, but colorless
cheeks, and hugged Patt, and possibly some of the others, to my heart.
Uncle Ro had more command of himself, though I could see that the sound
of his venerable parent's voice, in which the tremor was barely
perceptible, was near overcoming him.
"Dese be pedler, ma'am, I do s'pose," answered the black. "Dey's got box
wid somet'in' in him, and dey's got new kind of fiddle. Come, young man,
gib Miss Dus a tune--a libely one; sich as make an ole nigger dance."
I drew round the hurdy-gurdy, and was beginning to flourish away, when a
gentle sweet voice, raised a little louder than usual by eagerness,
interrupted me.
"Oh! not that thing, not that; the flute, the flute!" exclaimed Mary
Warren, blushing to the eyes at her own boldness, the instant she saw
that she was heard, and that I was about to comply.
It is hardly necessary to say that I bowed respectfully, laid down the
hurdy-gurdy, drew the flute from my pocket, and, after a few flourishes,
commenced playing one of the newest airs, or melodies, from a favorite
opera. I saw the color rush into Martha's cheeks the moment I had got
through a bar or two, and the start she gave satisfied me that the dear
girl remembered her brother's flute. I had played on that very
instrument ever since I was sixteen, but I had made an immense progress
in the art during the five years just passed in Europe. Masters at
Naples, Paris, Vienna, and London had done a great deal for me; and I
trust I shall not be thought vain if I add, that nature had done
something too. My excellent grandmother listened in profound attention,
and all four of the girls were enchanted.
"That music is worthy of being heard in a room," observed the former, as
soon as I concluded the air; "and we shall hope to hear it this evening,
at the Nest House, if you remain anywhere near us. In the meantime, we
must pursue our airing."
As my grandmother spoke she leaned forward, and extended her hand to me,
with a benevolent smile. I advanced, received the dollar that was
offered, and, unable to command my feelings, raised the hand to my lips,
respectfully but with fervor. Had Martha's face been near me, it would
have suffered also. I suppose there was nothing in this respectful
salutation that struck the spectators as very much out of the way,
foreigners having foreign customs, but I saw a flush in my venerable
grandmother's cheek, as the carriage moved off. _She_ had noted the
warmth of the manner. My uncle had turned away, I dare say to conceal
the tears that started to his eyes, and Jaaf followed toward the door of
the hut, whither my uncle moved, in order to do the honors of the place.
This left me quite alone with the Indian.
"Why no kiss _face_ of grandmodder?" asked the Onondago, coolly and
quietly.
Had a clap of thunder broken over my head, I could not have been more
astonished! The disguise that had deceived my nearest relations--that
had baffled Seneca Newcome, and had set at naught even his sister
Opportunity--had failed to conceal me from that Indian, whose faculties
might be supposed to have been numbed with age!
"Is it possible that you know me, Susquesus!" I exclaimed, signing
toward the negro at the same time, by way of caution; "that you remember
me at all! I should have thought this wig, these clothes, would have
concealed me."
"Sartain," answered the aged Indian, calmly. "Know young chief
soon as see him; know fader--know mudder; know gran'fader,
gran'mudder--great-gran'fader; _his_ fader, too; know all. Why forget
young chief?"
"Did you know me before I kissed my grandmother's hand, or only by that
act?"
"Know as soon as see him. What eyes good for, if don't know? Know uncle,
dere, sartain; welcome home!"
"But you will not let others know us, too, Trackless? We have always
been friends, I hope?"
"Be sure, friends. Why ole eagle, wid white head, strike young pigeon?
Nebber hatchet in 'e path between Susquesus and any of de tribe of
Ravensnest. Too ole to dig him up now."
"There are good reasons why my uncle and myself should not be known for
a few days. Perhaps you have heard something of the trouble that has
grown up between the landlords and the tenants, in the land?"
"What dat trouble?"
"The tenants are tired of paying rent, and wish to make a new bargain,
by which they can become owners of the farms on which they live."
A grim light played upon the swarthy countenance of the Indian: his lips
moved, but he uttered nothing aloud.
"Have you heard anything of this, Susquesus?"
"Little bird sing sich song in my ear--didn't like to hear it."
"And of Indians who are moving up and down the country, armed with
rifles and dressed in calico?"
"What tribe, dem Injin," asked the Trackless, with a quickness and a
fire I did not think it possible for him to retain. "What 'ey do,
marchin' 'bout?--on war-path, eh?"
"In one sense they may be said to be so. They belong to the anti-rent
tribe; do you know such a nation?"
"Poor Injin dat, b'lieve. Why come so late?--why no come when 'e foot of
Susquesus light as feather of bird!--why stay away till pale-faces
plentier dan leaf on tree, or snow in air? Hundred year ago, when dat
oak little, sich Injin might be good; now, he good for nuttin'."
"But you will keep our secret, Sus?--will not even tell the negro who we
are?"
The Trackless simply nodded his head in assent. After this he seemed to
me to sink back in a sort of brooding lethargy, as if indisposed to
pursue the subject. I left him to go to my uncle, in order to relate
what had just passed. Mr. Roger Littlepage was as much astonished as I
had been myself, at hearing that one so aged should have detected us
through disguises that had deceived our nearest of kin. But the quiet
penetration and close observation of the man had long been remarkable.
As his good faith was of proof, however, neither felt any serious
apprehension of being betrayed, as soon as he had a moment for
reflection.