I did something to-day which I have had vaguely in mind ever since I
took up my abode in the wilderness. I climbed to the very top of my hill
of refuge.
The principal reason why I have never attempted it before was that I
feared it would prove too much for me; would require too much exertion.
And 'Crombie, while advising and insisting upon continuous exercise, had
also warned me not to overdo it.
This morning I felt mighty as Tubal Cain. My walks, my regular hours, my
wholesome diet, are having effect. I am beginning to brown. At seven
o'clock, when I shaved, the path of my razor showed a firm, tanned skin.
My eyes are clear, and I can feel life coming into me. Oh, what a
glorious thing it is! Just simple, primitive, animal life! I don't know
when I have coughed. I can inflate my lungs, and imagine the
consternation of that "colony" at the inrushing flood of this ozone
laden air. I am not deluding myself that I am sound. 'Crombie said it
would take time, and 'Crombie knows. But I am better. My recent walks
have not caused me to pant and blow. That is why, this morning, I felt
the assurance within me that I could surmount old Baldy's peak, and feel
no bad results.
Rain fell last night. It began just as I went to bed, and I lay and
listened to it. There is something most fascinating about rain on the
roof after you have gone to bed. Last night it dropped gently, a steady
murmur. It came to my ears as a cradle song of Nature. I could hear it
outside the window near which I sleep. The patter, patter, and after a
while the gurgling of little streams over the clapboard eaves. I
remember of thinking what a good soaking my garden spot would get, and
of the consequent delay waiting for it to dry out before I could spade
it up, then I went to sleep.
This morning I was awakened by the orchestra of the birds. I had heard
stray notes before about daybreak. Snatches of song, broken trills,
single cries, and challenging calls. But this morning it was different.
I don't know how to account for it. Whether the rain had something to do
with it; whether they met by accident or appointment. The solution of
that question is a minor thing, however. I received the full benefit of
the gathering. I have never heard an exhibition which equaled that
forest symphony. There must have been nearly a dozen varieties of birds.
And each little fellow was singing with all the heart of him. I tell you
they made music. Each had a different tune, and among humans this would
have represented bedlam. But among the feathered kind--take my word for
it if you have never heard it--the effect was wonderful. It was one
great alleluia chorus, and the air throbbed with the sweetest music I
ever heard. I recognized many of the vocalists by their songs. I knew
that about my plateau were gathered the cardinal, the thrush, the
oriole, the catbird, the jay and the mockingbird. And when I mention the
jay, let no one rise up and point the finger of scorn, exclaiming on
that blue-coated fellow's harsh and grating scream. Mr. Caviler, your
voice is harsh and grating too when you get very angry, isn't it? But
have you never heard the love-note of the jay? Have you never, in the
dappled shade, when their half-fledged nestlings are flapping and
hopping about and stretching cavernous yellow jaws for worms and
moths--have you never heard the parent birds, watchful in the overhead
branches, make love? There was never a sweeter, mellower, richer tone
drawn from flute or harp than the love-note of the jay.
Many others were there that were strange to me, but the effect of the
whole was so sweet that I had to drag myself from bed, so charmed was I
by that chorus in the early dawn.
The sky was clear when I came out; a deep, rich, fathomless blue. Night
had taken the rain-clouds with it when it left. A woodsy, wet, earthy
odor, than which there was no perfume rarer, delighted my nostrils.
Everything was washed clean. The leaves, the trunks of the trees, the
very stones. It was then, as I stood and felt the might of the
everlasting hills entering into me, that I decided on my task for the
day. As yet it was too early. The ground was soft. It would be wet and
slippery on the slope above, and perhaps muddy. I determined to wait an
hour or two, so went down to my favorite seat under the pine tree,
taking with me Spencer's "First Principles," which is a book calculated
to make one use his mind, at least.
It was eleven o'clock before I looked at my watch--too late for mountain
climbing that morning. Upon reflection, I saw that this was just as
well. In fact, the afternoon would be a much better time to make the
ascent. The sun had been shining generously for several hours, drying
both the vegetation and the surface of the ground. So Mr. Spencer had
really done me a good turn in carrying me through the forenoon. I left
the book on the bench and went back to the Lodge, thinking to resume my
reading after I returned from the peak. I did not expect to be gone over
an hour and a half, allowing for plenty of time to rest.
After a leisurely dinner, I took my alpenstock, and imagining myself at
the base of the Matterhorn to lend zest, bravely fronted the upward
climb.
It was rather stiff work from the beginning. I flanked the Lodge for a
score of yards, and started up where the ascent was comparatively
gradual. This did not last long. Before I reached the encircling band of
evergreens I had to force my way through bushes which insisted on
rapping my nose, and vines which were equally determined to tie
themselves into knots over my toes, and trip me. At length I came to the
dark line of pines and cedars, where I stopped to investigate my
condition. My breath was coming pretty heavy, but I was not really
tired. So after a few moments' rest I went on. My going was tolerably
easy now while the trees lasted. Beneath their shade the earth was
barren. Some half dead moss and a plentiful sprinkling of pine cones was
all. As I walked over the latter they yielded softly to my feet, and
sent up a pungent odor. I heard no bird notes here, but once a
brown-winged shape flitted soundlessly by in front of me, low to the
ground. Everything was very still. There was no wind astir. The belt
proved to be a somber spot, and I was not sorry when I had passed it.
The dense shade had a depressing effect.
Then I came to open ground; open and bare. Two hundred and fifty feet
above me rose old Baldy's head. For perhaps half the distance a scrub
growth strove for existence in the rocky soil; beyond that the surface
was absolutely denuded. The incline had grown much sharper, but the
earth was knotty and uneven, in many places indented with excoriations,
and I found I could go forward with much greater ease than I had
anticipated. A quarter of an hour later found me facing the last ascent,
which was all but perilous in its sheer rise. My staff was of no avail
here; hands and feet must win. So I laid my alpenstock down, drew a deep
breath and started up. Just how I got to the top I cannot say. But there
is a big element of tenacity in my nature, and I fought on with squared
jaws and set teeth, slipping, scrambling, sprawling, until I had won. I
crawled over the crest on my hands and knees, and for quite ten minutes
I lay prostrate, recovering my wind and my spent strength. Then I got
onto my feet and looked about me.
It was a glorious prospect; even solemn and majestic. A prodigious sweep
of country was laid bare before me. I hesitate to say how many miles I
could see, for distance is most deceptive at great altitudes. But it was
the topography, more than the far reaching view, which impressed me. I
was standing in the midst of a world newly created, the only living
creature. Leagues upon leagues of virgin forest flowed back from my
point of vantage till the perspective ended in a misty blur. East and
west stretched the mighty ranges, with constantly diverging spurs, each
clothed with its own garment of green and glistening glory. Anon the
ancient hills valleyed into troughs whose length had no visible limit,
and it did not require the imagination of a poet to behold beneath me
the effect of an immense sea which had suddenly been frozen into
permanent form. How illimitable! How overpowering! Slowly I turned to
the different points of the compass. Far to the north a smudge of smoke
fouled the tender bosom of the sky, and I quickly looked another way.
Cedarton lay in that direction.
For a half-hour I stood and gazed, and wondered, and thought. Here was
incentive for rumination, and when I at length withdrew my eyes from the
bewildering panorama I felt infinitesimally puny, and weak, and small.
What was I? A mote in a sunbeam; an atom of matter; no more.
The point upon which I stood was an irregular circle, approximating
thirty feet in diameter. An imperfect stone formation marked its outer
boundaries; the effect of some Titanic convulsion in forgotten time. In
one place--toward the southwest--the rim of rock broke, and here the
earth had sloughed away before the ages-long war of the elements, the
result being a broad, flume-like chute leading downward. Instinctively I
drew back from this place, for it suggested unknown terrors. A sort of
sandy, granular deposit covered the top of the knob; the grinding caused
by years upon years of wind and rain.
My inspection of the peak occupied scarcely a minute. Then I sat down in
its exact center, lit my briar-root, hugged my knees, and allowed myself
for the first time that day to think of yesterday's experience. You
could never guess my first thought. It was that material would quickly
accumulate now for my book. I sensed the approach of things--of many
things, and not all of them were pleasant. In fact, some wore grisly
aspects. I believe in premonitions. I don't know what they are, or what
causes them, or anything about them except they exist. But one came to
me as I sat on the tiptop of old Baldy this afternoon, smoking my pipe
and hugging my knees, and feeling very much like a bird in its eyrie. I
was troubled and elated in turn; a queer experience, but common to all.
There was no reason in the world why I should have been either depressed
or uplifted. But somehow the near future looked to me to be vibrant with
incidents waiting their chance to happen, and in some unformed way I
felt that, innocently enough, I had set in motion a train of events
which would quickly envelope me in their workings. I say it was a
premonition--a prescience--and I believe I am right.
I can make nothing yet of Lessie or her household. Granf'er and Granny
have their prototypes among those who call themselves ultra refined.
Each is interesting to me, in his and her way. Granny has a suspicious
nature. I cannot think she is as down-right mean and crusty as she
pretends to be. Maybe Granf'er is trifling, and trying, and Granny might
have to lash him with her tongue to keep him in the traces. I am sure
the old lady's dislike for me is real, though why this should be I
cannot fathom just now. I have a strong suspicion that deep down in her
heart Granny has a feeling of worship for the Dryad, and in everything
which presents itself in masculine shape she sees a possible cause for
Lessie leaving her. That seems the most plausible reason for her
dislike. Lessie has plunged me into a quandary where I can see no light
at all. Her personality is the most complex I have ever encountered. She
is absolutely baffling. I can't understand the way she talked to me as
we came down the path from the house scarcely twenty-four hours ago.
What was it within her that suggested the things of which she spoke? If
she had delivered an oration in Latin I could not have been more
surprised. She--the product of many generations of hill dwellers, whose
intelligence always remained at a minimum, among whom the stirrings of
ambition were never felt and where knowledge had never gained the
slightest foothold--she to suffer the travail of a fettered mind
striving for light; of a shackled soul struggling for expression! What
could it mean? And to make the enshrouding darkness yet more dense, _she
was cousin to the Satyr_! The Satyr! That whimsical, hapless
ne'er-do-well who strolled the woods day after day, drinking white
whiskey, and bringing strains from his old fiddle which made one's flesh
creep with their weird sweetness. Is it a wonder I was puzzled? I
promised to help her, and I am going to do it. I know the task will be
pleasant. I will escape monotony, and she will be improved, and in this
way it will work good to both of us. I shall begin--but at this point in
my cogitations there floated suddenly across the field of memory that
tall, dark shadow standing on the Hebron road, still and stern.
I took the pipe from my mouth and stood up. The sun had more than half
completed its journey from zenith to horizon. I made another detour,
looking for the best place to descend. I found it a short distance from
where I had come up; almost a path, surprisingly easy to traverse. I
carefully noted its location with reference to the points of the
compass, and went down with practically no labor. Already I knew I
should come back, for the spot held a strong attraction for me. Not
alone for the view, which in itself was sufficient compensation for the
climb, but there was also a sense of such complete aloneness--and I have
that peculiarity. At times I want to be where no one can see me, or talk
to me. I want to be utterly alone, without the possibility of
interruption. Such a place I knew I had found on the peak of Bald Knob.
When I reached the evergreens I realized that it must be almost twilight
on the plateau. At least a cooling, grateful shade was there, and the
philosophy of Spencer.
A few moments later I crashed through the bush in the rear of the Lodge,
came around and flung my cap boy-like on one of the benches alongside
the door, then hurried toward the lone pine. When I had taken a
half-dozen steps I looked up, and halted abruptly.
Lessie was standing under the tree, holding "First Principles" open in
her hands.