THE NEW HOME.
It is not our intention to follow our travellers through the various
stages of their long, tiresome journey, but we will with them hasten on
to the close of a mild spring afternoon, when the whole company, wearied
and spiritless, drew up in front of a large, newly built log house, in
the rear of which were three smaller ones. These last were for the
accommodation of the negroes, who were soon scattering in every
direction, in order to ascertain, as soon as possible, all the
conveniences and inconveniences of their new home. It took Aunt Dillah
but a short time to make up her mind that “Kentuck was an ugly-looking,
out-of-the way place, the whole on’t; that she wished to gracious she’s
back in old Virginny;” and lastly, that “she never should have come, no
how, if marster hadn’t of ’sisted and ’sisted, till ’twasn’t in natur to
’fuse.”
This assertion Aunt Dillah repeated so frequently, that she at length
came to believe it herself. The old creature had no idea that she was
not the main prop of her master’s household, and we ourselves are
inclined to think that Mrs. Wilder, unaided by Dillah’s strong arm,
ready tact, and encouraging words, could not well have borne the
hardships and privations attending that home in the wilderness. Weary
and heart-sick, she stepped from the little waggon, while an expression
of sadness passed over her face as her eye wandered over the surrounding
country, where tract after tract of thick woodland stretched on and
still onward, to the verge of the most distant horizon.
Dillah, better than any one else, understood how to cheer her mistress,
and within an hour after their arrival a crackling fire was blazing in
the fire-place, while the old round iron-teakettle, or rather its
contents were hissing and moaning, and telling, as plainly as tea-kettle
could tell, of coming good cheer. At length the venison steaks and
Dillah’s short cake, smoking hot, were placed upon the old square table,
and the group which shared that first supper at Glen’s Creek were, with
the exception of Charlie, comparatively contented. He, poor child,
missed the scenes of his early home, and more than all, he missed his
playmate, Ella.
Long after the hour of midnight went by, he stood by his little low
window near the head of his bed, gazing up at the hosts of shining
stars, and wondering if they were looking upon his dear old home, even
as they looked down upon him, home-sick and lonely, afar in the
wilderness of Kentucky.