I
They had lived within a mile of each other for fifty-odd years, old
Judge Hampden and old Colonel Drayton; that is, all their lives, for
they had been born on adjoining plantations within a month of each
other. But though they had thus lived and were accounted generally good
men and good neighbors, to each other they had never been neighbors any
more than the Lévite was neighbor to him who went down to Jericho.
Kindly to everyone else and ready to do their part by all other men, the
Draytons and the Hampdens, whenever they met each other, always passed
by on the other side.
It was an old story--the feud between the families--and, perhaps, no
one now knew just how the trouble started. They had certainly been on
opposite sides ever since they established themselves in early Colonial
days on opposite hills in the old county from which the two mansions
looked at each other across the stream like hostile forts. The earliest
records of the county were those of a dispute between one Colonel
Drayton and one Captain Hampden, growing out of some claim to land; but
in which the chief bitterness appeared to have been injected by Captain
Hampden's having claimed precedence over Colonel Drayton on the ground
that his title of “Captain” was superior to Colonel Drayton's title,
because he had held a real commission and had fought for it, whereas
the Colonel's title was simply honorary and “Ye sayd Collonel had never
smelled enough powder to kill a tom-cat.”
However this might be and there was nothing in the records to show how
this contention was adjudicated--in the time of Major Wil-mer Drayton
and Judge Oliver Hampden, the breach between the two families had been
transmitted from father to son for several generations and showed no
signs of abatement. Other neighborhood families intermarried, but not
the Drayton-Hall and the Hampden-Hill families, and in time it came to
be an accepted tradition that a Drayton and a Hampden would not mingle
any more than would fire and water.
The Hampdens were dark and stout, hot-blooded, fierce, and impetuous.
They were apparently vigorous; but many of them died young. The
Draytons, on the other hand, were slender and fair, and usually lived
to a round old age; a fact of which they were wont to boast in contrast
with the briefer span of the Hampdens.
“Their tempers burn them out,” the Major used to say of the Hampdens.
Moreover, the Draytons were generally cool-headed, deliberate, and
self-contained. Thus, the Draytons had mainly prospered throughout the
years.
Even the winding creek which ran down through the strip of meadow was a
fruitful cause of dissension and litigation between the families. “It is
as ungovernable as a Hampden's temper, sir,” once said Major Drayton,
On the mere pretext of a thunder-storm, it would burst forth from its
banks, tear the fences to pieces and even change its course, cutting a
new channel, now to one side and now to the other through the soft and
loamy soil. A lawsuit arose over the matter, in which the costs alone
amounted to far more than the value of the whole land involved; but no
one doubted that old Major Drayton spoke the truth when he declared that
his father would rather have lost his entire estate with all its rolling
hills and extensive forests than the acre or two which was finally
awarded to Judge Hampden.
As neither owner would join the other even in keeping up a partition
fence, there were two fences run within three feet of each other along
the entire boundary line between the two places. With these double
fences, there could hardly be peace between the two families; for
neither owner ever saw the two lines running side by side without at
once being reminded of his neighbor's obstinacy and--of his own.
Thus, in my time the quarrel between the Drayton-Hall people and
the Hampden-Hill folks was a factor in every neighborhood problem or
proposition from a “church dressing” or a “sewing society meeting” to a
political campaign. It had to be considered in every invitation and in
every discussion.
It is not meant that there was no intercourse between the two families.
Major Drayton and Judge Hampden regularly paid each other a visit every
year--and oftener when there was serious illness in one house or the
other--but even on such occasions their differences were liable to crop
out. One of them held an opinion that when one gentleman was spending
the night in another gentleman's house, it was the part of the host
to indicate when bedtime had arrived; whilst the other maintained with
equal firmness the doctrine that no gentleman could inform his guest
that he was fatigued: that this duty devolved upon the guest himself.
This difference of opinion worked comfortably enough on both sides until
an occasion when Judge Hampden, who held the former view, was spending
the night at Colonel Drayton's. When bedtime arrived, the rest of the
household retired quietly, leaving the two gentlemen conversing, and
when the servants appeared in the morning to open the blinds and light
the fires, the two gentlemen were still found seated opposite each other
conversing together quite as if it were the ordinary thing to sit up and
talk all night long.
On another occasion, it is said that Major Drayton, hearing of his
neighbor's serious illness, rode over to make inquiry about him, and
owing to a slip of the tongue, asked in a voice of deepest sympathy,
“Any hopes of the old gentleman dying!”