MARCH MARSTON AT HOME--HIS ASTONISHING BEHAVIOUR--NARRATION OF HIS
EXTRAORDINARY ADVENTURES--WIDOW MARSTON'S BOWER--THE RENDEZVOUS OF THE
TRAPPERS--A STRANGE INTERRUPTION TO MARCH'S NARRATIVE--A WILD SURPRISE
AND RECOVERY OF A LOST LOVER--GREAT DESTRUCTION OF HOUSEHOLD GOODS--A
DOUBLE WEDDING AND TREMENDOUS EXCITEMENT--THE WILD MAN OF THE WEST THE
WISEST MAN IN PINE POINT SETTLEMENT.
Three months passed away, and at the end of that period March Marston
found himself back again in Pine Point settlement, sitting on a low
stool at that fireside where the yelling and kicking days of his infancy
had been spent, and looking up in the face of that buxom, blue-eyed
mother, with whom he had been wont to hold philosophical converse in
regard to fighting and other knotty--not to say naughty--questions, in
those bright but stormy days of childhood when he stood exactly
"two-foot-ten," and when he looked and felt as if he stood upwards of
ten feet two!
Three months passed away, and during the passage of that period March
Marston's bosom became a theatre in which, unseen by the naked eye, were
a legion of spirits, good, middling, and bad, among whom were hope,
fear, despair, joy, fun, delight, interest, surprise, mischief,
exasperation, and a military demon named General Jollity, who overbore
and browbeat all the rest by turns. These scampered through his brain
and tore up his heart and tumbled about in his throat and lungs, and
maintained a furious harlequinade, and in short behaved in a way that
was quite disgraceful, and that caused the poor young man alternately to
amuse, annoy, astonish, and stun his comrades, who beheld the exterior
results of those private theatricals, but had no conception of the
terrific combats that took place so frequently on the stage within.
During those three months, March saw many things. He saw his old
friends the prairie dogs, and the prong-horned antelopes, and the grisly
bears, and the wolves; more than that, he chased, and shot, and ate many
of them. He also saw clouds of locusts flying high in the air, so thick
that they sometimes darkened the very sky, and herds of buffaloes so
large that they often darkened the whole plain.
During those three months March learned a good deal. He learned that
there was much more of every sort of thing in this world than he had had
any idea of--that there was much, very much, to be thankful for--that
there were many, very many, things to be grieved for, and many also to
be glad about--that the fields of knowledge were inimitably large, and
that his own individual acquirements were preposterously, humblingly
small!
He thought much, too. He thought of the past, present, and future in
quite a surprising way. He thought of his mother and her loneliness, of
Dick and his obstinacy, of Mary and her sweetness, of the Wild Man of
the West and his invisibility. When this latter thought arose, it had
the effect invariably of rousing within him demon Despair; also General
Jollity, for the general had a particular spite against that demon, and,
whenever he showed symptoms of vitality, attacked him with a species of
frenzy that was quite dreadful to feel, and the outward manifestations
of which were such as to cause the trappers to fear seriously that the
poor youth had "gone out of his mind," as they expressed it. But they
were wrong--quite wrong--it was only the natural consequence of those
demons and sprites having gone into his mind, where they were behaving
themselves--as Bounce, when March made him his confidant, said--with
"horrible obstropolosity."
Well, as we have said, March was seated on a low stool, looking up in
his mother's face. He had already been three days at home, and, during
every spare minute he had he sat himself down on the same stool, and
went on with his interminable narrations of the extraordinary adventures
through which he had passed while among the Rocky Mountains and out upon
the great prairies.
Widow Marston--for she knew that she was a widow now, though the
knowledge added but little to the feeling of widowhood to which she had
been doomed for so many years--widow Marston, we say, listened to this
interminable narration with untiring patience and unmitigated pleasure.
There was as yet no symptom of the narrative drawing to a close, neither
was there the slightest evidence of the widow Marston becoming wearied.
We have seen a cat worried and pulled and poked by its kitten almost
beyond endurance, and we have observed that the cat endured it meekly--
nay, evidently rejoiced in the annoyance: it was pleasurable pain. As
it is with feline, so is it with human mothers. Their love overbears
and outweighs _everything_. Ah! good cause have the rugged males of
this world to rejoice that such is the fact; and although they know it
well, we hold that it is calculated to improve the health and refresh
the spirit of men to have that fact brought prominently and pointedly to
their remembrance!
Had March Marston talked the most unutterable balderdash, widow Marston
would have listened with unwearied delight as long, we believe, as her
eyes and ears could do their duty. But March did _not_ talk balderdash.
For a madman, he spoke a great deal of common, besides a considerable
amount of uncommon sense, and his mother listened with intelligent
interest: commenting on what he said in her quiet way, as she found
opportunity--we say this advisedly, for opportunities were not so
frequent as one might suppose. March had always been possessed of a
glib tongue, and he seemed, as Bounce remarked, to have oiled the hinges
since his return to Pine Point settlement.
"Mother," said March, after a short pause that had succeeded an
unusually long burst, "do you know it's only a few months since I left
you to go to this trip to the mountains?"
"I know it well, my son," replied the widow, smiling at the question.
"And do you know," he continued, "that it seems to me more like five
years? When I think of all that I've heard and all that I've done, and
all that I've seen, it seems to me as if it had took--as if it _must_
have took--five years to have heard and done and seen it all in?"
"And yet," said the widow musingly, "you failed to see the Wild Man o'
the West after all."
"Mother, I'll be angry with you if you say that again."
"Well, I won't," she replied, taking his hand in hers and stroking it.
"Tell me again, March, about Dick of the Cave and his little girl. I
like to hear about them; they were so kind to you, and that Dick, from
your account, seems to be such a fine fellow: tell me all about them
over again."
"I will, mother," said March, clearing his throat, and commencing in a
tone that showed clearly his intention of going on indefinitely.
Widow Marston's cottage had a pretty, comfortable-looking flower garden
behind it. In front the windows looked out upon a portion of the native
woods which had been left standing when the spot for the settlement was
cleared. In the back garden there was a bower which the widow's
brother, the blacksmith, had erected, and the creepers on which had been
planted by the widow's own hand when she was Mary West, the belle of the
settlement. In this bower, which was a capacious one, sat a number of
sedate, quiet, jolly, conversable fellows, nearly all of whom smoked,
and one of whom sketched. They were our friends Redhand, Bounce, Big
Waller, Gibault, Hawkswing, and Bertram.
It is observable among men who travel long in company together in a wild
country, that, when they return again to civilised, or to semi-civilised
life, they feel a strong inclination to draw closer together, either
from the force of habit, or sympathy, or both. On reaching Pine Point
the trappers, after visiting their friends and old chums, drew together
again as if by a species of electrical attraction. In whatever manner
they chanced to spend their days, they--for the first week at least--
found themselves trending gradually each evening a little before sunset
to a common centre.
Widow Marston was always at home. March Marston was always with his
mother--deep in his long-winded yarns. The bower was always invitingly
open in the back garden; hence the bower was the regular rendezvous of
the trappers. It was a splendid evening that on which we now see them
assembled there. The sun was just about to set in a flood of golden
clouds. Birds, wildfowl, and frogs held an uproarious concert in wood
and swamp, and the autumnal foliage glowed richly in the slanting beams
as it hung motionless in the still atmosphere.
"D'ye know," said Redhand, removing his pipe for a few minutes and
blowing aside the heavy wreaths of tobacco smoke that seemed unwilling
to ascend and dissipate themselves--"d'ye know, now that this trip's
over, I'm inclined to think it's about the roughest one I've had for
many a year? An' it's a cur'ous fact, that the rougher a trip is the
more I like it."
Bertram, who was (as a matter of course) sketching, turned over a few
leaves and made a note of the observation.
"I guess it was pretty much of a meddlin' jolly one," said Big Waller,
smoking enthusiastically, and with an expression of intense satisfaction
on his weather-beaten countenance.
"An' profitable," observed Bounce gravely.
"Ah! oui, ver' prof'table," echoed Gibault. "Dat is de main ting. We
have git plenty skins, an' have bring hom' our own skins, w'ich I was
not moche sure of one or two times."
"True," said Bounce; "that's wot we've got for to be thankful for.
Skins is skins; but the skin of a human ain't to be put in the balance
wi' the skin o' a beaver, d'ye see?"
Bounce glanced at Hawkswing as he spoke, but the Indian only looked
stolid and smoked solemnly.
"Yes," he continued, "a whole skin's better nor a broken one, an' it's
well to bring back a whole one, though I'm not a-goin' for to deny that
there's some advantage in bringing back other sorts o' skins too, d'ye
see? w'ich goes for to prove the true feelosophy of the fact, d'ye
see?--"
Bounce paused, in the midst of his mental energy, to take a parenthetic
whiff. His thoughts, however, seemed too deep for utterance, for he
subsided quietly into a state of silent fumigation.
"What a splendidly picturesque scene!" exclaimed Bertram, pushing back
his brigandish hat in order the better to get a view, at arm's length,
of his sketch and compare it with the original.
"Wot's the meanin' o' pikter-esk?" inquired Bounce. Theodore Bertram
looked and felt puzzled. He was not the first man who thought that he
knew the signification of terms well, and found himself much perplexed
on being suddenly called upon to give a correct definition of a
well-known word. While he is labouring to enlighten his friend, we
shall leave the bower and return to the hall, or kitchen, or reception
room--for it might be appropriately designated by any of these terms--
where March is, as usual, engaged in expounding backwoods life to his
mother. We have only to pass through the open door and are with them at
once. Cottages in Pine Point settlement were of simple construction;
the front door opened out of one side of the hall, the back door out of
the other. As the weather was mild, both were wide open.
March had just reached an intensely interesting point in his narrative,
and was describing, with flashing eyes and heightened colour, his first
interview with the "Vision in Leather," when his attention was attracted
by the sound of horses' hoofs coming at a rapid pace along the road that
led to the cottage. The wood above referred to hid any object
approaching by the road until within fifty yards or so of the front
door.
"They seem in a hurry, whoever they be," said March, as he and his
mother rose and hastened to the door, "an' there's more than one rider,
if I've not forgot how to judge by sounds. I should say that there's--
Hallo!"
The exclamation was not unnatural by any means, for at that moment a
very remarkable horseman dashed round the point of the wood and galloped
towards the cottage. Both man and horse were gigantic. The former wore
no cap, and his voluminous brown locks floated wildly behind him. On
they came with a heavy, thunderous tread, stones, sticks, and dust
flying from the charger's heels. There was a rude paling in front of
the cottage. The noble horse put its ears forward as it came up, took
two or three short strides, and went over with the light bound of a
deer, showing that the strength of bone, muscle, and sinew was in
proportion to the colossal size of the animal. The gravel inside the
paling flew like splashing water as they alighted with a crash, and
widow Marston, uttering a faint cry, shrank within the doorway as the
wild horseman seemed about to launch himself, with Quixotic
recklessness, against the cottage.
"_Dick_!" shouted March, who stared like one thunderstruck as the rider
leaped from the saddle to the ground, sprang with a single bound to the
widow's side, seized her right hand in both of his, and, stooping down,
gazed intently into her alarmed countenance. Suddenly the blood rushed
violently to her temples, as the man pronounced her name in a low, deep
tone, and with a look of wild surprise mingled with terror, she
exclaimed,--"Louis!"
The colour fled from her cheeks, and uttering a piercing cry, she fell
forward on the breast of her long-lost lover.
March Marston stood for some time helpless; but he found his voice just
as Redhand and the other trappers, rushing through the house, burst upon
the scene--"_Dick_!" shouted March again, in the highest pitch of
amazement.
"The Wild Man o' the West!" roared Bounce, with the expression of one
who believes he gazes on a ghost.
"Fetch a drop o' water, one o' you fellers," said the Wild Man, looking
anxiously at the pale-face that rested on his arm.
Every one darted off to obey, excepting Bertram, who, with eyes almost
starting out of their sockets, was already seated on the paling,
sketching the scene; for he entertained an irresistible belief that the
Wild Man of the West would, as he had already done more than once,
vanish from the spot before he could get him transferred to the pages of
his immortal book.
Trappers are undoubtedly men who can act with vigorous promptitude in
their own peculiar sphere; but when out of that sphere, they are rather
clumsy and awkward. Had they been in the forest, each man would have
fetched a draught of clear water from the nearest spring with the utmost
celerity; but, being in a settlement, they knew not where to turn. Big
Waller dashed towards a very small pond which lay near the cottage, and
dipping his cap into it, brought up a compound of diluted mud and
chickweed. Gibault made an attempt on a tiny rivulet with the like
success, which was not surprising, seeing that its fountain-head lay at
the bottom of the said pond. Bounce and Hawkswing bolted into the
cottage in search of the needful fluid; but, being unused to furniture,
they upset three chairs and a small table in their haste, and scattered
on the floor a mass of crockery, with a crash that made them feel as if
they had been the means of causing some dire domestic calamity, and
which almost terrified the household kitten into fits.
Then Bounce made a hopeful grasp at a teapot, which, having happily been
placed on a side table, had survived the wreck of its contemporary cups
and saucers, and the Indian made an insane effort to wrench the top off
a butter-churn, in the belief that it contained a well-spring of water.
Of all the party old Redhand alone stood still, with his bald head
glistening in the last rays of the sinking sun, and his kindly face
wrinkled all over with a sympathetic smile. He knew well that the young
widow would soon recover, with or without the aid of water; so he smoked
his pipe complacently, leaned against the doorpost, and looked on.
He was right. In a few minutes Mrs Marston recovered, and was tenderly
led into the cottage by her old lover, Louis Thadwick, or, as we still
prefer to call him, the Wild Man of the West. There, seated by her
side, in the midst of the wreck and debris of her household goods, the
Wild Man, quite regardless of appearances, began boldly to tell the same
old tale, and commit the same offence, that he told and committed
upwards of sixteen years before, when _he_ was Louis the Trapper and
_she_ was Mary West.
Seeing what was going forward, the judicious trappers and the
enthusiastic artist considerately retired to the bower behind the house.
What transpired at that strange interview no one can tell, for no one
was present except the kitten. That creature, having recovered from its
consternation, discovered, to its inexpressible joy, that, an enormous
jug having been smashed by Bounce along with the other things, the floor
was covered in part with a lakelet of rich cream. With almost closed
eyes, intermittent purring, quick-lapping tongue, and occasional
indications of a tendency to choke, that fortunate animal revelled in
this unexpected flood of delectation, and listened to the conversation;
but, not being gifted with the power of speech, it never divulged what
was said--at least, to human ears, though we are by no means sure that
it did not create a considerable amount of talk among the cat population
of the settlement.
Be this as it may, when the Wild Man at length opened the door, and
cried, "Come in, lads; it's all right!" they found the widow Marston
with confusion and happiness beaming on her countenance, and the Wild
Man himself in a condition that fully justified Bounce's suggestion that
they had better send for a strait-waistcoat or a pair of handcuffs. As
for March, he had all along been, and still was, speechless. That the
Wild Man of the West was Dick, and Dick the Wild Man of the West, and
that both should come home at the same time in one body, and propose to
marry his mother, was past belief--so of course he didn't believe it.
"Hallo! wait a bit; I do b'lieve I was forgettin'," cried the Wild Man,
springing up in his own violent, impulsive way, upsetting his chair (as
a matter of course, being unused to such delicacies), dashing through
the lake of cream to the all but annihilation of the kitten, opening the
door, and giving vent to a shrill whistle.
All rushed out to witness the result. They were prepared for anything
now--from a mad bison to a red warrior's ghost, and would have been
rather disappointed had anything feebler appeared.
Immediately there was a clatter of hoofs; a beautiful white pony
galloped round the corner of the wood, and made straight for the
cottage. Seated thereon was the vision in leather--not seated as a
woman sits, but after the fashion of her own adopted father, and having
on her leathern dress with a pair of long leggings highly ornamented
with porcupine quills and bead work. The vision leaped the fence like
her father, bounded from her pony as he had done, and rushed into the
Wild Man's arms, exclaiming, "Be she here, an' well, dear fader?"
"Ay, all right," he replied; but he had no time to say more, for at that
moment March Marston darted at the vision, seized one of her hands, put
his arm round her waist, and swung her, rather than led her, into his
mother's presence.
"Here's Mary, mother!" cried March with a very howl of delight.
The widow had already guessed it. She rose and extended her arms. Mary
gazed for one moment eagerly at her and then rushed into them. Turning
sharp round, March threw his arms round Bounce's neck and embraced him
for want of a better subject; then hurling him aside he gave another
shout, and began to dance a violent hornpipe on the floor, to the still
further horrification of the kitten (which was now a feline maniac), and
the general scatteration of the mingled mass of crockery and cream.
Seeing this, Bounce uttered a hysterical cheer. Hawkswing, being
excited beyond even savage endurance, drew his scalping-knife, yelled
the war-cry and burst into the war-dance of the Seneca Indians. In
short, the widow's cottage became the theatre of a scene that would have
done credit to the violent wards of a lunatic asylum--a scene, which is
utterly beyond the delineative powers of pen or pencil--a scene which
defies description, repudiates adequate conception, and will dwell for
ever on the memories of those who took part in it like the wild
phantasmagoria of a tremendous dream!
Of course, a wild man could not be induced, like an ordinary mortal, to
wait a reasonable time in order to give his bride an opportunity of
preparing her trousseau. He was a self-willed man, and a man of a
strong mind. He insisted upon being married "out of hand, and have done
with it." So he _was_ married--whether "out of hand" or not we cannot
tell--by the excellent clergyman of Pine Point settlement. On the same
day, and the same hour, March Marston was married--"out of hand," also,
no doubt--to the vision in leather!
There was something rather precipitate in these proceedings,
unquestionably; but those who feel disposed to object to them must bear
in mind, first, that backwoodsmen are addicted to precipitancy at times;
and, secondly, that facts cannot be altered in order to please the
fastidious taste of the so-called civilised world.
Public opinion in the settlement was strongly in favour of the doings of
the Wild Man of the West. Delay was deemed by all to be unnecessary,
and all the more so that the double wedding-day was to be celebrated as
a species of public event.
The romance connected with the previous life of Dick, and especially his
singular and unexpected return to his first love, created quite a
sensation, even in a region in which wild deeds and wonderful events
were so common that it required a man to be a real hero to enable him to
rise conspicuous above his fellows. Many trappers came in from a
considerable distance to take part in the rejoicings of that day, and
from the dance which followed the ceremony there was not absent a living
creature belonging to the settlement.
Every dog was there, of course, adding its vocal melody to the dulcet
tones of the blacksmith's violin. Even the cats of the settlement were
present, including that celebrated kitten which had been reduced to a
state of drivelling imbecility by the furious advent of the Wild Man.
Owls and other sagacious birds also came from afar to see the fun,
attracted by the light of the fire; for the ballroom was the green sward
of the forest, which was illuminated for the occasion by a bonfire that
would have roasted a megatherium whole, and also would have furnished
accommodation for a pot large enough to boil an elephant. Don't think,
reader, in the vanity of your heart, that you have conceived that fire!
You have not, as a Yankee would say, the most distant conception of the
small end of a notion of what it was! A hundred brawny arms, accustomed
to wield the broad axe, had lent their aid to rear the mighty pile and
feed the ravening flame.
It was kindled on a wide level plot in the outskirts of the settlement,
around which the trees spread their sheltering arms. On a plank raised
on two casks sat the blacksmith with his fiddle. The carpenter sat
beside him with a kettledrum, more literally a kettledrum even than the
real thing, for that drum _was_ a kettle! On a little mound that rose
in the centre of the plot sat, in state, Dick and Mary, March and the
vision in leather, their respective thrones being empty flour-casks.
Around them danced the youth and beauty of the settlement. These were
enclosed by a dense circle, composed of patriarchal, middle-aged, and
extremely juvenile admirers. The background of the picture was filled
up with the monstrous fire which saturated that spot in the forest with
light--bright as the broadest day. The extreme foreground was composed
of the trunk of a fallen tree, on which sat our friend the artist,
delineating the whole with the eagerness of an enthusiast who had _at
last_ fallen upon a scene truly worthy of his genius.
How Bounce did dance, to be sure! How the young trappers and the
blooming backwoods maidens did whirl and bound, on heel and toe, and, to
a large extent, on the whole sole of the foot! Yes, their souls were in
the work, and their spirits too; and that although there was not a drop
of spirits in the settlement. Happily, owing to the unaccountable delay
of a provision boat, there was not a glass of "fire-water" in the place
at that time. The whole affair was got up, carried on, and concluded on
tea. It was a great teetotal gathering, which would have drawn tears of
joy from the heart of Father Mathew and all his successors, whether
Romanist or Protestant, had they witnessed it.
Yet the excitement was tremendous. The Wild Man of the West, strange to
say, and, owing to some peculiar contradictoriness of character which
was unaccountable, was almost the only sane man of the whole party. He
flung himself on the ground beside his wife, and locking his arm round
the tough root of a pine tree refused to budge from the spot. As the
united efforts of all the men who could lay hold of him at one time
failed to root him up, he was suffered to lie there and amuse himself by
watching the dancers, looking up occasionally at Mary's blue eyes, and
playing with such of the juveniles as he could attract within the reach
of his long arm.
As for March Marston, he was mad now if ever he had been so in his life!
He danced with all the girls, and wrestled with all the men, and played
hide-and-seek with all the boys, and fraternised with all the old
people, and chased all the dogs, and astonished, not to say horrified,
all the cats. Yet, although he did all this, he did not neglect the
vision in leather, by no manner of means.
Long before the dawn of early morning that jovial party drank a parting
cup of cold tea, and, dispersing to their several homes, left the field
in possession of the village curs.
Now, dear reader--with a feeling of sadness we write it--all things must
have an end! We make this unquestionable assertion in order to break to
you, as gently as may be, the news that our tale has reached its close.
Had we taken in hand to write the life and adventures of our hero and
his friends from first to last, we should have had to prepare pens, ink,
and paper, for a work equal in size to the "Encyclopaedia Britannica."
We have only detailed one or two episodes in their wild career. What
they did and said and saw in after years must be left to future
historians, or to the imagination of romantic readers. This only will
we say in conclusion, that of all the men who dwelt in Pine Point
settlement, for many years after the events narrated in these pages, the
kindest, the wisest, the gentlest, the heartiest, the wildest, and the
most courageous was--the Wild Man of the West.