The occupation of being a red man, a merchant of baskets and beadwork,
is taken up by so many traders with a brogue and a twang at our
watering-places that it is difficult for the traveler to keep alive any
sentiment about this race. But at a station beyond Lewiston our tourists
were reminded of it, and of its capacity for adopting our civilization
in its most efflorescent development. The train was invaded by a band of
Indians, or, to speak correctly, by an Indian band. There is nothing in
the world like a brass band in a country town; it probably gives more
pleasure to the performers than any other sort of labor. Yet the delight
it imparts to the listeners is apt to be tempered by a certain sense
of incongruity between the peaceful citizens who compose it and the
bellicose din they produce. There is a note of barbarism in the brassy
jar and clamor of the instruments, enhanced by the bewildering ambition
of each player to force through his piece the most noise and jangle,
which is not always covered and subdued into a harmonious whole by the
whang of the bass drum.
There was nothing of this incongruity between this band of Tuscaroras
and their occupation. Unaccustomed to associate the North American
Indian with music, the traveler at once sees the natural relation of
the Indians with the brass band. These Tuscaroras were stalwart fellows,
broad-faced, big-limbed, serious, and they carried themselves with a
clumsy but impressive dignity. There was no uniformity in their apparel,
yet each one wore some portion of a martial and resplendent dress--an
ornamented kepi, or a scarlet sash, or big golden epaulets, or a
military coat braided with yellow. The leader, who was a giant,
and carried the smallest instrument, outshone all the others in his
incongruous splendor. No sooner had they found seats at one end of the
car than they unlimbered, and began through their various reluctant
instruments to deploy a tune. Although the tune did not get well
into line, the effect was marvelous. The car was instantly filled to
bursting. Miss Lamont, who was reading at the other end of the car, gave
a nervous start, and looked up in alarm. King and Forbes promptly opened
windows, but this gave little relief. The trombone pumped and growled,
the trumpet blared, the big brass instrument with a calyx like the
monstrous tropical water-lily quivered and howled, and the drum, banging
into the discord, smashed every tympanum in the car. The Indians looked
pleased. No sooner had they broken one tune into fragments than they
took up another, and the car roared and rattled and jarred all the
way to the lonely station where the band debarked, and was last seen
convoying a straggling Odd-Fellows' picnic down a country road.
The incident, trivial in itself, gave rise to serious reflections
touching the capacity and use of the red man in modern life. Here is a
peaceful outlet for all his wild instincts. Let the government turn all
the hostiles on the frontier into brass bands, and we shall hear no more
of the Indian question.
The railway along the shore of Lake Ontario is for the most part
monotonous. After leaving the picturesque highlands about Lewiston, the
country is flat, and although the view over the lovely sheet of blue
water is always pleasing, there is something bleak even in summer in
this vast level expanse from which the timber has been cut away. It may
have been mere fancy, but to the tourists the air seemed thin, and the
scene, artistically speaking, was cold and colorless. With every desire
to do justice to the pretty town of Oswego, which lies on a gentle slope
by the lake, it had to them an out-of-doors, unprotected, remote aspect.
Seen from the station, it did not appear what it is, the handsomest city
on Lake Ontario, with the largest starch factory in the world.
It was towards evening when the train reached Cape Vincent, where
the steamer waited to transport passengers down the St. Lawrence. The
weather had turned cool; the broad river, the low shores, the long
islands which here divide its lake-like expanse, wanted atmospheric
warmth, and the tourists could not escape the feeling of lonesomeness,
as if they were on the other side of civilization, rather than in one of
the great streams of summer frolic and gayety. It was therefore a very
agreeable surprise to them when a traveling party alighted from one
of the cars, which had come from Rome, among whom they recognized Mrs.
Farquhar.
“I knew my education never could be complete,” said that lady as she
shook hands, “and you never would consider me perfectly in the Union
until I had seen the Thousand Islands; and here I am, after many Yankee
tribulations.”
“And why didn't you come by Niagara?” asked Miss Lamont.
“My dear, perhaps your uncle could tell you that I saw enough of Niagara
when I was a young lady, during the war. The cruelest thing you Yankees
did was to force us, who couldn't fight, to go over there for sympathy.
The only bearable thing about the fall of Richmond was that it relieved
me from that Fall. But where,” she added, turning to King, “are the rest
of your party?”
“If you mean the Bensons,” said he, with a rather rueful countenance, “I
believe they have gone to the White Mountains.”
“Oh, not lost, but gone before. You believe? If you knew the nights I
have lain awake thinking about you two, or you three! I fear you have
not been wide-awake enough yourself.”
“I knew I could depend on you, Mrs. Farquhar, for that.”
The steamer was moving off, taking a wide sweep to follow the channel.
The passengers were all engaged in ascertaining the names of the islands
and of the owners of the cottages and club-houses. “It is a kind of
information I have learned to dispense with,” said Mrs. Farquhar. And
the tourists, except three or four resolutely inquisitive, soon tired
of it. The islands multiplied; the boat wound in and out among them
in narrow straits. To sail thus amid rocky islets, hirsute with firs,
promised to be an unfailing pleasure. It might have been, if darkness
had not speedily fallen. But it is notable how soon passengers on a
steamer become indifferent and listless in any sort of scenery. Where
the scenery is monotonous and repeats itself mile after mile and
hour after hour, an intolerable weariness falls upon the company. The
enterprising group who have taken all the best seats in the bow, with
the intention of gormandizing the views, exhibit little staying
power; either the monotony or the wind drives them into the cabin. And
passengers in the cabin occupying chairs and sofas, surrounded by their
baggage, always look bored and melancholy.
“I always think,” said Mrs. Farquhar, “that I am going to enjoy a ride
on a steamer, but I never do. It is impossible to get out of a draught,
and the progress is so slow that variety enough is not presented to
the eye to keep one from ennui.” Nevertheless, Mrs. Farquhar and King
remained on deck, in such shelter as they could find, during the three
hours' sail, braced up by the consciousness that they were doing their
duty in regard to the enterprise that has transformed this lovely stream
into a highway of display and enjoyment. Miss Lamont and the artist went
below, frankly confessing that they could see all that interested them
from the cabin windows. And they had their reward; for in this little
cabin, where supper was served, a drama was going on between the
cook and the two waiting-maids and the cabin boy, a drama of love and
coquetry and jealousy and hope deferred, quite as important to those
concerned as any of the watering-place comedies, and played with entire
unconsciousness of the spectators.
The evening was dark, and the navigation in the tortuous channels
sometimes difficult, and might have been dangerous but for the
lighthouses. The steamer crept along in the shadows of the low
islands, making frequent landings, and never long out of sight of
the illuminations of hotels and cottages. Possibly by reason of these
illuminations this passage has more variety by night than by day. There
was certainly a fascination about this alternating brilliancy and gloom.
On nearly every island there was at least a cottage, and on the larger
islands were great hotels, camp-meeting establishments, and houses and
tents for the entertainment of thousands of people. Late as it was in
the season, most of the temporary villages and solitary lodges were
illuminated; colored lamps were set about the grounds, Chinese lanterns
hung in the evergreens, and on half a dozen lines radiating from the
belfry of the hotel to the ground, while all the windows blazed and
scintillated. Occasionally as the steamer passed these places of
irrepressible gayety rockets were let off, Bengal-lights were burned,
and once a cannon attempted to speak the joy of the sojourners. It was
like a continued Fourth of July, and King's heart burned within him
with national pride. Even Mrs. Farquhar had to admit that it was a fairy
spectacle. During the months of July and August this broad river,
with its fantastic islands, is at night simply a highway of glory. The
worldlings and the camp-meeting gatherings vie with each other in the
display of colored lights and fireworks. And such places as the Thousand
Islands Park, Wellesley and Wesley parks, and so on, twinkling with
lamps and rosy with pyrotechnics, like sections of the sky dropped upon
the earth, create in the mind of the steamer pilgrim an indescribable
earthly and heavenly excitement. He does not look upon these displays
as advertisements of rival resorts, but as generous contributions to the
hilarity of the world.
It is, indeed, a marvelous spectacle, this view for thirty or forty
miles, and the simple traveler begins to realize what American
enterprise is when it lays itself out for pleasure. These miles and
miles of cottages, hotels, parks, and camp-meetings are the creation of
only a few years, and probably can scarcely be paralleled elsewhere
in the world for rapidity of growth. But the strongest impression
the traveler has is of the public spirit of these summer sojourners,
speculators, and religious enthusiasts. No man lives to himself alone,
or builds his cottage for his selfish gratification. He makes fantastic
carpentry, and paints and decorates and illuminates and shows fireworks,
for the genuine sake of display. One marvels that a person should come
here for rest and pleasure in a spirit of such devotion to the public
weal, and devote himself night after night for months to illuminating
his house and lighting up his island, and tearing open the sky with
rockets and shaking the air with powder explosions, in order that the
river may be continually en fete.
At half-past eight the steamer rounded into view of the hotels and
cottages at Alexandria Bay, and the enchanting scene drew all the
passengers to the deck.
The Thousand Islands Hotel, and the Crossman House, where our party
found excellent accommodations, were blazing and sparkling like the
spectacular palaces in an opera scene. Rows of colored lamps were set
thickly along the shore, and disposed everywhere among the rocks on
which the Crossman House stands; lights glistened from all the islands,
from a thousand row-boats, and in all the windows. It was very like
Venice, seen from the lagoon, when the Italians make a gala-night.
If Alexandria Bay was less enchanting as a spectacle by daylight, it was
still exceedingly lovely and picturesque; islands and bays and winding
waterways could not be better combined for beauty, and the structures
that taste or ambition has raised on the islands or rocky points are
well enough in keeping with the general holiday aspect. One of the
prettiest of these cottages is the Bonnicastle of the late Dr. Holland,
whose spirit more or less pervades this region. It is charmingly
situated on a projecting point of gray rocks veined with color,
enlivened by touches of scarlet bushes and brilliant flowers planted in
little spots of soil, contrasting with the evergreen shrubs. It commands
a varied and delicious prospect, and has an air of repose and peace.
I am sorry to say that while Forbes and Miss Lamont floated, so to
speak, in all this beauty, like the light-hearted revelers they were,
King was scarcely in a mood to enjoy it. It seemed to him fictitious and
a little forced. There was no message for him at the Crossman House. His
restlessness and absentmindedness could not escape the observation of
Mrs. Farquhar, and as the poor fellow sadly needed a confidante, she was
soon in possession of his story.
“I hate slang,” she said, when he had painted the situation black enough
to suit Mrs. Bartlett Glow even, “and I will not give my sex away, but I
know something of feminine doubtings and subterfuges, and I give you my
judgment that Irene is just fretting herself to death, and praying that
you may have the spirit to ride rough-shod over her scruples. Yes, it is
just as true in this prosaic time as it ever was, that women like to be
carried off by violence. In their secret hearts, whatever they may say,
they like to see a knight batter down the tower and put all the garrison
except themselves to the sword. I know that I ought to be on Mrs.
Glow's side. It is the sensible side, the prudent side; but I do
admire recklessness in love. Probably you'll be uncomfortable, perhaps
unhappy--you are certain to be if you marry to please society and not
yourself--but better a thousand times one wild rush of real passion,
of self-forgetting love, than an age of stupid, conventional affection
approved by your aunt. Oh, these calculating young people!” Mrs.
Farquhar's voice trembled and her eyes flashed. “I tell you, my friend,
life is not worth living in a conventional stagnation. You see in
society how nature revenges itself when its instincts are repressed.”
Mrs. Farquhar turned away, and King saw that her eyes were full of
tears. She stood a moment looking away over the sparkling water to the
soft islands on the hazy horizon. Was she thinking of her own marriage?
Death had years ago dissolved it, and were these tears, not those of
mourning, but for the great experience possible in life, so seldom
realized, missed forever? Before King could frame, in the tumult of his
own thoughts, any reply, she turned towards him again, with her usual
smile, half of badinage and half of tenderness, and said:
“Come, this is enough of tragedy for one day; let us go on the Island
Wanderer, with the other excursionists, among the isles of the blest.”
The little steamer had already its load, and presently was under way,
puffing and coughing, on its usual afternoon trip among the islands.
The passengers were silent, and appeared to take the matter seriously--a
sort of linen-duster congregation, of the class who figure in the homely
dialect poems of the Northern bards, Mrs. Farquhar said. They were
chiefly interested in knowing the names of the successful people who had
built these fantastic dwellings, and who lived on illuminations. Their
curiosity was easily gratified, for in most cases the owners had painted
their names, and sometimes their places of residence, in staring white
letters on conspicuous rocks. There was also exhibited, for the benefit
of invalids, by means of the same white paint, here and there the name
of a medicine that is a household word in this patent-right generation.
So the little steamer sailed, comforted by these remedies, through the
strait of Safe Nervine, round the bluff of Safe Tonic, into the open bay
of Safe Liver Cure. It was a healing voyage, and one in which enterprise
was so allied with beauty that no utilitarian philosopher could raise a
question as to the market value of the latter.
The voyage continued as far as Gananoque, in Canada, where the
passengers went ashore, and wandered about in a disconsolate way to see
nothing. King said, however, that he was more interested in the place
than in any other he had seen, because there was nothing interesting in
it; it was absolutely without character, or a single peculiarity either
of Canada or of the United States. Indeed, this north shore seemed to
all the party rather bleak even in summertime, and the quality of the
sunshine thin.
It was, of course, a delightful sail, abounding in charming views, up
“lost channels,” through vistas of gleaming water overdrooped by tender
foliage, and now and then great stretches of sea, and always islands,
islands.
“Too many islands too much alike,” at length exclaimed Mrs. Farquhar,
“and too many tasteless cottages and temporary camping structures.”
The performance is, indeed, better than the prospectus. For there are
not merely the poetical Thousand Islands; by actual count there are
sixteen hundred and ninety-two. The artist and Miss Lamont were trying
to sing a fine song they discovered in the Traveler's Guide, inspired
perhaps by that sentimental ditty, “The Isles of Greece, the Isles of
Greece,” beginning,
“O Thousand Isles! O Thousand Isles!”
It seemed to King that a poem might be constructed more in accordance
with the facts and with the scientific spirit of the age. Something like
this:
“O Sixteen Hundred Ninety-two Isles!
O Islands 1692!
Where the fisher spreads his wiles,
And the muskallonge goes through!
Forever the cottager gilds the same
With nightly pyrotechnic flame;
And it's O the Isles!
The 1692!”
Aside from the pyrotechnics, the chief occupations of this place
are boating and fishing. Boats abound--row-boats, sail-boats, and
steam-launches for excursion parties. The river consequently presents
an animated appearance in the season, and the prettiest effects are
produced by the white sails dipping about among the green islands. The
favorite boat is a canoe with a small sail stepped forward, which is
steered without centre-board or rudder, merely by a change of position
in the boat of the man who holds the sheet. While the fishermen are
here, it would seem that the long, snaky pickerel is the chief game
pursued and caught. But this is not the case when the fishermen return
home, for then it appears that they have been dealing mainly with
muskallonge, and with bass by the way. No other part of the country
originates so many excellent fish stories as the Sixteen Hundred and
Ninety-two Islands, and King had heard so many of them that he suspected
there must be fish in these waters. That afternoon, when they returned
from Gananoque he accosted an old fisherman who sat in his boat at the
wharf awaiting a customer.
“I suppose there is fishing here in the season?”
The man glanced up, but deigned no reply to such impertinence.
“Could you take us where we would be likely to get any muskallonge?”
“Likely?” asked the man. “What do you suppose I am here for?”
“I beg your pardon. I'm a stranger here. I'd like to try my hand at a
muskallonge. About how do they run here as to size?”
“Well,” said the fisherman, relenting a little, “that depends upon who
takes you out. If you want a little sport, I can take you to it. They
are running pretty well this season, or were a week ago.”
“Is it too late?”
“Well, they are scarcer than they were, unless you know where to go. I
call forty pounds light for a muskallonge; fifty to seventy is about my
figure. If you ain't used to this kind of fishing, and go with me, you'd
better tie yourself in the boat. They are a powerful fish. You see that
little island yonder? A muskallonge dragged me in this boat four times
round that island one day, and just as I thought I was tiring him out he
jumped clean over the island, and I had to cut the line.”
King thought he had heard something like this before, and he engaged
the man for the next day. That evening was the last of the grand
illuminations for the season, and our party went out in the Crossman
steam-launch to see it. Although some of the cottages were vacated, and
the display was not so extensive as in August, it was still marvelously
beautiful, and the night voyage around the illuminated islands was
something long to be remembered.
There were endless devices of colored lamps and lanterns, figures of
crosses, crowns, the Seal of Solomon, and the most strange effects
produced on foliage and in the water by red and green and purple fires.
It was a night of enchantment, and the hotel and its grounds on the dark
background of the night were like the stately pleasure-house in “Kubla
Khan.”
But the season was drawing to an end. The hotels, which could not
find room for the throngs on Saturday night, say, were nearly empty on
Monday, so easy are pleasure-seekers frightened away by a touch of cold,
forgetting that in such a resort the most enjoyable part of the year
comes with the mellow autumn days. That night at ten o'clock the band
was scraping away in the deserted parlor, with not another person in
attendance, without a single listener. Miss Lamont happened to peep
through the window-blinds from the piazza and discover this residuum of
gayety. The band itself was half asleep, but by sheer force of habit it
kept on, the fiddlers drawing the perfunctory bows, and the melancholy
clarionet men breathing their expressive sighs. It was a dismal sight.
The next morning the band had vanished.
The morning was lowering, and a steady rain soon set in for the day.
No fishing, no boating; nothing but drop, drop, and the reminiscence of
past pleasure. Mist enveloped the islands and shut out the view. Even
the spirits of Mrs. Farquhar were not proof against this, and she tried
to amuse herself by reconstructing the season out of the specimens of
guests who remained, who were for the most part young ladies who had
duty written on their faces, and were addicted to spectacles.
“It could not have been,” she thought, “ultrafashionable or madly gay. I
think the good people come here; those who are willing to illuminate.”
“Oh, there is a fast enough life at some of the hotels in the summer,”
said the artist.
“Very likely. Still, if I were recruiting for schoolmarms, I should come
here. I like it thoroughly, and mean to be here earlier next year.
The scenery is enchanting, and I quite enjoy being with 'Proverbial
Philosophy' people.”
Late in the gloomy afternoon King went down to the office, and the clerk
handed him a letter. He took it eagerly, but his countenance fell when
he saw that it bore a New York postmark, and had been forwarded from
Richfield. It was not from Irene. He put it in his pocket and went
moodily to his room. He was in no mood to read a homily from his uncle.
Ten minutes after, he burst into Forbes's room with the open letter in
his hand.
“See here, old fellow, I'm off to the Profile House. Can you get ready?”
“Get ready? Why, you can't go anywhere tonight.”
“Yes I can. The proprietor says he will send us across to Redwood to
catch the night train for Ogdensburg.”
“But how about the Lachine Rapids? You have been talking about those
rapids for two months. I thought that was what we came here for.”
“Do you want to run right into the smallpox at Montreal?”
“Oh, I don't mind. I never take anything of that sort.”
“But don't you see that it isn't safe for the Lamonts and Mrs. Farquhar
to go there?”
“I suppose not; I never thought of that. You have dragged me all over
the continent, and I didn't suppose there was any way of escaping the
rapids. But what is the row now? Has Irene telegraphed you that she has
got over her chill?”
“Read that letter.”
Forbes took the sheet and read:
“NEW YORK, September 2, 1885.
“MY DEAR STANHOPE,--We came back to town yesterday, and I find a
considerable arrears of business demanding my attention. A suit has
been brought against the Lavalle Iron Company, of which I have been the
attorney for some years, for the possession of an important part of its
territory, and I must send somebody to Georgia before the end of this
month to look up witnesses and get ready for the defense. If you are
through your junketing by that time, it will be an admirable opportunity
for you to learn the practical details of the business.... Perhaps it
may quicken your ardor in the matter if I communicate to you another
fact. Penelope wrote me from Richfield, in a sort of panic, that she
feared you had compromised your whole future by a rash engagement with a
young lady from Cyrusville, Ohio--a Miss Benson-and she asked me to
use my influence with you. I replied to her that I thought that, in the
language of the street, you had compromised your future, if that were
true, for about a hundred cents on the dollar. I have had business
relations with Mr. Benson for twenty years. He is the principal owner
in the Lavalle Iron Mine, and he is one of the most sensible, sound,
and upright men of my acquaintance. He comes of a good old New England
stock, and if his daughter has the qualities of her father and I hear
that she has been exceedingly well educated besides she is not a bad
match even for a Knickerbocker.
“Hoping that you will be able to report at the office before the end of
the month,
“I am affectionately yours,
“SCHUYLER BREVOORT.”
“Well, that's all right,” said the artist, after a pause. “I suppose the
world might go on if you spend another night in this hotel. But if you
must go, I'll bring on the women and the baggage when navigation opens
in the morning.”