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[Illustration: IKE TURTLE AND AUNT GRAVES.
"Marry? _Me_ marry--marry a man--a great, awful man!"--Page 160.]
THE PUDDLEFORD PAPERS;
OR,
HUMORS OF THE WEST.
BY H. H. RILEY.
_WITH ORIGINAL ILLUSTRATIONS._
BOSTON:
LEE AND SHEPARD, PUBLISHERS.
NEW YORK:
LEE, SHEPARD AND DILLINGHAM.
1875.
Entered, according to Act of Congress, in the year 1874,
BY LEE AND SHEPARD,
In the Office of the Librarian of Congress, at Washington.
Stereotyped at the Boston Stereotype Foundry,
No. 19 Spring Lane.
PREFACE.
Everybody who writes a book, is expected to introduce it with a preface; to
hang out a sign, the more captivating the better, informing the public what
kind of entertainment may be expected within. I am very sorry that I am
obliged to say that many a one has been wofully deceived by these outside
proclamations, and some one may be again.
I am unable to apologize to the public for inflicting this work upon it. It
was not through "the entreaty of friends" that it was written. It is not
the "outpourings of a delicate constitution." (I weigh one hundred and
sixty pounds.) I was not driven into it "by a predestination to write,
which was beyond my control." It is not "offered for the benefit of a few
near relatives, who have insisted upon seeing it in print;" nor do I expect
the public will tolerate it simply out of regard to my feelings, if their
own feelings are not enlisted in its favor.
The book is filled with portraits of Puddleford and the Puddlefordians.
The reader may never have seen the portrait of a genuine Puddlefordian.
Bless me, how much that man has lost! If the reader does not like the
painting after he _has_ seen it, I cannot help it; it may be the fault of
the original, or it may be from a want of skill in the painter.
Like the carrier-pigeon, let it go, to return with glad tidings, or none at
all.
PREFACE TO THE THIRD EDITION.
Many years have passed since Puddleford was first published. In the
meanwhile the world has turned round and round, and so has Puddleford. The
book, too, has been growing in size, from time to time, and some new
"matter" has been now introduced.
The object of the book was not merely humor. It was hoped by the author
that the reader would discover an undercurrent, showing strong points of
human nature in the rough, and how at last the rugged rock becomes rounded
and polished into the smooth stone--the iron cleaver turned into the
tempered sword. How stern, honest men, who are driven to grapple and
struggle with the hardships of a new country, meet and dispose of them in
an irregular and home-made way, by striking at the root of the question,
disregarding mere form. How the foundation of law, religion, and order is
laid in strength, if not in beauty. How other generations build thereon the
temple with its pillars and spire.
I cannot attempt to describe the Puddleford of to-day. Ike Turtle is old
and gray, but his children hold high positions in society and state. Some
of them have Ike's thorny, sharp genius, but toned down by education and
cultivation into method and power. Squire Longbow totters around on his
staff, tries over his old cases with anybody who will listen to him,
repeats his decisions of fifteen years ago, quotes Ike's jokes, and sums up
all the testimony for the fortieth time to his weary listeners. Aunt Sonora
has gone to her reward. Other courts are held in Puddleford now.
Technicalities are observed. Law is law. How much more justice is
administered, it is not for me to say.
The book is once more before the public. The public have received it in the
past quite as well as it deserved, perhaps. Its future is now committed to
the public again.
H. H. R.
SEPTEMBER 8, 1874.
CONTENTS.
CHAPTER I. PAGE
Puddleford.--Eagle Tavern.--Mr. and Mrs. Bulliphant.--May
Morning.--Birds.--Venison Styles.--General Character of
Society.--The Colonel.--Venison Styles's Cabin. 17
CHAPTER II.
Lawsuit: Filkins against Beadle.--Squire Longbow and his
Court.--Puddleford assembled.--Why Squire Longbow was a
Great Man.--Ike Turtle and Sile Bates, Pettifoggers.--Mrs.
Sonora Brown.--Uproar and Legal Opinions.--Seth
Bolles.--Miss Eunice Grimes.--Argument to Jury, and Verdict. 34
CHAPTER III.
Wanderings in the Wilderness.--A Bee-Hunt.--Sunrise.--The
Fox-Squirrel.--The Blue-Jay.--The Gopher.--The
Partridges.--Wild Geese, Ducks, and Cranes.--Blackbirds and
Meadow-Larks.--Venison's Account of the Bees' Domestic
Economy.--How Venison found what he was in Search of.--Honey
secured.--After-Reflections. 54
CHAPTER IV.
The Log-Chapel.--Father Beals.--Aunt Graves.--Sister
Abigail.--Bigelow Van Slyck, the Preacher.--His
Entree.--How he worked.--One of his Sermons.--Performance
of the Choir.--"Coronation" achieved.--Getting into
Position.--Personal Appeals.--Effect on the
Congregation.--Sabbath in the Wilderness.--Is Bigelow the
only Ridiculous Preacher? 66
CHAPTER V.
Indian Summer.--Venison Styles again.--Jim Buzzard.--Fishing
Excursion.--Muskrat City.--Indian Burying-Ground.--The
Pickerel and the Rest of the Fishes.--The Prairie.--Wild
Geese.--The Old Mound.--Venison's Regrets at the
degenerating Times.--His Luck, and Mine.--Reminiscences of
the Beavers.--Camping out.--Safe Return. 81
CHAPTER VI.
Educational Efforts.--Squire Longbow's "Notis."--"The
Saterday Nite."--Ike and the Squire.--Various Remarks to the
Point.--Mrs. Fizzle and the Temperance Question.--Collection
taken.--General Result. 96
CHAPTER VII.
Social War.--Longbow, Turtle & Co.--Bird, Swipes, Beagle &
Co.--Mrs. Bird.--Mrs. Beagle.--Mrs. Swipes.--Turkey and
Aristocracy.--Scandal.--Husking-Bees, and "such like."--The
Calathumpian Band.--The Horse-Fiddle.--The Giant
Trombone.--The Gyastacutas.--Tuning up.--Unparalleled
Effort.--Puddleford still a Representative Place. 105
CHAPTER VIII.
Puddleford and Politics.--Higgins against Wiggins.--The
Candidates' Personale.--Their Platforms.--Delicate
Questions.--Stump Speaking.--Wiggins on
Higgins.--Impertinent Interruptions.--Higgins on
Wiggins.--Ike Turtle not dead yet.--Commotion.--Squire
Longbow restores Order.--Grand Stroke of Policy.--The Roast
Ox at Gillett's Corners. 115
CHAPTER IX.
Winter upon us.--The Roosters in the early Morning.--The
Blue-Jays and the Squirrels.--The Improvident Turkey.--The
Domestic Hearth, and who occupied it.--The Old Dog.--The
Blessed Old Mail-Horse.--The Newspapers.--Our
Come-to-Tea.--Mrs. Brown, her Arrival and
Experiences.--Entree of Bird, Beagles & Co.--Conflicting
Elements, and how Ike Turtle assimilated all.--Gratifying
Consequences. 128
CHAPTER X.
Mrs. Longbow taken sick.--General Interest.--Dr.
Teazle.--His Visit.--"The Rattles."--Scientific
Diagnosis.--A Prescription.--Short and Dr. Dobbs.--"Pantod
of the Heart."--Dismissal of Teazle.--Installation of
Dobbs.--"Scyller and Chara_bi_des."--Ike's Views.--The
Colonel's.--Bates's.--Mrs. Longbow dies.--Who killed her:
conflicting Opinions.--Her Funeral.--Bigelow Van Slyck's
Sermon.--Interment. 148
CHAPTER XI.
Squire Longbow in Mourning.--The Great Question.--Aunt
Sonora's Opinion.--Other People's.--The Squire goes to
Church.--His Appearance on that Occasion.--Aunt Graves, and
her Extra Performance.--"Nux Vomica."--Anxious
Mothers.--Mary Jane Arabella Swipes.--Sister Abigail.--Ike
Turtle, and his Designs.--He calls on Aunt Graves.--She'll
go it.--Sister Abigail's Objection.--The Squire's First Love
Letter.--The Wedding.--Great Getting-up.--Turtle's
Examination.--The Squire runs the Risk of "the
Staterts."--Bigelow's Ceremony.--General Break-Down.--Not
_very_ Drunk. 156
CHAPTER XII.
The Group at "The Eagle."--Entree of a Stranger.--His
Opinion of the Tavern.--Bulliphant wakes up.--Can't pick
Fowls after Dark.--Sad Case of Mother Gantlet and Dr.
Teazle.--Mr. Farindale begins to unbend.--Whistle & Sharp,
and their Attorney.--Good Pay.--Legal Conversation.--Going
Sniping.--Great Description of the Animal.--The Party start,
Farindale holding the Bag.--"Waiting for
Snipe."--Farindale's Solitary Return.--His Interview with
Whistle & Sharp.--Suing a Puddleford Firm.--Relief
Laws.--Farindale gets his Execution.--The Puddleford
Bank.--The Appraisers.--Proceeds of the Execution. 166
CHAPTER XIII.
The "Fev-Nag."--Conflicting Theories.--"Oxergin and
Hydergin."--Teazle's Rationale.--The Scourge of the
West.--Sile Bates, and his Condition.--Squire Longbow and
Jim Buzzard.--Puddleford prostrate.--Various
Practitioners.--"The Billerous Duck."--Pioneer
Martyrs.--Wave over Wave. 182
CHAPTER XIV.
Uncommonly Common Schools.--Annual School District
Meeting.--Accounts for Contingent Expenses.--Turtle and Old
Gulick's Boy.--"That are Glass."--The Colonel starts the
Wheels again.--Bulliphant's Tactics.--Have we hired "Deacon
Fluett's Darter," or not?--Isabel Strickett.--Bunker Hill
and Turkey.--Sah-Jane Beagles.--The Question settled. 190
CHAPTER XV.
Venison Styles again.--Sermon on Nature.--Funeral Songs of
the Birds.--Their Flight and Return.--His Theory of
Government.--Sakoset.--The Indians. 198
CHAPTER XVI.
Some Account of John Smith.--Nicknames.--Progress of the
Age.--The Colonel's Opinion of Science.--John Smith's
Dream.--Ike Turtle's Dream.--Ike takes the Boots. 206
CHAPTER XVII.
Ike Turtle in his Office.--The Author consults him on Point
of Law.--Taxes of Non-Residents.--Law in Puddleford.--Mr.
Bridget's Case.--Legal Discussion.--The Case settled. 222
CHAPTER XVIII.
The Wilderness around Puddleford.--The Rivers and the
Forests.--Suggestions of Old Times.--Footprints of the
Jesuits.--Vine-covered Mounds.--Visit to the Forest.--The
Early Frost.--The Forest Clock.--The Woodland Harvest.--The
Last Flowers.--Nature sowing her Seed.--The Squirrel in the
Hickory.--Pigeons, their Ways and their Haunts.--The
Butterflies and the Bullfrog.--Nature and her Sermons.--Her
Temple still open, but the High-priest gone. 230
CHAPTER XIX.
The Old New England Home.--The Sheltered Village.--The
Ancient Buildings.--Dormer Windows.--An Old Puritanical
Home.--The Old Puritan Church.--The Burying-Ground.--Deacon
Smith, his Habits and his Helpers.--Major Simeon Giles, his
Mansion and his Ancestry.--Old Doctor Styles.--Crapo
Jackson, the Sexton.--"Training Days."--Militia
Dignitaries.--Major Boles.--Major General
Peabody.--Preparations and Achievements.--Demolition of an
Apple Cart.--"Shoulder Arms!"--Colonel Asher Peabody.--The
Boys, and their World.--My Last Look at my Native Village. 239
CHAPTER XX.
First Militia Law in Puddleford.--Aunt Sonora opposed to
it.--Turtle sets her right.--Meeting to choose
Officers.--Longbow electioneers for Captain: takes the
Chair.--Turtle objects.--P'ints of Order.--_Vivy Vocy_ Vote
won't do.--Legally authorized Boxes must be had.--Longbow's
Speech.--Turtle fined for Contempt.--Longbow elected
Captain.--Great Military Turn-out.--Company turn a Circle;
Break down.--Turn an Angle; Break down again.--Address to
Troops.--Adjourn _sine die_. 256
CHAPTER XXI.
Mrs. Bird gets in a Rage.--Starve a Child.--Mrs. Bird blows
off at Mrs. Beagle.--Takes Breath.--Blows off again.--Mrs.
Beagle gives a Piece of her Mind.--Aunt Sonora drops
in.--She has no Faith in Second Wives.--All adjourn to the
House of Mrs. Swipes.--General Fight of Tongues.--Mrs.
Swipes gives her Opinion.--A Dead Set by all upon Mrs.
Longbow.--Mrs. Longbow raps at the Door.--The Scene
changes.--Final Wind-up. 272
CHAPTER XXII.
Appeal of Case Filkins _vs._ Beadle.--Turtle's Affidavit and
"P'ints."--Longbow's Return.--County Court.--Turtle opens
his Law "P'ints."--Bates replies.--A Fight.--Collateral
Ish-ers.--Squire Longbow present.--The Court sustains Squire
Longbow.--Turtle gets into a Passion.--Impanelling the
Jury.--Mr. Buzzlebaum leaves.--Mr. Tumbleton upsets
Ike.--Mr. Flummer is cut short bob off.--Ike opens to the
Jury.--The Trial.--Charge of the Court.--Jury retire.--Can't
agree. 284
CHAPTER XXIII.
Amusements in Puddleford.--The Highland Fling.--A Fire-eater
comes next.--Runs a Sword down his Throat.--Starts his
Ribbon Factory.--Borrows Squire Longbow's Hat.--Boils Eggs
in it.--The Squire gets into a Passion.--The Grand Caravan
is posted.--Squire Longbow lectures on the Lion.--Bigelow
Van Slyck follows on the Ichneumon.--The Caravan
arrives.--Great Excitement.--Jim Buzzard still
himself.--Aunt Sonora in Trouble.--The Band blows away.--The
Canvas is raised.--Terrible Press of Puddlefordians.--The
Keeper shows up the Lion.--Explains why he has no Hair.--The
Ichneumon is found at last.--The Monkey Ride.--Breaking up. 309
CHAPTER XXIV.
The Tinkhams arrive.--Great Stir.--Miss Lavinia Longbow's
Head is turned.--Everybody in Love with the Tinkhams.--Wind
changes.--The Tinkhams fall.--The whole Pack out on
them.--They abandon the Settlement. 337
CHAPTER XXV.
And still New England.--Sui Generis.--Her Ruggedness the
Soil of Liberty.--The Contrast.--The New England
Conservative.--The New England Man of Business.--The West
has no Past.--_Fast_, and Hospitable.--Saxon Blood and Saxon
Spirit. 346
CHAPTER XXVI.
Spring at the West.--"Sugar Days."--Performances of the
Cattle.--April.--Advent of the Blue-Jays and the Crows.--The
Bluebirds, Phebes, and Robins.--April and its Inspiring
Days.--The Frogs and their Concerts.--Gophers, Squirrels,
Ants; Swallows, Brown-Threshers, and Blackbirds.--The
Swallows, the Martins, and the Advent of May. 357
CHAPTER XXVII.
A Railroad through Puddleford.--The Effect on Squire
Longbow.--Bright Prospects of Puddleford.--Change.--"The
Styleses."--The New Justice.--Aunt Sonora's Opinions.--Ike
Turtle grows too.--Venison disappears from among Men.--His
Grave and his Epitaph. 368
CHAPTER XXVIII.
CONCLUSION.--The Philosophy of Puddleford.--Diverse Elements
in Pioneer Life.--Longbow and his Administration.--Not
Expensive.--Two Hundred a Year, all told.--What would Chief
Justice Marshall have done as Justice of
Puddleford?--Longbow a great Man.--Fame and Politics.--Ike,
a Wheel.--Puddleford Theology.--Camp-Meetings.--Who will do
Bigelow's Work better than Bigelow?--Great Happiness, and
few Nerves.--No "Society."--No Fashion in Clothes, or
anything else.--Bull's-Eye and Pinchbeck.--The Great Trade
didn't "Come Off."--Abounding Charity and
Hospitality.--Pilgrim Blood.--Longbow's.--Planting the
_Mud-Sills_.--Old Associations, how Controlling!--Good by,
Reader. 372
THE PUDDLEFORD PAPERS.
CHAPTER I.
Puddleford.--Eagle Tavern.--Mr. and Mrs. Bulliphant.--May
Morning.--Birds.--Venison Styles.--General Character of
Society.--The Colonel.--Venison Styles' Cabin.
The township of Puddleford was located in the far west, and was, and is,
unknown, I presume, to a large portion of my readers. It has never been
considered of sufficient importance by atlas-makers to be designated by
them; and yet men, women, and children live and die in Puddleford. Its
population helps make up the census of the United States every ten years;
it helps make governors, congressmen, presidents. Puddleford does, and
fails to do, a great many things, just like the "rest of mankind," and yet
who knows and cares anything about Puddleford?
Puddleford was well enough as a township of land, and beautiful was its
scenery. It was spotted with bright, clear lakes, reflecting the trees that
stooped over them; and straight through its centre flowed a majestic river,
guarded by hills on either side. The village of Puddleford (there was a
village of Puddleford, too) stood huddled in a gorge that opened up from
the river; and through it, day and night, a little brook ran tinkling
along, making music around the "settlement." The houses in Puddleford were
very shabby indeed; I am very sorry to be compelled to make that fact
public, but they were very shabby. Some were built of logs, and some of
boards, and some were never exactly built at all, but came together through
a combination of circumstances which the "oldest inhabitant" has never been
able to explain. The log-houses were just like log-houses in every place
else; for no person has yet been found with impudence enough to suggest an
improvement. A pile of logs, laid up and packed in mud; a mammoth
fireplace, with a chimney-throat as large; a lower story and a garret,
connected in one corner by a ladder, called "Jacob's ladder," are its
essentials. A few very ambitious persons in Puddleford had, it is true,
attempted to build frame-houses, but there was never one entirely finished
yet. Some of them had erected a frame only, when, their purses having
failed, the enterprise was left at the mercy of the storms. Others had
covered their frames; and one citizen, old Squire Longbow, had actually
finished off two rooms; and this, in connection with the office of justice
of the peace, gave him a standing and influence in the settlement almost
omnipotent.
The reader discovers, of course, that Puddleford was a very
miscellaneous-looking place. It appeared unfinished, and ever likely to be.
It did really seem that the houses, and cabins, and sheds, and pig-sties,
had been sown up and down the gorge, as their owners sowed wheat. The only
harmony about the place was the harmony of confusion.
Puddleford had a population made up of all sorts of people, who had been,
from a variety of causes, thrown together just there; and every person
owned a number of dogs, so that it was very difficult to determine which
were numerically the strongest, the inhabitants or the dogs. There were
great droves of cows owned, too, which were in the habit of congregating
every morning, and marching some miles to a distant marsh to feed to the
jingle of the bells they wore on their necks.
There was one public house at Puddleford. It was built of logs, with a long
stoop running along its whole front, supported by trunks of trees roughly
cut from the woods, and bark and knots were preserved in the full strength
and simplicity of nature. Its bar-room was the resort of all the leading
men of Puddleford, besides several ragged boys and these self-same dogs. It
stood in the centre of the village, and announced itself to the public
through a sign, upon which were painted a cock crowing and a spread eagle.
The bar was fenced off in one corner of the room, and was supplied with
three bottles of whiskey, called, according to their color, brandy, rum,
and gin; but fly-tracks and dust had so completely covered them, that the
kind of liquor was determined by the pledge of the landlord, that always
passed current. There were also about a dozen mouldy crackers laid away on
the shelf in a discarded cigar-box, intended more particularly for the
travelling public. The walls of the bar-room were illuminated by a large
menagerie advertisement, which was the only real display of the fine arts
that ever entered the place. Upon a table, near the centre of the room,
stood a backgammon and checker-board, which were in use from the rising
sun to midnight. Pipes, crusted thick with soot, lay scattered about on the
window-stools and chimney-shelf--old stubs that had seen service--and all
over the floor rolled great quids of tobacco, ancient and modern, the
creatures of yesterday and years ago; for the floor of the "Eagle
Tavern"--such it was called--of Puddleford was never profaned by a broom,
nor its windows with water. He who attempted to look out would have
supposed there was an eternal fog in the streets.
The ladies' parlor, belonging to the Eagle Tavern of Puddleford, was a very
choice spot, and had been fitted up without regard to expense. Its floor
was covered with a faded rag-carpet, and its walls were enlivened with a
shilling print, showing forth Noah's Ark, and the animals entering therein.
Any person who had an eye for the practical, could see just how Noah loaded
his craft, as the picture brought out clearly a long plank thrown ashore,
up which the animals were climbing. I have often thought that I never saw
it rain so tremendously as it did in that picture. Near by hung a six-penny
likeness of Washington, somewhat defaced, as some irreverent Puddleford boy
had run his finger through the old general's eye, which detracted very much
from the dignity of his expression. He looked rather funny with one eye
cocked; and he felt, I presume--that is, if pictures can feel--just as
funny as he looked.
One advantage which the lodging-rooms of this tavern possessed ought not to
be overlooked. They were lit up by the everlasting stars, and the tired
traveller could go to sleep by the dancing rays that shot down through the
crevices of the roof above.
"Old Stub Bulliphant," as he was called, was, and had been for years,
landlord of the "Eagle." He was about five feet high, and nearly as many in
circumference. His eyes were of no particular color, although they were
once. His eye-lashes had been scorched off by alcoholic fire; and nature,
to keep up appearances, in a fit of desperation, substituted in their stead
a binding of red, which looked like two little rainbows hanging upon a
storm, for a rheumy water was continually running between them. His nose
was very red, and his face was always in blossom, winter and summer. A pair
of tow breeches and a red flannel shirt composed his wardrobe two thirds of
the year. The truth is, the old fellow drank, and always drank, and he
became, finally, preserved in spirits.
Puddleford was not destitute of a church, not by any means. The
"log-chapel," when I first became acquainted with the place, was an ancient
building. It was erected at a period almost as early as the tavern--not
quite--temporal wants pressing the early settlers closer than spiritual.
This, precious reader, is a skeleton view of Puddleford, as it existed when
I first knew it. Just out of this village, some time during the last ten
years, I took possession of a large tract of land, called "Burr-oak
Opening," that is, a wide, sweeping plain, thinly clad with burr-oaks. Few
sights in nature are more beautiful. The eye roams over these parks
unobstructed by undergrowth, the trees above, and the sleeping shadows on
the grass below.
The first time I looked upon this future home of mine, it lay calm and
bright, bathed in the warm sun of a May morning, and filled with birds. The
buds were just breaking into leaf, and the air was sweet with the wildwood
fragrance of spring. Piles of mosses, soft as velvet, were scattered about.
Wild violets, grouped in clusters, the white and red lupin, the mountain
pink, and thousands of other tiny flowers, bright as sparks of fire,
mingled in confusion. It was alive with birds; the brown thrasher, the
robin, the blue-jay, poured forth their music to the very top of their
lungs. The thrasher, with his brown dress and very quizzical look,
absolutely revelled in a luxury of melody. He mocked all the birds about
him. Now he was as good a blue-jay as blue-jay himself, and screamed as
loud; but suddenly bouncing around on a limb, and slowly stretching out his
wings, he died away in a most pathetic strain; then, darting into another
tree, and turning his saucy eye inquisitively down, he rattled off a chorus
or two, that I might know he was not so sad a fellow after all. Now, his
soft, flute-like notes fairly melted in his throat; then he drew out a
long, violin strain the whole length of his bow; then a blast on his
trumpet roused all the birds. He was "everything by turns, and nothing
long." After completing his performance, away he went, and his place, in a
moment almost, was occupied by another, repeating the medley, for the whole
wood was alive with them.
Scores of blue-jays, in the tops of the trees, were picking away at the
tender buds. The robin, that household bird, first loved by our children,
was also here. Sitting alone and apart, in a reverie, and blowing
occasionally his mellow pipe, he seemed to exist only for his own comfort,
and to forget that he was one of the choristers of the wood. Woodpeckers
were flitting hither and thither; troops of quails whistled in the
distance; the oriole streamed out his bright light through the green
branches; there was a winnowing of wings, a dashing of leaves, as birds
came rushing in and out. It was their festival.
This scene was heightened by the appearance of a hunter. He was a noble
specimen of the physical man. Tall, brawny--a giant in strength--his form
loomed up in the distance. He was attired with a red flannel "wamus," a
leathern belt girt around his waist, deer-skin leggins and moccasons, and a
white felt hat that ran up to a peak. His rifle and shot-pouch were slung
around him, and a few fox-squirrels hung dangling on his belt. His whole
figure exhibited a harmony of proportion, a majesty of combination,
sometimes seen in Roman statues. As I approached him, his face fairly
beamed with rustic intelligence and good nature, and the old man grasped me
by the hand, and shook it as heartily as if he had known me a thousand
years.
"So you are the person," said Venison Styles,--for such I afterwards
learned was the name he went by in the neighborhood,--"so you are the
person that's come in here to settle, I s'pose--to cut down the trees and
plough up this ere ground." I told him I was. "Well," said he, "so it goes;
I have moved and moved, and I can't keep out of the way of these ploughs
and axes. It was just as much as the deer, and beaver, and otter, _could_
do, to stand them government surveyors that went tramping around among 'em,
just as though they were going to be sold out wher-or-no. And then,"
continued Styles, growing warmer, "they tried to form a thing they called a
school _de_-strict about my ears; and then came a church, and they put a
little bell on it, and that scart out the game. Game can't stand
church-bells, stranger, they can't; they clears right out."
I tried to soothe the old man's feelings, and among other things, advised
him to give up his hunting and fishing, and settle down, and till the soil
for a living.
"What on airth does anybody want to till the soil for?" replied Styles.
"What does the soil want _tilling_ for? Warn't the airth made right in the
first place? The woods were filled with beast and bird, warn't they? and
the whole face of natur covered with grass and wild fruits? and streams and
lakes were scattered everywhere? Ain't there enough to eat, and drink, and
wear, growing nat'ral in the woods? and what else does anybody want,
stranger?"
"Yes, but you are growing old, and your sight is dim, my friend," said I.
"Old! dim! eyes bad! no! no! Venison Styles is good for twenty years yet. I
don't take physic. There ain't no more use of taking such stuff, than there
is of giving it to my dogs. 'Tain't nat'ral to take it, not no how. All a
man wants in sickness is a little saxafax-tea, or something warmin' of that
sort. Children are all spi'lt nowadays. Their heads and inards are crammed
with physic and larning, and they ain't good for nothing. For my part, I
hate physic, books, newspapers, and even the mail-carrier. None of my folks
were troubled with larning; for, as near as I can tell, the old man (his
father) died hunting game and furs down on the 'Hios, when it 'twas all
woods there, and I never know'd of his writing or reading any."
"Well, Venison," said I, "how long have you been around in these parts?"
"Not mor-nor four or five years, or so about," answered Styles. "The game
and I have kept running westard and westard, from civilization, as they
call it, till I have travelled nigh on a thousand miles, or so. I used to
hunt and trap way down on Erie, before them steamboats came a-snorting up,
but when they came, they scart all the deer and everything out of the woods
and streams; and then I left, too. This rifle," continued Styles, "this
rifle has been along with me for forty years. I have eat and slept with it.
I have worn out mor-nor twenty dogs--fairly _worn_ 'em out, and buried
every one with a tear; and byme-by old Venison himself will go, but he is
good on the track yet."
I assented to much that was said by old Styles, and growing warmer the more
interest I took in him, he rattled on about civilization--its effects, &c.,
&c.; and, finally, looking into a tree, where a cluster of spring birds
were singing, he turned to me, and pointing upward--"Do you hear that?" he
exclaimed; "that music was made when the world was--them throats warn't
tuned by any singing-master; they always keep in order. If men would only
jist let natur alone, we could get along well enough. 'Tain't right to make
any additions to natur. 'Tain't right to invent music, nor to mock the
birds, nor cut down the woods, nor dam up the streams. It's all agin natur,
the whole on't. The birds can't be improved on, and the streams and woods
belong to the fish and game. They are their houses as much as my house is
_my_ house. I always hated a saw-mill," continued Styles; "its very sound
makes me mad. I never know'd a deer to stay within hearing of one. They
roar away just as though they were going to tear down the whole forest,
and pile it up into boards. I always try to keep out of their way." But I
cannot give all the conversation of this eccentric genius of the forest,
with me. He was one of a class of men who are hurried along by immigration,
like clouds before the tempest. When the rays of improvement warmed Styles,
he had pushed farther back into the shade. He was a connecting link between
barbarism and civilization. One half of him was lit up with the light of
the sturdy pioneers, who crowded in upon him from the east, and the other
half stood dark and gloomy in savage solemnity. With all his antipathy to
the society of the whites, he was their stanch friend, and in many ways was
of great service. He became, as we shall see, one of my pleasantest
companions, and I cannot help now declaring, that few men have taken such
strong hold upon my affections as this same Venison Styles.
The old man shouldered his rifle, and inviting me to "drop into his cabin,
up the creek," bid me "good morning, stranger."
Reader, such was the scene presented to my eye the day I first looked upon
the piece of wild land upon which I finally settled and improved. I had
just arrived from an eastern village, where I was born, and "brought up,"
as the phrase is. A somewhat broken fortune and breaking health had driven
me from it, with a moderate family, to seek a spot elsewhere; and I
resolved to try the Great West, that paradise (if the word of people who
never saw it is to be taken) where the surplus population of a portion of
the world have found a home.
The change was great. But great as it was, I resolved to endure it. So, at
it I went. I procured "help," girdled the trees, put a breaking team of
twelve yoke of cattle on the ground, tore it up, fenced the land, raised a
log-house, and in the fall I had a crop of wheat growing, the withered oak
trees standing guard over it. My family, consisting of a wife and three
children, a boy of eight, and two girls of twelve and ten, were removed to
their new quarters, and I had thus fairly begun the world again, and all
things were as new about me as if I had just been born into it.
During the summer, I had an opportunity of studying the general character
of the inhabitants of Puddleford, and its surrounding country population.
Like most western settlements, it was made up of all kinds of materials,
all sorts of folks, holding every opinion. More than a dozen states had
contributed to make up its people. Society was exceedingly miscellaneous.
The keen Yankee, the obstinate Pennsylvanian, and the reckless Southerner
were there. Each one of these persons had brought along with him his early
habits and associations--his own views of business, law, and religion. When
thrown together on public questions, this composition boiled up like a
mixture of salts and soda. Factions, of course, were formed among those
whose early education and habits were congenial; divisions were created,
and a war of prejudice and opinion went on from month to month, and year to
year. The New England Yankee stood about ten years ahead of the
Pennsylvania German in all his ideas of progress, while the latter stood
back, dogged and sullen, attached to the customs of his fathers. Another
general feature consisted in this, that there was no permanency to society.
The inhabitants were constantly changing, pouring out and in, like the
waters of a river, so that a complete revolution took place every four or
five years. Everybody who remained in Puddleford expected to remove
somewhere else very soon. They were merely sojourners, not residents. There
was no attachment to, or veneration for, the past of Puddleford, because
Puddleford had no past. The ties of memory reached to older states. There
stood the church that sheltered the infant years of Puddleford's
population, and there swung the bell that tolled their fathers and fathers'
fathers to the tomb. There was the long line of graves, running back a
hundred years, where the sister of yesterday, and the ancestor whose
virtues were only known through tradition, were buried. There tottered the
old homestead which had passed through the family for generations, filled
with heirlooms that had become sacred. The school-house was there, where
the village boys shouted together. Looking back from a new country, where
all is confusion, to an old one, where figures have the stability of a
painting, objects which were once trivial start out upon the canvas in
bolder relief. The venerable, gray-headed pastor, who appeared regularly in
the village pulpit for half a century, to impart the word of life, rises in
the memory, and stands fixed there, like a statue. The quaint cut of his
coat, the neat tie of his neckcloth, the spectacles resting on the tip of
his nose, his hums and haws, his eye of reproof, his gestures of vengeance,
are now living things--are preaching still. We see again the changing
crowd, that year after year went in and out of that holy place; the spot
where the old deacon sat, his head resting on a pillar, his tranquil face
turned upward, his mouth open, enjoying a doze as he listened to the
sermon. We recollect the gay bridal, the solemn funeral, the buoyant face
of the one, the still, cold one of the other. We even remember the lame old
sexton, who rang the bell and went limping up to the burying-ground, with a
spade upon his shoulder. Even _he_, of no consequence when seen every day,
is transformed by distance, and mellowed by memory, into a real being. And
then there are the hills, and streams, and waterfalls, that shed their
music through our boyish souls, until they became a part of our very
existence. No man ever lived who entirely forgot these things, suppressed
though they might be by the cares and anxieties of maturer years. And no
circumstance so likely to bring them all up, glowing afresh, as a removal
to a new country. Of course, no one was attached to Puddleford, as a
locality, any more than the wandering Arab is attached to the particular
spot where he pitches his tent and feeds his camels.
Another general feature seemed to be the _strange character_ of a large
part of the population. Puddleford was filled with bankrupts, who had fled
from their eastern creditors, anxious for peace of mind and bread enough to
eat. Like decayed vessels, that had been tempest-tossed and finally
condemned, these hulks seemed to be lying up in ordinary in the wilderness.
Puddleford was to that class a kind of hospital. This man, upon inquiry, I
found had rolled in luxury, but a turn in flour one day blew him sky-high.
Another failed on a land speculation. Another bought more goods than he
paid for. Another had been mixed up in a fraud. Another had been actually
guilty of crime. The farming community were generally free from these
charges; but Puddleford proper was not.
The "Colonel," as we called him, was a fair specimen of the bankrupt class.
He was one of those unfortunate beings who was well enough started in the
world; but after having been tossed and buffeted around by his own
extravagance, he was finally driven into the forest. He was educated,
polished, proud, and poor. He had sunk two or three fortunes, earned by
somebody else, chasing pleasure around the world. His reputation having
become soiled, and his pockets emptied, he concluded--to use his own
language--to "hide himself from his enemies and die a kind of civil death."
"Men," said the Colonel, "are naturally robbers, and it is safer to run
than fight with them." I have heard him declare, in a jocose way, that he
was the most "injured man living; for the whole human family," he said,
"set to and picked his pockets, and now the public ought to support him."
He said, "he couldn't see why the government didn't pass laws for the
relief of cases like his; for a government is good for nothing that fails
to support its people. Starvation in a republic would be a disgrace, and
ought not to be permitted." The Colonel said "there was no use in fighting
destiny--no one man _can_ do it--and it was his destiny to be poor." He
said he "had no place to remove to, and that he couldn't get there if he
had;" that he was "like an old pump that needs a pail of water thrown in
every time it is used to set it a-going."
The Colonel resided in the village of Puddleford. His family was composed
of a wife and two daughters, a couple of dashing girls, who looked like
birds of fine plumage that had been driven by a storm beyond their
latitude. His household furniture was made up of the fag-ends of this and
that, which had somehow escaped a half a dozen sheriff's sales. His family
wardrobe had been rescued in the same way, and contained all the fashions
of the last twenty-five years. Here and there were scattered some plain
articles of western manufacture, by way of contrast. Three shilling chairs
stood on a faded Brussels carpet; an unpainted white-wood table supported a
silver tea-set; thus, the faded splendor of the past contrasted with the
rustic simplicity of the present. One thing I must not overlook: the
Colonel had an old tattered carriage that had followed him through good and
evil report, his ups and downs of life. I have often been amused to see it
roll along with a melancholy air of superiority, putting on the face of a
good man in affliction. It was drawn by two diminutive Indian ponies, who
would turn and look wildly at the antiquated thing, as if apprehensive of
danger.
The Colonel kept an office, and pretended to act as a kind of land agent,
and agent for insurance companies, and so on. He was never known to pay a
debt; it being against his principles, as he used to say: besides, he said
"his note would last a man ten times as long as the money; and they were
not very uncurrent neither; for the justice of the peace at Puddleford had
taken a very great many of them, and passed his judgment upon them for
their full face."
But I will not go into particulars with the Puddlefordians at present.
During the summer my acquaintance with Venison Styles had ripened into a
deeper affection for the old hunter. I accepted his invitation to visit
him, and found him sheltered in the depths of the forest, and nestled in a
valley, his hut, overshadowed by great trees, which were filled with birds
pouring forth their songs. A little brook tinkled down the slope by his
hut, singing all kinds of woodland tunes, as the breeze swelled and died
along its banks. The squirrels were chatting their nonsense, and the
rolling drum of the partridge was heard almost at his very door.
Venison was a hunter, a fisher, and a trapper. The inside walls of his
cabin were hung about with rifles, shot-guns, and fishing-rods, which had
been accumulating for years. Deer-horns and skins lay scattered here and
there, the trophies of the chase. Seines for lakes, and scoop-nets for
smaller streams, were drying outside upon the trees.
Venison kept around him a brood of lazy, lounging, good-for-nothing boys,
of all ages, about half-clothed, who followed the business of their father.
This young stock were growing up as he had grown, to occupy somewhere their
father's position, and lead his life. They lived just as well as the
hounds, for all stood on an equality in the family. These ragamuffins were
perfect masters of natural history. There was not an instinct or
peculiarity belonging to the denizens of the woods and streams which they
did not perfectly understand. They seemed to have penetrated the secrecy of
animal life, and fathomed it throughout. Birds, and beasts, and fish were
completely within their power; and there was a kind of matter-of-course
success with them in their capture that was absolutely provoking to a
civilized hunter.
It was of no importance where Venison Styles' boys made their home, or
under what particular roof. Their home was mainly a depot for their
fishing-tackles, guns, and game. They roamed away weeks at a time, fifty
miles off, up this stream and that, over many a lake, and camped out
nights, feeding upon their plunder; and Venison felt no more concern about
them than he did about the deer, who indeed were not much wilder than they.
They were as hard as flints, sharp on the chase, happy in their wild,
wayward-life, and generally managed to trap and kill just enough to be
self-supporting, and keep soul and body together.