CHAPTER III.

Wilson turned, and with a frown went moodily back to his desk and sat

down on the high stool gloomily eyeing the page in a ledger which he had

just consulted.

“By George, that woman’s a corker,” said the drummer, sociably, as he

came back and stood near the long wood-stove. “Of course, I don’t know

what it’s all about, but she’s her own boss, I’ll stake good money on

that.”

“She’s about the sharpest and in many ways the strongest woman in the

state,” said the storekeeper, with a sigh. “Good Lord, Masters, she’s

been my main-stay ever since I opened this shack, and now to think

because that loud-mouthed Bazemore, who expects me to pay a good part of

his salary, takes a notion to rip her up the back in meeting, why--”

“Oh, I see!” cried the drummer--“I understand it now. I heard about that

at Darley. So _she’s_ the woman! Well, I’m glad I got a good look at

her. I see a lot of queer things in going about over the country, but I

don’t think I ever ran across just her sort.”

“She’s had a devil of a life, Masters, from the time she was a blooming,

pretty young girl till now that she is at war with everybody within

miles of her. She’s always been a study to me. She’s treated me more

like a son than anything else--doing everything in her power to help me

along, buying, by George, things sometimes that I knew she didn’t need

because it would help me out, and now, because I didn’t get up in

meeting last Sunday and call that man down she holds me accountable. I

don’t know but what she’s right. Why should I take her hard-earned money

and sit still and allow her to be abused? She’s simply got pride, and,

lots of it, and it’s bad hurt.”

“But what was it all about?” the drummer inquired.

“The start of it was away back when she was a girl, as I said,” began

the storekeeper. “You’ve heard of Colonel Preston Chester, our biggest

planter, who lives a mile from here--old-time chap, fighter of duels,

officer in the army, and all that?”

“Oh yes, I’ve seen him; in fact, I was at college at the State

University with his son Langdon. He was a terrible fellow--very wild and

reckless, full half the time, and playing poker every night. He was

never known to pay a debt, even to his best friends.”

“Langdon is a chip off of the old block,” said Wilson. “His father was

just like him when he was a young man. Between you and me, the Colonel

never had a conscience; old as he now is, he will sit and laugh about

his pranks right in the presence of his son. It’s no wonder the boy

turned out like he did. Well, away back when this Mrs. Boyd was a young

and pretty girl, the daughter of honest, hard-working people, who owned

a little farm back of his place, he took an idle fancy to her. I’m

telling you now what has gradually leaked out in one way and another

since. He evidently won her entire confidence, made her believe he was

going to marry her, and, as he was a dashing young fellow, she must have

fallen in love with him. Nobody knows how that was, but one thing is

sure, and that is that he was seen about with her almost constantly for

a whole year, and then he stopped off suddenly. The report went out that

he’d made up his mind to get married to a young woman in Alabama who had

a lot of money, and he did go off and bring home the present Mrs.

Chester, Langdon’s mother. Well, old-timers say young Ann Boyd took it

hard, stayed close in at home and wasn’t seen out for a couple of years.

Then she came out again, and they say she was better-looking than ever

and a great deal more serious and sensible. Joe Boyd was a young farmer

those days, and a sort of dandy, and he fell in love with her and hung

about her day and night, never seeming willing to let her out of his

sight. Several other fellows, they say, was after her, but she seemed to

like Joe the best, but nothing he’d do or say would make her accept him.

I can see through it now, looking back on what has since leaked out, but

nobody understood it then, for she had evidently got over her attachment

for Colonel Chester, and Joe was a promising fellow, strong,

good-looking, and a great beau and flirt among women, half a dozen being

in love with him, but Ann simply wouldn’t take him, and it was the talk

of the whole county. He was simply desperate, folks say, going about

boring everybody he met with his love affair. Finally her mother and

father and all her friends got after her to marry Joe, and she gave in.

And then folks wondered more than ever why she’d delayed for she was

more in love with her husband than anybody had any reason to expect.

They were happy, too. A child was born, a little girl, and that seemed

to make them happier. Then Mrs. Boyd’s mother and father died, and she

came into the farm, and the Boyds were comfortable in every way. Then

what do you think happened?”

“I’ve been wondering all along,” the drummer laughed. “I can see you’re

holding something up your sleeve.”

“Well, this happened. Colonel Chester’s wife was, even then, a homely

woman, about as old as he was, and not at all attractive aside from her

money, and marrying hadn’t made him any the less devilish. They say he

saw Mrs. Boyd at meeting one day and hardly took his eyes off of her

during preaching. She had developed into about the most stunning-looking

woman anywhere about, and knew how to dress, which was something Mrs.

Chester, with all her chances, had never seemed to get onto. Well, that

was the start of it, and from that day on Chester seemed to have nothing

on his mind but the good looks of his old sweetheart. Folks saw him on

his horse riding about where he could get to meet her, and then it got

reported that he was actually forcing himself on her to such an extent

that Joe Boyd was worked up over it, aided by the eternal gab of all the

women in the section.”

“Did Colonel Chester’s wife get onto it?” the drummer wanted to know.

“It don’t seem like she did,” answered Wilson. “She was away visiting

her folks in the South most of the time, with Langdon, who was a baby

then, and it may be that she didn’t care. Some folks thought she was

weak-minded; she never seemed to have any will of her own, but left the

Colonel to manage her affairs without a word.”

“Well, go on with your story,” urged the drummer.

“There isn’t much more to tell about the poor woman,” continued Wilson.

“As I said, Chester got to forcing himself on her, and I reckon she

didn’t want to tell her husband what she was trying to forget for fear

of a shooting scrape, in which Joe would get the worst of it; but this

happened: Joe was off at court in Darley and sent word home to his wife

that he was to be held all night on a jury. The man that took the

message rode home alongside of Chester and told him about it. Well, I

reckon, all hell broke out in Chester that night. He was a drinking man,

and he tanked up, and, as his wife was away, he had plenty of liberty.

Well, he simply went over to Joe Boyd’s house and went in. It was about

ten o’clock. My honest conviction is, no matter what others think, that

she tried her level best to make him leave without rousing the

neighborhood, but he wouldn’t go, but sat there in the dark with his

coat off, telling her he loved her more than her husband did, and that

he never had loved his wife and that he was crazy for her, and the like.

How long this went on with her imploring and praying to him to go, I

don’t know; but, at any rate, they both heard the gate-latch click and

Joe Boyd come right up the gravel-walk. I reckon the poor woman was

scared clean out of her senses, for she made no outcry, and Chester went

to a window, his coat on his arm, and was climbing out when Joe, who

couldn’t get in at the front door was making for the one in the rear,

met him face to face.”

“Great goodness!” ejaculated the commercial traveller.

“Well, you bet, the devil was to pay,” went on the storekeeper grimly.

“Chester was mad and reckless, and, being hot with liquor, and regarding

Boyd as far beneath him socially, instead of making satisfactory

explanations, they say he simply swore at Boyd and stalked away.

Dumfounded, Boyd went inside to his miserable wife and demanded an

explanation. She has since learned how to use her wits with the best in

the land, but she was young then, and so, by her silence, she made

matters worse for herself. He forced her to explain, and, seeing no

other way out of the affair, she decided to throw herself on his mercy

and make a clean breast of things she and her family had kept back all

the time. Well, sir, she confessed to what had happened away back before

Chester had deserted her, no doubt telling a straight story of her

absolute purity and faithfulness to Boyd after marriage. Poor old Joe!

He wasn’t a fighting man, and, instead of following Chester and

demanding satisfaction, he stayed at home that night, no doubt suffering

the agony of the damned and trying to make up his mind to believe in

his wife and to stand by her. As it looks now, he evidently decided to

make the best of it, and might have succeeded, but somehow it got out

about Chester being caught there, and that started gossip so hot that

her life and his became almost unbearable. It might have died a natural

death in time, but Mrs. Boyd had an enemy, Mrs. Jane Hemingway, who had

been one of the girls who was in love with Joe Boyd. It seems that she

had never got over Joe’s marrying another woman, and when she heard this

scandal she nagged and teased Joe about his babyishness in being willing

to believe his wife, and told him so many lies that Boyd finally quit

staying at home, sulking about in the mountains, and making trips away

till he finally applied for a divorce. Ignorant and inexperienced as she

was, and proud, Mrs. Boyd made no defence, and the whole thing went his

way with very little publicity. But the hardest part for her to bear was

when, having the court’s decree to take charge of his child, Boyd came

and took it away.”

“Good gracious! that was tough, wasn’t it?” exclaimed the drummer.

“That’s what it was, and they say it fairly upset her mind. They

expected her to fight like a tiger for her young, but at the time they

came for it she only seemed stupefied. The little girl was only three

years old, but they say Ann came in the room and said she was going to

ask the child if it was willing to leave her, and they say she calmly

put the question, and the baby, not knowing what she meant, said, ‘Yes.’

Then they say Ann talked to it as if it were a grown person, and told

her to go, that she’d never give her a thought in the future, and never

wanted to lay eyes on her again.”

“That was pitiful, wasn’t it?” said Masters. “By George, we don’t dream

of what is going on in the hearts of men and women we meet face to face

every day. And that’s what started her in the life she’s since led.”

“Yes, she lived in her house like a hermit, never going out unless she

absolutely had to. She had an old-fashioned loom in a shed-room

adjoining her house, and night and day people passing along the road

could hear her thumping away on it. She kept a lot of fine sheep,

feeding and shearing them herself, and out of the wool she wove a

certain kind of jean cloth which she sold at a fancy figure. I’ve seen

wagon loads of it pass along the road billed to a big house in Atlanta.

This went on for several years, and then it was noticed that she was

accumulating money. She was buying all the land she could around her

house, as if to force folks as far from her as possible, and she turned

the soil to good purpose, for she knew how to work it. She hired negroes

for cash, when others were paying in old clothes and scraps, and, as she

went to the field with them and worked in the sun and rain like a man,

she got more out of her planting than the average farmer.”

“So she’s really well off?” said the drummer.

“Got more than almost anybody else in the county,” said Wilson. “She’s

got stocks in all sorts of things, and owns houses on the main street in

Darley, which she keeps well rented. It seems like, not having anything

else to amuse her, she turned her big brain to economy and money-making,

and I’ve always thought she did it to hit back at the community. You

see, the more she makes, the more her less fortunate neighbors dislike

her, and she loves to get even as far as possible.”

“And has she had no associates at all?” Masters wanted to know.

“Well, yes, there is one woman, a Mrs. Waycroft, who has always been

intimate with her. She is the only--I started to say she was the only

one, but there was a poor mountain fellow, Luke King, a barefoot boy who

had a fine character, a big brain on him, and no education. His parents

were poor, and did little for him. They say Mrs. Boyd sort of took pity

on him and used to buy books and papers for him, and that she really

taught him to read and write. She sent him off to school, and got him on

his feet till he was able to find work in a newspaper office over at

Canton, where he became a boss typesetter. I’ve always thought that her

misfortune had never quite killed her natural impulses, for she

certainly got fond of that fellow. I had an exhibition of both his

regard and hers right here at the store. He’d come in to buy something

or other, and was waiting about the stove one cold winter day, when a

big mountain chap made a light remark about Mrs. Boyd. He was a head

taller than Luke King was, but the boy sprang at him like a panther and

knocked the fellow down. They had the bloodiest fight I ever saw, and it

was several minutes before they could be separated. Luke had damaged the

chap pretty badly, but he was able to stand, while the boy keeled over

in a dead faint on the floor, bruised inside some way. The big fellow,

fearing arrest, mounted his horse and went away, and several of us were

doing what we could with cold water and whiskey to bring the boy around

when who should come in but Ann herself. She was passing the store, and

some one told her about it. People who think she has no heart and is as

cold as stone ought to have seen her that day. In all my life I never

saw such a terrible face on a human being. I was actually afraid of her.

She was all fury and all tenderness combined. She looked down at him in

all his blood and bruises and white face, and got down on her knees by

him. I saw a great big sob rise up in her, although her back was to me,

and shake her from head to foot, and then she was still, simply stroking

back his damp, tangled hair. ‘My poor boy,’ I heard her say, ‘you can’t

fight my battles. God Himself has failed to do that, but I won’t forget

this--never--never!’”

“Lord, that was strong!” said Masters. “She must be wonderful!”

“She is more wonderful than her narrow-minded enemies dream of,”

returned the storekeeper. “You see, its her pride that keeps her from

showing her fine feelings, and it’s her secluded life that makes them

misunderstand her. Well, she brought her wagon and took the boy away.

That was another queer thing,” Wilson added. “She evidently had started

to take him to her house, for she drove as far as the gate and then

stopped there to study a moment, and finally turned round and drove him

to the poor cabin his folks lived in. You see, she was afraid that even

that would cause talk, and it would. Old Jane Hemingway would have fed

on that morsel for months, as unreasonable as it would have been. Ann

sent a doctor, though, and every delicacy the market afforded, and the

boy was soon out. It wasn’t long afterward that Luke King went to

college at Knoxville, and now he’s away in the West somewhere. His

mother, after his father’s death, married a trifling fellow, Mark Bruce,

and that brought on some dispute between her and her son, who had tried

to keep her from marrying such a man. They say Luke told her if she did

marry Bruce he’d go away and never even write home, and so far, they

say, he has kept his word. Nobody knows where he is or what he’s doing

unless it is Mrs. Boyd, and she never talks. I can’t keep from thinking

he’s done well, though, for he had a big head on him and a lot of

determination.”

“And this Mrs. Hemingway, her enemy,” said the drummer tentatively, “you

say she was evidently the woman’s rival at one time. But it seems she

married some one else.”

“Oh yes, she suddenly accepted Tom Hemingway, an old bachelor, who had

been trying to marry her for a long time. Most people thought she did

it to hide her feelings when Joe Boyd got married. She treated Tom like

a dog, making him do everything she wanted, and he was daft about her

till he died, just a couple of weeks after his child was born, who,

by-the-way, has grown up to be the prettiest girl in all the country,

and that’s another feature in the story,” the storekeeper smiled. “You

see, Mrs. Boyd looks upon old Jane as the prime cause of her losing her

_own_ child, and I understand she hates the girl as much as she does her

mother.”

A man had come into the store and stood leaning against a show-case on

the side devoted to groceries.

“There’s a customer,” said the drummer; “don’t let me keep you, old man;

you know you’ve got to look at my samples some time to-day.”

“Well, I’ll go see what he wants,” said Wilson, “and then I’ll look

through your line, though I don’t feel a bit like it, after losing the

best regular customer I have.”

The drummer had opened his sample-case on the desk when Wilson came

back.

“You say the woman’s husband took the child away,” remarked the drummer;

“did he go far?”

“They first settled away out in Texas,” replied Wilson, “but Joe Boyd,

not having his wife’s wonderful head to guide him, failed at farming

there, and only about three years ago he came back to this country and

bought a little piece of land over in Gilmer--the county that joins this

one.”

“Oh, so near as that! Then perhaps she has seen her daughter and--”

“Oh no, they’ve never met,” said Wilson, as he took a sample pair of

men’s suspenders from the case and tested the elastic by stretching it

between his hands. “I know that for certain. She was in here one morning

waiting for one of her teams to pass to take her to Darley, when a

peddler opened his pack of tin-ware and tried to sell her some pieces I

was out of. He heard me call her by name, and, to be agreeable, he asked

her if she was any kin to Joe Boyd and his daughter, over in Gilmer. I

could have choked the fool for his stupidity. I tried to catch his eye

to warn him, but he was intent on selling her a bill, and took no notice

of anything else. I saw her stare at him steady for a second or two,

then she seemed to swallow something, and said, ‘No, they are no kin of

mine.’ And then what did the skunk do but try to make capital out of

that. ‘Well, you may be glad,’ he said, ‘that they are no kin, for they

are as near the ragged edge as any folks I ever ran across.’ He went on

to say he stayed overnight at Boyd’s cabin and that they had hardly

anything but streak-o’-lean-streak-o’-fat meat and corn-bread to offer

him, and that the girl had the worst temper he’d ever seen. Mrs. Boyd, I

reckon to hide her face, was looking at some of the fellow’s pans, and

he seemed to think he was on the right line, and so he kept talking. Old

Joe, he said, had struck him as a good-natured, lazy sort of

come-easy-go-easy mountaineer, but the girl looked stuck up, like she

thought she was some better than appearances would indicate. He said she

was a tall, gawky sort of girl, with no good looks to brag of, and he

couldn’t for the life of him see what she had to make her so proud.

“I wondered what Mrs. Boyd was going to do, but she was equal to that

emergency, as she always has been in everything. She held one of his

pans up in the light and tilted her bonnet back on her head, I thought,

to let me see she wasn’t hiding anything, and said, as unconcerned as if

he’d never mentioned a delicate subject. ‘Look here,’ she said, thumping

the bottom of the pan with her finger, ‘if you expect to do any business

with _me_, you’ll have to bring copper-bottom ware to me. I don’t buy

shoddy stuff from any one. These pans will rust through in two months.

I’ll take half a dozen, but I’m only doing it to pay you for the time

spent on me. It is a bad investment for any one to buy cheap, stamped

ware.’”

(To be Continued.)

[Illustration]

[Illustration: TWELFTH NIGHT.

_From Painting by Jan Steen._]

Twelfth Night.

BY CHARLES J. BAYNE.

Last of the wassail nights,

Wholesomely merry,

Still on the mistletoe

Clings the white berry;

Still are the apples red,

Brown is the ale;

Feast of our Saxon sires,

Hail and all hail!

Bring forth the boar’s head,

Bring forth the Rhenish;

Tankards that melt away

Haste to replenish;

Lift on the stoutest log;

Loud be the laughter,

Until the sound of mirth

Shake wall and rafter.

Call back the sturdy days

When hearts of oak

Beat to the lilting strains

We now invoke;

Call back the hearty days

When squire and yeoman

Feasted the home-returned

Pikeman and bowman.

Masques in the Temple hall,

Staged for the benchers,

Wait while the turning-spit

Heaps up the trenchers--

Wait while the venison,

Basted with spices,

Smokes as the richest

Of Yule’s sacrifices.

Now Merry Andrew comes,

Fresh from the morris;

Now rustic Corydon

Trips it with Chloris;

Let the soft virginals

Answer the tabor;

After this wassail night

Come days of labor.

Such were the old delights

Rounding the Yule;

Where sleeps His Majesty,

Lord of Misrule?

Still are the apples red,

Brown is the ale;

Feast of our Saxon sires,

Hail and all hail!

[Illustration]

[Illustration: “THE BODY HAD ROLLED OFF THE SLED.”]

Life and Times of Andrew Jackson.

BY THOS. E WATSON.

Andrew Jackson was born on March 15, 1767.

There has been a hot dispute over the place of his birth, but the weight

of the legal evidence favors South Carolina.

His parents were immigrants from the northern part of Ireland, where the

people are mainly Presbyterians in religion, and where there is an

inter-mixture of Scotch blood; but there seems to be no positive proof

that the Jacksons belonged to the over-worked family of Scotch-Irish.

They were poor people, living at Carrickfergus, linen weavers by trade,

and, if any one of them had ever been prominent in any way, the story is

lost. The most painstaking researches made by enthusiastic

hero-worshipers have failed to trace the Jackson lineage to a single

cattle-lifting lord, or to any other member of that upper world into

which the biographical snob is so eager to cast his anchor.

The Jacksons were plain, common, industrious, honest folks, who held a

respectable, independent place in their own community, but who were not

so prosperous as to resist the temptation to try their fortunes in the

New World.

Hugh Jackson, brother to Andrew’s father, had been a soldier in a

British regiment, and had served in America. He was present at

Braddock’s defeat, and may have known Fausett, the Virginia scout, who

is said to have given the rash British general the wound of which he

died. (_See note._)

_Note_:

“The Virginia provincials, under Washington, by their knowledge of

border warfare, and cool courage, alone saved the day.

“Braddock was himself mortally wounded by a provincial named Fausett.

A brother of the latter had disobeyed the silly orders of the General,

that the troops should not take position behind the trees, when

Braddock rode up and struck him down. Fausett who saw the whole

transaction, immediately drew up his rifle and shot him through the

lungs.”

_“The Great West,” Howe._

Apparently, Hugh Jackson became interested in the efforts of the Catawba

Land Company to colonize its holdings in the Carolinas, for upon his

return to Ireland he began to get together a band of kinspeople,

neighbors and friends, for the purpose of emigrating to America.

Among those whom Hugh Jackson persuaded was his brother, Andrew. But,

before everything could be got ready for the voyage, Hugh Jackson fell

in love with the daughter of well-to-do parents, and married her; and

the wife of Hugh was so satisfactory in herself and her surroundings

that the happy husband decided to remain in the old country--his wife

having vetoed his emigration scheme.

His brother Andrew, however, had probably already made his arrangements

to go to America, and, having got unsettled, found it not so easy to

sink back into his former life; therefore, after some hesitation, he and

the three Crawfords, one of whom was the husband of his wife’s sister,

took ship for Charleston.

Upon his coming to North Carolina, it seems that Andrew Jackson was too

poor to buy land. Instead, therefore, of locating in the Waxhaws

Settlement, where most of the immigrants from Carrickfergus had bought

homes, he went to Twelve-mile Creek, a branch of the Catawba.

Here he was seven miles distant from the Waxhaws Settlement, and was

face to face with the gigantic task of carving out a farm from the

wilderness.

The historian, the orator, the painter, have been eager in the duty of

blazoning the deeds of our pioneer missionaries, law-makers and

soldiers. The names of these heroes live, and deserve to live, in

letters of light upon the records of our country. But, to our pioneer

farmers, justice has never been done. Theirs was a combat calling for

every soldierly trait of John Smith and Miles Standish. The patient

courage which swung the axe, in the depths of primeval woods, was no

less heroic than the bravery which made the musket conquer. The toil of

the warrior’s march was slight by comparison with the homely, but

exhausting, work of preparing the soil for the sowing of seed. The

arrows of the red men were not more deadly to the soldier than were the

fevers which rose from the swamps and pulled down the settler as he

struggled to open out his farm.

In the South, in the East, in the West, the story of the pioneer plowman

of America is one of dauntless courage, of quiet heroism. He found the

New World a wilderness and he has well-nigh made it a garden. His axe,

his spade, his hoe, his plow, his muscle, his brain, his very heart and

soul have all been enlisted in the work; and never once have his lips

uttered the craven’s plea for “Protection.” Never once has he gone to

the doors of legislation begging special favors. Never once has he lied

to government and people for the purpose of securing a selfish advantage

at the expense of his fellowman.

No. He has not only not demanded of the government either Protection or

Privilege, but he has submitted--yes, for one hundred years he has

submitted!--to be robbed of a portion of his annual produce in order

that our Infant Industry Capitalists should be able to build up the

corporate power which now, in the form of Trusts, dominates the Republic

and secures the lion’s share of all the wealth created in every field of

industry.

Like many another pioneer of the American wilderness, Andrew Jackson

found the task too hard. He died under the strain. The impression which

his famous son had as to the immediate cause of his death was that he

ruptured a blood vessel in the handling of a heavy log.

The body of the hero who had fallen in the fight for his wife and little

ones--the fight to make a home for them in the wilderness--was buried in

the graveyard of the Waxhaw Settlement church. In after years, when

efforts were made to identify the spot it could not be done.

* * * * *

According to local tradition, there was held at the cabin-home of the

dead man the grewsome “wake” which was customary among the Irish in the

Old Country. Relatives from the Waxhaw settlement came out to Jackson’s

“clearing,” when they learned that he was no more; and, after preparing

the body for burial, their grief gradually wore itself out, and the

whiskey-jug became the ruling factor of the occasion. As lamentation

gave place to revelry, it is said that “the corpse came in for his share

of the refreshments.” What this may mean, each reader shall judge for

himself.

The same tradition claims that the body was hauled from the cabin to the

graveyard upon a rough wooden frame or sled, and that such was the

disorder of the journey that the corpse was jolted off the sled and

“tumbled on its face in a little bottom,” on the banks of Waxhaw Creek,

near the crossing.

The man who was riding the horse, which was hitched to the sled, had not

known that he had lost his load until one of the funeral party in

advance, happening to look back, saw “the sled bouncing up and down, in

a very light way.”

They had to go back miles before they came to the spot where the body

had rolled off the sled.

The numerous biographers of Andrew Jackson have shunned this local

tradition as something entirely too horrible to put in print; yet books

are only valuable to the extent that they tell the truth. The story is

useful as an illustration of the extreme roughness of frontier

conditions at that time; the poverty of the Jacksons, and the rude

simplicity of border funerals.

The immigrant had gone into the unbroken wilderness to build his log

cabin; and apparently there was no wagon road from his “clearing” to the

Waxhaw Settlement.

The use of the wooden frame or sled to carry the body on, would indicate

more strongly the lack of a road than the lack of a wagon, for, even

though the Jacksons had no such vehicle, the Waxhaw relatives would have

brought one if there had been a passable road. The corpse, tumbling off

the sled and being left behind on its face in the little bottom, is

uncanny, but to the dead the uncanny is not the uncommon.

The brilliant soldier--son of the Emperor Charles V--Don John of

Austria, who broke the sea-power of the Turks in the battle of Lepanto,

died dismally in the Netherlands; and his body was carried on horse-back

to Spain, in two sacks--half of the body in one sack and half in the

other.

When Abraham Lincoln died, his face discolored so rapidly that those in

charge, to save the feelings of the people who would want to gaze upon

the revered features, painted out the shocking discoloration; and, thus

artificially masked, the martyred President was borne to his tomb.

* * * * *

The widow Jackson and her two little boys did not go back to the

distant, lonely cabin on Twelve Mile Creek. From the church-ground where

the husband and father had been buried, they went to the home of George

McCamie, who had married Mrs. Jackson’s sister. Here, within a fortnight

of the funeral, a son was born to the widow; and this son she named

Andrew, after his father.

As soon as she was able to travel, the widow Jackson left the McCamie

home and went to live with James Crawford, her brother-in-law.

Mrs. Crawford was an invalid, and Mrs. Jackson took charge of the

Crawford housekeeping. Thus she and two of her boys lived for several

years, the oldest son, Hugh, remaining with George McCamie.

[Illustration: ANDREW JACKSON.]

The family name of Andrew Jackson’s mother was Hutchinson. She had, at

least, a primary English education, for it was she who taught Andrew to

read. That she was a woman of strong, lovable traits, is proven by the

sound advice she impressed upon the mind of her great son, and by the

passionate attachment to her which he carried throughout his life.

After the battle of New Orleans, when the victor had been crowned with

laurel in the Cathedral and acclaimed like a demi-god through the

streets, it was of his mother that he spoke to the officers whom he was

about to disband--their glorious work being done.

“_Gentlemen, if only_ SHE _could have lived to see this day!_”

As you follow the narrative of Andrew Jackson’s career, you will hear

him say many things that you will not approve, will see him do many

things which you cannot applaud, but when you recall that at the very

top-notch of his success and his pride, his heart stayed in the right

place, and was sore because his mother could not be there to gladden her

old eyes with the glory of her son--you will forgive him much in his

life that was harsh and cruel and utterly wrong.

During each Winter, for two or three years, after he had reached the age

of seven, Andrew Jackson was sent to the old-field school of a Mr.

Branch. After this, he attended the select school which a Presbyterian

preacher, Dr. David Humphreys, taught in the Waxhaw settlement. He

appears to have been going to this higher school in the spring of 1780,

when the inroad of Tarleton created a panic in that portion of the

Carolinas. At some later period of his youth, he is said to have

attended the old Queen College or Seminary at Charlotte a couple of

terms, but the time is not definitely known.

As to education, therefore, it may be safely stated that Andrew Jackson

enjoyed much more than the ordinary advantage of a back-woods boy of his

time. At the age of ten, he had become so good a reader that he was

often chosen to read the newspaper to the assembled neighbors; and he

remembered with pride, in after years, that he had thus had the honor of

“reading out loud” the Declaration of Independence upon its arrival in

the Waxhaws. For a lad of ten this was, indeed, something to remember

with honest pride.

He also learned to write “a good hand,” which can be easily read even to

this day: he was well up in arithmetic, and was fond of geography:

grammar he detested, as most of us did. While yet a school-boy he wrote

a composition which was in the nature of a patriotic proclamation,

reminding his countrymen that they must expect occasional defeats and

that they could hope to win only by steady effort and resolute courage.

From the advent of Tarleton, in 1780, and the Buford Massacre, until the

surrender of Cornwallis, the widow Jackson and her boys were tossed

hither and thither in the whirlwind of the Revolutionary War. The people

of the Carolinas were divided, as they were in other states, some being

Tories and in favor of remaining as subjects of Great Britain, while the

majority were Whigs, and in favor of Independence.

The feud between the two local factions waxed bitter, splitting into

savage groups almost every neighborhood, and often setting in hostile

array, the one against the other, members of the same family.

The troops sent over to this country by King George committed many

atrocities, some of which historians have shrunk from recording, but it

is also true that many a nameless horror was perpetrated by our own

people upon each other. In the later stages of the conflict, almost no

mercy was shown by Tory to Whig, or by Whig to Tory.

After Gates’ disastrous defeat at Camden, Andrew Jackson made his home

for a while at the house of Mrs. Wilson, a distant connection of Mrs.

Jackson. This lady lived a few miles from Charlotte. During his stay

with her, Andrew made himself useful pulling fodder, going to mill,

driving the cows to pasture, gathering vegetables for the table,

carrying in the wood, and taking farm tools to the blacksmith shop to be

mended.

Mrs. Wilson had a son who became Andrew Jackson’s playmate and friend;

and this son, who was afterward a prominent minister of the Gospel, used

to relate that whenever young Jackson went to the blacksmith shop he

would bring back with him some new weapon, spear, club, tomahawk, or

grass blade with which to kill the British.

Dr. Wilson remembered having told his mother one day, when speaking of

Jackson, “Mother, Andy will fight his way in the world.”

A girl of the neighborhood, who became in due time Mrs. Smart, happened

to see Andrew Jackson as he passed along the road, on his way to the

home of Mrs. Wilson.

She described the lad as being almost a scarecrow. He was riding a

little grass-fed pony or colt, which was so small that the long thin

legs of “the gangling fellow,” Jackson, could almost meet under the

horse’s belly. The rider wore a wide-brimmed hat which flapped down over

his face, which was yellow and worn. His figure was covered with dust,

and as this Knight of the Sorrowful Countenance galloped along the road,

he and his shabby little horse presented the forlornest spectacle that

had ever greeted the laughing eyes of the girl who was to become known

in Jacksonian annals as Mrs. Susan Smart.

Hugh Jackson, the oldest of the three boys, joined the band of patriots

which was raised and equipped, at his own expense, by that noble leader,

Colonel William R. Davie, of South Carolina. Only sixteen years of age,

Hugh Jackson left the field hospital, where he had been suffering from

fever, and joined in the assault upon Stono Ferry. The excitement, the

exertion, the heat of the day (June 20, 1779), brought on a relapse, and

the gallant youth died.

As to Andrew Jackson, he himself said,

“Take it altogether, I saw and heard a good deal of war in those days,

but did nothing toward it myself worth mention.”

However, he further stated that he acted for Colonel Davie as mounted

orderly, or messenger, “being a good rider and familiar with all the

roads in those regions.”

He witnessed the battles of Hanging Rock and Hobkirk’s Mill, and took

part in a skirmish with the Tories at the house of Captain Sands.

Andrew and Robert Jackson were taken prisoners, and it was while so held

that the boys were ordered, Robert first and then Andrew, to clean the

boots of one of Tarleton’s lieutenants. Both refused, and to each was

dealt a savage sabre-cut which had much to do with Robert’s death soon

afterward, and which gave to Andrew a scar and a hatred which he bore to

his grave.

To the rescue of her boys, came Mother Jackson, she who was “as gentle

as a dove and as brave as a lioness.”

The lads were so young, and were in such a desperate plight with

smallpox, that the British officers were perhaps glad to get rid of such

an encumbrance; at any rate they were released or exchanged, and the

forlorn group, the mother and her sick boys, journeyed back to their

home.

But Robert was already so far gone that he died; and when the smallpox

left Andrew he was a mere skeleton. “It took me all the rest of the year

(1781) to recover my strength and get flesh enough to hide my bones.”

To the sacred cause of liberty, Elizabeth Jackson had already given two

of her sons. The third had barely escaped a like fate. But the

golden-hearted woman was not to be cast down, or taught cowardly

prudence. No sooner was Andrew out of danger, than she sent him to the

home of Joseph White, another brother-in-law, and set out, herself, to

carry food and medicine to the sick and wounded patriots who were

confined in the British hulks in Charleston Harbor.

Braver, it may be, than the soldier himself is the battlefield nurse who

brings water to his parched lips, bandages to his bleeding wound, tender

ministrations to his dying hours.

May it yet come to pass that some time, SOME TIME, in the unfolding of

higher and better things, these angels of Mercy, the Good Women of the

Christian Nations, may be able to rush in between the lines, as _once_

happened in the days of old, and stay the hands lifted to shed human

blood!

Elizabeth Jackson, in the spirit of consecration, went to what seemed to

her the post of duty, thinking nothing of the cost to herself.

They were in prison--her neighbors, friends, compatriots--and she did

visit them. She brought to the suffering prisoners words of comfort;

messages from home; the motherly sympathy which heals like a balsam; the

kind word which is sweeter than myrrh.

Then the ministering angel, the best of all created things, a good

woman, passed out of the ship, carrying with her the deadly fever which

knew no difference betwixt the good and the bad. After a brief illness

she died, and she was buried near Charleston; but, like her husband, her

dust lies in a grave that cannot be found.

After the loss of his mother (in the fall of 1781), Andrew Jackson

remained with Joseph White, a saddler by trade, helping him in his shop,

in the making and mending of saddles and harness. At the same time, he

read everything he could lay his hands on--books, pamphlets and

newspapers. His uncle’s father was a local magistrate, possessed of a

book of law forms and rules of common practice. Most young men would lay

such a book underneath a volume of Sermons, and then spread a layer of

dust over both; but Andrew Jackson afterward said that he read and

re-read the law book until he knew it by heart.

But at this period in his growth an unfortunate thing happened. The

death of his father and his brothers had left Andrew Jackson the

heir-at-law to a considerable part of the estate of Hugh Jackson, of

Carrickfergus, his grandfather.

The amount, some fifteen hundred or two thousand dollars, was just about

enough to unsettle the average young man, jostling him out of the

routine of dull, monotonous industry--saddle-mending, for example.

The legal representative of the Hugh Jackson estate, in America, was the

William Barton, of Charleston, at whose house Elizabeth Jackson had

died. Why it was that he turned over the money to the young man before

he became of age is not explained. Perhaps Andrew wanted the money, and

had made up his mind to get it. If so, the conduct of Barton is

comprehensible. Whenever Andrew Jackson wanted a thing and made up his

mind to get it, he could become a most troublesome customer. At all

events, Mr. Barton paid over the money to the boy, and the boy sowed

wild oats with it.

He bought a fine horse, and fine equipments for the horse; he bought

fine raiment for his own person, including a gold watch; he bought a

fine pair of pistols, so that he would be ready in case it became

desirable to shoot somebody. In short, he went to going all the gaits of

a fast young man, until his money was gone.

At the last, he made a bet which would have swept away even his horse,

had he lost; but luck favored him; he won; and it is a convincing proof

of his inborn good sense that he immediately paid up his debts, and rode

his fine horse away from Charleston and its allurements.

CHAPTER II.

STUDYING LAW!

To that stage had Andrew Jackson came, in 1785, steered by the unseen

forces which govern the world. It is doubtful whether he himself could

have explained how he happened to drift into that profession rather than

some other.

In the finding of one’s life-work there is much more of feeling around

in the dark than is generally supposed. Cervantes did not begin to write

Don Quixote until he had tried success by many routes, and had landed on

the wrong side of a prison door. Bacon’s best work was done after his

disgrace as an officer of state and after Queen Elizabeth had expressed

the weighty opinion that he didn’t know much law.

Oliver Goldsmith, the neglected physician, wrote “The Deserted Village”

and “The Vicar of Wakefield” after he had waited in vain for patients

bringing fees.

Had Napoleon been a success as an author, he might never have meddled

with politics.

Had General Lew Wallace been a success as a soldier, he might never have

written “Ben Hur.”

Had U. S. Grant been a money-maker at the outbreak of the Civil War, he

might never have commanded on the winning side at Appomattox.

Had Sam Houston been able to wear with credit the harness of social and

political existence in Tennessee, he might never have thrown himself

amid the wilder men of the Southwest and won fame as a builder of

empire!

Patrick Henry’s failure in other fields shunted him into the legal

profession; and Jefferson’s partial failure as a lawyer became a

stepping-stone into the higher calling of practical statesmanship.

Happy is the man who can find out, early in life, the work which he is

best fitted to do. Among the most pitiable of the wretched is he who

grows old at a task which, too late, he learns was not set for _him_.

The gray-haired school-teacher or commonplace preacher, who realizes

that he should have been a merchant, lawyer, doctor or civil engineer,

is pathetic. To know what to try to do is the great problem, and it may

be that even the men who succeed in their chosen calling could have

rendered mankind better service in some other field.

Henry Brougham’s shrewd old mother bewailed his quitting the House of

Commons to don the robes of Lord Chancellor: Dr. Samuel Johnson lamented

the fate which never gave him a chance to try his hand in Parliament:

Edmund Burke writhed under Goldsmith’s famous lashing of him “who to

party gave up what was meant for mankind.”

What is it that draws the most ambitious men of modern times into “the

study of law”?

The reward, of course. All things considered, no other profession offers

so great a return upon the investment of time, talent and industry.

While the nations are standing in arms, clothed in steel from head to

foot, the purpose is not so much to fight as to discourage attack from

without and insurrection from within. The standing army gives the

education whose watchword is “_Obey!_” It cultivates the class-pride and

prejudice upon which caste rule is built. It interests millions of

citizens in the maintenance of “Law and Order”--the law which imposes

the yoke of the ruling caste and the order which restrains its victims

from revolt.

The military profession, therefore, is one which irresistibly attracts

very many aspirants to influence, to position, to power; but even the

military profession does not win over so many ambitious young men as

does “the study of the law.”

In the building up of our civilization we have complicated matters to

such an extent that the lawyer is indispensable, almost omnipotent.

Does the layman know anything about his own rights as a citizen? Very

little. Upon the simplest things only is he informed. At every turn he

finds himself under the necessity of getting help from the lawyer. Great

is the corporation--the bank, the railroad, the trust--but the

corporation dares not move a step without a lawyer in the pilot-house.

From the Justice’s Court in the rural district and the Mayor’s Court in

the village, all the way up to Presidential policies and Governmental

problems, the lawyer is the doctor who must be called in to look at the

tongue of the difficulty, and to write out a prescription.

In the business world the lawyer levies his tribute upon the great and

the small, the rich and the poor, the hayseed farmer and the silk-hat

financier.

Our Wall Street Money-Kings would no more think of organizing a rascally

scheme of High Finance without the help of lawyers than the buccaneers

of old would have thought of flying the pirate flag without guns on

board.

In the political world the lawyer is omnipresent, indispensable.

Who organizes the Machine and steers the Boss on his cruise, keeping him

off the reefs and bars of the Criminal Code?

The lawyer.

Who maps out the campaign, devises a fraud upon the people which the

statute cannot quite reach, and then, after the election has been stolen

from the people, shows the Boss how to keep the stolen goods in defiance

of right and in spite of the legal proceedings?

The lawyer.

Who is it that the beneficiaries of class-legislation naturally select

to advance their claims, voice their demands, guard their interests in

the legislatures of states, in the Congress of the United States, in the

Cabinet of the President?

The lawyer.

Under our system, so complex has it become, the man who wants to do

right doesn’t know how. Except in the simplest transactions, a lawyer

must show him how. If, on the contrary, a bad man wants to do wrong, but

wants to escape punishment, he needs, and can generally get, a lawyer to

show him the way.

The innocent man, accused of crime, needs a lawyer; is not safe without

one, and may be convicted, even then, if he happens to employ a sorry

one, who can be outwitted by the prosecution.

The guilty man, accused of crime, needs a lawyer; is not safe without

one; and if he employs a good one, while the prosecution is managed by a

sorry one, the jury may be forced to turn him loose, although they feel

that he is “as guilty as a dog.”

Thus, looked at from the standpoint of mere ambition, sordid

selfishness, the “study of law” powerfully attracts young men who want

to get on in the world.

But there is another point of view--thank God!

It is not every student of Blackstone or Coke who licks his chops, by

anticipation, over the sweets of mental prostitution.

It is not every student of the law who means to become the jackal to the

lion, the doer of dirty work for hire, the seller of divinely fashioned

genius to the highest bidder--with the morals of a harlot, without that

excuse of dire necessity which the harlot can often give.

In most cases the boy who comes to the study of the law is actuated by

nobler motives, a higher purpose. A generous ambition to gain knowledge,

to fit himself for a leader’s place among men, to arm himself with the

weapons which enable him to fight the battles of the weak and to defend

the right against the wrong, find place in his mind and heart, just as

they do in the beautiful language of the oath which he must take.

Almost in the very words--and quite in the identical spirit--that

ancient Chivalry solemnly swore the Knight-Errant to his duty, pledging

him to champion the cause of the weak and the oppressed, the oath of

office consecrates the young lawyer to his work by the same holy vows.

For it must be remembered that no profession has a more glorious

tradition and heritage than that of the law.

The Crusaders who have in modern times gone forth to redeem the Holy

Sepulchre of Truth from the Infidel have been led, by whom?

The lawyer.

The Knight-Errant who rode forth, panoplied in burnished steel, to break

the chains, lift the yoke, batter down the prison door of the captive,

the weak, the oppressed, has been, whom?

The lawyer.

Great was Mirabeau, but he dreamt only of changing France into a

constitutional monarchy, leaving Divine Right on the throne and

hereditary Privilege in force.

It was Danton, the lawyer, who led _the Revolution_, and sketched the

Democratic state, in which all the people should rule for the benefit of

all.

It was the lawyer who led in the long, hard fight for Civil liberty in

England; the lawyer who slew the monsters of her Criminal Code; the

lawyer who armed the private citizen with school-book and ballot.

It was the lawyer who pleaded Ireland’s cause at the bar of Public

Opinion, wrung from British intolerance Religious Freedom, compelled the

recognition of the Irishman’s rights in Irish land, and so won upon the

conscience and the fear of the ruling caste that the triumph of the

Cause of Ireland has become a question of time rather than a matter of

doubt.

In our own history, whose record is better than that of the lawyer?

Would our forefathers ever have gone to war with Great Britain had they

awaited the lead of Benjamin Franklin, John Dickinson and George

Washington?

_Never in the world._

Not until Patrick Henry and Dabney Carr and Thomas Jefferson and James

Otis and John Adams and Alexander Hamilton, _the hot-headed young

lawyers_, had fired the woods, and the flames were leaping onward with a

rush which none could stop, did those more cautious and conservative

citizens, Franklin, Dickinson and Washington, commit themselves to the

movement of the Colonies against the Mother Country.

The lawyer lit the signal fires of that Revolution, the lawyer wrote the

Declaration of Independence, the lawyer framed the Constitution, the

lawyer organized the Government. The lawyer struck down Feudalism in

America, wrote the statute for Religious Liberty, swung wide the doors

of individual opportunity, and forged, ready for use, every weapon

against tyranny which a free people need to protect themselves from

oppression.

Even at that early period there was another side to the shield, not so

bright as that which I have presented, but, throughout the Revolutionary

Era, the patriotic service of the lawyer was so splendidly conspicuous

that the reverse side of the shield was as the spot on the sun.

When Andrew Jackson rode into Salisbury, N. C. (1785), and put up at the

Rowan House, the old-fashioned tavern, he was eighteen years old, and

had already gone to the school of experience, to an extent which few of

his future competitors for national honor had equaled.

His boyhood had breathed in the hot atmosphere of war. The sound of

musketry, of rifle fire, of cannon play, had been familiar to his ear.

The sight of bloodshed, scenes of carnage, the ruthless deeds of Tory

hate and Whig revenge had burnt their impressions upon mind and heart.

The dangers amid which he had lived, the hardships which he had endured,

the lust of victory and the panic of defeat, the sudden flight from the

deadly attack, the narrow escape from awful death, the loss of his

brothers and mother, the imprisonment and maltreatment of himself, the

wild disorders and appalling cruelties of foreign invasion added to

Civil strife--all these things were factors in the molding of Andrew

Jackson.

When he entered the office of Spruce McCay to read law under that

influential attorney, he had already given evidence of the traits of

character which afterward made him one of the best loved and best hated

men that ever lived.

It had already been shown that he would fight at the drop of a hat; that

he was headstrong, impatient of contradiction, and overbearing. Weaker

boys who turned to him for protection got it. He would “take up” for the

small boy, and, if need were, wage his battle. He was high-tempered,

quick as powder, hard to get along with--and the boy who laughed at him

because he had what was called “a slobber mouth” had to run or fight.

He had shown that he was fond of outdoor life, outdoor sport games, and

recreations. He loved to hunt, was a good shot, an expert horseman and

rode admirably, excelled in running and jumping. Some say that even when

thrown by a stronger man he “wouldn’t stay throwed”; others relate that

John Lewis could out-jump him and throw him down; and that when John

Lewis threw him, Andy _did_ “stay throwed.” That he was believed to have

a generous nature is proven by the fact that he is said to have been a

great friend to this same John Lewis.

The eighteen-year old Jackson had already shown his fondness for

gambling at cards, on chicken fights and horse races, on the throw of a

dicebox, on almost any sort of game or contest. He was known also as a

wild young fellow who would drink too much whisky, indulge in too many

coarse practical jokes, and who, when inflamed by anger, could out-curse

anybody in all the regions round about.

During his stay of two years in Salisbury Jackson’s character continued

to unfold itself along those lines. He was not much of a student; it is

not recorded that he did any office work for Spruce McCay; nor does any

biographer explain how it was that he paid for his board and lodging.

It seems that he kept his horse, and that he was active in horse-racing,

cock-fighting, card-playing circles; but it is not probable that he

relied upon his winnings to pay his way.

How, then, did he do it?

Perhaps his work as school-teacher should be assigned to this period of

his life, and it is possible that some remnant of his legacy may have

tided him over.

Illustrative of the rougher side of his character is the practical joke

which he played upon the eminent respectabilities of Salisbury by

sending cards of invitation to the Christmas ball to two notorious

strumpets of the town. The unclean birds came to the ball, as per Andrew

Jackson’s cards, and the uproar in the fowl-house was considerable. But

Andy was a great favorite with the ladies--as “wild” young men have ever

been--and he succeeded in getting rid of the disturbers and at the same

time holding the admiration of the eminently respectable.

Another anecdote of the period represents him engaged with boon

companions in a carousal, which lasted throughout the night and wound up

with a general smashing of all the furniture in the room.

A flood of light is poured upon his standing with the “unco’ good and

rigidly righteous” at this time by the exclamation of the old lady of

Salisbury, who, on being told, forty years later, that Andrew Jackson

was a candidate for President, cried out:

“What! Jackson up for President? _Jackson?_ _Andrew_ Jackson? The

Jackson that used to live in Salisbury? Why, when he was here, he was

such a rake that my husband would not bring him into the house! It is

true, he _might_ have taken him out to the stable to weigh horses for a

race, and might drink a glass of whisky with him _there_. Well, if

Andrew Jackson can be President, anybody can.”

From the office of Judge Spruce McCay Jackson went to that of Colonel

John Stokes, where he continued his studies until he thought himself

ready for admission to the Bar. In the spring of 1787 he applied for and

received his license to practice law.

For a year after his admission to the Bar he appears to have lived at a

village in Martinsville, N. C., where two friends of his kept a store.

Tradition says that he helped them in running the business, and that he

accepted a local position as constable or deputy-sheriff. At any rate,

he realized soon that he was gaining no foothold in North Carolina, and

he made up his mind to try his fortune in the new country beyond the

mountains, where Robertson and Donelson and Sevier were planting the

beginning of another state on the Cumberland.

Before we follow Jackson into Tennessee, let us pause “to take his

picture.”

He was tall and slender--standing six feet and one inch in height.

Carrying himself straight as a ramrod, and stepping with a quick,

springing clearlift walk, he made the impression upon the observer that

he was as active as a cat--lithe, sinewy, tough, and with not a lazy

bone in his body.

He had a shock of red hair, and a pair of fine blue eyes, which rested

unwinkingly upon one in conversation, and which blazed when he was

aroused. His face was sallow, freckled, long, thin, angular, with a

fighting jaw.

His bearing toward men was open, frank, confident, self-assertive.

Toward women he was deferential, most attentive and polite. Surprising

as it may seem, there is no room for doubt that Andrew Jackson’s manner

toward ladies was from the first, captivating to a marked degree. By the

time he reached the age of eighteen he had developed a taste for good

dressing. The same trait which led him to want the finest-looking horse,

the richest caparison, the best pistols and guns, the best dogs and game

chickens, led him to choose for himself a style of wearing apparel, both

in the material and the make, which was far above the average of the

backwoods.

Some of his lady friends went to the courthouse the day he was examined

for admission to the Bar, and one of these has left a description of him

as he then appeared.

Those who recall Albert Gallatin’s statement that Jackson, when in

Congress, looked and dressed like an uncouth backwoodsman may not be

able to reconcile his testimony with that of Mrs. Anne Rutherford, who

says:

“He always dressed neat and tidy, and carried himself as if he was a

rich man’s son.

“The day he was licensed he had on a new suit, with a broadcloth coat,

ruffled shirt, and other garments in the best of fashion.”

There is no disputing about taste; and the reader is left to the

conclusion that a style of dressing which appeared to be the best of

fashion to a country girl of North Carolina may have seemed “irregular”

to such a cosmopolitan gentleman as Gallatin.

The red breeches of Thomas Jefferson had been “the best of fashion” in

Paris, but when he wore them in New York, as a member of Washington’s

Cabinet, social rumblings were heard and social upheavals feared.

(To be Continued.)

[Illustration]

The Blue Chamber.

BY PROSPER MERIMEE.

A young man was walking up and down the waiting room of a railway

station, in an agitated condition. He wore blue spectacles, and,

although he had not a cold, he used his pocket-handkerchief incessantly.

He held a little black bag in his left hand which, as I learned later,

contained a silk dressing-gown and a pair of Turkish pantaloons.

Every now and again he went to the door and looked into the street, then

he drew out his watch and consulted the station clock. The train did not

leave for an hour; but there are people who always imagine they will be

late. This train was not for people in a pressing hurry; there were very

few first-class carriages in it. It was not an hour at which

stock-brokers left, after business was finished, to go to their country

homes for dinner. When travellers began to appear, a Parisian would have

recognized from their bearing that they were either farmers, or small

suburban tradesmen. Nevertheless, every time anyone came into the

station, or a carriage drew up at the door, the heart of the young man

with the blue spectacles became inflated like a balloon, his knees

trembled, his bag almost fell from his hands, and his glasses off his

nose, where, we may mention in passing, they were seated crookedly.

His agitation increased when, after a long wait, a woman appeared by a

side door, from precisely the direction in which he had kept a constant

lookout. She was dressed in black with a thick veil over her face, and

she held a brown morocco leather bag in her hand, containing, as I

subsequently discovered, a wondrous morning-gown and blue satin

slippers. The woman and the young man advanced towards each other

looking to right and left, but never in front of them. They came up to

one another, shook hands, and stood several minutes without speaking a

word, trembling and gasping, a prey to one of those intense emotions for

which I would give in exchange a hundred years of a philosopher’s life.

“Leon,” said the young woman, when she had summoned up courage to speak

(I had forgotten to mention that she was young and pretty)--“Leon, what

a happy thought! I should never have recognized you with those blue

spectacles.”

“What a happy thought!” said Leon. “I should never have known you under

that black veil.”

“What a happy thought!” she repeated. “Let us be quick to take our

seats; suppose the train were to start without us!...” (and she squeezed

his arm tightly). “No one will suspect us. I am now with Clara and her

husband, on the way to their country house, where, _tomorrow_, I must

say good-bye to her; ... and,” she added, laughing and lowering her

head, “she left an hour ago; and tomorrow, ... after passing _the last

evening_ with her, ... (again she pressed his arm), tomorrow in the

morning, she will leave me at the station, where I shall meet Ursula,

whom I sent on ahead to my aunt’s.... Oh! I have arranged everything.

Let us take our tickets.... They cannot possibly guess who we are. Oh!

suppose they ask our names at the inn? I have forgotten them

already....”

“Monsieur and Madame Duru.”

“Oh no! Not Duru. There was a shoemaker called that at the pension.”

“Dumont, then?”

“Daumont.”

“Very well. But no one will ask us.”

The bell rang, the door of the waiting-room opened, and the carefully

veiled young woman rushed into a carriage with her youthful companion.

The bell rang a second time, and the door of their compartment was

closed.

“We are alone!” they exclaimed delightedly.

But, almost at the same moment, a man of about fifty, dressed completely

in black, with a grave and bored expression, entered the carriage and

settled himself in a corner. The engine whistled, and the train began to

move. The two young people drew back as far as they could from their

unwelcome neighbor and began to whisper in English as an additional

precaution.

“Monsieur,” said the other traveller, in the same tongue, and with a

much purer British accent, “if you have secrets to tell each other, you

had better not tell them in English before me, for I am an Englishman. I

am extremely sorry to annoy you; but there was only a single man in the

other compartment, and I make it a rule never to travel alone with one

man only.... He had the face of a Judas and this might have tempted

him.”

He pointed to his travelling-bag, which he had thrown before him on the

cushion.

“But I shall read if I do not go to sleep.”

And, indeed, he did make a gallant effort to sleep. He opened his bag,

drew out a comfortable cap, put it on his head, and kept his eyes shut

for several minutes; then he reopened them with a gesture of impatience,

searched in his bag for his spectacles, then for a Greek book. At length

he settled himself to read, with an air of deep attention. While getting

his book out of the bag he displaced many things piled up hap-hazard.

Among others, he drew out of the depths of the bag a large bundle of

Bank of England notes, placed it on the seat opposite him, and, before

putting it back in the bag, he showed it to the young man, and asked him

if there was a place in N---- where he could change banknotes.

“Probably, as it is on the route to England.”

N---- was the place to which the young people were going. There is quite

a tidy little hotel at N----, where people seldom stop except on

Saturday evenings. It is held out that the rooms are good, but the host

and his helpers are far enough away from Paris to indulge in this

provincial vice. The young man whom I have already called by the name of

Leon, had been recommended to this hotel some time previously, when he

was minus blue spectacles, and, upon his recommendation, his companion

and friend had seemed desirous of visiting it.

She was, moreover, at that time in such a condition of mind that the

walls of a prison would have seemed delightful, if they had enclosed

Leon with her.

In the meantime the train journeyed on; the Englishman read his Greek

book, without looking towards his companions, who conversed in that low

tone that only lovers can hear. Perhaps I shall not astonish my readers

when I tell them that these two were lovers in the fullest acceptation

of the term, and what was still more deplorable, they were not married,

because there were reasons which placed an obstacle in the way of their

desire.

They reached N----, and the Englishman got out first. Whilst Leon helped

his friend to descend from the carriage without showing her legs, a man

jumped on to the platform from the next compartment. He was pale, even

sallow; his eyes were sunken and bloodshot, and his beard unkempt, a

sign by which great criminals are often detected. His dress was clean,

but worn almost threadbare. His coat, once black, but now grey at the

back and by the elbows, was buttoned up to his chin, probably to hide a

waistcoat still more shabby. He went up to the Englishman and put on a

deferential tone.

“Uncle!” he said.

“Leave me alone, you wretch!” cried the Englishman, whose grey eyes

flashed with anger; and he took a step forward to leave the station.

“Don’t drive me to despair,” replied the other, with a piteous and yet

at the same time menacing accent.

“Will you be good enough to hold my bag for a moment?” said the old

Englishman, throwing his travelling-bag at Leon’s feet.

He then took the man who had accosted him by the arm, and led, or rather

pushed, him into a corner, where he hoped they would not be overheard,

and there he seemed to address him roughly for a moment. He then drew

some papers from his pocket, crumpled them up, and put them in the hand

of the man who had called him uncle. The latter took the papers without

offering any thanks, and almost immediately took himself off and

disappeared.

As there is but one hotel in N---- it was not surprising that, after a

short interval, all the characters of this veracious story met together

there. In France every traveller who has the good fortune to have a

well-dressed wife on his arm is certain to obtain the best room in any

hotel; so firmly is it believed that we are the politest nation in

Europe.

If the bedroom that was assigned to Leon was the best, it would be rash

to conclude that it was perfect. It had a great walnut bedstead, with

chintz curtains, on which was printed in violet the magic story of

Pyramis and Thisbe. The walls were covered with a colored paper

representing a view of Naples and a multitude of people; unfortunately,

idle and impertinent visitors had drawn moustaches and pipes to all the

figures, both male and female, and many silly things had been scribbled

in lead-pencil in rhyme and prose on the sky and ocean. Upon this

background hung several engravings: “Louis Philippe taking the Oath of

the Charter of 1830,” “The first Interview between Julia and

Saint-Preux,” “Waiting for Happiness,” and “Regrets,” after M. Dubuffe.

This room was called the Blue Chamber, because the two arm-chairs to

left and right of the fireplace were upholstered in Utrecht velvet of

that color; but for a number of years they had been covered with

wrappers of grey glazed calico edged with red braid.

Whilst the hotel servants crowded round the new arrival and offered

their services, Leon, who, although in love, was not destitute of common

sense, went to order dinner. It required all his eloquence and various

kinds of bribes to extract the promise of a dinner by themselves alone.

Great was his dismay when he learnt that in the principal dining-room,

which was next his room, the officers of the 3rd Hussars, who were about

to relieve the officers of the 3rd Chasseurs at N----, were going to

join at a farewell dinner that very day, which would be a lively affair.

The host swore by all his gods that, except a certain amount of gaiety

which was natural to every French soldier, the officers of the Hussars

and Chasseurs were known throughout the town for their gentlemanly and

discreet behavior, and that their proximity would not inconvenience

madam in the least; the officers were in the habit of rising from table

before midnight.

As Leon went back to the Blue Chamber but slightly reassured, he noticed

that the Englishman occupied the other room next his. The door was open,

and the Englishman sat at a table upon which were a glass and a bottle.

He was looking at the ceiling with profound attention, as though he were

counting the flies walking on it.

“What matter if they are so near,” said Leon to himself. “The Englishman

will soon be tipsy, and the Hussars will leave before midnight.”

On entering the Blue Chamber his first care was to make sure that the

communicating doors were tightly locked, and that they had bolts to

them. There were double doors on the Englishman’s side, and the walls

were thick. The partition was thinner on the Hussars’ side, but the door

had a lock and a bolt. After all, this was a more effectual barrier to

curiosity than the blinds of a carriage, and how many people think they

are hidden from the world in a hackney carriage!

Assuredly the most opulent imagination could certainly never have

pictured a more complete state of happiness than that of these two young

lovers, who, after waiting so long, found themselves alone and far away

from jealous and prying eyes, preparing to relate their past sufferings

at their ease and to taste the delights of a perfect reunion. But the

devil always finds out a way to pour his drop of wormwood into the cup

of happiness.

Johnson was not the first who wrote--he took it from a Greek

writer--that no man could say, “Today I shall be happy.” This truth was

recognized at a very remote period by the greatest philosophers, and

yet is ignored by a certain number of mortals, and especially by most

lovers.

Whilst taking a poorly served dinner in the Blue Chamber from some

dishes filched from the Hussars’ and the Chasseurs’ banquet, Leon and

his lover were much disturbed by the conversation in which the gentlemen

in the neighboring room were engaged. They held forth on abstruse

subjects concerning strategy and tactics, which I shall refrain from

repeating.

There were a succession of wild stories--nearly all of them broad and

accompanied by shrieks of laughter, in which it was often difficult for

our lovers not to join. Leon’s friend was no prude; but there are things

one prefers not to hear, particularly during a tete-a-tete with the man

one loves. The situation became more and more embarrassing, and when

they were taking in the officers’ dessert, Leon felt he must go

downstairs to beg the host to tell the gentlemen that he had an invalid

wife in the room adjoining theirs, and they would deem it a matter of

courtesy if a little less noise were made.

The noise was nothing out of the way for a regimental dinner, and the

host was taken aback and did not know what to reply. Just when Leon gave

his message for the officers, a waiter asked for champagne for the

Hussars, and a maidservant for port wine for the Englishman.

“I told him there was none,” she added.

“You are a fool. I have every kind of wine. I will go and find him some.

Port is it? Bring me the bottle of ratafia, a bottle of quince and a

small decanter of brandy.”

When the host had concocted the port in a trice, he went into the large

dining-room to execute Leon’s commission, which at first roused a

furious storm.

Then a deep voice, which dominated all the others, asked what kind of a

woman their neighbor was. There was a brief silence before the host

replied--

“Really, gentlemen, I do not know how to answer you. She is very pretty

and very shy. Marie-Jeanne says she has a wedding ring on her finger.

She is probably a bride come here on her honeymoon, as so many others

come here.”

“A bride?” exclaimed forty voices. “She must come and clink glasses with

us! We will drink to her health and teach the husband his conjugal

duties!”

At these words there was a great jingling of spurs, and our lovers

trembled, fearing that their room was about to be taken by storm. All at

once a voice was raised which stopped the manœuvre. It evidently

belonged to a commanding officer. He reproached the officers with their

want of politeness, ordered them to sit down again and to talk decently,

without shouting. Then he added some words too low to be heard in the

Blue Chamber. He was listened to with deference, but, nevertheless, not

without exciting a certain amount of covert hilarity. From that moment

there was comparative quiet in the officers’ room; and our lovers,

blessing the salutary reign of discipline, began to talk together with

more freedom.... But after such confusion it was a little time before

they regained that peace of mind which anxiety, the worries of

travelling, and, worse than all, the loud merriment of their neighbors,

had so greatly agitated. This was not very difficult to accomplish,

however, at their age, and they had very soon forgotten all the troubles

of their adventurous expedition in thinking of its more important

consequences.

They thought peace was declared with the Hussars. Alas! it was but a

truce. Just when they expected it least, when they were a thousand

leagues away from this sublunary world, twenty-four trumpets, supported

by several trombones, struck up the air well known to French soldiers,

“La victoire est nous!” How could anyone withstand such a tempest? The

poor lovers might well complain.

* * * * *

But they had not much longer to complain, for at the end the officers

left the dining-room, filed past the door of the Blue Chamber with a

great clattering of spurs and sabres, and shouted one after the other--

“Good night, madam bride!”

Then all noise ceased. No, I am mistaken; the Englishman came out into

the passage and cried out--

“Waiter! bring me another bottle of the same port.”

Quiet was restored in the hotel of N----. The night was fine and the

moon at the full. From time immemorial lovers have been pleased to gaze

at our satellite. Leon and his lover opened their window, which looked

on a small garden, and breathed with delight the fresh air, which was

filled with the scent of a bower of clematis.

They had not looked long, however, before a man came to walk in the

garden. His head was bowed, his arms crossed, and he had a cigar in his

mouth, Leon thought he recognized the nephew of the Englishman who was

fond of good port wine.

* * * * *

I dislike useless details, and besides, I do not feel called upon to

tell the reader things he can readily imagine, nor to relate all that

happened hour by hour in the inn at N----. I will merely say that the

candle which burned on the fireless mantle-piece of the Blue Chamber was

more than half consumed when a strange sound issued from the

Englishman’s room, in which there had been silence until now; it was

like the fall of a heavy body. To this noise was added a kind of

cracking, quite as odd, followed by a smothered cry and several

inarticulate words like an oath. The two young occupants of the Blue

Chamber shuddered. Perhaps they had been waked up suddenly by it. The

noise seemed a sinister one to both of them, for they could not explain

it.

“Our friend the Englishman is dreaming,” said Leon, trying to force a

smile.

But although he wanted to reassure his companion, he shivered

involuntarily. Two or three minutes afterwards a door in the corridor

opened cautiously, as it seemed, then closed very quietly. They heard a

slow and unsteady footstep which appeared to be trying to disguise its

gait.

“What a cursed inn!” exclaimed Leon.

“Ah, it is a paradise!” replied the young woman, letting her head fall

on Leon’s shoulder. “I am dead with sleep....”

She sighed, and was very soon fast asleep again.

A famous moralist has said that men are never garrulous when they have

all their heart’s desire. It is not surprising, therefore, that Leon

made no further attempt to renew the conversation or to discourse upon

the noises in the hotel at N----. Nevertheless, he was preoccupied, and

his imagination pieced together many events to which in another mood he

would have paid no attention. The evil countenance of the Englishman’s

nephew returned to his memory. There was hatred in the look that he

threw at his uncle even while he spoke humbly to him, doubtless because

he was asking for money.

What would be easier than for a man, still young and vigorous, and

desperate besides, to climb from the garden to the window of the next

room? Moreover, he was staying at the hotel, and would walk in the

garden after dark, perhaps ... quite possibly ... undoubtedly, he knew

that his uncle’s black bag contained a thick bundle of bank-notes....

And that heavy blow, like the blow of a club on a bald head! ... that

stifled cry! ... that fearful oath! and those steps afterwards! That

nephew looked like an assassin.... But people do not assassinate in a

hotel full of officers. Surely the Englishman, like a wise man, had

locked himself in, specially knowing the rogue was about.... He

evidently mistrusted him, since he had not wished to accost him bag in

hand.... But why allow such hideous thoughts when one is so happy?

Thus did Leon cogitate to himself. In the midst of his thoughts, which I

will refrain from analyzing at greater length, and which passed in his

mind like so many confused dreams, he fixed his eyes mechanically on the

door of communication between the Blue Chamber and the Englishman’s

room.

In France, doors fit badly. Between this one and the floor there was a

space of nearly an inch. Suddenly, from this space, which was hardly

lighted by the reflection from the polished floor, there appeared

something blackish and flat, like a knife blade, for the edge which the

candlelight caught showed a thin line which shone brightly. It moved

slowly in the direction of a little blue-satin slipper, which had been

carelessly thrown close to this door. Was it some insect like a

centipede?... No, it was no insect. It had no definite shape.... Two or

three brown streams, each with its line of light on its edges, had come

through into the room. Their pace quickened, for the floor was a

sloaping one.... They came on rapidly and touched the little slipper.

There was no longer any doubt! It was a liquid, and that liquid, the

color of which could now be distinctly seen by the candlelight, was

blood! While Leon, paralyzed with horror, watched these frightful

streams, the young woman slept on peacefully, her regular breathing

warming her lover’s neck and shoulder.

* * * * *

The care which Leon had taken in ordering the dinner on their arrival

at the inn of N---- adequately proved that he had a pretty level head, a

high degree of intelligence and that he could look ahead. He did not in

this emergency belie the character we have already indicated. He did not

stir, and the whole strength of his mind was strained to keep this

resolve in the presence of the frightful disaster which threatened him.

I can imagine that most of my readers, and, above all, my lady readers,

filled with heroic sentiments, will blame the conduct of Leon on this

occasion for remaining motionless. They will tell me he ought to have

rushed to the Englishman’s room and arrested the murderer, or, at least,

to have pulled his bell and rung up the people of the hotel. To this I

reply that, in the first case, the bells in French inns are only room

ornaments, and their cords do not correspond to any metallic apparatus.

I would add respectfully, but decidedly, that, if it is wrong to leave

an Englishman to die close by one, it is not praiseworthy to sacrifice

for him a woman who is sleeping with her head on your shoulder. What

would have happened if Leon had made an uproar and roused the hotel? The

police, the inspector and his assistant would have come at once. These

gentlemen are by profession so curious, that, before asking him what he

had seen or heard, they would have questioned him as follows:--

“What is your name? Where are your papers? And what about Madame? What

were you doing together in the Blue Chamber? You will have to appear at

the Assizes to explain the exact month, at what hour in the night, you

were witnesses of this deed.”

Now it was precisely this thought of the inspector and officers of the

law which first occurred to Leon’s mind. Everywhere throughout life

there are questions of conscience difficult to solve. Is it better to

allow an unknown traveller to have his throat cut, or to disgrace and

lose the woman one loves?

It is unpleasant to have to propose such a problem. I defy the cleverest

person to solve it.

Leon did then what probably most would have done in his place. He never

moved.

He remained fascinated for a long time with his eyes fixed upon the blue

slipper and the little red stream which touched it. A cold sweat

moistened his temples, and his heart beat in his breast as though it

would burst.

A host of thoughts and strange and horrible fancies took possession of

him, and an inward voice cried out all the time, “In an hour all will be

known, and it is your own fault!” Nevertheless, by dint of repeating to

himself “Qu’allais-je faire dens cette galere?” he finished up by

perceiving some few rays of hope. “If we leave this accursed hotel,” he

said to himself at last, “before the discovery of what has happened in

the adjoining room, perhaps they may lose trace of us. No one knows us

here. I have only been seen in blue spectacles, and she has only been

seen in a veil. We are only two steps from the station, and should be

far away from it in an hour.”

Then, as he had studied the time-table at great length to make out his

journey, he recollected that the train for Paris stopped at eight

o’clock. Very soon afterward they would be lost in the vastness of that

town, where so many guilty persons are concealed. Who could discover two

innocent people there? But would they not go into the Englishman’s room

before eight o’clock? That was the vital question.

Quite convinced that there was no other course before him, he made a

desperate effort to shake off the torpor which had taken possession of

him for so long, but at the first movement he made his young companion

woke up and kissed him half-consciously. At the touch of his icy cheek

she uttered a little cry.

“What is the matter?” she said to him anxiously. “Your forehead is as

cold as marble.”

“It is nothing,” he replied in a voice which belied his words. “I heard

a noise in the next room....”

He freed himself from her arms, then he moved the blue slipper and put

an armchair in front of the door of communication, so as to hide the

horrid liquid from his lover’s eyes. It had stopped flowing, and had now

collected into quite a big pool on the floor. Then he half opened the

door which led to the passage, and listened attentively. He even

ventured to go up to the Englishman’s door, which was closed. There were

already stirrings in the hotel, for day had begun. The stablemen were

grooming the horses in the yard, and an officer came downstairs from the

second story, clinking his spurs. He was on his way to preside at that

interesting piece of work, more agreeable to horses than to men, which

is technically known as _la botte_.

Leon re-entered the Blue Chamber, and, with every precaution that love

could invent, with the help of much circumlocution and many euphemisms

he revealed their situation to his friend.

It was dangerous to stay and dangerous to leave too precipitately; still

much more dangerous to wait at the hotel until the catastrophe in the

next room was discovered.

There is no need to describe the terror caused by this communication, or

the tears which followed it, the senseless suggestions which were

advanced, or how many times the two unhappy young people flung

themselves into each other’s arms, saying, “Forgive me! forgive me!”

Each took the blame. They voiced to die together, for the young woman

did not doubt that the law would find them guilty of the murder of the

Englishman, and as they were not sure that they would be allowed to

embrace each other again on the scaffold they did it now to suffocation,

and vied with each other in watering themselves with tears. At length,

after having talked much rubbish and exchanged many tender and harrowing

words, they decided, in the midst of a thousand kisses, that the plan

thought out by Leon, to leave by the eight o’clock train, was really the

only one practicable, and the best to follow. But there were still two

mortal hours to get through. At each step in the corridor they trembled

in every limb. Each creak of boots proclaimed the arrival of the

inspector.

Their small packing was done in a flash. The young woman wanted to burn

the blue slipper in the fireplace; but Leon picked it up and, after

wiping it by the bedside, he kissed it and put it in his pocket. He was

astonished to find that it smelt of vanilla, though his lover’s perfume

was “Bouquet de l’Imperatrice Eugenie.”

Everybody in the hotel was now awake. They heard the laughing of

waiters, servant-girls singing at their work, and soldiers brushing

their officers’ clothes. Seven o’clock had just struck. Leon wanted to

make his friend drink a cup of coffee, but she declared that her throat

was so choked up that she should die if she tried to drink anything.

Leon, armed with the blue spectacles, went down to pay the bill. The

host begged his pardon for the noise that had been made; he could not at

all understand it, for the officers were always so quiet! Leon assured

him that he had heard nothing, but had slept profoundly.

“I don’t think your neighbor on the other side would inconvenience you,”

continued the landlord; “he did not make much noise. I bet he is still

sleeping soundly.”

Leon leant hard against the desk to keep from falling, and the young

woman, who had followed him closely, clutched at his arm and tightened

the veil over her face.

“He is a swell,” added the pitiless host. “He will have the best of

everything. Ah! he is a good sort. But all the English are not like him.

There was one here who is a skinflint. He thought everything too dear;

his room, his dinner. He wanted me to take a five-pound Bank of England

note in settlement of his bill for one hundred and eighty-five francs,

... and to risk whether it was a good one! But stop, Monsieur; perhaps

you will know, for I heard you talking English with Madam.... Is it a

good one?”

With these words he showed Leon a five-pound bank-note. On one of its

corners there was a little spot of red which Leon could readily explain

to himself.

“I think it is quite good,” he said in a stifled voice.

“Oh, you have plenty of time,” replied the host; “the train is not due

here till eight o’clock, and it is always late. Will you not sit down,

Madam? You seem tired.”

At this moment a fat servant-girl came up.

“Hot water, quick,” she said, “for milord’s tea. Give me a sponge, too.

He has broken a bottle of wine and the whole room is flooded.”

At these words Leon fell into a chair, and his companion did the same An

intense desire to laugh overtook them both, and they had the greatest

difficulty in restraining themselves. The young woman squeezed his hand

joyfully.

“I think we will not go until the two o’clock train,” said Leon to the

landlord. “Let us have a good meal at midday.”

[Illustration]

The Lake of The Dismal Swamp.

BY JEANNETTE HOLLY.

At an early day in the history of our Nation, there had emigrated to the

Southeastern shore of the Old Dominion, an English gentleman, whose

manners and carriage bespoke aristocratic lineage, and whose free use of

money made it evident to those in the same locality, that he must have

been a man of parts in the country whence he had come.

He had bought up acres and acres of the land lying contiguous to the

Dismal Swamp, but occupied a hewn log house some miles distant from that

place of ill repute. The report gained credence that he had left the Old

Country “for the good of his health,” in other words, his knowledge of

and participation in the plots and counter-plots against the government,

made it safer for both himself and some, whose fingers had ever held the

pulse of the Nation, that he should live elsewhere; and we find him

making himself a home across the waters, with stint of nothing, for a

vessel never made harbor, that it did not bring a large consignment to

Theodore Stanton.

In the course of time he erected for himself and family a commodious

house, many of the necessary materials coming from abroad, and he was

ever ready to welcome to his board any wayfarer with whom he came in

contact.

It was during the time that his house was building, and he had been

scouring the country for help for the work, when one day, a young Indian

boy presented himself at his door asking, “Work for me do?” He spoke

very indifferent English, but Mr. Stanton understood he had come in

response to his inquiries for hands, and he asked, “What can you do?”

“Ride horse, shoot gun, hunt deer.”

His appearance appealed to Mr. Stanton, and he nodded his head saying,

“You can hunt deer and bear for me, eat.”

That seemed satisfactory and from that time on, he called Mr. Stanton’s,

home, and sure enough supplied the family with all the game they could

use.

But his especial attention seemed to be paid to Mr. Stanton’s little

girl, Alice, to whom he was devoted, and who never seemed so happy or

contented, as when perched on Powhatan’s shoulders and scouring the

country for flowers, nuts or berries. He had been at his chosen home

now, for a long time, and had learned to speak and understand our tongue

very well. He said he was descended from old Chief Powhatan and that

little Pocahontas was his kin, but that his father had been badly

treated and set aside and would not go with his tribe of Indians; but if

any questions were asked, as to where his father was, a stolid look

would settle over his countenance, and he would make no reply;

occasionally he would disappear, and be gone for a day or two, but

always came back, ready for his appointed duty, to hunt the meat for Mr.

Stanton. He was as straight as an arrow, and it required little

imagination to believe he might be descended from a line of kings, his

bearing was so dignified and regal. To no one was he communicative or

unbending, save little Alice, over whom he watched with jealous care.

Mrs. Stanton, Alice’s mother, had never liked him, and often expressed

uneasiness at the feeling that seemed to exist between her ewe lamb, and

this dusky son of the forest, and she begged her husband to consign her

to her sister’s care, in England, in that way breaking up the

association, and giving Alice, at the same time, opportunities for

education that she would lack in the States.

“No, wife, don’t ask me that; I have made sacrifices enough, God knows.

I cannot stand to be parted from my little one; send for tutors,

governesses or any other sort of SSS, that you want, I will bear all

expense, but let me see my dear daughter every day, that’s a dear.” Mrs.

Stanton said no more, but she watched with ever growing sorrow; the glow

of pride that came to Powhatan’s dark countenance, when gazing at

“Laughing Water,” as he called Alice.

The gentle girl was now turning sixteen, and had developed into great

loveliness, but seemed wholly unconscious of her charms, and really I

believe, that was the one thing that drew so many worshippers to her

shrine.

About this time a party of gentlemen had arrived from old England,

looking at lands for the settlement of some emigrants who were anxious

to throw in their fate with the new settled country, and among them were

the sons of some of Mr. Stanton’s early and close friends.

Frank Berkley, nephew of the ex-governor, was among the number, and

soon won his way to the hearts of old and young alike, by his kindliness

and sprightliness.

Alice seemed unusually lively, when he was regaling her with his

exploits at college or his tilts with the fair sex at home, and her

merry laugh would ring out at his bright wit or mirthful sallies.

None seemed to observe the vengeful scowls Powhatan would throw at the

jolly crowd, as he crossed and recrossed the Hall, but would never enter

the parlor, nor join in any of the sports. I said none--none save the

anxious mother, who ever had her eye on her darling and when as a great

secret Alice confided to her, that Frank wanted to take her across the

water with him as his bride, she assented cheerfully, for she felt that

to be the only way to save her child from some direful fate.

The party was going farther West, making explorations, and would return

about Christmas time, to enjoy the festivities of that season under Mr.

Stanton’s hospitable roof, and would then take shipping for home.

Farewells were said, and all were well on their way, but Frank lingered.

“Stay with us, Frank,” Alice said tearfully, “we will be so lonely when

you are gone,” and Frank felt he would willingly tear his heart out, if

it would comfort the little girl he had grown to love so much in two

months.

“But,” he said, “my darling, then I would be accounted a laggard in

duty, for don’t you know I was put in charge of this expedition; and

will be held strictly accountable for its failure?”

“Oh!” she said, “Frank, forgive me. I will not be such a baby. I know

you will soon be back, and I will try to scare away the blues and bid

you a cheerful good-bye,” and he never forgot to his dying day, how she

put her arms around his neck and kissed him a fond farewell. The last

echo brought to him her parting words, “back soon.” They did not know

that an eye had watched their parting, and the owner of that orb, had

trembled with rage when he witnessed the caress.

Powhatan tried to coax her to ride or row, and had made and painted pure

white, a little canoe for her, but she told him it made her tired to use

the oars. “Come and see what a beauty your boat is, Minnehaha; you care

no more for your poor Powhatan,” he said sadly.

“Oh yes, I do,” she replied, “but I worked so hard entertaining papa’s

friends, I must rest up, but I will see the boat,” and taking his hand

she ran lightly to the barn, to see and admire the little white canoe,

with places all around the top for lights to be inserted, when the

candles were lit at night; it certainly made a beautiful show. But his

coaxing could not induce her to go on the water in it, and the craft was

only rigged up to show to her friends, and still remained in Powhatan’s

workshop. The mornings were beginning to be frosty and the air to show

that the weeks had passed along and soon now, they might look for the

return of the friends. Wild turkeys were killed and dressed, venison

hams were baked and boiled, and the array of cakes and pies in the

pantry, looked most tempting. On the afternoon of the 23d of December,

Mr. Stanton was decorating the rooms, under the supervision of his good

wife, and calling to Alice, said, “Daughter, we do need some holly so

much, could you not take one of the boys, and get some from the wood on

the swamp road? I must hie me to the postoffice or would get it myself.”

“Oh, yes, Pop, I will take my pony and John and soon be back.”

As she went out Powhatan met her, and having heard what Mr. Stanton

said, begged to be allowed to accompany her, saying, “I will take care

of you, Minnehaha.” So she could not well refuse, and when he had

saddled her pony and old Thunder for himself, they mounted and rode

off.

The father returned with the mail, the mother dressed for the evening

meal, but Alice came not.

“Oh father,” she cried, “where can she be?” and the mother grew restless

and uneasy. Presently seeing John approaching, Mr. Stanton called out,

“John, where is Miss Alice, boy?”

“Sir, I didn’t go with her; she went long that Injun, he say he take

good care of her.” Mrs. Stanton was almost beside herself. Wringing her

hands, she begged her husband for “God’s sake,” to take some of the men

and seek the child, ere she was lost in the dreadful swamps. Searching

parties scoured the country all that night, and when the next morning,

Mr. Berkeley and his friends arrived, they, too, joined in the hunt,

which was kept up for a whole week, but nothing was ever discovered,

save Alice’s little pony, quietly grazing on the edge of the swamp.

A rumor came, that from the highest point overlooking the Lake in the

Dismal Swamp, a huge black horse, with two riders, was seen to jump

directly into the lake and never rose again. From the same fisherman,

who dwelt on some high knoll in the swamp the report was scattered far

and wide, that at 10 o’clock every bright night was seen a little white

canoe, lit with firefly lamps, pushed swiftly through the waters of the

lake by a beautiful girl with fair locks floating over her shoulders.

The story was that she crossed the lake and then disappeared in the dark

woods beyond. But nothing was ever seen or heard of Alice or her dusky

lover again. Mrs. Stanton took to her bed and died of a broken heart,

leaving young Berkley to care for the stricken old man, who was soon

laid beside her in the garden that had been sweet Alice’s playground.

Mr. Stanton left everything he had to Frank Berkley who mourned

sincerely for his lost love.

Educational Department.

CONDUCTED BY THOS. E. WATSON.

Various Phases of the Money Question.

_Hon. Thomas E. Watson, Thomson, Ga._:

DEAR SIR:--Your logical editorial in your October magazine under the

caption of “The Money Changer and the Politician” hit the bull’s eye and

went straight to the heart of the subject. I heartily endorse the

editorial. Hon. A. S. J. S----, a very able and conservative gentleman

and also a gold bug as we sometimes denominate them, takes issue with

you, as to some of your assertions, and as the Doctor is a subscriber to

your magazine and very much open to conviction I am led, as a result of

a pleasant discussion with him to ask you some questions on said

editorial for the purpose of drawing you out more fully on the subject

for the Doctor’s special benefit and for general light on the money

question.

The questions that I propound embody the objections of the Doctor to

what he otherwise concedes to be an able elaboration of the question

under discussion.

You say, “Sparta rose to be a state of the first class on a currency of

iron; Rome became Mistress of the World on legal tender copper; coined

silver did not come into use until the Northern barbarian beat down her

frontiers; gold held no place in the coinage till the imperialism of the

Caesars had taken its lead in her decline.”

(1) Do you mean to say, that gold and silver did not exist as currency,

prior to that period referred to in the passage just quoted?

The Doctor says you are all wrong here and asks that your authority for

the declaration be given.

(2) He wants you to give more explicitly your authority for contending

that paper money is Constitutional; he combats the idea of the

Constitutionality of a paper currency, asserting that gold and silver is

the money of the Constitution and not paper.

(3) What is your authority for saying that Mr. Cleveland ruled that

Governmental notes which were payable _in coin_ should be redeemed in

_gold only_? He disputes this.

(4) In your glowing description of the effects of paper currency, during

the wars referred to by you, how it fed and clothed the soldier and kept

starvation from those the soldiers left at home--he asserts that the

gold and silver currency in circulation during the times you allude to

could have accomplished all you claim; independent of a paper currency.

(5) Was the paper money issued by the Confederate Government during the

Civil War as good at any time, during said war, as the paper money

issued by the Federal Government during the same war? If not, why not?

Understand me, I am perfectly in accord with you. I am asking these

questions in order that you may have an opportunity to knock the

sophisticated props from under the gold bug delusions and the people

given the plain facts.

Respectfully,

W. M. HAIRSTON.

* * * * *

ANSWER.

(1) Yes. Gold and silver were used in commerce and commodities, even as

precious metals, _but not as legal tender money_. The legal tender money

of Sparta was of iron. Lycurgus made it so, for a special purpose. See

Plutarch’s “Lives,” or Aristotle on “Government.”

The legal tender money of Rome was copper during all the long and bloody

years of her relentless and resistless march to world-power.

Gold and silver were used in commerce _on the basis of barter_--but not

on any other.

Neither gold nor silver were coined _into legal tender money_, until

_after_ Rome had become Mistress of the World.

See any standard History of Rome--Mommsen’s for instance; and see, also,

Del Mar’s “Money and Civilization.”

(2) Paper money _is_ Constitutional, for the reason that the

Constitution, itself, gives to Congress the right to coin legal tender

money, and the Supreme Court of the United States, in a case brought to

test that very question, decided, in effect, that the word coin, as used

in the Constitution, has the sense of “create,” and that Congress can

create legal tender money out of paper, if it sees fit to do so.

Congress _had_ seen fit to do so, for the good and sufficient reason

that the expenses of the Government had increased to more than a million

dollars per day, and there was no specie money in the Treasury.

The Government made money out of paper because it had nothing else to

make it out of.

Ground hog case, Doctor.

(3) The facts in the case. The Contracts were payable in coin, just as

in France. The _option_, of payment in silver or in gold, belonged to

the Government _under the words and in the spirit of the contract_.

In France, it was the same. The creditors claimed payment in gold, both

in this country and in France.

The French Government calmly bossed the situation _as any real

Government should_, and paid the contracts as _it_ pleased _in either_

“coin.” When the French Government felt like paying gold coin, gold was

paid. When the Government felt like paying silver coin, silver was paid.

In either case, the creditor got what his contract entitled him to

get--COIN.

But Mr. Cleveland’s “Government” was not so robust. He took it into his

head that “the bankers had the country by the leg.” In fact, he told Mr.

Oates of Alabama that such was the case.

Absurd!

No _real Government_ would ever get into that kind of blue funk.