My progress was somewhat slower than I had anticipated; for, in many
places, the bushes grew very thick, and tangled underwood sometimes
prevented the possibility of advancing in a straight line.
Occasionally, too, a piece of swampy ground retarded me sadly; but
after having once caught sight of the wider part, or rather wood-road,
on the right, I always returned to within a few yards of it whenever
any impediment forced me to make a circuit, knowing that it must
necessarily lead into the high-road to Jerusalem. I thus exposed
myself, it is true, to some danger of being seen.
But we are all, I suppose, curious creatures in one respect. Whatever
may be said of man's selfishness, and by whatsoever strange cause a
sort of transposition of self into another may be supposed to be
brought about, certain it is that he who is the least careful, perhaps
reckless, of his own life, becomes wonderfully cautious, and even
timid, when one whom he loves is involved in the same peril with
himself. I am fully of opinion, from the difference of my feelings
that day, when Bessy was with me and when I was alone, that no
military or naval man should have his wife with him in camp or on
shipboard.
I felt, as I walked on, as if I could have routed a whole troop of
those insurgent negroes. I had a double-barrelled gun, well charged; a
pistol and a sword; and I thought I could answer for the lives of four
at least. Besides, the conviction grew upon me that these men would be
easily disheartened. The murder of women and children, I thought,
could be no very exhilarating remembrance; and whatever may be said of
the courage of despair, I am certain that the man who fights with a
rope round his neck is sure to fight ill.
However, neither I nor they were put to the test upon the present
occasion. All was quiet as I walked along; and athwart the path,
wherever I caught sight of it, poured the calm beams of the declining
sun, unchequered by the shadow of a living thing.
Several times I was tempted to go back by the thought of Bessy, and
the fear that some danger might approach her during my absence; still,
I believed it better to make sure that the wood, up to the junction of
the two roads, was clear, and I walked on.
At length I came to a spot where, through an opening of the trees, I
caught a glimpse of what seemed a sandy streak running along before
me; and a moment after I heard a voice crying,--
"Hi, hi! haw, John, haw!"
I hurried on with a glad heart, in the thought that I might find some
farmer driving his team to the town. When I came within sight,
however, I perceived it was only a negro carter, sitting on a barrel
in front of a heavily-laden cart, and driving a team of oxen by his
voice along the high-road to the county town. At first, I was tempted
to send a message by him to the sheriff and magistrates; but,
remembering the looseness which besets a negro's tongue, I judged he
was more likely to tell it to the first person of his own colour whom
he met, than to carry it to those for whom it was intended.
He did not perceive me as I stood among the bushes, but went on, now
urging his slow beasts on their way, now breaking forth into a
beautiful negro song, called "The Shocking of the Corn." The easy
indifference with which he went,--his apparent unconsciousness of any
subject of agitation or alarm, was a great comfort to me. I argued, in
the first place, that the high-road was clear of the enemy; and, in
the second place, that the insurrection could not have spread very
far; for had he been conscious of its existence, instead of sitting
there on his barrel, with his chin bent almost down to his knees, he
would have been gazing about in every direction with all the excitable
curiosity of a negro.
Satisfied that Bessy could proceed in safety towards Jerusalem, I
turned upon my steps, and made my way slowly back towards the meeting
of the paths. Though my mind was certainly much more at ease, yet I
took care to cast my eyes round on every side as far as possible,
seeking for any indication that could confirm or impair my sense of
security.
I met with nothing, however, till I came to a very narrow path, if
path it could be called, along which a man might make his way on foot,
but which seemed scarcely wide enough for any one to pass on
horseback; and yet upon the green grass which covered it, I saw the
print of several horses' hoofs. They might have been there when I
passed before, but I had not remarked them; and this sight was the
cause of fresh anxiety to me, as great as the sight of the savage's
footprint to Robinson Crusoe on his desert island.
The only thing to be done, however, was to hurry forward and rejoin
Bessy as soon as possible. I listened for every sound as I went, but I
heard nothing. There was no report of fire-arms, no scream or cry,
except that of a blue jay as he flew from tree to tree.
At length, I reached the junction of the roads, upon both of which I
saw the marks of horses' hoofs. Whether they were fresh or not, I
could not distinguish, for the ground was dry and sandy; and they
might very well have been left, I thought, by horsemen who had passed
in the morning.
Pushing my way on through the bushes, I presently came to a little
open space not more than a hundred and fifty yards from the angle
where the two paths joined, and in the midst I perceived a spot
covered with white ashes, and a sort of tripod of poles over it,
something like those on which our gipsies swing their kettles. This
was clearly the place where the mulatto women had been cooking; but
all were now gone, and with a feeling of dread I cannot express, I saw
the marks of horses' feet here also.
After one hasty glance around, which afforded no indication to base
any conclusion upon, I hurried on towards the spot where I had left
the dear girl with the two women, and made my way straight to it,
having taken care as I went to mark particular trees, so as to guide
me on my way back.
I came in sight of the little bank where it was first seen over the
bushes in front. Could I be mistaken? Bessy was not there! Could I
have missed the track, and come upon some spot in the mazes of the
forest like that where I had left her?
Vain hoping against hope! I broke through the bushes like some wild
animal pursued by dogs. I came rapidly on the ground. There could be
no more doubt or mistake. There were the fragments of the biscuits of
which we had made our scanty meal; there the paper in which they had
been wrapped; but not a living soul. Oh! how my heart sank!
But what had become of her? They had not killed her there, that was
clear; for no sign of a struggle was visible, and they were not likely
to impede their course by dragging a corpse away with them. Yet I
thought I saw upon the ground the traces of men's boots or
shoes--large, broad footmarks, and several of them. I could not be
very sure, for the ground was hard, and covered with dry grass. What I
saw might have been the marks of my own feet, and I stood bewildered
with feelings of dread and horror, such as I had never known in life
before.
I had heard of men losing their presence of mind in dangers and
difficulties. I had never known it in my own case; but now my brain
whirled. The thought of Bessy in the hands of those ruffians seemed to
confound, almost to annihilate, every other thought; and I stood for
more than one minute hesitating, undetermined, like a frightened girl.
Reason returned, at length, however. The first thing was to discover
some trace whither they had taken her, dead or alive. They must have
come from the angles of the roads, that was clear, and probably had
gone away by the other side. I examined the trees and bushes with
anxious care, and in one part, where they were not very thick, some of
the branches seemed bent back, and one twig I perceived was broken.
A step or two farther on, a large old tree stood prominently forward,
and on its rugged bark near the root was a small fragment of cotton
stuff, in colour resembling that in which the woman Jenny had been
dressed. This was the way they had dragged them, I concluded, and I
went on with steps which seemed sadly slow to the impatience of my
spirit. But I was too much alive to the necessity of watching the most
minute circumstances, if I would discover any trace of Bessy, to hurry
rashly on.
At length I came to a place covered thickly with tender wild plants,
about the height of my knee, and there I could clearly perceive, by
the crushed stems and leaves, that a number of persons must have
passed. But here, too, the troop seemed to have separated. The shrubs
were beaten down to the left, but very much more to the right, and the
party who had taken the latter course seemed to have bent their steps
in a direction almost back again.
After a moment's hesitation, I took the right-hand track, and found
traces of the band for a considerable distance. At length they ceased,
or, at all events, my eyes could detect them no longer. The party
seemed, in fact, to have separated, each man pursuing a course by
himself; and I stood anxious and confounded, not knowing which way to
take.
I cannot describe the pain of that moment; and now that it is all
over, it is hardly possible to convey to you all the fears, the pangs,
the anxieties, that pressed upon my mind and overloaded my heart. The
scene of blood and horror which I had witnessed at the house of Mr.
Travis, the blood dabbled bodies of the two lovely girls who had been
torn from their beds and gashed to death with hatchet-wounds, the
infant with its brains dashed out upon the floor, were all present to
my mind at that moment, and all connected themselves with the thought
of her I loved, and seemed only to illustrate the fate of Bessy
Davenport!
I felt as if I should go mad; but there was an eagerness, a
fierceness, pervading the wild, tumultuous sensations within me--a
spirit, good or evil, which seemed to cry eternally, "Find her! find
her, dead or alive! and take vengeance on her murderers, if thine own
life be the sacrifice!"
I could not consider accurately, or scan earnestly, which was the way
the larger or less bodies had taken; but after a moment of confused
and doubtful pause, I plunged headlong amongst the bushes, forcing my
way through the tangled laurels, as they are here called, till I came
to a more open space, where older trees rose out of the turf with very
little undergrowth.
The struggle with the obstacles in my way certainly had not calmed me;
but many a rapid thought had passed through my mind as I forced my
path on, and I paused on the more open ground to try to compose and
direct my thoughts.
The sun was now hardly an hour above the horizon; his slanting beams
passed in long stripes of light between the boughs of the old trees,
and gilded the grass beneath them; and as I gazed round, I fancied I
perceived that upon one somewhat various and circuitous track, every
here and there, was a dark little spot of shadow, as if something had
depressed the turf, and left an indentation which interrupted the long
lines of light. It was a man's footmark, and eagerly I followed it for
near a quarter of a mile.
At the end of that distance, I know not what it was made me pause. I
have heard of people, who, like some of the inferior animals, have a
sense, a strange mysterious impression of the vicinity of some noxious
creature--of a snake, a crocodile, a tiger. Such seemed, at that
moment, the case with me. I felt as if something loathed and dreaded
was near, and slackening my pace, and stepping noiselessly, I advanced
through the trees into one of those little open brakes which were
frequent in the forest. The moment I did so, my eyes fell upon a tall
negro-man lying at the foot of an oak, with a musket by his side. As
he lay, his face was turned a little away, and the boughs cast a deep
shadow over him; but the sound of my footfall, light as it was, made
him snatch up his gun, and start upon his feet in a moment; and, with
a strange feeling of satisfaction, I saw Nat Turner, the leader of
revolt, before me.
His musket and my gun were instantly levelled, and I heard the cock of
the musket click; but the next instant, the sun shining full on my
face, he recognized me, and exclaimed,--
"Hold hard, Englishman, hold hard! If you fire, you will never know
what you want to know."
The hope of finding Bessy was all powerful, and as he still held his
musket at his shoulder, I exclaimed,--
"Ground your arms, then, and I will ground mine."
He obeyed at once, trusting without hesitation to my honour. I dropped
the gun from my shoulder, and we stood for a moment or two gazing upon
each other, as if waiting to see who would speak the next word.