{101}
“He that questions whether God made the world, the Indian will teach
him. I must acknowledge I have received, in my converse with them,
many confirmations of those two great points: first, that ‘God is;’
second, ‘that he is a rewarder of all them that diligently serve
him.’”--Roger Williams.
Our readers’ sagacity has probably enabled them to penetrate the
slight mystery in which the circumstances that led to the apprehension
of Magawisca have been shrouded. Sir Philip Gardiner, after attending
Mrs. Grafton home on the Saturday night, memorable in the history of
our heroine, saw her enter the burial-place. Partly moved by his
desire to ascertain whether there was any cause for her running away
from him that might sooth his vanity, and partly, no doubt, by an
irresistible attraction towards her, he followed at a prudent distance
till he saw her meeting with Magawisca; he then secreted himself in
the thicket of evergreens, where he was near enough to hear and
observe all that passed; and where, as may be remembered, he narrowly
escaped being exposed by his dog.
Sir Philip had heard the rumour of a conspiracy among the natives; and
when he saw Magawisca’s extreme anxiety to secure a clandestine
interview with Miss Leslie, the probable reason for her secrecy at
once occurred to him. If he conjectured rightly, he was in possession
of a secret that might be of {102} value to the state, and, of course,
be made the means of advancing him in the favour of the governor. But
might he not risk incurring Miss Leslie’s displeasure by this
interposition in her affairs, and thus forfeit the object of all his
present thoughts and actions? He believed not. He saw that she yielded
reluctantly, and because she had no other alternative, to Magawisca’s
imposition of secrecy. With her romantic notions, it was most probable
that she would hold her promise inviolate; but would she not be bound
in everlasting gratitude to him who, by an ingenious manœuvre,
should, without in the least involving her honour, secure the recovery
of her sister? Thus he flattered himself he should, in any event,
obtain some advantage. To Miss Leslie he would appear solely actuated
by zeal for her happiness; to the governor, by devotion to the safety
and welfare of the Commonwealth.
Accordingly, on the following Monday morning, he solicited a private
interview with the magistrates, and deposed before them “that, on
returning to his lodgings on Saturday night, he had seen Miss Leslie
enter the burying-ground alone; that, believing she had gone to visit
some burial-spot consecrated by affection, and knowing the ardent
temper of the young lady, he feared she might forget, in the
indulgence of her feelings, the lateness of the hour. He had,
therefore, with the intention of guarding her from all harm, without
intruding on her meditations (which, though manifestly unseasonable,
might, he thought, tend to edification), followed her, and secluded
{103} himself in the copse of evergreens, where, to his astonishment,
he had witnessed her interview with the Indian woman.” The particulars
of their conversation he gave at length.
Unfortunately for Magawisca, Sir Philip’s testimony corresponded with
the story of a renegado Indian, formerly one of the counsellors and
favourites of Miantunnomoh. This savage, stung by some real or fancied
wrongs, deserted his tribe, and, vowing revenge, repaired to Boston,
and divulged to the governor the secret hostility of his chief to the
English, which, he said, had been stimulated to activity by the old
Pequod chief and the renowned maiden Magawisca.
He stated, also, that the chiefs of the different tribes, moved by the
eloquence and arguments of Mononotto, were forming a powerful
combination. Thus far the treacherous savage told the truth; but he
proceeded to state plots and underplots, and artfully to exaggerate
the number and power of the tribes. The magistrates lent a believing
ear to the whole story. They were aware that the Narragansetts, ever
since they had witnessed the defeat and extinction of their ancient
enemies the Pequods, had felt a secret dread and jealousy of the power
and encroachments of the English, and that they only waited for an
opportunity to manifest their hostility. Letters had been recently
received from the magistrates of Connecticut, expressing their belief
that a general rising of the Indians was meditated. All these
circumstances combined to give importance to {104} Sir Philip’s and
the Indian’s communications. But the governor felt the necessity of
proceeding warily.
Miantunnomoh had been the faithful friend and ally of the English. He
is described by Winthrop as a “sagacious and subtle man, who showed
good understanding in the principles of justice and equity, and
ingenuity withal.” Such a man it was obviously the policy of the
English not to provoke; and the governor hoped, by getting possession
of the Pequod family, to obtain the key to Miantunnomoh’s real
designs, and to crush the conspiracy before it was matured.
We have been compelled to this digression, in order to explain the
harsh reception and treatment of Magawisca; to account for the zeal
with which the governor promoted the party to the garden, and for the
signal which guided the boat directly to the Pequod family, and which
Sir Philip remained on the island to give. The knight had now got very
deep into the councils and favour of the magistrates, who saw in him
the selected medium of a special kindness of Providence to them.
He took good care
“That all his circling wiles should end
In feign’d religion, smooth hypocrisy;”
and, by addressing his arts to the predominant tastes and principles
of the honest men whom he deluded, he well sustained his accidental
advantage.
It would be vain to attempt to describe the various emotions of
Governor Winthrop’s family at the return of Hope Leslie. Madam
Winthrop, over-excited {105} by the previous events of the evening,
had fortunately escaped any farther agitation by retiring to bed,
after composing her nerves with a draught of valerian tea. Mrs.
Grafton, who had been transported with joy at the unlooked-for
recovery of Faith Leslie, was carried to the extreme of despair when
she saw the lifeless body of her beloved niece borne to her apartment.
Poor old Cradock went, like a certain classic bird, “up stairs and
down stairs,” wringing his hands, and sobbing like a whipped boy. The
elder Fletcher stood bending in mute agony over the child of his
affections, whom he loved with even more than the tenderness of a
parent. His tears, like those of old and true Menenius, seemed “salter
than a younger man’s, and venomous to his eyes;” and his good friend
Governor Winthrop, when he saw his distress, secretly repented that he
had acquiesced in a procedure that had brought such misery upon this
much-enduring man. Jennet bustled about, appearing to do everything,
and doing nothing, and hoping “to goodness’ sake the young lady would
come to herself, long enough, at least, to tell what had befallen
her:” “she always thought, she did, what her harem-scarem ways would
bring her to at last.” Miss Downing, without regarding, or even
hearing, these and many other similar mutterings, proceeded with
admirable presence of mind to direct and administer all the remedies
that were at hand, while Everell, almost distracted, went in quest of
medical aid.
A delirious fever succeeded to unconsciousness; {106} and for three
days Hope Leslie’s friends hung over her in the fear that every hour
would be her last. For three days and nights Esther Downing never
quitted her bedside, except to go to the door of the apartment to
answer Everell’s inquiries. Her sweet feminine qualities were now
called into action: she watched and prayed over her friend; and,
though her cheek was pale and her eye dim, she had never appeared half
so lovely to Everell as when, in her simple linen dressing-gown, she
for an instant left the invalid to announce some favourable symptom.
On the fourth morning Hope’s fever abated; her incoherent ravings
ceased, and she sunk, for the first time, into a tranquil sleep.
Esther sat perfectly still by her bedside, fearing to move, lest the
slightest noise should disturb her; she heard Everell walking in the
entry, as he had done incessantly, and stopping at every turn to
listen at the door. Till now, all her faculties had been in
requisition--her mind and body devoted to her friend--she had not
thought of herself; and if sometimes the thought of Everell intruded,
she blushed at what she deemed the unsubdued selfishness of her heart.
“Alas!” she said, “I am far from that temper which leads us to ‘weep
with those that weep,’ if I suffer thoughts of my own happy destiny to
steal in when my friend is in this extremity.” But these were but
transient emotions: her devotion to Hope was too sincere and
unremitting to afford occasion of reproach even to her watchful and
accusing conscience. But now, as she listened to Everell’s perturbed
footsteps, a new train {107} of thoughts passed through her mind.
“Everell has scarcely quitted that station. With what eagerness he has
hung over my words when I spoke of Hope! What a mortal paleness has
overspread his face at every new alarm! It would not, perhaps, have
been right, but methinks it would have been natural, that he should
have expressed some concern for me: I cannot remember that he has. How
often has he said to me, ‘Dear Esther, you will not leave her?’ and,
‘For the love of Heaven, trust her not a moment to the discretion of
her aunt;’ ‘Do not confide in Jennet;’ ‘Madam Winthrop has too many
cares for so delicate a charge: all depends on you, dear Esther.’ Yes,
he said _dear_ Esther; but how many times he has repeated it, as if
his life were bound up in hers. If I were in Hope’s condition, would
he feel thus? I could suffer death itself for such proofs of
tenderness. Sinful worm that I am, thus to dote on any creature.” The
serenity of her mind was disturbed: she rose involuntarily; as she
rose, her gown caught in her chair, and overthrew it. The chair fell
against a little stand by the bedside, covered with vials, cups, and
spoons, and all were overthrown, with one of those horrible clatters
that are as startling in a sick-room as the explosion of a magazine at
midnight.
Everell, alarmed by the unwonted noise, instinctively opened the door:
Hope awoke from her profound sleep and drew aside the curtain; she
looked bewildered, but it was no longer the wildness of fever:
thronging and indistinct recollections oppressed {108} her; but, after
an instant, a perfect consciousness of the past and the present
returned; she covered her eyes, and sank back on her pillow,
murmuring, “Thank God!” and tears of gratitude and joy stole over her
cheeks.
Esther lost every other emotion in unmixed joy. She went to the door
to Everell, who was still standing there as if he were transfixed. “It
is as you see,” she said; “the danger is past; she has slept sweetly
for three hours, and was now only disturbed by my carelessness: go to
your father with the good news; your face will tell it, even if your
lips refuse, as they do now, to move.”
They did now move, and the joy of his heart broke forth in the
exclamation, “You are an angel, Esther! My father owes to you the
preservation of his dearest treasure; and I--I--my life, Esther, shall
prove to you my sense of what I owe you.”
There was an enthusiasm in his manner that for the first time
satisfied Esther’s feelings; but, her religious sentiments habitually
predominating over every other, “I have been a poor but honoured
instrument,” she said; “let us all carry our thanksgivings to that
altar where they are due.” Then, after allowing Everell to press her
hand to his lips, she closed the door, and returned to Hope’s bedside.
Hope again put aside the bed-curtain: “Is not my sister here?” she
asked; “she must be here; and yet I can scarcely separate my dreams
from the strange accidents of that night.”
“She is here, safe and well, my dear Hope; but, {109} for the present,
you must be content not to see her: you have been very ill, and need
perfect rest.”
“I feel that I need it, Esther; but I must first know how it has fared
with Magawisca; she came on my solemn promise; I trust she has been
justly dealt by: she has been received as she deserved, Esther?”
Esther hesitated; but, seeing Hope’s lip quivering with apprehension,
and fearing the effects, in her weak state, of any new agitation, she,
for the first time in her life, condescended to an equivocation,
solacing herself with thinking that she ought to believe that
perfectly right which her uncle Winthrop appointed: she said,
“Magawisca has had a merited reception: now ask no more questions,
Hope, but compose yourself again to sleep.” If Hope had had the will,
she had not the power to disobey, for Nature will not be rifled of her
dues. But we must leave her to the restoring influence of the kindest
of all Nature’s provisions, to visit one from whom care and sorrow
banished sleep.
At an advanced hour of the following evening, Sir Philip Gardiner
repaired to the town jail, and was admitted by its keeper, Barnaby
Tuttle. The knight produced a passport to the cell of Thomas Morton,
and, pointing to the governor’s signature and seal, “You know that,
friend?” he said.
“As well as my own face; but I am loath to lead a gentleman of your
bearing to such an unsavoury place.”
“Scruple not, honest Master Tuttle; duty takes no note of time or
place.”
{110}
“You shall be served, sir, and with the better will, since you seem to
be, as it were, of a God-serving turn; but walk in, your worship, and
sit down in my bit of a place, which, though a homely one, and within
the four walls of a jail, is, I thank the Lord, like that into which
Paul and Silas were thrust, a place where prayers and praises are
often heard.”
Barnaby now lighted a candle, and while Sir Philip was awaiting his
dilatory preparations, he could not but wonder that a man of his
appearance should have been selected for an office that is usually
supposed to require a muscular frame, strong nerves, and a hardy
spirit. Barnaby Tuttle had none of these; but, on the contrary, was a
man of small stature, meager person, and a pale and meek countenance,
that bespoke the disposition that lets “I dare not wait upon I would.”
“Have you been long in this service of jailer?” asked Sir Philip.
“Six years, an please your worship, come the 10th day of next October,
at eight o’clock of the morning. I had long been a servant in the
governor’s own household, and he gave me the office, as he was pleased
to say, because he knew me trustworthy, and a merciful man.”
“But mercy, Master Barnaby, is not held to be a special qualification
for those of your calling.”
“It is not, sir? Well, I can tell your honour there’s no place it’s
more wanted; and here, in our new English colony, we have come, as it
were, under a new dispensation. Our prisoners are seldom {111} put in
for those crimes that fill the jails in Old England. Since I have been
keeper--six years next October, as I told you it is--I have had but
few in for stealing, and one for murder; and that was a disputed case,
there being no clear testimony; but, as he was proved to have lived an
atheist life, he was condemned to die, and at the last confessed many
sore offences, which, as Mr. Cotton observed in his sermon, preached
the next Lord’s day, were each and all held worthy of death by the
laws of Moses. No, sir, our prisoners are chiefly those who are led
astray of the devil into divers errors of opinions, or those who
commit such sins as are named at length in the Levitical law.”
“Ah,” said Sir Philip, with a well-pitched groan, “the depravity of
man will find a channel; stop it at one place, and it will out at
another. But come, friend Barnaby, time is going on: I’ll follow you.”
The jailer now led the way through a long, narrow passage, with doors
on each side which opened into small apartments. “Hark!” said Barnaby,
laying his hand on Sir Philip’s arm; “hear you that? It’s Gorton
praying: he and his company are all along in these wards; and betimes
I hear them calling on the Lord, like Daniel in the lions’ den, for
hours together. I hope it’s not a sin to feel for such woful heretics,
for I have dropped salt tears for them. Does not your honour think our
magistrates may have some way opened up for their pardon?”
“I see not how they can, Master Barnaby, unless these sore revilers
should renounce their heresies, {112} or,” he added, with an
involuntary sneer, fortunately for him, unobserved by his simple
companion, “or their title to the Indian lands.”
They had now arrived at one extremity of the passage, and Barnaby
selected a key from his bunch; but, before putting it in the lock, he
said, “Morton is in a little room within the Indian woman’s, taken the
other day.”
“So I understand; and by your leave, Master Tuttle, I would address a
private admonition to this Indian woman, who, as report saith, is an
obstinate heathen.”
“I suppose she is, your honour; they that should know say so. But she
hath truly a discreet and quiet way with her, that I would was more
common among Christian women. But, as you say you wish to speak in
private, I must beg your honour’s pardon for turning my bolt on you. I
will give you the light, and the key to the inner room; and when you
desire my attendance, you have but to pull a cord that hangs by the
frame of the door inside, and rings a bell in the passage: one word
more, your honour--be on your guard when you go into Morton’s cell. He
raves, by times, as if all the fiends possessed him; and then, again,
he sings and dances, as if he were at his revels on the Merry Mount;
and by times he cries--the poor old man--like a baby, for the
twenty-four hours round; so that I cannot but think a place in the
London Hospital would be fitter for him than this.”
“Your feelings seem not to suit with the humour of your profession,
Master Tuttle.”
{113}
“Maybe not, sir; but there is a pleasure in a pitiful feeling, let
your outward work be ever so hard, as, doubtless, your worship well
knows.”
Sir Philip felt that conscience sent a burning blush to his hardened
cheek; and he said, with an impatient tone, “I have my instructions:
let me pass in, Master Tuttle.” Barnaby unlocked the door, gave him
the candle, and then turned the bolt upon him.
Magawisca was slowly pacing the room to and fro; she stopped, uttered
a faint exclamation at the sight of her visiter, then turned away as
if disappointed, and resumed her melancholy step. Sir Philip held up
his candle to survey the apartment. It was a room of ordinary size,
with one small grated window, and containing a flock-bed and a
three-legged stool, on which stood a plate of untasted provisions.
“Truly,” said he, advancing into the room, “generous entertainment,
this, for a hapless maiden.” Magawisca made no reply, and gave no heed
to him, and he proceeded: “A godly and gallant youth, that Everell
Fletcher, to suffer one who risked her life, and cast away a precious
limb for him, to lie forgotten here. Methinks, if he had a spark of
thy noble nature, maiden, he would burn the town, or batter down this
prison wall for you.” An irrepressible groan escaped from Magawisca,
but she spoke not.
“He leaves you here, alone and helpless, to await death,” continued
the knight, thus venting his malignity {114} against Everell, though
he saw that every word was a torturing knife to the innocent maiden;
“death, the only boon you can expect from these most Christian
magistrates; while he, with a light heart and smirking face, is
dancing attendance on his lady-love.”
“On whom?” interrupted Magawisca, in a tone of fearful impatience.
“On her who played so faithfully the part of decoy-pigeon to thee.”
“Hope Leslie! My father, then, is taken?” she screamed.
“Nay, nay, not so; thy father and brother both, by some wondrous
chance, escaped.”
“Dost thou speak truth?” demanded Magawisca, in a thrilling voice, and
looking in Sir Philip’s face as if she would penetrate his soul; “I
doubt thee.”
The knight opportunely bethought himself of having heard Magawisca,
during her interview with Hope Leslie, allude to the Romish religion:
he took a crucifix from his bosom, and pressed it to his lips. “Then,
by this holy sign,” he said, “of which, if you know aught, you know
that to use it falsely would bring death to my soul, I swear I speak
truly.”
Magawisca again turned away; and drawing her mantle, which, in her
emotion, had fallen back, close over her shoulders, she continued to
pace the apartment without bestowing even a look on Sir Philip, who
felt himself in an awkward predicament, and found it difficult to
rally his spirits to prosecute the object of his visit. But habitually
confident, and, {115} like all bad men, distrusting the existence of
incorruptible virtue, he soon shook off his embarrassment, and said,
“I doubt, maiden, you would breathe more freely in the wild wood than
in this stifling prison, and sleep more quietly on the piled leaves of
your forests than on that bed that Christian love has spread for you.”
Magawisca neither manifested by word nor sign that she heard him, and
he proceeded more explicitly: “Do you sigh for the freedom of Nature?
Would you be restored to it?”
“Would I! would the imprisoned bird return to its nestlings?” She now
stopped, and looked with eager inquiry on Sir Philip.
“Then listen to me, and you shall learn by what means and on what
terms you may escape from this prison, and beyond the reach of your
enemies. Here,” he continued, producing from beneath his cloak a rope
ladder and a file and wrench, “here are instruments by which you can
remove those bars, and by which you may safely descend to the ground.”
“Tell me,” cried Magawisca, a ray of joy lighting her eyes, “tell me
how I shall use them.”
Sir Philip explained the mode, enjoined great caution, and then
proceeded to say, “By to-morrow night at twelve you can remove the
bars; the town will then be still; proceed directly to the point where
you last landed, and a boat shall there be in readiness, well manned,
to convey you beyond danger.”
“Well--well,” she replied, with breathless eagerness, “now tell me
what I am to do; what a poor {116} Indian prisoner can do to requite
such a favour as this?”
Sir Philip began a reply, stammered, and paused. He seemed to turn and
turn his purpose, and endeavoured to shelter it in some drapery that
should hide its ugliness; but this was beyond his art; and, summoning
impudence to his aid, he said, “I have a young damsel with me, who for
silly love followed me out of England. Now, you forester maiden, who
live according to the honesty of Nature, you could not understand me
if I were to tell you of the cruel laws of the world, which oblige
this poor girl to disguise herself in man’s apparel, and counterfeit
the duties of a page, that she may conceal her love. She hath become
somewhat troublesome to me: all that I ask as the price of your
liberty is, that she may be the companion of your flight.”
“Doth she go willingly?”
“Nay, not willingly; but she is young, and, like a tender twig, you
can bend her at will; all I ask is your promise that she return not.”
“But if she resist?”
“Act your pleasure with her; yet I would not that she were harmed. You
may give her to your brother in the place of this fair-haired damsel
they have stolen from him; or,” he added, for he saw that Magawisca’s
brow contracted, “or, if that suits not you nor him, you may take her
to your western forests, and give her to a Romish priest, who will
guide her to the Hotel Dieu which our good Lady of Bouillon has
established in Canada.” Magawisca {117} dropped at his feet the
instruments which she had grasped with such delight. “Nay, nay,
bethink you, maiden, it is a small boon to return for liberty and
life; for, trust me, if you remain here they will not spare your
life.”
“And dost thou think,” she replied, “that I would make my heart as
black as thine to save my life? Life! Dost thou not know that life can
only be abated by those evil deeds forbidden by the Great Master of
Life? The writing of the Great Spirit has surely vanished from thy
degraded soul, or thou wouldst know that man cannot touch life! Life
is naught but the image of the Great Spirit; and he hath most of it
who sends it back most true and unbroken, like the perfect image of
the clear heavens in the still lake.”
Sir Philip’s eye fell, and his heart quailed before the lofty glance
and unsullied spirit of the Indian maiden. Once he looked askance at
her, but it was with such a look as Satan eyed the sun in his “high
meridian tower.” With a feeling of almost insupportable meanness, he
collected, and again concealed beneath his cloak, the ladder and other
instruments, which he had been at no small pains to procure, and was
turning to summon Barnaby by ringing the bell, when he suddenly
recollected that Thomas Morton had been the ostensible motive of his
visit, and that it was but a prudent precaution to look in upon him
for an instant; and feeling too, perhaps, a slight curiosity to see
the companion of his former excesses, he changed his purpose, turned
to Morton’s door, unlocked and opened it.
{118}
The old man seemed to have shrunk away as if frightened, and was
gathered up almost into a ball in one corner of his miserable little
squalid den. A few remnants of his garments hung like shreds about
him. Every particle of his hair had dropped out; his grizzly beard was
matted together; his eyes gleamed like sparks of fire in utter
darkness. Sir Philip was transfixed. “Is this,” he thought, “Morton!
the gentleman--the gallant cavalier--the man of pleasure? Good God!
the girl hath truly spoken of life!” While he stood thus, the old man
sprang on him like a cat, pulled him within the door, and then, with
the action of madness, swift as thought, he seized the key, locked the
door on the inside, and threw the key through the bars of the window
without the prison. The candle had fallen and was extinguished, and
Sir Philip found himself immured, with his scarcely human companion,
in total darkness, without any means of rescue excepting through
Magawisca. His first impulse was to entreat her to ring the bell; but
he delayed for a moment, lest he should heighten the old man’s
paroxysm of madness.
In this interval of silence Magawisca fancied she heard a sound
against her window, and, on going to it, perceived, though the night
was extremely dark, a ladder resting against the bars; she listened,
and heard a footstep ascending; then there was a wrestling in Morton’s
room, and screams, “He’ll kill me--ring the bell.” Again all was
still, and she heard from the ground below, “Come down, Mr. Everell,
for the love of Heaven come down.” {119} The words were uttered in a
tone hardly above a whisper.
“Hush, Digby, I will not come down!”
“Then you are lost; those cries will certainly alarm the guard.”
“Hush! the cries have ceased.” Everell mounted quite to the window,
quick as if he had risen on wings.
“He is true!” thought Magawisca; and it seemed to her that her heart
would burst with joy, but she could not speak. He applied an
instrument to one of the iron bars, and wrenched it off. Repeated and
louder cries of “Murder! help! ring the bell!” now proceeded from
Gardiner, and the old maniac seemed determined to outroar him. Again
the noise ceased, and again Digby spoke in a more agitated voice than
before. “Oh, they are stirring in the yard; come away, Mr. Everell.”
“I will not--I had rather die; stand fast, Digby; one bar more, and
she is free;” and again he applied the instrument.
“Are you mad?” exclaimed Digby, in a more raised and eager voice; “I
tell you the lights are coming; if you do not escape now, nothing can
ever be done for her.”
This last argument had the intended effect. Everell felt that all hope
of extricating Magawisca depended on his now eluding discovery; and
with an exclamation of bitter disappointment, he relinquished the
enterprise for the present, and descending a few rounds of the ladder,
leaped to the ground, and, {120} with Digby, disappeared before the
guard reached the spot of operations. Magawisca saw two of the men go
off in pursuit, while the other remained picking up the implements
that Everell had dropped, and muttering something of old Barnaby
sleeping as if he slept his last sleep.
Relieved from the sad conviction of Everell’s desertion and
ingratitude, Magawisca seemed for a moment to float on happiness, and,
in her exultation, to forget the rocks and quicksands that encompassed
her. Another outcry from Sir Philip recalled her thoughts, and,
obeying the first impulse of humanity, she rang the bell violently.
Barnaby soon appeared with a lamp and keys, and learning the durance
of Sir Philip, he hastened to his relief. A key was found to unlock
the door, and, on opening it, the knight’s terror and distress were
fully explained. Morton had thrown him on his back, and pinned him to
the floor by planting his knee on Sir Philip’s breast, and had
interrupted his cries, and almost suffocated him, by stuffing his
cloak into his mouth. At the sight of his keeper the maniac sprang
off, and, with a sort of inarticulate chattering and laughing, resumed
his old station in the corner, apparently quite unconscious that he
had moved from it.
Sir Philip darted out, and shut the door as if he were closing a
tiger’s cage; and then, in wrath that overswelled all limits, he
turned upon poor Barnaby, and shaking him till his old bones seemed to
rattle in their thin casement, he poured out on him curses deep and
loud for leading him into that “devil’s {121} den.” Magawisca
interposed; but, instead of calming his wrath, she only drew it on
herself. He swore he would be revenged on her, “d--d Indian that she
was, to stand by and not lift her hand when she knew he was dying by
torture.” Magawisca did not vouchsafe any other reply to this attack
than a look of calm disdain; and Barnaby, now recovering from the
fright and amazement into which Sir Philip’s violence had thrown him,
held up his lamp, and reconnoitring the knight’s face and person, “It
is the same,” he said, resolving his honest doubts, “the same I let
in: circumstances alter cases, and men too, I think: why, I took him
for as godly a seeming man as ever I laid my eyes on--a yea and nay
Pilgrim; but such profane swearing exceedeth Chaddock’s men, or
Chaddock either, or the master they serve.”
“Prate not, you canting villain: why did not you come when you heard
my cries? or where was you that you heard them not?”
“Just taking a little nap in my rocking-chair; and I said to myself as
I sat myself down, ‘Now, Barnaby, if you should happen to fall out of
your meditation into sleep, remember to wake at the ringing of the
bell;’ and, accordingly, at the very first touch of it I was on my
feet and coming hitherward.”
Sir Philip’s panic and wrath had now so far subsided that he perceived
there was an alarming discordance between his extempore conduct and
his elaborate pretensions; and, reassuming his mask with an awkward
suddenness, he said, “Well, well, {122} friend Barnaby, we will both
forgive and forget. I will say nothing of your sleeping soundly at
your post, when you have such dangerous prisoners in ward that the
governor has thought it necessary to give you a guard; and you, good
Barnaby, will say nothing of my having for a moment lost the command
of my reason; though, being so sorely bestead, and having but a poor
human nature, I think I should not be hardly judged by merciful men.”
“As to forgiving and forgetting, your worship,” replied the
good-natured fellow, “that I can do as easily as another man, but not
from any dread of your tale-bearing; for I think the governor hath
sent the guard here partly in consideration of my age and feebleness;
and I fear not undue blame. Therefore, not for my own by-ends will I
keep close, but that I hold it not neighbourly to speak to another’s
hurt; and I well know it is but the topmost saints that are always in
the exercise of grace. But I marvel, your worship, that ye spoke those
evil words so glibly: it seemed like one casting away stilts, and
going on his own feet again.”
“All the fault of an ungodly youth, worthy Master Tuttle,” replied Sir
Philip, rolling up his eyes sanctimoniously; “and he who ensnared my
soul, thy miserable prisoner there, is now reaping the Lord’s
judgments therefor.”
“I think it is not profitable,” said the simple man, as he led the way
out of the prison, “to cast up judgments at any one; we are all--as
your worship has just suddenly and wofully experienced--we are {123}
all liable to falls in this slippery world; and I have always thought
it a more prudent and Christian part to lend a helping hand to a
fallen brother, than to stand by and laugh at him, or flout him.”
Sir Philip hurried away; every virtuous sentiment fell on his ear like
a rebuke. Even in an involuntary comparison of himself with the simple
jailer, he felt that genuine goodness, dimmed and sullied though it
may be by ignorance and fanaticism, like a good dull guinea, rings
true at every trial; while hypocrisy, though it show a face fair and
bright, yet, like a new false coin, betrays at every scratch the base
metal.
Perhaps no culprit ever turned his back on a jail with a more thorough
conviction that he deserved there to be incarcerated than did Sir
Philip. Detection in guilt is said marvellously to enlighten men’s
consciences: there may be a kindred virtue in disappointment in guilty
projects. The knight had become impatient of his tedious masquerade.
He was at first diverted with a new, and, as it seemed to him, a
fantastical state of society, and amused at the success with which he
played his assumed character. He soon became passionately enamoured of
Hope Leslie, and pursued her with a determined, unwavering resolution,
that, vacillating as he had always been, astonished himself. In the
eagerness of the chase, he underrated the obstacles that opposed him,
and, above all, the insuperable obstacle, the manifest indifference of
the young lady, which his vanity (must we add, his experience) led him
to {124} believe was affectation, whim, or accident; any or all of
these might be successfully opposed and overcome. He had tried to
probe her feelings in relation to Everell, and, though he was puzzled
by the result, and knew not what it meant, he trusted it did not mean
love. But if it did, what girl of Hope Leslie’s spirit, he asked
himself, would remain attached to a drivelling fellow, who, from
complaisance to the wishes of prosing old men, had preferred to her
such a statue of formality and Puritanism as Esther Downing? and,
Everell removed, Sir Philip feared no other competitor; for he counted
for nothing those gentlemen who might aspire to Miss Leslie’s hand,
but whose strict obedience to the canons of Puritanism left them, as
he thought, few of the qualities that were likely to interest a
romantic imagination. For himself, determined not to jeopard his
success by wearing his sanctimonious mask to Hope, he played the
magician with two faces, and to her he was the gay and gallant
chevalier; his formality, his preciseness, and every badge and
insignia of the Puritan school were dropped, and he talked of love and
poetry like any carpet-knight of those days, or drawing-room lover of
our own. But this was a dangerous game to play, and must not be
protracted. Some untoward accident might awaken the guardians of the
colony from their credulous confidence, and to this danger his wayward
page continually exposed him.
As our readers are already acquainted with the real character of this
unhappy victim of Sir Philip’s {125} profligacy, it only remains to
give the few untold circumstances of her brief history. She was the
natural child of an English nobleman. Her mother was a distinguished
French actress, who, dying soon after her birth, committed the child
to some charitable sisters of the order of St. Joseph. Her father, on
his death-bed, seized by the pangs of remorse, exacted a promise from
his sister, the Lady Lunford, that she would receive the orphan under
her protection. The lady performed the promise _à la lettre_, and no
more. She withdrew the unfortunate Rosa from her safe asylum, but she
kept from her, and from all the world, the secret of their
relationship, and made the dependance and desolateness of the poor
orphan a broad foundation for her own tyranny. Lady Lunford was a
woman of the world--a waning, Rosa, a ripening beauty. Her house was
the resort of men of fashion. Sir Philip paid his devotions there,
ostensibly to the noble mistress, but really to the young creature
whose melting eyes, _naïveté_, and strong and irrepressible feelings
enchanted him. Probably Lady Lunford found the presence of the young
beauty inconvenient. She certainly never threw any obstacle in Sir
Philip’s way; indeed, he afterward cruelly boasted to Rosa that her
patroness had persuaded him to receive her; but this was long after:
for many months he treated her with the fondest devotion; and she,
poor credulous child, was first awakened from dreams of love and
happiness by pangs of jealousy.
From her own confessions, Sir Philip learned how {126} far she had
divulged her sorrows to Hope Leslie, and from that moment he meditated
some mode of secretly and suddenly ridding himself of her, and finally
determined on the project which, as we have seen, was wofully
defeated; and he was compelled to retreat from Magawisca’s prison with
the tormenting apprehension that he might himself fall into the pit he
had digged.
Let those who have yet to learn in what happiness consists, and its
actual independence of external circumstances, turn from the gifted
and accomplished man of the world to the Indian prisoner; from the
baffled tempter to the victorious tempted. Magawisca could scarcely
have been made happier if Everell had achieved her freedom, than she
was by the certain knowledge of his interposition for her. The sting
of his supposed ingratitude had been her sharpest sorrow. Her
affection for Everell Fletcher had the tenderness, the confidence, the
sensitiveness of woman’s love; but it had nothing of the selfishness,
the expectation, or the earthliness of that passion. She had done and
suffered much for him, and she felt that his worth must be the sole
requital for her sufferings. She felt, too, that she had received much
from him. He had opened the book of knowledge to her; had given
subjects to her contemplative mind beyond the mere perceptions of her
senses; had in some measure dissipated the clouds of ignorance that
hung over the forest child, and given her glimpses of the past and the
distant; but, above all, he had gratified her strong national pride by
admitting {127} the natural equality of all the children of the Great
Spirit, and by allowing that it was the knowledge of the
Englishman--an accidental superiority--that forced from the
uninstructed Indian the exclamation, “Manittoo! Manittoo!” he is a
God.