CHAPTER IX.

Produced by Charles Aldarondo, Keren Vergon, Lynn Bornath

and the Online Distributed Proofreading Team at

https://www.pgdp.net

[Illustration: Frontispiece.]

GUY RIVERS:

A TALE OF GEORGIA.

BY W. GILMORE SIMMS,

AUTHOR OF "THE YEMASSEE," "THE PARTISAN," "MELLICHAMPE,"

"KATHARINE WALTON," "THE SCOUT," "WOODCRAFT," ETC.

"Who wants

A sequel may read on. Th' unvarnished tale

That follows will supply the place of one."

ROGERS' _Italy_.

New and Revised Edition.

CHICAGO:

DONOHUE, HENNEBERRY & CO.

407-425 DEARBORN STREET

1890

PRINTED AND BOUND BY

DONOHUE & HENNEBERRY

CHICAGO.

GUY RIVERS

CHAPTER I.

THE STERILE PROSPECT AND THE LONELY TRAVELLER.

Our scene lies in the upper part of the state of Georgia, a region at

this time fruitful of dispute, as being within the Cherokee territories.

The route to which we now address our attention, lies at nearly equal

distances between the main trunk of the Chatahoochie and that branch of

it which bears the name of the Chestatee, after a once formidable, but

now almost forgotten tribe. Here, the wayfarer finds himself lost in a

long reach of comparatively barren lands. The scene is kept from

monotony, however, by the undulations of the earth, and by frequent

hills which sometimes aspire to a more elevated title. The tract is

garnished with a stunted growth, a dreary and seemingly half-withered

shrubbery, broken occasionally by clumps of slender pines that raise

their green tops abruptly, and as if out of place, against the sky.

The entire aspect of the scene, if not absolutely blasted, wears at

least a gloomy and discouraging expression, which saddens the soul of

the most careless spectator. The ragged ranges of forest, almost

untrodden by civilized man, the thin and feeble undergrowth, the

unbroken silence, the birdless thickets,--all seem to indicate a

peculiarly sterile destiny. One thinks, as he presses forward, that some

gloomy Fate finds harbor in the place. All around, far as the eye may

see, it looks in vain for relief in variety. There still stretch the

dreary wastes, the dull woods, the long sandy tracts, and the rude hills

that send out no voices, and hang out no lights for the encouragement of

the civilized man. Such is the prospect that meets the sad and searching

eyes of the wayfarer, as they dart on every side seeking in vain for

solace.

Yet, though thus barren upon the surface to the eye, the dreary region

in which we now find ourselves, is very far from wanting in resources,

such as not only woo the eyes, but win the very soul of civilization. We

are upon the very threshold of the gold country, so famous for its

prolific promise of the precious metal; far exceeding, in the

contemplation of the knowing, the lavish abundance of Mexico and of

Peru, in their palmiest and most prosperous condition. Nor, though only

the frontier and threshold as it were to these swollen treasures, was

the portion of country now under survey, though bleak, sterile, and

uninviting, wanting in attractions of its own. It contained indications

which denoted the fertile regions, nor wanted entirely in the precious

mineral itself. Much gold had been already gathered, with little labor,

and almost upon its surface; and it was perhaps only because of the

limited knowledge then had of its real wealth, and of its close

proximity to a more productive territory, that it had been suffered so

long to remain unexamined.

Nature, thus, in a section of the world seemingly unblessed with her

bounty, and all ungarnished with her fruits and flowers, seemed desirous

of redeeming it from the curse of barrenness, by storing its bosom with

a product, which, only of use to the world in its conventional

necessities, has become, in accordance with the self-creating wants of

society, a necessity itself; and however the bloom and beauty of her

summer decorations may refresh the eye of the enthusiast, it would here

seem that, with an extended policy, she had planted treasures, for

another and a greatly larger class, far more precious to the eyes of

hope and admiration than all the glories and beauties in her sylvan and

picturesque abodes. Her very sterility and solitude, when thus found to

indicate her mineral treasures, rise themselves into attractions; and

the perverted heart, striving with diseased hopes, and unnatural

passions, gladly welcomes the wilderness, without ever once thinking how

to make it blossom like the rose.

Cheerless in its exterior, however, the season of the year was one--a

mild afternoon in May--to mollify and sweeten the severe and sterile

aspect of the scene. Sun and sky do their work of beauty upon earth,

without heeding the ungracious return which she may make; and a rich

warm sunset flung over the hills and woods a delicious atmosphere of

beauty, burnishing the dull heights and the gloomy pines with golden

hues, far more bright, if for less highly valued by men, than the

metallic treasures which lay beneath their masses. Invested by the

lavish bounties of the sun, so soft, yet bright, so mild, yet beautiful,

the waste put on an appearance of sweetness, if it did not rise into the

picturesque. The very uninviting and unlovely character of the

landscape, rendered the sudden effect of the sunset doubly effective,

though, in a colder moment, the spectator might rebuke his own

admiration with question of that lavish and indiscriminate waste which

could clothe, with such glorious hues, a region so little worthy of such

bounty; even as we revolt at sight of rich jewels about the brows and

neck of age and ugliness. The solitary group of pines, that, here and

there, shot up suddenly like illuminated spires;--the harsh and

repulsive hills, that caught, in differing gradations, a glow and glory

from the same bright fountain of light and beauty;--even the low copse,

uniform of height, and of dull hues, not yet quite caparisoned for

spring, yet sprinkled with gleaming eyes, and limned in pencilling beams

and streaks of fire; these, all, appeared suddenly to be subdued in

mood, and appealed, with a freshening interest, to the eye of the

traveller whom at midday their aspects discouraged only.

And there is a traveller--a single horseman--who emerges suddenly from

the thicket, and presses forward, not rapidly, nor yet with the manner

of one disposed to linger, yet whose eyes take in gratefully the

softening influences of that evening sunlight.

In that region, he who travelled at all, at the time of which we write,

must do so on horseback. It were a doubtful progress which any vehicle

would make over the blind and broken paths of that uncultivated realm.

Either thus, or on foot, as was the common practice with the mountain

hunters; men who, at seventy years of age, might be found as lithe and

active, in clambering up the lofty summit as if in full possession of

the winged vigor and impulse of twenty-five.

Our traveller, on the present occasion, was apparently a mere youth. He

had probably seen twenty summers--scarcely more. Yet his person was tall

and well developed; symmetrical and manly; rather slight, perhaps, as

was proper to his immaturity; but not wanting in what the backwoodsmen

call _heft_. He was evidently no milksop, though slight; carried himself

with ease and grace; and was certainly not only well endowed with bone

and muscle, but bore the appearance, somehow, of a person not

unpractised in the use of it. His face was manly like his person; not so

round as full, it presented a perfect oval to the eye; the forehead was

broad, high, and intellectual--purely white, probably because so well

shadowed by the masses of his dark brown hair. His eyes were rather

small, but dark and expressive, and derived additional expression from

their large, bushy, overhanging brows, which gave a commanding, and, at

times, a somewhat fierce expression to his countenance. But his mouth

was small, sweet, exquisitely chiselled, and the lips of a ripe, rich

color. His chin, full and decided, was in character with the nobility of

his forehead. The _tout ensemble_ constituted a fine specimen of

masculine beauty, significant at once of character and intelligence.

Our traveller rode a steed, which might be considered, even in the

South, where the passion for fine horses is universal, of the choicest

parentage. He was blooded, and of Arabian, through English, stocks. You

might detect his blood at a glance, even as you did that of his rider.

The beast was large, high, broad-chested, sleek of skin, wiry of limb,

with no excess of fat, and no straggling hair; small ears, a glorious

mane, and a great lively eye. At once docile and full of life, he trod

the earth with the firm pace of an elephant, yet with the ease of an

antelope; moving carelessly as in pastime, and as if he bore no sort of

burden on his back. For that matter he might well do so. His rider,

though well developed, was too slight to be felt by such a creature--and

a small portmanteau carried all his wardrobe. Beyond this he had no

_impedimenta_; and to those accustomed only to the modes of travel in a

more settled and civilized country--with bag and baggage--the traveller

might have appeared--but for a pair of moderately-sized twisted barrels

which we see pocketed on the saddle--rather as a gentleman of leisure

taking his morning ride, than one already far from home and increasing

at every step the distance between it and himself. From our privilege we

make bold to mention, that, strictly proportioned to their capacities,

the last named appurtenances carried each a charge which might have

rendered awkward any interruption; and it may not be saying too much if

we add, that it is not improbable to this portion of his equipage our

traveller was indebted for that security which had heretofore obviated

all necessity for their use. They were essentials which might or might

not, in that wild region, have been put in requisition; and the prudence

of all experience, in our border country, is seldom found to neglect

such companionship.

So much for the personal appearance and the equipment of our young

traveller. We have followed the usage among novelists, and have dwelt

thus long upon these details, as we design that our adventurer shall

occupy no small portion of the reader's attention. He will have much to

do and to endure in the progress of this narrative.

It may be well, in order to the omission of nothing hereafter important,

to add that he seems well bred to the _manège_--and rode with that ease

and air of indolence, which are characteristic of the gentry of the

south. His garments were strictly suited to the condition and custom of

the country--a variable climate, rough roads, and rude accommodations.

They consisted of a dark blue frock, of stuff not so fine as strong,

with pantaloons of the same material, all fitting well, happily adjusted

to the figure of the wearer, yet sufficiently free for any exercise. He

was booted and spurred, and wore besides, from above the knee to the

ankle, a pair of buckskin leggins, wrought by the Indians, and trimmed,

here and there, with beaded figures that gave a somewhat fantastic air

to this portion of his dress. A huge cloak strapped over the saddle,

completes our portrait, which, at the time of which we write, was that

of most travellers along our southern frontiers. We must not omit to

state that a cap of fur, rather than a fashionable beaver, was also the

ordinary covering of the head--that of our traveller was of a

finely-dressed fur, very far superior to the common fox skin cap worn by

the plain backwoodsmen. It declared, somewhat for the superior social

condition of the wearer, even if his general air and carriage did not

sufficiently do so.

Our new acquaintance had, by this time, emerged into one of those

regions of brown, broken, heathery waste, thinly mottled with tree and

shrub, which seem usually to distinguish the first steppes on the

approach to our mountain country. Though undulating, and rising

occasionally into hill and crag, the tract was yet sufficiently

monotonous; rather saddened than relieved by the gentle sunset, which

seemed to gild in mockery the skeleton woods and forests, just

recovering from the keen biting blasts of a severe and protracted

winter.

Our traveller, naturally of a dreamy and musing spirit, here fell

unconsciously into a narrow footpath, an old Indian trace, and without

pause or observation, followed it as if quite indifferent whither it

led. He was evidently absorbed in that occupation--a very unusual one

with youth on horseback--that "chewing of the cud of sweet and bitter

thought"--which testifies for premature troubles and still gnawing

anxieties of soul. His thoughts were seemingly in full unison with the

almost grave-like stillness and solemn hush of everything around him.

His spirit appeared to yield itself up entirely to the mournful

barrenness and uninviting associations, from which all but himself,

birds and beasts, and the very insects, seemed utterly to have departed.

The faint hum of a single wood-chuck, which, from its confused motions,

appeared to have wandered into an unknown territory, and by its uneasy

action and frequent chirping, seemed to indicate a perfect knowledge of

the fact, was the only object which at intervals broke through the spell

of silence which hung so heavily upon the sense. The air of our

traveller was that of one who appeared unable, however desirous he might

be, to avoid the train of sad thought which such a scene was so

eminently calculated to inspire; and, of consequence, who seemed

disposed, for this object, to call up some of those internal resources

of one's own mind and memory, which so mysteriously bear us away from

the present, whatever its powers, its pains, or its pleasures, and to

carry us into a territory of the heart's own selection. But, whether the

past in his case, were more to be dreaded than the present; or whether

it was that there was something in the immediate prospect which appealed

to sterile hopes, and provoking memories, it is very certain that our

young companion exhibited a most singular indifference to the fact that

he was in a wild empire of the forest--a wilderness--and that the sun

was rapidly approaching his setting. The bridle held heedlessly, lay

loose upon the neck of his steed; and it was only when the noble animal,

more solicitous about his night's lodging than his rider, or rendered

anxious by his seeming stupor, suddenly came to a full stand in the

narrow pathway, that the youth seemed to grow conscious of his doubtful

situation, and appeared to shake off his apathy and to look about him.

He now perceived that he had lost the little Indian pathway which he had

so long pursued. There was no sign of route or road on any side. The

prospect was greatly narrowed; he was in a valley, and the trees had

suddenly thickened around him. Certain hills, which his eyes had

hitherto noted on the right, had disappeared wholly from sight. He had

evidently deflected greatly from his proper course, and the horizon was

now too circumscribed to permit him to distinguish any of those guiding

signs upon which he had relied for his progress. From a bald tract he

had unwittingly passed into the mazes of a somewhat thickly-growing

wood.

"Old Blucher," he said, addressing his horse, and speaking in clear

silvery tones--"what have you done, old fellow? Whither have you brought

us?"

The philosophy which tells us, when lost, to give the reins to the

steed, will avail but little in a region where the horse has never been

before. This our traveller seemed very well to know. But the blame was

not chargeable upon Blucher. He had tacitly appealed to the beast for

his direction when suffering the bridle to fall upon his neck. He was

not willing, now, to accord to him a farther discretion; and was quite

too much of the man to forbear any longer the proper exercise of his own

faculties. With the quickening intelligence in his eyes, and the

compression of his lips, declaring a resolute will, he pricked the

animal forward, no longer giving way to those brown musings, which,

during the previous hour, had not only taken him to remote regions but

very much out of his way besides. In sober earnest, he had lost the way,

and, in sober earnest, he set about to recover it; but a ten minutes'

farther ride only led him to farther involvements; and he paused, for a

moment, to hold tacit counsel with his steed, whose behavior was very

much that of one who understands fully his own, and the predicament of

his master. Our traveller then dismounted, and, suffering his bridle to

rest upon the neck of the docile beast, he coursed about on all sides,

looking close to the earth in hopes to find some ancient traces of a

pathway. But his search was vain. His anxieties increased. The sunlight

was growing fainter and fainter; and, in spite of the reckless manner,

which he still wore, you might see a lurking and growing anxiety in his

quick and restless eye. He was vexed with himself that he had suffered

his wits to let fall his reins; and his disquiet was but imperfectly

concealed under the careless gesture and rather philosophic swing of his

graceful person, as, plying his silent way, through clumps of brush, and

bush, and tree, he vainly peered along the earth for the missing traces

of the route. He looked up for the openings in the tree-tops--he looked

west, at the rapidly speeding sun, and shook his head at his horse.

Though bold of heart, no doubt, and tolerably well aware of the usual

backwoods mode of procedure in all such cases of embarrassment, our

traveller had been too gently nurtured to affect a lodge in the

wilderness that night--its very "vast contiguity of shade" being

anything but attractive in his present mood. No doubt, he could have

borne the necessity as well as any other man, but still he held it a

necessity to be avoided if possible. He had, we are fain to confess, but

small passion for that "grassy couch," and "leafy bower," and those

other rural felicities, of which your city poets, who lie snug in

garrets, are so prone to sing; and always gave the most unromantic

preference to comfortable lodgings and a good roof; so, persevering in

his search after the pathway, while any prospect of success remained, he

circled about until equally hopeless and fatigued; then, remounted his

steed, and throwing the bridle upon his neck, with something of the

indifference of despair, he plied his spurs, suffering the animal to

adopt his own course, which we shall see was nevertheless interrupted by

the appearance of another party upon the scene, whose introduction we

reserve for another chapter.

CHAPTER II.

THE ENCOUNTER--THE CHEVALIER D'INDUSTRIE.

Thus left to himself, the good steed of our traveller set off, without

hesitation, and with a free step, that promised, at least, to overcome

space hurriedly, if it attained not the desired destination. The rider

did not suffer any of his own doubts to mar a progress so confidently

begun; and a few minutes carried the twain, horse and man, deeply, as it

were, into the very bowels of the forest. The path taken by the steed

grew every moment more and more intricate and difficult of access, and,

but for the interruption already referred to, it is not impossible that

a continued course in the same direction, would have brought the rider

to a full stop from the sheer inaccessibleness of the forest.

The route thus taken lay in a valley which was necessarily more fertile,

more densely packed with thicket, than the higher road which our rider

had been pursuing all the day. The branches grew more and more close;

and, what with the fallen trees, the spreading boughs, the undergrowth,

and broken character of the plain, our horseman was fain to leave the

horse to himself, finding quite enough to do in saving his eyes, and

keeping his head from awkward contact with overhanging timber. The pace

of the beast necessarily sunk into a walk. The question with his rider

was, in what direction to turn, to extricate himself from the mazes into

which he had so rashly ridden? While he mused this question, Blucher

started suddenly with evidently some new and exciting consciousness. His

ears were suddenly lifted--his eyes were strained upon the copse in

front--he halted, as if reluctant to proceed. It was evident that his

senses had taken in some sights, or sounds, which were unusual.

Of course, our traveller was by no means heedless of this behavior on

the part of the beast. He well knew the superior keenness of the brute

senses, over those of the man; and his own faculties were keenly

enlisted in the scrutiny. There might be wolves along the track--the

country was not wanting in them; or, more to be feared, there might be a

panther lurking along some great overhanging forest bough. There was

need to be vigilant. Either of these savages would make his propinquity

known, at a short distance, to the senses of an animal so timid as the

horse. Or, it might be, that a worse beast still--always worst of all

when he emulates the nature of the beast--man!--might be lurking upon

the track! If so, the nature of the peril was perhaps greater still, to

the rider if not the steed. The section of the wild world in which our

traveller journeyed was of doubtful character; but sparingly supplied

with good citizens; and most certainly infested with many with whom the

world had quarrelled--whom it had driven forth in shame and terror.

The youth thought of all these things. But they did not overcome his

will, or lessen his courage. Preparing himself, as well as he might, for

all chances, he renewed his efforts to extricate himself from his thick

harborage; pressing his steed firmly, in a direction which seemed to

open fairly, the sky appearing more distinctly through the opening of

the trees above. Meanwhile, he kept his eyes busy, watching right and

left. Still, he could see nothing, hear nothing, but the slight footfall

of his own steed. And yet the animal continued uneasy, his ears pricked

up, his head turning, this way and that, with evident curiosity; his

feet set down hesitatingly, as if uncertain whether to proceed.

Curious and anxious, our traveller patted the neck of the beast

affectionately, and, in low tones, endeavored to soothe his

apprehensions:

"Quietly, Blucher, quietly? What do you see, old fellow, to make you

uneasy? Is it the snug stall, and the dry fodder, and the thirty ears,

for which you long. I'faith, old fellow, the chance is that both of us

will seek shelter and supper in vain to-night."

Blucher pricked up his ears at the tones, however subdued, of his

rider's voice, which he well knew; but his uneasiness continued; and,

just when our young traveller, began to feel some impatience at his

restiffness and coyness, a shrill whistle which rang through the forest,

from the copse in front, seemed at once to determine the correctness of

sense in the animal, and the sort of beast which had occasioned his

anxieties. He was not much longer left in doubt as to the cause of the

animal's excitement. A few bounds brought him unexpectedly into a

pathway, still girdled, however, by a close thicket--and having an

ascent over a hill, the top of which was of considerable elevation

compared with the plain he had been pursuing. As the horse entered this

pathway, and began the ascent, he shyed suddenly, and so abruptly, that

a less practised rider would have lost his seat.

"Quiet, beast! what do you see?"

The traveller himself looked forward at his own query, and soon

discovered the occasion of his steed's alarm. No occasion for alarm,

either, judging by appearances; no panther, no wolf, certainly--a man

only--looking innocent enough, were it not for the suspicious fact that

he seemed to have put himself in waiting, and stood directly in the

midst of the path that the horseman was pursuing.

Our traveller, as we have seen, was not wholly unprepared, as well to

expect as to encounter hostilities. In addition to his pistols, which

were well charged, and conveniently at hand, we may now add that he

carried another weapon, for close quarters, concealed in his bosom. The

appearance of the stranger was not, however, so decided a manifestation

of hostility, as to justify his acting with any haste by the premature

use of his defences. Besides, no man of sense, and such we take our

traveller to be, will force a quarrel where he can make his way

peacefully, like a Christian and a gentleman. Our young traveller very

quietly observed as he approached the stranger--

"You scare my horse, sir. Will it please you to give us the road?"

"Give you the road?--Oh! yes! when you have paid the toll, young

master!"

The manner of the man was full of insolence, and the blood, in a moment,

rushed to the cheeks of the youth. He divined, by instinct, that there

was some trouble in preparation for him, and his teeth were silently

clenched together, and his soul nerved itself for anticipated conflict.

He gazed calmly, however, though sternly, at the stranger, who appeared

nothing daunted by the expression in the eyes of the traveller. His air

was that of quiet indifference, bordering on contempt, as if he knew his

duties, or his man, and was resolved upon the course he was appointed to

pursue. When men meet thus, if they are persons of even ordinary

intelligence, the instincts are quick to conceive and act, and the youth

was now more assured than ever, that the contest awaited him which

should try his strength. This called up all his resources, and we may

infer that he possessed them in large degree, from his quiet forbearance

and deliberation, even when he became fully sensible of the insolence of

the person with whom he felt about to grapple.

As yet, however, judging from other appearances, there was no violence

meditated by the stranger. He was simply insolent, and he was in the

way. He carried no weapons--none which met the sight, at least, and

there was nothing in his personal appearance calculated to occasion

apprehension. His frame was small, his limbs slight, and they did not

afford promise of much activity. His face was not ill favored, though a

quick, restless black eye, keen and searching, had in it a lurking

malignity, like that of a snake, which impressed the spectator with

suspicion at the first casual glance. His nose, long and sharp, was

almost totally fleshless; the skin being drawn so tightly over the

bones, as to provoke the fear that any violent effort would cause them

to force their way through the frail integument. An untrimmed beard, run

wild; and a pair of whiskers so huge, as to refuse all accordance with

the thin diminutive cheeks which wore them; thin lips, and a sharp

chin;--completed the outline of a very unprepossessing face, which a

broad high forehead did not tend very much to improve or dignify.

Though the air of the stranger was insolent, and his manner rude, our

young traveller was unwilling to decide unfavorably. At all events, his

policy and mood equally inclined him to avoid any proceeding which

should precipitate or compel violence.

"There are many good people in the world"--so he thought--"who are

better than they promise; many good Christians, whose aspects would

enable them to pass, in any crowd, as very tolerable and becoming

ruffians. This fellow may be one of the unfortunate order of virtuous

people, cursed with an unbecoming visage. We will see before we shoot."

Thus thought our traveller, quickly, as became his situation. He

determined accordingly, while foregoing none of his precautions, to see

farther into the designs of the stranger, before he resorted to any

desperate issues. He replied, accordingly, to the requisition of the

speaker; the manner, rather than the matter of which, had proved

offensive.

"Toll! You ask toll of me! By what right, sir, and for whom do you

require it?"

"Look you, young fellow, I am better able to ask questions myself, than

to answer those of other people. In respect to this matter of answering,

my education has been wofully neglected."

The reply betrayed some intelligence as well as insolence. Our traveller

could not withhold the retort.

"Ay, indeed! and in some other respects too, not less important, if I am

to judge from your look and bearing. But you mistake your man, let me

tell you. I am not the person whom you can play your pranks upon with

safety, and unless you will be pleased to speak a little more

respectfully, our parley will have a shorter life, and a rougher ending,

than you fancy."

"It would scarcely be polite to contradict so promising a young

gentleman as yourself," was the response; "but I am disposed to believe

our intimacy likely to lengthen, rather than diminish. I hate to part

over-soon with company that talks so well; particularly in these woods,

where, unless such a chance come about as the present, the lungs of the

heartiest youth in the land would not be often apt to find the echo they

seek, though they cried for it at the uttermost pitch of the pipe."

The look and the language of the speaker were alike significant, and the

sinister meaning of the last sentence did not escape the notice of him

to whom was addressed. His reply was calm, however, and his mind grew

more at ease, more collected, with his growing consciousness of

annoyance and danger. He answered the stranger in a vein not unlike his

own.

"You are pleased to be eloquent, worthy sir--and, on any other occasion,

I might not be unwilling to bestow my ear upon you; but as I have yet to

find my way out of this labyrinth, for the use of which your

facetiousness would have me pay a tax, I must forego that satisfaction,

and leave the enjoyment for some better day."

"You are well bred, I see, young sir," was the reply, "and this forms an

additional reason why I should not desire so soon to break our

acquaintance. If you have mistaken your road, what do you on this?--why

are you in this part of the country, which is many miles removed from

any public thoroughfare?"

"By what right do you ask the question?" was the hurried and

unhesitating response. "You are impertinent!"

"Softly, softly, young sir. Be not rash, and let me recommend that you

be more choice in the adoption of your epithets. Impertinent is an ugly

word between gentlemen of our habit. Touching my right to ask this or

that question of young men who lose the way, that's neither here nor

there, and is important in no way. But, I take it, I should have some

right in this matter, seeing, young sir, that you are upon the turnpike

and I am the gate-keeper who must take the toll."

A sarcastic smile passed over the lips of the man as he uttered the

sentence, which was as suddenly succeeded, however, by an expression of

gravity, partaking of an air of the profoundest business. The traveller

surveyed him for a moment before he replied, as if to ascertain in what

point of view properly to understand his conduct.

"Turnpike! this is something new. I never heard of a turnpike and a gate

for toll, in a part of the world in which men, or honest ones at least,

are not yet commonly to be found. You think rather too lightly, my good

sir, of my claim to that most vulgar commodity called common sense, if

you suppose me likely to swallow this silly story."

"Oh, doubtless--you are a very sagacious young man, I make no question,"

said the other, with a sneer--"but you'll have to pay the turnpike for

all that."

"You speak confidently on this point; but, if I am to pay this turnpike,

at least, I may be permitted to know who is its proprietor."

"To be sure you may. I am always well pleased to satisfy the doubts and

curiosity of young travellers who go abroad for information. I take you

to be one of this class."

"Confine yourself, if you please, to the matter in hand--I grow weary of

this chat," said the youth with a haughty inclination, that seemed to

have its effect even upon him with whom he spoke.

"Your question is quickly answered. You have heard of the Pony

Club--have you not?"

"I must confess my utter ignorance of such an institution. I have never

heard even the name before."

"You have not--then really it is high time to begin the work of

enlightenment. You must know, then, that the Pony Club is the proprietor

of everything and everybody, throughout the nation, and in and about

this section. It is the king, without let or limitation of powers, for

sixty miles around. Scarce a man in Georgia but pays in some sort to its

support--and judge and jury alike contribute to its treasuries. Few

dispute its authority, as you will have reason to discover, without

suffering condign and certain punishment; and, unlike the tributaries

and agents of other powers, its servitors, like myself, invested with

jurisdiction over certain parts and interests, sleep not in the

performance of our duties; but, day and night, obey its dictates, and

perform the various, always laborious, and sometimes dangerous functions

which it imposes upon us. It finds us in men, in money, in horses. It

assesses the Cherokees, and they yield a tithe, and sometimes a greater

proportion of their ponies, in obedience to its requisitions. Hence,

indeed, the name of the club. It relieves young travellers, like

yourself, of their small change--their sixpences; and when they happen

to have a good patent lever, such a one as a smart young gentleman like

yourself is very apt to carry about him, it is not scrupulous, but helps

them of that too, merely by way of _pas-time_."

And the ruffian chuckled in a half-covert manner at his own pun.

"Truly, a well-conceived sort of sovereignty, and doubtless sufficiently

well served, if I may infer from the representative before me. You must

do a large business in this way, most worthy sir."

"Why, that we do, and your remark reminds me that I have quite as little

time to lose as yourself. You now understand, young sir, the toll you

have to pay, and the proprietor who claims it."

"Perfectly--perfectly. You will not suppose me dull again, most candid

keeper of the Pony Turnpike. But have you made up your mind, in earnest,

to relieve me of such trifling encumbrances as those you have just

mentioned?"

"I should be strangely neglectful of the duties of my station, not to

speak of the discourtesy of such a neglect to yourself, were I to do

otherwise; always supposing you burdened with such encumbrances. I put

it to yourself, whether such would not be the effect of my omission."

"It most certainly would, most frank and candid of all the outlaws. Your

punctiliousness on this point of honor entitles you, in my mind, to an

elevation above and beyond all others of your profession. I admire the

grace of your manner, in the commission of acts which the more tame and

temperate of our kind are apt to look upon as irregular and unlovely.

You, I see, have the true notion of the thing."

The ruffian looked with some doubt upon the youth--inquiringly, as if to

account in some way for the singular coolness, not to say contemptuous

scornfulness, of his replies and manner. There was something, too, of a

searching malignity in his glance, that seemed to recognise in his

survey features which brought into activity a personal emotion in his

own bosom, not at variance, indeed, with the craft he was pursuing, but

fully above and utterly beyond it. Dismissing, however, the expression,

he continued in the manner and tone so tacitly adopted between the

parties.

"I am heartily glad, most travelled young gentleman, that your opinion

so completely coincides with my own, since it assures me I shall not be

compelled, as is sometimes the case in the performance of my duties, to

offer any rudeness to one seemingly so well taught as yourself. Knowing

the relationship between us so fully, you can have no reasonable

objection to conform quietly to all my requisitions, and yield the

toll-keeper his dues."

Our traveller had been long aware, in some degree, of the kind of

relationship between himself and his companion; but, relying on his

defences, and perhaps somewhat too much on his own personal capacities

of defence, and, possibly, something curious to see how far the love of

speech in his assailant might carry him in a dialogue of so artificial a

character, he forbore as yet a resort to violence. He found it

excessively difficult, however, to account for the strange nature of the

transaction so far as it had gone; and the language of the robber seemed

so inconsistent with his pursuit, that, at intervals, he was almost led

to doubt whether the whole was not the clever jest of some country

sportsman, who, in the guise of a levyer of contributions upon the

traveller, would make an acquaintance, such as is frequent in the South,

terminating usually in a ride to a neighboring plantation, and pleasant

accommodations so long as the stranger might think proper to avail

himself of them.

If, on the other hand, the stranger was in reality the ruffian he

represented himself, he knew not how to account for his delay in the

assault--a delay, to the youth's mind, without an object--unless

attributable to a temper of mind like that of Robin Hood, and coupled in

the person before him, as in that of the renowned king of the outlaws,

with a peculiar freedom and generosity of habit, and a gallantry and

adroitness which, in a different field, had made him a knight worthy to

follow and fight for Baldwin and the Holy Cross. Our young traveller was

a _romanticist_, and all of these notions came severally into his

thoughts. Whatever might have been the motives of conduct in the robber,

who thus audaciously announced himself the member of a club notorious on

the frontiers of Georgia and among the Cherokees for its daring

outlawries, the youth determined to keep up the game so long as it

continued such. After a brief pause, he replied to the above

politely-expressed demand in the following language:--

"Your request, most unequivocal sir, would seem but reasonable; and so

considering it, I have bestowed due reflection upon it. Unhappily,

however, for the Pony Club and its worthy representative, I am quite too

poorly provided with worldly wealth at this moment to part with much of

it. A few shillings to procure you a cravat--such as you may get of

Kentucky manufacture--I should not object to. Beyond this, however (and

the difficulty grieves me sorely), I am so perfectly incapacitated from

doing anything, that I am almost persuaded, in order to the bettering of

my own condition, to pay the customary fees, and applying to your

honorable body for the privilege of membership, procure those means of

lavish generosity which my necessity, and not my will, prevents me from

bestowing upon you."

"A very pretty idea," returned he of the road; "and under such

circumstances, your jest about the cravat from Kentucky is by no means

wanting in proper application. But the fact is, our numbers are just now

complete--our ranks are full--and the candidates for the honor are so

numerous as to leave little chance for an applicant. You might be

compelled to wait a long season, unless the Georgia penitentiary and

Georgia guard shall create a vacancy in your behalf."

"Truly, the matter is of very serious regret," with an air of much

solemnity, replied the youth, who seemed admirably to have caught up the

spirit of the dialogue--"and it grieves me the more to know, that, under

this view of the case, I can no more satisfy you than I can serve

myself. It is quite unlucky that your influence is insufficient to

procure me admission into your fraternity; since it is impossible that I

should pay the turnpike, when the club itself, by refusing me

membership, will not permit me to acquire the means of doing so. So, as

the woods grow momently more dull and dark, and as I may have to ride

far for a supper, I am constrained, however unwilling to leave good

company, to wish you a fair evening, and a long swing of fortune, most

worthy knight of the highway, and trusty representative of the Pony

Club."

With these words, the youth, gathering up the bridle of the horse, and

slightly touching him with the rowel, would have proceeded on his

course; but the position of the outlaw now underwent a corresponding

change, and, grasping the rein of the animal, he arrested his farther

progress.

"I am less willing to separate than yourself from good company, gentle

youth, as you may perceive; since I so carefully restrain you from a

ride over a road so perilous as this. You have spoken like a fair and

able scholar this afternoon; and talents, such as you possess, come too

seldom into our forests to suffer them, after so brief a sample, to

leave us so abruptly. You must come to terms with the turnpike."

"Take your hands from my horse, sirrah!" was the only response made by

the youth; his tone and manner corresponding with the change in the

situation of the parties. "I would not do you harm willingly; I want no

man's blood on my head; but my pistols, let me assure you, are much more

readily come at than my purse. Tempt me not to use them--stand from the

way."

"It may not be," replied the robber, with a composure and coolness that

underwent no change; "your threats affect me not. I have not taken my

place here without a perfect knowledge of all its dangers and

consequences. You had better come peaceably to terms; for, were it even

the case that you could escape _me_, you have only to cast your eye up

the path before you, to be assured of the utter impossibility of

escaping those who aid me. The same glance will also show you the

tollgate, which you could not see before. Look ahead, young sir, and be

wise in time; and let me perform my duties without hindrance."

Casting a furtive glance on the point indicated by the ruffian, the

youth saw, for the first time, a succession of bars--a rail fence, in

fact, of more than usual height--completely crossing the narrow pathway

and precluding all passage. Approaching the place of strife, the same

glance assured him, were two men, well armed, evidently the accomplices

of the robber who had pointed to them as such. The prospect grew more

and more perilous, and the youth, whose mind was one of that sort which

avails itself of its energies seemingly only in emergencies, beheld his

true course, with a moment's reflection, and hesitated not a single

moment in its adoption. He saw that something more was necessary than to

rid himself merely of the ruffian immediately before him, and that an

unsuccessful blow or shot would leave him entirely at the mercy of the

gang. To escape, a free rein must be given to the steed, on which he

felt confident he could rely; and, though prompted by the most natural

impulse to send a bullet through the head of his assailant, he wisely

determined on a course which, as it would be unlooked for, had therefore

a better prospect of success.

Without further pause, drawing suddenly from his bosom the bowie-knife

commonly worn in those regions, and bending forward, he aimed a blow at

the ruffian, which, as he had anticipated, was expertly eluded--the

assailant, sinking under the neck of the steed, and relying on the

strength of the rein, which he still continued to hold, to keep him from

falling, while at the same time he kept the check upon the horse.

This movement was that which the youth had looked for and desired. The

blow was but a feint, for, suddenly turning the direction of the knife

when his enemy was out of its reach, he cut the bridle upon which the

latter hung, and the head of the horse, freed from the restraint, was as

at once elevated in air. The suddenness of his motion whirled the

ruffian to the ground; while the rider, wreathing his hands in the mane

of the noble animal, gave him a free spur, and plunged at once over the

struggling wretch, in whose cheek the glance of his hoof left a deep

gash.

The steed bounded forward; nor did the youth seek to restrain him,

though advancing full up the hill and in the teeth of his enemies.

Satisfied that he was approaching their station, the accomplices of the

foiled ruffian, who had seen the whole affray, sunk into the covert;

but, what was their mortification to perceive the traveller, though

without any true command over his steed, by an adroit use of the broker

bridle, so wheel him round as to bring him, in a few leaps, over the

very ground of the strife, and before the staggering robber had yet

fully arisen from the path. By this manoeuvre he placed himself in

advance of the now approaching banditti. Driving his spurs resolutely

and unsparingly into the flanks of his horse, while encouraging him with

well known words of cheer, he rushed over the scene of his late struggle

with a velocity that set all restraint at defiance--his late opponent

scarcely being able to put himself in safety. A couple of shots, that

whistled wide of the mark, announced his extrication from the

difficulty--but, to his surprise, his enemies had been at work behind

him, and the edge of the copse through which he was about to pass, was

blockaded with bars in like manner with the path in front. He heard the

shouts of the ruffians in the rear--he felt the danger, if not

impracticability of his pausing for the removal of the rails, and, in

the spirit which had heretofore marked his conduct, he determined upon

the most daring endeavor. Throwing off all restraint from his steed, and

fixing himself firmly in the stirrup and saddle, he plunged onward to

the leap, and, to the chagrin of the pursuers, who had relied much upon

the obstruction, and who now appeared in pursuit, the noble animal,

without a moment's reluctance, cleared it handsomely.

Another volley of shot rang in the ears of the youth, as he passed the

impediment, and he felt himself wounded in the side. The wound gave him

little concern at the moment, for, under the excitement of the strife,

he felt not even its smart; and, turning himself upon the saddle, he

drew one of his own weapons from its case, and discharging it, by way of

taunt, in the faces of the outlaws, laughed loud with the exulting

spirit of youth at the successful result of an adventure due entirely to

his own perfect coolness, and to the warm courage which had been his

predominating feature from childhood.

The incident just narrated had dispersed a crowd of gloomy reflections,

so that the darkness which now overspread the scene, coupled as it was

with the cheerlessness of prospect before him, had but little influence

upon his spirits. Still, ignorant of his course, and beginning to be

enfeebled by the loss of blood, he moderated his speed, and left it to

the animal to choose his own course. But he was neither so cool nor so

sanguine, to relax so greatly in his speed as to permit of his being

overtaken by the desperates whom he had so cleverly foiled. He knew the

danger, the utter hopelessness, indeed, of a second encounter with the

same persons. He felt sure that he would be suffered no such long parley

as before. Without restraining his horse, our young traveller simply

regulated his speed by a due estimate of the capacity of the outlaws for

pursuit a-foot; and, without knowing whither he sped, having left the

route wholly to the horse, he was suddenly relieved by finding himself

upon a tolerably broad road, which, in the imperfect twilight, he

concluded to be the same from which, in his mistimed musings he had

suffered his horse to turn aside. He had no means to ascertain the fact,

conclusively, and, in sooth, no time; for now he began to feel a strange

sensation of weakness; his eyes swam, and grew darkened; a numbness

paralyzed his whole frame; a sickness seized upon his heart; and, after

sundry feeble efforts, under a strong will, to command and compel his

powers, they finally gave way, and he sunk from his steed upon the long

grass, and lay unconscious;--his last thought, ere his senses left him,

being that of death! Here let us leave him for a little space, while we

hurriedly seek better knowledge of him in other quarters.

CHAPTER III.

YOUNG LOVE--THE RETROSPECT.

It will not hurt our young traveller, to leave him on the greensward, in

the genial spring-time; and, as the night gathers over him, and a

helpful insensibility interposes for the relief of pain, we may avail

ourselves of the respite to look into the family chronicles, and show

the why and wherefore of this errant journey, the antecedents and the

relations of our hero.

Ralph Colleton, the young traveller whose person we have described, and

whose most startling adventure in life, we have just witnessed, was the

only son of a Carolinian, who could boast the best blood of English

nobility in his veins. The sire, however, had outlived his fortunes,

and, late in life, had been compelled to abandon the place of his

nativity--an adventurer, struggling against a proud stomach, and a

thousand embarrassments--and to bury himself in the less known, but more

secure and economical regions of Tennessee. Born to affluence, with

wealth that seemed adequate to all reasonable desires--a noble

plantation, numerous slaves, and the host of friends who necessarily

come with such a condition, his individual improvidence, thoughtless

extravagance, and lavish mode of life--a habit not uncommon in the

South--had rendered it necessary, at the age of fifty, when the mind,

not less than the body, requires repose rather than adventure, that he

should emigrate from the place of his birth; and with resources

diminished to a cipher, endeavor to break ground once more in unknown

forests, and commence the toils and troubles of life anew. With an only

son (the youth before us) then a mere boy, and no other family, Colonel

Ralph Colleton did not hesitate at such an exile. He had found out the

worthlessness of men's professions at a period not very remote from the

general knowledge of his loss of fortune: and having no other connection

claiming from him either countenance or support, and but a single

relative from whom separation might be painful, he felt, comparatively

speaking, but few of the privations usually following such a removal. An

elder brother, like himself a widower, with a single child, a daughter,

formed the whole of his kindred left behind him in Carolina; and, as

between the two brothers there had existed, at all times, some leading

dissimilar points of disposition and character, an occasional

correspondence, due rather to form than to affection, served all

necessary purposes in keeping up the sentiment of kindred in their

bosoms. There were but few real affinities which could bring them

together. They never could altogether understand, and certainly had

but a limited desire to appreciate or to approve many of the several

and distinct habits of one another; and thus they separated with but

few sentiments of genuine concern. William Colleton, the elder brother,

was the proprietor of several thousand highly valuable and

pleasantly-situated acres, upon the waters of the Santee--a river which

irrigates a region in the state of South Carolina, famous for its

wealth, lofty pride, polished manners, and noble and considerate

hospitality. Affluent equally with his younger brother by descent,

marriage had still further contributed toward the growth of possessions,

which a prudent management had always kept entire and always improving.

Such was the condition of William Colleton, the uncle of the young

Ralph, then a mere child, when he was taken by his father into

Tennessee.

There, the fortune of the adventurer still maintained its ancient

aspect. He had bought lands, and engaged in trade, and made sundry

efforts in various and honorable ways, but without success. Vocation

after vocation had with him a common and certain termination, and after

many years of profitless experiment, the ways of prosperity were as far

remote from his knowledge and as perplexing to his pursuit, as at the

first hour of his enterprise. In worldly concerns he stood just where he

had started fifteen years before; with this difference for the worse,

however, that he had grown older in this space of time, less equal to

the tasks of adventure; and with the moral energies checked as they had

been by continual disappointments, recoiling in despondency and gloom,

with trying emphasis, upon a spirit otherwise noble and sufficiently

daring for every legitimate and not unwonted species of trial and

occasion. Still, he had learned little, beyond _hauteur_ and

querulousness, from the lessons of experience. Economy was not more the

inmate of his dwelling than when he was blessed with the large income of

his birthright; but, extravagantly generous as ever, his house was the

abiding-place of a most lavish and unwise hospitality.

His brother, William Colleton, on the other hand, with means hourly

increasing, exhibited a disposition narrowing at times into a

selfishness the most pitiful. He did not, it is true, forego or forget

any of those habits of freedom and intercourse in his household and with

those about him, which form so large a practice among the people of the

south. He could give a dinner, and furnish an ostentatious

entertainment--lodge his guest in the style of a prince for weeks

together, nor exhibit a feature likely to induce a thought of intrusion

in the mind of his inmate. In public, the populace had no complaints to

urge of his penuriousness; and in all outward shows he manifested the

same general characteristics which marked the habit of the class to

which he belonged.

But his selfishness lay in things not so much on the surface. It was

more deep and abiding in its character; and consisted in the false

estimate which he made of the things around him. He had learned to value

wealth as a substitute for mind--for morals--for all that is lofty, and

all that should be leading, in the consideration of society. He valued

few things beside. He had different emotions for the rich from those

which he entertained for the poor; and, from perceiving that among men,

money could usurp all places--could defeat virtue, command respect

denied to morality and truth, and secure a real worship when the Deity

must be content with shows and symbols--he gradually gave it the chief

place in his regard. He valued wealth as the instrument of authority. It

secured him power; a power, however, which he had no care to employ, and

which he valued only as tributary to the maintenance of that haughty

ascendency over men which was his heart's first passion. He was neither

miser nor mercenary; he did not labor to accumulate--perhaps because he

was a lucky accumulator without any painstaking of his own: but he was,

by nature an aristocrat, and not unwilling to compel respect through the

means of money, as through any other more noble agency of intellect or

morals.

There was only one respect in which a likeness between the fortunes of

the two brothers might be found to exist. After a grateful union of a

few years, they had both lost their wives. A single child, in the case

of each, had preserved and hallowed to them the memories of their

mothers. To the younger brother Ralph, a son had been born, soothing the

sorrows of the exile, and somewhat compensating his loss. To William

Colleton, the elder brother, his wife had left a single and very lovely

daughter, the sweet and beautiful Edith, a girl but a few months younger

than her cousin Ralph. It was the redeeming feature, in the case of the

surviving parents, that they each gave to their motherless children, the

whole of that affection--warm in both cases--which had been enjoyed by

the departed mothers.

Separated from each other, for years, by several hundred miles of

uncultivated and untravelled forest, the brothers did not often meet;

and the bonds of brotherhood waxed feebler and feebler, with the swift

progress of successive years. Still, they corresponded, and in a tone

and temper that seemed to answer for the existence of feelings, which

neither, perhaps, would have been so forward as to assert warmly, if

challenged to immediate answer. Suddenly, however, when young Ralph was

somewhere about fifteen, his uncle expressed a wish to see him; and,

whether through a latent and real affection, or a feeling of self-rebuke

for previous neglect, he exacted from his brother a reluctant consent

that the youth should dwell in his family, while receiving his education

in a region then better prepared to bestow it with profit to the

student. The two young cousins met in Georgia for the first time, and,

after a brief summer journey together, in which they frequented the most

favorite watering places, Ralph was separated from Edith, whom he had

just begun to love with interest, and despatched to college.

The separation of the son from the father, however beneficial it might

be to the former in certain respects of education, proved fatal to the

latter. He had loved the boy even more than he knew; had learned to live

mostly in the contemplation of the youth's growth and development; and

his absence preyed upon his heart, adding to his sense of defeat in

fortune, and the loneliness and waste of his life. The solitude in which

he dwelt, after the boy's departure, he no longer desired to disturb;

and he pined as hopelessly in his absence, as if he no longer had a

motive or a hope to prompt exertion. He had anticipated this, in some

degree, when he yielded to his brother's arguments and entreaties; but,

conscious of the uses and advantages of education to his son, he felt

the selfishness to be a wrong to the boy, which would deny him the

benefits of that larger civilization, which the uncle promised, on any

pretexts. A calm review of his own arguments against the transfer,

showed them to be suggested by his own wants. With a manly resolution,

therefore, rather to sacrifice his own heart, than deny to his child the

advantages which were held out by his brother, he consented to his

departure. The reproach of selfishness, which William Colleton had not

spared, brought about his resolve; and with a labored cheerfulness he

made his preparations, and accompanied the youth to Georgia, where his

uncle had agreed to meet him. They parted, with affectionate tears and

embraces, never to meet again. A few months only had elapsed when the

father sickened. But he never communicated to his son, or brother, the

secret of his sufferings and grief. Worse, he never sought relief in

change or medicine; but, brooding in the solitude, gnawing his own heart

in silence, he gradually pined away, and, in a brief year, he was

gathered to his fathers. He died, like many similarly-tempered natures,

of no known disorder!

The boy received the tidings with a burst of grief, which seemed to

threaten his existence. But the sorrows of youth are usually

short-lived, particularly in the case of eager, energetic natures. The

exchange of solitude for the crowd; the emulation of college life; the

sports and communion of youthful associates--served, after a while, to

soothe the sorrows of Ralph Colleton. Indeed, he found it necessary that

he should bend himself earnestly to his studies, that he might forget

his griefs. And, in a measure he succeeded; at least, he subdued their

more fond expression, and only grew sedate, instead of passionate. The

bruises of his heart had brought the energies of his mind to their more

active uses.

From fifteen to twenty is no very long leap in the history of youth. We

will make it now, and place the young Ralph--now something older in mind

as in body--returned from college, finely formed, intellectual,

handsome, vivacious, manly, spirited, and susceptible--as such a person

should be--once again in close intimacy with his beautiful cousin. The

season which had done so much for him, had been no less liberal with

her; and we now survey her, the expanding flower, all bloom and

fragrance, a tribute of the spring, flourishing in the bosom of the more

forward summer.

Ralph came from college to his uncle's domicil, now his only home. The

circumstances of his father's fate and fortune, continually acting upon

his mind and sensibilities from boyhood, had made his character a marked

and singular one--proud, jealous, and sensitive, to an extreme which was

painful not merely to himself, but at times to others. But he was noble,

lofty, sincere, without a touch of meanness in his composition, above

circumlocution, with a simplicity of character strikingly great, but

without anything like puerility or weakness.

The children--for such, in reference to their experience, we may venture

to call them--had learned to recognise in the progress of a very brief

period but a single existence. Ralph looked only for Edith, and cared

nothing for other sunlight; while Edith, with scarcely less reserve than

her bolder companion, had speech and thought for few besides Ralph.

Circumstances contributed not a little to what would appear the natural

growth of this mutual dependence. They were perpetually left together,

and with few of those tacit and readily understood restraints,

unavoidably accompanying the presence of others older than themselves.

Residing, save at few brief intervals, at the plantation of Colonel

Colleton, they saw little and knew less of society; and the worthy

colonel, not less ambitious than proud, having become a politician, had

left them a thousand opportunities of intimacy which had now become so

grateful to them both. Half of his time was taken up in public matters.

A leader of his party in the section of country in which he lived, he

was always busy in the responsibilities imposed upon him by such a

station; and, what with canvassing at election-polls and muster-grounds,

and dancing attendance as a silent voter at the halls of the state

legislature, to the membership of which his constituents had returned

him, he saw but little of his family, and they almost as little of him.

His influence grew unimportant with his wards, in proportion as it

obtained vigor with his faction--was seldom referred to by them, and,

perhaps, if it had been, such was the rapid growth of their affections,

would have been but little regarded. He appeared to take it for granted,

that, having provided them with all the necessaries called for by life,

he had done quite enough for their benefit; and actually gave far less

of his consideration to his own and only child than he did to his

plantation, and the success of a party measure, involving possibly the

office of doorkeeper to the house, or of tax-collector to the district.

The taste for domestic life, which at one period might have been held

with him exclusive, had been entirely swallowed up and forgotten in his

public relations; and entirely overlooking the fact, that, in the silent

goings-on of time, the infantile will cease to be so, he never seemed to

observe that the children whom he had brought together but a few years

before might not with reason be considered children any longer.

Children, indeed! What years had they not lived--what volumes of

experience in human affections and feelings had the influence and genial

warmth of a Carolina sun not unfolded to their spirits--in the few sweet

and uninterrupted seasons of their intercourse. How imperious were the

dictates of that nature, to whose immethodical but honest teachings they

had been almost entirely given up. They lived together, walked together,

rode together--read in the same books, conned the same lessons, studied

the same prospects, saw life through the common medium of mutual

associations; and lived happy only in the sweet unison of emotions

gathered at a common fountain, and equally dear, and equally necessary

to them both. And this is love--they loved!

They loved, but the discovery was yet to be made by them. Living in its

purest luxuries--in the perpetual communion of the only one necessary

object--having no desire and as little prospect of change--ignorant of

and altogether untutored by the vicissitudes of life--enjoying the sweet

association which had been the parent of that passion, dependent now

entirely upon its continuance--they had been content, and had never

given themselves any concern to analyze its origin, or to find for it a

name. A momentary doubt--the presages of a dim perspective--would have

taught them better. Had there been a single moment of discontent in

their lives at this period, they had not remained so long in such

ignorance. The fear of its loss can alone teach us the true value of our

treasure. But the discovery was at hand.

A pleasant spring afternoon in April found the two young people, Ralph

and Edith--the former now twenty years of age, and the latter in the

same neighborhood, half busied, half idle, in the long and spacious

piazza of the family mansion. They could not be said to have been

employed, for Edith rarely made much progress with the embroidering

needle and delicate fabric in her hands, while Ralph, something more

absorbed in a romance of the day, evidently exercised little

concentration of mind in scanning its contents. He skimmed, at first,

rather than studied, the pages before him; conversing occasionally with

the young maiden, who, sitting beside him, occasionally glanced at the

volume in his hand, with something of an air of discontent that it

should take even so much of his regard from herself. As he proceeded,

however, in its perusal, the story grew upon him, and he became

unconscious of her occasional efforts to control his attention. The

needle of Edith seemed also disposed to avail itself of the aberrations

of its mistress, and to rise in rebellion; and, having pricked her

finger more than once in the effort to proceed with her work while her

eyes wandered to her companion, she at length threw down the gauzy

fabric upon which she had been so partially employed, and hastily rising

from her seat, passed into the adjoining apartment.

Her departure was not attended to by her companion, who for a time

continued his perusal of the book. No great while, however, elapsed,

when, rising also from his seat with a hasty exclamation of surprise, he

threw down the volume and followed her into the room where she sat

pensively meditating over thoughts and feelings as vague and inscrutable

to her mind, as they were clear and familiar to her heart. With a degree

of warm impetuosity, even exaggerated beyond his usual manner, which

bore at all times this characteristic, he approached her, and, seizing

her hand passionately in his, exclaimed hastily--

"Edith, my sweet Edith, how unhappy that book has made me!"

"How so, Ralph--why should it make you unhappy?"

"It has taught me much, Edith--very much, in the last half hour. It has

spoken of privation and disappointment as the true elements of life, and

has shown me so many pictures of society in such various situations, and

with so much that I feel assured must be correct, that I am unable to

resist its impressions. We have been happy--so happy, Edith, and for so

many years, that I can not bear to think that either of us should be

less so; and yet that volume has taught me, in the story of parallel

fortunes with ours, that it may be so. It has given me a long lesson in

the hollow economy of that world which men seek, and name society. It

has told me that we, or I, at least, may be made and kept miserable for

ever."

"How, Ralph, tell me, I pray you--how should that book have taught you

this strange notion? Why? What book is it? That stupid story!" was the

gasping exclamation of the astonished girl--astonished no less by the

impetuous manner than the strong language of the youth; and, with the

tenderest concern she laid her hand upon his arm, while her eyes, full

of the liveliest interest, yet moistened with a tearful apprehension,

were fixed earnestly upon his own.

"It is a stupid book, a very stupid book--a story of false sentiment,

and of mock and artificial feelings, of which I know, and care to know,

nothing. But it has told me so much that I feel is true, and that chimes

in with my own experience. It has told me much besides, that I am glad

to have been taught. Hear me then, dear Edith, and smile not carelessly

at my words, for I have now learned to tremble when I speak, in fear

lest I should offend you."

She would have spoken words of assurance--she would have taught him to

think better of her affections and their strength; but his impetuosity

checked her in her speech.

"I know what you would say, and my heart thanks you for it, as if its

very life depended upon the utterance. You would tell me to have no such

fear; but the fear is a portion of myself now--it is my heart itself.

Hear me then, Edith--_my_ Edith, if you will so let me call you."

Her hand rested on his assuringly, with a gentle pressure. He

continued--

"Hitherto we have lived with each other, only with each other--we have

loved each other, and I have almost only loved you. Neither of us, Edith

(may I believe it of you?) has known much of any other affection. But

how long is this to last? that book--where is it? but no matter--it has

taught me that, now, when a few months will carry us both into the

world, it is improper that our relationship should continue. It says we

can not be the children any longer that we have been--that such

intercourse--I can now perceive why--would be injurious to you. Do you

understand me?"

The blush of a first consciousness came over the cheek of the maiden, as

she withdrew her hand from his passionate clasp.

"Ah! I see already," he exclaimed: "you too have learned the lesson. And

is it thus--and we are to be happy no longer!"

"Ralph!"--she endeavored to speak, but could proceed no further, and her

hand was again, silently and without objection, taken into the grasp of

his. The youth, after a brief pause, resumed, in a tone, which though it

had lost much of its impetuousness, was yet full of stern resolution.

"Hear me, Edith--but a word--a single word. I love you, believe me, dear

Edith, I love you."

The effect of this declaration was scarcely such as the youth desired.

She had been so much accustomed to his warm admiration, indicated

frequently in phrases such as these, that it had the effect of restoring

to her much of her self-possession, of which the nature of the previous

dialogue had a little deprived her; and, in the most natural manner in

the world, she replied--perhaps too, we may add, with much of the

artlessness of art--

"Why, to be sure you do, Cousin Ralph--it would be something strange

indeed if you did not. I believe you love me, as I am sure you can never

doubt how much you are beloved by me!"

"_Cousin_ Ralph--_Cousin_ Ralph!" exclaimed the youth with something of

his former impetuosity, emphasizing ironically as he spoke the

unfortunate family epithet--"Ah, Edith, you _will not_ understand

me--nor indeed, an hour ago, should I altogether have understood myself.

Suddenly, dear Edith, however, as I read certain passages of that book,

the thought darted through my brain like lightning, and I saw into my

own heart, as I had never been permitted to see into it before. I there

saw how much I loved you--not as my cousin--not as my sister, as you

sometimes would have me call you, but as I _will not_ call you

again--but as--as--"

"As what?"

"As my _wife_, Edith--as my own, own wife!"

He clasped her hand in his, while his head sunk, and his lips were

pressed upon the taper and trembling fingers which grew cold and

powerless within his grasp.

What a volume was at that moment opened, for the first time, before the

gaze and understanding of the half-affrighted and deep-throbbing heart

of that gentle girl. The veil which had concealed its burning mysteries

was torn away in an instant. The key to its secret places was in her

hands, and she was bewildered with her own discoveries. Her cheeks

alternated between the pale and crimson of doubt and hope. Her lips

quivered convulsively, and an unbidden but not painful suffusion

overspread the warm brilliance of her soft fair cheeks. She strove,

ineffectually, to speak; her words came forth in broken murmurs; her

voice had sunk into a sigh; she was dumb. The youth once more took her

hand into his, as, speaking with a suppressed tone, and with a measured

slowness which had something in it of extreme melancholy, he broke

silence:--

"And have I no answer, Edith--and must I believe that for either of us

there should be other loves than those of childhood--that new affections

may usurp the place of old ones--that there may come a time, dear Edith,

when I shall see an arm, not my own, about your waist; and the eyes that

would look on no prospect if you were not a part of it, may be doomed to

that fearfullest blight of beholding your lips smiling and pressed

beneath the lips of another?"

"Never, oh never, Ralph! Speak no more, I beseech you, in such language.

You do me wrong in this--I have no such wish, no such thought or

purpose. I do not--I could not--think of another, Ralph. I will be

yours, and yours only--if you really wish it."

"If I wish! Ah! dear Edith, you are mine, and I am yours! The world

shall not pass between us."

She murmured--

"Yours, Ralph, yours only!"

He caught her in his passionate embrace, even as the words were murmured

from her lips. Her head settled upon his shoulder; her light brown hair,

loosened from the comb, fell over it in silky masses. Her eyes closed,

his arms still encircled her, and the whole world was forgotten in a

moment;--when the door opened, and a third party entered the room in the

person of Colonel Colleton.

Here was a catastrophe!

CHAPTER IV.

A RUPTURE--THE COURSE OF TRUE LOVE.

Colonel Colleton stood confounded at the spectacle before him. Filled

with public affairs, or rather, with his own affairs in the public eye,

he had grown totally heedless of ordinary events, household interests,

and of the rapid growth and development of those passions in youth which

ripen quite as fervently and soon in the shade as in the sun. These

children--how should they have grown to such a stature! His daughter, at

this moment, seemed taller than he had ever seen her before! and

Ralph!--as the uncle's eyes were riveted upon the youth, he certainly

grew more than ever erect and imposing of look and stature. The first

glance which he gave to the scene, did not please the young man. There

was something about the expression of the uncle's face, which seemed to

the nephew to be as supercilious, as it certainly was angry. Proud,

jealous of his sensibilities, the soul of the youth rose in arms, at the

look which annoyed him. That Edith's father should ever disapprove of

his passion for his cousin, never once entered the young man's brain. He

had not, indeed, once thought upon the matter. He held it to be a thing

of course that the father would welcome a union which promised to

strengthen the family bond, and maintain the family name and blood in

perpetuity. When, therefore, he beheld, in his uncle's face, such an

expression of scorn mixed with indignation, he resented it with the

fervor of his whole soul. He was bewildered, it is true, but he was also

chafed, and it needed that he should turn his eyes to the sweet cause of

his offence, before he could find himself relieved of the painful

feelings which her father's look and manner had occasioned him.

Poor Edith had a keener sense of the nature of the case. Her instincts

more readily supplied the means of knowledge. Besides, there were

certain family matters, which the look of her father suddenly

recalled--which had never been suffered to reach the ears of her

cousin;--which indicated to her, however imperfectly, the possible cause

of that severe and scornful expression of eye, in the uncle, which had

so confounded the nephew. She looked, with timid pleading to her

father's face, but dared not speak.

And still the latter stood at the entrance, silent, sternly scanning the

young offenders, just beginning to be conscious of offence. A surprise

of any kind is exceedingly paralyzing to young lovers, caught in a

situation like that in which our luckless couple were found on this

occasion. It is probable, that, but for this, Ralph Colleton would

scarcely have borne so meekly the severe look which the father now

bestowed upon his daughter.

Though not the person to trouble himself much at any time in relation to

his child, Colonel Colleton had never once treated her unkindly. Though

sometimes neglectful, he had never shown himself stern. The look which

he now gave her was new to all her experience. The poor girl began to

conceive much more seriously of her offence than ever;--it seemed to

spread out unimaginably far, and to involve a thousand violations of

divine and human law. She could only look pleadingly, without speech, to

her father. His finger silently pointed her to withdraw.

"Oh, father!"--the exclamation was barely murmured.

"Go!" was the sole answer, with the finger still uplift.

In silence, she glided away; not, however, without stealing a fond and

assuring glance at her lover.

Her departure was the signal for that issue between the two remaining

parties for which each was preparing in his own fashion. Ralph had not

beheld the dumb show, in which Edith was dismissed, without a rising

impulse of choler. The manner of the thing had been particularly

offensive to him. But the father of Edith, whatever his offence, had

suddenly risen into new consideration in the young man's mind, from the

moment that he fully comprehended his feelings for the daughter. He was

accordingly, somewhat disposed to temporize, though there was still a

lurking desire in his mind, to demand an explanation of those

supercilious glances which had so offended him.

But the meditations of neither party consumed one twentieth part of the

time that we have taken in hinting what they were. With the departure of

Edith, and the closing of the door after her, Colonel Colleton, with all

his storms, approached to the attack. The expression of scorn upon his

face had given way to one of anger wholly. His glance seemed meant to

penetrate the bosom of the youth with a mortal stab--it was hate, rather

than anger, that he looked. Yet it was evident that he made an effort to

subdue his wrath--its full utterance at least--but he could not chase

the terrible cloud from his haughty brow.

The youth, getting chafed beneath his gaze, returned him look for look,

and his brows grew dark and lowering also; and, for anger, they gave

back defiance. This silent, but expressive dialogue, was the work of a

single moment of time. The uncle broke the silence.

"What am I to understand from this, young man?"

"Young man, sir!--I feel it very difficult to understand you, uncle! In

respect to Edith and myself, sir, I have but to say that we have

discovered that we are something more than cousins to each other!"

"Indeed! And how long is it, I pray, since you have made this

discovery?"

This was said with a dry tone, and hard, contemptuous manner. The youth

strove honestly to keep down his blood.

"Within the hour, sir! Not that we have not always felt that we loved

each other, uncle; only, that, up to this time, we had never been

conscious of the true nature of our feelings."

The youth replied with the most provoking simplicity. The uncle was

annoyed. He would rather that Ralph should have relieved him, by a

conjecture of his own, from the necessity of hinting to him that such

extreme sympathies, between the parties, were by no means a matter of

course. But the nephew would not, or could not, see; and his surprise,

at the uncle's course, was perpetually looking for explanation. It

became necessary to speak plainly.

"And with what reason, Ralph Colleton, do you suppose that I will

sanction an alliance between you and my daughter? Upon what, I pray you,

do you ground your pretensions to the hand of Edith Colleton?"

Such was the haughty interrogation. Ralph was confounded.

"My pretensions, sir?--The hand of Edith!--Do I hear you right, uncle?

Do you really mean what you say?"

"My words are as I have said them. They are sufficiently explicit. You

need not misunderstand them. What, I ask, are your pretensions to the

hand of my daughter, and how is it that you have so far forgotten

yourself as thus to abuse my confidence, stealing into the affections of

my child?"

"Uncle, I have abused no confidence, and will not submit to any charge

that would dishonor me. What I have done has been done openly, before

all eyes, and without resort to cunning or contrivance. I must do myself

the justice to believe that you knew all this without the necessity of

my speech, and even while your lips spoke the contrary."

"You are bold, Ralph, and seem to have forgotten that you are yet but a

mere boy. You forget your years and mine."

"No, sir--pardon me when I so speak--but it is you who have forgotten

them. Was it well to speak as you have spoken?" proudly replied the

youth.

"Ralph, you have forgotten much, or have yet to be taught many things.

You may not have violated confidence, but--"

"I _have not_ violated confidence!" was the abrupt and somewhat

impetuous response, "and will not have it spoken of in that manner. It

is not true that I have abused any trust, and the assertion which I make

shall not therefore be understood as a mere possibility."

The uncle was something astounded by the almost fierce manner of his

nephew; but the only other effect of this expression was simply, while

it diminished his own testiness of manner in his speeches, to add

something to the severity of their character. He knew the indomitable

spirit of the youth, and his pride was enlisted in the desire for its

overthrow.

"You are yet to learn, Ralph Colleton, I perceive, the difference and

distance between yourself and my daughter. You are but a youth,

yet--quite too young to think of such ties as those of marriage, and to

make any lasting engagement of that nature; but, even were this not the

case, I am entirely ignorant of those pretensions which should prompt

your claim to the hand of Edith."

Had Colonel Colleton been a prudent and reflective man--had he, indeed,

known much, if anything, of human nature--he would have withheld the

latter part of this sentence. He must have seen that its effect would

only be to irritate a spirit needing an emollient. The reply was

instantaneous.

"My pretensions, Colonel Colleton? You have twice uttered that word in

my ears, and with reference to this subject. Let me understand you. If

you would teach me by this sentence the immeasurable individual

superiority of Edith over myself in all things, whether of mind, or

heart, or person, the lesson is gratuitous. I need no teacher to this

end. I acknowledge its truth, and none on this point can more perfectly

agree with you than myself. But if, looking beyond these particulars,

you would have me recognize in myself an inferiority, marked and

singular, in a fair comparison with other men--if, in short, you would

convey an indignity; and--but you are my father's brother, sir!" and the

blood mounted to his forehead, and his heart swelling, the youth turned

proudly away, and rested his head upon the mantel.

"Not so, Ralph; you are hasty in your thought, not less than in its

expression," said his uncle, soothingly, "I meant not what you think.

But you must be aware, nephew, that my daughter, not less from the

fortune which will be exclusively hers, and her individual

accomplishments, than from the leading political station which her

father fills, will be enabled to have a choice in the adoption of a

suitor, which this childish passion might defeat."

"Mine is no childish passion, sir; though young, my mind is not apt to

vary in its tendencies; and, unlike that of the mere politician, has

little of inconsistency in its predilections with which to rebuke

itself. But, I understand you. You have spoken of her fortune, and that

reminds me that I had a father, not less worthy, I am sure--not less

generous, I feel--but certainly far less prudent than hers. I understand

you, sir, perfectly."

"If you mean, Ralph, by this sarcasm, that my considerations are those

of wealth, you mistake me much. The man who seeks my daughter must not

look for a sacrifice; she must win a husband who has a name, a high

place--who has a standing in society. Your tutors, indeed, speak of you

in fair terms; but the public voice is everything in our country. When

you have got through your law studies, and made your first speech, we

will talk once more upon this subject."

"And when I have obtained admission to the practice of the law, do you

say that Edith shall be mine?"

"Nay, Ralph, you again mistake me. I only say, it will be then time

enough to consider the matter."

"Uncle, this will not do for me. Either you sanction, or you do not. You

mean something by that word _pretensions_ which I am yet to understand;

my name is Colleton, like your own, and--"

There was a stern resolve in the countenance of the colonel, which spoke

of something of the same temper with his impetuous nephew, and the cool

and haughty sentence which fell from his lips in reply, while arresting

that of the youth, was galling to the proud spirit of the latter, whom

it chafed nearly into madness.

"Why, true, Ralph, such is your name indeed; and your reference to this

subject now, only reminds me of the too free use which my brother made

of it when he bestowed it upon a woman so far beneath him and his family

in all possible respects."

"There again, sir, there again! It is my mother's poverty that pains

you. She brought my father no dowry. He had nothing of that choice

prudence which seems to have been the guide of others, of our family in

the bestowment of their affections. He did not calculate the value of

his wife's income before he suffered himself to become enamored of her.

I see it, sir--I am not ignorant."

"If I speak with you calmly, Ralph, it is because you are the indweller

of my house, and because I have a pledge to my brother in your behalf."

"Speak freely, sir; let not this scruple trouble you any longer. It

shall not trouble me; and I shall be careful to take early occasion to

release you most effectually from all such pledges."

Colonel Colleton proceeded as if the last speech had not been uttered.

"Edith has a claim in society which shall not be sacrificed. Her father,

Ralph, did not descend to the hovel of the miserable peasant, choosing a

wife from the inferior grade, who, without education, and ignorant of

all refinement, could only appear a blot upon the station to which she

had been raised. Her mother, sir, was not a woman obscure and

uneducated, for whom no parents could be found."

"What means all this, sir? Speak, relieve me at once, Colonel Colleton.

What know you of my mother?"

"Nothing--but quite as much as your father ever knew. It is sufficient

that he found her in a hovel, without a name, and with the silly romance

of his character through life, he raised her to a position in society

which she could not fill to his honor, and which, finally, working upon

his pride and sensibility drove him into those extravagances which in

the end produced his ruin. I grant that she loved him with a most

perfect devotion, which he too warmly returned, but what of that?--she

was still his destroyer."

Thus sternly did the colonel unveil to the eyes of Ralph Colleton a

portion of the family picture which he had never been permitted to

survey before.

Cold drops stood on the brow of the now nerveless and unhappy youth. He

was pale, and his eyes were fixed for an instant; but, suddenly

recovering himself, he rushed hastily from the apartment before his

uncle could interpose to prevent him. He heard not or heeded not the

words of entreaty which called him back; but, proceeding at once to his

chamber, he carefully fastened the entrance, and, throwing himself upon

his couch, found relief from the deep mental agony thus suddenly forced

upon him, in a flood of tears.

For the first time in his life, deriving his feeling in this particular

rather from the opinions of society than from any individual

consciousness of debasement, he felt a sentiment of humiliation working

in his breast. His mother he had little known, but his father's precepts

and familiar conversation had impressed upon him, from his childhood, a

feeling for her of the deepest and most unqualified regard. This feeling

was not lessened, though rebuked, by the development so unnecessarily

and so wantonly conveyed. It taught a new feeling of distrust for his

uncle, whose harsh manner and ungenerous insinuations in the progress of

the preceding half-hour, had lost him not a little of the youth's

esteem. He felt that the motive of his informer was not less unkind than

was the information painful and oppressive; and his mind, now more than

ever excited and active from this thought, went on discussing, from

point to point, all existing relations, until a stern resolve to leave,

that very night, the dwelling of one whose hospitality had been made a

matter of special reference, was the only and settled conclusion to

which his pride could possibly come.

The servant reminded him of the supper-hour, but the summons was utterly

disregarded. The colonel himself condescended to notify the stubborn

youth of the same important fact, but with almost as little effect.

Without opening his door, he signified his indisposition to join in the

usual repast, and thus closed the conference.

"I meet him at the table no more--not at his table, at least," was the

muttered speech of Ralph, as he heard the receding footsteps of his

uncle.

He had determined, though without any distinct object in view, upon

leaving the house and returning to Tennessee, where he had hitherto

resided. His excited spirits would suffer no delay, and that very night

was the period chosen for his departure. Few preparations were

necessary. With a fine horse of his own, the gift of his father, he knew

that the course lay open. The long route he had more than once travelled

before; and he had no fears, though he well knew the desolate character

of the journey, in pursuing it alone. Apart from this, he loved

adventure for its own sake. The first lesson which his father had taught

him, even in boyhood, was that braving of trial which alone can bring

about the most perfect manliness. With a stout heart, and with limbs not

less so, the difficulties before him had no thought in his mind; there

was buoyancy enough in the excitement of his spirit, at that moment, to

give even a pleasurable aspect to the obstacles that rose before him.

At an early hour he commenced the work of preparation: he had little

trouble in this respect. He studiously selected from his wardrobe such

portions of it as had been the gift of his uncle, all of which he

carefully excluded from among the contents of the little portmanteau

which readily comprised the residue. His travelling-dress was quickly

adjusted; and not omitting a fine pair of pistols and a dirk, which, at

that period, were held in the south and southwest legitimate companions,

he found few other cares for arrangement. One token alone of Edith--a

small miniature linked with his own, taken a few seasons before, when

both were children, by a strolling artist--suspended by a chain of the

richest gold, was carefully hung about his neck. It grew in value, to

his mind, at a moment when he was about to separate, perhaps for ever,

from its sweet original.

At midnight, when all was silent--his portmanteau under his arm--booted,

spurred, and ready for travel--Ralph descended to the lower story, in

which slept the chief servant of the house. Cæsar was a favorite with

the youth, and he had no difficulty in making himself understood. The

worthy black was thunderstruck with his determination.

"Ky! Mass Ralph, how you talk! what for you go dis time o'night? What

for you go 'tall?"

The youth satisfied him, in a manner as evasive and brief as possible,

and urged him in the preparation of his steed for the journey. But the

worthy negro absolutely refused to sanction the proceeding unless he

were permitted to go along with him. He used not a few strong arguments

for this purpose.

"And what we all for do here, when you leff? 'speck ebbery ting be dull,

wuss nor ditch-water. No more fun--no more shuffle-foot. Old maussa no

like de fiddle, and nebber hab party and jollication like udder people.

Don't tink I can stay here, Mass Ra'ph, after you gone; 'spose, you no

'jection, I go 'long wid you? You leff me, I take to de swamp, sure as a

gun."

"No, Cæsar, you are not mine; you belong to your young mistress. You

must stay and wait upon her."

"Ha!" was the quick response of the black, with a significant smirk upon

his lip, and with a cunning emphasis; "enty I see; wha' for I hab eye ef

I no see wid em? I 'speck young misses hab no 'jection for go too--eh,

Mass Ra'ph! all you hab for do is for ax em!"

The eye of the youth danced with a playful light, as if a new thought,

and not a disagreeable one, had suddenly broken in upon his brain; but

the expression lasted but for an instant He overruled all the hopes and

wishes of the sturdy black, who, at length, with a manner the most

desponding, proceeded to the performance of the required duty. A few

moments sufficed, and with a single look to the window of his mistress,

which spoke unseen volumes of love, leaving an explanatory letter for

the perusal of father and daughter, though addressed only to the

latter--he gave the rough hand of his sable friend a cordial pressure,

and was soon hidden from sight by the thickly-spreading foliage of the

long avenue. The reader has been already apprized that the youth, whose

escape in a preceding chapter we have already narrated, and Ralph

Colleton, are one and the same person.

He had set forth, as we have seen, under the excitation of feelings

strictly natural; but which, subtracting from the strong common sense

belonging to his character, had led him prematurely into an adventure,

having no distinct purposes, and promising largely of difficulty. What

were his thoughts of the future, what his designs, we are not prepared

to say. His character was of a firm and independent kind; and the

probability is, that, looking to the profession of the law, in the study

of which noble science his mind had been for some time occupied, he had

contemplated its future practice in those portions of Tennessee in which

his father had been known, and where he himself had passed some very

pleasant years of his own life. With economy, a moderate talent, and

habits of industry, he was well aware that, in those regions, the means

of life are with little difficulty attainable by those who are worthy

and will adventure. Let us now return to the wayfarer, whom we have left

in that wildest region of the then little-settled state of

Georgia--doubly wild as forming the debatable land between the savage

and the civilized--partaking of the ferocity of the one and the skill,

cunning, and cupidity of the other.

CHAPTER V.

MARK FORRESTER--THE GOLD VILLAGE.

There were moments when Ralph Colleton, as he lay bruised and wounded

upon the sward, in those wild woods, and beneath the cool canopy of

heaven, was conscious of his situation, of its exposure and its

perils--moments, when he strove to recover himself--to shake off the

stupor which seemed to fetter his limbs as effectually as it paralyzed

his thoughts;--and the renewed exercise of his mental energies, brought

about, and for a little while sustained, an increased consciousness,

which perhaps rather added to his pain. It taught him his own weakness,

when he strove vainly to support himself against the tree to which he

had crawled; and in despair, the acuteness of which was only relieved by

the friendly stupor which came to his aid, arising from the loss of

blood, he closed his eyes, and muttering a brief sentence, which might

have been a prayer, he resigned himself to his fate.

But he was not thus destined to perish. He had not lain many minutes in

this situation when the tones of a strong voice rang through the forest.

There was a whoop and halloo, and then a catch of a song, and then a

shrill whistle, all strangely mingled together, finally settling down

into a rude strain, which, coming from stentorian lungs, found a ready

echo in every jutting rock and space of wood for a mile round. The

musician went on merrily from verse to verse of his forest minstrelsy as

he continued to approach; describing in his strain, with a ready

ballad-facility, the numberless pleasures to be found in the life of the

woodman. Uncouthly, and in a style partaking rather more of the savage

than the civilized taste and temper, it enumerated the distinct features

of each mode of life with much ingenuity and in stanzas smartly

epigrammatic, did not hesitate to assign the preference to the former.

As the new-comer approached the spot where Ralph Colleton lay, there was

still a partial though dim light over the forest. The twilight was

richly clear, and there were some faint yellow lines of the sun's last

glances lingering still on the remote horizon. The moon, too, in the

opposite sky, about to come forth, had sent before her some few faint

harbingers of her approach; and it was not difficult for the sturdy

woodman to discern the body of the traveller, lying, as it did, almost

in his path. A few paces farther on stood his steed, cropping the young

grass, and occasionally, with uplifted head, looking round with

something like human wonderment, for the assertion of that authority

which heretofore had him in charge. At the approach of the stranger he

did not start, but, seeming conscious of some change for the better in

his own prospects, he fell again to work upon the herbage as if no

interruption had occurred to his repast.

The song of the woodman ceased as he discovered the body. With an

exclamation, he stooped down to examine it, and his hands were suffused

with the blood which had found its way through the garments. He saw that

life was not extinct, and readily supposing the stupor the consequence

of loss of blood rather than of vital injury, he paused a few moments as

in seeming meditation, then turning from the master to his unreluctant

steed, he threw himself upon his back, and was quickly out of sight. He

soon returned, bringing with him a wagon and team, such as all farmers

possess in that region, and lifting the inanimate form into the rude

vehicle with a tender caution that indicated a true humanity, walking

slowly beside the horses, and carefully avoiding all such obstructions

in the road, as by disordering the motion would have given pain to the

sufferer, he carried him safely, and after the delay of a few hours,

into the frontier, and then almost unknown, village of Chestatee.

It was well for the youth that he had fallen into such hands. There were

few persons in that part of the world like Mark Forrester. A better

heart, or more honorable spirit, lived not; and in spite of an erring

and neglected education--of evil associations, and sometimes evil

pursuits--he was still a worthy specimen of manhood. We may as well here

describe him, as he appears to us; for at this period the youth was

still insensible--unconscious of his deliverance as he was of his

deliverer.

Mark Forrester was a stout, strongly-built, yet active person, some six

feet in height, square and broad-shouldered--exhibiting an outline,

wanting, perhaps, in some of the more rounded graces of form, yet at the

same time far from symmetrical deficiency. There was, also, not a little

of ease and agility, together with a rude gracefulness in his action,

the result equally of the well-combined organization of his animal man

and of the hardy habits of his woodland life. His appearance was

youthful, and the passing glance would perhaps have rated him at little

more than six or seven-and-twenty. His broad, full chest, heaving

strongly with a consciousness of might--together with the generally

athletic muscularity of his whole person--indicated correctly the

possession of prodigious strength. His face was finely southern. His

features were frank and fearless--moderately intelligent, and well

marked--the _tout ensemble_ showing an active vitality, strong, and

usually just feelings, and a good-natured freedom of character, which

enlisted confidence, and seemed likely to acknowledge few restraints of

a merely conventional kind. Nor, in any of these particulars, did the

outward falsely interpret the inward man. With the possession of a

giant's powers, he was seldom so far borne forward by his impulses,

whether of pride or of passion, as to permit of their wanton or improper

use. His eye, too, had a not unpleasing twinkle, promising more of

good-fellowship and a heart at ease than may ever consort with the

jaundiced or distempered spirit. His garb indicated, in part, and was

well adapted to the pursuits of the hunter and the labors of the

woodman. We couple these employments together, for, in the wildernesses

of North America, the dense forests, and broad prairies, they are

utterly inseparable. In a belt, made of buckskin, which encircled his

middle, was stuck, in a sheath of the same material, a small axe, such

as, among the Indians, was well known to the early settlers as a deadly

implement of war. The head of this instrument, or that portion of it

opposite the blade, and made in weight to correspond with and balance

the latter when hurled from the hand, was a pick of solid steel,

narrowing down to a point, and calculated, with a like blow, to prove

even more fatal, as a weapon in conflict, than the more legitimate

member to which it was appended. A thong of ox-hide, slung over his

shoulder, supported easily a light rifle of the choicest bore; for there

are few matters indeed upon which the wayfarer in the southern wilds

exercises a nicer and more discriminating taste than in the selection of

a companion, in a pursuit like his, of the very last importance; and

which, in time, he learns to love with a passion almost comparable to

his love of woman. The dress of the woodman was composed of a coarse

gray stuff, of a make sufficiently _outré_, but which, fitting him

snugly, served to set off his robust and well-made person to the utmost

advantage. A fox-skin cap, of domestic manufacture, the tail of which,

studiously preserved, obviated any necessity for a foreign tassel,

rested slightly upon his head, giving a unique finish to his appearance,

which a fashionable hat would never have supplied. Such was the

personage, who, so fortunately for Ralph, plied his craft in that lonely

region; and who, stumbling upon his insensible form at nightfall, as

already narrated, carefully conveyed him to his own lodgings at the

village-inn of Chestatee.

The village, or town--for such it was in the acceptation of the time and

country--may well deserve some little description; not for its intrinsic

importance, but because it will be found to resemble some ten out of

every dozen of the country towns in all the corresponding region. It

consisted of thirty or forty dwellings, chiefly of logs; not, however,

so immediately in the vicinity of one another as to give any very

decided air of regularity and order to their appearance. As usual, in

all the interior settlements of the South and West, wherever an eligible

situation presented itself, the squatter laid the foundation-logs of his

dwelling, and proceeded to its erection. No public squares, and streets

laid out by line and rule, marked conventional progress in an orderly

and methodical society; but, regarding individual convenience as the

only object in arrangements of this nature, they took little note of any

other, and to them less important matters. They built where the land

rose into a ridge of moderate and gradual elevation, commanding a long

reach of prospect; where a good spring threw out its crystal waters,

jetting, in winter and summer alike, from the hillside or the rock; or,

in its absence, where a fair branch, trickling over a bed of small and

yellow pebbles, kept up a perpetually clear and undiminishing current;

where the groves were thick and umbrageous; and lastly, but not less

important than either, where agues and fevers came not, bringing clouds

over the warm sunshine, and taking all the hue, and beauty, and odor

from the flower. Those considerations were at all times the most

important to the settler when the place of his abode was to be

determined upon; and, with these advantages at large, the company of

squatters, of whom Mark Forrester, made one, by no means the least

important among them, had regularly, for the purposes of gold-digging,

colonized the little precinct into which we have now ventured to

penetrate.

Before we advance farther in our narrative, it may be quite as well to

say, that the adventurers of which this wild congregation was made up

were impelled to their present common centre by motives and influences

as various as the differing features of their several countenances. They

came, not only from parts of the surrounding country, but many of them

from all parts of the surrounding world; oddly and confusedly jumbled

together; the very _olla-podrida_ of moral and mental combination. They

were chiefly those to whom the ordinary operations of human trade or

labor had proved tedious or unproductive--with whom the toils, aims, and

impulses of society were deficient of interest; or, upon whom, an

inordinate desire of a sudden to acquire wealth had exercised a

sufficiently active influence to impel to the novel employment of

gold-finding--or rather gold-_seeking_, for it was not always that the

search was successful--the very name of such a pursuit carrying with it

to many no small degree of charm and persuasion. To these, a wholesome

assortment of other descriptions may be added, of character and caste

such as will be found ordinarily to compose everywhere the frontier and

outskirts of civilization, as rejected by the wholesome current, and

driven, like the refuse and the scum of the waters, in confused

stagnation to their banks and margin. Here, alike, came the spendthrift

and the indolent, the dreamer and the outlaw, congregating, though

guided by contradictory impulses, in the formation of a common caste,

and the pursuit of a like object--some with the view to profit and gain;

others, simply from no alternative being left them; and that of

gold-seeking, with a better sense than their neighbors, being in their

own contemplation, truly, a _dernier_ resort.

The reader can better conceive than we describe, the sorts of people,

passions, and pursuits, herding thus confusedly together; and with these

various objects. Others, indeed, came into the society, like the rude

but honest woodman to whom we have already afforded an introduction,

almost purely from a spirit of adventure, that, growing impatient of the

confined boundaries of its birthplace, longs to tread new regions and

enjoy new pleasures and employments. A spirit, we may add, the same, or

not materially differing from that, which, at an earlier period of human

history, though in a condition of society not dissimilar, begot the

practices denominated, by a most licentious courtesy, those of chivalry.

But, of whatever stuff the _morale_ of this people may have been made

up, it is not less certain than natural that the mixture was still

incoherent--the parts had not yet grown together. Though ostensibly in

the pursuit of the same interest and craft, they had anything but a like

fortune, and the degree of concert and harmony which subsisted between

them was but shadowy and partial. A mass so heterogeneous in its origin

and tendency might not so readily amalgamate. Strife, discontent, and

contention, were not unfrequent; and the laborers at the same

instrument, mutually depending on each other, not uncommonly came to

blows over it. The successes of any one individual--for, as yet, their

labors were unregulated by arrangement, and each worked on his own

score--procured for him the hate and envy of some of the company, while

it aroused the ill-disguised dissatisfaction of all; and nothing was of

more common occurrence, than, when striking upon a fruitful and

productive section, even among those interested in the discovery, to

find it a disputed dominion. Copartners no longer, a division of the

spoils, when accumulated, was usually terminated by a resort to blows;

and the bold spirit and the strong hand, in this way, not uncommonly

acquired the share for which the proprietor was too indolent to toil in

the manner of his companions.

The issue of these conflicts, as may be imagined, was sometimes wounds

and bloodshed, and occasionally death: the field, we need scarcely

add--since this is the history of all usurpation--remaining, in every

such case, in possession of the party proving itself most courageous or

strong. Nor need this history surprise--it is history, veracious and

sober history of a period, still within recollection, and of events of

almost recent occurrence. The wild condition of the country--the absence

of all civil authority, and almost of laws, certainly of officers

sufficiently daring to undertake their honest administration, and

shrinking from the risk of incurring, in the performance of their

duties, the vengeance of those, who, though disagreeing among

themselves, at all times made common cause against the ministers of

justice as against a common enemy--may readily account for the frequency

and impunity with which these desperate men committed crime and defied

its consequences.

But we are now fairly in the centre of the village--a fact of which, in

the case of most southern and western villages, it is necessary in so

many words to apprize the traveller. In those parts, the scale by which

towns are laid out is always magnificent. The founders seem to have

calculated usually upon a population of millions; and upon spots and

sporting-grounds, measurable by the olympic coursers, and the ancient

fields of combat, when scythes and elephants and chariots made the

warriors, and the confused cries of a yelping multitude composed the

conflict itself. There was no want of room, no risk of narrow streets

and pavements, no deficiency of area in the formation of public squares.

The houses scattered around the traveller, dotting at long and

infrequent intervals the ragged wood which enveloped them, left few

stirring apprehensions of their firing one another. The forest, where

the land was not actually built upon, stood up in its primitive

simplicity undishonored by the axe.

Such was the condition of the settlement at the period when our hero so

unconsciously entered it. It was night, and the lamps of the village

were all in full blaze, illuminating with an effect the most picturesque

and attractive the fifty paces immediately encircling them. Each

dwelling boasted of this auxiliary and attraction; and in this

particular but few cities afford so abundantly the materials for a blaze

as our country villages. Three or four slight posts are erected at

convenient distances from each other in front of the building--a broad

scaffold, sufficiently large for the purpose, is placed upon them, on

which a thick coat of clay is plastered; at evening, a pile is built

upon this, of dry timber and the rich pine which overruns and mainly

marks the forests of the south. These piles, in a blaze, serve the

nightly strollers of the settlement as guides and beacons, and with

their aid Forrester safely wound his way into the little village of

Chestatee.

Forming a square in the very centre of the town, a cluster of four huge

fabrics, in some sort sustained the pretensions of the settlement to

this epithet. This ostentatious collection, some of the members of which

appeared placed there rather for show than service, consisted of the

courthouse, the jail, the tavern, and the shop of the blacksmith--the

two last-mentioned being at all times the very first in course of

erection, and the essential nucleus in the formation of the southern and

western settlement. The courthouse and the jail, standing directly

opposite each other, carried in their faces a family outline of

sympathetic and sober gravity. There had been some effect at pretension

in their construction, both being cumbrously large, awkward, and

unwieldy; and occupying, as they did, the only portion of the village

which had been stripped of its forest covering, bore an aspect of mutual

and ludicrous wildness and vacancy. They had both been built upon a like

plan and equal scale; and the only difference existing between them, but

one that was immediately perceptible to the eye, was the superfluous

abundance of windows in the former, and their deficiency in the latter.

A moral agency had most probably prompted the architect to the

distinction here hit upon--and he felt, doubtless, in admitting free

access to the light in the house of justice, and in excluding it almost

entirely from that of punishment, that he had recognised the proprieties

of a most excellent taste and true judgment. These apertures, clumsily

wrought in the logs of which the buildings were made, added still more

to their generally uncouth appearance. There was yet, however, another

marked difference between the courthouse and jail, which we should not

omit to notice. The former had the advantage of its neighbor, in being

surmounted by a small tower or cupola, in which a bell of moderate size

hung suspended, permitted to speak only on such important occasions as

the opening of court, sabbath service, and the respective anniversaries

of the birthday of Washington and the Declaration of Independence. This

building, thus distinguished above its fellows, served also all the

purposes of a place of worship, whenever some wandering preacher found

his way into the settlement; an occurrence, at the time we write, of

very occasional character. To each of the four vast walls of the jail,

in a taste certainly not bad, if we consider the design and character of

the fabric, but a single window was allotted--that too of the very

smallest description for human uses, and crossed at right angles with

rude and slender bars of iron, the choicest specimens of workmanship

from the neighboring smithy. The distance between each of these four

equally important buildings was by no means inconsiderable, if we are

required to make the scale for our estimate, that of the cramped and

diminished limits accorded to like places in the cities, where men and

women appear to increase in due proportion as the field lessens upon

which they must encounter in the great struggle for existence. Though

neighbors in every substantial respect, the four fabrics were most

uncharitably remote, and stood frowning gloomily at one

another--scarcely relieved of the cheerless and sombre character of

their rough outsides, even when thus brightly illuminated by the glare

thrown upon them by the several blazes, flashing out upon the scene from

the twin lamps in front of the tavern, through whose wide and unsashed

windows an additional lustre, as of many lights, gave warm indications

of life and good lodgings within. At a point equidistant from, and

forming one of the angles of the same square with each of these, the

broader glare from the smith's furnace streamed in bright lines across

the plain between, pouring through the unclayed logs of the hovel, in

which, at his craft, the industrious proprietor was even then busily

employed. Occasionally, the sharp click of his hammer, ringing upon and

resounding from the anvil, and a full blast from the capacious bellows,

indicated the busy animation, if not the sweet concert, the habitual

cheerfulness and charm, of a more civilized and better regulated

society.

Nor was the smith, at the moment of our entrance, the only noisy member

of the little village. The more pretending establishment to which we are

rapidly approaching, threw out its clamors, and the din of many voices

gathered upon the breeze in wild and incoherent confusion. Deep bursts

of laughter, and the broken stanza of an occasional catch roared out at

intervals, promised something of relief to the dull mood; while, as the

sounds grew more distinct, the quick ear of Forrester was enabled to

distinguish the voices of the several revellers.

"There they are, in full blast," he muttered, "over a gallon of whiskey,

and gulping it down as if 'twas nothing better than common water. But,

what's the great fuss to-night? There's a crowd, I reckon, and they're a

running their rigs on somebody."

Even Forrester was at a loss to account for their excess of hilarity

to-night. Though fond of drink, and meeting often in a crowd, they were

few of them of a class--using his own phrase--"to give so much tongue

over their liquors." The old toper and vagabond is usually a silent

drinker. His amusements, when in a circle, and with a bottle before him,

are found in cards and dice. His cares, at such a period, are too

considerate to suffer him to be noisy. Here, in Chestatee, Forrester

well knew that a crowd implied little good-fellowship. The ties which

brought the gold-seekers and squatters together were not of a sort to

produce cheerfulness and merriment. Their very sports were savage, and

implied a sort of fun which commonly gave pain to somebody. He wondered,

accordingly, as he listened to yells of laughter, and discordant shouts

of hilarity; and he grew curious about the occasion of uproar.

"They're poking fun at some poor devil, that don't quite see what

they're after."

A nearer approach soon gave him a clue to the mystery; but all his

farther speculations upon it were arrested, by a deep groan from the

wounded man, and a writhing movement in the bottom of the wagon, as the

wheel rolled over a little pile of stones in the road.

Forrester's humanity checked his curiosity. He stooped to the sufferer,

composed his limbs upon the straw, and, as the vehicle, by this time,

had approached the tavern, he ordered the wagoner to drive to the rear

of the building, that the wounded man might lose, as much as possible,

the sounds of clamor which steadily rose from the hall in front. When

the wagon stopped, he procured proper help, and, with the tenderest

care, assisted to bear our unconscious traveller from the vehicle, into

the upper story of the house, where he gave him his own bed, left him in

charge of an old negro, and hurried away in search of that most

important person of the place, the village-doctor.

CHAPTER VI.

CODE AND PRACTICE OF THE REGULATORS.

Forrester was fleet of foot, and the village-doctor not far distant. He

was soon procured, and, prompt of practice, the hurts of Ralph Colleton

were found to be easily medicable. The wound was slight, the graze of a

bullet only, cutting some smaller blood-vessels, and it was only from

the loss of blood that insensibility had followed. The moderate skill of

our country-surgeon was quite equal to the case, and soon enabled him to

put the mind of Mark Forrester, who was honestly and humanely anxious,

at perfect rest on the subject of his unknown charge. With the dressing

of his wound, and the application of restoratives, the consciousness of

the youth returned, and he was enabled to learn how he had been

discovered, where he was, and to whom he was indebted for succor in the

moment of his insensibility.

Ralph Colleton, of course, declared his gratitude in warm and proper

terms; but, as enjoined by the physician, he was discouraged from all

unnecessary speech. But he was not denied to listen, and Forrester was

communicative, as became his frank face and honest impulses. The brief

questions of Ralph obtained copious answers; and, for an hour, the

woodman cheered the solitude of his chamber, by the narration of such

matters as were most likely to interest his hearer, in respect to the

new region where he was, perforce, kept a prisoner. Of Chestatee, and

the people thereof, their employment, and the resources of the

neighborhood, Forrester gave a pretty correct account; though he

remained prudently silent in regard to the probable parties to that

adventure in which his hearer had received his hurt.

From speaking of these subjects, the transition was natural to the cause

of uproar going on below stairs. The sounds of the hubbub penetrated the

chamber of the wounded man, and he expressed some curiosity in respect

to it. This was enough for the woodman, who had partially informed

himself, by a free conversation with the wagoner who drove the vehicle

which brought Ralph to the tavern. He had caught up other details as he

hurried to and fro, when he ran for the doctor. He was thus prepared to

satisfy the youth's inquiry.

"Well, squire, did you ever see a live Yankee?"

The youth smiled, answering affirmatively.

"He's a pedler, you know, and that means a chap what can wheedle the

eyes out of your head, the soul out of your body, the gould out of your

pocket, and give you nothing but brass, and tin, and copper, in the

place of 'em. Well, all the hubbub you hear is jest now about one of

these same Yankee pedlers. The regilators have caught the varmint--one

Jared Bunce, as he calls himself--and a more cunning, rascally,

presumptious critter don't come out of all Connecticut. He's been a

cheating and swindling all the old women round the country. He'll pay

for it now, and no mistake. The regilators caught him about three hours

ago, and they've brought him here for judgment and trial. They've got a

jury setting on his vartues, and they'll hammer the soul out of him

afore they let him git out from under the iron. I don't reckon they kin

cure him, for what's bred in the bone, you know, won't come out of the

flesh; but they'll so bedevil bone and flesh, that I reckon he'll be the

last Yankee that ever comes to practice again in this Chestatee country.

Maybe, he ain't deserving of much worse than they kin do. Maybe, he

ain't a scamp of the biggest wethers. His rascality ain't to be

measured. Why, he kin walk through a man's pockets, jest as the devil

goes through a crack or a keyhole, and the money will naterally stick to

him, jest as ef he was made of gum turpentine. His very face is a sort

of kining [coining] machine. His look says dollars and cents; and its

always your dollars and cents, and he kines them out of your hands into

his'n, jest with a roll of his eye, and a mighty leetle turn of his

finger. He cheats in everything, and cheats everybody. Thar's not an old

woman in the country that don't say her prayers back'ards when she

thinks of Jared Bunce. Thar's his tin-wares and his wood-wares--his

coffeepots and kettles, all put together with saft sodder--that jest go

to pieces, as ef they had nothing else to do. And he kin blarney you

so--and he's so quick at a mortal lie--and he's got jest a good reason

for everything--and he's so sharp at a 'scuse [excuse] that it's

onpossible to say where he's gwine to have you, and what you're a gwine

to lose, and how you'll get off at last, and in what way he'll cheat you

another time. He's been at this business, in these diggings, now about

three years. The regilators have swore a hundred times to square off

with him; but he's always got off tell now; sometimes by new

inventions--sometimes by bible oaths--and last year, by regilarly

_cutting dirt_ [flight]. He's hardly a chance to git cl'ar now, for the

regilators are pretty much up to all his tricks, and he's mighty nigh to

ride a rail for a colt, and get new _scores_ ag'in old scores, laid on

with the smartest hickories in natur'."

"And who are the regulators?" asked the youth, languidly.

"What! you from Georgy, and never to hear tell of the regilators? Why,

that's the very place, I reckon, where the breed begun. The regilators

are jest then, you see, our own people. We hain't got much law and

justice in these pairts, and when the rascals git too sassy and

plentiful, we all turn out, few or many, and make a business of cleaning

out the stables. We turn justices, and sheriffs, and lawyers, and settle

scores with the growing sinners. We jine, hand in hand, agin such a chap

as Jared Bunce, and set in judgment upon his evil-doings. It's a regilar

court, though we make it up ourselves, and app'ints our own judges and

juries, and pass judgment 'cordin' to the case. Ef it's the first

offence, or only a small one, we let's the fellow off with only a taste

of the hickory. Ef it's a tough case, and an old sinner, we give him a

belly-full. Ef the whole country's roused, then Judge Lynch puts on his

black cap, and the rascal takes a hard ride on a rail, a duck in the

pond, and a perfect seasoning of hickories, tell thar ain't much left of

him, or, may be, they don't stop to curry him, but jest halters him at

once to the nearest swinging limb."

"Sharp justice! and which of these punishments will they be likely to

bestow upon the Yankee?"

"Well thar's no telling; but I reckon he runs a smart chance of grazing

agin the whole on 'em. They've got a long account agin him. In one way

or t'other, he's swindled everybody with his notions. Some bought his

clocks, which only went while the rogue stayed, and when he went they

stopt forever. Some bought ready-made clothes, which went to pieces at

the very sight of soap and water. He sold a fusee to old Jerry Seaborn,

and warranted the piece, and it bursted into flinders, the very first

fire, and tore little Jerry's hand and arm--son of old Jerry--almost to

pieces. He'll never have the right use of it agin. And that ain't all.

Thar's no counting up his offences."

"Bad as the fellow is, do you think it possible that they will torture

him as you describe, or hang him, without law, and a fair trial?"

"Why, Lord love you, ha'n't I told you that he'll have a fair trial,

afore the regilators, and thar'll be any number of witnesses, and

judges, and sheriffs, and executioners. But, ef you know'd Bunce, you'd

know that a fair trial is the very last marcy that he'd aix of

Providence. Don't you think now that he'll git anything worse than his

righteous desarvings. He's a fellow that's got no more of a saving soul

in him than my whip-handle, and ain't half so much to be counted on in a

fight. He's jest now nothing but a cheat and a swindle from head to

foot; hain't got anything but cheat in him--hain't got room for any

principle---not enough either to git drunk with a friend, or have it

out, in a fair fight, with his enemy. I shouldn't myself wish to see the

fellow's throat cut, but I ain't slow to say that I shall go for his

tasting a few hickories, after that a dip in the horsepond, and then a

permit to leave the country by the shortest cut, and without looking

behind him, under penalty of having the saft places on his back covered

with the petticoats of Lot's wife, that we hear of in the Scriptures."

Ralph Colleton was somewhat oppressed with apathy, and he knew how idle

would be any attempt to lessen the hostility of the sturdy woodman, in

respect to the wretched class of traders, such as were described in

Jared Bunce, by whom the simple and dependent borderers in the South and

West, were shockingly imposed upon. He made but a feeble effort

accordingly, in this direction, but was somewhat more earnest in

insisting upon the general propriety of forbearance, in a practice which

militated against law and order, and that justice should he administered

only by the proper hands. But to this, Mark Forrester had his ready

answer; and, indeed, our young traveller was speaking according to the

social standards of a wholly different region.

"There, again, 'squire, you are quite out. The laws, somehow or other,

can't touch these fellows. They run through the country a wink faster

than the sheriff, and laugh at all the processes you send after them.

So, you see, there's no justice, no how, unless you catch a rogue like

this, and wind up with him for all the gang--for they're all alike, all

of the same family, and it comes to the same thing in the end."

The youth answered languidly. He began to tire, and nature craved

repose, and the physician had urged it. Forrester readily perceived that

the listener's interest was flagging--nay he half fancied that much that

he had been saying, and in his best style, had fallen upon drowsy

senses. Nobody likes to have his best things thrown away, and, as the

reader will readily conceive, our friend Forrester had a sneaking

consciousness that all the world's eloquence did not cease on the day

when Demosthenes died. But he was not the person to be offended because

the patient desired to sleep. Far from it. He was only reasonable enough

to suppose that this was the properest thing that the wounded man could

do. And so he told him; and adjusting carefully the pillows of the

youth, and disposing the bedclothes comfortably, and promising to see

him again before he slept, our woodman bade him good night, and

descended to the great hall of the tavern, where Jared Bunce was held in

durance.

The luckless pedler was, in truth, in a situation in which, for the

first time in his life, he coveted nothing. The peril was one, also,

from which, thus far, his mother-wit, which seldom failed before, could

suggest no means of evasion or escape. His prospect was a dreary one;

though with the wonderful capacity for endurance, and the surprising

cheerfulness, common to the class to which he belonged, he beheld it

without dismay though with many apprehensions.

Justice he did not expect, nor, indeed, as Forrester has already told

us, did he desire it. He asked for nothing less than justice. He was

dragged before judges, all of whom had complaints to prefer, and

injuries to redress; and none of whom were over-scrupulous as to the

nature or measure of that punishment which was to procure them the

desired atonement. The company was not so numerous as noisy. It

consisted of some twenty persons, villagers as well as small farmers in

the neighborhood, all of whom, having partaken _ad libitum_ of the

whiskey distributed freely about the table, which, in part, they

surrounded, had, in the Indian phrase, more tongues than brains, and

were sufficiently aroused by their potations to enter readily into any

mischief. Some were smoking with all the industrious perseverance of the

Hollander; others shouted forth songs in honor of the bottle, and with

all the fervor and ferment of Bacchanalian novitiates; and not a few,

congregating about the immediate person of the pedler, assailed his ears

with threats sufficiently pregnant with tangible illustration to make

him understand and acknowledge, by repeated starts and wincings, the

awkward and uncomfortable predicament in which he stood. At length, the

various disputants for justice, finding it difficult, if not impossible,

severally, to command that attention which they conceived they merited,

resolved themselves into something like a committee of the whole, and

proceeded to the settlement of their controversy, and the pedler's fate,

in a manner more suited to the importance of the occasion. Having

procured that attention which was admitted to be the great object, more

by the strength of his lungs than his argument, one of the company, who

was dignified by the title of colonel, spoke out for the rest.

"I say, boys--'tisn't of any use, I reckon, for everybody to speak about

what everybody knows. One speaker's quite enough in this here matter

before us. Here's none of us that sha'n't something to say agin this

pedler, and the doings of the grand scoundrel in and about these parts,

for a matter going on now about three years. Why, everybody knows him,

big and little; and his reputation is so now, that the very boys take

his name to frighten away the crows with. Now, one person can jist as

well make a plain statement as another. I know, of my own score, there's

not one of my neighbors for ten miles round, that can't tell all about

the rotten prints he put off upon my old woman; and I know myself of all

the tricks he's played at odd times, more than a dozen, upon 'Squire

Nichols there, and Tom Wescott, and Bob Snipes, and twenty others; and

everybody knows them just as well as I. Now, to make up the score, and

square off with the pedler, without any frustration, I move you that

Lawyer Pippin take the chair, and judge in this matter; for the day has

come for settling off accounts, and I don't see why we shouldn't be the

regulators for Bunce, seeing that everybody agrees that he's a rogue,

and a pestilence, and desarves regilation."

This speech was highly applauded, and chimed in admirably with all

prejudices, and the voice that called Lawyer Pippin to preside over the

deliberations of the assembly was unanimous. The gentleman thus highly

distinguished, was a dapper and rather portly little personage, with

sharp twinkling eyes, a ruby and remarkable nose, a double chin,

retreating forehead, and corpulent cheek. He wore green glasses of a

dark, and a green coat of a light, complexion. The lawyer was the only

member of the profession living in the village, had no competitor save

when the sitting of the court brought in one or more from neighboring

settlements, and, being thus circumstanced, without opposition, and the

only representative of his craft, he was literally, to employ the slang

phrase in that quarter, the "cock of the walk." He was, however, not so

much regarded by the villagers a worthy as a clever man. It required not

erudition to win the credit of profundity, and the lawyer knew how to

make the most of his learning among those who had none. Like many other

gentlemen of erudition, he was grave to a proverb when the occasion

required it, and would not be seen to laugh out of the prescribed place,

though "Nestor swore the jest was laughable." He relied greatly on saws

and sayings--could quote you the paradoxes of Johnson and the

infidelities of Hume without always understanding them, and mistook, as

men of that kind and calibre are very apt to do, the capacity to repeat

the grave absurdities of others as a proof of something in himself. His

business was not large, however, and among the arts of his profession,

and as a means for supplying the absence of more legitimate occasions

for its employment, he was reputed as excessively expert in making the

most of any difficulty among his neighbors. The egg of mischief and

controversy was hardly laid, before the worthy lawyer, with maternal

care, came clucking about it; he watched and warmed it without

remission; and when fairly hatched, he took care that the whole brood

should be brought safely into court, his voice, and words, and actions,

fully attesting the deep interest in their fortunes which he had

manifested from the beginning. Many a secret slander, ripening at length

into open warfare, had been traced to his friendly influence, either _ab

ovo_, or at least from the perilous period in such cases when the very

existence of the embryo relies upon the friendly breath, the sustaining

warmth, and the occasional stimulant. Lawyer Pippin, among his

neighbors, was just the man for such achievements, and they gave him,

with a degree of shrewdness common to them as a people, less qualified

credit for the capacity which he at all times exhibited in bringing a

case into, than in carrying it out of court. But this opinion in nowise

affected the lawyer's own estimate of his pretensions. Next to being

excessively mean, he was excessively vain, and so highly did he regard

his own opinions, that he was never content until he heard himself

busily employed in their utterance. An opportunity for a speech, such as

the present, was not suffered to pass without due regard; but as we

propose that he shall exhibit himself in the most happy manner at a

later period in our narrative, we shall abridge, in few, the long string

of queerly-associated words in the form of a speech, which, on assuming

the chair thus assigned him, he poured forth upon the assembly. After a

long prefatory, apologetic, and deprecatory exordium, in which his own

demerits, as is usual with small speakers, were strenuously urged; and

after he had exhausted most of the commonplaces about the purity of the

ermine upon the robes of justice, and the golden scales, and the

unshrinking balance, and the unsparing and certain sword, he went on

thus:--

"And now, my friends, if I rightly understand the responsibility and

obligations of the station thus kindly conferred upon me, I am required

to arraign the pedler, Jared Bunce, before you, on behalf of the

country, which country, as the clerk reads it, you undoubtedly are; and

here let me remark, my friends, the excellent and nice distinction which

this phrase makes between the man and the soil, between the noble

intellect and the high soul, and the mere dirt and dust upon which we

daily tread. This very phrase, my friends, is a fine embodiment of that

democratic principle upon which the glorious constitution is erected.

But, as I was saying, my friends, I am required to arraign before you

this same pedler, Jared Bunce, on sundry charges of misdemeanor, and

swindling, and fraud--in short, as I understand it, for endeavoring,

without having the fear of God and good breeding in his eyes, to pass

himself off upon the good people of this county as an honest man. Is

this the charge, my friends?"

"Ay, ay, lawyer, that's the how, that's the very thing itself. Put it to

the skunk, let him deny that if he can--let him deny that his name is

Jared Bunce--that he hails from Connecticut--that he is a shark, and a

pirate, and a pestilence. Let him deny that he is a cheat--that he goes

about with his notions and other rogueries--that he doesn't manufacture

maple-seeds, and hickory nutmegs, and ground coffee made out of rotten

rye. Answer to that, Jared Bunce, you white-livered lizard."

Thus did one of his accusers take up the thread of the discourse as

concluded in part by the chairman. Another and another followed with

like speeches in the most rapid succession, until all was again

confusion; and the voice of the lawyer, after a hundred ineffectual

efforts at a hearing, degenerated into a fine squeak, and terminated at

last in a violent fit of coughing, that fortunately succeeded in

producing the degree of quiet around him to secure which his language

had, singularly enough, entirely failed. For a moment the company ceased

its clamor, out of respect to the chairman's cough; and, having cleared

his throat with the contents of a tumbler of Monongahela which seemed to

stand permanently full by his side, he recommenced the proceedings; the

offender, in the meantime, standing mute and motionless, now almost

stupified with terror, conscious of repeated offences, knowing perfectly

the reckless spirit of those who judged him, and hopeless of escape from

their hands, without, in the country phrase, the loss at least of "wing

and tail feathers." The chairman with due gravity began:--

"Jared Bunce--is that your name?"

"Why, lawyer, I can't deny that I have gone by that name, and I guess

it's the right name for me to go by, seeing that I was christened Jared,

after old Uncle Jared Withers, that lives down at Dedham, in the state

of Massachusetts. He did promise to do something for me, seeing I was

named after him, but he ha'n't done nothing yet, no how. Then the name

of Bunce, you see, lawyer, I got from my father, his name being Bunce,

too, I guess."

"Well, Jared Bunce, answer to the point, and without circumlocution. You

have heard some of the charges against you. Having taken them down in

short-hand, I will repeat them."

The pedler approached a few steps, advanced one leg, raised a hand to

his ear, and put on all the external signs of devout attention, as the

chairman proceeded in the long and curious array.

"First, then, it is charged against you, Bunce, by young Dick Jenkins,

that stands over in front of you there, that somewhere between the

fifteenth and twenty-third of June--last June was a year--you came by

night to his plantation, he living at that time in De Kalb county; that

you stopped the night with him, without charge, and in the morning you

traded a clock to his wife for fifteen dollars, and that you had not

been gone two days, before the said clock began to go whiz, whiz, whiz,

and commenced striking, whizzing all the while, and never stopped till

it had struck clear thirty-one, and since that time it will neither

whiz, nor strike, nor do nothing."

"Why, lawyer, I ain't the man to deny the truth of this transaction, you

see; but, then, you must know, much depends upon the way you manage a

clock. A clock is quite a delicate and ticklish article of manufacture,

you see, and it ain't everybody that can make a clock, or can make it go

when it don't want to; and if a man takes a hammer or a horsewhip, or

any other unnatural weapon to it, as if it was a house or a horse, why I

guess, it's not reasonable to expect it to keep in order, and it's no

use in having a clock no how, if you don't treat it well. As for its

striking thirty-one, that indeed is something remarkable, for I never

heard one of mine strike more than twelve, and that's zactly the number

they're regulated to strike. But, after all, lawyer, I don't see that

Squire Jenkins has been much a loser by the trade, seeing that he paid

me in bills of the Hogee-nogee bank, and that stopped payment about the

time, and before I could get the bills changed. It's true, I didn't let

on that I knowed anything about it, and got rid of the paper a little

while before the thing went through the country."

"Now, look ye, you gingerbread-bodied Yankee--I'd like to know what you

mean about taking whip and hammer to the clock. If you mean to say that

I ever did such a thing, I'll lick you now, by the eternal scratch!"

"Order, order, Mr. Jenkins--order! The chair must be respected. You must

come to order, Mr. Jenkins--" was the vociferous and urgent cry of the

chairman, repeated by half a dozen voices; the pedler, in the meanwhile,

half doubting the efficacy of the call, retreating with no little terror

behind the chair of the dignified personage who presided.

"Well, you needn't make such a howling about it," said Jenkins,

wrathfully, and looking around him with the sullen ferocity of a chafed

bear. "I know jist as well how to keep order, I reckon, as any on you;

but I don't see how it will be out of order to lick a Yankee, or who can

hinder me, if I choose it."

"Well, don't look at me, Dick Jenkins, with such a look, or I'll have a

finger in that pie, old fellow. I'm no Yankee to be frightened by sich a

lank-sided fellow as you; and, by dogs, if nobody else can keep you in

order, I'm jist the man to try if I can't. So don't put on any shines,

old boy, or I'll darken your peepers, if I don't come very nigh plucking

them out altogether."

So spake another of the company, who, having been much delectified with

the trial, had been particularly solicitous in his cries for order.

Jenkins was not indisposed to the affray, and made an angry retort,

which provoked another still more angry; but other parties interfering,

the new difficulty was made to give place to that already in hand. The

imputation upon Jenkins, that his ignorance of the claims of the clock

to gentle treatment, alone, had induced it to speak thirty-one times,

and at length refuse to speak at all, had touched his pride; and, sorely

vexed, he retired upon a glass of whiskey to the farther corner of the

room, and with his pipe, nursing the fumes of his wrath, he waited

impatiently the signal for the wild mischief which he knew would come.

In the meanwhile, the examination of the culprit proceeded; but, as we

can not hope to convey to the reader a description of the affair as it

happened, to the life, we shall content ourselves with a brief summary.

The chair went on rapidly enumerating the sundry misdeeds of the Yankee,

demanding, and in most cases receiving, rapid and unhesitating

replies--evasively and adroitly framed, for the offender well knew that

a single unlucky word or phrase would bring down upon his shoulders a

wilderness of blows.

"You are again charged, Bunce, with having sold to Colonel Blundell a

coffee-pot and two tin cups, all of which went to pieces--the solder

melting off at the very sight of the hot water."

"Well, lawyer, it stands to reason I can't answer for that. The tin

wares I sell stand well enough in a northern climate: there may be some

difference in yours that I can't account for; and I guess, pretty much,

there is. Now, your people are a mighty hot-tempered people, and take a

fight for breakfast, and make three meals a day out of it: now, we in

the north have no stomach for such fare; so here, now, as far as I can

see, your climate takes pretty much after the people, and if so, it's no

wonder that solder can't stand it. Who knows, again, but you boil your

water quite too hot? Now, I guess, there's jest as much harm in boiling

water too hot, as in not boiling it hot enough. Who knows? All I can say

is, that the lot of wares I bring to this market next season shall be

calkilated on purpose to suit the climate."

The chairman seemed struck with this view of the case, and spoke with a

gravity corresponding with the deep sagacity he conceived himself to

have exhibited.

"There does seem to be something in this; and it stands to reason, what

will do for a nation of pedlers won't do for us. Why, when I recollect

that they are buried in snows half the year, and living on nothing else

the other half, I wonder how they get the water to boil at all. Answer

that, Bunce."

"Well, lawyer, I guess you must have travelled pretty considerable down

east in your time and among my people, for you do seem to know all about

the matter jest as well and something better than myself."

The lawyer, not a little flattered by the compliment so slyly and

evasively put in, responded to the remark with a due regard to his own

increase of importance.

"I am not ignorant of your country, pedler, and of the ways of its

people; but it is not me that you are to satisfy. Answer to the

gentlemen around, if it is not a difficult matter for you to get water

to boil at all during the winter months."

"Why, to say the truth, lawyer, when coal is scarce and high in the

market, heat is very hard to come. Now, I guess the ware I brought out

last season was made under those circumstances; but I have a lot on hand

now, which will be here in a day or two, which I should like to trade to

the colonel, and I guess I may venture to say, all the hot water in the

country won't melt the solder off."

"I tell you what, pedler, we are more likely to put you in hot water

than try any more of your ware in that way. But where's your

plunder?--let us see this fine lot of notions you speak of"--was the

speech of the colonel already so much referred to, and whose coffee-pot

bottom furnished so broad a foundation for the trial. He was a wild and

roving person, to whom the tavern, and the racecourse, and the cockpit,

from his very boyhood up, had been as the breath of life, and with whom

the chance of mischief was never willingly foregone. But the pedler was

wary, and knew his man. The lurking smile and sneer of the speaker had

enough in them for the purposes of warning, and he replied evasively:--

"Well, colonel, you shall see them by next Tuesday or Wednesday. I

should be glad to have a trade with you--the money's no object--and if

you have furs, or skins, or anything that you like to get off your

hands, there's no difficulty, that I can see, to a long bargain."

"But why not trade now, Bunce?--what's to hinder us now? I sha'n't be in

the village after Monday."

"Well, then, colonel, that'll just suit me, for I did calkilate to call

on you at the farm, on my way into the nation where I'm going looking

out for furs."

"Yes, and live on the best for a week, under some pretence that your nag

is sick, or you sick, or something in the way of a start--then go off,

cheat, and laugh at me in the bargain. I reckon, old boy, you don't come

over me in that way again; and I'm not half done with you yet about the

kettles. That story of yours about the hot and cold may do for the

pigeons, but you don't think the hawks will swallow it, do ye? Come--out

with your notions!"

"Oh, to be sure, only give a body time, colonel," as, pulled by the

collar, with some confusion and in great trepidation, responded the

beleagured dealer in clocks and calicoes--"they shall all be here in a

day or two at most. Seeing that one of my creatures was foundered, I had

to leave the goods, and drive the other here without them."

The pedler had told the truth in part only. One of his horses had indeed

struck lame, but he had made out to bring him to the village with all

his wares; and this fact, as in those regions of question and inquiry

was most likely to be the case, had already taken wind.

"Now, look ye, Bunce, do you take me for a blear-eyed mole, that never

seed the light of a man's eyes?" inquired Blundell, closely approaching

the beset tradesman, and taking him leisurely by the neck. "Do you want

to take a summerset through that window, old fellow, that you try to

stuff us with such tough stories? If you do, I _rether_ reckon you can

do it without much difficulty." Thus speaking, and turning to some of

those around him, he gave directions which imparted to the limbs of the

pedler a continuous and crazy motion, that made his teeth chatter.

"Hark ye, boys, jist step out, and bring in the cart of Jared Bunce,

wheels and all, if so be that the body won't come off easily. We'll see

for ourselves."

It was now the pedler's turn for speech; and, forgetting the precise

predicament in which he personally stood, and only solicitous to save

his chattels from the fate which he plainly saw awaited them, his

expostulations and entreaties were rapid and energetic.

"Now, colonel--gentlemen--my good friends--to-morrow or the next day you

shall see them all--I'll go with you to your plantation--"

"No, thank ye. I want none of your company--and, look ye, if you know

when you're well off, don't undertake to call me your friend. I say, Mr.

Chairman, if it's in order--I don't want to do anything disorderly--I

move that Bunce's cart be moved here into this very room, that we may

see for ourselves the sort of substance he brings here to put off upon

us."

The chairman had long since seemingly given up all hope of exercising,

in their true spirit, the duties of the station which he held. For a

while, it is true, he battled with no little energy for the integrity of

his dignity, with good lungs and a stout spirit; but, though fully a

match in these respects for any one, or perhaps any two of his

competitors, he found the task of contending with the dozen rather less

easy, and, in a little while, his speeches, into which he had lugged

many a choice _ad captandum_ of undisputed effect on any other occasion,

having been completely merged and mingled with those of the mass, he

wisely forbore any further waste of matter, in the stump-oratory of the

South usually so precious; and, drawing himself up proudly and

profoundly in his high place, he remained dignifiedly sullen, until the

special reference thus made by Colonel Blundell again opened the

fountains of the oracle and set them flowing.

The lawyer, thus appealed to, in a long tirade, and in his happiest

manner, delivered his opinion in the premises, and in favor of the

measure. How, indeed, could he do otherwise, and continue that tenacious

pursuit of his own interests which had always been the primary aim and

object, as well of the profession as the person. He at once sagaciously

beheld the embryo lawsuit and contingent controversy about to result

from the proposition; and, in his mind, with a far and free vision,

began to compute the costs and canvass the various terms and prolonged

trials of county court litigation. He saw fee after fee thrust into his

hands--he beheld the opposing parties desirous to conciliate, and

extending to him sundry of those equivocal courtesies, which, though

they take not the shape of money are money's worth, and the worthy

chairman had no scruples as to the propriety of the measure. The profits

and pay once adjusted to his satisfaction, his spirit took a broad

sweep, and the province of human fame, circumscribed, it is true, within

the ten mile circuit of his horizon, was at once open before him. He

beheld the strife, and enjoyed the triumph over his fellow-laborers at

the bar--he already heard the applauses of his neighbors at this or that

fine speech or sentiment; and his form grew insensibly erect, and his

eye glistened proudly, as he freely and fully assented to the measure

which promised such an abundant harvest. Vainly did the despairing and

dispirited pedler implore a different judgment; the huge box which

capped the body of his travelling vehicle, torn from its axle, without

any show of reverential respect for screw or fastening, was borne in a

moment through the capacious entrance of the hall, and placed

conspicuously upon the table.

"The key, Bunce, the key!" was the demand of a dozen.

The pedler hesitated for a second, and the pause was fatal. Before he

could redeem his error, a blow from a hatchet settled the difficulty, by

distributing the fine deal-box cover, lock and hinges, in fragments over

the apartment. The revelation of wares and fabrics--a strange admixture,

with propriety designated "notions"--brought all eyes immediately

around, and rendered a new order, for common convenience, necessary in

the arrangement of the company. The chairman, chair and man, were in a

moment raised to a corresponding elevation upon the table, over the

collection; and the controversy and clamor, from concentrating, as it

did before, upon the person of the pedler, were now transferred to the

commodities he brought for sale. Order having been at length obtained,

Colonel Blundell undertook the assertion of his own and the wrongs of

his fellow-sufferers, and kept uninterrupted possession of the floor.

"And now, Mr. Chairman, I will jist go a little into the particulars of

the rogueries and rascalities of this same Yankee. Now, in the first

place, he is a Yankee, and that's enough, itself, to bring him to

punishment--but we'll let that pass, and go to his other

transactions--for, as I reckon, it's quite punishment enough for that

offence, to be jist what he is. He has traded rotten stuffs about the

country, that went to pieces the first washing. He has traded calico

prints, warranted for fast colors, that ran faster than he ever ran

himself. He has sold us tin stuffs, that didn't stand hot water at all;

and then thinks to get off, by saying they were not made for our

climate. And let me ask, Mr. Chairman, if they wasn't made for our

climate, why did he bring 'em here? let him come to the scratch, and

answer that, neighbors--but he can't. Well, then, as you've all hearn,

he has traded clocks to us at money's worth, that one day ran faster

than a Virginny race-mare, and at the very next day, would strike lame,

and wouldn't go at all, neither for beating nor coaxing--and besides all

these doings, neighbors, if these an't quite enough to carry a skunk to

the horsepond, he has committed his abominations without number, all

through the country high and low--for hain't he lied and cheated, and

then had the mean cowardice to keep out of the way of the _regilators_,

who have been on the look-out for his tracks for the last half year?

Now, if these things an't _desarving_ of punishment, there's nobody fit

to be hung--there's nobody that ought to be whipped. Hickories oughtn't

to grow any longer, and the best thing the governor can do would be to

have all the jails burnt down from one eend of the country to the other.

The proof stands up agin Bunce, and there's no denying it; and it's no

use, no how, to let this fellow come among us, year after year, to play

the same old hand, take our money for his rascally goods, then go away

and laugh at us. And the question before us is jist what I have said,

and what shall we do with the critter? To show you that it's high time

to do something in the matter, look at this calico print, that looks, to

be sure, very well to the eye, except, as you see, here's a tree with

red leaves and yellow flowers--a most ridiculous notion, indeed, for who

ever seed a tree with sich colors here, in the very beginning of

summer?"

Here the pedler, for the moment, more solicitous for the credit of the

manufactures than for his own safety, ventured to suggest that the print

was a mere fancy, a matter of taste--in fact, a notion, and not

therefore to be judged by the standard which had been brought to decide

upon its merits. He did not venture, however, to say what, perhaps,

would have been the true horn of the difficulty, that the print was an

autumn or winter illustration, for that might have subjected him to

condign punishment for its unseasonableness. As it was, the defence set

up was to the full as unlucky as any other might have been.

"I'll tell you what, Master Bunce, it won't do to take natur in vain. If

you can show me a better painter than natur, from your pairts, I give

up; but until that time, I say that any man who thinks to give the woods

a different sort of face from what God give 'em, ought to be licked for

his impudence if nothing else."

The pedler ventured again to expostulate; but the argument having been

considered conclusive against him, he was made to hold his peace, while

the prosecutor proceeded.

"Now then, Mr. Chairman, as I was saying--here is a sample of the kind

of stuff he thinks to impose upon us. Look now at this here article, and

I reckon it's jist as good as any of the rest, and say whether a little

touch of Lynch's law, an't the very thing for the Yankee!"

Holding up the devoted calico to the gaze of the assembly, with a single

effort of his strong and widely-distended arms, he rent it asunder with

little difficulty, the sweep not terminating, until the stuff, which,

by-the-way, resigned itself without struggle or resistance to its fate,

had been most completely and evenly divided. The poor pedler in vain

endeavored to stay a ravage that, once begun, became epidemical. He

struggled and strove with tenacious hand, holding on to sundry of his

choicest bales, and claiming protection from the chair, until warned of

his imprudent zeal in behalf of goods so little deserving of the risk,

by the sharp and sudden application of an unknown hand to his ears which

sent him reeling against the table, and persuaded him into as great a

degree of patience, as, under existing circumstances, he could be well

expected to exhibit. Article after article underwent a like analysis of

its strength and texture, and a warm emulation took place among the

rioters, as to their several capacities in the work of destruction. The

shining bottoms were torn from the tin-wares in order to prove that such

a separation was possible, and it is doing but brief justice to the

pedler to say, that, whatever, in fact, might have been the true

character of his commodities, the very choicest of human fabrics could

never have resisted the various tests of bone and sinew, tooth and nail,

to which they were indiscriminately subjected. Immeasurable was the

confusion that followed. All restraints were removed--all hindrances

withdrawn, and the tide rushed onward with a most headlong tendency.

Apprehensive of pecuniary responsibilities in his own person, and having

his neighbors wrought to the desired pitch--fearing, also, lest his

station might somewhat involve himself in the meshes he was weaving

around others, the sagacious chairman, upon the first show of violence,

roared out his resignation, and descended from his place. But this

movement did not impair the industry of the _regulators_. A voice was

heard proposing a bonfire of the merchandise, and no second suggestion

was necessary. All hands but those of the pedler and the attorney were

employed in building the pyre in front of the tavern some thirty yards;

and here, in choice confusion, lay flaming calicoes, illegitimate silks,

worsted hose, wooden clocks and nutmegs, maple-wood seeds of all

descriptions, plaid cloaks, scents, and spices, jumbled up in ludicrous

variety. A dozen hands busied themselves in applying the torch to the

devoted mass--howling over it, at every successive burst of flame that

went up into the dark atmosphere, a savage yell of triumph that tallied

well with the proceeding.

"Hurrah!"

The scene was one of indescribable confusion. The rioters danced about

the blaze like so many frenzied demons. Strange, no one attempted to

appropriate the property that must have been a temptation to all.

Our pedler, though he no longer strove to interfere, was by no means

insensible to the ruin of his stock in trade. It was calculated to move

to pity, in any other region, to behold him as he stood in the doorway,

stupidly watching the scene, while the big tears were slowly gathering

in his eyes, and falling down his bronzed and furrowed cheeks. The

rough, hard, unscrupulous man can always weep for himself. Whatever the

demerits of the rogue, our young traveller above stairs, would have

regarded him as the victim of a too sharp justice. Not so the

participators in the outrage. They had been too frequently the losers by

the cunning practice of the pedler, to doubt for a moment the perfect

propriety--nay, the very moderate measure--of that wild justice which

they were dealing out to his misdeeds. And with this even, they were not

satisfied. As the perishable calicoes roared up and went down in the

flames, as the pans and pots and cups melted away in the furnace heat,

and the painted faces of the wooden clocks, glared out like those of

John Rogers at the stake, enveloped in fire, the cries of the crowd were

mingled in with a rude, wild chorus, in which the pedler was made to

understand that he stood himself in a peril almost as great as his

consuming chattels. It was the famous ballad of the _regulators_ that he

heard, and it smote his heart with a consciousness of his personal

danger that made him shiver in his shoes. The uncouth doggrel, recited

in a lilting sort of measure, the peculiar and various pleasures of a

canter upon a pine rail. It was clear that the mob were by no means

satisfied with the small measure of sport which they had enjoyed. A

single verse of this savage ditty will suffice for the present, rolled

out upon the air, from fifty voices, the very boys and negroes joining

in the chorus, and making it tell terribly to the senses of the

threatened person. First one voice would warble

"Did you ever, ever, ever!"--

and there was a brief pause, at the end of which the crowd joined in

with unanimous burst and tremendous force of lungs:--

"Did you ever, ever, ever, in your life ride a rail?

Such a deal of pleasure's in it, that you never can refuse!

You are mounted on strong shoulders, that'll never, never fail,

Though you pray'd with tongue of sinner, just to plant you

where they choose.

Though the brier patch is nigh you, looking up with thorny faces,

They never wait to see how you like the situation,

But down you go a rolling, through the penetrating places,

Nor scramble out until you give the cry of approbation.

Oh! pleasant is the riding, highly-seated on the rail,

And worthy of the wooden horse, the rascal that we ride;

Let us see the mighty shoulders that will never, never fail.

To lift him high, and plant him, on the crooked rail astride.

The seven-sided pine rail, the pleasant bed of briar,

The little touch of hickory law, with a dipping in the mire.

"Did you ever, ever, ever," &c.,

from the troupe in full blast!

The lawyer Pippin suddenly stood beside the despairing pedler, as this

ominous ditty was poured upon the night-winds.

"Do you hear that song, Bunce?" he asked. "How do you like the music?"

The pedler looked in his face with a mixed expression of grief, anger,

and stupidity, but he said nothing.

"Hark ye, Bunce," continued the lawyer. "Do you know what that means?

Does your brain take in its meaning, my friend?"

"Friend, indeed!" was the very natural exclamation of the pedler as he

shrank from the hand of the lawyer, which had been affectionately laid

upon his shoulder. "Friend, indeed! I say, Lawyer Pippin, if it hadn't

been for you, I'd never ha' been in this fix. I'm ruined by you."

"Ruined by me! Pshaw, Bunce, you are a fool. I was your friend all the

time."

"Oh, yes! I can see how. But though you did stop, when they began, yet

you did enough to set them on. That was like a good lawyer, I guess, but

not so much like a friend. Had you been a friend, you could have saved

my property from the beginning."

"Nay, nay, Bunce; you do me wrong. They had sworn against you long ago,

and you know them well enough. The devil himself couldn't stop 'em when

once upon the track. But don't be down in the mouth. I can save you

now."

"Save me!"

"Ay! don't you hear? They're singing the regulation song. Once that

blaze goes down, they'll be after you. It's a wonder they've left you

here so long. Now's your time. You must be off. Fly by the back door,

and leave it to me to get damages for your loss of property."

"You, lawyer? well, I should like to know how you calkilate to do that?"

"I'll tell you. You know my profession."

"I guess I do, pretty much."

"Thus, then--most of these are men of substance; at least they have

enough to turn out a pretty good case each of them--now all you have to

do is to bring suit. I'll do all that, you know, the same as if you did

it yourself. You must lay your damages handsomely, furnish a few

affidavits, put the business entirely in my hands, and--how much is the

value of your goods?"

"Well, I guess they might be worth something over three hundred and

twenty dollars and six shillings, York money."

"Well, give me all the particulars, and I venture to assure you that I

can get five hundred dollars damages at least, and perhaps a thousand.

But of this we can talk more at leisure when you are in safety. Where's

your cart, Bunce?"

"On t'other side of the house--what they've left on it."

"Now, then, while they're busy over the blaze, put your tackle on, hitch

your horse, and take the back track to my clearing; it's but a short

mile and a quarter, and you'll be there in no time. I'll follow in a

little while, and we'll arrange the matter."

"Well, now, lawyer, but I can't--my horse, as you see, having over eat

himself, is struck with the founders and can't budge. I put him in

'Squire Dickens' stable, 'long with his animals, and seeing that he

hadn't had much the day before, I emptied the corn from their troughs

into his, and jest see what's come of it. I hadn't ought to done so, to

be sure."

"That's bad, but that must not stop you. Your life, Bunce, is in danger,

and I have too much regard for you to let you risk it by longer stay

here. Take my nag, there--the second one from the tree, and put him in

the gears in place of your own. He's as gentle as a spaniel, and goes

like a deer. You know the back track to my house, and I'll come after

you, and bring your creature along. I 'spose he's not so stiff but he

can bring me."

"He can do that, lawyer, I guess, without difficulty. I'll move as you

say, and be off pretty slick. Five hundred dollars damage, lawyer--eh!"

"No matter, till I see you. Put your nag in gears quickly--you have

little time to spare!"

The pedler proceeded to the work, and was in a little while ready for a

start. But he lingered at the porch.

"I say, lawyer, it's a hard bout they've given me this time. I did fear

they would be rash and obstropulous, but didn't think they'd gone so

far. Indeed, it's clear, if it hadn't been that the cretur failed me, I

should not have trusted myself in the place, after what I was told."

"Bunce, you have been rather sly in your dealings, and they have a good

deal to complain of. Now, though I said nothing about it, that coat you

sold me for a black grew red with a week's wear, and threadbare in a

month."

"Now, don't talk, lawyer, seeing you ha'n't paid me for it yet; but

that's neither here nor there. If I did, as you say, sell my goods for

something more than their vally, I hadn't ought to had such a punishment

as this."

The wild song of the rioters rang in his ears, followed by a

proposition, seemingly made with the utmost gravity, to change the plan

of operations, and instead of giving him the ride upon the rail, cap the

blazing goods of his cart with the proper person of the proprietor. The

pedler lingered to hear no further; and the quick ear of the lawyer, as

he returned into the hall, distinguished the rumbling motion of his cart

hurrying down the road. But he had scarcely reseated himself and resumed

his glass, before Bunce also reappeared.

"Why, man, I thought you were off. You burn daylight; though they do

say, those whom water won't drown, rope must hang."

"There is some risk, lawyer, to be sure; but when I recollected this

box, which you see is a fine one, though they have disfigured it, I

thought I should have time enough to take it with me, and anything that

might be lying about;" looking around the apartment as he spoke, and

gathering up a few fragments which had escaped the general notice.

"Begone, fool!" exclaimed the lawyer, impatiently. "They are upon

you--they come--fly for your life, you dog--I hear their voices."

"I'm off, lawyer"--and looking once behind him as he hurried off, the

pedler passed from the rear of the building as those who sought him

re-entered in front.

"The blood's in him--the Yankee will be Yankee still," was the muttered

speech of the lawyer, as he prepared to encounter the returning rioters.

CHAPTER VII.

THE YANKEE OUTWITS THE LAWYER.

It was at this moment that Forrester entered the tavern-hall; curious to

know the result of the trial, from which his attendance upon Ralph had

unavoidably detained him. The actors of the drama were in better humor

than before, and uproarious mirth had succeeded to ferocity. They were

all in the very excess of self-glorification; for, though somewhat

disappointed of their design, and defrauded of the catastrophe, they had

nevertheless done much, according to their own judgment, and enough,

perhaps, in that of the reader, for the purposes of justice. The work of

mischief had been fully consummated; and though, to their notion, still

somewhat incomplete from the escape of the pedler himself, they were in

great part satisfied--some few among them, indeed--and among these our

quondam friend Forrester may be included--were not sorry that Bunce had

escaped the application of the personal tests which had been

contemplated for his benefit; for, however willing, it was somewhat

doubtful whether they could have been altogether able to save him from

the hands of those having a less scrupulous regard to humanity.

The sudden appearance of Forrester revived the spirit of the

transaction, now beginning somewhat to decline, as several voices

undertook to give him an account of its progress. The lawyer was in his

happiest mood, as things, so far, had all turned out as he expected. His

voice was loudest, and his oratory more decidedly effective than ever.

The prospect before him was also of so seductive a character, that he

yielded more than was his wont to the influences of the bottle-god: who

stood little iron-hooped keg, perched upon a shelf conveniently in the

corner.

"Here Cuffee, you thrice-blackened baby of Beelzebub!--why stand you

there, arms akimbo, and showing your ivories, when you see we have no

whiskey! Bring in the jug, you imp of darkness--touch us the

Monongahela, and a fresh tumbler for Mr. Forrester--and, look you, one

too for Col. Blundell, seeing he's demolished the other. Quick, you

terrapin!"

Cuffee recovered himself in an instant. His hands fell to his sides--his

mouth closed intuitively; and the whites of his eyes changing their

fixed direction, marshalled his way with a fresh jug, containing two or

more quarts, to the rapacious lawyer.

"Ah, you blackguard, that will do--now, Mr. Forrester--now, Col.

Blundell--don't be slow--no backing out, boys--hey, for a long drink to

the stock in trade of our friend the pedler."

So spoke Pippin; a wild huzza attested the good humor which the

proposition excited. Potation rapidly followed potation, and the jug

again demanded replenishing. The company was well drilled in this

species of exercise; and each individual claiming caste in such circle,

must be well prepared, like the knight-challenger of old tourney, to

defy all comers. In the cases of Pippin and Blundell, successive

draughts, after the attainment of a certain degree of mental and animal

stolidity, seemed rather to fortify than to weaken their defences, and

to fit them more perfectly for a due prolongation of the warfare. The

appetite, too, like most appetites, growing from what it fed on,

ventured few idle expostulations; glass after glass, in rapid

succession, fully attested the claim of these two champions to the

renown which such exercises in that section of the world had won for

them respectively. The subject of conversation, which, in all this time,

accompanied their other indulgences, was, very naturally, that of the

pedler and his punishment. On this topic, however, a professional not

less than personal policy sealed the lips of our lawyer except on those

points which admitted of a general remark, without application or even

meaning. Though drunk, his policy was that of the courts; and the

practice of the sessions had served him well, in his own person, to give

the lie to the "_in vino veritas_" of the proverb.

Things were in this condition when the company found increase in the

person of the landlord, who now made his appearance; and, as we intend

that he shall be no unimportant auxiliary in the action of our story, it

may be prudent for a few moments to dwell upon the details of his

outward man, and severally to describe his features. We have him before

us in that large, dark, and somewhat heavy person, who sidles awkwardly

into the apartment, as if only conscious in part of the true uses of his

legs and arms. He leans at this moment over the shoulders of one of the

company, and, while whispering in his ears, at the same time, with an

upward glance, surveys the whole. His lowering eyes, almost shut in and

partially concealed by his scowling and bushy eyebrows, are of a quick

gray, stern, and penetrating in their general expression, yet, when

narrowly observed, putting on an air of vacancy, if not stupidity, that

furnishes a perfect blind to the lurking meaning within. His nose is

large, yet not disproportionately so; his head well made, though a

phrenologist might object to a strong animal preponderance in the rear;

his mouth bold and finely curved, is rigid however in its compression,

and the lips, at times almost woven together, are largely indicative of

ferocity; they are pale in color, and dingily so, yet his flushed cheek

and brow bear striking evidence of a something too frequent revel; his

hair, thin and scattered, is of a dark brown complexion and sprinkled

with gray; his neck is so very short that a single black handkerchief,

wrapped loosely about it, removes all seeming distinction between itself

and the adjoining shoulders--the latter being round and uprising,

forming a socket, into which the former appears to fall as into a

designated place. As if more effectually to complete the unfavorable

impression of such an outline, an ugly scar, partly across the cheek,

and slightly impairing the integrity of the left nostril, gives to his

whole look a sinister expression, calculated to defeat entirely any

neutralizing or less objectionable feature. His form--to conclude the

picture--is constructed with singular power; and though not symmetrical,

is far from ungainly. When impelled by some stirring motive, his

carriage is easy, without seeming effort, and his huge frame throws

aside the sluggishness which at other times invests it, putting on a

habit of animated exercise, which changes the entire appearance of the

man.

Such was Walter, or, as he was there more familiarly termed Wat Munro.

He took his seat with the company, with the ease of one who neither

doubted nor deliberated upon the footing which he claimed among them. He

was not merely the publican of his profession, but better fitted indeed

for perhaps any other avocation, as may possibly be discovered in the

progress of our narrative. To his wife, a good quiet sort of body, who,

as Forrester phrased it, did not dare to say the soul was her own, he

deputed the whole domestic management of the tavern; while he would be

gone, nobody could say where or why, for weeks and more at a time, away

from bar and hostel, in different portions of the country. None ventured

to inquire into a matter that was still sufficiently mysterious to

arouse curiosity; people living with and about him generally

entertaining a degree of respect, amounting almost to vulgar awe, for

his person and presence, which prevented much inquiry into his doings.

Some few, however, more bold than the rest, spoke in terms of suspicion;

but the number of this class was inconsiderable, and they themselves

felt that the risk which they incurred was not so unimportant as to

permit of their going much out of the way to trace the doubtful features

in his life.

As we have already stated, he took his place along with his guests; the

bottles and glasses were replenished, the story of the pedler again

told, and each individual once more busied in describing his own

exploits. The lawyer, immersed in visions of grog and glory, rhapsodized

perpetually and clapped his hands. Blundell, drunkenly happy, at every

discharge of the current humor, made an abortive attempt to chuckle, the

ineffectual halloo gurgling away in the abysses of his mighty throat;

until, at length, his head settled down supinely upon his breast, his

eyes were closed, and the hour of his victory had gone by; though, even

then, his huge jaws opening at intervals for the outward passage of

something which by courtesy might be considered a laugh, attested the

still anxious struggles of the inward spirit, battling with the

weaknesses of the flesh.

The example of a leader like Blundell had a most pernicious effect upon

the uprightness of the greater part of the company. Having the sanction

of authority, several others, the minor spirits it is true, settled down

under their chairs without a struggle. The survivors made some

lugubrious efforts at a triumph over their less stubborn companions, but

the laborious and husky laugh was but a poor apology for the proper

performance of this feat. Munro, who to his other qualities added those

of a sturdy _bon-vivant_, together with Forrester, and a few who still

girt in the lawyer as the prince of the small jest, discharged their

witticisms upon the staggering condition of affairs; not forgetting in

their assaults the disputatious civilian himself. That worthy, we regret

to add, though still unwilling to yield, and still striving to retort,

had nevertheless suffered considerable loss of equilibrium. His speeches

were more than ever confused, and it was remarked that his eyes danced

about hazily, with a most ineffectual expression. He looked about,

however, with a stupid gaze of self-satisfaction; but his laugh and

language, forming a strange and most unseemly coalition, degenerated at

last into a dolorous sniffle, indicating the rapid departure of the few

mental and animal holdfasts which had lingered with him so long. While

thus reduced, his few surviving senses were at once called into acute

activity by the appearance of a sooty little negro, who thrust into his

hands a misshapen fold of dirty paper, which a near examination made out

to take the form of a letter.

"Why, what the d----l, d----d sort of fist is this you've given me, you

bird of blackness! where got you this vile scrawl?--faugh! you've had it

in your jaws, you raven, have you not?"

The terrified urchin retreated a few paces while answering the inquiry.

"No, mass lawyer--de pedler--da him gib um to me so. I bring um straight

as he gib um."

"The pedler! why, where is he?--what the devil can he have to write

about?" was the universal exclamation.

"The pedler!" said the lawyer, and his sobriety grew strengthened at the

thought of business; he called to the waiter and whispered in his ears--

"Hark ye, cuffee; go bring out the pedler's horse, saddle him with my

saddle which lies in the gallery, bring him to the tree, and, look ye,

make no noise about it, you scoundrel, as you value your ears."

Cuffee was gone on his mission--and the whole assembly aroused by the

name of the pedler and the mysterious influence of the communication

upon the lawyer, gathered, with inquiries of impatience, around him.

Finding him slow, they clamored for the contents of the epistle, and the

route of the writer--neither of which did he seem desirous to

communicate. His evasions and unwillingness were all in vain, and he was

at length compelled to undertake the perusal of the scrawl; a task he

would most gladly have avoided in their presence. He was in doubt and

fear. What could the pedler have to communicate, on paper, which might

not have been left over for their interview? His mind was troubled, and,

pushing the crowd away from immediately about him, he tore open the

envelope and began the perusal--proceeding with a measured gait, the

result as well of the "damned cramp hand" as of the still foggy

intellect and unsettled vision of the reader. But as the characters and

their signification became more clear and obvious to his gaze, his

features grew more and more sobered and intelligent--a blankness

overspread his face--his hands trembled, and finally, his apprehensions,

whatever they might have been, having seemingly undergone full

confirmation, he crumpled the villanous scrawl in his hands, and dashing

it to the floor in a rage, roared out in quick succession volley after

volley of invective and denunciation upon the thrice-blasted head of the

pedler. The provocation must have been great, no doubt, to impart such

animation at such a time to the man of law; and the curiosity of one of

the revellers getting the better of his scruples in such matters--if,

indeed, scruples of any kind abode in such a section--prompting him to

seize upon the epistle thus pregnant with mortal matter, in this way the

whole secret became public property. As, therefore, we shall violate no

confidence, and shock no decorum, we proceed to read it aloud for the

benefit of all:--

"DEAR LAWYER: I guess I am pretty safe now from the _regilators_,

and, saving my trouble of mind, well enough, and nothing to complain

about. Your animal goes as slick as grease, and carried me in no

time out of reach of rifle-shot--so you see it's only right to thank

God, and you, lawyer, for if you hadn't lent me the nag, I guess it

would have been a sore chance for me in the hands of them savages

and beasts of prey.

"I've been thinking, lawyer, as I driv along, about what you said to

me, and I guess it's no more than right and reasonable I should take

the law on 'em; and so I put the case in your hands, to make the

most on it; and seeing that the damages, as you say, may be over

five hundred dollars, why, I don't see but the money is jest as good

in my hands as theirs, for so it ought to be. The bill of

particulars I will send you by post. In the meanwhile, you may say,

having something to go upon, that the whole comes to five hundred

and fifty dollars or thereabouts, for, with a little calculation and

figering, I guess it won't be hard to bring it up to that. This

don't count the vally of the cart, for, as I made it myself, it

didn't cost me much; but, if you put it in the bill, which I guess

you ought to, put it down for twenty dollars more--seeing that, if I

can't trade for one somehow, I shall have to give something like

that for another.

"And now, lawyer, there's one thing--I don't like to be in the reach

of them 'ere regilators, and guess 'twouldn't be altogether the

wisest to stop short of fifteen miles to-night: so, therefore, you

see, it won't be in my way, no how, to let you have your nag, which

is a main fine one, and goes slick as a whistle--pretty much as if

he and the wagon was made for one another; but this, I guess, will

be no difference to you, seeing that you can pay yourself his vally

out of the damages. I'm willing to allow you one hundred dollars for

him, though he a'n't worth so much, no how; and the balance of the

money you can send to me, or my brother, in the town of Meriden, in

the state of Connecticut. So no more, dear lawyer, at this writing,

from

"Your very humble sarvant

"to command, &c."

The dismay of the attorney was only exceeded by the chagrin with which

he perceived his exposure, and anticipated the odium in consequence. He

leaped about the hall, among the company, in a restless paroxysm--now

denouncing the pedler, now deprecating their dissatisfaction at finding

out the double game which he had been playing. The trick of the runaway

almost gave him a degree of favor in their eyes, which did not find much

diminution when Pippin, rushing forth from the apartment, encountered a

new trial in the horse left him by the pedler; the miserable beast being

completely ruined, unable to move a step, and more dead than alive.

CHAPTER VIII.

NEW FRIENDS IN STRANGE PLACES.

Ralph opened his eyes at a moderately late hour on the ensuing morning,

and found Forrester in close attendance. He felt himself somewhat sore

from his bruises in falling, but the wound gave him little concern.

Indeed, he was scarcely conscious of it. He had slept well, and was not

unwilling to enter into the explanatory conversation which the woodman

began. From him he learned the manner and situation in which he had been

found, and was furnished with a partial history of his present

whereabouts. In return, he gave a particular account of the assault made

upon him in the wood, and of his escape; all of which, already known to

the reader, will call for no additional details. In reply to the

unscrupulous inquiry of Forrester, the youth, with as little hesitation,

declared himself to be a native of the neighboring state of South

Carolina, born in one of its middle districts, and now on his way to

Tennessee. He concluded with giving his name.

"Colleton, Colleton," repeated the other, as if reviving some

recollection of old time--"why, 'squire, I once knew a whole family of

that name in Carolina. I'm from Carolina myself, you must know. There

was an old codger--a fine, hearty buck--old Ralph Colleton--Colonel

Ralph, as they used to call him. He did have a power of money, and a

smart chance of lands and field-niggers; but they did say he was going

behindhand, for he didn't know how to keep what he had. He was always

buying, and living large; but that can't last for ever. I saw him first

at a muster. I was then just eighteen, and went out with the rest, for

the first time. Maybe, 'squire, I didn't take the rag off the bush that

day. I belonged to Captain Williams's troop, called the 'Bush-Whackers.'

We were all fine-looking fellows, though I say it myself. I was no

chicken, I tell you. From that day, Mark Forrester wrote himself down

'_man_' And well he might, 'squire, and no small one neither. Six feet

in stocking-foot, sound in wind and limb--could outrun, outjump,

outwrestle, outfight, and outdo anyhow, any lad of my inches in the

whole district. There was Tom Foster, that for five long years counted

himself cock of the walk, and crowed like a chicken whenever he came out

upon the ground. You never saw Tom, I reckon, for he went off to

Mississippi after I sowed him up. He couldn't stand it any longer, since

it was no use, I licked him in sich short order: he wasn't a mouthful.

After that, the whole ground was mine; nobody could stand before me,

'squire; though now the case may be different, for Sumter's a destrict,

'squire, that a'n't slow at raising game chickens."

At the close of this rambling harangue, Mark Forrester, as we may now be

permitted to call him, looked down upon his own person with no small

share of complacency. He was still, doubtless, all the man he boasted

himself to have been; his person, as we have already briefly described

it, offering, as well from its bulk and well-distributed muscle as from

its perfect symmetry, a fine model for the statuary. After the

indulgence of a few moments in this harmless egotism, he returned to the

point, as if but now recollected, from which he set out.

"Well, then, Master Colleton, as I was saying, 'twas at this same muster

that I first saw the 'squire. He was a monstrous clever old buck now, I

tell you. Why, he thought no more of money than if it growed in his

plantation--he almost throwed it away for the people to scramble after.

That very day, when the muster was over, he called all the boys up to

Eben Garratt's tavern, and told old Eben to set the right stuff afloat,

and put the whole score down to him. Maybe old Eben didn't take him at

his word. Eben was a cunning chap, quite Yankee-like, and would skin his

shadow for a saddle-back, I reckon, if he could catch it. I tell you

what, when the crop went to town, the old 'squire must have had a mighty

smart chance to pay; for, whatever people might say of old Eben, he knew

how to calculate from your pocket into his with monstrous sartainty.

Well, as I was saying, 'squire, I shouldn't be afraid to go you a a

little bet that old Ralph Colleton is some kin of your'n. You're both of

the same stock, I reckon."

"You are right in your conjecture," replied the youth; "the person of

whom you speak was indeed a near relative of mine--he was no other than

my father."

"There, now--I could have said as much, for you look for all the world

as if you had come out of his own mouth. There is a trick of the eye

which I never saw in any but you two; and even if you had not told me

your name, I should have made pretty much the same calculation about

you. The old 'squire, if I rightly recollect, was something stiff in his

way, and some people did say he was proud, and carried himself rather

high; but, for my part, I never saw any difference 'twixt him and most

of our Carolina gentlemen, who, you know, generally walk pretty high in

the collar, and have no two ways about them. For that matter, however, I

couldn't well judge then; I may have been something too young to say,

for certain, what was what, at that time of my life."

"You are not even now so far advanced in years, Mr. Forrester, that you

speak of your youth as of a season so very remote. What, I pray, may be

your age? We may ask, without offence, such a question of men: the case

where the other sex is concerned is, you are aware, something

different."

The youth seemed studiously desirous of changing the direction of the

dialogue.

"Man or woman, I see, for my part, no harm in the question. But do call

me Forrester, or Mark Forrester, whichever pleases you best, and not

mister, as you just now called me. I go by no other name. Mister is a

great word, and moves people quite too far off from one another. I never

have any concern with a man that I have to mister and sir. I call them

'squire because that's a title the law gives them; and when I speak to

you, I say 'squire, or Master Colleton. You may be a 'squire yourself,

but whether you are or are not, it makes no difference, for you get the

name from your father, who is. Then, ag'in, I call you master--because,

you see, you are but a youth, and have a long run to overtake my years,

few as you may think them. Besides, master is a friendly word, and comes

easy to the tongue. I never, for my part, could see the sense in mister,

except when people go out to fight, when it's necessary to do everything

a little the politest; and, then, it smells of long shot and cold

business, 'squire. 'Tisn't, to my mind, a good word among friends."

The youth smiled slightly at the distinction drawn with such nicety by

his companion, between words which he had hitherto been taught to

conceive synonymous, or nearly so; and the reasons, such as they were,

by which the woodman sustained his free use of the one to the utter

rejection of the other. He did not think it important, however, to make

up an issue on the point, though dissenting from the logic of his

companion; and contented himself simply with a repetition of the

question in which it had originated.

"Why, I take shame to answer you rightly, 'squire, seeing I am no wiser

and no better than I am; but the whole secret of the matter lies in the

handle of this little hatchet, and this I made out of a live-oak sapling

some sixteen years ago--It's much less worn than I, yet I am twice its

age, I reckon."

"You are now then about thirty-two?"

"Ay, just thirty-two. It don't take much calculating to make out that.

My own schooling, though little enough for a large man, is more than

enough to keep me from wanting help at such easy arithmetic."

With the exception of an occasional and desultory remark or two, the

conversation had reached a close. The gravity--the almost haughty

melancholy which, at intervals, appeared the prevailing characteristic

of the manners and countenance of the youth, served greatly to

discourage even the blunt freedom of Mark Forrester, who seemed piqued

at length by the unsatisfactory issue of all his endeavors to enlist the

familiarity and confidence of his companion. This Ralph soon discovered.

He had good sense and feeling enough to perceive the necessity of some

alteration in his habit, if he desired a better understanding with one

whose attendance, at the present time, was not only unavoidable but

indispensable--one who might be of use, and who was not only willing and

well-intentioned, but to all appearance honest and harmless, and to whom

he was already so largely indebted. With an effort, therefore, not so

much of mind as of mood, he broke the ice which his own indifference had

suffered to close, and by giving a legitimate excuse for the garrulity

of his companion, unlocked once more the treasurehouse of his good-humor

and volubility.

From the dialogue thus recommenced, we are enabled to take a farther

glance into the history of Forrester's early life. He was, as he phrased

it, from "old So. Ca." pronouncing the name of the state in the abridged

form of its written contraction. In one of the lower districts he still

held, in fee, a small but inefficient patrimony; the profits of which

were put to the use of a young sister. Times, however, had grown hard,

and with the impatience and restlessness so peculiar to nearly all

classes of the people of that state, Mark set out in pursuit of his

fortune among strangers. He loved from his childhood all hardy

enterprises; all employments calculated to keep his spirit from

slumbering in irksome quiet in his breast. He had no relish for the

labors of the plough, and looked upon the occupation of his forefathers

as by no means fitted for the spirit which, with little besides, they

had left him. The warmth, excitability, and restlessness which were his

prevailing features of temper, could not bear the slow process of

tilling, and cultivating the earth--watching the growth and generations

of pigs and potatoes, and listening to that favorite music with the

staid and regular farmer, the shooting of the corn in the still nights,

as it swells with a respiring movement, distending the contracted

sheaves which enclose it. In addition to this antipathy to the pursuits

of his ancestors, Mark had a decided desire, a restless ambition,

prompting him to see, and seek, and mingle with the world. He was fond,

as our readers may have observed already, of his own eloquence, and

having worn out the patience and forfeited the attention of all auditors

at home, he was compelled, in order to the due appreciation of his

faculties, to seek for others less experienced abroad. Like wiser and

greater men, he, too, had been won away, by the desire of rule and

reference, from the humble quiet of his native fireside; and if, in

after life, he did not bitterly repent of the folly, it was because of

that light-hearted and sanguine temperament which never deserted him

quite, and supported him in all events and through every vicissitude. He

had wandered much after leaving his parental home, and was now engaged

in an occupation and pursuit which our future pages must develop. Having

narrated, in his desultory way to his companion, the facts which we have

condensed, he conceived himself entitled to some share of that

confidence of which he had himself exhibited so fair an example; and the

cross-examination which followed did not vary very materially from that

to which most wayfarers in this region are subjected, and of which, on

more than one occasion, they have been heard so vociferously to

complain.

"Well, Master Ralph--unless my eyes greatly miscalculate, you cannot be

more than nineteen or twenty at the most; and if one may be so bold,

what is it that brings one of your youth and connections abroad into

this wilderness, among wild men and wild beasts, and we gold-hunters,

whom men do say are very little, if any, better than them?"

"Why, as respects your first conjecture, Forrester," returned the youth,

"you are by no means out of the way. I am not much over twenty, and am

free to confess, do not care to be held much older. Touching your

further inquiry, not to seem churlish, but rather to speak frankly and

in a like spirit with yourself, I am not desirous to repeat to others

the story that has been, perhaps, but learned in part by myself. I do

not exactly believe that it would promote my plans to submit my affairs

to the examination of other people; nor do I think that any person

whomsoever would be very much benefited by the knowledge. You seem to

have forgotten, however, that I have already said that I am journeying

to Tennessee."

"Left Carolina for good and all, heh?"

"Yes--perhaps for ever. But we will not talk of it."

"Well, you're in a wild world now, 'squire."

"This is no strange region to me, though I have lost my way in it. I

have passed a season in the county of Gwinnett and the neighborhood,

with my uncle's family, when something younger, and have passed, twice,

journeying between Carolina and Tennessee, at no great distance from

this very spot. But your service to me, and your Carolina birth,

deserves that I should be more free in my disclosures; and to account

for the sullenness of my temper, which you may regard as something

inconsistent with our relationship, let me say, that whatever my

prospects might have been, and whatever my history may be, I am at this

moment altogether indifferent as to the course which I shall pursue. It

matters not very greatly to me whether I take up my abode among the

neighboring Cherokees, or, farther on, along with them, pursue my

fortunes upon the shores of the Red river or the Missouri. I have

become, during the last few days of my life, rather reckless of human

circumstance, and, perhaps, more criminally indifferent to the

necessities of my nature, and my responsibilities to society and myself,

than might well beseem one so youthful, and, as you say, with prospects

like those which you conjecture, and not erroneously, to have been mine.

All I can say is, that, when I lost my way last evening, my first

feeling was one of a melancholy satisfaction; for it seemed to me that

destiny itself had determined to contribute towards my aim and desire,

and to forward me freely in the erratic progress, which, in a gloomy

mood, I had most desperately and, perhaps, childishly undertaken."

There was a stern melancholy in the deep and low utterance--the close

compression of lip--the steady, calm eye of the youth, that somewhat

tended to confirm the almost savage sentiment of despairing indifference

to life, which his sentiments conveyed; and had the effect of eliciting

a larger degree of respectful consideration from the somewhat uncouth

but really well-meaning and kind companion who stood beside him.

Forrester had good sense enough to perceive that Ralph had been gently

nurtured and deferentially treated--that his pride or vanity, or perhaps

some nobler emotion, had suffered slight or rebuke; and that it was more

than probable this emotion would, before long, give place to others, if

not of a more manly and spirited, at least of a more subdued and

reasonable character. Accordingly, without appearing to attach any

importance to, or even to perceive the melancholy defiance contained in

the speech of the young man, he confined himself entirely to a passing

comment upon the facility with which, having his eyes open, and the

bright sunshine and green trees for his guides, he had suffered himself

to lose his way--an incident excessively ludicrous in the contemplation

of one, who, in his own words, could take the tree with the 'possum, the

scent with the hound, the swamp with the deer, and be in at the death

with all of them--for whom the woods had no labyrinth and the night no

mystery. He laughed heartily at the simplicity of the youth, and entered

into many details, not so tedious as long, of the various hairbreadth

escapes, narrow chances, and curious enterprises of his own initiation

into the secrets of wood-craft, and to the trials and perils of which,

in his own probation, his experience had necessarily subjected him. At

length he concluded his narrative by seizing upon one portion of Ralph's

language with an adroitness and ingenuity that might have done credit to

an older diplomatist; and went on to invite the latter to quarter upon

himself for a few weeks at least.

"And now Master Colleton, as you are rambling, as you say, indifferent

quite as to what quarter you turn the head of your creature--suppose now

you take up lodgings with me. I have, besides this room, which I only

keep for my use of a Saturday and Sunday when I come to the village--a

snug place a few miles off, and there's room enough, and provisions

enough, if you'll only stop a while and take what's going. Plenty of hog

and hominy at all times, and we don't want for other and better things,

if we please. Come, stay with me for a month, or more, if you choose,

and when you think to go, I can put you on your road at an hour's

warning. In the meantime, I can show you all that's to be seen. I can

show you where the gold grows, and may be had for the gathering. We've

snug quarters for the woods, plenty of venison; and, as you must be a

good shot coming from Carolina, you may bring down at day-dawn of a

morning a sluggish wild turkey, so fat that he will split open the

moment he strikes the ground. Don't fight shy, now, 'squire, and we'll

have sport just so long as you choose to stay with us."

The free and hearty manner of the woodman, who, as he concluded his

invitation, grasped the hand of the youth warmly in his own, spoke quite

as earnestly as his language; and Ralph, in part, fell readily into a

proposal which promised something in the way of diversion. He gave

Forrester to understand that he would probably divide his time for a few

days between the tavern and his lodge, which he proposed to visit

whenever he felt himself perfectly able to manage his steed. He

signified his acknowledgment of the kindness of his companion with

something less of hauteur than had hitherto characterized him; and,

remembering that, on the subject of the assault made upon him, Forrester

had said little, and that too wandering to be considered, he again

brought the matter up to his consideration, and endeavored to find a

clue to the persons of the outlaws, whom he endeavored to describe.

On this point, however, he procured but little satisfaction. The

description which he gave of the individual assailant whom alone he had

been enabled to distinguish, though still evidently under certain

disguises, was not sufficient to permit of Forrester's identification.

The woodman was at a loss, though evidently satisfied that the parties

were not unknown to him in some other character. As for the Pony Club,

he gave its history, confirming that already related by the outlaw

himself; and while avowing his own personal fearlessness on the subject,

did not withhold his opinion that the members were not to be trifled

with:--

"And, a word in your ear, 'squire--one half of the people you meet with

in this quarter know a leetle more of this same Pony Club than is

altogether becoming in honest men. So mind that you look about you,

right and left, with a sharp eye, and be ready to let drive with a quick

hand. Keep your tongue still, at the same time that you keep your eyes

open, for there's no knowing what devil's a listening when a poor weak

sinner talks. The danger's not in the open daylight, but in the dark.

There's none of them that will be apt to square off agin you while

you're here; for they knew that, though we've got a mighty mixed nest,

there's some honest birds in it. There's a few of us here, always ready

to see that a man has fair play, and that's a sort of game that a scamp

never likes to take a hand in. There's quite enough of us, when a

scalp's in danger, who can fling a knife and use a trigger with the

best, and who won't wait to be asked twice to a supper of cold steel.

Only you keep cool, and wide awake, and you'll have friends enough

always within a single whoop. But, good night now. I must go and look

after our horses. I'll see you soon--I reckon a leetle sooner than you

care to see me."

Ralph Colleton good humoredly assured him that could not the case, and

with friendly gripe of the hand, they parted.

CHAPTER IX.

MORE OF THE DRAMATIS PERSONÆ.

In a few days, so much for the proper nursing of Mark Forrester, and of

the _soi-disant medico_ of the village, Ralph Colleton was able to make

his appearance below, and take his place among the _habitués_ of the

hotel. His wound, slight at first, was fortunate in simple treatment and

in his own excellent constitution. His bruises gave him infinitely more

concern, and brought him more frequent remembrances of the adventure in

which they were acquired. A stout frame and an eager spirit, impatient

of restraint, soon enabled our young traveller to conquer much of the

pain and inconvenience which his hurts gave him, proving how much the

good condition of the physical man depends upon the will. He lifted

himself about in five days as erectly as if nothing had occurred, and

was just as ready for supper, as if he had never once known the loss of

appetite. Still he was tolerably prudent and did not task nature too

unreasonably. His exercises were duly moderated, so as not to irritate

anew his injuries. Forrester was a rigid disciplinarian, and it was only

on the fifth day after his arrival, and after repeated entreaties of his

patient, in all of which he showed himself sufficiently _impatient_,

that the honest woodman permitted him to descend to the dinner-table of

the inn, in compliance with the clamorous warning of the huge bell which

stood at the entrance.

The company at the dinner-table was somewhat less numerous than that

assembled in the great hall at the trial of the pedler. Many of the

persons then present were not residents, but visiters in the village

from the neighboring country. They had congregated there, as was usually

the case, on each Saturday of the week, with the view not less to the

procuring of their necessaries, than the enjoyment of good company.

Having attended in the first place to the ostensible objects of their

visit, the village tavern, in the usual phrase, "brought them up;" and

in social, yet wild carousal, they commonly spent the residue of the

day. It was in this way that they met their acquaintance--found society,

and obtained the news; objects of primary importance, at all times, with

a people whose insulated positions, removed from the busy mart and the

stirring crowd, left them no alternative but to do this or rust

altogether. The regular lodgers of the tavern were not numerous

therefore, and consisted in the main of those laborers in the diggings

who had not yet acquired the means of establishing households of their

own.

There was little form or ceremony in the proceedings of the repast.

Colleton was introduced by a few words from the landlord to the

landlady, Mrs. Dorothy Munro, and to a young girl, her niece, who sat

beside her. It does not need that we say much in regard to the

former--she interferes with no heart in our story; but Lucy, the niece,

may not be overlooked so casually. She has not only attractions in

herself which claim our notice, but occupies no minor interest in the

story we propose to narrate. Her figure was finely formed, slight and

delicate, but neither diminutive nor feeble--of fair proportion

symmetry, and an ease and grace of carriage and manner belonging to a

far more refined social organization than that in which we find her. But

this is easily accounted for; and the progress of our tale will save us

the trouble of dwelling farther upon it now. Her skin, though slightly

tinged by the sun, was beautifully smooth and fair. Her features might

not be held regular; perhaps not exactly such as in a critical

examination we should call or consider handsome; but they were

attractive nevertheless, strongly marked, and well defined. Her eyes

were darkly blue; not languishingly so, but on the contrary rather

lively and intelligent in their accustomed expression. Her mouth,

exquisitely chiselled, and colored by the deepest blushes of the rose,

had a seductive persuasiveness about it that might readily win one's own

to some unconscious liberties; while the natural position of the lips,

leaving them slightly parted, gave to the mouth an added attraction in

the double range which was displayed beneath of pearl-like and

well-formed teeth; her hair was unconfined, but short; and rendered the

expression of her features more youthful and girl-like than might have

been the result of its formal arrangement--it was beautifully glossy,

and of a dark brown color.

Her demeanor was that of maidenly reserve, and a ladylike dignity, a

quiet serenity, approaching--at periods, when any remark calculated to

infringe in the slightest degree upon those precincts with which

feminine delicacy and form have guarded its possessor--a stern severity

of glance, approving her a creature taught in the true school of

propriety, and chastened with a spirit that slept not on a watch, always

of perilous exposure in one so young and of her sex. On more than one

occasion did Ralph, in the course of the dinner, remark the indignant

fire flashing from her intelligent eye, when the rude speech of some

untaught boor assailed a sense finely-wrought to appreciate the proper

boundaries to the always adventurous footstep of unbridled

licentiousness. The youth felt assured, from these occasional glimpses,

that her education had been derived from a different influence, and that

her spirit deeply felt and deplored the humiliation of her present

condition and abode.

The dinner-table, to which we now come, and which two or three negroes

have been busily employed in cumbering with well-filled plates and

dishes, was most plentifully furnished; though but few of its contents

could properly be classed under the head of delicacies. There were eggs

and ham, hot biscuits, hommony, milk, marmalade, venison, _Johnny_, or

journey cakes, and dried fruits stewed. These, with the preparatory

soup, formed the chief components of the repast. Everything was served

up in a style of neatness and cleanliness, that, after all, was perhaps

the best of all possible recommendations to the feast; and Ralph soon

found himself quite as busily employed as was consistent with prudence,

in the destruction and overthrow of the tower of biscuits, the pile of

eggs, and such other of the edibles around him as were least likely to

prove injurious to his debilitated system.

The table was not large, and the seats were soon occupied. Villager

after villager had made his appearance and taken his place without

calling for observation; and, indeed, so busily were all employed, that

he who should have made his _entrée_ at such a time with an emphasis

commanding notice, might, not without reason, have been set down as

truly and indefensibly impertinent. So might one have thought, not

employed in like manner, and simply surveying the prospect.

Forrester alone contrived to be less selfish than those about him, and

our hero found his attentions at times rather troublesome. Whatever in

the estimation of the woodman seemed attractive, he studiously thrust

into the youth's plate, pressing him to eat. Chancing, at one of these

periods of polite provision on the part of his friend, to direct his

glance to the opposite extreme of the table, he was struck with the

appearance of a man whose eyes were fixed upon himself with an

expression which he could not comprehend and did not relish. The look of

this man was naturally of a sinister kind, but now his eyes wore a

malignant aspect, which not only aroused the youth's indignant retort

through the same medium, but struck him as indicating a feeling of

hatred to himself of a most singular character. Meeting the look of the

youth, the stranger rose hurriedly and left the table, but still

lingered in the apartment. Ralph was struck with his features, which it

appeared to him he had seen before, but as the person wore around his

cheeks, encompassing his head, a thick handkerchief, it was impossible

for him to decide well upon them. He turned to Forrester, who was busily

intent upon the dissection of a chicken, and in a low tone inquired the

name of the stranger. The woodman looked up and replied--

"Who that?--that's Guy Rivers; though what he's got his head tied up

for, I can't say. I'll ask him;" and with the word, he did so.

In answer to the question, Rivers explained his bandaging by charging

his jaws to have caught cold rather against his will, and to have

swelled somewhat in consequence. While making this reply, Ralph again

caught his glance, still curiously fixed upon himself, with an

expression which again provoked his surprise, and occasioned a gathering

sternness in the look of fiery indignation which he sent back in return.

Rivers, immediately after this by-play, left the apartment. The eye of

Ralph changing its direction, beheld that of the young maiden observing

him closely, with an expression of countenance so anxious, that he felt

persuaded she must have beheld the mute intercourse, if so we may call

it, between himself and the person whose conduct had so ruffled him. The

color had fled from her cheek, and there was something of warning in her

gaze. The polish and propriety which had distinguished her manners so

far as he had seen, were so different from anything that he had been led

to expect, and reminded him so strongly of another region, that, rising

from the table, he approached the place where she sat, took a chair

beside her, and with a gentleness and ease, the due result of his own

education and of the world he had lived in, commenced a conversation

with her, and was pleased to find himself encountered by a modest

freedom of opinion, a grace of thought, and a general intelligence,

which promised him better company than he had looked for. The villagers

had now left the apartment, all but Forrester; who, following Ralph's

example, took up a seat beside him, and sat a pleased listener to a

dialogue, in which the intellectual charm was strong enough, except at

very occasional periods, to prevent him from contributing much. The old

lady sat silently by. She was a trembling, timid body, thin, pale, and

emaciated, who appeared to have suffered much, and certainly stood in as

much awe of the man whose name she bore as it was well fitting in such a

relationship to permit. She said as little as Forrester, but seemed

equally well pleased with the attentions and the conversation of the

youth.

"Find you not this place lonesome, Miss Munro? You have been used, or I

mistake much, to a more cheering, a more civilized region."

"I have, sir; and sometimes I repine--not so much at the world I live

in, as for the world I have lost. Had I those about me with whom my

earlier years were passed, the lonely situation would trouble me

slightly."

She uttered these words with a sorrowful voice, and the moisture

gathering in her eyes, gave them additional brightness. The youth, after

some commonplace remark upon the vast difference between moral and

physical privations, went on--

"Perhaps, Miss Munro, with a true knowledge of all the conditions of

life, there may be thought little philosophy in the tears we shed at

such privations. The fortune that is unavoidable, however, I have always

found the more deplorable for that very reason. I shall have to watch

well, that I too be not surprised with regrets of a like nature with

your own, since I find myself constantly recurring, in thought, to a

world which perhaps I shall have little more to do with."

Rising from her seat, and leaving the room as she spoke, with a smile of

studied gayety upon her countenance, full also of earnestness and a

significance of manner that awakened surprise in the person addressed,

the maiden replied--

"Let me suggest, sir, that you observe well the world you are in; and do

not forget, in recurring to that which you leave, that, while deploring

the loss of friends in the one, you may be unconscious of the enemies

which surround you in the other. Perhaps, sir, you will find my

philosophy in this particular the most useful, if not the most

agreeable."

Wondering at her language, which, though of general remark, and fairly

deducible from the conversation, he could not avoid referring to some

peculiar origin, the youth rose, and bowed with respectful courtesy as

she retired. His eye followed her form for an instant, while his

meditations momentarily wrapped themselves up more and more in

inextricable mysteries, from which his utmost ingenuity of thought

failed entirely to disentangle him. In a maze of conjecture he passed

from the room into the passage adjoining, and, taking advantage of its

long range promenaded with steps, and in a spirit, equally moody and

uncertain. In a little time he was joined by Forrester, who seemed

solicitous to divert his mind and relieve his melancholy, by describing

the country round, the pursuits, characters, and conditions of the

people--the habits of the miners, and the productiveness of their

employ, in a manner inartificial and modest, and sometimes highly

entertaining.

While engaged in this way, the eye of Ralph caught the look of Rivers,

again fixed upon him from the doorway leading into the great hall; and

without a moment's hesitation, with impetuous step, he advanced towards

him, determined on some explanation of that curious interest which had

become offensive; but when he approached him with this object the latter

hastily left the passage.

Taking Forrester's arm, Ralph also left the house, in the hope to

encounter this troublesome person again. But failing in this, they

proceeded to examine the village, or such portions of it as might be

surveyed without too much fatigue to the wounded man--whose hurts,

though superficial, might by imprudence become troublesome. They rambled

till the sun went down, and at length returned to the tavern.

This building, as we have elsewhere said, was of the very humblest

description, calculated, it would seem, rather for a temporary and

occasional than a lasting shelter. Its architecture, compared with that

even of the surrounding log-houses of the country generally, was

excessively rude; its parts were out of all proportion, fitted seemingly

by an eye the most indifferent, and certainly without any, the most

distant regard, to square and compass. It consisted of two stories, the

upper being assigned to the sleeping apartments. Each floor contained

four rooms, accessible all, independently of one another, by entrances

from a great passage, running both above and below, through the centre

of the structure. In addition to the main building, a shed in the rear

of the main work afforded four other apartments, rather more closely

constructed, and in somewhat better finish than the rest of the

structure: these were in the occupation of the family exclusively. The

logs, in this work, were barbarously uneven, and hewn only to a degree

barely sufficient to permit of a tolerable level when placed one upon

the other. Morticed together at the ends, so very loosely had the work

been done, that a timid observer, and one not accustomed to the survey

of such fabrics, might entertain many misgivings of its security during

one of those severe hurricanes which, in some seasons of the year, so

dreadfully desolate the southern and southwestern country. Chimneys of

clay and stone intermixed, of the rudest fashion, projected from the two

ends of the building, threatening, with the toppling aspect which they

wore, the careless wayfarer, and leaving it something more than doubtful

whether the oblique and outward direction which they took, was not the

result of a wise precaution against a degree of contiguity with the

fabric they were meant to warm, which, from the liberal fires of the

pine woods, might have proved unfavorable to the protracted existence of

either.

The interior of the building aptly accorded with its outline. It was

uncoiled, and the winds were only excluded from access through the

interstices between the remotely-allied logs, by the free use of the

soft clay easily attainable in all that range of country. The light on

each side of the building was received through a few small windows, one

of which only was allotted to each apartment, and this was generally

found to possess as many modes of fastening as the jail opposite--a

precaution referable to the great dread of the Indian outrages, and

which their near neighborhood and irresponsible and vicious habits were

well calculated to inspire. The furniture of the hotel amply accorded

with all its other features. A single large and two small tables; a few

old oaken chairs, of domestic manufacture, with bottoms made of ox or

deer skin, tightly drawn over the seat, and either tied below with small

cords or tacked upon the sides; a broken mirror, that stood

ostentatiously over the mantel, surmounted in turn by a well-smoked

picture of the Washington family in a tarnished gilt frame--asserting

the Americanism of the proprietor and place--completed the contents of

the great hall, and were a fair specimen of what might be found in all

the other apartments. The tavern itself, in reference to the obvious

pursuit of many of those who made it their home, was entitled "The

Golden Egg"--a title made sufficiently notorious to the spectator, from

a huge signboard, elevated some eight or ten feet above the building

itself, bearing upon a light-blue ground a monstrous egg of the deepest

yellow, the effect of which was duly heightened by a strong and thick

shading of sable all round it--the artist, in this way, calculating no

doubt to afford the object so encircled its legitimate relief. Lest,

however, his design in the painting itself should be at all

questionable, he had taken the wise precaution of showing what was meant

by printing the words "Golden Egg" in huge Roman letters, beneath it;

these, in turn, being placed above another inscription, promising

"Entertainment for man and horse."

But the night had now closed in, and coffee was in progress. Ralph took

his seat with the rest of the lodgers, though without partaking of the

feast. Rivers did not make his appearance, much to the chagrin of the

youth, who was excessively desirous to account for the curious

observance of this man. He had some notion, besides, that the former was

not utterly unknown to him; for, though unable to identify him with any

one recollection, his features (what could be seen of them) were

certainly not unfamiliar. After supper, requesting Forrester's company

in his chamber, he left the company--not, however, without a few

moments' chat with Lucy Munro and her aunt, conducted with some spirit

by the former, and seemingly to the satisfaction of all. As they left

the room, Ralph spoke:--

"I am not now disposed for sleep, Forrester, and, if you please, I

should be glad to hear further about your village and the country at

large. Something, too, I would like to know of this man Rivers, whose

face strikes me as one that I should know, and whose eyes have been

haunting me to-day rather more frequently than I altogether like, or

shall be willing to submit to. Give me an hour, then, if not fatigued,

in my chamber, and we will talk over these matters together."

"Well, 'squire, that's just what pleases me now. I like good company,

and 'twill be more satisfaction to me, I reckon, than to you. As for

fatigue, that's out of the question. Somehow or other, I never feel

fatigued when I've got somebody to talk to."

"With such a disposition, I wonder, Forrester, you have not been more

intimate with the young lady of the house. Miss Lucy seems quite an

intelligent girl, well-behaved, and virtuous."

"Why, 'squire, she is all that; but, though modest and not proud, as you

may see, yet she's a little above my mark. She is book-learned, and I am

not; and she paints, and is a musician too and has all the

accomplishments. She was an only child, and her father was quite another

sort of person from his brother who now has her in management."

"She is an orphan, then?"

"Yes, poor girl, and she feels pretty clearly that this isn't the sort

of country in which she has a right to live. I like her very well, but,

as I say, she's a little above me; and, besides, you must know, 'squire,

I'm rather fixed in another quarter."

They had now reached the chamber of our hero, and the servant having

placed the light and retired, the parties took seats, and the

conversation recommenced.

"I know not how it is, Forrester," said the youth, "but there are few

men whose looks I so little like, and whom I would more willingly avoid,

than that man Rivers. What he is I know not--but I suspect him of

mischief. I may be doing wrong to the man, and injustice to his

character; but, really, his eye strikes me as singularly malicious,

almost murderous; and though not apt to shrink from men at any time, it

provoked something of a shudder to-day when it met my own. He may be,

and perhaps you may be able to say, whether he is a worthy person or

not; for my part, I should only regard him as one to be watched

jealously and carefully avoided. There is something creepingly malignant

in the look which shoots out from his glance, like that of the

rattlesnake, when coiled and partially concealed in the brake. When I

looked upon his eye, as it somewhat impertinently singled me out for

observation, I almost felt disposed to lift my heel as if the venomous

reptile were crawling under it."

"You are not the only one, 'squire, that's afraid of Guy Rivers."

"Afraid of him! you mistake me, Forrester; I fear no man," replied the

youth, somewhat hastily interrupting the woodman. "I am not apt to fear,

and certainly have no such feeling in regard to this person. I distrust,

and would avoid him, merely as one who, while possessing none of the

beauty, may yet have many of the propensities and some of the poison of

the snake to which I likened him."

"Well, 'squire, I didn't use the right word, that's certain, when I said

afraid, you see; because 'tan't in Carolina and Georgia, and hereabouts,

that men are apt to get frightened at trifles. But, as you say, Guy

Rivers is not the right kind of man, and everybody here knows it, and

keeps clear of him. None cares to say much to him, except when it's a

matter of necessity, and then they say as little as may be. Nobody knows

much about him--he is here to-day and gone to-morrow--and we never see

much of him except when there's some mischief afoot. He is thick with

Munro, and they keep together at all times, I believe. He has money, and

knows how to spend it. Where he gets it is quite another thing."

"What can be the source of the intimacy between himself and Munro? Is he

interested in the hotel?"

"Why, I can't say for that, but I think not. The fact is, the tavern is

nothing to Munro; he don't care a straw about it, and some among us do

whisper that he only keeps it a-going as a kind of cover for other

practices. There's no doubt that they drive some trade together, though

what it is I can't say, and never gave myself much trouble to inquire. I

can tell you what, though, there's no doubt on my mind that he's trying

to get Miss Lucy--they say he's fond of her--but I know for myself she

hates and despises him, and don't stop to let him see it."

"She will not have him, then, you think?"

"I know she won't if she can help it. But, poor girl, what can she do?

She's at the mercy, as you may see, of Munro, who is her father's

brother; and he don't care a straw for her likes or dislikes. If he says

the word, I reckon she can have nothing to say which will help her out

of the difficulty. I'm sure he won't regard prayers, or tears, or any of

her objections."

"It's a sad misfortune to be forced into connection with one in whom we

may not confide--whom we can have no sympathy with--whom we can not

love!"

"'Tis so,'squire; and that's just her case, and she hates to see the

very face of him, and avoids him whenever she can do so without giving

offence to her uncle, who, they say, has threatened her bitterly about

the scornful treatment which she shows him. It's a wonder to me how any

person, man or woman, can do otherwise than despise the fellow; for,

look you, 'squire, over and above his sulky, sour looks, and his haughty

conduct, would you believe it, he won't drink himself, yet he's always

for getting other people drunk. But that's not all: he's a quarrelsome,

spiteful, sore-headed chap, that won't do as other people. He never

laughs heartily like a man, but always in a half-sniffling sort of

manner that actually makes me sick at my stomach. Then, he never plays

and makes merry along with us, and, if he does, harm is always sure,

somehow or other, to come of it. When other people dance and frolic, he

stands apart, with scorn in his face, and his black brows gathering

clouds in such a way, that he would put a stop to all sport if people

were only fools enough to mind him. For my part, I take care to have

just as little to say to him as possible, and he to me, indeed; for he

knows me just as well as I know him: and he knows, too, that if he only

dared to crook his finger, I'm just the man that would mount him on the

spot."

Ralph could not exactly comprehend the force of some of the objections

urged by his companion to the character of Rivers: those, in particular,

which described his aversion to the sports common to the people, only

indicated a severer temper of mind and habit, and, though rather in bad

taste, were certainly not criminal. Still there was enough to confirm

his own hastily-formed suspicions of this person, and to determine him

more fully upon a circumspect habit while in his neighborhood. He saw

that his dislike and doubt were fully partaken of by those who, from

circumstance and not choice, were his associates; and felt

satisfied--though, as we have seen, without the knowledge of any one

particular which might afford a reasonable warranty for his

antipathy--that a feeling so general as Forrester described it could not

be altogether without foundation. He felt assured, by an innate

prediction of his own spirit, unuttered to his companion, that, at some

period, he should find his anticipations of this man's guilt fully

realized; though, at that moment, he did not dream that he himself, in

becoming his victim, should furnish to his own mind an almost

irrefutable argument in support of that incoherent notion of relative

sympathies and antipathies to which he had already, seemingly, given

himself up.

The dialogue, now diverted to other topics, was not much longer

protracted. The hour grew late, and the shutting up of the house, and

the retiring of the family below, warned Forrester of the propriety of

making his own retreat to the little cabin in which he lodged. He shook

Ralph's hand warmly, and, promising to see him at an early hour of the

morning, took his departure. A degree of intimacy, rather inconsistent

with our youth's wonted haughtiness of habit, had sprung up between

himself and the woodman--the result, doubtless, on the part of the

former, of the loneliness and to him novel character of his situation.

He was cheerless and melancholy, and the association of a warm,

well-meaning spirit had something consolatory in it. He thought too, and

correctly, that, in the mind and character of Forrester, he discovered a

large degree of sturdy, manly simplicity, and a genuine honesty--colored

deeply with prejudices and without much polish, it is true, but highly

susceptible of improvement, and by no means stubborn or unreasonable in

their retention. He could not but esteem the possessor of such

characteristics, particularly when shown in such broad contrast with

those of his associates; and, without any other assurance of their

possession by Forrester than the sympathies already referred to, he was

not unwilling to recognise their existence in his person. That he came

from the same part of the world with himself may also have had its

effect--the more particularly, indeed, as the pride of birthplace was

evidently a consideration with the woodman, and the praises of Carolina

were rung, along with his own, in every variety of change through almost

all his speeches.

The youth sat musing for some time after the departure of Forrester. He

was evidently employed in chewing the cud of sweet and bitter thought,

and referring to memories deeply imbued with the closely-associated

taste of both these extremes. After a while, the weakness of heart got

seemingly the mastery, long battled with; and tearing open his vest, he

displayed the massive gold chain circling his bosom in repeated folds,

upon which hung the small locket containing Edith's and his own

miniature. Looking over his shoulder, as he gazed upon it, we are

enabled to see the fair features of that sweet young girl, just entering

her womanhood--her rich, brown, streaming hair, the cheek delicately

pale, yet enlivened with a southern fire, that seems not improperly

borrowed from the warm eyes that glisten above it. The ringlets gather

in amorous clusters upon her shoulder, and half obscure a neck and bosom

of the purest and most polished ivory. The artist had caught from his

subject something of inspiration, and the rounded bust seemed to heave

before the sight, as if impregnated with the subtlest and sweetest life.

The youth carried the semblance to his lips, and muttered words of love

and reproach so strangely intermingled and in unison, that, could she

have heard to whom they were seemingly addressed, it might have been

difficult to have determined the difference of signification between

them. Gazing upon it long, and in silence, a large but solitary tear

gathered in his eye, and finally finding its way through his fingers,

rested upon the lovely features that appeared never heretofore to have

been conscious of a cloud. As if there had been something of impiety and

pollution in this blot upon so fair an outline, he hastily brushed the

tear away; then pressing the features again to his lips, he hurried the

jewelled token again into his bosom, and prepared himself for those

slumbers upon which we forbear longer to intrude.

CHAPTER X.

THE BLACK DOG.

While this brief scene was in progress in the chamber of Ralph, another,

not less full of interest to that person, was passing in the

neighborhood of the village-tavern; and, as this portion of our

narrative yields some light which must tend greatly to our own, and the

instruction of the reader, we propose briefly to record it. It will be

remembered, that, in the chapter preceding, we found the attention of

the youth forcibly attracted toward one Guy Rivers--an attention, the

result of various influences, which produced in the mind of the youth a

degree of antipathy toward that person for which he himself could not,

nor did we seek to account.

It appears that Ralph was not less the subject of consideration with the

individual in question. We have seen the degree and kind of espionage

which the former had felt at one time disposed to resent; and how he was

defeated in his design by the sudden withdrawal of the obnoxious

presence. On his departure with Forrester from the gallery, Rivers

reappeared--his manner that of doubt and excitement; and, after hurrying

for a while with uncertain steps up and down the apartment, he passed

hastily into the adjoining hall, where the landlord sat smoking,

drinking, and expatiating at large with his guests. Whispering something

in his ear, the latter rose, and the two proceeded into the adjoining

copse, at a point as remote as possible from hearing, when the

explanation of this mysterious caution was opened by Rivers.

"Well, Munro, we are like to have fine work with your accursed and

blundering good-nature. Why did you not refuse lodgings to this

youngster? Are you ignorant who he is? Do you not know him?"

"Know him?--no, I know nothing about him. He seems a clever,

good-looking lad, and I see no harm in him. What is it frightens you?"

was the reply and inquiry of the landlord.

"Nothing frightens me, as you know by this time, or should know at

least. But, if you know not the young fellow himself you should

certainly not be at a loss to know the creature he rides; for it is not

long since your heart was greatly taken with him. He is the youth we set

upon at the Catcheta pass, where your backwardness and my forwardness

got me this badge--it has not yet ceased to bleed--the marks of which

promise fairly to last me to my grave."

As he spoke he raised the handkerchief which bound his cheeks, and

exposed to view a deep gash, not of a serious character indeed, but

which, as the speaker asserted, would most probably result in a mark

which would last him his life. The exposure of the face confirms the

first and unfavorable impression which we have already received from his

appearance, and all that we have any occasion now to add in this respect

will be simply, that, though not beyond the prime of life, there were

ages of guilt, of vexed and vexatious strife, unregulated pride, without

aim or elevation, a lurking malignity, and hopeless discontent--all

embodied in the fiendish and fierce expression which that single glimpse

developed to the spectator. He went on--

"Had it been your lot to be in my place, I should not now have to tell

you who he is; nor should we have had any apprehensions of his crossing

our path again. But so it is. You are always the last to your

place;--had you kept your appointment, we should have had no difficulty,

and I should have escaped the mortification of being foiled by a mere

stripling, and almost stricken to death by the heel of his horse."

"And all your own fault and folly, Guy. What business had you to advance

upon the fellow, as you did, before everything was ready, and when we

could have brought him, without any risk whatever; into the snare, from

which nothing could have got him out? But no! You must be at your old

tricks of the law--you must make speeches before you cut purses, as was

your practice when I first knew you at Gwinnett county-court; a practice

which you seem not able to get over. You have got into such a trick of

making fun of people, that, for the life of me, I can't be sorry that

the lad has turned the tables so handsomely upon you."

"You would no doubt have enjoyed the scene with far more satisfaction,

had the fellow's shot taken its full effect on my skull--since, besides

the failure of our object, you have such cause of merriment in what has

been done. If I did go something too much ahead in the matter, it is but

simple justice to say you were quite as much aback."

"Perhaps so, Guy; but the fact is, I was right and you wrong, and the

thing's beyond dispute. This lesson, though a rough one, will do you

service; and a few more such will perhaps cure you of that vile trick

you have of spoiling not only your own, but the sport of others, by

running your head into unnecessary danger; and since this youth, who got

out of the scrape so handsomely, has beat you at your own game, it may

cure you of that cursed itch for tongue-trifling, upon which you so much

pride yourself. 'Twould have done, and it did very well at the county

sessions, in getting men out of the wood; but as you have commenced a

new business entirely, it's but well to leave off the old, particularly

as it's now your policy to get them into it."

"I shall talk as I please, Munro, and see not why, and care not whether,

my talk offends you or not. I parleyed with the youth only to keep him

in play until your plans could be put in operation."

"Very good--that was all very well, Guy--and had you kept to your

intention, the thing would have done. But he replied smartly to your

speeches, and your pride and vanity got to work. You must answer smartly

and sarcastically in turn, and you see what's come of it. You forgot the

knave in the wit; and the mistake was incurable. Why tell him that you

wanted to pick his pocket, and perhaps cut his throat?"

"That was a blunder, I grant; but the fact is, I entirely mistook the

man. Besides, I had a reason for so doing, which it is not necessary to

speak about now."

"Oh, ay--it wouldn't be lawyer-like, if you hadn't a reason for

everything, however unreasonable," was the retort.

"Perhaps not, Munro; but this is not the matter now. Our present object

must be to put this youth out of the way. We must silence suspicion,

for, though we are pretty much beyond the operation of law in this

region, yet now and then a sheriff's officer takes off some of the club;

and, as I think it is always more pleasant to be out of the halter than

in it, I am clear for making the thing certain in the only practicable

way."

"But, are you sure that he is the man? I should know his horse, and

shall look to him, for he's a fine creature, and I should like to secure

him; which I think will be the case, if you are not dreaming as usual."

"I am sure--I do not mistake."

"Well, I'm not; and I should like to hear what it is you know him by?"

A deeper and more malignant expression overspread the face of Rivers,

as, with a voice in which his thought vainly struggled for mastery with

a vexed spirit, he replied:--

"What have I to know him by? you ask. I know him by many things--and

when I told you I had my reason for talking with him as I did, I might

have added that he was known to me, and fixed in my lasting memory, by

wrongs and injuries before. But there is enough in this for

recollection," pointing again to his cheek--"this carries with it answer

sufficient. You may value a clear face slightly, having known none other

than a blotted one since you have known your own, but I have a different

feeling in this. He has written himself here, and the damned writing is

perpetually and legibly before my eyes. He has put a brand, a Cain-like,

accursed brand upon my face, the language of which can not be hidden

from men; and yet you ask me if I know the executioner? Can I forget

him? If you think so, Munro, you know little of Guy Rivers."

The violence of his manner as he spoke well accorded with the spirit of

what he said. The landlord, with much coolness and precision, replied:--

"I confess I do know but little of him, and have yet much to learn. If

you have so little temper in your speech, I have chosen you badly as a

confederate in employments which require so much of that quality. This

gash, which, when healed, will be scarcely perceptible, you speak of

with all the mortification of a young girl, to whom, indeed, such would

be an awful injury. How long is it, Guy, since you have become so

particularly solicitous of beauty, so proud of your face and features?"

"You will spare your sarcasm for another season, Munro, if you would not

have strife. I am not now in the mood to listen to much, even from you,

in the way of sneer or censure. Perhaps, I am a child in this, but I can

not be otherwise. Besides, I discover in this youth the person of one to

whom I owe much in the growth of this very hell-heart, which embitters

everything about and within me. Of this, at another time, you shall hear

more. Enough that I know this boy--that it is more than probable he

knows me, and may bring us into difficulty--that I hate him, and will

not rest satisfied until we are secure, and I have my revenge."

"Well, well, be not impatient, nor angry. Although I still doubt that

the youth in the house is your late opponent, you may have suffered

wrong at his hands, and you may be right in your conjecture."

"I am right--I do not conjecture. I do not so readily mistake my man,

and I was quite too near him on that occasion not to see every feature

of that face, which, at another and an earlier day, could come between

me and my dearest joys--but why speak I of this? I know him: not to

remember would be to forget that I am here; and that he was a part of

that very influence which made me league, Munro, with such as you, and

become a creature of, and a companion with, men whom even now I despise.

I shall not soon forget his stern and haughty smile of scorn--his proud

bearing--his lofty sentiment--all that I most admire--all that I do not

possess--and when to-day he descended to dinner, guided by that meddling

booby, Forrester, I knew him at a glance. I should know him among ten

thousand."

"It's to be hoped that he will have no such memory. I can't see, indeed,

how he should recognise either of us. Our disguises were complete. Your

whiskers taken off, leave you as far from any resemblance to what you

were in that affair, as any two men can well be from one another; and I

am perfectly satisfied he has little knowledge of me."

"How should he?" retorted the other. "The better part of valor saved you

from all risk of danger or discovery alike; but the case is different

with me. It may be that, enjoying the happiness which I have lost, he

has forgotten the now miserable object that once dared to aspire--but no

matter--it may be that I am forgotten by him--he can never be by me."

This speech, which had something in it vague and purposeless to the mind

of Munro, was uttered with gloomy emphasis, more as a soliloquy than a

reply, by the speaker. His hands were passed over his eyes as if in

agony, and his frame seemed to shudder at some remote recollection which

had still the dark influence upon him. Munro was a dull man in all

matters that belong to the heart, and those impulses which characterize

souls of intelligence and ambition. He observed the manner of his

companion, but said nothing in relation to it; and the latter, unable to

conceal altogether, or to suppress even partially his emotions, did not

deign to enter into any explanation in regard to them.

"Does he suspect anything yet, Guy, think you?--have you seen anything

which might sanction a thought that he knew or conjectured more than he

should?" inquired Munro, anxiously.

"I will not say that he does, but he has the perception of a lynx--he is

an apt man, and his eyes have been more frequently upon me to-day than I

altogether relish or admire. It is true, mine were upon him--as how,

indeed, if death were in the look, could I have kept them off! I caught

his glance frequently; turning upon me with that stern, still

expression, indifferent and insolent--as if he cared not even while he

surveyed. I remember that glance three years ago, when he was indeed a

boy--I remembered it when, but a few days since, he struck me to the

earth, and would have ridden me to death with the hoofs of his horse,

but for your timely appearance."

"It may be as you believe, Guy; but, as I saw nothing in his manner or

countenance affording ground for such a belief, I can not but conceive

it to have been because of the activity of your suspicions that you

discovered his. I did not perceive that he looked upon you with more

curiosity than upon any other at table; though, if he had done so, I

should by no means have been disposed to wonder; for at this time, and

since your face has been so tightly bandaged, you have a most

villanously attractive visage. It carries with it, though you do regard

it with so much favor, a full and satisfactory reason for observance,

without rendering necessary any reference to any more serious matter

than itself. On the road, I take it, he saw quite too little of either

of us to be able well to determine what was what, or who was who, either

then or now. The passage was dark, our disguises good, and the long hair

and monstrous whiskers which you wore did the rest. I have no

apprehensions, and see not that you need have any."

"I would not rest in this confidence--let us make sure that if he knows

anything he shall say nothing," was the significant reply of Rivers.

"Guy, you are too fierce and furious. When there's a necessity, do you

see, for using teeth, you know me to be always ready; but I will not be

for ever at this sort of work. If I were to let you have your way you'd

bring the whole country down upon us. There will be time enough when we

see a reason for it to tie up this young man's tongue."

"I see--I see!--you are ever thus--ever risking our chance upon

contingencies when you might build strongly upon certainties. You are

perpetually trying the strength of the rope, when a like trouble would

render it a sure hold-fast. Rather than have the possibility of this

thing being blabbed, I would--"

"Hush--hark!" said Munro, placing his hand upon the arm of his

companion, and drawing him deeper into the copse, at the moment that

Forrester, who had just left the chamber of Ralph, emerged from the

tavern into the open air. The outlaw had not placed himself within the

shadow of the trees in time sufficient to escape the searching gaze of

the woodman, who, seeing the movement and only seeing one person, leaped

nimbly forward with a light footstep, speaking thus as he approached:

"Hello! there--who's that--the pedler, sure. Have at you, Bunce!"

seizing as he spoke the arm of the retreating figure, who briefly and

sternly addressed him as follows:--

"It is well, Mr. Forrester, that he you have taken in hand is almost as

quiet in temper as the pedler you mistake him for else your position

might prove uncomfortable. Take your fingers from my arm, if you

please."

"Oh, it's you, Guy Rivers--and you here too, Munro, making love to one

another, I reckon, for want of better stuff. Well, who'd have thought to

find you two squatting here in the bushes! Would you believe it now, I

took you for the Yankee--not meaning any offence though."

"As I am not the Yankee, however, Mr. Forrester, you will I suppose,

withdraw your hand," said the other, with a manner sufficiently haughty

for the stomach of the person addressed.

"Oh, to be sure, since you wish it, and are not the pedler," returned

the other, with a manner rather looking, in the country phrase, to "a

squaring off for a fight"--"but you needn't be so gruff about it. You

are on business, I suppose, and so I leave you."

"A troublesome fool, who is disposed to be insolent," said Rivers, after

Forrester's departure.

"Damn him!" was the exclamation of the latter, on leaving the copse--"I

feel very much like putting my fingers on his throat; and shall do it,

too, before he gets better manners!"

The dialogue between the original parties was resumed.

"I tell you again, Munro--it is not by any means the wisest policy to

reckon and guess and calculate that matters will go on smoothly, when we

have it in our own power to make them certainly go on so. We must leave

nothing to guess-work, and a single blow will readily teach this youth

the proper way to be quiet."

"Why, what do you drive at, Guy. What would you do--what should be

done?"

"Beef--beef--beef! mere beef! How dull you are to-night! were you in yon

gloomy and thick edifice (pointing to the prison which frowned in

perspective before them), with irons on your hands, and with the

prospect through its narrow-grated loopholes, of the gallows-tree, at

every turning before you, it might be matter of wonder even to yourself

that you should have needed any advice by which to avoid such a risk and

prospect."

"Look you, Guy--I stand in no greater danger than yourself of the

prospect of which you speak. The subject is, at best, an ugly one, and I

do not care to hear it spoken of by you, above all other people. If you

want me to talk civilly with you, you must learn yourself to keep a

civil tongue in your head. I don't seek to quarrel with anybody, but I

will not submit to be threatened with the penalties of the rogue by one

who is a damned sight greater rogue than myself."

"You call things by their plainest names, Wat, at least," said the

other, with a tone moderated duly for the purpose of soothing down the

bristles he had made to rise--"but you mistake me quite. I meant no

threat; I only sought to show you how much we were at the mercy of a

single word from a wanton and head-strong youth. I will not say

confidently that he remembers me, but he had some opportunities for

seeing my face, and looked into it closely enough. I can meet any fate

with fearlessness, but should rather avoid it, at all risks, when it's

in my power to do so."

"You are too suspicious, quite, Guy, even for our business. I am older

than you, and have seen something more of the world: suspicion and

caution are not the habit with young men like this. They are free

enough, and confiding enough, and in this lies our success. It is only

the old man--the experienced in human affairs, that looks out for traps

and pitfalls. It is for the outlaw--for you and me--to suspect all; to

look with fear even upon one another, when a common interest, and

perhaps a common fate, ought to bind us together. This being our habit,

arising as it must from our profession, it is natural but not reasonable

to refer a like spirit to all other persons. We are wrong in this, and

you are wrong in regard to this youth--not that I care to save him, for

if he but looks or winks awry, I shall silence him myself, without

speech or stroke from you being necessary. But I do not think he made

out your features, and do not think he looked for them. He had no time

for it, after the onset, and you were well enough disguised before. If

he had made out anything, he would have shown it to-night; but, saving a

little stiffness, which belongs to all these young men from Carolina, I

saw nothing in his manner that looked at all out of the way."

"Well, Munro, you are bent on having the thing as you please. You will

find, when too late, that your counsel will end in having us all in a

hobble."

"Pshaw! you are growing old and timid since this adventure. You begin to

doubt your own powers of defence. You find your arguments failing; and

you fear that, when the time comes, you will not plead with your old

spirit, though for the extrication of your own instead of the neck of

your neighbor."

"Perhaps so--but, if there be no reason for apprehension, there is

something due to me in the way of revenge. Is the fellow to hurl me

down, and trench my cheek in this manner, and escape without hurt?"

The eyes of the speaker glared with a deadly fury, as he indicated in

this sentence another motive for his persevering hostility to

Colleton--an hostility for which, as subsequent passages will show, he

had even a better reason than the unpleasing wound in his face; which,

nevertheless, was in itself, strange as it may appear, a considerable

eyesore to its proprietor. Munro evidently understood this only in part;

and, unaccustomed to attribute a desire to shed blood to any other than

a motive of gain or safety, and without any idea of mortified pride or

passion being productive of a thirst unaccountable to his mind, except

in this manner, he proceeded thus, in a sentence, the dull simplicity of

which only the more provoked the ire of his companion--

"What do you think to do, Guy--what recompense would you seek to

have--what would satisfy you?"

The hand of Rivers grasped convulsively that of the questioner as he

spoke, his eyes were protruded closely into his face, his voice was

thick, choking and husky, and his words tremulous, as he replied,

"His blood--his blood!"

The landlord started back with undisguised horror from his glance.

Though familiar with scenes of violence and crime, and callous in their

performance, there was more of the Mammon than the Moloch in his spirit,

and he shuddered at the fiendlike look that met his own. The other

proceeded:--

"The trench in my cheek is nothing to that within my soul. I tell you.

Munro, I hate the boy--I hate him with a hatred that must have a

tiger-draught from his veins, and even then I will not be satisfied. But

why talk I to you thus, when he is almost in my grasp; and there is

neither let nor hinderance? Sleeps he not in yon room to the northeast?"

"He does, Guy--but it must not be! I must not risk all for your passion,

which seems to me, as weak as it is without adequate provocation. I care

nothing for the youth, and you know it; but I will not run the thousand

risks which your temper is for ever bringing upon me. There is nothing

to be gained, and a great deal to be lost by it, at this time. As for

the scar--that, I think, is fairly a part of the business, and is not

properly a subject of personal revenge. It belongs to the adventure, and

you should not have engaged in it, without a due reference to its

possible consequences."

"You shall not keep me back by such objections as these. Do I not know

how little you care for the risk--how little you can lose by it?"

"True, I can lose little, but I have other reasons; and, however it may

surprise you, those reasons spring from a desire for your good rather

than my own."

"For my good?" replied the other, with an inquiring sneer.

"Yes, for your good, or rather for Lucy's. You wish to marry her. She is

a sweet child, and an orphan. She merits a far better man than you; and,

bound as I am to give her to you, I am deeply bound to myself and to

her, to make you as worthy of her as possible, and to give her as many

chances for happiness as I can."

An incredulous smile played for a second upon the lips of the outlaw,

succeeded quickly, however, by the savage expression, which, from being

that most congenial to his feelings, had become that most habitual to

his face.

"I can not be deceived by words like these," was his reply, as he

stepped quickly from under the boughs which had sheltered them and made

toward the house.

"Think not to pursue this matter, Guy, on your life. I will not permit

it; not now, at least, if I have to strike for the youth myself."

Thus spoke the landlord, as he advanced in the same direction. Both were

deeply roused, and, though not reckless alike, Munro was a man quite as

decisive in character as his companion was ferocious and vindictive.

What might have been the result of their present position, had it not

undergone a new interruption, might not well be foreseen. The sash of

one of the apartments of the building devoted to the family was suddenly

thrown up, and a soft and plaintive voice, accompanying the wandering

and broken strains of a guitar, rose sweetly into song upon the ear.

"'Tis Lucy--the poor girl! Stay, Guy, and hear her music. She does not

often sing now-a-days. She is quite melancholy, and it's a long time

since I've heard her guitar. She sings and plays sweetly; her poor

father had her taught everything before he failed, for he was very proud

of her, as well he might be."

They sunk again into the covert, the outlaw muttering sullenly at the

interruption which had come between him and his purposes. The music

touched him not, for he betrayed no consciousness; when, after a few

brief preliminary notes on the instrument, the musician breathed forth

the little ballad which follows:--

LUCY'S SONG.

I.

"I met thy glance of scorn,

And then my anguish slept,

But, when the crowd was gone,

I turned away and wept.

II.

"I could not bear the frown

Of one who thus could move,

And feel that all my fault,

Was only too much love.

III.

"I ask not if thy heart

Hath aught for mine in store,

Yet, let me love thee still,

If thou canst yield no more.

IV.

"Let me unchidden gaze,

Still, on the heaven I see,

Though all its happy rays

Be still denied to me."

A broken line of the lay, murmured at intervals for a few minutes after

the entire piece was concluded, as it were in soliloquy, indicated the

sad spirit of the minstrel. She did not remain long at the window; in a

little while the song ceased, and the light was withdrawn from the

apartment. The musician had retired.

"They say, Guy, that music can quiet the most violent spirit, and it

seems to have had its influence upon you. Does she not sing like a

mocking-bird?--is she not a sweet, a true creature? Why, man! so forward

and furious but now, and now so lifeless! bestir ye! The night wanes."

The person addressed started from his stupor, and, as if utterly

unconscious of what had been going on, _ad interim_, actually replied to

the speech of his companion made a little while prior to the appearance

and music of the young girl, whose presence at that moment had most

probably prevented strife and, possibly, bloodshed. He spoke as if the

interruption had made only a momentary break in the sentence which he

now concluded:--

"He lies at the point of my knife, under my hands, within my power,

without chance of escape, and I am to be held back--kept from

striking--kept from my revenge--and for what? There may be little gain

in the matter--it may not bring money, and there may be some risk! If it

be with you, Munro, to have neither love nor hate, but what you do, to

do only for the profit and spoil that come of it, it is not so with me.

I can both love and hate; though it be, as it has been, that I entertain

the one feeling in vain, and am restrained from the enjoyment of the

other."

"You were born in a perverse time, and are querulous, for the sake of

the noise it makes," rejoined his cool companion. "I do not desire to

restrain your hands from this young man, but take your time for it. Let

nothing be done to him while in this house. I will run, if I can help

it, no more risk for your passions; and I must confess myself anxious,

if the devil will let me, of stopping right short in the old life and

beginning a new one. I have been bad enough, and done enough, to keep me

at my prayers all the rest of my days, were I to live on to eternity."

"This new spirit, I suppose, we owe to your visit to the last

camp-meeting. You will exhort, doubtless, yourself, before long, if you

keep this track. Why, what a prophet you will make among the

crop-haired, Munro! what a brand from the burning!"

"Look you, Guy, your sarcasm pleases me quite as little as it did the

young fellow, who paid it back so much better than I can. Be wise, if

you can, while you are wary; if your words continue to come from the

same nest, they will beget something more than words, my good fellow."

"True, and like enough, Munro; and why do you provoke me to say them?"

replied Rivers, something more sedately. "You see me in a passion--you

know that I have cause--for is not this cause enough--this vile scar on

features, now hideous, that were once surely not unpleasing."

As he spoke he dashed his fingers into the wound, which he still seemed

pleased to refer to, though the reference evidently brought with it

bitterness and mortification. He proceeded--his passion again rising

predominant--

"Shall I spare the wretch whose ministry defaced me--shall I not have

revenge on him who first wrote villain here--who branded me as an

accursed thing, and among things bright and beautiful gave me the badge,

the blot, the heel-stamp, due the serpent? Shall I not have my

atonement--my sacrifice--and shall you deny me--you, Walter Munro, who

owe it to me in justice?"

"I owe it to you, Guy--how?"

"You taught me first to be the villain you now find me. You first took

me to the haunts of your own accursed and hell-educated crew. You taught

me all their arts, their contrivances, their lawlessness, and crime. You

encouraged my own deformities of soul till they became monsters, and my

own spirit such a monster that I no longer knew myself. You thrust the

weapon into my hand, and taught me its use. You put me on the scent of

blood, and bade me lap it. I will not pretend that I was not ready and

pliable enough to your hands. There was, I feel, little difficulty in

moulding me to your own measure. I was an apt scholar, and soon ceased

to be the subordinate villain. I was your companion, and too valuable to

you to be lost or left. When I acquired new views of man, and began, in

another sphere, that new life to which you would now turn your own

eyes--when I grew strong among men, and famous, and public opinion grow

enamored with the name, which your destiny compelled me to exchange for

another, you sought me out--you thrust your enticements upon me; and, in

an hour of gloom, and defeat, and despondency, you seized upon me with

those claws of temptation which are even now upon my shoulders, and I

gave up all! I made the sacrifice--name, fame, honor, troops of

friends--for what? Answer _you_! You are rich--you own slaves in

abundance--secure from your own fortunes, you have wealth hourly

increasing. What have I? This scar, this brand, that sends me among men

no longer the doubtful villain--the words are written there in full!"

The speaker paused, exhausted. His face was pale and livid--his form

trembled with convulsion--and his lips grew white and chalky, while

quivering like a troubled water. The landlord, after a gloomy pause,

replied:--

"You have spoken but the truth, Guy, and anything that I can do--"

"You will not do!" responded the other, passionately, and interrupting

the speaker in his speech. "You will do nothing! You ruin me in the love

and esteem of those whom I love and esteem--you drive me into exile--you

lead me into crime, and put me upon a pursuit which teaches me practices

that brand me with man's hate and fear, and--if the churchmen speak

truth, which I believe not--with heaven's eternal punishment! What have

I left to desire but hate--blood--the blood of man--who, in driving me

away from his dwelling, has made me an unrelenting enemy--his hand

everywhere against me, and mine against him! While I had this pursuit, I

did not complain; but you now interpose to deny me even this. The boy

whom I hate, not merely because of his species, but, in addition, with a

hate incurred by himself, you protect from my vengeance, though

affecting to be utterly careless of his fate--and all this you conclude

with a profession of willingness to do for me whatever you can! What

miserable mockery is this?"

"And have I done nothing--and am I seeking to do nothing for you, Guy,

by way of atonement? Have I not pledged to you the person of my niece,

the sweet young innocent, who is not unworthy to be the wife of the

purest and proudest gentleman of the southern country? Is this

nothing--is it nothing to sacrifice such a creature to such a creature?

For well I know what must be her fate when she becomes your wife. Well I

know you! Vindictive, jealous, merciless, wicked, and fearless in

wickedness--God help me, for it will be the very worst crime I have ever

yet committed! These are all your attributes, and I know the sweet child

will have to suffer from the perpetual exercise of all of them."

"Perhaps so! and as she will then be mine, she must suffer them, if I so

decree; but what avails your promise, so long as you--in this matter a

child yourself--suffer her to protract and put off at her pleasure. Me

she receives with scorn and contempt, you with tears and entreaties; and

you allow their influence; in the hope, doubtless, that some lucky

chance--the pistol-shot or the hangman's collar--will rid you of my

importunities. Is it not so, Munro?" said the ruffian, with a sneer of

contemptuous bitterness.

"It would be, indeed, a lucky event for both of us, Guy, were you safely

in the arms of your mother; though I have not delayed in this affair

with any such hope. God knows I should be glad, on almost any terms, to

be fairly free from your eternal croakings--never at rest, never

satisfied, unless at some new deviltry and ill deed. If I did give you

the first lessons in your education, Guy, you have long since gone

beyond your master; and I'm something disposed to think that Old Nick

himself must have taken up your tuition, where, from want of

corresponding capacity, I was compelled to leave it off."

And the landlord laughed at his own humor, in despite of the hyena-glare

shot forth from the eye of the savage he addressed. He continued:--

"But, Guy, I'm not for letting the youth off--that's as you please. You

have a grudge against him, and may settle it to your own liking and in

your own way. I have nothing to say to that. But I am determined to do

as little henceforth toward hanging myself as possible; and, therefore,

the thing must not take place _here_. Nor do I like that it should be

done at all without some reason. When he blabs, there's a necessity for

the thing, and self-preservation, you know, is the first law of nature.

The case will then be as much mine as yours, and I'll lend a helping

hand willingly."

"My object, Munro, is scarcely the same with yours. It goes beyond it;

and, whether he knows much or little, or speaks nothing or everything,

it is still the same thing to me. I must have my revenge. But, for your

own safety--are you bent on running the risk?"

"I am, Guy, rather than spill any more blood unnecessarily. I have

already shed too much, and my dreams begin to trouble me as I get

older," was the grave response of the landlord.

"And how, if he speaks out, and you have no chance either to stop his

mouth or to run for it?"

"Who'll believe him, think you?--where's the proof? Do you mean to

confess for both of us at the first question?"

"True--," said Rivers, "there would be a difficulty in conviction, but

his oath would put us into some trouble."

"I think not; our people know nothing about him, and would scarcely lend

much aid to have either of us turned upon our backs," replied Munro,

without hesitation.

"Well, be it then as you say. There is yet another subject, Munro, on

which I have just as little reason to be satisfied as this. How long

will you permit this girl to trifle with us both? Why should you care

for her prayers and pleadings--her tears and entreaties? If you are

determined upon the matter, as I have your pledge, these are childish

and unavailing; and the delay can have no good end, unless it be that

you do in fact look, as I have said, and as I sometimes think, for some

chance to take me off, and relieve you of my importunities and from your

pledges."

"Look you, Guy, the child is my own twin-brother's only one, and a sweet

creature it is. I must not be too hard with her; she begs time, and I

must give it."

"Why, how much time would she have? Heaven knows what she considers

reasonable, or what you or I should call so; but to my mind she has had

time enough, and more by far than I was willing for. You must bring her

to her senses, or let me do so. To my thought, she is making fools of us

both."

"It is, enough, Guy, that you have my promise. She shall consent, and I

will hasten the matter as fast as I can; but I will not drive her, nor

will I be driven myself. Your love is not such a desperate affair as to

burn itself out for the want of better fuel; and you can wait for the

proper season. If I thought for a moment that you did or could have any

regard for the child, and she could be happy or even comfortable with

you, I might push the thing something harder than I do; but, as it

stands, you must be patient. The fruit drops when it is ripe."

"Rather when the frost is on it, and the worm is in the core, and decay

has progressed to rottenness! Speak you in this way to the hungry boy,

whose eyes have long anticipated his appetite, and he may listen to you

and be patient--I neither can nor will. Look to it, Munro: I will not

much longer submit to be imposed upon."

"Nor I, Guy Rivers. You forget yourself greatly, and entirely mistake

me, when you take these airs upon you. You are feverish now, and I will

not suffer myself to grow angry; but be prudent in your speech. We shall

see to all this to-morrow and the next day--there is quite time

enough--when we are both cooler and calmer than at present. The night is

something too warm for deliberation; and it is well we say no more on

the one subject till we learn the course of the other. The hour is late,

and we had best retire. In the morning I shall ride to hear old Parson

Witter, in company with the old woman and Lucy. Ride along with us, and

we shall be able better to understand one another."

As he spoke, Munro emerged from the cover of the tree under which their

dialogue had chiefly been carried on, and reapproached the dwelling,

from which they had considerably receded. His companion lingered in the

recess.

"I will be there," said Rivers, as they parted, "though I still propose

a ride of a few miles to-night. My blood is hot, and I must quiet it

with a gallop."

The landlord looked incredulous as he replied--"Some more deviltry: I

will take a bet that the cross-roads see you in an hour."

"Not impossible," was the response, and the parties were both lost to

sight--the one in the shelter of his dwelling, the other in the dim

shadow of the trees which girdled it.

CHAPTER XI.

FOREST PREACHING.

At an early hour of the ensuing morning, Ralph was aroused from his

slumbers, which had been more than grateful from the extra degree of

fatigue he had the day before undergone, by the appearance of Forrester,

who apologized for the somewhat unseasonable nature of his visit, by

bringing tidings of a preacher and of a preaching in the neighborhood on

that day. It was the sabbath--and though, generally speaking, very far

from being kept holy in that region, yet, as a day of repose from

labor--a holyday, in fact--it was observed, at all times, with more than

religious scrupulosity. Such an event among the people of this quarter

was always productive of a congregation. The occurrence being

unfrequent, its importance was duly and necessarily increased in the

estimation of those, the remote and insulated position of whom rendered

society, whenever it could be found, a leading and general attraction.

No matter what the character of the auspices under which it was

attained, they yearned for its associations, and gathered where they

were to be enjoyed. A field-preaching, too, is a legitimate amusement;

and, though not intended as such, formed a genuine excuse and apology

for those who desired it less for its teaching than its talk--who sought

it less for the word which it brought of God than that which it

furnished from the world of man. It was a happy cover for those who,

cultivating a human appetite, and conscious of a human weakness, were

solicitous, in respecting and providing for these, not to offend the

Creator in the presence of his creatures.

The woodman, as one of this class, was full of glee, and promised Ralph

an intellectual treat; for Parson Witter, the preacher in reference, had

more than once, as he was pleased to acknowledge and phrase it, won his

ears, and softened and delighted his heart. He was popular in the

village and its neighborhood, and where regular pastor was none, he

might be considered to have made the strongest impression upon his

almost primitive and certainly only in part civilized hearers. His

merits of mind were held of rather an elevated order, and in standard

far over topping the current run of his fellow-laborers in the same

vineyard; while his own example was admitted, on all hands, to keep pace

evenly with the precepts which he taught, and to be not unworthy of the

faith which he professed. He was of the methodist persuasion--a sect

which, among those who have sojourned in our southern and western

forests, may confidently claim to have done more, and with motives as

little questionable as any, toward the spread of civilization, good

habits, and a proper morality, with the great mass, than all other known

sects put together. In a word, where men are remotely situated from one

another, and can not well afford to provide for an established place of

worship and a regular pastor, their labors, valued at the lowest

standard of human want, are inappreciable. We may add that never did

laborers more deserve, yet less frequently receive, their hire, than the

preachers of this particular faith. Humble in habit, moderate in desire,

indefatigable in well-doing, pure in practice and intention, without

pretence or ostentation of any kind, they have gone freely and

fearlessly into places the most remote and perilous, with an empty

scrip, but with hearts filled to overflowing with love of God and

good-will to men--preaching their doctrines with a simple and an

unstudied eloquence, meetly characteristic of, and well adapted to, the

old groves, deep primitive forests, and rudely-barren wilds, in which it

is their wont most commonly to give it utterance: day after day, week

after week, and month after month, finding them wayfarers still--never

slumbering, never reposing from the toil they have engaged in, until

they have fallen, almost literally, into the narrow grave by the

wayside; their resting-places unprotected by any other mausoleum or

shelter than those trees which have witnessed their devotions; their

names and worth unmarked by any inscription; their memories, however,

closely treasured up and carefully noted among human affections, and

within the bosoms of those for whom their labors have been taken; while

their reward, with a high ambition cherished well in their lives, is

found only in that better abode where they are promised a cessation from

their labors, but where their good works still follow them. This,

without exaggeration, applicable to the profession at large, was

particularly due to the individual member in question; and among the

somewhat savage and always wild people whom he exhorted, Parson Witter

was in many cases an object of sincere affection, and in all commanded

their respect.

As might readily be expected, the whole village and as much of the

surrounding country as could well be apprized of the affair were for the

gathering; and Colleton, now scarcely feeling his late injuries, an

early breakfast having been discussed, mounted his horse, and, under the

guidance of his quondam friend Forrester, took the meandering path, or,

as they phrase it in those parts, the old _trace_, to the place of

meeting and prayer.

The sight is something goodly, as well to the man of the world as to the

man of God, to behold the fairly-decked array of people, drawn from a

circuit of some ten or even fifteen miles in extent, on the sabbath,

neatly dressed in their choicest apparel, men and women alike well

mounted, and forming numerous processions and parties, from three to

five or ten in each, bending from every direction to a given point, and

assembling for the purposes of devotion. No chiming and chattering bells

warn them of the day or of the duty--no regularly-constituted and

well-salaried priest--no time-honored fabric, round which the old

forefathers of the hamlet rest--reminding them regularly of the

recurring sabbath, and the sweet assemblage of their fellows. We are to

assume that the teacher is from their own impulses, and that the heart

calls them with due solemnity to the festival of prayer. The preacher

comes when the spirit prompts, or as circumstances may impel or permit.

The news of his arrival passes from farm to farm, from house to house;

placards announce it from the trees on the roadside, parallel, it may

be, with an advertisement for strayed oxen, as we have seen it

numberless times; and a day does not well elapse before it is in

possession of everybody who might well avail themselves of its promise

for the ensuing Sunday. The parson comes to the house of one of his

auditory a night or two before; messages and messengers are despatched

to this and that neighbor, who despatch in turn to other neighbors. The

negroes, delighting in a service and occasion of the kind--in which,

by-the-way, they generally make the most conspicuous figures--though

somewhat sluggish as couriers usually, are now not merely ready, but

actually swift of foot. The place of worship and the preacher are duly

designated, and, by the time appointed, as if the bell had tolled for

their enlightenment, the country assembles at the stated place; and

though the preacher may sometimes fail of attendance, the people never

do.

The spot appointed for the service of the day was an old grove of

gigantic oaks, at a distance of some five or six miles from the village

of Chestatee. The village itself had not been chosen, though having the

convenience of a building, because of the liberal desire entertained by

those acting on the occasion to afford to others living at an equal

distance the same opportunities without additional fatigue. The morning

was a fine one, all gayety and sunshine--the road dry, elevated, and

shaded luxuriantly with the overhanging foliage--the woods having the

air of luxury and bloom which belonged to them at such a season, and the

prospect, varied throughout by the wholesome undulations of valley and

hill, which strongly marked the face of the country, greatly enlivened

the ride to the eye of our young traveller. Everything contributed to

impart a cheering influence to his senses; and with spirits and a frame

newly braced and invigorated, he felt the bounding motion of the steed

beneath him with an animal exultation, which took from his countenance

that look of melancholy which had hitherto clouded it.

As our two friends proceeded on their way, successive and frequent

groups crossed their route, or fell into it from other roads--some

capriciously taking the by-paths and Indian tracks through the woods,

but all having the same object in view, and bending to the same point of

assemblage. Here gayly pranced on a small cluster of the young of both

sexes, laughing with unqualified glee at the jest of some of their

companions--while in the rear, the more staid, the antiques and those

rapidly becoming so, with more measured gait, paced on in suite. On the

road-side, striding on foot with step almost as rapid as that of the

riders, came at intervals, and one after the other, the now

trimly-dressed slaves of this or that plantation--all devoutly bent on

the place of meeting. Some of the whites carried their double-barrelled

guns, some their rifles--it being deemed politic, at that time, to

prepare for all contingencies, for the Indian or for the buck, as well

as for the more direct object of the journey.

At length, in a rapidly approaching group, a bright but timid glance met

that of Colleton, and curbing in the impetuous animal which he rode, in

a few moments he found himself side by side with Miss Munro, who

answered his prettiest introductory compliment with a smile and speech,

uttered with a natural grace, and with the spirit of a dame of chivalry.

"We have a like object to-day, I presume," was, after a few

complimentary sentences, the language of Ralph--"yet," he continued, "I

fear me, that our several impulses at this time scarcely so far resemble

each other as to make it not discreditable to yours to permit of the

comparison."

"I know not what may be the motive which impels you, sir to the course

you take; but I will not pretend to urge that, even in my own thoughts,

my route is any more the result of a settled conviction of its high

necessity than it may be in yours, and the confession which I shame to

make, is perhaps of itself, a beginning of that very kind of

self-examination which we seek the church to awaken."

"Alas, Miss Lucy, even this was not in my thought, so much are we men

ignorant of or indifferent to those things which are thought of so much

real importance. We seldom regard matters which are not of present

enjoyment. The case is otherwise with you. There is far more truth, my

own experience tells me, in the profession of your sex, whether in love

or in religion, than in ours--and believe me, I mean this as no idle

compliment--I feel it to be true. The fact is, society itself puts you

into a sphere and condition, which, taking from you much of your

individuality, makes you less exclusive in your affections, and more

single in their exercise. Your existence being merged in that of the

stronger sex, you lose all that general selfishness which is the strict

result of our pursuits. Your impulses are narrowed to a single point or

two, and there all your hopes, fears and desires, become concentrated.

You acquire an intense susceptibility on a few subjects, by the loss of

those manifold influences which belong to the out-door habit of mankind.

With us, we have so many resources to fly to for relief, so many

attractions to invite and seduce, so many resorts of luxury and life,

that the affections become broken up in small, the heart is divided

among the thousand; and, if one fragment suffers defeat or denial, why,

the pang scarcely touches, and is perhaps unfelt by all the rest. You

have but few aims, few hopes. With these your very existence is bound

up, and if you lose these you are yourselves lost. Thus I find that your

sex, to a certain age, are creatures of love--disappointment invariably

begets devotion--and either of these passions, for so they should be

called, once brought into exercise, forbids and excludes every other."

"Really, Mr. Colleton, you seem to have looked somewhat into the

philosophy of this subject, and you may be right in the inferences to

which you have come. On this point I may say nothing; but, do you

conceive it altogether fair in you thus to compliment us at our own

expense? You give us the credit of truth, a high eulogium, I grant, in

matters which relate to the the affections and the heart; but this is

done by robbing us entirely of mental independence. You are a kind of

generous outlaw, a moral Robin Hood, you compel us to give up everything

we possess, in order that you may have the somewhat equivocal merit of

restoring back a small portion of what you take."

"True, and this, I am afraid, Miss Lucy, however by the admission I

forfeit for my sex all reputation for chivalry, is after all the precise

relationship between us. The very fact that the requisitions made by our

sex produce immediate concession from yours, establishes the dependence

of which you complain."

"You mistake me, sir. I complain not of the robbery---far from it; for,

if we do lose the possession of a commodity so valuable, we are at least

freed from the responsibility of keeping it. The gentlemen, nowadays,

seldom look to us for intellectual gladiatorship; they are content that

our weakness should shield us from the war. But, I conceive the reproach

of our poverty to come unkindly from those who make us poor. It is of

this, sir, that I complain."

"You are just, and justly severe, Miss Munro; but what else have you to

expect? Amazon-like, your sex, according to the quaint old story, sought

the combat, and were not unwilling to abide the conditions of the

warfare. The taunt is coupled with the triumph--the spoil follows the

victory--and the captive is chained to the chariot-wheel of his

conqueror, and must adorn the march of his superior by his own shame and

sorrows. But, to be just to myself, permit me to say, that what you have

considered a reproach was in truth designed as a compliment. I must

regret that my modes of expression are so clumsy, that, in the utterance

of my thought, the sentiment so changed its original shape as entirely

to lose its identity. It certainly deserved the graceful swordsmanship

which foiled it so completely."

"Nay, sir," said the animated girl, "you are bloodily-minded toward

yourself, and it is matter of wonder to me how you survive your own

rebuke. So far from erring in clumsy phrase, I am constrained to admit

that I thought, and think you, excessively adroit and happy in its

management. It was only with a degree of perversity, intended solely to

establish our independence of opinion, at least for the moment, that I

chose to mistake and misapprehend you. Your remark, clothed in any other

language, could scarcely put on a form more consistent with your

meaning."

Ralph bowed at a compliment which had something equivocal in it, and

this branch of the conversation having reached its legitimate close, a

pause of some few moments succeeded, when they found themselves joined

by other parties, until the cortege was swollen in number to the goodly

dimensions of a cavalcade or caravan designed for a pilgrimage.

"Report speaks favorably of the preacher we are to hear to-day, Miss

Munro--have you ever heard him?" was the inquiry of the youth.

"I have, sir, frequently, and have at all times been much pleased and

sometimes affected by his preaching. There are few persons I would more

desire to hear than himself--he does not offend your ears, nor assail

your understanding by unmeaning thunders. His matter and manner, alike,

are distinguished by modest good sense, a gentle and dignified ease and

spirit, and a pleasing earnestness in his object that is never

offensive. I think, sir, you will like him."

"Your opinion of him will certainly not diminish my attention, I assure

you, to what he says," was the reply.

At this moment the cavalcade was overtaken and joined by Rivers and

Munro, together with several other villagers. Ralph now taking advantage

of a suggestion of Forrester's, previously made--who proposed, as there

would be time enough, a circuitous and pleasant ride through a

neighboring valley--avoided the necessity of being in the company of one

with respect to whom he had determined upon a course of the most jealous

precaution. Turning their horses' heads, therefore, in the proposed

direction, the two left the procession, and saw no more of the party

until their common arrival at the secluded grove--druidically conceived

for the present purpose--in which the teacher of a faith as simple as it

was pleasant was already preparing to address them.

The venerable oaks--a goodly and thickly clustering assemblage--forming

a circle around, and midway upon a hill of gradual ascent, had left an

opening in the centre, concealed from the eye except when fairly

penetrated by the spectator. Their branches, in most part meeting above,

afforded a roof less regular and gaudy, indeed, but far more grand,

majestic, and we may add, becoming, for purposes like the present, than

the dim and decorated cathedral, the workmanship of human hands. Its

application to this use, at this time, recalled forcibly to the mind of

the youth the forms and features of that primitive worship, when the

trees bent with gentle murmurs above the heads of the rapt worshippers,

and a visible Deity dwelt in the shadowed valleys, and whispered an

auspicious acceptance of their devotions in every breeze. He could not

help acknowledging, as, indeed, must all who have ever been under the

influence of such a scene, that in this, more properly and perfectly

than in any other temple, may the spirit of man recognise and hold

familiar and free converse with the spirit of his Creator. Here, indeed,

without much effort of the imagination; might be beheld the present

God--the trees, hills and vales, the wild flower and the murmuring

water, all the work of his hands, attesting his power, keeping their

purpose, and obeying, without scruple, the order of those seasons, for

the sphere and operation of which he originally designed them. They were

mute lessoners, and the example which, in the progress of their

existence, year after year, they regularly exhibited, might well

persuade the more responsible representative of the same power the

propriety of a like obedience.

A few fallen trees, trimmed of their branches and touched with the adze,

ranging at convenient distances under the boughs of those along with

which they had lately stood up in proud equality, furnished seats for

the now rapidly-gathering assemblage. A rough stage, composed of logs,

rudely hewn and crossing each other at right angles, covered, when at a

height of sufficient elevation, formed the pulpit from which the

preacher was to exhort. A chair, brought from some cottage in the

neighborhood, surmounted the stage. This was all that art had done to

accommodate nature to the purposes of man.

In the body of the wood immediately adjacent, fastened to the

overhanging branches, were the goodly steeds of the company; forming, in

themselves, to the unaccustomed and inexperienced eye, a grouping the

most curious. Some, more docile than the rest; were permitted to rove at

large, cropping the young herbage and tender grass; occasionally, it is

true, during the service, overleaping their limits in a literal sense;

neighing, whinnying and kicking up their heels to the manifest confusion

of the pious and the discomfiture of the preacher.

The hour at length arrived. The audience was numerous if not select. All

persuasions--for even in that remote region sectarianism had done much

toward banishing religion--assembled promiscuously together and without

show of discord, excepting that here and there a high stickler for

church aristocracy, in a better coat than his neighbor, thrust him

aside; or, in another and not less offensive form of pride, in the

externals of humility and rotten with innate malignity, groaned audibly

through his clenched teeth; and with shut eyes and crossed hands, as in

prayer, sought to pass a practical rebuke upon the less devout

exhibitions of those around him. The cant and the clatter, as it

prevails in the crowded mart, were here in miniature; and Charity would

have needed something more than a Kamschatka covering to have shut out

from her eyes the enormous hypocrisy of many among the clamorous

professors of that faith of which they felt little and knew less. If she

shut her eyes to the sight, their groans were in her ears; and if she

turned away, they took her by the elbow, and called her a backslider

herself. Forrester whispered in the ears of Ralph, as his eye

encountered the form of Miss Munro, who sat primly amid a flock of

venerables--

"Doesn't she talk like a book? Ah, she's a smart, sweet girl; it's a

pity there's no better chance for her than Guy Rivers. But where's

he--the rascal? Do you know I nearly got my fingers on his throat last

night. I felt deusedly like it, I tell you."

"Why, what did he to you?"

"Answered me with such impudence! I took him for the pedler in the dark,

and thought I had got a prize; it wasn't the pedler, but something

worse--for in my eyes he's no better than a polecat."

But, the preacher had risen in his place, and all was silence and

attention. We need scarcely seek to describe him. His appearance was

that of a very common man; and the anticipations of Colleton, as he was

one of those persons apt to be taken by appearances, suffered something

like rebuke. His figure was diminutive and insignificant; his shoulders

were round, and his movements excessively awkward; his face was thin and

sallow, his eyes dull and inexpressive, and too small seemingly for

command. A too-frequent habit of closing them in prayer contributed, no

doubt, greatly to this appearance. A redeeming expression in the high

forehead, conically rising, and the strong character exhibited in his

nose, neutralized in some sort the generally-unattractive outline. His

hair, which was of a deep black, was extremely coarse, and closely

cropped: it gave to his look that general expression which associated

him at once in the mind of Ralph, whose reading in those matters was

fresh, with the commonwealth history of England--with the puritans, and

those diseased fanatics of the Cromwell dynasty, not omitting that

profound hypocrite himself. What, then, was the surprise of the youth,

having such impressions, to hear a discourse unassuming in its dictates,

mild in its requisitions, and of a style and temper the most soothing

and persuasive!

The devotions commenced with a hymn, two lines of which, at a time,

having been read and repeated by the preacher, furnished a guide to the

congregation; the female portion of which generally united to sing, and

in a style the sweetness of which was doubly effective from the utter

absence of all ornament in the music. The strains were just such as the

old shepherds, out among the hills, tending their charges, might have

been heard to pour forth, almost unconsciously, to that God who

sometimes condescended to walk along with them. After this was over, the

preacher rose, and read, with a voice as clear as unaffected, the

twenty-third psalm of David, the images of which are borrowed chiefly

from the life in the wilderness, and were therefore not unsuited to the

ears of those to whom it was now addressed. Without proposing any one

portion of this performance as a text or subject of commentary, and

without seeking, as is quite too frequently the case with small

teachers, to explain doubtful passages of little meaning and no

importance, he delivered a discourse, in which he simply dilated upon

and carried out, for the benefit of those about him, and with a direct

reference to the case of all of them, those beautiful portraits of a

good shepherd and guardian God which the production which he read

furnished to his hands. He spoke of the dependence of the

creature--instanced, as it is daily, by a thousand wants and exigencies,

for which, unless by the care and under the countenance of Providence,

he could never of himself provide. He narrated the dangers of the

forest--imaging by this figure the mazes and mysteries of life--the

difficulty, nay, the almost utter impossibility, unless by His sanction,

of procuring sustenance, and of counteracting those innumerable

incidents by fell and flood, which, in a single moment, defeat the cares

of the hunter and the husbandman--setting at naught his industry,

destroying his fields and cattle, blighting his crops, and tearing up

with the wing of the hurricane even the cottage which gives shelter to

his little ones. He dwelt largely and long upon those numberless and

sudden events in the progress of life and human circumstance, over

which, as they could neither be foreseen nor combated with by man, he

had no control; and appealed for him to the Great Shepherd, who alone

could do both. Having shown the necessity of such an appeal and

reference, he next proceeded to describe the gracious willingness which

had at all times been manifested by the Creator to extend the required

protection. He adverted to the fortunes of all the patriarchs in support

of this position; and, singling out innumerable instances of this

description, confidently assured them, in turn, from these examples,

that the same Shepherd was not unwilling to provide for them in like

manner. Under his protection, he assured them, "they should not want."

He dilated at length, and with a graceful dexterity, upon the

truths--the simple and mere truths of God's providence, and the history

of his people--which David had embodied in the beautiful psalm which he

had read them. It was poetry, indeed--sweet poetry--but it was the

poetry of truth and not of fiction. Did not history sustain its every

particular? Had not the Shepherd made them to lie down in green

pastures--had he not led them beside the still waters--restored he not

their souls--did he not lead them, for his name's sake, in the paths of

righteousness--and though at length they walked through the valley where

Death had cast his never-departing shadow, was he not with them still,

keeping them even from the fear of evil? He furnished them with the rod

and staff; he prepared the repast for them, even in the presence of

their enemies; he anointed their heads with oil, and blessed them with

quiet and abundance, until the cup of their prosperity was running

over--until they even ceased to doubt that goodness and mercy should

follow them all the days of their life; and, with a proper consciousness

of the source whence this great good had arisen, they determined, with

the spirit not less of wise than of worthy men, to follow his guidance,

and thus dwell in the house of the Lord for ever. Such did the old man

describe the fortunes of the old patriarchs to have been; and such,

having first entered into like obligations, pursuing them with the same

fond fixedness of purpose, did he promise should be the fortunes of all

who then listened to his voice.

As he proceeded to his peroration, he grew warmed with the broad and

boundless subject before him, and his declamation became alike bold and

beautiful. All eyes were fixed upon him, and not a whisper from the

still-murmuring woods which girded them in was perceptible to the senses

of that pleased and listening assembly. The services of the morning were

closed by a paraphrase, in part, of the psalm from which his discourse

had been drawn; and as this performance, in its present shape, is not to

be found, we believe, in any of the books devoted to such purposes, it

is but fair to conclude that the old man--not unwilling, in his

profession, to employ every engine for the removal of all stubbornness

from the hearts of those he addressed--sometimes invoked Poetry to smile

upon his devotions, and wing his aspirations for the desired flight. It

was sung by the congregation, in like manner with the former--the

preacher reading two lines at a time, after having first gone through

the perusal aloud of the piece entire. With the recognised privilege of

the romancer, who is supposed to have a wizard control over men, events,

and things alike, we are enabled to preserve the paraphrase here:--

"SHEPHERD'S HYMN"

"Oh, when I rove the desert waste, and 'neath the hot sun pant,

The Lord shall be my shepherd then--he will not let me want--

He'll lead me where the pastures are of soft and shady green,

And where the gentle waters rove the quiet hills between.

"And when the savage shall pursue, and in his grasp I sink,

He will prepare the feast for me, and bring the cooling drink--

And save me harmless from his hands, and strengthen me in toil,

And bless my home and cottage-lands, and crown my head with oil.

"With such a Shepherd to protect--to guide and guard me still,

And bless my heart with every good, and keep from every ill--

Surely I shall not turn aside, and scorn his kindly care,

But keep the path he points me out, and dwell for ever there."

The service had not yet been concluded--the last parting offices of

prayer and benediction had yet to be performed--when a boy, about

fourteen years of age, rushed precipitately into the assembly. His

clothes were torn and bloody, and he was smeared with dirt from head to

foot. He spoke, but his words were half intelligible only, and

comprehended by but one or two of the persons around him. Munro

immediately rose and carried him out. He was followed by Rivers, who had

been sitting beside him.

The interruption silenced everything like prayer; there was no further

attention for the preacher; and accordingly a most admired disorder

overspread the audience. One after another rose and left the area, and

those not the first to withdraw followed in rapid succession; until,

under the influence of that wild stimulant, curiosity, the preacher soon

found himself utterly unattended, except by the female portion of his

auditory. These, too, or rather the main body of them at least, were now

only present in a purely physical sense; for, with the true

characteristic of the sex, their minds were busily employed in the

wilderness of reflection which this movement among the men had

necessarily inspired.

Ralph Colleton, however, with praiseworthy decorum, lingered to the

last--his companion Forrester, under the influence of a whisper from one

over his shoulder, having been among the first to retire. He, too, could

not in the end avoid the general disposition, and at length took his way

to the animated and earnest knot which he saw assembled in the shade of

the adjoining thicket, busied in the discussion of some concern of more

than common interest. In his departure from the one gathering to the

other, he caught a glance from the eye of Lucy Munro, which had in it so

much of warning, mingled at the same time with an expression of so much

interest, that he half stopped in his progress, and, but for the seeming

indecision and awkwardness of such a proceeding, would have

returned--the more particularly, indeed, when, encountering her gaze

with a corresponding fixedness--though her cheek grew to crimson with

the blush that overspread it--her glance was not yet withdrawn. He felt

that her look was full of caution, and inwardly determined upon due

circumspection. The cause of interruption may as well be reserved for

the next chapter.

CHAPTER XII.

TROUBLE AMONG THE TRESPASSERS.

Ralph now made his way into the thick of the crowd, curious to ascertain

the source of so much disquiet and tumult as now began to manifest

itself among them. The words of peace which they had just heard seemed

to have availed them but little, for every brow was blackened, and every

tongue tipped with oaths and execrations. His appearance attracted no

attention, if, indeed, it were not entirely unobserved. The topic in

hand was of an interest quite too fresh and absorbing to permit of a

single glance toward any other of more doubtful importance, and it was

only after much delay that he was enabled at length to get the least

insight into the mystery. All were speakers, counsellors, orators--old

and young, big and little, illustrious and obscure--all but the

legitimate and legal counsellor Pippin, who, to the surprise of the

youth, was to be seen galloping at the uttermost stretch of his horse's

legs toward the quiet of his own abode. The lawyer was known to have a

particular care of number one, and such a movement excited no remark in

any of the assembly. There was danger at hand, and he knew his

value--besides, there might be business for the sessions, and he valued

too highly the advantages, in a jury-case, of a clean conscience, not to

be solicitous to keep his honor clear of any art or part in criminal

matters, saving only such connection as might come professionally.

That the lawyer was not without reason for his precaution, Ralph had

soon abundant testimony himself. Arms and the munitions of war, as if by

magic, had been rapidly collected. Some of the party, it is true, had

made their appearance at the place of prayer with rifles and fowling

pieces, a practice which occasioned no surprise. But the managers of the

present movement had seemingly furnished all hands with weapons,

offensive and defensive, of one kind or another. Some were caparisoned

with pistols, cutlasses, and knives; and, not to speak of pickaxes and

clubs, the array was sufficiently formidable. The attitude of all

parties was warlike in the extreme, and the speeches of those who, from

time to time, condescended to please themselves by haranguing their

neighbors, teemed with nothing but strife and wounds, fight and furious

performance.

The matter, as we have already remarked, was not made out by the youth

without considerable difficulty. He obtained, however, some particulars

from the various speakers, which, taken in connection with the broken

and incoherent sentences of Forrester, who dashed into speech at

intervals with something of the fury of a wounded panther in a

cane-brake, contributed at length to his full enlightenment.

"Matter enough--matter enough! and you will think so too--to he robbed

of our findings by a parcel of blasted 'coons, that haven't soul enough

to keep them freezing. Why, this is the matter, you must know: only last

week, we miners of Tracy's diggings struck upon a fine heap of the good

stuff, and have been gathering gold pretty freely ever since. All the

boys have been doing well at it; better than they ever did before--and

even Munro there, and Rivers, who have never been very fond of work,

neither of them, have been pretty busy ever since; for, as I tell you,

we were making a sight of money, all of us. Well now, somehow or other,

our good luck got to the ears of George Dexter and his men, who have

been at work for some time past upon old Johnson's diggings about

fourteen miles up on the Sokee river. They could never make much out of

the place, I know; for what it had good in it was pretty much cleaned

out of it when I was there, and I know it can't get better, seeing that

gold is not like trees, to grow out every year. Well, as I say, George

Dexter, who would just as lief do wrong as right, and a great deal

rather, got tired, as well as all his boys, of working for the fun of

the thing only; and so, hearing as I say of our good luck, what did they

do but last night come quietly down upon our trace, and when Jones, the

old man we kept there as a kind of safeguard, tried to stop 'em, they

shot him through the body as if he had been a pig. His son got away when

his father was shot, though they did try to shoot him too, and come post

haste to tell us of the transaction. There stands the lad, his clothes

all bloody and ragged. He's had a good run of it through the bushes, I

reckon."

"And they are now in possession of your lands?"

"Every fellow of 'em, holding on with gun in hand, and swearing to be

the death of us, if we try for our own. But we'll show them what's what,

or I can't fling a hatchet or aim a rifle. This, now, Master Colleton,

is the long and the short of the matter."

"And what do you propose to do?" asked Ralph, of his informant.

"Why, what should we do, do you think, but find out who the best men

are, and put them in possession. There's not a two-legged creature among

us that won't be willing to try that question, any how, and at any time,

but more particularly now, when everything depends upon it."

"And when do you move, Forrester?"

"Now, directly--this very minute. The boys have just sent for some more

powder, and are putting things in readiness for a brush."

The resolution of Ralph was at once adopted. He had nothing, it is true,

to do with the matter--no interest at stake, and certainly no sympathy

with the lawless men who went forth to fight for a property, to which

they had not a jot more of right than had those who usurped it from

them. But here was a scene--here was incident, excitement--and with all

the enthusiasm of the southern temper, and with that uncalculating

warmth which so much distinguishes it, he determined, without much

regard to the merits of the question, to go along with the party.

"I'll ride with you, Forrester, and see what's going on."

"And stand up with us, 'squire, and join in the scuffle?" inquired his

companion.

"I say not that, Forrester. I have no concern in this matter, and so

long as I am let alone myself, I see no reason for taking part in an

affair, of the merits of which I am almost entirely ignorant."

"You will take your arms with you, I suppose. You can lend them to those

who fight, though you make no use of them yourself."

"Yes--I never go without arms in travelling, but I shall not lend them.

A man should no more lend his arms than he should lend his coat. Every

man should have his own weapons."

"Yes; but, 'squire, if you go along with us, you may be brought into the

scrape. The other party may choose to consider you one of us."

"It is for this reason, not less than others, that I would carry and not

lend my arms."

"Well, 'squire, you might lend them to some of us, and I would answer

for them. It's true, as you say, that every man should have his own

weapons; but some among us, you see, ha'n't got 'em, and it's for that

we've been waiting. But come, it's time to start; the boys are beginning

to be in motion; and here come Munro and that skunk Rivers. I reckon

Munro will have the command, for he's thought to be the most cunning

among us."

The party was now ready for departure, when a new interruption was

experienced. The duties of the pastor were yet to begin, and,

accordingly, sallying forth at the head of his remaining congregation,

Parson Witter placed himself in front of the seceders. It is unnecessary

that we should state his purpose; it is as little necessary that we

should say that it was unavailing. Men of the kind of whom we speak,

though perhaps not insensible to some of the bolder virtues, have no

sympathy or love for a faith which teaches forbearance under wrong and

insult, and meekness under blows. If they did not utterly laugh in his

face, therefore, at his exhortations, it was because, at the very first,

they had to a man turned their backs upon him, and were now generally

mounted. Following the common lead, Ralph approached the group where

stood his fair friend of the morning; and acknowledged, in an

under-tone, to herself, the correctness of her opinion in regard to the

merits of the sermon. She did not reply to the observation, but seeing

his hand upon the bridle, asked hurriedly--

"Do you, sir--does Mr. Colleton go with this party?"

"I do; the circumstance are all so novel, and I am curious to see as

much of manners and events foreign to those to which I have been

accustomed, as may be practicable."

"I fear, sir, that those which you may behold on occasions such as

these, and in this country, though they may enlighten you, will do

little toward your gratification. You have friends, sir, who might not

be willing that you should indulge in unnecessary exposure, for the

satisfaction of a curiosity so unpromising."

Her manner was dignified, and though as she spoke a something of rebuke

came mingled with the caution which her language conveyed, yet there was

evidently such an interest in his fortunes embodied in what she said,

that the listener whom she addressed could not feel hurt at the words

themselves, or the accompanying expression.

"I shall be a mere looker-on, Miss Munro, and dare to disregard the

caution which you bestow, though duly sensible of the kindness which

gives it utterance. Perhaps, too, I may be of service in the way of

peace-making. I have neither interest nor wish which could prompt me to

any other course."

"There is every need for caution among young travellers, sir; and though

no astrologer, it seems to me your planet is full of unfavorable

auguries. If you will be headstrong, see that you have your eyes about

you. You have need of them both."

This was all in by-play. The group had passed on, and a single nod of

the head and a doubtful smile, on her part, concluded the brief dialogue

we have just narrated. The youth was puzzled to understand the

significant warnings, which, from time to time, she had given him. He

felt unconscious of any foe in particular, and though at that time

sojourning with a people in whom he could repose but little confidence,

he yet saw no reason to apprehend any danger. If her manner and words

had reference simply to the general lawlessness of the settlement, the

precaution evidently conveyed no compliment to his own capacities for

observation. Whatever might have been her motive, the youth felt its

kindness; and she rose not a little in his esteem, when he reflected

with how much dignity and ladylike propriety she had given, to a

comparative stranger, the counsel which she evidently thought necessary

to his well-being. With a free rein he soon overtook Forrester, and with

him took his place in the rear of the now rapidly advancing cavalcade.

As Forrester had conjectured, the command of the party, such as it was,

was assigned to the landlord. There might have been something like forty

or fifty men in all, the better portion of them mounted and well

armed--some few on foot struggling to keep pace with the riders--all in

high spirits, and indignant at the invasion of what they considered

their own. These, however, were not all hunters of the precious metal,

and many of them, indeed, as the reader has by this time readily

conjectured, carried on a business of very mixed complexion. The whole

village--blacksmith, grocer, baker, and clothier included, turned out

_en masse_, upon the occasion; for, with an indisputable position in

political economy, deriving their gains directly or indirectly from this

pursuit, the cause was, in fact, a cause in common.

The scene of operations, in view of which they had now come, had to the

eye all the appearance of a moderate encampment. The intruding force had

done the business completely. They had made a full transfer, from their

old to their new quarters, of bag and baggage; and had possessed

themselves of all the log-houses in and about the disputed region. Their

fires were in full heat, to use the frontier phrase, and the water was

hissing in their kettles, and the dry thorns crackling under the pot.

Never had usurpers made themselves more perfectly at home; and the rage

of the old incumbents was, of course, duly heightened at a prospect of

so much ease and felicity enjoyed at their expense.

The enemy were about equal in point of number with those whom they had

so rudely dispossessed. They had, however, in addition to their

disposable force, their entire assemblage of wives, children, slaves,

and dependants, cattle and horses, enough, as Forrester bitterly

remarked, "to breed a famine in the land." They had evidently settled

themselves _for life_, and the ousted party, conscious of the fact,

prepared for the _dernier_ resort. Everything on the part of the

usurpers indicated a perfect state of preparedness for an issue which

they never doubted would be made; and all the useless baggage,

interspersed freely with rocks and fallen trees, had been well-employed

in increasing the strength of a position for which, such an object

considered, nature had already done much. The defences, as they now

stood, precluded all chance of success from an attack by mounted men,

unless the force so employed were overwhelming. The defenders stood

ready at their posts, partly under cover, and so arrayed as easily to

put themselves so, and were armed in very nearly the same manner with

the assailing party. In this guise of formidable defence, they waited

patiently the onset.

There was a brief pause after their arrival, on the part of the invading

force, which was employed principally in consultation as to the proper

mode of procedure, and in examination of the ground. Their plan of

attack, depending altogether upon the nature of circumstances yet to be

seen, had not been deliberated upon before. The consultation lasted not

long, however, and no man's patience was too severely tried. Having

deputed the command to the landlord, they left the matter pretty much to

that person; nor was their choice unhappy.

Munro had been a partisan well-taught in Indian warfare, and it was said

of him, that he knew quite as well how to practise all their subtleties

as themselves. The first object with him, therefore, in accordance with

his reputation, was to devise some plot, by which not only to destroy

the inequality of chances between the party assailing and that defending

a post now almost impregnable, but to draw the latter entirely out of

their defences. Still, it was deemed but courteous, or prudent at least,

to see what could be done in the way of negotiation; and their leader,

with a white handkerchief attached to a young sapling, hewn down for the

purpose, by way of apology for a flag, approached the besieged, and in

front of his men demanded a conference with the usurping chief.

The demand was readily and at once answered by the appearance of the

already named George Dexter; a man who, with little sagacity and but

moderate cunning, had yet acquired a lead and notoriety among his

fellows, even in that wild region, simply from the reckless boldness and

fierce impetuosity of his character. It is useless to describe such a

person. He was a ruffian--in look and manner, ruffianly--huge of frame,

strong and agile of limb, and steeled against all fear, simply from a

brute unconsciousness of all danger. There was little of preliminary

matter in this conference. Each knew his man, and the business in hand.

All was direct, therefore, and to the point. Words were not to be wasted

without corresponding fruits, though the colloquy began, on the part of

Munro, in terms of the most accredited courtesy.

"Well, George Dexter, a pleasant morning to you in your new

accommodations. I see you have learned to make yourself perfectly at

home when you visit your neighbors."

"Why, thank you, Wat--I generally do, I reckon, as you know of old. It's

not now, I'm inclined to think, that you're to learn the ways of George

Dexter. He's a man, you see, Wat, that never has two ways about him."

"That's true, friend George, I must say that for you, were I to have to

put it on your tombstone."

"It's a long ride to the Atlantic, Wat; and the time is something off

yet, I reckon, when my friends will be after measuring me for a six-foot

accommodation. But, look you, Wat, why are all your family here?--I did

think, when I first saw them on the trail, some with their twisted and

some with smooth bores, tomahawks, and scalping-knives, that they took

us for Indians. If you hadn't come forward now, civilly, I should have

been for giving your boys some mutton-chops, by way of a cold cut."

"Well, George, you may do that yet, old fellow, for here we have all

come to take our Sunday dinner. You are not in the notion that we shall

let you take possession here so easily, without even sending us word,

and paying us no rent--no compensation?"

"Why, no, Wat--I knew you and your boys too well for that. I did look,

you see, to have a bit of a brush, and have made some few preparations

to receive you with warmth and open arms," was the response of Dexter,

pointing as he spoke to the well-guarded condition of his intrenchments,

and to his armed men, who were now thickly clustering about him.

Munro saw plainly that this was no idle boast, and that the disposition

of his enemy's force, without some stratagem, set at defiance any attack

under present circumstances. Still he did not despair, and taught in

Indian warfare, such a position was the very one to bring out his

energies and abilities. Falling back for a moment, he uttered a few

words in the ear of one of his party, who withdrew unobserved from his

companions, while he returned to the parley.

"Well, George, I see, as you have said, that you have made some

preparations to receive us, but they are not the preparations that I

like exactly, nor such as I think we altogether deserve."

"That may be, Wat--and I can't help it. If you will invite yourselves to

dinner, you must be content with what I put before you."

"It is not a smart speech, Dexter, that will give you free walk on the

high road; and something is to be said about this proceeding of yours,

which, you must allow, is clearly in the teeth of all the practices

prevailing among the people of the frontier. At the beginning, and

before any of us knew the value of this or that spot, you chose your

ground, and we chose ours. If you leave yours or we ours, then either of

us may take possession--not without. Is not this the custom?"

"I tell you what, Munro, I have not lived so long in the woods to listen

to wind-guns, and if such is the kind of argument you bring us, your

dumpy lawyer--what do you call him?--little Pippin, ought to have been

head of your party. He will do it all day long--I've heard him myself,

at the sessions, from mid-day till clean dark, and after all he said

nothing."

"If you mean to persuade yourself, George, that we shall do no more than

_talk_ for our lands and improvements, you are likely to suffer

something for your mistake."

"Your 'lands and improvements!' Well, now, I like that--that's very

good, and just like you. Now, Wat, not to put you to too much trouble,

I'd like to look a little into your title to the lands; as to the

improvements, they're at your service whenever you think proper to send

for them. There's the old lumber-house--there's the squatter's

house--there's where the cow keeps, and there's the hogsty, and half a

dozen more, all of which you're quite welcome to. I'm sure none of you

want 'em, boys--do you?"

A hearty laugh, and cries in the negative, followed this somewhat

technical retort and reply of the speaker--since, in trespass, according

to the received forms of law, the first duty of the plaintiff is to

establish his own title.

"Then, George, you are absolutely bent on having us show our title? You

won't deliver up peaceably, and do justice?"

"Can't think of such a thing--we find the quarters here quite too

comfortable, and have come too far to be in a hurry to return. We are

tired, too, Wat; and it's not civil in you to make such a request. When

you can say 'must' to us, we shall hear you, but not till then; so, my

old fellow, if you be not satisfied, why, the sooner we come to short

sixes the better," was the response of the desperado.

The indifferent composure with which he uttered a response which was in

fact the signal for bloodshed, not less than the savage ferocity of his

preparations generally, amply sustained his pretension to this

appellative. Munro knew his man too well not to perceive that to this

"fashion must they come at last;" and simply assuring Dexter that he

would submit his decision to his followers, he retired back upon the

anxious and indignant party, who had heard a portion, and now eagerly

and angrily listened to the rest of the detail.

Having gone over the matter, he proceeded to his arrangements for the

attack with all the coolness, and certainly much of the conduct of a

veteran. In many respects he truly deserved the character of one; his

courage was unquestionable, and aroused; though he still preserved his

coolness, even when coupled with the vindictive ferocity of the savage.

His experience in all the modes of warfare, commonly known to the white

man and Indian alike, in the woods, was complete; everything, indeed,

eminently fitted and prepared him for the duties which, by common

consent, had been devolved upon him. He now called them around him,

under a clump of trees and brushwood which concealed them from sight,

and thus addressed them, in a style and language graduated to their

pursuits and understandings:--

"And now, my fine fellows, you see it is just as I told you all along.

You will have to fight for it, and with no half spirit. You must just

use all your strength and skill in it, and a little cunning besides. We

have to deal with a man who would just as lief fight as eat; indeed, he

prefers it. As he says himself, there's no two ways about him. He will

come to the scratch himself, and make everybody else do so. So, then,

you see what's before you. It's no child's play. They count more men

than we--not to speak of their entrenchments and shelter. We must

dislodge them if we can; and to begin, I have a small contrivance in my

head which may do some good. I want two from among you to go upon a nice

business. I must have men quick of foot, keen of sight, and cunning as a

black-snake; and they mustn't be afraid of a knock on the head either.

Shall I have my men?"

There was no difficulty in this, and the leader was soon provided. He

selected two from among the applicants for this distinction, upon whose

capacities he thought he could best rely, and led them away from the

party into the recess of the wood, where he gave them their directions,

and then returned to the main body. He now proceeded to the division,

into small parties, of his whole force--placing them under guides rather

than leaders, and reserving to himself the instruction and command of

the whole. There was still something to be done, and conceiving this to

be a good opportunity for employing a test, already determined upon, he

approached Ralph Colleton, who surveyed the whole affair with intense

curiosity.

"And now, young 'squire, you see what we're driving at, and as our

present business wo'nt permit of neutrality, let us hear on which side

you stand. Are you for us or against us?"

The question was one rather of command than solicitation, but the manner

of the speaker was sufficiently deferential.

"I see not why you should ask the question, sir. I have no concern in

your controversy--I know not its merits, and propose simply to content

myself with the position of a spectator. I presume there is nothing

offensive in such a station."

"There may be, sir; and you know that when people's blood's up, they

don't stand on trifles. They are not quick to discriminate between foes

and neutrals; and, to speak the truth, we are apt, in this part of the

country, to look upon the two, at such moments, as the same. You will

judge, therefore, for yourself, of the risk you run."

"I always do, Mr. Munro," said the youth. "I can not see that the risk

is very considerable at this moment, for I am at a loss to perceive the

policy of your making an enemy of me, when you have already a sufficient

number to contend with in yonder barricade. Should your men, in their

folly, determine to do so, I am not unprepared, and I think not

unwilling, to defend myself."

"Ay, ay--I forgot, sir, you are from Carolina, where they make nothing

of swallowing Uncle Sam for a lunch. It is very well, sir; you take your

risk, and will abide the consequences though I look not to find you when

the fray begins."

"You shall not provoke me, sir, by your sneer; and may assure yourself,

if it will satisfy you, that though I will not fight for you, I shall

have no scruple of putting a bullet through the scull of the first

ruffian who gives me the least occasion to do so."

The youth spoke indignantly, but the landlord appeared not to regard the

retort. Turning to the troop, which had been decorously attentive, he

bade them follow, saying

"Come on, boys--we shall have to do without the stranger; he does not

fight, it seems, for the fun of the thing. If Pippin was here,

doubtless, we should have arguments enough from the pair to keep _them_

in whole bones, at least, if nobody else."

A laugh of bitter scorn followed the remark of Munro, as the party went

on its way.

Though inwardly assured of the propriety of his course, Ralph could not

help biting his lip with the mortification he felt from this

circumstance, and which he was compelled to suppress; and we hazard

nothing in the assertion when we say, that, had his sympathies been at

all enlisted with the assailing party, the sarcasm of its leader would

have hurried him into the very first rank of attack. As it was, such was

its influence upon him, that, giving spur to his steed, he advanced to a

position which, while it afforded him a clear survey of the whole field,

exposed his person not a little to the shot of either party, as well

from without as from within the beleaguered district.

The invading force soon commenced the affair. They came to the attack

after the manner of the Indians. The nature of forest-life, and its

necessities, of itself teaches this mode of warfare. Each man took his

tree, his bush, or stump, approaching from cover to cover until within

rifle-reach, then patiently waiting until an exposed head, a side or

shoulder, leg or arm, gave an opportunity for the exercise of his skill

in marksmanship. To the keen-sighted and quick, rather than to the

strong, is the victory; and it will not be wondered at, if, educated

thus in daily adventure, the hunter is enabled to detect the slightest

and most transient exhibition, and by a shot, which in most cases is

fatal, to avail himself of the indiscretion of his enemy. If, however,

this habit of life begets skill in attack and destruction, it has not

the less beneficial effect in creating a like skill and ingenuity in the

matter of defence. In this way we shall account for the limited amount

of injury done in the Indian wars, in proportion to the noise and

excitement which they make, and the many terrors they occasion.

The fight had now begun in this manner, and, both parties being at the

outset studiously well sheltered, with little or no injury--the shot

doing no more harm to the enemy on either side than barking the branch

of the tree or splintering the rock behind which they happened

individually to be sheltered. In this fruitless manner the affray had

for a little time been carried on, without satisfaction to any

concerned, when Munro was beheld advancing, with the apology for a flag

which he had used before, toward the beleaguered fortress. The parley he

called for was acceded to, and Dexter again made his appearance.

"What, tired already, Wat? The game is, to be sure, a shy one; but have

patience, old fellow--we shall be at close quarters directly."

It was now the time for Munro to practise the subtlety which he had

designed, and a reasonable prospect of success he promised himself from

the bull-headed stupidity of his opponent. He had planned a stratagem,

upon which parties, as we have seen, were despatched; and he now

calculated his own movement in concert with theirs. It was his object to

protract the parley which he had begun, by making propositions for an

arrangement which, from a perfect knowledge of the men he had to deal

with, he felt assured would not be listened to. In the meantime, pending

the negotiation, each party left its cover, and, while they severally

preserved their original relationships, and were so situated as, at a

given signal, to regain their positions, they drew nearer to one

another, and in some instances began a conversation. Munro was cautious

yet quick in the discussion, and, while his opponent with rough sarcasms

taunted him upon the strength of his own position, and the utter

inadequacy of his strength to force it, he contented himself with sundry

exhortations to a peaceable arrangement--to a giving up of the

possessions they had usurped, and many other suggestions of a like

nature, which he well knew would be laughed at and rejected. Still, the

object was in part attained. The invaders, becoming more confident of

their strength from this almost virtual abandonment of their first

resort by their opponents, grew momently less and less cautious. The

rifle was rested against the rock, the sentinel took out his tobacco,

and the two parties were almost intermingled.

At length the hour had come. A wild and sudden shriek from that part of

the beleaguered district in which the women and children were

congregated, drew all eyes in that direction where the whole line of

tents and dwellings were in a bright conflagration. The emissaries had

done their work ably and well, and the devastation was complete; while

the women and children, driven from their various sheltering-places, ran

shrieking in every direction. Nor did Munro, at this time, forget his

division of the labor: the opportunity was in his grasp, and it was not

suffered to escape him. As the glance of Dexter was turned in the

direction of the flames, he forgot his precaution, and the moment was

not lost. Availing himself of the occasion, Munro dashed his flag of

truce into the face of the man with whom he had parleyed, and, in the

confusion which followed, seizing him around the body with a strength

equal to his own, he dragged him, along with himself, over the low table

of rock on which they had both stood, upon the soft earth below. Here

they grappled with each other, neither having arms, and relying solely

upon skill and muscle.

The movement was too sudden, the surprise too complete, not to give an

ascendency to the invaders, of which they readily availed themselves.

The possession of the fortress was now in fact divided between them; and

a mutual consciousness of their relative equality determined the two

parties, as if by common consent, quietly to behold the result of the

affair between the leaders. They had once recovered their feet, but were

both of them again down, Munro being uppermost. Every artifice known to

the lusty wrestlers of this region was put in exercise, and the struggle

was variously contested. At one time the ascendency was clearly with the

one, at another moment it was transferred to his opponent; victory, like

some shy arbiter, seeming unwilling to fix the palm, from an equal

regard for both the claimants. Munro still had the advantage; but a

momentary pause of action, and a sudden evolution of his antagonist, now

materially altered their position, and Dexter, with the sinuous agility

of the snake, winding himself completely around his opponent, now

whirled him suddenly over and brought himself upon him. Extricating his

arms with admirable skill, he was enabled to regain his knee, which was

now closely pressed upon the bosom of the prostrate man, who struggled,

but in vain, to free himself from the position.

The face of the ruffian, if we may so call the one in contradistinction

to the other, was black with fury; and Munro felt that his violation of

the flag of truce was not likely to have any good effect upon his

destiny. Hitherto, beyond the weapons of nature's furnishing, they had

been unarmed. The case was no longer so; for Dexter, having a momentary

use of his hand, provided himself with a huge dirk-knife, guarded by a

string which hung around his neck, and was usually worn in his bosom: a

sudden jerk threw it wide, and fixed the blade with a spring.

It was a perilous moment for the fallen man, for the glance of the

victor, apart from the action, indicated well the vindictive spirit

within him; and the landlord averted his eyes, though he did not speak,

and upraised his hands as if to ward off the blow. The friends of Munro

now hurried to his relief, but the stroke was already descending--when,

on a sudden, to the surprise of all, the look of Dexter was turned from

the foe beneath him, and fixed upon the hills in the distance--his blow

was arrested--his grasp relaxed--he released his enemy, and rose

sullenly to his feet, leaving his antagonist unharmed.

[Transcriber's note: The following chapter was misnumbered in the

original book. It is actually Chapter XIII.]

CHAPTER IX.

NEW PARTIES TO THE CONFLICT.

This sudden and unlooked-for escape of Munro, from a fate held so

inevitable as well by himself as all around him, was not more a matter

of satisfaction than surprise with that experienced personage. He did

not deliberate long upon his release, however, before recovering his

feet, and resuming his former belligerent attitude.

The circumstance to which he owed the unlooked-for and most unwonted

forbearance of his enemy was quickly revealed. Following the now common

direction of all eyes, he discerned a body of mounted and armed men,

winding on their way to the encampment, in whose well-known uniform he

recognised a detachment of the "Georgia Guard," a troop kept, as they

all well knew, in the service of the state, for the purpose not merely

of breaking up the illegal and unadvised settlements of the squatters

upon the frontiers, upon lands now known to be valuable, but also of

repressing and punishing their frequent outlawries. Such a course had

become essential to the repose and protection of the more quiet and more

honest adventurer whose possessions they not only entered upon and

despoiled, but whose lives, in numerous instances, had been made to pay

the penalty of their enterprise. Such a force could alone meet the

exigency, in a country where the sheriff dared not often show himself;

and, thus accoutred, and with full authority, the guard, either _en

masse_, or in small divisions like the present, was employed, at all

times, in scouring, though without any great success, the infested

districts.

The body now approaching was readily distinguishable, though yet at a

considerable distance--the road over which it came lying upon a long

ridge of bald and elevated rocks. Its number was not large, comprising

not more than forty persons; but, as the squatters were most commonly

distrustful of one another, not living together or in much harmony, and

having but seldom, as in the present instance, a community of interest

or unity of purpose, such a force was considered adequate to all the

duties assigned it. There was but little of the pomp or circumstance of

military array in their appearance or approach. Though dressed uniformly

the gray and plain stuffs which they wore were more in unison with the

habit of the hunter than the warrior; and, as in that country, the rifle

is familiar as a household thing, the encounter with an individual of

the troop would perhaps call for no remark. The plaintive note of a

single bugle, at intervals reverberating wildly among the hills over

which the party wound its way, more than anything beside, indicated its

character; and even this accompaniment is so familiar as an appendage

with the southron--so common, particularly to the negroes, who acquire a

singular and sweet mastery over it, while driving their wagons through

the woods, or poling their boats down the streams, that one might fairly

doubt, with all these symbols, whether the advancing array were in fact

more military than civil in its character. They rode on briskly in the

direction of our contending parties--the sound of the bugle seeming not

only to enliven, but to shape their course, since the stout negro who

gave it breath rode considerably ahead of the troop.

Among the squatters there was but little time for deliberation, yet

never were their leaders more seriously in doubt as to the course most

proper for their adoption in the common danger. They well knew the

assigned duties of the guard, and felt their peril. It was necessary for

the common safety--or, rather, the common spoil--that something should

be determined upon immediately. They were now actually in arms, and

could no longer, appearing individually and at privileged occupations,

claim to be unobnoxious to the laws; and it need occasion no surprise in

the reader, if, among a people of the class we have described, the

measures chosen in the present exigency were of a character the most

desperate and reckless. Dexter, whose recent triumph gave him something

in the way of a title to speak first, thus delivered himself:--

"Well, Munro--you may thank the devil and the Georgia guard for getting

you out of that scrape. You owe both of them more now than you ever

calculated to owe them. Had they not come in sight just at the lucky

moment, my knife would have made mighty small work with your windpipe, I

tell you--it did lie so tempting beneath it."

"Yes--I thought myself a gone chick under that spur, George, and so I

believe thought all about us; and when you put off the finishing stroke

so suddenly, I took it for granted that you had seen the devil, or some

other matter equally frightful," was the reply of Munro, in a spirit and

style equally unique and philosophical with that which preceded it.

"Why, it was something, though not the devil, bad enough for us in all

conscience, as you know just as well as I. The Georgia guard won't give

much time for a move."

"Bad enough, indeed, though I certainly ought not to complain of their

appearance," was the reply of Munro, whose recent escape seemed to run

more in his mind than any other subject. He proceeded:--

"But this isn't the first time I've had a chance so narrow for my neck;

and more than once it has been said to me, that the man born for one

fate can't be killed by another; but when you had me down and your knife

over me, I began to despair of my charm."

"You should have double security for it now, Wat, and so keep your

prayers till you see the cross timbers, and the twisted trouble. There's

something more like business in hand now, and seeing that we shan't be

able to fight one another, as we intended, all that we can do now is to

make friends as fast as possible, and prepare to fight somebody else."

"You think just as I should in this matter, and that certainly is the

wisest policy left us. It's a common cause we have to take care of, for

I happen to know that Captain Fullam--and this I take to be his

troop--has orders from the governor to see to us all, and clear the

lands in no time. The state, it appears, thinks the land quite too good

for such as we, and takes this mode of telling us so. Now, as I care

very little about the state--it has never done me any good, and I have

always been able to take care of myself without it--I feel just in the

humor, if all parties are willing, to have a tug in the matter before I

draw stakes."

"That's just my notion, Wat; and d--n 'em, if the boys are only true to

the hub, we can row this guard up salt river in no time and less. Look

you now--let's put the thing on a good footing, and have no further

disturbance. Put all the boys on shares--equal shares--in the diggings,

and we'll club strength, and can easily manage these chaps. There's no

reason, indeed, why we shouldn't; for if we don't fix them, we are done

up, every man of us. We have, as you see and have tried, a pretty strong

fence round us, and, if our men stand to it, and I see not why they

shouldn't, Fullam can't touch us with his squad of fifty, ay, and a

hundred to the back of 'em."

The plan was feasible enough in the eyes of men to whom ulterior

consequences were as nothing in comparison with the excitement of the

strife; and even the most scrupulous among them were satisfied, in a

little time, and with few arguments, that they had nothing to gain and

everything to lose by retiring from the possessions in which they had

toiled so long. There was nothing popular in the idea of a state

expelling them from a soil of which it made no use itself; and few among

the persons composing the array had ever given themselves much if any

trouble, in ascertaining the nice, and with them entirely metaphysical

distinction, between the _mine_ and _thine_ of the matter. The

proposition, therefore, startled none, and prudence having long since

withdrawn from their counsels, not a dissenting voice was heard to the

suggestion of a union between the two parties for the purpose of common

defence. The terms, recognising all of both sides, as upon an equal

footing in the profits of the soil, were soon arranged and completed;

and in the space of a few moments, and before the arrival of the

new-comers, the hostile forces, side by side, stood up for the new

contest as if there had never been any other than a community of

interest and feeling between them. A few words of encouragement and

cheer, given to their several commands by Munro and Dexter, were

scarcely necessary, for what risk had their adherents to run--what to

fear--what to lose? The courage of the desperado invariably increases in

proportion to his irresponsibility. In fortune, as utterly destitute as

in character, they had, in most respects, already forfeited the shelter,

as in numberless instances they had not merely gone beyond the sanction,

but had violated and defied the express interdict, of the laws; and now,

looking, as such men are apt most usually to do, only to the immediate

issue, and to nothing beyond it, the banditti--for such they were--with

due deliberation and such a calm of disposition as might well comport

with a life of continued excitement, proceeded again, most desperately,

to set them at defiance.

The military came on in handsome style. They were all fine-looking men;

natives generally of a state, the great body of whose population are

well-formed, and distinguished by features of clear, open intelligence.

They were well-mounted, and each man carried a short rifle, a sword, and

pair of pistols. They rode in single file, following their commander; a

gentleman, in person, of great manliness of frame, possessed of much

grace and ease of action. They formed at command, readily, in front of

the post, which may be now said to have assumed the guise of a regular

military station; and Fullam, the captain, advancing with much seeming

surprise in his countenance and manner, addressed the squatters

generally, without reference to the two leaders, who stood forth as

representatives of their several divisions.

"How is this, my good fellows? what is meant by your present military

attitude? Why are you, on the sabbath, mustering in this

guise--surrounded by barricades, arms in your hands, and placing

sentinels on duty. What does all this mean?"

"We carry arms," replied Dexter, without pause, "because it suits us to

do so; we fix barricades to keep out intruders; our sentinels have a

like object; and if by attitude you mean our standing here and standing

there--why, I don't see in what the thing concerns anybody but

ourselves!"

"Indeed!" said the Georgian; "you bear it bravely, sir. But it is not to

you only that I speak. Am I to understand you, good people, as assembled

here for the purpose of resisting the laws of the land?"

"We don't know, captain, what you mean exactly by the laws of the land,"

was the reply of Munro; "but, I must say, we are here, as you see us

now, to defend our property, which the laws have no right to take from

us--none that I can see."

"So! and is that your way of thinking, sir; and pray who are you that

answer so freely for your neighbors?"

"One, sir, whom my neighbors, it seems, have appointed to answer for

them."

"I am then to understand, sir, that you have expressed their

determination on this subject, and that your purpose is resistance to

any process of the state compelling you to leave these possessions!"

"You have stated their resolution precisely," was the reply. "They had

notice that unauthorized persons, hearing of our prosperity, were making

preparations to take them from us by force; and they prepared for

resistance. When we know the proper authorities, we shall answer

fairly--but not till then."

"Truly, a very manful determination; and, as you have so expressed

yourself, permit me to exhibit my authority, which I doubt not you will

readily recognise. This instrument requires you, at once, to remove from

these lands--entirely to forego their use and possession, and within

forty-eight hours to yield them up to the authority which now claims

them at your hands." Here the officer proceeded to read all those

portions of his commission to which he referred, with considerable show

of patience.

"All that's very well in your hands, and from your mouth, good sir; but

how know we that the document you bear is not forged and false--and that

you, with your people there, have not got up this fetch to trick us out

of those possessions which you have not the heart to fight for? We're up

to trap, you see."

With this insolent speech, Dexter contrived to show his impatience of

the parley, and that brutal thirst which invariably prompted him to

provoke and seek for extremities. The eye of the Georgian flashed out

indignant fires, and his fingers instinctively grasped the pistol at his

holster, while the strongly-aroused expression of his features indicated

the wrath within. With a strong and successful effort, however, though

inwardly chafed at the necessity of forbearance, he contrived, for a

while longer, to suppress any more decided evidence of emotion, while he

replied:--

"Your language, sirrah, whatever you may be, is ruffianly and insolent;

yet, as I represent the country and not myself in this business, and as

I would perform my duties without harshness, I pass it by. I am not

bound to satisfy you, or any of your company, of the truth of the

commission under which I act. It is quite enough if I myself am

satisfied. Still, however, for the same reason which keeps me from

punishing your insolence, and to keep you from any treasonable

opposition to the laws, you too shall be satisfied. Look here, for

yourselves, good people--you all know the great seal of the state!"

He now held up the document from which he had read, and which contained

his authority; the broad seal of the state dangling from the parchment,

distinctly in the sight of the whole gang. Dexter approached somewhat

nearer, as if to obtain a more perfect view; and, while the Georgian,

without suspicion, seeing his advance, and supposing that to be his

object, held it more toward him, the ruffian, with an active and sudden

bound, tore it from his hands, and leaping, followed by all his group,

over his defences, was in a moment close under cover, and out of all

danger. Rising from his concealment, however, in the presence of the

officer, he tore the instrument into atoms, and dashing them toward

their proprietor, exclaimed--

"Now, captain, what's the worth of your authority? Be off now in a

hurry, or I shall fire upon you in short order!"

We may not describe the furious anger of the Georgian. Irritated beyond

the control of a proper caution, he precipitately--and without that due

degree of deliberation which must have taught him the madness and

inefficacy of any assault by his present force upon an enemy so

admirably disposed of--gave the command to fire; and after the

ineffectual discharge, which had no other result than to call forth a

shout of derision from the besieged, he proceeded to charge the barrier,

himself fearlessly leading the way. The first effort to break through

the barricades was sufficient to teach him the folly of the design and a

discharge from the defences bringing down two of his men warned him of

the necessity of duly retrieving his error. He saw the odds, and

retreated with order and in good conduct, until he sheltered the whole

troop under a long hill, within rifle-shot of the enemy, whence,

suddenly filing a detachment obliquely to the left, he made his

arrangements for the passage of a narrow gorge, having something of the

character of a road, and, though excessively broken and uneven, having

been frequently used as such. It wound its way to the summit of a large

hill, which stood parallel with the defences, and fully commanded them;

and the descent of the gorge, on the opposite side, afforded him as good

an opportunity, in a charge, of riding the squatters down, as the summit

for picking them off singly with his riflemen.

He found the necessity of great circumspection, however, in the brief

sample of controversy already given him; and with a movement in front,

therefore, of a number of his force--sufficient, by employing the

attention of the enemy in that quarter, to cover and disguise his

present endeavor--he marshalled fifteen of his force apart from the

rest, leading them himself, as the most difficult enterprise, boldly up

the narrow pass. The skirmishing was still suffered, therefore, to

continue on the ground where it had begun, whenever a momentary exposure

of the person of besieged or besieger afforded any chance for a

successful shot. Nor was this game very hazardous to either party. The

beleaguered force, as we have seen, was well protected. The assailants,

having generally dismounted, their horses being placed out of reach of

danger, had, in the manner of their opponents, taken the cover of the

rising ground, or the fallen tree, and in this way, awaiting the

progress of events, were shielded from unnecessary exposure. It was only

when a position became awkward or irksome, that the shoulder or the leg

of the unquiet man thrust itself too pertinaciously above its shelter,

and got barked or battered by a bullet; and as all parties knew too well

the skill of their adversaries, it was not often that a shoulder or leg

became so indiscreetly prominent.

As it was, however, the squatters, from a choice of ground, and a

perfect knowledge of it, together with the additional guards and

defences which they had been enabled to place upon it, had evidently the

advantage. Still, no event, calculated to impress either party with any

decisive notion of the result, had yet taken place; and beyond the

injury done to the assailants in their first ill-advised assault, they

had suffered no serious harm. They were confident in themselves and

their leader--despised the squatters heartily--and, indeed, did not

suffer themselves for a moment to think of the possibility of their

defeat.

Thus the play proceeded in front of the defences, while Fullam silently

and industriously plied his way up the narrow gorge, covered entirely

from sight by the elevated ridges of rock, which, rising up boldly on

either side of the pass, had indeed been the cause of its formation. But

his enemy was on the alert; and the cunning of Munro--whom his

companions, with an Indian taste, had entitled the "Black Snake"--had

already prepared for the reception of the gallant Georgian. With a quick

eye he had observed the diminished numbers of the force in front, and

readily concluded, from the sluggishness of the affair in that quarter,

that a finesse was in course of preparation. Conscious, too, from a

knowledge of the post, that there was but a single mode of enfilading

his defences, he had made his provision for the guardianship of the

all-important point. Nothing was more easy than the defence of this

pass, the ascent being considerable, rising into a narrow gorge, and as

suddenly and in like manner descending on the point opposite that on

which Fullam was toiling up his way. In addition to this, the gulley was

winding and brokenly circuitous--now making a broad sweep of the

circle--then terminating in a zigzag and cross direction, which, until

the road was actually gained, seemed to have no outlet; and at no time

was the advancing force enabled to survey the pass for any distance

ahead.

Everything in the approach of the Georgian was conducted with the

profoundest silence: not the slightest whisper indicated to the

assailants the presence or prospect of any interruption; and, from the

field of strife below, nothing but an occasional shot or shout gave

token of the business in which at that moment all parties were engaged.

This quiet was not destined to continue long. The forlorn hope had now

reached midway of the summit--but not, as their leader had fondly

anticipated, without observation from the foe--when the sound of a human

voice directly above warned him of his error; and, looking up, he

beheld, perched upon a fragment of the cliff, which hung directly over

the gorge, the figure of a single man. For the first time led to

anticipate resistance in this quarter, he bade the men prepare for the

event as well as they might; and calling out imperatively to the

individual, who still maintained his place on the projection of the rock

as if in defiance, he bade him throw down his arms and submit.

"Throw down my arms! and for what?" was the reply. "I'd like to know by

what right you require us to throw down our arms. It may do in England,

or any other barbarous country where the people don't know their rights

yet, to make them throw down their arms; but I reckon there's no law for

it in these parts, that you can show us, captain."

"Pick that insolent fellow off, one of you," was the order; and in an

instant a dozen rifles were lifted, but the man was gone. A hat

appearing above the cliff, was bored with several bullets; and the

speaker, who laughed heartily at the success of his trick, now resumed

his position on the cliff, with the luckless hat perched upon the staff

on which it had given them the provocation to fire. He laughed and

shouted heartily at the contrivance, and hurled the victim of their

wasted powder down among them. Much chagrined, and burning with

indignation, Fullam briefly cried out to his men to advance quickly. The

person who had hitherto addressed him was our old acquaintance

Forrester, to whom, in the division of the duties, this post had been

assigned. He spoke again:--

"You'd better not, captain, I advise you. It will be dangerous if you

come farther. Don't trouble us, now; and be off, as soon as you can, out

of harm's way. Your bones will be all the better for it; and I declare I

don't like to hurt such a fine-looking chap if I can possibly avoid it.

Now take a friend's advice; 'twill be all the better for you, I tell

you."

The speaker evidently meant well, so far as it was possible for one to

mean well who was commissioned to do, and was, in fact, doing ill. The

Georgian, however, only the more indignant at the impertinence of the

address, took the following notice of it, uttered in the same breath

with an imperative command to his own men to hasten their advance:--

"Disperse yourselves, scoundrels, and throw down your arms!--on the

instant disperse! Lift a hand, or pull a trigger upon us, and every man

shall dangle upon the branches of the first tree!"

As he spoke, leading the way, he drove his rowels into the sides of his

animal; and, followed by his troop, bounded fearlessly up the gorge.