-BY DERVEISTT. 
 
 
 MRS. ANN S. STEPHENS, 
 
 AUTHOR OP "FASHION AND FAMINE," "THE OLD HOMESTEAD," 
 
 "THE GIPSY S LEGACY; OR, THE HEIRESS OF GREENHURST," 
 
 ETC., ETC., ETC. 
 
 | H I a Jr tl p Ir i it : 
 
 T. B. PETERSON AND BROTHERS, 
 
 306 CHESTNUT STREET. 
 

 
 
 
 5> 
 
 ENTERED according to Act of Congress, in the year 1858, by 
 
 MRS. ANN S. STEPHENS, 
 III the Clerk s Office of the District Court of the United States, for the Southern District of New York. 
 

 TO MYT DEAR FRIEND, 
 
 MRS. SAMUEL BENEDICT, 
 
 OP WYOMING VALLEY, 
 
 THE SCENE IN WHICH THE HISTORICAL EVENTS OF MY STORY TRANSPIRED, 
 THIS BOOK 
 
 IS AFFECTIONATELY DEDICATED. 
 
 ANN S. STEPHENS, 
 
 NEW Yonk, June let, 1858. 
 
 Ml749 
 
CONTENTS. 
 
 
 CHAPTER I. 
 
 
 
 
 TAGE 
 
 THE VALLEY OP "WYOMING, . 
 
 
 , . . . 9 
 
 
 CHAPTER II. 
 
 
 HOLY INFLUENCES, . . 
 
 
 , . . .14 
 
 
 CHAPTER III. 
 
 
 THE CRUEL ENLIGHTENMENT, . 
 
 
 , . ... 17 
 
 
 CHAPTER IV. 
 
 
 THE HEMLOCK HOLLOW, 
 
 
 , . . . 21 
 
 
 CHAPTER V. 
 
 
 
 
 . . . . 27 
 
 
 CHAPTER VI. 
 
 
 
 
 . . . . 34 
 
 
 CHAPTER VII. 
 
 
 
 
 
 CHAPTER VIII. 
 THE TEMPTER AND THE TEMPEST, .... ...... 47 
 
 CHAPTER IX. 
 THE WOODLAND LODGE, ........ 55 
 
 CHAPTER X. 
 
 TUB MISSIONARY S CABIN, 
 

 VI CONTENTS. 
 
 CHAPTER XI. 
 
 | PAGE 
 
 CATHARINE S CONFESSION, 71 
 
 CHAPTER XII. 
 MY FATHER S WARD, 11 
 
 CHAPTER XIII. 
 MY HUSBAND, .84 
 
 CHAPTER XIV. 
 A NEW WORLD, 89 
 
 CHAPTER XV. 
 STRUGGLES AND PENALTIES, 98 
 
 CHAPTER XVI. 
 THE STOLEN VISIT, 103 
 
 CHAPTER XVII. 
 THE WEDDING FESTIVAL, 109 
 
 CHAPTER XVIII. 
 DRKAMS AND FANTASIES, 116 
 
 CHAPTER XIX. 
 THE LOST YEAR, 122 
 
 CHAPTER XX. 
 THE COTTAGE AND THE WIPDERNESS, 131 
 
 CHAPTER XXI. 
 QUEEN ESTHER, . . . ... 134 
 
 CHAPTER XXII. 
 THE DEATH-FIRE AND THE SACRIFICE, 189 
 
 .. . CHAPTER XXIII. 
 THE MARRIAGE CONTRACT, = -. . . . 144 
 
 CHAPTER XXIV. 
 SAVAGE STATESMANSHIP, 153 
 
 CHAPTER XXV. 
 THK CASKET OP JEWELS, . . ... . . . . . . . 159 
 
CONTENTS. Vll 
 
 CHAPTER XXYI. 
 
 PAGE 
 
 THE CHERRY-TREE SPRING, * 165 
 
 CHAPTER XXVII. 
 THE MERITED LESSON, 173 
 
 CHAPTER XXVIII. 
 AUNT POLLY CARTER, 1ST 
 
 CHAPTER XXIX. 
 THE SERPENT BRACELET, 201 
 
 CHAPTER XXX. 
 THE OLD JOHNSON HOUSE, 211 
 
 CHAPTER XXXI. 
 THE LAKE BY STARLIGHT, 241 
 
 CHAPTER XXXII. 
 WALTER BUTLER S CAPTURE, . . .248 
 
 CHAPTER XXXIII. 
 THE WIFE S STRUGGLE, - ... .259 
 
 CHAPTER XXXIV. 
 HOUSEHOLD TALK, 2CT 
 
 CHAPTER XXXV. 
 THE JAIL AT ALBANY, 278 
 
 CHAPTER XXXVI. 
 THE DISGUISED SERVANT, 284 
 
 CHAPTER XXXVII. 
 THE GATHERING STORM, 287 
 
 CHAPTER XXXVIII. 
 THB UNEXPECTED GUEST, ... . .__ ...... 2S9 
 
 CHAPTER XXXIX. 
 THE FIRST SKIRMISH, 300 
 
 CHAPTER XL. 
 THE WEDDING PRESENT, , . . . .303 
 
Vlll CONTENTS. 
 
 CHAPTER XLI. 
 
 PAGE 
 
 THE CHIEF S BURIAL, 814 
 
 CHAPTER XLII. 
 THE WHITE QUEEN S GIFT, . 827 
 
 CHAPTER XLIIL , 
 TUB WOMEN AT FORTY FORT, t 832 
 
 CHAPTER XLIV. 
 TIIE BATTLE-FIELD, 
 
 CHAPTER XLV. 
 THE HUSBAND AND WIFE, ............ 842 
 
 CHAPTER XLVL 
 ASSAULT AND CONFLAGRATION, ........... 847 
 
 CHAPTER XLVII. 
 THE WARNING AND FLIGHT, ......... 35g 
 
 CHAPTER XL VIII. 
 QUEEN ESTHER S ROCK, ..... 
 
 CHAPTER XLIX. 
 THE ISLAND GRATE, 866 
 
 CHAPTER L. 
 THE CAPITULATION, ..;... opn 
 
 CHAPTER LI. 
 THE DOUBLE WEDDING, 07-0 
 
 CHAPTER LII. 
 THE FATHER AND DAUGHTER, ^ 87g 
 
 CHAPTER LIII. 
 
 THE LAST SACRIFICE, . oo- 
 
 CHAPTER LIV. 
 THE INHERITANCE, ........ 
 
 CHAPTER LV. 
 THE ASHES OF POWER, ..... 
 
in 
 
 MARY DERWENT, 
 
 CHAPTER I. 
 
 THE VALLEY OF WYOMING. 
 
 MONOCKONOK ISLAND lies in the stream of the Susquehanna, 
 where the Valley of Wyoming presents its greenest fields and 
 most level banks to the sunshine. It is a quiet little spot, lying 
 dreamily in the river, which breaks and sparkles around it with a 
 silvery tumult. The Indians have gathered up the music of 
 these waters in a name that will live forever Monockonok 
 rapid or broken waters. You scarcely notice the island amid 
 the luxuriant scenery of Wyoming, it seems so insignificant in 
 its prettiness. Hedges of black alder, hazel branches, and sedgy 
 rushes stand in thickets, or droop in garlands along its shores. 
 All its slopes and hollows are enamelled with wild flowers and 
 mossy grasses, and it lies serenely in its girdle of flashing waves, 
 like a reef of emeralds drifted up from the bed of the stream. 
 
 A fine view is obtained from this island up and down the river. 
 Broad flats of meadow-land sweep greenly back from the oppo 
 site shores, bounded a mile or two away by mountain ranges, 
 broken with rocky cliffs and great forest trees. These hills, 
 as you look up or down the stream, take a thousand picturesque 
 forms, sometimes crowding towards the river in rugged cliffs, or 
 consolidated in steep precipices, which cast their shadows half 
 
 1* 
 
E E w E N T . 
 
 across the valley. Again the mountains fall back with a majestic 
 sweep, leaving many a luxuriant corn-field and breezy grove open 
 to the sight, while pretty farm-houses, filled with prosperous life, 
 are scattered everywhere down the valley. 
 
 A few miles below Monockonok, between a curve of the river 
 and a picturesque sweep of the mountains, lies the town of 
 Wilkesbarre, a gem among villages set in a haven of loveliness. 
 
 Two or three miles higher up may be seen the town of Pitts- 
 ton, with its mines, its forges, its mills, and its modern dwelling- 
 houses, crowding close up to the heart of the valley, in which 
 the Lackawanna and the Susquehanna unite among exhaustless 
 coal-beds and the eternal beat of human industry. 
 
 Thus Wyoming lies at this day, peacefully cradled in its wild 
 mountains, with the Susquehanna sweeping majestically through 
 its green fields, its slopes clothed with orchards and heavy with 
 grain, bounded by wild precipices and deep ravines, in which the 
 great primeval forest trees are still rooted. 
 
 But Wyoming is classical ground, and my pen glides timidly 
 back to scenes which the genius of a great poet has already 
 given to the world. 
 
 Like Campbell, I must cast aside this beautiful picture of re 
 fined life, and go back to Wyoming when it first knew the tread 
 of civilization. Then it was a wild, deep hollow, breaking 
 through the heart of Luzerne, and losing itself in the wilderness 
 that spreads southwestward where the main branches of the Sus 
 quehanna unite. 
 
 For twenty miles below the Lackawanna gap, the < valley, 
 though under partial cultivation for nearly a quarter of a cen 
 tury, seemed scarcely more than an unbroken forest. The 
 beautiful river in its bosom was almost hidden beneath the huge 
 black walnuts, the elms and sycamores that crowded to its 
 banks. When their dead foliage lay under the winter snows/ 
 huge hemlocks and pines spread their eternal .green among the 
 naked branches, giving broader glimpses of the river, but still 
 sheltering it with verdure. 
 
THE VALLEY OF WYOMING. 11 
 
 But with all this beautiful wildness, the strife of disputed civi 
 lization had already been felt in the valley. Indian forages were 
 frequent, and the Connecticut settlers had been twice driven 
 from their humble dwellings by the Pennsylvanians, who were 
 restive at the introduction of pioneers from the neighboring 
 States into this fertile region. 
 
 The blackened ruins of a dwelling here and there, left evidence 
 of this unnatural contest, while stockades and block-houses of 
 recent erection, scattered along the valley, gave picturesque 
 proofs of continued anxiety and peril. 
 
 From twenty to thirty houses occupied the spot where Wilkes- 
 barre now stands, while log cabins were grouped near the forts, 
 each with its clearing, its young fruit-orchard, and its patch of 
 wheat or corn. 
 
 Still all these defences and clearings made but little inroad on 
 the grandeur of the scene. The smoke that occasionally curled 
 up through the trees, gave evidence of an extensive clearing, 
 that was scarcely visible in the dense forest around. The more 
 important settlements were far apart, and with the forts and 
 stockades, but served to render a scene of wonderful beauty still 
 more interesting from the glimpses of life they afforded. 
 
 A single log cabin, sheltered by a huge old elm, with a slope 
 of grass descending to the water in front, and a garden in the 
 rear, enriched with variously-tinted vegetables, and made cheer 
 ful by a few holyhocks, marigolds, and sun-flowers, stood like a 
 mammoth bird s nest on Monockonok Island. Wild roses and 
 bittersweet vines crept over the rough logs of the house, and, in 
 the summer time, its little windows were clouded with an azure 
 drapery of morning-glories, dashed with crimson glimpses of the 
 scarlet runners that crept in and out, tangling their dewy bells 
 with the golden bittersweet berries. 
 
 Two immense black walnuts, with their mast-like trunks naked 
 thirty feet high, stood back from the house. The shore was 
 broken up with clumps of sycamores, oaks, maples, and groups 
 of drooping willows, while an undergrowth of dogwood, moun- 
 
12 MAKYDEKWENT. 
 
 tain-ash and tamarisk trees chained into huge garlands by frost 
 grape-vines and wild clematis, were seen in picturesque leafiness 
 along the banks. 
 
 This log cabin had been built years before, by a young man 
 who came with his mother and his two little orphan girls to seek 
 a home, and hide the deep grief occasioned by the loss of his 
 wife in the wilderness. Derwent took up his residence in Wyo 
 ming with the New England settlers on their second return to 
 the valley, when it was almost as much inhabited by the Indians 
 as the whites. 
 
 With that intuitive taste which seizes upon the beautiful 
 wherever it is found, Derwent selected the fairy island for his 
 home. All the sympathies of humanity struck deep, and brought 
 forth pleasant fruit among these hardy settlers ; and they came 
 up from along shore, even from Wilkesbarre, for a grand log 
 rolling, which ended in the rustic cabin we have described. 
 
 Nay, in consideration of his feebleness, these good neighbors 
 came many days, and made considerable inroads into the forest, 
 which covered the flat that lies westward from the island, and 
 almost like magic the young man saw a field of wheat waving on 
 the banks of the river, where only a season before the forest had 
 gathered thickest. 
 
 Derwent struggled manfully in his new enterprise, but it was 
 with a broken spirit and by stern moral force alone. His health, 
 always delicate, sunk beneath the labor of establishing a new 
 home, and though he worked on month by month, it was as a 
 pilgrim toils toward a shrine, patiently and with endurance 
 rather than hope. 
 
 But with all his languor the young man found strength to beau 
 tify his little domain. Shrubs and young trees were brought 
 from the older settlements. The native fruit trees that grew in 
 abundance among the rocks and on the margin of the river, 
 were transplanted to the island, and arranged singly or in groups. 
 The brushwood and stinted shrubs were cleared away, and a few- 
 years after, when the trees were burdened with fruit ; when the 
 
THE VALLEY OF WYOMING. 13 
 
 apples hung in crimson clusters on the bough ; when the peach, 
 the purple grape, and the wild plum blushed together and 
 ripened in the same sunshine, this little island might have been 
 mistaken for a miniature garden of the East, lost among the pic 
 turesque scenery of our colder climate. 
 
 Two little girls formed the sunshine of this humble family, 
 and the fairy island was made brighter by their pleasant voices 
 and graceful ways, as it was by the wild birds that haunted it 
 with music. In the great indulgence of the invalid father, and 
 the active love of that dear old grandmother, they had early lost 
 all sense of orphanage, and were happy as the wild birds, free as 
 the striped squirrels that peeped at them from the branches of the 
 black walnut trees where they loved to play. 
 
 Very different were these two children from infancy up. Jane, 
 the youngest, was a bright, happy little creature, full of fun, 
 eager for a frolic, and heedless of everything else ; endowed with 
 common-place goodness and a pleasant temper, she was simply a 
 bright, lovable child. But Mary, who seemed younger by half 
 than her robust sister, was so fragile, so delicate, that you 
 dreaded to see the very winds of heaven blow upon her, even 
 when they left the spring blossoms unhurt. Her large wistful 
 eyes were full of earnestness. She was so fair, so fragile, sway 
 ing as she walked like a flower too heavy for its stem, and with 
 that look of unutterable sweetness for ever about the little mouth. 
 Indeed, I might as well attempt to describe a spirit, as this angel 
 child, with that depth of look, that fair bent form, and the frag 
 ments of strange thought that sometimes fell from her lips. 
 With Derwent Little Mary was an object of singular tenderness, 
 while the force and life of his warmer affections went to the 
 younger child. He was their only teacher, and during the years 
 that he lived it was a pleasant recreation to give them such in 
 struction as his own rather superior attainments afforded. 
 
 Thus in primitive happiness the little family lived till Mary 
 passed gently out of her childhood. There was little visiting 
 among the pioneers, and a stranger seldom made way to Mo- 
 
14: M A K Y D E K W E N T . 
 
 nockonok. An Indian sometimes touched the island with his 
 canoe in his progress down the river ; but this was always a 
 happy event to the children, who received the savages with 
 childish admiration, as if they had been orioles or golden robbins. 
 At the sight of a canoe, Jane would run gleefully to the river, 
 waving kisses to the savage with her hand, and flaunting out her 
 apron as a signal to win him shoreward. It was a singular fact, 
 but the Indians seldom obeyed these signals unless Mary was by 
 her side. A single gleam of her golden hair a glimpse of her 
 bent form would prove more effectual than all her sister s pretty 
 wiles. 
 
 Why did these savages come so readily at her look ? What 
 was the meaning of the strange homage with which they ap 
 proached her ? Why did they never touch her dress, or smooth 
 her hair, or give her any of those wild marks of liking which 
 Jane received so cheerfully ? Why did they lay eagles plumes 
 and the skins of flame-colored birds at her feet, with so much 
 humility ? Mary could never comprehend this, but it filled her 
 with vague awe, while the savages went away thoughtfully, like 
 men filled with a spirit of worship. 
 
 CHAPTER II. 
 
 HOLY INFLUENCES. 
 
 ONE other person sometimes visited the island, who had a 
 powerful influence over these children. This man was an Indian 
 missionary, who, following the path of Zinzendorf, had made his 
 home in the wilderness, about the time that Derwent entered the 
 valley. He was evidently a man of birth and education, for even 
 the wild habits of the woods had been insufficient to disguise the 
 
HOLY INFLUENCES. 15 
 
 natural refinement of mind and manners which made the humi 
 lity of his character so touchingly beautiful. 
 
 This man came often to the island. Sometimes he remained 
 all night in the cabin. Sometimes he lingered days with the 
 family, teaching the little girls those higher branches which their 
 father could not control, and planting a thousand holy thoughts 
 in the young minds, that lifted themselves to his knowledge, as 
 the flower opens its cup. for the night dew. 
 
 Serene and gentle as a child, he possessed that pure dignity 
 which gives moral force to manhood. His whole being was so 
 imbued with the Saviour s spirit, that his very presence brought 
 a heavenly influence with it an influence which Mary Derwent 
 felt to the uttermost depths of her soul. 
 
 He was not a sorrowful man, and yet you saw that he had 
 been, at some period of life, a sufferer, and that the shadows of 
 a softened grief lay upon him yet. To this man Mary Derwent 
 gave out her entire soul as naturally as perfume exhales from a 
 flower when the sunshine is warm. She would sit on his lap for 
 hours together, looking wistfully into his deep blue eyes, as if 
 she were studying out the mysterious memories that had left 
 them so sweetly sad. She would touch the long silken hair that 
 flowed down to his shoulders with shy tenderness, and if he 
 smiled a rare and most beautiful thing was that smile the 
 color would break over her face, her eyes would grow misty, and 
 she would gaze upon him with a deep, serious earnestness, as if 
 the smile troubled her more than his usual sad serenity. 
 
 Under these beautiful and almost holy influences, the children 
 lived in their island home, each taking from the elements around 
 her such nutriment as her nature craved, till Derwent, who had 
 been ill since their first remembrance, sunk slowly to his deathbed. 
 
 The last attack came suddenly, while the missionary was 
 absent among the Shawnees, far down the valley ; but scarcely 
 had the little family felt the need of his presence, when he 
 appeared quietly and kindly, as our Saviour sometimes stole 
 upon his apostles in their need. All one night he remained with 
 
16 MAKY DERWENT. 
 
 the sick man ; their conversation could be heard in broken frag 
 ments in the next room, where the old mother sat weeping over 
 her grandchildren, holding Jane fondly in her lap, while Mary 
 sat upon the floor, so chilled with grief that she did not feel the 
 tender sorrow lavished upon her sister, as neglect of herself. 
 Like a pure white lily broken at the stem, she sat wistfully 
 gazing in the distance, wondering what death was, vaguely and 
 in dreamy desolation. They were called at last, and with a 
 dying effort Jane was drawn to her father s bed, the last breath, 
 the last blessing fell upon her. Mary had no time ; the father s 
 life was exhausted in that one benediction. 
 
 But the missionary saw how terribly she was chilled, and took 
 her in his arms ah ! so tenderly and kissed her forehead. 
 
 It was the first time he had ever kissed one of the children 
 since their remembrance, and now the kiss was for her, all for 
 her. A thrill ran through her from heart to limb. It seemed 
 as if her father had come back in that caress, and had thus atoned 
 for the lost blessing. 
 
 The missionary led her forth into the open air. He said but 
 little, and his voice fell dreamily on the senses of the child ; 
 but its first low cadence filled her soul with infinite resignation. 
 From that time Mary could never realize that her father had 
 died leaving no blessing for her. It seemed as if the missionary 
 had inhaled the life from his departing soul, and turned it all to 
 love. The child recognized a double presence in this holy man. 
 Not even her grandmother was permitted to kiss the forehead 
 which his lips had touched. Her brow became sacred from that 
 time, and she would shrink back with a cry of absolute pain, if 
 any one attempted to disturb the kiss which was to her in the 
 place of a lost blessing. 
 
 All these things made a strong impression on the child. She 
 never thought of her father as dead, for this man always arose 
 between her soul and the thought, like the angel who stood at 
 the mouth of the Saviour s sepulchre, denoting his absence only 
 by a flood of light. 
 
THE CRUEL ENLIGHTENMENT. 1 7 
 
 Another thing tended to confirm this beautiful impression. 
 When she went down to the clump of mossy old cedars under 
 which Derwent was buried, she frequently found the missionary 
 waiting, as if he had known of her coming long before it entered 
 her own mind ; and to an imaginative child, this apparent fore 
 knowledge of her wishes formed a mysterious and sacred 
 influence. 
 
 The missionary had many duties to perform, and Ms inter 
 course with the island was sometimes interrupted for months ; 
 but the little heart that clung to him could live upon a remem 
 brance of his teachings, even when his presence was withheld. 
 It was a wonderful influence, that which his strong, pure soul 
 had obtained over the child. "While these feelings were taking 
 root in the nature of one sister, the other was working out her 
 own life, and the grandmother took up the duties imposed by 
 her bereavement with great resolution. 
 
 CHAPTER III. 
 
 THE CRUEL ENLIGHTENMENT. 
 
 GRANDMOTHER DERWENT had contrived to purchase implements 
 for spinning and weaving the coarse cloth, which constituted 
 the principal clothing of the settlers. The inhabitants gave her 
 plenty of work, and produce from her farm supplied her house 
 hold with grain and vegetables. 
 
 Even the little girls, who under many circumstances would have 
 been a burden, were in reality an assistance to her. 
 
 Jane was a bright and beautiful child, with dark silky hair, 
 pleasant eyes, and lips like the damp petals of a red rose. She 
 was, withal, a tidy, active little maiden, and, as Mrs. Derwent was 
 wont to say, " saved grandma a great many steps," by running 
 
 2 
 
18 MARY DERWENT. 
 
 to the spring for water, winding quills, and doing what Miss 
 Sedgwick calls the " odds and ends of housework." 
 
 Jane led a pleasant life on the island. She was a frank, mirth 
 ful creature, and it suited her to paddle her cauoe on the bosom 
 of the river, or even to urge it down the current, when " grand 
 ma " wanted a piece of cloth carried to the village, or was anx 
 ious to procure from thence tea and other little delicacies for her 
 household. 
 
 When Mrs. Derwent s quill-box was full, and " the work all done 
 up," Jane might be found clambering among the wild rocks, 
 which frowned along the eastern shore, looking over the face of 
 some bold precipice at her image reflected in the stream below ; 
 or, perchance, perched in the foliage of a grape-vine, with her rosy 
 face peering out from the leaves, and her laugh ringing merrily 
 from cliff to cliff, while her little hands showered down the purple 
 clusters to her sister below. 
 
 Such was Jane Derwent, at the age of fourteen ; but poor 
 little Mary Derwent ! nature grew more and more cruel to her. 
 While each year endowed her sister with new beauty and un 
 clouded cheerfulness, she, poor delicate thing, was kept instinct 
 ively from the notice of her fellow-creatures. The inmates of 
 that little cabin could not bear that strange eyes should gaze on 
 her deformity for it was this deformity which had ever made 
 the child an object of such tender interest. 
 
 From her infancy, the little girl had presented a strange mixture 
 of the hideous and the beautiful. Her oval face with its marvel 
 lous symmetry of features, might have been the original from 
 which Dubufe drew the chaste and heavenly features of Eve, in 
 his picture of the " Temptation." The same sweetness and pur 
 ity was there, but the expression was chastened and melancholy. 
 Her soft blue eyes were always sad, and almost always moist ; 
 the lashes drooped over them, with an expression of languid mis 
 ery. A smile seldom brightened her mouth the same mournful 
 expression of hopelessness sat forever on that calm, white fore 
 head ; the faint color would often die away from her cheek, but 
 
THE CRUEL ENLIGHTENMENT. 19 
 
 it seldom deepened there. Her tresses, bright as sunbeams, and 
 silky as thistle-down, seemed too free and golden to shadow that 
 joyless face, or to perform their office of concealment, when they 
 fell in shining radiance over the unseemly hump, and the distorted 
 limbs, which rendered her misshappen person piteous to look 
 upon. Nature, as if to inflict the greatest injury with the most 
 cruel consciousness of it, had imbued her spirit with that subtle 
 fire men call genius, and which often exists through a lifetime 
 unwritten and unrecorded save in keen sensation and in lu 
 minous flashes of thought ; but this unuttered genius mingles 
 with the delicate nature of woman, like the holy flame which 
 lighted the altars of the ancients, consuming the heart it preys 
 upon, with a rapidity proportioned to its brightness. 
 
 It is almost startling to learn the strength of feeling, and the 
 hoard of bitter thoughts, which are sometimes exposed lurking 
 in the bosom of a child. Mary was fifteen before any person 
 supposed her conscious of her horrible malformation, or was 
 aware of the deep sensitiveness of her nature. The event which 
 brought both to life, occurred a few years after the death of 
 her father. Both the children had been sent to school, and her 
 first trial came on the clearing, before the little log school-house 
 of the village. Mary was chosen into the centre of the merry 
 ring, by Edward Clark, a bright-eyed, handsome boy, with 
 manners bold and frank almost to carelessness. 
 
 The kind-hearted boy drew her gently into the ring, and 
 joined the circle, without the laugh and joyous bound which usu 
 ally accompanied his movements. There was an instinctive feel 
 ing of delicacy and tenderness towards the little girl, which for 
 bade all boisterous merriment when she was by his side. It was 
 her turn to select a partner ; she extended her hand timidly to 
 wards a boy somewhat old*er than herself the son of a rich 
 landholder in the valley ; but young Wintermoot drew back with 
 an insulting laugh, and refused to stand up with the hunchback. 
 
 Instantly the ring was broken up. Edward Clark leaped for 
 ward, and with a blow, rendered powerful by honest indignation, 
 
20 MABY DEB WENT. 
 
 smote the insulter to the ground. For one moment Mary looked 
 around bewildered, as if she did not comprehend the nature of 
 the taunt ; then the blood rushed up to her face, her soft blue 
 eyes blazed with a sudden flash of fire, the little hand was 
 clenched, and her distorted form dilated with passion. Instant 
 ly the blood flowed back upon her heart, her white lips closed 
 over her clenched teeth, and she fell forward with her face upon 
 the ground, as one stricken by unseen lightning. 
 
 The group gathered around her, awe-smitten and afraid. They 
 could not comprehend this fearful burst of passion in a creature 
 habitually so gentle and sweet-tempered. It seemed as if the in 
 solent boy had crushed her to death with a sneer. 
 
 Her brave defender knelt and raised her head to his bosom, 
 tears of generous indignation still lingered on his burning cheek, 
 and his form shook with scarcely abated excitement. Unmindful 
 of the threats and hostile gestures of his antagonist, he fanned 
 the pale face, which lay so like marble upon his bosom, rubbed 
 the cold hands, and exerted all his little skill to re-animate her. 
 Jane stood by, wringing her hands and moaning like a demented 
 thing ; poor child, she was ignorant of the strength of human 
 passions, and thought that nothing but death could take a form 
 so appalling. 
 
 At length Mary Derwent arose with the calmness of a hushed 
 storm upon her face, and turning to her inevitable solitude, 
 walked silently away. 
 
 There was something terrible in the look of anguish with 
 which she left her companions, taking, as it were, a silent and 
 eternal farewell of all the joys that belong to childhood. The 
 coarse taunt of the boy had been a cruel revelation, tearing away 
 all the tender shields and loving delusions with which home-af 
 fection had so long sheltered her. She did know what meaning 
 lay in the word hunchback, but felt, with a sting of unutterable 
 shame, that it was applied to her because she was unlike other 
 girls. That she must never be loved as they were never hope 
 to be one of them again. 
 
THE HEMLOCK HOLLOW. 21 
 
 The school-children looked on this intense passion with silent 
 awe. Even Jane dared not utter the sympathy that filled her 
 eyes with tears, or follow after her sister. 
 
 CHAPTER IV. 
 
 THE HEMLOCK HOLLOW. 
 
 So with terror and shame at the cruel discovery at her heart, 
 Mary went away. The blood throbbed in her temples, and 
 rushed hotly through all her veins. An acute sense of wrong 
 seized upon her, and thirsting to be alone, she fled to the woods 
 like a hunted animal, recoiling alike from her playfellows and 
 her home. 
 
 Through the thick undergrowth, and over wild rocks, the poor 
 creature tore her way, struggling and panting amid the thorny 
 brushwood, as if life and death depended upon her progress. 
 
 There was but one human being whom she could have met 
 without a cry of pain, and him she sought blindly, but with that 
 inscrutable instinct which leads the thirsty deer to a spring in the 
 mountains. 
 
 Over many a rough mile the poor child urged her way, till 
 she stood on the edge of a shallow ravine, through which a 
 mountain brook rushed with mellow gurgles and bright, musical 
 leaps. A line of mossy green marked its course to the river, 
 forming pleasant little pools, and breaking into miniature rapids 
 all the way. Tall hemlocks, pines, and chestnuts, gave an 
 atmosphere of greenish gold to the hollow, while dogwood and 
 wild honeysuckles shed the glory of their blossoms and the gloom 
 of their leaves over the brook. 
 
 Beds of rich forest moss, tipped with adder s-tongue, blood- 
 root, and fern-leaves, covered the descending slopes, and just 
 
22 MAKYDEKWENT. 
 
 beneath her a huge flat rock, tufted with grass and carpeted 
 with moss, choked up the bed of the stream. 
 
 The poor weary girl looked down into the hollow with a wist 
 ful gaze. Her limbs were heavy her cheeks pale as marble. 
 She longed to creep away into some lonesome spot and rest. 
 This was the place ; nothing but the mellow laughter of the 
 brook to disturb her not even a bird to wonder at her pre 
 sence. 
 
 Impelled, perhaps, by the fatigue, which had left her so pallid, 
 or, it may be, guided by that God who watches more helpless 
 things than she was, with divine guidance, she stole down into 
 the depths of the ravine, and there, desolate and heart-broken, 
 sat down upon the rock which had grown mossy in the bed of 
 the trout-stream. 
 
 Nothing but solitude nothing but the waters to trouble her 
 with their murmur ! She looked keenly around, fearing that 
 some forest animal might be eyeing her, for a sense of her de 
 formity was now fastened keenly upon every thought. At each 
 sound she started. A sudden rush of wind through the branches 
 sent a glow of terror to her eyes. She shuddered at the sight of 
 anything alive anything ever so small that could reproach her 
 deformity with its curious eyes. 
 
 A striped squirrel ran along the boughs of a chestnut tree 
 overhead, and peered down upon her from among the long green 
 leaves and tassel-like blossoms. She started up. A flush came 
 to her beautiful forehead, and with a cry that seemed in itself a 
 pang, she tore up a stone to fling at it. The squirrel started 
 away, uttering a broken noise, that fell upon her sore heart like 
 a taunt. Why did the little creature follow her ? Why did it 
 bend those sharp, black eyes upon her, with its head turned so 
 mockingly upon one side ? Was she never to be alone ? Was 
 the cruel animal still gibing at her through the chestnut leaves ? 
 Where could she go ? Where was the spot of earth which would 
 hold no living thing but herself ? 
 
 She stood up and peered into the chestnut branches, with an- 
 
THE HEMLOCK HOLLOW. 23 
 
 other stone in her hand, determined to kill the squirrel, or any 
 living creature that dared to look upon her. Poor child ! It 
 was the first time a cruel thought ever entered her mind ; but 
 her delicate organization was all unstrung. She felt like a leper 
 driven into the wilderness. Her soul was at enmity with every 
 thing that broke upon her solitude. Loneliness she felt to be 
 her right the only one left to her forever. 
 
 The squirrel darted from bough to bough, and at last ran 
 down the trunk of the chestnut. Mary followed it with eager 
 glances, till her eyes fell upon the root of the tree. The stone 
 dropped from her hand, the angry color fled from her face, 
 and stretching out her arms with a cry that perished on her lips, 
 she waited for the missionary to descend. 
 
 He came rather quickly, and the gentle serenity of his coun 
 tenance was disturbed, but still a look of unutterable goodness 
 rested upon it. When he reached Mary her eyes were flooded 
 with tears, and she trembled from head to foot. His sympathy 
 she could endure. His very look had opened the purest foun 
 tains of her heart again. She was not altogether alone. 
 
 " Crying, Mary, crying ?" he said, in a tone of inquiry, rather 
 than of reproach. " Who has taught you to weep ?" 
 
 " Oh I father, father, what can I do ? Where can I hide 
 myself ?" cried the poor girl, lifting her clasped hands piteously 
 upward. 
 
 The missionary saw it all. For a moment the color left his 
 lips, and his eyes were full of trouble to their azure depths. He 
 sat down by her side, and drew her gently towards him, like 
 the father she had learned to call him. 
 
 " And this has driven you so far from home !" he said, smooth 
 ing her hair with one hand, which trembled among the golden 
 tresses, for never had his sympathies been drawn more power 
 fully forth. " Who has done this cruel thing, Mary ?" 
 
 She did not answer, but he felt a shudder pass over her frame, 
 as she made a vain effort to speak. 
 
 " Was it your playfellows at school ?" 
 
24: MAKTDEKWENT. 
 
 " I shall never have playfellows again," broke from the 
 trembling lips which seemed torn apart by the desolating words ; 
 " never again, for where does another girl like me live in the 
 world ? God has made no playfellow for me !" 
 
 The missionary allowed her to weep. He knew that a world 
 of bitterness would be carried from her bosom with those tears. 
 
 " But God has made us for something better than playfellows 
 to each other," he said at last, taking her little hand in his. 
 
 She looked at him wistfully, and answered with unutterable 
 sadness, " But I cannot be even that, I am alone 1" 
 
 " No," answered the missionary, " not alone not alone, 
 though you never heard another human voice even here in the 
 deep woods you would find something to love and help too 
 never think yourself alone, Mary, while any creature that God 
 has made is near." 
 
 "But who will love me? Who will help me?" cried the girl 
 with a burst of anguish. 
 
 " Who will love you, Mary ! Do not I love you ? Does 
 not your grandmother and sister love you ?" 
 
 " But now now that they know about this that I am a 
 hunchback, it will be all over." 
 
 Poor girl 1 she had not reflected that the revelation which fell 
 with the suddenness of an earthquake on her own heart, had 
 always been a fact with those who loved her. 
 
 The missionary smiled pityingly at this delusion, so natural 
 and so touching. 
 
 " But they have known it, Mary, ever since you were a little 
 child. Well, well, we must not talk about it, but think how 
 much every one at home has loved you." 
 
 " And they knew it all they saw it while I was blind, and 
 loved me still," murmured the girl, while great tears of gratitude 
 rolled down her cheeks, " and they will love me always just the 
 game you promise me this ?" 
 
 " Always the same, Mary I" 
 
 "Yes, yes I see they have loved me always, more than if I 
 
THE HEMLOCK HOLLOW. 25 
 
 were ever so beautiful they were sorry for me, I understand I" 
 There was a sting of bitterness in her voice. The love which 
 came from compassion, wounded her. 
 
 " But our Saviour loves his creatures most for this very reason. 
 Their imperfections and feebleness appeal like an unuttered 
 prayer to him. It is a beautiful love, Mary, that which strength 
 gives to dependence, for it approaches nearest to that heavenly 
 benevolence which the true soul always thirsts for." 
 
 Mary lifted her eyes to his face as he spoke. The unshed 
 tears trembled like diamonds within them. She became very 
 thoughtful, and drooped slowly downward, coloring faintly be 
 neath his eyes, as maidens sometimes blush at their own inno 
 cent thoughts, when nothing but the eye of God is upon them. 
 
 44 But there is another love, my father ; I have seen it at the 
 school and in the cabins, I have watched it as I have the moun 
 tain flowers, and thought that God meant this love for me, like 
 the rest ; but when I go among other girls, no one will ever 
 think that I am one of them no one but Edward Clark, and he 
 only feels pity love for me ; to all the rest I am a hunchback." 
 
 A look of great trouble came upon the face of the missionary. 
 For some moments he did not answer, and the poor girl drooped 
 by his side. The blush faded from the snow of her forehead, 
 and she trembled all over with vague shame of the words she 
 had spoken. His silence seemed like a reproach to her. 
 
 " My child !" oh, with what holy sweetness the words fell 
 from his lips " my child, it is true, this love must never be 
 yours." 
 
 " Never 1" echoed the pale lips of the child, " never !" 
 
 " But in this, oh, believe it, Mary ! you but share the fate of 
 tuoufe_uids beautiful as your sister good as yourself. This love 
 is a lost angel, who wandered forth with our first parents from 
 paradise, whom a few entertain unawares, and more never 
 find." 
 
 " But those who find him must be so happy I" cried the girl 
 with another flush of the whole face. 
 
26 M A It Y D E li W E N T . 
 
 "I do not know," answered the missionary in a sad voice, " I 
 do not know." 
 
 " And I never can know," answered the deformed. 
 
 " Do not believe that God has stricken you alone, or without 
 purpose, my child. If he has closed one blessing to you which 
 seems open for all, others are given which your school-fellows, 
 who seem so much more fortunate, can never hope for. Look 
 around you, and even here in the woods, how many sources of 
 happiness are in sight, which would be nothing to them. From 
 the tiny creeper at your feet, to the flashes of sunshine that 
 shoot through the green of the hemlocks yonder, everything is 
 clothed in beauty for you. If you have a joy, God has given it 
 a more exquisite keenness, and your suffering, Mary, sharp 
 though it must be, leads to a deeper sympathy and broader 
 benevolence for those who suffer also." 
 
 Mary listened and a smile parted her lips. 
 
 " You smile, Mary, because your heart tells you that all this 
 is real. Do not mourn, then, over that which God has permitted 
 in your person, but receive the blessings that have taken the 
 place of symmetry, and ask only for a deeper gift of heavenly 
 love, in place of that forbidden to you on earth." 
 
 The smile grew luminous all over that lovely face, and Mary 
 drew closer to her friend. 
 
 " This dream of love, give it up, Mary, while it is but a 
 dream," added the missionary in a raised and firmer voice. " To 
 many more than yourself it is a hope never, never realized. Do 
 not struggle for it do not pine for it God help you, child 
 God help us all 1" 
 
 The anguish in his voice thrilled her to the soul. She bent 
 her forehead meekly to his knee, murmuring 
 
 " I will try to be patient but oh, do not look at me so 
 mournfully." 
 
 He laid his hands softly under her forehead, and, lifting her 
 face to his, gazed mournfully upon it, as if his soul were looking 
 far away through her eyes into the dim past. 
 
THE FOREST WALK. 27 
 
 " Father, believe me, I will try." 
 
 His hands dropped downwards at the sound 6f her voice, and 
 his lips began to move, as if unuttered words were passing through 
 them. Mary knew that he was praying, and her face drooped 
 reverently downward. When, or how this silence broke into 
 words she never knew, but over her soul went the burning elo 
 quence of his voice carried heavenward by prayer by the wind, 
 and the rush of the mountain stream. The very breath lay still 
 upon her lips, as she listened, and she felt more like a winged 
 angel close to the gate of heaven, than the poor deformed girl, 
 whose soul had, a few hours before, been so full of bitterness. 
 
 CHAPTER V. 
 
 THE FOREST WALK. 
 
 WHEN the missionary arose from his knees for to that posi 
 tion he had unconsciously fallen Mary stood beside him quiet 
 and smiling. The hemlocks overhead were bathed in a glow of 
 crimson, and kindled at the top with flashes of dying gold. 
 The waters were all in shadow, but through an opening between 
 the hemlocks and the chestnut trees, a stream of light came 
 over them and the rock upon which they stood. His eyes were 
 bent on the gentle girl, his brow was covered with moisture, a 
 heavenly glow shone on his face, and the last sunshine which fell 
 aslant his hair, crowned him as with a glory. 
 
 " Come, my child," he said, taking Mary by the hand, and 
 loading her up from the, ravine. " It is almost night, and you 
 have wandered far from the island ; see, the woods are already 
 dusky. The birds and squirrels are settling down in the leaves; 
 you would have been afraid to go home in the dark." 
 
28 MAKYDEKWENT. 
 
 " I might have been lost, but not afraid," answered Mary, in 
 a sad voice ; " after this, darkness will be my best friend." 
 
 " But the forest is full of Indians, Mary, and now, since the 
 English have excited them against us, no white person is safe 
 after dark ; I will go home with you, but after this, promise me 
 never to come alone to the woods again." 
 
 " The Indians will not harm me," answered Mary, with a 
 mournful smile ; " they pity me, I think, and love me a little 
 too. I am not afraid of them ; their tomahawks are not so 
 sharp as Jason Wintermoot s words were this morning." 
 
 As she spoke there was a rustling among the bushes at their 
 right, and through the purple gloom of the woods they saw a 
 group of Indians crouching behind a rock, and glaring at them 
 through the undergrowth. One had his rifle lifted with a dusky 
 hand, creeping towards the rock ; the others were poised for a 
 spring. Mary saw them, and leaped upon a rock close by, pro 
 tecting the missionary from the aim taken at his life. 
 
 " Not him not him," she cried, flinging up both arms in wild 
 appeal ; " shoot me, you don t know how I long to die." 
 
 As she uttered this pathetic shout, her hair, so delicately 
 golden, floated back upon the wind; only her beautiful beauti 
 ful face was seen through the dusk, and that was like a troubled 
 cherub lighted up with tenderness and faith. 
 
 The Indians looked at each other in dismay. The threatening 
 rifle fell with a clang upon the rock, and instead of an assault, 
 the savages crept out from their ambush, lighting up the dusky 
 ravine with their gorgeous war-dresses, and gathered around the 
 young girl, like a flock of tropical birds surrendering themselves 
 to the charms of a serpent. 
 
 Mary met them fearlessly ; a wild, spiritual beauty lighted up 
 her face. The Indians lost their ferocity, and looked on her 
 with grave tenderness ; one of them reached forth his hand, she 
 laid hers in the swarthy palm, where it rested like a snow-drop 
 on the brown earth ; he looked down upon it, and smiled ; her 
 courage charmed him. 
 
THE FOREST WALK. 29 
 
 " The white bird is brave, the Great Spirit folds his wing over 
 her which is pure like the snow," he said, addressing his com 
 panions in their own language. 
 
 Mary knew a little of the Shawnee tongue, and looking up at 
 the savage, said very gently 
 
 " Why harm my father ? the Great Spirit covers him, also, 
 with a wing which is broad and white like the clouds. Look in 
 his face, is he afraid ?" 
 
 The Indians drew back, and looked fiercely at the missionary, 
 gathering up their rifles with menacing gestures. 
 
 He understood their language well, and spoke to them with 
 that calm self-possession which gives dignity to courage. 
 
 " My children," he said, " what wrong have I done that you 
 should wish to kill me ?" 
 
 The leading savage set down his gun with a clang upon the 
 rock. 
 
 "You have sat by the white man s council-fire down yonder. 
 The Great Father over the big water is our friend, but you hate 
 the Indian, and will help them drive us through the wind-gap 
 into strange hunting grounds." 
 
 "I am not your enemy. See, I carry no tomahawk or musket ; 
 my bosom is open to your knives. The Great Spirit has sent 
 me here, and He will keep me free from harm." 
 
 Unconsciously the missionary looked at the deformed girl as 
 he spoke. The Indians followed his glance, and changed their 
 defiant gestures. 
 
 "He speaks well. Mineto has sent his beautiful medicine 
 spirit to guard him from our rifles. The medicine father of the 
 Shawnees is dead, his lodge is empty. The white bird shall be 
 our prophet. You shall be her brother, live in the great Medi 
 cine Lodge, and dream our dreams for us when we take the 
 war-path. Do we speak well ?" 
 
 The missionary pondered a moment before he spoke. He read 
 more in these words than one not acquainted with Indian cus 
 toms might have understood. 
 
30 M A R Y D E E W E N T . 
 
 " Yes," he said at last, " I will come to your Medicine Lodge, 
 and tell you all the dreams which the Great Spirit sends to me. 
 She, too, will love the Indians, and dream holy dreams for them, 
 but not here, not in the Medicine Lodge. She must stay in 
 Monokonok among the broken waters. The Great Spirit has 
 built her lodge there under the tall trees, where the Indians can 
 seek her in their canoes. Go back to your council-fire, my chil 
 dren, before its smoke goes out. I will light the calumet, and 
 smoke with you. Now the Great Spirit tells me to go with this 
 child back to Monokonok. Farewell." 
 
 He took Mary Derwent by the hand, turned his back on the 
 menacing rifles without fear, and walked away unmolested. 
 
 Mary had wandered miles away from home ; nothing but the 
 superior knowledge of her guardian could have found her way 
 back through all that dense aud unequal forest. It was now al 
 most nightfall ; but a full moon had risen, and by its light, this 
 man, accustomed to the woods, guided their way back towards the 
 river. But after the wildest of her excitement had worn away, 
 Mary began to feel the toil of her long walk. She did not com 
 plain, however, and the missionary was unconscious of this over 
 tax of strength, till she sunk down on a broken fragment of rock, 
 utterly exhausted. He stopped in great distress, and bent over 
 her. She smiled, and attempted to speak, but the pale lids 
 drooped over her eyes, and the strength ebbing completely from 
 her limbs, left them pale and limp. She lay before him entirely 
 senseless, with the moonbeams falling over her like a winding- 
 sheet. 
 
 Nothing but the angels of heaven could see or understand the 
 look of unutterable thankfulness which came to his noble features 
 as the missionary stooped and took the young girl in his arms. A 
 smile luminous as the moonlight that played upon it, stole over 
 his whole face, and the words that broke from his lips were 
 sweet and tender, such as the Madonna might have whispered to 
 her holy child. 
 
 He took no pains to bring her back to life, but when she did 
 
THE FOREST WALK. 31 
 
 come to, soothed her with hushes, and laid her head tenderly 
 upon his shoulder till she fell asleep, smiling like himself. In 
 deed, as the moonbeams fell on those two faces, they were 
 strangely alike, not in form or feature, but the glow of one beau 
 tiful soul seemed to spread over both. 
 
 Mary Derwent was a slight little creature ; still a journey over 
 that rough forest ground was exhausting to any man even with 
 out encumbrance. He did not feel the weight, but folded her 
 closer and closer to his heart, till it seemed ready to break. 
 
 As he came in sight of Monokonok, a swell of regretful tender 
 ness swept all his strength away more surely than fatigue could 
 have done. He sat down upon a fallen tree on the bank just 
 opposite the island, and looked down into that sweet face with a 
 gaze of heavenly affection. His head drooped slowly down, he 
 folded her closer, and pressed his lips upon the closed eyes, the 
 forehead, the lips, and cheeks of the sleeping child with a passion 
 of tenderness that shook his whole frame. 
 
 " Oh, my God, my God ! forgive me if this is sinful ! my soul 
 aches under this excess of love ; the very fountains of my life are 
 breaking up ! Father of heaven, I am thine, all thine, but she 
 is here on my breast, and I am but human." 
 
 Deep sobs broke away from his heart, almost lifting her from his 
 bosom ; tears rained down his face; and dropped thick and fast 
 amid the waves of her hair. He was like a child that calm- 
 hearted man of God, like a little child. 
 
 His sobs aroused Mary from her slumber. She was not quite 
 awake, but stirred softly, and folded her arms about his neck. 
 How the strong man trembled under the clasp of those arms ! 
 how he struggled and wrestled against the weakness that had 
 almost overpowered him, and not in vain 1 A canoe was moored 
 under a clump of alders, just below him. It belonged to the is 
 land, and in that Mary must be borne to her home. He was 
 obliged to row the canoe, and of course must awake her. Once 
 more he pressed his lips upon her face, once more he strained her 
 to his heart, and then with loving violence aroused her. 
 
03 M ART DER WENT. 
 
 " Mary come, little one, wake up, wake up ! see how late it 
 is ! Grandmother will be frightened." 
 
 " Let me alone oh please, let me alone !" murmured the 
 weary child. 
 
 " No, Mary, arouse yourself ; you and I have slept and 
 dreamed too long. There, there ! look around. See how the moon 
 light ripples upon the river ! Look at the island ; there is a light 
 burning in the cabin. They are anxious no doubt at your long 
 stay. Come, child, let us be strong : surely you can walk to 
 the river s brink." 
 
 Yes, Mary could walk again ; that sweet sleep had given back 
 her strength. She sat down in the canoe, tranquilized and hap 
 pier than she had ever hoped to be again. The bitterness of the 
 morning had entirely passed away. They floated on down the 
 river a few minutes. Then the missionary bent to his oars, and 
 the canoe shot across the silvery rapids, and drew up in a little 
 cove below the house. 
 
 The missionary stepped on shore. Mary followed him. 
 
 " Are you happier now ? are you content to live as God 
 wills it 1" he said, extending his hand, while his eyes beamed 
 upon her. 
 
 " Yes, father, I am content." 
 
 " To live even without earthly love ?" 
 
 Mary shrunk within herself it takes more than a few words, 
 a struggle, or a single prayer, to uproot a desire for human love 
 from a woman s heart. 
 
 He did not reason with her, or upbraid her then, but only said, 
 " God will find a way have no fear, all human beings have 
 some road to happiness if they will but let the Heavenly Father 
 point it out. Good night, Mary." 
 
 " Good night," responded the young girl, while her eyes filled 
 with grateful tears, " good night, my father I" 
 
 He turned around, laid his hands on her head, and blessed 
 her, then stepped into the canoe, and disappeared along the 
 path of silver cast downward by the moon. The young girl 
 
THE FOREST WALK. 38 
 
 smiled amid her tears. How dark it was when he found her at 
 noontide, how bright when he went away ! 
 
 Mary Derwent entered that log cabin a changed being. She 
 scarcely understood herself, or anything that had filled her life 
 up to that day. Her own nature was inexplicable. One great 
 shock had thrust her forward, as it were, to a maturity of suffer 
 ing ; her smile became mournful and sad in its expression, as if 
 the poor creature had become weary of life and of all living 
 things. She never again joined in the childish sports of her 
 companions. 
 
 When shouts of merriment rang loudest on the green, Mary 
 was alone among the wild, high rocks, or away by the river s 
 brink, gazing upon the perpetual flow of its waters, and musing, 
 hour after hour, upon the beautiful fancies which at that period 
 dawned upon her intellect, as if to compensate for the evils that 
 had been heaped upon her person. In the solitude of nature, 
 alone, could she escape the terrible consciousness of her deform 
 ity, a consciousness so suddenly and cruelly brought home to 
 her delicate spirit. But the new happiness that dawned upon 
 her was an exquisite blessing ; looking up to the Most High so 
 directly through His works, she was sometimes almost in com 
 munion with the angels. When alone, she had no enemies in 
 the earth or in the sky. The flowers had no eyes to mock at 
 her unshapely form, as it bent over them ; the moss received her 
 weary frame as lovingly as if limbs of the most perfect mould 
 pressed its green bosom. There was no hollow mockery in the 
 gurgle of the rivulet, as it leaped, like a shower of liquid light, 
 from its basin in the wild rocks no disgust in the heavy green 
 ness of the trees, or the fluttering birds that congregated, with 
 their bright plumage and sweet voices, among the leaves. The 
 young girl lived alone with nature till her spirit became imbued 
 with its poetry, as the spring grass receives color from the light 
 in which it exists. Her heart became delicate as a flower, yet 
 in the unfathomed depths thereof lay strength and passion, and 
 
 3 
 
34: MARYDEKWENT. 
 
 fervency of feeling, with that vivid imagination which lavishes a 
 portion of its own brightness on all earthly things. 
 
 To the few beings who had been the cherishers of Mary s 
 helpless state, her heart twined with a double intensity, from the 
 repulse she had met with elsewhere. She clung to the love of 
 her grandmother with the fondness of a sickly infant. To her 
 sister, Jane, she was at once a dependent, from physical weak 
 ness, and a monitress in intellect. Though exceedingly sweet and 
 affectionate in her nature, she retained an influence over the head 
 strong will and more common-place propensities of her beautiful 
 and healthy sister, which the lofty and strong mind always pos 
 sesses over those of a more earthly mould. Her spirit mingled 
 with the coarser and more buoyant mind of her sister, as the 
 sweet song which rises and swells from the heart of a nightin 
 gale, while she sits panting with the love of her own music among 
 the branches, may charm the notes of a louder and stronger 
 bird, hushing him to silence by the sweetness of a richer and 
 more thrilling melody. 
 
 CHAPTER VI. 
 
 THE ISLAND COVE. 
 
 THE two sisters stood together under the willow trees that 
 overhung the little cove from which Mary had landed with the 
 missionary three years before. Both had grown into girlhood 
 since then, and both had improved in loveliness ; Jane in the 
 bloom and symmetry of her person Mary in that exquisite love 
 liness of countenance which touches the soul-like music in a 
 sound, or tints in a picture. Jane Derwent was just seventeen 
 years old that day. 
 
 " And so you will go, Mary, dear though this is my birth-day ? 
 I have a great mind to cut the canoe loose and set it adrift." 
 
THE ISLAND COVE. 35 
 
 " And then how will your company get to the island ?" said 
 Mary Derwent, raising her eyes to the blooming face of her sis 
 ter, while a quiet smile stole out from their blue depths. 
 
 " I don t care for company 1 I don t care for anything you 
 are so contrary so hateful. You never stay at home when the 
 young folks are coming it s too bad I" And Jane flung herself 
 on the grass which surrounded the little cove where a bark canoe 
 lay rocking in the water, and indulged her petulance by tearing 
 up the strawberry-vines which her sister had planted there. 
 
 " Don t spoil my strawberry-bed," said Mary, bending over 
 the wayward girl and kissing her forehead. " Come, be good- 
 natured and let me go ; I will bring you some honeysuckle-ap 
 ples, and a whole canoe full of wood-lilies. Do say yes ; I can t 
 bear to see you discontented to-day 1" 
 
 " I would not care about it so much though it is hard that 
 you will never go to frolics, nor enjoy yourself like other folks 
 but Edward Claik made me promise to keep you at home to 
 day." 
 
 A color, like the delicate tinting of a shell, stole into Mary s 
 cheek, as it lay caressingly against the rich damask of her 
 sister s. 
 
 " If no one but Edward were coming, I should be glad to 
 stay," she replied, in a soft voice ; " but you have invited a great 
 many, hav n t you ? Who will be here from the village ?" 
 
 Jane began to enumerate the young men who had been invited 
 to her birth-day party ; they held precedence in her heart, and 
 consequently in her speech ; for, to own the truth, Jane Derwent 
 was a perfect specimen of the rustic coquette ; a beauty, and a 
 spoiled one ; but a warm-hearted, kind girl notwithstanding. 
 
 " There are the Ward boys, and John Smith, Walter Butler 
 from the fort, and Jason Wintermoot " 
 
 Jane stopped, for she felt a shiver run over the form around 
 which her arms were flung, as she pronounced the last name, and 
 saw the cheek of her sister blanch to the whiteness of snow. 
 
 " I had forgotten," she said, timidly, after a moment ; " I am 
 
36 MARY DEE WENT. 
 
 sorry I asked him. You are not angry with me, Mary, are 
 you r 
 
 11 Angry, no ! I never am angry with you, Jane. I don t want 
 to refuse you anything on your birth-day but I will not meet 
 these people. You cannot guess you can have no idea of my 
 sufferings when any one looks upon me except those I love very, 
 very dearly." 
 
 " That is just what they say, * replied Jane, while a flush of 
 generous feeling spread over her forehead. 
 
 "What, who says?" inquired Mary, for her heart trembled 
 with a dread that some allusion was threatened to her person, 
 and she felt as if the sister whom she loved so dearly would be 
 shut out from her heart forever, were she to repeat the unfeeling 
 remarks which she suspected to have been made on her deformity 
 by those who had been the playmates of her childhood. 
 
 After her question, there was a moment s silence. They had 
 both arisen, and the deformed girl stood before her sister with a 
 tremulous lip and a wavering, anxious eye. The expression of 
 her face was like that of a troubled angel. Yet with the jealous 
 restlessness of spirit, which, in such natures, never tastes one 
 drop of a bitter cup without draining it to the dregs, as if en 
 amored with soul-torture, she could not help putting her question 
 again somewhat impatiently. 
 
 " Why will you not tell me what they say ?" 
 
 Jane was quick-witted, and, with many faults, very kind of 
 heart. When she saw the distress visible in her unfortunate 
 sister s face, she formed her reply with more of tact and kind 
 feeling than with strict regard to truth. 
 
 " Why, it is nothing," she said ; " the girls always loved you, 
 and petted you so much when we were little children in school 
 together, that they don t like it when you go away without see 
 ing them. They think that you are grown proud since you have 
 taken to reading and talking fine language. You don t have to 
 work like the rest of us, and they feel slighted, and think you put 
 
THE ISLAND COVE. 37 
 
 Oh, it is happiness to feel that we are still cared for and 
 sought after by those whom we have supposed estranged from 
 us ; and the highly gifted those whom we might suppose inde 
 pendent of social ties from their mental resources, are perhaps 
 the most susceptible to kindly feelings in others ; the most un 
 willing to break any of those sacred illusions which keep the 
 heart young. Tears stole into the eyes of the deformed girl, 
 and a sudden light, the sunshine of an affectionate heart, broke 
 over her face as she said, 
 
 " It is not that, my sister. I have loved them very much all 
 
 these years that I have not seen them ; but since that day 
 
 sister, you are very good, and oh, how beautiful ; but you cannot 
 dream how a poor creature like myself feels when happy people 
 are enjoying life together. Without sympathy, without compan 
 ions, hunch-backed and crooked. Tell me, Jane, am I not hide 
 ous to look upon ?" 
 
 This was the first time in her life that Mary had permitted a 
 consciousness of her malformation to escape her in words. The 
 question was put in a voice of mingled agony and bitterness, 
 wrung from the very depths of her heart. She fell upon the 
 grass as she spoke, and with her face to the ground, lay grovel 
 ling at her sister s feet, like some wounded animal ; for now that 
 the loveliness of her face was concealed, her form seemed scarcely 
 human. 
 
 All that was generous in the nature of Jane Derwent, swelled 
 in her heart as she bent over her sister. The sudden tears fell 
 like rain, glistening in drops upon the warm damask of her 
 cheeks, and filling her voice with affectionate sobs, as she strove 
 to lift her from the ground ; but Mary shrunk away with a 
 shudder, and kneeling down, Jane raised her head with gentle 
 violence to her bosom. 
 
 " Hideous I oh, Mary, how can you talk so ? Don t shake 
 and tremble in this manner. You are not frightful nor homely ; 
 only think how beautiful your hair is. Edward Clark says he 
 never saw anything so bright and silky as your curls he said 
 
38 M A R Y D E 11 W E N T . 
 
 so, indeed he did, Mary ; and the other day when he was read 
 ing about Eve, in the little book you love so well, he told grand 
 mother that he fancied Eve must have had a face just like 
 yours." 
 
 " Did Edward say this ?" murmured the poor deformed, as 
 Jane half lifted, half persuaded her from the ground, and with 
 one arm flung over her neck, was pressing the face she had been 
 praising to her own troubled bosom. 
 
 Poor Mary, though naturally tall, was so distorted that when 
 she stood upright her head scarcely reached a level with the 
 graceful bust of her sister, and Jane stooped low to plant reas 
 suring kisses upon her forehead. 
 
 " Did he say it, Mary ? Yes, he certainly did ; and so did I 
 say it. Look here." And eagerly gathering the folds of a large 
 shawl over the shoulders of the deformed, she gently drew her to 
 the brink of the basin, where the canoes still lay moored. 
 " Look there," she exclaimed, as they bent together over the 
 edge of the green sward ; " can you wish for anything hand 
 somer than that face ? Dear, good Mary, look." 
 
 The two young girls did, indeed, form a beautiful picture, as 
 they stood, with their arms interlaced, bending over the tranquil 
 waters. Never had that smooth surface mirrored two faces 
 more strikingly lovely, yet more unlike in their beauty." Un 
 consciously had they taken the attitude a painter would have 
 chosen. The head and half the form of the elder, from the finely 
 rounded shoulders down to the graceful outline of the waist, 
 was flung back with the exactness of life. Her seventeenth birth 
 day had brought its richest bloom to her cheek, and recent 
 excitement lent a brilliancy to her eyes, and an intellectual 
 beauty to the forehead, which was scarcely natural to them. 
 Her head was partly bent, and a profusion of rich curls fell over 
 her graceful neck. A wreath of crab-apple blossoms had been 
 twined among them in honor of her party, and thus she was 
 mirrored, half concealing the form of her sister, whose face, in 
 all its spiritual loveliness, beamed out from the protection of her 
 
THE ISLAND COVE. OU 
 
 arm. It was the head of a cherub, sheltered and cherished by a 
 form of earthly beauty. 
 
 An elm tree waved its branches over them, and the sunshine 
 came shimmering through the leaves with a wavy light. The 
 river was tranquil as a summer sky, and the sisters were still 
 gazing on the lovely faces speaking to theirs from its clear 
 depths, when a canoe swept suddenly round the grassy promon 
 tory which formed one side of the cove. 
 
 With a dash of the oar, the fairy skiff shot, like an arrow, into 
 the basin, and its occupant, a young man of perhaps two-aud- 
 twenty, leaped upon the green sward. The sisters started from 
 their embrace. A glad smile dimpled the round cheek of the 
 elder, as she stepped forward to greet the new comer. But 
 Mary drew her shawl more closely over her person, and shrunk 
 timidly back, with a quickened pulse, a soft welcome beaming 
 from her eyes, and her face deluged with a flood of soft rosy 
 color, which she strove to conceal with the tresses that fell about 
 her like a golden mist. 
 
 " I have just come in time to keep you at home for once," 
 said the youth, approaching the timid girl, after having gaily 
 shaken hands with her sister. " I am sure we shall persuade 
 you" 
 
 He was interrupted by a call from Jane, who had run off to 
 the other side of the cove, no doubt with the hope of being speed 
 ily followed by her visitor. 
 
 " Come here, Edward, do, and break me some of this sweet- 
 brier ; it scratches my fingers so." 
 
 Clark dropped Mary s hand and went to obey this capricious 
 summons. 
 
 " Don t try to persuade Mary to stay," said Jane, as she took 
 a quantity of the sweet-brier from the hands of her compo,nion. 
 " She is as restless when we have company as the mocking-bird 
 you gave us ; and which we never could tame, besides," she 
 added, with a little hesitation, " Wintermoot will be here, and 
 she don t like him." 
 
40 MARYDERWENT. 
 
 " It were strange if she did," replied the youth ; and a frown 
 passed over his fine forehead ; " but tell me, Jane, how it hap 
 pened that you invited Col. Butler, when you know that I dis 
 like him almost as much as she does Wintermoot ?" 
 
 Jane looked confused, and like most people when they intend 
 to persist in a wrong, began to get into a passion. 
 
 " I am sure I thought I had the right to ask any one I 
 pleased," she said, petulantly and gatherhng her forehead into a 
 frown. 
 
 " Yes, but one might expect that it would scarcely please you, 
 to encourage a man who has so often insulted your house with 
 unwelcome visits ; and Wintermoot my blood boils when I 
 think of the wretch ! Poor Mary, I had hoped to see her enjoy 
 herself to-day ; but now she must wander off alone as usual. 
 I have a great mind to go with her." 
 
 And turning swiftly away from the angry beauty, Clark went 
 to Mary, spoke a few words, and they stepped into his canoe 
 together. But he had scarcely pushed it from the shore, when 
 Jane ran forward and leaped in after them. 
 
 " If you go, so will //" she said angrily, seating herself in the 
 bottom of the canoe. 
 
 Mary was amazed and perplexed. She looked into the stern, 
 displeased face of the young man, and then at the sullen brow 
 of her sister. 
 
 " What does this mean ?" she inquired, gently, " what is the 
 matter, Jane ?" 
 
 Jane began to sob, but gave no answer, and they rowed across 
 the river in silence. The canoe landed at the foot of a broken 
 precipice, that hung over the river like a ruined battlement. 
 Clark assisted Mary to the shore, and was about to accompany 
 her up the foot path, which wound over the precipice, but Jane, 
 who had angrily refused his help to leave the boat, began to fear 
 that she had carried her resentment too far, and timidly called 
 him back. 
 
 A few angry words from the young man expostulation and 
 
THE ISLAND COVE. 
 
 tears from the maiden, all of which a bend in the path prevented 
 Mary observing ; and then, Clark went up the hill told the 
 solitary girl not to wander far to be careful and not sit on the 
 damp ground and that he would come for her by sun-down ; 
 the young folks would have left the island by that time. They 
 were all going down to Wilkesbarre, to have a dance in the 
 school-house. He and Jane were going, but they would wait 
 and take her home first. 
 
 Edward was almost out of breath as he said all this, and he 
 appeared anxious to go back to the canoe. But Mary had not 
 expected him to join her lonely wanderings, and his solicitude 
 about her safety, so considerate and kind, went to her heart like 
 a breath of summer air. She turned up the mountain path, 
 lonely and companionless ; but very happy. Her eyes were full 
 of pleasant tears, and her heart was like a flower unfolding to 
 the sunshine. There is pleasure in complying with the slightest 
 request from those we love ; and Mary confined her ramble to 
 the precipice and the shore, merely because Edward Clark had 
 asked her not to wander far. She saw him land on the island 
 with her sister, while half sitting, half reclining on a crag of the 
 broken rock, at whose foot she had landed. She saw the boat 
 sent again, and again, to the opposite shore, returning each 
 time, laden with her former companions. 
 
 By degrees she became very sad. The melancholy and the 
 loneliness of her position pressed itself gloomily upon her ; she 
 would have given worlds, had she possessed them, to have min 
 gled in equality with the gay beings, flitting through the trees, 
 and wandering over the green sward of her island home. The 
 ringing laugh, and the music of cheerful words, came swelling on 
 the wind, to her isolated seat. Happiness and sunshine were all 
 around her ; budding-moss, bird-songs, and flowers ; but her 
 heart was weighed down with a sense of its utter loneliness. 
 Then she would think of Edward Clark, and of his late kind 
 words, and wonder why they had ceased to make her happy. 
 Dwelling on this sweet theme, she fell into a dreamy state of con- 
 
4:2 HARYDERWENT. 
 
 tent, and dropped asleep under the shadow of a drooping birch, 
 which grew in a cleft of the rock on which she lay. 
 
 Her sleep was very quiet and refreshing. A mocking-bird 
 had perched himself in the tree, above her, and his melody float 
 ed in her dreams. They were of a far-off world ; Edward Clark 
 was there, and it was her home ; but her form was changed, and 
 she had become beautiful beautiful as her sister Jane. 
 
 CHAPTEK VII. 
 
 TAHMEROO. 
 
 SHE was aroused by the rustling of branches over her head, fol 
 lowed by a bounding step, as of a deer in flight ; then a young 
 girl sprang out upon a point of rock which shot over the platform 
 on which she lay, and bending over the edge, gazed eagerly 
 down upon the river. 
 
 Mary held her breath and remained motionless, for her poetical 
 fancy was aroused by the singular and picturesque attitude of 
 the figure. There was a wildness and grace in it, which she 
 had never witnessed before. At the first glance, she supposed 
 the stranger to be a wandering Indian girl, belonging to some 
 of the tribes that roamed the neighboring forests. But her com 
 plexion, though darker than the darkest brunette of our own 
 race, was still too light for any of the savage nations yet seen 
 in the wilderness. It was of a clear, rich, brown, and the blood 
 glowed through the round cheeks like the blush on a ripe peach. 
 
 Her hair was long, profusely braided, and of a deep black ; 
 not the dull lustreless color common to the Indians ; but with 
 a bloom upon it like that shed by the sunlight on the wing of a 
 flying raven. She appeared to be neither Indian nor white, but 
 of a mixed race. The spirited and wild grace of the savage was 
 
TAHMEKOO. 43 
 
 blended with a delicacy of feature and nameless elegance more 
 peculiar to the whites. In her dress, also, might be traced the 
 same union of barbarism and refinement a string of bright 
 scarlet berries encircling her head, and interwoven with the long 
 braids of her hair, glanced in the sunlight, as she moved her head, 
 like a chain of dim rubies. 
 
 A robe of gorgeous chintz, where crimson and deep brown 
 were the predominating colors, was confined at the waist by a 
 narrow belt of wampum, and terminated a little below the knee, 
 in a double row of heavy fringe, leaving the flexible and slender 
 ankles free and uncovered. Her robe fell open at the shoulders ; 
 but the swelling outline of the neck, thus exposed, was unbroken, 
 except by a necklace of cherry-colored cornelian, from which a 
 small heart of the same blood-red stone fell to her bosom. The 
 round and tapering beauty of her arms was fully revealed and 
 unencumbered by a single ornament. Her moccasins were of 
 dressed deerskin, fringed and wrought with tiny beads, inter 
 woven with a vine of silk buds and leaves done in such needle 
 work as was in those days only taught to the most refined and 
 highly educated class of whites. Mary had never seen anything 
 so exquisitely beautiful in its workmanship as that embroidery, 
 or so brightly picturesque as the whole appearance of the 
 stranger. 
 
 For more than a minute the wild girl retained the position 
 assumed by her last bounding step. There was something statue- 
 like in the tension of those rounded and slender limbs, as she 
 stood on the shelf of rock, bending eagerly over the edge, with 
 her weight thrown on one foot and the other strained back, as 
 if preparing for a spring. All the grace, but not the chilliness, 
 of marble lived in those boldly poised limbs, so full of warm, 
 healthy life. There was spirit and fire in their very repose, for 
 after an eager glance up and down the river, she settled back, 
 and with her arms folded, remained for a moment in an attitude 
 of dejection and disappointment. 
 
 A merry laugh, which came ringing over the waters, from the 
 
44 MAKY DEE WENT. 
 
 Island, drew her attention to the group of revellers, glancing in 
 and out of the shrubbery which surrounded Mother Derwent s 
 dwelling. Flinging back her hair with a gesture of fiery im 
 patience, she sprang upward and dragged down the branch of a 
 young tree, which she grasped for support, while throwing 
 herself still more boldly over the very edge of the cliff. 
 
 Mary almost screamed with affright. But there was some 
 thing grand in the daring of the girl, which aroused her admira 
 tion, even more than her fear. She knew that the breaking of 
 that slender branch would precipitate her down a sheer descent 
 into the river. But she felt as if the very sound of a human 
 voice would startle her into eternity. 
 
 Motionless with dread, she fixed her eyes, like a fascinated 
 bird, on the strange being thus hovering over death, so fearlessly 
 and so beautiful. All at once, those bright, dark eyes kindled, 
 one arm was flung eagerly outward her red lips parted, and a 
 gush of music, like the song of a mocking-bird, but louder and 
 richer, burst from them. 
 
 Mary started forward in amazement. She could not convince 
 herself that it was not the notes of a real bird. She turned her 
 head and peered among the leaves of the birch, where she fancied 
 the songster, which had lulled her to sleep, still nestled himself ; 
 but it had flown on the approach of the stranger. Before she 
 could lift her eyes to the cliff again, a low, shrill whistle came 
 sharply up from the direction of the Island. She caught one 
 glance of those kindling cheeks and flashing eyes as the strange 
 wild girl leaped back from the cliff a gleam of sun-light on 
 her long hair, as she darted into a thicket of wild cherry-trees 
 and there was no sign of her remaining, save a rushing sound of 
 the young trees, as the bent limb swayed back to its fellows. 
 Again the notes, as of a wild, eager bird, arose from a hollow 
 bank on the side of the mountain ; and, after a moment, that 
 shrill whistle was repeated from the water, and Mary distinctly 
 heard the dipping of an oar. 
 
 She crept to the edge of the rock, which had formed her con- 
 
TAHMEKOO. 45 
 
 cealment, and looked down upon the river. A canoe, rowed by 
 a single oarsman, was making its way swiftly from the Island. 
 She could not distinguish the face of the occupant ; but there 
 was a band of red paint around the edge of the canoe, and she 
 remembered that Edward Clark s, alone, was so ornamented. It 
 was the same that had brought her from the Island. Did the 
 signal come from him from Edward Clark ? What had he m 
 common with the wild, strange girl, who had broken upon her 
 solitude ? A thrill of pain, such as she had never dreamed of 
 before, shot through her heart, as she asked these questions. 
 She would have watched the landing of the canoe, but all strength 
 suddenly left her, and she sunk back to a fragment of stone, 
 almost powerless, and in extreme suffering. 
 
 In a little more than an hour, she saw the same solitary rower 
 crossing the river, but with more deliberate motion. She watched 
 him while he moored the canoe in the little cove, and caught 
 another glimpse of him as he turned a corner of her dwelling, 
 and mingled with the group of young persons, who were drinking 
 tea, on the green sward in front. 
 
 It was a weary hour to the deformed girl, before the party 
 broke up and were transported to the opposite shore, where 
 farm-wagons stood ready to convey them to Wilkesbarre. The 
 sun was almost down, and the Island quiet again, when she saw 
 two persons coming from the house to the cove. She arose, and 
 folding her shawl about her, prepared to descend to the shore. 
 The ledge, on which she had spent the afternoon, towered back 
 from the river in a mass of broken rocks, crowned by a thick 
 growth of stunted pines and hemlocks. The side along which 
 the footpath wound, fell with an abrupt descent, to a deep ravine 
 which opened to the river covered with loose soil, interspersed 
 with fragments of rocks, and cut up into hollows, where the 
 mountain stream had washed away the forest sward. The whole 
 was overrun with a luxuriant undergrowth, and a few large 
 white pines had anchored themselves in the hollows. 
 
46 MAEYDEKWENT. 
 
 Mary had walked half way down the ledge, when she stopped 
 abruptly in the path ; for sitting on the moss beneath one of 
 these pines was the strange girl who had so excited her wonder. 
 Mary s slow step had not disturbed her, and unconscious of a 
 witness, she was unbraiding the string of berries from her hair, 
 and supplying their place with a rope of twisted coral. The 
 strings of scarlet ribbon with which she knotted it on her temple 
 were bright, and had evidently never been tied before. Mary s 
 heart beat painfully, and she hurried forward as if some fierce 
 animal had sprung up in her path. An uncontrollable repulsion 
 to that wild and beautiful girl, which she neither understood nor 
 tried to account for, seized upon her. When she reached the 
 shore, the canoe, with Edward Clark and her sister seated in it, 
 was making leisurely towards the mouth of the ravine, and she 
 sat down on the shadowy side of an oak to await their coming. 
 Their approach was so noiseless, that she did not know they had 
 reached the shore, till the voice of Edward Clark apprised her 
 of it. He was speaking earnestly to her sister, and there was 
 both agitation and deep tenderness in his voice a breaking forth 
 of the heart s best feelings, which she had never witnessed in him 
 before. 
 
 " No, Jane," he said, in a resolute voice, shaken with a sor 
 rowful tremor ; " you must now choose between that man and 
 me ; there can be nothing of rivalry between us ; I heartily de 
 spise him 1 I am not jealous I could not be a creature so 
 unworthy ; but it grieves me to feel that you can place him 
 for a moment on a level with yourself. If you persist in this 
 degrading coquetry, you are unworthy of the love which I have 
 given you. Forgive me, Jane, if I speak harshly ; don t cry it 
 grieves me to wound your feelings, but " 
 
 He was interrupted by a sound as of some one falling heavily 
 to the ground. He leaped from the canoe, and there, behind 
 the great oak, lay Mary Derwent, helpless and insensible. 
 
 " She has wandered too far, and exhausted herself," said the 
 agitated young man, as he bore her to the canoe. " Sit down, 
 
THE TEMPTER AND THE TEMPEST. 47 
 
 Jane, and take her head in your lap your grandmother will 
 know what to do for her." 
 
 Jane reached forth her arms and received the insensible head 
 on her bosom. She turned her face petulently away from that 
 of her lover, and repulsed him with sullen discontent when, in 
 his attempts to restore Mary, his hand happened to touch hers. 
 
 " Set her down," she said, pushing him indignantly away. 
 " Attend to your oars ; we neither want your help or yoor ill- 
 natured grumblings. I tell you, Ned Clark, you are just the 
 Grossest creature I ever saw. Take that for your pains !" 
 
 Cark did not answer this insolent speech, but gravely took np 
 the oars and pushed off. 
 
 They were half way across the river, when Mary began to 
 recover animation. Edward laid down his oar and taking her 
 hand in his, was about to speak ; but she drew it away with a 
 faint shudder, and burying her face in her sister s bosom, re 
 mained still and silent as before. 
 
 CHAPTER VIII. 
 
 THE TEMPTER AND THE TEMPEST. 
 
 TAHMEROO, the Indian girl, was sitting under the pine, as 
 Mary Derwent had left her. With the coral but half twisted in 
 her hair, she had paused in her graceful task, and, sinking 
 gently back to the bank of moss which formed her seat, reclined 
 on one elbow, with her long tresses unbraided, and floating in 
 wavy masses over her person. She was yielding to the repose 
 of a soft and dreamy re very, new, and very sweet to her wild, 
 young heart, when the sound of voices and the dash of an oar 
 aroused her. She started to her feet and listened. The fire 
 flashed back to those large dark eyes, but late so pleasant and 
 
48 MARY DERWENT. 
 
 soft in their expression, and a rich crimson rushed to her cheek. 
 The voices ceased for a moment, then were renewed, and the 
 rapid beat of the paddle became still more audible. 
 
 Tahmeroo sprang forward, and ran up to a point of the hill 
 which commanded a view of the river. The little canoe, with its 
 band of red paint, was making from the shore, and in it sat Jane 
 Derwent, with the head of the deformed girl resting in her lap. 
 The back of the oarsman was towards the shore; his head was 
 bent, and the eyes, the beautiful eyes of Jane Derwent, were 
 fixed on him, with an expression which Tahmeroo s heart, un 
 learned as it was, taught her to understand. A storm of sur 
 prise, anger and fear, rushed through the heart of the young 
 Indian. The oarsman turned his head, and the face was re 
 vealed. Then a smile, vivid and bright as a burst of sunshine 
 after a tempest, broke over her features. 
 
 Tahmeroo breathed deeply and turned away. It seemed as if 
 an arrow had been withdrawn from her heart by the sight of 
 that face. She hurried down the hill towards a clump of black 
 alders that overhung the river s brink, and unmoored a light 
 canoe hitherto concealed beneath the dark foliage. Placing 
 herself in the bottom, she gave two or three vigorous strokes 
 with the paddle, and shot like a bird up the stream. 
 
 As Tahmeroo proceeded up the river, the scenery, till then 
 half pastoral, half sublime, became more savage and gloomy in 
 its aspect. Huge rocks shot up against the sky in picturesque 
 grandeur ; the foliage which clothed them grew dusky in the 
 waning light, and fell back to the ravines in dark, heavy 
 shadows. A gloom hung about the towering precipices, and the 
 thick masses of vegetation, like funeral drapery, swathing the 
 pillars and wild arches of a monastic ruin. It was the darkness 
 of a gathering tempest. There was something sublime and 
 almost awful in the gradual and silent mustering of the ele 
 ments. 
 
 Tahmeroo was of a savage race, and she loved the wild and 
 fierce in nature with the enthusiasm of a daring spirit ; but the 
 
THE TEMPTER AND THE TEMPEST. 49 
 
 red blood that kindled her heart to more than feminine courage, 
 was mingled with that of a gentle and civilized class. She was 
 but half an Indian all a woman and her high spirit cowered 
 beneath the sombre magnificence of the hour and scene. Though 
 eager to reach her destination, her arm relaxed its vigor, and the 
 little canoe crept timidly up the blackened waters, while she looked 
 anxiously about, now on the frowning banks, then up into the 
 darkened sky. 
 
 The broken clouds, surging up from the west like troops of 
 frightened birds with their wings in motion, aroused her to fresh 
 exertion. She bent to her task with an energy that sent the 
 perspiration like rain drops to her forehead. The paddles 
 glanced rapidly in and out of the water, and the canoe sped on 
 and on, with the velocity of a sparrow-hawk in the air. At 
 length it curved round with a bold sweep, and shot into the stu 
 pendous gap through which the Lackawanna empties its coal- 
 stained tribute into the bosom of the Susquehanna. It was like 
 the meeting of the sinful and the good in the valley of death 
 the commingling of those streams in the gathering twilight the 
 one so dark and turbid, the other so bright and beautiful. 
 
 Tahmeroo rested, for a moment, as she entered the rocky jaws 
 of the mountain ; and as her frail bark rocked to the current of 
 wind which swept down the gorge, she looked around with a 
 feeling of hushed terror. A mountain, cleft in twain to the 
 foundation, towered to the sky on either hand, bold, bleak, and 
 sombre. Through the rent, down hundreds of feet from the 
 summit, crept the deep river, stealthily and slow, like a huge 
 serpent winding himself around the bulwark of a stronghold. 
 The darkness of the forests was so dense, and the clouds so 
 heavy, that there was nothing to distinguish the outline of the 
 murky waters from the majestic ramparts through which they 
 glided. All was wild, solemn, and gloomy. 
 
 As the Indian girl looked upward, the clouds swept back for 
 a moment, and the last rays of sunset fell with a glaring light on 
 the bold summit of the mountain, rendering by contrast the 
 
 4 
 
50 MARY DER WENT. 
 
 depths of the chasm more dreary in its intense shadow. Tahme- 
 roo had seen the gap often before, but never at that hour, or 
 with that gloomy blackness of shadow. She held her breath 
 and scarcely dared to dip her paddle in the water, as she glided 
 through the massive portals which gave them an outlet. But 
 when the gap was cleared, she proceeded up the windings of the 
 Susquehanna with a firmer hand and sterner courage. The 
 threatened storm had seemingly passed over, and a few stars 
 trembled in the depths of the sky, when she moored her canoe 
 in a little inlet, washed up into the mouth of a narrow ravine, 
 which opened on the river s brink. 
 
 Tahmeroo tore away the dry brambles and brushwood which 
 clothed the entrance of the defile, and made her way through a 
 scarcely defined footpath up the hill-side. Through this ravine 
 rushed a mountain torrent, known to the Indians as the Falling 
 Spring, which filled the whole forest with its silvery tumult. 
 
 Tahmeroo kept close to the banks of this torrent, helping 
 herself forward by the brushwood and trailing vines that grew 
 thickly on its margin. Nothing less sure-footed than an ante 
 lope could have forced a passage through the broken rocks and 
 steep precipices which guarded the passage of this stream up to 
 its source in Campbell s Ledge. A little way from the river, it 
 name, with a single leap, through a chasm in the rocks, and lost 
 itself, in a storm of white spray, among the mossy boulders 
 which choked up the ravine. 
 
 The storm had mustered again so blackly, that Tahmeroo 
 could scarcely see her course, but lost herself among the rocks 
 and young pines below the fall. Still she climbed upward, leap 
 ing from rock to rock, till the sheer precipices that walled in the 
 cataract on either side, obstructed her passage, and she stood 
 poised half way up, uncertain which way to turn, or how to 
 move. 
 
 A flash of lightning revealed her position, kindled up the 
 young trees to a lurid green; gave the slippery brown precipices 
 to view, and shot in and out of the foaming torrent, as it leaped 
 
THE TEMPTEK AND THE TEMPEST. 51 
 
 by like flashes of fire, tearing a snow-drift into flakes again, and 
 scattering it to the wind. 
 
 The lightening revealed her peril and her path. She sprang 
 back from the precipice, from which the next leap would have 
 precipitated her downward with the cataract into the depths of 
 the ravine, and tore her way into the bosom of the hills, keeping 
 Campbell s Ledge on the right. 
 
 A less vigorous form would have fainted beneath the toil of 
 that mountain pass ; but the young Indian scarcely thought of 
 fatigue ; for a dull, moaning sound came up from the depths of 
 the forest, like the hollow beat of a far off ocean ; the pent-up 
 thunder muttered and rumbled among the black clouds, floating 
 like funeral banners above her, every other instant pierced 
 and torn with arrowy lightning. These signs of the storm, 
 gathering so fearfully about the mountains, terrified and be 
 wildered the Indian girl. Though a wild rover of the forest, she 
 had been gently nurtured, and, for the first time in her life, was 
 alone among the hills after nightfall. 
 
 There is something terrible in the roar of thunder, even to 
 those who understand the philosophy of the elements. It sounds 
 upon the heart like the blast of a trumpet, awakening it to a 
 sense of its own insignificance, and of the mighty power of a 
 Creator ! Few are the nerves that have not trembled, or the 
 hearts that have not quaked, when the artillery of heaven was 
 sounding among the clouds, and the arrows of the sky were 
 shooting earthward, feathered and afire with principles of de 
 struction. Daring and wicked must that spirit be which refuses 
 to yield its belief to God, when his power is made audible in the 
 voice of the tempest ! 
 
 To the imaginative and superstitious Indian girl, there was a 
 terrific mystery in the hoarse rolling sound, entombed, as it were, 
 in the depths of the sky. It was, in her belief, the dread voice 
 of the Great Spirit in his wrath a denunciation fulminated from 
 the portals of heaven on the guilty and deceitful of earth. Her 
 heart quailed within her, and, as the first loud peal broke upon 
 
52 MARYDERWENT. 
 
 her ear, she leaped back, clasped one hand over her aching eyes, 
 then sprang onward in the dark path, with the bound of a 
 hunted deer. Now, she was lost in the darkness of a ravine ; 
 then a flash of lightning revealed her leaping from one cliff to 
 another clambering up the face of a precipice, or swinging her 
 self over the narrow chasms by the saplings which the fitful 
 flashes revealed to her. 
 
 At length she stood on a high ledge of rocks, panting and in 
 despair ; she had lost the path that led to the Indian encamp 
 ment, and found herself on the sweep of a mighty precipice, far 
 above the valley. After one wild, hopeless look upon the sky, 
 she sunk to the ground, and burying her face in her hands, mut 
 tered, in a trembling and husky voice : 
 
 " Tahmeroo has been wicked. She has acted a lie. The Great 
 Spirit is very angry. Why should she strive to shut out his 
 voice ? Tahmeroo can die." 
 
 While she spoke there was a hush in the elements, and the 
 sound of many hoarse, guttural voices arose from the foot of the 
 ledge. The terrified Indian lifted her head, and a wild, doubtful 
 joy gleamed over her face as the lightning revealed it, with the 
 damp, unbraided hair floating back from the pallid temples, the 
 lips parted, and the eyes charged with terror, doubt, and eager 
 joy. She listened intently for a moment, then sunk cautiously to 
 the ground, as one who fears to break a pleasant delusion, and 
 crept to the edge of the rock. 
 
 The scene on which she looked was one of wild and gloomy 
 beauty. A space comprising more than an acre of the richest 
 greensward, hedged in by a broken circle of irregular rocks and 
 ledges, lay beneath her, one immense basin, scooped in the heart 
 of the mountain, overflowing with verdure and alive with human 
 beings. Though the winds were swaying the mighty forest trees 
 above, as if they had been rushes in its path, the long, thick 
 grass lay motionless in the bottom of the rocky basin, and tufts 
 of wild-roses and wood-honeysuckles bloomed tranquilly in the 
 light of the watch-fires. The broken rocks which surrounded 
 
THE TEMPTER AND THE TEMPEST. 53 
 
 the camping ground were rough, and irregular ; but it was only 
 here and there that a sharp angle broke through the thick, rich 
 moss which clung around them, or could be seen from under the 
 shower of viny foliage falling in massive festoons from the clefts 
 and crevices on every side. 
 
 A dozen watch-fires flashed up in a semi-circle, flinging a broad 
 light over the whole enclosure, and gleaming redly on the waving 
 vines, the weeping birches, and the budding hemlocks, that inter 
 mingled along its broken ramparts. A hundred swarthy forms, 
 half naked and hideously painted, were moving about, and others 
 lay crouching in the grass, apparently terrified by the tempest 
 gathering so blackly above them. 
 
 The untrodden grass and fresh herbage told that this hollow had 
 recently been made a place of encampment ; yet, in the enclosure 
 was one lodge, small and but rudely constructed a sylvan hut, 
 more picturesque than any cabin to be found in the settlements. 
 How recently it had been constructed, might be guessed 
 by the green branches yet fresh on the half-hewn logs. A score 
 of savage hands had been at work upon it the whole day, for the 
 Chief of the Shawnees never rested in the open air with the lower 
 members of his tribe, when his fierce mother, his haughty wife, 
 or beautiful daughter, was of his hunting party. 
 
 Tahmeroo had wandered upward from the path which led to 
 the encampment. She had madly clambered to the highest 
 chain of rocks which surrounded the enclosure, when she should 
 have made her way around its base to the opening which gave 
 egress to the forest. She arose from the edge of the rock, where 
 she had been lying high above the encampment, and was about 
 to descend to the path she had missed, when a sound, like the 
 roar and tramp of a great army, came surging up from the forest. 
 The tall trees swayed earthward, flinging their branches and 
 green leaves to the whirlwind as it swept by. Heavy limbs were 
 twisted off, and mighty trunks, splintered midway, mingled the 
 sharp crash of their fall with the hoarse roar of the tempest. 
 The thunder boomed among the rocks, peal after peal, and the 
 
54: MAEY DEE WENT. 
 
 quick lightning darted through the heaving trees like fiery ser 
 pents wrangling with the torn foliage. 
 
 The very mountain seemed to tremble beneath the maiden s 
 feet. She threw herself upon the ledge, and with her face buried 
 in its moss, lay motionless, but quaking at heart, as the whirl 
 wind rushed over her. 
 
 A still more fearful burst of the elements struck upon the 
 heights, lifted a stout oak from its anchorage, and hurled it to 
 the earth. The splintered trunk fell with a crash, and the top 
 most boughs bent down the young saplings with a rushing sweep, 
 and fell, like the wings of a great bird of prey, above the pros 
 trate Indian. She sprang upward, with a cry, and seizing the 
 stem of a vine, swung herself madly over the precipice. Fortu 
 nately, the descent was rugged, and many a jutting angle af 
 forded a foothold to the daring girl, as she let herself fearlessly 
 down now clinging among the leaves of the vine now grasping 
 the sharp point of a rock, and dropping from one cleft to another. 
 Twice she forced herself back, as if she would have sunk into the 
 very rock, and dragged the heavy vines over her, when a fresh 
 thunder-burst rolled by, or a flash of lightning blazed among the 
 leaves ; but when they had passed, she again swung herself 
 downward, and finally dropped unharmed upon the grass, back 
 of her father s lodge. 
 
 The enclosure was now perfectly dark ; for the rain had ex 
 tinguished the watch-fires and the lightning but occasionally 
 revealed a group of dark forms cowering together, awed by the 
 violence of the tempest, and rendered abject by superstitious 
 dread. 
 
THE WOODLAND LODGE. 55 
 
 CHAPTER IX. 
 
 THE "WOODLAND LODGE. 
 
 A TWINKLING light broke through the crevices of the lodge ; but 
 Tahmeroo lingered in the rain, for now that the fierceness of the 
 storm was over, she began to have a new fear the dread of her 
 mother s stern presence. Cautiously, and with timid footsteps, 
 she advanced to the entrance and lifted the huge bear skin that 
 covered it. She breathed freely ; for there was no one present 
 save her father, the great Chief of the Shawnees. He was 
 sitting on the ground, with his arms folded on his knees, and his 
 swarthy forehead buried in his robe of skins. The heart of the 
 Indian King was sorely troubled, for he knew that the wing of 
 the Great Spirit was unfolded in its wrath above his people. 
 
 Tahmeroo crept to the extremity of the lodge and sat down in 
 silence upon the ground. She saw that preparations had been 
 made for her comfort. A pile of fresh berries and a cake of 
 cornbread lay on a stool near by, and a couch of boughs woven 
 rudely together stood in the corner, heaped with the richest furs 
 and overspread with a covering of martin skins, lined and 
 bordered with fine scarlet cloth. A chain of gorgeous bead work 
 linked the deep scallops on the border, and heavy tassels fell 
 upon the grass from the four corners. The savage magnificence 
 of that couch was well worthy the daughter of a great chief. 
 
 Another couch, but of less costly furs, and without ornament, 
 stood at the opposite extremity. Tahmeroo threw one timid 
 look towards it, then bent her head, satisfied that it was 
 untenanted, and that her mother was indeed absent. As if 
 suddenly recollecting herself, she half started from the ground, 
 and disentangled the string of coral from her damp hair. With 
 her eyes fixed apprehensively on the chief, she thrust it under 
 the fur pillows of her couch, and stole back to her former 
 position. 
 
56 MARYDEKWENT. 
 
 Tahmeroo had scarcely seated herself, when the bear skin was 
 flung back from the entrance of the lodge, and Catharine the wife 
 of the Shawnee chief, presented herself in the opening. The 
 light from a heap of pine knots fell on the woman s face as she 
 entered ; but it failed to reveal the maiden, where she sat in the 
 shadowy side of the lodge. 
 
 The chief lifted his head and uttered a few words in the 
 Indian tongue, but received no answer ; while his wife gave one 
 quick look around the lodge, then sallied back, clasped her 
 hands tightly and groaned aloud. 
 
 Tahmeroo scarcely breathed, for never had she seen her 
 mother so agitated. It was, indeed, a strange sight those 
 small, finely cut features, usually so stern and cold, working with 
 emotion the pallid cheek, the high forehead, swollen and knit 
 ted at the brows the trembling mouth the eyes heavy with 
 anguish. This was a sight which Tahmeroo had never witnessed 
 before. She had marked the dread paleness of anger settle over 
 that face till it became hueless as a corpse. She had watched 
 stern resolve and savage joy gendered in those eyes, like venom 
 in the jaw of a serpent ; but never before had she seen regret or 
 anguish stir those beautiful lineaments. There she stood a 
 second Niobe, trembling and disordered ; her robe soiled, and 
 heavy with rain ; her long hair falling in wet and knotted masses 
 to her waist, moaning, wringing her hands, and bewailing 
 the absence of her child. And this was the stern, haughty 
 woman the white Indian who ruled the Shawnee braves with 
 despotic rigor whose revenge was deadly, and whose hate 
 was a terror. This was Catharine Montour ! 
 
 When Tahmeroo heard her name mingled with the lamenta 
 tions of her mother, she started forward exclaiming with tremu 
 lous and broken earnestness, " Mother, oh, mother, I am here 1" 
 
 A burst of fierce thanksgiving broke from the lips of Catha 
 rine. She caught her daughter to her heart and kissed her 
 wildly again and again. 
 
 " Thank God, oh, thank my God, I am not quite alone !" she 
 
THE WOODLAND LODGE. 57 
 
 exclaimed ; and tears started in the eyes that had not known 
 them for twenty snmraers. 
 
 Those words of Christian thankfulness those tears of maternal 
 love were strange sounds for the lodge of a savage chief ; but 
 stranger far were they to the lip and the eye of that stern, 
 woman. 
 
 Without a word of question as to her strange absence, 
 Catharine drew her child to the couch, and, seeing the bread 
 and the berries yet untasted, she forced her to eat while she 
 wrung the moisture from her hair and took away the damp robe. 
 She smoothed the cushions of crimson cloth that served as pillows, 
 and drawing the coverlet of martin skins over the form of her 
 child, sat beside her till she dropped to a gentle slumber. Then 
 she heaped fresh knots on the burning pine, and changed her 
 own saturated raiment. 
 
 The sombre chief threw himself upon the unoccupied heap of 
 furs, and Catharine was left alone with her thoughts. She stole 
 again to the couch of her daughter, and a swann of good and 
 tender feelings, long unknown to that heart, arose at the 
 thoughts of her child s late peril and of her present safety. She 
 did not, as was her wont, force back these gentle feelings to 
 their source, but permitted them to flow till they refreshed the 
 arid places of her heart, like dews on a bed of withered flowers. 
 
 Thoughts of home and kindred, and of her innocent childhood, 
 thronged upon her mind. Remembrances that had been locked 
 in the secret cells of her heart for years, now stole forward, with 
 a softening influence, till the present was lost in the past, and she, 
 the Indian s wife, sat in her husband s wigwam, lost in mournful 
 thoughts of a home among her own people, and of hopes whose 
 uprooting had sent her to the wilderness, seared in heart, 
 and hardened, almost beyond the feelings of her sex and 
 race. 
 
 Long and sad were the vigils of that stern watcher ; yet they 
 had a good influence on her heart. There was tenderness and 
 regret nay, almost repentance in her bosom, as she gazed on 
 
58 MARYDERWENT. 
 
 the slumbers of her child the only being on earth whom she 
 dared to love. More than once she pressed her lips fondly to 
 the forehead of the sleeper, as if to assure herself of her dear 
 presence after the frightful dangers of the storm. She remained 
 till after midnight pondering upon past events, with the clinging 
 tenacity of one who seldom allowed herself to dwell on aught 
 that could soften a shade of her haughty character ; at length 
 she was about to throw herself by the side of her daughter, more 
 from the workings of unquiet thoughts than from a desire for 
 rest. But the attempt disturbed the slumbering girl. She 
 turned restlessly on her couch, and, oppressed by its warmth, 
 pushed away the covering,. 
 
 Catharine observed that the cheek, which lay against the scar 
 let cloth, was flushed and heated. She attempted to draw the 
 pillow away, when her fingers became entangled in the string of 
 coral concealed beneath it. Had a serpent coiled around her 
 hand, it could not have produced a more startling effect. She 
 shook it off, and drew hastily back, as if something loathsome 
 had clung to her. Then she snatched up the ornament, went to 
 the pile of smouldering embers, stirred them to a flame, and ex 
 amined it minutely by the light. Her face settled to its habitual 
 expression of iron resolution as she arose from her stooping pos 
 ture. Her lips were firmly closed, and her forehead became 
 calm and cold ; yet there was more of doubt and sorrow than 
 of anger in her forced composure. 
 
 She returned to the couch and placed herself beside it, with 
 the coral still clenched in her hand. Her face continued passion 
 less, but her eyes grew dim as she gazed on the sleeper ; thoughts 
 of her own youth lay heavily upon her heart. 
 
 Tahmeroo again turned restlessly on her pillow, her flushed 
 cheeks dimpled with a smile, and she murmured softly in her 
 sleep. Catharine laid her hand on the round arm, flung out upon 
 the martin skins, and bent her ear close to the red and smiling 
 lips, thus betraying with their gentle whisperings the thoughts 
 that haunted the bosom of the sleeper. It was a fearful contrast, 
 
THE WOODLAND LODGE. 
 
 59 
 
 as the blaze shone on those two faces the one blooming and 
 beautiful, smiling amid the pleasant dreams of a young heart ; 
 the other moulded with a symmetry more rare and intellectual, 
 yet stamped with the iron impress of stern deeds and unhappy 
 thoughts, the lineaments rigid and fixed as marble, yet frozen 
 to composure by her own powers of self-command, rather than 
 by the influence of time or of nature. 
 
 Again Tahmeroo dreamed aloud. A name was whispered in 
 her soft, broken English, coupled with words of endearment and 
 gentle chiding. The name was spoken imperfectly, and Catharine 
 bent her ear still lower, as if in doubt that she had heard aright. 
 Again that name was pronounced, and now there was no doubt ; 
 the enunciation was low, but perfectly distinct. The mother 
 started upright ; her face was ashy pale, and she looked strangely 
 corpse-like in the dusky light. She snatched a knife from its 
 sheath in her girdle, and bent a fierce glance on the sleeper. A 
 moment the blade quivered above the heart of her only child, 
 then the wretched woman flung it from her with a gesture of 
 self-abhorrence, and, sinking to the ground, buried her face in 
 both hands. After one fierce shudder, she remained motionless 
 as a statue. 
 
 It was more than an hour before that stern face was lifted 
 again ; shade after shade of deep and harrowing agony had 
 swept over it while buried in the folded arms, and now it was 
 very pale, but with a gentler expression upon it. Traces of 
 anguish and deep commiseration were there, as she arose and 
 bent over her daughter. If the beautiful doctrine of good arid 
 evil spirits hovering about the heart, each striving for mastery, 
 be true, Catharine Montour s bosom was the seat of a fierce 
 spiritual warfare that night ! Now the good, and then the evil 
 predominated, like shifting lights and shadows thrown athwart 
 the sky, when tempests struggle against the sunshine. She laid 
 a hand on the rounded shoulder, from which the covering had 
 been flung, passed the other quickly over her eyes, and awoke 
 the sleeper. 
 
60 MARTDEKWENT. 
 
 " Tahmeroo," she said, but her voice was low and husky, and 
 it died away in her throat. 
 
 The maiden started to her elbow and looked wildly about. 
 When she saw her mother with the string of red coral in her 
 hand, she sunk back and buried her face in the pillow. 
 
 " Tahmeroo, look up 1" said the mother, in a soft, low voice, 
 from which all traces of emotion had flown. " Has Tahmeroo 
 dreams which she does not tell her mother ? The white man s 
 gift is under her pillow whence came it ?" 
 
 A blush spread over the face, neck, and bosom of the young 
 girl, and she shrunk from the steady gaze of her mother. She 
 was sensible of no wrong, save that of concealment ; yet her 
 confusion was painful as guilt. Catharine had compassion on 
 her embarrassment, and turned away her eyes. 
 
 " Tahmeroo," she said, in a voice still more gentle and win 
 ning, " tell me all am I not your mother ? do I not love 
 you ?" 
 
 The young Indian girl rose and looked timidly towards the 
 couch of the Shawnee Chief. 
 
 " Does my father sleep ?" and her eyes again fell beneath the 
 powerful glance which she felt to be fixed upon her. 
 
 " Yes, he sleeps ; speak in English, and have no fear." 
 
 Catharine went to the heap of blazing pine and flung ashes on 
 it ; then returned to her daughter, folded her to her bosom, and 
 for half an hour the low voice of Tahmeroo alone broke the still 
 ness of the lodge. 
 
 Scarcely had Catharine interrupted the confession of her child 
 with a word of question. She must have been powerless from 
 emotion, for more than once her breath came quick and gasp 
 ingly ; and the heavy throbbing of her heart was almost audible 
 at every pause in that broken narrative. Yet her voice was 
 strangely cold and calm when she spoke. 
 
 " And you saw him again this day ?" 
 
 "Yes, mother." 
 
 " Did he tell you to keep these meetings from my knowledge ?" 
 
THE WOODLAND LODGE. 61 
 
 " He said the Great Spirit would visit me with his thunder, if 
 I but whispered it to the wind." 
 
 u The name tell me the name once more ; but low, I would 
 not hear it aloud. Whisper it in my ear yet the hiss of a ser 
 pent were sweeter," she muttered inly. 
 
 Tahmeroo raised her lips to her mother s ear, and whispered 
 as she was commanded. She felt a slight shudder creep over 
 the frame against which she leaned, and all was still again. * 
 
 " You first saw this this man, when we were at the encamp 
 ment on the banks of Seneca Lake, three moons since, and I was 
 absent on a mission to Sir William Johnson : did I hear aright 
 in this ?" questioned the mother after a few minutes of silence. 
 
 " It was there I first saw him, mother." 
 
 " Listen to me, Tahmeroo : were I to command you never 
 again to see this man, could you obey me ?" 
 
 The young Indian started from her mother s arms, and the fire 
 of her dark eyes flashed even in the half smothered light. 
 
 " Never see him ? What, tear away all this light from my 
 own heart ? Obey ? No, mother, no. Put me out from my 
 father s lodge make me a squaw of burden, the lowest woman 
 of our tribe give me to the tomahawk, to the hot fire but ask 
 me not to rend the life from my bosom. The white blood which 
 my heart drank from yours must curdle that of the Indian when 
 his child gives or takes love at the bidding of anything but her 
 own will ! No, mother, I could not obey I would not." 
 
 Catharine Montour was struck dumb with astonishment. Was 
 she, the despotic ruler of a fierce war-tribe, to be braved by her 
 own child ? The creature she had loved and cherished with an 
 affection so deep and passionate had she turned rebellious to 
 her power ? Her haughty spirit aroused itself ; the gladiator 
 broke from her eyes, as they were bent on the palpitating and 
 half-recumbent form of Tahmeroo. 
 
 The girl did not shrink from the fierce gaze, but met it with a 
 glance of resolute daring. The young eaglet had begun to 
 plume its wing 1 There was something of wild dignity in her 
 
62 MARYDERWENT. 
 
 voice and gesture, which assorted well with the curbless strength 
 of her mother s spirit. She respected the strong and energetic 
 mind, even when it rebelled against her own power. Though 
 stern and despotic to others, her anger had never seriously till 
 now, burst on the head of her daughter. The beautiful and wild 
 creature whom she had reared in the depths of the wilderness, 
 had been to her a thing set apart, not for the fond quiet of ma 
 ternal love, but for the idolatry of a seared and erring heart, 
 which turned with affection to nothing on earth or in heaven, 
 save that one pure girl. Her very love was a sin, for it gave to 
 the creature a worship persistently withheld from the Creator. 
 
 With untiring application and a degree of patience foreign to 
 her character, she had withdrawn her daughter from the women 
 of her tribe, and lavished on her young mind all that had ever 
 been bright or beautiful in her own. The lore and pure accents 
 of her own native land, were made familiar to the lips of the 
 young Indian, and all the accomplishments gathered in the 
 favored youth of the mother, were transferred to the child. 
 Even the beautiful doctrines of Christianity, which sometimes 
 stole upon the mother s memory like the whisperings of a holy 
 dream, were instilled in the heart of the child; for Catharine had 
 too much poetry and taste mingled with her stern nature, not to 
 admire the beauties of truth, though she sacrilegiously withheld 
 reverence from them. 
 
 Catharine Moutour loved power, but that which she possessed 
 was not of a kind to satisfy her ambition ; for into this passion 
 had many others merged themselves. She understood the na 
 ture of her influence over the tribe of her husband too perfectly 
 to receive pleasure from it. It was not that of a great spirit 
 over its own compeers, but of the intellectual over the animal 
 It was the power of a resolute mind, crafty and unhesitating in 
 its means, over the ignorance, superstition, and brute strength 
 of a savage and almost barbarous race. She ruled a people 
 with whom she had no sympathy. 
 
 But the dominion which she held over her daughter s heart 
 
THE MISSIONARY S CABIN. 63 
 
 was woven with all the gentle and better feelings left to her na 
 ture. It was the power of intellect over intellect of love over 
 a loving heart ; and her absolute rule over that one soul had 
 been to her a sovereignty, dear alike to her pride and to her 
 affections. It had kept one well-spring pure in the depths of a 
 wicked heart. 
 
 Catharine Montour had studied the human heart as a familiar 
 book, and she knew that it would be in vain to contend with 
 the spirit so suddenly aroused in the strength of its womanhood. 
 She felt that her power over that heart must hereafter be one of 
 love unmixed with fear an imperfect and a divided power. The 
 heart of the strong woman writhed uuder the conviction, but she 
 stretched herself on the couch without a word of expostulation. 
 Her own fiery spirit had sprung to rapid growth in the bosom 
 of her child ; passions akin to those buried in her experience, 
 had shot up, budded and blossomed, in a night time. The stern 
 mother trembled when she thought of the fruit which, in her own 
 life, had turned to ashes in the ripening. 
 
 When Tahmeroo awoke in the morning, the lodge was empty. 
 Her mother had left the encampment at early dawn. 
 
 CHAPTER X. 
 
 THE MISSIONARY S CABIN. 
 
 THE history of Wyoming is interwoven with that of the Indian 
 missionary whose paternal care had so long protected the family 
 on Monokonok Island. Like Zinzendorf, his life was one errand 
 of mercy, alike to the heathen and the believer. For years, he had 
 served as a link of union between the savage life of the woods 
 and the civilization of the plains. 
 
64: MARYDERWENT. 
 
 While a comparatively young man, he had come among the 
 Six Nations nameless and unarmed, with his life in his hand, 
 ready to live or die at his post. His home was in the wilder 
 ness ; sometimes he passed through the white settlements, 
 preached in their school-houses and slept in their cabins ; but it 
 was always as a guest; his mission lay with the forest children, 
 and in the wilds where they dwelt was his home. 
 
 Almost the entire portion of years which, had elapsed since 
 his encounter with Mary Derwent in the hills, he had spent 
 among the savages that kept possession of broad hunting 
 grounds beyond the Wind Gap. But a movement of the tribes 
 toward Wyoming, where a detachment of their own people from 
 about Seneca Lake had been appointed to meet them in council, 
 filled him with anxiety for his friends in the valley, and he came 
 back also to watch over their safety. He knew what the 
 settlers were ignorant of as yet, that the Shawnees were about 
 to unite with the Tories, whose leader lay at Wiutermoot fort, 
 and that great peril threatened the inhabitants of Wyoming in 
 this union. 
 
 This man was alone in a log cabin^Vhich Zinzendorf had 
 once occupied on a curving bank of the Susquehanna between 
 Wilkesbarre and Monokonok Island. His face, always sad and 
 merciful, now bore an anxious expression. The patient sweetness 
 of his mouth was a little disturbed. He was pondering over the 
 hostile attitude threatened by the Indians against the whites, 
 and that subject could not be otherwise than a painful one. 
 
 His dress was of the plainest material, yet its general neat 
 ness, and the air of refinement betrayed in every point, were 
 sufficient to distinguish him, to the most careless observer, as 
 one bred to a station far different to the character he had chosen. 
 The hair was parted from his forehead after a peculiar fashion, 
 and fell loosely to his shoulders, giving the upper portion of his 
 face an air of meek and almost feminine softness. It had once 
 been of raven darkness, but was now thickly interspersed with 
 silver, and had fallen entirely from the back part of the head. 
 
THE MISSIONARY S CABIN. 65 
 
 His whole appearance was that of a man of chastened and 
 benevolent spirit, to whom a child or a wounded bird would 
 instinctively have crept for protection. Years had made a 
 great difference in his person. 
 
 The hut was small, and but for recent repairs would have been 
 in ruins. It consisted only of one room. A deal box stood in 
 one corner, filled with books and rolls of manuscript. Two 
 stools and a rude table, with a few cooking utensils, were the 
 only remaining furniture. The missionary sat by the table, im 
 plements for writing were before him, and the pages of a 
 worn Bible lay open, which, after a little while, he began to 
 read. 
 
 The morning was yet young, and the fresh air came balmily 
 to his temples as he read. The forest trees, which interwove 
 their branches like an arbor over the hut, were vocal with bird- 
 songs, and the murmur of a mountain cascade came softly 
 through the unglazed window. 
 
 The missionary occasionally lifted his head and looked out 
 with a faint smile, when a bird came flitting by the door, or 
 shook the dew from the green boughs waving against the win 
 dow. Then he would smooth back the pages which the breeze 
 playfully lifted whenever he removed his hand, and again became 
 absorbed in his book. 
 
 It was a picture of holy thought and quiet study ; but the 
 crackling of branches, and the sound of approaching footsteps 
 interrupted its beautiful tranquillity. 
 
 The silvery flow of water from a spring close by was broken 
 by the sound ; the birds fluttered away from their green nestling 
 places in the leaves, and a half-tamed fawn, which had been 
 sleeping in a tuft of fern leaves, started up, gazed a moment on 
 the intruder with his dark, intelligent eye, and dashed up the 
 river s bank, as she crossed the threshold of the lowly dwelling. 
 
 The missionary looked up as the stranger entered, and a feel 
 ing of astonishment mingled with the graciousness which, long 
 habit had made a portion of his nature. He arose, and with a 
 
 5 
 
66 MARYDEKWENT. 
 
 slight inclination of the head, placed the stool, on which he had 
 been sitting, for her accommodation. 
 
 The intruder bent her head in acknowledgment of the 
 courtesy, but remained standing. She was a woman majestic in 
 her bearing, of well developed form, and somewhat above the 
 middle height ; her air was courtly and graceful, but dashed 
 with haughtiness approaching to arrogance. She had probably 
 numbered forty years ; her face, though slightly sun-browned, 
 bore traces of great beauty, spite of its haughty expression. 
 The mouth had been accustomed to smiles in its youth, and 
 though an anxious frown clouded the broad forehead, it was still 
 beautifully fair. The missionary had spent his life amid the 
 aristocracy of European courts, and had passed from thence to 
 the lowly settlement, and to the still more remote Indian 
 encampment ; but there was something in the appearance 
 of this strange woman that filled him with vague uneasiness, 
 and he looked upon her with a sort of terror. Her air and 
 dress were not strictly those of any class with which he had as 
 yet become familar. There was wildness mingled with the 
 majesty of her presence, and her rich and picturesque attire par 
 took at once of the court and the wigwam. 
 
 Her long, golden, and still abundant hair, was wreathed in 
 braids around her head, and surmounted by a small coronet of 
 gorgeous feathers. A serpent of fine, scaly gold, the neck and 
 back striped and variegated with minute gems, was wreathed 
 about the mass of braids on one side of her head, and formed a 
 knot of slender coils where it clasped the coronet. There was 
 something startlingly like vitality in these writhing folds when 
 the light struck them, and the jewelled head shot out from the 
 feathers and quivered over the pale temple with startling abrupt 
 ness. There was an asp-like glitter in the sharp, emerald eye, 
 and the tiny jaw seemed full of subtle venom. It was a magnifi 
 cent and rare ornament to be found in the solitude of an Ameri 
 can forest ; yet scarcely less remarkable than the remainder of 
 the strange woman s apparel. 
 
THE MISSIONARY S CABIN 67 
 
 A robe of scarlet cloth, bordered with the blackest lynx fur, 
 was girded at the waist by a cord of twisted silk, and fell back 
 at the shoulders in lappels of rich black velvet. Above the fur 
 border, ran a wreath of embroidery, partly silk, partly wampum, 
 but most exquisitely wrought in garlands of mountain flowers, 
 with tiny golden serpents knotting them together and creeping 
 downward, as it were, to hide themselves in the fur. It had 
 loose, hanging sleeves, likewise lined with velvet, beneath 
 which the white and still rounded arm gleamed out in strong 
 contrast. 
 
 A serpent, mate to the one on her head, but glowing with 
 still more costly jewels, coiled around the graceful swell of her 
 right arm, a little below the elbow, but its brilliancy was con 
 cealed by the drapery of the sleeve, except when the arm was in 
 motion. She wore elaborately wrought moccasins, lined with 
 crimson cloth, but the embroidery was soiled with dew, and the 
 silken thongs, with which they had been laced to the ankle, had 
 broken loose in the rough path through which she had evidently 
 travelled. 
 
 The missionary stood by the table, while his visitor cast a 
 hasty glance around the apartment, and turned her eyes keenly 
 on his face. 
 
 " I am not mistaken," she said, slowly withdrawing her gaze. 
 " You are the godly man of whom our people speak the Indian 
 missionary ?" 
 
 The man of God bent his head in reply. 
 
 " You should be, and I suppose are, an ordained minister of 
 the church ?" she resumed. 
 
 " I am, madam." 
 
 His voice was deep-toned and peculiarly sweet. The woman 
 started as it met her ear ; a gleam of unwonted expression shot 
 over her features, and she fixed another penetrating glance on 
 his face, as if some long buried recollection had been aroused ; 
 then, satisfied with the scrutiny, she turned her eyes away, and 
 drawing a deep breath, spoke again. 
 
68 MARYDEKWENT. 
 
 " I ask no more than this ; of what church matters little. But 
 have you authority to perform marriages after the established 
 law ?" 
 
 " I have ; but my services are seldom required. I mingle but 
 little with the whites of the settlement, and Indians have their 
 peculiar forms, which, to them, are alone binding." 
 
 " True," replied the woman, with a slight wave of the hand ; 
 " these forms shall not be wanting ; all the bonds of a Christian 
 church and savage custom will scarcely yield me security." 
 
 She spoke as if unconscious of a second presence, and again 
 abruptly addressed the missionary. 
 
 " Your services are needed in the Shawnee encampment, a few 
 miles back in the mountains. A guide shall be sent for you at 
 the appointed time. Stay in this place during the next twenty- 
 four hours, when you will be summoned." 
 
 The missionary, though a humble man, was by no means 
 wanting in the dignity of a Christian gentleman. He was dis 
 pleased with the arrogant and commanding tone assumed by his 
 singular visitor, and threw a slight degree of reproof into his 
 manner when he answered. 
 
 " Lady, if the welfare of a human being if the safety of an 
 immortal soul, can be secured by my presence, I will not hesitate 
 to trust myself among your people, though they come here on an 
 errand I can never approve ; but for a less important matter, I 
 cannot promise to wait your pleasure." 
 
 " Rash man, do you know who it is you are braving ?" said 
 the woman, fixing her eyes sternly on his face. " If your life is 
 utterly valueless, delay but a moment in following the guide 
 which I shall send, and you shall have the martyrdom you seem 
 to brave ! Catharine Montour s will has never yet been disputed 
 within twenty miles of her husband s tent without frightful retri 
 bution." 
 
 The missionary started at the mention of that name, but he 
 speedily regained his composure, and answered her calmly and 
 with firmness. 
 
THE MISSIONARY S CABIN. 69 
 
 " Threats are powerless with me, lady. The man who places 
 himself unarmed and defenceless in the midst of a hoard of sava 
 ges, can scarcely be supposed to act against his conscience from 
 the threat of a woman, however stern may be her heart, and 
 however fearful her power. Tell me what the service is which 
 I am required to perform, and then you shall have my answer." 
 
 The haughty woman moved towards the door with an angry 
 gesture, but returned again, and with more courtesy in her 
 manner seated herself on the stool which had been placed for 
 her. 
 
 " It is but just," she said, " that you should know the service 
 which you are required to perform. There is in the camp now 
 lying beneath Campbell s Ledge, a maiden of mixed blood, my 
 child my only child ; from the day that she first opened her 
 eyes to mine in the solemn wilderness, with nothing but savage 
 faces around me, with no heart to sympathize with mine, that 
 child became a part of my own life. For years I had loved 
 nothing ; but the tenderness almost dead in my heart broke 
 forth when she was born, the sweet feelings of humanity came 
 back, and the infant became to me an idol. In the wide world I 
 had but one object to love, and for the first time in a weary 
 life, affection brought happiness to me. You may be a father ; 
 think of the child who has lain in your bosom, year after year, 
 pure and gentle as a spring blossom, who has wound herself 
 around your heart-strings think of her, when dearest and love 
 liest, stolen from your bosom, and her innocent thoughts usurped 
 by another." 
 
 " Forbear in mercy forbear !" said the missionary, in a voice 
 of agony, that for an instant silenced the woman. 
 
 Catharine looked up and saw that his eyes were full of tears ; 
 her own face was fearfully agitated, and she went on with a 
 degree of energy but little in keeping with the pathos of her last 
 broken speech. 
 
 " A white, one of my own race, came to the forest stealthily, 
 like a thief, and with our Indian forms, which he taught her to 
 
TO MARYDERWENT. 
 
 believe were a bond of marriage among his people, also lured the 
 heart of my child from her mother. Now, I beseech you, for I 
 see that you are kind and feeling I was wrong to command 
 come to the camp at nine to-night, for then and there shall my 
 child be lawfully wedded." 
 
 " I will be there at the hour, replied the missionary, in a, 
 voice of deep sympathy. " Heaven forbid that I should refuse 
 to aid in righting the wronged, even at the peril of life." 
 
 " My own head shall not be more sacred in the Shawnee camp 
 than yours," said Catharine, with energy. 
 
 " I do not doubt it ; and were it otherwise, I should not 
 shrink from a duty. I owe an atonement for the evil opinion I 
 had of you. A heart which feels dishonor so keenly cannot de 
 light in carnage and blood." 
 
 " Can they repeat these things of me ?" inquired Catharine, 
 with a painful smile ; " they do me deep wrong. Fear not ; I 
 appear before you with clean hands. If the heart is less pure, it 
 has sufficiently avenged itself ; if it has wronged others, they 
 have retribution ; has not the love of my child gone forth to 
 another ? Am I not alone ?" - 
 
 " Lady," said the missionary, with deep commiseration in his 
 look and voice, for he was moved by her energetic grief, " this 
 is not the language of a savage. Your speech is refined, your 
 manner noble. Lady, what are you ?" 
 
 There are seasons when the heart will claim sympathy, spite of 
 all control which a will of iron may place upon it. This power 
 was upon the heart of Catharine Montour. 
 
 " Yes, I will speak," she muttered, raising her hand and press 
 ing it heavily to her eyes. The motion flung back the drapery 
 of the sleeve, and the light flashed full on the jewelled serpent 
 coiled around her arm. The missionary s eyes fell upon it, and 
 he sallied back against the logs of the hut, with a death-like 
 agony in his face. 
 
CATHARINE S CONFESSION. 71 
 
 CHAPTER XL 
 
 CATHARINE S CONFESSION. 
 
 CATHARINE MONTOUR was too deeply engrossed by her own 
 feelings to observe the strange agitation which had so suddenly 
 come upon the missionary. She seated herself on the stool, and, 
 with her face buried in her robe, remained minute after minute 
 in deep silence, gathering strength to unlock the tumultuous 
 secrets of her heart once more to a mortal s knowledge. 
 
 When she raised her face, there was nothing in the appearance 
 of her auditor to excite attention. He still leaned against the 
 rude wall, a little paler than before, but otherwise betraying no 
 emotion, save that which a good man might be supposed to feel 
 in the presence of a sinful and highly gifted fellow-creature. 
 
 She caught his pitying and mournful look, fixed so earnestly 
 upon her face, as she raised it from the folds of her robe, and 
 her eyes wavered and sunk beneath its sorrowful intensity. 
 There was a yearning sympathy in his glance, which fell upon 
 her heart like sunshine on the icy fetters of a rivulet ; it awed 
 her proud spirit, and yet encouraged confidence ; but it was not 
 till after his mild voice had repeated the question " Lady, con 
 fide in me who and what you are ?" that she spoke. 
 
 When she did find voice, it was sharp, and thrilled painfully 
 on the ear of the listener. The question aroused a thousand 
 recollections, that had long slumbered, in the life of this wretched 
 woman. She writhed under it, as if a knot of scorpions had 
 suddenly began to uncoil in her heart. 
 
 " What am I ? It is a useless question. Who on earth can 
 tell what he is, or what a moment shall make him ? I am that 
 which fate has ordained for me, Catharine Montour, the wife of 
 Gi-en-gwa-tah, a great chief among his people. If at any time I 
 have known another character, it matters little. Why should 
 
2 MAKYDEBWENT. 
 
 you arouse remembrances which may not be forced back to their 
 lethargy again ? I ask uo sympathy, nor seek counsel ; let me 
 depart in peace ?" 
 
 With a sorrowful and deliberate motion, she arose, and would 
 have left the cabin, but the missionary laid his hand gently on 
 her arm and drew her back. 
 
 " We cannot part thus," he said. " The sinful have need of 
 counsel, the sorrowing of sympathy. The heart which has been 
 long astray requires an intercessor with the Most High. 7 
 
 " And does the God whom you serve suffer any human heart 
 to become so depraved that it may not approach his footstool in 
 its own behalf ? Is the immaculate purity of Jehovah endangered 
 by the petition of the sinful or the penitent, that you offer to 
 mediate between me and my Creator ? No I if I have sinned, 
 the penalty has been dearly paid. If I have sorrowed, the tears 
 shed in solitude have fallen back on my own heart, and frozen 
 there ! I ask no intercession with the being you worship ; and I 
 myself lack the faith which might avail me, were I weak enough 
 to repine over the irredeemable past. I have no hope, no God 
 wherefore should I pray ?" 
 
 " This hardiness and impiety is unreal. There is a God, and, 
 despite of your haughty will and daring intellect, you believe in 
 him ; ay, at this moment, when there is denial on your lips 1" 
 
 "Believe ay, as the devils, perchance ; but I do not trem 
 ble 1" replied the daring woman, with an air and voice of de 
 fiance. 
 
 The missionary fixed his eyes with stern and reproving steadi 
 ness on the impious woman. She did not shrink from his glance, 
 but stood up, her eyes braving his with a forced determination, 
 her brow locked in defiance beneath its gorgeous coronet, and a 
 smile of scornful bitterness writhing her mouth. Her arms were 
 folded over her bosom, flushed by the reflection of her robe, and 
 the jewelled serpent glittered just over her heart, as if to guard 
 it from all good influences. She seemed like a beautiful and 
 rebellious spirit thrust out forever from the sanctuary of heaven 
 
CATHARINE S CONFESSION. 73 
 
 A man less deeply read in the human heart, or less persever 
 ing in his Christian charities, would have turned away and left 
 her, as one utterly irreclaimable, but the missionary was both 
 too wise and too good thus to relinquish the influence he had 
 gained. There was something artificial in the daring front and 
 reckless impiety of the being before him, which betrayed a 
 strange, but not uncommon, desire to be supposed worse than 
 she really was. 
 
 With the ready tact of a man who had made character a 
 study, he saw that words of reproof or authority were unlikely 
 to soften a heart so stern in its mental pride, arid his own kind 
 feelings taught him the method of reaching hers. This keen 
 desire to learn something of her secret history would have been 
 surprising in a man of less comprehensive benevolence, and even 
 in him there was a restless anxiety of manner but little in accord 
 ance with his usual quiet demeanor. His voice was like the 
 breaking up of a fountain when he spoke again. 
 
 " Catharine," he said. 
 
 She started at the name her arms dropped she looked 
 wildly in his eyes : 
 
 " Oh, I mentioned the name," she muttered, refolding her arms 
 and drawing a deep breath. 
 
 " Catharine Montour, this hardihood is unreal ; you are not 
 thus unbelieving. Has the sweet trustfulness of your childhood 
 departed forever ? Have you no thought of those hours when 
 the young heart is made up of faith and dependence when 
 prayer and helpless love break out from the soul, naturally as 
 moisture exhales when the sun touches it ? Nay," he continued, 
 with more powerful earnestness, as he saw her eyes waver and 
 grow dim beneath the influence of his voice, " resist not the good 
 spirit, which even now is hovering about your heart, as the ring 
 dove broods over its desolated nest. Hoarded thoughts of evil 
 beget evil. Open your heart to confidence and counsel. Confide 
 in one who never yet betrayed trust one who is no stranger to 
 sorrow, and who is too frail himself to lack charity for the sin? 
 
: MAKYDERWENT. 
 
 of others. I beseech you tell me, are you not of English 
 birth r 
 
 Tears, large and mournful tears, stood in Catharine Montour s 
 eyes. She was once more subdued and humble as an infant. A 
 golden chord had been touched in her memory, and every heart, 
 string vibrated to the music of other years. Thoughts of her 
 childhood, so innocent and isolated, of the time when her heart 
 was full of affection and kindness, when hopes were springing up 
 and blossoming with each new day, when the whole earth was 
 pleasant and beautiful to her young mind all the recollections 
 of her youth came thronging to her bosom, like a host of gentle 
 spirits to their desolated haunts. 
 
 She sat down and opened her history to that strange man 
 abruptly, and as one under the influence of a dream. The large 
 tears rolled one after another down her cheeks, and fell to her 
 robe as she spoke ; but she appeared unconscious that she was 
 weeping, and sat with her hands locked in her lap, and her face 
 raised to that of the missionary, with the humility of a penitent 
 child confessing its faults to some indulgent parent. 
 
 It was a beautiful contrast with her late bold and unfeminine 
 assumption of superiority. Her voice was broken and changeful 
 as she spoke, now sinking to the deepest pathos, and again ris 
 ing in passionate appeal, or concentrating in accents of bitterness 
 and reproach, sometimes applied to herself, and at others to 
 persons who had been linked with her remarkable destiny. 
 
 " Yes, I was born in England," she said ; " born in a place so 
 beautiful that any human being might be happy from the mere 
 influence of its verdant and tranquil quietness. I have stood in 
 the heart of an American forest, where civilized foot had never 
 trod, surrounded by the solemn gloom of the wilderness, and 
 overshadowed by massive branches, which had been outspread 
 centuries and centuries before my insignificant existence. I have 
 felt the blood creep through my veins when standing thus alone, 
 encompassed by the stirless solitude of nature. When a deer 
 has bounded through the thickets, or a serpent glided across my 
 
CATHARINE S CONFESSION. 75 
 
 path, breaking with a sound of life the deep hush of the forest, 
 I have started with a feeling of awe, as if I were treading, un 
 authorized, upon the confines of a darker world. 
 
 " There is, indeed, something awful in the majestic scenery of 
 this new world ; I have seen all that is savage and grand in it 
 all that is rich and beautiful in my own land ; but never yet 
 have I known a spot so quiet and lovely as my own birth-place. 
 
 " No traveller ever passed through that village without stopping 
 to admire its verdant and secluded tranquillity. There was 
 something picturesque and holy in the little stone church, with 
 its porch overrun with ivy, and its narrow gothic windows half 
 obscured by the soft moss and creeping foliage which had gathered 
 about them from age to age something that subdued the gayest 
 heart in the deathly stillness of the grave-yard, with its stones 
 slanting away among the rank grass beneath the dark solemn 
 shadows of the yew trees. Artists came from a distance to sketch 
 that church ; and never did there pass a summer day in which 
 that grave-yard was not haunted by some stranger, detained in 
 the village by its exceeding loveliness. 
 
 "Back from the church stood the parsonage, an irregular old 
 building, surrounded by a grove of magnificent oaks, through 
 which its pointed roof and tall chimnies alone could be seen from 
 the village. Around the narrow lattices, and up to the pointed 
 gables, a rich, viny foliage had been allowed to blossom and 
 luxuriate year after year, unpruned and abandoned to its own 
 profuse leafiuess, till only here and there a sharp angle or a rude 
 stone balcony broke out from the masses of leaves and flowers 
 that clung around the old building, wherever a tendril could en- 
 weave itself or a bud find room for blossoming. 
 
 " A tribe of rooks dwelt in the oaks, and a whole bevy of wrens 
 came and built their nests in the vines. With my earliest recol 
 lection comes the soft chirp of the nestlings under my win 
 dow, and the carrolling song which broke up from the larks 
 when they left the long grass in the grave-yard, where they 
 nested during the summer nights. I remember one little timid 
 
76 MAKYDEKWENT. 
 
 hare which haunted the violet banks, that sloped down from be 
 hind the grove, from season to season, unmolested and in safety, 
 so harmless and quiet was everything around that dwelling : and 
 yet that was my birth-place. 
 
 " My father was rector of the parish, the younger son of a 
 noble family. He had a small independent fortune, which 
 allowed him to distribute the income from his living among the 
 poor of the village. He was a man of simple habits, quiet and 
 unostentatious in his benevolence, dwelling among his books, 
 with his wife and child, without a thought of ambition, or a de 
 sire beyond his own pleasant hearth-stone. He was a fine 
 scholar, deeply read in ancient lore, and familiar with every 
 branch of modern belles-letters. From the resources of his own 
 mind he delighted in cultivating mine ; but he was too mild and 
 contemplative in his nature to hold sufficient restraint over a will 
 so resolute and feelings so ardent. Indeed, he could hardly com 
 prehend a nature every way at variance with his own, much less 
 control it ; for long before it obtained a full development he was 
 with the angels. 
 
 " My mother was a gentle creature, of refined and delicate, 
 but not comprehensive mind. She loved my father, and next 
 to him, or rather as a portion of himself, me, her only child. 
 Years passed on, and I grew in culture and beauty. I remem 
 ber my own looks as reflected in the mirror, when my mother 
 caressed me in her little boudoir ; I was indeed very beautiful, 
 but it was the wild and graceful loveliness of a spoiled child, 
 petted and caressed as an idol, or a spirited plaything, rather 
 than that of a being endowed, as my father believed me to be, 
 with an imperishable soul. 
 
 " As a child, I was passionate and wayward, but warm of 
 heart, forgiving and generous. My spirit brooked no control ; 
 but my indulgent father and sweet mother could see nothing more 
 dangerous than a quick intellect and over-abundant healthfulness 
 in the capricious tyranny of my disposition. Though even as a 
 child, I had strong feelings of dislike towards some distasteful 
 
MY FATHER S WAKD. 77 
 
 individuals ; my nature was very affectionate, and I loved every 
 thing appertaining to my home with a fervor seldom experienced 
 at my early years. The wealth of my affections seemed inex 
 haustible. It was lavished without stint on everything about 
 me, from the parents who took me nightly to their bosoms with 
 kisses and blessings, to the flowers that clung around my nursery 
 window, and the sweet birds that haunted them with melody. 
 
 " I was passionately fond of my mother, and when she sometimes 
 stole to my bed-side and hushed me to sleep with her soft kisses 
 and pleasant voice, I would promise in my innermost heart never 
 to grieve her again ; yet the next day I experienced a kind of 
 pleasure in bringing the tears to her gentle eyes, by some way 
 ward expression of obstinacy or dislike. 
 
 " It is strange that we often take pleasure in teasing and tor 
 menting those whom we most love. There is a feeling of selfish 
 power in it by no means confined to the thoughtlessness of child 
 hood, and often acted upon by those who would despise the feel 
 ing could they trace it to its unworthy source. At ten years of 
 age I was absolute in my father s house, and tyrannized over the 
 hearts of both my parents with an innate thirst for ascendency ; 
 yet I loved them very, very dearly I 
 
 CHAPTER XII. 
 MY FATHER S WARD. 
 
 " WHEN I was fifteen, an old collage associate died and left my 
 father guardian to his son and heir. This young gentleman s 
 arrival at the parsonage was an epoch in my life. A timid and 
 feminine anxiety to please took possession of my heart. I gave 
 up for his use my own little sitting-room, opening upon a wilder 
 ness cf roses and tangled honeysuckles that had once been a gar 
 den, but which I had delighted to see run wild in unchecked 
 
T8 MARYDERWENT. 
 
 luxuriance, till it had become as fragrant and rife with blossoms 
 as an East India jungle. 
 
 " It was the first act of self-denial I had ever submitted to, and 
 I found a pleasure in it which more than compensated for the 
 pain I felt in removing my music and books, with the easel which 
 I had taken such pains to place in its proper light, to a small 
 chamber above. 
 
 " It was not in my nature to do things by halves. With ray 
 favourite room I resigned to our expected guest all the orna 
 ments that had become most endeared to me. The drawings, over 
 which I had lingered day after day, were left upon the wall. My 
 pet cage-birds were allowed to remain among the passion-flowers 
 which draped the balcony. The most treasured of my Italian 
 poets still encumbered the pretty rose-wood table ; and I ran 
 sacked the garden and little green-house again and again for 
 choice flowers to fill the vases of antique china, which had been 
 handed down an heir-loom in my mother s family. 
 
 " My father went to meet his ward at the last stage I shall 
 never forget the girlish impatience with which I waited his return ; 
 but it was not till after the canaries had nestled down on their 
 perches in the evening twilight, and the little room which I had 
 prepared for our guest was misty with odors shed from the nu 
 merous vases and wafted in from the flowering thickets beneath 
 the windows, that we saw them slowly picking their way through 
 the tangled luxuriance of my garden. 
 
 " Heedless of my mother s entreaty, that I would remain quiet 
 and receive our guest in due form, I sprang out upon the balcony, 
 and winding my arm around one of its pillars, pushed back 
 the clustering passion-flowers, and bent eagerly over to obtain a 
 perfect view of our visitor. I did not care that my arm was 
 crushing the delicate flowers which clung around the pillar, and 
 that my canaries were fluttering in affright from my sudden ap 
 proach, but fixed my eyes with a deeper feeling than that of 
 mere curiosity on my father and his companion. 
 
 " He was a slight, aristocratic youth, with an air of thoughtful 
 
MY FATHER S WARD. 79 
 
 manliness beyond his years, not the manliness to be acquired in 
 society alone ; but a dignity originating in deep and correct 
 habits of thought, seemed natural to him. He was very hand 
 some, almost too much so for a man. , The symmetry and calm 
 repose of his features were not sufficiently marked for changeful 
 expression ; yet their usual tone was singularly pleasing. I have 
 never seen a face so strongly characterized by intellect and bene 
 volence. 
 
 "He was speaking as he advanced up the serpentine walk which 
 led to the balcony, and seemed to be making some observation 
 on the wild beauty of the garden. Once he stooped to put back 
 a tuft of carnations which fell over the path, and again he paused 
 to admire a large white-rose tree, which half concealed the flight 
 of steps leading to the balcony on which I stood. 
 
 " There was something in the tones of his voice, a quiet dignity 
 in his manner, that awed me. I shrunk back into the room where 
 my mother was sitting, and placed myself by her side. My cheek 
 burned and my heart beat rapidly when he entered. But my con 
 fusion passed unnoticed, or if remarked, was attributed to the 
 bashfulness of extreme youth. 
 
 " Varnham was my senior by four years, and he evidently con 
 sidered me as a child, for, after a courteous bow on my introduc 
 tion, he turned to my mother and began to speak of the village 
 and its remarkable quietude. He even seemed surprised when I 
 joined familiarly in conversation during the evening ; and more 
 than once looked in my face with an air of concern and disap 
 proval when I answered either of my parents in the careless and 
 abrupt manner which their excessive indulgence had made habi 
 tual to me. 
 
 " I returned to my room that night out of humor with myself, 
 and somewhat in awe of our guest. I had evidently rendered 
 myself an object of dislike to him, when I had been most anxious 
 to please. This consciousness originated a feeling of self-distrust, 
 and I was both hurt and offended that he did not look on me with 
 the blind partiality of my parents. 
 
80 MARY DER WENT. 
 
 " For the first time in my life I went to the mirror, anxious 
 about my personal appearance. I had been taught, or rather 
 allowed, to believe myself beautiful ; but it rather displeased me 
 than otherwise. There was something of contempt in my nature 
 for mere personal loveliness, which rendered its possession a mat 
 ter of slight importance. I had an innate longing to be loved 
 for something more lofty than mere symmetry of person or fea 
 tures an ambition to be distinguished for the qualities and 
 accomplishments which I could myself acquire, rather than for 
 those bestowed by nature. But this evening I loosened the 
 blue ribbon which bound my hair, and shook the mass of long 
 tresses over my shoulders, with a feeling of anxiety which I had 
 never before experienced. I contrasted the rich bloom on my 
 cheek with the pale and graceful loveliness of my mother, and 
 felt how infinitely I fell short of that exquisite refinement of look 
 and manner which characterized her above all women I had ever 
 seen. I was disgusted with the richness and exuberance of my 
 own healthful beauty, and felt almost jealous of the gentle attrac 
 tions of my sweet parent. 
 
 " The disapproving look with which young Varnham had re 
 garded me, haunted my slumbers. It was the first token of disap 
 probation that had ever reached my heart, and it filled me with 
 strange hesitation and self-distrust. I could not bring myself to 
 wish our new inmate away, and yet I felt under restraint in my 
 father s house. 
 
 " The history of the next two years would be one of the heart 
 alone a narrative of unfolding intellect and feeling. It was im 
 possible that two persons, however dissimilar in taste and dispo 
 sition, should be long domesticated in the same dwelling without 
 gradually assimilating in some degree. Perhaps two beings more 
 decidedly unlike never met than Varnham and myself, but after 
 the first restraint which followed our introduction wore off, he 
 became to me a preceptor and most valuable friend. 
 
 " Hitherto my reading had been desultory, and my studies inter 
 rupted. I had become accomplished almost without effort, deeply 
 
MY FATHER S WARD. 81 
 
 read without method, and conversant even with many of the ab 
 struse sciences by constant intercourse with my father I had 
 little application, and yet accomplished much by mere force of 
 character. My whole energies were flung into the occupation of 
 the moment, and almost instinctively I had accumulated a rich 
 store of mental wealth; but my mind lacked method. I had 
 extensive general, but little minute knowledge. Except in the 
 common run of feminine accomplishments, I had submitted but 
 to imperfect discipline. Among these, painting and music were 
 my peculiar delight; a travelling artist had given me lessons in 
 the first, and my own sweet mother taught me the last to her 
 gentle heart, music was almost as necessary as the air she breathed. 
 I inherited all her love and all her talent for it; but with her it 
 was a sweet necessity; with me a passion. I revelled in the lux 
 ury of sound; she only delighted in it. 
 
 " Not even Varnham and his power with me was great could 
 induce me to undertake a course of regular study; but, after his 
 residence with us, my mind gradually yielded to the influence of 
 his teaching became stronger, more methodical, and far more 
 capable of reasoning. But as I more nearly approached the 
 standard of his intellect, my reverence for him decreased. The 
 awe in which he first held me gradually died away, and that feel 
 ing which had been almost love, settled down to strong sisterly 
 affection deeper and more lasting, perhaps, than a more passion 
 ate attachment might have been. I could no longer look up to 
 him as a being of superior strength and energy to myself; but 
 next to my parents he was the dearest object to me in existence. 
 
 " Two years brought Varnham to his majority. His fortune, 
 though limited, was equal to his wants; he resolved to travel, 
 and then take orders, for he had been intended for the church. 
 It was a sorrowful day to us when he left the parsonage. The 
 lonely feelings which followed his departure never gave place to 
 cheerfulness again. In four weeks from that day my father was 
 laid in the vault of his own loved church. My gentle mother 
 neither wept nor moaned when she saw the beloved of her youth 
 
 G 
 
82 MAKYDERWENT. 
 
 laid beside the gorgeous coffins of his lordly ancestors. But in 
 three weeks after, I was alone in the wide world ; for she was 
 dead also. 
 
 " Two weary, sad nights, I sat beside that beautiful corpse, 
 still and tearless, in a waking dream. I remember that kind 
 voices were around me, and that more than once pitying faces 
 bent over me, and strove to persuade me away from my melan 
 choly vigils. But I neither answered nor moved ; they sighed as 
 they spoke, and passed in and out, like the actors of a tragedy 
 in which I had no part. I was stupefied by the first great trouble 
 of my life ! 
 
 " The third night, came strange men into the room, bearing a 
 coffin covered with crimson velvet and glittering with silver. My 
 heart had been very cold, but it lay within me like marble 
 when those men reverently lifted the body of my beautiful 
 mother, and laid it upon the pillow which had been placed for 
 her last rest. Had they spoken a word I think my heart would 
 have broken ; but they passed out with a slow, solemn tread, 
 bearing the coffin between them. 
 
 " I rose and followed to the little room in which I had first seen 
 Varnham. A thrill of pain, like the quick rush of an arrow, 
 shot through my heart as I entered. It was the first keen 
 anguish I had felt since the burial of my father. The men sat 
 down the coffin, and again I was alone with my dead alone in 
 the dear sanctuary of our domestic affections. 
 
 " As I looked around the apartment, gentle associations 
 crowded on my heart, and partially aroused it to a sense of its 
 bereavement. The scent of withered flowers was shed from the 
 neglected vases, and a soft night wind came through the sash- 
 doors, wafting in a cloud of perfume from the garden. The 
 balmy air came refreshing to my temples, and aroused my heart 
 from the torpid lethargy which had bound it down in the gloomy 
 and suffocating chamber above ; but even yet, I could not fully 
 comprehend the extent of my desolation. Around me were a 
 thousand dear and cherished things, connected with my mother ; 
 
MY FATHER S WARD. 83 
 
 and before me lay the gorgeous coffin in which she was sleeping 
 her last, long death sleep. There was something horrible in a 
 sense of the stifling closeness of that silken-lined coffin. I raised 
 the lid, and felt a relief when the cool air stole over the beautiful 
 face beneath ; it seemed as if my mother must bless me that I 
 had released her once more from the terrible closeness of the grave 
 that I had given her back to life and the pure air of heaven. 
 
 " A silver lamp stood on the mantel-piece, shedding a dim 
 funereal light through the room, and revealing the sweet, pale 
 face of the dead with the shadowy indistinctness of moonlight. 
 But, though she lay there so still and cold, I could not, even yet, 
 feel that she was truly and forever departed. The fountains of 
 my heart were still locked, and as one in a dream I turned away 
 and stepped out upon the balcony. 
 
 " The passion-flower was in bloom, and hung in festoons of starry 
 blossoms from the balustrades. The solitary white-rose tree was 
 Standing by the steps as it had two years before ; but its 
 branches had spread and shot upwards over the front of the 
 balcony in profuse leafiness. A host of pearly blossoms, inter 
 mingled with the passion-flowers, and hung in clustering beauty 
 around the pillars and rude stone-work. The steps were white 
 with a shower of leaves which the breeze had shaken from the 
 over-ripe roses, and their breath was shed around with a soft 
 steady sweetness. The holy moonlight was around me, bathing 
 the flower-beds at my feet and trembling over the dewy thickets 
 beyond, lay the grave-yard, half veiled by the shadow of the 
 little church. Where the light fell upon it, a few marble slabs 
 gleamed up from the rank grass, and the yew trees swayed 
 gently in the wind with a soft dirge-like melody. 
 
 " An agonizing conviction of my loss struck upon my heart like 
 the toll of a bell I felt it all ! My father was dead buried 
 that humble church shut him out from my sight forever ! My 
 mother was there I did not weep nor moan ; my heart seemed 
 silently breaking. While the pang was keenest, I gathered a 
 handful of roses from the tree which my mother had planted ; care- 
 
84 MAE Y DEE WENT. 
 
 fully selecting the half-blown and most delicate flowers, such as 
 she had most loved, and scattered them, heavy with dew as they 
 were, over the pillow and the velvet of my mother s coffin. There 
 was one bud but half unfolded, and with a soft blush slumbering 
 within its core such as she had always worn in her bosom on 
 my father s birth-day. That germ brought the date of the 
 month to my mind. That should have been our annual day of 
 rejoicing, and they were both gone to keep it in another world ; 
 I was alone alone ! 
 
 " I took the bud carefully, that the dew might not fall away 
 from its heart, and removing the grave-clothes, laid it on the 
 marble bosom of my mother. I was about to draw the shroud 
 over it, that she might go down to the grave with the sweet me 
 morial blooming within her bosom, when the leaves trembled 
 beneath my gaze as if stirred by the pulsation of the heart 
 beneath. A cry, half of joy, half of fear, burst from my lips : 
 I pressed my shivering hand down upon her heart it was still 
 oh, how still ! The night winds had mocked me. 
 
 " Then, the passion of grief burst over me. I fell to the floor, 
 and my very life seemed ebbing away in tears and lamentations. 
 Hour after hour passed by, and I remained as I had fallen, in an 
 agony of sorrow. I know not how it was, but towards morning 
 I sunk into a heavy slumber. 
 
 CHAPTER XIII. 
 
 MY HUSBAND. 
 
 " WHEN I awoke, the dawn was trembling through the heavy 
 foliage of the balcony, and I observed, without thinking how it 
 had happened, that in my death-like slumber I had been lifted 
 from the carpet and laid upon a sofa. My head was dizzy, and 
 
MY HUSBAND. 85 
 
 acute pain shot through my temples ; but I arose and staggered 
 to the coffin. It was closed, but the roses which I had scattered 
 over it, lay still fresh and dewy upon the glowing velvet. I made 
 a feeble attempt to unclose the lid, but my head reeled, and I 
 fell to the floor. A step was on the balcony, the sash-door was 
 carefully opened; some one raised me tenderly in his arms and 
 bore me away. 
 
 " When I again returned to consciousness, Varnham was sit 
 ting beside my bed ; physicians and attendants were gliding softly 
 about the room, and everything was hush as death around me. 
 I was very tired and weak ; but I remembered that my mother 
 was dead, and that I hacl fainted ; I whispered a request to see 
 her once more she had been buried three weeks. 
 
 " Varnham had heard of my father s death in Paris, and 
 hastened home, to find me an orphan doubly bereaved, to become 
 my nurse and my counsellor my all. Most tenderly did he 
 watch over me during my hours of convalescence. And I re 
 turned his love with a gratitude as fervent as ever warmed the 
 heart of woman. 
 
 " I knew nothing of business, scarcely that money was necessary 
 to secure the elegancies I enjoyed. I had not even dreamed of 
 a change of residence, and when information reached us that a 
 rector had been appointed to supply my father s place, and that 
 Lord Granby, the elder brother of my lamented parent, had 
 consented to receive me as an inmate of his own house, I sunk 
 beneath the blow as if a second and terrible misfortune had be 
 fallen me. 
 
 "The thought of being dragged from my home from the sweet 
 haunts which contained the precious remembrances of my parents 
 and conveyed to the cold, lordly halls of my aristocratic uncle, 
 nearly flung me back to a state of delirium. 
 
 " There was but one being on earth to whom I could turn for 
 protection, and to him my heart appealed with the trust and 
 tender confidence of a sister. I pleaded with him to intercede 
 with my uncle, that I might be permitted still to reside at the 
 
86 MAKYDERWENT. 
 
 parsonage that I might not be taken from all my love could 
 ever cling to. Varnham spoke kindly and gently to me ; he ex 
 plained the impropriety, if not the impossibility of Lord Granby s 
 granting my desire, and besought me to be resigned to a fate 
 which many in my forlorn orphanage might justly covet. He 
 spoke of the gaieties and distinction which my residence with 
 Lord Granby would open to me, and used every argument to 
 reconcile me to my destiny. But my heart clung tenaciously to 
 its old idols, and refused to be comforted. 
 
 " Had I been flung on the world to earn my bread by daily toil, 
 there was enough of energy in my nature to have met difficulties 
 and to have struggled successfully with*them ; but to become a 
 hanger-on in the halls of my ancestors a humble companion to 
 my fashionable and supercilious cousin the heiress of Lord 
 Granby s title and wealth subject to her surveillance, and sub 
 missive to her caprices, was a life which my heart revolted at; 
 I spurned the splendid slavery which was to compromise my in 
 dependence and humble my pride. 
 
 " Had Varnham counselled action instead of patience and sub 
 mission ; had he bade me go forth in the world, depend on 
 my own energies, and win for myself a station highest among 
 women, my own spirit would have seconded his counsel. The 
 ambition, which from my childhood had slumbered an inherent 
 but undeveloped principle in my heart, might have sprung up 
 from the ashes of my affections, and the wild dreams of struggle 
 and distinction, which haunted my earliest years, might have 
 lured me from the sweet home I had so loved, and from the rest 
 ing-place of those who had so loved me. 
 
 " But I was called upon to give up all for a distinction which 
 had nothing in it to satisfy a free heart like mine ; I had no 
 desire for notoriety no merely selfish wish to shine as a 
 beauty or a Idk-esprit among a crowd of superficial, heartless 
 creatures of fashion. Ambition was with me but the aspirations 
 of a proud and loving nature a dream of power, indistinct, and, 
 as yet, never brought into action, but closely united with the 
 
MY HUSBAND. 
 
 87 
 
 affections. In intellect, I was, perhaps, too independent in 
 feeling, the most fervent and clinging of human beings a desire 
 to be loved predominated over every other wish of my being ; 
 and yet my best friend counselled me to yield up all, and content 
 myself with cold, hollow grandeur. I strove to obey him, but 
 looked forward with no hope. 
 
 " It was deep in the morning my uncle s coroneted chariot 
 was drawn up before my quiet home. The sun flashed brightly 
 over the richly-studded harnesses of four superb horses, which 
 tossed their heads and pawed the earth impatient for the road. 
 A footman, in livery, lounged upon the door steps, and the su 
 percilious coachman stood beside his horses, dangling his silken 
 reins, now and then casting an expectant look into the hall door. 
 
 " It was natural that he should be impatient, for they had 
 been kept waiting more than an hour. I thought that I had 
 nerved myself to depart ; but when I descended from my cham 
 ber, and saw that gorgeous carriage, with its silken cushions 
 and gilded panels, ready to convey me to the hospitality of one 
 who was almost a stranger, my heart died within me. I turn 
 ed into the little room where I had spent that night of sor 
 row, by my mother s corpse; I flung myself on the sofa, and 
 burying my face in the pillows, sobbed aloud in the wretchedness 
 of a heart about to be sundered from all it had ever loved. 
 Varnhain was standing over me, pale and agitated. He strove 
 to comfort me was prodigal in words of soothing and endear 
 ment, and at length of passionate supplication. I was led to 
 the carriage his affianced wife. 
 
 " My year of mourning was indeed one of sorrow and loneliness 
 of heart ; I was a stranger in the home of my ancestors, and 
 looked forward to the period of my marriage with an impatience 
 which would have satisfied the most exacting love. It was a 
 cheap mode of obliging his orphan niece, and Lord Granby pre 
 sented the living which had been my father s to Varnham, who 
 had taken orders, and was ready to convey me back a bride to 
 my old home. 
 
88 MARY DER WENT. 
 
 " Had my relative lavished his whole fortune on me, I should 
 not have been more grateful ! My capacities for enjoyment 
 were chilled by the cold, formal dullness of his dwelling. I 
 panted for the dear solitude of my old haunts, as the prisoned 
 bird pines for his home in the green leaves. We were married 
 before the altar where my father had prayed, and where I had 
 received the sacrament of baptism. The register which recorded 
 my birth, bore witness to my union with Varnham, the only true 
 friend my solitary destiny had left to me. We entered our old 
 home, rich in gentle affections and holy memories. I was con 
 tent with the pleasant vistas of life that opened to us. How 
 could I tell if the gratitude, the affectionate trust with which I 
 regarded my husband reached not the entire depths of my na 
 ture ? How could I question if my heart were capable of a 
 deeper, more passionate and fervent attachment if it might not 
 concentrate its whole being on one object. My own nature was 
 a sealed book then I had not learned that it might be opened, 
 where my whole being would tremble in the reading. 
 
 " Our united fortunes were sufficient for our wants. We de 
 termined to live a life of seclusion, study, and well performed 
 duties, such as had made the happiness of my parents. Filled 
 with these innocent hopes, I took possession of my old home, a 
 cheerful and contented wife. We saw but little company, but 
 my -household duties, my music, painting, and needlework, gave 
 me constant and cheerful occupation, and three years of almost 
 thorough contentment passed by without bringing a wish beyond 
 my own household. At this time a daughter was born to us, 
 and in the fullness of my content, I forgot to ask if there was a 
 degree of happiness which I had never tasted. 
 
 " The fourth year after my marriage, another coffin was placed 
 in the family vault beside my parents that of James, Earl of 
 Granby. My cousin, Georgian a, scarcely outlived the period of 
 her mourning ; and, at the age of twenty-two, I, who had never 
 dreamed of worldly aggrandizement, suddenly found myself a 
 peeress in my own right, and possessor of one of the finest estates 
 
A NEW WORLD. 89 
 
 in England, for the Granby honors descended alike to male and 
 female heirs, and I was the last of our race. 
 
 " At first I was bewildered by the suddenness of my exalta 
 tion ; then, as if one burst of sunshine were only necessary to 
 ripen the dormant ambition of my heart, a change came over 
 my whole being. A new and brilliant career was opened to me ; 
 visions of power, greatness, and excitement floated through my 
 imagination. The pleasant contentment of my life was broken 
 up forever. 
 
 " Varnham took no share in my restless delight ; his nature 
 was quiet and contemplative his taste refined and essentially 
 domestic. What happiness could he look for in the brilliant 
 destiny prepared for us ? From that time there was a shadow 
 as of evil foreboding in his eye, and his manner became constrained 
 and regretful. Perhaps with his better knowledge of the world, 
 he trembled to find me so near that vortex of artificial life into 
 which I was eager to plunge myself. 
 
 " He made no opposition to my hasty plans nay, admitted 
 the necessity of a change in our mode of living but that anxious 
 expression never for a moment left his eyes. He seemed rather 
 a victim than a partaker in my promised greatness. From that 
 time our pursuits took different directions. I had thoughts and 
 feelings with which he had no sympathy. When an estrange 
 ment of the mind commences, that of the heart soon follows." 
 
 CHAPTER XIV. 
 
 A NEW WORLD. 
 
 " AGAIN that splendid carriage stood before our home, ready 
 to convey us to the pillared halls of my inheritance. There were 
 few, and those few transient, regrets in my heart when, with a 
 
90 MARTDEBWENT. 
 
 haughty consciousness of power and station, I sunk to the 
 cushioned seat, swept proudly around that old church, and 
 away from the sweet leafy bower in which I had known so much 
 of happiness. 
 
 " There was nothing of awkwardness or constraint in my feel 
 ing when I entered the domain which was henceforth to own me 
 its mistress. My pride, not my vanity, was gratified by the 
 manifestations of respect which met us at every step after passing 
 its broad boundaries. If I did not feel all the stern responsibili 
 ties which fate had heaped upon me with the princely fortune I 
 was about to possess myself of, there was nothing of levity 
 mingled with the stronger sensations of my heart. The predomi 
 nating feeling was a deep and almost masculine consciousness of 
 power, a sense of personal dominion. 
 
 " While in the possession of another, I had viewed the ap 
 pendages of greatness, the pomp and state affected by the aristo 
 crat, with careless, if not contemptuous indifference. I had 
 reverence for them only when connected with high intellect or 
 pure virtue ; but when I found myself possessed of these hitherto 
 despised attributes when I saw them centered around my own 
 person, and found that there was dominion in them how 
 proudly my heart exulted beneath its burden of external greatness ! 
 There is a secret love of power in every heart. In mine that 
 love had become a passion, from the day such abundant means 
 had been opened for its gratification. 
 
 " The house in which I had spent my year of mourning, was 
 on a smaller estate in a distant county, and I had never seen 
 Ashton till a sudden turn in the road brought us in full view of 
 it. With an impulse of admiration I checked the carriage. 
 Before me was the seat of my ancestors, and around, on either 
 hand, as far as the eye could reach, extended my domains. The 
 village lay in the undulating distance, amid fields of waving corn 
 and rich pasture-lands, that swelled greenly up to the horizon. 
 The groves of heavy timber through which we passed, the vene 
 rable residence of my forefathers, whic,h had never for an hour 
 
A NEW WORLD. 91 
 
 been out of the direct line of my race all lay within my gaze, 
 and all were mine mine ! How proudly the consciousness of 
 possession throbbed at my heart ! 
 
 " The house of my ancestors was a vast and imposing pile. In 
 its construction the architecture of two distinct ages was blended, 
 without in any way destroying the harmony and grandeur of the 
 whole. The lofty and turreted building which formed the cen 
 tral front, towered upward in dusky and gothic magnificence. 
 The impress of by-gone centuries was graven upon it like furrows 
 upon the brow of an aged man. The wings, which spread out 
 on either side behind the tall old trees that flung a cheerful dra 
 pery around them, were of more recent creation by three centu 
 ries, yet they were built of the same dark, pondrous stone, and 
 their massive strength was in excellent keeping with the original 
 building. 
 
 " The breeze which swept by us was heavy with fragrance, 
 and the glow of an extensive flower-garden broke up from the 
 shadow of the building, and could be seen at intervals through 
 the intervening shrubbery, even from the distance at which 
 we halted. A lawn of the richest sward fell with a long, 
 gradual slope from the mansion, till it was lost in the deep leafy 
 shadows of a park, which was almost a forest in extent and 
 denseness of foliage. Some of the finest old oaks in the kingdom 
 grew within it, overshadowing a hundred winding paths, inter 
 sected by a bright stream, which flowed capriciously through the 
 knotted roots, now flashing across a vista, and again leaping off 
 in a foaming cascade, sending out a clear, bell-like music from 
 the green depths, then starting away again, scarcely breaking 
 the hush of the wood in its soft and pleasant progress. 
 
 " Our road lay through the outskirts of the park, and the 
 half-tamed deer came out of their coverts and gazed on us, as 
 we passed by, with their dark intelligent eyes, then bounded 
 away through the firm old oaks, as if they, too, would hold some 
 share in the general rejoicing. I shall never forget the strong 
 and thrilling delight of that hour. 
 
92 MAKYDERWENT. 
 
 " The first night spent beneath the roof of my inheritance was 
 one of restlessness and inquietude. My brain was thronged with 
 shifting and brilliant visions, and I lay with sleepless eyes and 
 aching temples, extended on my silken bed, exhausted and weary 
 with pleasurable excitement. I shall never forget the delight 
 with which I half rose in the morning and looked about my sump 
 tuous apartment, while Varnham was quietly sleeping, un 
 moved by the change which had made me almost forgetful of him. 
 
 " The sun was stealing through rose-colored curtains of the 
 richest silk, which fell heavily over the windows, and shed a 
 mellow and blooming light through the room. Pale green dra 
 pery, lined with the same soft rose-tint, looped and fringed with 
 gold, fell from the canopy above my couch, and swept the Per 
 sian carpet which spread away in a succession of brilliant and 
 yet subdued colors over the floor. The foot sunk deep into its 
 moss-like texture when it was trod upon, and it seemed breaking 
 into bloom beneath me, so natural did the gorgeous flowers glow 
 out in the tinted light. Two exquisite cabinet pictures hung 
 before me, and my recumbent form was reflected back by a tall 
 mirror as I half leaned out of bed, that I might comprehend in 
 one view all the luxurious arrangement of my chamber. 
 
 " There was a charm flung over everything ; for all was en 
 joyed for the first time, and all was mine ! My own beauty 
 never before seemed so rich as when it was revealed to me in 
 that broad mirror, and after I had become satisfied with dwell 
 ing on the splendor which surrounded me, I turned with newly 
 aroused vanity to gaze upon myself upon the long and beauti 
 ful hair which, in my restlessness, had broken loose over my 
 shoulders in all the golden gloss of youth upon 
 
 " But my husband awoke, and I sunk to my pillow, blushing 
 and ashamed of this overweening selfishness ; for in all that I 
 had looked upon, he was forgotten. I had in my heart given 
 him no share, and when he arose and kissed my cheek, and 
 spoke in his old familiar voice, it seemed as if that gentle kiss 
 flung coldness upon my aspiring wishes. 
 
ANEWWOBLD. 93 
 
 " Everything rich and beautiful had been lavished by my pre 
 decessor in the adornment of Ashton. Paintings of priceless 
 worth lined its galleries, and sculptured marble started up at 
 every turn to charm me with the pure and classic loveliness 
 of statuary. Tables of rare mosaic ancient tapestry and 
 articles of virtu, gathered from all quarters of the globe, were 
 collected there ; my taste for the arts my love of the beautiful, 
 made it almost a paradise, and it was long before I wearied of 
 the almost regal magnificence which surrounded me. But after 
 a time these things became familiar ; excitement gradually wore 
 away, and my now restless spirit panted for change for deeper 
 draughts from the sparkling cup, which I had found so pleasant 
 in tasting. 
 
 " As the season advanced I proposed going up to London ; 
 Varnham consented, but reluctantly ; I saw this almost without 
 notice ; the time had passed when his wishes predominated over 
 mine. I had become selfish and unyielding in my aggrandizement. 
 I wished him to fling aside the dignified and unostentatious con 
 tentment of a heart which found sufficient resources for happi 
 ness in its own exceeding purity and cultivation, and to tread 
 hand in hand with me the dazzling path through which I had 
 begun to lead so proudly. But it was not in his nature ; there 
 was too much of calmness and quiet too little of aspiring energy 
 in his disposition to assimilate with mine. In short, he was 
 too good had too much of real loftiness of mind to sacrifice 
 his intellectual ease to the idols which I was so ready to bow 
 before. 
 
 " Varnham was not ambitious, but he was essentially a proud 
 man. He sought not and cared not for station and renown, but 
 guarded well the dignity of his own upright heart the treasure 
 of his firm self esteem. In those days I was not capable of 
 appreciating the rare combinations of a character like his, and 
 took that for weakness which was in truth the highest degree of 
 moral and mental strength. 
 
 " There was a disparity in our condition which must have pained 
 
94 MARYDEKWENT. 
 
 him, though he gave no outward demonstrations of it. Ho 
 was not master of his own dwelling. It was his wife s house 
 which he inhabited, not his own. In all things a secondary 
 object, his position was a false one, and there could be no 
 happiness in it. But I was young then young, full of bright, 
 vague projects, and never dreamed that, in my thoughtless pride, 
 I was pulling down the pillars of my own safety : that in thus 
 planting myself in front of my husband before the world, I was 
 degrading him in his estimation, and from his station in my own. 
 heart. 
 
 " I am certain that Yarnham doubted my strength to resist 
 the temptations of a season in town. It was a groundless fear ; 
 there was nothing in the heartless supercilious people of fashion, 
 whom I met to captivate a heart like mine. I was young, beauti 
 ful, new, and soon became the fashion the envy of women, 
 and the worshipped idol of men. I was not for a moment de 
 luded by the homage lavished upon me. I received the worship, 
 but in my heart despised the worshippers. No ! I passed through 
 the whirl and brilliant bustle of a London season unscathed in. 
 heart and mind. My conquest over the circle of fashion had 
 been too easily obtained. There was nothing to gratify a higher 
 feeling than vanity in it, and from the impulses of empty self- 
 love alone I was in no danger. Nothing seemed capable of 
 filling the strange void in my life, I possessed power and all that 
 makes power of value, but the men and women on whom it could 
 be exercised disappointed me terribly. 
 
 " One advantage was gained to Varnham which was little to be 
 expected. I had always cherished a beau ideal in my mind 
 which he failed to reach. Until my residence in London, I had 
 never had an opportunity to compare him with the great mass 
 of men. But when this privilege was given me, how infinitely 
 did he rise above the throng of lordly exquisites, the literary 
 pretenders and cold-blooded politicians, who surrounded me with 
 their homage. I felt that I had never truly estimated the calm 
 dignity of his mind before ; but even then I did not love him as 
 
A NEW WORLD. 95 
 
 I felt myself capable of loving. The pure, sisterly affection I 
 had ever felt for him the esteem and even tenderness with which 
 I met him on the first day of our union, returned wholly to my 
 heart, but that was not love at least, not the love of a soul like 
 mine. 
 
 " Varnham did not entirely relinquish his rectorship, but gave 
 its emoluments to the curate who performed the duties, reserving 
 the house which we both loved, to ourselves. He went down to 
 the old place occasionally, and though I never accompanied him, 
 it was pleasant to know that the haunts of my early love were 
 still kept sacred. When the season broke up I invited a party 
 to Ashton, but Varuham persuaded me to spend the month which 
 would intervene before its arrival, at the parsonage. I was 
 weary with the rush and bustle of my town life, and willingly 
 consented to his plan. 
 
 " Our house was shut up, the servants went down to Ashton, 
 and Varnham, one friend and myself, settled quietly in our own 
 former home. The repose of that beautiful valley had some 
 thing heavenly in it, after the turmoil of London. Old associ 
 ations came up to soften the heart, and I was happier than I 
 had been since coming in possession of my inheritance. 
 
 " The friend whom Varnham invited to share the quiet of the 
 parsonage with us, had made himself conspicuous as a young 
 man of great talent in the lower house ; yet I knew less of him 
 than of almost any distinguished person in society. We had 
 met often in the whirl of town life, but a few passing words and 
 cold compliments alone marked our intercourse. There was 
 something of reserve and stiffness in his manner, by no means 
 flattering to my self-love, and I was rather prejudiced against 
 him than otherwise from his extreme popularity. 
 
 " There was something in my nature which refused to glide 
 tamely down the current of other people s opinions, and the sud 
 den rise of young Murray with his political party, the adulation 
 lavished upon him by the lion-loving women of fashion, only 
 served to excite my contempt for them, and to make me with- 
 
96 MARYDEKWENT. 
 
 hold from him the high opinion justly earned by talents of no 
 ordinary character. 
 
 " When he took his seat in our travelling carriage, it was with 
 his usual cold and almost uncourteous manner ; but by degrees 
 all restraint wore off, his conversational powers were excited, 
 and I found myself listening with a degree of admiration seldom 
 aroused in my bosom, to his brilliant off-hand eloquence. Yarn- 
 ham seemed pleased that my former unreasonable prejudices were 
 yielding to the charm of his friend s genius and our ride was 
 one of the most agreeable of my then pleasant life. 
 
 " It was not till after we had been at the parsonage several 
 days, that the speeches which had so suddenly lifted our guest 
 into notice, came under my observation. I was astonished at 
 their depth and soundness. There was depth and brilliancy, 
 flashes of rich, strong poetry, mingled with the argument a vivid, 
 quick eloquence in the style, that stirred my heart like martial 
 music. By degrees the great wealth of Murray s intellect, the 
 manly strength and tenderness of his nature, revealed themselves. 
 His character was a grand one ; I could look up to that man with 
 my whole being, and grow prouder from the homage. 
 
 " A love of intellectual greatness, a worship of mind, had ever 
 been a leading trait in my character. In that man I found more 
 than mind. He was strong in principle, rich in feeling, deep 
 earnest feeling, which a great soul might battle against if duty 
 commanded, and restrain, but never wholly conquer. 
 
 "We had mistaken each other, and there lay the danger. I 
 had believed him cold and ambitious. He had looked upon 
 Lady Granby as a frivolous, selfish woman, who would be for 
 ever quaffing the foam of life but never reach the pure wine ; 
 one with whom it was hardly worth while to become ac 
 quainted. 
 
 " A few days in the old parsonage house sufficed to enlighten 
 us both. There I was natural, gentle, loving glad to get among 
 innocent things again. In those little rooms I forgot everything 
 but the pleasure of being at home. Weeks passed before I knew 
 
ANEW WORLD. 97 
 
 why that home had been turned into a paradise to which all pre 
 vious memories were as nothing. 
 
 " I think he recognized the evil that was creeping over us first, 
 for he began to avoid me, and for a time, though in the same 
 house, we scarcely spoke together. 
 
 " But he loved me spite of his struggles, his sensitive honor, his 
 iron resolves ; he loved me, his friend s wife, but he was strong 
 and honorable. The mighty spirit which had taken possession 
 of his heart unawares, could not all at once be driven forth, but 
 it had no power to overcome his integrity. He was too brave 
 and loyal for domestic treason. 
 
 " This nobility of character was enough to chain my soul to his 
 forever. I did not attempt to deceive myself ; well I knew 
 that the sweet but terrible power growing up in my life was a 
 sin to be atoned for with years of suffering, for souls like ours 
 must avenge themselves for the wrong feelings, more certainly 
 than ordinary natures find retribution for evil deeds. 
 
 " When the first knowledge came upon me that I loved my 
 husband s friend, it overwhelmed me with consternation. The 
 danger of a thing like this had never entered my thoughts my 
 heart had been asleep its awaking frightened me. Mine was 
 not a mad passion that defies human laws, and moral ties, or that 
 deceives itself with sophistry. Never for a moment did I at 
 tempt to justify or excuse it. I knew that such love would have 
 changed my whole being to gentleness, holiness, humility, any 
 thing bright and good, had freedom made it innocent ; but I 
 never once thought of breaking the ties that bound me. If I was 
 a slave, my own will had riveted the chains upon my wrist ; I 
 was not one to tear them off because the iron began to gall 
 me. 
 
 " No, no ; the love that I bore him was deep and fervent, but 
 not weak. It might kill, but never degrade me. I believed it 
 then, I am certain of it now. I have trampled on my heart. It 
 has been crushed, broken, thrust aside but the love of that man 
 lives there yet. I struggled against it tortured my heart into 
 
 7 
 
98 MAKYDEKWENT. 
 
 madness fled with this clinging love into the depths of the 
 wilderness to the wilderness, but it lives here yet it lives 
 here yet." 
 
 Catharine Montour pressed one hand upon her heart, as she 
 spoke ; her face was pallid with an expression of unutterable 
 pain. Her eyes seemed to plead with the missionary for pity. 
 
 He answered that appeal with looks of sorrowful compassion. 
 
 " There was confidence between us at last ; each knew that 
 the other suffered, and that the other loved. 
 
 " I have said that Murray was an honorable man, but his love 
 was a tyrant, or it would never have been expressed. He was no 
 tempter, nor was I one to be tempted. It was in his goodness 
 that our strength lay, for we were strong and in every act of our 
 lives faithful to the duties that chained us. 
 
 " Murray seized upon this passion with his grasping intellect, 
 and strove to force it into friendship, or into that deceptive, Pla 
 tonic sentiment which is neither friendship nor love. My heart 
 followed him my mind kept pace with his anything that did 
 not separate us, and which was not degradation, I was strong 
 enough to endure. We could not give up each other s society ; 
 that we did not even attempt, for both felt its impossibility. 
 
 CHAPTER XV. 
 
 STRUGGLES AND PENALTIES. 
 
 " VARNHAM was absent when our confession was first looked, 
 then breathed, and at last desperately uttered. He had been 
 gone more than a week making preparations for our return to 
 Ashton. Had every action of our lives been counted during that 
 time, the most austere moralist could have detected no wrong. 
 The sin with us was too subtle and deep for human eyes, even 
 
STRUGGLES AND PENALTIES. 99 
 
 for our own. We could not believe that feelings which had no 
 evil wish, might be in themselves evil. But when my husband 
 returned, the pang of shame and regret that fell upon us should 
 have been proof enough of wrong. When had we ever blushed 
 and trembled in his presence before ? 
 
 " We were alone, Murray and myself, in the little boudoir which 
 I have mentioned so often. He was sitting on the sofa to which 
 my husband had so tenderly lifted me on the night before my 
 mother s funeral, reading one of my favorite Italian poets. I sat 
 a little way off, listening to the deep, melody of his voice, watch 
 ing the alternate fire and shadow that played within the depths 
 of his large eyes, the clear, bold expression of his forehead, and 
 the smile upon his lips, which seemed imbued with the soft 
 poetry that dropped in melody from them. 
 
 " I had forgotten everything for the time, and was lost in the 
 first bewildering dream which follows, with its delicious quietude, 
 the entire outpouring of the soul ; when thought itself arises but 
 as sweet exhalation from the one grand passion which pervades 
 the whole being ; when even a sense of wrong but haunts the 
 heart as the bee slumbers within the urn of a flower, rendered 
 inert and stingless by the wealth of honey which surrounds it. 
 
 " Murray had been bred in society, and could not so readily 
 fling off the consciousness of our position. A shadow, darker 
 than the words of his author warranted, settled on his brow as 
 he read, and more than once he raised h-is eyes from the page in 
 the middle of a sentence, and fixed them with a serious and al 
 most melancholy earnestness on my face. Then I would inter 
 rupt his thoughts with some of the pleasant words which love 
 sends up from the full heart, naturally as song gushes from 
 the bosom of a nightingale. He would muse a moment after 
 this and resume his book, allowing his voice to revel in the 
 melody of the language, then hurry on with a stern and ab 
 rupt emphasis, as one who strives by rapidity of utterance to 
 conquer painful thoughts. 
 
 " I was not conscious of it, but tears gathered in my eyes 
 
100 MAKY DERWENT. 
 
 while they were yet steadfastly fixed on Murray s, and when he 
 looked up, the expression of my face must have told him some 
 thing of what was passing in my mind, of the restlessness, doubt, 
 and terror. I could not endure to see him look grave. He 
 threw down his book, and by gentle words, strove to win me 
 again to cheerfulness. He was murmuring over soft fragments 
 of the poem he had been reading, resolutely abandoning himself 
 to the happiness of the moment, when there was a rustling among 
 the shrubbery beneath the window, and quick footsteps smote 
 along the gravel walk leading to the balcony. 
 
 " Every footfall jarred upon my ear like the vibrations of a bell. 
 The sudden recoil of my heart was suffocating, then its deep, 
 heavy throbbings grew almost audible. I felt the blood ebbing 
 away from my face, and a faintness was upon me. Murray start 
 ed and grasped my hand with a violence that pained me. 
 
 " Lady Granby, be yourself, why do you tremble, have we 
 in wish or act wronged this man ? 
 
 " No no ; the angels of Heaven might bear us witness but 
 I have a secret here, and oh, God, forgive me, I am not glad to 
 see him/ 
 
 " And I, he said, turning pale, am I the cause of this terror? 
 indeed, lady, it is better that we part now this weak 
 ness 
 
 " The very thought of his departure drove me wild, I am 
 not weak nor wicked either, I said with a proud smile ; see, if 
 I prove so 1 
 
 " Then wringing my hand from his grasp, I deliberately opened 
 the sash-door, and went out to meet my husband. He was al 
 ready upon the balcony, and sprang forward to greet me with 
 more earger affection than I had ever witnessed in him before. 
 During one moment I was drawn to his bosom unresistingly. I 
 was faint with agitation. He must have felt me tremble, but 
 evidently imputed the emotion to joy at his sudden return ; with 
 his arms about my waist, he drew me into the room. Oh, how 
 thoroughly I loathed the hypocrisy which one forbidden feeling 
 
STRUGGLES AND ? f, X A L 1 I E H - 
 
 had imposed on the future ! Murray nerved himself for the in 
 terview, and stood up, pale and collected, to receive his late 
 riend. When he saw my position, a faint flush shot over his 
 forehead, but his forced composure was in nothing else dis 
 turbed. 
 
 " I put away my husband s arm and sunk to a seat, overwhelm 
 ed with a painful consciousness of the moral degradation I had 
 heaped upon myself. 
 
 " Murray went up to London on the next day ; a few brief 
 words of farewell were all that could be granted me. I went 
 away by myself and wept bitterly. In my secret thoughts, I 
 reproached him that he could leave me to the bitter task of conceal 
 ment without his support, burthened as he knew my heart must 
 be with anxieties and feelings which I might never reveal. 
 
 " From no other human being could I claim sympathy or coun 
 sel ; I felt the necessity of his absence, but was deeply pained by 
 it. Deceit was a hard burthen to impose on a heart frank and 
 confiding like mine. I felt to the depths of my soul tha,t in this 
 one secret, I had sacrificed the birthright of a free spirit for 
 ever. My very thoughts travelled after Murray ; he filled my 
 whole life. I gloried in the voluntary bondage which he had 
 imposed upon himself. 
 
 " The society of my husband grew wearisome, and yet I said 
 again and again to myself, We have done him no wrong, this love 
 which fills my heart never was his never existed before, it is pure 
 and honorable/ As I said this my cheek burned with the falsehood. 
 Was not deception itself a sin ! Oh, how many painful apprehen 
 sions haunted my imagination. For two days I was tormented 
 by shadowy evils. My mornings were full of inquietude, and 
 my sleep was not rest. Then came his first letter, so considerate 
 and gentle, so full of manly solicitude for my peace of mind. I 
 flung aside all doubt and self-distrust. Happiness sprung back 
 to my heart like a glad infant to its mother s bosom. The earth 
 seemed bursting into blossom around me. Again I surrendered 
 my spirit to its first sweet dream of contentment, and strove to 
 
102 M A Ji 1 DEKWENT. 
 
 convince myself that feelings were harmless till they sprang into 
 evil actions. When my intellect refused this sophistry, 1 reso 
 lutely cast all thought aside. 
 
 " Murray joined us at Ashton. Among the guests who spent 
 Christmas with us, was a young lady of refined and pleasant 
 manners, the orphan of a noble family, whose entailed property 
 had fallen to a distant heir on the death of her father. Thus 
 she was left almost penniless, dependent on a wealthy aunt, who 
 seemed anxious to get rid of her trust with as little expense as 
 possible. 
 
 " My sympathy was excited in the young lady s behalf, for her 
 coarse relative supplied her but sparingly with the means of sup 
 porting her station in society, and in her vulgar eagerness to 
 have the poor girl settled and off her hands, was continually 
 compromising her delicacy and wounding her pride. 
 
 " Louisa was reserved, and somewhat cold in her disposition, 
 but my feelings had been enlisted in her behalf, and I contrived by 
 every little stratagem in my power, to supply her want of wealth, 
 and to shield her from the match-making schemes of her aunt. 
 
 "Being much in my society, she was thrown into constant 
 companionship with Muiray. He did not at first seem interested 
 in her, for she was retiring and not really beautiful, but by de 
 grees the gentle sweetness of her character won its way to his 
 heart, and he seemed pleased with her society, but there was 
 nothing in the intimacy to alarm me. I was rather gratified than 
 otherwise that he should be interested in my protegee. 
 
 " When we again took up our residence in town, I occasion 
 ally acted as chaperon to Miss Jameson, but as my hope center 
 ed more trustfully around one object, my taste for general society 
 diminished, and I surrounded myself with a small circle of dis 
 tinguished individuals, and mingled but little in the dissipations 
 of the world, where her aunt was continually forcing her to ex 
 hibit herself. I was still interested in her, but the repulsive 
 coarseness of her relative prevented a thorough renewal of the 
 intimacy which had existed while she was yet my guest. 
 
THE STOLEN VISIT. 103 
 
 11 A year passed by, in which had been crowded a whole life of 
 mingled happiness and misery, a dreamy tumultuous year, that 
 had been one long struggle to preserve the love which had be 
 come a portion of my soul, and to maintain that integrity of 
 thought and deed, without which life would be valueless. My 
 love for Murray was in no way diminished, but its character had 
 changed. The first sweet dream of happiness which came with 
 the early outpouring of my heart, had departed forever. A set 
 tled foreboding of separation and evil had chastened my expec 
 tations, and instead of looking forward with hope, my spirit gra 
 dually gathered up its strength to meet its destined fate when 
 ever it might come. 
 
 " Love is almost intuitive in its perceptions. Long before I 
 had any proof, I felt that Murray was changed. He strove to 
 deceive me strove to deceive himself ; but the very means which 
 he took to delude away the reason of both, served to fasten the 
 truth upon my heart. I had made his nature a study, and when 
 I saw him day by day becoming more respectful, more gentle 
 and compassionate in his manner towards me, I knew that there 
 would soon be no hope. It was not in his nature to turn rudely 
 and crush the being who loved him ; but what mattered it how 
 the steel was tempered, so long as the blade struck home ? 
 
 CHAPTER XVI. 
 
 THE STOLEN VISIT. 
 
 " THE blow fell at length ; Murray was about to be married. 
 He did not allow mo to be tortured by public rumor, but came 
 and told me with his own lips. 
 
 " I had been very sad all the morning, and when I heard 
 

 104: MAKY DEE WENT. 
 
 his familiar knock at the street door, and the footsteps 
 to which my heart had never yet failed to thrill, approach 
 ing my boudoir, a dark presentiment fell upon me, and I 
 trembled as if a death-watch was sounding in my ears. But I 
 had learned to conceal my feelings, and sat quietly in my 
 cushioned chair, occupied with a piece of fine needle-work, when 
 he entered. 
 
 " He was deeply agitated, and his hand shook violently when I 
 arose to receive him. Mine was steady. I was not about to 
 heap misery on the heart that had clung to me. He spoke of 
 those days at the parsonage ; of the dreams, those impossible 
 dreams, out of which we were to win happiness, innocent happi 
 ness to ourselves a happiness that should wrong no one, and 
 yet fill our whole lives. He spoke of it all as a dream a sad, 
 mocking delusion, which was like feeding the soul on husks. It 
 was in vain, he said, to deceive ourselves longer ; the love which 
 had existed he did not say still existed between us, must inevi 
 tably perish under the restraints which honor and conscience 
 imposed. We were sure of nothing, not even of those brief 
 moments of social intercourse which society allows to those who 
 have no secret feelings to conceal. 
 
 " I lifted my hand. Why listen to these arguments ? Had I 
 not felt the cruelty of this bondage ? and yet how impossible it 
 was for me to cast it off. He was a man, and had more strength, 
 unoccupied energies, and a broader field of action, from which 
 this ill-fated passion kept him back. But I would not think of 
 this ; one reason alone presented itself to my mind he had 
 ceased to love me. The restraints of our position had worn out 
 his patience. He was ready to leave me forever, and for whom ? 
 
 " With an intuition born of the pain he had inflicted, I felt cer 
 tain that Murray had resolved on some decisive step, and would 
 forge new ties and another destiny for himself. Perhaps even 
 then his heart was filled by another. 
 
 " The uplifting of my hand had silenced him. He stood before 
 me very pale, with locked features, and eyes glittering with pain. 
 
THE STOLEN VISIT. 105 
 
 " I neither expostulated nor reasoned, but with a calmness 
 which startled even myself, I inquired the name of my rival. 
 
 " It was Louisa Jameson, the creature whom I had cherished 
 even as a sister. No matter, I had nerved myself to bear all. 
 If my heart trembled, no emotion stirred my face. He had not 
 yet proposed, but he knew that she loved him, and her position 
 was one to excite his compassion. She was so helpless and 
 gentle ; the time must come, he knew, when we would regard 
 each other as sisters. This marriage would help us both to for 
 get the past. Still he would not propose unless I consented. 
 He had come to throw himself on my generosity. 
 
 " I did consent. Measuredly and coldly the words were spoken, 
 but they did not satisfy him. He would have me feel willing 
 his happiness should not be secured at the expense of mine, if 
 from my whole heart I could not resign him. No advantage 
 should be taken of a freedom rendered only from the lips. 
 
 " There was bitterness in my heart that kept up its strength, 
 for his words seemed like mockery. He had flung me to the 
 dust, and asked me to smile while his foot was trampling me 
 there. I tried to dissemble; why should I show him the ruin he 
 was making ? would it take back the words he had spoken ? 
 would he love me again ? Could I love him ? Never. There 
 was nothing of hate or dislike, scarcely indignation, in my heart 
 certainly no wish for vengeance ; but I would have been torn to 
 atoms by wild horses, rather than have let him see how much I 
 suffered. I would have dropped dead at his feet, could that have 
 convinced him that I, too, had ceased to love, and had bowed 
 before the cold reason which had conquered him. 
 
 "My heart was like a rock, hardened with pride and 
 agony. 
 
 " Oh, how calm I was after he left me ! I took up that 
 piece of fine needlework, and finished the pattern neatly, 
 very neatly ; my fingers never quivered for an instant ; the needle 
 went in and out rapidly ; its glitter dazzled my sight, yet I 
 worked on, faster and faster, till the muslin dropped from my 
 
106 MARY DERWENT. 
 
 hands. I had no power to take it up, but sat there helplessly 
 gazing on it. 
 
 " For three whole hours, I remained numb and still. At last, 
 my maid came to remind me of a ball and supper to which I was 
 engaged. 
 
 " I arose, and bade her array me in my gayest apparel. Never 
 do I remember myself so beautiful as on that night. There was 
 fever in my cheek, the fire of a tortured spirit a wild, sparkling 
 wit flashed from my lips, and among the gay and the lovely 
 I was most gay and most recklessly brilliant. 
 
 " I was among the last of the revelers, when I sprang to my 
 carriage, waving kisses to my noble escort, and was whirled 
 away amid the light of attendant flambeaux. There was many 
 a heart that envied the beautiful and happy Lady Granby. 
 Why not ? Did they see the sudden recoil of that overtasked 
 spirit, or follow me home to witness dark shadows gather around 
 the eyes they had admired, and the hollow whiteness of my 
 cheek, when the glittering raiment had been removed from my 
 form, and the flowers unwreathed from my hair ? They never 
 dreamed of the sharp pain that shot through my side, nor saw 
 the red blood-drops springing to my lips as I lay tremblimg and 
 exhausted on the floor of my dressing-room, while my frightened 
 attendant bathed my temples and wept over me. All were 
 deceived, even Murray, for he was at the ball. It was no pale, 
 forlorn creature that he saw there, but a proud woman radiant 
 with diamonds, queenly from the homage which she excited and 
 received. Varnham was down at Ashton, and the relief of soli 
 tude, at least, was at my command. 
 
 " Murray called in the morning, for we were to be friends still. 
 I had suffered much during the night, but I put rouge on my 
 pallid cheeks, and with forced cheerfulness went down to 
 receive him. He appeared ill at ease. Perhaps he feared 
 reproaches after I recovered from the first effect of his desertion, 
 but the anguish it had wrought was too deep for tears or weak 
 complaints ; when the death-blow conies, we cease to struggle. 
 
THE STOLEN VISIT. 107 
 
 " Men are willing to believe that which they most desire, and 
 Murray readily persuaded himself that my outward appearance 
 of contentment was real : that wounded pride and, perhaps, a 
 passing disappointment, was all he had to reproach himself with 
 inflicting. He seemed relieved and really grateful ; we should 
 yet be very happy, he said. The fortitude with which I had 
 consented to his union with my friend, had ensured his respect 
 forever. I should henceforth be to him as a very dear sister ; to 
 Louisa, a generous friend. 
 
 " Murray was sincere in all this ; he resolutely deceived himself 
 into a belief of his own wishes. I went through the scene 
 bravely; no word or look betrayed the agony forced back to the 
 solitude of my own bosom. I had no weak, feminine wish that 
 he should be appalled by the pain he had inflicted. 
 
 " I ascertained that Miss Jameson s aunt had refused to bestow 
 a fortune with her niece, and I knew that Murray was far, far 
 from wealthy enough to meet the expenses of an establishment 
 befitting his rank. I could not bear that his fine mind should be 
 cramped by the petty annoyances of a limited income, nor his wife 
 forever crushed beneath the humiliating consciousness of poverty. 
 Yarnham never allowed himself to exceed his own little income, 
 and the revenues of the Granby estates far exceeded our general 
 expenditure. It was therefore easy for me to raise a sum 
 sufficient to endow my rival, and thus indirectly secure a com 
 petence to him. 
 
 11 1 gave orders to my agent that twenty thousand pounds 
 should be immediately raised for me. When the sum was 
 secured, I went privately to the house of my rival, and, with lit 
 tle persuasion, induced her parsimonious relative to present it to 
 Miss Jameson, as the gift of her own generosity. I knew that 
 my secret was safe, for she was a worldly woman, and was not 
 likely to deprive herself of the eclat of a generous deed, by expos 
 ing my share in it. 
 
 " There was something in the performance of this act which 
 softened my feelings, and when I left the old lady s apartment, 
 
108 M A Ii Y D E K W E N T . 
 
 and descended the stairs, it was with a gentler and more resigned 
 sensation than I had known for days. The sound of a horse 
 stopping upon the pavement, made me start back like a guilty 
 thing. The drawing-room door was ajar, and I saw Louisa Jameson 
 rise from her seat and glide to a window, her eyes sparkling, and 
 her cheeks flushed with expectation. A quick, double knock, and 
 Murray entered. He gave his hat carelessly to a servant, as one 
 who had a right to claim instant attendance ; then I saw his 
 eyes kindle, and an answering smile greet hers when his affianced 
 bride came forward to meet him. 
 
 " I drew back upon the stairs, faint with the heavy throb 
 bing of my heart ; I heard their low voices mingle, saw their 
 hands clasp, and their lips meet. I saw him draw her gently to 
 a sofa, and then my eyes grew dim. I felt that I was fainting, 
 but had yet power over the anguish that tortured me. I was 
 obliged to support myself by the bannister, but made my way 
 unobserved into the street. They were too happily occupied for 
 notice of the wretched woman who had thus exposed her heart 
 to another blow, that she might do them a service. 
 
 " His saddle-horse, the same that had borne him to my door 
 almost every morning for a year, stood upon the pavement. It 
 was a noble beast, and had been the companion of our rides at 
 Ashton. My own favorite horse had been purchased to match 
 him. I was on foot, without attendant, and wore a large close 
 bonnet, that none might recognize me near the house of my rival, 
 but the sagacious creature knew me spite of this disguise. He 
 began to paw the stones, and curved his head round with a low, 
 whimpering neigh, as I passed by. How soothingly any token 
 of attachment, even from the lowliest animal, goes to a desolate 
 heart. I could not resist the impulse, but turned back and 
 patted the beautiful animal s neck, as I have been wont to do in 
 happier days. 
 
 " Have a care, miss/ said the man who held him, he is apt to 
 be skittish with strangers. I never saw but one lady that was 
 not afraid of him. 
 
THE WEDDING FESTIVAL. 109 
 
 " l And wlio was that T I inquired, gathering the thick veil 
 more closely over my face. 
 
 " Oh, the Lady Granby, God bless her ; I should like to see 
 the horse she could not manage. Bluebuck was always like 
 a lamb when she was near, and would snuff round and eat bread 
 from her little white hand as daintily as a lap-dog Why ! 
 
 " John/ said a voice from the window, you may take Bluebuck 
 away. I shall walk home/ 
 
 " I grasped my veil tighter, and hurried forward as if caught 
 in some disgraceful act. A moment after, the groom galloped by 
 me, nodding and smiling with a freedom which my own fami 
 liarity had warranted. This act, in itself, was sufficient proof 
 that I was unknown, but the proud blood mounted to my cheek, 
 and I felt as if his servant had offered me an indignity as if I 
 should never be respected or loved again. 
 
 CHAPTER XVII. 
 
 THE WEDDING FESTIVAL. 
 
 " I ENTERED that house once again, to see the man whom I 
 could never cease to love, wedded to another. The pang with 
 which I received the invitation to that wedding was keener than 
 any pain death will bring but I gave no tokens of the anguish 
 that consumed me. It was strange, but I felt a kind of gladiator s 
 pleasure in goading my heart on to madness a stern, unrelent 
 ing love of self-torture. I resolved to be present at the marriage. 
 
 " I strove to rest, but could not. In vain I loosened the 
 golden cords and darkened my sumptuous couch with its wealth 
 of drapery. In vain I heaped its pillows of down, and drew the 
 sheets of fine linen over my head. The pain rankling in my heart 
 would not be appeased. Still I sought for rest. Should I go 
 
110 MARY DKKWENT, 
 
 with my sunken eyes and pallid looks to his wedding festival ? 
 and that to come on the morrow ? Sleep sleep, I must have sleep, 
 for smiles and bloom would be wanted on the coming day ; after 
 that, I cared not ; for it seemed as if my destiny would be con 
 summated then. 
 
 " I went to my dressing-table and poured out laudanum, a 
 large quantity; but some was shed over the table, for my hand shook 
 as I emptied the vial. I cared not if the sleep it brought should 
 prove eternal. The cup was of gold from which I drank the po 
 tion, and its jewelled rim sparkled in the flame of my night-lamp, 
 as I raised it to my lips. I would have given it with all the vast 
 wealth from which it had been purchased, for one hour of sweet, 
 calm slumber. But it could not be ; a heavy sense of suffering 
 settled upon my frame, and that was all. My body became 
 stupid, but there was no oblivion to the intense workings of the 
 mind. 
 
 " The morning found me in my dressing-room, buried in the 
 velvet depths of an easy-chair, with my eyes wide open, as they 
 had been the whole night. A dressing-mirror swung on its stand 
 before me, and an image, which I shuddered to recognize as the 
 reflection of myself, seemed watching my wretchedness with sad, 
 heavy eyes, that would not close. I buried my face in my dress, 
 that I might not be haunted by the picture of my own misery, 
 for I had no strength to wheel the chair away, or remove the 
 mirror. 
 
 " I must have slept awhile, for when I raised my face again, 
 broad sunshine was streaming through the window-drapery, and 
 a clock on the mantel-piece beat nine. 
 
 " In one hour he was to be married. 
 
 " I rang the bell and ordered that my dress should be as 
 splendid as possible, but took no further note of the costly robes 
 which my bewildered maid brought out for my choice. I gave 
 directions, but abandoned myself wholly to her taste, not caring 
 that the splendor in which she arrayed me was little befitting the 
 early hour, so long as it shed life over the deathly hue of my fea- 
 
THE WEDDING FESTIVAL. Ill 
 
 tares. She had spoken to me more than once, but I gave no answer, 
 only exclaiming sharply from time to time, hasten hasten 
 no matter if the gems do gird my forehead. Set them even, but 
 hasten. 7 My eyes were fixed all the time on the clock, whose 
 pointer had crept round the dial, and almost touched the hour. 
 
 " Hasten, quick quick, I almost shrieked, starting up. 
 
 " But my toilet was not completed ; she held me by the arm, 
 unlocked a slender band of chased gold from my arm, and flung it 
 carelessly aside to make room for the magnificent bracelet which 
 she had drawn from its casket. I dashed the glittering bauble 
 from her hold, and seized upon the precious circlet with a shaking 
 hand, which refused to lock it on my wrist again. That bracelet 
 was his gift. It had never left my arm since his hands had 
 placed it there. It maddened me that its clasp should have 
 been undone by a menial, and on that day. 
 
 11 1 gave one glance at the mirror before I went out. Excite 
 ment had begun its work of beauty ; a startling brilliancy was 
 in my eyes, and a feverish red bloomed in either cheek. My 
 terrified Frenchwoman had performed her task bravely. Jewels 
 flashed in my hair, and shed a starry brightness over my arms 
 and neck ; my poor heart trembled, like a wounded bird, beneath 
 a girdle that might have won a prince s ransom. Oh, it was all 
 a sad, sad mockery ! 
 
 " Like the stricken deer which still bounds on and on, though 
 the arrow is rankling in his side, I mingled among the crowd of 
 high-born guests invited to Murray s wedding. Oh, how strange 
 everything seemed 1 The murmuring sound of happy and pleasant 
 voices was in my ear ; feathers, and diamonds, and glittering 
 satins floated confusedly before me, and it all appeared like a 
 phantasmagoria. 
 
 " Then my sight cleared, and my hearing became keen, for 
 there was a hush in the throng, and a stately noble came fortli 
 with the young bride leaning on his arm. I saw the changing 
 of her soft cheek beneath the bridal veil, and the happy light of 
 her eye as they led her before the bishop. A moment, and he 
 
112 MAKY DEE WENT. 
 
 stood by her side. The hurried words of his response came dis 
 tinctly to my ear, and the voice was that which had been the 
 music of my life. Those words consigned me to utter, utter 
 wretchedness. 
 
 " That man had loved me, yet I stood within a few paces of 
 him, ill with grief, and so wretched that the very beggars in 
 the streets might have pitied me, while he made his solemn vows 
 to another, and did not feel my presence. The guests gathered 
 about the newly-wedded pair, and the sound of their congratula 
 tions came mockingly to me, where I sat alone in a distant part 
 of the room. 
 
 " Sorrow had nearly bereft me of all my strength ; I could not 
 move, though I felt that curious eyes might speculate upon me, 
 sitting thus apart and agitated. I struggled for a moment s 
 energy, and penetrated the crowd. The moment my eyes rested 
 on his face, and saw the proud, happy smile and kindling eye, I 
 became calm, very calm, for pride was yet strong within me. 
 Had that triumphant smile lingered one moment on his lips after 
 he saw me, my congratulations would have been careless as the 
 rest. But when he turned from the greeting of a fair girl by 
 his side, and saw me standing before him, his brow and lip 
 became colorless, and he recoiled as if a spirit from the dead 
 had started up in his path. One glance revealed the ruin he 
 had made, for with all my mastery over the agony struggling 
 within, it must have forced its impress on my face. It was a 
 dangerous moment for us both, for many curious eyes were upon 
 us. I heeded it not ; life or good name was nothing to me 
 then. He grasped the hand which I had extended with a force 
 that thrilled back to my heart. He saw that my lips moved 
 without syllabling a word, but he answered, as if the usual con 
 gratulations had been spoken. I addressed a few words to his 
 bride ; what they were, I do not remember, but she smiled, 
 raised her eyes wonderingly to my face, and asked if I had 
 been ill. 
 
 " I would have left the house then, for my unnatural strength 
 
THE WEDDING FESTIVAL. 113 
 
 was giving way, but the bridal equipage was drawn up before 
 the door, and my carriage could not be called till it had driven 
 off. I shrunk away to a window, and drew the heavy curtains 
 over the recess, for there was that stirring within my heart 
 which would no longer brook the gaze of a crowd. I stood 
 behind the silken drapery with my throbbing forehead pressed 
 against the casement, and my hands clasped hard over my heart, 
 when the curtain was suddenly lifted and Murray stood by my 
 side. He was pale as death, and there was anguish, such as I 
 had never before witnessed, in his eyes. A moment he pored 
 over my face, while his own worked with strong emotion ; then 
 grasping my hands in both his, he said in a whisper of thrilling 
 reproach, Oh, Caroline I why have you deceived me thus ? 
 Why did you lead me to believe that you had freely consented 
 to this ? 
 
 " I did not speak. I could not ; but my face was lifted to 
 his, and he must have read there all the misery I was henceforth 
 to endure. I did not strive to conceal it, for my pride was ut 
 terly crushed ; I had no strength left. Footsteps approached 
 the window Murray started the grasp of his cold hand tight 
 ened on mine I was alone ! 
 
 " There was a bustle on the steps. A white veil gleamed 
 before my aching eyes. Then the form of the bridegroom ap 
 peared. His pale locked face was raised to the window where 
 I stood for one instant ; then my brain grew giddy ; I remem 
 bered nothing more, save a flash of white ribbons, and the whirl 
 of a chariot passing before my eyes ; then the tramp of many 
 horses seemed smiting me to the earth. I did not faint ; there 
 was fever in my veins, and that gave me strength to endure. 
 
 " When my own carriage was drawn to the door, I went again 
 through the crowd ; a hand was extended ; I smiled and ac 
 cepted it ; but to this day do not know who led me from the 
 room. 
 
 " I entered my house. Desolate and very melancholy it 
 seemed. There was none to feel for me no kind voice to ask 
 
114 MAKY DEKWENT. 
 
 why I was so wretched. Had my mother been alive, I could 
 have crept to her bosom, and, blameless as she was, have told her 
 all. With her voice in my ear, and my arms about her neck, I 
 could have melted to tears ; for she would have pitied and com 
 forted me. But she was in her cold grave : even this memory 
 brought no moisture to my eyes. I could not weep ; nowhere 
 could I turn for sympathy. I had no mother, no sister, nor 
 friend. My pride was crushed, and I had no strength left ; yet 
 my heart would not break. 
 
 " Then I thought of Varnham for the first time in many days, 
 not as the husband I had been estranged from, but as the kind, 
 good friend who had watched beside me, and loved me amid all 
 my sorrows. I was not wholly in my right mind, and reflected 
 imperfectly on the step I was about to take. Mr. Varnham was 
 at Ashton, and I resolved to go to him, but with no definite aim, 
 for I was incapable of any fixed plan. But he was my only 
 friend, and my poor heart turned back to him in its emergency 
 of sorrow, with the trust of former years. I forgot that it had 
 locked up the only well-spring of sympathy left to it, by the very 
 course of its anguish. 
 
 "I flung a large cloak over my splendid attire, and while my 
 carriage was yet at the door, entered it and ordered them to 
 proceed to Ashton. We travelled all day ; I did not once leave 
 my seat, but remained muffled in my cloak with the hood drawn 
 over my head, lost in the misty half-consciousness of partial 
 insanity. I believe that the carriage stopped more than once, 
 that food and rest were urged on me by my servants ; but I 
 took no heed, only ordering them to drive forward, for the rapid 
 motion relieved me. 
 
 " It was deep in the night when we reached Ashton. Every 
 thing was dark and gloomy ; but one steady lamp glimmered 
 from the library window, and I knew that Varnham was up, and 
 there. The library was in the back part of the house, and the 
 sound of the carriage had not reached it. 
 
 " I made my way throngh the darkened hall, and entered my 
 
THE WEDDING FESTIVAL. 115 
 
 husband s presence. For one moment the feverish beating of my 
 heart was hushed by the holy tranquillity of that solitary student. 
 There was something appalling in the sombre gloomy magnifi 
 cence of the room, in which he sat. The noble painted window 
 seemed thick and impervious in the dim light. The rich book 
 cases were in shadow, and cold marble statues looked down from 
 their pedestals with a pale, grave-like beauty, as I entered. 
 
 " Varnham was reading. One small lamp alone shed its lustre 
 on the rare Mosaic table over which he bent, and threw a broad 
 light across the pale, calm forehead which had something 
 heavenly in its tranquil smoothness. I was by his side, and yet 
 he did not see me. The solemn stillness of the room had cleared 
 away my brain, and for a moment I felt the madness of my 
 intended confidence. I staggered, and should have fallen but for 
 the edge of the table, which I grasped with a force that made 
 the lamp tremble. 
 
 " Varnham started up astonished at my sudden presence ; but 
 when he saw me standing before him, with the fire of excitement 
 burning in my eyes and crimsoning my cheeks, with jewels 
 twinkling in my hair and blazing on my girdle, where it flashed 
 out from the cloak which my trembling hand had become power 
 less to hold, he seemed intuitively to feel the evil destiny that I 
 had wrought for myself. His face became pale, and it was a 
 minute before he could speak. Then he came forward, drew me 
 kindly to his bosom and kissed my forehead with a tenderness 
 that went to my heart like the hushings of my mother s voice. 
 I flung myself upon his bosom, and wept with a burst of pas 
 sionate grief. He seated himself, drew me closer to his heart, 
 and besought me to tell him the cause of my sorrow. 
 
 " I did tell him and then he put me from his bosom as if I 
 had been a leper, with a cry of rage, bitter rage on the lips that 
 had never till then known aught but blessings ; not against me 
 no, he could never have denounced me but on Murray. Then 
 I bethought me of the evil that might follow. I arose from the 
 floor and fell before him, where he stood, and tried to plead and 
 
116 MART DERWENT. 
 
 to call back all I had said. He lifted me again in his arms, 
 though I felt a tremor run through his whole frame as he did so; 
 he told me to be comforted, said many soothing words, and pro 
 mised never to reproach me again, but he said nothing of him, 
 and when I again strove to plead in his defence, he put me 
 sternly away. Then I went wholly mad. 
 
 CHAPTER XVIII. 
 
 DREAMS AND FANTASIES. 
 
 " WE are taught to look with pity and dread on the insane, 
 and when the mind takes a malignant or melancholy character, 
 perhaps there is no greater object of compassion than a person 
 bereft of reason, yet subject still to the torment which caused 
 his misfortune. But with me, madness took a strange and plea 
 sant form. It was but the loss of reason and acuteness of feel 
 ing, while the fancy was left unbridled to revel at will among 
 the high and beautiful things of its own wild creation. The 
 realities which had tortured me to madness, entirely departed 
 from my memory : I turned again to the soft fancies and pleasant 
 feelings of childhood, mingled with dreams of such fantastic and 
 wild loveliness, that the time of my mental bereavement seemed 
 rather spent in some higher and happier world, than in the 
 confines of my own domain. 
 
 " Almost every day I took to myself some new form. Some 
 times I fancied myself a nightingale, cradling my nest in the 
 boughs of an acacia that grew beneath my window. When 
 such fantasies held possession of my shattered mind, I would 
 fold my arms on my bosom, and strains of the wildest and most 
 thrilling melody would steal from my lips, hour after hour, such 
 as must have exhausted the heart of any sane being. 
 
DKEAMS AND FANTASIES. 117 
 
 " When a strange bird came fluttering about the casement, I 
 would chirp coaxingly, and let my notes fall to a soft liquid flow, 
 that I might win the companionship of a creature which seemed 
 of like attributes with myself. Even now I can remember how 
 my heart swelled, and how my voice quivered with disappoint 
 ment, when the bird looked shily about, and fluttered away to 
 some distant tree, startled, and yet half allured by my effort to 
 detain him. At such times I would hush ray voice to a low, 
 mournful strain, and weep and sing with a child-like sorrow, till 
 Varnham came and persuaded me away to rest such rest, sweet 
 and quiet, as I had never known since my infancy. 
 
 " Another time I would dream myself a seraph, up among the 
 clouds, floating away with wavy and pleasant motion through 
 the sky, and waiting with tranquillity for the evening to come, 
 that I might wander among the planets, and bathe my wings in 
 the moonlight. There was one large, bright star which shone 
 night after night, with a clear, gem-like brilliancy through the 
 leaves of my acacia. The moment it appeared, I plumed my fan 
 cied wings, and shot away through its dazzling walls to a world of 
 such happiness as my perfect mind had never imagined. I 
 peopled this new creation with shapes of aerial beauty such 
 pure, spiritual creatures as haunt the brain of the poet, till he 
 turns away from earth, and dwells for ever with the children of 
 his own mind. 
 
 " With these I found companionship, and in my wild conception 
 grew ethereal and lovely in form and mind, even as they were. 
 Nightly I went to my ideal world, and we sported together my 
 sister spirits and I in groves where, the trees formed bowers of 
 eternal beauty, sheltering basins of transparent alabaster, in 
 which the crystal waters flowed with unceasing melody. Clouds 
 of heavy foliage gathered in the atmosphere each leaf a broad 
 emerald, which struck against its fellow with a soft, bell-like 
 chime, making the air melodious, as if the leaves were fairy harps 
 set in motion by the breeze. We wandered together, to and fro, 
 beneath the emerald shade, where columns of heavenly sculpture 
 
118 MARY DEKWENT. 
 
 shot their snowy shafts up from among the trees; where temples, 
 pillared with jasper and domed with fluted pearl and burning 
 opal stone, stood in clouds of soft light, which curled upward for 
 ever, with a continued silvery smoke emitted from their own ex- 
 haustless censers. 
 
 " We again soared upward and away, shaking the rosy light from 
 our wings as we flew, now high in the mellow atmosphere, now just 
 skimming the earth. Perchance, we might stop to rest on the 
 crystal basin of a fountain, where our forms were flung back with a 
 thousand rainbow beauties, as we hovered among the thick vines 
 which drooped to the margin. These vines were heavy with 
 leaves, and with clusters of blood-red rubies and purple amethysts, 
 each gem shedding a light from its own burning core upon the 
 waters, that sparkled and laughed in their bed; then flowed away 
 in soft liquid murmurs, towards the grove we had left behind. 
 
 " The laws which regulate earth were unknown in this world of 
 my wild creation. There was neither sun, nor moon, nor stars, to 
 shed down their light. But an atmosphere soft and bland as that 
 which broods over a bed of water-lilies, when they unfold their 
 pearly hearts to the evening breeze, received a rainbow light from 
 the glowing trees, and the delicate flowers that burst to blossom 
 everywhere. This atmosphere floated hazily around the leaping 
 cascades, among the transparent rocks, and high up on the distant 
 mountains that bounded the sight with their faint gold and 
 billowy purple. 
 
 "Oh! how happy I fancied myself in this ideal region! How I 
 loved to interlace my wings with the bright beings I have but 
 faintly described, and while we nestled together among the vines, 
 or lay on the odorous flowers, to whisper to them of the things 
 I had seen on earth, of the sorrows which had saddened my heart, 
 and of the tears that I had shed; I fancied that they gathered 
 around me with expressions of wonder at the name of sorrow, like 
 innocent children when the cold, drear grave, and the unfathom 
 able mysteries of eternity are first opened to their young minds. 
 They the sweet seraphs of my imagination could not under- 
 
DKEAMS AND FANTASIES. 119 
 
 stand how affection for any thing might be wrong; their very 
 being was love, and they could comprehend nothing which was 
 not spiritual and holy like themselves. 
 
 " There was one little creature, beautiful beyond anything my 
 wild realm contained. She never mounted like the rest, but 
 wandered about in my chamber before the birds came to lure 
 me off with their singing. She was a loving little spirit, some 
 times sorrowful as if she had rambled from heaven and lost her 
 way. At other times full of gladness and happy as the sunshine, 
 Bleeping in the acacia, she would climb to my bed and wind her 
 arms around my neck as if to hold me down from the clouds, 
 to which she, poor thing, could never mount. 
 
 " Try as I would, she always kept close to the earth. I longed 
 to take her with me when I fled to the stars ; for, with her pale 
 golden hair and those soft blue eyes, she was far more lovely than 
 all the heavenly children I met with. One day oh, how well I re 
 member it, for even in my darkened mind it left an impression which 
 returning reason took up with bitter anguish this pretty creature 
 came into my chamber looking so happy. The skirt of her mus 
 lin frock was full of flowers that dropped around her tiny feet as 
 she walked. She had gathered these flowers from the garden 
 under my window; I had been watching her as she fluttered to 
 and fro, waving my hand when she waved hers, echoing her sweet 
 childish shout and beckoning her to fly upwards with the birds 
 who fluttered around my casement. At last she came, bringing 
 a fragrant load of blossoms. It was near sunset, and I was 
 seated by the window. A shower had just fallen, and masses 
 of white clouds caught gleams of purple and gold as they 
 floated to the west. Just as the child came in a rainbow sprang 
 across the zenith, and lost itself in this embankment of clouds. 
 
 I was glad from the depths of my heart. This was the first time 
 the angels had flung out a bridge for me; I knew why they had 
 done it now. The little earth cherub had never flown from the 
 ground. They had provided this glittering arch, that I might 
 lead her across it to our star revels. I clasped my hands with 
 
120 MAKY DEKWENT. 
 
 joy. She came in huddling up the blossoms to her bosom with 
 both arms, and laughing amid their perfume. I stooped forward 
 and kissed her, feeling for her wings with my hands. She dropped 
 the skirt of her dress, and kneeling down among the falling roses, 
 cried out: 
 
 " Oh, joy, joy! she has kissed me! she has kissed me. Then 
 up she started, and would have run away clapping her hands, and 
 looking so proud and happy. 
 
 " I sprang after her, come, come, I said, go with me to the 
 stars, my angels have built us a bridge of jewels; buried deep iu 
 yon clouds we shall find the golden cup. It shall be yours. When 
 the crystal fountains of the upper heavens are unsealed, you and 
 I will drink of their waters and become immortal. Come, little 
 one, come and tread that winding path with these little feet. 
 
 " She threw her arms around my neck, and kissed me fondly 
 as I carried her to the window. I rent the little white mantle 
 that she wore in equal parts, and fluttered the fragments out 
 over each shoulder, while she stood upon the broad stone sill, 
 smiling in my face, pleasing myself that she had wings at last. 
 
 " There, I said, exultant, as this visionary plumage began 
 to nutter in the wind, go go and tell the angels I am com 
 ing ! 
 
 " She turned her beautiful head over one shoulder, and looked 
 down. The flower garden was far beneath us, and she began to 
 tremble. 
 
 " No, no, I said sternly, as she stretched forth her arms ; 
 God gives his angels wings for you he has done more. Be 
 hold ! the rainbow is fading even now ! 
 
 " I was terrified lest the arch should break away, and pushed 
 her toward it ; but she clung to me, shrieking with affright. 
 Then a gust of wind swept by, scattering her golden hair abroad, 
 and seizing upon her garments. That wind would bear her up ; 
 it was sent by the angels for that purpose. I forced her arms 
 from my neck; I stifled her cries with my palm, and thrust her 
 forth, looking upward to see her ascend. 
 
DREAMS AND FANTASIES. 121 
 
 " A cry, a dull fall, and then dead silence. I was very sorrow 
 ful that she would not rise, and, when the rainbow melted away, 
 wept bitterly ; nor would I visit the stars that night, but filled 
 the house with my wails, clamoring for my earth-cherub, till, in 
 order to appease my grief, they brought her into my room and 
 laid her before me. Snow was not whiter than that beautiful 
 face. Her hair was stained with blood ; a broad purple mark 
 spread up from her shoulder. She was dead dead ! 
 
 " There was no more heaven for me after that. I never 
 thought of the angels without a shudder never heard the night 
 ingales sing without shrieks of pain. The sunset clouds became 
 billows of flame, and the sight of a rainbow froze the blood in 
 my veins. 
 
 " It was, perhaps, this great shock which brought back my 
 reason, for afterwards my old life came slowly back, each 
 memory bringing its own pain. 
 
 " I can never describe the cold, hopeless struggle of my heart 
 to retain the delusions which haunted my insane moments, when 
 my intellect began to resume its functions. It seemed as if some 
 cruel spirit were gradually tightening the bonds of earth about 
 me, and ruthlessly dragging me back to reason, while my spirit 
 clung with intense longing to its own wild ideal. 
 
 " It was a sad, sad night to me, when that star arose in the 
 sky, and sent its pure beams down to the bosom of my acacia, 
 and I knew that the clear orb would henceforth be to me only a 
 star that the realms which I had located in its distant bosom, 
 were but the dream of a diseased fancy, that would return no 
 more with its beautiful and vivid faith, which had no power to 
 reason or doubt. 
 
 " But we can force the fantasies of a mind no more than 
 the affections of the heart. My disease left me ; then the pas 
 sions and aspirations of my old nature started up, one after an 
 other, like marble statues over which a midnight blackness had 
 fallen. And there in the midst, more firmly established than 
 ever, his image remained his name, his being, and the sad his- 
 
122 
 
 MAEY DEKWENT. 
 
 tory of my own sufferings, had, for one whole year, been to me 
 but as an indefinite and painful dream. But sorrow, and insan 
 ity itself, had failed to uproot the love which had led to 
 such misery. Can I be blamed that I prayed for insensibility 
 
 CHAPTEK XIX. 
 
 THE LOST YEAR. 
 
 " VARNHAM had watched me for one year, as a mother guards 
 her wayward child. But a few days before the death of my 
 earth-cherub, the sudden illness of a near relative forced him 
 from his guardianship. In my wildest moments I had always 
 been gentle and submissive, but I was told that he left me 
 with much reluctance to the care of my own maid, the house 
 keeper, and my medical attendant. They loved me, and he 
 knew that with them I should be safe. When I began to ques 
 tion them of what had passed during my confinement, they ap 
 peared surprised by the quietness and regularity of my speech, 
 but were ready to convince themselves that it was only one of 
 the fitful appearances of insanity which had often deceived them 
 during my illness. They, however, answered me frankly, and 
 with the respect which Varnham had ever enjoined upon them, 
 even when he supposed that I could neither understand nor re 
 sent indignity. 
 
 " They told me, that on the night of my arrival at Ashton, they 
 were all summoned from their beds by a violent ringing of the 
 library bell ; when they entered, my husband was forcibly hold 
 ing me in his arms, though he was deadly pale, and trembling 
 BO violently that the effort seemed too much for his strength. 
 At first they dared not attempt to assist him ; there was some- 
 
THE LOST YEAR. 123 
 
 thing so terrible in my shrieks and wild efforts to free myself, 
 that they were appalled. It was not till I had exhausted my 
 strength, and lay breathless and faintly struggling on his bosom, 
 that they ventured to approach. 
 
 " I must have been a fearful sight, as they described me, with 
 the white foam swelling to my lips, my face flushed, my eyes 
 vivid with fever, and both hands clenched wildly in the long hair 
 which fell over my husband s arms and bosom, matted with the 
 jewels which I had worn at Murray s wedding. At every fresh 
 effort I made to extricate myself, some of these gems broke 
 loose, flashed to the floor, and were trampled beneath the feet 
 of my servants, for everything was unheeded in the panic which 
 my sudden phrenzy had created. 
 
 " Oh, it was an awful scene 1 exclaimed the old housekeeper, 
 breaking off her description, and removing the glasses from her 
 tearful eyes as she spoke. I was frightened when I looked at 
 you, but when my master lifted his face, and the light lay full 
 upon it, my heart swelled, and I began to cry like a child. There 
 was something in his look I cannot tell what it was some 
 thing that made me hold my breath with awe, yet sent the tears 
 to my eyes. I forgot you when I looked at him. 
 
 " We carried you away to this chamber, and when we laid 
 you on the bed, you laughed and sung in a wild, shrill voice, 
 that made the blood grow cold in my veins. I have never heard 
 a sound so painful and thrilling as your cries were that night. 
 For many hours you raved about some terrible deed that was to 
 be done, and wildly begged that there might be no murder. Then 
 you would start up and extend your arms in a pleading, earnest 
 way to my master, and would entreat him with wild and touch 
 ing eloquence, to let you die to imprison you in some cold, 
 drear place, where you would never see him again, but not to 
 wound you so cruelly with his eyes. 
 
 " I knew that all this was but the effect of a brain fever that 
 there could be no meaning in your words. Yet it seemed to me 
 that my master should have striven to tranquillize you more than 
 
124: MART DERWENT. 
 
 he did. Had he promised all you required, it might have had 
 a soothing influence ; for you were strangely anxious that he 
 should give a pledge not to hate or even condemn some person 
 who was not named. Yet, though you would at moments plead 
 for mercy and protection with a piteous helplessness that might 
 have won the heart of an enemy to compassion, he stood over 
 you unchanged in that look of stern sorrow, which had struck 
 me so forcibly in the library. He scarely seemed to comprehend 
 the wild pathos of your words, but his composure was stern and 
 painful to look upon. 
 
 " At last you appeared to become more quiet, but still kept 
 your eyes fixed pleadingly on his face, and a wild, sweet strain 
 breathed from your lips, with a rise and fall so sad and plaintive, 
 that it seemed as if half your voice must have dissolved to tears, 
 and a broken heart was flowing away in its own low melody. 
 
 " While the music yet lingered about your lips, you began to 
 talk of your mother, of a stone church where she had first taught 
 you to pray of a coffin, and a large white rose-tree, that grew 
 beneath a window, which you had loved because her dear hand 
 had planted it ; then you besought him to bring some of those 
 roses white and pure, you said that they might be laid upon 
 your heart and take the fever away ; then none need be ashamed 
 to weep when you died, and, perhaps, they might bury you 
 beside your mother. 
 
 " It was enough to break one s heart to hear you plead in that 
 sad, earnest way, and I saw, through the tears which almost 
 blinded me, that my master was losing his self-command. The veins 
 began to swell on his forehead, and a tremulous motion became 
 visible about his mouth, which had, till then, remained as firm 
 and almost as white as marble. He made a movement as if 
 about to go away ; but just then you raised your arms, and 
 winding them about his neck, said : " Nay, Varnham, you will 
 not leave me to die here. Let us go to our own old home. I will 
 be very quiet, and will not try to live only promise me this : 
 bury me beneath the balcony, and let that lone, white rose-tree 
 
THE LOST YEAR. 125 
 
 blossom over me for ever and ever. I cannot exactly tell why, 
 but they will not let me rest beside my mother, so my spirit shall 
 stay among those pure flowers in patient bondage, till all shall 
 proclaim it purified and stainless enough to go and dwell with 
 her. Kiss me once more, and say that you will go." 
 
 " My master could but feebly resist the effort with which his 
 face was drawn to yours ; but when your lips met his, he began 
 to tremble again, and strove to unwind your arms from his 
 neck ; but you laid your head on his bosom, and that low, sad 
 melody again broke from your lips, and your arms still wound 
 more clingingly about him, at every effort to undo their clasp. 
 
 " He looked down upon the face that would not be removed 
 from its rest ; his bosom heaved, he wound his arms convulsively 
 about your form for a moment, then forced you back to the pil 
 low, and fell upon his knees by the bed-side. His face was buried 
 in the counterpane, but the sound of his half-stifled sobs grew 
 audible throughout the room, and the bed shook beneath the 
 violent trembling of his form. I beckoned the maid, and we 
 stole from his presence, for it seemed wrong to stand by and 
 gaze upon such grief. 
 
 " When we returned, you were silent, and apparently asleep. 
 He was sitting by the bed, and his eyes were fixed on your face 
 with the same mournful, forgiving look with which I have seen 
 him regard you a thousand times since. He spoke in his usual 
 gentle way, and told us to tread lightly that we might not dis 
 turb you. It was many hours before you awoke. My master 
 was concealed by the drapery ; you started up with a wild cry, 
 and asked if he had gone to do murder. He caught you in his 
 arms as you were about to spring from the bed, and with gentle 
 violence forced you back to the pillows again. Then he waved 
 his hand for us to draw back, and spoke to you in a solemn and 
 impressive voice ; but the last words only reached me. They 
 were, 
 
 " "I have promised, solemnly promised, Caroline try to com 
 prehend me and be at rest." 
 
126 MART DERWENT. 
 
 " Your fever raged many days after that, and you were con 
 stantly delirious, but never violent, and that frightful dread of 
 some impending evil seemed to have left you entirely. Your 
 disease, at length abated, and the bloom gradually returned to 
 your cheek, but every new mark of convalescence, only seemed 
 to deepen the melancholy which had settled on my master. 
 
 " He was restless, and sometimes most irritable when we 
 pointed out proofs of returning health and reason. But when 
 day after day passed by, and your mind still continued its child 
 like gentleness and its fanciful wanderings, when you would smile 
 upon him so sweetly, and talk of the beautiful things you had 
 seen, of strange worlds and flowers and birds, with an enthusiasm 
 which combined the wildness of insanity with the gentle sim 
 plicity of childhood, he seemed to love you more fondly than 
 ever. He would sit and talk to you of these sweet themes, and 
 listen to your singing, which never seemed so full of the heart 
 as then, and encouraged all your childish wishes with the indul 
 gence of an anxious parent. 
 
 " * When I saw you both so contented and so constantly to 
 gether, I thought of those times when we had so much company 
 at Ashton, of the hours which my good master would spend 
 alone in the library, when everybody else was so gay. Arid as 
 I compared your soft voice and submissive manners with the 
 imperious and lofty air of those times, it did not seem so strange 
 that my master should content himself with the mental aliena 
 tion, which never took a more lovely form or brought a human 
 soul back more gently to its childhood. 
 
 14 When the physicians decided that your mind would never 
 regain its former strength, but that it would ever remain wan 
 dering and gentle, and full of beautiful images as the fever had 
 left it, my master became almost cheerful. He would allow no 
 restraint to be placed upon you, and gave orders that you should 
 be attended with all the respect and deference that had ever 
 been rendered to your station. He never seemed more happy 
 than while wandering with you about the gardens, and in the 
 
THE LOST TEAK. 127 
 
 9. ( : . 
 
 park ; yet there were times when he would sit and gaze on your 
 face as you slept, with a sad, regretful look, that betrayed how 
 truly he must have sorrowed over your misfortune. There was 
 a yearning tenderness in his eye at such times, more touching 
 far than tears. I could see that he struggled against these feel 
 ings, as if there existed something to be ashamed of in them, but 
 they would return again/ 
 
 " All this, and much more, my good housekeeper said, in an 
 swer to the questions which I put to her, as my reason began to 
 connect the present with the past. She did not hesitate to in 
 form me of anything that I might wish to know, for she had no 
 belief in my power to understand and connect her narrative. I 
 had often questioned her before, and invariably forgot her an 
 swers as they fell from her lips ; but every word of this conver 
 sation was graven on my memory, and if I have not repeated 
 her exact language, the spirit and detail of her information is 
 preserved. 
 
 " There was one subject that my housekeeper had not men 
 tioned my child. At first my intellect was too feeble for con 
 tinued thought, and I did not notice this strange omission. 
 Besides, some painful intuition kept me silent ; the very thought 
 of my own child was painful. 
 
 " At last I questioned her. 
 
 " Where/ I said, is my daughter ? Surely, in my illness he 
 has not kept her from me V 
 
 11 The old woman became deadly pale ; she turned away, re 
 pulsing the subject with a gesture of her withered hands, which 
 terrified me. 
 
 " My child I I said ; why are you silent ? What have you 
 done with her ? 
 
 " Still the old woman was speechless ; but I could see tears 
 stealing down her face. 
 
 " Bring her hither/ I said, sick with apprehension ; I wish 
 to see how much my daughter has grown. 7 
 
128 3tfARY DERWENT. 
 
 " The old woman flung herself at my feet. Her hands gather 
 ed np mine and held them fast. 
 
 " Do not ask do not seek to remember. Oh, my lady, forget 
 that you ever had a child ! 
 
 " Forget and why ? Who has dared to harm the child of 
 my bosom, the heiress of my house ? 
 
 " She hid her face in my lap ; she clung to my knees, moaning 
 piteously. 
 
 "A vague remembrance seized npon me that pale form 
 shrouded in its golden hair my heart was like ice. I bent down 
 and whispered in the old woman s ear : 
 
 " Who was it harmed my child ? 
 
 " She lifted her head with a wild outbreak of sorrow my 
 question almost drove her mad. 
 
 " Oh, lady, my master would let her come to your room 
 we were not to blame ; you had always been so sweet-tempered 
 and loving with her that we had no fear. 
 
 "She stopped short, frightened by my looks. I whispered 
 hoarsely : 
 
 " My child ! my child \> 
 
 "That horrible pause was broken at last. She lifted her 
 hands to heaven, the tears streamed down her face like rain. 
 
 " Do not ask oh, my lady, I beseech you, do not ask. 
 
 " My child my child ? 
 
 " I could feel the whispers lose themselves in my throat ; but 
 she understood them, and her own voice sunk so low that, had 
 not my soul listened, the terrible truth could not have reached 
 it. 
 
 " With your own hands you destroyed her with your own 
 hands you dashed her from the window ! 
 
 " Slowly from heart to limb the blood froze in my veins ; for 
 two days I lay in rigid silence, praying only for death. No, not 
 even insanity would return. As yet, I had only spent the holy- 
 day of my error. God would permit my brain to slumber no 
 longer. 
 
THE LOST TEAK. 129 
 
 " I had but one wish to escape that house, to flee from every 
 thing and everybody that had ever known me. It was no mad 
 desire no remnant of insanity. I reasoned coldly and well. 
 Why not ? utter hopelessness is wise. 
 
 " I dreaded but one thing on earth the return of my hus 
 band. We never could be united again. He would not find 
 the helpless being he had left, but a proud woman, whose heart 
 if not her life had wronged him. He would not find the mother 
 of his child, but its innocent, wretched murderer. I felt how 
 bitter must be the news of my returning reason to the man who 
 had forgiven the errors of my real character, because they had 
 been so painfully lost in a visionary one, which disarmed resent 
 ment only from its very helplessness. I understood all Varnham s 
 generosity, all his extraordinary benevolence ; but I knew, also, 
 that he was a proud man, with an organization so exquisitely 
 refined, that the sins of alienated affection would affect him more 
 deeply than actual crime, with ordinary men. I felt that it was 
 impossible for me ever to see him again. 
 
 " My plan for the future was soon formed. I resolved to leave 
 England for ever. My heart sickened when I thought of ming 
 ling in society, of meeting with people who might talk to me of 
 things which would rend my heart continually with recollections 
 of the past. The love which had been the great error of my life, 
 still held possession of my heart with a strength which would 
 not be conquered. Could I go forth, then, into the world ? 
 Could I live in my own house, where everything was associated 
 with recollections of that love where every bush and flower 
 would breathe a reproach to the heart which still worshipped on, 
 when worship was double guilt and double shame ? Could I 
 look upon the spot where my child had perished, and live ? No, 
 I resolved to leave all, to break every tie which bound me to 
 civilized man, and to fling myself into a new state of existence. 
 I thought, and still think, that it was the only way by which I 
 could secure any portion of tranquillity to my husband. It woujd 
 be terrible for him to believe that I had died by my own hands, 
 
 9 
 
130 MAKY DEKWENT. 
 
 but mucli more terrible if he returned and, in place of the mind 
 less being who had become so utterly helpless, so completely the 
 object of his compassion, found the woman who had wronged 
 him, fully conscious of her fault, yet without the humility and 
 penitence which should have followed his generous forgiveness. 
 There was too much of the pride of my old nature left. I could 
 not have lived in the same house with the man I had so injured. 
 
 " The Granby property was unentailed, with the exception of 
 one small estate, which went with the title. Immediately on 
 coming in possession of the estates, I had made a will, bequeath 
 ing the whole vast property to my child, and making my husband 
 her trustee ; but in case of her death, all was to revert to him. 
 He knew nothing of this ; but the will was consigned to the 
 hands of honorable men, and I was certain that it would be le 
 gally acted upon. In raising the sum which I devoted to Mur 
 ray, my agent had sold stocks to more than quadruple the 
 amount. This money had been paid to me, but in the excite 
 ment of my feelings, I had neglected to place it with my banker, 
 and had left it in an escritoir, at our town house, where was 
 also deposited the most valuable portion of my jewels. I had no 
 arrangements to make which could in any way reveal the course 
 I had determined to pursue. 
 
 " There was one subject which I had not yet ventured to men 
 tion. My cheek burned, and my heart beat quick, when I at last 
 brought myself to inquire about Murray. He was living a se 
 cluded life at a small cottage near Richmond. It was all I cared 
 to learn. 
 
 " The second night after the conversation with my house 
 keeper, I stole softly to the room of a sleeping housemaid, and 
 dressed myself in a suit of cast-off clothing which was not likely 
 to be missed ; then, with a few guineas which I found in my 
 desk, I went cautiously out, and left my house forever. 
 
 " Along the edge of the park ran a stream of small magnitude, 
 but remarkable for its depth. On the brink of this stream I 
 left a portion of the garments I had worn j then departed on 
 
THE COTTAGE AND THE WILDERNESS. 131 
 
 foot for the nearest post town, where I procured a passage to 
 London. I found ray house closed, but entered it with a private 
 key, and took from my escritoir the money and jewels which 
 had been left there more than a year before. 
 
 CHAPTER XX. 
 
 THE COTTAGE AND THE WILDERNESS. 
 
 " THE third evening after leaving Ashton, I stood in front of 
 a beautiful cottage, separated from the thickly settled portions 
 of Richmond by pleasure grounds, rather more spacious than is 
 usual in that neighborhood, and still farther secluded by groups 
 of ornamental trees. A light broke softly through the wreathing 
 foliage which draped the windows of a lower room, and I could 
 distinguish the shadow of a man walking to and fro within. 
 
 " I knew that it was Murray, and that I should see him once 
 more that night, yet my heart beat slow and regularly, without 
 a throb to warn me of the deep feeling which still lived there in 
 undying strength. I had no hope, and entire hopelessness is 
 rest. I inquired for the housekeeper, and told her that I had 
 been informed she wished to hire a housemaid ; that I was with 
 out a place, and had come all the way from the city to secure 
 one with her. I knew that she could not find it in her heart to 
 send me back to London late at night and alone, and, as I anti 
 cipated, was invited to stay till morning. 
 
 "When the kind housekeeper was asleep, I stole from her 
 chamber and sought the apartment where I had seen the light. It 
 was a small room, partly fitted up as a study, and partly as a 
 parlor. Books and musical instruments lay scattered about ; a 
 few cabinet pictures hung upon the walls, and a portrait of Mur- 
 
132 MARY DEKWENT. 
 
 ray looked down upon me from over the mantel-piece as I entered. 
 A lamp was still burning-, and an open work-box seemed to have 
 been pushed from its station on the table, directly beneath it, 
 to make room for a small book of closely filled manuscript which 
 lay open, as if it had just been written in. A pen lay by, and 
 the ink was yet damp on the unfinished page. Even across the 
 room I knew the handwriting ; the impulse to read which seized 
 upon me was unconquerable. I held my breath, for the stillness 
 around was like n. hush of a tomb, and the characters seemed to 
 start up like living witnesses beneath my eye, as I bent over the 
 book. Thus the page ran : 
 
 " They tell me she is mad that her fine mind is broken, 
 and her warm heart unstrung forever. They say this, and com 
 ment and speculate upon causes in my presence as if I could not 
 feel. I sit with apparent calmness, and listen to things which 
 would break a common heart. 
 
 " The soft smile of my wife is ever upon me, the cheek of my 
 boy dimples beneath my glance if I but raise my eyes to his 
 innocent face, and yet there are times when I cannot look upon 
 them. The image of that noble and ruined being is forever 
 starting up between me and them. I did not intend this when I 
 took upon myself the right to regulate the destiny of a fellow- 
 being madness no, no, I never thought of that I I did not 
 dream that my own nature but why should I w r rite this ? Yet 
 I cannot keep these feelings forever pent up in my heart. 
 
 " It was terrible news ! Why did that officious physician 
 come here to tell me there was no hope, and this day above all 
 others in the year ? Was it any reason that he should wound 
 me with this news, because I was known to be a friend of 
 the family a friend truly ? How coldly the man told me that 
 she could never recover her reason ! It was like the slow stab 
 of a poignard; my heart quivered under it. Just then my wife 
 must come with her innocent and loving voice, to give me the 
 good-night kiss before she left me. Poor thing, she little dreamed 
 of the melancholy tidings which caused me to return her caress 
 
THE COTTAGE AND THE WILDERNESS. 133 
 
 so coldly. I will try and -seek rest, bnt not with them ; sometimes I 
 wish that I might never see them again. I must be alone to-night ! 
 
 " It was but the fulfillment of my own prophecy. I knew that 
 he could not be happy ; that he never would be again ; never 
 even tranquil till he believed me in my grave. My resolution 
 was more firmly established, I would not live a continual cause 
 of torment to him. I had no desire that he too should be miser 
 able ; in my most wretched moments the feeling had never entered 
 my heart. 
 
 " The rustle of silk caused me to start from my position as I 
 was bending over the book. It was only the night wind sweep 
 ing through an open casement, that sent the curtain, which had 
 dropped over it, streaming out like a banner into the room. I 
 stood upright, silent and breathless, for on a low couch, which the 
 window drapery had half concealed till now, lay Grenville Mur 
 ray. The lamp shone full upon his face, arid even from the dis 
 tance, I could see the change which a year of mental agitation 
 had made in it. 
 
 " I went softly to the couch, knelt down, and gazed upon him 
 with a hushed and calm feeling, like that which a mother might 
 know while bending over the couch of a beloved, but wayward 
 child. Twice the clock chimed the hour, and still I knelt by 
 that couch and gazed on that pale, sleeping face, with a cold 
 hopeless sorrow, which had no voice for lamentation. 
 
 " A third time the clock beat. I bent forward and pressed my 
 lips to his forehead for the first time in my life. Oh 1 how my 
 heart swelled to my lips with that one soft kiss. It seemed 
 breaking with solemn tenderness such tenderness as we give to 
 the dead before the beloved clay is taken from us forever. My 
 lips were cold and tremulous, but he did not awake beneath the 
 pressure, and I did not repeat it, or look on him again. I knew 
 we were, parting forever, but had no power to look back. 
 
 " I passed from the house slowly, and with a solemn feeling of 
 desolation, as one might tread through a grave-yard alone, and at 
 midnight. 
 
134: MAKY DEE WENT. 
 
 " In the disguise, which had served me so well, I sailed for 
 America. I had no wish to mingle with my race, but took my 
 way from New York to the valley of the Mohawk, and sought 
 the presence of Sir William Johnson. To him I revealed myself 
 and as much of my history as was necessary to ensure his 
 co-operation in my plan for the future. Under a solemn promise 
 of secrecy, which has never been broken, I entrusted my wealth 
 to his agency, and procured his promise of an escort to the 
 tribe of Indians, then located in his neighborhood. Among 
 these savages I hoped to find perfect isolation from my race ; to 
 begin a new life and cast the old one away forever ; this was 
 more like rising from the grave into another life, than anything 
 human existence had to offer. I remained some months in the 
 Mohawk Valley, waiting for news from England. I was anxious 
 to hear that my efforts at concealment had been effectual and that 
 my friends really believed me dead. News came at last, that 
 shook my soul to its centre once more. Varnham, my husband, 
 was dead. He would not believe iu my destruction, and after 
 strict search traced me to London, and on shipboard, spite of 
 my disguise. 
 
 " He put my property in trust, and taking the next ship that 
 sailed, followed me to America, with what purpose I never 
 knew. The ship was lost, and every soul on board perished. 
 
 CHAPTER XXI. 
 
 QUEEN ESTHER. 
 
 " THE Shawnee Indians had long been governed by a woman, 
 whose name was both feared and respected through all the Six 
 Nations. I need not dwell either upon her cruelty or her great- 
 
QUEEN ESTHER. 135 
 
 ness. Had Elizabeth, of blessed memory, as sarcastic history 
 names her, been thrown among savages, she would have been 
 scarcely a rival to this remarkable chieftainess. The same indo 
 mitable love of power the same ferocious affections, caressing 
 the neck one day, which she gave to the axe on the next the 
 same haughty assumption of authority marked Queen Esther, 
 the forest sovereign, and Elizabeth, the monarch of England. 
 Both were arrogant, crafty, selfish and ruthless, proving their 
 power to govern, only as they became harsh and unwomanly. 
 
 " Queen Esther was the widow of a great chief, whose authority 
 she had taken up at his grave, and never laid down during 
 twenty-five years, when Gi-en-gwa-tah, her eldest son, had earned 
 a right to wear the eagle plume, and fill his father s place on the 
 war path and at the council table. The great secret of this 
 woman s power over her tribe lay in her superior intelligence and 
 the remnants of an early education ; for she was a white woman, 
 brought in the bloom of girlhood from Canada, where she had 
 been taken prisoner in the wars between the French and the Six 
 Nations. Her father was a governor of Canada, and she had 
 been destined to fill a high station in civilized life, but she soon 
 learned to prefer savage rule to all the remembrances of a deli 
 cately nurtured childhood, and, wedded to a native chief, flung 
 off the refinements of life, save where they added to her influence 
 among the savages. 
 
 " Her name, like her history, was thrown back upon the past 
 the very blood in her veins seemed to have received a ferocious 
 tint. She was, doubtless, from the first, a savage at heart. 
 Because this woman was, like myself, cast out, by her own free 
 will, from civilized life, I sought her in her wild home, and, under 
 an escort from Sir William Johnson, claimed a place in her 
 tribe. The lands around Seneca Lake were then in possession 
 of the Shawnees. Queen Esther occupied a spacious lodge at 
 the head of this lake, and had put large tracts of land under cul 
 tivation around it. 
 
 " Around this dwelling, she had gathered all the refinements of 
 
136 MAKY DEE WENT. 
 
 her previous life that could be wrested from rude nature or ani 
 mal strength. Her lodge possessed many comforts that the 
 frontier settlers might have envied. The lands were rich with 
 corn and fruit. Her apple orchards blossomed and cast their 
 fruit on the edge of the wilderness. The huts of her people 
 were embowered with peach trees, and purple plums dropped upon 
 the forest sward at their doors. In times of peace, Queen 
 Esther was a provident and wise sovereign. In war but I need 
 not say how terrible she was in war. Beautiful as I have 
 described it, was the country of the Shawnees, when my escort 
 drew up in front of Queen Esther s lodge. She came forth to 
 meet me, arrayed in her wild, queenly garb, and treading the 
 green turf like an empress. She was then more than sixty years 
 of age, but her stately form bore no marks of time ; there was 
 not a thread of silver in her black hair, and her eyes were like 
 those of an eagle, clear and piercing. 
 
 " She read Sir William s letter, casting glances from that to my 
 face, as if perusing the two with one thought ; then advancing 
 to my horse, she lifted me to the ground and gave me her hand 
 to kiss, as if I had been a child and she an emperor, who had 
 vouchsafed an act of gallantry. It is well/ she said. You 
 shall have a mat in my lodge. Gi-en-gwa-tah shall spread it 
 with his own hands, for we of the white blood bring wise thoughts 
 and sweet words to the tribe, and must not work like squaws. 
 When women sit in council the braves spread their mats, and 
 spear salmon for them. This is my law. 
 
 "I answered promptly, that I had brought gold, knowledge, and 
 a true heart into the wilderness ; that all I asked was a corner 
 in her lodge, and permission to rest among her people ; to learn 
 their ways, and be one of them till death called me away. 
 
 " * It is well/ she answered. This letter says that you have 
 fled from many tears, and brought wisdom and gold from over 
 the big waters. Come, I have a robe embroidered with my own 
 hand, and plumage from flame-colored birds, with which my 
 women shall crown you before my son comes from the war-council 
 
QUEEN ESTHER. 137 
 
 of the Six Nations. My eyes are getting dim, and I can no 
 longer string the wampum or work garlands on the robes my 
 women have prepared for my needle. You shall be eyes to me ; 
 when my voice grows weak you shall talk sweet words to the 
 warriors, and they will obey me still. When I am dead, struck 
 down with the white frost of age, then you shall be queen in 
 my place ; I will teach the chiefs to obey you. Have I spoken 
 well ? 
 
 " She waited for no answer, but led me into the lodge, brought 
 forth a robe of embroidered skins, such as clothed her own stately 
 person, and clothed me in it with her own hands. If she 
 used any other ceremony of adoption, I did not understand it, 
 nor indeed how much this act portended. Queen Esther was a 
 shrewd woman, ambitious for herself and her tribe. She knew 
 well the value of the gold which I had deposited with Sir Wil 
 liam Johnson, and how rich a harvest my coming might secure 
 to them. 
 
 " Queen Esther kept her promise. Her influence placed me at 
 once in a position of power. She never asked my name, but 
 gave me that which she had cast aside on renouncing her own 
 race, Catharine Montour. 
 
 " I was among the children of nature, in the broad, deep for 
 ests of a new world. I had broken every tie which had bound 
 me to my kind, and was free. For the first time in my life I felt 
 the force of liberty and the wild, sublime pleasures of an un 
 shackled spirit. Every new thought which awoke my heart in 
 that deep wilderness, was full of sublimity and wild poetic 
 strength. There was something of stern, inborn greatness in the 
 savages who had adopted me something picturesque in their 
 raiment, and majestic in their wild, untaught eloquence, that 
 aroused the new and stern properties of my nature, till my very 
 being seemed changed. 
 
 " The wish to be loved and cherished forsook me forever. 
 New energies started to life, and I almost scorned myself, that I 
 had ever bowed to the weakness of affection. What was domin- 
 
138 MAET DERWENT. 
 
 ion over one heart compared to the knowledge that the wild, 
 fierce spirits of a thousand savage beings were quelled by the 
 sound of my footsteps ? not with a physical and cowardly fear, 
 but with an awe which was of the spirit a superstitious dread, 
 which was to them a religion. Without any effort of my own, I 
 became a being of fear and wonder to the whole savage nation. 
 They looked upon me as a spirit from the great hunting-ground, 
 sent to them by Manitou, endowed with beauty and supernatural 
 powers, which demanded all their rude worship, and fixed me 
 among them as a deity. 
 
 11 1 encouraged this belief, for a thirst for rule and ascendency 
 was strong upon me. I became a despot and yet a benefactress 
 in the exercise of my power, and the distribution of my wealth. 
 Did one of those strong, savage creatures dare to offend me, I 
 had but to lift my finger, and he was stripped of his ornaments 
 and scourged forth from his nation, a disgraced and abandoned 
 alien, without home, or people, or friends. On the other hand, 
 did they wish for trinkets, or beads, or powder for the rifles 
 which I had presented to them, they had to bend low to their 
 White Prophetess as she passed ; to weave her lodge with 
 flowers, and line it with rich furs ; to bring her a singing-bird, 
 or to carry her litter through the rough passes of the mountains, 
 and a piece of smooth bark, covered with signs which they knew 
 nothing of, was sent to Sir William Johnson, and lo, their wants 
 were supplied. 
 
 " This was power, such as my changed heart panted for. I 
 grew stern, selfish and despotic, among these rude savages, but 
 never cruel. Your people wrong me there ; no drop of blood 
 has ever been shed by me or through my instrumentality ; but 
 my gold has bought many poor victims from the stake, who 
 falsely believe that my vindictive power had sent them there ; my 
 entreaties have saved many a village from the flames, and many 
 hearths from desolation, where my name is spoken as a word of 
 fear." 
 
THE DEATH -FIKE AND THE SACRIFICE. 139 
 
 CHAPTER XXII. 
 
 THE DEATH-FIRE AND THE SACRIFICE. 
 
 " THE eldest son of Queen Esther was a noble. He came of his 
 father s race, with something of refinement, which his mother never 
 could entirely cast aside, blended with it. From her early recol 
 lections Queen Esther had given him fragments of a rude poetical 
 education, and this, with the domestic refinement of her lodge, 
 had lifted him unconsciously above the other chiefs of his tribe. 
 
 " He not only possessed that bravery which won the admiration 
 of his people, and was essential to their respect, but in his char 
 acter were combined all the elements of a warrior and a states 
 man. Indepjndent of this superior knowledge, his mind was 
 naturally too majestic and penetrating to yield me the homage 
 which was so readily rendered by the more ignorant of his tribe. 
 
 "It is painful to dwell on this period of my life. Suffice it, 
 again I heard the pleadings of love from the untutored lips of a 
 savage chief. I, who had fled from the very name of affection as 
 from a pestilence who had given up country, home, the semblance 
 of existence that my heart might be at rest, was forced to listen to 
 the pleadings of love from a savage, in the heart of an American 
 wilderness. A savage chief, proud of his prowess, haughty in 
 his barbarous power, came with a lordly confidence to woo me 
 as his wife. My heart recoiled at the unnatural suggestion, but 
 I had no scorn for the brave Indian who made it. If his mode 
 of wooing was rough, it was also eloquent, sincere, manly; and 
 those were properties which my spirit had ever answered with 
 respect. No ; I had nothing of scorn for the red warrior, but I 
 rebuked him for his boldness, and threatened to forsake his tribe 
 for ever should he dare to renew the subject. 
 
 " A month or two after the kingly eavage declared his bold 
 wishes a contest arose between the Shawnees and a neighboring 
 
140 MAEY DERWENT. 
 
 tribe, and the chief went angry to the war-path. One day his 
 party returned to the encampment, bringing with them three 
 prisoners, a white man, his wife and child. My heart ached when 
 I heard of this, for I dared not, as usual, entreat the chief for 
 their release, nor even offer to purchase their freedom with gold. 
 His disappointment had rendered him almost morose, and I shud 
 dered to think of the reward he might require for the liberation 
 of his prisoners. I had full cause for apprehension. 
 
 " From the day that I rejected her son, Queen Esther had kept 
 proudly aloof from me. She did not deign to expostulate, but 
 guarded her pride with stern silence, while a storm of savage pas 
 sions lowered on her brow, and sounded in her fierce tread, till 
 her presence would have been a terror to me had I been of a na 
 ture to fear anything. 
 
 " This woman seemed to rejoice at the idea of wreaking the 
 vengeance she would not express in words on my helpless com 
 patriots, and prepared herself to join this horrid festival of death 
 in all the pomp of her war-plumes and most gorgeous raiment. 
 For the first time in my life I humbled myself before this woman, 
 on my knees, for she was one to exact the most abject homage. 
 I besought her to save my countrymen from death. 
 
 " She met my entreaties with a cold sneer that froze me to 
 the heart. 
 
 " It is well, she said, wrapping her robe around her with a 
 violence that made its wampum fringes rattle like a storm of shot. 
 The woman who refuses the great chief of the Shawnees 
 when he would build her a lodge larger than his mother s, 
 should be proud, and stand up with her face to the sun, not 
 whine like a baby because her people do not know how to die. 
 
 " Her air and voice were more cruel than her words. I saw 
 that my intercession would only add to the tortures that I was 
 powerless to prevent, for if the mother was so unrelenting what 
 had I to expect from thte son ? 
 
 " Queen Esther tore her garments from my clasp, and plunged 
 into the forest to join her son. 
 
THE DEATH-FIKE AND THE SACRIFICE. 14:1 
 
 " I shudder even now, when I think of the horrible sensation 
 which crept over me as the warriors went forth from the camp, 
 file after file, painted and plumed with gorgeous feathers, each 
 with his war-club and tomahawk, to put three beings, of my 
 blood and nation, to a death of torture. 
 
 " I dared not plead for their release in person, but sent to 
 offer ransom, earnestly appealing to the generosity of the chief 
 in my message. He returned me no answer. I could do nothing 
 more, but as the hours crept by, my heart was very, very heavy; 
 it seemed as if the sin of blood were about to be heaped upon 
 it. 
 
 " The night came on, dark and gloomy as the grave. The 
 whole tribe, even to the women and children, had gone into the 
 forest, and I was alone in the great lodge almost alone in the 
 village. There was something more appalling than I can de 
 scribe in the dense gloom that settled on the wilderness, in the 
 whoop and fierce cries of the revelling savages, which surged up 
 through the trees like the roar and rant of a herd of wild beasts 
 wrangling over their prey. 
 
 " Not a star was in the sky, not a sound stirred abroad no 
 thing save the black night and the horrid din of those blood 
 thirsty savages met my senses. Suddenly, a sharp yell cut 
 through the air like the cry of a thousand famished hyenas, then 
 a spire of flame darted up from the murky forest, and shot into 
 the darkness with a clear, lurid brightness, like the flaming 
 tongue of a dragon, quivering and afire with its own venom. 
 Again that yell rang out again and again, till the very air 
 seemed alive with savage tongues. 
 
 " I could bear no more ; my nerves had been too madly ex 
 cited. I sprang forward with a cry that rang through the dark 
 ness almost as wildly as theirs, and rushed into the forest. 
 
 " They were congregated there in the light of that lurid fire, 
 dancing and yelling like a troop of carousing demons ; their 
 tomahawks and scalpiug-knives flashed before me, and their 
 fierce eyes glared more fiercely as I rushed through them to the 
 
14:2 MART DEKWENT. 
 
 presence of their chief. The dance was stopped by a motion of 
 his war-club, and he listened with grave attention to my frantic 
 offer of beads or blankets or gold to any amount, in ransom for 
 his prisoners. He refused all ; but one ransom could purchase 
 the lives of those three human beings, and that I could not pay. 
 It was far better that blood should be shed than I should force 
 my heart to consummate a union so horrible as mine with this 
 savage. 
 
 " I turned from the relentless chief sorrowing and heart- 
 stricken. The blood of his poor victims seemed clogging my 
 feet as I made my way through the crowd of savage forms that 
 only waited my disappearance to drag them forth to death. 
 Even while I passed the death-fire, fresh pine was heaped upon 
 it, and a smothered cry burst forth from the dusky crowd as a 
 volume of smoke rolled up and revealed the victims. 
 
 " They were bound to the trunk of a large pine, which towered 
 within the glare of the death-fire, its heavy limbs reddening and 
 drooping in the cloud of smoke and embers that surged through 
 them to the sky, and its slender leaves falling in scorched and 
 burning showers to the earth, whenever a gust of wind sent the 
 flames directly among its foliage. 
 
 " The prisoners were almost entirely stripped of clothing, and 
 the lurid brightness shed over the pine revealed their pale forms 
 with terrible distinctness. The frightened child crouched upon 
 the ground, clinging to the knees of his mother, and quaking in 
 all its tiny limbs as the flames swept their reeking breath more 
 and more hotly upon them. The long, black hair of the mother 
 fell over her bent face; her arms were extended downwards to 
 wards the boy, and she struggled weakly against the thongs that 
 bound her waist, at every fresh effort which the poor thing made 
 to find shelter in her bosom. There was one other face, pale 
 and stern as marble, yet full of a fixed agony, which spoke of 
 human suffering frightful to behold. That face was Grenville 
 Murray s. 
 
 " My feelings had been excited almost to the verge of renewed 
 
THE DEATH-FIRE AND THE SACRIFICE. 143 
 
 insanity, but now they became calm calm from the force of 
 astonishment, and from the strong resolve of self-sacrifice which 
 settled upon them. I turned and forced my way through the 
 crowd of savage forms, rushing toward that hapless group, and 
 again stood before their chief. I pointed toward the prisoners 
 now concealed by the smoke and eddying flames. 
 
 " Call away those fiends/ I said. Give back all that has 
 been taken from the prisoners. Send them to Canada with a 
 guard of fifty warriors, and I will become your wife. 
 
 " A blaze of exultation swept over that savage face, and the 
 fire kindled it up with wild grandeur. I saw the heaving of his 
 chest, the fierce joy that flashed from his eyes, but in that mo 
 ment of stern resolve, my heart would not have shrunk from its 
 purpose though the fang of an adder had been fixed in it. The 
 chief lifted his war-club and uttered a long peculiar cry. In 
 stantly, the savages that were rushing like so many demons 
 toward their prey, fell back and ranged themselves in a broad 
 circle around their chief. 
 
 " He spoke a few sentences in the Indian tongue. Words of 
 energetic eloquence they must have been to have torn that 
 savage horde from their destined victims, for like wild beasts 
 they seemed athirst for blood. When the chief ceased speaking, 
 the tribe arose with a morose gravity that concealed their disap 
 pointment, and dispersed among the trees ; the mellow tramp 
 of their moccasins died away, and fifty warriors alone stood 
 around their chief, ready to escort the prisoners to a place of 
 safety. 
 
 " I drew back beneath the concealment of a tree, and secure 
 in my changed dress, saw them lead forth the prisoners. I heard 
 the sobs of the happy mother as the boy clung, half in joy and 
 half in affright, to her bosom. I saw tears stand on the pale 
 and quivering cheek of the father, as he strove to utter his gra 
 titude. I heard the tramp of the horses, and the measured tread 
 of the fifty warriors come faintly from the distance ; then the 
 fire which was to have been the death-flame of Grenville Murray 
 
144: MARY DERWENT. 
 
 and his household, streamed up into the solitude, and in its red 
 glare I stood before the savage whose slave I had become." 
 
 CHAPTER XXIII. 
 
 THE MARRIAGE CONTRACT. 
 
 TOWARD sunset, on the same day that witnessed Catharine 
 Montour s interview with the missionary, Mary Derwent wander 
 ed alone into the forest, for her spirit more than ever, felt the 
 need of solitude. With a strong religious principle, which had 
 gradually strengthened in her young heart during her daily com 
 munion with the high things in nature, she had striven to con 
 quer the sweet impulses of love that are the heritage of woman 
 hood, and to lend all her soul toward that heaven to which the mis 
 sionary had so tenderly pointed her. But with the purest and best 
 of earth it is hard to make this life a blank one, on which we must 
 write only the future. How could she protect herself against feel 
 ings of whose approach she knew nothing ? How was she to 
 stay the throbbings of a warm young heart, and crush them into 
 subjection by thoughts of her own deformity ? Alas, poor girl, 
 the general fate was upon her but worse than this, she was 
 unloved. The love of this one man, like all other good endow 
 ments, went to her beautiful sister Jane. This bitter truth burned 
 like a fever in her brain. Poor Mary ! she had great need of soli 
 tude, and greater need of prayer All night long she had prayed 
 earnestly to that God whom she had learned to love through 
 his own beautiful works, for strength to endure and power to 
 conquer. She took her heart, with all its pure and affectionate 
 impulses, and laid it at the feet of Jehovah, with the beautiful 
 and unquestioning truthfulness which sends an infant to its 
 mother s bosom ; and, with the eloquence of a poetic and exalted 
 
THE MARRIAGE CONTRACT. 14:5 
 
 faith, she had won power over her own nature. The spiritual 
 and subdued loveliness of a conscience at rest with itself, shed its 
 softness about her. 
 
 She wandered through the forest, indulging in a tranquil hap 
 piness which had never visited her before. The flowers seemed 
 smiling with a new beauty as she turned aside, that they might 
 not be trodden into the moss by her footsteps ; the birds seem 
 ed vocal with a sweeter music, and the air came balmy to her 
 lips ; yet the day, in reality, was no finer than a hundred others 
 had been. The religious quietude of her spirit shed its own 
 brightness over the face of nature. Her heart had acquired a 
 first great conquest over itself, and there can be no happiness 
 like a consciousness of moral right. 
 
 Mary lingered awhile on the shelf of rocks, which we have 
 described in a former chapter, as overhanging the Susquehanna, 
 nearly opposite Monockonok Island, before she went down to 
 the canoe which she had moored at its base. It seemed as if 
 this spot waS henceforth to be a scene of adventure to her, for 
 scarcely had she been there a Ihoment, when the copsewood 
 above her head was agitated, as it had been on the previous day, 
 and a young man, of two or three and twenty, stepped cautiously 
 out upon the platform which shot above the shelf on which she 
 stood, and where the Indian girl had previously appeared. 
 
 Mary sank back to the birch, where she could command a full 
 view of his person without being herself seen. He was scarcely 
 above the middle height, and of slight person, but muscular, and 
 giving, in every firmly-knitted limb, indications of strength 
 greater than his size would have warranted. The face was one 
 which might have been pronounced intellectual and striking. His 
 forehead, low and broad, was shaded by hair of the deepest 
 brown ; the nose, a little too prominent for beauty, was thin and 
 finely cut, and the large black eyes full of brilliancy, which was 
 a part of themselves rather than a light from the soul, gave a 
 masculine spirit to his head, which redeemed the more earthly 
 and coarser mould of the mouth and chin. 
 
 10- 
 
146 MAET DERWENT. 
 
 He was expensively dressed for the period and condition of our 
 country, but his neckcloth was loosened at the throat, as if to 
 refresh himself with air after some severe physical exertion, and 
 his richly-laced hand-ruffles hung dripping with water over a pair 
 of wrists which were by far too slender and white ever to have sub 
 mitted to much labor. His garments throughout were dashed 
 with water-drops, and he had evidently been rowing hard upon 
 the river. He wiped away the perspiration which stood in large 
 drops on his forehead, and looked cautiously about, till his eyes 
 settled in a long, anxious gaze up the stream. 
 
 In its side position Mary obtained a more perfect view of his 
 face, and her heart throbbed with a painful feeling of surprise, 
 for she recognized the matured lineaments of Walter Butler, a 
 Tory officer, who had visited the valley some months before and 
 was the intimate friend of young Wintermoot, the young man 
 who had so cruelly insulted her deformity when both were school 
 children. In his previous visit Butler had by many a rude out 
 rage and insolent speech, shocked the moral sense of the inhabi 
 tants, and it was an evil sign when he and the *Wintermoots 
 were sheltered under the same roof. The poor girl shrunk timid 
 ly behind the birch, for she was terrified and afraid of being dis 
 covered, but she did not withdraw so far as to prevent herself 
 watching his movements. 
 
 After waiting a few moments, he went down so as to preclude 
 all possibility of being observed from the island, and uttered the 
 same sharp whistle that had answered the Indian girl s summons 
 on the previous day. Mary almost started from her concealment 
 with surprise, when the brushwood was again torn back, and a 
 strange woman, singularly attired, stepped down on the plat 
 form, and stood directly before the young man as he arose from 
 his stooping position. 
 
 Butler started back almost to the verge of the precipice, when 
 he found himself thus unexpectedly confronted. His face became 
 crimson to the temples, and he looked with an air of extreme 
 embarrassment, now on the strange woman, then on the path 
 
THE MARRIAGE CONTRACT. 14:7 
 
 which led from the precipice, as if meditating an escape. The 
 strange woman kept her eyes fixed keenly upon his movements ; 
 when he stepped a pace forward, as if about to leave her pre 
 sence, she made a detaining motion with her hand. 
 
 " You were expecting Tahmeroo, the Shawnee maiden. I am 
 Catharine Montour, her mother." 
 
 The blood suddenly left the young man s face. He bit his 
 lips impatiently, for a half checked oath trembled upon them ; 
 but his confusion was too overwhelming for any attempt at an 
 answer. After a moment s pause, Catharine, who kept her pier 
 cing gaze steadily fixed on his face, drew forth the string of red 
 coral which had been given to her daughter, and said : 
 
 " Last night my daughter told me all that you bade her con 
 ceal ; from your first meeting on the shores of Seneca Lake, 
 down to the crafty falsehood of this pledge, I know, everything." 
 
 The crimson flush again spread over the young man s face, his 
 eyes sunk beneath the scrutiny fixed upon him, and he turned his 
 head aside, muttering 
 
 " The beautiful witch has exposed me at last," then he looked 
 Catharine Montour in the face with an affectation of cool effron 
 tery, and said 
 
 " Well, madam, if Tahmeroo has chosen to confide in her 
 mother, I do not see anything remarkable in it, except that I 
 should be sought out as a party in the affair." 
 
 " Young man," exclaimed the unhappy mother, in a voice of 
 stern and bitter anguish, which made even his heart recoil, "you 
 know not what you have done you cannot dream of the wretch 
 edness which you have heaped on a being who never injured you. 
 I can find no words to tell how dear that child was to me, how com 
 pletely every thought and wish was centred in her pure existence. 
 I had guarded her as the strings of my own heart every thought 
 of her young mind was pure every impulse an affectionate one, 
 I will not reproach you, man 1 I will try not to hate you, 
 though, Heaven is my judge, I have just cause for hate. Listen 
 to me I did iiot come here to heap invectives on you " 
 
148 MARY DEKWENT. 
 
 " May I be permitted to ask what you did come for ?" inter 
 rupted Butler, with a cool effrontery, which was now real, for his 
 awe of Catharine Montour abated when he saw her sternness 
 giving way to the grief and indignation of a wronged mother. 
 " I really am at a loss to know why you should address me in this 
 strange manner. I have not stolen the girl from your wigwam, 
 nor have I the least intention of doing so foolish a thing. You 
 have your daughter, what more do you require !" 
 
 Catharine Montour drew her lips hard together, and her 
 frame shook with a stern effort to preserve her composure. 
 
 " I would have justice done my child," said she, in a voice so 
 low and calm, yet with such iron determination in its tone, that 
 the young man grew pale as it fell upon his ear ; and though his 
 words continued bold, the voice in which they were uttered was 
 that of a man determined to keep his position, though he begins 
 to feel the ground giving way beneath his feet. 
 
 " This demand, in the parlance of our nation, would mean that 
 I should submit to a marriage with the girl," he said ; " but even 
 her mother can hardly suppose that I, a descendant of one of 
 England s proudest families should marry with a Shawnee half- 
 breed, though she were beautiful as an angel, and amiable as her 
 respected mamma. You have evidently seen something of life, 
 madam, and must see how impossible it is that I should marry 
 your daughter, yet in what other form this strange demand is to 
 be shaped, I cannot imagine." 
 
 Catharine Montour forced herself to hear him out, though a 
 scornful cloud gathered on her forehead. Her lips writhed, her 
 eyes flashed with the angry contempt which filled her soul against 
 the arrogance and selfishness betrayed in the being before her. 
 
 " It is a legal marriage, nevertheless, which I require of you," 
 she said. " Listen before you reply I have that to offer which 
 may reconcile you even to an union with the daughter of a Shaw- 
 nee chief. You but now boasted of English birth and of noble 
 lineage. You are young, and one s native land is very dear ; 
 you should wish to dwell in it. Make my daughter your wife 
 
THE MARRIAGE CONTRACT. 149 
 
 go with her to your own country, where her Indian blood will 
 be unsuspected, or, if known, will be no reproach, and I pledge 
 myself, within one week after your marriage, to put you in pos 
 session of fifty thousand pounds as her dowry to relinquish her 
 forever," here Catharine s voice trembled in spite of her effort to 
 speak firmly, " and to hold communion with her only on such 
 terms as you may yourself direct. Nay, do not speak, but hear 
 me out before you answer. 
 
 " I make this offer because the happiness of my child is 
 dearer to me than my own life. I cannot crush her young life 
 by separating her from you forever ; better far that I should 
 become childless and desolate again. Take her to your own 
 land; be a kind, generous protector to her, and there is wealth in 
 England that will make the amount I offer of little moment. 
 For her sake I will once more enter the world, and claim my 
 own. But deal harshly with her let her feel a shadow of un- 
 kindness after you take her from the shelter of my love, and my 
 vengeance shall follow you to the uttermost ends of the earth. 
 Give me no answer yet, but reflect on the alternative should you 
 refuse one who has but to speak her will, and a thousand fierce 
 savages are on your track by day and by night, till your heart is 
 haunted to death by its own fears, or is crushed beneath the blow 
 which sooner or later some dark hand will deal in the requital of 
 the disgrace which you have put upon the daughter of a Shawnee. 
 
 Before Butler could recover from his astonishment at her extra 
 ordinary proposal, Catharine had disappeared among the brush 
 wood. He stood as if lost in deep thought for several minutes 
 after her departure, then walked the platform to and fro with an 
 air of indecision and excitement, which was more than once de 
 noted by a low laugh, evidently at the singular position in which 
 he found himself placed. Once he muttered a few indistinct 
 words, and looked towards the island with a smile which Mary 
 was at a loss to understand. There was something of the plot 
 ting demon in it, which made her tremble as if some harm had 
 been intended to herself. 
 
150 MARY DERWENT. 
 
 When Catharine Montour returned, Butler was the first to 
 speak. " Should I be inclined to accept your proposal," he said, 
 " and to speak candidly, your daughter is beautiful enough to 
 tempt a man to commit much greater folly ; how can I be cer 
 tain of your power to endow her as you promise ?" 
 
 Catharine drew up her heavy sleeve and displayed the jewelled 
 serpent coiled around her arm. 
 
 " This is some proof of my power to command wealth ; at the 
 encampment you shall be convinced beyond the possibility of a 
 doubt." 
 
 " But how am I to be secure of personal safety, should the 
 proof be insufficient to satisfy me, or should I see other reasons 
 to decline this strange contract ? Once in the power of your 
 savage tribe, I shall have but little chance of independent 
 choice." 
 
 Catharine made no reply, but a smile of peculiar meaning passed 
 over her face. She took a small whistle from her bosom, blew a 
 shrill call, and stood quietly enjoying the surprise of her compan 
 ion, as some fifty or sixty red warriors started up from behind 
 the shattered rocks and stunted trees that towered back from the 
 precipice on which they stood, each armed with a rifle and with 
 a tomahawk gleaming at his girdle. 
 
 "Were compulsion intended, you see I am not without power; 
 were I but to lift this hand, you would be in eternity before it 
 dropped to my side again ; but fear nothing ; go with me to the 
 encampment, and on the honor of an Englishwoman, you shall be 
 free should I fail to return and make good my promise." 
 
 " You give me excellent proofs of freedom," said the young 
 man, glancing at the dusky faces lowering on him from the 
 shrubbery on every side. 
 
 Catharine stepped forward, and spoke a few words in the 
 Indian tongue. Directly each swarthy form left its station, and 
 the whole force departed in a body over the back of the preci 
 pice. Directly a fleet of canoes was unmoored from the shelter 
 ing underbrush that fringed the shore, and shot away up stream 
 
THE MARRIAGE CONTRACT. 151 
 
 towards the Lackawanna gap. When the tramp of their reced 
 ing feet died away in the forest, Catharine returned to the young 
 man. 
 
 " You must be convinced, now, that no treachery is intended ; 
 that you are free to decide." 
 
 " I do not exactly fancy the idea of being forced to take a 
 wife, whether I will or not ; and at best, all this looks marvel, 
 lously like it. But without farther words, I accept your proposal, 
 on condition, however, that Tahmeroo is suffered to remain with 
 her people till I may wish to retreat to England. 
 
 " There is an aristocratic old gentleman in the valley of the 
 Mohawk, who calls himself my father; he might not fancy the 
 arrangement, were I to introduce my Indian bride to the com 
 panionship of his wife and daughters. Arrange it that she 
 remains with the tribe for the present, and settle the rest as you 
 will." 
 
 Catharine gave a joyful start, which she strove in vain to sup 
 press. The happiness of keeping her child a little longer, made 
 every nerve in her body thrill ; but she grew calm in an instant, 
 and coldly consented to that which she would have given worlds 
 to obtain, but dared not propose. 
 
 Butler spoke again. 
 
 " Now, madam, I entreat you to return to the camp. I give 
 my honor that I will follow in a half hour s time, but in mercy 
 grant me a few minutes breathing-space. The thought of this 
 sudden marriage affects me like a shower-bath ; it is like forcing 
 a man to be happy at the point of the bayonet. Think of having 
 half a dozen of those savage-looking rascals for groomsmen 
 rifles, scalping-knives, and all. I wish my dear, stern old father 
 were here to give the bride away ; the thoughts of his fury half 
 reconciles me to the thing, independent of the thousands. Who, 
 under heavens, would have thought of seeking an heiress among 
 a nest of Shawiiee squaws ?" 
 
 The latter part of his speech was spoken in soliloquy, for 
 Catharine had departed at his first request, without any apparent 
 
152 MARY DEKWENT. 
 
 suspicion of his good faith. The concealed girl was both sur 
 prised and touched to observe that tears were streaming down 
 the face which had appeared so stern and calm but a moment 
 before. 
 
 " She is left to me a little longer I could have blessed him 
 when he said it." 
 
 Mary heard these words as the extraordinary woman passed, 
 and her pure heart ached for the unhappy mother. 
 
 Butler remained on the rock till Catharine Montour had en 
 tirely disappeared ; then he darted down the hill, and before 
 Mary dared to venture forth from her concealment, his canoe was 
 cutting across the river toward Monockonok Island. 
 
 Mary stood almost petrified with astonishment when she saw 
 the direction he was taking. " What had Walter Butler to do 
 in the vicinity of her home ?" Her heart throbbed painfully as 
 she connected this question with the conversation which she had 
 overheard between her sister and Edward Clark, on the previous 
 day. She stood motionless till his canoe shot into the little cove 
 where her own was always moored, and when a sharp whistle 
 sounded from that direction, she bent breathlessly forward with 
 her eyes fixed intently on the door of her own dwelling. It 
 opened, and her sister, Jane, came out with her sun-bonnet in 
 her hand, and walked swiftly toward the cove. 
 
 But the poor deformed girl pressed her hands hard upon her 
 heart, and groaned aloud, when her suspicions were thus pain 
 fully confirmed. She sunk upon the ground, and burying her 
 face in her hands, prayed fervently and with an earnestness of 
 purpose that brought something of relief to her fears. For half 
 an hour she sat upon the rock with her pale face looking toward 
 the island, watching the cove through the tears which almost 
 blinded. Her silent, anxious sorrow was more like that of an an 
 gel grieving over the apostacy of a sister spirit, than that of a 
 mortal suffering under the conviction of moral wrong in a beloved 
 object. She saw her sister slowly return to the house, and re 
 marked that she stopped more than once to look after Walter 
 
SAVAGE STATESMANSHIP. 153 
 
 Butler, as he urged his canoe toward the precipice again. Mary 
 buried her face in her hands, and held her breath, as his foot 
 steps smote along the neighboring path, and were lost in the 
 forest. Poor child ! it seemed as if a stain had been cast upon 
 the purity of her own heart. She went home reluctantly, for the 
 confidence which had rendered their humble hearth-stone a hap 
 py one, had departed for ever. Oh, what a sad thing is suspi 
 cion of the moral worth of a beloved object. If seraphs could be 
 unhappy, this might make them so. 
 
 CHAPTER XXIV. 
 
 SAVAGE STATESMANSHIP. 
 
 CATHARINE MONTOUR sat in the door of her lodge at the foot 
 of Campbell s Ledge. The encampment was almost deserted. 
 Few women ever followed the warriors when they were called to 
 a distant council fire, and the men had gone into the forests on 
 the opposite shore of the river, to meet their brethren from the 
 Wind-gap. The Tories from about Fort Wintermoot were to 
 join the council, and from her high lodge Catharine could see a 
 hundred council fires, gleaming out from the dense foliage which 
 clothed the opposite hill. 
 
 The night was overcast, the moon and stars floated in soft 
 gray vapors overhead, or were covered with black clouds some 
 times sending pale ghastly gleams upon the mountains, and again 
 whelming everything in darkness. Catharine was accustomed 
 to the gloom of the forest, and her spirit always rose to meet 
 the storms that swept over it ; but now there was really no temp 
 est, nothing but sombre stillness all around. The winds mutter 
 ed and moaned along the mountain side. The waters rushed 
 
154: MAEY DEE WENT. 
 
 heavily down the valley, and those council fires were suggestive 
 of scenes more gloomy still. Like the black clouds overhead, 
 they were full of brooding destruction. 
 
 But more sombre than all was the heart of Catharine Montour. 
 On the morrow she was to resign all right over her only child to 
 a man against whom her whole soul revolted. A bad, cruel man, 
 whose name had even now become a terror wherever his foot had 
 trod. She knew well that his influence among the Indians had 
 always been pernicious ; that as the war of the Kevolution gather 
 ed strength, he had instigated the various savage tribes to parti 
 cipate in the contest ; and urged on cruelties that even savage 
 warfare had not yet invented. A thousand times would that wo 
 man have died rather than given her daughter up to his wicked 
 power, but here her supremacy was at fault. Tahmeroo loved 
 the man, and the mother had suffered so bitterly in her own life 
 from thwarted affection, that she dared not interpose a stern 
 authority over the wishes of her child, otherwise the heathenish 
 bond that already united those two persons, would have been 
 rent asunder, though she had died in the effort. 
 
 But now she had tenderness for her child, and the savage am 
 bition of the Shawnee chief to contend against. It had long 
 been his policy to unite his daughter with some white leader of 
 power, for he was sufficiently educated himself to feel how unfit 
 she would become for the savage life in which she was born ; be 
 sides he wished to strengthen his political alliance with the 
 whites and Col. John Butler, the father of this young man, was 
 well known to the Indians as an officer of high authority among 
 the Tories. His Tioga Rangers carried terror wherever they 
 went, and the Shawnees had fought side by side with them in 
 the Revolution too often for any doubt of their leader or his son. 
 In acts of bravery, stern revenge and subtle diplomacy, such as 
 the savages respected most, Walter Butler surpassed his father ; 
 and when Catharine looked toward the council fires, she knew 
 well that this young man was there, pouring his poisonous counsel 
 into the listening ears of her people. How terribly that poison 
 
SAVAGE STATESMANSHIP. 155 
 
 might work against herself, she did not yet know. In fact many 
 events had transpired in the tribe during her absence from the 
 settlement on Seneca Lake, of which she was not fully informed. 
 Her grim mother-in-law, Queen Esther, had been busy during her 
 late sojourn in the Mohawk Valley, and the effects of her crafty 
 statesmanship were felt among the struggling revolutionists dur 
 ing the entire war. In this bold bad youth the cruel woman 
 had found an ally, wicked and relentless as herself ; in the war 
 councils of the Shawnees, and at the council table of the whites, 
 he was her firm supporter. 
 
 Queen Esther had never forgiven Catharine s first refusal of her 
 son ; the indignity galled her savage pride. To this was added 
 jealousy of the influence and power which the younger woman had 
 soon obtained over the chief and his tribe. In the intelligence, 
 beauty, and stern will of Catharine, Queen Esther found a rival 
 whom she could neither overpower, despise, or intimidate. Both 
 as a white woman and an Indian princess, she soon learned to 
 regard her daughter-in-law with intense hate. 
 
 Like her son, Queen Esther had resolved to strengthen herself 
 by an alliance between Tahmeroo and some partisan of her own. 
 The chief loved his daughter with all the strength of his rude 
 and poetic nature, and readily listened to any thing that pro 
 mised to give her happiness, and which should also forward 
 these purposes. 
 
 When he learned from the crafty old queen that Tahmeroo 
 had met the young white chief, Walter Butler, on the lake 
 shore, while out in her canoe, and that an attachment had 
 sprung up between them, both his ambition and his affections 
 were aroused. Notwithstanding the great influence that Catha 
 rine had obtained over him, the pride of manhood was strong 
 within him, and his own right of action he yielded to no one. 
 In this Indian blood and breeding spoke out. Over his wife, 
 his child, and his tribe, he kept dominion. Against his will 
 even Catharine was powerless. 
 
 When he questioned Tahmeroo, and learned how completely 
 
156 MAKY DEE WENT. 
 
 the young white man had wound himself around her heart : when 
 Butler himself, knowing well how lightly such ties were regarded 
 by his own people, came and asked his daughter in marriage, 
 according to the usages of the tribe, Gi-en-gwa-tah, regard 
 less of the mother s absence, gave his child away, and adopted 
 the young man as a Shawnee brave. With the Indians these 
 ceremonies were solemn rites with Walter Butler only one of 
 the wild adventures he delighted in. 
 
 Directly after this heathen marriage, that section of the tribe 
 which inhabited the head of Seneca Lake, went to meet their 
 brother Shawnees, who still remained on the Susquehanna. A 
 swift runner was sent to inform Catharine Montour of the move 
 ment, and when she rejoined the warriors of her tribe, they were 
 encamped in the Lackawanna Gap, where a lodge had already 
 been erected for her. 
 
 On the day of her arrival, and before she knew anything of 
 these events, Tahmeroo had stealthily left the camp and made 
 her way down the river in search of Butler. She knew well 
 that some special ceremony was necessary to a marriage among 
 the whites, and shrunk with terror from the very thought of 
 confiding what had passed to her mother, till these forms were 
 added to the Indian customs that already united them. 
 
 Butler had pacified her entreaties by the gift of coral, which 
 Catharine took from under her pillow, and which led to that 
 midnight explanation, and afterward to her interview with the 
 missionary. 
 
 And now the unhappy woman sat waiting for the time of her 
 sacrifice to arrive. As the shadows gathered darker and darker 
 around her, Tahmeroo stole softly to the door and sat down on 
 the turf at her feet; an hour back Catharine had spent some 
 time in arraying her child for the ceremony that was to follow 
 the breaking up of the council. With bitter but silent indig 
 nation at the wrong that had been done her by the chief and 
 his mother, she had performed her task. Of all her unhappy 
 life this hour was filled with the heaviest and deepest trouble to 
 
SAVAGE STATESMANSHIP. 157 
 
 that unhappy woman. Tahmeroo nestled close to her mother, 
 took one hand in hers very tenderly, and laid her cheek in the 
 palms. 
 
 " Mother, why are you so sad ? Tahmeroo is very happy, but 
 when she begins to smile this mournful look turns her joy into 
 sighs." 
 
 Catharine turned her heavy eyes on that beautiful face. How 
 strange it looked ! The costly raiment which had displaced 
 her savage costume, seemed unnatural alike to mother and 
 child. 
 
 "And you are truly happy, my child ? say it again." 
 
 " Very happy 1" answered the maiden, smiling. 
 
 " And you love this man very very much ?" 
 
 "Oh, so much, dear mother 1" 
 
 " I am glad of this, my child. I have no hope for you except 
 in this love." 
 
 "No hope save in this love! Then your whole life may be 
 full of hope. Without this love, Tahmeroo would die; for it 
 fills all the world to her. Oh, mother, I did not know how 
 beautiful the earth was till he came ; the water down which his 
 canoe passes grows pure as I look; if his hand touches a flower, 
 it brightens to a star under my eye ; the winter-berries turn to 
 gold as he gathers them for me; I could kneel down and kiss 
 the moss which his foot has walked over ; the sound of his moc 
 casins, away off in the forest, makes my heart leap for joy. Is 
 not this love, mother ?" 
 
 Catharine sobbed aloud; every sweet word that fell from her 
 child brought its memory to stab her. 
 
 " Speak to me, mother are you offended that I love him so 
 much ?" 
 
 Catharine writhed in her chair ; it seemed as if she must die. 
 Had she fled to the wilderness only to crucify her heart over again 
 in the person of her child? Were the consequences of one error 
 to follow her forever and ever ? She lifted her clasped hands to 
 heaven, and wildly asked these questions as if the lurid stars 
 
158 MAEY DERWENT. 
 
 could answer her from the blackness that covered them, " Are 
 you sorry that I love him so ?" said Tahrneroo, weeping softly. 
 
 Catharine buried her face in both hands, while a struggle for 
 composure shook her whole frame. 
 
 " See, see," whispered Tahmeroo, pointing toward the oppo 
 site mountains, " the council fires have gone out. There, now 
 that the moon gleams, I can see their canoes on .the water. In a 
 few moments he will be here." 
 
 Catharine looked suddenly up. 
 
 " Come," she said, taking Tahmeroo by the hand, " we must 
 be ready." 
 
 As she spoke a noise in the brushwood made her pause and 
 listen ; directly a man came forward, walking quietly toward the 
 lodge. 
 
 Even in the darkness Tahmeroo could see that her mother 
 turned pale. 
 
 It was the missionary who, punctual to his appointment, had 
 found his way to the encampment. He sat down in the dim 
 lights of the lodge. No one spoke ; for he, too, seemed im 
 pressed by the solemn sadness of the hour. The next ten min 
 utes were spent in dead silence you could almost have heard 
 the wild bound of Tahmeroo s heart, when sound of coming foot 
 steps came up from the forest. Still no word was spoken. The 
 pine knots heaped on the hearth gleamed up suddenly, and sent 
 a ruddy glow over the lodge, revealing a strange, strange picture, 
 
 Catharine Moutour sat on the couch of scarlet cloth and soft 
 furs, robed in the same dress which she wore in the morning. Her 
 arms were folded over her bosom, and her eyes dwelt sadly on the 
 ground, though at every noise from without, they were directed 
 with a sharp, anxious look towards the door, that changed to a 
 dull troubled glow, as if the approaching footsteps had some, 
 thing terrible in them. 
 
 Tahmeroo nestled to her mother s side, and looked wonder- 
 ingly around the lodge ; now upon the missionary, who sat in a 
 rude chair opposite, with his face shaded by his hand, then on 
 
THE CASKET OF JEWELS. 159 
 
 her own strange dress, with a sort of shy curiosity ; she did not 
 quite recognize herself in that rich satin and those yellow old 
 laces. Indeed her dress would have been remarkable to any 
 one, either savage or civilized. Her Indian costume had been re 
 placed by a robe of gold-colored satin, of an obsolete but graceful 
 fashion, which had prevailed twenty years before, in England. 
 A chain of massive gold was interwoven among the braids of long 
 hair, for the first time enwreathed about her beautiful head, after 
 the fashion of the whites ; and a pair of long filagree ear-rings 
 broke the exquisite outline of her throat on the other side. 
 
 There was something a little stiff and awkward in the solemn 
 stillness of those around her, and in the strangeness of her dress, 
 which kept her bright eyes on the ground, and sent the smile 
 quivering from her lips as the tramp of feet came nearer and 
 nearer to the lodge. 
 
 CHAPTER XXV. 
 
 THE CASKET OF JEWELS. 
 
 WHILE the inmates of the lodge remained waiting in silent 
 anxiety, a shadow fell across the opening, and Butler appeared 
 before them with his clothes in much disorder, and evidently fa 
 tigued from his long walk through the forest. 
 
 Tahmeroo sprang impulsively to meet him ; the wild joy of her 
 Indian blood revelled in her cheek, and sparkled in her dark eyes 
 till they met her mother s reproving look, and felt the pitying 
 gaze which the missionary fixed upon her. Then she shrunk 
 back to her seat, blushing and trembling as if her natural joy at 
 seeing the man she loved, were something to be reproached for. 
 
 " Ha, my jewel of a red skin, have they made you afraid of 
 me already 1" said Butler, approaching her with a reckless kind of 
 
160 MAKY DEKWENT. 
 
 gaiety in Ms demeanor, and without appearing to observe the 
 presence of any one except herself " but why the deuce did you 
 allow them to trick you out in this manner ? You were a thou 
 sand times more piquante in the old dress. Come, don t look 
 frightened, you are beautiful enough in anything. Pray, what 
 are these good people waiting for ?" 
 
 Then turning to Catharine Montour, who had risen at his bold 
 approach, he said, with insolent familiarity, " Thank you, my 
 stately madam, for sending away your nest of Shawnee friends, 
 though you have made me expend a great deal of fierce cour 
 age for nothing. I had prepared myself to run the gauntlet 
 bravely among the red devils. Thank you again but I hope 
 my solemn father-in-law is to be present, I left him camped 
 around a burning circle of pitch pine and hemlock, settling all 
 creation over his calumet. 
 
 Catharine listened with a frowning brow to his flippant speech, 
 without deigning to answer. 
 
 " Upon my soul this is pleasant," said the young man, turning 
 to the missionary. " I am invited to my own wedding, but find 
 only faces that would make tears unnecessary at a funeral. 
 Faith, if this is considered a cordial reception into the wigwam 
 of one s father-in-law, I ll retire." 
 
 The missionary looked gravely in his face, but did not speak ; 
 while Catharine arose with a frowning brow, and thrusting her 
 hand under the pillows of the couch, drew forth a crimson-velvet 
 casket, encrusted with gold, and set with three or four exquisite 
 ly painted medallions, each in itself a gem. She then drew an 
 ebony box from under the couch, and unlocked it with some dif 
 ficulty, for the spring turned heavily from disuse. This box she 
 proceeded to open, though her hands looked cold as death, and 
 her face was like marble as she lifted the lid. 
 
 Butler kept his eyes fixed on her movements, while he con 
 tinued his unbecoming freedom of speech. 
 
 " Upon my honor," he whispered, glancing at the happy face 
 of Tahmeroo, and drawing her towards him, " that smile is re- 
 
THE CASKET OF JEWELS. 161 
 
 freshing after the gloomy brow of your august mother. Pray, 
 my dear " 
 
 He broke off suddenly, for that instant the Shawnee chief 
 swept aside the bear skin from the door of his lodge and stood 
 in the opening, with his council-robe gathered in cumbrous dra 
 pery about his imposing person, and his high, dusky brow crowned 
 with a coronet of scarlet feathers, whence a plume shot up from 
 the left side of his head. He was entirely unarmed, and held his 
 calumet loosely in his right hand. 
 
 With a single stride he confronted the young man so abruptly, 
 that he drew back, catching his breath. 
 
 " Young brave," he said, in pure, stern English, " when the 
 chief of the Shawnees bows his head to a woman, all other men 
 speak low and look on the ground, listening for her voice. . You 
 speak fast. Your words come like the mountain brook that is 
 shallow and breaks into foam, which is not good to drink. It is 
 not well." 
 
 The stern grandeur of this rebuke brought the blood into 
 Butler s face. He muttered something about a cold reception, 
 but threw aside the flippant air which had been so offensive. It 
 was not for his interest, or safety either, to brave the haughty 
 Shawnee in his own encampment. 
 
 Catharine Montour came forward. She had several old docu 
 ments in her hands, title deeds and letters patent, written on 
 vellum, with broad seals, and the yellow tinge of age bespeaking 
 their antiquity. These documents she placed in Butler s hands. 
 
 A keen, hungry greed broke into the young man s eyes as he 
 read. Once or twice he turned his look from the parchment to 
 Catharine s face, with increasing wonder and respect. 
 
 " And all this you consent to resign in behalf of Tahmeroo," 
 he said, " or rather, in behalf of her husband ?" 
 
 " So far as the law permits, I resign it to my daughter," an 
 swered Catharine. 
 
 A flush stole over the young man s forehead ; he knew by her 
 voice that she comprehended all his meanness. But he was now 
 
 11 
 
162 MAKY DEKWENT. 
 
 more anxious than Catharine herself for the ceremony that gave 
 so much wealth to his control ; and this eager wish increased 
 when he saw the casket open in her hand. She raised a neck 
 lace and a bracelet of magnificent diamonds from among the 
 gems which it contained, and held them out for his inspection. 
 
 " Make yourself certain of their value," she said, in a dry, 
 business tone, that had something of sarcasm in it, "for they 
 are the security which I am about to offer, that my draft on Sir 
 William Johnson shall be honorably met in a week from this 
 date." 
 
 " I see that you intend to make a business transaction of the 
 affair," replied Butler, carelessly receiving the jewels, which, 
 however, he scrutinized with a closeness which betrayed a rapa 
 cious interest in their worth. 
 
 Catharine placed the casket in his hands with a smile of keen 
 contempt. 
 
 * After you are fully satisfied of their value, this reverend man 
 will receive them in trust. He has my sanction to deliver them 
 to you three weeks from this day, should the draft which you 
 hold in your hand remain at the time unpaid. Are you content 
 with this arrangement ?" 
 
 " I know little of the value of jewels," replied Butler, slowly 
 closing the casket, " but should suppose that these might be suf 
 ficient security for the money." 
 
 " Perhaps this gentleman s opinion will satisfy your doubts," 
 and taking the casket from Butler s hand, Catharine again 
 touched the spring and held it before the missionary. 
 
 " No, no ; I am not a judge," exclaimed the missionary, draw 
 ing back in his chair and pushing the casket away ; but after a 
 moment he looked up more composedly and said, " Excuse me, 
 lady, I need not examine the jewels ; from what I saw of them 
 in the young gentleman s hand, I am certain that they are worth 
 more than the sum named." 
 
 " Are you convinced ?" said Catharine, again turning to 
 Butler. 
 
THE CASKET OF JEWELS. 163 
 
 " Perfectly let the ceremony proceed." 
 
 With a kingly gesture, the chief lifted the bear-skin again, and 
 taking Tahmeroo by the hand, led her out upon the turf in front 
 of her mother s lodge. Here a scene of wild grandeur presented 
 itself. The whole encampment was surrounded by warriors in 
 full costume, and glittering with arms. The Shawnees had risen 
 from their council fires, and moved in single file through the 
 woods to the foot of Campbell s Ledge. Here they wound them 
 selves, rank after rank, round the encampment, till the chief and 
 his family were hedged in by a living wall. Those in the front 
 rank held torches of pitch pine knots kindled at the dying coun 
 cil brands, which flamed up in one vast girdle of fire, lighting up 
 the savages in their gorgeous dresses, the dense forest trees in the 
 background, and throwing smoky gleams on the bold face of the 
 ledge itself. 
 
 The eyes of the Shawnee chief flamed up with natural triumph 
 as he stood upon the forest sward, which those broad lights were 
 turning to gold under his feet, and, with a wave of his hand, 
 motioned Butler to his side. 
 
 " White Brave," he said, " two moons ago I led my daughter 
 to your wigwam, and, in the face of our tribe, she became your 
 wife. It was well. But Catharine Montour is not content ; she 
 mourns that her child was given away, and she not there to 
 rejoice. She says that your people have other laws, and that a 
 wife given by the Shawnees is not a wife with our white fathers. 
 Catharine is wise, and speaks well. The white brave shall make 
 Tahmeroo his wife before his white brother here, who takes his 
 law from the Great Spirit himself. Warriors, draw near and 
 listen, while the young white brave makes his vow." 
 
 The chief placed Tahmeroo s hand in Butler s, and grasped 
 them both in his own, while he waved one arm on high, thus 
 commanding the warriors to draw near. 
 
 There was a stir among the savages ; rank glided into rank, 
 circle closed upon circle, till a triple ring of torches encircled the 
 young pair, and a sea of waving plumes, wild faces, and sharp, 
 
164: MARY DEKWENT. 
 
 glittering eyes, surged back into the forest. All this concourse 
 of men stood motionless, obedient to the lifted hand of their 
 chief. 
 
 Catharine Montour came forth from the lodge, pale and rigid, 
 as if she were going to execution ; after her, walked the mis 
 sionary, with a movement so still that it seemed a shadow glid 
 ing over the grass. He took his place before the young couple, 
 opened his prayer-book, and commenced the ceremony. There 
 was a slight delay, for Butler was unprovided with a ring. 
 Catharine drew one from her finger, and gave it to the missionary. 
 He touched her hand in receiving this ring. It was cold as ice. 
 
 It was a wonderful sound in the heart of that dense forest, the 
 voice of a devout Christian giving that solemn marriage bene 
 diction, girded round by savages who had scarcely ever heard of 
 the true God in their lives. But a stranger sight it was when 
 the haughty chief, the proud English lady, the minister, and that 
 newly married couple sank gently to their knees, and all that 
 tribe of savages fell to the earth also, with their swarthy fore 
 heads in the dust, while the voice of that good man rose clear 
 and loud, piercing the heavens with its solemn eloquence. Even 
 the savages looked at each other with awe, and trod stealthily 
 as they broke up in bands, and moved back toward the woods. 
 
 It was, indeed, a holy hour ; for, though blood, flame, and 
 rapine marked the course of that tribe for years after that august 
 ceremony, the Indians sometimes grew less relentless when a cry 
 for mercy reminded them of the marriage of their chief s daugh 
 ter. When all was over, the missionary departed noiselessly as 
 he came. The chief was disappointed when he looked round 
 and saw that he was gone. He had munificently prepared a 
 present of furs and wampum, which he desired to present, after 
 the fashion of the whites. Catharine Montour saw nothing j she 
 was still prostrate on the earth. 
 
 Butler went away soon after the missionary, scarcely deigning 
 to make an excuse for his absence or name the time of his return. 
 Tahmeroo gazed after him till great tears gathered in her eyes. 
 
THE CHERRY-TREE SPRING. 165 
 
 Then a sudden thought a quick pain ; and, while her father 
 gave orders to his warriors, and her mother bowed herself in the 
 dust, she darted into the woods. Still dressed in those singular 
 wedding garments, she forced her path through the forest along 
 the mountain stream, and down the steep ramparts of Fall 
 ing Spring, till she came out upon the river. Fragments of 
 golden satin and rich lace were torn from her dress, and left 
 clinging to brushwood and thorns in her passage, but she took 
 no heed ; the Indian blood in her veins was all on fire with jea 
 lousy. As she reached the foot of Falling Spring, a canoe 
 shot out from the ravine through which its waters plunged to the 
 river. She saw the waves glitter in its track, sprang downward, 
 unmoored her own little craft, and flew along the windings of the 
 Susquehanna like a sparrow hawk. 
 
 CHAPTER XXVI. 
 
 THE CHERRY-TREE SPRING. 
 
 MARY DERWENT returned home with a mournful determina 
 tion to seek the confidence of her sister to inform her frankly 
 of the knowledge she had obtained, and, if possible, to save her 
 from the consequences of her unprincipled encouragement of 
 Walter Butler, when her faith was pledged to another. 
 
 She found Edward Clark and her sister seated by the only 
 glazed window of the cabin, conversing cordially as usual. But, 
 as the evening wore on, she observed that Jane grew petulant 
 and restless. Two or three times she went to the door, looked 
 out hurriedly, and returned without any obvious reason. She 
 would not sit down by Clark again, but when he addressed her, 
 answered him impatiently, as if his society had all at once 
 become irksome. 
 
166 MAEY DEE WENT. 
 
 Once Edward made some allusion to a farm which his father 
 had promised to give him when he settled for life, and spoke of 
 the kind of house he intended to build, asking Jane s opinion. 
 
 She answered abruptly, that she was tired of farming and 
 hard work of all kinds; indeed, she hoped the time would come 
 when she need not be obliged to live in a log-house, and spoil 
 her hands by washing dishes from morning till night. 
 
 Young Clark looked a little surprised at this sudden outbreak 
 of discontent, but laughingly told the spoiled beauty that she 
 should have a two-story frame-house, with glass windows in 
 every room, when his ship came in from the moon, and the 
 Indians were all driven from Wyoming. 
 
 Jane was about to return some saucy reply, but that instant 
 a shrill whistle came up from the river, which brought a torrent 
 of crimson into her face, and she looked wistfully at the door 
 without daring to approach it. 
 
 Mary understood it all, and her pure heart ached within her. 
 She blushed even more deeply than her sister; and when Jane 
 attempted to speak carelessly of night birds which roosted on 
 the island, her face grew troubled like that of an angel who sees 
 a beloved companion ready to fall. 
 
 Clark observed this embarrassment without suspecting its 
 cause, while Mother Derwent droned on with her flax wheel, 
 and talked about the comfort of living upon an island where the 
 wolves could only bark at you from the opposite shore, thus 
 unconsciously aiding in her granddaughter s deception. 
 
 After a time, Clark mentioned Walter Butler, and observed 
 that he had seen him on the river that day; something in Jane s 
 manner seemed to excite his attention that moment, for he asked 
 a little suspiciously, if the young tory had landed on the island. 
 
 Jane crimsoned to the temples again, but answered promptly, 
 that she had not seen Mr. Butler in a week that was, since her 
 birth-day. 
 
 This direct falsehood smote Mary to the heart; tears swelled 
 to her eyes till she could hardly discern the beautiful face of her 
 
THE CHEEKY-TREE SPRING. 167 
 
 sister through their mist. Falsehood! falsehood I what love can 
 outlive that ? 
 
 Filled with these unquiet thoughts, Mary went to her little 
 bedroom that she might weep and pray alone. As she closed 
 the door, her bister was asking Edward Clark how far it was 
 from Wyoming to Canada, and if all the handsome ladies there 
 wore silk dresses and had hired people to wait on them ? 
 
 Mary closed the door and went to bed, but she could not 
 sleep; for the first time, the sweet voice of her sister, as it 
 sounded through the thin partition, brought disquiet to her 
 affectionate heart. She heard Edward Clark leave the house 
 about ten o clock, but it was more than an hour before Jane 
 came to bed. When, at length, she felt the familiar touch of 
 her cheek, it was heated with feverish thought. The deformed 
 lay within her sister s arms, apparently asleep, but deliberating 
 on the most effectual method of opening the subject which lay 
 so heavily on her heart, when that whistle which had haunted 
 her footsteps continually since the night before, again sounded 
 from the cove with a shrillness that cut to her heart like a dag 
 ger. Jane caught her breath, rose suddenly to her elbow, and 
 listened, while her frame trembled till it shook the bed. After 
 a few minutes, during which the whistle sounded sharply again, 
 she crept softly from the bed, put on her clothes, and stole from 
 the house. Mary was so shocked and confounded, that it was 
 several minutes before she could collect her thoughts sufficiently 
 to decide what course to pursue. At last she arose, and hastily 
 dressing herself, ran down to the cove. 
 
 The trees hung in leafy quiet over the green sward, and the 
 moonbeams shed their radiance on the waters as they rippled 
 against the bank; no human being was in sight, but a strange 
 canoe lay rocking at its mooring by the side of her own, and the 
 murmur of distant voices came faintly from the direction of a 
 spring which supplied the household with water. 
 
 It was a fairy nook, the spring to which Mary bent her steps; 
 rocks, covered with velvet moss, were piled about it, and a clump 
 
168 MARY DERWENT. 
 
 of crab-apple and wild-cherry trees interlaced their boughs, and 
 mingled their white and rose-colored blossoms above it in their 
 season; as the summer advanced, the black cluster and the 
 green apple hung in ripening beauty over the creeping plants 
 and modest wild-flowers that enamelled the moss, and fringed 
 the rivulet which stole from the rocky basin of the spring with 
 a cool, murmuring sound. 
 
 The moonlight lay full on the overhanging trees as Mary 
 approached, and, in the stillness, the voices she had heard, 
 became each moment more distinct. She paused in the shadow 
 which fell across the footpath where it curved down into the 
 little hollow. Her sister, Jane, was sitting on a rock just within 
 the moonlight, which flickered through the boughs above, and 
 by her side, with her hand in his, was Walter Butler. 
 
 He was speaking, and Mary s heart swelled with indignation, 
 as she listened to his words 
 
 " Take your choice," he said, " remain here and become the 
 wife, the drudge of Edward Clark condemn these beautiful 
 hands to perpetual toil; milk his cows, cook for his workmen, 
 be content with the reward of a homespun dress, now and then, 
 to set off this form, which a king might look upon with admira 
 tion; accept this miserable life if you choose. But do not pass 
 by the offer I make, without thought; for it is wealth, ease, lux 
 ury, in fact, everything that beauty craves, against neglect and 
 drudgery. I offer the heart of a man who knows how to esti 
 mate your beauty who will deck it in gold and robe it in silks 
 who will provide servants to do your bidding, and surround 
 you with such elegance as you never dreamed of. It is no idle 
 promise, Jane, for I have become rich, very rich, independent 
 of my father. What are you crying for ? can I offer more than 
 this ?" 
 
 " Oh, no," replied the infatuated girl, " I was thinking of poor 
 old grandma and dear, dear Mary; what will they do when I 
 am gone what will Edward Clark think of me ?" 
 
 " Edward Clark again ! and that old woman and selfish girl 
 
THE CHEKEY-TKEE SPRING. 169 
 
 who have made you a slave. Will you never stop whimpering 
 about them ? have I not promised that you shall send them 
 money ?" 
 
 " They would not take it ; I am sure they would not touch a 
 cent of your money. Indeed, I cannot help feeling bad when I 
 think of leaving them in this manner. When we are married, 
 you will bring me back sometimes, won t you ?" 
 
 " Yes, when we are married I will certainly bring you to see 
 them ; have no fear of that. It is now past twelve, and we 
 must be many miles hence before daybreak. Come, dry these 
 tears and go with me to the canoe we are losing time what 
 good is there in all these tears ; they only spoil your beauty ; 
 come, come." 
 
 As Butler spoke, he placed his arm round the weeping girl, 
 and drew her with some violence along the footpath ; but they 
 had scarcely reached the bend which led into the open moonlight 
 when Mary Derwent stood in the way. 
 
 " The little Hunchback, by all the furies !" exclaimed Butler, 
 girding the waist of his companion with a firm arm and attempt 
 ing to drag her forward, though she struggled in his embrace, 
 and with tears and sobs entreated him to free her. 
 
 " Jane sister 1 you will not go with this wicked man ; listen 
 to me before you take this dreadful step ! Ask him where he 
 obtained the money which he but now boasted of. Jane, I have 
 never, in the whole course of my life, told you a falsehood. Be 
 lieve me now this wicked man dares not deny what I say. He 
 is another woman s husband ! I heard him make the promise 
 I saw him on his way to perform that promise 1 Jane, it is a 
 married man for whom you were about to forsake us. Let him 
 deny it if he dare." 
 
 " Out of my path, lying imp, before I trample your shapeless 
 carcass under my feet," cried Butler, through his shut teeth. 
 
 But the undaunted girl kept her station, and her steady voice 
 told how little effect his taunt on her deformity had made. 
 
 " I have told no lie," she exclaimed boldly, " and you dare not 
 
170 MARY DEKWENT. 
 
 accuse me of it. Last evening I heard all that passed between 
 you and the strange white woman who lives among the Shaw- 
 nees. Jane, look in that face. Is there no guilt there ?" 
 
 " You do not believe this," said Butler, still attempting to 
 draw the wretched girl away. 
 
 " Yes, I do I" cried Jane, with sudden vehemence, and leaping 
 from his grasp, she flung her arms around Mary where she stood, 
 and urged his departure with a degree of energy that he could 
 no longer contend against. Baffled and full of rage, he loaded 
 them both with bitter imprecations, and pushed out into the 
 stream. Locked in each other s arms, the sisters saw him de 
 part ; one shedding tears of penitence and shame, the other full 
 of thanksgiving. 
 
 As they stood thus, unable to speak from excess of feeling, 
 the young vines were torn apart just above them, a pair of 
 glittering eyes looked through, and a voice that made them cling 
 closer to each other, broke upon the night, sharp and wild as 
 the cry of an angry bird. 
 
 " Look up, that I may see the pale face that comes between 
 Tahmeroo and her love I" 
 
 With a wild bound, that tore the vines before her into shreds, 
 Tahmeroo leaped down among the loose rocks, and seizing Jane 
 Derwent by the shoulder, dragged her up the path into the 
 moonlight ; for the clouds that had tented her wedding with their 
 gloom were swept away now, leaving the sky clear, full of stars, 
 and pearly with the glow of a full moon. 
 
 Jane Derwent shrunk and cowered under those flashing eyes. 
 She was forced to her knees among the stones, and held there, 
 while Tahmeroo perused her face, lineament by lineament, as if 
 it had been a book in which her own destiny was written. A 
 fierce, angry fire burned in those black eyes, and that mouth, so 
 beautiful when it smiled, writhed and trembled with terror, 
 gcorn, and bitter, bitter hate. She clutched her hand on the 
 poor girl s shoulder till its nails penetrated the skin ; with the 
 other hand she groped at her girdle, and drew a knife from its 
 
THE CHEKRY-TKEE SPRING. 171 
 
 glittering sheath, at her side; for this remnant of her savage 
 dress she still retained. 
 
 Jane crouched down to the earth, shielding herself with both 
 uplifted hands ; her shrieks rang out, one upon another, till the 
 opposite rocks echoed them back like demons. 
 
 This terror exasperated the young Indian to still keener mad 
 ness. She drew back the knife with a force that lifted her clear 
 of the form grovelling at her feet, the next instant it would 
 have been buried in the white neck but Mary Derwent sprang 
 upon her, seized the uplifted arm and dragged it downward. 
 
 "Would you kill her? This is murder she has never 
 wronged you \" 
 
 Tahmeroo s rage broke fearfully over the gentle girl as she 
 clung to her arm ; for one instant it seemed checked by the 
 agony of that lovely face ; but another cry from Jane brought 
 the fury back ; her eyes rained fire ; she tore her arm from the 
 grasp of those poor little hands ; again the knife quivered on 
 high again she drew back to give a sure blow. 
 
 But a stronger arm than Mary s grasped her now. The knife 
 was torn from her with a force that sent her reeling down the 
 bank its blade flashed over her, struck with a sharp clink 
 against the stones, rebounded and plunged into the spring, send 
 ing up a storm of diamonds as it fell. 
 
 " Tahmeroo woman squaw how dare you touch this girl 1" 
 
 Butler lifted Jane from the earth as he spoke, and holding 
 her with one arm, thus confronted his young wife, as she rose 
 from the stones where he had dashed her. 
 
 She could not speak ; her face was blanched ; specks of foam 
 settled on her marble lips ; her eyes were lurid with smould 
 ering fire, and all her limbs quivered like those of a dying 
 animal. 
 
 At last her voice broke forth. 
 
 " You have struck Tahmeroo, and for her." 
 
 Something more than anger spoke in that voice it had the 
 dull hollow sound of desolation. 
 
172 MARY DEKWENT. 
 
 " Squaw traitoress half-breed 1 go back to your wigwam, 
 before I lay you dead at the girl s feet !" 
 
 The Indian girl withered under this fiendish speech ; she fell 
 forward, grovelling, with her face to the earth, and lay there like 
 a drift of autumn leaves, through which the wind is moaning. 
 Her lamentations broke forth in the Indian tongue, but the tones 
 were enough to win tears from marble. 
 
 Mary Derwent knelt down and took the drooping head upon 
 her lap ; the anguish in that face as it was turned to the moon 
 light, went to her gentle soul. 
 
 " Oh, me, you have killed her, cruel, cruel man I" she said, 
 lifting her eyes to the lowering face of Butler, who was striving to 
 re-assure Jane Derwent, passing by the sufferings of his wife with 
 reckless scorn. " She cannot speak, every breath is a moan." 
 
 " Let her rest then ; no one wants her to speak, the young 
 tigress 1 My poor Jane, the dagger was quivering over you when 
 I came up. I shudder to think what might have happened but 
 for your cries; had I been a little farther off, your cries could not 
 have reached me, and I should have lost you eternally. Look up, 
 dear one, now that I have saved your life it is mine, all mine." 
 
 Tahmeroo evidently heard these words ; she struggled to 
 get up, but sunk back again, moaning out, "no, no, Tahmeroo 
 is his wife 1" 
 
 " You hear," said Mary Derwent, looking up at her sister, who, 
 still trembling with terror, clung to young Butler with all her 
 strength, and seemed soothed by his expressions of tender in 
 terest. " This poor girl is his wife, his cruel words are killing 
 her. Leave his arms, sister ; stand up alone, and look upon the 
 woman you have both wronged, asking God to forgive you !" 
 
 " Come, come, with me now. Let the crooked little witch 
 preach on. You are not safe here the moment I leave you, this 
 pretty fiend will find her knife again. She will not let you live a 
 week. See how your sister tends her as if she, not you, had been 
 hurt ! Leave them together, sweet one, we can reach the canoe 
 before they miss us. I shall leave Wyoming at once. Horses are 
 
THE MERITED LESSON 
 
 173 
 
 ready for us down at Aunt Polly s tavern ; before daylight we 
 shall reach the Blue Mountains." 
 
 Butler whispered these words into Jane Derwent s ear, draw 
 ing her down to his side as he spoke, and enforcing his intreaties 
 with covert caresses. 
 
 Half overcome with terror, half with these entreaties, the un 
 happy girl yielded herself to the power of his arm, and they both 
 fled towards the shore. 
 
 CHAPTER XXVII. 
 
 THE MERITED LESSON. 
 
 TAHMEROO heard the movement, sprang to her feet, and away, 
 almost throwing Mary down the steep, with her first impetuous 
 leap. 
 
 Recovering from the shock, Mary followed her, calling despe 
 rately after her sister. 
 
 In his hurry to reach the spring, Butler had dragged his 
 canoe half-way up the bank, and it took a few moments to shove 
 it into the water again. Frightened and weak, Jane had seated 
 herself on a loose boulder, and eagerly watched him as he tugged 
 at the little craft. By this time, Tahmeroo confronted her hus 
 band, dragged the canoe desperately from his hold, and with the 
 strength of a lioness, sent it shooting into the river. 
 
 The canoe was out of reach in a moment for the quick cur 
 rent seized it, and it was soon dancing down its own silver path 
 on the " broken waters," leaving the baffled villain and his vic 
 tim helpless on the shore. 
 
 Butler ground his teeth. If he did not again load the poor 
 Indian with rude epithets, it was from excess of rage. Tahmeroo 
 was neither fierce nor weak now. The iron of her nature was 
 
174: MAKY DEKWENT. 
 
 taking its white heat ; all the fiery sparks had been shot forth, 
 but she was dangerous to trifle with just then, even without 
 arms, and so still. 
 
 Mary was pleading with her sister. 
 
 " You are wronging her, degrading yourself throwing away 
 your good name forever," she said. " The poor feeling he calls 
 love was given to her once, and you see how he outrages her 
 now. Even though he had the power to make you his wife, her 
 fate would be yours, Jane." 
 
 Jane turned her back upon the gentle pleader, repulsing her 
 with both hands. 
 
 "That young Indian is not his wife, I say," she answered 
 petulantly, and weeping, as much from annoyance as any re 
 morseful feeling. " It takes something more than a savage pow 
 wow in the woods to bind an officer of the king. What does it 
 amount to if she does call herself his wife !" 
 
 " Nothing, nothing whatever," said Butler, interposing, while 
 Tahmeroo stood proudly silent. "Such contracts never last 
 beyond the moon in which they are formed. If the Shawnee 
 chief would insist on giving me his daughter, am I to blame ? 
 Such hospitality is a habit of his tribe." 
 
 " And dare you say that this is all the bond which unites you 
 with this poor girl ?" questioned Mary with great dignity. 
 
 " Dare I say that ? of course I dare. She knows it well enough 
 can you think me a fool ?" 
 
 "Yes," said a voice, which made the audacious young man 
 start, " if cruelty and falsehood are folly, you are the worst of 
 fools. How dare you stand up in the face of high heaven and 
 disclaim vows yet warm on your lips ? Jane Derwent, for your 
 father s sake believe me. This very evening I, invested with 
 sacred power by the church, married Walter Butler to this young 
 girl. He came from the Lodge, where this ceremony was per 
 formed, directly here. I was myself coming to the Island, think 
 ing to rest in your cabin till morning, but his arm was strongest 
 and he reached the shore first." 
 
THE MERITED LESSON. 175 
 
 " You hear him you will believe this now I" said Mary ten 
 derly, leaning over her sister. 
 
 Jane began to sob. 
 
 " What is the difference, supposing he speaks the truth 1" said 
 Butler, also bending over her, " I love you, and have the means 
 of performing all my promises. Who will know or care about 
 this forest hawk in our world ?" 
 
 Jane Derwent was weak and miserably vain, but not vicious. 
 Butler had enlisted no really deep feeling in his behalf. Indeed, 
 but for her terror of the Indian girl, it is doubtful if she would 
 have followed him to the shore. She had been taught from child 
 hood up, to regard the missionary with reverence, and never for 
 an instant dreamed of doubting his word. Arising with an 
 angry gesture, she put Butler aside and submitted herself to the 
 caressing arm of her sister. 
 
 " Go to your wife," she said, with a burst of mortification. 
 " She is only too good for you. I am sorry for her and despise 
 you a pretty creature you intended to make of me." 
 
 " Not at all, my dear. It was the Lord that made you a 
 pretty creature to begin with, or I should never have troubled 
 my head about you. After all, I dare say the whole thing would 
 have turned out more plague than pleasure." 
 
 "Or profit either," said the missionary, with the nearest ap 
 proach to sarcasm that his heavenly voice or features could ex 
 press. " Remember, for the present, I am that poor girl s trus 
 tee ; wrong her by another word, and the draft upon Sir John 
 Johnson shall be cancelled. Before morning, I will deliver it 
 back with the casket of jewels in ray bosom, to the lady, whose 
 munificence you have abused. Gold cannot re-kindle the love 
 that would give happiness to this unfortunate child, but it shall 
 save her from cruelty." 
 
 " Upon my word, old gentleman, you should have been a law 
 yer; among that hive of red skins up yonder. I really thought 
 praying your vocation, but you are rather hard upon my harmless 
 enterprise. I only wanted to torment little hunchback here, who 
 
176 MAKY DEKWENT. 
 
 has been following me round like a wildcat the whole week ; 
 there was nothing serious in the matter I assure you, upon the 
 honor of a gentleman." 
 
 The missionary regarded him for a moment in dead silence ; 
 the audacity of this falsehood was something new to him. It is 
 probable he would have rebuked this coarse attempt at deception, 
 but Tahmeroo came proudly up at the instant, and for her sake 
 he refrained. 
 
 During this entire conversation the Indian bride had kept 
 aloof, standing alone on the banks of the cove ; as she moved 
 towards them Butler s last speech fell upon her ear. She drew a 
 deep breath, and listened for more. The light shone full upon 
 her face ; it was pale, but very beautiful, with the new hope his 
 words had aroused her eyes shone like stars. All the spirit of 
 her fathers lay in the movement of that slender form. With 
 the elasticity of sudden hope she came back to her old life. 
 
 Butler was eager to retaliate upon Jane, to convince the 
 missionary and appease his bride. With that quick transition of 
 manner which rendered him almost irresistible at times, he meet 
 Tahmeroo half way. 
 
 " There," he said, holding out both hands, " have I punished 
 you enough, my fiery flamingo? Did you think I could not see that 
 you were following my canoe all the time ? But for that, I 
 should have been in the fort long ago ; why, child, had it not 
 been for my seeming wrath, you would have killed that silly girl 
 yonder, and that would have set every patriot in the valley on 
 your track." 
 
 She stood looking at him, the haughtiness dropped away from 
 her figure, and her lips began to tremble. 
 
 "Tahmeroo s heart is like a white flower on the rocks; it 
 opens to the rain, but folds itself close when thunder comes," she 
 said at last. " Speak again, that she may know how to answer." 
 
 He knew that she was trembling from head to foot ; that a 
 passionate outbreak of forgiveness lay under those figurative 
 words. 
 
THE MERITED LESSON. ITT 
 
 " What shall I say, Tahmeroo ? what is there to explain, 
 where two people love each other as we do ?" 
 
 She gave him her hand then she gathered both his against 
 her heart, that he might feel how loudly it was beating. 
 
 Butler cast a triumphant look on Jane. It pleased him that 
 she witnessed the passionate love, the ready forgiveness, of that 
 spirited young creature. 
 
 " Did you think, sir," he said, leading his bride up to the mis 
 sionary, "that any man could earnestly seek another while a 
 being like this belonged to him ?" 
 
 Poor Jane, she was no match for the audacity of this man, 
 but fairly burst into tears of mortified vanity. It was a salutary 
 lesson, which no one wished to render less impressive than it 
 proved. 
 
 Tahmeroo stood by her husband in silence. All her sensitive 
 modesty had returned, and she was restless like a wild bird eager 
 to get back to its cage. 
 
 The missionary did not reply. He seemed to have forgotten what 
 had gone before, and stood mournfully gazing on that young face. 
 
 " God be thanked if I have saved her one pang," he mur 
 mured, in answer to some thought that arose at the sight of her 
 beauty. 
 
 But the young man became impatient. 
 
 " Tahmeroo waits to take leave of you, reverend sir. I trust 
 this reckless escapade has done us no harm in your good opinion. 
 The young lady there will tell you it was but a wild freak to 
 annoy her sister, and to punish Tahmeroo a little for the jealousy 
 which sent her off like a wild hawk upon the night. I trust you 
 will not think it worth while to mention the affair to my august 
 mother-in-law before we meet again in the valley of the Mo 
 hawk !" 
 
 " I understand," answered the missionary briefly, and inform 
 you that the power to enforce the conditions of your marriage 
 contract rests with me, so Jet the fact of your visiting this island 
 remain among ourselves." 
 
 12 
 
178 MARY DERWENT. 
 
 " You are generous, sir," answered Butler, covering the bitter 
 ness of his defeat under an appearance of grateful feeling. 
 " Come, Tahmeroo, show me your craft, and I will take you 
 back to the ledge. My poor canoe is half way to Wilkesbarre 
 by this time, I dare say." 
 
 He wound his arm around the young Indian exactly as he had 
 supported Jane Derwent a few minutes before, passed by that 
 astonished girl with a careless nod of the head, and in this fash 
 ion was about to leave the cove ; but Tahmeroo disengaged 
 herself from his arm, and came back with a wild grace, that 
 touched the missionary to the heart. She knelt down before 
 him, and bent her head for a blessing, as she had bowed at his 
 feet once before that night. 
 
 He did not touch her head ; some unaccountable feeling kept 
 him from that ; but he lifted both hands to heaven and blessed 
 her fervently. Tahmeroo arose, passed Jane quickly, and, taking 
 Mary s hand, with a look of ineffable gratitude laid it against her 
 heart. 
 
 " When the war storm comes, Tahmeroo will remember the 
 white bird." 
 
 With a throb of affection, for which she could not account 
 even to herself, Mary wound her arms around that bending neck, 
 and drew the Indian girl close to her bosom. For an instant 
 those two hearts beat against each other with full heavy throbs. 
 When Mary unlocked her arms, it seemed as if a portion of her 
 own life had been carried away, leaving her richer than ever. 
 
 Before she had time to wonder at this, Tahmeroo and her 
 husband had disappeared. 
 
 Jane Derwent might well have trembled, had she known the 
 vindictive feelings that man took away with him. 
 
 Mary Derwent arose early in the morning. She had not slept 
 over night, but strove with many a gentle wile to soothe the in 
 dignant grief of her sister, and win for her the sleep that forsook 
 her own eyelids. All night long she heard the missionary walk 
 ing up and down the outer-room, with a sad, heavy step, as if 
 
THE MERITED LESSON. 179 
 
 some painful subject kept him from rest. At daybreak the front 
 door closed, and his tread rose softly up from the greensward, as 
 he passed down to the water. 
 
 Mary stole out of bed and followed him. Jane had dropped 
 asleep at last, and lay with the tears still trembling on her closed 
 lashes and hot cheeks. Both anger and penitence for the time 
 were hushed in slumber. Thus, the deformed girl left the cabin 
 unmolested, and overtook the missionary just as he was getting 
 into his canoe. 
 
 " May I go with you ?" she said, bending her sweet, troubled 
 face upon him as he took up the oars. 
 
 " Why did you follow me, child ?" he answered. "It is very 
 early." 
 
 " I do not know I was awake all night something told me 
 to follow you. They are all asleep and will not miss me please 
 take me in. I want to feel the wind from the river our room 
 has been so close all night that I can t breathe." 
 
 The missionary grew thoughtful while she was speaking ; but 
 at last he smiled, and bade her step into the canoe. She placed 
 herself at his feet, sighing gently, as if some pain had left her 
 heart. 
 
 " Is it far ?" she asked, looking up stream toward Campbell s 
 Ledge. 
 
 The missionary had told her nothing of his object ; but he an 
 swered as if there had been some previous appointment between 
 them. 
 
 " Last night they were encamped under the Ledge." 
 
 " And you will tell this white queen what happened you will 
 keep that bad man away from Monockonok ?" 
 
 " It is for this I seek the camp ; but why did you follow me ? 
 how did you guess where I was going ?" 
 
 " I don t know. That strange lady never spoke to me never 
 saw me in all her life ; but I want to look at her again. She 
 seemed standing by the bed all last night, asking me not to 
 sleep. Sometimes I could almost see her crimson feathers wave, 
 
180 MAET DERWENT. 
 
 and hear the wampum fringes rattle on her moccasins. I think 
 that no shadow was ever so real before." 
 
 " And it was this strange fancy that sent you out so early ?" 
 
 " Yes, for it was a fancy. I could see, as the day broke, that 
 grandmother s crimson cardinal, which hung against the wall, 
 had flung its shadow downward ; but the idea of that strange 
 lady had sunk into my heart, before the light told me what it 
 was. I longed to hear her voice again, to see her with the sun 
 light quivering about her head. Indeed, sir, she was like a queen 
 standing there upon the rock. I caught my breath every time 
 she spoke." 
 
 " And yet she did not speak to you ?" 
 
 " No ; I was out of sight, behind the brushwood. She did 
 not know that a poor creature like me existed how should 
 she ?" 
 
 The missionary bent heavily to his oars ; drops of perspira 
 tion rose to his forehead ; he beat the water with heavy, des 
 perate pulls ; but it was long before he answered. 
 
 They landed at Falling Spring, and made their way into the 
 hills. A trail was broken through the undergrowth, where 
 the Indians had passed up to the ledge the night before. Here 
 and there a blackened pine-torch lay in the path, and fragments 
 of rude finery clung to the thorn bushes. 
 
 The missionary moved on, buried in thought. Mary followed 
 after, panting for breath, but unwilling to lag behind. At last 
 he noticed that she mounted the hill with pain, and began 
 to reproach himself, tenderly helping her forward. She saw that 
 he grew pale with each advancing step, and that his hand shook 
 nervously as he took hers, in the ascent. Why, she could not 
 think. Surely he did not fear the savages then, after having 
 stood in their midst the night before. 
 
 At last they came out upon a pile of rocks that overlooked 
 the encampment. The whole basin, so full of savage life ten 
 hours before, lay empty at their feet ; not a human being was 
 in sight ; trampled grass, extinguished torches, and torn vines 
 
THE MERITED LESSON. 181 
 
 betrayed a scene of silent devastation. In the midst of it all 
 stood Catharine Montour s lodge, drearily empty. The bear skin 
 was torn down from the entrance ; the rich furs that had lined 
 it were all removed ; it was a heap of bare logs, through which 
 the morning winds went whispering nothing more. 
 
 The missionary and Mary Derwent looked wistfully in each 
 other s faces ; a dead feeling of disappointment settled upon 
 them both. 
 
 " They are gone," he said, looking vaguely around; "gone 
 without a sign ; we are too late, Mary." 
 
 " It is dreary," said the deformed, seating herself on the thresh 
 old of Catharine s lodge ; " I had so hoped to find the white 
 lady here." 
 
 All at once she shaded her eyes with one hand, looking steadily 
 westward. 
 
 " See ! see !" 
 
 " What, my child ?" 
 
 Far off, up the banks of the Susquehanna, she saw glimpses 
 of moving crimson and warm russet breaking the green of the 
 forest. The missionary searched the distance, and saw those 
 living masses also. 
 
 " It is the whole tribe in motion another dream vanishing 
 away," he said, following the train with a look of indescribable 
 sadness. " Let us descend, Mary ; this is not God s time, but it 
 will come." 
 
 Mary sat upon a fragment of rock, gazing up the river, with a 
 feeling of keen disappointment ; she had hoped to see that stately 
 white woman again, and to have said one more kindly word to 
 the young Indian bride ; but there was no chance of that left. 
 Even as she gazed, those living waves swept over a curve of the 
 hills, and were lost in the green west. The girl sighed heavily, 
 and stood up to go. 
 
 They went silently down the mountain together, and then as 
 silently floated with the current of the river till their little shal 
 lop once more shot into the cove at Monockonok Island. 
 
182 MART DERWENT. 
 
 Jane was still asleep when her sister entered their little room ; 
 but an angry frown gathered on her face, and she muttered dis 
 contentedly as Mary strove to arouse her. When they came 
 forth, Mother Derwent had the breakfast ready, waiting before 
 the kitchen fire. The spider was turned up before a bed of 
 coals, and the johnny cake within rose round and golden to the 
 heat ; a platter of venison steaks stood ready on the hearth, and 
 the potatoes she was slicing into the hot gravy which they had 
 left in the long-handled frying-pan, hissed and browned over the 
 fire, while the old lady stood, with the handle in one hand and 
 a dripping knife in the other, waiting for the family to assemble 
 around the little pine table set out so daintily in the centre of 
 the kitchen. 
 
 Jane came from her room sullen and angry. The old lady 
 was a little cross because no one had volunteered to help her get 
 breakfast, and, as the best of women in those olden times would, 
 scolded generally as she proceeded with her work. 
 
 " It was very strange," she said, " what had come over the 
 young people of that day the smartness had all gone out of 
 them. When she was a girl, things were different children 
 were brought up to be useful then. They never thought of hav 
 ing parties, and dressing in chintz dresses not they. An apple- 
 cut or a log-rolling, once a year, was amusement enough. True, 
 some families did get up an extra husking, or quilting frolic, but 
 when such excessive dissipation crept into a neighborhood, the 
 minister took it up in his pulpit, and the sin was handled without 
 mittens. 
 
 Jane sat down by the window, moody and restless. At an 
 other time the old granddame might have croned on with her 
 complaints, and the girl would scarcely have heard them, she 
 was so used to this eternal exaltation of the past over the present, 
 which always has been, and always will be, a pleasant recreation 
 for old ladies ; but now Jane was fractious, and disposed to take 
 offence at everything ; so she broke into these running complaints 
 with a violent burst of weeping, which startled the old dame till 
 
THE ME KITED LESSON. 183 
 
 she almost dropped the frying-pan. The dear soul was quite un 
 conscious that she had been scolding all the morning, and Jane s 
 injured looks startled her. 
 
 " Are you sick, Janey dear ?" she inquired kindly. 
 
 " No, Jane was not sick but she wished she was dead that 
 phe had never been born in short, she didn t know what people 
 were born for at all, especially girls that could nt help being 
 good-looking, and that nobody would let alone. If she had only 
 been laid, by her dear, dear father, under the cedar trees, the 
 whole world wouldn t have been bent on persecuting her, espe 
 cially her grandmother !" 
 
 This touched the old lady s heart to the centre. She forgot 
 to stir the potatoes, and let them brown to a crisp in the pan. 
 Indeed, she went so far as to rest that long handle on the back 
 of a chair, and forsook her post altogether. 
 
 " Why, Janey, what is all this about, dear ? Grandma wasn t 
 scolding you, only talking to herself in a promiscuous way, about 
 things in general. Don t cry so that s a darling. Come, now, 
 grandma will get you something nice for breakfast some pre 
 served plums." 
 
 " No, Jane had no desire for preserved plums ; she only wanted 
 to die ; it was a cruel world, and she didn t care, for her part, 
 how soon she was out of it. Everybody was set against her. 
 Mary did nothing but find fault, and as for Edward Clark well, 
 of course, some one would be slandering her to him next. The 
 missionary himself might do it ministers always must be med 
 dling with other people s business. She shouldn t be surprised 
 if Clark were even to believe that she did t care for him, but was 
 disappointed that Captain Butler had demeaned himself into 
 marrying that little good-for-nothing squaw, who had been chas 
 ing after him so long. In fact, such was her own opinion of 
 human nature she should nt be astonished at anything, not even 
 if the -missionary, who had more silver on his head than he would 
 ever get into his pocket, should fall in love with Mary." 
 
 At this grandma was horrified. How could Jane think of any- 
 
184: MAKY DEKWENT. 
 
 thing so dreadful ? but then, poor child, she was out of temper, 
 and said whatever came uppermost of course, it meant nothing, 
 and Jane must not think she was scolding again nothing of the 
 sort. 
 
 But Jane did think grandma was scolding. Perhaps it was 
 right that she, a poor orphan, who had only one dear grand 
 mother in the wide, wide world, should have that grandmother 
 set against her. This was her destiny, she supposed, and sub 
 mission was her duty ; she only hoped nobody would be sorry for 
 it after she was dead and gone, that was all. 
 
 How long Jane Derwent might have kept up this state of 
 martyrdom it is difficult to say, but just as she was indulging in 
 another outbreak of sorrowful self-compassion, Mary came up 
 from the cove, looking pale and concerned. She had been to call 
 the missionary to breakfast, and found him bailing out his canoe, 
 ready to start from the Island. He had spoken few words in 
 leaving, but the hands which touched her forehead, as he blessed 
 her, were cold as ice. She felt the chill of that benediction, holy 
 as it was, at her heart yet; the sorrow upon her face startled Jane 
 into a little natural feeling. She forgot to torment that kind 
 old woman, and condescended to approach the breakfast table 
 without more tears. 
 
 " Where is the minister ? why don t he come to breakfast ?" 
 inquired Mrs. Derwent, looking ruefully at the crisp little pile of 
 potatoes left in the frying-pan. " I ve had the table sot out a 
 hull hour, and now everything is done to death. I wonder what 
 on arth has come over you all !" 
 
 " The minister has gone away," answered Mary, and the tears 
 swelled into her eyes as she spoke. 
 
 " Gone away 1 marcy on us, and without a mouthful of break 
 fast. Why, gals, what have you been a doing to him ? he ain t 
 mad nor nothing, is he ?" 
 
 Mary smiled through her tears. The very idea of petty 
 anger connected with the missionary seemed strange to her. 
 
THE MERITED LESSON. 185 
 
 " Oh, grandma, he is never angry," she said ; " but he seems 
 anxious and troubled about something." 
 
 " Worried to death by them Inguns, I dare say," muttered 
 the granddame, with a shake of the head that made her cap- 
 borders tremble around the withered face. " They ll scalp him 
 one of these days, for all the pains he takes." 
 
 " No, no ; they love him too well you don t really think this, 
 grandma," cried Mary, turning pale with sudden terror. 
 
 " Well, no ; I suppose he stands as good a chance as the rest 
 of us ; but that isn t saying over-much, for I tell yon what, gals, 
 there 11 be squally times in the valley afore another year goes 
 over our heads, or I lose my guess. All these ere forts and 
 stockades ain t being built for nothing." 
 
 Jane started up in affright. " You don t think they mean to 
 attack us at once ? that they are camping under the ledge in 
 order to pounce upon* us unawares, do you, grandma ? Oh, I 
 wish I was away ! I wish I d gone while there was a chance ! 
 They ll scalp me the very first one I can almost feel that hor 
 rid Indian girl s knife in my hair !" 
 
 " Don t fear that," said Mary ; " they have left Campbell s 
 Ledge. I was up there at daylight, and found the camp 
 empty." 
 
 " You up there at daylight, Mary ? What for ?" cried Jane, 
 flushing with angry surprise. " Who did you go to see ?" 
 
 " I went with the missionary." 
 
 " And who was he after, I should like to know ?" 
 
 <f I believe, Jane, he wished to speak with the young girl whom 
 ae married to Walter Butler last night, and perhaps to her 
 mother, the strange white lady, also." 
 
 " And what about ? what business has that man with Walter 
 Butler s affairs ? I should think he d meddled enough already," 
 cried the angry beauty. 
 
 " It was not Butler, but his wife whom the minister went in 
 search of." 
 
186 MARY DERWENT. 
 
 " His wife !" cried Jane, with a magnificent curve of the lip, 
 and a lift of the head that Juno might have envied. " What 
 does an Indian wife amount to in the law ?" 
 
 " A great deal, if she has been married by the law. 7 
 
 " But I don t believe one word of that ; Butler isn t such a 
 fool ; he only said it to torment me, to to " 
 
 Jane lost herself here, for the keen look which Grandmother 
 Derwent turned upon her, brought caution with it. 
 
 " Well, gals, what on earth are you talking about ? I don t 
 want the name of that tory captain mentioned under my cabin 
 roof. His place is with the Wintermoots, the Van Garders, and 
 Van Alstyns birds of a feather flock together. While I live, 
 the man that makes himself friends with the off-scouring from 
 York State had better keep clear of Monockonok island." 
 
 Jane bit her lips with vexation, but she said nothing ; for 
 when the old woman waxed patriotic there was no opposing her, 
 and even the beautiful favorite feared to urge the conversation 
 farther. 
 
 Mother Derwent stepped to the door, and shading her eyes 
 with one hand, looked up and down the river. Her kind old heart 
 was distressed at the idea of the missionary going away without 
 his breakfast. She saw his canoe at last gliding along the op 
 posite shore, and turned briskly around. 
 
 " There he is, neither out of sight nor hearing yet. Mary, run 
 up stairs and shake a white cloth out of the garret window. 
 You, Jane, bring me the tin dinner-horn. I ll give him a blast 
 that shall bring him back, depend on t. 
 
 Mary ran to make the signal, and Jane took down a long tin 
 dinner-horn from behind the door, which Mother Derwent blew 
 vigorously, rising on tiptoe, and sending blast after blast upon 
 the water as if she had been summoning an army. The mission 
 ary heard the sound, and saw Mary with her white signal at the 
 window. He waved his hand two or three times, sat down 
 again, and directly disappeared in a bend of the shore. 
 
 Mary watched him with a heavy heart. It seemed as his 
 
AUNT POLLY CAKTEK. 
 
 1ST 
 
 canoe was lost to her sight that half her life had departed for 
 ever, and he, looking mournfully back, saw the snowy signal 
 floating from the window, with a gush of tender sorrow. It was 
 like the wing of an angel unfurling itself with vain efforts to fol 
 low him. 
 
 CHAPTER XXVIII. 
 
 AUNT POLLY CARTER. 
 
 BUT old Mother Derwent was not altogether disappointed. As 
 if answering the blast of her horn a female appeared on the op 
 posite shore, signalizing for a boat with great vigor. Mary 
 could only see that the woman wore a short scarlet cloak, and 
 that the brilliant cotton handkerchief flaunting so impatiently 
 was large enough for a sail to any craft on the river. 
 
 Jane had withdrawn sulkily into the bedroom. She was by no 
 means pleased with the efforts her grandmother was making to 
 bring the missionary back : in her heart she was beginning to 
 detest the good man. 
 
 When Mary came down and saw there was no one else to 
 answer the stranger s signal, she went at once to unmoor her own 
 pretty canoe, and was soon across the river. 
 
 " Oh, is it you, my pet ?" cried a cordial voice, as she neared 
 the shore. " I thought mebby Jane would be on hand to row 
 me across. Is grandmarm to hum, and how s your sister ? purty 
 well, I hope ?" 
 
 Mary s face brightened. The visitor was Aunt Polly from the 
 Elm-tree tavern on the Kingston shore, a welcome guest at any 
 house from Wilksbarre to the Lackawanna gap, but a woman 
 who seldom left the shelter of her own roof, and her presence 
 BO far from her home might well be a matter of wonder. 
 
188 MA BY DERWENT. 
 
 " Why, Aunt Polly, is it you ? How glad grandma will be," 
 said Mary, looking up from her seat in the canoe with pleasure 
 in her eyes. 
 
 " Yes, it s me sure enough, safe and sound. I ll just take the 
 bits out of General Washington s mouth, and let him crop a bite 
 of grass while I go over and say how-do-you-do to grandma. 
 See how the old feller eyes that thick grass with the vilets in it 1 
 There, old chap, go at it." 
 
 As she spoke, the old maid went up to a huge farm horse, 
 cumbered with a saddle much too narrow for his back, which bore 
 unmistakable evidence of its Connecticut origin ; for the horns 
 curved in like those of a vicious cow, and the stirrups were so 
 short that a tall rider, like Aunt Polly, was compelled to double 
 her limbs up till they formed a letter A under her calico skirt 
 whenever General Washington had the honor of carrying her in 
 state upon the wonderful mechanism of that side-saddle, which 
 was the pride and glory of her house. 
 
 " There, now," she said, unbuckling the throat-latch, and slip 
 ping the bridle, bits and all, around General Washington s stumpy 
 neck, which she patted with great affection. " Go in for a feed, 
 and no mistake, Giueral, only keep to the bank, and mind you 
 don t roll on that saddle it couldn t be matched on this side the 
 Green Mountains, I tell you, now." 
 
 General Washington seemed to understand all this perfectly, 
 for he gave his great lumbering head a toss which signified plainer 
 than words, that he understood the value of that saddle quite as 
 well as his mistress, and knew how to keep his peace, if it came to 
 that, without being lectured about it. He whinnied out his 
 satisfaction, in answer to Aunt Polly s caresses, and trotted off 
 with great dignity toward a little rivulet, on the bank, where the 
 grass was green as emeralds, and the violets blue as a baby s 
 eyes. 
 
 "There," said Aunt Polly, looking after him as he rolled 
 heavily along, with the flesh quivering like a jelly under his sleek 
 hide, " isn t he a picterful sight ? Why, Mary dear, that hoss 
 
AUNT POLLY CARTEK. 189 
 
 knows more than two-thirds of the men in Wyoming. Now, that 
 saddle is jest as safe on his back as if it was hung up by the stir 
 rup in my kitchen he s a wonderful critter, is General Wash 
 ington." 
 
 With her head half turned back, in proud admiration of her 
 steed, Aunt Polly let herself down the bank, talking all the time, 
 and at last sat down in the bottom of the canoe, gathering her 
 scarlet cloak around her, and covering her ankles decorously with 
 the skirt of her striped dress. Then, with a gentle dip of the 
 oars, Mary headed her little craft for the island. 
 
 Mother Derwent was both pleased at and annoyed by the sight 
 of her visitor pleased, because Aunt Polly Carter was born in 
 the same old Connecticut town with herself ; and annoyed, that 
 she, the very best cook and housekeeper in Wyoming, should 
 find a spoiled breakfast on the hearth potatoes browned into 
 chips, venison steaks with all the gravy dried up, and the johnny- 
 cake overdone. It was a terrible humiliation, and Mother Der 
 went felt as if she had been detected in some shameful act of 
 negligence by her old friend of the Elm Tree tavern. 
 
 " Just in time," exclaimed Aunt Polly, taking off her cloak 
 and untying her bonnet ; " I was afraid breakfast ed be over 
 afore I got here. Gracious goodness, Miss Derwent, don t you 
 see that johnny cake s burnt to a crisp ? here, give it to me half 
 cold too, dear, dear never mind, good soul, it might a been 
 worse there, take it this way, and beat it between both hands 
 a trifle oh, that tea smells something like, oh, ha you haven t 
 forgot to cook a meal of victuals yet ; you and I can give these 
 Pennsylvanians a lesson any day, Miss Derwent." 
 
 Grandma explained how the breakfast had been kept waiting 
 till it was quite spoiled ; but Aunt Polly would listen to nothing 
 of the kind everything was excellent, the tea drawn beautifully, 
 and the butter perfection. As for the preserved plums and crab 
 apples, she had tasted nothing equal to them in years ; they 
 had the real Connecticut flavor quite put her in mind of old 
 times. 
 
190 MART DEKWENT. 
 
 They had all been seated at the table some minutes before 
 Jane made her appearance. She was still moody, and received 
 Aunt Polly with distrustful reserve, which the good lady did not 
 seem to regard in the least, but went on with her breakfast, 
 tranquil as a summer s day. 
 
 After they arose from the table, there was a world of ques 
 tions to ask, and experiments to try. Aunt Polly took pride in 
 exhibiting all her accomplishments before the young girls. She 
 sat down at the flax wheel, arranged the threads in the flyers, 
 and directly the whole cabin was filled with their hum. 
 
 " Look here, girls, and see how an old housekeeper can spin. 
 Why, long before I was of your age I had yards and yards of 
 homespun linen out in father s spring meadow, whitening for my 
 setting out. I ve got a great chest full of that ere identical 
 linen in my house this minute, that s never been used, and never 
 will be till I m settled for life." 
 
 Now, as Aunt Polly was a middle-aged woman when she left 
 Connecticut, and had lived at the Elm Tree tavern twenty-five 
 years, this idea of settling for life which, of course, comprised 
 a husband, who might also be landlord to that establishment 
 struck the young girls at once as so improbable, that they both 
 smiled. 
 
 Aunt Polly knew nothing of this, but kept spinning on tread, 
 tread, tread now dipping her fingers in the dried shell of a 
 mock orange, that hung full of water to the distaff, and daintily 
 moistening the flax as it ran through them now stopping to 
 change the thread on her flyer, and off again hum hum with 
 a smile of self-satisfaction that was pleasant to behold. 
 
 After this little display, the good landlady tried her hand at 
 the loom, where a linen web was in progress of completion ; but 
 finding the quill box empty, she called out with her cheerful 
 voice for Jane to come and wind some quills, for she was dying 
 to try her hand at the shuttle, if it was only to show them how 
 things were done when she was a girl. 
 
 Jane could not altogether resist this good humor j still, she 
 
AUNT POLLY CARTER. 191 
 
 came forward, half pouting, dragged the lumbering old swifts out 
 from under the loom, banded her quill wheel, and soon supplied 
 the empty shuttle, which Aunt Polly was so impatient to use. 
 
 Now there was a clatter indeed ; the treadles rose and fell 
 with grating moans beneath those resolute feet ; the rude gear 
 ing shrieked on its pullies ; the shuttle flew in and out, now dart 
 ing into the weaver s right hand now into the left, while the 
 lathe banged away, and the old loom trembled in all its 
 timbers. 
 
 " That s right look on, girls," cried the old maid with enthu 
 siasm. " It ll be a good while, I reckon, before either of you 
 can come up to this ; but live and learn is a good saying. 
 Your grandmother and I ve seen the time when we broke more 
 threads with awkward throws than we knew how to mend with 
 two thumbs and eight fingers. Just see this shuttle fly isn t it 
 beautiful ? Oh, girls, there s nothing like work it keeps the 
 body healthy, and the soul out of mischief. Wind away, Janey, 
 it ll do you lots of good ; we ll keep at it till Miss Derwent has 
 washed up the morning dishes ; an extra yard 11 help her along 
 wonderfully that s the music keep the old wheel agoing more 
 quills more quills !" 
 
 Jane took a double handful of quills from her lap and brought 
 them to the loom. While Aunt Polly was putting one in her 
 shuttle, she looked keenly in the young girl s face, shook her 
 head, and went to work again more vigorously than before. 
 Mary saw this, and was satisfied that the old maid had some 
 deeper object in her visit than these experiments with her grand 
 mother s wheel and loom. 
 
 But Aunt Polly went on with her work, becoming more and 
 more excited with every fling of the shuttle. She let out her 
 web and rolled her cloth-beam eight or nine times before her en 
 thusiasm began to flag. 
 
 " There," she said at last, laying the empty shuttle daintily 
 upon the cloth she had woven, and forcing herself out from the 
 slanting seat, " if anybody wants an evener yard of cloth than 
 
192 MAKY DEKWENT. 
 
 that, let them weave it, I say. Now, Janey, come and show me 
 your garden, and let s see if it s as forward as mine. I ve had 
 lettuce and peppergrass up this week." 
 
 Aunt Polly strode toward the door as she spoke, and Jane 
 followed her. 
 
 " Now," said the old maid, facing round as they reached the 
 garden, "you needn t suppose that I took Gineral Washington 
 from the plough, and come up to Monockonok just to see you. 
 all. I should have waited till after planting-time for that ; but 
 I heard something last night that worried me more than a little,, 
 and I want to know what it means, for we marriageable females 
 ought to stand by each other. How comes it, Jane Derwent, 
 that the young men in my bar-room talk about you with their 
 loose tongues, and dare to drink your health in glasses of corn, 
 whisky which they sometimes forget to pay for ?" 
 
 " Who has done this ?" questioned Jane, firing up, " and if 
 they have, how can I help it ?" 
 
 " I ll tell you how it was, Jane Derwent. Last night, nigh on 
 to morning, Walter Butler and young WiAtermoot, with three or 
 four other rank tories from the fort, came to my house, banging 
 away at the door for us to get up and give them something to 
 drink. Now, I hate these young fellers worse than pison, 
 but one can t keep tavern and private house at the same 
 time when a sign swings agin your door ; any loafer has a right 
 to call you out of bed when he pleases. Well, they knocked and 
 hammered till I woke up the barkeeper, and sent him down with, 
 orders to make their sling weak, and get rid of them the minute 
 he could ; but, mercy on us, gal, they had come down the river 
 like a flock of wolves, and was just as easy to pacify. The 
 amount of whisky they drank among them in less than an hour 
 no one would believe that hadn t seen it. There was nothing but 
 a board partition between me and the bar-room ; so I heard every 
 word they said, and considering that I was a respectable female 
 that might be called upon to accept an offer of marriage any 
 day, their conversation was not exactly what it should have been. * 
 
AUNT POLLY C A K T E R . 193 
 
 " And they mentioned me you said that ?" 
 
 " Mentioned you ? I should think they did Butler, Winter- 
 moots, and all the rest on em. I declare it made my blood bile 
 to hear the language they used." 
 
 " Will you tell me what it was, Aunt Polly me, and no one 
 else, for I would not have grandma and Mary know it for the 
 world r 
 
 " Yes that is what I came for. Young Wintermoot began 
 first teasing Butler because he d tried to run away with you, 
 and had to give it up after you d both started, when a little 
 hunchback and a sneak of a minister said he mustn t. These 
 were his exact words. Then another set in and wanted to drink 
 success to the next time in bumpers of hot toddy. Directly there 
 was a crash of glasses and a shout, and in all the noise I heard 
 your name over and over. Some were laughing ; some said you 
 were a beauty and no mistake, while Butler talked loudest, and 
 said he was sure to get you away from the hunchback yet, spite 
 jf all your pride and ridiculous nonsense." 
 
 " He said that, did he ?" cried Jane, biting her lips with silent 
 rage. 
 
 " Yes, he said that, and more, yet. When one of the fellows 
 asked what the pretty squaw would do, he laughed, and an 
 swered, as welt as he could for hiccuping, that after he d got some 
 money that he expected from Sir John Johnson, she might go to 
 Amsterdam, or where she could find more fire and less water, for 
 all he cared. Then he went on telling how he had left her in 
 the woods above Falling Spring, only a few hours before, crying 
 like a baby because he would not stay and tramp back to Sene 
 ca Lake with her tribe. 
 
 " The young tories received all this with bursts of laughter, jok 
 ing about his squaw wife, and telling him what a fool he was to 
 let you go when once a most off. They said it was clear enough 
 you didn t want to go with him, that he d got the mitten straight 
 out, because you liked Edward Clark better than him, and so he 
 had married the squaw out of spite. 
 
 13 
 
194 MARY DERWENT. 
 
 " That set him to swearing like a trooper ; he said there wasn t 
 a word of truth in it, that you were crazy in love with him, and 
 would follow him like a dog to the ends of the earth, wife or no 
 wife, if you could only escape from the island, and no one the 
 wiser more, he said that he left you crying your eyes out that 
 very night because he went off with the Indian girl instead of 
 you." 
 
 " It .was false there was not a word of truth in it, Aunt 
 Polly. I hope I may drop down dead in ray tracks if there was," 
 cried Jane, trembling with rage and shame. " I was glad to see 
 him go ; Mary can tell you as much." 
 
 " Then you have seen him ?" questioned Aunt Polly " then he 
 was on the island last night, as he said ?" 
 
 " I can t help his coming to the island, Aunt Polly ; every one 
 comes here who has a boat, if he pleases ; but I can say nobody 
 wanted Walter Butler. He s been a visiting the Wintermoots off 
 and on for three or four months. I invited him and the Winter- 
 moots to my birthday-party, and was a fool for my pains ; but 
 as for liking him, the tory, the young outcast, I I " 
 
 Here Jane burst into a torrent of angry tears. Aunt Polly 
 began to dry up this sorrow tenderly with her great cotton 
 handkerchief, which seemed large enough to block up a mill sluice. 
 
 " Don t cry, Janey, don t cry, that s a dear. There, there, I 
 shan t tell anybody but yourself about the scamp s boasting, not 
 even Edward, though his father is my cousin." 
 
 " No, don t, Aunt Polly, don t tell him of all people in the 
 world." 
 
 I 1 " Why why, Janey, dear ? How red you are ! Tell me, 
 you and Edward ain t keeping company nor nothing, are you ?" 
 
 " Yes, we are, Aunt Polly, and have been this ever so long. 
 He would kill that hateful villain if he knew half that he said 
 at your house last night." 
 
 " But he shan t know it, child ; you, and I, and Mary will set 
 tle that affair amongst ourselves, to say nothing of grandma, 
 who would be worth us a}} if it came to a running scold." 
 
AUNT POLLY CAETER. 195 
 
 " Don t don t say a word to Mary or grandma," cried Jane, 
 in breathless fear ; " but you have not told me all yet." 
 
 " No, Jane ; what is to come makes the old Connecticut blood 
 bile in my veins. I swan to man, it was all I could do to keep 
 from jumping out of bed, and going in amongst them, when they 
 sot down, and made up a plot to carry you off them young 
 Wintermoots was to do it, and meet Butler in the Blue Moun 
 tains after he d got a heap of money that he expected from Sir 
 John Johnson. I suppose that s the son of Sir William Johnson, 
 the old reprobate who had so many Injun wives in the Mohawk 
 Valley, as if one wife wasn t enough for any man in a new coun 
 try where women folks are scarce. Well, as I was a saying, 
 Butler told em to go over to the island some night, and whistle 
 like that here he sent a long whistle through the partition that 
 made me e en amost start up in bed, and the young Wintermoots 
 practised on it like schoolboys learning their a-b-abs till they 
 filled the hull house like a nest of blackbirds and brown 
 thrashers. 
 
 " Butler told em that you d spring out of bed like a hawk 
 from its nest the moment you heard that, and if they only flat 
 tered you a little, and told you for earnest that he didn t care a 
 king s farthing for the Indian girl, and wasn t married to her 
 only Indian fashion, you d be off with them, and glad enough to go." 
 
 " He did, ha ? he thinks I ll follow him. Never mind, Aunt 
 Polly. Let him come let them whistle. Oh, how I wish I was 
 a man." 
 
 " Yes," said Aunt Polly, thoughtfully, " men have their privi 
 leges. It s something to be able to knock a chap down when he 
 deserves it, and then, agin, when a man s heart is full he can 
 speak out, and not let his feelings curdle like sour milk in a pan. 
 Yes, Janey, I think it would be pleasant if some of us could be 
 men once in a while ; but human nature is human nature, and it 
 ain t to be expected." 
 
 " And this was all these wicked men said ?" questioned Jane, 
 who had lost half this speech in her own bitter thoughts. 
 
196 MARY DEKWENT. 
 
 " Yes, for when their plot was laid, they left the house. I 
 peeped through the window, holding the vallance close, that 
 they could not see my night-cap, you know, and watched them 
 shake hands before Butler mounted his horse. He rode off down 
 stream, and the other fellers turned up the road towards Winter- 
 moot s Fort." 
 
 " And this was all ?" 
 
 " All that belongs to you ; but now I ve a word to say to 
 Mary ; by that time Gineral Washington will be tired of crop 
 ping vilets, I reckon, and we ll be jogging down stream again." 
 
 " Mary ! what can you want with Mary ? not to tell her " 
 
 " By no manner of means, Janey. If you want anybody else 
 to help you, arter what I ve told about these chaps, the truth is, 
 you aint woth helping any how. A gal that can t take care of 
 herself when once warned, wouldn t be kept back from ruin if a 
 hull meeting-houseful of jest sich angels as our precious Mary 
 was standing in the way. No, I don t mean to torment that 
 heavenly critter with uny sich wickedness ; but yet I ve got a 
 few words to say to her, and you ll oblige me by going to the 
 cabin and sending her out here at onst." 
 
 Jane was glad to obey. This interview with the old maid had 
 not been so pleasant that she wished to prolong it ; so she went 
 and summoned Mary. 
 
 That gentle girl went into the garden a little anxious, for the 
 excitement of th^last night had found its reaction, and she was 
 ready to tremble at the fall of a leaf. 
 
 The change that had come over Aunt Polly was a beautiful 
 proof of the influence of a character like that of Mary Derwent. 
 With Jane, the old maid had been peremptory and dictatorial, 
 feeling very little respect for the wayward girl she expressed 
 none ; but for Mary, her heart was filled with a world of tender 
 reverence. She touched her daintily, as she would have plucked 
 a snowdrop, and spoke to her in a low, earnest voice, such as 
 she would have used in prayer, had she been much inclined to 
 devotion. 
 
AUNT POLLY CARTER. 197 
 
 " Mary," she said, laying one hard hand lightly on the maid 
 en s shoulder, " a strange thing happened to me this morning. 
 As Ginerai Washington and I was on our way up stream, a 
 woman came out from the beach-woods on the flats, and stopped 
 right in the road, afore that knowing animal and me, as if she 
 wanted to say something ; but she didn t speak, and the Ginerai 
 sort a shied at fust, for the red dress, all glittering with wampum, 
 was enough to scare any hoss." 
 
 " Had she a scarlet dress on, a crown of feathers around her 
 head, and a glittering snake twisted in her hair ?" inquired Mary, 
 quickly. 
 
 " That s her to a T. I shall never forget the sharp, red eyes 
 of that sarpent ; a live rattlesnake couldn t have eyed the 
 Ginerai and I more fiercely. I waited a minute, to give the wo 
 man a chance, if she wanted to speak, but she was sarching my 
 face with her eyes, as if she wanted to look me through afore 
 she opened her lips. I was a most tempted to up whip and ride 
 straight over her ; but the Ginerai seemed to have his own idee 
 not a huff would he lift. I shook the bridle like all-possessed, 
 and cherruped him along as if he d been a nussing baby ; but 
 there he stood stock-still in the road, a-eyeing the strange 
 woman jest as independent as she was eyeing him and me." 
 
 "And did she say nothing?" 
 
 " By-an-by she spoke, and though it was afor sunrise, it seemed 
 as if a bust of light broke over her face, it lit up so." 
 
 " Can you tell me, she said, where I can find a small island 
 that lies in the river about here ? I have passed one or two, but 
 there are no houses on em, and the one I want has a cabin some 
 where near the shore. 
 
 " Mcbby you want Monockonok, says I, where old Miss 
 Derwent lives ? 
 
 " Yes/ says she, that is the island and Derwent is the name. 
 She has two daughters, I believe. 
 
 " Two granddaughters, says I. 
 
198 MARY DERWENT. 
 
 " Granddaughters, are they ? And do you know these girls ? 
 says she. 
 
 " Well, yes, I reckon so/ says I, and mighty smart gals 
 they are. Jane s a beauty, without paint or whitewash, I can, 
 
 tell you ; and as for Mary But no matter what I said 
 
 about you, my dear ; it wasn t all you desarved, but " 
 
 " No matter oh there was no need of saying anything about 
 me," murmured the deformed, shrinking within herself, as she 
 always did, when her person was alluded to. 
 
 Aunt Polly paused abruptly, and began to whip a sweetbriar 
 bush near her with great vigor. She had but a vague idea of 
 all the keen sensitiveness her words ha.d disturbed, but that was 
 sufficient ; her rough, kind heart was troubled at the very 
 idea of giving pain to that gentle girl. 
 
 " Well, I only said if ever there was an angel on arth, you 
 was one ; but I m sorry as can be, now ; I wouldn t a said so for 
 the world, if I d thought you didn t like it," pleaded the old maid 
 with deprecating meekness. "You know, Mary Derwent, I al- 
 tvays thought you was the salt of the arth that s the worst I 
 will say of you any how, like it or not." 
 
 " But the woman, Aunt Polly the strange lady with that 
 living serpent around her head what did she want of Jane and 
 me ?" inquired Mary, keenly interested in the subject. " What 
 could she mean by inquiring about grandmother ?" 
 
 " Not knowing, can t tell, Miss Mary. She fell to thinking, 
 with her hand up to her forehead a purty hand it was too 
 afore I d done talking ; at last says she 
 
 " That is the one I wish to speak with/ 
 
 " Which/ says I, Miss Jane ? 
 
 " No/ says she, the golden-haired one that you ve been tell 
 ing me about/ 
 
 " Well/ says I, what of her, inarm ? I m just a-going over 
 to Monockonok, and can show you the way, if you want to 
 see her. 
 
A.UNT POLLY CARTER. 199 
 
 " No, not just now, says she, I ve something else to attend 
 to first ; but if you see this girl, tell her to meet me, near sun 
 set, at the spring where she went so late last night she will 
 understand you. 
 
 " Well, says I, if I may be so bold, what do you want with 
 Mary Derwent ? 
 
 " I wish to speak with her, says she, with a wave of her 
 hand that made Giueral Washington back off sideways ; only 
 give my message, good woman, and here s a guinea for you. 
 
 " Here she took a piece of gold from her pocket, and held it 
 out." 
 
 " But you did not take it, Aunt Polly ?" 
 
 " Didn t take it ! trust me for letting a bright golden guinea 
 slip through these fingers when it can be honestly come by of 
 course I took it." 
 
 Here Aunt Polly drew forth a shot-bag from her enormous 
 pocket, untied the tow string, and exhibited a quantity of silver 
 and huge copper pennies, and from among them, daintily folded 
 in a dry maple leaf, she took a bright piece of gold. 
 
 " There it is, harnsouie as a yaller bird," she cried exultingly. 
 " Look at it, Mary I don t mind your holding it a minute or so 
 in your hand. Pd like to see any woman in Wyoming match 
 that I" 
 
 " I never saw a golden guinea before," said Mary, scanning 
 the coin with innocent curiosity. " It is very beautiful ; but 
 somehow, Aunt P^lly, I can t help wishing you hadn t taken it." 
 
 " Well, if you think so," said the old maid, eyeing the gold 
 with a rueful look, " if you really think so, Mary Derwent, jest 
 give it back to the lady when she comes. I don t want to be 
 mean, nor nothing, but but no, give it here I can stand a 
 good deal, but as for giving up money when it s once been in my 
 puss, that s too much for human nature to put up with." 
 
 She snatched eagerly at the gold, and, with a grim smile upon 
 her mouth, and a flush about the eyes, hustled it back into her 
 shot-bag, tied the strings with a jerk, and crowded the treasure 
 
200 MART DEKWENT. 
 
 down into the depths of her pocket, uttering only a few grim 
 words in the energetic operation. 
 
 " There now I d like to see anybody strong enough to get 
 that are money puss out of this ere pocket, that s all !" 
 
 Mary felt how impossible it was for the old maid to release 
 her hold on money, when she once got it in her grasp ; so with 
 a faint smile, which made the stingy old soul flush about the eyes 
 once more, she turned the subject. 
 
 " At sunset, did you say, Aunt Polly ?" 
 
 " Yes, at sunset to-night, and you wasn t to fail I promised 
 that much." 
 
 " Can I tell Jane or grandmother ?" inquired Mary, thought 
 fully. 
 
 " Not on no account. The lady for anybody that dressed 
 up like that, with a pocket full of gold, must be a lady, anyhow 
 you can fix it the lady says she, Tell Mary Derwent to come 
 alone, and, says I, she shall, if my name s Polly Carter. When 
 my word is giv, it s giv so you must go down to the spring all 
 alone, jest at sundown, Mary Derwent." 
 
 " Yes, I ll go," said Mary, looking wistfully into the distance ; 
 " of course, I ll go." 
 
 " That s a good gal I was sure you would. Now, I ll jest 
 say good by to Miss Derwent, and Giueral Washington and I 
 will make tracks for home." 
 
 Aunt Polly strode away up the garden, muttering to herself, 
 
 "Wai, I ve killed two birds with one stone, and catch d a 
 goldfinch to boot. That are side-saddle wasn t mounted for 
 nothing. If vartue al es gets rewarded in this way, I ll keep 
 Gineral Washington agoing." 
 
 These muttered thoughts brought the old maid up to the cabin, 
 and she called out from the threshold, 
 
 " Jane, remember what I was a-saying, now do. When will 
 you all come and take tea with me ? Shall be proper glj,d to 
 see you any time the sooner the better. Good-bye, Miss Der 
 went ; good-bye all." 
 
THE SERPENT BRACELET. 201 
 
 Here Aunt Polly gave a comprehensive sweep of the hand, 
 including grandma in the house, Mary in the garden, and Jane, 
 who stood by her on the door-stone. 
 
 " Good-bye all. Come, Janey, set me on the other side, and 
 I ll speak a good word for you to the beaux, when they come to 
 my tavern." 
 
 Jane tied a handkerchief over her head, followed the old maid 
 to the cove, unmoored her canoe, and soon reached the western 
 shore. 
 
 Aunt Polly shook her by the hand, repeated a world of grim 
 advice, then mounted the bank and threw out her handkerchief, 
 as a signal to Gineral Washington. 
 
 That inestimable beast had made the best of his time, and would 
 willingly have stayed longer ; but seeing his mistress s gorgeous 
 signal fluttering in the air, like the mainsail of a schooner, he 
 made one more desperate crop at the rich herbage, and came 
 trotting decorously forward, with the foam and short grass drop 
 ping from his mouth at every step. 
 
 Aunt Polly replaced the bit, let out an inch of the girth, to 
 accommodate the animal s digestive organs, mounted a hemlock 
 stump, littered all round with fresh chips, and, after coaxing 
 Gineral Washington into the right position, seated herself grimly 
 on the side-saddle and rode away. 
 
 CHAPTER XXIX. 
 
 THE SERPENT BRACELET. 
 
 MARY DERWENT was restless and dreamy all day, after Aunt 
 Polly left the island. Spite of herself, she was sad no cause 
 existed now Jane was safe at home, sorry for her indiscretion, 
 at heart, no doubt ; Butler, she hoped and believed, had left the 
 
202 MAKY DEKWENT 
 
 Bailey certainly there was nothing to apprehend nor much to 
 regret yet tears lay close to those beautiful eyes all the day 
 long. She pined to hide herself in some quiet place, and cry all 
 her fancied trouble away. The strange woman was before her 
 every moment ; she could not, with any force of will, put that 
 picturesque image aside ; it came, like the shadow from some 
 wild dream, and took full possession of her. 
 
 She went to the spring early, just as the first golden waves of - 
 sunset began to ripple up the west. The blossoming crab -apples 
 flung a rosy tint above her, and the soft whispers of the spring as 
 it ran off among the stones, sounded sad and tearful as the breath 
 in her bosom. A hundred times she had sat in that place before, 
 but never with that hush of expectation, or that dim paleness 
 upon her face. 
 
 The sunset came on slowly now a gleam of crimson, now of 
 gold, crept with its warm light through the dusk around her. 
 It seemed as if she were waiting for her own funeral herself 
 chief mourner. 
 
 How often she had seen Edward Clark sitting among those 
 stones with Jane by his side, while she sat by, so little regarded 
 that they had gone on with their sweet love-talk as if she could 
 not hear. How often had she been condemned to listen while the 
 very sound of their voices was torture. And now Jane was ready 
 to fling that great love aside a few flattering words, a vague 
 promise of luxury and greatness had been enough. Clark was at 
 least for the time forgotten ; she would have given him to Mary 
 carelessly as she might have flung a withered garland into her lap. 
 And yet the young man loved faithfully a word from Mary 
 would have turned his heart aside in disgust, greater perhaps 
 than this temporary inconstancy deserved ; but sad and desolate 
 as she was, the gentle girl never once thought of this. Her only 
 desire was to win Jane back to her old love, and make her more 
 worthy of his. But in self-abnegation there is always a tender 
 sadness, and this half heavenly, half human feeling settled 
 mournfully on her beautiful features as Mary sat and waited. 
 
THE SERPENT BRACELET. 203 
 
 There was no sound, for the Indian moccasin treads lightly as 
 a leaf falls, and Catharine Montour stood close by the young girl 
 before she was aware of any human approach. / 
 
 Mary lifted her face suddenly, and there, revealed by golden 
 gleams of light that penetrated the boughs, she saw that strange 
 face, surmounted by the serpent whose blood-red eyes glittered 
 on her like a venomous asp about to bite. 
 
 Mary was the first to speak. 
 
 " You are the lady who wished me to be here ?" 
 
 Her voice scarcely rose above the whispering waters, but 
 Catharine heard it distinctly. Still she did not speak at once 
 some unaccountable emotion checked the breath on her 
 lips. 
 
 " Yes ; I asked a woman who said she was coming here to 
 give my message . You are very kind to answer it so promptly." 
 
 These were not the words Catharine had intended to say ; but 
 the gentle, almost holy presence of that young girl changed the 
 whole current of her feelings. She came haughtily as an inquisi 
 tor who had suffered wrong, but remained overpowered by the 
 ineek dignity of her reception. 
 
 " I had seen you once before, lady, and was glad to come." 
 
 " Seen me, child, and where ?" 
 
 41 At the ledge, on the opposite shore, when you met Walter 
 Butler." 
 
 " And you heard that conversation ?" 
 
 " Yes. I could not help it. Before it was possible to get 
 away you had said everything." 
 
 " Then you know that he is married to my daughter ?" 
 
 " I know that he is married to a young Indian girl, who may 
 be your daughter. The missionary told me of the marriage, but 
 nothing more." 
 
 " And your sister for it is of her I wish to speak, it is her I 
 warn did she know this ?" 
 
 " She knows it now." 
 
 " Yet last night, Tahmeroo, my daughter the bride of Walter 
 
204: MAKY DERWENT. 
 
 Butler, found your sister here under these very branches planning 
 to elope with him." 
 
 " I know it," answered Mary, shrinking together, and turning 
 pale as if she, not Jane, had been in fault " I know it ; but 
 that is all over now." 
 
 " Do not be so sure of that, my poor child ; there is no security 
 against treachery and weakness ; but if you are already informed 
 that Walter Butler is married by every law that can bind two 
 persons for life, my errand here is half done. Last night, my un 
 happy child came to the camp wild with the torture that wicked 
 man had inflicted. I will not speak harshly of your sister : if 
 her folly works sharper than wickedness, it is not your fa-alt ; 
 but my business here was to warn her of the danger she is 
 braving. I did not, wish to see a person whose folly has already 
 irritated a temper not particularly placable, but sent for you, 
 because my child told me of your kindness your true generous 
 courage. I wished to thank you to impress you with the dan 
 ger that hangs over your family if Tahineroo receives farther 
 wrong or insult here." 
 
 " I would rather die than think it could happen again," 
 answered Mary Derwent, with gentle earnestness. " My sister 
 is so young so very, very beautiful, that she is not content with 
 the love of a single heart, as one who has nothing pleasant about 
 her might be. It is only a fancy a wild dream with her. Pm 
 sure you would believe it could you see how dearly she is loved 
 by by one, oh 1 so much superior to this Captain Butler." 
 
 " Then your sister is beloved she is engaged, perhaps ?" 
 
 " Beloved oh, yes 1" answered Mary, in a voice so sweetly 
 mournful, that the haughty soul of Catharine Montour thrilled 
 within her. " They are engaged, too, I believe. You know it 
 would be impossible for him to live near Jane and not wish to 
 marry her. As for him, of course, she cannot help loving him 
 who could ?" 
 
 The last two words were uttered in a sigh so deep and heart 
 broken, that Catharine felt it thrilling through her own frame. 
 
 
THE SERPENT BRACELET. 205 
 
 Her forest life had never possessed the power to dull or break 
 that one string in her heart; it was sensitive arid tremulous as 
 ever. She understood all that Mary was suffering, and back 
 upon her soul rushed a tide of sympathy so earnest and delicate, 
 that for a time those two beings, so opposite in all things else, 
 felt painfully together the one sad from memory, the other 
 suffering under the weight of a cruel reality eternally present in 
 her own person. 
 
 Unconsciously Catharine s right hand fell upon the beautiful 
 head, which bent under it like a flower on its stalk. 
 
 " Poor, poor child 1" she murmured, and tears kept resolutely 
 from her eyes, broke forth in her voice : "I know well how to 
 feel for you." 
 
 " No, no," answered Mary. " One so grand so like a queen, 
 could not feel as I do; I never expect it. In the wide world 
 there is not another girl like me. I sometimes feel as if the 
 angels would only give me pity-love after I am dead, and then 
 there would be no heaven for me either." 
 
 " And are you so lonely of heart ?" inquired Catharine, seating 
 herself on the stone before Mary, and taking both her pale little 
 hands with a kindly clasp. " You and I should feel for each 
 other ; for the same rugged path lies before you that I have trod." 
 
 " The same oh no, lady ! You are straight and proud as a 
 poplar. You don t know what it is to go through life with your 
 face bent to the ground, and the heart in your bosom warm and 
 full of love like other people s." 
 
 " Poor soul, arid does this thought trouble you so ? Are you 
 indeed worse off than I have been, and so patient, too ? Has 
 the wilderness no hiding-place for human suffering ?" 
 
 "I don t know," said Mary, filled with her own thoughts. 
 " It seems as if I never could hide away ; people are sure to find 
 me out and stare at me. I think there is no place but the grave 
 where one would be sure." 
 
 Catharine could not speak ; tears overmastered her, and fell 
 down her face like rain. 
 
206 MART DERWENT. 
 
 " Poor soul," she said, " how can I comfort you ?" 
 
 " I don t know," said Mary. " The minister sometimes tries 
 to comfort me, but I m afraid he has gone away for a long time ; 
 when he tells me that I can be useful, and make others happy 
 just as I am, this trouble goes oif a little. Oh 1 ma am, I wish 
 you could know the minister; or if you really care about making 
 a poor girl like me feel better, talk as he does." 
 
 " Alas !" said Catharine, " I am not humble and good, like 
 him; but I can pity these feelings, and be your friend a more 
 powerful friend, perhaps, than he is, for I can protect you and 
 yours from the hatred of the Indians." 
 
 " Oh, but the Indians are my friends now; they love me a 
 little I am sure, for they smile when I speak to them, and call 
 me pet names, as if I were a bird ; perhaps it is because the 
 minister likes me so much." 
 
 " No; it is because because of your " 
 
 " Of this," said Mary, interrupting her with a frightened look, 
 and touching her shoulder with one hand. " Is it only pity with 
 them, too ?" 
 
 Catharine looked upon that pale spiritual face with ineffable 
 compassion. She understood all the sorrow that rendered it so 
 painfully beautiful. 
 
 " No, my child, it is not pity with them, but homage, adoration. 
 That which you feel as a deformity, they hold to be a sacred 
 seal of holiness which the Great Spirit sets upon his own. With 
 them you, and such as you, are held only as little lower than the 
 angels. This superstition may yet be your salvation, but a time 
 is coming when even that will not be enough to protect you from 
 harm." 
 
 " What ! would the Indians kill me is that it ?" 
 
 " They are savages, and hard of restraint ; but I think that 
 nothing human could be found to harm a creature so good and 
 so helpless." 
 
 " Then you think they could not be brought to kill me ?" said 
 Mary, with a look almost of disappointment. 
 
THE SERPENT BRACELET 207 
 
 " Why, you speak sadly, like one who wishes death." 
 
 Mary shook her head. 
 
 11 No, I dare not wish death ; but if the Indians wanted any 
 one, and must have a life, they couldn t find any person so ready 
 to go, I m sure." 
 
 " This is very mournful," said Catharine, drawing Mary s 
 head, with all its loose golden hair, to her bosom. " I wish the 
 missionary, or any one else were here to console you. I am 
 struck mute. Yet heaven knows, if my own life could remove 
 the cause of your sorrow, I would lay it down this moment. 
 Do you believe me, child ?" 
 
 " Oh, yes ; but is this love or pity ?" 
 
 " Pity is a gentle feeling, but it would not urge one to a sacri 
 fice like that. Love, compassion, sentiment I do not know 
 what it is; but I solemnly say to you, Mary Derwerit, in twenty 
 years I have not felt my heart swell with feelings like these 
 not even when my own child was first laid in my bosom." 
 
 " It is love ! this is love 1" cried Mary, joyfully winding her 
 arms around Catharine Montour s neck, and laying her cheek close 
 to the proud woman s face. " I think I am sure this is love !" 
 
 " God knows it is some holy feeling that has overtaken mo 
 unawares." 
 
 " Yes, yes ; love is a holy feeling !" 
 
 " But this is the first time you and I have ever met." 
 
 " Is it ? I don t remember this moment my thoughts will 
 not take the thing in; but I am sure we shall never be strangers 
 again that we never were strangers in all our lives. At first I 
 was afraid of you: now I should like to follow after you like a 
 wild bird, that you would feed sometimes with crumbs from your 
 hands, and call me by pretty pet names. I should like, of all 
 things, to watch over you in the night, and keep everything still 
 that you might dream sweet dreams. That beautiful girl, your 
 daughter, should not care for you more than I. Is not this 
 love, dear lady ?" 
 
 " It is something very heavenly," said Catharine Montour. 
 
208 MARY DERWENT. 
 
 " I dread to have it pass away, and yet it must 1" 
 
 "Must! And why?" 
 
 " Because all things beautiful do pass away love with the 
 rest, nothing is immortal here." 
 
 " But yonder," said Mary, pointing upward, where a young 
 moon rode the sky like a golden shallop laden with pearls. 
 
 " I know nothing of that," answered Catharine, with momen 
 tary impatience." " It is at best a land of dreams and conjec 
 tures to us all," but we will not talk of that deep mystery the 
 future, my child. I would not willingly disturb any belief that 
 can make you happier. I can dream no longer, hope no more 
 mine will be a life of wild action, and then " 
 
 " And then " repeated Mary, turning her pure eyes upward, 
 " and then, there is a God above, and rest, eternal rest yet 
 eternal action too, with his angels." 
 
 " Who taught you these things ; surely this is not the language 
 of a frontier settlement ?" 
 
 " I don t know," said Mary, with sweet though tfulness, " such 
 ideas spring up most naturally I should think in the woods which 
 God alone has touched ; men teach us words, but thought comes 
 to us, I am sure, as flowers spring from the gi^tss ; we scarcely 
 know when they shoot, bud, or blossom, till their breath is all 
 around us. I cannot remember, lady, that any one ever taught 
 me to think." 
 
 " Not the mission o.ry ?" 
 
 " Perhaps it might have been unawares but no, he told me 
 once, I remember, that God himself sent me many thoughts that 
 other children never have, in order to be company for me when 
 I sit alone in the woods. So after all, dear lady, the missionary 
 understands what they mean, and tells me j that is all. The 
 thoughts come from God himself." 
 
 Catharine Montour was weeping, for that gentle girl had 
 found the well-spring of her nature ; laying her cheek down 
 upon those golden tresses, which remained on her bosom, silent 
 from tender reverence. 
 
THE SERPENT BRACELET. 209 
 
 " Are these thoughts so strange that you wonder at them ?" 
 asked Mary. 
 
 " Yes, they are very strange to me now." 
 
 " Don t let them be strangers after this, dear lady," when you 
 send them away, as I did once, it is like turning angels out of 
 doors. Catharine sobbed for the first time, in years and years. 
 
 " When they come swarming around your heart," continued 
 Mary, " let them in, for they are pleasant company, and, better 
 than all, crowd so much trouble out." 
 
 " Alas," said Catharine, covering her face with both hands in 
 a burst of sorrow," it is long since these thoughts have visited 
 me." 
 
 " That is because you keep the door shut against them I dare 
 say ; but it is open now or you would not cry so ; gentle 
 thoughts always follow tears, just as violets start after a brook 
 overflows." 
 
 Catharine stooped forward with one hand to her brow ; she 
 could not realize that tears were dropping so fast from her eyes, 
 or that any human voice possessed the power of unlocking such 
 feelings of tenderness in her soul. She who had become iron, 
 scarcely recognized her own identity when the old nature came 
 back. Mary grew anxious at her long silence. 
 
 " Have I offended you, lady," she said, pressing her timid 
 little hand on that which lay in Catharine s lap." 
 
 " Offended me ! Oh, no, no." 
 
 " Please look up then ; while you stoop the shadows fall around 
 you like a mourning cloak and I grow chilly ; hark, what is 
 that ?" 
 
 Catharine Moantour started up, for a low cry like that of 
 some wild animal in pain sounded from the water. " It is my 
 Indians," she said hurriedly ; " they are restive at this long stay 
 I must go now or they will come in search of me." 
 
 " But not far not forever, lady, I have only seen you twice 
 in all my life ; but it seems as if a stone had fallen on my heart 
 when I think that you may never come back." 
 
 14 
 
210 MARY DEKWENT. 
 
 " I will come back, trust me I will. How and when it is im 
 possible for me to say ; but rest certain we shall meet again, 
 and that for good to us both." 
 
 " But soon oh, tell me that it will be soon." 
 
 " I cannot say, these are wild times on the frontier, and worse 
 may be expected ; but if danger comes I shall not be far from 
 you ; rest sure of that." 
 
 Mary looked oh, so wistfully into the lady s face. 
 
 " And will there be danger for you ?" 
 
 " None, child I but you and the inhabitants of this valley 
 will be forever in peril. Stay, put back the sleeve from your 
 arm, undo this bracelet, a gleam of moonlight strikes the spring 
 just here so !" 
 
 As she spoke, Mary touched the clasp pointed out, and directly 
 one of the serpent bracelets uncoiled from Catharine s wrist, as 
 if it had been a living thing, and she wound it on Mary s arm, 
 above the elbow, shutting the spring with a noise that sounded 
 like a hiss. 
 
 " It will guard you," she said, eagerly. " There is not a Shawnee 
 savage who does not hold that sign sacred, nor one among the 
 Six Tribes who will not protect its wearer keep it on your arm 
 night and day, till we meet again. 
 
 " I came here to learn all that relates to your sister s acquaint 
 ance with Walter Butler, to warn her of the peril which will 
 surely follow her reckless daring, if she even sees him or speaks 
 with him again ; but somehow you have led my thoughts far from 
 the subject, and there is no time for much that I intended to 
 say. But I have no fear that under your influence, this girl can 
 wrong my daughter." 
 
 Before Mary could speak, a long kiss was pressed on her fore 
 head a rustling of the branches as they swayed to their places, 
 and she was alone more alone than she had ever been in her 
 life. 
 
THE OLD JOHNSON HOUSE. 211 
 
 CHAPTER XXX. 
 
 THE OLD JOHNSON HOUSE. 
 
 IN the Mohawk Valley, about four miles north of Fouda, 
 stands to this day the first baronial mansion ever erected in the 
 state of New York. Its present proprietor, Mr. Eleazer Wells, 
 has, with unusual good taste, preserved the old mansion with all 
 its historical associations undisturbed, and even in this age of 
 republican palaces, the old Johnson House would be considered 
 a noble mansion. Its broad front, flanked at each end by mas 
 sive block-houses of stone, perforated near the roof with holes 
 for musketry, has an imposing appearance. The broad entrance- 
 hall, with heavy ballustrades winding up the stairs, all hacked 
 by savage tomahawks ; its high ceilings ; its rooms wainscoted 
 with panel work, and ornamented with elaborate carving all 
 speak of former wealth and power. 
 
 In 1775-6, this mansion was occupied by Sir John Johnson, 
 the heir of Sir William, its first proprietor, whose loyalty to the 
 crown, and cruelty to the patriots of the Revolution, are on 
 record forever in the history of the great period of our national 
 struggles. Then the hall was surrounded with forests, deep, 
 broad, and seemingly boundless as the ocean. Sir William had 
 hewed an estate out of this wilderness, which lay upon a gentle 
 slope, like a beautiful glimpse of Arcadia, surrounded and framed 
 in by the woods. 
 
 The season had deepened since the Indians were encamped 
 in the Wyoming Valley. The cultivated trees, then in blossom all 
 over the country, had set their fruit ; Indian corn was half a foot 
 high ; and the wheat fields looked like meadows ready for the 
 scythe. The thickets around Johnson Hall had cast off their 
 flowers, and were now heavy with leaves and swelling nuts. The 
 whole region was beautiful, as if no war existed in the world. 
 
212 MART DERWENT. 
 
 It was just after dusk on one of these late spring days, 
 when a horseman, with two or three Indians in his train, rode 
 up to the front of this mansion, inquired for Sir John Johnson, 
 and dismounted, like a person well acquainted with the premises, 
 and certain of a cordial reception. The Indians followed him to 
 the front portico, and sat down on the steps, waiting in solemn 
 patience for his return. 
 
 Walter Butler entered the hall unannounced, and opening a 
 side door, stood some moments on the threshold before its in 
 mates became aware of his presence. It was after dusk ; but 
 Sir William Johnson had carried all the aristocratic arrange 
 ments of his European life into the wilderness, and those habits 
 were strictly followed up by his son. Thus, late as the hour was, 
 Sir John remained at table with a guest who shared his hospi 
 tality, and as the wine passed sluggishly between them, the two 
 men conversed together with more earnestness than is usual at 
 the dinner table. 
 
 Butler was well acquainted with Sir John a handsome young 
 ish-looking man, who sat at the head of the table, a little flushed 
 either with wine or some excitement of suppressed temper, and 
 apparently doing the honors of his own house with unusual con 
 straint. The other person, who sat quietly picking over the nuts 
 on his plate for the meal was evidently at its conclusion was 
 a tall man, a little past middle age, and of a calm, lofty presence, 
 difficult to describe, except by its contrast with the restless and 
 somewhat coarse manner of the frontier baronet. The repose 
 of his appearance was perfect ; yet there was a faint red on his 
 cheek, and a scarcely perceptible curve of the lip, that betrayed 
 deep though well curbed emotions, which had received some 
 shock. 
 
 Butler had never seen this man before, and his presence was 
 by no means agreeable ; the interview which he desired with Sir 
 John was of a kind which rendered witnesses unpleasant, and for 
 an instant he paused in the door, hesitating to enter. Sir John 
 supposed it was a servant, and went on with his conversation. 
 
THE OLD JOHNSON HOUSE. 213 
 
 " No," he said, a little roughly, " you on the other side can 
 hardly be expected to understand the necessity of these measures. 
 It is easy enough making speeches in the House of Lords or 
 Commons humanity serves well to round off an eloquent period 
 with, I dare say but we live in the midst of dangers ; the war 
 is a real thing to us j we do not study it out on a parchment 
 map, while lolling in a cushioned easy-chair, but tramp after the 
 rebels through swamps and over mountains. If we burn their 
 cabins, they retaliate on our halls nothing is safe from them. 
 Why, the very plate off which you are dining will be stowed 
 away in the block-house, under a guard of muskets, for safe 
 keeping, the moment it leaves the table." 
 
 "The loss of your plate, Sir John, costly as it is, would be a 
 trifle, compared to one burning cabin, where the bones of women 
 and children are found in the ashes," said the stranger, casting a 
 careless glance at the gold and silver plate glittering on every part 
 of the board. " I would consent to dine upon a wooden trencher, 
 all the days of my life, if that could save one of these innocent 
 families from destruction. I repeat it, Sir John, the savage war 
 fare commenced in this neighborhood, is shocking to humanity. 
 If the rights of our king can only be maintained by hordes of 
 savages, let them go ; the loyalty of an enlightened people will 
 never be secured by barbarisms, at which even the better edu 
 cated savage revolts. This league with the Six Nations is in 
 human, nay, a statesman would say, worse it is bad policy." 
 
 " It holds the traitors in fear, at any rate. They dare not be 
 insolent when the war reddens their hearths." 
 
 " As a Commissioner of the King, Sir John, I protest against 
 the introduction of savage tribes into his Majesty s army. It 
 may be carried out in violence to this opinion, for in war men 
 become ruthless ; but so far as I have influence with the Minis 
 try, this odious policy shall not prevail." 
 
 Butler, regardless of the low breeding exhibited by the act, 
 stood in the door, and listened to this conversation ; but as 
 
214: MARY DERWENT. 
 
 the stranger ceased speaking, Sir John looked up, and called out 
 cheerfully, like one who greets a much-needed ally : 
 
 " Ha, Butler, is it you ? Come in come in ; we are just dis 
 cussing a subject with which you are more familiar than I am. 
 Mr. Murray, this gentleman belongs to the king s army Capt. 
 Walter Butler, of the Tryon Kangers. As half his fathers s 
 forces are Indians, he will be able to speak advisedly on the ques 
 tion we were discussing, or, I am afraid, almost disputing." 
 
 The two gentlemen saluted each other rather distantly. Then 
 Butler turned to his host, and said, with a dash of off-handed im 
 pudence : 
 
 " No war or politics for me, Sir John. I came on a very dif 
 ferent errand ; so cut the field and give me some dinner, unless 
 your negroes in the kitchen are hacking away at the venison and 
 roast-beef as usual, before the master is through with his dessert." 
 
 Sir John laughed, knocked on the table with the handle of his 
 knife, and ordered the black slave, who obeyed the summons, to 
 see that something was sent up from the kitchen fit for a gentle 
 man to eat. 
 
 The slave grinned till his white teeth glittered again, and went 
 lazily towards the kitchen. Meantime Butler went into the hall, 
 threw his hat and whip on a table, and strode back with his 
 spurs ringing on the sanded floor, and his fine hair half escap 
 ing from the crimson ribbon that gathered it in a queue behind. 
 
 " I beg ten thousand pardons," he said, throwing himself on a 
 seat, and leaning his elbow on the table, with his back half 
 turned upon the stately guest. " Pray, congratulate me, Sir 
 John. I forgot to tell you that it is a married man you have the 
 honor of entertaining." 
 
 " Hallo, Butler, what is this ? Married what you ? Non 
 sense 1" 
 
 " True as the gospel, upon my honor." 
 
 " But the bride where on earth did you find the bride ?" 
 
 " Among the wigwams. Like your honored father, Sir John, 
 
THE OLD JOHNSON HOUSE. 215 
 
 I have a fancy for picturesque women. My wife is a half- 
 breed no, I ain too deep she is a white on her mother s side, 
 and half Indian in the paternal line, but bright as a hawk, 
 sharp as steel, and moves like a panther." 
 
 " And you have married an Indian girl absolutely and lawful 
 ly married her ?" 
 
 "Absolutely and lawfully married her," answered Butler, tak 
 ing a knife from the table, tapping the cloth with its silver 
 handle, and nodding his head, as if he were beating time to 
 music. " Handcuffed for life. No jumping the broomstick in 
 this affair ; none of that Indian hospitality which your father 
 installed, but a downright, honest marriage, done to a turn, by 
 an ordained minister of the church, and served up with this 
 order, which you will please countersign or cash without delay." 
 
 Sir John took the document extended to him, and read it with 
 evident surprise. 
 
 " Catharine Montour ; it is her signature and secret mark. 
 In Heaven s name, where did you get this document, Butler ?" 
 
 " From the lady s own fair hand. You recognize her writing, 
 it seems, and I hope hold possession of the needful mentioned. 
 Rather a good speculation for a clasp of the hands, locked by a 
 dozen words of nonsense, ha I" 
 
 " I do not comprehend." 
 
 " You understand the draft, and that is the most important 
 thing just now, Sir John ; as for the rest, it is a pill which I can 
 swallow without the help of friends." 
 
 Sir John laid the draft down upon the table, and began to 
 smoothe the paper with both his hands, regarding it with a puz 
 zled, doubtful look, like one who cannot make up his mind how 
 to act. 
 
 " There is no doubt regarding the funds, I hope," said Butler, 
 growing meanly anxious at this hesitation. 
 
 " No," was the hesitating reply ; " but have you any know 
 ledge of the position in which a marriage with Catharine Mon- 
 tour s daughter places you ?" 
 
216 MARY DERWENT. 
 
 Now, Butler had no information on this ^subject, nor had he 
 ever heard it mentioned ; but he saw by Sir John s manner 
 that some mystery was kept from him, and, with characteristic 
 cunning, hinted at a knowledge which he did not possess. 
 
 " Have I any knowledge of my position ? Now, that is too 
 good, Sir John ; can yon possibly suppose me fool enough to 
 marry the girl with anything unexplained ?" 
 
 " Then you know who Catharine Montour really was, and to 
 what her daughter is heiress ?" 
 
 " Know ? of course. Do I look like buying a pig in a poke ?" 
 
 " Complimentary to your bride, at any rate ; but I am glad 
 Lady Granby has been frank at last." 
 
 Butler started, but his surprise was nothing to the effect the 
 announcement of that name made upon the king s commissioner. 
 He started from his chair with the sharp spasmodic movement of a 
 man shot through the heart. His forehead contracted, his lips 
 grew white as marble. Sir John shrunk from the terrible ex 
 pression of that face. ^ 
 
 " Lady Granby Lady Granby 1" 
 
 The words dropped from his lips like hail stones when a storm 
 is spent. He began to shake and quiver in all his limbs, then fell 
 into his chair, with one elbow on the table shrouding his face. 
 Sir John and Butler looked at each other in dumb astonishment ; 
 the sudden passion of that man was like the burst of a volcano 
 which gives forth no warning smoke. The silence became op 
 pressive. 
 
 " Did you ever know the lady ?" inquired Butler, who respect 
 ed no man s feelings, and never allowed laws of etiquette to in 
 terfere with his curiosity. 
 
 Murray withdrew the hand slowly from his face, and Wtoked at 
 his questioner with dull, dreamy eyes for some moments. The 
 eager curiosity in that face brought back his thoughts ; he was 
 not a man to expose his heart long under a gaze like that. 
 
 "Yes," he said, leaning back in his chair. "The Granby 
 title is among the most ancient in our country, and the more 
 
THE OLD JOHNSON HOUSE. 217 
 
 remarkable because the entail extends to females of the blood as 
 well as males." 
 
 " Ha ! is that so, Johnson ?" inquired Butler, quickly. 
 
 "Yes. This fact was among the secrets intrusted to my 
 father, and transmitted to me." 
 
 " And the estates must be very large to allow of accumulations 
 like the deposits in your custody," said Butler, keenly alive to 
 his own interests. 
 
 " I believe they are among the finest in England," said Sir 
 John, drily. 
 
 Butler started up, and walked the room, urged into action by 
 selfish-excitement. Murray again shaded his face with one hand, 
 while Sir John examined the draft once more. 
 
 " Are you sure," inquired Butler, at last, " are you sure, Sir 
 John, that this lady was legally married to Queen Esther s son, 
 for, after all, everything depends on that ?" 
 
 " Sir John smiled a little sarcastically. Butler was too coarse 
 in his selfishness not to be understood. Murray again looked up. 
 He evidently felt a keen interest in the question. 
 
 " She was legally married, I fancy. Whatever might have 
 been the cause which drove her to the wilderness, Lady Granby 
 was not a person to degrade herself knowingly." 
 
 " You fancy, Sir John I I should like to have some security 
 besides a man s fancy where an inheritance like this is con 
 cerned. You are certain, sir, that the property is entailed that 
 female heirs come in, in short" 
 
 " In short," interrupted Sir John, with cutting sarcasm, " I 
 have no fear that your interests are in peril, unless there is some 
 informality in her mother s marriage ; your wife is the legal 
 heiress of the Granby estates." 
 
 Butler sat down again, struck breathless by this unexpected 
 good fortune, so far beyond his wildest hopes. 
 
 " You mistook my meaning," he said, even his coarse nature 
 becoming conscious of the revolting light in which his conduct 
 must appear to any observer ; " I was thinking of Tahmeroo 
 
218 MARY DEE WENT. 
 
 she is too lovely a flower to waste her bloom in the wilder 
 ness." 
 
 " You grow poetical, sir," said Sir John, laughing ; " your 
 wife s perfections are dawning upon you with new force." 
 
 Butler did not appear to notice this remark, but went on with 
 his own train of reflection. 
 
 " Then were Catharine Montour dead, no power could deprive 
 Tahmeroo of the Granby estates and title ?" 
 
 " None, sir ; the daughter of Gi-en-gwa-tah, the Shawnee chief, 
 will be Countess of Granby." 
 
 Murray started anew at that name so rudely uttered, his 
 hand clenched itself on the arm of his chair, and a spasm of 
 wounded pride contracted his forehead. With a powerful effort, he 
 mastered himself once more, and leaned back in his seat, with his 
 face turned from the light, and listening with apparent calmness 
 to their conversation. 
 
 " And the rents," said Butler, "the income you have an idea 
 of its amount ?" 
 
 " Have you never ascertained ?" asked Sir John. 
 
 " Not exactly you see Catharine Montour dislikes to speak 
 of anything connected with her past life, and it is difficult to get 
 a clear answer from her concerning the actual amount of the 
 property." 
 
 " Then, sir, I, of course, am not at liberty to betray anything 
 which she sees fit to keep secret." 
 
 " But there can be no treason in asking a question concerning 
 a fortune which will one day be my own ?" 
 
 " There may be none in your asking, if you think it proper," 
 returned Sir John ; " but it certainly would be treachery in 
 me to expose anything which the lady desires to remain 
 untold." 
 
 " You inherit all of your father s chivalry/ retorted Butler, 
 insolently. " Doubtless he had good reason for keeping the 
 lady s secrets." 
 
 A flush shot up to Sir John s forehead, and his lips compressed 
 
 * 
 
 
THE OLD JOHNSON HOUSE. 219 
 
 themselves suddenly ; but restraining his anger, he replied with 
 unmoved courtesy : 
 
 " I trust that I possess the chivalry which should be the 
 birthright of every true gentleman. As for my father, no man 
 trifles with his name or memory here." 
 
 " Well, that is vastly fine ; but plain speech in these days 
 helps a man along faster than the chivalry of all the old cru 
 saders could do," said Butler, carelessly. " Out in the woods 
 here, fine speeches and poetic sentiments are thrown away." 
 
 "That depends entirely upon the persons with whom one 
 chances to come in contact. I have seen as true gentlemen in 
 the wilds of this new world as I ever met at the court of a Euro 
 pean sovereign." 
 
 " Of course," returned Butler, laughing ; " you and I live here, 
 you know, following your grand old father s example." 
 
 Sir John s lip curled, for this attempt at playfulness was even 
 more distasteful to him than the man s previous conversation 
 had been, and without reply he resumed his scrutiny of the docu 
 ment which Butler had placed in his hands. 
 
 " What the deuce could have put it into Catharine Montour s 
 head to come out here and marry my dusky father-in-law ?" 
 continued the young man. " She must have been mad or 
 worse " 
 
 " Doubtless she is a better judge of her own actions than either 
 you or I," replied Sir John, losing all patience with his guest. 
 
 " Oh, I ll wager that she had some good reason," sneered But 
 ler, irritated by the other s haughtiness, and his own failure at 
 discovering the amount of fortune which he hoped one day to 
 claim. " Women don t do those out-of-the-way things unless 
 they are forced. Now, be honest, Sir John, and tell me why 
 this woman left a high position and great wealth in her own 
 country, and came here to act the part of a Shawnee squaw in 
 the valley of the Mohawk." 
 
 " There are many good motives which might have prompted 
 an act like that," said Sir John, gravely : " the good which she 
 
220 MARY DERWENT. 
 
 could do among those ignorant savages the forbearance and 
 cessation from cruelty which she is able to teach them " 
 
 " Stuff and nonsense ! Catch an old bird with chaff, if you 
 can ! No, no, I m not fool enough to believe that Catharine 
 Montour came over here for any such reason ! There s some 
 confounded mystery somewhere, and sooner or later, I ll get to 
 the bottom of it. Take my head for a target, if you don t find 
 that my Lady Granby had played out her game in England, and 
 found it convenient to disappear from among the haughty dames 
 of England." 
 
 " Stop, sir !" exclaimed a low voice, that made both listeners 
 start, as if a thunder-clap had burst over their heads. " Couple 
 the Lady Granby s name with insult again, and it is to me that 
 you must answer for it 1" 
 
 Murray had risen from his seat, and stood before the aston 
 ished man with burning eyes and a brow of iron. 
 
 " What the deuce have I said ?" muttered Butler. 
 
 " You have said that wliich I cannot allow to remain un 
 answered, Captain Butler," answered Sir John, with more dignity 
 than he had yet assumed. " One portion of your question I can 
 answer without betraying confidence which was sacred with Sir 
 William, and rests so with me. You ask, why a high-born Eng 
 lish lady forsook her own land to become the wife of an Indian 
 chief? Why she left England, I am not at liberty to say ; but, 
 upon the honor of a gentleman, it was from no unworthy act or 
 motive her career had been a proud and blameless one, as this 
 gentleman can, doubtless, testify ; but the deeper reasons which 
 influenced this expatriation, no human being, except herself, has 
 ever possessed the power to explain." 
 
 " Nor why she took up with a swarthy Indian when she got 
 here that is one of her delicate mysteries also, I dare say," re 
 torted Butler, growing insolent under the stern glances turned 
 upon him by the English Commissioner. " Come, come, Johnson, 
 it s hardly worth while exhausting eloquence on the subject ; the 
 whole affair has given me a picturesque little wildcat of a wife, 
 
THE OLD JOHNSON HOUSE. 221 
 
 who loves me like a tempest. Better than this, she promises to 
 make me a potentate, one of these days, unless the lady-mother 
 outlives her, which may happen after all, for she has the vigor 
 and health of a tigress. As for disinheriting her child, or any 
 thing of that sort, she hasn t the power, thank my stars. But 
 the main question is left out, after -all : how and where was 
 Catharine Montour married to the Shawnee Chief? Was it a 
 ceremony which our English laws hold valid ? If not, my wild 
 bird has nothing but her pretty plumage after all." 
 
 " Do you consider this nothing ?" said Sir John, holding up 
 the draft. 
 
 " Faith, I don t know. It seemed a good deal when I presented 
 it ; but now that I have learned how much remains behind, it 
 seems as if my queenly mamma had treated me rather shabbily." 
 
 " Sir John, forgive me, but you have not answered Captain 
 Butler s question : by what train of circumstances was a lady so 
 delicate in all her tastes as Lady Granby, led into a union with 
 a savage ? Surely it could not have been of her own free will," 
 said the commissioner. 
 
 " If a martyr ever went to the stake of his own will if self-ab 
 negation of any kind is free this lady did voluntarily marry the 
 Indian Chief. It was a sublime sacrifice, which every true man 
 must regard with homage an act of chivalric humanity of which 
 few women, and scarcely a man on earth, would have been 
 capable." 
 
 u I can well believe it," exclaimed Murray, with kindling eyes. 
 
 " Then she was decidedly married," cried Butler, faithful to 
 his mercenary instincts, and hunting that one fact down like a 
 hound. 
 
 " I saw her married myself, on the steps of this very mansion, 
 where she stood like a priestess between two races for the hall 
 was crowded with whites, of which my father, Sir William, was 
 the head ; while on the lawn, in the thickets, and all around, belt 
 ing the forest, three thousand warriors were gathered. The whole 
 Six Nations were represented by their bravest chiefs. It was a 
 
222 MARY DERWENT. 
 
 sight to remember one s lifetime. The red sunset streamed 
 through the forest trees, only a little more gorgeous thaii the 
 eavage groups that camped under them. The windows of the 
 Hall blazed with gold ; the whole interior was illuminated. lu 
 the flower-beds and thickets the Indians grouped themselves like 
 flocks of orioles, flamingos, and restless ravens. It was the most 
 picturesque sight I ever beheld." 
 
 "But Caroline Catharine Montour wha.t of her ?" exclaimed 
 the commissioner, losing his self-control ; " was all this savage 
 pomp assembled to witness the sacrifice of that noble creature ?" 
 
 "Yes ; in the midst of it all she stood, white as death and firm 
 as stone, her hand in that of the chief a fine, noble looking fel 
 low he was too, with just enough of white blood in his veins to 
 save the whole thing from being repulsive. Indeed, in my whole 
 life, I have seldom seen a man of nobler presence. On the mo 
 ther s side, you are already informed, he was nearly white ; from 
 her he had learned many of the gentler graces, both of manner 
 and costume, which made his appearance rather picturesque than 
 savage. Instead of a blanket or skin-robe, he wore a hunting- 
 shirt of some rich color, heavy with fringes and embroidery ; his 
 hair was long to the shoulders, black and glossy as a crov/ s wing. 
 After all, a woman of good taste might have been excused for 
 admiring the fellow for his own sake." 
 
 The commissioner writhed in silence under this description ; 
 his eyes burned with deep fire ; his very fingers quivered with 
 suppressed excitement. 
 
 " And she was married thus ?" he questioned, in a hoarse 
 whisper. 
 
 " Yes, it was done bravely before the whites assembled in my 
 father s hall ; before the Six Nations, swarming upon the grounds. 
 Her lips were white as snow when the vow passed them ; her 
 eyes burned like a she eagle s when her young is threatened ; 
 she clenched the chief s hand till even he must have felt the pain. 
 YeSj it was bravely done ; she had promised, and no entreaty 
 could move her to reconsider the matter. Sir William, who was 
 
THE OLD JOHNSON HOUSE. 223 
 
 not much given to sentiment, besought her with tears in his 
 eyes to desist ; the women who crowded the hall wept like chil 
 dren ; but she stood firm ; I can almost hear her deep, ringing 
 voice now, as she answered the priest." 
 
 " Then it was a marriage by the priest !" almost shouted 
 Butler, dashing the handle of his knife down on the table, till 
 the plate rang again. 
 
 " She hud pledged herself to become the chief s wife, and was 
 a Christian how could she keep her vow, except by Christian 
 rites ! She had honorably fulfilled her conditions she as honor 
 ably redeemed her promise." 
 
 "What were those conditions?" inquired the commissioner, 
 and his voice became lower and hoarser each moment. 
 
 " The redemption of three white prisoners from torture." 
 
 " Three prisoners three ?" 
 
 * Yes, a gentleman, his wife, and child, taken on the Canada 
 frontier." 
 
 " And when was this ?" 
 
 Sir John mentioned the date rather carelessly ; he was pour 
 ing out a glass of wine, and did not observe the wild anxiety 
 with which his guest awaited this answer. 
 
 " Oh, my God my God !" 
 
 His arms spread themselves on the table, his face fell between 
 them, while a terrible burst of passion shook him from limb to 
 centre. 
 
 " Oh, my God my God !" 
 
 It was all he could say ; the words were suffocating him as 
 they rose. 
 
 The host and Butler looked at each other in silent amazement. 
 An earthquake could not have surprised them more. Even But 
 ler was awed by an outbreak of feeling, the more impressive 
 because of the apparent composure that had preceded it. 
 
 At last Murray lifted his head ; every feature was quivering 
 with emotion joy, regret, sharp pain, and wild triumph, strug 
 gled there. 
 
224: MARY DERWENT. 
 
 " Gentlemen," he said, " it was I it was my wife and child 
 whose lives Lady Granby bought by the horrible sacrifice. Till 
 to-night I was ignorant of all this ignorant that she yet lived. 
 You will not wonder that I am unmanned." 
 
 " But she never mentioned your name, Mr. Murray," said 
 Sir John. 
 
 " Perhaps she did not know. She might have do.ne as much 
 for strangers even ; upon the broad earth there does not exist a 
 woman so capable of great sacrifices." 
 
 Butler laughed, and looked meaningly at his host. 
 
 " I dare say it was no great sacrifice after all," he said. " By 
 Sir John s account, the Indian was as handsome as a young 
 Apollo" 
 
 " Stop." 
 
 The word flew from Murray s lips like a hot bolt, his eyes 
 flashed fire. 
 
 " Another word against that lady, here or elsewhere, and I 
 will hold you to a sharp account, young man !" 
 
 Murray passed around the table as he spoke, laid his hand 
 with a heavy pressure on Butler s shoulder, and bowing to Sir 
 John, passed from the room and the house. Before either of the 
 gentlemen left behind had recovered from their surprise, the 
 sound of a horse s hoofs galloping down the hard carriage road 
 warned them of Murray s abrupt departure from the Hall. 
 
 " Well, upon my word, this is high tragedy !" exclaimed 
 Butler, recovering from his stupor of cowardly astonishment. 
 " What the deuce did I say that need have aroused a tempest 
 like that ?" 
 
 11 Common decency, sir," said Sir John, for a moment yielding to 
 his better feelings, " should have prevented your expressing 
 such doubt of any woman, least of all, of one who is the mother 
 of your wife." 
 
 " Well, well, let it rest we won t quarrel. I have no reason 
 to think hardly of the Countess of Granby. Kelations should 
 agree," he continued, uttering the name with pompous pride, 
 
THE OLD JOHNSON HOUSE. 225 
 
 as if feeling that the title reflected honor upon him. Come, Sir 
 John, let s talk seriously." 
 
 " Concerning what, sir ?" 
 
 " This fortune, of course these estates." 
 
 " I can give you no farther information, Mr. Butler ; any 
 future knowledge that you may desire must be obtained from 
 Catharine Montour herself." 
 
 Butler pushed back his chair with a muttered oath, then 
 remembering how impolitic a quarrel with Sir John might prove, 
 he drew towards the table again and smoothed his forehead, en 
 deavoring to fall into a more friendly and familiar style of con 
 versation, an effort in which he was not at first seconded by his 
 companion. 
 
 " Well, let the wigwam rest for once ; we have talked about 
 these things long enough," he said, with a great effort, wrench 
 ing his thoughts from the Granby estates. " What does this 
 crusty Don want at Johnson Hall, when he leaves it with so little 
 ceremony ?" 
 
 " Oh," answered Sir John, firing up, and draining glass after 
 glass of wine while he was speaking ; " he is a sort of commis 
 sioner from the king, sent to keep us all in order our mode of 
 warfare does not suit his taste, he was just making an eloquent 
 protest against bringing Indians into the service, as you came in." 
 
 " And be hanged to him !" cried Butler, filling his glass. 
 " Why, we might as well strike our tents at once ; the savages 
 work beautifully besides they make capital scape-goats, when 
 we wish to indulge in a little of their amusements ; upon my 
 word, Johnson, there s a sort of relish in their way of scalping and 
 roasting a traitor when he comes in, that has its charm ; do 
 away with the savages I why, that would be throwing aside 
 buckler and cloak too." 
 
 " I told him so plainly enough," said Sir John, whom the 
 wine was making more and more social. " Why, Schuyler him 
 self, could not have preached mercy with more eloquence ; he a 
 king s commissioner. I wish the Indians had roasted him when 
 
 15 
 
226 MARY DEKWENT. 
 
 they had the chance to come here lecturing me, a Johnson, of 
 Johnson Hall ; as if I had not been outraged and insulted 
 enough by General Schuyler and his minions, at Guy Park." 
 
 " Is it true, Sir John, that Schuyler forced you into giving up 
 the stores and ammunition which had been gathered here at the 
 Hall ?" v 
 
 " Forced is a strong word, captain," answered Sir John, turn 
 ing red with the humiliating remembrances brought up by the 
 rough question ; " he required my word of honor not to act 
 against Congress, and demanded the arms, stores, and accoutre 
 ments held by our friends, and the Indians. I refused to com 
 ply, and he marched upon the Hall ; I sent for our Indian allies, 
 and for you. My messenger found Queen Esther almost alone in 
 the Seneca Lake encampment. The whole tribe were gone to 
 hold a council-fire in Wyoming. You were away, no one could 
 guess where. After this fashion, Captain Butler, was I sustained 
 by my friends." 
 
 " Faith, I had no idea of Schuyler s movement till the escort 
 came in with Catharine Montour, who would force me to stay 
 and get my hands tied ; but the very day after our wild wedding, 
 I was on the road," said Butler. 
 
 Sir John grew more and more excited. 
 
 " I could have driven the traitors back with my brave High 
 landers, without going beyond the estate, for he started with 
 only seven hundred men, but the Try on county militia turned out 
 like wasps, and increased his force to three thousand ; with no 
 hopes of reinforcement from you or your father, my Indian allies 
 absent, and no time for preparation, I was compelled to negoti 
 ate, and to a certain extent succumb, but it was only for a time ; 
 to-morrow you must ride over to Fonda and collect our forces. 
 Brant is hard at work among the Seuecas. Where have you 
 left Gi-en-gwa-tah with his warriors ?" 
 
 " They are on the lake by this time." 
 
 " That is good news, we will soon have them at work ; my 
 tenants are all under arms ; I expect Brant to join us in a few 
 
THE OLD JOHNSON HOUSE. 227 
 
 days, with an account of his organization. We will give the 
 rebels a hot reception the next time they venture into this 
 county, or" 
 
 Sir John broke off with a quick exclamation ; the loud gal 
 lop of a horse approaching the house brought both the baronet 
 and his guest to their feet. 
 
 " What is that ?" said Sir John, listening ; " surely not the 
 Hon. Mr. Murray returning no, no, he would keep the road ; 
 but this fellow rides over everything. Now that hoof strikes the 
 turf, now the gravel ; it can be no good tidings that bring any 
 one here in such hot haste at this hour ? I must learn at once 
 what it means." 
 
 He rose hurriedly from his seat, and Butler followed ; but be 
 fore they reached the door, it opened, and one of Sir John s slaves, 
 a faithful and confidential old servant, entered the room, evident 
 ly in great agitation and fear. 
 
 " What is it, Pompey ?" Sir John asked. 
 
 " There is a man wants to speak to massar right off ; some 
 thing very portant : them consarned Whigs is up again." 
 
 " Call him in be quick, Pomp 1" exclaimed Sir John. 
 " What can these traitors be at now ?" he continued, as the ser 
 vant left the room to execute his order. 
 
 " I thought you would get into difficulty with them about 
 this time," replied Butler ; " they begin to suspect that you 
 haven t kept that extorted promise very faithfully your High 
 landers have come out too boldly, and begun to worry the enemy 
 they are sure of re-enforcements." 
 
 " A promise made to a set of traitors !" said Sir John, scorn 
 fully ; " only wait till the time comes that I can crush them 
 like so many vipers, miserable rebels 1" 
 
 Before Butler could answer, the door was opened again, and 
 Pompey ushered into the room a man whose disordered garments 
 betrayed the haste in which he had arrived. 
 
 "Your errand ?" cried Sir John, imperiously "don t waste 
 words, but speak out 1" 
 
228 MARY DERWENT. 
 
 " The rebel Congress has taken measures against you," re 
 turned the man, bluntly, " and a company of soldiers are on 
 their way here to take you prisoner." 
 
 " This does look like earnest," said Butler, with a prolonged 
 whistle ; " what is the cue now, Sir John ?" 
 
 " How near are they ?" inquired the baronet. 
 
 " They will reach here in an hour, at the farthest you have 
 no time to spare." 
 
 " An hour so, so I We shall see they haven t caught the 
 fox yet ! Where is Mr. Murray, Pomp ?" 
 
 " Gone, massar ; the commissioner rode off half an hour ago : 
 said he wasn t gwine to come back." 
 
 " Confound him 1" muttered Butler ; " he d be little help, I 
 fancy. What shall you do, Sir John no chance to stand a fight ?" 
 
 " Fight no ! Curse them, they have left me neither arms 
 nor ammunition ; there s nothing for it but to decamp in double 
 quick time, and take our revenge after." 
 
 " Who has command ?" asked Butler. 
 
 " Congress ordered General Schuyler to take measures, and he 
 commissioned Colonel Dayton with the command of the expedi 
 tion." 
 
 " Which will prove a fruitless one, unless my lucky star has 
 deserted me," said the baronet. " Here, Pomp, I can trust you. 
 Collect all the plate, and put it in the iron chest that stands in 
 my office." 
 
 " What are you going to do with it ?" inquired Butler. 
 
 "Bury it deep, as I wish these infernal rebels were. You 
 don t think I intend to leave it for them, do you ? Be alive, 
 Pomp ; I ll bring you the papers and valuables out of my cham 
 ber, and do the work yourself quietly, without saying a word to 
 any one." 
 
 " Yes, massar trust old Pomp for that." 
 
 " I know I can, you sooty villain ; you are one of the few 
 men, black or white, in whom one can place confidence." 
 
 "Tank yer, masser," and the old slave grasped his hand 
 
THE OLD JOHNSON HOUSE. 229 
 
 with fervor. " Now, do yer get off, and leave me to manage 
 eberyting ; dem rebels ain t cute enough for dis yer chile, Fse 
 willin to bet, ha, ha I" 
 
 "Take care of yourself, Pomp I must leave you behind. 
 What s that now ?" he cried, breaking off hurriedly. 
 
 " Another swift rider," said Butler. " Can it be the rebels ?" 
 
 " Quick, masser don t lose a minute 1" 
 
 " It isn t them," interrupted the messenger ; " I rode like the 
 wind they cannot have so nearly overtaken me." 
 
 " See who it is, Pomp some friend, perhaps if it only proves 
 so, I should like to give them a hot welcome." 
 
 " Before the negro could obey, the door was flung open, and a 
 muscular, powerful man strode into the room. 
 
 11 Brant 1" exclaimed both gentlemen at once. 
 
 " Yes, Brant," returned the man, in a deep, stern voice. " Like 
 a fool, I left the Indians to follow me, or we would give the ras 
 cals down yonder hot work." 
 
 " Then you have brought me no help, Colonel ?" 
 
 " Not fifty men ; you must run for it this time." 
 
 The savage uttered the words in a tone of sullen wrath 
 which betrayed his deep hatred of the Whigs. His hand 
 clutched unconsciously over the hilt of his knife, and a terrible 
 frown settled upon the heavy darkness of his forehead. He was 
 a picturesque object in spite of the evil expression of his features. 
 Like his manner, the dress that he wore was a singular ming 
 ling of the Indian costume and the attire of the whites. Under 
 his frock of deerskin was buttoned a military vest, doubtless 
 the spoil taken from some one of his numerous victims, and over 
 his shoulders was flung an Indian blanket, worn with the grace 
 of a regal mantle. His long, black hair fell in dull masses about 
 his neck, and from under his shaggy brows blazed his unquiet 
 eyes with a deadly fire from which the bravest might well have 
 recoiled. 
 
 " Do you go with me, Brant ?" asked Sir John. 
 
 " Yes, Brant will be your guide. Queen Esther is not many 
 
230 MARY DERWENT. 
 
 miles away with a portion of her tribe ; you will find protection 
 among them." 
 
 " Is Catharine Montour there ?" interrupted Butler. 
 
 " No, she rests at Seneca Lake ; the young woman whom you 
 have made your wife is with her. Sir John, you have no time 
 to lose in useless questions is all ready ?" 
 
 " In one moment. Here, Pomp, come to my chamber." 
 
 They went out ; and in a few moments Sir John returned pre 
 pared for flight. 
 
 " Choose your best horse," said Brant ; " we must take to the 
 forest at once, for there we have friends." 
 
 They followed him into the hall, through the open door of 
 which were visible their horses, ready for a start. 
 
 " Stop !" exclaimed Brant, " I must leave a sign behind." 
 
 He mounted the stairs, and brandishing his tomahawk, began 
 making deep gashes in the balustrade, at a distance of about a 
 foot apart. 
 
 " What the deuce are you about ?" exclaimed the men in as 
 tonishment. ; . 
 
 The renegade made no reply, but continued his work to the 
 top of the staircase. 
 
 " The house is safe now," he said, as he came down again. 
 " Should it be attacked by the Indians during your absence, they 
 will leave it uninjured." 
 
 " You leave a stern mark, Colonel," said Butler, glancing up 
 at the hacked wood. 
 
 " That Brant always does he will leave a more lasting one, 
 though, on these rebels, before long." 
 
 The party hurried into the open air and mounted their horses, 
 but before they could gallop away, Pompey rushed out and 
 grasped his master s bridle. 
 
 " It s all safe, Massy John," he whispered ; " let em come 
 now as soon as they like ; this chile has matched em." 
 
 " That s a fine fellow hold them at bay, Pompey I shall see 
 you again keep a good heart." 
 
THE OLD JOHNSON HOUSE. 231 
 
 "Good by, masser come back fore long old Pompey ll 
 keep dem ere silver platters, and milk jugs, and all de cetras 
 safe as de dead folks in em graves you can pend on dat 
 masser." 
 
 " Good by, Pomp good by !" 
 
 They put their horses into a gallop, and rode away through the 
 forest. For many moments no one spoke, and the only sound 
 that arose was the smothered beat of their horses hoofs on the 
 turf, and the mournful shiver of the leaves, as the wind sighed 
 through them. Brant took the lead, tracking the narrow path 
 as unerringly as if it had been a highway. Suddenly he checked 
 his horse, and made a signal to his companions to halt. 
 
 " The rebels are coming," he said ; " they have got on our 
 traces." 
 
 They listened ; the heavy tramp of steeds came up from the 
 distance. 
 
 " They will overtake us 1" exclaimed Sir John ; " what are we 
 to do, Brant ?" 
 
 "Let them pass we will baffle them yet follow me we 
 know the woods, at any rate." 
 
 He turned aside from the path, and urged his horse through 
 the underbrush, followed by his companions, until he reached a 
 little dell, through which a brook crept with a pleasant gurgle. 
 
 " They will go on, and so miss us," he said, reining in his 
 horse. " If we had only our guns now !" 
 
 Nearer and nearer came the tramp of the horses rushing 
 past the dell in hot pursuit, and growing fainter in the distance. 
 
 " They have gone by," said Butler. " Oh for a good rifle 
 I d have one shot 1" 
 
 " We must take another path," said Brant ; " keep a tight 
 rein, gentlemen." 
 
 While he was glancing around in the starlit gloom for some 
 trace to guide his course, there came up a sudden cry from the 
 depths of the forest ; the trees were illuminated by torches, and 
 in an instant they were surrounded by their pursuers. 
 
232 MAEY DERWENT. 
 
 " This way," shouted Brant, " they are upon us !" 
 
 He urged his horse through the woods, closely followed by his 
 companions. Butler was last ; his horse slipped in ascending the 
 bank, rolled over, carrying his rider with him. The rest fled, 
 ignorant of his misfortune, and before he could free himself from 
 his saddle the pursuers had surrounded him. 
 
 " Is it the baronet ?" asked one. 
 
 They flashed a torch in his face, and at the sight of those fea 
 tures a simultaneous cry went up : 
 
 " The Tory Butler 1 Tie him fast !" 
 
 Butler struggled and attempted to draw back ; he was speedily 
 overpowered by numbers, his hands tied, and himself bound upon 
 a horse. After a brief consultation, they resigned the pursuit 
 of Sir John, and turned to retrace their steps, with the prisoner 
 in their midst. 
 
 When the fugitives drew rein to breathe their horses, they 
 perceived for the first time that Walter Butler was missing. 
 
 " They have caught him 1" exclaimed Sir John. 
 
 " Fool I" said Brant, contemptuously. " He deserves hanging, 
 but I am sorry it happened ; Queen Esther likes him, and I 
 would rather encounter a troop of fiends than her tongue, when 
 she learns what has happened." 
 
 "But wo are not to blame we were powerless to assist 
 him, and" 
 
 " As if that would change her mind ! No, no ; I can promise 
 you a hot welcome. But it is not for her interest to risk a seri 
 ous quarrel with us, and her majesty looks to that, I can tell 
 you." 
 
 They rode on for another hour in security, and on reaching a 
 break in the forest, the camp-fires of the Indians became visible 
 in the valley below. 
 
 " Here we are," said Brant ; " now for Queen Esther." 
 
 They rode into the camp, and Brant was received by the sav 
 ages with demonstrations of joy. 
 
 "Where is the queen ?" he asked, in the Shawnee dialect. 
 
THE OLD JOHNSON HOUSE. 233 
 
 " Yonder is her tent she is still watching." 
 
 " Follow me, Johnson," said Brant ; " we must pacify the old 
 tigress before she shows her teeth." 
 
 " But I am not in fault." 
 
 " Make her believe it then !" 
 
 " But she will not dare " 
 
 " She would dare everything ! But you are in no danger 
 only be ready to receive every sort of invective that a woman s 
 tongue can invent, or the fury of a she panther give birth to." 
 
 They moved towards the tent; Brant seized his companion 
 by the arm and drew back, for that moment the heavy mat 
 ting which fell before the tent was flung suddenly aside, and 
 Queen Esther stood before them not fierce and wild as Sir John 
 had expected to find her, but with the sharp, cool look of a per 
 son so used to adventure, that nothing could surprise her. 
 Though a tall woman, she was scarcely imposing in her person, 
 for a life of sharp action had made her nerves steel, and her 
 muscles iron ; of flesh, she had only enough to bind these tough 
 threads of vitality together. The rest was all intellect and stern 
 passion. 
 
 As if in scorn of all those wild or gentle vanities, which are 
 beautiful weaknesses in the sex, both in the wigwam and draw 
 ing-room, Esther allowed no bright color or glittering ornament 
 to soften the grey of a stern old age, which hung about her like 
 a garment; her doe-skin robe, soft, pliant, and of a dull buff color, 
 had neither embroidery of wampum or silk ; her leggins were 
 fringed with chippped leather ; and over her shoulders was flung a 
 blanket of fine silver-grey cloth, gathered at the bosom by a 
 small stiletto, with a handle of embossed platina, and a short, 
 keen blade, that glittered like the tongue of a viper, and worn 
 as a Roman woman arranged her garments in the time of the 
 Ctesars. Her hair was white as snow, silvery as moonlight, and 
 so abundant, even at eighty years of age, that it folded around 
 her head in a single coil, like a turban. The high, narrow fore 
 head, the aquiline nose, curved with time like the beak of an 
 
234: MARY DEE WENT. 
 
 eagle, and the sharp, restless eyes, stood out from beneath this 
 woof of hair stern and clear as if chiselled from stone. The very 
 presence of old age rendered this woman majestic. 
 
 She paused a moment in the entrance of her tent ; a torch 
 burnt within, sending its resinous smoke around her, as she 
 appeared clearly revealed, with a back-ground of dull crimson 
 for the tent was lined with cloth of this warm tint, and she stood 
 against it, like a grey ghost breaking out from the depths of a 
 dusky sunset. 
 
 " Are you friends or enemies ?" she inquired, shading her eyes 
 from the smoky torch-light with a hand that looked like a dead 
 oak leaf. 
 
 " Who but friends would dare to enter Queen Esther s camp 
 at night ?" answered Brant, stepping forward. " You and I are 
 on the same hunt ; our war-paths cross each other here, that is 
 all." 
 
 " Ha, Colonel Brant, this is well ! I had dispatched a swift 
 runner in search of you. Schuyler has sent a force of armed 
 men into Tryon County, and the settlements are astir. Gi-en- 
 gwa-tah was away when the news came, but I have brought his 
 warriors forward. Our spies send word that they threaten the 
 master of Johnson Hall." 
 
 "He is here," said Brant, pointing to Sir John ; " we got 
 news of Dayton s approach just in time to fly." 
 
 " In time to fly 1 Were there no armed men upon the estate, 
 that you should sneak away from your ancestral hall like a dog 
 which fears the lash ? This was not the way that your father 
 defended himself, young man." 
 
 " There were but three of us, besides the servants," said Brant, 
 laying his hand heavily on Sir John s arm, to prevent the sharp 
 reply which sprang to the baronet s lips ; " there was no time 
 to summon the tenants ; even your new grandson, Walter Butler, 
 counselled escape to the forest, where we can organize at lei 
 sure, and sweep down upon the rebels when they least expect 
 us." 
 
THE OLD JOHNSON H O U S "5 . 235 
 
 " Walter Butler the husband of my grand-daughter and is 
 he with you ?" 
 
 Esther spoke without emphasis, and with an intonation sharp as 
 the ring of steel ; there was neither softness, auger, nor surprise 
 in that voice. She turned her keen glance from Brant to John 
 son, questioning them both. 
 
 " He was with us a few minutes ago," answered Sir John, 
 whose indignation was aroused by this cutting composure, " but 
 an ambush scattered us in the woods, and he has not come in 
 yet." 
 
 A cold glitter shot into Queen Esther s eyes ; her lips sunk 
 with a quick pressure, and almost lost themselves between the 
 contracted nostrils and the protruding chin. She beckoned to 
 the Indian who had stood sentinel before her tent, uttered a few 
 words of his own language in a whisper, that sounded like the 
 suppressed hiss of a snake, and, with a slow sweep of the hand, 
 passed from before her guests suddenly and softly, as a cloud 
 precedes the tempest. 
 
 " A cold reception this," said Sir John, when his hostess was 
 swallowed up in the night. " Is her serene highness about to 
 grill us for the loss of her cub ?" 
 
 " From her quietness, I should think it likely," said Brant. 
 " When her majesty grows polite and silky, it is a sure proof 
 that she intends to strike. Like a leopard, she never shows her 
 nails in earnest till the paw falls. She is a wonderful woman 
 the only person in all the Six Nations whose influence can oppose 
 mine I" 
 
 " But you cannot really think she intends us any harm," said 
 Sir John, whose bravery was not always bullet proof. 
 
 " Don t trust her 1 If she finds out, or fancies that we have 
 got Butler into this scrape, she will make smooth work of it. I 
 have seen her shave off a head, as if it had been an over-ripe 
 thistle, with her own hand. Her tomahawk is sharp, and quick 
 as lightning. It is the only thing she is dainty about : the head 
 is burnished with gold, and the ebony handle, worn smooth as 
 
236 MAKY DE It WENT. 
 
 glass, is richly veined with coral and mother of pearl. That 
 which other women lavish on their persons, she exhausts upon 
 her arms. But for your comfort, Sir John, if Queen Esther orna 
 ments them like a woman, she wields them like a man. No war 
 rior of her tribe strikes so sure a blow. 7 
 
 " But she will not dare !" 
 
 " I should not wonder if the Earl of Essex said as much when 
 he lay in the Tower ; but his faith did not prevent Elizabeth, 
 whom I can t help thinking a good deal like our savage queen 
 here, chopping off his head." 
 
 "But you are powerful more powerful among the savages 
 than she can be and I " 
 
 " Yes, with three thousand warriors at my back ; but just 
 now my body-guard is scattered, and if this lady tiger chooses 
 to tie us up to the next tree, and give her people a human bar- 
 bacue, I could only fight single-handed like yourself." 
 
 " Hark ! they are gathering now," said Johnson, turning pale. 
 " How quietly she does her work !" 
 
 Brant listened, and cast a sharp glance around the encamp 
 ment. A low, humming noise came from its outer margin, like 
 that of a hive of bees swarming : he began to be really 
 alarmed. 
 
 " Surely she is not so mad 1" he muttered, grasping the handle 
 of his tomahawk. " A man would not dare but this creature 
 has enough of her sex to be uncertain, if nothing more/ 
 
 The noise that had startled him, instead of increasing, died 
 away. He looked keenly forward : a train of human beings 
 swept out from the heart of the camp, headed by a single horse, 
 whose tramp echoed harshly back from the mellow sound of a 
 hundred pair of retreating moccasins. 
 
 " By the great Medicine, she has left the camp 1" almost 
 shouted Brant. " I tell you, Sir John, that woman would 
 shame the bravest officer in your king s army." 
 
 As he spoke, a savage came forward, and addressed Brant 
 A tent had been pitched near that of Queen Esther, and she had 
 
THE OLD JOHNSON HOUSE. 237 
 
 politely left an invitation that he and the baronet would take 
 possession of it, and rest after their joarney. 
 
 " This does not look like auto-da-fe" said Sir John, preparing 
 to accept the invitation. 
 
 " The more for this politeness," was the answer, " as I told 
 you. Queen Esther carries the etiquette of her father s court 
 even into her son s camp. The daughter of a French governor, 
 the widow and mother of savages, is always courteously cruel. 
 We shall see what all this means when she returns." 
 
 " Why wait for that ? supposing we take to the woods again. 
 My cousin Guy must be in force somewhere in the district ; I 
 have no fancy for hospitality like this." 
 
 " Take to the woods 1" cried Brant, with a scornful laugh 
 " what run from a woman ? Not I ; besides, Sir John, just 
 look at this fellow with all his sullen civility, he is nothing more 
 nor less than a guard set to watch us. So make the best on t ; till 
 the fate of that scoundrel Butler is ascertained, we are nothing 
 more nor less than prisoners." 
 
 " But what if the rebels have killed him ?" 
 
 " No danger," cried Brant, with a scornful lift of the shoulder 
 which made all the fringes on his hunting-shirt rattle again ; 
 " the fellow wasn t born to be killed in honest battle ; he ll turn 
 up somewhere, depend on t. So, as the tent is ready, and our guard 
 of honor set, let s take a little rest while the old silver-headed 
 dame settles our fate." 
 
 Brant strode off to the tent as he spoke, followed by Sir John, 
 who was not a little crest-fallen and apprehensive. Up to this 
 time he had met the Indians as a monarch musters his vassals, on 
 the steps of his father s hall, with wealth, power, and a vast ten 
 antry to back him. Now he was a fugitive, separated from his 
 followers, in the hands of a woman exasperated by the loss 
 of her favorite, and evidently filled with scorn of his cowardly 
 desertion both of the home of his ancestors, and the companion 
 of his flight. It was an unpleasant position, and one which 
 Brant maliciously rendered more distressing by his cool review 
 
238 MARY DEKWENT. 
 
 of the dangers that surrounded them. The crafty and brave In 
 dian gloated over the cowardly fears of his companion, for in the 
 depths of his heart he both hated and despised his white allies. 
 It was his happiness to torment them whenever the opportunity 
 arose. Though a willing tool in their hands, he was not a blind 
 one. 
 
 Meantime Queen Esther swept on with her train of warriors 
 into the forest. A savage ran before her horse, searching out 
 the trail with his keen eyes. He was one of the Indians that had 
 followed Brant from the Hall. As she rode along, Queen Esther 
 questioned this man in a cautious voice till she had gathered all 
 the information he possessed. 
 
 " So you took shelter in the deep cut, and he was lost ? Wheel 
 to the left ; there is a shorter cut they will return to the 
 Hall. On !" 
 
 Quick and sinuous as a serpent might alter his course, the 
 train of savages swept on one side, and darted off in a run, fol 
 lowing their stern leader. For a full hour they kept forward, 
 steady, silent, and swift, threading the wilderness as a flash of 
 lightning cuts through a storm cloud. 
 
 " Hist 1" 
 
 It was the Indian scout who came running back with one hand 
 uplifted. 
 
 " Hist hist 1" The word ran like a serpent s hiss through 
 the whole train, and every moccasin rested in its track. 
 
 Queen Esther dismounted, and a savage tied her horse to a 
 tree. Again that low hiss ran through the line, and it swept for 
 ward. Scarcely a branch swayed, scarcely a stick of bushwood 
 crackled : the wind sighing in the tree-tops made a louder noise 
 than all that band of fierce human beings. 
 
 Crash, tramp, crash the sound which the scout had detected 
 came sharp and clear now. Hoofs beat the turf, oaths rang on 
 the air. The rush of a quick progress swept back louder and 
 louder. In the oath, Queen Esther detected the voice of 
 Butler. 
 
THE OLD JOHNSON HOUSE. 239 
 
 " Ha !" she said, sharply, " he is alive. Faster, faster ; but 
 more silently. Are your rifles ready ?" 
 
 She was answered by the sharp click of flints. Again that 
 silent sweep of human beings. They moved more boldly now, 
 for the close beat of hoofs bore down the faint noise of their 
 moccasins. 
 
 Again Esther whispered the word of command. The caval 
 cade were in sight. One horseman, carrying a lantern on his 
 saddle bow, revealed the rest. With a sudden manoeuvre a de 
 tachment of savages, headed by Queen Esther, threw themselves 
 in front of the party. Quick as thought, the rest fell into place, 
 surrounding the enemy with a triple hedge of men a wall of 
 rifles bristled around the doomed group. 
 
 The leader was taken by surprise, and reined back his horse. 
 The motion exposed his left side ; crack ! a bullet passed through 
 him. The horse reared, plunged, and fell dead, striking against 
 his nearest companion. Before the revolutionists could reach 
 their holsters, it was too late. Some turned to fly, but the flash 
 of muskets, shedding lurid fire among the green leaves, met them 
 everywhere. A few broke the lines, and rushed away, wounded 
 and bleeding. Three or four escaped unhurt, and fled like mad 
 men into the deep forest. Queen Esther took no prisoners, but 
 shot down her enemies in their track. Shrieks of pain and sharp 
 cries of defiance answered to the storm of her bullets. Her 
 blood rose, the fiery serpent in that woman s heart crested itself. 
 She shrieked to her followers, urging them on, and flinging her 
 scalping knife into the melee, called aloud for trophies. 
 
 Stern and terrible was that conflict, the more terrible because 
 it occupied but a few minutes. The candle that burned in that 
 lantern where it had dropped, was not the fraction of an inch 
 shorter, and yet more than twenty souls had been torn out of 
 life in that brief time. 
 
 " Now," cried Queen Esther, cutting the thongs that bound 
 Butler s wrists, and sheathing her red scalping-knife, " catch their 
 
240 MARY DEKWENT. 
 
 horses, mount and follow me to the camp. Some few stay be 
 hind, and kill those who are not quite dead. Remember, every 
 rebel s scalp is worth a piece of silver and a bottle of fire-water 
 on I" 
 
 She took the stilletto from her bosom, pricked her black steed 
 on the shoulder, and was carried away, with Butler by her side, 
 sweeping that train of red warriors like a whirlwind through the 
 darkness. 
 
 A few hours after, they came thundering into the camp; 
 Queen Esther dismounted, without a flush on her cheek or a 
 quickened breath to tell of the fearful work she had done. Just 
 as gravely and coldly as she had left the camp, she preceded 
 Butler to the tent provided for her guests. Brant stood in the 
 entrance with exultation in his eyes. 
 
 " I expected as much," he said. " In the whole Six Tribes, 
 there is no warrior like Queen Esther. You see, Sir John, our 
 heads are safe; the victorious are always generous. Well, 
 Butler, I did not expect to see you again to-night." 
 
 " And so left me to be rescued by a woman. I thank you," 
 said Butler, sullenly. 
 
 Brant s massive features broke into a smile. 
 
 "Tush," he said; "a man who suffers himself to be taken 
 prisoner by a handful of rebels deserves no better. I am not 
 leagued with your white troopers to pick up the fools that drop 
 off in a skirmish ; men who surrender without even a blow of the 
 fist should be left to the women." 
 
 "Take care!" answered Butler, fiercely, "you hajre indulged 
 in these taunts more than is wholesome for you. At any rate, 
 you are not hired to insult the king s officers." 
 
 " Hired !" said Brant; "hired !" 
 
 "Yes, hired; do your people bring in a scalp which is not 
 paid for in so much gold or silver. It is a better business than 
 trapping mink, and so you take it." 
 
 Not another word passed between those two men, but their 
 
THE LAKE BY STARLIGHT. 241 
 
 fierce eyes met as Butler turned upon his heel and left the tent, 
 and that glance told of the mortal enmity which must thence 
 forth exist between them. Still they slept under the same 
 blanket for an hour or two before the day broke that morning. 
 
 CHAPTER XXXI. 
 
 THE LAKE BY STARLIGHT. 
 
 A THOUSAND stars shone upon Seneca Lake; clear stars that 
 smiled goldenly alike on scenes of strife, such as we have left, and 
 pictures of thrifty peace, to which we now turn. 
 
 On the shore lay Catharinestown, the Shawn ee village, one of 
 the most lovely spots in the world. All the land between the 
 shore and that charming cluster of lodges was richly cultivated; 
 fruit trees stood thick where the hemlocks and oaks had fallen. 
 If a grove or thicket was left here and there, it was the result 
 of Catharine Montour s fine taste, for her gold had served to 
 turn the wilderness on that lone shore into a paradise, and her 
 own poetic spirit had shed beauty on everything she touched. 
 Thus grape arbors screened the humbler lodges, and bowers of 
 peach trees drooped over the unseemly wigwams. What Sir 
 William Johnson had done for his estate in the Mohawk valley, 
 Catharine Montour, in less time, and with better taste, had 
 accomplished at the head of Seneca Lake. 
 
 If she had achieved nothing more than this advance in civiliza 
 tion, the life of that unhappy woman had not been utterly 
 thrown away since she came to the wilderness. With her bene 
 volence, her gold, and those wonderful powers of persuasion, 
 with which no woman was ever more richly endowed, she had 
 softened many a savage heart, and won many a rough acre of 
 forest into smiling culture. The large stone mansion which 
 
 16 
 
24:2 MAKY DEKWENT. 
 
 Queen Esther haughtily denominated her palace, was by far the 
 most imposing building in the settlement. But nearer the brink 
 of the lake, and sheltered by a grove of sugar maples, was a 
 smaller lodge of hewn logs, on a foundation of stone, with a 
 peaked roof and deep windows, neatly shingled and glazed. 
 The walls were covered on one end by a massive trumpet vine, 
 that crept half over the roof, where its burning flowers lay in 
 great clusters through all the late summer weeks. Wild honey 
 suckles, sweetbrier, and forest ivy crept over the front, and a 
 majestic tulip tree sheltered it with a wealth of great golden 
 blossoms when these were out of flower. Thus, with the rude 
 logs clothed with foliage, the windows brilliant with pure glass, 
 and no uncouth feature visible, Catharine Montour s residence 
 was far more beautiful than that of her fiercer mother-in-law, and 
 a stranger might well have marvelled to see anything so tasteful 
 in the neighborhood of an Indian settlement. 
 
 From this dwelling, Catharine Montour and her daughter 
 looked out upon the lake on that star-lit night. Queen Esther 
 and the chief had each gone forth with a detachment of warriors 
 to their separate war-paths. Thus, but few of the tribe remained 
 at home, and these were under Catharine s direct control, for the 
 younger brother of Gi-en-gwa-tah had accompanied the chief, 
 and no meaner authority was acknowledged in the tribe. 
 
 It was a pleasant scene upon which Catharine gazed. A 
 hundred canoes, each with a burning torch at its prow, lay, as it 
 were, sleeping upon the waters. At her command, the warriors 
 left behind by her mother-in-law and husband had gone out to 
 spear salmon, and she was watching the picturesque effect of the 
 canoes on the water, with a gentle thrill of admiration of which 
 her heart had been incapable a few moths before. Tahmeroo 
 was at her feet, resting against her lap, and looking oh, how 
 wistfully! far beyond the group of canoes with their flaming 
 lights, that fell like meteors on the waters. Her heart, poor 
 girl, was full of wild longings and those vague fears which 
 always follow want of trust in a beloved object. 
 
THE LAKE BY STARLIGHT. 24:3 
 
 They had been silent a long time; one watching the fishers, 
 the other looking far beyond them into the still night. 
 
 "Mother!" 
 
 Catharine Montour started, and withdrawing her eyes from 
 the lake, looked with a kindly glance into the earnest face lifted 
 to hers. 
 
 " Well, my child ?" 
 
 "Is it possible oh, tell me, mother mightn t he come to 
 night ?" 
 
 "My poor child!" 
 
 " Why do you call me poor child, mother, and with that voice 
 too ? Is it because you fear that he will not come ?" 
 
 " Not that, Tahmeroo. I dare say he will be here before 
 long; for your sake, I hope so." 
 
 " And only for my sake, mother; is there no love in your 
 heart for my husband ?" 
 
 " I love you, child," said Catharine, with tender caresses. 
 
 " And not him! Oh, mother, try and love him a little, if it 
 is only for my sake." 
 
 " Be content; I shall give him all the love he merits, and 
 more for your dear sake." 
 
 "It is a long, long time since he went away from Wyoming. 
 We have been here one entire week ; indeed, it seems like years. 
 Johnson Hall is not so far away that he cannot come back any 
 time now is it, mother ?" 
 
 " No, my child, he might have been here to-night. But your 
 father left us soon after he did, and has not yet been heard of." 
 
 " Has he been gone so long ? I did not know it," said Tah 
 meroo, innocently. 
 
 Catharine sighed : had she, too, become of so little account 
 with her child. 
 
 " The chief has gone through a, part of the country thick 
 with enemies," she said, probing that young heart with jealous 
 affection. 
 
 " But he is wise and brave," answered Tahmeroo, proudly. 
 
244 MART DEEWENT. 
 
 " The very glance of our chiefs eyes would send an enemy from 
 his path." 
 
 " But there is war on every side now. It may be a long, long 
 time before he comes back to the lake." 
 
 " Oh no; when Walter comes, he will send all our warriors to 
 help the great chief." 
 
 Again Catharine sighed. It was hard to see the very soul 
 of her child carried off by that bad man. Tahmeroo did not 
 heed the sigh, but started up suddenly, catching her breath with 
 a throb of keen delight. 
 
 " Look, mother, look away, away off where the shadows are 
 thick. The stars cannot strike there, and yet I see light one, 
 two, three, a hundred the black waters are paved with them 
 oh, mother, he is coming." 
 
 " You forget," said Catharine, straining her eyes to discover 
 the lights which Tahmeroo saw at once with the quick intelli 
 gence of love. " It may only be Queen Esther returning with 
 her detachment of warriors heaven forbid that she has found 
 an enemy." 
 
 " No, mother, no. I am sure those torches are lighting him 
 home. Let us meet him. The stars are out, and all the lake is 
 light with our salmon fishers. It is warm and close here my 
 canoe lies among the rushes come, mother, come, I will carry 
 you across the lake like a bird." 
 
 Catharine arose with a faint smile and followed her daughter 
 to the shore. 
 
 With eager haste, Tahmeroo unmoored her little craft, and 
 rowing round a sedgy point, took her mother in. The salmon 
 fishers lay in a little fleet a few rods off, reddening the waves with 
 their torches. At another time Catharine would have paused to 
 rock awhile on the waters, and watch the Indians at their pictu 
 resque work, as she had done a hundred times before ; but 
 Tahmeroo was full of loving impetuosity ; she cut through the 
 crimson waters saw spear after spear plunged into their depths, 
 and the beautiful fish flash upward and descend into the canoes 
 
THE LAKE BY STARLIGHT. 245 
 
 without notice. How could such scenes interest her when the 
 distant shores were lighted by his presence. Away she sped, 
 turning neither to the right nor left, but on and on, cleaving the 
 silver waters like an arrow, and wondering why the distance 
 seemed so much greater than it ever was before. 
 
 At last a fleet of canoes came rounding a point cast a ruddy 
 light over the forest trees that fringed it in passing, and floated 
 out on the broad bosom of the lake. In the foremost canoe sat 
 a young man with his hat off, and the night winds softly lifting 
 his hair. 
 
 "It is he ! oh, mother, it is he I" said Tahmeroo. All at 
 once her strength forsook her the oars hung idly in her hands, 
 and her face fell forward upon her bosom. She remembered 
 how coldly Butler had parted from her, and became shy as a 
 fawn. Like a bird checked upon the wing, her canoe paused an 
 instant on the waves, then turned upon its track, and fled away 
 from the very man its mistress had sought in such breathless 
 haste. 
 
 But she had been recognized. A shout followed her retreat ; 
 two canoes shot from the rest, and pursued her like a brace of 
 arrows. 
 
 " Tahmeroo ! Tahmeroo 1" 
 
 It was his voice he was glad to see her ; never had so much 
 cordial joy greeted her before. She dropped the oars, crept to 
 her mother s bosom, and burst into a passion of tears oh, such 
 happy, happy tears ! that moment was worth a life-time to her. A 
 canoe darted up. The Indian girl felt herself lifted from the 
 arms of her mother and pressed to her husband s bosom. 
 
 As Catherine relinquished her child, a hand clutched the other 
 side of her canoe, and turning quickly, she saw Gi-en-gwa-tah 
 stooping toward her, while the cold grey face of Queen Esther 
 peered upon her from behind. Catharine was chilled through 
 by that face, and cowered down in the boat, afraid almost for 
 the first time in her life and why ? The Indian chief was 
 grave and kind as ever ; as for the old queen, she was smiling. 
 
24-6 MAEY DEEWENT. 
 
 Butler and Sir John Johnson went to Catharine s lodge, while 
 Esther marched up to the settlement at the head of her war 
 riors. 
 
 In the interior of her house Catharine had gathered so many 
 beautiful objects which appertained to her civilized life, that it 
 appeared more like the boudoir of some European palace than 
 a lodge in the backwoods of America ; books, pictures, and 
 even some small specimens of statuary stood around ; draperies 
 of rich silk flowed over the windows; and while his tribe main 
 tained most of their savage customs, no prince ever dined on 
 more costly plate and china than did the Shawnee chief when he 
 made Catharine s lodge his home. 
 
 With her face all aglow with happiness, Tahmeroo hurried 
 back and forth in the room where her mother sat with her 
 guests, preparing the evening meal with her own hands, for 
 Catharine seldom allowed any personal service that was not 
 rendered by her daughter ; it was the one thing in which her 
 affection had ever been exacting. 
 
 Tahmeroo loved the gentle task which affection imposed on 
 her. With lips smiling and red as the strawberries heaped in 
 the crystal vase she carried, the young girl brought in the luscious 
 fruits and cream, glancing timidly from under her black lashes to 
 see if Butler was regarding her. He looked on, well pleased. 
 How could he help it ? Bad as he was, the wild grace of that 
 young creature would make itself felt even in his hard heart. 
 And Tahmeroo was happy. She did not dream, poor child, that 
 a new power had been added to her attractions since Butler had 
 learned that she was heiress to a title and the vast wealth he 
 could never hope to touch, except through her. Three weeks 
 before, the selfish man would have laughed at the idea of a wild, 
 bright girl like that breaking her heart from his indifference ; 
 now her life was very precious to him, and there was no degree 
 of affectionate regard which he would not have feigned, rather 
 than see her cheek grow a shade paler. 
 
 Catharine saw this, and her heart rose against the man whom 
 
THE LAKE BY STARLIGHT. 
 
 she was forced to acknowledge as her son ; but Tahmeroo was 
 satisfied. Of the inheritance that might sometime be hers, she 
 knew nothing, and cared less ; her husband s love was all the 
 treasure she coveted on earth. 
 
 Butler saw Catharine s eyes following him, and struck with a 
 malicious desire to retaliate on her, broke out just as they were 
 all seated at table, with a rude allusion to the English commis 
 sioner who had visited Johnson Hall, on the evening before its 
 master was driven away. 
 
 " Oh, dear lady, I forgot to tell you," he said ; " Sir John had 
 the honor of entertaining an old friend of yours the day before 
 he left the Hall ; a person who knew you well in England, he 
 said ; and who professes that it was to purchase his life you 
 married the chief here." 
 
 " Captain Butler," exclaimed Sir John, with sharp indignation ; 
 " by what right do you repeat conversation heard at my table ?" 
 
 " Hallo, have I been blundering, and told tales in the wrong 
 presence ? I am sure Murray spoke of the whole thing openly 
 enough." 
 
 A low cry broke from Catharine ; but one, for she seemed 
 frozen into stone by that name. Every feature was hushed and 
 cold ; her very hands looked hard and chiselled, like marble. 
 
 The chief glanced at her, a slow fire rose and burned in his 
 eyes. His savage heart was stung with memories to which those 
 few cruel words had given a bitter interpretation. No king 
 upon his throne was ever prouder than that stern chief. 
 
 " Surely, that stately old potentate was not a former lover," 
 said Butler, glorying in her anguish ; and urged on, both 
 by malice and self-interest, to wound that proud spirit in every 
 possible way ; but his coarseness overshot its mark Catharine 
 arose, bent her head in calm courtesy, and saying, in a low, sad 
 voice, 
 
 " I cannot forget that you are my daughter s husband," moved 
 quietly out of the room. 
 
 The chief arose also and left the house. He wandered in the 
 
248 MAKY DERWENT. 
 
 woods all night, while she lay fainting and still as marble ou her 
 chamber floor ; but the bolt was shot, and no one ever knew 
 how terrible was the anguish of that night. 
 
 The next day Catharine and the chief recognized each other 
 as ever. But, alas ! in their souls they never met again. 
 
 For weeks and months after this, Butler made his home in the 
 Shawnee camp, till at last the war raged too hotly, and he went 
 once more to his murderous work. 
 
 CHAPTER XXXII. 
 
 WALTER BUTLER S CAPTURE. 
 
 IN a lonely, deserted spot, on the outskirts of the little village 
 called the German Flats, stood a dreary looking board house, 
 inhabited by a man named Shoemaker, who enjoyed the un 
 enviable reputation of being a Tory in disguise. 
 
 One evening in the early part of the month of August, in 
 1777, this man and his family were gathered about their supper- 
 table, in one of the lower rooms of the house. The heat of the 
 weather precluded the idea of fire, but after the fashion of 
 many farmers of that period, the hearth was filled with blazing 
 knots of pitch-pine, which served to illuminate the apartment in 
 place of candles. The evening meal of samp and milk was just 
 concluded, and they were moving back from the table, when a 
 cautious knock sounded at a door in the rear of the house. 
 
 Seated at the table with the family, was a workman, a staunch 
 Whig, who had for some time watched his employer with 
 vigilance, and the slightest occurrence of an unusual nature was 
 enough to rouse his suspicions. 
 
 He saw Shoemaker start when the knock was repeated, and 
 rising hastily, offered to open the door. 
 
WALTER BUTLER S CAPTURE. 249 
 
 " Keep your seat/ exclaimed the farmer ; "I open my own 
 doors, and don t thank any man to be putting on airs, as if he 
 was the owner." 
 
 " Some neighbor, I dare say," suggested the wife, as her hus 
 band walked towards the door in answer to a third signal. 
 
 " They re mighty afeard of coming in," muttered the Whig ; 
 moving restlessly in his chair. 
 
 " Manners is manners," retorted the old lady, sententiously. 
 " You don t expect strangers to pull the string without knock 
 ing ; if you do, I don t." 
 
 As she spoke, the farmer opened the door ; a few whispered 
 words passed between him and some one outside ; but instead 
 of ushering the visitor into the house, he stepped out and closed 
 the door behind him. Before those within could express their 
 surprise, except by looks, Shoemaker returned, slamming the door, 
 and saying with a rough laugh 
 
 " Who do you think it was, but that tarnal Jim Davis, come 
 up here, thinking to find Betsey Willets that he was sparking 
 last winter. That are was the rap he used to give by way of 
 sign, to call her out. I told him she wasn t here now, and sent 
 him off about his business." 
 
 If Shoemaker thought by this to quiet his suspicious friend 
 he had only awakened a new uneasiness, for during several months 
 back, Master Sim had regarded the aforesaid Betsey with wist 
 ful appreciation. 
 
 " Consarn the fellow s impudence !" he exclaimed, springing to 
 his feet ; " if I don t larn him better manners than to be knock 
 ing after gals that like his room better n his company, my name 
 isn t Sim White." 
 
 He made a stride towards the door, with the look of a man 
 quite ready to extinguish the claims of half a dozen rivals ; but 
 the farmer caught his arm. 
 
 " Jest set down and mind your business I ll have no muss 
 about my house set down, I say." 
 
 " Wai," muttered Sim, sinking slowly into his chair again, and 
 
250 MARY DEKWENT. 
 
 ejecting bis tobacco with great violence among the blazing pine 
 knots, " only wait till I meet him with that new Sunday coat of 
 his on ef I don t embroider it off for him in fine style, I miss 
 my calculation that s all I ve got to say." 
 
 " Don t be a fool !" expostulated Shoemaker ; " never quarrel 
 about a gal you don t know where you ll find yourself. I wish 
 you d go down to the tavern for me, and ask Jacob Harney to 
 come up here to-morrow ; if he wants that grey mare of mine, 
 he s got to take her now." 
 
 " It s getting late," suggested Sim. 
 
 "You can stay all night, and come back in the morning. 
 Consarn me, if I don t believe the fellow s afeard of meeting Jim 
 Davis." 
 
 Sim disdained to reply either to this taunt or the housewife s 
 laughter ; but planting his old straw hat firmly on his head, was 
 going out of the back door. 
 
 " That s a new fit of yourn," called out the farmer ; " don t 
 you know that t other door leads to the road, you blockhead 
 you !" 
 
 Sim turned back without a word, and passed out of the door 
 Shoemaker had named ; but once in the road, he stopped and 
 looked back at the house. 
 
 " There s something wrong," he muttered. " Old Ike Shoe 
 maker, you aint cute enough yet for this chap, by a long shot. 
 I m bound to see what s going on here ; that wan t Jim Davis, 
 no how ; the darned old Tory has got some mischief afloat, and 
 I m a-goin to find it out." 
 
 He turned and hastened down the road, for at that moment 
 the door opened, and the farmer s wife appeared, looking eagerly 
 around, evidently to discover if he were lingering about the house. 
 Sim walked quickly on, and waited till everything should once 
 more be restored to tranquillity before he ventured to return and 
 verify his suspicions. 
 
 As soon as they believed him gone, Shoemaker opened the 
 back door and gave a low whistle. Instantly a number of men 
 
251 
 
 started up in the gloom and filed into the stoop, moving very 
 cautiously. Shoemaker grasped the hand of their leader, and 
 drew him into the room. When the flame of the pine knots fell 
 upon his face, it exposed the features of Walter Butler. 
 
 " What on earth, captain I" exclaimed Shoemaker, looking 
 out in astonishment at the group of men. 
 
 " I will explain all to you," returned Butler ; " but first, you 
 must find some place for my men we are too many to stay in 
 this open room we want some supper, too." 
 
 " Up this way," said Shoemaker, opening a door that exhibited 
 a stairway leading to an upper story. " Light a dip, Sally I ll 
 take em up ; they ll be safe there, and the old woman will find 
 em some supper, I guess." 
 
 Butler made a signal, and a band of twenty-eight men, four 
 teen whites, and fourteen savages, with arms concealed under 
 their blankets and outer garments, entered the room, and passed 
 almost noiselessly up the staircase. 
 
 As they mounted the stairs, unremarked by any of the occu 
 pants of the room a human face appeared at the window and 
 looked cautiously through a gap in the curtain, watching every 
 movement with keen vigilance. 
 
 When the farmer had seen the men safely stowed in the loft, 
 he closed the door behind them and returned to the room, where 
 Walter Butler had thrown himself into a chair, like one wearied 
 by a long march. 
 
 "Why, captain, who d a thought of seeing you here," said 
 Shoemaker, taking a seat near him, and lighting his pipe, with 
 all the phlegm of his Dutch ancestors. " You oughtn t to come 
 on a fellow so sudden ; you might have been- ketched as easy as 
 not, if I hadn t had the gumption to get rid of a fellow who was 
 here." 
 
 " Well, we re safe now, at all events," said Butler, carelessly ; 
 " there s nothing to be gained, if we don t dare all ; my men and 
 I have been in greater peril than this during the last few days, 
 I can tell you, Shoemaker." 
 
252 MARY DERWENT. 
 
 " Why, where do you come from ?" 
 
 " From Seneca Lake, where the Shawnees have made their 
 head-quarters most of the time for the last year. The old queen 
 don t lead off as she used to, but she s out again now." 
 
 "But what brings you to this place what on earth do you 
 expect to do here ?" 
 
 " Give us some supper before you ask me to open my mouth ; 
 I am fairly worn out." 
 
 " Hurry up, old woman I" said Shoemaker. " While she s about 
 it, captain, here s what ll set you all right," he continued, 
 producing from a cupboard a bottle of rum and a couple of tin cups. 
 
 Butler poured out a quantity of the spirits, and drank it off at 
 a swallow. 
 
 " That has the right flavor," he said, wiping his lips ; " we 
 haven t had a drop since yesterday." 
 
 In the meantime, the farmer s wife had been busy frying a 
 large platter of ham and pork, and, assisted by her daughter, 
 began spreading a homespun cloth upon the table, to prepare 
 Butler s meal. A liberal portion of this savory food was carried 
 to the men above stairs ; and when all was ready, Butler seated 
 himself before the table, with the keen appetite of a man who 
 had not tasted food for twelve hours. 
 
 " Fall to, captain," said Shoemaker, pushing the bread and 
 butter within his reach ; " the victuals arn t handsome much, 
 but I guess you ll find em good, especially after a long fast." 
 
 Butler s appetite proved that hunger had given a keen relish 
 to the humble fare, and the farmer smoked his pipe in silence, 
 until his guest pushed back his plate, and filled his glass again 
 from the bottle of spirits. 
 
 All this while, the face at the window was intently regarding 
 them. Picking loose the putty from one of the window panes with 
 his fingers, Sim took the glass softly out, as the old woman and 
 girl prepared to leave the room, and the two men drew close 
 together, and began their conversation. Thus, with his ear 
 close to the opening, he listened to all that passed. 
 
WALTER BUTLER S CAPTURE. 253 
 
 " So you can t understand what brings me here," Butler said, 
 sipping his rum. " You see I ve doffed my regimentals," he add 
 ed, pointing to the hunter s frock which he wore, " and am ready 
 for any kind of work." 
 
 " I wouldn t a known you, I do believe, cap tin. Well, fine 
 feathers do make fine birds, and no mistake. You look like one 
 of us now." 
 
 " Wesson is in command of Fort Dayton, isn t he ?" Butler 
 asked. 
 
 "Yes, and keeping a sharp look-out. You don t mean to 
 attack him, do you ?" 
 
 " No ; but before morning I intend to sack old Davis s house 
 he s got some papers of Sir John Johnson s that we must have, 
 and we may as well take his useless life along with them." 
 
 " Wai, I guess the neighborhood can spare him, ; said the 
 farmer, indifferently. " He s one of the worst rebels in the dis 
 trict. Jest set fire to his haystacks while you re about it I d 
 like to see em burn." 
 
 " His house isn t near the fort, is it ?" 
 
 " No ; it s on the other road, and stands as much alone as 
 mine does ; you won t have any difficulty about settling his 
 hash." 
 
 " I ll have the papers, if I murder and burn the whole settle 
 ment I" exclaimed Butler, with an oath. 
 
 " Wai, they d do the same by you if they ketched you. It isn t 
 a week since I heard old Davis himself say, he d hang you if ever 
 he laid hands on you." 
 
 "Let him look to himself!" muttered Butler, all the fero 
 city of his nature breaking forth in his glance. " My men 
 shall tie him hand and foot, and burn him in his own house." 
 
 " When will you start ?" 
 
 " About midnight. By that time the whole neighborhood will 
 be quiet, and my men refreshed we ve had a long march, 
 and they are tired enough, but always ready for this kind of 
 work." 
 
254: MARY D K R W E N T . 
 
 " There s no trouble about it," said Shoemaker ; " we ll make 
 it as merry as a wedding." 
 
 The face which had long watched them disappeared from the 
 window, and the fugitive fled lightly down the road towards the 
 fort. 
 
 " Will you, indeed ?" muttered Sim White, as his long legs 
 measured off the ground at a tremendous pace. " We ll see about 
 that 1 I ve got you this time, you old Tory ; I haven t watched 
 you two months for nothing ! Old Davis, indeed I and to think 
 I wanted to lick Jim only jest wait a little I" 
 
 The two men continued their conversation in fancied security. 
 At length Butler flung himself upon a rude settle, with his Indian 
 blanket under his head for a pillow, and fell into a heavy slum 
 ber. The farmer remained in his chair, but after a time his head 
 fell forwards, the pipe dropped from his fingers, and he also sank 
 into a quiet sleep. 
 
 Sim White made no pause for breath until he reached the lit 
 tle block-house which was dignified by the name of fort. His 
 violent knocking speedily aroused the sentinels, and the door was 
 cautiously opened. 
 
 " A pooty set of fellers," exclaimed Sim, as he rushed in pant 
 ing and exhausted, " to be snoozing here, while all our lives are 
 in danger ! Call up Colonel Wesson !" 
 
 "What is it, Sim ?" echoed a dozen voices. 
 
 " The Tories and Injuns are at us, that s all !" returned Sim. 
 " Call the colonel, you darned blunderheads !" 
 
 " Here I am 1" exclaimed a manly voice, and the commander 
 appeared from the inner room. " What has happened ?" 
 
 Sim explained in a few energetic words the scene that he had 
 witnessed, and the projected attack upon Davis s house. 
 
 " You haint got no time to lose," continued Sim. " There s 
 twenty-eight of em, Injuns and Tories, and that Walter Butler 
 at their head, and old Ike Shoemaker is as bad as any, cuss him ! 
 Only let me get my gripe on him ! Only to think that I ve lived in 
 his house a most a year, and he a flat-footed Tory all the time !" 
 
WALTER BUTLER S CAPTURE. 255 
 
 Colonel Wesson quickly arranged the plan of action, and in a 
 few moments the men he selected were in marching order. 
 
 "All you ve got to do is to surround the house," said Sim. 
 " The men are up in the loft, and there s no winder for em to 
 fire out of. We ll have them like so many rats in a ha,y stack." 
 
 " Come on, men," said the colonel. " Sim, do you go with 
 us?" 
 
 " Go with you ? Wai now, that s a pooty question, ain t it ? 
 When did you ever know Sim White to shrink out off a fight 
 with the bloody Tories ? Give me a pitchfork, or a scythe, or 
 anything that comes handy. I ll stick em, or mow off their heads 
 to the tune of Yankee Doodle. Go with you ? I wonder what 
 you mean by that !" 
 
 " We ll look you up a gun, Sim," said the colonel, laughing ; 
 " you ll find that more useful." 
 
 " I ain t no ways perticler about the weapon," replied Sim ; 
 " all I ask is a shy at old Ike. Ef I don t stuff his pipe down 
 his piratical old throat, I hope I may have to sarve crazy 
 George to the end of my days, that s all !" 
 
 " Shed as little blood as possible, men," said Colonel Wesson ; 
 " and by all means, take Walter Butler alive." 
 
 " Yes sir," said Sim ; " there s an old rope in Shoemaker s barn 
 that they tie the kicking heifer with the noose in it 11 fit that 
 feller s neck to a T." 
 
 " We are all ready," said the colonel. " File out, men steady 
 and quiet. Forward, march !" 
 
 Walter Butler still slept upon the wooden settle, moving rest 
 lessly in his slumbers, and uttering broken exclamations which 
 betrayed how even his dreams took a share in the cruel and 
 bloody projects he had formed. The farmer dozed quietly upon 
 the hearth, the pine knots had burned almost to ashes, and the 
 kitchen was wrapped in gloom, save when the dying embers 
 crackled and sent up a lurid flame for an instant, only to die out 
 and leave the gloom and stillness deeper than before. 
 
 Up the road came that little band of faithful Whigs, in stem 
 
256 MAKY DEKWENT. 
 
 and silent indignation against the men who had so often laid 
 waste their peaceful homes, and scattered ruin and desolation 
 wherever they passed. 
 
 The troops surrounded the house with noiseless caution, but 
 still there was no sound within. The door had been left unfast 
 ened in their secure carelessness, and yielded without an effort 
 to the assailants touch. 
 
 Suddenly there was a tread of heavy feet the room was 
 bright with the glare of torches, and Walter Butler sprang to 
 his feet from a troubled dream, to find himself in the sure grasp 
 of the men he had so often persecuted. 
 
 " The rebels are on us 1" he shouted. " Here men, men !" 
 
 This cry was echoed by a war whoop from the Indians above, 
 but as the foremost of his men burst upon them, he fell dead, 
 pierced by a bullet from one of the Whigs. Another and another 
 shared the same fate, and the savages and Tories retreated in 
 confusion to their place of concealment. 
 
 Walter Butler struggled with the desperate energy of a man 
 fighting for his life ; striking aimlessly with his hunting-knife, but 
 he was speedily overpowered and thrown upon the floor. 
 
 Shoemaker, as soon as he could collect his wits, had sought 
 refuge in the pantry, but Sim White speedily discovered his hid 
 ing place, and dragged him back into the kitchen, where he fell 
 upon his knees, writhing and supplicating in abject fear. 
 
 " I m not to blame I m an innocent man 1" he cried. " Don t 
 kill me, don t kill me, Sim White ; it s agin nature that you 
 should kill a man you ve sat at table with." 
 
 " Shut up I" said Sim, giving him a vigorous shake ; " nobody 
 wants yer cussed old life, you ain t worth killin 1" 
 
 Butler shouted again to his men with loud curses ; once 
 more they essayed to force a passage into the room, but the 
 foremost fell under the unerring aim of the Whigs, and they 
 retreated again. Before the Whigs discovered it, they had found 
 means of egress through the only window the loft contained, and 
 escaped, leaving their leader behind. 
 
WALTER SUTLER S CAPTURE. 257 
 
 11 Cowards 1" cried Butler writhing himself free from the grasp 
 of his captors and seeking to draw his pistols, " I ll sell my life 
 dearly any way I" 
 
 Again he was overpowered, flung upon the settle, and tied 
 securely hand and foot, so that he could only vent his rage in 
 impotent blasphemies. 
 
 Sim stood guard over the farmer, who besought him in vain 
 to be released. 
 
 "Only let me go, Sim, I ll tell you the whole. I will, sartin 
 as you live." 
 
 " As ef I didn t know the hull didn t I hear every word you 
 said ! Jim Davis, indeed, you pesky varmint. Shut up, not a 
 word out of yer Tory head 1" 
 
 " Just let Jim Davis lay his hands on you, that s all !" added 
 another ; " he ll settle your affair sudden, now I tell you." 
 
 Walter Butler lay writhing in ineffectual efforts to free him 
 self ; his struggles attracted Sim s attention. 
 
 " Somebody hold the old chap a minute," he said ; " while I 
 get the halter for the captain, the noose ill fit his neck as well 
 as any other wild colt s." 
 
 Colonel Wesson checked them in their project. 
 
 " He is here taken on our ground a spy, and worse than a spy. 
 Mr. Butler must be brought before a court-martial," he said ; " we 
 will give him a fair trial. You have no right to commit murder." 
 
 " Who wants to commit murder 1" said Sim. " I only meant 
 to noose him, that s all. Here, old shaking bones, stand up and 
 have your hands tied come along." 
 
 " Oh, don t 1 don t !" shrieked the trembling coward. " Let 
 me go I ve got a wife and child I" 
 
 At this moment the mother and daughter rushed into the 
 room, where they had remained concealed quaking with fear, and 
 besought Colonel Wesson to spare his life. 
 
 " We shall not harm him," replied the soldier ; " but he must 
 go with us ; his fate is in the hands of others." 
 
 " They ll hang me ! They ll hang me 1" groaned the farmer. 
 
 11 
 
258 MARY DEKWENT. 
 
 " Of course they will," said Sim, consolingly ; " but it s quick 
 over ! Set fire to old Davis s hay-stacks, will you, you pesky old 
 weasel ! 
 
 Conducting their prisoners, the party returned to the block 
 house, where a court-martial was speedily formed to decide upon 
 the fate of Walter Butler. 
 
 He listened in sullen silence to the arguments, smiling fero 
 ciously when different acts of his cruelty were cited, and exhibit 
 ing a callous unconcern, which was the effect of desperation 
 rather than manly courage. 
 
 He was sentenced to be hung as a spy at day-light, and when 
 the court-martial broke up, was placed in rigid confinement dur 
 ing the few hours which must elapse before his death. After his 
 removal, Colonel Wesson debated the validity of their sentence, 
 and deemed it more prudent to grant the prisoner a reprieve, 
 and have him removed to Albany, where the Commander-in-chief 
 might control his fate. This was received with disfavor by the 
 Whigs, but Wesson s arguments finally prevailed, and it was 
 decided that instead of meeting his sentence at day-break, he 
 should be conveyed at once, under a strong guard, to Albany. 
 
 The old Tory, Shoemaker, was condemned to receive a score 
 of lashes, and left to return home. Sim listened to the sentence 
 with the utmost glee, and made strange confusion amid the 
 solemnity of the scene, by offering to apply the lashes with his 
 own hand. 
 
 When morning dawned, Walter Butler was sent forth from 
 the settlement a prisoner. For once his cruel schemes had failed ; 
 and as he possessed only the courage of a weak, wicked man, he 
 looked forward, with inward trembling, to the doom that awaited 
 him. 
 
 For a year he pined in the close confinement of a jail ; at the 
 expiration of that time he was reported ill, and through the 
 intercession of his father s friends among the patriots, he was 
 still closely watched, but allowed more liberty of action, and 
 surrounded by the comforts and luxuries which his sensuous 
 
THE WIFE S STRUGGLE. 259 
 
 nature found so essential, in spite of the training and capability 
 for enduring hardships, which a long residence in the backwoods 
 had given him. 
 
 CHAPTER XXXIII. 
 
 THE WIFE S STRUGGLE. 
 
 MANY months had elapsed since Walter Butler s capture, and 
 no tidings of him had reached his young Indian wife, left mourning 
 in her home on the borders of Seneca Lake. 
 
 Catharine Montour believed that he had deserted her child, for 
 she knew him to be a man capable of any deed, however des 
 picable, and though her heart was wrung with anguish by the 
 sight of Tahmeroo s suffering, she could not regret his absence, 
 feeling that the misery of desertion was nothing compared to 
 that which the poor girl might have been forced to endure from 
 his indifference and cruelty. 
 
 Queen Esther had exhibited no astonishment at Butler s ab 
 sence, but in truth her lion-like heart was stirred by many con 
 flicting emotions, all over-powered by a strong desire to 
 avenge the slight which he had dared to put upon her grand 
 child. So, amid them all, Tahmeroo found little comfort, and 
 wore away the time as best she might, concealing her sorrow with 
 all the fortitude of her savage nature, though her altered face 
 and wasted form betrayed the grief preying within. 
 
 At length her father returned from the war-path, and, after 
 much persuasion, consented to go forth and seek for tidings of 
 the absent husband. Even his stern nature was moved by his 
 daughter s suffering, and, collecting a band of his warriors, he set 
 forth, promising ere long to return with tidings which should 
 relieve the girl s wretchedness. 
 
260 MARY DERWENT. 
 
 On the fourth day of his absence Tahmeroo went up to the 
 great stone house where Queen Esther dwelt in almost regal 
 state. The old woman was absent, and Tahmeroo sat down in a 
 deserted apartment to await her return. She crouched upon a 
 low stool in a darkened corner, not weeping, but hiding her face 
 in her hands, and bearing her suffering with the silent endurance 
 natural to her Indian blood. She could not believe that Butler 
 had deserted her, and still confident of his love, could she but 
 discover his residence, would gladly have crept to him with the 
 affection which nothing could shake, and besought him to return. 
 That strong love had completely subdued the passionate pride of 
 her nature and, rather than be parted from him, she would have 
 sold herself a slave in his behalf, asking only the sunshine of 
 his presence and the glory of his love. That wild devotion had 
 so mingled itself with the religious creed her mother had taught 
 the girl that it became a part of her religion, and only death 
 could have torn it from her heart. 
 
 There she sat in the gloomy chamber, motionless as a figure 
 carved from stone, her rich garments falling over her bosom in 
 stirless folds, as if no pulse beat beneath. A touch aroused her, 
 she sprang to her feet arid glared around with her feverish eyes, 
 thinking that it might be her father who had returned, but when 
 she met her grand-dame s steely glance she fell back to her seat 
 in the apathy of deeper despair. 
 
 Queen Esther had entered the room with her usual panther- 
 like movement and approached her unheeded. She stood for a 
 moment regarding her in silence, her withered hand still resting 
 upon the girl s shoulder. If any feeling of sympathy stirred in 
 that stony bosom her hardened features were incapable of ex 
 pressing it, and her cold eyes looked down upon the unhappy girl 
 in unmoved sternness. 
 
 "Arise, Tahmeroo," she said at length, in her clear, metallic 
 voice ; "a chief s daughter should not crouch down and weep 
 like a puny pale-face. Wrestle with your sorrow, and if you 
 cannot cure it, tear the heart from your bosom." 
 
THE WIFE S STRUGGLE. 261 
 
 " I am not weeping," replied the girl, sullenly ; " Tahrneroo has 
 no tears, and she is not afraid to meet her grief is not Queen 
 Esther s blood in her veins ?" 
 
 " Brave girl ! Wait wait we will lie in ambush for our 
 prey, and when we catch him, Esther s knife shall avenge her 
 grandchild s wrongs." 
 
 " No, no !" shrieked the affrighted creature, grasping the old 
 woman s uplifted arm ; " you will not harm him, promise me that 
 you will not have mercy 1" 
 
 " Did Esther ever fail to avenge a wrong ? Does Tahmeroo 
 think the old queen in her dotage that she talks to her of mercy ? 
 To an insult there is but one answer a bullet, flames, or the 
 knife !" 
 
 " Then I swear by the Great Spirit that you shall kill me too; 
 the knife that drinks his blood shall be sheathed in mine ; then 
 let Queen Esther carry it next her bosom, if she will. 7 
 
 Her form was thrown back in wild energy, all the fire and 
 beauty returned to her face, before so pale and spiritless. 
 The woman looked at her with exultation which she seldom 
 exhibited. 
 
 " The blood of the Shawnee chief is hot in his daughter s 
 bosom," she said, proudly. " Let Tahmeroo have patience, the 
 white brave may yet return; he is no traitor, and he loves our 
 wandering life ; he hates the rebels, too, and in his cabin hang 
 many war scalps, with pale hair streaming from them." Tah 
 meroo heard only a portion of these words and her heart clung 
 to that cold assurance as if it had been a prophecy. 
 
 " He will return I" she exclaimed; " I know he will return 
 perhaps he may come back with the chief ; he has been delayed 
 by sickness, or " 
 
 "Death!" said Esther. 
 
 The word fell like a blow on the heart of her listener. 
 
 "No, he is not dead," she sobbed. "Tahmeroo would have 
 known it ; the dream-spirit would have revealed it to her say 
 that he is not dead." 
 
262 MARY DEKWENT. 
 
 A wild animal would have been softened by the anguish of her 
 tone, but Esther only waved her off, saying, coldly 
 
 " We shall know; let Tahmeroo be patient." 
 
 The tramp of horses sounded from without, and through the 
 casement, Tahmeroo saw her father dismounting before the door, 
 in the midst of his warriors. 
 
 She rushed into the broad hall, but Queen Esther drew her 
 back with a fierce grasp. 
 
 "Shame!" she hissed; "will the chief s daughter expose 
 herself to her father s braves, like the burden-women of her 
 tribe ?" 
 
 She flung Tahmeroo aside, as she might have thrown down one 
 of the young panther cubs, which she fed daily from her own 
 hands. 
 
 The chief Gi-en-gwa-tah entered the room with his usual 
 stately tread, and in spite of her grandmother s warning frown, 
 Tahmeroo sprang towards him, extending her hands in mute 
 supplication. 
 
 " What news does the chief bring to his daughter ?" Queen 
 Esther asked, in the Shawnee dialect, for she seldom spoke her 
 own language, carrying her hatred of the race even to an aver 
 sion of their tongue. 
 
 " The white brave is alive," Gi-en-gwa-tali replied. 
 
 " Then, why does he not come ?" asked Esther, sternly. 
 
 "Speak, father," pleaded Tahmeroo; "is he sick? where is 
 he ? let me go to him !" 
 
 " Tahmeroo questions like a foolish maiden," he said, reprov 
 ingly, " and gives the chief no time to answer." 
 
 " The girl is anxious," Esther said, sternly, with woman s true 
 spirit of contradiction, rebuking the chief for severity which she 
 herself would have shown had he remained silent. "Where is 
 the young pale face ? speak." 
 
 " A prisoner among the rebels," returned Gi-en-gwa-tah. 
 
 Tahmeroo fell forward with a low moan, and lav upon the 
 floor writhing in silent anguish. Even the chief s dark face 
 
THE WIFE S STRUGGLE. 263 
 
 softened, and though nothing enraged Queen Esther so violently 
 as any display of weakness, she spoke no word of chiding, but 
 raised the girl and placed her on a seat. 
 
 " Where where ?" gasped Tahmeroo, as soon as she could 
 speak. 
 
 " In Albany there he has been for months, confined in jail 
 under sentence of death." 
 
 "Save him, oh, save him!" pleaded Tahmeroo. "You 
 are a great warrior, my father; you will save him! Grand- 
 dame queen bring back Tahmeroo s husband, or let her die, 
 now." 
 
 " If he is killed, we will avenge him!" hissed Esther, clutching 
 the hilt of the hunting-knife which she wore in her girdle. 
 " Look up, Tahmeroo, we will have blood for blood!" 
 
 " That will not give him back to me," said Tahmeroo, shud 
 dering; "blood, always blood I am sick of vengeance I want 
 my husband." 
 
 "We can do nothing," Esther replied; "nothing yet 
 Tahmeroo must be patient; she knows that the young chief is 
 true to her." 
 
 " Who dared think otherwise?" exclaimed Tahmeroo, with 
 passionate defiance. " Let all beware Tahmeroo can revenge 
 also, not herself, but her husband. I must find him," she con 
 tinued, shrinking again into her womanly weakness; " he shall be 
 set at liberty. Father, father, is there no way ?" 
 
 " Let Tahmeroo leave us for a while," said Esther; "the chief 
 cannot counsel with children." 
 
 " But you will free him you are very powerful ?" 
 
 "We can do nothing yet, but we can revenge his death !" 
 
 Tahmeroo hurried away, horror-stricken by the oft-repeated 
 word, and flew down the road towards the lake. Her mother s 
 house was upon the border of the water, and full three miles dis 
 tant; but Tahmeroo never paused for breath, speeding along with 
 the grace and swiftness of a young doe. There was a terrible pres 
 sure a,t her heart, but hope had once more begun to revive in it ; 
 
264: MARY DEKWENT. 
 
 she knew where her husband was, and could not believe that 
 those so all-powerful as she deemed her own family, could bo 
 without ability to save him. 
 
 Catharine Montour was seated in her lonely house, brooding 
 over the sad thoughts which for months had returned to torture 
 her with greater force from the few vague words which Butler had 
 dropped that night, half in wantonness, half in revenge. Her 
 conversation with the missionary had opened her long-silent 
 heart, and amid the solitude of her life she was forced to listen 
 to its troubled beatings. She had lost much of the indomitable 
 will which had so long supported her, and the barbarous cruelly 
 by which she was surrounded became every day more painful 
 and revolting; as her own noble nature resumed its sway, she 
 grew kind and gentle as a child, but very sad. 
 
 Those cruel words which Butler had flung like a dagger at her 
 heart, were harder to bear than all beside. Murray was still 
 alive the evil chances of their destiny might bring them once 
 more together, and that meeting would be as painful as if all the 
 long weary past had been obliterated and the early vitality of 
 their suffering brought back upon them. Catharine was worn 
 out with struggles; her former pride and courage had forsaken 
 her, and she longed to creep away to some quiet haunt where 
 she might die alone. 
 
 The hard spirit of infidelity which she had forced upon her 
 soul was shaken off; she could no longer delude herself with the 
 false belief with which she had long endeavored to silence the 
 pleadings of her conscience, and the familiar truths taught her 
 in childhood, which were coming back to her soul like a flock of 
 doves to their desolated nests, had not yet acquired strength 
 enough to afford her comfort. 
 
 When the door opened, and Tahmeroo rushed into the room, 
 pale and agitated, she looked dreamily up, like one whose 
 thoughts come back, with an effort, from afar, unfolded her 
 hands from the loose sleeves of her robe, and smiled a sad 
 welcome. 
 
THE WIFE S STRUGGLE. 265 
 
 " Mother oh, mother !" exclaimed the girl, " the chief has 
 news my brave is a prisoner among the rebels." 
 
 Catharine Montour felt almost a pang of disappointment ; she 
 knew that his desertion or death would be nothing to what must 
 come. Tahmeroo s pride would, in a measure, have aided her to 
 bear the former ; but there was no refuge from his coldness or 
 neglect. His safety seemed to her a misfortune. 
 
 " Speak, mother comfort Tahmeroo, she is very wretched ! 
 Will you not help her will you not save her husband ? The 
 grand-dame talks of vengeance, but your child pines for her 
 mate you are merciful and good oh, help me 1" 
 
 "Alas, my poor bird !" .Catharine said, folding her to her 
 heart, "I am powerless ; the rebels are our enemies, and I can 
 not go into their camps." 
 
 " But he is in their city in Albany." 
 
 " There, least of all they would only imprison me also." 
 
 " What is imprisonment or death 1" cried Tahmeroo. " I would 
 dare everything to be near him ! Go with me, mother go with 
 me !" 
 
 " It is impossible the chief would never consent ; besides, we 
 should rather do harm than good. I will write to Sir John 
 Johnson, who is in Canada ; he may have captives that he can 
 exchange for your for Butler." 
 
 "But weeks and months will be wasted, and I must find him 
 at once." 
 
 " But there is no way ; be calm, child you cannot." 
 
 "Mother, I will I The blood of great warriors beats in Tah- 
 meroo s heart ; she will dare everything danger, death to free 
 her husband !" 
 
 " Listen to me, Tahmeroo, and try to understand ; don t trem 
 ble and look so wild ! The means that you propose could be of 
 no avail. You must wait until we hear from Canada ; then we 
 shall be able to decide what is best." 
 
 " I cannot oh, I cannot 1" cried Tahmeroo, with a sudden 
 
266 MAEY DEKWENT. 
 
 burst of grief. " Nobody has any pity on me none of you ever 
 loved, or you would not treat Tahmeroo so coldly." 
 
 Catharine s arms released their hold and fell to her side ; a 
 sickly pallor gathered about her mouth, and her sad eyes grew 
 dim. 
 
 " Everywhere the same !" she murmured, " everywhere ! Life, 
 life, if we could only escape it cast it forth!" 
 
 " What do you say, mother ? How white your lips are. Oh, 
 you do pity Tahmeroo hold me to your heart again, and tell 
 me that you pity me !" 
 
 Catharine took the unhappy girl to her bosom in a long em 
 brace, and Tahmeroo wept for a time in silence. But soon her 
 impatience came back, and again she began pleading for aid to 
 send after her husband. 
 
 " Let a band of warriors go to their city," she said ; " we 
 will burn it to ashes, if they refuse to give him up 1" 
 
 " Oh, Tahmeroo !" shuddered Catharine ; " do not become a 
 fiend like the rest let not my own child be an added curse to 
 me ! Think of the bloodshed, the innocent lives that would suf 
 fer ; the loving hearts hearts like your own that would be 
 tortured !" 
 
 " Forgive me, mother ; but ah, I suffer so ! I seem going mad ! 
 Then the whole tribe will pity me, for when the Great Spirit 
 tortures a brain with fire, they can pity." 
 
 She fell at her mother s feet, with renewed prayers and suppli 
 cations ; but Catharine was powerless, and though she pitied her 
 child, she was so worn out by the struggles of the past months, 
 that she had no energy left. She arose at length, and pushing 
 Tahmeroo gently away, walked slowly out of the room. 
 
 The girl stood for some moments in despairing silence ; then a 
 gleam of hope brightened over her face. 
 
 " I will go," she exclaimed aloud, " I will go myself to Albany 
 at least, I shall be near him. And the young pale face of 
 Wyoming the Great Spirit has given her strange power I will 
 go to her, she will help me." 
 
HOUSEHOLD TALK. 267 
 
 Before her mother returned to the apartment, Tahmeroo had 
 disappeared whither, no one knew. Half a dozen of her father s 
 warriors quitted the settlement with her ; but they left no trail 
 the forest by which her route could be traced. 
 
 CHAPTER XXXIV. 
 
 HOUSEHOLD TALK. 
 
 THE brightness of a sunset in early May settled on Monockonok 
 Island. It was now the spring of 1778 that year so eventful 
 in the annals of Wyoming but as yet there was no warning of 
 the fell tragedy which afterwards desolated that beautiful spot. 
 
 In the tidy kitchen of their little cabin, Mother Derweut was 
 seated at her work, while her two grand-daughters sat by. The 
 old lady s wheel was flying round with a pleasant hum, and the 
 placid expression of her wrinkled face betrayed thoughts that 
 had gone back to pleasant memories of the past. Mary Derwent 
 sat by the window, a Bible lay open on her lap, from which she 
 had been reading aloud; and the spring breeze fluttered through 
 the casement, making restless lights on her golden hair, and 
 rustling with a musical sound among the worn leaves of the 
 sacred volume. The past year had somewhat changed Mary ; 
 her look of patient sorrow had given place to one of undisturbed 
 resignation ; those soft blue eyes had cleared themselves from 
 every mist, and if there was no joyousness in their depths, neither 
 was there a trace of human grief they were pure and serene as 
 violets that have caught their hue by looking up to heaven. 
 
 On a low stool at her feet sat her sister Jane, occupied with 
 some feminine needlework ; but her skill seemed often at fault, 
 and she would put her work on Mary s lap, with pretty childish 
 petulance, asking for help. Mary would look up from her read- 
 
268 MARY DERWENT. 
 
 ing, take the work, and by a few dexterous touches of her nimble 
 fingers, set it once more in order ; then restore it with a kind 
 smile to the beautiful girl, whose mind seemed diverted by pleas 
 ant fancies from her task oftener than was at all compatible with 
 its progress. 
 
 Jane, too, looked happier and more quiet, the loveliness of 
 her face was no longer disfigured by the discontent which had 
 formerly brooded over it. The holy influence of Mary s life had 
 wrought its effect on her wavering character. The pure soul of 
 one sister had buoyed up the weak girlishness of the other ; from 
 the calm strength of her sister s mind Jane caught rays of light 
 full of serenity and trustfulness. With no tempter by, and good 
 influences all around her, Jane had thrown off much that had 
 been reprehensible in her character, and was now more reasona 
 ble and considerate than she had ever been in her life. 
 
 The afternoon wore on, and Jane hovered restlessly over her 
 work, like a bird longing to forsake its nest for the free air, 
 ever and again glancing towards the winding road of the Kings 
 ton shore, which was visible from the window. 
 
 " There, Mary," she said, at length, unable longer to control 
 her impatience, "I have almost finished it. Don t you think I 
 might as well leave off till to-morrow nay fingers do ache so ?" 
 
 " You have been very industrious this afternoon," Mary said, 
 smiling. " I really think you have earned your liberty." 
 
 " Besides," said Jane, " it is almost sundown." 
 
 " And then ?" 
 
 The color spread over Jane s forehead, and she laid her head 
 on Mary s knee, twisting her apron-strings with girlish modesty, 
 born of real love, which she now really felt for her affianced hus 
 band, though she replied as if her sister had spoken plainly. 
 
 " Yes ; Edward Clark is coming. Oh, Mary " She broke 
 
 off abruptly, and turned her face still more away, while the color 
 deepened on her cheek. 
 
 " What is it, Janey ?" 
 
 " He is coming, because that is, I promised " 
 
HOUSEHOLD TALK. 269 
 
 " Well tell me what you promised." 
 
 Grandmother Derwent s wheel hummed on, and she heard 
 nothing of their conversation. 
 
 When he was here, Sunday," continued Jane, with that desper 
 ate haste with which one rushes into a difficult revelation, " he 
 made me promise to name the day the very next time he came, 
 and he will be here in an hour." 
 
 The pulses of Mary Derwent s heart grew faint and tremulous, 
 but she forced back the rising emotion, her face grew clear as 
 moonlight, and when she answered, her voice was soft, but with 
 a touch of sadness in it. 
 
 " And is that so difficult ?" she asked. " Have you not 
 learned by this time what will make your chief happiness ?" 
 
 " Yes, yes, and I have to thank you for it, Mary. Yon have 
 taught me to be a better girl ; I never will be wayward again 
 indeed I won t. But I can t make up my mind set to the time 
 I know I can t." 
 
 Mary laid her hand caressingly upon her white forehead, and 
 brushed back the long tresses from it. 
 
 " When can you be ready how long will it take ?" 
 
 " Oh, I can be all ready by July," returned Jane, eagerly ; then 
 checking herself, she added, " at least I think so. I want to 
 whiten another web of cloth, and Aunt Polly Carter has pro 
 mised me a rag carpet, though when it comes to the point, I don t 
 believe she can find it in her heart to give one away." 
 
 " Then you must tell Edward that you will be ready in July," 
 Mary said, seriously, riot heeding the petty details to which her 
 sister s mind had wandered. " And oh, remember, Jane, this is 
 one of the most serious moments in your life. Do not leave a 
 single consideration un weighed before you make this decision. It 
 is an important thing to do, my sister." 
 
 " Don t look so sober and talk so gravely please don t 1 I 
 have thought about it a great deal I know I shall be happy 
 as as " 
 
 She paused again, but this time Mary made no effort to urge 
 
270 MAKY DEE WENT. 
 
 her completion of the sentence. She sat* in dreamy silence, with 
 her eyes bent upon the rushing waters. Jane went on with an 
 effort, and a great seriousness came over her, when she added 
 
 " As Edward Clark s wife." 
 
 Even her volatile nature was moved by the enunciation of those 
 solemn words which fell oh, with such desolation on Mary s 
 ear. For many moments Jane sat in silence, hiding her face in 
 the folds of her sister s dress. 
 
 Suddenly the sound of oars broke up through the stillness, 
 and Jane started to her feet with a bustle that roused Grand 
 mother Derwent from her revery. 
 
 " I know who s coming," she said ; "there s only one pair of 
 oars on the river that can make Janey jump so." 
 
 Jane was hastening out of the room, but she upset her basket, 
 and was forced to pause and collect its scattered contents, 
 so that, blushing crimson, she had the full benefit of the old 
 lady s speech. 
 
 " It was rather different when that Walter Butler used to 
 come. Jane ain t the same creetur she was in them days." 
 
 " Oh, Grandmother, you are too bad !" exclaimed the poor 
 girl, letting her basket fall, and fairly running out of her room, 
 though not quick enough to escape the audible tone in which the 
 good woman continued her reflections. 
 
 " Well, it s the truth ; she s worth a hundred times what she 
 was then, and does double the work. I like Edward Clark ; no 
 body need be any more industrious than he is, and if his wife 
 ain t as happy as the day is long, it ll be her own fault, I am 
 sure of that." 
 
 Jane had escaped, and Mary, after quietly putting aside the 
 disordered work, threw a light shawl over her head, and went 
 out. She was in no mood to witness the oppressive happiness 
 of those two young beings, so fall of life, and strength, and hope. 
 She felt the need of solitude, and stole quietly out to the humble 
 grave beneath the cedar tree, which had been from childhood 
 
HOUSEHOLD TALK. 271 
 
 her favorite haunt for thought and prayer, when these melan 
 choly feelings came over her. 
 
 The gorgeousness of the sunset fell around her, and sitting down 
 by her father s grave, Mary s heart went up in a silent prayer 
 for strength and resignation. When she lifted her head again, 
 she saw the missionary standing a little way off, regarding her 
 with the beaming affection which his face always wore when he 
 looked upon her. 
 
 Mary went towards him without the slightest surprise or em 
 barrassment, and laid her hand in his, which closed over it with 
 a mute caress. 
 
 " I thought you would come yesterday," she said, leading him 
 to their accustomed seat under the shadow of the trees, " but I 
 was disappointed." 
 
 " I was occupied, my child, and had not a moment to spare, 
 but I thought of you a great deal, and felt that you would be 
 expecting me. Have you been well is all at rest within ? You 
 were praying, I think, child, when I came up." 
 
 " But not in grief," Mary replied, with heavenly sadness ; 
 " only I am a weak creature and need to pray more than other 
 people ; if I don t, strange thoughts are sure to crowd into my 
 heart and I get quite frightened at myself." 
 
 " Poor child I" returned the missionary ; "poor chosen lamb, 
 how little you know of yourself ! And is all well at home; 
 Janey ?" 
 
 " She is well oh, sir, she is going to be married very soon." 
 Mary uttered the words untremulously, and if the missionary 
 noted the flutter at her heart he made no comment. 
 
 " I am glad," he said ; " I never felt that she was really safe ; 
 young Butler may return at any time, but, once married to 
 Edward, we need have no fear." 
 
 " She will be happy," said Mary, " very happy, he loves her 
 and she loves him, you do not know how much ! She is not so 
 childish now she grows quite womanly in her ways, and works 
 till grandma does nothing but boast of her industry. This is 
 
272 MARY DEKWENT. 
 
 all very pleasant, and our home is so quiet now, one can rest 
 in it." 
 
 " And you, Mary, what are you going to do ?" 
 
 Mary looked startled what was she to do ? The thought 
 had so seldom presented itself that she was astonished by its 
 strangeness. 
 
 " Do ?" she repeated. " Live with grandma ; what else can 
 I do ?" 
 
 " But the time will come when she will no longer need your 
 care, or feel your affection." 
 
 " Then I shall stay with Jane no, I think that could never 
 be, at any rate, for a long time; but I have you; perhaps, if 
 grandmother left me, you would not mind it if I came to live 
 with you." 
 
 " What ! in the wilderness ?" 
 
 " Yes, I love the woods best." 
 
 " An angel might love you for a companion," murmured the 
 missionary ; then he added, aloud, " but have you never thought 
 of a more extended field of usefulness ? Is there nothing higher 
 for which your mind and acquirements fit you ?" 
 
 " No, never ; but it was wrong of me," she said, reproach 
 fully. " I am afraid I have been very idle what must I do ? 
 Is there anything I can do ?" 
 
 " You have left nothing undone, my child ; you have been 
 everything to your grandmother, a guardian angel to your sister. 
 But the time may come when they will not need you." 
 
 "Then I shall come and ask what I am to do you will teach 
 me and help me, I know that well enough." 
 
 " Always, child, darling, always 1" 
 
 Mary clasped her hand over his again, and they stood, side by 
 side, looking across the waters into the fading glory of the sunset. 
 The crimson and gold died slowly away, the sombre tints of 
 twilight struggled with the clear blue of the evening sky, a few 
 stars came out and trembled on the horizon, as if eager to wing 
 their flight towards the pale moon, that had been riding the 
 
HOUSEHOLD TALK. 273 
 
 heavens a full hour, looking like a faded cloud amid the bright 
 ness of the setting sun. 
 
 The plash of oars disturbed them as they stood there. Mary 
 looked quickly around. 
 
 " It cannot be Edward going so soon," she said ; " I did not 
 know that any one else was on the island." 
 
 There was the soft tread of moccasins on the grass, and before 
 either could move, Tahmeroo, the Shawnee chief s daughter, was 
 standing before them. 
 
 Mary uttered an exclamation of joy and surprise ; the In 
 dian girl threw herself forwards, as if to kneel at Mary s feet, 
 but the gentle girl stretched forth her arms and drew the young 
 Indian to her bosom with a fervent embrace. The missionary 
 stood silent and pale during that prolonged caress, his hand ex 
 tended almost as if he would have repulsed the savage and forced 
 Mary from her clinging arms. 
 
 " I began to think you would never return," murmured the 
 deformed, when the Indian girl raised her head ; " I am so glad 
 to see you once more !" 
 
 " Yes, it is many, many moons ; but Tahmeroo has never for 
 gotten the young pale-face. Tahmeroo has great trouble, and 
 she comes to you for help, to you and this good prophet," she 
 continued, turning toward the missionary. 
 
 " What can we do for you ?" Mary asked. 
 
 " Much the white medicine is very powerful ; he will help 
 me, and you, too, you will not send Tahmeroo away miserable, 
 and without some hope, of seeing her lord again." 
 
 The missionary looked at her earnestly, and the stern pallor 
 of his face softened. That short year had wrought a great 
 change in the poor girl. The healthful brown of her cheek had 
 given place to a sickly pallor, her temples were hollow and 
 sunken, and her black eyes blazed with a strange brilliancy, 
 which betrayed the consuming fever within. Her dress looked 
 travel-stained, and there was a carelessness about her attire 
 
 18 
 
274 MARY DEEWENT. 
 
 widely at variance with the picturesque neatness which had for 
 merly characterized her. 
 
 The unrest of the heart was in her face, painful always to re 
 mark in the young, doubly painful when breaking through the 
 wild beauty of that youthful savage. She understood the im 
 pression which her altered lineaments made upon her observers, 
 and said, with a forced smile 
 
 " Tahmeroo is a girl no longer ; sorrow has forced the fresh 
 ness out of her heart, as the thunder tempest beats the breath 
 out of the wild rose." 
 
 " What has happened to you ?" questioned Mary. " Your 
 mother, your noble mother ?" 
 
 The missionary started, and echoed the words, " Your mo 
 ther." 
 
 " Catharine Montour is well, though she may be pining for 
 her child ; but he, my husband, they have taken him prisoner ; 
 Tahmeroo has not seen him for months ; they will kill him, per 
 haps, before she can reach the spot. No one would help save 
 him, not even my mother, so I fled hither." 
 
 " I had heard of this," whispered the missionary ; "he was 
 taken nearly a year since, and put in prison, as a spy." 
 
 " A spy 1" repeated Tahmeroo, overhearing the last word ; 
 " he serves his king. Those that have captured him are miserable 
 rebels. But let them beware it is Gi-en-gwa-tah s son that they 
 have imprisoned ; the children of Queen Esther never forget nor 
 forgive." 
 
 Her face darkened with passion, and would have been abso 
 lutely forbidding, had not womanly tenderness for her husband 
 softened its hardness. 
 
 " Shame, Tahmeroo !" exclaimed the missionary. " You must 
 know that such thoughts are wrong ; your mother has taught 
 you that they offend the Great Spirit." 
 
 " Forgive me, oh forgive Tahmeroo !" she cried, throwing her 
 self on the ground at his feet, and clasping his knees with her 
 
HOUSEHOLD TALK. 275 
 
 wasted arms. The missionary struggled for an instant, as if her 
 touch were unpleasant to him, but she held him firmly. " Tah- 
 meroo is very wretched, oh speak some comfort to her a good 
 prophet finds consolation for every one, Catharine Montour says 
 oh, take pity on her child." 
 
 The missionary raised her gently, and for the first time, held 
 her hand firmly in his clasp, though his form shook with emotion. 
 Mary s tears were falling like gentle rain, as she bent over the 
 suffering girl, and the missionary placed Tahmeroo s head upon 
 her bosom, saying softly 
 
 " Ay, comfort her, little one ; it is but right I" 
 
 Tahmeroo remained motionless for many moments ; at length 
 she raised her head, and wiping away the tear-drops with her 
 long black hair, strove to relate her story more connectedly. 
 
 " I came all the way from Seneca Lake to find you," she said. 
 " No one could help me our great medicine men could only pity me 
 when asked for counsel. My father had power to revenge his 
 loss, but that did not bring him back. Catharine, my mother, 
 who was once brave as a lion when Tahmeroo was wronged, even 
 in a little thing, now looked on with heavy eyes, and when I 
 pleaded with her, said oh, with such cruel stillness It is better 
 thus, my child ; his presence here must ever be a curse to me and 
 mine. Such words stung me like wasps my heart burned I 
 remembered you a sweet medicine spirit, whom even our enemies 
 love. I left my grandmother s lodge in the night, caught a 
 horse, and fled." 
 
 I " And you will," she said in conclusion, while the tears of her 
 spent gust of passion rolled slowly down her cheeks ; " you will 
 help the Indian girl, for you are good and powerful. When 
 you ask, his enemies will give him up." 
 
 " My poor child !" returned the missionary j " I can see no 
 way to help you." 
 
 " If they will only let her see her husband once more, Tah 
 meroo would be a slave to his enemies." 
 
 " But he is in prison, you cannot get near him." 
 
276 MARY DERWENT. 
 
 " But the white prophet will ask, and the prison door will be 
 left open that Tahmeroo may steal in." 
 
 " Yes, I will write to General Schuyler ; he will hardly refuse 
 to let a wife see her husband." 
 
 Tahmeroo fell to kissing his hands, while the tears in her eyes 
 flashed like diamonds. 
 
 " You will write. They will take pity on me, and let me hear 
 him speak." 
 
 " But they will not let you remain with him." 
 
 " But I will stay in sight of his prison ; I will sell myself 
 as a slave do anything, if they will only let me stay near 
 him." 
 
 The missionary sat down upon the ground, and taking from 
 his coat the little case of writing materials, which he always 
 carried about him, wrote a few lines and gave them to Tah 
 meroo. 
 
 " Read them," he said, " I can do nothing more." 
 
 "It is enough, enough ! Bless you, bless you 1" exclaimed 
 Tahmeroo, seizing his hand and pressing it to her lips. The 
 missionary withdrew it gently, and rose to his feet. 
 
 " And when do you start ?" Mary asked. 
 
 " Before the evening stars look into the water, Tahmeroo will 
 be far away." 
 
 " Come home with me first, and get some food and rest," 
 Mary urged, taking her hand. 
 
 " Tahmeroo has no need of food and rest." She laid one 
 hand on her heart, and finished the sentence with a mournful 
 bend of the head. 
 
 " Do not go to-night stay with me." 
 
 " The pale medicine is very kind, and Tahmeroo loves her, but 
 she must go ; some of her father s warriors wait near the old 
 camping-ground, and will show her the way." 
 
 "But you must not seek your husband in that dress. The 
 Shawnees are enemies to the people you seek ; to go in their 
 costume would be dangerous. Mary, see to this ; one of your 
 
HOUSEHOLD TALK. 277 
 
 sister Jane s dresses will answer. Take the poor stranger into 
 the cabin and prepare her for the journey." 
 
 With gentle hospitality, Mary led the young Indian away. 
 Fortunately, the old lady had gone down to the spring to 
 dampen some cloth she was whitening there, and as we have 
 seen, Jane was rambling upon the opposite shore with her lover. 
 
 The missionary was right, Jane s dresses fitted Tahmeroo very 
 neatly, and fifteen minutes after she entered the little bed-room, 
 arrayed in her own gorgeous raiment, she came forth as pretty 
 a country girl as one would wish to see ; carrying her own clothes 
 tied up in a little bundle, for she could not be persuaded to leave 
 them behind. 
 
 " But you will come back again," said Mary, with tears in her 
 eyes, as they once more stood by the missionary under the 
 cedars. 
 
 "Or sleep," said Tahmeroo, pointing to the earth with a 
 significant gesture ; "for when the corn shoots green, you will 
 call for help, and Tahmeroo will keep her ears open." 
 
 " But the distance is great you will perish on the way." 
 
 " Farewell I Tahmeroo must follow her heart. She has her 
 rifle, and knows how to shoot. Son of the Great Spirit, lay 
 your hand once more upon my head ; it will give me courage." 
 
 She bowed her head before tlie missionary, and he lifted his 
 eyes to heaven, full of devout pity for that poor creature, who 
 had been so hardly tried. 
 
 " Farewell 1" 
 
 Without a word more, Tahmeroo turned from the spot, sprang 
 into her canoe, and pushed it out of the cove, a few vigorous 
 strokes of her lithe arms sending it far up the river. 
 
 Once she looked back and waved her hand ; Mary saw the 
 signal through her blinding tears, and waved her shawl in return. 
 The Indian girl did not cast another glance towards them ; but 
 bending all her energies to the task, kept her little craft on its 
 course up the stream. 
 
 Mary and the missionary stood watching her until a bend in 
 
278 MAEY DEKWENT. 
 
 the shore shut the canoe from sight ; then they turned and walked 
 slowly towards the house, inexpressibly moved by the sight of 
 that poor girl s wretchedness and fortitude. 
 
 CHAPTER XXXV 
 
 THE JAIL AT ALBANY. 
 
 AN Indian girl no uncommon thing in the streets of Albany, 
 in the days of the Revolution stood patiently waiting before 
 the entrance to the jail at Albany. She had remained in the 
 same spot at least six hours, without moving from the stone abut 
 ment against which she leaned, or turning her eyes from the 
 door, with its iron knobs and enormous lock, which was sunk 
 deep into the gable-end of that old building. The hot noon-day 
 sun had beat upon her head ; she drew the crimson shawl a little 
 more over her face, but gave no signs of moving. The quaint 
 gables threw their lacework shadows down where the sun had 
 been ; but she took no heed. It was only when some step ap 
 proached near the jail, or a sound came from within, that she 
 gave signs of the quick life burning in her bosom. 
 
 Three or four times during that day had Tahmeroo beat her 
 hands against that cruel door, hoping madly that some one might 
 come and let her in. But prison portals do not yield readily to 
 human impatience, either from within or without, and the poor 
 girl had nothing left but that long watch, where she stood mo 
 tionless, though on the alert, full of fiery impatience, but of stub- 
 resolution too. 
 
 As she stood upon this steady watch, a horseman rode up the 
 street, followed by a servant. Instead of galloping on, as so 
 many had done during the day, he drew up before the jail, flung 
 
THE JAIL AT ALBANY. 279 
 
 his bridle to the attendant, and going up to the door which Tah- 
 ineroo was eyeing so wistfully, struck it a blow with the loaded 
 handle of his riding-whip. 
 
 Tahmeroo sprang forward when she heard the bolts begin to 
 move, but she was an instant too late. A dark passage within 
 engulfed the visitor, and the door swung back to its lock again 
 with a loud jar, which made the poor girl almost cry out, so 
 great was the shock of her disappointment. 
 
 The servant saw the anguish in her face, and being a good- 
 natured fellow, with nothing else to employ him at the moment, 
 moved towards the jail, and kindly inquired what she wanted 
 there. 
 
 " I only want that door to open and let me in," she said, cast 
 ing a pitiful look at the entrance, from which she had been so 
 cruelly excluded. 
 
 " Aud who is it you want to see, my purty red bird ? Now, I 
 tell you what, it s easier getting into that door than getting out 
 again, as many a poor feller can tell you. Who is it you re after ?" 
 
 " I want to see my husband." 
 
 " Your husband ?" 
 
 " Yes, Captain Walter Butler." 
 
 " Hallo ! and are you his wife ? Why, the general has just 
 gone in to see with his own eyes if the Tory spy is as sick as he 
 pretends." 
 
 " Sick is he sick, did you say ?" cried Tahmeroo, turning of 
 an ashen paleness. 
 
 " Don t turn so pale don t fret about it I ve an idee it s all 
 sham ; but the general will soon find out it isn t easy cheating 
 him." 
 
 " But he is sick I must see him this moment do you hear ? 
 this moment tell me where I can carry this letter ; they told 
 me the gentleman was not here, but I will go where he is I ll 
 follow on, and on, forever, to find the man that has power to 
 pass me through that door 1" 
 
 " Let me look at the letter." 
 
280 MAKY DERWENT. 
 
 Tahraeroo gave it to him, trembling with impatience to be off. 
 
 "Why, this is to General Schuyler himself 1 All right just 
 wait here and give it to him as he comes out don t be afraid ; 
 for all his grand looks, he s tender hearted as a baby. Come, 
 come ; don t get so down in the mouth j it ll all turn out right 
 somehow things always do." 
 
 " And was that the man who holds my husband in prison ?" 
 said Tahmeroo, flushing with indignation. "By what right 
 how dares he ?" 
 
 " Hush hush that talk ll never do ; soft words are better 
 than bullets here ; just let them bright tears creep into your 
 eyes again, if you can just as easy as not ; they ll do more for 
 you than a hull artillery of curses." 
 
 Tahmeroo scarcely heard this advice, but stood with the letter 
 in her hand, keenly watching the door. She placed herself di 
 rectly between the restive war-horse and the entrance to the jail. 
 At last there was a clang of bolts, a sudden swing of the pon 
 derous door, and Tahmeroo saw in the darkness beyond two 
 men, who paused together in that gloomy arch for a moment s 
 conversation. 
 
 One of these men the Indian girl recognized at once, by the 
 glitter of his uniform and the singular dignity of his counte 
 nance, which in breadth of forehead and the grave composure 
 which marks a well-regulated character, was not unlike that of 
 General Washington himself. 
 
 After a moment, Schuyler stepped out of the darkness. He 
 was then forty-four years of age; a period when the impulses of 
 youth are mellowed, but not hardened in the bosoms of truly 
 great men. 
 
 " Now now ?" whispered the attendant. 
 
 Tahmeroo held her breath, and went slowly forward, her 
 bright, steady glance fastened on the general s face, till their 
 very intensity drew his glance that way. 
 
 " What is this ?" he said, stopping short with the missionary s 
 letter in his hand, but perusing that young face with a penetrating 
 
THE JA.IL AT ALBANY. 281 
 
 glance before he opened it. "A letter from , ha ! I under 
 stand it now and have you corne all this distance to see your 
 husband ? so young, too 1" 
 
 Tahmeroo could only point to the door with her trembling 
 finger. 
 
 " My husband he is there oh, make them open the door. 
 Tahmeroo has no breath to speak with till they let her in 
 yonder." 
 
 Schuyler smiled, turned upon his heel, and knocked again at 
 the prison door. It was promptly opened. 
 
 " Conduct this young woman to Captain Butler s room; she is 
 his wife," he said, addressing the jailer. " See that no one 
 treats her rudely but this one interview must be enough ; to 
 morrow the young man will be removed to the custody of a 
 private family, where his health can be cared for; he frets like a 
 caged panther here." 
 
 Turning to Tahmeroo, before he mounted his horse, the gene 
 ral said in a kindly, paternal way: "Now make the best of 
 your time, my poor girl; it is well you caught me here, for I 
 should have been off to the camp again in less than an 
 hour." 
 
 Tahmeroo could not speak; she saw the door open, and cast 
 ing back one brilliant glance of gratitude, darted through. 
 
 Schuyler smiled quietly, muttered, " Poor thing, poor thing!" 
 once or twice, and mounting his horse, rode away. 
 
 " My husband Walter 1" 
 
 Butler sprang to his feet, with an exclamation of delight. 
 He was prostrate on a low camp bed when she entered, as 
 General Schuyler had left him, apparently exhausted by illness. 
 
 " Tahmeroo, my hawk my pretty rattlesnake." 
 
 "Oh, you are sick, you are dying!" cried the heart-stricken 
 wife, losing all strength and dropping on her knees by the bed 
 he had just left. 
 
 " Hush, hush, child don t make all this outcry. It isn t sick 
 ness at all ; see, I am strong enough to lift you ;" and taking 
 
MAKY DEE WENT. 
 
 the young Indian in his arms, he bore her across the small room 
 and returning again, sat down on the bed, still holding her in 
 his embrace. 
 
 She did not speak, she did not weep; to breathe then and 
 there, was happiness enough for her. 
 
 " Ah, but you cheat Tahmeroo. Your face is white as snow; 
 you, you " 
 
 " I tell you I am well, never better in my life," he whispered, 
 hurriedly; " but my only chance of escape lay in seeming ill. I 
 have petitioned again and again to see General Schuyler, but 
 until to-day he never came. I have made my face white and my 
 voice weak for him. It has done its work, Tahmeroo; to-mor 
 row I shall be taken from this gloomy place, and confined in a 
 private family, from which there is some chance of escape. 
 Now, are you satisfied that I am not dying ?" 
 
 Tahmeroo laughed, and clasped her hands hard to keep from 
 clapping them, in her joy. Her eyes shone like diamonds. The 
 whole thing fired her Indian blood, which delighted in craft 
 almost as much as in courage. 
 
 " And I shall go with you I shall see you every day. Oh, I 
 remember now that proud man said that I must only come this 
 once only once." 
 
 "Don t cry; don t begin to tremble after this fashion. An 
 Indian wife should be brave," said Butler, terrified by her 
 agitation. 
 
 She lifted her head, and shook back the hair from her temples 
 with a gesture of queenly pride. 
 
 " Tahmeroo is brave. See, if you can find tears in her 
 eyes ? 
 
 " That s right; now listen. Since you have come in I have 
 thought of something. If you only had an old dress with 
 you, such as white people wear; but these things are too fanci 
 ful, they will never do." 
 
 " How ! you want a poor dress, stained by water and faded 
 by the sun; is that it?" 
 
K * 
 
 THE JAIL AT ALBANY. 283 
 
 " Exactly; but this toggery can never be brought into the 
 right condition." 
 
 " Look, will this do ?" 
 
 Tahmeroo untied a little bundle which she had carried under 
 her shawl, and displayed the dress Mary Derwent had given her, 
 worn and faded by a long journey on horseback; and which, 
 notwithstanding the missionary s advice to the contrary, she had 
 exchanged for her own more brilliant costume, before visiting 
 her husband. 
 
 "Do 1 it is just the thing. Put it up put it up, before the 
 jailer comes in. Now listen thank heaven, you can read. In 
 this paper you will find the name of a family with which they 
 intend to confine me. The people excused themselves from 
 taking me to-day from want of help. Servants are not easily 
 got in Albany these times do you comprehend ?" 
 
 " Yes," answered Tahmeroo, taking up his thoughts quick as 
 lightning. " I am to put on this dress, comb back rny hair, look 
 like a white girl used to work, and be a servant to these people. 
 Then, then some night after all are asleep, I must watch the 
 sentinel, give him fire-water, or take the flint from his gun, and 
 then away for the forest." 
 
 " My brave, bright girl 1" 
 
 Tahmeroo went on: 
 
 " My warriors are in the neighborhood, waiting with their 
 horses I have gold in my dress I am strong, proud it seems 
 as if all our warriors were fighting for you, and I leading them 
 on, this moment 1" 
 
 She fell into his arms, trembling for very joy. 
 
 He held her to his heart it was not all base when that noble 
 creature lay against it. He kissed her warmly. There was a 
 world of selfishness in that kiss, but Tahmeroo guessed nothing 
 of that. 
 
 " Now go, my lark, go search out the house they intend for 
 my prison. To-morrow I shall find you there." 
 
 Tahmeroo arose ; she was in haste to be at work ; the idea of 
 
284 MAEY DERWENT. 
 
 saving her husband made her forget that he was eager to send 
 her away. No one but the jailer saw her when she departed ; 
 but he wondered at the splendor of her beauty, which seemed 
 to have heightened tenfold since she entered the building. 
 
 CHAPTER XXXVI. 
 
 THE DISGUISED SERVANT. 
 
 A MIDDLE-AGED gentleman and lady sat in one of those quaint 
 parlors, which occupied the gable-front of an old Dutch house, 
 such as may be seen in Albany, as relics of a past age, even to 
 this day. The room was neat, almost to chilliness : blue tiles 
 ornamented the chimney-piece ; blue tiles ran in a border round 
 the oaken floor ; the gentleman s coat was of blue ; his stockings 
 were seamed with blue ; and his dame s linen dress was striped 
 with the same color. Thus they sat in this coldly-tinted apartment, 
 after dinner, conversing together about the strange guest they 
 had consented to receive into their house, at the urgent request 
 of General Schuyler, who believed that close confinement rrad 
 really endangered Butler s life, and wished to be humane ; while 
 he was not willing to set a man so dangerous at perfect liberty. 
 
 While the good Dutchman and his wife were talking over the 
 difficulties of this arrangement, which became more important 
 from the fact, that their only maid-servant had left her place, 
 on hearing of the new claim likely to be made on her labors, a 
 staid old man, who had been detailed to guard the prisoner when 
 he came, entered the room, and announced a country girl, from 
 across the river, who wished to hire herself out. 
 
 This was a piece of good fortune which neither of the occu 
 pants of the parlor had expected for servants were not to be 
 
THE DISGUISED SERVANT. 285 
 
 had for the asking, when so much wild land lay ready for tillage, 
 and labor was mostly applied in building up homes for the work 
 ing classes. 
 
 While they were quietly congratulating themselves, the appli 
 cant came into the room. She was a plain, and rather shabbily 
 dressed girl singularly handsome, notwithstanding the poverty 
 of her raiment who entered the parlor with the free grace of a 
 fawn, and spoke in accents which would have appeared far too 
 pure for her humble appearance with any one to whom the 
 English language was a native tongue. 
 
 The Dutchman, fortunately, understood very little English, and 
 the country girl was profoundly ignorant of Dutch ; so as the 
 conversation was necessarily carried on between the soldier and 
 the girl, the matter of reference was easily settled. In half an 
 hour after her entrance, the maid was busy at her work in the 
 kitchen. 
 
 The next day Butler was brought to his new prison, seeming 
 very feeble, and scarcely strong enough to walk to the chamber, 
 far up in the peaked roof, which had been assigned for his safe 
 keeping. The soldier observed that he looked earnestly at the 
 new maid-servant in passing up stairs, and that a smile quivered 
 on his lip, when he saw her. But this was not strange ; older 
 ev M than his might have kindled at the sight of that beautiful 
 f JP; it almost made a fool of the tender-hearted soldier him 
 self. 
 
 After the prisoner had been installed in his chamber, the new 
 servant would linger there a little after serving his meals, and 
 once the sentinel fancied that he saw the two whispering together, 
 as she sat down the dishes ; but when the rustic beauty came 
 out, she was sure to drive all suspicion from his head with an 
 arch smile, that intoxicated him more deliciously than the best 
 corn whisky he ever drank. 
 
 On the third day, what little heart the poor fellow had left 
 after his first interview was completely gone ; and when she 
 came up at nine o clock, and asked him, with a charming smile, 
 
286 MARY DEE WENT. 
 
 to step down into the kitchen and taste a mug of hot punch, 
 with lemon in it, which she had just been brewing, it required all 
 his patriotism to refuse ; and he apologized for doing his duty, 
 with humility, as if it had been a sin. 
 
 The new servant pouted at first, but took better thought and 
 suffered herself to be appeased ; so, as a pledge of perfect recon 
 ciliation, after the little quarrel, she proposed to run to the kit 
 chen and bring the jug of punch up to his post, where he might 
 drink and smoke at his leisure, while she filled the glass. 
 
 This was a charming arrangement, and the sentinel enjoyed 
 it amazingly ; he drank of the punch, and tried the Dutchman s 
 best pipe, which the maid brought surreptitiously from the parlor, 
 after her master had retired to bed. Thus he drank and smoked 
 till everything became foggy around him, and he seemed to be 
 encompassed by half a dozen pretty girls, all serving out punch 
 for him, to say nothing of any number of grotesque pipes that 
 danced under his nose, and a whole stock of muskets that crowd 
 ed round his own trusty shooting-iron, which rested against the 
 door. 
 
 After this singular phenomenon, the trusty sentinel kept his 
 post with great pertinacity but he was sound asleep, and breath 
 ing like an engine under a double head of steam. 
 
 Then the chamber-door was softly unlocked, and the pretty 
 maid-servant gave a signal to some one within. Directly Butler 
 appeared, ready dressed, and, treading softly over the sentinel, 
 followed his Indian wife down stairs, out of the house, and along 
 the narrow streets of Albany. 
 
 A quick walk to the outskirts of the town, a low whistle, and 
 out from a piece of woods came half a dozen mounted savages, 
 leading two horses, forest bred, and swift as deer. 
 
 Tahmeroo leaped upon one, Butler mounted the other, and 
 away for the Valley of Wyoming, where Butler knew that his 
 father would soon meet him with an avenging army. 
 
THE GATHERING STOEM. 287 
 
 CHAPTER XXXVII. 
 
 THE GATHERING STORM. 
 
 THE year of 1778 marked a terrible epoch in the annals of our 
 Revolution. Sir John and Guy Johnson, with the Butlers and 
 other native Tories of New York State, had vigorously cooperated 
 with Brant, Queen Esther, and Gi-en-gwa-tah, whose united in 
 fluence gave almost the entire strength of the Six Nations to the 
 British. With all these unnatural combinations at work on the 
 frontier witli Brant perpetrating his barbarities on one hand, 
 Sir John Johnson sweeping down from his refuge in Canada, 
 devastating wherever he went, and the regular army too busily 
 occupied on the sea-board for any hope of succor from that 
 source, the isolated towns and villages of what was then the " far 
 west," became the scenes of the most ruthless system of warfare 
 ever perpetrated among civilized nations. 
 
 But all the cruelties that had commenced in 1777 were no 
 thing compared to those now in preparation, when the savages 
 were ready to take up arms in masses, after their own ruthless 
 fashion, and the exiled Royalists, driven out from their homes, had 
 become more vindictive, if possible, than their savage allies. 
 
 The Valley of Wyoming was that year peculiarly exposed. 
 Its strongest men were serving in the general army, but those 
 who were left not only foresaw the peril which lay before them, 
 but prepared against it to the extent of their ability. Winter- 
 rnoot s Fort was nothing less than a stronghold of the enemy, and 
 the resort of Tories who had fled or wandered from the interior 
 of New York, for the real natives of the valley were true 
 patriots, almost to a man. 
 
 With prompt energy these men went to work, strengthening 
 their defences. Block-houses, already made, were put in repair, 
 stockades were planted, new forts were built, till the river, above 
 
288 MART DERWENT. 
 
 and below Wintermoot s Fort, was, to every possible extent, 
 fortified against the common enemy. 
 
 But this military work was done in connection with the usual 
 agricultural labor. While forts were building, seed was put 
 into the earth, and on the first of July, 1778, every acre of land 
 as yet redeemed from the wilderness was rich with a springing 
 harvest. 
 
 Each farmer, as he worked, held himself ready for military 
 duty. Eeady to seize his axe or scythe, at the blast of a horn, 
 or the summon of a conch shell, in the hand of an old woman or 
 child, if peril threatened either, and lay down his life, if need 
 was, in their defence. In those days men carried their muskets 
 to the meadow, or plough-field, regularly as they went to 
 work. 
 
 The women of Wyoming rose and took their places bravely 
 upon the hearthstone, ready to defend the children who clung 
 to their garments, when the son or father fell upon the door 
 step. They worked like their husbands ; impending danger gave 
 them quick knowledge, and women whose ideas of chemistry had 
 never gone beyond the ash leech and cheese-press, fell to manu 
 facturing saltpetre. They tore up the floors of their cabins, 
 dug up the earth, put it in casks, and mingling the water, 
 drained through with ash ley, boiled it above their fires, and 
 when the compound grew cold in their wash-tubs, saltpetre rose 
 to the top, and thus a supply of gunpowder was obtained. Nor 
 did the women of Wyoming stop here. While the young men 
 were carried off to the Continental army, and old silver-headed 
 men were left to till the earth and muster in companies for de 
 fence, delicate women and fair young girls took to the field and 
 worked, side by side, with the old men, whose strength was 
 scarcely greater than their own. It was a brave, beautiful sight, 
 which the American woman of our nineteenth century will do 
 wisely to remember. 
 
 That doomed valley might well be on the alert. The Six 
 Nations had receded entirely from the solemn pledges of neu- 
 
THE UNEXPECTED G-UEST. 289 
 
 trality and, in connection with Brant, the Johnsons, and Colonel 
 John Butler, were fighting upon the upper waters of the Susque- 
 hanna. Many of the Tories from about Wintermoot s Fort had 
 fled to them with complaints of harsh treatment from the patriot 
 Whigs. In vain these doomed people had petitioned Congress 
 for help. Then, as now, Congress was slow to act, while the 
 enemy was prompt and terrible. 
 
 Thus lay the Valley of Wyoming when our story returns 
 to it. 
 
 The first signal of the mustering storm came suddenly one 
 afternoon, about the first of July, when Walter Butler, whom 
 every one had thought a close prisoner at Albany, appeared at 
 the head of eight or ten mounted savages, and, with his young 
 Indian wife galloping by his side, swept up the valley towards 
 Wintermoot s Fort. 
 
 The very hardihood of this appearance among his bitterest 
 enemies probably secured his safety, for, before the astonished 
 inhabitants could realize the amount of his audacity, and 
 while the glitter of her rich Indian dress was before their eyes, 
 his cavalcade thundered into the fort, and a clamorous shout 
 from those within attested the satisfaction with which he waa 
 received. 
 
 CHAPTER 5XXYIII. 
 
 THE UNEXPECTED GUEST 
 
 A LONG wooden bridge at this time connects Wilkesbarre with 
 the Kingston side of the Susquehanna ; a spacious and most 
 excellent hotel stands on the sweep of the road where it winds 
 over from the former place, and the engine whistle may be heard 
 shrieking almost every hour, as some train rashes fiercely up the 
 
 19 
 
290 MARY DERWENT. 
 
 valley, dashing over coal-beds, sweeping across the broad river, 
 at its juncture, and away where the Indian war trail was first 
 laid along the Lackawanna ; but, in 1718, there was neither 
 bridge nor hotel, unless a low log-house, fronted by a magnificent 
 elm, and made of consequence by a log stable, a huge hay-stack 
 and a shingle roof, might be called such. A public house it 
 certainly was intended to be, for a rudely painted sign hung 
 groaning and creaking among the thick leaves of the elm, and 
 the chickens which congregated about the haystack were always 
 seen to flutter and creep away into hiding-places whenever a 
 traveller was seen to emerge from the shaded road which leads 
 across the Wilkesbarre mountains, a kind of timidity seldom 
 observed at private houses, except at the approach of a travel 
 ling minister or a schoolmaster who boards about. 
 
 There was little of refinement, but everything essential to 
 comfort, in the interior of Aunt Polly s tavern, for to that re 
 spected female the log building with its sign belonged. Two 
 small square rooms, separated by a board partition, were divided 
 off from the kitchen, one was the dormitory of Aunt Polly her 
 self, while the other, which served the chance wayfarer as bed 
 chamber, dining and sitting-room, had the usual furniture of 
 splint chairs, a small looking-glass, surmounted by a tuft of fresh 
 asparagus a fire-place filled with white-pine tops, a bed decked 
 with sheets of the whitest homespun, and a coverlid of blue and 
 white yarn, woven in what Aunt Polly called orange quarters, and 
 doors and windows. 
 
 Later in the evening which witnessed Walter Butler s return, 
 a gentleman was impatiently pacing this little room, and more 
 than once he opened the door which led to the kitchen to hurry 
 Aunt Polly in her preparations for supper. This restless im 
 patience in her guest put Aunt Polly somewhat out of patience. 
 
 " She was doing as fast as she could," she said, " and she did 
 hate to be driv." 
 
 Still, at each interruption, the good lady dipped an unfortu 
 nate chicken, with more desperate energy, into the kettle of hot 
 
THE UNEXPECTED GUEST. 291 
 
 water that stood on the hearth before her, and tore away the 
 dripping plumage, handful after handful, with a zeal which might 
 have satisfied the most hungry traveller that ever claimed hospi 
 tality at her door. 
 
 An iron pot, filled with potatoes, and a tea-kettle, hung, like a 
 brace of martyrs, in the blazing fire, and everything was in fair 
 progress for a comfortable meal, when the young man entered 
 the kitchen, as if weary of remaining alone, and began to chat 
 with Aunt Polly, while she dissected the unfortunate fowl, after 
 it came out, clean and featherless, from the hot bath in which she 
 had plunged it. 
 
 " I see you keep everything clean and snug as usual, Aunt 
 Polly," he said, looking about the apartment where, however, 
 might be observed greater marks of confusion than was common 
 with the thrifty old maid. 
 
 " Nothing to brag of," replied Polly, shaking her head and 
 looking at the loom which stood in one corner with a web of rag 
 carpeting rolled on the cloth beam. A quill-wheel and a rickety 
 pair of swifts were crowded against the heavy posts, the one un- 
 banded, and the other with a few threads of tow-yarn tangled 
 among the sticks, and a skein of cut rags falling heavily around 
 them. " I don t know how it is, Captain Butler, but you al ea 
 make me fling everything to sixes and sevens when you come. 
 Now, I meant to have wove a yard on that are carpet aforo 
 night anybody else would have took up with a cold bite ; but 
 you re awful dainty about victuals, captain, and al es was." 
 
 Well, never mind that, Polly ; you know I am always willing 
 to pay for what I have. But, tell me, is there no news stirring 
 in the valley ? I see you have got a new fort over the river 
 who commands there ?" 
 
 " Who but Edward Clark, your old schoolmate ; though I 
 rather think that there won t be much watch kept up there this 
 week the captain s got better fish to fry. You haint forgot 
 how reg lar he went a sparking to old mother Derwent s, have 
 you ?" 
 
292 MAKY DERWENT. 
 
 As Aunt Polly received no answer, she busied herself stirring 
 the simmering members of the fowl with a large wooden spoon, 
 while her auditor began to pace the floor with a brow that 
 grew darker and a step that became heavier each instant. 
 
 The landlady wiped the perspiration from her face, and looked 
 rather inquisitively at him. 
 
 " Why, what has come over you ?" she said ; " you look as 
 black as a thunder-cloud all tu once." 
 
 " This week. Did you say that Edward Clark and Jane Der- 
 went were to be married so soon ?" 
 
 " Yes they ll have a wedding on the Island afore Sunday, 
 or I ll loose my guess." 
 
 " What day and hour do you know the hour ?" 
 
 " Why, no I don t spose they re particular to a minute." 
 
 " So the rebel dog thinks to have Jane Derwent at last, does 
 he 1" exclaimed Butler, pausing angrily in his walk, and bending 
 his flushed brow on the landlady ; then turning away he muttered 
 between his teeth : 
 
 " By the Lord that made me, I will spoil his fun this once !" 
 
 " Lard a marcy, how mad you look," said Aunt Polly. " You 
 amost make my hair stand on eend but the first sight of you 
 was enough for that ; why, we all thought you were dead and 
 hung, long ago." 
 
 " And were rejoiced at it, I dare say ?" 
 
 " Can t pretend to answer for the men folks, not al es knowing 
 exactly where to find em, but for my part, men s too scarce in 
 this region, for us women folks to want em hung." 
 
 " But I dare say, your precious patriots, as they call them 
 selves, would hang me high as Haman if they had the chance, 
 which I don t intend to give em, though I was fool enough to 
 come here." 
 
 " Why, they haven t any right to touch you, captain. York 
 State laws ain t good for nothing here, are they ?" 
 
 " None, that I would not answer back with a shower of bul 
 lets," answered Butler, fiercely ; "so, once for all, keep quiet 
 
THE UNEXPECTED GUEST. 293 
 
 about my being here, or anything I have said ; it will prove the 
 worse for you if you don t." 
 
 " Why, how you talk there ain t no mischief a brewing agin 
 the valley, is there, captain ? Edward Clark would not be per 
 suaded to leave the fort, if it was to get married, if he thought so." 
 
 Butler paid no attention to her question, but made a rapid 
 succession of inquiries about the family on Monockonok Island, 
 and craftily gathered from the old maid a pretty accurate account 
 of the military force now in the valley. At last a noise from 
 without, which Aunt Polly evidently did not hear, made him 
 start and listen. He took out his watch, and hastily replacing 
 it, muttered something in an under tone, and left the house, 
 regardless of the supper which he had been so impatient for a 
 few minutes before. 
 
 " I wish to gracious, Sim White was here ; I rather guess my 
 hay will suffer if the captin feeds his own hoss," said the old 
 maid, as the door closed ; " the feller thinks no more of a peck 
 of oats than if it was cut straw. I wish he d make haste tho , 
 the victuals is purty near done, and I begin to feel kinder hungry 
 myself. Oh, I d a most forgot these Tory fellers al es want tea 
 just to spite us, I reckon ; but a tavern is a tavern, and while 
 my sign swings on that are elm tree, travellers shall have just 
 what they ask for when I ve got it." 
 
 With these words, Aunt Polly opened a rude closet, took out 
 a small tin canister containing the unpopular herb, and filling 
 the little round top, smoothed it off with her finger, and " put 
 the tea to drawing." Then spreading a snowy table-cloth in the 
 best room, she placed thereon the nicely cooked fowl, the smok 
 ing potatoes, a plate of bread and a ball of golden butter, and 
 gave the finishing touch to her table by saucers of preserved 
 crab-apples and wild plums placed on each corner. After all 
 was ready, she seated herself by a little waiter, scarcely larger 
 than a good sized snuffer-tray, and as she placed and re-placed 
 the milk-cup and sugar-bowl, muttered her impatience for the 
 return of her guest. 
 
294: MARY DEB WENT. 
 
 " I wonder what on arth keeps him so I could a foddered 
 my whole stock afore this. Walter Butler didn t use to be so 
 long tending his horse afore he eat, himself. Dear me, the gravy 
 is gitting thick about the chickens the fried cabbage is stun 
 cold, and the tea ll be drawn to death ! I do wish oh, here 
 he comes I" 
 
 The old maid brightened as she heard footsteps coming through 
 the kitchen, and snatching up the tea-pot, she began pouring 
 out the half cold beverage into the little earthenware cups which 
 were only produced to regale the Tory guests who graced her 
 house. 
 
 " Do come along, and set to, captin your supper is gitting 
 stun cold," she said, without raising her eyes from the tea-cups. 
 " I ve been a-waiting this ever so long." 
 
 " I hope that I have made no mistake, my good woman," 
 replied a strange voice from the door in answer to her hospitable 
 invitation ; " I supposed this to be a public house." 
 
 Aunt Polly set down the tea-pot, her hands dropped to her 
 lap, and her eyes grew large with astonishment ; a tall, stately 
 gentleman stood in the door-way, where she had last seen her 
 younger guest ; he was evidently of higher rank, and of far 
 more dignified and lofty carriage than any person who had ever 
 before sought the shelter of her roof. His hat was in his hand, 
 and a few grey hairs silvered the dark locks about his high fore 
 head The expression of his face was that of stern decision ; 
 yet there was a softness in his smile as he observed the astonished 
 landlady, which made it almost winning. He advanced into the 
 room with a courteous ease, which Aunt Polly could feel much 
 better than understand. 
 
 " I hope I am not mistaken at least, you will not refuse me 
 a portion of this tempting dish ?" he said, laying his hat and 
 riding-whip on the bed. 
 
 By this time, Aunt Polly had recovered her speech. " There 
 is no mistake, this is a tavern that advertises feed for man and 
 boss, and does all it promises," she said, with an accession of 
 
THE UNEXPECTED GUEST. 295 
 
 pompous hospitality ; " so set by, and help yourself to such as 
 there is. I ve kept public-house here these ten years. Don t 
 stand to be axed, if you want supper it s all ready, I began to 
 think that I had cooked it for nothing. You take tea I s pose 
 from the looks of your coat." 
 
 The stranger seated himself at the table, and took the prof 
 fered cup. 
 
 " You have prepared for other guests ?" he observed, as she 
 arose to get another cup and saucer from the closet. 
 
 " Yes Captin Butler will be in purty soon, I reckon ; but 
 there s no calculating when." 
 
 The stranger looked up with a degree of interest when the 
 name was pronounced. "Is it of Captain Walter Butler you 
 speak ?" he inquired. 
 
 " Yes, his name s Walter, and an awful smart feller he is, too 
 but the worst sort of a Tory. Do you know him ? if I may be 
 so bold." 
 
 " Can you tell me how he escaped from confinement, and by 
 what means he reached the valley ?" inquired the stranger, 
 without seeming to heed her question. 
 
 Aunt Polly broke into a crackling laugh, one of those sharp 
 cachinnations which sometimes frightened her poultry from the 
 roost. 
 
 "How did he escape? I only wondered how anybody man 
 aged to keep him. Why, he s a fox, an eel, a weasel. Of all 
 them Hudson and Mohawk Valley chaps that hive at Winter- 
 moots Fort, he s the cutest. They say he s made lots of money 
 lately in making believe he married one of the handsomest little 
 squaws that you every sot eyes on ; some say that he is married in 
 rale downright arnest ; but I don t believe all I hear it s been 
 a kind of Indian scrape a jumping over the broomstick I s pose. 
 He rode through the valley with her this arternoon as bold as a 
 lion, followed by a lot of wild Injuns. The hull biling on em 
 may be a coming down on us for all I know." 
 
 11 But the mother of this Indian girl is she in the valley ?" 
 
MARY DEKWENT. 
 
 " Catharine Montour ? is that the person you want to ask 
 about ? cause if it is, I saw that identical woman once, and a 
 rale, downright lady she is. Fve got the gold guinea she gave 
 me in my puss yet." 
 
 " And you saw her ?" 
 
 " Yes, with these two eyes, and that s more than most folks 
 can say. She came out on Gineral Washington and I that s 
 my hoss, sir, not the commander-in-chief jest as the angel stood 
 afore Balaam. At first, I raly thought that I was struck dum, 
 and the gineral d have to speak for me, whether or no." 
 
 " But the lady how did she look ? changed, older was she 
 beautiful ?" cried the man, while a quiver of agitation ran 
 through his voice up to this time so calm and measured. 
 
 " Harnsome ? I suppose you mean by all that. Wai, yes, 
 I should carlculate that a most any one would a called that lady 
 harnsome enough for anything. She wasn t so young mebby 
 as she had been ; but, marcy on us, no queen on her throne ever 
 looked grander." 
 
 " And did she seem happy content ?" 
 
 " Wai, that s difficult saying ; wimmen don t tell out all that s 
 in their bosoms at once. She looked sort of anxious, but there s no 
 telling what it was about ; but if you stay in these parts long, 
 and my out-room is empty if you want it you ll likely as not 
 see her yourself : when the young Injun gal is here, Catharine 
 Montour can t be far off. The hull tribe camped under Camp 
 bell s Ledge a year or two ago, and held a grand council with 
 the Injuns about the Wind Gap. I hope they won t come for 
 anything wuss the next time." 
 
 " And did you converse with this lady ?" 
 
 " Yes ; I reckon what was said atween us might a been con 
 sidered convarsing. She sent a message to Mary Derwent, and 
 I carried it. The talk was purty much all about that." 
 
 " And this is all you can tell me of her ?" said the stranger, 
 in a tone of bitter disappointment, which interested the old maid 
 more and more in his behalf. 
 
THE UNEXPECTED GUEST. 297 
 
 " It is all I know, sartinly ; but if you want to hear more 
 about her, the Injun missionary 11 tell you all about her. He 
 was up to the camp when they held that council-fire, and talked 
 with her face to face " 
 
 " And where can this missionary be found ?" 
 
 " Well, jest now, that would be hard to say ; he s been in the 
 valley, off and on, all last year ; but a month or two ago, he went 
 away to Philadelphia to tell the Congress and Gineral Washington 
 to send our own sojers back to take care of us, if they can t afford 
 nothing more. But he ought to be back about this time, and I 
 shouldn t wonder if you found him at his old place, at Toby s 
 Eddy. He s got a cabin down there, in the very spot where the 
 rattlesnake scared off the Injuns, when they went to kill Mr. 
 Zin Zin Zin" 
 
 " Zinzendorf, probably that is the name," said the traveller, 
 smiling gravely. " I remember the circumstance. So, you think 
 it possible that I might find the minister at Toby s Eddy ? Can 
 you tell me what direction to take ?" 
 
 " Keep on down stream till you come to a spot where the river 
 gives a bend like this." Here Aunt Polly bent her elbow into an 
 angle, which she endeavored in vain to torture into a curve 
 which should describe that magnificent crescent formed in the 
 banks of the Susquehanna, and known as Toby s Eddy. 
 
 " When you reach the spot, you ll know it by the great syca 
 more trees with their white balls ; ask somebody to show you the 
 missionary s cabin. You couldn t miss on it if you tried." 
 
 The stranger thanked her gravely, and laying a piece of gold 
 on the table, went out quietly as he had entered. 
 
 Aunt Polly started up, and going to the back door, cried 
 vigorously across the bed of young cabbages for Sim White, the 
 hired man who had lived with her all winter, to hurry up and 
 bring out the gentleman s critter. But while the words were on 
 her lips, she heard the tramp of a horse, and running to the front 
 window saw her guest riding at a brisk pace down the river. 
 
 " Well, if this don t beat all creation," said the old maid, lay- 
 
298 MAKYDERWENT. 
 
 ing the guinea in her palm, and examining it on both sides with 
 delight. " I wonder who on arth he can be 1" 
 
 Muttering these words, the landlady drew forth her shot-bag 
 from a corner cupboard, and after examining the gold pieces al 
 ready there, with loving curiosity, laid her new treasure beside it. 
 
 " Now, there s luck in that," she said, tying the shot-bag up, 
 with a grim smile. " I wonder what ll come next. It never 
 rains but it storms. The gold has come, and now I must take 
 a run on something else. I wonder where Sim White has hid 
 himself. If Captain Butler don t want this ere chicken, I don t 
 know any one that has a better right to it than Sim." 
 
 As she was covering the dish to set it down by the fire, Aunt 
 Polly happened to glance towards the back window, and there, 
 much to her surprise, she saw the face of her hired man, Sim 
 White, peering curiously in. 
 
 " There now, if that ain t too much," she said, flushing to the 
 eyes with the force of a new discovery that had just dawned 
 upon her. "If the critter ain t getting jealous arter all; well, 
 now, I never did! He thought that grand-looking gentleman a 
 beau of mine. Just as likely as not well, I won t let him know 
 that I ketched him peaking, anyhow." 
 
 " Aunt Polly busied herself about the fire acting upon this 
 generous resolution, till the door softly opened, and Sim thrust 
 his head cautiously in, and gave a sharp look around the room. 
 Aunt Polly smiled with grim satisfaction, and began to punch 
 the fire vigorously, though she could not resist the temptation to 
 cast side glances towards the door all the time." 
 
 "Where is he? hush! speak in a whisper where is the 
 eternal rascal gone to ? I ve got a dozen stout fellows out in 
 the yard, armed to the teeth with scythes and pitchforks, and a 
 beautiful halter hitched to a beam in the barn, all ready. I 
 shan t trust to the law this time; it ain t worth a tow-string, or 
 his hash d a been settled long ago come, speak out, where is 
 he?" 
 
 Now, Aunt Polly was rather pleased with the idea of Sim s 
 
THE UNEXPECTED GUEST. 299 
 
 jealousy; but when it took this ferocious form, and she thought 
 of her guests being strung up one by one to a beam in her own 
 barn, the whole thing began to take a form that she did not 
 quite relish. 
 
 " Mr. White," said she, with great dignity, " what do you 
 mean ? Can t I speak to a traveller in my own kitchen, but you 
 must talk of scythes and pitchforks, and halters, too ?" 
 
 Sim did not answer, but went peering about the kitchen, 
 opening closets and looking under tables, until he landed in the 
 out room, where his search was continued still more vigilantly. 
 At last, he opened the door of Aunt Polly s bed-room and 
 stepped in. The white valance in front of the bed was in 
 motion; his eyes began to glisten. He had no doubt that the 
 object of his search was there. Daintily lifting the edge of the 
 valance between his thumb and finger, he stooped and looked 
 under. It was only to meet the glaring green eyes of Aunt 
 Polly s cat, who had inadvertently disturbed the valance, and 
 thus led Sim White into a dilemma; for as he dropped the mus 
 lin, and was about to rise from his stooping position, Aunt Polly 
 stood before him, towering in wrathful indignation. 
 
 " Mr. Simon White, what do you mean ?" 
 
 " I mean to find out if that etarnal scamp is hid away in this 
 ere house, or not," answered Sim, looking desperately around 
 the little apartment. " He s my prisoner. I took him myself at 
 German Flats, just afore I come here to live. If them fools in 
 Albany have let him loose, I ll tighten him up again in short 
 order." 
 
 " Who on arth are you talking about ?" 
 
 " Why, that Butler, to be sure; only let me lay my hands 
 on him, that s all." 
 
 " Why, Captain Butler went off an hour ago," said Polly, in 
 accents of deep mortification. 
 
 " Which way ?" 
 
 " I don t know; he slid off without saying good bye ! I was 
 just saving his supper for you." 
 
300 MARY DEKWENT. 
 
 "And Fve had all this trouble for nothing, consarn the 
 fellow I" 
 
 " Come now, ain t you a rnost ready to go out ?" said Aunt 
 Polly, sliding up to the bed, where her nightcap crowned 
 one of the posts. Snatching it off and dexterously concealing it 
 behind her, she muttering to herself, " I wouldn t a cared so 
 much, if it had only had a ruffled border." Then she added, 
 rather tartly, " Come, the chicken ll be stun cold." 
 
 Sim turned and followed her to the kitchen. He was terribly 
 disappointed at the failure of his attempt to regain his prisoner, 
 and sent away the farmers who had gladly rallied to his aid, 
 with a crest-fallen look, which was more than equalled by Aunt 
 Polly s downcast countenance. She was unusually cross all the 
 evening, poured any quantity of water into the teapot, set away 
 the preserves before Sim had tasted them, and altogether acted 
 in a very unaccountable manner indeed. 
 
 CHAPTER XXXIX. 
 
 THE FIRST SKIRMISH. 
 
 THE vague rumors that had reached the inhabitants of 
 Wyoming, no one could exactly tell how, filling each house 
 hold with alarm, were not without foundation. A force of 
 eleven hundred strong, under the command of Colonel John 
 Butler, consisting of Tory Rangers, a detachment of Johnson s 
 Royal Greens, and six hundred savages, picked warriors from 
 the Shawnee and Seneca tribes, had already crossed Geuesee 
 county. They had embarked from Tioga Point in canoes, 
 which were abandoned at the mouth of Bowman s Creek, where 
 the whole body was encamped on the second of July. 
 
 Queen Esther, Gi-en-gwa-tah, and two or three Seneca chiefs. 
 
THE FIKST SKIRMISH. 301 
 
 commanded the savage forces. Catharine Montour was in the 
 army, for she had been warned by one of the Indians who had 
 aided in Walter Butler s escape from Albany, that he had pro 
 ceeded at once to Wyoming with his wife, and would await the 
 appearance of his father at Wintermoot s Fort. 
 
 The hopes of seeing her child, and a harassing terror lest 
 that angel girl on Monockonock Island might come to harm in 
 the savage warfare impending over the valley, had forced her 
 into scenes from which her very soul revolted, and she opened 
 her eyes with terror as each day carried the fearful warwhoop of 
 her tribe nearer and nearer that peaceful region. 
 
 From the encampment at Bowman s Creek scouts were sent 
 forwards, and a small detachment of warriors swept down the 
 river in the night, headed by Queen Esther s youngest son, a 
 handsome brave, who, eager to earn the first eagle s plume in the 
 coming fight having won this privilege from the grim queen 
 and his lofty brother set forth on his errand of blood. 
 
 Like a flock of red birds on the water, the chief and his war 
 riors floated down the Susquehanna, each with a rifle at his 
 feet, and a tomahawk or a sharp knife glittering in his girdle. 
 
 Their persons glowed with war paint ; their sinewy arms bent 
 to the oars. Now and then, as they passed through the sloping 
 mountains, a faint whoop broke on the waters, betraying their 
 impatience for contest. 
 
 But as they reached the rocky jaws of the Susquehanna, 
 all was still as death ; no flock of birds ever flitted over that 
 stream more silently. About a mile above Fort Jenkins, they 
 took to the shore. This fort was in the hands of the patriots, 
 and the chief thirsted to strike a leading blow in the contest. 
 Instead of proceeding to Wintermoot s Fort, he drew his war 
 riors from the river, and clearing the stockades like a pack of 
 wolves, took the fort by surprise. 
 
 But brave men lay waiting behind those rough logs old men 
 of cool courage and nerves of iron. Three of their number fell 
 dead in front of the fort, where, unconscious of danger, they had 
 
302 MAKY DERWENT. 
 
 been conversing in the starlight. The savages rushed on to 
 complete their work, but they were met with a blaze of musketry, 
 so sudden and furious, that half a dozen stalwart forms fell upon 
 the men they had murdered. Then the crack of a single rifle a 
 shrill cry the youngest son of Queen Esther leaped into the air, 
 and fell dead upon the sward he had been so eager to bathe with 
 blood. 
 
 The skirmish had not lasted half an hour, when that band of 
 savages retreated, under shelter of the night, and laying the 
 body of their chief in a canoe, floated down the river with a low, 
 monotonous death-chant, which was lost in the deep solitude of 
 the woods. When they came opposite Wintermoot s, they again 
 lifted their chief and bore him among them into the fort, still 
 wailing out that mournful death-song. 
 
 The garrison was aroused ; armed men came out and bore the 
 body of the dead brave into the inclosure. 
 
 Tahmeroo, who lay awake, waiting the return of her husband, 
 heard the death wail of her tribe, and followed the sound, pale 
 with apprehension. A group of warriors sat upon the earth, 
 with their faces buried in their robes ; the death-song was hushed, 
 but the silence of those stout hearts was more solemn even than 
 the mournful voices had been. 
 
 In the centre of this group she saw the prostrate form of a 
 chief, with his gorgeous war robes lying in heavy masses around 
 him. The Indian girl held her breath and crept forwards, looking 
 fearfully down into the face of the dead. It was her father s 
 brother 1 She asked no questions, but crouched down on the 
 earth among those silent warriors, and was still as the dead she 
 mourned. 
 
 After a little, a young warrior rose from the circle and went 
 out ; no one spoke, no one looked up ; but they all knew that 
 he was departing to bear to Queen Esther tidings of her son s 
 death. 
 
 Slowly and with mournful steadiness, the lone savage crept up 
 the river ; he broke the profound stillness of the mountains with 
 
THE WEDDING PRESENT. 303 
 
 the death-cry, as he passed along ; the lonely whippowill an 
 swered him from the woods ; and between the pauses of its mel 
 ancholy wail, the sleepless owl hooted him for not dying instead 
 of his chief. It was daybreak when he reached the encampment 
 at Bowman s Creek. Queen Esther was lying awake in her tent ; 
 indeed no one could tell if the old woman ever slept ; come upon 
 her at any time in the night no matter with what tidings and 
 she was sure to meet you with those vigilant glances that seemed 
 never to relax an instant. When the warrior lifted the mat from 
 her tent, and stood so solemnly in the light of her dying fire, 
 she prolonged that look, till it seemed to cut into him like 
 steel. All at once a gleam of cruel trouble shot into the glance ; 
 those stony features moved, and a spasm of agony locked them 
 closer than before. The smoky light could not alone have left 
 those shadows on her face ; they were the color of ashes. 
 
 He laid the tomahawk, red at the edge, the keen scalping 
 knife, and the rifle that had belonged to her son down at the 
 old queen s feet. There was a rustle under her robes, as of dry 
 boughs in winter, and her head drooped slowly forwards on her 
 bosom, while her fierce eyes gleamed down on the implements of 
 death colder and sharper than they. 
 
 CHAPTER XL. 
 
 THE WEDDING PRESENT. 
 
 THE morning after the events described in the preceding chap 
 ter, Aunt Polly rose at an early hour and went rigorously about 
 her multifarious duties, preparing breakfast for herself and Sim, 
 helping to milk the cows, and setting the house in order gene 
 rally. 
 
 Thoughts of much importance were evidently weighing with 
 
304: MARY DERWENT. 
 
 great force upon Aunt Polly s mind, for all through breakfast 
 she was very absent-minded, though her manner to Sim was un 
 usually gentle even bordering on tenderness. 
 
 " Now, Sim," she said, when he rose from the table, " have 
 Gineral Washington saddled by the time I get the dishes washed, 
 for Pm going right over to the island." 
 
 " So, Jane Derwent and Clark are really goin to be married ?" 
 
 " And it s the best thing for em ! When a man has made up 
 his mind to ask a woman to have him, what s the use of his put 
 ting it off till the Day of Judgment ? He may as well speak up 
 at once." , 
 
 Sim assented with a dubious shake of the head ; and with his 
 thoughts reverting to the fickle Betsy, remarked sententiously, 
 that women were onsartin creeturs. 
 
 " Some on em," replied Aunt Polly, " but not all ! I like a 
 woman that can make up her own mind ; but just mind this, Mr. 
 White, if a man want s a wife that s good for anything, he mustn t 
 marry a little fool of fifteen or sixteen no gal is fit to get mar 
 ried under thirty-five." 
 
 Sim nodded his head. 
 
 " Did you ever see my settin out, Sim ? If it hasn t been used 
 long afore this, it wasn t for want of offers." 
 
 Sim never had seen this wonderful setting out, and Aunt Polly 
 promised to show it to him at some future time. Finally, he 
 sauntered away about his work, and Aunt Polly began clearing 
 up the table. When everything was in order, she sat down 
 before the loom, in which was the unfinished rag carpet that she 
 had promised to Jane Derwent as a wedding present. She un 
 rolled from the ponderous beam the yards which were completed 
 and looked at them admiringly. 
 
 "There never was a neater carpet," she said, "never ; that 
 orange in the warp is as bright as a guinea, and I never see a 
 purtier blue. I don t believe, arter all, it would fit any room in 
 Edward Clark s new house, and I don t see what Jane wants of 
 it ; young folks shouldn t begin life by being extravagant." 
 
THE WEDDING PRESENT. 305 
 
 She folded the carpet slowly up, regarding it with covetous 
 eyes. 
 
 " I guess," she continued, slowly, " Pll look out a counterpane 
 for her ; she ll like it just as well, and it s a better wedding pre 
 sent ; folks can get along without a carpet, but they must have 
 bed kiverin ." 
 
 She went up to a spare chamber, and opened the chest of 
 drawers in which were safely packed the various articles apper 
 taining to her own much-lauded " setting out." There were piles 
 of linen and bed-clothes, all getting yellow from disuse ; from the 
 latter she selected a blue and white yarn counterpane, and spread 
 it over the bed. 
 
 " Wai, that is dreadful purty 1 I kinder hate to part with it ; 
 mother helped me make it, and I don t feel as if twould be ex 
 actly right to give it away. I ll give Janey a pair of sheets and 
 ruffled pillow-cases instead." 
 
 She took out the sheets and pillow-cases, smoothing down the 
 ruffles and admiring their fineness. They looked more elegant 
 than ever, and Aunt Polly decided that the sheets alone would 
 be present enough, so she refolded the pillow-cases and put them 
 back in the drawer, where they had formerly reposed. Still she 
 was not satisfied, and wavered a long time between a woollen 
 blanket and the sheets ; but Jane s bridal stock was doomed to 
 want both. Aunt Polly s eye fell upon a roll of articles which 
 seemed intended for the decoration of a baby s cradle ; even in 
 her chaste solitude, the old maid fingered them -with decorous 
 hesitation. 
 
 She unrolled the bundle and took up two patchwork quilts 
 exactly alike, and pieced from gorgeous scraps of calico by her 
 own fair hands. She compared and measured them, to see that 
 there was no difference, and finally chose the one that proved a 
 fraction of an inch narrower than the other. 
 
 " It s big enough," she muttered, absently ; " it ll cover a child 
 a year old, and that s as much as any one could reasonably ask 
 
 for " 20 
 
306 MAEY DEKWENT. 
 
 Having made her decision, she seemed more at ease in her 
 mind, laid the other things carefully away, sprinkled fresh laven 
 der over them, and turned the key once more upon her treasures, 
 taking up the quilt with a jerk and hastening down stairs, as if 
 she feared to remain longer, lest she should lock that up too. 
 
 Before Sim brought General Washington out of the barn, Aunt 
 Polly was in readiness. She had heroically picked her finest bell- 
 necked squash, and stood on the stoop in front of the house, her 
 monstrous poke bonnet sitting up on her head, with a defiant air, 
 and grasping in her hand that enormous vegetable, which might 
 have been scooped out as a drinking-cup for one of the giants 
 of the olden time. 
 
 At length Sim appeared, leading the old white horse up to the 
 stump which served as a mounting-block, on which Aunt Polly 
 established herself, with her skirts held closely about her, as if 
 she were preparing for a dive. 
 
 " Gineral Washington looks like a picter," she said, regarding 
 the old horse admiringly. " Wai, I always did say, Sim White, 
 that you could curry a horse better than any other man in Wy 
 oming ; why, the old feller shines like a looking-glass ; I can t 
 bear a man that is careless with a horse ; I wouldn t marry him 
 if he had ten bags of golden guineas, for if he can t treat a dumb 
 creetnr well, what would he do to a wife." 
 
 "Are you going to Mother Derwent s right off?" Sim asked, 
 somewhat heedless of Aunt Polly s remark. 
 
 " Yes, I am ; I want to see that they ve got everything all 
 right. Now, make the Gineral side up, and help me on." 
 
 The old maid rested one hand on the horn of the saddle and 
 the other upon Sim s shoulder, who put his stalwart arm about 
 her waist, and before she could make any resistance, if she had 
 felt so inclined, lifted her to her seat. 
 
 "Wai, if I ever !" she exclaimed, indignantly, though the 
 corners of her mouth worked with suppressed pleasure. " I never 
 did see such a man aint you ashamed get away now suppos 
 ing anybody had come by and seen you 1* 
 
THE WEDDING PRESENT. 307 
 
 " You see I couldn t help it, Aunt Polly." 
 
 " Aunt Polly I" shrieked the old maid, in anger and defiance. 
 " Miss Carter, ef you please that s my name ! You re a man 
 nerly feller, aint you ? Pretty age you are, to be calling me 
 such a name ! Get away with you, and if that garden aint all 
 weeded afore I get back, you needn t expect many good words 
 from me." 
 
 " Now, don t get into a passion," said Sim, either really anx 
 ious to mollify her, or impelled by a desire to escape his task ; 
 " I didn t mean no harm ; the boys and gals call you so." 
 
 " Wai, you aint a boy, nor a gal neither ; there s grey in your 
 hair, plain enough to be seen !" 
 
 " Now, don t be mad," said Sim, catching hold of her bridle, 
 as she manifested some intention of riding away ; " I ll never let 
 my tongue slip again ; come, Miss Carter I" 
 
 The old maid -put "her hand on his shoulder, and said with 
 her blandest smile : 
 
 " Put the squash in my lap, Sim, and hang the bundle on the 
 horn ; you may call me Polly I don t mind that, though I 
 don t know," she added, with virtuous reflection, " whether it s 
 just the thing afore people are married." 
 
 " It can t do no hurt," returned Sim, sagely turning his tobacco 
 over in his mouth, " even if they don t intend to get married." 
 
 " Yes it can 1" retorted the spinster. " No man shall ever 
 call me Polly that don t want to marry me right out, now, I tell 
 you 1" 
 
 Sim retreated a little, and did not exhibit that eagerness to 
 pronounce the euphonious syllable which Aunt Polly seemed to 
 expect, and she chirruped to General Washington with renewed 
 displeasure. 
 
 " Are you a-coming up to the wedding ?" she asked, sharply. 
 " I s pose so ; Edward Clark wanted me to play the fiddle for 
 them to dance a little." 
 
 " Wai, I jest wish you wouldn t go it makes it very unplea 
 sant for me." 
 
308 MARY DERWElfcT. 
 
 " Why on arth shouldn t I go, Miss Carter ?" 
 
 " They all laugh at me so," said Aunt Polly, with interesting 
 confusion. 
 
 " What do they laugh at you for cause I choose to fiddle ?" 
 
 " Your actions, I suppose," she replied, indignantly, ; " tain t 
 likely I ve told em all the things you ve said to me. If I had, I 
 know my friends would insist on my settling things right off 
 but I m hard to coax, very hard, Sim." 
 
 Her hand went down on to his arm again, and this time 
 Sim rather took it of his own accord. 
 
 " Are you ?" he said, doubtfully ; "I guess not very hard be 
 you, Aun Polly ?" 
 
 " Oh, Sim, you shouldn t have spoke out so sudden women is 
 sensative creeturs. Wai, I don t know ; I wouldn t say yes to 
 any other man, as plenty of em could tell you from experience ; 
 but since it s you, Sim, there, jest let out that stirrup-leather a 
 trifle." 
 
 She gathered the skirts decorously around her feet while Sim 
 performed this duty, and rested her hand on his shoulder in 
 settling herself again. Sim looked a little puzzled, and somewhat 
 unappreciative of the honor Aunt Polly had bestowed upon him ; 
 but he passed it off with better grace than could have been 
 expected, and even called her outright by her baptismal ap 
 pellation. 
 
 " I m goin now," said the old maid, crimsoning with delight. 
 " I shall have to get some of the gals to come and stay a while 
 with me. It wouldn t be proper for us to be alone in the house, 
 you know. I guess we ll have to hurry up things, too, on their 
 account ; for they can t none of em stay away from home long. 
 Good bye, Sim ; never mind the garding good bye. Get up, 
 Gineral Washington. Come over early, Sim and oh, you ll 
 find some new gingerbread in the stone crock. I ve put out a 
 nice dinner for you. Good bye, Sim." 
 
 She rode off, and left Sim standing in the road buried in deep 
 thought. 
 
THE BEDDING PRESENT. 309 
 
 " Wai," he said at length, putting a fresh morsel of tobacco 
 in his mouth, and speaking aloud, " she seems to think it s all 
 settled; and I don t know as I much mind either way. I d kind 
 o like to show Betsy Willets, too, that I don t care a rush for 
 her marryin Jim Davis consarn her! The old maid s worth 
 having any way; this is just as good a farm as there is in all 
 Wyoming, and the tavern stand ain t so bad as it might be. A 
 feller might go farther and fare worse. Besides, tain t manners, 
 dad used to say, to look a gift horse in the mouth so, if she s 
 suited, let it go." 
 
 Sim gave his head a philosophical shake and turned towards 
 the barn, whistling Yankee Doodle as he went. There were a 
 few tremulous variations now and then, which threatened to 
 subside into Old Hundred, as an image of the faithless Betsy 
 would present itself; but Sim solaced his mind by glancing about 
 the neat, thrifty-looking premises, and fell to whistling harder 
 than before, conscientiously repeating the parts which he had 
 slurred over with a firmness that would have satisfied Aunt 
 Polly herself. 
 
 The old maid rode on up towards the river, and as she reached 
 the turn of the highway, leading to Forty Fort, she spied in 
 advance of her, a troop of soldiers on horseback and on foot 
 proceeding towards the fort. 
 
 "What on airth!" exclaimed Aunt Polly, urging General 
 Washington on; " what are they about ?" 
 
 " She rode without hesitation towards the little band, and 
 discovering an acquaintance in the leader, called out 
 
 " Why, Captain Slocum, what s up now ?" 
 
 " Nothing very important, Miss Carter," he replied. " There 
 were some men shot at Fort Jenkins last night, and Walter 
 Butler, with a troop of Injuns, is in the valley. We must be on 
 our guard." 
 
 " Ain t a going to have a fight to-day, are we ?" 
 
 " I can t tell; it may come any minute." 
 
 "Wai, do your duty, Captain Harding; do your duty!" said 
 
310 MARY DEKWENT. 
 
 Auut Polly, assuming the tone in which she h-ad heard revolu 
 tionary speeches delivered. " Wyoming expects every man of 
 ye to stand up to the mark take care of the widows, the 
 orphans, and perticlarly of such young females as haven t yet 
 secured their natral protectors." 
 
 " We will do our best, Miss Carter," returned the captain, 
 concealing a smile, and glancing reprovingly towards his men, 
 who looked more amused than moved by Aunt Polly s elo 
 quence. 
 
 "I know you will; I can trust you, captain," replied the old 
 maid, approvingly, as if she felt that a great responsibility 
 rested upon her shoulders. " If you want a hoss, captain, 
 send for Gin ral Washington, you re welcome to him; the old 
 feller has stood fire too many training days to be afraid of Tories 
 or Injuns ither." 
 
 " Thank you; if we have occasion, I ll send for him," said the 
 captain, trying to move on, a manoeuvre difficult to execute, for 
 Aunt Polly had stationed herself directly in front of the troop. 
 
 "Do; and oh, captain," checking the general, as he seemed 
 inclined to give way to the soldiers, " if you want a treat for 
 your men, I ve got a keg of Jamaica spirits in my cellar that s 
 u leetle ahead of anything you ve tasted lately you re welcome 
 to it." 
 
 " That is very kind of you," replied Slocum, while his men 
 listened with lively interest; but he had rashly interrupted Aunt 
 Polly. 
 
 " Let em drink all they want," she said. " I know you re too 
 much of a man to cheat me out of a gill, captain. I can trust 
 you Sim White 11 show you where it is." 
 
 " Forward, men!" exclaimed the commander; "we re losing 
 time here." 
 
 " Law bless me, don t run over a body!" cried Aunt Polly; 
 " the gin ral and I ain t Tories, cap tin." 
 
 But the men pushed on, heedless of her expostulations, and 
 the old maid was forced to give way. 
 
THE WEDDING PRESENT . 311 
 
 " Don t forget the rum," she shrieked after them. " You and 
 I ll settle for it to-morrow, captain." 
 
 She rode on without farther interruption until she came oppo 
 site the island. She dismounted with the bell-necked squash 
 under her arm, took a small bundle carefully off the saddle, 
 loosened the girth a little, and sent the general up the bank with 
 a pat of her hand. A vigorous and prolonged call speedily 
 brought Mary Derwent out of the house, and in a few mo 
 ments her little canoe had reached the shore where Aunt Polly 
 stood. 
 
 " You see, Mary, I ve come over early," she said ; " I thought 
 you d have lots to do. Here, ketch this bundle handle it care- 
 fal, it s something for Janey. I guess I wish I d taken the sad 
 dle across too, for it might be stolen by some of them rascally 
 Tories." 
 
 " Are they around again ?" Mary asked, anxiously. 
 
 " Yes, so Captain Slocum told me. I met him and his men 
 agoin to Forty Fort. I told em their duty, and they looked 
 quite sober about it." 
 
 " I fear that terrible times are coming," said Mary, sadly ; 
 " the Valley has never been in such confusion as it is now. 
 Edward Clark could only stay with us a few moments last night, 
 and won t be back till evening." 
 
 " That s right 1" exclaimed Aunt Polly. " Tisn t proper for 
 him to come till the minister does. I never was married myself, 
 but I know what aught to be done, as well as anybody there s 
 nothing like being prepared, one never knows when an offer may 
 pop up." 
 
 She looked very meaningly at Mary, but the poor girl was 
 too anxious and troubled, to take notice of the peculiarity of 
 the old maid s manner. 
 
 " Don t say a word to trouble grandma and Jane," she said, 
 when they reached the island ; " it will do no good." 
 
 " Of course not ; when did you ever know me to speak the 
 
312 MART DEE WENT. 
 
 wrong word at the wrong minute ? Give me that squash, Mary ; 
 handle it keerful that s it." 
 
 She walked towards the house, and Mary, having secured the 
 canoe, followed at a slower pace. Within the little kitchen, 
 there was a savor of chickens roasting, and various other eat 
 ables preparing for the evening. Mother Derwent was frying 
 dough-nuts when Aunt Polly entered, and she wiped her floury 
 hands on her checked apron, in order to return her friendly greet 
 ing with due cordiality. 
 
 " Wai, Jane," said the old maid, turning to Jane, who was 
 rolling out pie-crust with great diligence ; " how do you do ? You 
 see, we all have to come to it, first or last but law, the thought 
 takes away my breath. I never can bear it as you do." 
 
 " Why, Aunt Polly, do you think of getting married, too ?" 
 said Jane, laughing. 
 
 " Stranger things than that have happened," returned the 
 spinster. " Men are sich determined critters, there ain t no 
 getting rid of them when once they get sot on a thing a body 
 has to say yes, whether or no." 
 
 " Who is the man that torments you so much ?" Jane in 
 quired, laughing merrily. 
 
 " No, you don t you can t surprise no secrets out of me 1" 
 Aunt Polly turned away her face in pretended confusion, to 
 Jane s great amusement ; at length she recovered, and taking 
 the squash from the table where she had placed it, she held it 
 towards the old lady. 
 
 " How are you off for pies, Miss Derwent ?" 
 
 " Wai, pretty well ; we ve got lots of strawberries and rasp 
 berries, and some dried pumpkin." 
 
 " Dried punken 1" repeated the old maid, with awful disdain ; 
 "just try that are squash ; dried punken, indeed 1" 
 
 " This ll just finish you up now get me a knife, and Pll 
 have it sliced in short order." 
 
 The day wore on in busy employment for all, though Mary s 
 
THE WEDDING PRESENT. 313 
 
 heart was full of evil forebodings, which she did not breathe 
 aloud, and she heard little of the running stream of talk which 
 Aunt Polly kept up all the while her hands were so actively 
 employed. 
 
 At length the old maid drew Jane mysteriously into the inner 
 room, and pointed to a bundle laying on the bed. 
 
 " There s a present for you, Janey," she whispered ; " don t 
 say nothing about it. You re just as welcome as can be." 
 
 Before Jane could express her thanks, Aunt Polly had untied 
 the package, and held up before the astonished girl a small 
 patch-work baby quilt, valuable as a curiosity, and with a rising 
 sun in gay colors, forming the centre. 
 
 " I knew I couldn t give you nothing more useful, nor purtier," 
 she continued, complacently, while Jane stood looking at her in 
 confused surprise. " Taint no common quilt that was a part 
 of my own settin out ; I pieced it with these two hands. I ve 
 got another jest like it, only the middle is pink and blue ; 
 but I had to keep that," sinking her voice to a whisper, "for 
 taint best to leave oneself quite destitute." 
 
 Jane tried to murmur something, but between suppressed mirth 
 and confusion, she was dumb. 
 
 " You see it s so much better for you than that carpet we talked 
 about, that ain t near done, and Pm so slow ; besides, young 
 folks oughtn t to cosset themselves up with sich things. Scrub 
 bing floors is the wholesomest work you can have, and I really 
 think carpets are unhealthy, they make you ketch cold every 
 time you go into the air." 
 
 Jane expressed her perfect satisfaction with the gift, and 
 Aunt Polly fell into a confidential conversation with her, and 
 before they returned to the kitchen, had revealed her intended 
 marriage with Sim White, under promise of proposed secrecy. 
 Jane was faithful to her pledge, but as Aunt Polly, in the course 
 of the afternoon, was closeted with Mary and the old grand 
 mother, each in her turn, and confided the interesting news to 
 
314: M A E, Y D E K W E N T . 
 
 both under the same vow of solemn silence, Jane s fidelity did 
 not meet with its due reward. 
 
 Before four o clock everything was prepared, and the whole 
 house set in order. 
 
 " Wai," said Aunt Polly, glancing with pride and affection at 
 the rows of pies and huge piles of dough-nuts and cakes ; "if 
 anybody wants nicer fixins than these, let them get em up, 
 that s all. If ever I get married not that I say I m goin to 
 but if I ever should, I won t have no stingy doins good eatin 
 and plenty of it ll be had, now I tell you." 
 
 At last Mary escaped, to obtain a few quiet moments for reflec 
 tion ; and Jane retired to the other room to give the finishing 
 touches to the simple bridal attire spread out upon the coverlet. 
 Aunt Polly, and grandmother Derwent, sat down in front of the 
 door, to indulge in a quiet chat, and when the girls were fairly 
 out of sight, Aunt Polly took sundry surreptitious pinches of 
 snuff from the old lady s box, by no means with the air of a 
 novice, but like a woman refreshing herself after a season of 
 rigid self-denial 
 
 CHAPTER XLI. 
 
 THE CHIEF S BUKIAL 
 
 FOR a full half hour Queen Esther sat motionless in the chill 
 of that appalling silence, her eyes fixed upon the weapons of 
 death at her feet with a dull glare, more terrible than the fiercest 
 rage of passion. 
 
 She rose slowly, at length, laid the rifle and scalping-knife 
 carefully aside, and clutching the tomahawk of her dead son in 
 her hand, passed noiselessly out of the tent. At the entrance 
 she met the chief, Gi-en-gwa-tah, motioned him to follow with a 
 
THE CHIEF S BUEIAL. 315 
 
 stern gesture of command, and moved on towards the roused en 
 campment, issuing her brief orders in a voice hard as iron. 
 
 From the seclusion of her own tent, Catharine Montour watched 
 the hasty preparations for departure, and her heart sank at the 
 Bight of those rigid faces, as the old queen and her son went 
 out, for she understood only too well what their calmness por 
 tended. 
 
 She dared utter no word of remonstrance ; the b ravest heart 
 would have shrunk from offering consolation to that grim woman. 
 It was still dark as midnight, and the smouldering fires cast a 
 lurid glare around, lighting up the stern visages flitting like sha 
 dows among the tents, while the waning moon trembled like a 
 crescent of blood on the verge of the western horizon, a sign of 
 approaching carnage and warfare. 
 
 At length, a detachment of warriors, armed with rifles and 
 tomahawks, and hideous with war paint, broke out from the 
 great mass, and mounting their horses, remained stationary on 
 the outskirts of the camp. Queen Esther s horse was led out, 
 flowing with gems torn from the persons of former victims ; her 
 tomahawk glittered at the saddle-bow, and the head of her 
 steed was decorated with raven s plumes, that waved slowly to 
 and fro with every motion of his proud neck. Catharine saw the 
 old queen come forth again from her tent, grasping in her hand 
 the weapon which her son had wielded in his last battle. Pass 
 ing with stern composure through the group of Indians, she 
 planted one hand upon the saddle, and with a single effort of her 
 sinewy arm, lifted herself to the seat. With no sound but the 
 muffled tread of their horses on the short turf, the band swept 
 on, with that silent woman leading them on, and were lost in the 
 darkness beyond. 
 
 The great body of Indians and the army of whites, encamped 
 at a little distance, still kept their position, though preparations 
 for departure were evident among them carried on by the In 
 dians in sullen quiet, far more terrible than the shouts and oaths 
 which came up from the Tory tents. 
 
316 MAKT DEKWENT. 
 
 Catharine Montour watched all, heard all, but still she did not 
 move. The chief did not once approach her tent, and though a 
 sickness like that of death was on her, she knew that the slight 
 est remonstrance would only increase the Shawnee s thirst for 
 vengeance. She did not stir from the spot until everything was 
 ready for their departure and her horse was led up to the en 
 trance of her tent. 
 
 Swiftly the detachment, with Queen Esther for their leader, 
 swept down the rocky path which led towards the Susquehanna. 
 After a ride of about twenty miles, they came out upon the river, 
 opposite the foot of CampbelPs Ledge, and, crossing the stream 
 there, continued their course into the valley, only pausing while 
 Esther dispatched a scout in advance, to see that their way to 
 the fort would be unobstructed. 
 
 She had halted just where the Falling Spring came leaping 
 down the steep precipice, white and spectral in the gathering 
 day. Beyond, loomed up the giant masses of the Ledge, and at 
 her feet the river flowed in its pleasant quietness, bearing no 
 warning of ill to the doomed inhabitants of the valley. 
 
 During the absence of their scout, the silence was unbroken ; 
 the warriors were banded together in portentous impassibility ; 
 and Queen Esther, with her horse drawn a little distance apart, the 
 reins falling loosely upon his neck, sat with her eyes fixed upon 
 the tomahawk still grasped in her hand. The Indian returned, 
 and at his signal the party swept down the war-trail, which ran 
 in nearly the same course that the roadway of the present day 
 takes, following the river in its sinuous windings. 
 
 Just above Pittston, the Susquehanna and Lackawanna meet, 
 and at their point of union a little island, picturesque even now, 
 rests on the bosom of the waters. The band paused on the 
 shore of the Susquehanna, in sight of this island. A scow, used 
 by the inhabitants of the region as a common means of transpor 
 tation across the stream, was unmoored, and the whole band 
 were rowed over to the opposite shore. Again they paused, and 
 waited until the main force of Tories and savages came up, with 
 
THE CHIEF S BURIAL. 317 
 
 Gi-en-gwa-tah at their head, and Catharine Montour in their 
 midst. 
 
 At the chief s command, the body of Indians swam their horses 
 over to the little island, their leader guiding the steed on which 
 Catharine rode, and commenced immediate preparations for the 
 rearing of her tent. 
 
 On swept the Tories, headed by Queen Esther and her band, 
 over the smooth plains, then green with rustling forests, and 
 keeping within sight o f the river. When the dawn broke, grey 
 and chill, Wintermoofs Fort, the stronghold of the Tories, 
 loomed before them, surrounded by bristling stockades and forti 
 fied outworks. 
 
 At their approach, the gates were thrown open, and the whole 
 army swept into the inclosure. Those within the fort crowded 
 around, in eager curiosity, to gaze upon the old queen ; but she 
 seemed unconscious of their glances, dismounting at once from 
 her horse, and following the commander of the fort into the room 
 where the body of her son had been carried. 
 
 Tahmeroo was sitting on the floor by the corpse, but she did 
 not raise her head when ihe~door opened, and Queen Esther 
 moved towards the ben ch where the body lay without paying 
 any heed to the presence of her grandchild. She stood over the 
 dead chief without any sign of emotion ; her frame never once 
 relaxed not a muscle moved, not an eyelash quivered ; her mo 
 tionless right hand fell at her side, with the gleaming tomahawk 
 still clutched between her clasped fingers. 
 
 The Indians entered the room, took up the body and bore it 
 forth, with a low death-wail, that sounded ominously drear in 
 the solemn stillness which came over all within the fort. 
 
 Among that group of awe-struck gazers stood Grenville 
 Murray. He had come into the fort a few hours before, and 
 had vainly attempted to instill some idea of mercy into the 
 ferocity of the Indians and Tories, but the pacific measures which 
 he pleaded were as much unheeded as if they had been made to 
 wolves in the forest. 
 
318 MART DERWENT. 
 
 The train, bearing the dead chief, passed through the inclosure, 
 and Queen Esther followed, erect and still, looking neither to 
 the right nor the left, while Tahmeroo crouched behind, horror- 
 stricken and pale. 
 
 " Will she take him away ?" Murray whispered to the com 
 mander. 
 
 " Yes, for burial." 
 
 " But she is partly a white woman ; surely she will not allow 
 him to be buried in this heathenish fashion." 
 
 " Do you think Queen Esther a saint ?" sneered the leader ; 
 " the scalpiug-knife is her religion !" 
 
 Murray stepped forwards and stood before the queen. She 
 looked up, neither in anger nor surprise, when he ventured thus 
 to confront her. 
 
 " Madam," he said, in a low tone, " I am informed that there 
 is a clergyman in the neighborhood will you not wait here until 
 he can be summoned ? At least, let your son be buried with the 
 rites of your country s faith." 
 
 " The wilderness is my country," she replied, in a voice tho 
 more startling from its iciness ; " my son was an Indian brave ; 
 no mummeries of the pale-faces shall desecrate his grave." 
 
 She passed on without giving him an opportunity to reply, 
 and the procession moved out of the fort, down to the bank of 
 the river, where several canoes had been procured for the 
 removal of the corpse. 
 
 Into the bark with the dead man, stepped Tahmeroo and the 
 old queen. The rowers bent to their task, and the canoe swept 
 up the current. The Indian girl sat down by the body of her re 
 lative, but the old queen stood upright in the stern of the boat, 
 the rising sun gilding the faded dun of her robes, and gleaming 
 balefully over the murderous weapon in her hand. 
 
 A tent had been erected on the lower part of the beautiful 
 island, and in the doorway stood Catharine Montour, watching 
 the approach of the three canoes. The Indians, with their 
 chief, were grouped about the shore, and as the canoes came in 
 
KURIAL. 319 
 
 sight they struck up a death-song, in answer to the chant from 
 the boats, prolonged by the women into a mournful wail, which, 
 accustomed as she was to such scenes, made Catharine s blood 
 run cold. 
 
 The boats came up, the old queen remained standing on the 
 shore, while Tahmeroo sprang forwards and was silently clasped 
 to her mother s bosom. It was the first time they had met since 
 the girl s flight in search of her husband, but there was no time 
 given for joy, and, without a word, they stood side by side while 
 the mournful ceremonies proceeded. 
 
 At the lower extremity of the island may be seen, to this day, 
 a group of four willow trees, with their trunks distorted and 
 bent, and when the wind is low, the long branches sway to the 
 ground with a sorrowful music, which sounds like a requiem pro 
 longed from that funeral wail. 
 
 Under the shadow of those trees they dug the young chief a 
 grave and laid him therein, his face covered with war-paint and 
 his most precious possessions by his side. Rifle and scalping- 
 kriife were placed reverently down, but when they searched for the 
 tomahawk, Queen Esther took her own decorated weapon from 
 an Indian near by and flung it beside the body, standing erect as 
 ever while the earth was thrown in and the grave filled 
 quickly up. 
 
 When all was over, obeying her imperious motion, the tribe 
 withdrew to a little distance, and she stood alone by the head 
 of the grave, with her right hand stretched over it once her 
 lips moved faintly, then shut and locked themselves closer than 
 before ; but in that moment of fearful self-communion, Queen 
 Esther had registered a terrible vow. 
 
 As the groups broke up, Butler landed in his canoe and came 
 towards them. Passing Catharine and Tahmeroo with a hasty 
 nod, he approached Queen Esther and whispered in her 
 ear : 
 
 " The man I told you of is at the fort ; they tell me he spoke 
 with you the missionary, also, is near. Queen Esther need not 
 
320 MAEY DEKWENT. 
 
 go beyond her own camp-fires to discover the instigator of this 
 deed." 
 
 The queen returned no answer, but a slight shiver of the 
 tomahawk proved that his fiendish whisper had produced its 
 effect, and Butler moved away. Though their conference lasted 
 scarce a second, and their glances never once wandered towards 
 the place where she stood, Catharine Montour felt that the first 
 threads of some plot against her safety and life lia$ been formed 
 above the grave of the young warrior. ;) / 
 
 She laid her hand on Tahmeroo s arm an,d enterecl the lodge, 
 trembling so violently from weakness and,riervous agitation, that 
 she was unable to stand. The girl sat down, chilled by her hus 
 band s coldness, and awaiting his eiitranc e with impatience, the 
 more harassing from a mournful consciousness that she occupied 
 no place in that reckless man s heart. 
 
 After a little, Queen Esther collected her own band of war 
 riors and left the island, retracing the path towards Winter- 
 moot s Fort. Butler and the chief, Gi-en-gwa-tah, held a con 
 versation together upon the shore, during which the gloomy brow 
 of the Indian grew constantly darker, and the fire in his eyes 
 kindled into new ferocity. At length, he turned away from the 
 young man, and entering his wife s tent, sat down in sullen 
 quiet. 
 
 Catharine Montour sat apart, with her eyes fixed in painful 
 apprehension on the wrathful face of the chief. There was no 
 thing of the fierce courage in her demeanor that had formerly 
 characterized it ; a most astonishing change had been gradually 
 wrought in her mind and person since the day which witnessed 
 her interview with the missionary, and more visibly after Butler s 
 return from Johnson Hall, with intelligence of Murray s presence 
 in America. The healthful roundness of her person had fallen 
 away, and her features had sharpened and grown of a cold pale 
 ness, till they seemed as if chiselled from marble. Her cheeks 
 were hollow, her high forehead was changed in its lofty and dar 
 ing expression, a calm sadness had settled upon it, and her eyes, 
 
THE CHIEF S BUKIAL. 321 
 
 formerly fierce and keen almost as a wild eagle s, were full of 
 gentle endurance, at that moment disturbed by apprehension and 
 fear, but by no sterner emotion. 
 
 Never in the days of her loftiest pride had Catharine Montour 
 appeared so touchingly lovely, so gentle and so woman-like, as 
 on that evening. She had been pleading for her people with the 
 fierce chief pleading that vengeance should not fall on the in 
 habitants of the neighboring valley in retribution for the death 
 of a single brave. But the Shawnee had taken other counsellors 
 to his bosom within the year. Since the fierce pride of Catha 
 rine s character had passed away, her influence over him had 
 decreased ; while that of Butler was more thoroughly estab 
 lished, and Queen Esther had regained all the supremacy which 
 for a season had yielded to the influence of his wife. 
 
 When almost as stern and unyielding as himself, Catharine 
 might command now she could but supplicate. The higher and 
 better portion of her nature was, like her history, a sealed book 
 to him ; he could understand and respect strong physical cour 
 age, but the hidden springs which form the fearful machinery of 
 a highly cultivated woman, making weakness in some things a 
 virtue, and even fear itself lovely, he could not comprehend. A 
 terrible suspicion had been instilled into his proud nature, and 
 lie mistook her utterly ; his nobility of character, which was 
 lifted above either savage or civilized cunning, had made him the 
 dupe of a bad man. When moral goodness began to predomi 
 nate in Catharine s character, he mistook its meek and gentle 
 manifestations for cowardice, and she became to him almost an 
 object of contempt. There was no longer any power in her 
 patient perseverance and persuasive voice to win his nature to 
 mercy ; the daring spirit which had formerly awed and con 
 trolled his, had departed forever beneath the gradual deepening 
 of repentance in her heart. 
 
 Tahmeroo joined earnestly with her mother s pleading ; but he 
 answered only with abrupt monosyllables, and even with their 
 voices in his ear, his sinewy fingers worked eagerly about the 
 
 21 
 
322 MARY DEKWENT. 
 
 haft of bis knife, conveying an answer more appalling than the 
 fiercest words could have given. There had been silence for 
 some time. Catharine Montour sat with one hand shading her 
 troubled brow, pondering on some means of preventing the blood 
 shed which she had so much cause to apprehend, and sorely re 
 penting that she had ever instigated the Indians to take up arms 
 in the dispute waged between England and her colonies. Tah" 
 nieroo stole away to a corner of the tent, and resting her cheek 
 on the palm of her hand, listened for the footstep of her husband, 
 hoping with all the faith of affection, that he would second her 
 mother s plea for mercy ; and nestling closer and closer down, as 
 she thought of the mother and infants whom her father s war 
 riors had already murdered, and whose scalps hung with their 
 long and sunny hair streaming over the door of the lodge. 
 
 " Oh, if Butler would but come in!" she murmured, while tears 
 started to her eyes, brought there by her mother s sorrow and the 
 pain which his absence during the whole night had produced, 
 increased by the lonely vigil which she had kept over the body 
 of her relative " He can do anything with the tribe." 
 
 As she spoke, the mat was flung aside, and her husband stood 
 before her. Tahmeroo sprang joyfully to his bosom, and kissed 
 his cheek, and lips, and brow, in all the abandonment of a happy 
 and most affectionate heart; nor did she mark the stern and 
 malignant expression of the face she had been covering with 
 kisses, till he hastily released himself from her arms, and without 
 returning her greeting, advanced to the chief, to whom he whis 
 pered again. 
 
 A fiendish light broke to the Shawnee s eye ; he arose, thrust 
 a tomahawk into his belt, and taking up his rifle, went out 
 Butler was about to follow, but Tahmeroo again stood before 
 him, extending her arms with an imploring gesture. 
 
 " You will not go away yet," she said. " You have scarcely 
 spoken to me since we reached Wyoming don t go yet!" 
 
 " Stand out of the way, foolish child," he exclaimed, rudely 
 pushing her aside. " I have other matters to think of !" 
 
THE CHIEF S BUKIAL. 323 
 
 The Indian blood flashed up to Tahmeroo s cheek, her eye 
 kindled, her form was drawn to its proudest height, as she stood 
 aside, and allowed her husband to pass out. 
 
 Catharine had started to her feet when the Shawnee went out, 
 and now stood pale as death ; so much agitated by her appre 
 hensions, that the rudeness offered to her daughter escaped her 
 notice. But as Butler was hurrying through the doorway, she 
 stepped forwards and grasped his arm with an energy that caused 
 him to turn with something like an oath, at what he supposed 
 the importunity of his wife. Catharine took no heed of his 
 impatience. 
 
 "Butler," she said, "I fear there will be more bloodshed; for 
 sweet mercy s sake, appease the chief. You have the power; 
 oh, do not lose the opportunity. I think it would kill us all, 
 were another scalp to be brought in " 
 
 She broke off suddenly, and shrunk back with a sick shudder, 
 for a gust of wind swept the long hair which streamed from a 
 female scalp over the entrance, directly across her face. Butler 
 took advantage of her emotion to make his escape. 
 
 " Have no fear, madam," he said, freeing his arm from her 
 grasp, and brushing the scalp carelessly back with his hand, as 
 he went out; " you shall have no cause. I must hasten to the 
 council at the fort." 
 
 Catharine Montour comprehended him, but too sick for 
 reply, drew back to her daughter s couch, and sat down faint 
 and quite overcome. There had been something horrible in the 
 feeling of that long, fair hair, as it swept over her face; her 
 nerves still quivered with the thought of it. 
 
 " Mother," said Tahmeroo, rising from the ground, where she 
 had cast herself, and winding her arms around Catharine, "oh, 
 mother, comfort me do comfort me, or my heart will break I" 
 
 Catharine pressed her lips upon the forehead of the young 
 wife, and murmured, 
 
 " What troubles you, my child ?" 
 
 She looked fondly and affectionately on the grieved face whith 
 
324 MAEY DEKWENT. 
 
 lay upon her bosom as she spoke, and her heart ached when she 
 saw how disappointments, regrets, and checked tenderness had 
 worn upon its former rich beauty. The wrung heart had spread a 
 sadness over those features, as the worm in the bosom, of a 
 flower withers all its surrounding leaves. 
 
 Tahmeroo burst into a passion of tears at her mother s ques 
 tion. 
 
 " Did you not see him, mother ? how he pushed his own wife 
 aside, as if she had been a wild animal did you not see him 
 thrust her away without a kiss, or one kind word ? Oh, mother, 
 my heart is growing hard. 1 shall hate him, mother." 
 
 Catharine laid her hand on the throbbing forehead of her 
 daughter, and remained in a solemn and serious thought. At 
 length, she spoke in a deep and impressive voice. 
 
 "No, my child, I did not see this rudeness, for my thoughts 
 were on other things but listen to me, Tahmeroo. Since the 
 day that yon were first laid in my bosom, like a young bird in 
 the nest of its mother, my heart has hovered over yours, as that 
 mother-bird guards its youngling. I have watched every new 
 faculty as it sprung up and blossomed in your mind. I have 
 striven to guide each strong passion as it dawned in your heart; 
 your nature has been to me as a garden, which I could enter 
 and cultivate and beautify, when disgusted with the weedy and 
 poisonous growth of human nature as I have found it in the 
 world; as I have found it in my own heart; but there is one 
 thing which I have not done. I have laid no foundation of 
 religion and principle in this young soul; I had become an unbe 
 liever in the faith of my fathers. I acknowledged no God, and 
 resolutely turned my thoughts from a future. My spirit had 
 erected to itself one idol an idol which it was sin to love, and 
 double sin to worship as I worshipped. 
 
 " I will not show to you, my child, the progress of a life a 
 wretched destiny which was regulated by one sin; a foible most 
 men would call it, for human judgment fixes on acts, not on that 
 more subtle sin, a train of unlawful thoughts; 1 will not show to 
 
THE CHIEF S BURIAL. 325 
 
 you the working of that sin; it is the curse of evil that its 
 consequences never cease; that thought is interlinked with 
 thought, event with event, and that the effects of one wrong 
 creep like serpents through the whole chain of a human life, 
 following the perpetrator even in the grave. 
 
 " My own destiny would be a painful illustration of this truth 
 might be the salvation of many in its moral, but when did 
 example save ? When did the fall of one human being prevent 
 the fall of another ? Why should I expose my own errors in 
 hopes to preserve you, my child, from similar wrong ? What 
 you have just said, startles and pains me; I know your nature, 
 and know that you will never cease to love the man whom you 
 have married; indifferent you will never be a sense of wrong 
 indignation, if indulged in, may make the love of your heart a 
 pain may sap away the good within you, engender all those 
 regrets that poisons the joy of affection. 
 
 "Tahmeroo, struggle against this feeling; you little dream of 
 the terrible misery which it will bring to you. Bear everything, 
 abuse, insult, neglect everything, but cast not yourself loose 
 from your only hope. Your safety lies in the very love which, 
 though it make the bitterness of your life, is its safeguard, too. 
 In your own heart is the strength you must look for, not in his. 
 If he wrongs you, forget it, if you can excuse it, if you cannot 
 forget. Think not of your own rights too much ; where struggling 
 is sure to bring misery, it is better to forbear. I could say much 
 more, for my heart is full of anxiety and sorrow. I know not 
 why, but my spirit droops, as if your head were on my bosom, 
 and your arms about me for the last time forever." 
 
 Catharine stooped down and kissed the tremulous lips of her 
 child. She was answered back with a gush of gentle tears. 
 
 " Weep on, my daughter; I love to see you shed such tears, for 
 there is no passion in them. I cannot tell you how dearly I love 
 and have ever loved you, for deep feeling has no words; but we 
 shall part soon; there is something in my heart which tells me so 
 
326 MAEY DEB WENT. 
 
 the grave will come between ns, and you will be left with no 
 stronger guide than your own warm impulses. 
 
 " Kiss me once more, and listen. Should we be parted by 
 death, or should Butler claim my promise to send you to Eng 
 land, go first to the missionary, and convey to him the little 
 ebony box at the head of your couch ; tell him all that I have 
 said to you, and ask him to become a protector and a friend to 
 Catharine Granby s child. Tell him, that since the night of her 
 daughter s marriage, she has been a changed woman that the 
 voice of his prayer that night awoke memories which will never 
 sleep again awoke answering prayer in a bosom which had 
 almost forgotten its faith. He will listen to you, my child, and 
 when I am gone, you will find a safe and, wise protector in him. 
 He will teach you how to regulate your too enthusiastic feelings. 
 Promise that you will seek this good man when I am taken away 
 do you promise, Tahmeroo ?" 
 
 " I will promise anything everything, mother; but do not 
 talk so sadly your voice sounds mournful as the night wind 
 among the pines." 
 
 Tahmeroo said no more, for her heart was full ; but she 
 laid her cheek against her mother s, and remained in her 
 embrace, silent and sorrowful. 
 
THE WHITE QUEEN S GIFT. 327 
 
 CHAPTER XLIL 
 
 WHILE these events were transpiring, the morning wore on at 
 Mother Derwent s cottage in the quiet which we have before 
 described. But while Aunt Polly and the old lady held their 
 cheerful conversation by the door, the sound of drums and 
 ehrill fifes came from the distance, and confused sounds rose from 
 about Wintermoot s Fort. The two women started up in affright. 
 Jane Derwent rushed, half-dressed, from the inner room, trem 
 bling with terror. Mary was aroused from her solitude, and 
 came forth very pale, but self-possessed and calm. 
 
 " Do not be alarmed," she said ; " it will probably only lead 
 to a skirmish." 
 
 " Oh, if Edward should be out !" exclaimed Jane. 
 
 "If he is," returned Mary, solemnly, " God takes care of 
 those who perform their duty trust to him, sister." 
 
 " If anything should happen to him !" said Jane, weeping ; 
 " I have treated him so bad, teased him so dreadfully !" 
 
 " Law, Janey, don t fret 1" urged Aunt Polly ; " it does the 
 men good to tease em afore you re married, it s soon enough to 
 give up after the knot is tied. 
 
 " Hark !" exclaimed Mother Derwent. " Hear that shout." 
 
 " I wish we knew," said Mary ; " if I were only on the shore." 
 
 " Don t go, Mary I" pleaded Jane ; " I shall die if you leave 
 me. Besides, I ain t dressed oh, Mary, do help me ; it ll all 
 turn out well enough, I dare say come." 
 
 " Yes, go," said Aunt Polly, smoothing out her dress ; " I ll 
 stay with grandma." Mary followed the agitated girl into 
 the little bedroom which they had occupied since their childhood. 
 The room was neatly arranged. Mother Derwent s best blue 
 worsted quilt, with the corners neatly tucked in at the foot-posts , 
 
328 MARY DERWENT. 
 
 covered the high bed, and the white linen pillows lay like snow- 
 heaps upon it. The old lady s best patch-work cushion was 
 placed in the arm-chair which stood in a corner, and a garland 
 of Princes pine hung around the little looking-glass, before 
 which Jane Derwent stood, " with a blush on her cheek and a 
 smile in her eye," arranging the folds of her white muslin bridal- 
 dress over a form that would not have seemed out of place in a 
 palace. 
 
 " Mary, shall I tie this on the side or behind ?" inquired the 
 blooming girl, holding up a sash of the most delicate blossom 
 color, with the usual volatility of her nature, forgetting her 
 alarm in the pleasant excitement of the moment. Mary lifted 
 her face from the wreath of wild-roses which she was forming 
 for her sister s hair, and smiled as she answered ; but it was a 
 smile of soft and gentle sadness ; patient and sweet as the breath 
 of a flower, though her cheek was pale with anxiety, for she 
 felt that something terrible was close upon them. 
 
 " Let me tie it for you," she said, laying the wreath on the 
 pillow, and removing a handful of roses from her lap to a basket 
 which stood on the rude window seat. " There, now sit down, 
 while I twist the roses among your curls." 
 
 Jane sunk gracefully to her sister s feet, while she per 
 formed her task. When the last blossom was entwined on her 
 temple, the bride raised her beautiful face to her sister s with an 
 expression of touching love. "Oh, Mary, should I have been 
 so happy, if it had not been for you? How glad I am 
 that you persuaded me to tell Edward about that bad man!" 
 
 Mary did not answer in words, bat her eyes filled with pleasant 
 tears ; she bent down and laid her cheek against that of the 
 bride, and they clung together in an embrace full of love and 
 sisterly affection. 
 
 While they were talking, a boat put off from the opposite 
 shore, and, as Jane looked out, she saw Edward Clark and the 
 missionary land on the Island. Edward ran towards the houso 
 in breathless haste. 
 
THE WHITE QUEEN S GIFT. 329 
 
 " Oh, Mary, that s him and the minister. Please go out first, 
 sister, while I get my breath." 
 
 But while she was speaking, Edward Clark ran through the 
 kitchen, and dashing into the bed-room, flung his arms around 
 Jane, who stood with her lips apart, lost in astonishment. 
 
 " Jane, dear Jane, forgive me ! Oh, how beautiful you look I 
 But it cannot be. Mary, Ma.ry, the wedding is all broken up. 
 Wintermoot s Fort is swarming with Tory troops. The woods 
 are full of Indians. Get ready, I beg of you get into my boat, 
 and make the best of your way to Forty Fort. The Tories have 
 already taken Fort Jenkins ; but we shall give them hot work 
 before they get hold of another block-house. Jane, dear Jane, 
 look up don t tremble so I come, be a brave girl, like Mary. 
 Grandmother Grandmother Derwent, do you know what I am 
 saying ? Aunt Polly Carter, you ought to have some courage ; 
 do come and help them off I Keep close to the east bank of the 
 river till you get opposite the Fort, then land, and run for 
 your lives. Jane, Jane, in the name of Heaven, do not 
 faint !" 
 
 " Edward, Edward, what is it how can we go what must 
 we do ?" exclaimed Jane, throwing her arms around his neck, 
 wild with terror. 
 
 " Our marriage, it cannot take place to-day. The valley is 
 full of enemies. Our people are halfway to Wintermoot s ; 
 I must go back at once every man is needed," he repeated 
 breathlessly. 
 
 " They will kill you they will kill you, and us !" shrieked the 
 bride. 
 
 " Hush, Jane I" and Mary drew her sister av?ay ; " this is no 
 time for tears ; Edward has need of all his strength." 
 
 At that moment the missionary came in. 
 
 " Away !" he cried, addressing Clark ; " why do you loiter 
 here ? your friends are on the move by this time. Away, I tell 
 you ! Leave the family to inc." 
 
 A scene of confusion followed. Jane Derwent sank fainting in 
 
330 MARY DEKWENT. 
 
 the arms of her sister, and all Mary s energies were tasked to 
 recover her from that death-like swoon. 
 
 " God, save her 1" cried Edward Clark, pressing a kiss on the 
 forehead of his betrothed, and hastening away. 
 
 " Oh 1" exclaimed Aunt Polly, " if I only knew where Sim 
 White was 1" 
 
 " I saw him last at Forty Fort", replied Clark rushing past her 
 
 " Then I m agoin there too !" she exclaimed. " Here, grand 
 ma Derwent, give me a sun-bonnet, a handkerchief, or somethin . 
 Tain t no use to spile my best Sunday bonnet." 
 
 " We ll all go," cried Mrs. Derwent ; " we shall be safe there. 
 Mary, Mary Derwent 1" 
 
 " What shall we do," cried Mary, who heard this call from the 
 next room, turning to the missionary " how must I act ? She 
 is quite senseless, and I cannot carry her." 
 
 " Give her to me," answered the minister. " Go and get 
 something to wrap round her." 
 
 A mantle hung on the wall. Mary left her sister to the minis 
 ter, and reached up to take the garment down. Her sleeves 
 broke loose in the effort, and fell back from her arms, exposing 
 the jewelled serpent that Catharine Montour had clasped around 
 it. The missionary saw the jewel, and gave a start that almost 
 dislodged Jane from his hold. 
 
 " Where tell me, child where did you get that ?" he said, 
 with a sort of terror as if he had seen a living snake coiled on 
 the snow of her arm. 
 
 " She gave it to me the white queen whom they call Catha- 
 ine Montour." 
 
 " Where and when ?" 
 
 "One night the very next, I remember now, after Walter 
 Butler tried to persuade her. You know all I would say. This 
 strange lady sent for me to meet her at the spring." 
 
 " And you went you saw her ?" cried the minister, forgetting 
 the danger of the insensible girl in his arms everything in the 
 question. 
 
THE WHITE QUEEN S GIFT. 331 
 
 " Yes, I saw her. She talked to me ah, how kindly ! and 
 at the end, clasped this on my arm. Now I remember, she told 
 me if danger threatened me or mine from the Indians, to show 
 them this, and it would save us." 
 
 " Trust to it yes, trust to it, and remain here in safety. This 
 strange lady is in the valley ; her tents are pitched on the little 
 island in the mouth of the Lackawanna. Her jewel must have 
 power among the savages." 
 
 " I feel certain of it," answered Mary, dropping her arm, and 
 leaving the mantle on the wall. " I would risk more than my 
 life on that noble lady s word." 
 
 The missionary looked on her earnestly, and evidently without 
 knowing it, for his eyes filled with tears, which he made no effort 
 to hide. 
 
 " You saw her, and she saw you? Was she kind was sho 
 gentle ?" 
 
 " Oh, very kind very gentle. If I dared, perhaps I might 
 say more than kind, for she hold me against her heart almost 
 all the time we were talking, and once I am sure she kissed my 
 hair." 
 
 11 Stay here ; trust to her promise till I come again," said the 
 minister, laying Jane on the bed, and preparing to leave the 
 room. 
 
 " I will stay," answered Mary, bending over her sister, and 
 kissing her lips, which were just beginning to crimson with new 
 life. 
 
 As the missionary passed through the kitchen, Aunt Polly ran 
 ufter him. 
 
 " If you re going over, just set me across. Gineral Washington 
 is on t other side, and I can t leave him among the Tories, anyhow. 
 We ll set Mother Derwent and the gals afloat, and then every 
 one for his self, says I. There, Miss Derwent, don t patter round, 
 looking for sun-bonnets any longer. I ll risk the other rather 
 than wait. Mary Mary Derwent, I say I" 
 
 The missionary did not appear to understand her, but passed 
 
332 MAEY DEE WE NT. 
 
 through the room as if she had not spoken. Mary left her sister 
 for an instant, and entered the kitchen. 
 
 " Come, get ready and go with me," cried the old maid. 
 " Mrs. Derwent and Janey can pull down in the canoe, and I ll 
 take you behind me on the Gineral." 
 
 " No," replied Mary ; " we are safe here the Indians have al 
 ways liked me. Be calm, grandmother ; you are in no danger 
 we will stay here. I may be able to assist those on the shore if 
 the battle goes against us." 
 
 " Fm gone 1" cried Aunt Polly, dashing forwards after the 
 missionary. " The Tories ain t agoin to scare me ! I hope to 
 goodness Cap tin Slocums ill fight in the rear ; I shall never 
 get my pay for that ere rum if he don t turn up safe." 
 
 She followed the missionary, and placed herself in his boat 
 just as it was putting off, leaving old Mother Derwent weeping 
 helplessly on the hearth, and Mary encouraging her sister, full 
 of serene fortitude, and praying silently for the safety of the 
 neighbors and friends who were marching to the fight.] 
 
 CHAPTER XLIIL 
 
 THE WOMEN AT FORTY FORT. 
 
 AND now the cry of mustering battle rose like wildfire through 
 the valley. The farmers forsook the fields, mechanics left their 
 workshops, and armed with such weapons as presented them 
 selves, gathered in companies, eager to drive out their invaders. 
 Women left their cabins, and with their children sought the 
 shelter of various forts, or armed themselves like the men, and 
 stood at bay on their own thresholds. It was one of these com 
 panies filing off towards Forty Fort, the most extensive fortifica 
 tion on the river, which Aunt Polly had met on her way to 
 
THE WOMEN AT FOKTY FOET. 333 
 
 Monockonok Island. Col. Zebulon Butler, a staunch patriot and 
 an officer of the continental army, had chanced to return home 
 on a visit to his family at this awful period, and was by unani 
 mous consent made commander-in-chief. Colonels Denison and 
 Dorrance volunteered their aid, and that day came five commissions 
 from the army, accompanied by the missionary, who having at 
 tained intelligence of the invasion, went to urge their presence. 
 Thus the raw recruits were officered by experienced men, and 
 there was hope from delay, for Captain Spralding was already 
 on his march to the valley with a well drilled company. 
 
 With these advantages and hopes there arose a division of 
 opinion in the council at Forty Fort ; but the impetuous and in 
 experienced carried the day, and the opinion of the brave com 
 mander was overruled. Alas, for that council and the men who 
 controlled it ! The fatal order was given. In a body the pa 
 triots were about to storm Wmtermoot s Fort, hoping to surprise 
 its garrison. 
 
 Having decided their own fearful destiny, this band of martyrs 
 marched out of the fort and mustered under the clear sun, which 
 they would never see rise again. 
 
 It was a mournful sight those old Connecticut women stand 
 ing in front of the block-house ready to say farewell, and call 
 God s mercy down upon the heads their bosoms had pillowed, in 
 some cases, for fifty years ; heads too grey for the general ser 
 vice for which their sons had gone, but not too grey for defence 
 of those grand old wives and mothers, who, fired with patriotism 
 and yet pale with terror, stood to see them go. 
 
 Seldom have troops like those gone forth to battle. No 
 fathers and sons marched side by side there, but grandfathers 
 and grandsons, the two extremes of life, stood breast to breast 
 on that fearful day. Congress had drawn the strength and pith 
 of the valley into its, own army and left it cruelly defenceless. 
 Thus each household gave up its old men and boys, while the 
 mothers, already half bereaved, looked on with trembling lips, 
 ready to cry out with anguish, but making mournful efforts to 
 
334 MARY DEKWENT. 
 
 cheer them with their quivering voices. Lads, too young for 
 battle, saw their elder brothers file off with reckless envy, while 
 the little grandchildren, who looked upon the whole muster as a 
 pleasant show, clapped their hands in glee, more painful still, 
 and followed the grey-headed battalion with sparkling eyes. 
 
 Younger women, with husbands in the wars, strove to console 
 their mothers, but dropped into silence with the vague words 
 upon their lips, while the children tugged at their garments and 
 clamored for one more sight at the- soldiers. 
 
 When all were gone when the hollow tramp of those moving 
 masses could no longer be heard, the women looked at each 
 other with a vague feeling of desolation. The bravest heart 
 gave way then ; one woman threw an apron over her head that 
 no one might see her crying, another looked upon the earth with 
 her withered hands locked, and tears finding mournful channels 
 in the wrinkles of her quivering face ; another sat down on the 
 ground, gathered her children around her, and wept in their 
 midst, while two or three strove to dash their fears away with 
 wild attempts at boastfulness and defiance, and the rest fell to 
 work preparing to receive the fugitives who were every moment 
 applying for admission to the fort. 
 
 Thus the day wore on. For some hours everything outside 
 the fort was still as death, but, a little after noon, that dull tramp 
 of feet came back, measured and stern, and a little girl, who had 
 climbed to a loop-hole in the fort, called out that she saw the 
 " sogers going through the trees, with their guns and bayonets 
 a shining like everything;" and, again, " that she saw Colonel Zeb. 
 Butler on his great brown horse, with his cocked hat on, and a 
 grand feather dancing up and down oh beautifully I" 
 
 <l What next, what next who goes next ?" cried the grand- 
 dame ; " look, Hetty, do look if you can see grandpa anywhere. ; 
 
 " No, grandma," cried out the child, in great glee, " but there s 
 Colonel Denison, and Lcftenant Dorrance, and Leftcnant Ransom, 
 all with their swords out. Oh, Aunt Eunice, Aunt Eunice ! hero 
 comes Captain Durkee." 
 
THE WOMEN AT FOETY FOET. 335 
 
 " My ROD my son 1" cried an old woman in the crowd, while 
 the tears coursed down her face, " look again, Hetty, dear, and 
 tell me just how he seems." 
 
 " I can t, Aunt Eunice, taint no use ; here comes Captain 
 Bidlack ahead of his company. Oh, here s a lot of folks I 
 know Mr. Pensil and Mr. Holenback, and there goes Mr. 
 Dana, and, oh dear, oh dear, there s Uncle Whitton, looking 
 this way." 
 
 " My husband my husband 1" cried a fair young girl, only 
 three weeks a bride ; " here, Hetty, catch my handkerchief and 
 shake it out of the port-hole ; he ll know it and fight the 
 harder." 
 
 "Do, Hetty, darling, that s a purty gal ; do look once more 
 for Captain Durkee. There," continued the old woman, appeal 
 ing to the crowd around her with touching deprecation, w I 
 hain t hardly had a chance to speak to him yet. Mebby you 
 don t know that when the Continentals wouldn t give him leave 
 to come hum and take care of his old inarm, he just threw up 
 his commission, and there he is a volunteer among the rest on 
 em ; so du give me one more chance du you see him yet, 
 Hetty ?" 
 
 " Yes, Aunt Eunice, I kinder think I see his feather a-dancing 
 over the brush." 
 
 " And not his face ? Oh dear, if I could only climb ; will some 
 on ye help me ; Du now, I beg on ye." 
 
 The poor old woman made a struggle to climb up the rude 
 logs, but fell back, tearing away a handful of bark and bringing 
 it down in her grasp. 
 
 " They ve all gone now," cried out the child ; " I can t see no 
 thing but s^me crows agin the sky, follering arter em." 
 
 " Following arter em Lord a massy upon us then!" whispered 
 the old woman drawing a heavy breath, and she turned away with 
 a deadly paleness on her face, without addressing the child again. 
 
 " There, they all go on the run now hurra hurra I Won t 
 the Injuns catch it hurra 1" 
 
336 MAKY DEKWENT. 
 
 All the little voices in the fort set up an answering shout as 
 the child clambered down from her post. The younger women 
 received this infant battle-cry as an omen. Their faces, hitherto 
 so anxious, flushed with enthusiasm ; those who had wept before, 
 started up and went to work at random, tearing up old sheets 
 and scraping lint, while a group of little boys built a fire within 
 the stockade, and went to work vigorously, moulding bullets 
 from hot lead they melted in the iron skillets, which were yet 
 warm from cooking the last household breakfast. 
 
 The women knew that the troops had moved up stream, and 
 would go on till they met the enemy ; so, with their hearts 
 leaping at every noise, they waited in terrible suspense for the 
 first shot. Thus two hours crept by two long, terrible hours, 
 that no human being in that fort ever forgot. Two or three 
 times little Hetty climbed up to her old look-out the loop-hole, 
 but came down in silence, for nothing but the still plain met her 
 search. The third time, however, she called out, but with less 
 enthusiasm than before : 
 
 " Here conies somebody down the cart-road, full trot, on a 
 great white hoss ; oh, it s Aunt Polly Carter, with her go-to- 
 meeting bonnet on, a-riding like split ; I guess somebody 7 ed 
 better let her in, for she s turning right up to the fort." 
 
 " She comes from up stream ; she must a seen the army ; some 
 one run and tell the guard to let her in," cried a score of voices ; 
 " she s got news she ll bring news." 
 
 With a clamor of eager expectation, the women rushed up to 
 meet Aunt Polly, who, in defiance of all military laws, rode Gene 
 ral Washington within the stockade, and close up to the fort. 
 She was greatly excited ; her huge bonnet had taken a military 
 twist, and loomed out from one side of her head, giving her grim 
 features to full view ; a large cotton shawl, flaming with gor 
 geous colors, was crossed over her bosom and tied in a fierce knot 
 behind ; she carried a long walnut switch in her right hand, worn 
 to a tiny brush at the end, for in the excitement of that ride she 
 had beaten General Washington into a hard gallop every other 
 minute. 
 
THE WOMEN AT FORTY FOKT. 337 
 
 " Have I seen em of course I have, and a wonderful sight it 
 was hull battalions of sogers a-moving majestically." 
 
 " Did you see my son was the enemy near can they surprise 
 Wintermoot s Fort ?" 
 
 " Don t ask me, neighbors don t say a word 1" cried Aunt 
 Polly, dismounting from General Washington, and turning from 
 one eager inquirer to another, "for I don t know much more than 
 you do ; but this is sartin, them Tory Butlers know what they re 
 about ; they re outside of the fort, and drawn up in battle array ; 
 I never could a got through the sogers, if it hadn t been for Cap 
 tain Walter Butler ; he knew me at the first sight, and made 
 some of his men ride by Gineral Washington till we got this side 
 his army." 
 
 " How many are there did you see any Injuns ?" 
 
 " I couldn t begin to calkerlate ; yes, I did see a lot of Injuns 
 skulking in the swamp ; but seeing the Tories with me, they 
 didn t shute." 
 
 " But our side, our side where did you meet them ?" 
 
 " About halfway, marching right straight on Sim White 
 and all every man of J em ready to die for his country. Mr 
 White couldn t do more than slip out of the ranks, to tell me 
 how he come to be there, instead of waiting on me hum from 
 Miss Derwent s to-night, when Captain Durkee called arter 
 him." 
 
 " Then you saw my son ?" whispered Mrs. Durkee, drawing 
 close to the old maid ; " how did he look ? du tell me !" 
 
 " Brave as a lion, Miss Durkee ; except Sim White, thera 
 wasn t a man to match him in the hull company. Feller citi 
 zens, do your duty/ says I, stopping Gineral Washington as 
 they come in sight." 
 
 " We will God help us, and we will ! Tell our women folks 
 at Forty Fort to keep a good heart ; every man here ll die in 
 his tracks afore the enemy reaches them." 
 
 Aunt Polly drew the back of her hand across her eyes as she 
 said this ; her words were answered by a simultaneous sob ; even 
 
 22 
 
338 MAEY DEE WENT. 
 
 the children began to look wistfully at each other through their 
 tears. 
 
 "By and by," said Aunt Polly, "you ll hear em beginning. 
 Lord a massy on us, that s a shot 1" 
 
 A low cry ran through the crowd ; then a drawing in of the 
 breath, and a deep hush. Faces, tearful before, became deathly 
 pale now ; the old women locked their withered hands, and sent 
 dumb prayers to heaven ; the children huddled together and 
 began to cry. 
 
 " That s an awful sound," said Aunt Polly, looking over the 
 crowd. " Let every mother as has got a son up yonder, and 
 every woman as has got a husband tu lose, kneel down with me 
 and say the Lord s Prayer ; we women folks can t fight, and I 
 don t know nothing else that we can do. Lord a massy on usl ; 
 
 They fell upon their knees old women, young wives, and little 
 children uttering broken fragments of prayer, and quaking to 
 the sound of each volley that sw^pt down the forest. At first 
 the shots fell steadily and at intervals ; then volley succeeded 
 volley ; hoarse cries, the more terrible from their faintuess ; then 
 the awful war-whoop rose loud and fierce, sweeping all lesser 
 sounds before it. 
 
 The words of prayer froze on those ashen lips ; wild eyes 
 looked into each other for one awful moment ; the horror of that 
 sound struck even anguish dumb ; the shots died away, fainter 
 and fainter ; a moment s hush, and then louder, shriller, and ap 
 proaching the fort, came another whoop, prolonged into a sharp 
 
 yell. 
 
 Old Mrs. Durkee rose from her knees ; her voipe rang out 
 with fearful clearness over the crowd : 
 
 " Mothers, orphans, and widows, lift your faces to heaven, for 
 nothing but Almighty God can help us now 1" 
 
THE BATTLE-FIELD. 339 
 
 CHAPTER XLIV. 
 
 THE BATTLE-FIELD. 
 
 FIRED with stern enthusiasm, three hundred men a large 
 proportion of them grey haired and beyond their prime, the rest 
 brave boys had filed out from the fort and organized on the 
 banks of a small stream, which winds its way from the moun 
 tains and falls into the Susquehanna, above Kingston. Six com 
 panies marched from the fort, and here the civil officers and jus 
 tices of the court from Wilkesbarre joined them. After a brief 
 consultation, Captain Durkee, Ransom, and Lieutenants Ross 
 and Wells, were sent forward to reconnoitre. As their horses 
 thundered off, the Wyoming companies approached separately, 
 and filed into columns ; there was the pallor of stern courage in 
 every face ; a gleam of desperate energy in every eye. 
 
 The march commenced ; steadily and eagerly that little body 
 of patriots moved forward ; the hot sun poured down upon 
 them ; the unequal plain broke the regularity of their march ; 
 but the steady tramp of their approach never faltered ; the 
 youngest boy in the ranks grew braver as he passed the fort 
 where his mother watched, and turned his face to the enemy ; 
 old, grey-headed men lifted their bent frames and grew eagle- 
 eyed, as they looked back towards the shelter of their dames, 
 and onward for the foe. 
 
 Late in the afternoon, they came in sight of Wintermoot s 
 Fort. The enemy was prepared to receive them : Colonel John 
 Butler and his Rangers occupied the banks of the river between 
 them and the fort, and all the black, marshy plain, stretching to 
 the mountains, was alive with savages, led on by Gi-en-gwa-tah 
 and Queen Esther. Indian marksmen stood at intervals along the 
 line, and Johnson s Royal Greens formed on Col. Butler s right. 
 
 The Butlers had chosen their own battle-ground a level 
 
34:0 MARY BEEWENT. 
 
 plain, covered witli shrub oaks and yellow pines, with patches 
 of cultivation between. 
 
 The Americans halted. For one moment, there was a dead, 
 solemn pause. Col. Zebulon Butler spurred his horse, and rode 
 in front of his lines ; he lifted his hand his voice rang like a 
 trumpet from man to man. 
 
 " Men, yonder is the enemy. We came out to fight, not for 
 liberty, but for life itself, and, what is dearer, to preserve our 
 homes from conflagration, and women and children from the 
 tomahawk. Stand firm the first shock, and the Indians will give 
 way. Every man to his duty I" 
 
 There was no shout, no outcry of enthusiasm, but a stern fire 
 burned in those old men s eyes, and the warrior boys grew white 
 with intense desire for action. The brave leader wheeled his 
 horse, and fronted the enemy. His sword flashed upward three 
 hundred uncouth weapons answered it, and the battle commenced, 
 for against all that fearful odds, the Americans fired first, obey 
 ing their orders steadily, and advancing a step at each volley. 
 
 The Tory leader met the shock, and thundered it back again. 
 His plumes and military trappings were all cast aside ; a crimson 
 handkerchief girded his forehead, and he fought like any common 
 soldier, covered with dust and blackened with smoke, while his 
 son, who held no other command, galloped from rank to rank 
 carrying his orders. 
 
 But notwithstanding the fierce valor of their leader and the 
 discipline of those troops, the charge made by men fighting for 
 their wives and little ones was too impetuous for resistance. 
 The British lines fell back after the third charge. He threw 
 himself before them like a madman, rallied them, and gained his 
 own again. Then the fight grew terrible on both sides ; the 
 Americans, brave as they were, began to feel the power of num 
 bers. 
 
 A flanking party of Indians, concealed in the shrub oaks, 
 poured death into their ranks. In the midst of this iron rain 
 Captain Durkee was shot down, leading on his men. The Indian 
 
THE BATTLE-FIELD. 341 
 
 sharp-shootors saw him fall, and set up a fiendish yell that pierced 
 the walls of Forty Fort, and made every soul within quake with 
 horror. 
 
 The strife was almost equal. On the left wing, the force under 
 Colonel Denison fought desperately against the Indians, but they 
 outflanked him at last, and pouring from the swamp, fell like 
 bloodhounds on his rear a raking fire swept his men. 
 
 Thus beset by the savages behind and the Tories in front, he 
 thought to escape the iron tempest by a change of position. In the 
 heavy turmoil, his order was mistaken, and the word " retreat " went 
 hissing through his ranks. It flew like fire from lip to lip, striking 
 a panic as it fell. The British lines already wavered, another 
 moment, and they would have yielded. But that terrible mistake 
 gave them the victory. As Denison s division fell into confusion, 
 they rallied, pressed forward, and the battle became a rout. 
 
 In vain Zebulon Butler plunged into their midst, and riding 
 like a madman through a storm of bullets, entreated them to 
 rally. 
 
 " Don t leave me, my children !" he cried ; " one blow more 
 a bold front, and the victory is ours 1" 
 
 It was all in vain. The ranks were already scattered, the In 
 dians leapt in among them like ravenous wild beasts. The cap 
 tains were cut down while striving to rally their companies. 
 Tomahawks and bullets rained and flew after them as they fled. 
 Some were pierced with stone-headed lances ; some fell with their 
 heads cleft ; some broke away towards Forty Fort, or making 
 for the river, plunged in, and struggled against the rushing 
 stream for their lives. 
 
 No beasts of prey were ever hunted down like those unhappy 
 men. They were shot down everywhere in the grain fields, in the 
 swamp. Regardless of all cries for mercy, they were chased to 
 the river bank, dragged out from the bushes in which they 
 sought to hide themselves, even back from the waves, or beaten 
 and slaughtered among the stones which smoked with the warm 
 blood, poured over them. Thus the pursuit raged opposite 
 
34:2 MARY DEKWENT. 
 
 Monockonok Island. Towards Forty Fort scenes of equal hor 
 ror were perpetrated. The Indians rushed, leaping and howling, 
 like hungry wolves over the plain, cutting off retreat to the fort, 
 and those poor fellows who turned that way were shot and hewed 
 down in scores, or dragged back prisoners, and hurled among 
 the savages for future torture. 
 
 CHAPTER XLV. 
 
 THE HUSBAND AND WIFE. 
 
 FOR a long time Catharine Montour and her daughter re 
 mained absorbed in painful reflection amid the silence of the 
 tent ; then, as their thoughts began to revert to surrounding ob 
 jects, the entire stillness reigning upon the island, roused them at 
 the same moment. 
 
 " Mother, how is this ? I hear no sound abroad !" exclaimed 
 Tahmeroo, starting from her mother s arms, and looking appre 
 hensively in her face. 
 
 Catharine rose to her feet, and went out into the camp. The 
 island was wholly deserted, save by a few squaws, and the usual 
 guard around her tent. In a moment, she returned with some 
 thing of former energy in her manner. 
 
 " There is treachery intended here," she said ; " not an Indian 
 is on the island. This bloodshed must be prevented. Hark ! 
 there are shots. I hear distant drums that yell 1 God help 
 the poor souls that must perish this day I" 
 
 " But what can we do, mother ? The fight rages now !" 
 
 " Give me time to think," returned Catharine, clasping her 
 hands over her forehead, and striving to force back her old forti 
 tude. 
 
 " Oh, may God help rne ! that angel girl on the island ! Tah- 
 
THE HUSBAND AJSTD WIFE. 343 
 
 meroo, we must save her. I have promised but the warriors 
 leave me that bracelet may not be enough 1" 
 
 " Mother, I will preserve her life with my own let us go, for 
 this will be a terrible day. Come, mother, come !" 
 
 " Listen I" exclaimed Catharine ; " I hear the sound of oars." 
 
 " It may be Butler oh, if it is !" cried Tahmeroo, the thought 
 of her husband always uppermost in her mind. 
 
 Catharine hastened towards the entrance of the tent, but at 
 that moment the hangings were put aside, and the missionary 
 stood before them. 
 
 " Woman Lady Granby 1" he exclaimed, " what do you here 
 death and blood are all around beware that it does not 
 rest on your soul. Stop the progress of your savages save the 
 innocent." 
 
 " My God! I am helpless!" broke from Catharine s lips. "Go, 
 Tahmeroo, go at once and find the queen or the chief hasten, if 
 you would not have this murder on our heads. Oh, sir, I am 
 almost powerless here ; but what a weak woman can do, I 
 will." 
 
 Tahmeroo bounded away like a wild animal, while Catharine 
 sank into a seat, unnerved as she had not been for years. 
 
 " This is no time for weakness," exclaimed the missionary, 
 almost sternly; "you have grown too familiar with scenes of 
 blood to shrink here, lady. " 
 
 "But I am unusually helpless now," she said, clcspondingly ; 
 " my power is gone." 
 
 " Is not Gi-en-gwa-tah your wedded slave ? is not your will 
 a law among his people ?" 
 
 "It was, while I was reckless and strong to maintain it; but 
 now, alas! I am only a poor weak woman ! Since we first met 
 on the banks of this river, thoughts have awakened in my bosom 
 which had slept for years. This terrible life shocks me to the 
 soul, and the chief despises what he deems cowardice. Queen 
 Esther has regained her old power, and Walter Butler, my 
 child s husband, urges them on like a demon. They have leffc 
 
344 MAKY DEKWENT. 
 
 me here without a word; heaven only knows what the end will 
 be." 
 
 " You must do something do not give way; there is not a 
 moment to spare; human life is at stake 1" 
 
 " It is like a dream," said Catharine, vaguely; "the present 
 is gone from me your voice carries me back back to my early 
 youth. Where did I hear it then ?" 
 
 " This is no time for dreams, lady," cried the missionary. 
 " Only rouse yourself come away. Do you hear those shots 
 that yell ?" 
 
 But Catharine yielded more completely to the power which 
 dulled her senses she could realize nothing; years rolled back 
 their troubled tempest from her brain; she was once more in her 
 English home. Even the warwhoop of her tribe could not arouse 
 her. 
 
 " Will you not move ?" groaned the missionary. " The whole 
 valley will be slaughtered that innocent child on the island will 
 be killed. A second time, Caroline, as you value your soul, save 
 her !" 
 
 " That child the girl with an angel s face, and that form/ 
 said Catharine, dreamily, but with a look of affright, as if she 
 were just awakening. "Bless her, Heaven bless that angel girl!" 
 
 " Can you realize nothing ? Then I must say that which will 
 waken, or drive you wholly mad ! Woman Lady Granby 
 fly save that girl for as there is a God to judge between us 
 two, she is your own daughter." 
 
 Catharine sat motionless, staring at him vaguely with her 
 heavy eyes. 
 
 " I have no daughter but Tahmeroo," she said; "and she is 
 only half my child now." 
 
 " I tell you Mary Derwent is your daughter the child whom 
 you nearly killed in your insanity ! and believed dead." 
 
 Catharine started up with a cry, so long and wild that it made 
 the missionary start almost with terror. 
 " And you," she gasped; " you" 
 
THE HUSBAND AND WIFE. 34:5 
 
 " I am Varnham, yonr husband." 
 
 She fell back with the dull heavy fall of a corpse, burying her 
 face in her robe. The missionary raised her, trembling, and 
 shrinking both from her and himself 
 
 " Caroline my wife look up. Or has God been merciful, 
 and is this death ?" 
 
 "My husband my husband is dead; he is dead drowned, 
 in the deep, deep, unfathomable sea, years and years ago." 
 
 " Caroline, do not longer deceive yourself. Look at this 
 picture, this ring; do you recognize me now ?" 
 
 " And Heaven has not blasted me 1" she moaned. " I live still !" 
 
 " Your daughter our child Caroline ! They will murder her !" 
 
 " My daughter !" She rose to her feet again and repeated 
 the words with a gasp, as if she were shaking a great weight 
 from her heart. " My daughter!" 
 
 " Save her. The battle rages close by the island where she 
 lives. Go with me; your presence alone will protect her." 
 
 The anguish of his tone might have roused marble to con 
 sciousness; it brought back Catharine s tottering reason. 
 
 ".Child Mary daughter I will go, I will go. At least we 
 can die together! I and that child whom the angels loved, 
 but would not take." 
 
 She rushed from the tent, followed by Varnham. They met 
 Tahmeroo, who had just landed. 
 
 "They are near the fort," she cried, "fighting like wolves. 
 The chief and Queen Esther are in the thickest of the battle, 
 and Butler, too, my husband oh, my husband!" 
 
 " Fly to her, and say her mother is coming, Varnham. Man 
 or ghost, help me," cried Catharine. " I cannot speak I cannot 
 even have your forgiveness ; but we will save her, and then God 
 may be good, and let us die." 
 
 He rushed to his canoe without a word, and sped down the 
 waters like an arrow from the bow. All of Catharine s strength 
 came back. With resolute command she put off the madness 
 which had begun to creep over her, and turned to Tahmeroo. 
 
346 MARY DEKWENT. 
 
 " Follow me to the island near the fort. There is a young 
 girl there. Oh, my God, my God, let me see her once morel 
 Let me call her child, and die." 
 
 They pushed off in their canoe, and kept it steadily down the 
 stream, until within a mile of the island. 
 
 The sun was setting, and the crimson of the sunset deluged 
 the western sky, but the whole horizon was dark with smoke. 
 The report of fire-arms the echo of bullets the shrieks of the 
 dying, filled the air with awful clamor, and surged heavily over 
 the waters. 
 
 " My husband, my husband !" moaned Tahmeroo. 
 
 Catharine never spoke, but watched eagerly for a sight of the 
 island. She scarcely breathed, and her eyes were terrible in 
 their strained gaze. 
 
 At that moment a party of Indians appeared on the western 
 shore. They pointed to the canoe with angry gestures. Sud 
 denly they sprang into the water, like wild beasts and swam 
 towards the canoe. 
 
 " Mother," cried Tahmeroo, " they are coming here. Queen 
 Esther has sent them to murder us I" 
 
 A dozen hands grasped the frail bark, and dusky faces, terri 
 ble with war-paint, glared on the two women. 
 
 "Back!" exclaimed Catharine, rising up in the canoe, and 
 drawing her knife; "dare to disobey me and you shall be sent 
 from the tribe. Catharine Montour has spoken." 
 
 " The chief commands; Catharine Montour must go on shore." 
 
 " Yes, on the island yonder, but nowhere else. Tell Butler, 
 your white chief, that he will find me there." 
 
 They wrested the knife from her grasp, and sprang into the 
 canoe, offering no harm to either of the two women, but urging 
 the boat to the shore, heedless of cries and expostulations. 
 
 " God, oh God, my child 1" groaned Catharine, from between 
 her clenched teeth; " lost, lost 1" 
 
 When they reached the shore, the savages forced them out of 
 the boat, and with their tomahawks stove it to atoms. Then 
 
ASSAULT AND CONFLAGRATION. 347 
 
 they rushed off with a whoop that apprised their employer of his 
 
 triumph. 
 
 " This is Butler s work !" cried Catharine. " They are lost!" 
 " No, mother, come, we will go on foot it is not far there 
 
 may be a boat near the island." 
 
 They hastened along the shore with frantic speed through the 
 
 gloom of the coming night, pausing neither for words nor breath, 
 
 clasping each other s hands closer as the breeze bore nearer and 
 
 nearer the sounds of conflict. 
 
 CHAPTER XLVI. 
 
 ASSAULT AND CONFLAGRATION. 
 
 THE storm of battle was over, but the scenes that followed 
 were more terrible by far than the first shock of arms had been ; 
 for now murder ran red-handed over the plains, and the demons 
 of victory were, like wild beasts, ravenous for more blood. 
 
 Along that vast plain there was but one hope of escape ; a 
 broad swamp, teeming with Indians, lay between them and the 
 mountains, who covered the ground above Forty Fort, and cut 
 off the wretched men who turned that way ; but Monockonok 
 Island was almost in a line with the battle-field, and, though the 
 river was swollen from a late freshet, to a good swimmer, a pas 
 sage was not impossible ; from thence they escaped up a gulley 
 in the hills on the other side ; and to this point the patriots 
 made, in the frenzy of desperation. 
 
 As Catharine Montour and Tahmeroo came down the river, 
 urged to breathless speed by the shrieks of dying men and the 
 fiendish yells of their captors, fugitive after fugitive fled to the 
 water ; some were shot down before their eyes ; some making 
 superhuman efforts, swam for the island, and dashing across, 
 cither escaped or perished on the other side ; the savages fol- 
 
34:8 MAKY DEKWENT. 
 
 lowed them like demons ; but their human game was too thick 
 in the bushes of the shore for individual pursuit upon the river ; 
 and when a man escaped that way, the painted hounds sent a 
 derisive yell after him, and turned to other bloody work. 
 
 The Tories were more relentless still ; to them kindred blood 
 gave zest to murder, and many a brother fell on that awful shore 
 by the hands that had helped rock his cradlo. 
 
 To this spot General Murray came, while Catharine was toil 
 ing towards it in the gathering twilight. He had appealed to 
 the Butlers, and expostulated with the savages, but all in vain ; 
 he might as well have attempted to force bloodhounds from their 
 scent, as persuade these monsters from their horrid work. 
 So desperately were they urged by insatiate passion, that 
 torches were applied to their own fort, that the red glare of 
 conflagration might give them light for more murder, when the 
 sun refused longer to lookdownupon their sickening cruelties. 
 
 Hopeless of doing good, and shocked to the soul by scenes 
 into which he had been inadvertently thrown, Murray turned to 
 the island, hoping to find the missionary there, and unite with 
 him in some project to save the prisoners yet left alive. 
 
 As he stood upon the shore, looking vaguely for some means 
 of conveyance, a figure rushed by him, plunged into the water, 
 and swam for life towards the nearest point of land ; a half 
 dozen Indians bounded after the man, shrieking and yelling out 
 their disappointment. Directly, a young man, black with pow 
 der and fierce as a tiger, sprang in among the savages, crying out : 
 
 "Have you got him ? Give me the scalp twenty-five guineas 
 to the man who holds his scalp !" 
 
 The Indians pointed to the struggling man, now but dimly 
 seen in the smoky twilight ; Butler uttered a fierce oath, snatched 
 a rifle from the nearest savage, and levelling it with deliberate 
 aim, fired sending an oath forwards with the bullet. 
 
 The fugitive sunk, and his disappearance was greeted with 
 another yell from the savages ; but a moment after the head re 
 appeared, and Edward Clark struggled up the banks of the wil- 
 
ASSAULT AND CONFLAGRATION. 349 
 
 low cove and went towards the cabin, staggering either from ex 
 haustion or some wound. 
 
 " Pve missed him," cried Butler, tossing the rifle back to its 
 owner ; " but we ll save that island, and all that s on it, for our 
 night carouse. There is a little hunchbacked imp that you may 
 have for your own humors, but as for that young rascal, and a 
 girl that we shall find there, I don t give them up to any one. 
 Now off again ; here are more rats creeping to the river." 
 
 Murray had stepped behind a tree as the party came up and 
 rushed away again, yelling and whooping as they went. He was 
 about to throw off his coat, and attempt to spring into the river, 
 and make for the island, when he was startled by footsteps, and 
 the quick, heavy breathing of persons in his close neighborhood. 
 He peered among the thick trees that towered around him, but 
 could discern no one, though the sound of murmuring voices 
 came distinctly to his ear. 
 
 " Thank God !" said a clear, female voice, in accents of deep 
 feeling, "thank God, the horrid work has not commenced here ; 
 let us hasten to the fort we may yet be in time !" 
 
 " No, mother, no," replied a voice of sadder melody ; " if there 
 is more bloodshed, it will be done on that little island. If my 
 husband has a part in this, the fair girl whom I have seen gliding 
 among the trees yonder, day after day, waiting his coming, that 
 girl will be his victim ; she must have angered him in some way. 
 That beautiful girl was to have been married to-night, mother. 
 Can you think why Butler should seek vengeance on her ? Oh, 
 you do not know all ! You have not heard him whisper her 
 name in his sleep, sometimes mingling it with endearments, and 
 again with curses. You have not felt his heart beating beneath 
 your arm, and known that it was burning with love, or hate born 
 of love, for another. But why do we stand here ? I do not 
 wish her to die, and he shall not take her alive. Let us go and 
 give them warning ; is there no boat nothing that will take us 
 over V 
 
 " Alas, no ! what can we do ?" 
 
350 MAKY DERWENT. 
 
 " Mother, help me pull off my robe ; I can swim." 
 
 " Father of heaven ! No ; the distance is beyond your 
 strength the water is very deep I" exclaimed the first voice 
 in alarm. 
 
 "Mother, he shall not kill that angel girl he shall not have 
 the other. I am very strong ; I can swim to that island ; see, 
 now the lights stream upon the water ; it does not look so dan 
 gerous. Let me try !" 
 
 " Is there no other way ?" exclaimed the answering voice. 
 " I cannot consent to this risk j it may be death to you, my 
 child 1" 
 
 But while the words were on her mother s lips, Tahmeroo 
 flung off her robe, and with a wild leap, plunged far out into the 
 waves, calling back : 
 
 " Stay there do not move I will come back with a canoe." 
 
 " My child oh, Father of mercies, she is lost !" 
 
 " Not so, madam ; she is light and self-possessed have no 
 fear," said Murray, stepping out from the shadow in which he 
 had stood. 
 
 Before Catharine could turn, or had distinctly heard his voice, 
 a man rushed by her, with the bound of a wild animal, and 
 plunged into the river. Catharine caught one glance at the 
 wild face, but before she could catch her breath, he was strug 
 gling with the current and his pursuers stood upon the bank. 
 The men were both white, though the ferocity of fifty savages 
 broke from the eyes which glared down upon the water, where 
 that old friend was struggling. 
 
 " Come back, Lieutenant Shoemaker come back," cried the 
 man upon the bank ; " the current is too swift you ll be lost ; 
 come on shore and I ll protect you." 
 
 The fugitive turned. That man had fed at his table ; par 
 taken of his wealth and his kindness ; he belonged to the Tory 
 army, and a word from him was safety. He was almost 
 sinking, but these words of sweet charity brought him to life 
 again ; and swimming back to the shore, he held up his trern- 
 
ASSAULT AND CONFLAGRATION. 351 
 
 bling hand to be dragged from the water. "Windecker, for that 
 was the demon s name, grasped the hand, whirled his tomahawk 
 aloof, and buried it in that noble forehead, uplifted in gratitude 
 towards him 1 
 
 Catharine Montour uttered a shriek of horror ; the fiend 
 turned his face towards her with a sickening laugh, and lifting 
 the body of his benefactor half from the water, dashed him back, 
 reddening the waves with his blood, and shouting : 
 
 " That s the way to serve traitors 1" 
 
 All this happened so suddenly that the horror was perpetrated 
 and the assassin had fled while Murray and Catharine were 
 stunned by the shock. 
 
 When the atrocity came upon her in its force, Catharine sat 
 down on the earth, sick and trembling, while Murray drew his 
 sword to cut the murderer down ; but he plunged into the bushes 
 and rushed off towards the fort, which was now one vast cloud 
 of lurid smoke. 
 
 Murray returned to the bank just as Tahmeroo shot across the 
 river in Mary Derwent s little craft, which she found in the cove. 
 
 " It was bravely thought of 1" exclaimed Murray, stepping 
 into the boat and drawing Catharine after him ; " they must 
 search for other boats and this will give us time. Ha ! they 
 have completed their work at the fort. See 1" 
 
 As he spoke, a volume of dusky light surged heavily across 
 river, and a spire of flame shot upwards, quivering and 
 flashing, and flinging off smoke and embers, till the forest trees 
 and the still waters gleamed red and duskily for miles about the 
 burning fort. The poetry of Catharine Montour s nature was 
 aroused by the fierce solemnity of this scene. 
 
 " See !" she cried, starting to her feet in the canoe, and point 
 ing down the river, where the fire reflected itself like a vast 
 banner of scarlet, torn, and mangled, and weltering in the waters. 
 " See ! the very river seems a-flame the woods and the moun 
 tains, all are kindling with light. Can a day of judgment be 
 more terrible than that ?" 
 
352 MAKY DEE WENT. 
 
 She stood upright as she spoke, with one hand pointing down 
 the stream. Her crimson robe floated out on the wind, and the 
 jewelled serpent about her brow gleamed like a living thing in 
 the red light which lay full upon her. As she stood there, the 
 very priestess of the scene, her extended arm was grasped until 
 the gemmed bracelet sunk into the flesh, and a face, pale and 
 convulsed, was bent to hers. 
 
 " Woman Caroline Lady Granby I speak to me." The 
 words died on Murray s lips; he remained with his grasp still 
 fixed on her arm, and his eyes bent on her face, speechless as 
 marble. 
 
 A wild, beautiful expression of joy shot over Catharine Mon- 
 tour s face ; her heart leaped to the sound of her own name, 
 and she started as if to fling herself upon his bosom. The im 
 pulse was but for an instant ; her hand had quivered down to 
 her side, but while his eyes were fixed on her face, it became 
 calm and tranquil as a child s. She released herself gently from 
 his grasp and sat down. 
 
 " Grenville Murray," she said, in a clear, steady voice ; " for 
 more than twenty years we have been dead to each other ; do 
 not disturb the ashes of the past. My child my first-born child 
 is in danger on that island. Help me to save her, and then let- 
 is part again forever and ever I" 
 
 The words were yet on her lips when a bullet whistled from 
 the shore, and cut away the ruby crest of the serpent which lay 
 upon her temple. 
 
 She fell forwards at Murray s feet, stunned, but not otherwise 
 injured. A moment, and she lifted her head. 
 
 " Who was shot ? Was he killed ?" she muttered, drawing her 
 hand over her eyes, and striving to sit upright. 
 
 " The gentleman is safe, mother," said Tahmeroo, " and I 
 you hear me speak and I am well." 
 
 " Bless you, my brave girl I Grenville Murray, why are we 
 here ? There is death all around us ! On, on 1" 
 
 Murray had regained his self-command ; he took up the oar 
 
ASSAULT AND C O N F L A G K A T I O N . 353 
 
 which Tahmeroo had dropped, and urged the canoe forwards with 
 a steadiness that belied his pale face and trembling haads. Bullet 
 after bullet cut along their track before they reached the island ; 
 but the distance became greater, and the aim of their pursuers 
 was more uncertain. 
 
 They reached the little cove and sprung on shore. But they 
 had scarcely touched the green-sward, when the flames rushed 
 up from the burning pile in a bright, lurid sheet of fire, reveal 
 ing the opposite shore, and the forest far beyond, as if a volcano 
 had burst among the mountains. 
 
 " Mother, look yonder 1" said Tahmeroo, in a voice full of 
 terror, which arose to little above a husky whisper, and she 
 pointed to the opposite shore, where it lay in the full glare of 
 the burning fort. A swarm of red warriors were gathered upon 
 the steep banks, and lay crouching along the brink of the river, 
 like a nest of demons, basking in the fire-light ; and there, on 
 the spot which they had just left, she saw her husband, standing 
 with arms in his hands, stamping with rage as he saw them from 
 the distance. 
 
 " We have landed on the wrong side of the island," said Ca 
 tharine Montour, after a hasty glance at the demons swarming 
 on the shore, and securing the cable of another boat that lay 
 moored in the cove. " Tahmeroo, remain with this gentleman 
 and warn the people at the house, while I take the boat to the 
 opposite side there will be no escape within the range of their 
 rifles." 
 
 " Caroline Lady Granby, this must not be," said Murray, evi 
 dently forgetting their relative positions in the deep interest of 
 the moment. " How are you to escape the rifle-balls which 
 those fiends may level at you, for they are mad with blood, and 
 fire on friends and foes alike. I will take the boats round, while 
 you and this young woman warn the people up yonder." 
 
 The familiar name which Murray had unconsciously used, 
 melted like dew over the heart that listened ; but Catharine 
 struggled against the feelings which almost made a child of her, 
 
 9.3 
 
354: MARY DEE WE NT. 
 
 even in that hour of danger. The thoughts of other years were 
 swelling in her bosom, but there was calmness and decision in 
 her voice as she answered him. 
 
 " The danger would be alike to either," she said ; " nor could 
 one person row the canoe and secure the others at the same time. 
 I will go with you. My child, hasten to the house and warn 
 them of their danger keep within the bushes as you pass ; send 
 them down to the shore in small numbers ; and, mark me, avoid 
 bustle or appearance of alarm. Do you understand, and have 
 you courage to go alone ?" 
 
 The unhappy young woman stood with her face turned towards 
 the shore ; tears rolled down her cheek and dropped on her 
 clasped hands, while her mother was speaking. 
 
 " Yes, mother, I understand, and will save that poor girl 
 though he kill me, I will save her. I know the path ; I have trod 
 den it before," she replied, in a sorrowful and abstracted voice. 
 
 A low howl, like the prolonged cry of a pack of hungry wolves, 
 fired her to action once more. She looked on her mother. 
 " They have found some means of crossing," she said ; " they 
 will murder us when they see us warning their prey ; but I will 
 do it. Kiss me, mother farewell 1" 
 
 One wild kiss, a quick embrace, and Tahmeroo dashed up the 
 
 th with the bound of a wild deer. 
 
 Catharine Montour turned wildly to her companion. " That 
 cry I In in !" she cried, vehemently, springing into the 
 canoe. " They are upon the water ; let them fire upon us if 
 they will. Give me an oar, I can use one hand. Father of 
 Heaven I Did you hear that shout ?" 
 
 Murray saw that no time was to be lost. He sprang to her 
 side and steered round the island as rapidly as her impatient 
 spirit could demand, though his superior coolness kept them from 
 danger which she would have braved. By rowing close within 
 the shadow of the island, he escaped observation from the In 
 dians ; and those two persons, who had been a destiny each to 
 the other, sat alone, side by side, without speaking a word, and 
 
ASSAULT AND CONFLAGRATION 355 
 
 with scarcely a thought of each other. The lives of more than 
 fifty persons were in peril, and among them Catharine had two 
 children the Indian girl, already on her path of mercy, and 
 the gentle deformed, whom she was to call child for the first 
 time. 
 
 They landed on the eastern shore of the island. Murray was 
 drawing the canoes half on land, while Catharine dashed forward, 
 expecting every instant to meet Tahmeroo with the family she 
 had come to save. But instead of the females she sought, a half 
 dozen men, white as death, with bloodshot eyes, and hair erect 
 with terror, dashed by aiming for the gully on the eastern shore. 
 They were fugitives from the battle, and reeled with the terrible 
 exhaustion of swimming the river as they passed her with wild, 
 staggering bounds. 
 
 They saw her Indian dress, swerved with a despairing cry, and 
 fell upon their faces. 
 
 " On, on I" cried Catharine, waving her hand as she ran to 
 wards the house ; " I am no enemy. In the name of Heaven, 
 gave yourselves I" * 
 
 They started up again, and rushed to the river saw the 
 canoes half in the water, half upon the land pushed them into 
 the stream, dashed Murray aside, and sent him reeling back 
 against the trunk of a tree, when he attempted to interfere, and 
 tumbling over each other in desperate haste, pushed off, leaving 
 the family on the island, and those who had come to save them, 
 in a more desperate situation than ever. 
 
356 MARY DERWENT. 
 
 CHAPTER XLVII. 
 
 THE WARNING AND FLIGHT. 
 
 ALL that day, Mary Derwent, her grandmother, and sister re 
 mained alone in the house. They heard the mustering battle, the 
 sharp strife, and the scattering horrors of the rout that followed. 
 Towards nightfall, the plain grew foggy from the smoke which 
 began to rise and spread from the smouldering fort. The yells 
 and sharp rifle shots came close to the shore, and rang with hor 
 rible distinctness over the island. 
 
 The two girls were on their knees by the window, looking out 
 between the fragments of prayer which fell from their pale lips, 
 and quaking from soul to limb as the savage yells came nearer 
 and nearer the shore. 
 
 Mother Derwent was affected differently, and bringing down 
 an old rusty rifle that had belonged to her son, set to work and 
 scoured out the lock, and wiped the muzzle with a piece of oiled 
 deer-skin, which she afterwards wrapped around her bullets when 
 she was ready to load ; and such a charge it was what with 
 powder, wadding, buck-shot, and bullets, the old rifle was as 
 good as a cannon, only it was a great deal more likely to beat 
 the old woman s brains out by a vicious recoil than pour all that 
 amount of lead upon the enemy. Still Mother Derwent waxed 
 valiant as the danger grew near, and, with every war-whoop, 
 put in a new charge, pushing it down with a stick from her 
 swifts, which was the best ramrod to be found, and waited for 
 another whoop to load again. 
 
 " Come, gals, don t be sitting there, scared to death ; that 
 ain t no way to act in war-time. Don t you see my ammunition s 
 give out a ready. Bring out the pewter tea-pot, and I ll melt it 
 down. Oh, marcy on us, here they are !" 
 
 The girls started up, looking wildly out of the window. A 
 
THE WAENING AND FLIGHT. 357 
 
 man came up the footpath, bounding towards the house, his 
 clothes dripping wot, and water streaming from his hair. 
 
 " It is Edward Clark 1" shrieked Jane Derwent, rushing to 
 wards the door. 
 
 "It is Edward," whispered Mary, with a throb of exquisite 
 thankfulness. 
 
 Mother Derwent only heard footsteps rushing towards her 
 cabin. Planting herself on the hearth, she lifted the rifle to her 
 shoulder, and stood with her face to the door, ready to fire 
 whenever an enemy appeared. 
 
 But the door burst open, and while she was tugging at 
 the obstinate trigger, Edward Clark rushed by her, calling 
 out : 
 
 " Flee to the east shore, one and all. A horde of savages are 
 making for the river 1" 
 
 While he spoke, half a dozen more fugitives came rushing up, 
 followed by others, till fifteen or twenty men, too exhausted for 
 swimming, and without other hope, turned at bay, and proceeded 
 to barricade themselves in the cabin. 
 
 " You will not let them murder us ?" gasped Jane Derwent, 
 clinging to her lover with all the desperation of fear. 
 
 The young man strained her to his bosom, pressed a kiss upon 
 her cold lips, and strove to tear himself from her arms ; but she 
 clung the more wildly to him in her terror, and he could not free 
 himself. 
 
 " Jane," said a low, calm voice from the inner room, " come 
 and let us stay together. The great God of heaven and earth is 
 above us He is powerful to save !" 
 
 Jane unwound her arms from her lover s neck, and tottered 
 away to the foot of the bed where her sister was kneeling. There 
 she buried her face in her hands and remained motionless ; and 
 none would have believed her alive, save that a shudder ran 
 through her frame whenever a rifle shot was heard from the 
 river. A few moments of intense stillness then a loud fierce 
 howl, appallingly near, and several rifles were discharged iu 
 
358 MAKY DEKWENT. 
 
 quick succession. A paler hue fell on every stern face in that 
 little phalanx ; but they were desperate men, and stood ready 
 for the death, pale and resolute. 
 
 The door was barricaded, and Edward Clark stationed him 
 self at the window with his musket, and kept his eye steadily 
 fixed on the path which led to the cove. But with all their pre 
 caution, one means of entrance had been forgotten. The win 
 dow of Mary Derwent s bedroom remained open ; and the basket 
 of roses lay in it, shedding perfume abroad, sweetly as if human 
 blood were not about to drench them. 
 
 The hush of expectation holding back the pulsations of so 
 many brave hearts, caused Jane, paralyzed as she was with fear, 
 to raise her face. Her eyes fell on the window a scream broke 
 from her, she grasped her sister s shoulder convulsively, and 
 pointed with her right hand to a young Indian woman who stood 
 looking upon them, with one hand on the window-sill. When 
 she saw those-two pale faces looking into hers, Tahmeroo beck 
 oned with her finger ; but Jane only shrieked the more wildly, 
 and again buried her face in the bed-clothes. 
 
 Mary arose from her knees, and walked firmly to the window, 
 for she recognized Tahmeroo. A few eager whispers passed be 
 tween them, and Mary went into the next room. There was a 
 stir, the clang of a rifle striking the hearth, then the valorous old 
 woman rushed into the bedroom. 
 
 Tahmeroo had torn away the sash, and had leapt in 
 forcing the bewildered girl through the opening. When her 
 charge was on the outer side, the young Indian cleared the win 
 dow with the bound of an antelope, and dragged her on, calling 
 on the rest to follow. 
 
 " Let the fair girl keep a good heart," whispered the Indian, 
 urging her companion to swifter speed ; " if we have a few mo 
 ments more all will be saved." 
 
 The words were scarcely uttered, when a blood-thirsty yell 
 broke up from the cove: the war-whoop, the war-whoop ! 
 
 " The boats are waiting be quick ! more can be done yet," 
 
THE WARNING AND FLIGHT. 359 
 
 cried Catharine Montour, as she rushed up from the river towards 
 the house. 
 
 Oh, it was a horrid fight that which raged around Mother 
 Derwent s dwelling the next moment. A swarm of fiends seemed 
 to have encompassed it, with shouts and yells, and fierce, blood 
 thirsty howling. The whiz of arrows, the crash of descending 
 tomahawks, and the sharp rifle-shot, mingled horribly with the 
 groans, the cries, and oaths of the murderers and the mur 
 dered. The floor of that log-house was heaped with the dying 
 and the dead: yet the fight raged on with a fiercer and more 
 blood-thirsty violence, till the savages prowled among the slain 
 like a host of incarnate fiends, slaking their vengeance on the 
 wounded and the dead, for want of other victims. 
 
 Through all this carnage, the Moravian missionary passed 
 unscathed, searching for his child. Many a fiery eye glared upon 
 him; many a hatchet flashed over his head; but none descended. 
 Another tall and lordly man there was, who rushed in the midst 
 of the savages, and strove in vain to put an end to the massacre. 
 They turned in fury upon him. He snatched arms from a dead 
 Indian, and defended himself bravely. Savage after savage 
 rushed upon him, and he was nearly borne to the ground, when 
 Catharine Montour sprung in the midst, with the bound of a 
 wounded lioness, and flinging her arms about him, shouted 
 
 "Back, fiends ! back, I say. He is our brother." 
 
 The descending knife recoiled with the fierce hand that 
 grasped it, and the savage darted away, searching for a new 
 victim. That instant, Queen Esther sprang upon them, the 
 bloodless grey of her face looking more horrible from a glare 
 of smouldering fire that broke up from the kitchen behind 
 her. 
 
 She had just flung her tomahawk, but wrenched the stiletto 
 from her torn robe. It flashed upwards, quivered, and fell 
 noiselessly as a blasted leaf descends. Catharine gasped heavily 
 again the knife descended. Murray felt a sharp pang, but so 
 keen was the agony of feeling that woman on his bosom, so 
 
360 MAKY DERWENT. 
 
 close, and yet so far away, that he was ignorant when the 
 poignard entered his side. 
 
 He cleared the door with one spasmodic leap; and, as the 
 dwelling burst into flames behind him, rushed towards the spring 
 with his bleeding burden, nor slackened his speed till her arms 
 relaxed their clasp, and her face fell forwards on his breast. He 
 felt the warm blood-drops falling upon his bosom, and pressed 
 her closer to him, but with a shudder, as if they had been drop 
 ping upon his bare heart. 
 
 Down the tortuous path he staggered, growing deathly 
 sick as he sat down, folding her madly in his arms. He thought 
 that it was the beat of her heart against his, that made him so 
 faint; but it was his own life ebbing slowly away, through the 
 wound Queen Esther had given him. 
 
 Meantime, Tahmeroo urged her companion forwards with an 
 impulse, sharpened by the sounds of conflict which followed 
 them. Half mad with contending feelings, Jane Derwent strug 
 gled in her conductor s hold, and would have rushed back iu 
 search of those she had left, could she have freed herself. But 
 the young Indian kept a firm grasp on her arm, and dragged her 
 resolutely towards the boats, regardless of her entreaties. They 
 were too late; the canoes had put off. 
 
 When Mary saw her sister on her way to safety, she turned 
 back and went in search of her grandmother, whom she found at 
 bay on the hearth-stone. She seized her by the arm, and point 
 ing to the cellar door, dragged her down the ladder, closing the 
 entrance after her. A hatch door opened into the garden, and 
 through this the old woman and the girl fled into the open air. 
 
 The savages were rioting there, whirling firebrands snatched 
 from the hearth, and striving to kindle the heavy logs into a 
 conflagration. They saw Mary, in her floating white dress, and 
 fell back, gazing after her with dull awe, through the smoke of 
 their smouldering brands. Her deformity saved the old woman, 
 for to them it was a mark from the Great Spirit, and to harm 
 her would be sacrilege. 
 
THE WARNING AND FLIGHT. 361 
 
 So the old woman and the angel girl passed through the sav 
 ages unharmed ; bat there was more danger from the Tories, 
 who shamed the heathen red men with coarser barbarities than 
 they yet knew, for family ties were sacred to the Indian. 
 
 As the two females fled shorewards, many fugitives ran across 
 the outskirts of the island, hiding among the vines and willows, 
 or recklessly aiming for the eastern shore. 
 
 Among the rest, two men passed them ; both were white, and 
 one was pursuing the other with desperate fury. One faltered 
 and fell as he passed her, staggering to his knees as the other 
 came up. 
 
 " Brother brother ! In the name of her who bore us, do not 
 kill me 1" shrieked the wretched man, looking with horror on the 
 uplifted tomahawk. " I will be your slave anything, every 
 thing, but do not kill me, brother 1" 
 
 " Infernal traitor 1" 
 
 The words hissed through his clenched teeth ; the tomahawk 
 whirled in the air, and came down with a dull crash ! The fra 
 tricide fled onwards a brother s life had not satiated him. 
 
 Mary turned sick with horror. 
 
 " On, grandmother, on 1" she called ; " they will kill her too, 
 our sister 1" 
 
 Jane saw them coming, sprang to her sister s arms, and began 
 to plead in a voice of almost insane agony. 
 
 " Oh, Mary, let us go back and try to find him ; we may 
 as well all die together for they will murder us 1" 
 
 Tahmeroo parted them abruptly, and springing into the water, 
 waded to a log which lay bedded among the rushes, and rolled 
 it into the current. It was scarcely afloat, when a party of In 
 dians came in sight, and, with a fierce whoop, rushed towards 
 the little group. Tahmeroo sprang back upon the bank, point 
 ing to the log. 
 
 " See, it floats ! Fling yourself upon it I will keep them 
 back !" 
 
 She did not wait to see her directions obeyed, but walked 
 firmly towards the savages. 
 
362 MAEY DEKWENT. 
 
 CHAPTER XLVIII. 
 
 QUEEN ESTHER S ROCK. 
 
 THOSE three females made their way to the floating timber ; 
 Mary and Jane forced the old grandmother on it first, then 
 placed themselves firmly on either side of her, and with a branch 
 of driftwood, which Jane snatched from a thicket, pushed out on 
 the deep river. The current, swift and strong, bore them on 
 wards, and with a terrible sense of vastness, they floated off into 
 the night, leaving shrieks, the rattle of shot, and red flames 
 roaring and quivering where that old home had been. 
 
 The night had set in, but that red conflagration kindled up 
 the waters and the dense woods with its lurid glare, which played 
 about the bridal garments of the young girls, and that beautiful 
 head, crowned with flowers, in fantastic contrast. The battle 
 was over, but the yell of some sav.age, as he sprang on his 
 victim, sounded horribly through the gathering stillness, and 
 made those hapless females shrink closer together on their frail 
 support. 
 
 Shuddering, and half paralyzed by these horrors, and those 
 they had just escaped, the little group drifted helplessly on. 
 But now, a new fear crept over Mary, for she alone noticed the 
 danger. As the pores of the timber gradually filled, its size 
 became insufficient for their weight ; every moment it was sink 
 ing lower and lower in the water. At first she was appalled, 
 but after a moment, the sublime bravery of her soul came back. 
 The timber was heavy enough for two the old grand-dame and 
 that beautiful sister should be saved as for her 
 
 She looked down into the waters deep, deep ; the crimson of 
 the distant fires warmed them up like blood ; she could not give 
 herself to them there ; it was like bathing in a new horror. But 
 
QUEEN ESTHER S HOCK. 363 
 
 soon the log floated nearer the shore, and carried them into deep 
 shadows. 
 
 " Grandmother Jane !" 
 
 "What, Mary, dear are you frightened?" said the old 
 woman. 
 
 " You speak strangely has the cold chilled yon through, 
 sister ?" questioned Jane, shivering herself in the chill night air. 
 
 " Grandmother sister you know where to go ; when you 
 come opposite Kingston, do your best to get on shore ; run to 
 Aunt Polly Carter s tavern, and hide till there is some chance of 
 escape over the mountains. Do you listen, Jane ?" 
 
 " Yes, yes ; but you are with us you will tell us how to act 
 then." 
 
 Mary did not speak for a moment ; a sob rose to her lips, but 
 made no sound. 
 
 " It is well to understand," she said, faintly. " Grand 
 mother ?" 
 
 " Yes, Mary, but hold on ; your arms fall away you will slip 
 off hug me closer, Mary." 
 
 The arms clung around her with sudden tightness ; that pale 
 face fell upon her shoulder, and a kiss touched her withered 
 Deck ; one hand groped farther, and caught eagerly at Jane 
 Derwent s dress. 
 
 " Jane oh, sister Jane !" 
 
 " Don t, Mary ; you almost pull me off." 
 
 The hand fell back. 
 
 " Mary Mary for mercy s sake, hold tight ! Oh, dear oh, 
 Mary Mary !" 
 
 "What what is it? Grandmother, you make me tremble 
 with these cries. Mary, don t frighten her so she s old." 
 
 " She s gone God forgive us two she s gone slipped off 
 drowned !" 
 
 Jane uttered a wild cry, and seizing the timber with both 
 hands, strove madly to hold it back ; but the current had them 
 in its power, and mercilessly bore them on. 
 
364: MART DERWENT. 
 
 A cloud of white rose upon the water as they swept .down 
 ward, sending back cries and shrieks of anguish. It sunk and 
 rose again, this time nearer the shore. Then some human being, 
 Indian or white, dashed through the brushwood, leaped into the 
 stream, striking out for that mass of floating white. A plunge, 
 a long, desperate pull, and the man was struggling up the bank, 
 carrying Mary in his arms. 
 
 It was the missionary ! He held her close to his heart ; he 
 warmed her cold face against his own, searching for life upon 
 her lips, and thanking God with a burst of gratitude when he 
 found it. 
 
 Mary stirred in his embrace. The beat of her arms on the 
 waters had forced them to deal tenderly with her ; and the breath 
 had not yet left her bosom. For a moment she thought herself 
 in heaven, and smiled pleasantly to know that he was with her. 
 But a prolonged yell from the plain, followed by a slow and ap 
 palling death-chant, brought her to consciousness with a shock. 
 She started up, swept back her hair, and looked off towards the 
 sound. There she met a sight that drove all thoughts of heaven, 
 from her brain. A huge fragment of stone lay in the centre of 
 a ring, from which the brushwood had been cut away, as an 
 executioner shreds the tresses of a victim, in order to secure a 
 clear blow. Around this rock sixteen prisoners were ranged, 
 and behind them a ring of savages, each holding a victim pressed 
 to the earth. And thus the doomed men sat face to face, 
 waiting for death. 
 
 As she gazed, Queen Esther, the terrible priestess of that 
 night, came from her work on Monockonok Island, followed by 
 a train of Indians, savage as herself, and swelled the horrid 
 scene. With her son s tomahawk gleaming in her hand, she 
 struck into a dance, which had a horrid grace in it. With every 
 third step, the tomahawk fell, and a head rolled at her feet ! 
 The whole scene was lighted up by a huge fire, built from the 
 brushwood cleared from the circle, and against this red light her 
 figure rose awfully distinct. The folds of her long hair had 
 
QUEEN ESTHER S EOCK. 365 
 
 broken loose and floated behind her, gleaming white and terrible ; 
 while the hard profile of her face cut sharply against the flames, 
 like that of a fiend born of the conflagration. 
 
 Mary turned her eyes from this scene to the missionary : he 
 understood the appeal. 
 
 " I will go," he said ; " it may be to give up my life for 
 theirs." 
 
 " And I," said Mary, with pale firmness " God has smitten 
 me with a great power." 
 
 She touched her deformed shoulder, as an angel might have 
 pointed out its wings, and sped onwards towards the scene of 
 slaughter her feet scarcely touched the earth. The missionary, 
 with all his zeal, could hardly keep pace with her. 
 
 Queen Esther s death-chant increased in volume and fury as 
 the chain of bleeding heads lengthened and circled along her 
 tracks. Life after life had dropped before her, and but two were 
 left, when Mary Derwent forced herself through the belt of 
 savages and sprang upon the rock. 
 
 " Warriors, stop the massacre in the name of the Great 
 Spirit, I command you !" 
 
 She spoke in the Indian tongue, which had been a familiar 
 language since her childhood ; her hand was uplifted ; her eyes 
 bright with inspiration ; around her limbs the white garments 
 clung like marble folds to a statue. 
 
 Queen Esther paused and looked up with the sneer of a de 
 mon in her eyes. But the Indians who held the men yet 
 alive, withdrew their hold, and fell upon their faces to the earth. 
 
 The two men crouched on the ground, numb with horror ; 
 they did not even see the being who had come to save them. 
 
 The missionary bent over them and whispered 
 
 " Up and flee towards Forty Fort." 
 
 They sprang up and away. The Indians saw them, but did 
 not move. Queen Esther heard their leap, and ended her chant 
 in a long, low wail. Then she turned in her rage, and would 
 have flung her tomahawk at the angel girl, but the Indians 
 
366 MARY DERWENT. 
 
 sprang upon the rock and guarded her with their uplifted 
 weapons. Superstition, with them, was stronger than reverence 
 for their demon queen. 
 
 The rage of that old woman was horrible. She prowled 
 around the phalanx of savages like a tigress ; menaced them 
 with her weapons with impotent fury, and, springing on her 
 horse, galloped through the forest by the smouldering fort and 
 across the plain, until she came out opposite the little island 
 where her son was buried. Her horse paused on the brink of 
 the stream, white with foam and dripping with sweat, but she 
 struck him with the flat of her tomahawk and he plunged in, 
 bearing her to the island. Here she cast her steed loose, stag 
 gered up to the new-made grave, dropped the reeking toma 
 hawk upon it, and fell down from pure physical exhaustion, 
 bathed with blood as a fiend is draped in flame. 
 
 As the aged demon took her way to that grave, the angel girl 
 turned to her path of mercy. For that night the massacre was 
 stayed. To the Indians she had appeared as a prophetess from 
 the Great Spirit, who had laid his hand heavily upon her shoulder 
 as a symbol of divine authority. 
 
 CHAPTER SLIX. 
 
 THE ISLAND GRAVE. 
 
 THE morning broke, with a quiet, holy light, through the 
 thicket of crab-apple, and wild cherry trees, which overlaced the 
 spring in the centre of the island ; and there upon the blooming 
 turf beneath, lay the form of Catharine Montour. Her eyes 
 were closed, and the violet tint of exhaustion lay about them. 
 The feathers which composed her coronet were crushed in a 
 gorgeous mass beneath her pale temple, and her forehead was 
 
THE ISLAND GKAVE. 367 
 
 contracted with a slight frown, as if the serpent coiled around it 
 were girding her brow too tightly. Ever and anon her pale 
 hands clutched themselves deep into the moss, and her limbs 
 writhed in the agony of her wounds. The pale, haggard face 
 of Grenville Murray lay upon the moss where he had fallen 
 when she dropped away from his arms, as it had done the whole 
 night ; and Varnham, the missionary, sat a little way off, look 
 ing mournfully on them both. There was a solemn and awful 
 sorrow in his silence ; yet something of cold sternness. He 
 could not look on that pale, haughty man so near his wife, with 
 out some thought of the evil that had been done him. 
 
 On the swell of the bank, a short distance from the spring, 
 crouched another miserable being. Tahmeroo sat upon the 
 ground, looking upon her mother, in dreary desolation. 
 
 The expression of pain gradually cleared from Catharine Mon- 
 tour s face, and at last her eyes unclosed and turned upon Mur 
 ray. She saw the death-drops on his forehead, and, struggling 
 to her elbow, took his cold hand. 
 
 " Lady Granby, speak to me ! In the name of God, I pray 
 you, speak before it is too late. Say that I am forgiven !" he 
 murmured. 
 
 There was a depth of agony in that voice which might have 
 won forgiveness from the dead. Catharine Montour strove to 
 speak, her lips moved, and her eyes filled with solemn light. 
 Murray fell back and gave up her hand. Must he go into eter 
 nity with a doubt upon his soul ! 
 
 " Caroline," said a low, broken voice, and a face full of anguish 
 bent over her, " forgive this man, as I do, before he dies." 
 
 The hand which Yaruham took was cold, but it moved with 
 a faint clasp, and her eyes, which had opened again, turned with 
 a confident and gentle expression upon the missionary s. A soft 
 and almost holy emile, like that which slumbers about the sweet 
 mouth of an infant, fell upon the lips of Catharine Montour, and a 
 pleasant murmur, which was more than forgiveness, reached the 
 dying man s ear. 
 
368 MAKY DERWENT. 
 
 " Great God, I thank thee that thou hast vouchsafed me the 
 grace to forgive this man !" burst from the missionary ; his 
 face fell forwards upon his bosom, and he wept aloud, as one 
 who had found the great wish of a lifetime. 
 
 Murray turned his eyes, now freezing with death, upon Catha 
 rine s face ; he saw that smile, and over his own features came 
 a light that for one moment threw back the ashen shadows 
 gathering there. 
 
 Varnham moved gently to his side, took the cold hand, and 
 held it till it stiffened into the marble of death. Catharine 
 watched his face, as it saddened, shade by shade with the ebbing 
 pulses that quivered under his touch. When she saw that all 
 was over, a cold chill crept through her frame, the lids closed 
 heavily over her eyes, and she was almost as lifeless as the man 
 who had been her destiny. 
 
 Yarnham laid the hands of the dead reverently down, and 
 lifting Catharine Montour in his arms, rested her head upon his 
 bosom, while he called on Tahmeroo for water. She ran down 
 to the spring, formed a cup with her two hands, and sprinkled 
 the deathly face. But there came no signs of consciousness. 
 She seemed utterly gone. Varnham knew that her heart was 
 beating, for he felt it against his own, and for the moment 
 a faintness crept over him ; he forgot where he was, and that 
 death lay close by ; all the years and events that had separated 
 those two souls floated away, like mist ; he bent down and 
 whispered, " Caroline, my Caroline !" as he had done a thousand 
 times when she was insane and unconscious as then of the love 
 which had not died, which never could die. 
 
 " Caroline, my Caroline." 
 
 His head was bent, and his trembling lips almost touched her 
 forehead ; he heard nothing, saw nothing ; an exclamation of 
 surprise arid alarm broke from Tahmeroo, but he was all uncon 
 scious of it till the form of Catharine Montour was torn from his 
 arms by the chief Gi-en-gwa-tah, who folded her to his broad 
 chest, casting a look of sovereign disdain over his shoulder, as he 
 
THE CAPITULATION. 369 
 
 bore her away. A company of fifty Indians had followed him 
 to the Island, and when Varnham rose, dizzy with the sudclea 
 attack, they swarmed around him, offering no violence, but cut 
 ting off his retreat. When they left him at liberty again, he 
 was alone with the body of his forgiven enemy. 
 
 In a little out-house that had escaped the flames, Varnham 
 found a spade and pickaxe. He left the body with Tahmeroo, 
 and, going down to the old cedars, dug a grave with his own 
 hands. Then, with the assistance of the Indian girl, he bore the 
 body away, and laid it in the cold earth with unuttered prayers 
 and awful reverence. The sods with which they heaped the 
 earth that covered him were green, and the night dew was still 
 upon them. But a drop fell upon that grave more pure than all 
 the dew that trembled there. It was the tear of a man who 
 had learned to forgive as he hoped to be forgiven. 
 
 CHAPTER L. 
 
 THE CAPITULATION. 
 
 THERE was no hope for the people of Forty Fort, the stockade 
 at Pittston had surrendered, Fort Jenkins was already taken, and 
 from Wilksbarre the inhabitants were fleeing to the hills. Thus 
 helpless and hopeless, the fugitives who had succeeded in reach 
 ing the fort with the women and children already there, had no 
 choice between the terms of capitulation offered by Colonel John 
 Butler and another massacre. 
 
 While the plain was strewn with the dead bodies of men who 
 
 had marched forth from those gates so valiantly the day before, 
 
 they were thrown open that the triumphant enemy might pass 
 
 in. At the command of their colonel, the patriots came slowly 
 
 i, 24 
 
370 MAEY DEEWENT. 
 
 forwards and stacked their arms in the centre of the stockade. 
 The women and children clustered in miserable groups, and stood 
 in dead silence, waiting for the murderers of their sons and 
 husbands. 
 
 The victors approached with beating drums and flying colors, 
 divided in two columns. The Tories were headed by the 
 Butlers, while in at the south gate marched the savages, with 
 Queen Esther and Gi-en-gwa-tah at their head. 
 
 The faces of the Whigs were marked by the Indians with black 
 paint in order to insure their safety. The children retreated 
 from this savage kindness with loud outcries. While the pallid 
 women passed before their captors in defile, shrinking with 
 horror from their touch. 
 
 " Ain t you ashamed, wimmen of Wyoming ?" cried Aunt 
 Polly Carter, marching boldly up to the tall savage who distri 
 buted the war-paint. "What are ye skeered at? I never 
 expected to have the mark of Cain sat on my forehead by a wild 
 Injun; but if I must, I must ! Here, Mr. Copperhead, make it 
 good and black. I don t want no mistake, if any of your chiefs 
 should take a notion for more scalps; and I say, Mr. Injun, hold 
 your head down here, while I whisper something. If you could 
 just put an extra dab on to let your men folks know I m 
 engaged, if they should want to marry any of our wimmen, I d 
 be much obleeged to you." 
 
 The Indian, who did not comprehend a word of all this, crossed 
 his blackened stick on her cheek, gave her a push, and was ready 
 for the next trembling creature that presented herself. As Aunt 
 Polly took her place among the marked women, a little boy 
 pulled her by the dress, and whispered that he had just seen 
 Gineral Washington with an Injun on his back. 
 
 " General Washington my boss you don t say so ?" 
 
 " Yes, Aunt Polly, his own self, with a big Injun a riding 
 him." 
 
 " He shan t ride him out of the fort, anyhow," exclaimed 
 Polly. " Captin Captin Walter Butler I call on you to help 
 
THE CAPITULATION. 371 
 
 me get my hoss back. One of them ere red fellers has stole 
 Gineral Washington right afore my two eyes." 
 
 " I am afraid you will have to buy him back," replied Butler, 
 laughing. " What can you give ?" 
 
 " Give ! I shan t give nothing for what s my own now, I tell 
 you." 
 
 " Then, I am afraid, you and the General will have to part." 
 
 The savages began to march out of the fort, and Aunt Polly 
 followed in hot haste. 
 
 " Captin! captin!" she shrieked, "make the bargain for me 
 do; that s a good soul." 
 
 Butler addressed a savage near him in his own tongue, and 
 turned again to the old maid. 
 
 " Give him some money, Miss Carter, and you can have the 
 horse." 
 
 " Money! pay money for a hoss that I ve owned these 
 
 twen this long time I Wai, that is a purty how de do, I 
 
 must say." 
 
 But Butler s remonstrances and the sullen look of the Indian 
 proved that she could not obtain the faithful animal on any other 
 terms. That moment, the General looked towards his mistress, 
 and recognizing her with a low neigh of delight, Aunt Polly 
 could not withstand that appeal. She put her hand in her 
 bosom and drew forth an old shot-bag, as ruefully as if it had 
 been her own heart, untied it, and took out the two guineas, her 
 chief treasures. She eyed them ruefully, and was about to 
 thrust them into the bag again, when the General, sagacious 
 animal, whinnied. Aunt Polly grasped one of the pieces, and 
 thrust the rest into her bosom. 
 
 " Perhaps you could persuade him to take a string of beads, 
 or some gew-gaw instead," whispered Butler, rather pitying her 
 distress. 
 
 " Lawful sakes !" cried the old maid, joyfully. " I ve got 
 just the purtiest string ; stand in front of me, captin, and turn 
 your back, while I loosen my dress so as to get em off" 
 
372 MART DEKWENT. 
 
 Butler obeyed, laughing heartily, and Aunt Polly hurriedly 
 untied a string of bright blue glass beads, and held them up 
 before the Indian, who gave a humph of delight, and snatched 
 them from her hand, at the same moment. Aunt Polly darted 
 towards the General, slipped the bridle over her arm, and rushed 
 back into the fort with old horse trotting behind her ; she reached 
 a safe corner, and sat down on the ground, fairly hysterical with 
 tears and laughter. 
 
 " Oh, Gin ral, Gin ral Washington, I should have died, if Pd 
 lost you I know I should I He ! he ! only to think how I 
 cheated the feller poor old Gin ral, you re thin as a shad ! A 
 string of old blue beads, that wasn t worth ten coppers try 
 agin, when you want to cheat a born Connecticut woman, you 
 red varmint you." 
 
 When the Tories and savages had fairly disappeared, Aunt 
 Polly was among the first to leave the fort. 
 
 " Wai," she said to the bystanders, as she mounted on the 
 General, with the aid of a broken bench, " I ve lost my saddle; 
 but, thank goodness, I can ride bare-back. But where s Captin 
 Slocum ? he hain t said a word about that ere rum." 
 
 The unhappy inmates of the fort were too much occupied with 
 their own griefs to heed these pathetic lamentations, and Aunt 
 Polly rode briskly away, muttering confusedly of her losses, and 
 her delight at rescuing the General at so little cost. 
 
 Her heart sank when she drew near her own house, for she 
 had passed nothing but smoking cabins all the way; but a sud 
 den rise of ground revealed it, standing and unharmed. As she 
 galloped up to the door, Sim White, looking really glad, came 
 out to meet her, while Mother Derwent and Jane appeared in 
 the doorway. 
 
 " All safe !" cried Aunt Polly, springing to the ground. 
 " Where s Mary, and the minister ?" 
 
 " Mary is on the bed, worn out with last night s work," 
 began the old lady, but Aunt Polly did not pause to hear her 
 out. 
 
THE DOUBLE WEDDING. 373 
 
 "Sim, take the Gin ral, feed him well and, Sim you may 
 kiss me. I don t care if Grandmother Derwent and Jane do sec 
 you." 
 
 " Sim gave her a hearty embrace, and they all entered the 
 house, where Aunt Polly related all that had happened, and 
 bringing out a blacking-brush, insisted on marking all their faces 
 like her own. 
 
 But this quiet lasted only a few hours. The Indians, in total 
 disregard of the terms of the capitulation, began plundering and 
 setting on fire all the houses in the district. 
 
 CHAPTER LI. 
 
 THE DOUBLE WEDDING. 
 
 In a few hours after Aunt Polly s return home, the missionary 
 came to the tavern, looking more haggard than he had ever ap 
 peared before. He inquired in a tremulous voice after Mary, 
 and when be found her lying pale and exhausted on Aunt Polly s 
 bed, but wir.h an expression of sublime thankfulness on her face, 
 the tears absolutely swelled into his eyes. 
 
 " Are you ill are you hurt ?" inquired the young girl, reach 
 ing forth her hand. 
 
 He shook his head mournfully. 
 
 "And the lady that beautiful white queen did you find her 
 at last. I was almost sure that she passed me as I ran 
 towards the river ; but you could not believe it. Oh, tell me, 
 did you hear nothing about her or the Indian girl ?" 
 
 " I saw them both ; one is unhurt, the other" 
 
 " The other not her, not her I Oh, do not tell me that she 
 has come to harm !" 
 
 " I found her wounded not mortally, I hope and believe ; 
 
374: MARY DEKWENT. 
 
 but she was forced from me while insensible, and carried away 
 by the savages ; but God is merciful, my child, and she has 
 learned to trust in him." 
 
 Mary had turned her face on the pillow, and was weeping 
 bitterly. 
 
 " Mary, my child, be comforted." 
 
 His voice thrilled her soul with its sorrowful tenderness. 
 
 " My child I Oh, that is a sweet, holy word. She called me 
 her child in the same way, and my heart trembled within me as 
 it does now." 
 
 The missionary stretched forth his arms as if to gather the 
 gentle girl to his bosom, but checked himself with an effort that 
 shook his whole frame, and seating himself by the bed, began to 
 talk hopefully to her. 
 
 " You are safe here, at least for the present," he said. 
 " Young Butler has taken this house under his protection from 
 some kindness to the landlady ; but your sister Jane will endan 
 ger everything. Clark has escaped to Wilkesbarre ; he must 
 not rest there Butler would burn every house in the village to 
 reach him. Tell your sister to be in readiness for instant flight. 
 I will seek for Edward Clark, bring him here, and perform the 
 marriage ceremony, that they can depart in company, and join 
 the unhappy fugitives that are now in the mountains." 
 
 Mary arose at once. 
 
 " We will be ready," she said, with quiet firmness. 
 
 " No, not you, or the old lady ; for you, there is no danger." 
 , " But my sister ?" 
 
 " She will be with her husband, and I have need of you." 
 
 A faint flush rose to Mary s cheek. Spite of danger and 
 death, her heart would betray its secret in that delicate color. 
 
 " I have great need of you, for we must seek out that strange 
 lady together." 
 
 Her eyes brightened. 
 
 " Seek her ? can we ever hope to know who she is, and why 
 she affects every one so strangely ?" 
 
THE DOUBLE WEDDING. 375 
 
 " Yes. You shall learn everything soon, Mary only be pa 
 tient and trust in me a little longer. Now, farewell for an hour 
 or so. Tell Jane to have all things in readiness against my 
 return." 
 
 "We will obey you," she replied ; and without speaking to 
 the rest, he left the house. 
 
 When Aunt Polly heard the object of his visit, she was great 
 ly excited. If it was dangerous for an individual to remain sin 
 gle in such perilous times, she thought, for her part, that one 
 person was just as much to be considered as another. 
 
 She wasn t so certain of her house being kept over her head, and 
 if her visitors couldn t feel safe without getting married, she cer 
 tainly should be scared out of her seven senses. Just as if But 
 ler wouldn t have as much spite against any other single woman 
 as Jane Derweut indeed ! 
 
 Sim, who had just come from the barn, where he had bounti 
 fully provided for General Washington, heard the latter part 
 of this speech with some dismay, but recovered himself imme 
 diately, and signified that he was ready to stand up to the mark 
 whenever Miss Carter spoke the word. 
 
 Directly, there was such a rummaging in the old chest of 
 drawers, up stairs, as hadn t been known since they first held 
 that setting out. Half a dozen old silk dresses were taken out 
 and tried on ; a new pair of morocco shoes were fitted over the 
 fine homespun stockings, provided for this interesting occasion 
 thirty years before, and after a reasonable delay, the energetic 
 spinster made her appearance, clothed in a light green silk, with 
 a waist three inches long under the arms, and a skirt gored 
 like an umbrella cover. The dainty fashion with which she en 
 tered the room where Jane Derwent sat, in her soiled and dreary. 
 Jooking white dress, would have made even the missionary smile 
 had he been there, heavy as his heart was. 
 
 " I calkerlate they won t find us back ards in getting ready, 
 Jane," she observed, seating herself with great dignity ; " you 
 don t happen to know if Mr. White has gone up stairs do ye ?" 
 
376 MAKY DEKWENT. 
 
 Here Sim appeared at the door, with his best home-spun coat 
 on, and a broad ruffle, plaited by Miss Polly s own fingers, flut 
 tering from his bosom like a fan. 
 
 Aunt Polly rewarded this prompt devotion with an approving 
 nod, settled the skirt of her dress, and observed to Jane that 
 the minister seemed to be a long time in coming. 
 
 Jane answered with a faint smile that deepened to a look of 
 sorrowful delight as she saw Edward Clark and the missionary 
 coming through the door-yard gate. Mrs. Derwent and Mary 
 came in, and a brief ceremony united the couple whose wedding 
 had been so fearfully disturbed the day before. 
 
 Then Aunt Polly arose, and observed to the minister that, 
 seeing as everything was so unsartin in war-time, he might as 
 well kill two birds with one stone. 
 
 The missionary was too much troubled for a smile, but grave 
 ly performed the required ceremony, which made Miss Polly Car 
 ter Mrs. Simon White, and placed that inestimable lady on the 
 pinnacle of human felicity even in that region of death and sor 
 row. 
 
 Two horses had been provided for Clark and his bride, and 
 within half an hour after their marriage they were on their route 
 to the mountains, over which half the inhabitants of the valley 
 were wandering, houseless, wretched, and desolate, soul and 
 body. 
 
 Aunt Polly, whose fears had entirely left her after she became 
 Mrs. White, insisted upon supplying Jane with a warm shawl 
 and a home-spun dress, with a pillow-case full of biscuits, dried 
 beef, and dough-nuts. Indeed, that little ceremony had so com 
 pletely opened her heart that she made no objections when the 
 missionary proposed to fill a flour-bag with similar food, which 
 he would place upon the back of General Washington and him- 
 self convey to the mountains, for without such help he knew well 
 that starvation must fall upon the unhappy fugitives. 
 
 A few hours after, the newly married couple and the mission 
 ary were deep in the Pocono Mountains the young people flying 
 
THE DOUBLE WEDDING. 377 
 
 for their lives, the minister eager to carry help to those who 
 were ready to perish. It was after dark when they came upon 
 the great body of fugitives, and oh, it was a terrible sight ! 
 More than a hundred women and children, with but one man to 
 guide them, were struggling up the steep ascent of the hills, 
 some pausing to look upon the valley they had left, which their 
 burning homes made a wilderness of fire. Others rushing wild 
 ly forwards towards the gloomy swamp where so many were to 
 perish, afraid to look behind them lest some savage might spring 
 from the thicket and snatch the little children from their arms. 
 Women, so young in widowhood that they could not yet realize 
 their loneliness, would turn with vague hope to see if the be 
 loved one was not following them into the wilderness. Old wo 
 men, more helpless than the little ones, would toil up those steep 
 ascents with uncomplaining patience. 
 
 Among the group came a mother carrying a lifeless infant in 
 her arms, where it had died against her bosom. She could not 
 stay behind long enough to dig a grave for the little one, and so 
 folded the precious clay to her heart and toiled onwards. These 
 wretched women had fled from their burning homes without time 
 for preparation ; most of them were without food, and now the 
 pangs of hunger gnawed away the Uttle strength that terror had 
 left to them. One by one the faint and the feeble dropped off 
 and were left to perish. Children wandered away into the 
 swampy grounds, and never came forth again. Old people st 
 down patiently on the rocks and fallen trees, and saw them 
 selves abandoned without complaint. 
 
 As the missionary and his companions penetrated the moun 
 tains, they found these wretched beings perishing in their path. 
 The minister raised them up, fed them from his stores of food, 
 and let them ride, by turns, upon the horses, from which the 
 young and strong dismounted. 
 
 When they came up with the main body, it had halted for rest. 
 The little ones were clamoring for food, while the widowed 
 mothers had nothing but tears to give in answer to their cries. 
 
378 MAKY DEKWENT. 
 
 Into this scene of misery the minister brought his horse, laden 
 with food, and while the tears stood in his eyes, distributed it. 
 This kindness gave life and hope to them all. 
 
 At midnight the whole company lay down to rest, and the 
 sleep of exhaustion fell upon them. Then, in the stillness of 
 the woods, rose a wail, the faint, faint voice of a human soul 
 born in the midnight of the wilderness, amid tears and desola 
 tion. It was a mournful sound, the first cry of human innocence 
 trembling along that track of human guilt. When the weary 
 sleepers awoke, and prepared to move on, that pale mother 
 folded this blessed sorrow to her bosom, and prepared to keep 
 her place with the rest, but Jane gave up her horse to the suf 
 ferer, and toiled on, side by side with her young husband, made 
 happy, almost for the first time in her life, by conferring help on 
 others. 
 
 At daybreak, the missionary, having distributed his last morsel 
 of food, bade the unhappy wanderers farewell, and returned, 
 with a heavy heart, to the valley. 
 
 CHAPTER LII. 
 
 QUEEN ESTHER S DEPARTURE. 
 
 AT last the Tories, accompanied by their leaders and a greater 
 part of the Indians under the command G-i-en-gwa-tah and Queen 
 Esther, marched out of the valley. Mingling with the mournful 
 savageness of the scene, there was much that was droll and lu 
 dicrous. The squaws who followed the retiring invaders were 
 decked with the spoils taken from the burning houses, the more 
 fortunate wearing five or six silk and chintz dresses, one over 
 the other, and above these dropped the scalps taken from their 
 victims, which served as hideous fringes to their new costume. 
 
QUEEN ESTHER S DEPARTURE. 379 
 
 Many of them were mounted on stolen horses, and one old wo 
 man rode proudly in advance upon the identical side-saddle 
 which had so long been the chief treasure of Aunt Polly s man 
 sion ; upon her head were perched half a dozen headdresses of 
 every size and hue, the old maid s immense bonnet crowning the 
 whole, its yellow streamers floating out on the wind with every 
 movement of the delighted wearer. 
 
 Catharine Montour, still in the dull delirium of fever, was car 
 ried on a litter in their midst, but neither the chief nor Queen 
 Esther ever approached it. The old queen, from time to time, cast 
 glances of malignant passion towards the unconscious victim of 
 their cruelty, while Gi-en-gwa-tah rode on in stern impassi 
 bility. 
 
 Tahmeroo rode by her husband s side, and as he smiled upon 
 her, she forgot all the suffering and horror of the past days, look 
 ing up into his face with proud affection, and bending to catch each 
 passing glance. Butler treated her kindly now, and her love for 
 him had recovered its first bewildering intensity ; but at length 
 her presence wearied him he wished to converse with the chief 
 and Queen Esther. Before the discovery of the secret which 
 made her so precious to him, Butler would have sent her rudely 
 away ; but now he employed art instead of cruelty. 
 
 " You ought not to leave your mother so long," he said ; "she 
 may rouse up and require something." 
 
 " I have been cruel," said Tahmeroo, with a pang of self-re 
 proach. " Will you ride back with me ?" 
 
 " I will join you very soon, my red bird ; but now I must talk 
 with the chief." 
 
 Tahmeroo looked disappointed, but he patted her cheek and 
 smiled so kindly, that she would have gone to the ends of the 
 earth at his bidding. Without a word, she rode back to the 
 side of her mother s litter, and kept her station there. 
 
 Butler s eyes followed her, and his glance rested with malignant 
 cruelty upon the litter. 
 
 " They say she is better," he muttered j " why didn t she die, 
 
380 MAET DEKWENT. 
 
 and make an end of it ? Then Tahmeroo would have been Lady 
 Granby, and I an English landholder, with an income that dukes 
 might envy. She shall not stand between me and this fortune ; 
 I ll pay her off, too, for all her scorn and hatred 1" 
 
 He galloped up to Queen Esther as she rode, in gloomy 
 silence, at the head of her warriors. The fury still smouldering 
 in her eyes showed that her vengeance was not yet satisfied. 
 Bloodshed only made her crave more, and she awaited a new 
 opportunity to wreak her hate upon the people who had de 
 prived her of a son. 
 
 " They tell me Catharine Montour is better," Butler said, ab 
 ruptly, as he drew his horse close to hers, that their conversa 
 tion could not be overheard. 
 
 Queen Esther did not reply, but her lips compressed until the 
 hooked nose and projecting chin almost met. 
 
 " You must be satisfied now that my suspicions are true she 
 is a traitress, and was from the beginning." 
 
 " And will meet the fate of all traitors 1" returned Esther, in 
 a voice of terrible composure. 
 
 " But the chief is so blindly attached to his wife ; that he 
 will not allow you to punish her as she deserves." 
 
 " Allow me 1" The gladiator rushed into the woman s eyes. 
 "I am Queen Esther ; who dares dispute my will ? I would drive 
 Gi-en-gwa-tah himself out of the tribe if he opposed me I" 
 
 " Pleasant old devil 1" muttered Butler ; " I think I shan t 
 have much trouble in waking her up 1" He bowed his head, 
 saying aloud, " I know that Queen Esther is all-powerful." 
 
 " You leave us soon ?" she. asked, without heeding his flattery. 
 
 " Yes. I must accompany my father and his men to Niagara 
 we shall find work enough there." 
 
 " Go ; if you return with new victories, you will be welcome." 
 
 11 Never fear ; I shall do my best. Tahmeroo stays behind ; 
 she would only be in my way. I hope when I get back I shan t 
 find Catharine Montour with all her old insolence and power 
 opposed to you." 
 
QUEEN ESTHER S DEPARTURE. 381 
 
 Queen Esther laid her hand on his arm ; her lips moved, but 
 she checked her utterance, though the light in her eyes revealed 
 the murderess in her soul. Making a gesture to Butler signify 
 ing that their conference had ended, she rode on, followed by her 
 troops. 
 
 On the fifth day, the armies separated, the Tories, under the 
 command of the two Butlers, marching in the direction of Nia 
 gara, while the Indians continued their course towards Seneca 
 Lake. 
 
 Tahmeroo was wild with grief at parting from her husband, but 
 he promised a speedy return, and quieted her with elaborate kind 
 ness. After he had left them, Catharine required all her care, 
 and she had little time to brood over her loneliness. 
 
 Catharine Montour s condition was a most critical one, and 
 for days she hovered between life and death ; but the chief 
 never inquired after her, or paused, except for their accustomed 
 rest. When Catharine came back to consciousness, she was far 
 away from Wyoming. For a while she believed that all had 
 been a dream ; but at length thought came more clearly back, 
 and with it remembrance. She started feebly up, with a faint 
 cry for her child. 
 
 Tahmeroo heard the voice, and parting the curtains of the 
 litter, said : 
 
 " I am here, mother." 
 
 " Not you," murmured the sufferer " it is not you I call for. 
 
 She fell back on the pillows, too weak for words, powerless 
 even to think collectedly. Day after day she remained thus, with 
 life struggling feebly for supremacy, listening to Tahmeroo s 
 conversation, or the hollow tramp of the savages who bore her 
 swiftly on. She only remembered that Murray was dead, his 
 cold face seemed lying forever on the pillow close to hers. She 
 had a child a husband both lived, and she was separated 
 from them, perhaps to all eternity. It was better thus, she felt 
 almost a sense of relief in that rapid retreat another meeting 
 with husband or child, or even a clear thought of one who had been 
 
382 MART DERWENT. 
 
 so closely linked with her past history, would have brought back 
 the madness which a free life in the forest had so long kept at bay. 
 What mournful hours she spent thus ! Unable to wrestle 
 with her anguish, it lay like a weight upon her heart every 
 beautiful hope that had brightened her other life was dead, eternal 
 ly dead, now. It was well that she could look upon her early years 
 almost as another existence, and the broad ocean which rolled 
 between her and that distant home as the tideless sea that sepa 
 rates time from eternity. When her fever would return and fill 
 her mind with strange fancies, she believed that it was indeed 
 eternity in which she groped ; that the darkness must be ever 
 lasting. At such times she would call aloud upon Mary, her 
 angel child, and as that face seemed to rise before her in its 
 loveliness, she would grow calm again, and fall asleep, taking 
 those features into her dreams to brighten their dreariness. A fort 
 night elapsed before they reached the settlement at Seneca Lake. 
 Catharine was borne to her house, accompanied by Tahmeroo ; 
 but Queen Esther went directly up to her gloomy palace, and the 
 chief joined the general encampment of his tribe. 
 
 The summer months waned and deepened into the gorgeous 
 brightness of autumn before Catharine Montour was able to 
 leave her house. After that, accompanied by Tahmeroo, she 
 would take short rambles in the forest, or the Indian girl would 
 pile a bed of skins in her canoe, and row her about the lake for 
 hours, seeming by instinct to understand her mood, talking to her 
 in that pleasant young voice, or bending over her oars in silence, 
 and allowing Catharine to recline in thought upon her couch 
 whenever she saw her disinclined for conversation. 
 
 The girl became dearer than ever to the chastened woman, 
 but Catharine would not think of her as her daughter with 
 that name rose the image of the pale girl far away, and her 
 heart yearned towards her with all its remaining life. Tahmeroo 
 was henceforth her friend, her young sister, but never again her 
 child. To her, the thought was sacrilege. 
 
 Catharine s strength came slowly back, but her hard, proud 
 
QUEEN ESTHER S DEPASTURE. 383 
 
 nature was gone forever. She had grown meek and humble as 
 a child ; grateful for affection, almost timid in her new woman 
 liness. Gi-en-gwa-tah was absent, and Queen Esther kept 
 aloof. This was a great relief, for in the silence of her home she 
 could sometimes forget the reality around her. She suffered 
 continually, but it was no longer the stern, bitter conflict of former 
 days her heart bowed beneath the rod of the chastener and 
 found solace in new and holier aspirations. 
 
 Keen self-reproach she was also forced to endure, though her 
 marriage with the chief had been an innocent one, for she had 
 solemnly believed her husband dead, it pressed upon her soul 
 like a premeditated sin. Besides, Murray s terrible death tortured 
 her continually. In the stillness of that awful night he had told 
 her of his regrets, his broken life and loveless age. His wife 
 and child were dead, and with the curse of unrest upon him, he 
 had come a second time to America, accepting a commission from 
 the ministry, but with no belief that she was yet alive. 
 
 Since the day of his marriage he had never seen her, and 
 when the fact of her existence, and of the terrible sacrifice she 
 had made for his sake, was so coarsely revealed to him at the 
 table of Sir John Johnson, he had started at once to find her 
 and crave the forgiveness without which he could never hope 
 for rest. 
 
 He had reached Seneca Lake two days after the tribe set forth 
 for Wyoming, and following rapidly as possible, met her there, 
 but only to die. 
 
 With mournful distinctness, Catharine remembered every word 
 those dying lips had uttered. She knew that her husband had 
 appeared with the first dawn, and that they three were together 
 again, sitting silently in the valley of the shadow of death. These 
 terrible memories kept back her strength. Queen Esther s poniard 
 seemed still in her bosom, rusting closer to her heart each day. 
 She had but one wish on earth, an unquenchable thirst for the 
 company of her child. To accomplish this, she would go on 
 knees to Varnham, and then die. 
 
334: MAEY DERWENT. 
 
 Late in the fall, while Catharine was yet very feeble, she 
 was startled by the sudden presence of Butler in the settlement. 
 He had come with a troop of soldiers to convey his wife into 
 Canada, where she was to be left under the care of Sir John 
 Johnson and his lady, while his father s troop lay on the fron 
 tier. 
 
 Butler did not deign to soften this cruel blow to the woman 
 whose child, and sole companion, he was tearing away ; but sent 
 for Tahmeroo to meet him at her grandmother s mansion. The 
 young wife, selfish in her joy, ran eagerly to Catharine s chamber. 
 
 " Oh, mother, he has come, I shall see him this very hour ! 
 he loves me, he loves me and will take me with him now." 
 
 Catharine listened in pale silence. Was nothing on earth to 
 be left for her ? Must she be utterly deserted and alone with her 
 Borrow ? 
 
 Tahmeroo s better nature arose at once. 
 
 " But my mother ; how can I leave you, so ill, so sorrowful V 
 Tahmeroo will not forsake her mother." 
 
 " You will start to-night !" said Queen Esther, abruptly enter 
 ing the lodge. 
 
 " It is sudden I am not prepared to part with Tahmeroo at 
 an hour s warning," said Catharine. 
 
 " You go to-night," repeated Esther ; addressing Tahmeroo, 
 as if her mother were not in the room. 
 
 Tahmeroo s proud spirit revolted at this tyranny, and she replied 
 with flashing eyes 
 
 " Tahmeroo is the chief s daughter. Queen Esther has no 
 power to drive her out of her father s tribe ; she will not go, if 
 Catharine Montour wishes her to remain." 
 
 " Traitor, and child of a traitor," muttered Esther ; but Tah 
 meroo turned to her mother. 
 
 " Shall I go or stay, mother ? I will do as you bid me." 
 
 Catharine looked at her with sad affection ; she saw the wild 
 hope breaking through all the anger in those flashing eyes, and 
 would not quench it. 
 
THE FATHER AND DAUGHTER. 385 
 
 " Go where your heart is," she replied, " and be happy." 
 
 " But you will rniss me ?" 
 
 " I shall know that you are happy ; it will not be for long 
 you will soon come back again." 
 
 Queen Esther turned abruptly, and left the lodge. 
 
 An hour passed in sorrowful conversation. Then they were 
 disturbed by the appearance of Butler s soldiers, leading Tah- 
 meroo s horse in their midst. The girl clung, weeping, to her 
 mother. 
 
 Catharine pressed her once more to her bosom. 
 
 " Go," she murmured ; " and if we never meet again, remem 
 ber how fondly I have loved you, and all that I have said." 
 
 Tahmeroo sprang onto her horse with a burst of tears, and 
 rode away. Catharine stood watching her from the door of her 
 lodge. As the train reached a turn in the path, Tahmeroo 
 checked her courser, and looked back, waving her hand in a last 
 farewell. Catharine returned the signal, and the band disap 
 peared, leaving the childless woman gazing sorrowfully after 
 them through the dim windings of the forest. 
 
 Still Gi-en-gwa-tah was absent with the body of his warriors, 
 which, at Colonel Butler s request, were active on the frontier of 
 Canada. For the time, Queen Esther was supreme in the settle 
 ment. 
 
 CHAPTER LIII. 
 
 THE FATHER AND DAUGHTER. 
 
 AN Indian war-trail lay along the southern bank of Seneca 
 Lake, scarcely discernible now that the snow was deep, and the 
 trees shivering in the wind ; but a man accustomed to the woods 
 might have found sure indications of a path in the deep notches 
 cut in the larger trees at equal distances, and in the broken 
 25 
 
386 MAEY DEKWENT. 
 
 boughs of hemlocks and pine that fell here and there like banners 
 over the buried path. 
 
 Through the still woods, and across the glittering snow, came a 
 small party on horseback, toiling onwards with a dull, patient 
 movement, which was evidently the result of a long journey and 
 severe weather. The party consisted of three men and a female, 
 so muffled in fur, and shielded from the cold that it was impossi 
 ble to judge of their condition. The female seemed like a little 
 child, she sat so low on the horse ; but the face which looked 
 out from its hood of dark blue silk was more like that of a cherub 
 than a human being. 
 
 Two men rode in front ; one was evidently a guide, the other 
 led a horse on which a canvas tent was packed, while the third, 
 who seemed master of the party, kept close to the female, and 
 every moment or two caught her horse by the bridle when he sank 
 through the snow, or carefully folded the fur mantle about her 
 form that she might not be chilled by the keen wind which kept 
 the naked trees above them in a continued wail and shiver, inex 
 pressibly saddening. 
 
 " Are you very cold, my child ?" inquired the man, looking 
 with tender anxiety into that lovely face. 
 
 " Cold no. This fur mantle is warm. I am not near so 
 chilled as I was yesterday, when the storm overtook us," she 
 replied. 
 
 " Do not be discouraged. This stretch of snow is like a 
 desert, but the guide says we cannot be more than twenty miles 
 from the settlement now, and part of the way is along the shore, 
 where the Indians will have beaten a path. If our horses do 
 not break down under all this heavy toil, we shall be there 
 to-night." 
 
 " My father," said Mary Derwent, with a slight quiver in 
 her voice, for her heart rose painfully with the question, " who 
 is the lady whom we are searching for ? Was it her name you 
 called upon when we seemed perishing in the storm ? Why is 
 it that my breath comes quick when I think of her, and that I 
 
THE FATHER AND DAUGHTER. 387 
 
 seem so lonesome when you speak as if she might be dead ? 
 Who is she, father what am I to her ?" 
 
 " She is your mother, Mary." 
 
 " My mother ?" 
 
 " She is your mother, and was once my wife ; for as truly as 
 there is a God to bless you, Mary, I am your father, not in name 
 alone, but in the sight of heaven." 
 
 Mary was not even surprised, she could not remember the time 
 when the man supposed to be her father had been half so dear 
 as the one before her. She reached out her hand, took that 
 outstretched by the missionary, and bending forwards, kissed it 
 with tender reverence. 
 
 " My father 1" 
 
 The word never sounded so holy and sweet before ; tears 
 swelled to the missionary s eyes ; a drop or two trembled on 
 Mary s lashes, and froze as they fell away like pearls thrown up 
 by the troubled waters of her heart. 
 
 " And now may I talk of my mother my mother," she re 
 peated with a gush of ineffable tenderness " that is a new 
 word." 
 
 "It is a holy name, my daughter ; when you were born, it 
 kept me from thinking if the angels had any music so sweet." 
 
 " But my mother ? I cannot understand Jane my grand 
 mother ?" 
 
 " They have been very kind, and Jane believes you to be her 
 sister. The old woman kept my secret faithfully ; Derwent was 
 my loyal friend to the last." 
 
 " But why was it a secret why did this lady, my mother, let 
 me live all these years, and never speak to me but once ?" 
 
 " She did not know that you were alive. She believed you 
 resting in the tomb of her family in England, sent there by her 
 own hand." 
 
 "But why should any one keep a parent from her child a 
 poor, little girl, so helpless as I am, from the sight of her own 
 mother ?" 
 
388 MARY DEKWENT. 
 
 " I could not find her. For years and years I travelled 
 through these forests, searching for her in every savage tribe, 
 for she was not in her right mind, Mary, when she fled from her 
 home ; and I would have given my life to have carried her back to 
 her country, and guarded her helplessness again. But she had taken 
 another name the name which that terrible Queen Esther had 
 cast off, but by which she was still known among the whites. At 
 first, I hoped to find my lost wife in this Catharine Montour, but 
 they spoke of her as a half-breed, already grey with age, and it 
 was not till the council-fire at Wyoming that I found your 
 mother bearing the cast off name of that terrible woman." 
 
 " But you saw her then ?" 
 
 " Yes, as the dead might come back and find the living forever 
 lost to them. She had heard of the shipwreck in which I was 
 reported to have been cast away, and believed herself free. 
 Mary, she must have been insane still, wildly insane, for against 
 her own wishes, and fired with terrible magnanimity, she became 
 the wife of Gi-en-gwa-tah, the Shawnee chief the mother of that 
 wild girl who came to us on the island." 
 
 Mary shuddered. "Oh, this is terrible I My mother, my 
 mother 1" 
 
 " She believed me dead she believed that you, my child, 
 had perished by her own hand, for in the wild fancy that you 
 were an angel that could help her up to heaven, she seized 
 you in her arms, one day, and dropped you from the high win 
 dow of the room in which we had confined her. We took you 
 up, crushed and senseless, maimed, hopelessly maimed for life. 7 
 
 " And she did my own mother do this ?" said Mary, looking 
 down at her person. " Was I straight like other children before 
 that ? 
 
 " Paradise itself had not a more lovely child. She never -saw 
 you again till you lay upon her bosom at the spring on Mouocko- 
 nock Island, without knowing that you were her own child. I 
 did not tell her then how could I say to the wife of that stern 
 chief to the mother of that wild forest maiden Behold ! here 
 
THE FATHER AND DATJGHTEB. 389 
 
 is the husband and child whom you believed dead, rising up in 
 judgment against you for this unnatural marriage 1 It would 
 have driven her mad again. Still, I would have done it, after 
 prayer and reflection for it was a solemn duty ; but when I 
 sought for her at the foot of Campbell s Ledge, she was gone. 
 Mary, I was ill after that, very ill for a long time, and unable to 
 follow her ; but we met face to face in that terrible massacre, 
 and I told her all." 
 
 " Then she knows that I am her child ; she will be wondering 
 where I am, waiting for me." 
 
 " Mary," said the missionary, regarding her excitement with a 
 troubled look, "Mary, your mother was terribly wounded on 
 the Island that night woundt*! twice for while the battle 
 was raging, she learned that her husband and child lived then 
 Queen Esther s poniard struck her down." 
 
 " Oh, my mother my mother !" cried Mary. 
 
 " Let us be calm ; I have heard from her twice ; she was 
 slowly recovering." 
 
 " Oh, God is very good to us 1 In a little time I shall see her ; 
 we will take her away from these savages ; no one shall tend her 
 but myself ; I am her oldest child ; never till now did I know 
 what a mother was ; how pleasant the sound, when one can say 
 father, and know it has a meaning. Father, when I was so 
 lonely, why did you never say, Mary Mary Derwent, you are 
 my own, own child ! I could have borne everything after 
 that." 
 
 " I dared not. The love of one being had filled my soul with 
 the sin idolatry ; God allowed me to be smitten through my heart 
 and through my pride ; but I could neither cast off the love nor 
 the resentment which a wrong that has no name, and which 
 you could never understand, fastened like a viper on my heart. 
 I dared not give up my soul to another worship, and thus offer a 
 feeble service to my God. Besides, but you will not comprehend 
 this, the very sight of you filled me with a tenderness so painful, 
 that I had no power to speak. Until I had ceased to hate my 
 
390 MARY DEE WE NT. 
 
 enemy, I could not love her child without a pang of self- 
 reproach." 
 
 " But you love me now ?" 
 
 The missionary smiled. 
 
 " Love you ! I thank my God there is nothing but love in my 
 heart love and forgiveness. I ask but to place you in her 
 arms, and leave the rest with him." 
 
 Mary looked eagerly forwards ; the night was closing in ; and 
 through the leafless hickory and beech trees a red sunset streamed 
 along their path. 
 
 " It cannot be far off," she said, with kindling eyes ; "let us 
 keep on, father all night, if it takes so long. I shall never get 
 warm again till her arms fold me. Look, the moon is rising ; 
 shall we get off and walk by its light ; the snow-crust is strong 
 enough to hold us, though our horses sink through it. Father, 
 I feel as if some one wanted me and I must come." 
 
 Varnham dismounted, and left their horses with the guides. 
 He, too, was stricken with a sudden impulse to press forwards, 
 and penetrate towards the lake. They walked on at a rapid 
 pace across the gleaming snow-crust, where all the naked branches 
 and innumerable twigs of the forest were pencilled by the moon 
 light ; the hacked oaks guided their way ; and the winds in the 
 distant hemlocks moaned after the father and child as they 
 
THE LAST SACRIFICE. 391 
 
 CHAPTER LIV. 
 
 THE LAST SACRIFICE. 
 
 THE first snow of winter had fallen, and lay heavily upon the 
 forest. The lake was frozen, till it shone like a sheet of rock 
 crystal. The Indians left behind by the chief amused themselves 
 in skating, and catching fish through holes cut in the ice. Gi-en- 
 gwa-tah had not yet returned, and Catharine received no tidings 
 of Tahmeroo. Once she sent to Queen Esther s house to make in 
 quiries, but the old woman vouchsafed no answer ; and Catharine 
 was left alone with her feebleness and her weary heart. 
 
 One day she sat in her lonely lodge, looking out upon the lake. 
 The wind moaned through the forest ; the air was keen and 
 sharp with sparks of frost; flakes of snow came down at intervals, 
 but it was too cold for a heavy fall. Catharine Montour was 
 more oppressed than usual ; there was a strange trouble at her 
 heart, and she felt that danger menaced her or, possibly, her 
 child, in some more terrible form. For herself, she did not fear ; 
 but the thought of harm to Tahmeroo or Mary, wrung her heart 
 with anguish. The day wore on, and the night followed cold, 
 still, and icy. The moon was high in heaven, flooding the frozen 
 lake with silver, and turning the snow wreaths to garlands of 
 pearls. Still Catharine sat looking forth, listening to the dirge- 
 like moan of the pine forest with dreary thoughtfulness. 
 
 All was strangely still ; the silence had something awful in it. 
 The coldness about the watcher s heart grew deeper, till it seemed 
 as if the frosty air from without had penetrated to her soul. The 
 silence became insupportable at length ; she arose and passed 
 through the different rooms ; not an attendant was in sight ; 
 she looked out, searching for the guard which always sur 
 rounded her lodge ; it had disappeared ; not an Indian was to 
 be seen. 
 
392 MAKY DEKWENT. 
 
 The stillness seemed to increase even the low wind died 
 away, and the beating of her own heart sounded to Catharine 
 like the ticking of a clock in the gloom. The fire had died down, 
 and the apartment was lighted only by the moonbeams that crept 
 in at the casement, and poured their ghostly pallor upon the floor 
 
 Catharine could endure it no longer torment, death, any 
 thing, were preferable to that fearful suspense. She folded a 
 fur mantle about her and went out, taking the path which led 
 to the settlement. Midway between the Indian village and 
 Queen Esther s mansion, she saw the flames of a council-fire, 
 turning the snow golden with its brightness ; seated about it 
 were the old men of the tribe, whom the chief had left behind, 
 with Queen Esther in their midst. 
 
 Catharine drew nearer, and from the rise of ground upon 
 which she stood, looked down upon the scene. 
 
 It was a strange sight, that blazing council-fire streaming far up 
 in the heavens ; that circle of stern warriors gathered about it, 
 silent and motionless, with that grim woman in their midst, 
 evidently speaking, though she made no movement or gesture. 
 In the outskirts of the group, hovered some young men and 
 women of the tribe, with signs of awe breaking through the natu 
 ral impassibility of their features. 
 
 Catharine drew closer still, and, concealed from view by a 
 massy hemlock, listened to what was passing. 
 
 " Drive her forth !" said the old queen, in her low terrible 
 voice ; " a traitress and a craven. She has wronged your chief, 
 and now only waits to sell his tribe to the rebels." 
 
 " She shall die," exclaimed the prophet of the tribe, who had 
 always been Catharine s secret enemy ; "the great medicine has 
 had a vision the white woman shall no longer stay in the tribe 
 she wishes to sell !" 
 
 " Let her die," echoed a score of stern voices. 
 
 " No," returned Esther, " sudden death were too sweet ; drive 
 her forth into the wilderness ; let the cold and the wild beasts 
 destroy her, and leave her bones to bleach without a grave." 
 
THE LAST SACRIFICE. 393 
 
 " The queen speaks well," returned the prophet ; " it shall be 
 so." 
 
 " This very night !" exclaimed Esther. " Let the tribe go in 
 a body to her lodge let her be dragged forth and driven into 
 the forest, followed by the curses of the people whose queen she 
 has braved whose chief she has betrayed." 
 
 A low murmur of approval ran through the group, and the 
 whole tribe gathered nearer the council-fire, like a pack of 
 wolves on the scent of blood. 
 
 The warriors rose in a body and filed into rank ; but before 
 they could take a step in advance, Catharine came out from 
 the shelter of the tree and confronted them. 
 
 " You need not seek her like wild beasts hunting their prey," 
 she said ; " Catharine Montour is here I" 
 
 There was an instant hush, as Catharine Montour stepped, 
 with that calm, sad face, into their midst. Even those savage 
 hearts were awed by her fearless dignity ; but Queen Esther was 
 less human, and her voice woke again the fierce passions which 
 her artful address had aroused. 
 
 " She braves the Shawnee chiefs because they are old !" 
 exclaimed the fiendish woman. " She comes among you with her 
 hands dyed in the blood of your people Gi-en-gwa-tah s brother 
 fell by her treachery." 
 
 Catharine lifted her hand. I have done you much good ; my 
 wealth has been freely spent in your service; will the chiefs listen ?" 
 
 " That gold," cried Esther, " belongs to Tahmeroo, the 
 daughter of your chief ; but while this woman lives, she cannot 
 touch it. When she is gone, the young white brave will give 
 you all. She has kept it to herself her lodge is full of bright 
 things, which she shares with no one, not even with the widow of 
 your old chief. Your queen speaks no lie, ask her if Gi-en-gwa- 
 tah s step has sounded in her lodge since we fought at Wyoming. 
 Let her be driven forth." 
 
 The women took up the cry, crowding about the handful of 
 warriors, and forcing them on. Catharine stood calmly confronting 
 
394: MAKY DERWENT. 
 
 them nearer gathered those stern faces horrible eyes glared 
 into her own, but she met them unflinchingly. 
 
 " Away with her," shrieked Esther ; " the voice of her agony 
 will be sweet to the murdered brave." 
 
 " Let it come ; I have not sought death, but life is a burden 
 to me now ; you thought to revenge yourself, but I thank you 
 for this release from heavy trouble; what matters the way ? it is 
 brief at best." 
 
 " Drive her forth !" cried the old queen, roused to insane fury 
 by the composure of her victim. 
 
 The whole tribe rushed towards Catharine with yells and 
 execrations. She made no effort to fly, but was borne helplessly 
 along by the heaving mass. Balls of snow and ice were hurled 
 at her, the sharp fragments struck her on the temples, but she 
 made no outcry. Her long hair broke loose and streamed on 
 the wind, while the serpent that girded her forehead, flashed in 
 the moonlight, the raised head with its open jaws seeming to 
 hiss defiance at her pursuers. 
 
 Her silence and her meekness only added to Esther s rage, 
 though the chiefs began to feel respect for her courage. 
 
 " Faster," shrieked the queen, " faster, drive her deep, deep 
 into the woods, where no trail or path can lead her out again." 
 
 Thus fiercely urged, the savages swept on, dragging their victim 
 rudely over the snow. They passed the outskirts of the settlement, 
 and plunged into the forest, sinking knee deep into the crusted 
 snow at every step. When all her strength was exhausted, and 
 they were compelled to drag her forwards like a corpse, they 
 flung her down upon the white earth and retreated, singing a 
 low death song, as they left her to die. 
 
 She had fallen in the depths of a hemlock grove ; thick green 
 branches, wreathed with snow, drooped over her, swayed heavily 
 by the sobbing wind. No moon could penetrate there ; even the 
 snow looked inky in those dense shadows. 
 
 A savage, less fiendish than the rest, came back, planted his 
 burning torch in the snow, and went away ; its red light streamed 
 
THE LAST SACRIFICE. 395 
 
 over her locked features. She felt the warmth, and struggled 
 to get up. The motion shook the jewelled serpent from her head 
 which uncoiled itself from her temple, and lay writhing upon the 
 snow like a living reptile creeping away from the flame. 
 
 She could not stand erect ; she had no strength to cry aloud ; 
 but as all the terrors of that lonely death fell upon her, struggled 
 fully, and answered the wind with her sobs. They had torn the 
 fur mantle from her shoulders, and left her wrapped only in that 
 crimson robe. The cold penetrated her to the heart, sharp 
 particles of frost cut across her face. Her blue lips quivered 
 above her chattering teeth. She crept towards the torch, and 
 holding her purple hands on each side of it in piteous helpless 
 ness, strove to warm them ; but they fell numbly down, and with 
 a faint instinct she drew them under the flowing sleeves of her 
 robe, and lay motionless, with death creeping steadily to her 
 vitals. 
 
 " What is that, father ? what is that shining like a fallen 
 star through the hemlocks ? See how that little column of smoke 
 trembles through the leaves." 
 
 Yarnham turned from his path and the two bent their steps 
 to the hemlock woods, following the light. Why did that pale 
 man hold his breath as he moved forwards ? Why did Mary 
 shiver audibly beneath her warm mantle ? They had not yet 
 seen that deathly face, the serpent scattering its mocking bright 
 ness on the snow, or the crimson robe that lay in masses over 
 those frozen limbs. But a few steps more, and the torch re 
 vealed all this. The father and child looked at each other in 
 mute horror. It lasted but a moment. Varnham swept back 
 the hemlock branches and lifted his wife up from the snow. 
 Mary took off her mantle and folded it around those heavy limbs, 
 while the strong man gathered her to his heart and strove to 
 warm that purple mouth with the life that sobbed and quivered 
 through his own lips. 
 
 It was all in vain. The love which possessed no power over 
 her youth, though it shook his soul to the centre, had not force 
 
396 MAKY DEE WENT. 
 
 enough to arouse his wife from that numb death-sleep. She 
 opened her eyes once, after he bore her out to the moonlight, 
 and, for an instant, Varnham felt her heart beat against his own. 
 A cry of exquisite pain broke from him, then a tender young voice 
 sobbed out 
 
 " Mother mother 1" 
 
 A gleam of light stole over Catharine s face. It would have 
 been a smile, but those features were frozen into marble, and 
 had lost all power of expression ; but the eyes had meaning in 
 them still. They turned upon that -angel face, and filling with 
 love-light froze in their sockets. 
 
 Mile after mile Varnham carried his marble burden through 
 the forest and across a bend of the lake, till he stood, in the 
 grey of that cold winter s morning, in the hall of Queen Esther s 
 dwelling. 
 
 A troop of Indians, fresh from the war-path, were drawn up 
 before the entrance, and among them was Gi-en-gwa-tah, 
 mounted on his war-horse. The chief never would wear paint, 
 like meaner men of his tribe, and those who looked on him at 
 tentively saw that his face was haggard and his eagle eyes 
 heavy. 
 
 Queen Esther met him at the door. 
 
 "Mother," he said, "you and the young brave have talked 
 with serpent tongues. The Great Spirit has been whispering in 
 my heart, and it beats loud. Gi-en-gwa-tah will be just. Let 
 his white queen speak for herself." 
 
 As he spoke, Varnham glided by him, bearing the dead body 
 of Catharine Montour in his arms. The Indians, who had come 
 out of the lodge with Esther, sat down and covered their faces 
 in sign of penitence, but the old queen stood up, cold and firm as 
 a rock. 
 
 " Gi-en-gwa-tah is weak, like a girl, but Queen Esther can 
 take care of her son s honor. See, yonder is the woman whose 
 serpent words killed his brother. Last night the Council drove 
 her out to die like a wolf." 
 
THE LAST SACRIFICE. 397 
 
 The chief sprang from his horse, and, striding into the hall, 
 fell down before the body of Catharine Montour ; the anguish 
 quivering in that stern face struck pity even into those savage 
 bosoms ; his chest heaved, his eyes grew large, wandering from 
 the dead to his mother, with such wild sorrow that even she 
 turned away, half repenting what she had done. 
 
 All at once he fell upon his face, and burst into a passion of 
 grief, which shook his frame like a thunder gust. Once and 
 again the storm swept over him, then he arose, terrible in the 
 majesty of his grief, and, passing the old queen, mounted his 
 war-horse. A small golden bugle, the gift of Catharine Montour, 
 hung over his bosom ; he lifted it and sent forth a blast which 
 brought every warrior in the settlement around him. 
 
 "Warriors," he said, "this is no longer my home. That 
 woman is not my mother, but the murderess of my wife. Let 
 every man who went with her into the forest, last night, step to 
 her side. Neither they nor their leader are longer of our tribe. 
 I leave her to the Great Spirit, whose curse shall hang about her 
 as lightning strikes an old hemlock dead at the top. Warriors, 
 let us depart." 
 
 The chief wheeled his horse, the tribe fell into order, and while 
 Queen Esther stood like a pillar of stone, with the last human 
 feeling in her bosom struck dead at the root, the whole tribe, 
 save those who had partaken of her crime, filed into the war-trail, 
 from which they never returned again. 
 
398 MARY DERWENT. 
 
 CHAPTER LV. 
 
 THE INHERITANCE. 
 
 " LOOK, look, Tahmeroo, yonder is your home ! To the right, 
 to the left, on either side, from horizon to horizon the land is 
 yours. 1" 
 
 It was Walter Butler s voice, exultant and loud, addressing 
 his wife as they came in sight of Ashton. 
 
 Tahmeroo leaned out of the carriage, and looked around, with 
 a glow of proud delight. How different this scene from the 
 broad forests of her native land how calm and beautiful lay the 
 hills and fields, rolling westward from the eminence upon which 
 they had paused 1 A thousand blossoming hedges chained them 
 together, as it were, with massive and interminable garlands. 
 She saw clumps of trees, vividly green cascades and brooks mean 
 dering towards the one bright stream which cut the lands in 
 twain. Upon the opposite hill-side stood a mansion, vast, state 
 ly and old, towering upwards from a park of fine oaks, and chest 
 nuts heavy with flowers. A prince might have looked proudly 
 on a domain like that without asking for more. 
 
 " And is this all mine my own, to do with as I please ?" said 
 Tahmeroo, turning her brilliant eyes from the landscape to But 
 ler s face. " That pretty village, the old church, and all ?" 
 
 "Yes, my red bird, you are mistress here everything is 
 yours." 
 
 " Not so," answered Tahmeroo, and her bright eyes filled. 
 " What is Tahmeroo without her husband ? it is his, everything 
 Tahmeroo wants nothing but his love." 
 
 " But words cannot convey property, my bird ; it takes yel 
 low parchment and wax, and the signing of names to change an 
 estate." 
 
 " But there must be plenty of parchment in that grand old 
 
THE INHERITANCE. 399 
 
 house, and, thank the Great Spirit, Tahmeroo can write beauti 
 fully, like Catharine her mother. She will not shame the white 
 brave in his new home he shall yet be a great chief among 
 these proud people." 
 
 " And you will do this willingly, my wild-rose T cried Butler, 
 with a glitter of the eyes from which even the confiding wife had 
 learned to shrink. " It will be easily done ; the entailed portion 
 of the estates are large enough for any woman ; as for the 
 rest " 
 
 " Let the man drive quick that we may find the parchment," 
 answered Tahmeroo, eager to sacrifice her wealth. 
 
 Butler repeated her orders to the coachman, and the carriage, 
 with its outriders for Butler took state upon himself immediate 
 ly on reaching England dashed forwards, and soon drew up be 
 fore the lordly old mansion. The door swung open a crowd of 
 servants stood ranged in the hall, and as Tahmeroo entered the 
 mansipn a score of voices hailed her as the lady of Ashton. 
 
 The next day Butler went back to London in order to take 
 legal steps for the transfer of his wife s property. For three 
 weeks Tahmeroo wandered restlessly through the apartments of 
 her new home, which had all the loneliness of the forest without 
 its freedom. She was like a wild bird, and fled with shy timidity 
 from the attendants when they came to take her orders. How 
 often during those weeks did she sigh for her own savage home 
 at the head of Seneca Lake. 
 
 At last Butler returned, accompanied by a couple of the worst 
 class of London lawyers, and a company of reckless young men, 
 whom he persuaded Tahmeroo were necessary witnesses to the 
 transfer she was so anxious to make. These men, who came down 
 more out of curiosity to see the wild forest girl who had turned 
 out a countess than from any other motive, were assembled iu 
 the library, a vast apartment, whose tarnished gilding and faded 
 draperies bespoke the long disuse that had fallen upon its mag 
 nificence. 
 
 Tahmeroo, in her wild-wood innocence, received her husband s 
 
4:00 MAEY DEKWENT. 
 
 guests with genuine Indian hospitality. She was eager to com 
 plete the deeds which would make her lord a chief among them, 
 and was bright with thankfulness for this opportunity to prove 
 her love. 
 
 The entail of the Granby estates covered only an unimpor 
 tant portion of the property, and when Tahmeroo was so eager 
 to sign the deed which put Butler in possession, she was divest 
 ing her rank of all its appurtenances, and sweeping the property 
 of a proud old family into the hands of a profligate and ruffian. 
 
 Still it was a beautiful sight when that true-hearted woman 
 came into the room, arrayed with just enough of her former 
 gorgeousness to give effect to her modern garments. A band of 
 her own raven hair wreathed her head with a glossy coronet ; 
 her robe of crimson brocade, scattered over with bouquets of 
 flowers, flowed in warm, rich folds about her person. She came 
 in with all the stateliness of a queen, and the wild grace of a 
 savage, her cheeks glowing like a ripe peach, and her eyes 
 bright with affectionate triumph. She gloried in the sacrifice 
 when the legal men told her how important it was. 
 
 A few smiling dashes of the pen, and the great bulk of Tah- 
 meroo s wealth was swept away, and with it more terrible for 
 her all the power she possessed, over the kindness of her 
 husband. 
 
 That night that very night while the ink was scarcely dry 
 upon those parchments, he turned sullenly from her when she spoke 
 of the happy life they should lead in that beautiful home, and 
 muttered something which cut her to the heart, about encum 
 brances being attached to everything he touched. 
 
 When the deeds were signed which made Tahmeroo her hus 
 band s slave again, the young landholder and his guests sat 
 down for a grand carouse, over which that queenly young wife 
 was to preside. 
 
 The very presence of these men in the house was an insult to 
 its mistress ; but what did she know of that ? With all her 
 pride and natural refinement, she had yet to learn that civiliza- 
 
THE INHERITANCE. 401 
 
 tion sometimes exhibits phases at which the savage would blush. 
 But ignorant as she was of all this, with the intuition of a deli 
 cate nature, she felt the coarseness of their manners and the ab 
 sence of all that respect with which her father s tribe had ever 
 surrounded her. Looking upon her as a beautiful wild animal, 
 the guests put no restraints upon themselves, but following their 
 host s example, called on her to fill their goblets, and made free 
 comments on the beauty of their cup-bearer, recklessly uncon 
 scious of the proud nature they were attempting to degrade. 
 
 No squaw of burden in her tribe could have been treated with 
 more coarse contempt, than Butler heaped upon that noble young 
 creature, before that reckless group rose from the table. At 
 last, wounded and outraged, she scarcely knew how or why, the 
 young Indian turned from them with a hot cheek and eyes full 
 of indignant tears and left the room, refusing to come back when 
 Butler, flushed with wine and insolent with triumph, called after 
 her. 
 
 The rioters about the board set up a drunken shout, and levelled 
 coarse jeers at their host. 
 
 " By Jove !" said one, " she moves off like a lioness in her jun 
 gle ; you will find her hard to tame, Butler." 
 
 " What a haughty glance she cast back upon us," said another, 
 looking at Butler over his wine-glass as he drained it ; " you ll 
 find that handsome animal difficult to break in." 
 
 " Shall I ?" answered Butler, hoarse with rage ; " she has 
 given me the whip-hand to-night ; come, see how I will use it." 
 
 They all started up and reeled from the table, crowding into 
 the hall. 
 
 Tahmeroo, urged by the force of habit, had flung open the 
 outer door with her own hands, and was going through into the 
 night air. She could not breathe within doors ; her proud spirit 
 was all in arms against her husband s guests ; even yet she 
 never dreamed of blaming him ; it seemed so natural to be his 
 slave. 
 
 As she stepped on the stone terrace, followed by a stream of 
 
 26 
 
402 MARY DERWENT. 
 
 light from the hall, the young men came out of the saloon, and 
 seeing her, were about to advance ; but as they looked beyond, 
 the outline of two carriages dimly appeared in front of the man 
 sion, and a group of five persons were that moment mounting 
 the steps. 
 
 Tahmeroo sprang forwards with a cry of delight, embraced 
 some one passionately, and fled to her husband s side with the 
 swiftness of a deer. 
 
 "It is the white angel ! the beautiful beautiful" 
 
 She broke off, all in a glow of delight, for that moment Varn- 
 ham entered the hall, leading Mary Derwent by the hand. They 
 were followed by a young man, with a female leaning on his arm, 
 and behind them all came an old lady, who looked half terrified 
 by the magnificence into which she had been introduced. 
 
 Butler looked on this intrusion, dumb with astonishment, for 
 the whole group was known to him. At last rage brought back 
 his speech ; with a flushed face and unequal step, he advanced 
 to meet the young couple, for there his fury concentrated 
 itself. 
 
 " Edward Clark, and you, Jane Derwent, I do not know what 
 has brought you here, or how you have crossed the Atlantic, 
 but permit me to say, that this house is mine, and it receives no 
 guests whom I do not invite." 
 
 Before Clark could answer, Varnham stepped back and con 
 fronted tljp-^ngry man, with Mary on his arm. 
 
 "You mistake," he said, gently ; "this house belongs to Lady 
 Granby s daughter ; you cannot be its master." 
 
 Butler broke into an insulting laugh, and beckoned Tahmeroo 
 with his finger. 
 
 " It did belong to Lady Granby s daughter ; but my squaw 
 here will tell you that it is now deeded to me, and these gentle 
 men can prove that it was done by her own free act." 
 
 " Indeed," said Varnham, casting a compassionate glance on 
 Tahmeroo ; " but she will fail to give you any claim here. This 
 young lady is Lady Granby s daughter, born in her first and only 
 
THE INHERITANCE. 403 
 
 legal marriage ; even your wife has no right at Ashtoii, save as 
 the half sister of the young countess." 
 
 Here Mary reached out her hand towards Tahineroo, with a 
 look of tender humility, as if she begged pardon for being the 
 elder and the legal child of their common mother. 
 
 Tahmeroo did not take the hand, but drew close to Butler ; 
 she could not quite comprehend the scene. 
 
 Again Butler laughed, but hoarsely and with a troubled ab 
 ruptness. 
 
 "And you expect me to believe this ; you" 
 
 " Not without proof ; one of you," said Varnham, turning to 
 the servants that now came crowding into the hall, " one of you 
 call the housekeeper, if she is yet alive." 
 
 An old woman, whose hair was folded, white as snow, under 
 her cap, came into the hall, and shading her eyes with one hand, 
 fell to perusing his features with a disturbed manner. 
 
 " Mrs. Mason 1" 
 
 She knew the voice ; the hand dropped from her eyes, and 
 tears began to course down her cheek. 
 
 " My master my master 1" 
 
 The oldest servants, who had held back till then, crowded 
 forwards, smiling and crying in the same breath. 
 
 " The master oh, the master has come back 1" 
 
 Butler grew pale ; the very earth seemed slipping from under 
 his feet. 
 
 11 Who are you, and what right has this crooked imp at Ash- 
 ton ?" he demanded. 
 
 " I am the husband of Caroline Lady Granby ; you see, these 
 good people all recognize me." 
 
 " We do we do every one of us ; his hair has grown white, 
 and his forehead is not so smooth, but there is the old smile, and 
 the old look of the eye ; God bless the master." 
 
 " And you will know this face too," said Varnham, removing 
 Mary s bonnet, and allowing the golden hair to fall over her 
 shoulders j "she is my child little Mary." 
 
4:04 MAEY DERWENT. 
 
 The servants began to weep some covered their faces ; others 
 came forward on tip-toe and tenderly examined those beautiful 
 features. The old housekeeper sunk to her knees, and drew the 
 face down to her bosom ; then she looked up wistfully at Varn- 
 ham ; he understood all she desired to ask, and turned his eyes 
 sorrowfully on his child s mourning-dress. 
 
 A quiet awe stole over the group of servants ; they asked no 
 more questions. 
 
 Gravely and quietly, like one who takes up a pleasant duty, 
 the young Countess of Granby assumed the great power of her 
 birthright. Her father had spent half his life in striving to in 
 troduce the blessings of civilization among the savages ; but in. 
 remedying the evils which civilization had yet left untouched in 
 that rich domain, both he and the gentle Mary found ample scope 
 for all the benevolence of their great hearts. 
 
 While Edward Clark managed the estates, and his young wife 
 brought all her sprightliness and beauty into the household of 
 her sister for so she still called the Lady of Ashton the lovely 
 girl herself moved about her own mansion, in her simple dress of 
 black silk or velvet, more like a spirit of mercy than the mistress 
 of a proud name and broad lands. Her tastes continued simple 
 and child-like as ever, and when she appeared in public, it was 
 to be greeted with such love as a beautiful spirit let the form 
 which clothes it be what it will is sure to command from the 
 good. 
 
THE ASHES OF POWER. 405 
 
 CHAPTER LVI. 
 
 THE ASHES OF POWER. 
 
 AFTER a few weeks of desperate struggle, Butler gave up all 
 hopes of maintaining the rights he had so haughtily assumed, 
 and departed abruptly for America, leaving his wife at Ashton, 
 for a time unconscious of his desertion. 
 
 But when she knew that he was gone, no wild bird, torn from 
 its mate, ever became so restless in its thralldom as she did in 
 that princely mansion. She pined without ceasing, and refusing 
 all food, sat down with her face shrouded, after the manner of 
 her race, and refused to be comforted. 
 
 In vain, both Varnham and Mary strove to persuade the un 
 happy young creature to stay with them, and share the wealth 
 which Catharine Montour s violent death had undoubtedly pre 
 vented her dividing. The forest girl could not be made to com 
 prehend the value of property. As for gold, she scarcely knew 
 its use, or that the beautiful objects with which her mother had 
 been surrounded, did not come naturally to those whom the Great 
 Spirit favored, as leaves grew upon the summer boughs. She 
 pined for the presence of her husband, and smiled with scorn 
 when any one sought to console her for his absence with gold 
 which she did not want, and lands that bore blossoms and grain 
 rather than the mighty old forest trees, under which her father s 
 warriors had hunted all their lives. 
 
 At last, a strange belief came upon her that Butler had not 
 intentionally left her behind. She had known him called away 
 suddenly to battle, when he had no time to warn her. Was not 
 this occasion urgent, as those had been. She would not doubt 
 it, in the faith of her great love she trusted in him still. One 
 morning, when Mary went up to her sister s chamber, hoping to 
 comfort her, she found the room empty. Tahmeroo had left 
 Ashton in the night, and followed after her husband. 
 
406 MARY DEKWENT. 
 
 Across the ocean she came, into her own beautiful, wild coun 
 try. She was told that Butler might be found in the Mohawk 
 Valley, leading his Indians on to battle again ; and to that point 
 she bent her way. Wherever a fight had been, or a body of 
 savages gathered, she came in breathless haste, searching for the 
 man who had cast her off. 
 
 In October, 1181, the poor Indian wife found herself on the 
 banks of a creek, deep in the forest, with an escort of two or 
 three Indians who had been detached from their companions, 
 and were glad to take charge of their chiefs daughter. 
 
 There had been a skirmish on this stream during the day, and 
 from some of the fugitives Tahmeroo had learned that her hus 
 band was in command of the Indians. Without a thought of 
 the dangers she was sure to encounter in a running fight of this 
 kind, the young wife kept on her route, led forwards by scat 
 tering shots ; till the woods, now dun with withered foliage, were 
 filled with the cold gloom of the coming night. As she moved 
 on, the wind rose, filling the air with dead leaves, and above that 
 came the rush and flap of wings. The patter of stealthy feet, 
 and the low growl of wolves, disturbed by the approach of 
 human beings. 
 
 A little hollow was before her full of shadows, and with a 
 black cloud of crows gathering over it. 
 
 Tahmeroo rode to the brink of the hollow, and looked down, 
 stooping over the bent neck of her horse. From the side of a rock, 
 around which a little stream of water was creeping, three ravens 
 soared upwards, flapping their heavy wings, and roosting on a 
 tree-branch, sullenly eyed her approach. She did not heed them, 
 for by the rock was a mass of blackness more terrible than the 
 ravenous birds to her. She dropped slowly down the side of 
 her horse, crept across the rock and bent over. 
 
 When her escort reached her, she lay with her face downwards, 
 and her eyes open, as they had looked on the dead body of .her 
 husband, but those eyes saw nothing, and when the savages lifted 
 her up, she felt nothing all the world was dark to her then. 
 
THE ASHES OF POWEK. 407 
 
 As if Gi-en-gwa-tah s curse had fulfilled itself, the settlement 
 at Seneca Lake had atoned for the massacre of Wyoming, and 
 now lay desolated ; the beautiful grounds were black with ruin, 
 the charred trunks of the dead trees rose in black groups where 
 life and greenness had been. Heaps of stone lay where the 
 houses had stood, and a few bark wigwams, in which the broken 
 remnants of Queen Esther s followjrs still sheltered themselves, 
 were all that Sullivan s avenging troops had left to the old queen. 
 
 The mansion which she had called her palace, was a heap of 
 ruins, but some of the walls remained, and one of the largest 
 rooms had been roofed over with plank and slabs, thus giving 
 shelter to that terrible woman, who lay like a sick lioness on a 
 buffalo skin in the centre, smitten by her son s curse, and strug 
 gling with that dogged old age which chains the passions it 
 cannot quench. 
 
 On the broken door-step sat a group of savages, looking 
 gloomily into the yawning hall. They dared not intrude on the 
 sick woman without a summons ; but sat listening, not for moans 
 or complaints those they never could expect but for a sound of 
 the death-rattle, which must soon follow the appalling stillness 
 in which she rested. 
 
 As she lay thus picking perpetually at the fur on the buffalo 
 robe, with a keen glare of the eyes, as if that work must be done 
 before she could enter eternity, a figure glided past the Indians 
 on the door-step, and entered that death-chamber. It was Tah- 
 meroo, her grandchild, but so haggard and lifeless that the In 
 dians, whom she passed, had not known her. 
 
 The old woman turned her eyes that way, but kept picking, 
 picking, picking at the fur. 
 
 All at once, she seemed to comprehend that one of her own 
 kindred stood beside her. She raised herself up on one hand ; 
 the snow-white hair swept back from her face, leaving it stony 
 and ashen. Up and up, inch by inch, she struggled, shaking 
 like a naked tree in the winter, till she stood upright. 
 
 " Tell him that you saw his mother die upon her feet. He 
 
408 MART DEE WENT. 
 
 struck her with a curse, but death is not so strong. I grapple 
 with him, face to face, tooth and tooth ; but a child s curse who 
 can bear 1" 
 
 She reeled heavily, flung out her clenched hands, striving 
 to balance herself, but fell, with a dull crash. There was 
 a sound in her throat, like the muffled rattle of chains in a dun 
 geon, and the old queen lay across her buffalo robe stiff and 
 dead. 
 
 All that day and night a death-chant rose and swelled through 
 those ruins. The blackened trees, dead, like their owner, shiv 
 ered as the wind passed them burdened with that mournful wail. 
 That little group of Indians, broken off from the great tribe by 
 the curse of their chief, buried their queen among the blackened 
 ruins, covered her grave with ashes, and sat down by it in patient 
 desolation. 
 
 Then Tahmeroo glided among them like a ghost. " Old 
 men," she said, in the gentleness of solemn grief, "sit no longer 
 in the ashes of my father s curse. Gi-en-gwa-tah will listen to 
 Catharine Montour s child when she tells him all the sweet words 
 which her mother left behind. Gather up the dried fruit 
 and corn in your wigwams, and follow me to the great-waters, 
 where the tribe are planting young trees and building new 
 lodges." 
 
 The Indians arose in dead silence, and filed away. As they 
 gathered the scant provisions from their wigwams, the death-chant 
 was hushed, but when they struck into file again, and Tahmeroo 
 placed herself at their head, it broke forth once more, and went 
 moaning down the banks of the lake, deeper and deeper into the 
 wilderness, till a sob of wind carried the last sound away. 
 
 THE END. 
 

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T. B, PETERSON & BROTHERS PUBLICATIONS, 5 
 
 CHARLES DICKENS WORKS. 
 
 Fourteen Different Editions in Octavo Form. 
 
 "PETERSON S" are the only complete and uniform editions of Charles Dickens 
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 Old Curiosity Shop,.... 50 " 
 
 Sketches by "Boz," 50 " 
 
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 Wreck of the Golden 
 
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 Perils of certain En 
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 3 do. Oliver Twist, Sketches by "Boz," and Bar 
 
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 ILLUSTRATED OCTAVO EDITION. 
 
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6 T. 3. PETERSON & BROTHERS PUBLICATIONS. 
 
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T. B. PETERSON & BROTHERS PUBLICATIONS. 7 
 
 PEOPLE S DUODECIMO EDITION. 
 
 PiMished in Eight Different Styles. 
 
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 HARRY COCKTON S WORKS. 
 
 Valentine Vox, the Ventrilo- The Sisters. By Henry Cockton, 
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