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 GR E YSL AER; 
 
 ROMANCE OF THE MOHAWK. 
 
 CHARLES F E N N O HOFFMAN, 
 
 AUTHOR OF "A WINTER IN THE WEST," "WILD SCENES OF THE 
 FOREST AND PRAIRIE," ETC., ETC. 
 
 "There is a Divinity that sha|*s our emls, 
 Rough hew them how we will." 
 
 FOURTH EDITION 
 
 VOL. II. 
 
 NEW YORK : 
 
 BAKER & SCR1BNER, 
 
 145 NASSAU STREET, AND 36 1' A R K ROW 
 
 1849.
 
 Entered, according to Act of Congress, in the year 1848, by 
 CHARLES FENNO HOFFMAN, 
 
 In the Clerk's Office of Hie District Court of the United Slates, for the Southern 
 District of New York. 
 
 EDWAED O. JENKINS, PRINTER, 
 114 Nassau street, New York.
 
 / 
 BOOK FOURTH. 
 
 THE WILDWOOD. 
 
 " Where am I now ? Feet, find me out a way 
 Without the counsel of my troubled head ; 
 I'll follow you boldly about these woods, 
 O'er mountains, through brambles, pits and floods." 
 
 BEAUMONT and FLETCHER. 
 
 " I know each lane, and every alley green, 
 Dingle and bushy dell of this wild wood, 
 And every bosky bourn from side to side, 
 My daily walks and ancient neighborhood." MILTON. 
 
 " Joys unexpected and in desperate plight, 
 Are still most sweet, and prove from whence they come, 
 When earth's still moon-like confidence in joy 
 Is at her full. True joy descending far 
 From past her sphere, and from the highest heaven 
 That moves and is not moved. CHAPMAN. 
 
 " I did not take my leave of him, 
 
 But had most pretty things to say: Ere I could tell him 
 
 How I would think of him at certain hours, 
 
 Such thoughts and such ; or ere I could 
 
 That parting kiss, which I had set 
 
 Betwixt two charming words, comes in my father." 
 
 CTMBELINE.
 
 BOOK FOURTH. 
 
 THE WILDWOOD. 
 
 CHAPTER I 
 
 THE WANDERERS, 
 
 " When those we love are absent far away, 
 When those we love have met some hapless fate, 
 How pours the heart its lone and plaintive lay, 
 As the wood-songster mourns her stolen mate ! 
 Alas 1 the summer bower how desolate ! 
 The winter hearth how dim its fire appears ! 
 While the pale memories of by-gone years 
 Around our thoughts like spectral shadows wait." 
 
 PARK BENJAMIN. 
 
 " She led him through the trackless wild 
 Where noontide sunbeam never blazed." SPRAGUE. 
 
 THE glad spring has come again over the land, and no 
 where do the flowers spring more joyfully beneath her 
 flushing footsteps than in the lovely valley of the Mohawk. 
 Here the seeds of civil discord lie crushed, or, at least, inert, 
 at present. The storm of war has rolled off to distant 
 borders ; or if, indeed, it be lowering near again, its ter 
 rors are unfelt, because unseen. The husbandman has 
 once more driven his team afield, free from the apprehen-
 
 262 GREYSLAER; 
 
 sion that he may return to find a blazing roof-tree and 
 slaughtered household when the close of the day shall re 
 lieve him from his toils. The wife once more has joyed 
 to see him go forth whistling on his way, confident that 
 the protector of her children will not fall slaughtered in 
 the ploughshare's furrow, but return to glad her eyes at 
 nightfall. Alas! these simple people dream not that the 
 present calm is but a breathing-spell in the terrible strug 
 gle, which, ere it pass away, shall print every cliff of this 
 beautiful region with a legend of horror, and story its ro 
 mantic stream with deeds of fiendish crime. 
 
 Clad in the deepest mourning, the orphan heiress of the 
 Hawksnest sits by the trellised window, gazing out upon 
 the lovely fields, of which the supposed death of her lover 
 and relative has made her the possessor. Her wild 
 brother, surrendering his share in the estate to her, has 
 gone to seek a soldier's fortune or a patriot's death by 
 fighting in the armies of his country. The green mound 
 that covers the remains of her last surviving parent and 
 of her only sister is seen through a vista of trees upon a 
 swell of land beyond. It is the mellow hour of twilight, 
 when the thoughtful heart loves best to ponder upon such 
 mementoes of the departed. And has Alida, when her 
 eye o'erbrims, and her hands are clasped in agitation at 
 the thoughts of the cruel fate which has overtaken her 
 household has she no thought, no one woman's regretful 
 tear for the lover who had dared everything to shield those 
 who were dear to her from harm ; the lover who had 
 thrown away his own life in the effort to snatch her from 
 a captivity worse than death ? 
 
 She had thought of him. She now thought of him. She 
 had too often and too long thought of him. At least, some-
 
 A ROMANCE OF THE MOHAWK. 263 
 
 times she herself so believed, when accusing herself of 
 dwelling more upon his memory than upon that of those 
 who ought to be dearer to her. But, then, was there no 
 excuse for that, which her woman's heart straightway 
 supplied ? For her sister and father it was pleasurable, 
 but vain, to grieve. It was challenging the will of Heaven 
 ever to dwell gloomily upon their fate, which Heaven, for 
 good or ill, had fixed for ever. But of Greyslaer she 
 could think hopefully, as of one who might still return to 
 share her friendship and receive her gratitude. "Her 
 friendship /" Yes, that was the word, if her thoughts had 
 been syllabled to utterance when she hoped for Greyslaer's 
 return. But there were moments when she hoped not 
 thus ; moments of dark conviction that he had ceased to 
 be upon this earth ; that death had overtaken him as well 
 as others for whom she was better schooled to grieve. 
 
 That black death is a strange touchstone of the human 
 heart. How instantly it brings our real feelings to the 
 surface ! How it reawakens and calls out our stiffly ac 
 corded esteem ! How it quickens into impetuous life our 
 reluctant tenderness, that has been withheld from its ob 
 ject till it can avail no more ! 
 
 Strange inconsistency of woman's nature ! Alida 
 mourned the dead Greyslaer as if he had been her affi 
 anced lover; but hoped for the reappearance of the living 
 one as of a man who could never be more to her than a 
 cherished friend a brother a dear, dear brother ! 
 
 Alack ! young Max, couldst thou but now steal beside 
 that twilight window, hear those murmured words of sor 
 row, and take that taper hand which is busied in brushing 
 away those fast-dropping tears, thy presence at such a 
 melting moment might bring a deeper solace, call out a
 
 2(54 GREYSLAE 11 
 
 softer feeling than simple joy at recovery of a long-lost 
 friend. Alack ! that moments so propitious to a lover 
 should pass away for naught ! 
 
 And where, then, is Greyslaer? The autumn was not 
 spent idly by his friends in exploring the wilderness for 
 traces of his fate ; and even in mid-winter Bait crossed 
 the Garoga lakes on snow-shoes, followed up the cascades 
 of Konnedieyu, and penetrated deep into the Sacondaga 
 country upon the same errand. The spot where Brant 
 once held his secret camp, and to which his captives were 
 carried, had been twice examined since Alida lent her aid 
 to direct Bait to the spot. But the wigwams were long 
 since deserted, and the snow which beat down and broke 
 their flimsy frames, obliterated every track by which 
 the migrating Indians could be followed. Bait again took 
 up the search the moment the severity of winter became 
 relaxed. He has now followed the spring in her graceful 
 mission northward ; and the lakes of the Upper Hudson, 
 the wild recesses of the Adirondack Mountains, that mys 
 terious wilderness which no white man has yet explored, 
 is said to be the scene of his faithful wanderings. Thither 
 we will soon follow him. But first, however, we must go 
 back some months, and take up the thread of our narra 
 tive at the squaw camp of Thaykndanagea, if we would 
 follow out the fortunes of Greyslaer from the moment 
 when the desperado Valtmeyer so fearfully crossed his 
 path. 
 
 The first red streaks of dawn were beginning to dapple 
 the east, when the luckless captive found himself travers 
 ing a deep hemlock forest, with " The Spreading Dew" 
 for his guide. The Indian girl, after reviving him from 
 the stunning effects of the blow which had prostrated
 
 A ROMANCE OF THE MOHAWK. 
 
 him, by sprinkling water upon his forehead, had bound up 
 the contusion with a fillet of colewort leaves, which was 
 kept in its place by a strip of strouding torn from her own 
 dress ; and, urging her still bewildered patient from the 
 scene of his mishap, had thridded the swamp and guided 
 him to the hills in the rear of the Indian camp. These 
 hills stretch away toward the north, increasing continually 
 in altitude as they recede from the Mohawk, until they 
 finally swell into those stupendous highlands known as the 
 Adirondack Mountains. 
 
 Greyslaer, though ignorant of the precise geography of 
 this Alpine region, had still some idea of the vast wilder 
 ness which extended toward the Canada border ; and 
 when he saw his guide, after reaching a rapid and turbu 
 lent stream, turn her face to the northward, and strike up 
 along its banks, as if about to follow the water to the 
 mountain lake in which it probably headed, he paused, and 
 was compelled, for the first time, to reflect upon what use 
 he should make of his newly-recovered liberty, and which 
 way it were best for him now to direct his steps. His 
 first object must be, of course, to reach the nearest body 
 of his friends. But, since the events in which he had 
 been an actor, and those which might have transpired 
 during the weeks that he was ill and a prisoner, he knew 
 not where those friends might be found. He was igno 
 rant what changes might have taken place in the valley of 
 the Mohawk, or which party might have the ascendency 
 now that the spirit of civil discord was fairly let loose in 
 that once tranquil region. Should he fall into the hands 
 of some straggling band of Tories, or should he even ven 
 ture to claim the hospitality of those who, but a month 
 since, had stood neutral while the conflict was impending,
 
 UKEYSLAER; 
 
 he might find himself seized upon by some new convert 
 to the royal party, who would gladly afford the most 
 lively proofs of his new-born zeal for the crown by secur 
 ing so active a partisan of the patriot cause. The city of 
 Albany was, therefore, his only safe destination, if he 
 would preserve that liberty of action, by the preservation 
 of which alone he could hope to succor Alida. 
 
 He determined, therefore, not to venture descending 
 into the lower country till he could strike it at least as far 
 east as Schenectady. But hovv, if he concluded to make 
 this long circuit through the woods, could he find his way 
 amid the wild forests he must traverse ? Was this lonely In 
 dian girl, who was little more than a child, to be his only 
 guide ? and, if so, how were they to procure subsistence 
 in a journey through the wilderness, where the path was 
 so toilsome that many days must elapse before he could 
 accomplish the distance which, upon an ordinary road, 
 can be traversed in one ? Max abruptly broke off these 
 unsatisfactory reflections by asking his companion whither 
 she was now guiding him. The reply of " The Dew" 
 told him that much might be gained by admitting her into 
 his counsels. The foresight of the Indian maid had an 
 ticipated at least the most serious of the difficulties which 
 embarrassed her companion. She was leading him to the 
 Garoga lakes, where her tribesmen had once had a fishing 
 camp, in which they might at least find a shelter from the 
 elements, and where Greyslaer could readily obtain sub 
 sistence for himself until " The Dew" could make her way 
 to the settlements and gain some tidings of his friends, or, 
 at least, procure him some more eligible guide than her 
 self from the lower castle of the Mohawks; a small band 
 of that tribe, under their leader Hendrick, being friendly
 
 A ROMANCE OF THE MOHAWK. 267 
 
 to the patriot cause. Greyslaer hoped, however, that if 
 he could once secure a retreat, where, for a few days, he 
 should be safe from pursuit, he might find means to com 
 municate with his faithful and cherished follower, old 
 Bait, if, indeed, the stout forester had not perished in 
 the fray in which he himself was taken prisoner. 
 
 These anxious reflections upon the chances of the future 
 served for a while to turn his thoughts from a more bitter 
 channel. But the recollection of the scene in which Alida 
 had been torn from his side now recurred with all its 
 horrors. 
 
 It is a hard thing to love vainly. It is a hard thing 
 for the young heart, that has given its first generous burst 
 of affection to another, to be flung back upon itself, 
 shocked, borne down, blasted upon the very threshold of 
 existence. The growth of the sentiment in some minds 
 in those which love most deeply is often the first 
 emotion that has ever compelled them to look into their 
 own souls ; that has ever made them fully aware of the 
 sentient and spiritual essence which they bear within 
 this earthly tabernacle. And to surrender that sentiment 
 seems like parting with the vital spirit that animates them. 
 Such surrenderment of their early dreams is, however, 
 the fate of thousands ; for love young love like the 
 Bird of Lightning in the Iroquois fable, which bears the 
 flame from Heaven to teach men only where first the 
 purifying element had birth, seems to fulfil his mission, 
 reckless where'er his burning wings may sweep, so that 
 his mysterious errand be accomplished. 
 
 But Greyslaer's was no common tale of misplaced 
 hopes and unrequited attachment. He could not fling
 
 268 GKEYSLAER; 
 
 from him the image of Alida as an idle vision of his 
 dreaming boyhood. Her sorrows had become his own ; 
 and the love which might have perished from hopeless 
 ness seemed born anew from sympathy aye, though he 
 were doomed hereafter to have neither part nor lot in 
 aught else belonging to her, save this share in her sor 
 rows only, yet such community of grief was so dear to 
 him, that the world had now no prize for which Greyslaer 
 would have bartered his gloomy heritage of woe. Alas ! 
 what a joyless and barren destiny did he thus embrace ! 
 Flinging his fresh and blossoming youth, like a worthless 
 weed, away ; grafting upon his ripening manhood a shoot 
 of bitterness, that must dwarf its energies and wither its 
 fruit of promise. 
 
 The shrill burst of the Indian warwhoop startled Grey 
 slaer from the stern revery with which we have ventured 
 to blend our own reflections while detailing its general 
 character. The wild cry seemed to come from beneath 
 his very feet. He recoiled a step, and gazed eagerly 
 down the rocky defile he was descending. The sumach 
 and sassafras grew thick and heavy, imbowering the 
 broken path below. The Indian girl was nowhere to be 
 seen. He turned and threw a hurried glance along the 
 sides of the glen, where ledges of rock here and there cut 
 the foliage horizontally before him. He caught a glimpse, 
 as of the figure of the light-footed maiden scaling the walls 
 of the glen, and retreating from him. He advanced a pace 
 to see if it were indeed she who was thus flying from him 
 at his utmost need. On the instant, a tomahawk hurtled 
 through the air, and cleaving the light branches near, 
 buried itself in a maple-tree beside him. Quick as light, 
 Max seized the weapon, and plucked it from the bark in
 
 A ROMANCE OF THE MOHAWK. 2GO 
 
 which it quivered. But, instantaneous as was the move 
 ment, it did not avail him ; for, as he was in the act of 
 wheeling round to confront the peril in the direction 
 whence the hatchet came, he was grappled in the arms of 
 a sinewy Indian. Down they both went together, the 
 Indian uppermost ; and so completely did he seem to 
 have Greyslaer at advantage, that he leisurely addressed 
 him while partly raising himself to draw his knife. 
 
 " My broder thought it time to leave the camp when 
 Isaac come, eh, my broder ? Aha !" And, as the mis 
 creant spoke, he made a motion across the skull of his 
 prostrate prisoner, as if he felt tempted to go through the 
 ceremony of scalping while life, yet vigorous in his veins, 
 should give a zest to the cruelty. 
 
 But Max was not the man to be sportively handled in 
 a death encounter. His dark eye followed the gleaming 
 weapon, as the barbarian flourished it above his head, with 
 a glance as keen as that of the hawk-eyed Indian. He 
 had fallen with one arm under him, and happily, it was 
 that which held the tomahawk, which thus escaped the 
 notice of his foe. It was for the moment pinioned to the 
 ground, not less by the weight of his own body than by 
 that of the savage ; and the force with which he had been 
 hurled to the earth so paralyzed the strength of Greyslaer, 
 that he did not at first attempt to extricate his hand. But 
 now, throwing back his head, as if he shrunk from the 
 knife that was offered at it, he suddenly arched his back 
 so as to lift the savage and himself together ; and, slipping 
 his arm from under him as the other bore him down again 
 by throwing the full weight of his person lengthwise upon 
 him, he dealt a side blow with the hatchet which nearly
 
 270 GREYSLAER; 
 
 crushed the skull of the Indian. The fellow relaxed his 
 grip of Greyslaer's throat in an instant, and rolled over, 
 and lay as if stricken to death upon the spot, while, 
 breathless and disordered, young Max regained his feet.
 
 A ROMANCE OF THE MOHAWK. 271 
 
 CHAPTER II 
 
 THE MARCH OF THE CAPTIVE. 
 
 " Amid thy forest solitudes he climbs 
 O'er crags that proudly tower above the deep, 
 And knows that sense of danger which sublimes 
 The breathless moment when his daring step 
 Is on the verge of the cliff, and he can hear 
 The low dash of the wave with startled ear, 
 Like the death-music of his coming doom, 
 And clings to the green turf with desperate force, 
 As the heart clings to life; and when resume 
 The currents in his veins, their wonted course, 
 There lingers a deep feeling, like the moan 
 Of wearied ocean when the storm is gone." 
 
 HALLECK. 
 
 UPON examining the features of the Indian, which were 
 of a singularly brutal cast, Greyslaer felt convinced that 
 he had beheld them before, but where or when it was 
 impossible for him to say. 
 
 Bending near to scrutinize them more closely, he ob 
 served that life still remained ; for the eyes, which were 
 shut, had their lids, not smoothly drooping as when closed 
 in death, but knit and screwed together as when suddenly 
 closed in a paroxysm of rage or pain. They opened 
 now, as a heavy gasp broke from the bosom of the sav 
 age. Max instantly possessed himself of the scalping- 
 knife which lay near, and held it, like a dagger of miseri-
 
 272 GREYSLAER; 
 
 corde, at the throat of his reviving foe. The slightest 
 thrust would have rid him at once of all further difficulty ; 
 but it was not in his heart to slaughter a living man thus 
 laid at his mercy, and he shouted to the girl to bring him 
 a withe that he might bind his prisoner. The Dew replied 
 not to his call. But. he heard a quick trampling near, 
 which he mistook for her approach. 
 
 He looked in the direction whence the sound of foot 
 steps came, but the leafy covert was so thick in that 
 direction that he could descry nothing. He listened 
 anxiously ; they came nearer, but there was no reply to 
 his repeated calls. The footsteps paused a moment. He 
 leaned forward to peer beneath the heavy branches ; and 
 in the same moment that an armed Indian darted from 
 the covert before him, the shadow of another, who was 
 approaching from behind, was cast athwart him. He 
 had not time to spring to his feet before he was again a 
 captive and defenceless. 
 
 The two last-comers were soon joined by others, who 
 quickly made a rude litter of boughs for their wounded 
 tribesman, and the whole party then took their way 
 through the woods with their captive. They did not, 
 however, carry their prisoner back to the squaw camp, 
 as he first expected they would, when, under the circum 
 stances, he anticipated the usual wretched doom of an 
 Indian prisoner. But, moving along leisurely until they 
 came to a level and marshy piece of ground, they paused 
 for a moment, and seemed in doubt what next to do, when 
 one, who had aided in carrying the wounded man, gave 
 his place to another, and approached to him who seemed 
 to act as leader of the party. He murmured something, 
 which, from the low tones in which the Indians usually 
 pitch their voice?. Greyslaer could not overhear.
 
 A ROMANCE OF THE MOHAWK. 373 
 
 " Wahss !" (go !) was the brief reply to his communica 
 tion. 
 
 The man beckoned to two others, and the three, plung 
 ing into a copse near by, appeared the next moment, each 
 with a birchen canoe upon his shoulders. Crossing the 
 trail they had been travelling, the whole party entered a 
 thicket of alders, where a thread of water, scarce three 
 inches deep, crept noiselessly along. The others care 
 fully parted the bushes, so that the canoemen could let 
 down their shallops into this slender rill, which was so 
 narrow that the water was wholly hidden when a canoe 
 was placed upon its surface. 
 
 The wounded man was assigned to the forward canoe, 
 and Max, with his arms still pinioned behind him. placed 
 in the centre. The whole party were then again soon in 
 motion. The runnel was too narrow for the use of pad 
 dles, and for some time they propelled themselves for 
 ward merely by the aid of the bushes which overreached 
 their heads. 
 
 At last they came to a spot where the swamp around 
 them, being confined between two hills, poured its oozing 
 springs more completely into a single current. The 
 water, running deeper and swifter, cut its way down 
 through the black mould until a channel of yellow peb 
 bles was revealed beneath it. The alders were separated 
 more widely from each other, and grew more in scattered 
 clumps, which sometimes formed green islets, circled with 
 a fringe of scarlet, wherever their red roots were washed 
 and polished by the flowing waters. 
 
 Now the stream would sweep amid tussocks of long 
 waving grass, crowned here and there by a broad 
 branching elm, whose branches dipped in the tide, that 
 13
 
 274 GREYSLAER; 
 
 whirled in deepening eddies where its projecting roots 
 overhung the water. Now it rippled for a few yards 
 over a pebbly bottom, and then, turned by a spit of yel 
 low sand thick trodden with the tracks of deer, of 
 wolves, and not {infrequently with those of bears and 
 panthers it would slide round a point of land black 
 with the shade of lofty pines. A frith of long wild grass, 
 growing evenly as a fresh-mowed meadow, and em 
 bayed among the thousand points of a tamarack swamp, 
 received now the spreading river. And now, again, it. 
 was circumscribed once more into a deep, black, formal- 
 looking pool, circled with water-lilies ; and henceforth, 
 around many a beetling crag, thick sheathed with laurel 
 and the clustering hemlock, and beneath the shadows of 
 many a tall mountain rising from forests of bass-wood 
 and maple, it marched proudly onward till it expanded 
 into a magnificent lake. 
 
 Coasting along the shores of this lake for a mile or two. 
 they came to an Indian hunter's camp, which, as it seemed, 
 belonged to a man who furnished the canoes. The place 
 was offensive from the smell of dead animals, such as 
 minks, otters, and musquashes, whose carcasses, stripped 
 of their skins, were suspended from the boughs of trees 
 around the cabin as food for the Indian dogs. But the 
 Indians, notwithstanding their proverbial keenness of 
 scent, seemed no wise molested by this savory atmosphere.* 
 
 * A sporting friend, the companion of the author in more than one excur 
 sion among these mountain wilds, seeing some Indians with whom he hunted 
 busied in removing these objects of annoyance from the camp as the party 
 approached it, was wholly at a loss to conceive the motive of placing them 
 where they were found, until the sudden appearance of two half-famished
 
 A ROMANCE OF THE MOHAWK. 375 
 
 Leaving their wounded tribesman under the care of 
 this worthy, who laid claim to some skill as a medicine 
 man, the rest of the party started again with their captive 
 on the following day, and, crossing several mountain 
 ridges, and winding their way among innumerable ponds 
 and lakes, halted near a beautiful sheet of water, which 
 still bears the name of Indian Lake, from its having been 
 a sacred place of resort to the Iroquois. 
 
 The outlet of this lake, though it is buried in a region 
 of lofty and sterile mountains, winds through natural pas 
 tures of deep grass* imbowered with enormous elms, 
 forming a soft and open sylvan landscape, which is in the 
 most delicious contrast to the thick and rugged forests 
 which frown from the adjacent hills. This was the seat 
 of the mysterious KENTICOYS, or solemn meetings of the 
 Mohawks, when, at the opening and closing year, the dif 
 ferent tribes of the Iroquois retired, each to some such 
 forest-temple, to worship the Supreme Being, whose 
 power was alike acknowledged by all. 
 
 dogs revealed tlie mystery ; for it is the custom of a hunter, -when leaving 
 his dogs to protect his camp in his absence, to hang the food prepared for 
 them at different heights, so that the animal might not devour all his stores 
 at once, but have to leap higher for it as he grows leaner. 
 
 These dogs, as one might have supposed from their fatigued appearance, 
 had been off somewhere pursuing the chase for their own amusement. But, 
 upon this being suggested to the old Indian hunter, who spoke a few words 
 of broken English, and was more communicative than most of his race, he 
 was indignant at the idea of an Indian dog deserting his charge. He pointed 
 to a mountain peak at the other end of the lake, and assured our friend 
 that they had been watching for him from its summit, Avhen they saw hia 
 boat upon the water and hurried homeward. 
 
 * Called " flys " or " vlies " by our hunters. "
 
 276 GREYSLAER; 
 
 The prisoner, though treated at this sacred season with 
 a degree of mildness and forbearance that was new to 
 him as a trait of Indian character, was only allowed to 
 approach the threshold of the valley, where a guardian 
 was appointed him until the solemn days were over. 
 
 The garden-like plain was spread out below the emi 
 nence upon which stood the shanty which was his tem 
 porary prison-house ; and Greyslaer could from time to 
 time discern some plumed band defiling from the hills and 
 losing themselves among the far-reaching groves, to which 
 the Indians repaired from every side. But of the form of 
 their ceremonial or the nature of their worship he could 
 discern nothing. Nor has any white man been able to 
 learn more of these periodical gatherings of the Iroquois, 
 save only their name and their object.* 
 
 It was two days after these unknown rites were con 
 summated that Greyslaer found himself ascending a rug 
 ged mountain under the care of his captors, who stil-l 
 withheld all harsh treatment, while warily watching him 
 as if they only held him in trust as the captive of some 
 one more powerful than themselves. It could scarcely 
 be the wounded Isaac, however ; for, since his first seiz 
 ure, Max had been studiously kept out of the sight of that 
 ferocious Indian, whose bloody-minded disposition fre- 
 
 * It is curious to remark, however, how, with the spread of Christianity 
 and civilization along our Indian borders, this custom of retiring away from 
 the haunts of men to worship God among primeval woods, grew up among 
 our frontiers-men ; while some might even discover an analogy between 
 the rude but not irreligious feeling which first suggested the ancient Kenti- 
 coys of the Iroquois, and the policy which still keeps alive the practice of 
 " camp-meetings " among a numerous and not unenlightened sect of Chris 
 tians. See Flint's Valley of the Mississippi.
 
 A ROMANCE OF THE MOHAWK. 277 
 
 quently showed itself during the delirium of fever under 
 which he was left at the hunter's cabin. 
 
 Whatever disposition it was ultimately intended to make 
 of the prisoner, his life seemed in little danger during the 
 march ; but a measure adopted by his captors as he now 
 reached the highest pinnacle of the mountain appeared to 
 indicate that its crisis was at hand. They led him to the 
 edge of a lofty precipice, which commanded a view al 
 most completely around the compass, and motioned to 
 him to cast his eyes above and below him. 
 
 It was the hour of autumn sunset, when the golden air 
 seems to glorify every object on which it rests. Never 
 did it bathe in molten light a lovelier landscape of moun 
 tain peaks, interminable to the eye ; interlaced by lakes 
 so numerous that, as these last reflect the tints of the glow 
 ing sky, the mountains themselves seem, in their autumn 
 livery, like rainbow masses floating in liquid ether. The 
 heart of Greyslaer thrilled within him at the sight ; and 
 not the least painful part of the death that seemed to 
 hover near was the thought of closing his eyes for ever 
 upon such a world of glorious beauty. But his struggles 
 to prevent them from bandaging his eyes were vain, for 
 his hands were bound behind him ; and now he stood 
 blinded and helpless above the gulf into which each mo 
 ment he expected to be hurled. 
 
 Suddenly he felt a rude hand upon either shoulder, and 
 he gasped the prayer which he believed to be his last 
 but the next moment the two Indians who had fixed their 
 gripe upon him only turned their captive round several 
 times, fast held between them, and led him away from the 
 precipice. He became then conscious of gradually de 
 scending. Again he felt that his path led upward over
 
 278 G-R-E Y 8 L A E B , 
 
 innumerable obstacles, which his guides patiently aided 
 him in surmounting. Once more, again, he was convinced 
 that he was descending, though his path-way wound so 
 hither and thither that it was impossible to say how steep 
 the slope might be. 
 
 At last he heard the sound of water faintly dashing 
 upon the shore. His guides halted and removed the 
 bandage from his eyes. He looked up, and found himself 
 upon the edge of a small lake or mountain tarn, deep set 
 at the bottom of a rocky bowl or hollow less than a mile 
 in diameter, circled around by naked crags and splintered 
 pinnacles of rock, some straggling copse- wood or a blasted 
 tree here and there alone relieving the utter barrenness 
 of the scene, which at once conveyed the idea of the ex 
 tinct crater of a volcano. 
 
 This heart-chilling sterility was, however, somewhat 
 redeemed, when, after circling the lake for a short dis 
 tance, the Indians came to a few acres of well-wooded 
 land in a recess of the circular valley. Here Greyslaer 
 again heard the voices of women and children from a 
 camp of safety, and resigned himself to the monotony of 
 captivity in a stronghold from which there seemed no 
 escape. 
 
 It were bootless to relate the varied sufferings of Max 
 Greyslaer during his long winter of captivity in that dreary 
 mountain, which Indians call " The Thunder's Nest :"* to 
 tell how he passed weeks of nearly utter starvation, when 
 fortune failed the two or three Indian hunters upon whose 
 success the whole community depended for subsistence ; 
 
 * Crane Mountain is its present unmeaning name.
 
 A ROMANCE OF THE MOHAWK. 279 
 
 how eagerly he caught at the relief to his monotonous 
 existence, when his captors ordered him also to turn out 
 and hunt the bear, the lynx, and the panther, the only 
 animals which are found among those high mountain fast 
 nesses in the winter season, while the Iroquois themselves 
 pursued on snow-shoes the moose and red deer in the 
 valleys below ; to tell of the harsh treatment he received 
 when, weary and faint, with limbs half frozen and lacer 
 ated from toiling through the frozen snow-crust, he re 
 turned from a fruitless hunt ; of the capricious gleams of 
 kindness of which he was the object when his address and 
 prowess in the chase awakened alike the admiration and 
 the jealousy of those who watched his every motion while 
 pursuing it with him. But now the spring, which has 
 been long in reaching this highland region, has, while 
 thickening the forest around, brought with it the hope of 
 escape, amid some of those greenwood coverts. It is true 
 that he is no longer permitted to wander as far as when 
 the woods were bare. Yet if he can break his thraldom 
 for an hour, there is one at hand with both the will and 
 the ability to guide him from the wilderness. 
 
 There has been an accession of numbers to the Indian 
 camp, bringing rumors that Brant and his warriors have 
 all left the lower country. And The Spreading Dew, 
 who came in with the rest, has even communicated to 
 Greyslaer that Sir John Johnson and his loyalist retain 
 ers, both Indian and white, have withdrawn from the Val 
 ley of the Mohawk and fled to Canada. The patriots 
 must be in the ascendency ! Why is Max (jreyslaer not 
 there to share the triumph of his friends ?
 
 280 GREYS LAER; 
 
 CHAPTER III. 
 
 THE FORESTERS. 
 
 " The woodland rings with laugh and shout, 
 
 As if a hunt were up, 
 And woodland flowers are gathered 
 
 To crown the soldier's cup. 
 With merry song we mock the wind 
 
 That in the pine-top grieves, 
 And slumber long and sweetly 
 On beds of oaken leaves." 
 
 BKYANT. 
 
 THERE were preparations for a hunter's carousal in the 
 heart of the forest. The scene of their revel was a sunny 
 glade, where a dozen idlers were lounging away the noon 
 tide beneath the dappled boughs. A fire had been kin 
 dled upon a flat rock near by, and from the rivulet that 
 gurgled around its base, the neck of a black bottle pro 
 truded, where it had been anchored to cool in the running 
 water. A fresh-killed buck lay as if just thrown upon 
 the sod in the midst of the woodland crew, who stirred 
 themselves from the shade as the hunter who had flung 
 the carcass from his strong shoulders turned to lean his 
 rifle against the fretted trunk of a walnut-tree that spread 
 its branches near. 
 " Why, Kit Lansingh, my boy, you are no slouch of a
 
 A ROMANCE OF THE MOHAWK. 281 
 
 woodsman to carry a yearling of such a heft as that," cried 
 our old friend Bait, lifting the deer by its antlers partly 
 from the ground. "You must have struck the crittur, too, 
 a smart distance from here, for none of us have heard the 
 crack of your rifle to-day." 
 
 " Somebody may, though you have not, Uncle Bait ; 
 for, let me tell you, boys, there's other folks in the woods 
 besides us chaps here." 
 
 The hunters started up and were now all attention 
 for the signs of strangers in the forest is ever a source of 
 keen interest to the woodsman, who, when the frontier is 
 in arms, never ventures to strike the game of which he is 
 in search without remembering that he himself may be, 
 at that very moment, the human quarry of some more 
 dangerous hunter that hovers near. 
 
 " Nay, Conyer, go on cutting up the carcass. I've left 
 no trail to guide a redskin to this spot," said the hunter, 
 disembarrassing himself of his powder-horn and shooting- 
 pouch, which he hung upon a wild plum-bush near by. 
 " We can sit down to dinner without any of Brant's peo 
 ple coming to take pot-luck with us ; for I've scouted 
 every rod of ground within miles of the camp. But the 
 redskins are out, nevertheless, I tell ye." 
 
 " Where, Kit, where ? How know you ?" simultane 
 ously cried a dozen voices. 
 
 " Why, you see, it must be at least four hours agone 
 since I struck that yearling, which was down in the 
 Whooping Hollow by Cawaynoot Pond." 
 
 " Cawaynoot Pond !" ejaculated a hunter. " What, that 
 little bog-bordered lake, with the island that floats loose 
 upon it like a toast in a tankard ?" 
 
 " Go on, go on, Kit," cried another. " We all know 
 3*
 
 282 GREYSLAER; 
 
 the Whooping Hollow ; but you were a bold fellow to 
 strike a deer there." 
 
 " Yes, I stirred him first in the mash at this eend of 
 Cawaynoot, and that's a fact. But, instead of taking the 
 water there he puts out westward, and clips it right over 
 toward the river, till he brought me in sight of the Potash 
 Kettle." 
 
 " Senongewah ' The Great Upturned Pot' the Abre- 
 gynes call it," ejaculated Bait ; " I know the mounting." 
 
 " Well," pursued Lansingh, " the buck doesn't keep on 
 toward the river, but hooks it right round the rim of the 
 Kettle, and back again toward the east. It was, in 
 course, long afore I could git a shot ; and, following hard 
 on his trail along a hillside overgrown with short sprangly 
 bushes, I saw, by the way in which they were trampled 
 down, that a white man must have passed that way 
 before me." 
 
 " A white man?" cried several voices, with increasing 
 interest, 
 
 " Yes, a white man ; and that within no very great time, 
 any how." 
 
 " How knew you that, Kit ?" asked Bait. 
 
 " Why, I cleared the bushes aside, looked down, and 
 there, as plain as my Bible, I saw the print of his shoe in 
 the moss." 
 
 " Which, in course, would not hold a foot-print long if it 
 was fresh and springy. Kit is right, boys," said Bait. 
 
 "And that wasn't all, uncle. I saw a shoe-print in the 
 fresh moss, with that of a small Injun moccasin treading 
 right in his footsteps. (A little salt, Teunis ; now let the 
 gravy of that other slice drip on my corn-cake till I'm 
 ready for it so fashion.")
 
 A ROMANCE OF THE MOHAWK. 283 
 
 " A moccasin ? Go on, go on, Kit," cried an eager 
 young hunter. 
 
 " Let a man eat in whiles, won't you, lads ?" said Lan- 
 singh, who seemed disposed to make the most of his narra 
 tive. " Well, I went on, followed my deer till I got a shot 
 at him from behind a cranberry bush in Whooping Hol 
 low, and just as he was bending his knees to take the 
 water near the very spot where I first started him, (it was 
 nateral. you know, Uncle Bait, for the crittur to go back 
 where he belonged a drop of that liquor, if you please,) 
 he caught my bullet in the back of his neck, gave a splurge, 
 and was done for. 
 
 "So, after pulling him out of the water, I hangs up the 
 carcass out of reach of the wolves, and goes back to look 
 after the white man's trail. 
 
 "It kept along the hillside only a short distance, and 
 then struck suddenly off atween two rocks and among 
 some dogbriers, where I nearly lost it, right over the 
 ridge, on the opposite side of which it led right back in 
 the direction from which I had first traced it. Now, says 
 I to myself, says I, it's after all only some fool of a fellow 
 that has lost himself in these woods, which are about the 
 easiest to travel in a human crittur could have, seeing that the 
 hills are so many landmarks all around. Let him go to 
 the old boy, says I, for a dunderhead as he is. No, again 
 says I, here's an Injun moccasin right in his track, and 
 perhaps it's some unfortunate who's been driven to take 
 to the bush by the troubles of the times, and not come 
 here to make a fool of himself for pastime ; so, Kit Lan- 
 singh, streak it ahead, man, and look after your fellow- 
 crittur." 
 
 " I'd a disowned ye for my sister's son had ye done 
 otherwise," interrupted Bait.
 
 284 GREYSLAER; 
 
 " Well," pursued the hunter, " I did go ahead, and that 
 though it took me myself out of my way, Uncle Bait. 1 
 followed the scent for miles toward the east, till I thought 
 it would take me clean out to Lake George. But at last 
 I saw what paid me for my trouble ; for, in crossing a bit 
 of pine barren, I came upon a raal Indian trail, and no 
 mistake about it where a dozen men or more had streaked 
 it through the sand after my shoe and moccasin." 
 
 " Tormented lightning !" cried Bait, rubbing his hands 
 in much excitement ; " go on, go on, Kit ; d'ye say a dozen 
 Injuns ?" 
 
 " Yes, uncle, not a copperskin less ; and let me tell you 
 now that this discovery discomboberated me considerably. 
 Why, says I to myself, says I, why should a dozen red 
 skins be led away thus after one poor wanderer, when 
 they might see already, from the double trail, that he is a 
 doomed man, from the moccasin tread that is still fresh 
 in his footfalls ; here's something new, now, to study in 
 Injun natur, and I'll see the eend of it. So, with that, I 
 ups and ons. 
 
 " And now I soon saw, by the way in which the white 
 man's track doubled and doubled again, crossing and re- 
 crossing that of the Injuns in one etarnal everlasting snarl, 
 that the fellow could not be cutting such carlicues for 
 nothing. He knows what he's about. He's a chap that 
 understands himself, says I ; and I began to have respect 
 for him. 
 
 " By this time, though I ought to have said it afore, the 
 trail had led west again ; yes, indeed, clean across the 
 river, which I forded in following it, and then up and 
 away over the ridge on the opposite side, striking clean 
 over to the Sacondaga. I mistrusted that it would cross 
 that river, too, as it had the other branch ; but no, it fol-
 
 A ROMANCE OF THE MOHAWK. 285 
 
 lows down to the meeting of the waters, or Tiosaronda* 
 as the Abregynes call it. There, where the falls of the 
 main river roar through the rocky chasm as it hurries 
 along like mad to join the other fork. And here, says I, 
 the game will either be up with Shoeties, or he will give 
 Moccasin the slip altogether. And raaly, boys, I defy the 
 best woodsman among ye I defy the devil, or Uncle 
 Bait himself to find any leavings of that white man around 
 the place. You may see there the woods trampled all 
 round by Injuns. You may see where they have slipped 
 down the bank, and where they've clomb up again. You 
 may follow their trail backward and forward along either 
 fork of the stream for a mile, and you may see where 
 they all united again, and trudged off as if to take up the 
 back track once more afresh, and so make a new thing of 
 it ; but how or whither that white man cleared himself, 
 you cannot find out !" 
 
 " That flogs natur," cried a hunter. " And saw ye no 
 other trace of the critturs anywhere, Kit ? Not a hair's 
 ashes of them ?" 
 
 " Yes ! but not thereabouts ; and now, boys, I'm about 
 to tell you the curiosest part o' the hull business. For 
 you must know, that, if I had not left my deer where I 
 did, the snarl might have remained without any further 
 clew. But as, after giving up the chase, I made back 
 tracks up the river, recrossed, and struck out again for 
 Whooping Hollow to bring the venison on here to camp, 
 what should I discover but the self-same track of the 
 white man right in the heart of the hollow. I did not 
 
 * Now Luzerne.
 
 286 GREYSLAER; 
 
 look to see whether the floating island was near shore, or 
 if he had stepped aboard and floated off on it ; but, ' my 
 friend,' says I to him I mean, says I to myself ' my 
 friend,' says I, ' had I seen your first track in the Whoop 
 ing Hollow, and on the very shores of Cawaynoot, you 
 would never have led me sich a Jack-a-lantern chase as 
 this. I'm not a gentleman that keeps company with the 
 Striped Huntsman or Red-heeled Bob, as the Scotch set 
 tlers call ye; and, if we are. ever to make acquaintance, 
 your own parlor in the Whooping Hollow is not exactly 
 the place I would choose for an introduction.' With that 
 I cut out in quick order from the hollow, and made clean 
 tracks for camp. And that, boys, is the hull o' my story ; 
 and now let's have something to drink." 
 
 The woodsmen all listened with deep attention to this 
 long rigmarole narrative as it was slowly detailed by the 
 young hunter. By some it was received merely as an 
 idle tale of wonder, such as those who love the marvel 
 lous may often hear from the simple-minded rangers of 
 our forest borders. It was but one of the thousand sto 
 ries told about the Whooping Hollow, whose mysteries 
 none could, and few cared to solve. (For though the 
 wild, whooping sound, from which, in former times, the 
 hollow took its name, is now never heard, save in echo 
 to a human voice, the floating island is still pointed out to 
 the traveller as his road winds around the basin at the 
 bottom of which reposes the little lake of Cawaynoot.*) 
 
 * Cawaynoot is the term for "island" in the Mohawk tongue. The lake 
 is now generally called " Adam's Pond," from the name of a settler upon 
 its banks.
 
 A ROMANCE OF THE MOHAWK. 287 
 
 Others, again, regarded the story of Christian's adventures 
 as affording positive evidence of the neighborhood of In 
 dians ; and though " The Striped Huntsman," as he was 
 called, might be at the bottom of the business, yet it was 
 evident that a considerable band of mortals like them 
 selves had been equally, with young Lansingh, misled by 
 his deviltries and lured into their immediate neighbor 
 hood. This last was, in fact, the view which old Bait 
 took of the matter. 
 
 "Not," said the honest woodsman, "that the crittur 
 whom folks call ' The Striped Huntsman' be t'ther a good 
 sperrit or a bad sperrit, or whether or no there be any 
 sperrit at all about the matter ! Nother do I pretend to 
 say, with some people, that the Striped Huntsman is only 
 some roguish half-breed or outlawed Injun Medicine 
 man, who has pitched upon this unsettled part of the pat 
 ent between the Scotch and German clearings and the 
 Mohawk hunting grounds, as the very corner of the airth 
 from which it was the business of no one in partiklar to 
 oust him, whatever shines he might cut up on his own 
 hook. No, I leave it to the domine, whose business it is 
 to settle sich matters. (Pity the good man couldn't catch 
 some droppings o' eloquence from yonder preaching 
 brook to lifen his sarmints !) But I tell ye, boys, that if 
 it be raaly the track of the crittur which lies fresh in our 
 neighborhood, it's not such an unlikely sperrit after all ; 
 for why may we not captivate some of the redskins that 
 it has coaxed towards us, and thus, mayhap, git tidings 
 of the poor lost capting ?" 
 
 " Old Bait," said a hunter, " you are for ever thinking 
 of poor Captain Max, whose bones must be long since 
 cold."
 
 288 . GREYSLAER; 
 
 "And for what else, Rhynier Peterson, did we come off 
 on this tramp, if it was not that all of us had some thought 
 of the capting ? And born heathens we'd a' been had we 
 not come to look after him," added Bait, indignantly. 
 
 " Yes, but Bait," said another, " though we all of us fol 
 lowed you willingly enough at first, yet haven't we all 
 determined long ago that it was a wildgoose chase you 
 were leading us after ? Here, now, we've been fifty miles 
 above here, poking about among mountains so big, that, if 
 the summer ever manages to climb them, it is only to rest 
 herself for a week or so, when she slants down the other 
 side, and leaves the snow right off to settle in her place. 
 The old ' North,' too, haven't we followed up the river to 
 where it dodges about, trying to hide its raal head in a 
 hundred lakes ? These lakes, moresomever, haven't we 
 slapped through them into five times as many more, and 
 made portages up to the leetlest tricklings of some of 
 them ? To be sure we have ; and what good has it done 
 us, all this trampoosing and paddling hither and thither in 
 this etarnal wilderness? We are now within ten miles of 
 Lake George, and less than half that distance of the mouth 
 of the Sacondaga, and my say is, either to strike over at 
 once to Fort William Henry, or to cross the river below 
 the forks, and make the best of our way to Saratoga." 
 
 " And that's my say too," said a gray-headed hunter 
 who had not yet spoken. " It's a fool's errand looking 
 further for the captain. I don't myself altogether believe 
 that young Max is completely done for in this life ; for we 
 found traces enough of him in the deserted squaw camp 
 last autumn ; and if the Injuns kept him alive so long, he 
 may yet wear his scalp in safety. But it all comes to the 
 same thing if Brant has carried him off to Canada, where 
 he'll be sure to keep him till these wars are over."
 
 A KOMANCE OF THE MOHAWK.' 289 
 
 <; What ! you too, Hank Williams !" replied Bait, with a 
 look of keen reproach at the last speaker; "you who were 
 the first to offer to take to the woods with me, and keep 
 there till, dead or alive, we found the capting ! Well, 
 boys, I don't want to get riled with ye, when, mayhap, 
 we are jist upon the pint of a fight, where a man wants 
 all his coolness ; but I tell ye one thing, I came out here 
 after young Max, and, dead or alive, I don't go in without 
 him. You may drop off one by one, or go away the hull 
 biling on ye together, ye may ; but old Bait will not leave 
 these woods till he gets fairly upon his trail ; and, once 
 upon it, he'll follow it up, if he has to streak it again clean 
 through the mountains to Canada. So, now we under 
 stand each other, let's eat our dinner without no more 
 words said about the matter, but go and look after these 
 Injuns as soon as may be." 
 
 " Why, uncle," said Christian Lansingh, as the rest of 
 the party now addressed themselves silently to the rude 
 meal before them, " I never thought for a moment .of giv 
 ing up the chase as long as you thought it well to go 
 ahead." 
 
 " I know'd it, boy, I know'd it ; the son of old Christian 
 and my nephew is not the chap to be skeered from his 
 promise by some nigger nurse's gammon about the Striped 
 Huntsman and sich fooleries." 
 
 " Oh. our friends don't stickle about the matter we have 
 now in hand," said another young hunter, modestly ; 
 "but, you know, Bait, some of them have left their homes 
 and " 
 
 '' Their hums ? And who in all natur wants a better 
 hum nor this ? Here are walls that rise straight upward 
 higher than any you see in housen, keeping the wind
 
 290 GKEYSLAER; 
 
 away, yet letting you step about where you choose with 
 out getting out o' doors for these walls follow you, as it 
 were, and close around you wherever you move ; and as 
 for them as wants a fireside, why, aint the woods right 
 full of clean hearth-stones and cosy nestling-places? A 
 hum ? Tormented lightning ! is it a soft bed ye want 
 there, lads ? Why, isn't yonder mossy tussock as fresh and 
 springy as e'er a pillow your good woman could shake up 
 for ye there, I mean, where that woof of vine-leaves, 
 close as an Injun mat, spreads over to keep alike the 
 sun and dews away ? Lads, lads, I'm ashamed on ye 
 to talk o' housen in a place like this, where the very' light 
 from heaven looks young and new you may laugh, Bill, 
 but it does, I say the light o' God looks bright, and fresh, 
 and tender here, as if it might a' been twin-born with the 
 young Summer this very year see only jist see for 
 yourselves how it scatters down through the green thatch 
 of yonder boughs, which lift each moment as if some live 
 and pleasant thing dropped from them on the sod below !" 
 
 " It is of those they have left at home," rejoined the 
 young hunter, the moment that Bait, pausing to catch 
 breath, allowed him to put in a word ; " our friends have 
 left wives and families at home, whom they must look 
 after in times like these ; but here's half a dozen of us use 
 less lads, who will keep the woods with you until you 
 yourself shall say that we have made a clean thing of 
 it." 
 
 The doughty Bait seemed to wince a little under the 
 first of these remarks ; for he was compelled to admit the 
 force of it. He did not reply, however, save by patting the 
 speaker on the shoulders, and nodding to him kindly as he 
 buried his face in the flagon from which the whole of the
 
 A ROMANCE OF THE MOHAWK. 
 
 company drank in succession. The rest of the meal was 
 despatched in silence, and the party then made their pre 
 parations for proceeding to the spot where Christian Lan- 
 singh had last seen the mysterious footprints. 
 
 Leaving Bait and his crew of foresters to make a cau 
 tious and weary reconnoissance of this enchanted ground, 
 let us give our attention to the two wanderers, who the 
 reader may soon have cause to suspect were the real flesh 
 and blood actors in this game of woodland magic.
 
 2<J2 GREYSLAEll; 
 
 CHAPTER IV. 
 
 THE FLIGHT FROM THE THUNDER'S NEST. 
 
 " He has left the green valley for paths where the bison 
 Roams through the forest or leaps o'er the flood ; 
 Where the snake in the swamp sucks the deadliest poison, 
 And the cat of the mountains keeps watch for its food ; 
 But the leaf shall be greener, the sky shall be purer, 
 The eye shall be clearer, the rifle be surer, 
 And stronger the arm of the fearless endurer 
 That trusts naught but Heaven in his way through the wood." 
 
 BRAIXARD. 
 
 LET it bring no reproach to the manhood of Max Grey- 
 slaer, that now, in the very prime of youthful vigor, with 
 a frame schooled by hardship to endurance of every kind, 
 he must still depend upon female address to deliver him 
 from bondage, 
 
 Twice already had he attempted, at the free peril of his 
 life, to regain his liberty ; once, as we have before seen, 
 when, lost in the mazes of the forest, he rushed again un 
 awares directly into the arms of his enemy : and again, 
 during his abode in the Thunder's Nest, he had, when nearly 
 succeeding in the attempt, been overtaken in the deep 
 snowdrifts, amid which he must have perished, even if 
 successful, and carried back in triumph to the Indian camp. 
 
 Then, upon his second recapture, he had undergone all
 
 A ROMANCE OF THE MOHAWK. 393 
 
 the horrors of mind which must precede a death of Indian 
 torture with those who have read or heard of its cruelly 
 ingenious and protracted agonies. He had been subjected 
 to all the savage preparations for the stake, and had then 
 confronted death in its most awful shape. He had seen the 
 flames kindled around him. The fire-tipped arrows had 
 been shot into his body, and torments far more excruciat 
 ing were about to follow, when, as an Indian beldame ad 
 vanced to tear the only remaining strip of vesture from 
 his body, the totem of Brant imprinted upon it was re 
 vealed to the hellish crew of executioners around him, 
 and saved him from a death so horrible. 
 
 Since that moment, though still strictly guarded, he had 
 been treated with all the forbearance which characterized 
 the conduct of the party which had brought him thither, 
 though they had long since gone off and left him in other 
 hands. But as, though wearing the insignia of an imme 
 diate follower of Thayendanagea, he had never undergone 
 the ceremony of being formally adopted into any tribe of 
 the Mohawks, he was conscious that his change of treat 
 ment arose only from his being now regarded rather as a 
 slave than a prisoner. He was determined once more to 
 seize an opportunity to escape, and to perish rather than 
 be retaken. He relied much, however, it must be confess 
 ed, upon The Dew to make such opportunity for him. Nor 
 was that hope and confidence misplaced. 
 
 Max, though still given to that half romantic, half phi 
 losophic mood of wrapping one's self up in one's own 
 dreams and speculations, which belongs to that inexperi 
 enced season of life when we value our own thoughts far 
 more than the material objects around us, was still not de 
 ficient in keen and curious observation of character. And
 
 294 GREYSLAER; 
 
 for months it had been one of his chief mental resources to 
 study the personal traits and peculiarities of the singular 
 people among whom his present lot was cast. 
 
 He was sitting one morning a little aloof from a group 
 of loungers of all sexes and sizes, listening to a rude legend 
 which an old woman, employed in weaving mats, was re 
 lating for their edification. The wild tradition with which 
 she was engaged related to those strange subterranean 
 sounds which are still, from time to time, heard among 
 these mountains. She told of some bold hunter who went 
 out determining to trace the spot whence these groanings 
 of the earth had travelled out. And Greyslaer, who had 
 looked with a curious eye upon the remarkable peculiar 
 ities of this volcanic region, bent near to hear how the 
 strange fancy of an Iroquois would account for natural 
 phenomena to whose existence he himself could bear tes 
 timony. 
 
 At this moment the report of a gun was heard not far 
 off. It probably was discharged by some hunter belong 
 ing to the camp, and excited no attention among the listen 
 ing group. Presently, however, The Dew, who had gone 
 down to the shore of the lake to bring water, appeared, 
 and saying aloud that the hunter who had just fired needed 
 the assistance of the white man in bringing some game to 
 camp, motioned Greyslaer the path in which he should go, 
 which, strangely enough, was in an opposite direction from 
 that whence the sound came. The others were too much 
 engaged with the story-teller to notice the discrepancy, 
 whose purport, however, was intuitively understood by the 
 prisoner ; and, before the approaching hunter had reached 
 the camp on the one side, he had gained a considerable dis 
 tance on the other. He pierced far into the ravine through
 
 A ROMANCE OF THE MOHAWK. .295 
 
 which the waters of the lake discharge themselves from 
 the hollow, and now only hesitated which way to turn his 
 steps. The ravine, though at first distinctly defined, had, 
 within a few hundred yards of the lake, so broadened and 
 broken up into a thousand rocky inequalities, that it was 
 impossible, as the forest thickened around him, to tell what 
 route to take in order to descend the mountain. The out 
 let of the lake would seem to have been a sufficient guide ; 
 but this, a mere rill at its commencement, was broken up 
 into a hundred slender threads of water, which, losing 
 themselves now among matted leaves, and now creeping 
 beneath the mossy woof which wraps the living rocks and 
 the rotten trunks wedged between them, in the same green 
 vesture, served only to distract the judgment that would lean 
 upon them as a guide. Greyslaer, in fact, had only gained 
 a lower and broader basin than that which held the waters 
 of the lake ; and though it likewise was walled round by 
 craggy pinnacles, yet here there was a heavy forest- 
 growth ; and these barriers themselves, as well as the pas 
 sage through them, were wholly screened from view by 
 the intervening foliage. 
 
 But now, darting like a bird from the greenwood covert, 
 The Dew suddenly presented herself in the path before 
 him, and beckoned Max onward. As yet there were no 
 signs of pursuit behind : but the moments were precious ; 
 for the descent of the mountain abounded in difficulties, 
 and they had still a ravine to gain and a narow gorge to 
 pass through before gaining the bottom ; a gorge so nar 
 row that it might serve as a gateway to this labyrinth of 
 natural fortifications ; and here a single armed man might 
 prevent their egress. The maiden now doubted for a 
 moment what path to take. The sides of the ravine might
 
 296 GREYSLAER; 
 
 be the safest, if they would avoid any chance wanderers 
 returning to the Indian camp from the valley below. But 
 these were every here and there broken by tall benches 
 of rock too high to leap from, and doubling the toil of 
 those who ever and anon must climb over the loose stones 
 around their base. The girl, therefore, descended still 
 further into the Hollow, where a sloping pavement of 
 smooth rock, some hundred yards in length, seamed the 
 mountain. It looked as if it had been once overlaid by 
 soil and forest growth like that around ; but the stratum 
 of matted roots and earths had been peeled off the steep 
 declivity, and the fountains of a rivulet, oozing out from 
 the compost of leaves and fibres which still overlaid the 
 upper end of the slope, glided with thin and noiseless flow 
 over the naked rock. And now, as the shallow rill deep 
 ened into a brook, which gurgled among the loose boul 
 ders, they followed it down as it kept its way through an 
 easy swale of less broken land. 
 
 The woods upon its banks were here an open growth 
 of ash and maple ; and Greyslaer's confidence in the 
 sagacity of his guide was for a moment shaken when he 
 saw her persist in keeping her way along so exposed a 
 path. He thought that they had already gained the base 
 of the mountain, from the lofty and frowning cliffs of rock 
 which now and then he could descry afar off, lifting them 
 selves above the tree-tops around. He would fain have 
 struck off to some thickets which, through these open 
 glades, could be plainly seen crowning the lower and 
 nearer ridges of rock that traversed the hillsides above 
 them. 
 
 But the girl directed his attention in advance, and, for 
 the first time, he saw the sunshine playing upon som.e
 
 A ROMANCE OF THE MOHAWK. 297 
 
 spruce and cedar tops that were immediately upon a 
 level with his line of vision. She pointed to the brook, 
 still their emulous companion, and he understood at once 
 that it must have some sudden fall where those trees 
 were growing. There must be a change of soil, rocks, 
 and thickets there ; a swamp, perhaps, and possibly one 
 or more tributaries to the brook ere it reached the plain 
 below. And, truly enough, the sound of a waterfall soon 
 greeted his ears. The sides of the swale became steeper, 
 and it narrowed at last suddenly, as if the ground had 
 sunk. There were irregular walls of stone on either 
 side, with springs welling here and there from their 
 mossy intervals. Loose boulders clogged up the main 
 current of the brook, which, foaming and fretting for a 
 while, emerged at last from the rocky gorge, and took up 
 a more stately march through the heavy forests that 
 spread themselves over a richer soil below. 
 
 The fugitives followed on until that guiding water 
 reached the Upper Hudson, where their toilsome descent 
 from the Thunder's Nest, but not the peril of their flight, 
 was ended. 
 
 The spot where they first gained the banks of the wild 
 and romantic river of the north, was a few miles above 
 that beautiful pass called Teohoken by the Indians, where 
 the dark-rolling waters which form the outlet of Scroon 
 Lake, sweep into the Hudson. Here Max quickly con 
 structed a raft from the floating timbers which he found 
 in profusion in the eddies of the stream ; and the two 
 voyagers drifted down with the current, till, reaching the 
 rapids at the approach of night, they were compelled to 
 betake themselves to an island which divides the waters 
 14
 
 298 GREYSLAER; 
 
 of the Hudson just above its junction with the Scroon, at 
 Teohoken. 
 
 It was a strange situation for the youthful captain, when 
 he found himself alone at nightfall, with that beautiful, 
 elfish creature, upon an island of the wilderness ; but the 
 Indian girl, seeming to take no thought of the peculiarity 
 of her position, relieved him from the embarrassment of 
 his. She pointed him to a mossy bank, where a clump 
 of overshadowing basswood kept off the dew ; and, retir 
 ing herself to a leafy hollow T not far remote, the fatigues 
 they had undergone soon plunged them both in slumber, 
 while the virgin moon, shining down upon an open in 
 terval between them, was their only sentinel through the 
 night. 
 
 The voyagers gained the western shore with the break 
 of dawn, and, following it down till they had passed the 
 rapids, seized upon and appropriated a canoe which they 
 found at the mouth of a little trouting brook which comes 
 into the Hudson a short distance below the forks. In this 
 they floated down the rushing stream, which, with the 
 Indian girl at the helm, and Greyslaer plying his active 
 paddle at the prow, whirled their frail bark safely over 
 its rocky channel. The rapid windings of the river, and 
 the overhanging woods, which at early day let down only 
 here and there a burst of sunshine on its shadowy bosom, 
 swept them so quickly from alternate light to gloom, that 
 the startled deer drinking from the river's brink, had 
 scarcely time to fix his gaze ere the shifting pageant had 
 passed away. 
 
 They came at last within sound of the falls of Tiosa- 
 ronda, and landing here on the western side of the river,
 
 A ROMANCE OF THE MOHAWK. 299 
 
 near the base of Senongewoh, they circled the northern 
 side of the hill, and struck into the forest in a direction 
 towards Lake George, where Max hoped to find a mili 
 tary post occupied by his countrymen. 
 
 Hitherto our bold voyagers seemed to have been 
 utterly free from pursuit. But now they had not ad 
 vanced far into the forest, climbing two or three hilly 
 ridges in succession, before Greyslaer's steps were arrest 
 ed by a startling cry, which seemed to come almost from 
 beneath his very feet. He looked up, and saw The Dew, 
 with one foot advanced, her hands averted, as if motion 
 ing him back, while she herself gazed forward, as if trying 
 to pierce a shadowy glen that yawned across her path. 
 The yell was again repeated from below, and the maid, 
 cowering towards the ground, made signs to Greyslaer 
 to imitate her movements. Crouching as she command 
 ed, he ventured, however, to approach with stealthy 
 caution to the place where she stood. The Dew gently 
 moved the tilting boughs of a stunted hemlock which was 
 in the rifted side of the cliff on whose edge she hovered : 
 a sprinkling of light showered upon the bald rock, and, 
 as Max peered through the leafy grating, which the hand 
 of the maid had partially removed, the cause of her agita 
 tion was at once revealed to him. 
 
 A band of Mohawks were clustered around what 
 seemed to be the fresh track of a white man in the forest. 
 Greyslaer, from the intervening foliage, could by no 
 means distinguish the object at which the Indians point 
 ed, but the significant gestures of the whole party left no 
 doubt upon his mind that the joyful discovery of an ene 
 my's trail had caused the wild yell which first startled 
 him and his companion. The Indians had apparently
 
 300 GREYSLAER; 
 
 been pursuing their way through the ravine in a direc 
 tion nearly parallel to that which he was traversing. 
 The next moment, and the whole band had disappeared 
 from beneath his eye ; the Mohawks vanishing behind 
 the gray trees so suddenly and silently, that, as their 
 painted forms and tufted plumage disappeared amid the 
 dark foliage, it seemed as if some wild vision of the forest 
 had melted amid its glooms ; and he almost expected 
 them to reappear the next moment by his side from be 
 neath the rugged bark of the huge oaks around him ; 
 such as unfolded to release the fabled Dryads of old. 
 
 The Dew waited until sufficient time had elapsed for 
 the Indians to gain several hundred yards, and then, 
 motioning to Greyslaer to tread carefully in her foot 
 steps, descended the steep bank a few paces and com 
 menced moving rapidly along the hillside. She had not 
 proceeded far in this direction, however, before, coming 
 to a spot where some huge rocks, covered only with dog- 
 briers, let down the light too broadly into the forest, she 
 turned abruptly from the path, thridded the thorny defile, 
 and, crossing to the opposite side of the ridge, regained 
 the point from which she had recently started. The old 
 path was then followed back for full a mile, and then 
 again as suddenly left as before. Four distinct trails 
 were thus made to branch out at intervals from that 
 which Max and his guide were actually travelling ; and 
 the maid, seeming content with these precautions, now 
 kept the way steadily forward ; save that, ever and anon, 
 she would pause for a moment in some more open glade, 
 poise herself upon some fallen trunk, throw a keen but 
 furtive glance around her, and then flit lightly as a bird 
 from its perch into the leafy shadows beyond.
 
 A KOMANCE OF THE MOHAWK. 301 
 
 A deep swamp received them next ; and no youth less 
 light of foot than Greyslaer could have kept up with the 
 forest damsel as she glided from one half-floating tussock 
 to another, her feet scarce touching the black and slippery 
 logs, which, plunged as they were in the slimy mould, 
 afforded yet the firmest stepping-place around. 
 
 A windfall upon the hillside was to be traversed nexi. 
 The uprooted trees, wrenched from their ancient seats by 
 the tornado's force, lay with their twisted stems, their 
 boughs fast locked together, their enormous roots turned 
 vertically to the sky, with fragments of rock and clay 
 matted by their fibres, and walling one side of the pit from 
 which they had been upturned, while barriers of rankly- 
 grown briers inclosed the others. But the splintered 
 tree, the thorny copse, the deep pitfalls, the palisade of 
 gnarled roots and jagged rocks protruding from them, 
 offered no obstacle to the fairy footsteps of The Dew. 
 The little crossbill of the mountain, the bird that best loves 
 the "windfall," and whose twinkling form and brown and 
 gray plumage is often the only object that enlivens these 
 ghastly wrecks of the forest, seemed hardly more at home 
 among them. 
 
 A tract of level land was gained at last. It was a pine 
 barren, where the trees shot upward, a hundred feet or 
 more, with not a leaf of underwood around their stems, 
 with not a shrub below them, and scarcely a green bough 
 appearing to break the monotonous range of columns, save 
 those which formed the verdant roof which shut in this 
 solemn temple. The brown maid here told her white 
 companion to take the lead. She pointed through an al 
 most straight vista between the interminable trunks ; and 
 Max, seeing his way before him, stepped fleetly forward,
 
 302 G.REYSLAER; 
 
 his companion treading cautiously in his footsteps upon 
 the yielding sand. 
 
 They had nearly crossed these dangerously open glades, 
 when Greyslaer suddenly felt a light hand upon his shoul 
 der ; he turned and saw the girl pointing, with an agitated 
 look, to an object that was advancing toward them nearly 
 in the direct line they were travelling. It was an Indian 
 just emerging from the thickets of ash and maple that 
 grew upon the edge of the barren. A few moments more, 
 and they would have gained the same leafy covert. 
 
 The girl in an instant knew the man for a Mohawk. 
 She waited not to see whether he was followed by others. 
 It might be one of the same band she had seen a few hours 
 before upon the trail of the white hunter ; and, if so, all 
 her efforts to avoid them had but involved her friend in 
 their toils. But whether it were the same or another 
 party of her tribesmen, it mattered not ; the life of Grey 
 slaer now depended more than ever upon her faithful and 
 sagacious guidance. The Indian paused and looked back 
 ward, as if awaiting the coming up of his party. The 
 Dew seized the moment, and, followed by Greyslaer, sped 
 backward on her path. She crossed and recrossed it 
 repeatedly, Greyslaer now in his turn stepping lightly and 
 carefully in her footprints, so as to cover, yet not wholly 
 erase them, while their way yet lay through the sands of 
 the pine barren. 
 
 They gained at last the thick greenwood, where the 
 deciduous trees imbowered their path, and the elastic car 
 pet of moss and wild flowers, and spongy trunks over 
 grown with juniper, and tangled thickets of moose-wood 
 and wytch-hopple, gave now the springy footing the tired 
 hunter loves, and now afforded the deep covert where the 
 hounded deer will seek to hide.
 
 A ROMANCE OF THE MOHAWK. -J03 
 
 Proceeding thus in a westward direction, the fugitives 
 soon found themselves again within sight of the river, and 
 near the very place where they had landed in the morn 
 ing. The current ran swiftly, but they did not hesitate to 
 ford it, and clamber a mountainous ridge opposite. They 
 paused upon a lofty ledge of rock to look back, and saw 
 their pursuers already in the stream. They crossed the 
 ridge and descended to the other side. They gained the 
 banks of another river not larger than the first, but hesi 
 tated to cross ; for the yell of the Indians was echoed 
 from the rocks above them, and they feared to be seen 
 while making the passage. Whither shall they now fly ? 
 They turn and follow down the stream, though it leads 
 them nearly in the direction from which the pursuit is 
 coming ; but their only hope is in doubling thus upon their 
 tracks. They make the point where the two branches 
 meet and mingle their waters. They turn to leave the 
 stream they have been following, and clamber up the sides 
 of the glen through which it flows, and find themselves 
 upon a narrow isthmus, with another stream, deeper and 
 far more violent, roaring around its rocky base. Max 
 approached the verge of the precipice, and despaired of 
 proceeding further. The cliff opposite was steep as 
 that whereon they stood. The main stream, whose tribu 
 tary it seemed he had been last traversing, had here cloven 
 its way through a rocky ridge in a channel so narrow 
 that any of the trees around him would span the black 
 chasm. But he had no axe to fell one, nor would he have 
 dared to disturb the echoes of the forest if one were at 
 hand. 
 
 At this moment the shrill whoop of the Mohawks rose 
 fearfully behind him. They were near. He spoke a few
 
 304 GREYSLAER; 
 
 words to his companion, seized a pendant vine that flour 
 ished near the spot, and flung himself out from the face of 
 the cliff, as if determined to drop into the roaring current, 
 and take his chance for escape in its angry bosom. He 
 cast one glance back on the maid ere he let himself drop 
 in the tide below. She had not sprung forward to pre 
 vent him, but stood with folded arms and a look of indig 
 nant sorrow upon her brow. Was it mingled scorn and 
 pity that he should thus desert his preserver ? So thought 
 Greyslaer, as, still holding his grasp on the vine, he per 
 mitted himself to swing back by her side. "Surely you 
 can swim, you do not shrink from trying that stream with 
 me," he cried. 
 
 " Were my brother an otter, he could not live in that 
 terrible water," replied the maiden. 
 
 The whoop was again pealed nearer and more near ; 
 it rose, too, this time, from a dozen savage voices. The 
 girl wrung her hands as if in despair, while Greyslaer 
 folded his arms and leaned against a tree, as if moodily 
 resigned to his fate. Suddenly, however, the thought of 
 a new device inspired The Dew. She clambered like a 
 squirrel toward the tree-top from which the vine depend 
 ed ; loosing a long and vigorous tendril from the stem as 
 she ascended, she quickly passed another and a smaller 
 one round it, so as to attach it firmly to a projecting bough ; 
 descended a few yards, and, grasping the vine tightly in 
 her hands, darted out from the wall of foliage like a swal 
 low from the face of a cliff, cleared the chasm, and landed 
 safely upon a dizzy ledge opposite. 
 
 Greyslaer, who, unappalled for himself, had but a few 
 moments before hung suspended over the gulf below, cov 
 ered his face with his hands in the instant the daring feat
 
 A ROMANCE OF THE MOHAWK. 3Q5 
 
 was in the act of being accomplished ; and, almost ere he 
 could look again, the maid had recrossed the chasm and 
 dropped nimbly by his side. But why did they still de 
 lay ? The sound of pursuit grew nigher, yet Max refused 
 to take the chance of escape, of which his noble guide had 
 so daringly set him the example, until she herself was in 
 a place of safety. The breath of an instant was precious, 
 and now The Dew again made the airy passage, and was 
 followed by her friend the instant he could recover the 
 vine as it swung back within his reach. The Dew, with 
 Indian precaution, seized it once more as he was thought 
 lessly about releasing it from his grasp, and, winding the 
 end around a heavy stone, she handed it to Max, and sig 
 nified to him to throw it into a thicket upon the same side 
 of the stream whereon it grew. The two had then barely 
 time to plunge into the bushes beyond them, when the 
 pursuing Mohawks appeared upon the headland opposite, 
 and they soon after heard their baffled howl of disappoint 
 ment at the broken and lost trail of the fugitives. 
 
 14*
 
 306 GREYSLAER; 
 
 CHAPTER V. 
 
 A NIGHT IN THE WHOOPING HOLLOW. 
 
 " Then sweet the hour that brings release 
 
 From danger and from toil, 
 "We talk the battle over, 
 
 And share the battle's spoil." 
 
 Song of Marion's Men. 
 
 " A gentle arm entwines her form, a voice is in her ear, 
 Which even in death's cold grasp itself 'twould win her back to hear ; 
 Now happy is that Santee maid, and proudly bless'd is he, 
 And in her face the tear and smile are strangely sweet to see." 
 
 SIMMS. 
 
 THE Whooping Hollow lay now" directly in their route 
 to Fort George, and thither the footsteps of the fugitives 
 were directed. The Dew was faint from hunger, and the 
 weary spirits of Greyslaer were anything but cheered by 
 the desolate scene of that swampy-shored lake, with here 
 and there a dead tree waving the long moss from its gray 
 arms as it stood solitary amid the half-floating bog. All 
 concern for himself, however, was forgotten in distressing 
 anxiety for his companion. 
 
 They had still eight or ten miles to travel to reach Fort 
 William Henry, and the day was nearly spent. But now 
 a new source of interest presented itself to stimulate his 
 nerves. He heard a distant volley of fire-arms, followed
 
 A ROMANCE OF THE MOHAWK. 307 
 
 by a broken but rapid discharge, as of a running fight be 
 yond the hills. It neared him, and he fancied he could 
 hear the rallying shout of white combatants mingling 
 hoarsely with the shrill yell of Indian onslaught. Un 
 armed as he was, Greyslaer bounded forward, as if to aid 
 those of his own blood, who, it would seem, were borne 
 down in the battle. He turned to give one look at his 
 companion. The languid eyes of the Iroquois girl kin 
 dled with new life as she motioned to him to leave her to 
 her fate and rush forward. 
 
 But now, again, another volley, another shout, and then 
 the Indian whoop grew fainter and fainter, as of men 
 scattered and fleeing in pursuit. He listened intently, but 
 the sounds of the battle had died away in the distance. 
 
 The twilight has come, the night closes in, and again 
 the moon marches up the heavens to cheer the wander 
 ers, if, indeed, her ghastly light, shining down among those 
 haggard trees, and gleaming upon the pool that has set 
 tled in that dreary hollow, have aught of cheering in it. 
 The gentle-souled Greyslaer looks often into the deep and 
 languid eyes of the suffering and innocent-hearted girl 
 who had dared and endured so much for him. He blames 
 himself for having permitted her to encounter the perils 
 they had undergone ; not the least of which, that of star 
 vation in the wilderness, they are now beginning to realize. 
 The fort, it is true, is not far ; but will The Dew have 
 strength to reach it on the morrow ? 
 
 He made her a couch of fern and leaves, where the 
 cradling roots of an ancient birch supplied her mossy pil 
 low : and now she shrank not from his ministering care 
 as he sat near, watching till her eyes were closed in slum 
 ber. But hark ! there are other human sounds in the
 
 308 GREYSLAER; 
 
 forest besides the cry of the whooping savage or the dis 
 tant din of border conflict. Can it be a crew of merry 
 makers, or is it only the echoes of the place which wake 
 in chorus to the song now trolled along the hillside : 
 
 " Room, boys, room, by the light of the moon, 
 Oh why shouldn't every man enjoy hia own room ? 
 Enough in the greenwood, if not in the hall, 
 By the light of the moon there's enough for us all." 
 
 " Hist ! halloo there, white man ! where the devil do you 
 come from ?" cried the foremost of the forest choir, ad 
 vancing from under the boughs into the moonlight, and 
 levelling his rifle upon Greyslaer as he spoke. " King or 
 Congress ! Speak up, my good fellow, if you've got a 
 tongue." 
 
 " De Roos !" 
 
 " Whose voice is that ? Good God ! Max Greyslaer, 
 is it your living self that I hold in my arms ?" And the 
 impetuous brother of Alida for it was no other than Der 
 rick himself drew back from the embrace of Greyslaer, 
 into which he had thrown himself, to look earnestly into 
 the wan features of his long-lost friend. Their aspect of 
 suffering filled him with emotions which he could only con 
 ceal in part, as turning round he shouted to his comrades, 
 
 " Bait, Lansingh, Miller, carry on, men, carry on. Here 
 are more wonders in the woods to-night than those we've 
 yet dreamed of." 
 
 But Bait had heard the first joyful cry of recognition 
 between the friends, and was already hugging Greyslaer 
 in his arms with an unceremonious vigor, that sensibly re 
 minded Max of De Roos's unfortunate speech, assimilating 
 him to a bear, which had once given such deep offence to
 
 A ROMANCE OF THE MOHAWK. 30<J 
 
 the worthy woodsman. The salutations of the other 
 hunters, though, of course, less familiar, were hardly less 
 hearty, as Bait stood by and proudly encouraged them to 
 come up and take the hand of his old pupil. 
 
 " Didn't I tell ye, boys," said he, " that young Max would 
 come to hand the right side up ? Alive ? eh ! only look 
 at the young springald. Thin and raw-boned as he is, 
 there's life enough in him to squeeze it out of any of us. 
 Law sorts, Capting Max, how your shoulders have spread ; 
 and your face, too, is as brown as Kit Lansingh's here. 
 Kit, you land-lougher, stand up and measure hathes with 
 the capting." 
 
 But Greyslaer had turned away, and was bending with 
 anxious solicitude over a figure that had hitherto escaped 
 the notice of his friends. " Some water, Bait ; quickly, 
 in the name of Heaven, quickly, old man. She faints, she 
 faints," said Greyslaer, in tones of almost agonizing solici 
 tude, as he supported the sinking head of The Dew upon 
 his bosom. " Ah ! they'll be an age in returning from the 
 lake. Your canteen, De Roos; a drop from that may yet 
 revive her." 
 
 De Roos tore the canteen from his side ; and, as Max 
 applied the cordial to her lips, the maid opened her eyes. 
 
 " Have you no refreshment a single biscuit in your 
 pouch ?" asked Greyslaer. 
 
 " Here's a corn-cake, captain," said a hunter, handing 
 a fragment of the coarse bread to Greyslaer. 
 
 " Yes, and we can soon get you up plenty of venison," 
 cried Lansingh, who now returned from the lake-side with 
 the water, for which two or three of his comrades had 
 simultaneously rushed together. 
 
 "Off, then, with you at once, Kit," rejoined Bait, who
 
 310 GREYSLAER; 
 
 now came puffing and blowing up the hill. " We must 
 needs camp here, I take it ; for the gal's state won't allow 
 her removal to-night. Who'd a' guessed, though, of find 
 ing a petticoat here with the capting ?" 
 
 " Carry on, boys, carry on, then ; get up your shanties 
 as soon as may be," said De Roos, while those of the 
 hunters who had not gone off with Lansingh after the re 
 mains of the deer upon which they had already feasted, 
 bestirred themselves on every side. Some cut stakes 
 and rafters for the frame of the wigwam ; some peeled the 
 heavy bark from ancient hemlocks, which, though prostrate 
 upon the ground, had not yet mouldered, spreading the 
 broad pieces over the roof and adown the sides ; while 
 others strewed the floor of the shanty with the fragrant 
 branches shorn from the living tree, after felling it for the 
 purpose of being thus stripped. Some busied themselves 
 in kindling a fire before the opening of this sylvan shed, 
 while the forest resounded \vith the stroke of the axe, as 
 others felled the hard-wood trees, chopped them up, and 
 piled them near to feed the growing flame when wanted. 
 
 Greyslaer, in the mean time, now that his anxiety about 
 4< The Dew" was relieved, summarily detailed his principal 
 adventures, speaking always of the disinterested and heroic 
 Indian girl in terms that would have deepened even the 
 color of her red cheek could she have understood the 
 language in which they were uttered. De Roos, in return, 
 gave him information of both a public and private nature 
 which claimed his deepest interest. The account which 
 Derrick gave him of Alida's escape from the cavern of 
 Waneonda, though bringing to Max the blessed assurance 
 of her present safety, was anything but satisfactory ; for 
 while the hot-headed Derrick inveighed against the whole
 
 A ROMANCE OF THE MOHAWK. Si I 
 
 race of rascally Tories, as concerned in her imprisonment, 
 Greyslaer could not but have his own convictions that this 
 mysterious business was one with which the royalists as 
 a party had but little to do. This, however, was not the 
 moment to dwell upon a subject so painful. Nor was De 
 Roos the character with whom he could venture upon any 
 half-formed surmises, without betraying the confidence of 
 Alida to the full extent that she had intrusted him in her 
 affairs. 
 
 " But tell me, De Roos," cried Max, making an effort to 
 dash these bewildering thoughts from his mind, " how came 
 you in these woods with old Bait ?" 
 
 " With old Bait ? Why, an hour since, I believed truly 
 that he was a hundred miles from here, as I did that you, 
 dear Max, were enjoying the hospitality of our refugee 
 friends in Canada. Bait must tell you himself how he 
 came here ; for I deferred hearing his story till we gained 
 his camp, whither he was conducting me when I fell in 
 with you." 
 
 " But yourself; how came you here yourself?" 
 
 " Oh, why, you know, we are only a few miles from the 
 fort ; so it's no great wonder that I should be here. Van 
 Schaick sent me yesterday to look after some batteaux at 
 Glen's Falls, which are ordered up from below for the 
 transportation of the baggage of the command which, 
 you know r , has been relieved." 
 
 " I know ? How should I know anything about the 
 matter, or imagine, even, that you were at Fort George, 
 or who, indeed, was its commandant ?" 
 
 " True, ay, true ; I forgot how you have been cooped up 
 in these stirring times. Well, you see, as I was about to 
 mention, an incidental part of my duty led me back to the
 
 312 GREYSLAER; 
 
 lake by this route, which is only a few miles longer to the 
 fort. Gansevoort, our lieutenant-colonel, got some in 
 formation from Albany a day or two since about that cut 
 throat Tory, Joe Bettys, who " 
 
 " Joe Bettys, the cut-throat Tory !" cried Greyslaer, 
 .echoing his words in astonishment. " What, not Ensign 
 Joe Bettys, who was so ardent a Whig, albeit a boon 
 companion and crony of the Tory Bradshawe ?" 
 
 " The same man, Max ; and a brave Whig, too, he 
 proved himself under Arnold in Canada. But, either from 
 some disgust with our officers, or an original want of 
 principle, he has been won over to the other side, and 
 commenced his Tory career in a dashing style, that must 
 make him long remembered in these parts. He is said to 
 have taken up his quarters here in the Whooping Hollow, 
 and, assuming the disguise of a mongrel mountebank, an 
 outcast Indian vagrant, whom he killed, he has practised 
 so successfully upon the superstitious fears of the people 
 below, that they would make no effort to follow and seize 
 him upon his retreating here after some deed of blood or 
 plunder. So I took an Indian guide, and came poking 
 through here to see if I could beat up his quarters in pass 
 ing, or, at least, light upon his trail." 
 
 " And you fell in with Bait " 
 
 " Just in time to lend a volley which saved him from 
 a devil of a licking ; for he and his handful of hunters 
 were mad enough to engage with a score of Mohawks, 
 led on, as I suspect, by Isaac Brant, or Au-neh-yesh, as 
 he calls himself." 
 
 " Isaac Brant ? Why, I have already told you that I 
 left him upon the shores of a lake far west of this a dying 
 man, as I thought, and "
 
 A ROMANCE OF THE MOHAWK. 313 
 
 " Ay, but that was some six months since, if I under 
 stood you rightly ; and I assure you he is bloody Isaac 
 Redivivus now. Everybody has nine lives in these times. 
 Isaac I know at least to be alive and kicking ; for, with 
 Kasselman, Empie, and other scoundrelly Tories who 
 fight under the disguise of Indians, he makes as much 
 noise in this neighborhood as his father, with fifty times 
 the number of men, is creating along the Unadilla region. 
 There is, though, a touch of humanity about old Joseph 
 that his son is wholly innocent of." 
 
 "And you think, then, that Isaac's tribesmen, who were 
 in pursuit of me, guided him hither to-night ?" 
 
 " Even so." 
 
 "But the friendly Indian who was your pioneer to the 
 Hollow, I don't see him here." 
 
 " He loitered behind, where I left my corporal to bury 
 some two or three brave fellows whom I have lost by this 
 night's business. By the way-, it is our old boyish friend 
 Teondetha. The Try on county committee sent him as a 
 runner to Albany, whence he was despatched with the 
 message to the fort, requiring the presence of our regi 
 ment to overawe the Tories on the Mohawk. But here 
 comes Miller and his men. You put_those brave boys to 
 bed safely, Miller?" 
 
 "Safely and snugly, captain; neither wolves nor In 
 dians will trouble them, I reckon," replied the corporal, 
 touching his hat. 
 
 " Where's the Oneida ?" 
 
 " He cleared out as soon as he had taken the hair of 
 the redskins that fell on the other side. I mistrust he has 
 followed on to see if he couldn't add another scalp to his 
 string."
 
 314 GREYSLAER; 
 
 "It's the natur of all of them," ejaculated Bait ; "dog 
 eating dog. He must have had good picking, too, among 
 the dead varmint, Adam ; for there they lay on the grass, 
 six big buck Injuns, likely fellows all, besides a withered 
 chap that I clipped over with my hatchet, and left to curl 
 up and die." 
 
 " And the boy," said De Roos, without heeding Bait's 
 words, in a slight tone of anxiety ; " you saw nothing of 
 the boy, Adam ?" 
 
 " A'othing, captain ! The brat was missing from the 
 moment we came in sight of the enemy. Isaac's people 
 must have swooped him up in a moment; and he doubt 
 less was glad enough to go with them." 
 
 " What boy is that you speak of?" asked Greyslaer, 
 with some anxiety. 
 
 " Xobody nothing only a half-breed brat that we 
 picked up on our march. Near the falls, wasn't it, Mil 
 ler ?" 
 
 "Yes, captain, in the shanty at the batteaux landing 
 which you visited when we went down afore, you know. 
 That time, I mean, when you had high words with the 
 old woman, because you said you knew better when she 
 declared that the child ou^ht rightfully to belong to Isaac 
 
 o o / o 
 
 Brant, whose son he was, and when " 
 
 " Silence, sir," commanded De Roos, who seemed both 
 irritated and annoyed by the loquacity of his non-commis 
 sioned officer. " There was no child there at the time, 
 you know well, Miller." 
 
 " Ceriing / there was not, capting ; but you know you 
 asked when next he would be there, or his mother, I for 
 get which." 
 
 " Wel_, well, it's no matter what you forget, so you
 
 A ROMANCE OF THE MOHAWK. 315 
 
 don't, forget your duty, which no one can accuse you of, 
 my brave fellow. And now let your me* build another 
 fire for themselves, for here come the hunters with some 
 thing to make a broil." 
 
 Greyslaer, in the mean time, had listened to this dia 
 logue with an interest much beyond that of ordinary curi 
 osity. The early dissipation of Mad Dirk de Roos, as his 
 friend was universally called when they were college 
 mates together, was not unknown to him ; for, though 
 younger than Derrick, yet, being of a graver and more 
 earnest character, he had often taken upon himself the 
 duty of an older person in lecturing his hair-brained chum. 
 He recollected well that, during one of their vacation 
 visits to the Hawksnest, the scandal of the country people 
 had associated De Roos's name with that of a beautiful 
 squaw, who, those connected with the Indian office at 
 Guy Park said, was betrothed to Isaac Brant. He re 
 membered, too, that, one Christmas morning. Guy John 
 son rode over to the Hawksnest with a magistrate, who 
 was at the Park enjoying the hospitality of the season, 
 and closeted themselves with his guardian, De Roos's fa 
 ther, upon business which, though deemed by the family 
 to be of a political nature, had filled him with anxiety for 
 his friend, who was absent at the time. And more facts 
 and reminiscences equally linked together, and having 
 the bearing of strong circumstantial evidence upon this 
 delicate matter, might have suggested themselves to 
 Greyslaer's mind, had he not suddenly been startled from 
 his painful musings by a wild cry of joy from The Dew 
 as Teondetha suddenly presented himself in the light of 
 the fire before her. 
 
 The maid recoiled abashed and agitated the instant she
 
 316 UHEYSLAER; 
 
 had uttered this natural outbreak of her feelings, while 
 Teondetha, whoijfcwith noiseless step, had approached to 
 light his calumet by the fire, started erect from his stoop 
 ing posture, and gazed with eagle glance around. But 
 the girl had sunk back upon the pile of brush upon which 
 she was reclining in one corner of the shanty, and the 
 tall spire of flame which shot up between them prevented 
 her for a moment from being seen by her lover. De 
 Roos, in high spirits, as usual, was busy superintending 
 the preparations for supper at the different fires, and jok 
 ing with the men grouped around them as he restlessly 
 moved to and fro from one to the other. Greyslaer alone 
 had his eye upon the Indian pair, and. as he now fully 
 understood their language, he was not a little amused 
 with the cool generalship with which the Oneida made 
 his advances. 
 
 "My sister," said Teondetha, seating himself on a log 
 near the opening of the shanty, the moment he discovered 
 the vicinity of his lady-love ; " how is it with her ?" 
 
 " As with the bird that has wandered from its nest, and 
 knows not where to alight. As with the sunbeam that 
 drops into the forest, and finds no sister ray to receive 
 and mingle with her beneath its chilling leaves." 
 
 " Teondetha is the tree whereon the bird would alight. * 
 His heart is the fountain that would send back a ray to 
 mingle with the sunbeam. Teondetha is a great warrior. 
 He must build a lodge of his own, wherein to hang up the 
 scalps of his enemies. Who will be there to light the 
 pipe of the young chief?" 
 
 The girl, so far from shrinking at sight of the gory 
 
 * The meaning of Teondetha is " a fallen tree"
 
 A ROMANCE OF THE MOHAWK. 317 
 
 trophies at his belt, gazed now admiringly upon them as 
 her half-savage lover held them up to her eyes. 
 
 " The young chief has earned a right to smoke before 
 the women," she said. " The Dew will not extinguish his 
 pipe when he lights it." 
 
 " Good !" said the copper-colored gallant ; and, bending 
 over the coals, he carelessly swept up one with his hand, 
 and dropped it into the bowl of his pipe. He puffed away 
 calmly for a few moments, while his thoughts seemed oc 
 cupied only in watching the smoke-wreaths that circled 
 around him. 
 
 "What sees my brother in the smoke?" asked the girl, 
 after watching her taciturn wooer for a while. 
 
 " A bird," replied the Indian gravely. 
 
 The girl smiled, was silent for a moment, and then look 
 ing down rather demurely, and pulling to pieces the twigs 
 whereon she sat, asked : 
 
 " What says the bird to my brother ?" 
 
 " It says that Teondetha is a tree whose leaves will only 
 flourish by The Spreading Dew." 
 
 The girl laughed outright, (girls will laugh !) but the 
 solemn composure of her companion seemed nowise dis 
 turbed by her merriment. The laugh, however, ceased 
 at once, without subsiding into a titter. 
 
 " And what does my brother see now ?" she resumed, 
 so soon as she had recovered her sobriety. 
 
 " He sees a beaver." 
 
 " And what says the beaver 1 
 
 " The beaver reminds him of a promise which The 
 Dew made many moons ago, off by the yellow waters 
 that flow from Garoga Lake. The beaver says that those 
 of his tribe who have no lodcfe become worthless casta-
 
 318 GREYSLAER; 
 
 ways. ' Teondetha,' says the beaver, ' let not The Dew 
 go out of your sight again till you have built one for both 
 of you.'" 
 
 " The beaver is never foolish," murmured the girl. 
 
 A heavy puff of smoke from the fire at that moment 
 wrapped the lovers from Greyslaer's sight, and he could 
 not see whether the Indian pair sealed this important pas 
 sage of their courtship with the impress that fairer wooers 
 would perhaps have used ; but, as the smoke cleared 
 away, he thought that he distinguished The Dew with 
 drawing her little hand from that of Teondetha, who had 
 slightly changed his position. 
 
 " Carry on, carry on," cried De Roos, at this moment, in 
 viting all parties to supper in his favorite phrase, which, 
 like the " push along, keep moving," of English farce, or 
 the "go ahead" of modern American slang, served him 
 alike upon all occasions, and was equally in requisition 
 whether at feast or fray. 
 
 Max, who had eaten nothing, as yet, save a biscuit which 
 he got from the knapsack of a slain soldier, upon which he 
 had been seated near the fire, was sufficiently sharp-set to 
 fall to with a keen relish of the fare now placed before him. 
 
 " There's the cup by your side, capting, if it's that ye're 
 looking for. Lean over, now, with your cracker here, till 
 I put this slice of venison upon it. It's done to a crisis, I tell 
 ye ; brown on the outside, and juicy red within. The 
 crittur himself would be tempted to taste one of his own 
 cutlets, if he were of a flesh-faring natur. There, now, add 
 the salt and pepper fixings, and the king himself hasn't a 
 slicker supper. Never mind the squaw, never mind the 
 squaw, capting ; Scalpy yonder will look after her." And 
 running on thus while he acted as cook, butler, and waiter
 
 A ROMANCE OF THE MOHAWK 319 
 
 for Greyslaer, old Bait, ever on the alert to serve him, 
 eyed his pupil at intervals with an affectionate interest, as 
 if it cheered his very heart to see the half-famished wan 
 derer relishing this rude entertainment. 
 
 "Ah, capting," he resumed, "but Miss Alida will be 
 glad to see you. We've had some rare doings in the val 
 ley since you were missed from among us. Sir John, as 
 you mayhap know, broke his parole and cleared out for 
 Canada, after being stolen off by old Joseph, who cut his 
 way at midnight through the streets of Johnstown in tak 
 ing him from the Hall. Folks talk hard of the baronet for 
 leaving as he did ; but Bait could have told them some 
 thing which would prove he was not so much to blame. 
 He thought he wasn't safe, he did, after the killing of Mr. 
 Fenton during the armistice between the Whigs and To 
 ries. But Mr. Fenton, you know, sought h's own death ; 
 and, sorry as I was for it, how could I help smashing him 
 as I did ? You don't think I could, capting." 
 
 " It was a bad business, Bait ; but, according to the ac 
 count which Captain de Roos gave me to-night, you were 
 certainly not to blame." 
 
 " I mistrust I wasn't I raaly hope not ; but Mr. Fen 
 ton was a fine man, a likely man, capting, and it was some 
 comfort to me to give him Christian burial. I sent home 
 his watch, and what little money he had about him, to his 
 family ; and the two or three papers I found in his pocket 
 I kept till you should come back to tell me what to do 
 about them. What else could I? I never had book- 
 larnin enough to read written hand, and I didn't know but 
 what the papers might hold political matters of some valw 
 to our friends ; yet I was afeared to give them to stran 
 gers to read, lest there might be private things in them
 
 320 GREYSLAER; 
 
 about Mr. Fenton's folks that the family would not like to 
 have go abroad." 
 
 " Where are the papers now ?" asked Greyslaer. 
 
 " Miss Alida sealed them up for me, and put them away 
 in the old brass beaufet at the Hawksnest ; but she looked, 
 oh ! so sad when I told her that they must stay there till 
 you come hum, that I was sorry I had not still continued 
 to carry them about in my shooting-pouch with me. But 
 how did I know but that I should leave my pouch and 
 scalp both among these wild hills?" 
 
 " You did most rightly, Bait," said Greyslaer, not un 
 touched by these proofs of the just sense of propriety 
 which seemed to govern the simple woodsman. " But see, 
 that tired girl has already dropped her head upon her arm, 
 as if sleep had overtaken her. Let us withdraw from the 
 neighborhood of the shanty to the other fire, and see what 
 disposition of us Captain de Roos proposes for the night." 
 
 " Yes, and there's the Oneida stretched like a hound 
 upon the edge of the ashes, so that no one can enter the 
 shanty without stepping over him. It is but judgmatical 
 for us to look for a snoozing-place elsewhere." 
 
 De Roos, however, when they joined his party a few 
 yards off. seemed to have no idea of any one's seeking 
 their rest so soon. He had just relieved the sentinels who 
 had been posted here and there in the woods around, and 
 the rest of his half-disciplined followers were ready enough 
 to unite with Bait's hunters in the chorus, as the mad cap 
 tain again broke out in the song with which he had first 
 waked the echoes of the forest round about, and which he 
 had originally learned from old Bait himself. Greyslaer, 
 however, borrowing a blanket from one of the soldiers, 
 was permitted to forego a part in this midnight saturnalia
 
 A ROMANCE OF THE MOHAWK. 321 
 
 of the forest ; for his plea of excessive weariness was ad 
 mitted when De Roos remembered that they must reach 
 Fort George early on the morrow, if they would have a 
 place in the column when his regiment took up their line 
 of march. The wayworn heir of the Hawksnest was 
 soon plunged in deep slumber ; but the words of the fol 
 lowing song ever and anon mingled in his dreams, as the 
 woodland revellers bore down merrily in the chorus. 
 
 SONG OF HALT THE HUNTER. 
 
 1. 
 
 There was an old hunter camped down by the kill, 
 
 Who fished in this water and shot on that hill ; 
 
 The forest for him had no danger nor gloom, 
 
 For all that he wanted was plenty of room. 
 
 Says he, "The world's wide, there is room for us all; 
 
 Room enough in the greenwood, if not in the hall. 
 Room, boys, room, by the light of the moon, 
 For why shouldn't every man enjoy his own room ?" 
 
 He wove his own mats, and his shanty was spread 
 With the skins he had dressed and stretched out overhead ; 
 Fresh branches of hemlock made fragrant the floor, 
 For his bed as he sung when the daylight was o'er, 
 " The world's wide enough, there is room for us all ; 
 Room enough in the greenwood, if not in the hall. 
 Room, boys, room , by the light of the moon, 
 For why shouldn't every man enjoy his own room f" 
 
 8. 
 
 That spring, now half choked by the dust of the road, 
 Through a grove of tall maples once limpidly flowed ; 
 By the rock whence it bubbles his kettle was hung, 
 Whicli their sap often filled, while the hunter he sung, 
 15
 
 322 GREYSLAER; 
 
 " The world's wide enough, there is room for us all ; 
 
 Room enough in the greenwood, if not in the hall. 
 Room, boys, room, by the light of the moon, 
 For why shouldn't every man enjoy his own room ?" 
 
 4, 
 
 And still sung the hunter when one gloomy day 
 He saw in the forest what saddened his lay ; 
 'Twas the rut which a heavy -wheeled wagon had made, 
 Where the greensward grew thick in the broad forest glade 
 " The world's wide enough, there is room for us all ; 
 Room enough in the greenwood, if not in the hall. 
 Room, boys, room, by the light of the moon, 
 For why shouldn't every man enjoy his own room ?'' 
 
 He whistled his dog, and says he, " We can't stay ; 
 I must shoulder my rifle, up traps, and away." 
 Next day, through those maples the settler's axe rung, 
 While slowly the hunter trudged off as he sung, 
 " The world's wide enough, there is room for us all ; 
 Room enough in the greenwood, if not in the hall. 
 Room, boys, room, by the light of the moon, 
 For why ?houldn't every man enjoy his own room ?''
 
 A ROMANCE OF THE MOHAWK. 333 
 
 CHAPTER VI. 
 
 ESTRANGEMENT. 
 
 " Where love, that cannot perish, grows 
 For one, alas ! that little knows 
 How love may sometimes last ; 
 Like sunshine wasting in the skies, 
 
 When clouds are overcast." DAWES. 
 
 ' Is the prayer rejected the suit disdained ? 
 
 The pleadings of love are they vain ? 
 Has the student no lore, has his voice no skill, 
 
 To bring back lost smiles again ?" Mas. EMBURY. 
 
 GLAD rumors of the success which had finally crowned 
 the hunter Bait in his wild-wood quest preceded the arri 
 val of the popular young Max among his old friends and 
 neighbors. It were difficult to define the emotions of 
 Alida when the news of his deliverance' from captivity 
 and death first reached her ears. For, though joy and 
 delight for Greyslaer's escape first swallowed up all other 
 feelings, yet painful reflections succeeded, and doubts and 
 fears crept into her mind, to alloy this generous burst of 
 heartfelt sensibility. 
 
 She felt, she owned to herself, that, were it not for 
 the canker of an old sorrow, she could have loved 
 her fresh-hearted worshipper. But this thought had
 
 324 GRBYSLAER; 
 
 only been admitted into her heart when she believed 
 the barrier of the grave was closed between them. 
 How was it now with her when Greyslaer lived 1 lived, 
 while a barrier more hideous even than that of the 
 grave must keep them apart for ever ! But why dwell 
 now upon her past relations with Greyslaer ? Why im- 
 bitter her hours by musing upon their possible future 
 position toward each other ? 
 
 Long months had intervened since the passionate decla 
 ration of her noble-spirited lover. There was time enough 
 even for him to have forgotten his youthful fancy, or ex 
 changed it for another, if some fair face had presented 
 itself to him when away from her. Besides, had she not 
 revealed that to him which must crush all hope upon the 
 instant ? Surely he could not have gone on feeding with 
 vain dreams of what might be his misplaced and most un 
 fortunate attachment he had not consumed a captive's 
 long and lonely hours in such fruitless and imbittered 
 musings upon his baffled affections? His sorrows must 
 have been those only of a young and ardent mind, that 
 grieves to find itself cut off, in the season of its vigor, 
 from the paths of ambition which men so love to tread ; 
 his dreams, only those which will crowd into a mind fer 
 tile as his when planning his escape from present evil a 
 prisoner's dream of home and friends, of free will and 
 unrestricted motion, and the bright world which, fresh as 
 ever, was to be enjoyed again. 
 
 Alida hoped that it might be so ; yet she grew sad even 
 in so hoping ! A sensible and modest mind is not merely 
 flattered, but substantially raised in its own estimation by 
 the sincere and unaffected attachment of another as well 
 constituted as itself, even when it cannot return the pas-
 
 A ROMANCE OF TI^E MOHAWK. 325 
 
 sion. And though it can hardly with precision be said 
 either to grieve or humble us when that regard passes 
 away, yet there is something of sorrow, something of 
 humiliation, when we become assured of its decay. 
 
 In the mean time the presumed heiress of the Hawks- 
 nest had not wanted for admirers, though the natural im- 
 periousness of her disposition prepared a haughty rebuff 
 for more than one who made haste to address the beauti- 
 ful orphan, even in her first secluded months of mourning. 
 The advances of some of these suitors were well known 
 in the neighborhood, and their supposed rejection, when 
 they successively withdrew from the field, became very 
 naturally the talk of the country people, who, when 
 Greyslaer's return from captivity was bruited abroad, 
 unanimously agreed that Fate had intended that he should 
 be the happy man. . " Surely," they argued, " young Max 
 would never take possession of the estate which Miss 
 Alida had so long enjoyed as his nearest kinswoman, and 
 the co-heir of mad Derrick, without offering first to make 
 her his wife ? And where was the girl in the valley that 
 would refuse him? Proud and uppish as she was, old De 
 Roos, though a respectable man enough, and the old friend 
 of Sir William, was no such great shakes, after all, that 
 his daughter might turn up her nose upon the only son of 
 Colonel Greyslaer that was." 
 
 As for Max himself, it was agreed, without any dissent, 
 that he would seek a wife forthwith. He was the last of 
 his name ; and, though sternly republican in his political 
 principles, democracy entered not into his ideas of the 
 social relations, and he was believed to inherit from his 
 stately old father sufficient pride of family not to wish 
 the name of Greyslaer to expire with himself.
 
 326 GREYSLAER; 
 
 Max, in the meanwhile, wholly unconscious that he 
 and his affairs were furnishing the only subject of gossip 
 to the good wives of the neighborhood, now that the storm 
 of war had rolled away from the valley for a season, and 
 left leisure for such harmless themes, disappointed every 
 one by the quietude of his proceedings. A lawyer from 
 the county town, calling upon Miss de Roos, informed 
 her that Captain Greyslaer, being about to join his regi 
 ment, which belonged to a brigade of volunteers that had 
 recently been draughted into the service of Congress, he 
 had no idea of taking possession of the Hawksnest, and 
 that Miss de Roos would add to the obligations which 
 Captain Greyslaer already felt himself under to her late 
 lamented father, if she would continue to preside over an 
 establishment which must otherwise be broken up, and 
 perhaps fall to ruins ; for the aged housekeeper was now 
 too infirm for the charge, and Captain Greyslaer was at a 
 loss what disposition to make of his other servants in 
 times so disturbed. " The captain," said the lawyer, look 
 ing round upon the ancient furniture, "seems to have his 
 heart bent upon keeping these old sticks together, and 
 there is no one but you, madam, to whom he can look, as 
 one feeling the same sort of interest in the place as that 
 which he cherishes." 
 
 The latter part of his agent's statement was enforced 
 by a note from Greyslaer, containing an eloquent appeal 
 to her on the score of their mutual childish associations, 
 and on the impracticability of his making any humane dis 
 position of his black servants ; for manumitting them a 
 resource w r hich had suggested itself would in the ex 
 isting state of the country, be, in fact, the cruellest thing 
 he could do, there being now no employment for laborers 
 of that class.
 
 A ROMANCE OF THE MOHAWK. 337 
 
 Alida, who had not been left unprovided for by her 
 father, and was,' therefore, not thus rendered dependent 
 upon the bounty of a distant kinsman, who stood toward 
 her in the delicate relation of a discarded lover, scarcely 
 hesitated in her determination. " She would remain be 
 side the graves of her father and sister, and consider 
 herself as mistress of the Hawksnest until Captain Grey- 
 slaer was prepared to enter into his possessions ; but it 
 must be as a tenant, upon the same terms that her father 
 had held the property." 
 
 A month or more had elapsed after the adjustment of 
 this delicate matter, and Greyslaer, writing weekly to 
 her from Albany arid New York, whither his professional 
 duty had led him, managed always in his letters to pre 
 serve a tone of easy friendliness, such as had prevailed 
 between them in the younger days of their intercourse. 
 This composure upon paper, however, vanished entirely 
 when at last they met. The frank cordiality which Max 
 assumed, was rather overdoing nature, as Alida thought 
 when she observed his rapid utterance and restless mo 
 tions ; and G/eyslaer was conscious that Alida trembled 
 with agitation when he smilingly proffered the ordinary 
 salute which fashion so inconsistently permitted among 
 the polite, considering the otherwise ceremonious man 
 ners of that formal day. They each seemed laboring 
 under a continual exertion to maintain the tone in which 
 Max had so happily commenced their correspondence, 
 and which had hitherto been successfully kept up between 
 them. But the restraint which either felt at heart must 
 soon have convinced them that they mutually stood in a 
 false position toward each other. 
 
 A famous modern sayer of apothegms tells us that
 
 '328 GREYSLAER; 
 
 friendship may sometimes warm into love, but love can 
 subside into friendship never ; and of the ancients one 
 goes still further, by making hatred the only change of 
 which love is capable. As indifference will often super 
 vene to the most violent passion, the creed of the latter is 
 manifestly absurd ; but there is something of truth in the 
 proverb of the former ; for though the sentiment of friend 
 ship, a feeling of the warmest and kindest regard, may 
 indeed exist where love has once been, yet the calm rela 
 tion of friends, with all its easy and pleasurable frankness 
 of intercourse, can hardly grow up between two parties 
 where love has been the source of interest to either, and 
 that love has been once avowed. There must be some 
 lurking mortification, if not some secret trace of sorrow, 
 on one side or the other ; a jealousy of mutual re 
 spect, a quickness to take offence, and, above all, the 
 mournful memory of former passages, endeared only in 
 recollection, perhaps, by their being associated with the 
 halcyon season of youth and hope, but still endeared to it; 
 there must be this memory to come over the spirit amid 
 its gayest sallies, and make the society of the one who has 
 elicited them, saddening, if not oppressive, to the mind for 
 the moment. 
 
 What wonder, then, if Greyslaer's visits to the Hawks- 
 nest were gradually intermitted ? A character so earnest 
 as his cannot always find material for conversation amid 
 themes of passing interest, while one that fills his whole 
 soul is utterly forbidden ; for conversation with her, 
 moreover, whose presence unlocked the secret chambers 
 of his mind, and peopled it with thoughts that might not 
 walk abroad. 
 
 He had promised Alida never officiously to thrust him-
 
 A ROMANCE OF THE MOHAWK. 339 
 
 self further into her confidence, and he remembered his 
 promise ; but the forced durance she had suffered at the 
 hands of Bradshawe was known to him, and he burned 
 to resolve his suspicions concerning that dark and des 
 perate man. He had hoped, in his earlier visits, that 
 their discourse might at some future time lead to Alida's 
 reposing that full confidence in him which he persuaded 
 himself was due to the truthfulness and steadfastness of 
 his attachment, under the changed form in which he was 
 determined she should view it. But the moment did not 
 come ; and upon each succeeding visit Greyslaer seemed 
 further from the hope of such a revelation than ever. 
 Alida, in fact, did not dream of making it. 
 
 Whether it was that she did not consider Greyslaer, 
 her young friend, the most proper party to interest him 
 self about her affairs ; whether she paled at the peril to 
 which Greyslaer her lover would be exposed by the steps 
 he might adopt upon receiving the disclosure ; whether 
 she shrank, with true female delicacy, from the further 
 agitation of a subject so painful ; or whether she had 
 proudly determined to be herself the arbiter of her own 
 destiny, it is impossible to say. But while there are 
 some circumstances which diminish the force of the last 
 supposition such as the present banishment of Brad 
 shawe from this region, and the change which seemed 
 to have come over the character of Alida after she came 
 to realize the full extent of her family bereavements it 
 is probable that all these considerations swayed her by 
 turns, and suggested the reserve of conduct which was 
 the result. 
 
 And now Captain Greyslaer has become noted alike 
 among his equals in rank and his superior officers for his 
 15*
 
 330 GREYSLAER; 
 
 rigid and exclusive attention to his military duties. He 
 seldom goes beyond the limits of the post where he is 
 stationed. His visits to the Hawksnest, which is only a 
 few miles off, seem gradually to have ceased altogether ; 
 and a book or newspaper from New York, with some 
 pencilled remarks upon the news it contains from the 
 seat of war, is, when transmitted through his orderly, the 
 only intercourse he holds with its inmates. 
 
 Alida though other officers of the garrison sought by 
 assiduous attention to supply the place of Max Alida, it 
 must be confessed, began soon to miss his accustomed 
 visits. The superior mental accomplishments of Grey- 
 slaer the student, would with her have given him but 
 slight advantage over his military comrades ; but the 
 character of Greyslaer the soldier, of Greyslaer the 
 young partisan, whose wild adventures and perilous 
 escapes among the Indians were the theme of every 
 tongue, appealed more forcibly to the romantic admira 
 tion of Alida ; and apart from all tender associations of 
 the past, regarding him only in the light of an acquaint 
 ance of the day, she would have felt an interest in the 
 society of Max that no other of his sex whom she had 
 hitherto known could inspire. 
 
 There might possibly, too, be something in the altered 
 aspect of Greyslaer which more or less affected the light 
 in which a woman's eye would regard him, now that his 
 cheek had lost its freshness from hardship and exposure ; 
 and that almost boyish air which characterized his ap 
 pearance even in early manhood, had been changed by 
 more recent habits of action, of command, and of self-re 
 liance. 
 
 The mother who, welcoming her long-absent son, sighs
 
 A ROMANCE OF THE MOHAWK. 331 
 
 as she looks vainly in his features for those gentler traits 
 which graced the handsome stripling with whom she 
 parted, smiles the next moment with inward pride at the 
 sentiment of newly-awakened respect with which she is 
 mysteriously inspired toward her own offspring; she 
 startles at the altered modulations of his voice as heard at 
 a distance ; she wonders at the changed cadence of his 
 footfalls, as his approaching step, which was ever music to 
 her ear, grows nearer ; she marks his graver and more 
 even mien ; she gazes upon the brow where manhood has 
 already stamped its lordly impress ; yet, even while lean 
 ing for counsel upon him who so lately looked to her for 
 care, she can scarcely realize the swift and silent change 
 that is now so fully wrought. 
 
 So had it been with Alida. Greyslaer was to her a stripling 
 student no more ; and if her own feelings had not taught her 
 thus, the conviction must have been forced upon her by 
 the light in which, as she saw. he was regarded by those 
 far older than herself. His opinions upon all subjects 
 seemed to be quoted by those who were his immediate 
 associates ; and she heard continually of grave cases in 
 which Greyslaer's judgment was appealed to by members 
 of the Committee of Safety, and others charged with the 
 various clashing powers of the provisionary government 
 of the period. The friendship of such a man she felt was 
 to be valued, and she even acknowledged to herself that, 
 had not circumstances placed an insurmountable barrier 
 between them, Greyslaer judging him only by the char 
 acter he had formed for himself in the world Max Grey 
 slaer was the man of all others to whom her proud and 
 aspiring heart would have been rendered up. 
 
 But, alas ! what booted such knowledge now ? Of what
 
 332 GREYSLAER; 
 
 avail was it that reason reluctantly at last sanctioned the 
 preference which a secret tenderness suggested, when 
 reason was wholly at war with the indulgence of these 
 partial feelings? Reason, though she sustained with the 
 one hand the judgment which guided that partiality, 
 pointed sternly with the other to an abyss of hopeless 
 ness. Alida might love Greyslaer, but she never could 
 be his. 
 
 With minds of a gentler mould, or even with one lofty 
 as hers, if attempered by the sweet influences of Religion, 
 a quiet and uncomplaining resignation would have been 
 the alternative of one thus \veighed down by the hand of 
 fate. But Alida, though her fervid soul was in a high de 
 gree characterized by that sentiment of natural piety 
 which, existing in almost every highly-gifted mind, is so 
 often mistaken for the deeper and more permanent princi 
 ple which alone deserves the name of true religion Alida 
 had never yet known that sober, and holy-conserving in 
 fluence by whose aid alone, the preacher tells us, we may 
 possess our minds in peace. She rebelled against the lot 
 to which she seemed doomed as a disappointed, if not 
 broken-hearted woman. She would struggle against the 
 blind pressure of circumstance, and war till the last with 
 the fate which only served to exasperate while it over 
 shadowed her spirit. 
 
 It is strange how, while most minds grow haughty, ex 
 acting, and imperious from success, misfortune, so far from 
 bringing humility with it, produces precisely the same 
 effect in others ; they seem to harden in the struggle with 
 sorrow, and grow insolent as they gain knowledge of their 
 own powers of endurance. 
 
 'I'll go no more," said Greyslaer one evening, as throw-
 
 A ROMANCE OF THE MOHAWK. 333 
 
 ing himself dejectedly into the saddle, he passed through 
 the gate which opened upon the grounds of the Hawks- 
 nest, and turned his horse's head toward the garrison; "I'll 
 go no more. Had her reception been merely cold and 
 formal after the long interval I have ceased visiting her, 
 I should not have complained of such notice of my neglect ; 
 for she, perhaps, never suspects the cause that keeps rne 
 away. But those two fingers so carelessly accorded to 
 my grasp, with that light laugh as she turned round in 
 speaking to that group of idlers, even in the moment that 
 I was expressing my pleasure at seeing her pshaw ! there 
 are no sympathies between that woman and myself; there 
 never was, there never can be any ;" and he struck the 
 rowels into his horse almost fiercely, as, thus bitterly mus 
 ing, one angry thought after another chased through his 
 mind. 
 
 " And what if she be ?" he exclaimed, reining up sud 
 denly again to a slower pace. " What if she be wayward, 
 fitful, and exacting to me alone of all other men ? For 
 getful of the devoted and all-absorbing love I have borne 
 her; forgetful of the feelings which, save on that terrible 
 night only, I have always kept trained in obedience to what 
 I deemed her happiness ? She never attempted to inspire 
 this misplaced and mistaken interest; she never lured me 
 on to the avowal ; she never trifled with the emotions that 
 prompted it. What right have I to arraign her conduct, 
 to sit in judgment upon her conduct toward me ? Her 
 character is the same that I have ever known it. Her 
 conduct toward me? Am I, then, such an egotist that that 
 is to change my estimation of her? She does not love 
 me, she cannot love me ; and if she did, is there not this 
 hideous bar between us ! What care I, then, for the show
 
 334 GREYSLAER; 
 
 of interest, when the reality can never be indulged ? No ! 
 my part is taken irretrievably taken, and I would not 
 recall my choice. For me there is no fragment of happi 
 ness that I can save from the wreck of the past, but I 
 will still drift with her wheresoever the sea of events may 
 hurl us." 
 
 It is well for us that it is only in very early life that we 
 are thus prodigal of our chances of happiness, and willing 
 to concentrate them all upon a single issue. Alas ! how 
 soon do we learn, in maturer years, to shift our interest 
 from scheme to scheme ; to see wave after wave, upon 
 which the bark of our hopes has been upborne, sink from 
 beneath it, until the very one upon which it was about to 
 float at last triumphantly, strands us upon the returnless 
 shores of the grave ! 
 
 But, though many a worldling has commenced his ex 
 perience of life with views hardly less romantic than 
 those of Max Greyslaer, his was not the mere wayward 
 devotedness of youth to its first sorrow. The very con 
 stitution of his mind was of a loyal, venerating kind ; (for, 
 deeply imbued as he was, by the classic culture of his 
 mind, with that ancient, intellectual spirit of republicanism 
 which had at once determined his political position in the 
 present civil struggle, Greyslaer, under another system of 
 education, might possibly have turned out almost a bigoted 
 royalist ;) and the sentiment which still attached him to 
 Alida was nearly akin to that which, in another age and 
 under other circumstances, would have inspired his self- 
 devotion to some dethroned and expatriated prince, like 
 him for whom one of his maternal ancestors had suffered 
 upon the scaffold. Had he never declared his passion for 
 Alida, he might have succeeded in crushing it; he would
 
 A ROMANCE OF THE MOHAWK. 335 
 
 certainly have attempted to reason it away the moment 
 that he discovered that he must love in vain ; but, the 
 avowal once made, he never dreamed of withdrawing 
 the adhesion he had thus given in, much less of transfer 
 ring his affections to another. He had made an error of 
 choice; a most unhappy, a most cruel one ; but still he 
 would abide by that choice, whatever consequences might 
 accrue. The part which Max Greyslaer had thus chosen 
 would, in a rational point of view, become only an ill-regu 
 lated, almost, we might say, a half-besotted mind. Yet 
 the weakness of choosing such a part is precisely that 
 which has dwarfed the growth and distorted the other 
 wise noble proportions of minds naturally the most mascu 
 line and commanding. There is something of the high 
 Christian daring of wild romance, something of the solemn 
 obstinacy of the classic heathen fatalist, in the proud per 
 versity with which they would beard a Doom and grapple 
 with a Destiny. 
 
 But the feelings and reflections of Greyslaer, upon 
 which we have dwelt, perhaps, somewhat too minutely, 
 received a new direction at this moment, as he heard the 
 clatter of a horse's hoofs rapidly approaching in an oppo 
 site course to that which he was travelling. The speed 
 of the coming horseman seemed to announce that he was 
 either fleeing from pursuit, or riding upon some errand of 
 the utmost urgency ; and, ere Greyslaer could make out 
 the figure of the strange rider amid the darkness, his con 
 jectures as to his character were cut short by an occur 
 rence which may best be told in another chapter.
 
 336 GREYSLAER; 
 
 CHAPTER VII. 
 
 THE DISCOVERY . 
 
 " Colons. What kind, indulgent power 
 Has smiled on Calous, that so much bliss 
 At once should dissipate his darkest gloom, 
 And make a noon of midnight ! 
 
 " At hen! a. His ways are dark and deeply intricate 
 When Heaven was kindest, innocence was lost, 
 And Paradise gave birth to misery." 
 
 Athenia of Damascus. 
 
 THERE was a blacksmith's shop at the forks of the road, 
 a few yards in advance of the spot where Greyslaer, the 
 moment he became aware of the stranger's approach, had 
 reined up to challenge him in passing. For, in these 
 times, when almost every passenger upon the highway 
 was an object of scrutiny, a horseman who journeyed so 
 hotly by night naturally awakened suspicion as to his 
 character. 
 
 Max, remembering the neighborhood of the black 
 smith's hovel, thought for a moment that it might be only 
 some farmers boy, who, directing his way thither to have 
 a horse-shoe replaced, was endeavoring by speed to dimin 
 ish the lateness of the hour in which he must return home 
 ward when his errand was finished. But the toils of the 
 blacksmith seemed already ended for the day, as the
 
 A KOMANCE OF THE MOHAWK. 337 
 
 sound of his anvil had ceased, and no light hovered around 
 his shanty to tell that the bellows was busy within. The 
 horseman, too, did not check his speed as he approached 
 the smithy, but came thundering on as before, evidently 
 about to pass it. As it chanced, however, the owner of 
 the premises was still there at work around his smoulder 
 ing fire ; and in the very moment that the stranger passed 
 the large unglazed window of the hovel, a sudden puff of 
 his bellows sent the sparks up from the chimney of the 
 forge, and threw a ruddy strip of light across the road. 
 The horse of the stranger, startled at the sudden glare, 
 shyed, and flung his rider upon the spot. 
 
 Greyslaer, who clearly beheld the adventure from 
 where he stood, spurred forward, threw himself from the 
 saddle, and assisted the blacksmith, who had rushed to 
 his door, in raising the fallen man from the ground. The 
 smith, who was none other than the doughty Wentz, men 
 tioned in the earlier chapters of our narrative, uttered a 
 significant cry of surprise the moment he beheld the fea 
 tures of the dismounted traveller; and Max, upon scruti 
 nizing them more narrowly as they together dragged 
 their helpless load to the light, was at no loss to recognize 
 the savage apparition of the Haunted Rock in the bruised, 
 bedraggled, and crestfallen being before him. 
 
 " You may look for the master where you find the 
 man," said Hans, shaking his head wisely as he dipped a 
 handful of dirty water from the trough in which he gene 
 rally cooled his irons, and threw it in the face of the 
 stunned and senseless man. 
 
 "His master?" interrogated Greyslaer, a dark chain of 
 suspicious and vengeful thoughts forming in his mind 
 with the rapidity of lightning.
 
 338 GREYSLAER; 
 
 " Well, his leader then his employer, or whatever 
 name you would give him who has always used this chap 
 in his doings when he had work on hand. He, I say, 
 Wat Bradshawe, must be astir when Red Wolfert rides 
 abroad after this fashion. It were a mercy, now, to the 
 whole country, captain, to knock him in the Head with 
 this iron." 
 
 " What! murder a man that lies helpless before you? 
 Surely, Hans, your heart is not harder than the flinty 
 road which has just spared the wretch's life. Lay those 
 pistols out of his reach, however, and this knife loo ; he 
 must not handle it on reviving," said Max, as the weapons 
 caught his eye while loosing Valtmeyer's girdle to enable 
 him to breathe more freely. 
 
 " Thousand devils ! where am I ?" muttered the bri 
 gand, opening his eyes, and quickly closing them again, 
 as if the glare from the forge offended his sight. 
 
 "In safe hands enough, Wolfert," answered the black 
 smith, as Greyslaer silently motioned him to reply. 
 
 " Aha ! whose voice is that 1" cried the ruffian, rubbing 
 his bloodshot eyes, but not yet raising his head, as he 
 rolled them from side to side. " Hans Blacksmith, was it 
 you that spoke, good Hans ? Thousand devils ! where's 
 my mare ?" 
 
 " Far enough by this time, I guess, from the round rate 
 in which she scoured down the south fork. Are you hurt 
 much?" 
 
 " Um . Has Greyslaer, the rebel captain, passed 
 
 along here yet to-night ?" 
 
 " Why do you ask?" 
 
 "Because we mustn't let him go by, that's all." 
 
 "We! Why, you're drunk, Wolfert. Do you think I
 
 A KO MANGE OF THE MOHAWK. 339 
 
 will aid you in stopping passengers on the People's high 
 way ?" 
 
 Valtmeyer answered only by raising himself upon the 
 bench whereon he had been laid ; but he moved so stiffly 
 and slowly that Greyslaer had time to withdraw a few 
 steps within the deep shadows of the place. 
 
 " Drunk, you say, um " and the desperado fumbled 
 
 around his waist for the arms he generally wore there. 
 " Dunder und blixem ! who in the name of hell has re 
 moved my arms ?" 
 
 " Your belt must have burst a buckle when you were 
 thrown," replied Hans, calmly. 
 
 Valtmeyer fixed a penetrating gaze upon his counte 
 nance ; but the immobility of the blacksmith's features 
 taught him nothing. He raised himself to his feet with a 
 slight groan, paused, and passed his hands down his sides, 
 as if to feel whether or not his ribs were broken ; and 
 then, without saying a word, moved toward the single 
 tallow candle which, stuck into a gourd, stood on the an 
 vil near by. 
 
 " I can't spare my only candle, if it's your arms you 
 want to look for," said Hans, stepping forward ; " the night 
 air will flare it all away. Nobody will touch your belt 
 where it lies atween now and to-morrow morning." 
 
 The outlaw, glowering upon him, muttered something 
 inaudible in reply ; and, without heeding the behest of 
 Hans, seized upon the candle. The first movement he 
 made in lifting it, threw the light full upon Greyslaer. 
 Valtmeyer, in his surprise, let the gourd fall from his 
 hands, and the taper it held was instantly extinguished 
 in the black dust beneath his feet. There was now barely 
 light enough from the forge to distinguish the outlines of
 
 340 G K E Y S L A E K ; 
 
 his person where he stood, and, by plunging instantly 
 into the surrounding darkness, he might at once have es 
 caped. But, uttering the cry of "Treachery" in the 
 moment he let the candle fall, he snatched from the fur 
 nace a red-hot iron a crowbar, as it seemed from its 
 size and, swinging it double-handed about his head, 
 made for the door. 
 
 The entrance to the hovel lay in deep shadow, but his 
 glowing weapon betrayed his position as he dashed from 
 one side to the other to find the means of exit. Hans struck 
 at him repeatedly with a cold iron which he had caught 
 up at the first onset ; but Valtmeyer, at one moment whirl 
 ing his terrible truncheon like a flail about his ears, and 
 launching it forward like a harpoon the next, not only 
 warded off the attack, but at one of his thrusts fairly bore 
 Hans to the ground ; while the leathern apron of the black 
 smith, shrivelling up at the contact, alone prevented the 
 red-hot iron from passing through his body. 
 
 As Hans stumbled over a billet of wood in falling, Valt 
 meyer might yet have followed up his advantage ; but 
 Greyslaer, who, with drawn sword, had planted himself 
 in the doorway to prevent his escape in the first instance, 
 now rushed forward and dealt a blow which would have 
 smitten any common man to the earth, and even the braw 
 ny Valtmeyer went down on one knee beneath it. Another 
 blow with the sabre's edge would here have terminated 
 his career ; but Max, seeing him drop the crowbar, as if 
 his right arm had been paralyzed from his shoulder, was 
 thrown off his guard by Valtmeyer's apparently defence 
 less condition, and in another instant the active ruffian was 
 beyond the reach of his sword. 
 
 There was a long, low, open window, such as are usual
 
 A ROMANCE OF THE MOHAWK. 341 
 
 in a blacksmith's shanty, near where Valtmeyer fell, and 
 the sill of which he had grasped with his left hand in fall 
 ing. Through this he flung himself, unharmed by the 
 pistol shot with which Greyslaer almost simultaneously 
 accompanied his sudden movement. 
 
 Max leaped instantly after him in pursuit ; but, as the 
 fugitive became invisible in the surrounding darkness, he 
 turned to secure his horse, of which the outlaw might 
 otherwise make prize. Hans appeared the next moment 
 with a light. They traced Valtmeyer by the blood from 
 his sword-cut for a few yards only. The dust of the road 
 was spotted with it, but the dew lay heavy upon the grass 
 which bordered it, and there were thickets opposite, into 
 which he must instantly have plunged, after crossing the 
 highway. 
 
 Valtmeyer's belt for holding his arms, to which his bul 
 let-pouch was still attached, was the first thing that caught 
 Greyslaer's eye as he re-entered the cabin. The weapons 
 he handed over to Hans, who seemed better contented 
 with the issue of the night's adventure as he scrutinized 
 his share of the spoils with a workmanlike eye. But the 
 seams of the girdle inclosed matters far more interesting 
 to Max than the ammunition with which the pouch was 
 stored. There were letters from some of the leading To 
 ries in Albany, who, as is now well known, maintained 
 throughout the war a secret correspondence, which the 
 sagacious Schuyler, in order to avail himself of the intelli 
 gence from Canada thus procured, wisely permitted to go 
 forward so long as he could successfully counterplot with 
 these subtle traitors. These papers were, of course, to 
 be forwarded at once to the Committee of Safety at Alba 
 ny. But there were also letters relating to private mat-
 
 342 GREYSLAEK; 
 
 ters which awakened a deeper personal interest in Grey- 
 slaer, and whose contents he did not feel called upon him 
 self to communicate, save to the parties immediately 
 interested. One of them was from the famous Joe Bettys 
 to Bradshawe himself; and the heart of Greyslaer thrilled 
 within him as he read the following passage : 
 
 " Wolfert will do all that is necessary among our friends 
 in the Valley. The business on hand in this district will 
 not allow us both to leave it. The best rallying-point is 
 somewhere among the Scotch clearings north of the Mo 
 hawk. The Cave of Waneonda, you may depend upon it, 
 will never do ; and that for more reasons than one. Your 
 revival of that c d D. R. affair must have made it more 
 or less notorious. How the devil did that wench slip 
 through your fingers ? Valtmeyer has explained the mat 
 ter to me a dozen times, but I cannot understand it. 
 Zounds ! I would like to make an honest woman of that 
 mettlesome huzzy myself. But your claim must ever pre 
 vent her becoming Mistress Joe Bettys. By the way, 
 Wat, did she ever suspect who played the parson's part 
 in the beginning of that wild business? The jade must 
 some day know how much she is beholden to me ; but the 
 secret, I need hardly tell you, is safe until the endorsement 
 of a genuine black-coat shall make all things secure. Had 
 you been the man I took you for, the girl would have 
 gone on her knees to ask for it before you ever let her es 
 cape from Waneonda. But to return," &c. 
 
 Greyslaer could read no further. The characters swam 
 before his eyes ; his senses became dizzied ; and were it 
 not for the support of the workbench against which he 
 leaned, he must have fallen to the ground. It was but for an 
 instant, however, that he was thus unmanned, and it were
 
 A ROMANCE OF THE MOHAWK. 343 
 
 impossible to say what feeling predominated in the con 
 flicting emotions which for that first moment overwhelmed 
 him ; though a wild joy, an eager and confident hope 
 prompted his next movement, as, calling in an agitated 
 voice for his horse, he waited not for Hans to pass out of 
 the door, but, brushing almost rudely past him, threw him 
 self into the saddle, and galloped off in the direction of the 
 Hawksnest. 
 
 The astounded smith stood listening for a few moments 
 to his horse's footfalls as they rapidly died away in the 
 distance, shook his head, and touched his forehead signifi 
 cantly, as if he feared that all were not right with his 
 young friend ; then slowly withdrawing into his shop, he 
 shot the bolt behind him, extinguished the fires, and, taking 
 up the outlaw's belt, which he paused to examine again for 
 a moment, passed through a side wicket into a log cabin 
 which adjoined the shed, and constituted his humble dwell 
 ing. 
 
 Greyslaer, before reaching the Hawksnest, was chal 
 lenged by the party of his friends whom he met returning 
 from their evening visit, and whose approach, though the 
 young officers rode gayly along, talking and laughing with 
 each other, he did not notice till he was in the midst of 
 them. A few hurried words, suggesting on their part 
 that he must have forgotten something of importance, and 
 implying upon his that he would overtake them before 
 they reached the garrison, was all that passed between 
 them as he brushed impatiently by. 
 
 The family had all retired when he reached the home 
 stead ; but a light still burned in Alida's apartments. He 
 threw his rein over the paling, and, after trying the outer
 
 344 GREYSLAER; 
 
 door in vain, stepped back from the verandah, and looked 
 to the only window through which the light appeared. 
 The curtain was drawn, but a shadow, which ever and 
 anon fell across it, showed that the inmate of the cham 
 ber had not yet sought her repose. It was with Alida 
 alone that he must secure an interview ; and Max, in the 
 agitation of his spirits, did not hesitate at the first means 
 which presented themselves. There was on that side of 
 the house a porch, with a balcony over it, having a single 
 window cut down to the floor. This window opened into 
 Alida's dressing-room, which communicated with her bed 
 chamber. Greyslaer clambered to the top of the balcony, 
 and tapped against the panes of glass in the moment that 
 the light was extinguished. 
 
 " Fear not," he said, " it is I, Max Greyslaer. I come 
 with tidings of such import to you that I could not sleep 
 before possessing you of them." 
 
 Alida, hastily throwing a loose wrapper around her 
 person, opened the casement. " Heavens ! Captain Grey- 
 sjaer," she exclaimed, " what urgent peril can have my 
 brother Derrick, it is not of him " 
 
 " No, no, no peril nothing of Derrick undo the door 
 below it is of you it is your concerns alone which have 
 brought me here at this untimely hour." 
 
 " Is the matter, then, so pressing ? Can we not wait till 
 morning ?" said Alida, in strange agitation. 
 
 " I cannot trust it till the morrow. I cannot sleep, I 
 must not move from near you, till you hear it." 
 
 " Speak it out at once, then, Max, for my poor nerves 
 will not bear this suspense," said Alida, with increasing 
 tremor of voice.
 
 A ROMANCE OF THE MOHAWK. 345 
 
 " I cannot speak it all ; I must have light to reveal it by. 
 See here this written paper, Alida." 
 
 " And what does it say ?" she replied with forced calm 
 ness. " Tell me, Max Greyslaer ; if it be good or evil, I 
 had rather receive it from your lips than from any other 
 source." 
 
 il Heaven bless you for those words. My tidings are 
 far from evil, yet I scarce know how to break them to 
 you. There was a bird do you remember it, Alida, one 
 day in years gone by ? a bird that we watched together 
 as it sat crouched upon the lowest bough of yonder chest 
 nut, while a hawk long hovered mid the topmost branches ; 
 it seemed withering in the shadow of those ill-omened 
 wings. A chance shot from Derrick at a distance frighted 
 the falcon from his perch of vantage ; but the besieged 
 songster also fell to the ground at sound of the report 
 which drove his enemy from his stooping-place, and 
 seemed like to perish, when you caught up the little trem 
 bler and cherished him in your bosom." 
 
 " Oh ! Max, what mean these wild words, spoken at 
 such a time ?" said Alida ; for this fanciful allusion seemed 
 90 unsuited to the earnest purposes of the moment, and 
 was so unlike the wonted manly directness of Greyslaer's 
 mind, that, coupled with his agitated manner and the other 
 strange circumstances of the interview, Alida was shocked 
 for the moment with the apprehension that his brain might 
 be disordered. 
 
 " Nay, but they are not unmeaning, if you will but in 
 terpret them, Alida ! Have you not sat thus beneath the 
 withering wing of sorrow ? Have you not been ruth 
 lessly hawked at, and made the prey of villainy the most 
 hideous ? And has not chance, or God's own providence 
 16
 
 346 CREYSLAER; 
 
 call it rather, brought the hour of relief, which is come 
 even now ?" 
 
 " Is he dead, then ?" whispered Alida, clasping her 
 hands, as a light seemed to break in upon her from Grey- 
 slaer's words. 
 
 " Dead ? ay ! no, not that ; but he is to you as if he 
 never lived. They deceived you, Alida ; the supposed 
 ties which so manacled your soul have never yet had an 
 existence ; it was a false marriage, a fiend-like and most 
 damnable contrivance to destroy you. Look not so doubt 
 ful and bewildered. I have the written evidence of what 
 I say ! Alida, dearest Alida, speak speak and tell me 
 that you doubt not. It is I, Max Greyslaer, who always 
 loved, and never yet deceived you ; it is I " 
 
 But Alida was mute and motionless. Her tottering 
 knees had failed to support her, though she clung to the 
 dressing-table near which she stood for support. Grey 
 slaer quickly passed through the window, and, catching 
 her fainting form from the floor, bore her out to the bal 
 cony. Supporting her there on one knee, he anxiously 
 chafed her pulses, while the refreshing breeze of night, 
 playing through the long tresses which dropped over her 
 shoulders, aided in reviving his lovely burden. 
 
 It was a strange scene that which followed ; nor could 
 any one, however familiar with the proud and wayward 
 spirit of Alida, have divined how it would eventuate. A 
 new crisis in her destiny was at hand ; a double crisis, as 
 it seemed from Greyslaer's last words of earnest affection. 
 She was not prepared for either of them ; and she endeav 
 ored to avoid the last by overwhelming Max with grati 
 tude for his disinterestedness. 
 
 " No. Miss de Roos, no." said Greyslaer, almost
 
 A ROMANCE OF THE MOHAWK. 347 
 
 fiercely. " I will receive no gratitude, no thanks, no 
 friendship at your hands. There is but one return such 
 love as mine can accept, and if you give me not that we 
 part for ever." 
 
 li Oh why, kindest of friends, can we not still be to each 
 other as we have been ?" 
 
 "Alida," cried Max with wild emotion, "you would 
 turn the madness of my nature against, itself." 
 
 " What madness ? Oh, kind, good, noble Greyslaer, be 
 not so excited." 
 
 " Woman, you will infuriate me. I am neither of these. 
 Whatever there seems of good in me springs from my 
 love of you, Alida ;" and the tones in which he now pro 
 nounced her name thrilled through her very spirit. " Ali 
 da, thou knowest that my devotion to you was a madness ! 
 Beautiful, oh, bewilderingly beautiful as thou art, what 
 other man breathing, had he known what I know, or be 
 lieved what I believe, would have lavished his worship 
 on such an idol would have consecrated his manhood to 
 misery, and left his age without a solace ? It was mad 
 ness in me." 
 
 " Could I help it ?" gasped Alida, now deadly pale. 
 
 " No, you could not," said Max, with a smile of bitter 
 pride ; " it was a devotion self-lavished from the fullness 
 of my soul, not wrung from it by the imperious exac 
 tion of yours." 
 
 " And you believe, Greyslaer," said the girl with a 
 flush of generous disdain, " that I would turn this noble 
 weakness of your nature if weakness indeed it be that I 
 would turn it against yourself?" 
 
 "Believe it? I know it," answered Max with eye of
 
 348 GREYSLAER; 
 
 open frankness but lip compressed with stern determina 
 tion. 
 
 " Am I so mean of soul then, in Captain Greyslaer's 
 opinion?" said Alida, with flashing eye. 
 
 But Greyslaer quailed not, though his voice was hoarse 
 with suppressed emotion, as he replied, " You are a 
 woman, Alida all, all of woman, or these hungry veins 
 had not wasted in consuming passion for you." The 
 girl trembled, and he paused and pressed his folded arms 
 upon his bosom, as if keeping down emotion, and then, with 
 gaze fixed upon her, and clear, slow enunciation, went on. 
 *' You are a woman, and fond of power as are all your sex. 
 You have lived of late, for months, amid its triumphs. 
 Unscathed by one jealous pang, I even joyed to see you 
 thus forget your sorrows ; but it was amid your sorrows 
 that I remained your slave." 
 
 " I can never be too grateful," said Alida tearfully. 
 
 " Grateful ! grateful !" responded Max with scorn. 
 
 "Indeed, most grateful," repeated Alida with something 
 of demureness. 
 
 " Woman, you shall not thus foil me," cried her lover, 
 while his broad brow glistened with the white heat of 
 transcendent passion, illuminating it from within. " You 
 love me, Alida, you know it, you feel it. You dare not 
 look into your heart's core, and say there is not there a 
 love as boundless, an affection as infinite as my own. But 
 you would cover it up yes, you would cover up the tide 
 of sympathy that surges your soul toward mine, till deep 
 should answer to deep, in exhaustless, never-wearying 
 tenderness." 
 
 Alida trembled like an aspen, and Max hesitated. She
 
 A ROMANCE OF THE MOHAWK. 349 
 
 recovered, and, in reply to a haughty bend of the head, 
 he, under the still haughtier influence of tyrannic passion, 
 went on : " You would you would stifle, you would turn 
 aside God's blessed current of true emotion you would 
 forget all deny all, to me to yourself deny it. And 
 why ?" 
 
 " And why, sir ?" 
 
 " Because, in your unconscious, secret, self-willed arro 
 gance of heart, you would turn the mad devotedness of 
 my nature against itself, and still in your prosperity, drink 
 up the wild homage I gave you in adversity, until my de 
 feated life should be numbered among the triumphs of 
 your woman's power. And then, self-idolizing girl, while 
 I withered for thee, thou wouldst call thy soul-defrauding 
 ministry, * Friendship.' ' 
 
 " Oh God ! am I such a thing as that ?" cried Alida, 
 borne down by the impetuosity of her lover. 
 
 " Alida noble Alida," said Max, now deeply affected, 
 but still firm, " you are that woman your lonely wrest 
 ling with a terrible sorrow at one time, your reckless 
 efforts to dissipate it at another, have thus made you, un 
 consciously, self-absorbed." 
 
 " Oh, Max ! I am most unworthy of your love." 
 
 " Unworthy ? Hear me, Alida ; without you I were 
 companionless amid my kind for ever ; but I accept your 
 companionship upon no terms of gratitude, of friendship, 
 of sisterly communion. Mine you are ; mine you must 
 be ; mine all mine ; mine in your heart, in your spirit, 
 in your affections, in your pride in all the rich abun 
 dance of a glorious nature that God sent here for me to 
 idolize in that form of loveliness."
 
 350 GREYSLAER. 
 
 " And could you could you then leave me, Max, if I do 
 not thus acknowledge thee ?" 
 
 She spoke these words in a low appealing tone. A con 
 vulsive tremor shook the sinewy form of the young soldier 
 as he replied with solemn emphasis : 
 
 " God only knows if I can give thee up and live. But 
 / know that I will if here under these stars to-night 
 thy soul does not make true and full answer unto mine. 
 I will leave thee, and for ever." 
 
 " Jind then we should both be miserable" 
 
 The words were few, and she pronounced them calmly 
 like a simple truism ; but they told the whole tale of a 
 common sympathy, they acknowledged the full law of a 
 common destiny between them ; and she did not with 
 draw her own hand, nor recoil from the light touch of his 
 arm, as Max circled her waist in kneeling. 
 
 The moon, which was in its last quarter, at this moment 
 cast above the trees the golden light she loves to shed in 
 waning. The mellow beam caught the eyes of Alida, and 
 a tear the first tear of affection Max had ever seen her 
 shed trembled upon their lids as she turned from that 
 soft harbinger of happier days to the soulful face of her 
 lover. The impulse was resistless which made Greyslaer, 
 in that moment, snatch her to his bosom. " Yes, dearest 
 Max, I am yours :" are not those the words she murmurs 
 in reply to the unutterable tenderness of his mute caress ? 
 
 She paused : and in that pause there was an Elysian 
 moment for them both. But in another instant Alida ex 
 tricated herself from his embrace ; and though she suffered 
 him still to retain her hand, her voice was yet painfully 
 constrained and altered as she spoke what follows.
 
 A ROMANCE OF THE MOHAWK, 351 
 
 "Ah ! Greyslaer, I i'ear me this flood of happiness has 
 come in too quickly to last for either of us. That paper 
 may be nay, look not thus hurt I doubt not that it con 
 tains sufficient to produce entire conviction in your rnind as 
 well as mine; for, had it not been for the deep reliance I place 
 upon your judgment, Max a judgment so far beyond your 
 years I should never have betrayed the feelings you have 
 beheld this night. But, whatever be the fate of the regard 
 I bear you, Greyslaer, you have won it, and it is yours. 
 No, never would I recall this hour." Max mutely pressed 
 her hand to his lips, and she went on. " But it is a strange 
 and dark story of which we have now the threads in our 
 hands, and I shudder with the fear that, deeming too 
 quickly we have unravelled it all, there may be others 
 interwoven with it not so easy to disentangle. My name 
 must be cleared, not only to your satisfaction, Greyslaer, 
 but to that of all who have ever heard its sound, before I 
 will change it for yours ; and in these troubled times it is 
 long before I can hope for such a result." 
 
 ' Your name, Alida ! None have ever, none dare ever, 
 connect that with dishonor. Your name ! Why. this 
 terrible secret has been so kept from the world, that I 
 never dreamed of mystery attending you till you yourself 
 revealed that there was one." 
 
 " Yes, in the class with which we have most mingled, 
 my story is but little known ; but there must be many of 
 the country people of a different grade, though worthy of 
 respect as those who sometimes pretend to engross it all, 
 who cannot but have heard of it ; and I would not have 
 the simplest rustic cherish a memory that can do irrever 
 ence to the wife of Greyslaer. Let us wait, dearest Max ; 
 wait till time till chance, which has already done so much
 
 352 GREYSLAER; 
 
 for me, shall determine still farther. Till then, affianced 
 to you in soul Alida will still remain ; and whate'er betide, 
 she will never be another's." 
 
 Greyslaer, who knew too well the character of Alida to 
 remonstrate against her purpose when settled, determined 
 at least to defer whatever he had to urge against her reso 
 lution until a more propitious season. Besides, with a 
 lover's thoughtful consideration, he feared that the night 
 air might blow too chilly upon the loosely-arrayed person 
 of Alida to render it safe to protract the interview. They 
 parted not with the prolonged caressing adieux of newer 
 and happier lovers, but when the hand which Greyslaer 
 was loth to release trembled in his pressure as he bade 
 farewell, he stooped to print a salute upon the pale cheek 
 which was not withdrawn from him ; and in the next in 
 stant, seizing her to his bosom as if she would grow there, 
 his lips met hers in one long kiss, as if each then drank in 
 the other's soul for ever. 
 
 And now, good steed, thou bearest a different man upon 
 thy back from him who has thrice already guided thee over 
 the same road to-night. The stern and disappointed man 
 that, with firm hand and even rein, bent his twilight course 
 hither; the moody and abstracted lover that loitered 
 homeward at a fitful pace ; the wild-riding horseman, who 
 spurred ahead, as if each moment were of importance to 
 solve the riddle he had already read were not each and 
 all of these a different being from the buoyant cavalier 
 who now, with ringing bridle, gallops gayly over hill and 
 dale, leaning forward now to pat thy glossy neck and 
 speak cheering words of encouragement, and now rising 
 in the stirrup as if his happy spirit vaulted upward at each 
 gallant bound beneath him ? Surely there is a music in
 
 A ROMANCE OF THE MOHAWK. 353 
 
 the good horse's motions which times itself ever to our 
 mood, whate'er the changes be. 
 
 Alas ! many were the changes of mood that Greyslaer 
 was yet doomed to know ere the story of his strange 
 loves was ended. But of the delay that sickens hope, 
 the doubt that withers it ; of the chilling thoughts, the 
 shadowy fears of the future, he dreamed not, cared not 
 now, more than he did for the clouds which crept over 
 the skies and obscured the path before him. His mind 
 was filled with but one idea, which excluded all others. 
 He knew what once to know or once to believe, in that 
 first hour of belief or knowledge, makes all the world a 
 Paradise around He knew that he was BELOVED. 
 
 Shall we pause to paint the next interview between 
 Max and Alida when the happy lover won from her 
 lips the final words of her full betrothal to him ? Shall 
 we describe those which followed, when Max, with argu 
 ments she did not wish to answer, convinced her that 
 there was now no real bar to their wedded happiness, 
 and she yielded up all thought of seeking redress for her 
 wrongs, save through him who was shortly to become 
 the rightful guardian of her honor ; to the friend who 
 had already become dearer to her than her life ? Shall 
 we tell how the softening influence of love gradually 
 melted the Amazonian spirit of her earlier day, until the 
 romantic dream of retribution, which had so sternly 
 strung the soul of the once haughty Alida, became lost 
 at last in the loving woman's tender fears lest Bradshawe, 
 now so far removed from the vengeance of her lover, 
 should yet cross his path 1 Shall we dwell upon the 
 transports of feeling which agitated the soul of Max, now 
 burning with impatience to exact such retribution, and 
 16*
 
 354 GREYSLAER. 
 
 now absorbed in a wild confusion of delight as the day 
 approached which should make Alida his for ever? 
 
 Or shall we rather describe his chafing vexation and 
 her mute forebodings when the call of military honor, 
 abruptly summoning him away to distant and dangerous 
 duty, deferred that blessed expectation of their union to a 
 period which the fearful chances of civil war only could 
 determine ? 
 
 Shall we follow the patriot soldier in his bright career 
 of achievement, as, courted and caressed by the glowing 
 eyes and chivalrous spirits of the South, he measures his 
 sword with the boldest of his country's invaders, or min 
 gles with few superiors in council among the noblest of 
 his country's defenders ? Shall we survey him in that 
 broader field of action, where the indulgence of personal 
 animosity and schemes of vengeance against a low adven 
 turer like Bradshawe are forgotten and swallowed up in 
 the more general and nobler interests that press upon 
 him ; but where the image of Alida is still as dear to his 
 mind as when last he waved a reluctant adieu to his na 
 tive valley ? 
 
 But no, young Max, it is not for us to track the meteor 
 windings of thy soldierly career amid those thrilling 
 scenes which Lee, Sumter, Pickens, Marion, and Tarlton 
 their gallant foe, have since immortalized in guerilla 
 story, and made the heritage of other names than thine. 
 The record of thy exploits is fully chronicled, mayhap, in 
 one true heart only, and that grows daily sadder as it 
 counts the hours of thy absence and dreams of the friend 
 who is far away.
 
 BOOK FIFTH. 
 
 INVASION. 
 
 " Then comes a power 
 Into this kingdom, who already, 
 Wise in our negligence, have secret feet 
 In some of our best ports, and are at point 
 To show their open banner." KINO LEAR. 
 
 " The fatal Time 
 
 Cuts off all ceremonies and vows of love 
 And ample interchange of such discourse 
 Which so long sundered friends should dwell upon." 
 
 RICHARD III. 
 
 " On the stage 
 
 Of my mortality my youth hath acted 
 Some scenes of vanity, drawn out at length 
 By varied pleasures, sweeten'd in the mixture, 
 But tragical in issue." THE BROKEN HEART. 
 
 " Thus to rob a lady 
 Of her good name is an infectious sin 
 Not to be pardoned. Be it false as hell, 
 'Twill never be redeemed if it be sown 
 Among the people, fruitful to increase 
 All evils they shall hear." LOVE LIES A-BLEEDING. 
 
 " How has kind Heaven adorn'd the happy land, 
 And scatter'd blessings with a wasteful hand ! 
 But what avail her unexhausted stores, 
 Her blooming mountains, and her sunny shores, 
 With all the gifts that Heaven and Earth impart, 
 The smiles of nature and the charms of art, 
 While proud oppression in her valleys reigns 
 And tyranny usurps her happy plains ?" ADDISOW.
 
 BOOK FIFTH 
 
 INVASION. 
 
 CHAPTER I. 
 
 RANGERS' REVELS. 
 
 " Round -with the ringing glass once more, 
 
 Friends of my youth and of my heart, 
 No magic can this hour restore ; 
 Then crown it ere we part. 
 
 " Ye are my friends, my chosen ones, 
 
 Whose blood would flow with fervor true 
 For me ; and free as this wine runs, 
 "Would mine, by Heaven ! for you." 
 
 HAMILTON BOGART. 
 
 A YEAR has passed away the second year of the 
 Revolution and Greyslaer is not nearer the fruition of 
 his hopes than in the hour when they first dawned anew 
 upon his soul. The calls of military duty have, in the 
 mean time, carried him far from his native valley, to 
 which, with a sword whose temper has been tried on 
 many a Southern field, he is now returning ; for New 
 York at this moment needs all her children to defend her 
 soil. Burgoyne upon the Hudson, and St. Leger along
 
 358 GREYSLAER; 
 
 the Mohawk, are marching to unite their forces in the 
 heart of the province, and sweep the country from the 
 lakes to the seaboard. 
 
 The ascendency which, upon the first outbreak of hos 
 tilities, the Whigs of Tryon county attained over the 
 opposite faction, seemed, at this period of the great 
 struggle, about to be wrenched from their hands. The 
 conspiring bands of Tories which had been driven out or 
 disarmed when Schuyler marched upon Johnstown and 
 crushed the first rising of the royalists, had lifted the 
 royal standard anew upon the border, and rumors of the 
 thousands who were flocking to it struck dismay into the 
 patriot councils. Brant and his Mohawks had always 
 kept the field in guerilla warfare, and the frontiersmen 
 were habituated to the terror of his name ; but now Guy 
 Johnson, who had been stirring up the more remote 
 tribes, was said to have thickened his files with a cloud 
 of savage warriors. The combined Indian and refugee 
 forces had rendezvoused at Oswego, thoroughly armed 
 and appointed for an efficient campaign ; and Barry St. 
 Leger, who took command of the whole, boasted confi 
 dently that he would effect a conjunction with Burgoyne, 
 if that leader could make good his march upon Albany. 
 
 Availing himself of the numerous streams and lakes of 
 the country to transport his artillery and heavy munitions, 
 St. Leger advanced with forced marches from the wilds 
 of the north and the west, and, penetrating into the Val 
 ley of the Mohawk, invested Fort Stanwix, the portal of 
 the whole region beyond the Hudson. The province far 
 and wide was alarmed at this bold and hitherto successful 
 invasion ; and some of the sturdiest patriots of Tryon 
 county stood aghast at the incoming torrent which threat-
 
 A ROMANCE OF THE MOHAWK. 359 
 
 ened to overwhelm them. But the anxiety of the mass 
 was more akin to the alarm that rouses than to the terror 
 which paralyzes action. There was a spirit abroad among 
 the people; a spirit of determined resolve, of vengeful 
 hatred against those who had come back to desolate the 
 land with fire and sword. Sir John Johnson, who stood 
 high in the councils of the invading general, had approached 
 the threshold of his forfeited patrimony ; but the arrogant 
 though brave baronet, had he penetrated as far as the 
 broad domain over which his family once exercised an 
 almost princely sway, would have found that strange 
 changes had taken place among his rustic and once hum 
 ble neighbors. 
 
 The march of armies, the pomp and parade of martial 
 times, with many of the dark incidents of civil feud shad 
 owing the pageantry of regular warfare, had been beheld 
 in the Valley of the Mohawk, and the lapse of a shor 
 two years had markedly altered the character of the dis 
 trict in which the principal scenes of our story are laid. 
 The inhabitants no longer gathered together in village or 
 hamlet to reason calmly about their rights, and pass for 
 mal resolutions upon the conduct of their rulers. The 
 reckless assertion, the hot and hasty reply, the careless 
 laugh or fierce oath which cut short the laggard argu 
 ment, showed that men's tempers had altered, and the 
 times of debate had long since given way to those of ac 
 tion. The soldier had taken the place of the civilian ; 
 the military muster supplanted the political assemblage ; 
 and the plain yeomanry of a rural district were no longer 
 recognizable in the gay military groups that seemed to 
 have usurped their place at the roadside inn. And when 
 the proclamation of the commandant of the district sum-
 
 360 GREYSLAER; 
 
 moned every male inhabitant capable of bearing arms to 
 the field, the highways were filled with yeomanry corps, 
 battalions of infantry, volunteers from the villages, and 
 squadrons of mounted rangers from the remote settle 
 ments, all urging their way to the general rendezvous at 
 Fort Dayton. 
 
 Hitherward, too, occasionally, intermingled with these 
 raw levies, were likewise marching bodies of experienced 
 partisan troops, which, as the scene of war shifted from 
 one part of the northern frontier to another, had kept the 
 field from the first. Armed and trained to serve as either 
 cavalry or infantry, the "Mohawk Ysegers," as they 
 called themselves, were found acting now as videttes and 
 foraging parties for the Congressional forces ; fighting 
 now by themselves with the Indians in guerilla conflict, 
 and now again co-operating with the Continental army in 
 regular warfare. The public house of Nicholas Wingear, 
 which lay immediately upon the road to Fort Dayton, 
 was at this time a favorite stopping-place of refreshment 
 with the different corps which composed this motley 
 army, and a small command had halted there for the 
 night at the time we resume the thread of our story. 
 
 The old stone-built inn, with its ruined sheds and out 
 houses of half-hewn logs, which used to stand somewhere 
 about midway upon the road between Canajoharie and 
 German Flats, has probably long since given place to 
 some more modern hostelrie. Mine ancient host, too, the 
 worthy Deacon Wingear unless the flavor of his liquor 
 lives in the memory of some octogenarian toper is per- 
 hapsjikewise forgotten. It is not less our duty, however, 
 to chronicle his name here while opening this act of our 
 drama beneath the hospitable roof of Nicholas.
 
 A ROMANCE OF THE MOHAWK. 361 
 
 The apartment in which the ranger corps were carous 
 ing was large and rudely furnished, containing only be 
 sides the permanent fixture of a bar for the sale of liquors, 
 which was partitioned oft' under the staircase at one end 
 of the room a small cherry-wood table and a few rush- 
 bottomed chairs as its customary movables. Temporary 
 arrangements seemed, however, to have been lately made 
 for a greater number of guests than these would accom 
 modate. An oaken settle had been brought from its place 
 in the porch, and arranged, with several hastily-con 
 structed benches, around a rude substitute for a dining- 
 table, formed by nailing a pair of shutters upon a stout 
 log placed upright upon the floor ; the convenience being 
 eked out in length by some unplaned boards resting upon 
 an empty cask or two. 
 
 The rudeness of this primitive banqueting furniture 
 could hardly be said to be smoothed away by a soiled 
 and crumpled table-cloth which scantily concealed less 
 than half of its upper surface. It appeared, however, to 
 answer the purpose with the bluff campaigners who were 
 now seated around it, filling beaker after beaker from a 
 huge pewter flagon which rapidly circulated around the 
 board. Nor did they, while making the most of these 
 ungainly appliances for their comfort, envy the burly and 
 selfish lounger who occupied and monopolized two or 
 three of the chairs, as well as the smaller and neater 
 table in one corner of the apartment. Of this privileged 
 and loutish individual we shall speak hereafter. A heavy 
 black patch covered one of his eyes ; but the curious 
 glances which he with the other ever and anon cast upon 
 the carousing soldiery would appear to intimate that they
 
 362 GREYSLAER; 
 
 were worthy of a more minute description than we have 
 yet given of them. 
 
 Their stacked arms and knapsacks flung carelessly in 
 the corners might indicate that they were only some fa 
 tigue party of militia that had stopped here for refresh 
 ment ; or it might be a detachment from some larger 
 body of light troops which had halted for the night upon 
 their march through the country. The absence of all 
 military etiquette, and the free and equal tone of their 
 intercourse, as they sat all drinking at the same board, 
 would imply that they were only privates of some volun 
 teer company of foot. And yet, if his sabre and spurs 
 were wanting, there was still that in the appearance as 
 well as the equipments of more than one of their number 
 which would anywhere have distinguished him from the 
 common soldier of a marching regiment, much more from 
 an ordinary militia-man. His looks were too intelligent 
 for those of a mere human machine, accustomed only to 
 act in mechanical unison with others. His features were 
 earnest, but not rigid. His air was martial, but yet not 
 strictly military. It betrayed the schooling of service 
 rather than the habit of discipline. It bespoke the sol 
 dier, who had been made such by circumstances rather 
 than by the drill sergeant. In a word, it was the air of 
 a guerilla, and not of a regular. 
 
 But listen; the partisan grows musical in his cups. 
 There is a grave pause in his wild wassail; he has linked 
 hands with his comrades ; and now, with one voice, they 
 raise their battle hymn together. It is that half-German 
 gathering song which, in the days of the Revolution, used 
 to stir the Teuton blood of "The old Residenters," as the 
 men of the Mohawk called themselves.
 
 A ROMANCE OF THE MOHAWK. 363 
 
 FLING ABROAD THE STARRY BANNER. 
 
 Raise the heart, raise the hand, 
 Swear ye for the glorious cause, 
 Swear by Nature's holy laws 
 
 To defend your fatherland ! 
 By the glory ye inherit, 
 
 By the deeds that patriots dare, 
 By Columbia's freedom, swear it: 
 
 By YOUR COUNTRY this day swear ! 
 Raise the heart, raise the hand, 
 
 Fling abroad the starry banner, 
 
 Ever live our country's honor, 
 Ever bloom our native land. 
 
 2. 
 
 Raise the heart, raise the hand, 
 Let the earth and heaven hear 
 While the sacred oath we swear, 
 
 Swear to uphold our fatherland ! 
 Wave, thou lofty ensign glorious, 
 
 Floating foremost in the field ; 
 While thine eagle hovers o'er us 
 
 None shall tremble, none shall yield. 
 Raise the heart, raise the hand, 
 
 Fling abroad the starry banner, 
 
 Ever live our country's honor, 
 Ever bloom our native land. 
 
 3. 
 
 Raise the heart, raise the hand, 
 Raise it to the Father spirit, 
 To the Lord of Heaven rear it, 
 
 Let the soul tow'rtl HIM expand !
 
 364 GREYSLAER; 
 
 Truth unwavering, faith unshaken, 
 
 Sway each action, word, and will ; 
 That which man hath undertaken, 
 
 Heaven can alone fulfil. 
 Raise the heart, raise the hand, 
 
 Fling abroad the starry banner, 
 
 Ever live our country's honor, 
 Ever bloom our native land. 
 
 The solitary lounger, who sat aloof from the soldiers, 
 exhibited every sign of boorish impatience short of being 
 directly offensive, as each new verse followed the repeti 
 tion of the chorus from the other table. He was a strong- 
 featured, bull-necked fellow, whose slouched drab beaver, 
 huge loaded whip, and blanket-cloth overcoat indicated 
 the occupation of a teamster or drover. A pipe and pot 
 of beer had been placed before him while the soldiers 
 were in the midst of their song ; with whose soothing lux 
 ury he seemed not fully content, however, judging by the 
 growling impatience with which, ever and anon, he now 
 asked about some toasted cheese that it appeared was pre 
 paring for him in the kitchen. His remarks were ad 
 dressed to mine host, a thin-faced, lank-haired worthy, in a 
 complete suit of black velveteen, who stood behind the 
 bar with slate in hand, ready to make any addition to his 
 reckoning at the first call for replenishing the jorum of 
 the soldiers ; and partly to a tight lass that glided to and 
 fro through the room, on the alert to receive the orders of 
 the company. 
 
 "Why, Tavy, gal," said the drover, "I shall have 
 drank up all my ale before that cheese is forthcoming. 
 Your mammy ought to be able to toss up such a trifle at 
 five minutes' notice. I must ride far to-night and that 
 right soon, to overtake my cattle, which must be driven
 
 A ROMANCE OF THE MOHAWK. 365 
 
 to Fort Dayton before breakfast to-morrow. And here 
 one moment I would tell you something, my pretty 
 Tavy." 
 
 " Octavia Sarah Ann," cried a shrewish female voice 
 from the kitchen. 
 
 " Go, Tavy, my good girl, to your mother," said mine 
 host, evidently uneasy to get the girl out of the way of 
 the cheese customer. " Your call shall be obeyed in a 
 moment, worthy sir ; only have a little patience. We are 
 anything but strong-handed in this house just now. My 
 son Zachariah went off with the Congress soldiers yes 
 terday, and Scotch Angus stole away to join the king's 
 people last week. The niggers are all sorting the horses 
 that came in to-night, and my good woman has no one to 
 split a stick for her till Zip comes in from the stable." 
 
 " Well, Bully Nick, you might have spared all that long 
 palaver if you had left spry-tongued Tavy to tell me the 
 same thing in three words, instead of squinting and blink 
 ing to her to clear out, as you did just now. Hark ye, 
 Nicholas, I would say a word to you ;'' and the man, 
 whose lawless features put on a scowl, as if some angry 
 thought had struck him, beckoned to the innkeeper to ap 
 proach near enough for them to exchange a whisper 
 together. But this mark of confidence Wingear seemed 
 sedulously to avoid ; and the traveller, at last rising ab 
 ruptly from his seat, strode up to the bar, and flinging down 
 his reckoning, stalked out of the apartment ; not, however, 
 before he had leaned over the counter, and catching the 
 shrinking Nicholas by the collar of his coat, muttered in 
 his ear, 
 
 " I see you know me, worthy Nick ! and, seeing that 
 you do, I've half a mind to split your weasand for fighting
 
 366 GREYSLAER; 
 
 so shy of an old acquaintance. Sc/tinos ! breathe but a 
 syllable to this rebel gang, and I'll roast you and your 
 household among these rotten timbers before morning. 
 Remember ! I have an eye upon you, even among that 
 batch of fools yonder." 
 
 " I say, deacon," cried one of the Y aggers, as the inn 
 keeper, stooping down behind the bar, as if busied in 
 arranging something, managed thus to conceal the terror 
 which this formidable speech had inspired, " I say, dea 
 con, my boy, who the devil's that surly chap who's just 
 left us?" 
 
 " That's more than I can tell you, Captain de Roos," 
 replied Wingear, with difficulty mastering the trepidation 
 into which he had been thrown, and still averting his face 
 as he plied his towel industriously along the shelves over 
 which he leaned. " The man's in the cattle business, I 
 believe, sir, as he talked of driving some critturs to Fort 
 Dayton for the troops there." 
 
 The officer paused for a moment in mere idleness of 
 thought, as it seemed from the intentness with which he 
 watched the smoke-wreaths from his mouth curling up 
 ward toward the rafters ; and then knocking the ashes 
 from his segar, he resumed abruptly, before replacing it 
 in his lips, 
 
 " Did you ever see anything of Wolfert Valtmeyer in 
 these parts, Nicky ?" 
 
 " Oh yes, sir," answered Octavia, who that moment en 
 tered with a fresh flagon from the cellar*; " he stopped 
 here about harvest time two years ago with Mr. Brad- 
 shawe, just as the troubles were beginning. They went 
 off in a hurry ; folks said because old Bait the hunter 
 came down here to look after their doings."
 
 A ROMANCE OF THE MOHAWK. 367 
 
 " You are mistaken, Tavy," said her father, uneasily ; 
 " Bradshawe and the drover and Valtmeyer I mean 
 put down the pitcher, gal, and don't stand gaping at me 
 so. The drover and Brad I mean Wolfert " 
 
 " You mean ! and what the devil do you mean ?" said 
 the soldier, turning round fiercely, and fixing a stern eye 
 upon the innkeeper. " Keep a straight tongue between 
 your teeth, Nick, or you may wish it bitten off when too 
 late." 
 
 The abashed publican, quailing beneath the penetrat 
 ing glance of De Roos, was glad of any excuse for re 
 maining silent, while the other, addressing the girl, thus 
 pursued his inquiries : 
 
 " And so, my pretty Tavy, you saw Valtmeyer about 
 two years since, eh 1 About the time of Greyslaer's fight, 
 wasn't it?" 
 
 " Yes, sir, either just before or just after Brant carried 
 off Miss Alida." 
 
 The features of the gay soldier darkened as she spoke; 
 but quickly resuming his air of unconcern, he continued 
 his questions by asking, 
 
 " What kind of a looking fellow was Wolfert then ? 
 Did he bear any resemblance to the drover that was here 
 but now?" 
 
 " He was about as tall as the drover, sir, but not so 
 fleshy. When the drover had his back turned I almost 
 mistrusted it was Mr. Valtmeyer; but then the drover was 
 much younger and rounder-faced, and, in spite of the black 
 patch over his eye, altogether more likely looking than 
 Mr. Valtmeyer, who looked mighty homely with his great 
 sprangly beard, he did ;" and the girl smoothed down her 
 apron, and cast a glance over her shoulder at a bit of
 
 368 GREYSLAER; 
 
 looking-glass stuck against a post of the bar, as if she 
 questioned the taste of the unshorn Wolfert in having by 
 his toilet shown such indifference to her charms. 
 
 " He was thinner, and wore a long beard, eh ? a razor 
 and good quarters would easily make all the difference," 
 soliloquized De Roos. "But the impudent scoundrel would 
 scarcely dare thus to put his head in the lion's mouth. 
 Yet I must have an eye to the puritanical curmudgeon 
 that this simple lass has the courtesy to call father." And 
 then resuming aloud, he added, "Did your father ever 
 know " 
 
 " Octavia Sarah Ann," interrupted the shrill voice 
 from the kitchen. 
 
 " Curse the beldam !" muttered De Roos, as the nuisance 
 was instantly repeated. 
 
 " Octavia Sarah Ann, come take this toasted cheese 
 to the cattle merchant." 
 
 " Yes, mother, yes, I'm coming ! Had you any more 
 questions to ask me, captain ?" 
 
 " Go, gal, go," growled old Wingear, in a low voice. 
 " You are too fond, young missus, of keeping here among 
 the sogers." 
 
 " Any more questions ? no stay one moment, sweet 
 Tavy, my blooming Tavy. Where got you those gay 
 ribands which lace that bodice so charmingly ?" 
 
 " Law, sir," replied the girl, bashfully retiring a step or 
 two as the gallant soldier stretched out his hand as if to 
 draw her near and examine the trim of her tasteful little 
 figure more curiously ; " law, sir, it's only the blue and; 
 buff, the Congress colors, you know, that old Bait brought 
 me, with other fixings, from Schenectady." 
 
 "Octavia Sarah Ann, if ye're not here in the peeling of
 
 A ROMANCE OF THE MOHAWK. 359 
 
 an inion, 'twill be the worse for you," screamed the virago 
 mother. 
 
 " You see, captain, I must go." 
 
 " Zounds ! what a tight ankle the girl has too," quoth 
 the captain, as she tripped out of the apartment. " And 
 so that queer quiz, old Bait, has induced her to mount the 
 patriot colors ! Well, I hope a finer riband will not in 
 duce her to change them for the blue and silver of ' The 
 Royal New Yorkers/ as Johnson's motley gang call them 
 selves. For ' Bold and true, in buff and blue, &c. ;' " and 
 the mercurial ranger strolled off to the stables, humming 
 some verses of an old song, which was quickly taken up 
 and echoed by his comrades. 
 
 Oh bold and true, 
 
 In buff and blue, 
 Is the soldier-lad that will fight for you, 
 
 In fort or field, 
 
 Untaught to yield 
 Though Death may close his story 
 
 In charge or storm, 
 
 'Tis woman's form 
 That marshals him to glory ; 
 
 For bold and true, 
 
 In buff and blue, 
 Is the soldier-lad that will fight for you. 
 
 In each fair fold 
 
 His eyes behold 
 When his country's flag waves o'er him 
 
 In each rosy stripe, 
 
 Like her lip so ripe, 
 His girl is still before him. 
 
 For bold and true, 
 
 In buff and blue, 
 
 Is the soldier -lad that will fight for you. 
 17
 
 370 OBEYSLAEE; 
 
 " There he goes God bless him singing for all the 
 world like a Bob-a-linkum on the wing a crittur whose 
 very natur it is not to keep still for a moment, and to make 
 music wherever he moves." 
 
 " And what mare's nest has our singing bird found now, 
 corporal ?" 
 
 " Well, I don't know, sargeant ; only, if the captain has 
 got upon the trail of Wild Wolfert, as his words belikened, 
 it would be a tall thing for us boys to seize that limb o' 
 Satan, and carry him along with us to the German Flats." 
 
 " Ay, ay, it would indeed ; but though our scouts would 
 make us believe that both he and Bradshawe are snooping 
 about the country among the Tories, 1 rather guess that 
 they are both snug in St. Leger's lines before Fort Stan- 
 wix." 
 
 "No doubt, no doubt," said a trooper, rapping an empty 
 flagon with the hilt of his sabre, as if tired of the discus 
 sion of so dry a subject. " Butler could never spare such 
 an officer as Bradshawe at such a time as this." 
 
 " Yes," rejoined another, " and if he were really skulk 
 ing about among the Tories, the hawk-eyed Willet must 
 have lighted upon him while screwing his way through 
 such a ticklish region to come down and alarm the lower 
 country as he did." 
 
 " Come, lieutenant," cried one who had not yet spoken, 
 "give us another song ; and be it a merry or droll one, if 
 it suits you ; this is the last night we are to mess together 
 like gentlemen volunteers. To-morrow we shall be mus 
 tered with the old Continentals, and then the cursed 
 etiquette of army discipline puts an end to all fun among 
 us. It takes Captain Dirk a whole campaign to thaw 
 out into a clever fellow after passing a week with his com-
 
 A ROMANCE OF THE MOHAWK. 371 
 
 pany in the regular lines ; and as for you, Tom Wiley, 
 who've sat the whole evening " 
 
 "Spare me, worthy Hans ; I hate to find myself under 
 the command of a Congress officer as much as you do, 
 only you know that, for the honor of the corps, we Yaegers 
 should keep up the observances of military rank when act 
 ing with the government forces." 
 
 " That's a fact, boys," said the corporal. " What ! would 
 you have your free companies confounded with the com 
 mon-draughted milishy, and laughed at by all the Con 
 tinentals as they be ? No, no ; I may wince as much as 
 any on ye when I feel the screws o' discipline first begin 
 ning to set tight, but I like to see our captain take airs 
 upon himself with the best on 'em when it's for the honor 
 of the corps. There now's the Refugee partisans that 
 fight on their own hook just like ourselves Johnson's 
 Greens and Butler's Rangers, Tories though they be toe 
 the mark like raal sodgers upon a call of duty. Oh, you 
 should have beeninGreyslaer's company to see discipline, 
 and that, too, jist when the war was breaking out; only 
 ask Cornet Kit Lansingh, when the poor boy comes safe 
 to hand again from that wild tramp of hisn ! As sure as 
 my name's Adam Miller, if Major Max ever comes back 
 from the South 
 
 " It will be to haunt you, Adam, for prosing about these 
 gloomy byegones instead of drinking your liquor. Major 
 Greyslaer has been dead these six months, and his ghost 
 ought to be laid by this time. As for poor Cornet Kit,~the 
 only service we can render him is to drink his memory all 
 standing." 
 
 "Don't tell me that," said the corporal, his face reddening 
 with indignation. " You cnn't riley me about the major.
 
 372 GREYSLAER; 
 
 Tom Wiley ; for, though folks would make out that he fell 
 at Fort Moultrie, I knows what I knows about him ! As 
 for Kit Lansingh, you needn't waste liquor by drinking to 
 his memory yet a while ; for hasn't old Bait got scent of 
 him clean off in the Genesee country? and aint he upon his 
 living trail by this time with the friendly Mohegan that I 
 myself heerd tell about having seen Kit with his own eyes 
 among the Oneidas last winter ?" 
 
 "What, Bait try to carry his scalp safely through the 
 Seneca nation, not to mention the Onondagoes and Cayu- 
 gas, through all of which he'll have to run the gauntlet 
 before reaching the Genesee ? Pshaw, man, the old hunter 
 is as cold as my spurs long before this." 
 
 Though the reckless trooper spoke thus only for the 
 sake of teasing his comrade, yet the partisan corporal was 
 familiar enough with the dangers of the wilderness not to 
 fear that what Wiley said was true. But, as if to shake 
 off the ungrateful conviction, he emptied his beaker at a 
 draught, shook his "head, and was silent, while another of 
 the Yoegers changed the subject by saying : 
 
 " Well, well, let's have Wiley's song. Come, Wiley, if 
 it must be the last time we have a bout of free and equal 
 fellowship like this together, just tune up something we 
 can all join in." 
 
 The vocalist began to clear his throat, filled a bumper, 
 threw himself back in his chair, and had got more than 
 half through the usual preliminaries with which most pre 
 tenders to connoisseurship chill and deaden the impulsive 
 flow of festive feeling, (in instantaneous sympathy with 
 which their song should burst forth if they mean to sing 
 at all,) when he was suddenly superseded in his vocation. 
 
 " Tavy, my light lass ! Tavy, my border blossom !"
 
 A ROMANCE OF THE MOHAWK. 373 
 
 cried the gay voice of De Roos without ; and then, as 
 entering the room from one door, while the girl peeped 
 shyly in from the other : " Come hither hither, my flow 
 ering graft of a thorny crab ; come hither, my peeping 
 fawn, and learn news of the kind old forester who 
 has always played the godfather to you. They have suc 
 ceeded, boys. Kit Lansingh lives and thrives. Here's a 
 messenger from Fort Dayton, bringing the news from 
 Bait himself, now at that post. Carry on, carry on, and 
 tell us your tidings ; but hold, the poor fellow's athirst, 
 perhaps. Wash the dust from his mouth with a cup of 
 apple-jack, Adam, and then he'll speak." 
 
 The countryman, who, entering the room at the heels 
 of De Roos, had cast a wistful eye upon the table from 
 the first, advanced without saying a word, and tossed off 
 the liquor which the corporal filled out for him, smacked 
 his lips, wiped his mouth with his coat-sleeve, and thus 
 delivered himself: 
 
 " All I have to say, gentlemen, is nothing more or less 
 than what I was telling the capting here when he broke 
 away from me like mad at the stable door ; where, who 
 should I first happen upon but the capting when I went to 
 put up my pony, before looking round for him here. * Is 
 there anything astir among the people ?' says the capting, 
 says he, when I delivered him that note from Colonel 
 Weston, which he holds in his hand, and which, if I don't 
 make too bold, is an order " 
 
 " Yes, yes, an order for me to move forward to-night. 
 Carry on, man, carry on with your story," cried the im 
 patient De Roos. 
 
 " Well, as I was saying, ' Is there anything astir?" says 
 the capting, says he. 'Why, to be sure there is,' says I;
 
 374 GREYSLAER; 
 
 * and a mighty pretty stir it is, too,' says I. ' Hasn't old 
 Bait got back from his wild tramp, and doesn't he bring 
 the best of news for us in times as ticklish as these? I 
 guess he does, though,' says I. ' There's the young chief 
 Teondetha and a white man he rescued from the Cayugas, 
 and took home among his people for safety, are coming 
 down to help the country, with three hundred Oneida ri 
 fles at their backs,' says I ; ' and didn't they send Bait a 
 short cut ahead to warn our people not to move upon 
 Fort Stanwix until they could have time to crawl safely 
 round the enemy and join old Herkimer at the German 
 Flats ? To be sure they did,' says I ; and then the cap- 
 ting, what does he do but, instead of hearing me out, he 
 ups at once and asks me the name of the white man as 
 furiously as if it was for dear life he spoke ; and when I 
 told him it was Mr. Christian Lansingh, the likely young 
 nephew of old Bait, he tore away from me as if I had the 
 plague ; and I I ups and follows at once to see the end 
 of his doings ; and there, now, gentlemen, you have the 
 hull history o' the matter, so I'll jlst put another drop o' 
 liquor in this glass and drink sarvice to all on ye, not for 
 getting that right snug young woman, whose color has 
 been coming and going like all natur while I told my 
 story meaning no offence whatever, miss." 
 
 " Offence to Tavy, my lad ! no one suspects you of that. 
 There are mettlesome chaps enough here to take care of 
 her," said a soldier. 
 
 " Ay," echoed another, " she has a brother in every 
 man in the troop." 
 
 " And she shall choose a husband among the best of ye, 
 when the wars are over," cried De Roos. " But carry on, 
 men, carry on ; we must sound for the saddle in twenty
 
 A ROMANCE OF THE MOHAWK. 375 
 
 minutes; and, unless you would leave your liquor un- 
 drunk, carry on, carry on." 
 
 "Ay, ay, fill round for our lust toast," said the serjeant, 
 rising: " War and woman wassail we've had enough of 
 to-night war and woman the myrtle and steel/' 
 
 " The myrtle and steel," echoed a dozen voices. " Your 
 song, your song now, Wiley." 
 
 *' War and woman the myrtle and steel," shouted De 
 Roos ; and then, before the twice-foiled lieutenant could 
 collect his wits for the occasion, the spirit of the wild par 
 tisan broke forth in the song with which we close this 
 record of the rangers' revels. 
 
 1. 
 
 One bumper yet, gallants, at parting, 
 
 One toast ere we arm for the fight ; 
 Fill around, each to her he loves dearest 
 
 Tis the last he may pledge her ! to-night. 
 Think of those who of old at the banquet 
 
 Did their weapons in garlands conceal, 
 The patriot heroes who hallowed 
 
 The entwining of Myrtle and Steel ! 
 
 Then hey for the Myrtle and Steel, 
 
 Then ho for the Myrtle and Steel, 
 Let every true blade that e'er loved a fair maid, 
 
 Fill around to the Myrtle arid Steel. 
 
 2. 
 'Tis in moments like this, when each bosom 
 
 With its highest-toned feeling is warm, 
 Like the music that 's said from the ocean 
 
 To rise in the gathering storm, 
 That her image around us should hover, 
 
 Wlio.se name, though our lips ne'er reveal, 
 We may breathe through the foam of a bumper, 
 
 As we drink to the Myrtle and Steel.
 
 376 GREYSLAEK; 
 
 Then hey for the Myrtle and Steel, 
 Then ho for the Myrtle and Steel, 
 Let every true blade that e'er loved a fair maid, 
 Fill around to the Myrtle and- Steel. 
 
 3. 
 Now mount, for our bugle is ringing 
 
 To marshal the host for the fray, 
 "Where our flag to the firmament springing 
 
 Flames over the battle array : 
 Yet gallants one moment remember, 
 
 When your sabres the death-blow would deal, 
 That MERCY wears her shape who 's cherished 
 
 By lads of the Myrtle and Steel. 
 
 Then hey for the Myrtle and Steel, 
 
 Then ho for the Myrtle and Steel, 
 Let every true blade that e'er loved a fair maid, 
 
 Fill around to the Myrtle and Steel.
 
 A ROMANCE OF THE MOHAWK. 377 
 
 CHAPTER II. 
 
 THE SOLDIER'S RETURN. 
 
 ; ' Home of our childhood ! how affection clings 
 And hovers round thee with her seraph wings ! 
 Dearer thy hills, though clad in autumn brown, 
 Than fairest summits which the cedars crown ; 
 Oh happy he, whose early love unchanged, 
 Hopes undissolved, and friendship unestranged, 
 Tired of his wanderings, still can deign to see 
 Love, hopes, and friendship centering all in thee." 
 
 HOLMES. 
 
 IT was a summer's evening, when Max Greyslaer, re 
 turning, after a long absence, to his native valley, left his 
 tired horse at the adjacent hamlet, and hurried off on foot 
 to present himself at the Hawksnest. The sun of a fiercer 
 climate, not less than the unhealthy swamps of the South, 
 had stolen the freshness from his cheek ; and the arduous 
 campaign in which he had lately signalized himself, had 
 left more than one impress of its peril upon his manly 
 front. But the heart of the young soldier was not less 
 buoyant within him because conscious that the comeliness 
 of youth had passed away from his scarred and sallow 
 features. He had learned, before reaching its neighbor 
 hood, that the beloved inmate of the homestead was well ; 
 and, breathing again the health-laden airs of his native 
 17*
 
 378 GREYSLAER; 
 
 north, he felt an elasticity of feeling and motion such as 
 he had not known in many a long month before. The 
 stern realities of life which he had beheld, not less than 
 the active duties in which he had shared, had long since 
 changed Max Greyslaer from a dreaming student into a 
 practical-minded, energetic man ; but his whole moral 
 temperament must have been altered completely, if the 
 scene which now lay around, and the- circumstances 
 under which he beheld it, had not called back some of the 
 thoughtful musings of earlier days. 
 
 The atmosphere, while slowly fading into the gray of 
 evening, was still rich in that golden hue which dyes our 
 harvest landscape. The twilight shadows lay broad and 
 still upon the river which glided tranquilly between its 
 overhanging thickets ; but, while those on the further side 
 were purpled with the light of evening, the warm hues of 
 lingering sunset still played upon the canopy of wild vines 
 which imbowered those that were nearer, touching here 
 and there the top of a tall elm with a still ruddier glow, 
 and bathing the stubble field on some distant hill in a flood 
 of yellow light. But, lovely and peaceful as seemed the 
 scene, there was something of sadness in the deep silence 
 which hung over it. The whistle of the ploughboy, the 
 shout of the herdsman, the voices of home-returning boors 
 loitering by the roadside to chat for a moment together 
 when their harvest-day's work was over none of these 
 rustic sounds were there. The near approach of invasion 
 had summoned the defenders of the soil away from their 
 native fields, and the region around was almost denuded 
 of its male inhabitants ; infirm age or tender youth alone 
 remaining around the hearths they were too feeble to 
 protect. The deep bay of a house-dog was the first thing
 
 A ROMANCE OF THE MOHAWK. 379 
 
 that reminded Greyslaer that some sentinels at least were 
 not wanting to watch over their masterless homesteads. 
 
 The young officer, fresh from the animated turmoil of a 
 camp-life, had ridden all day along highways bustling with 
 the march of yeomanry corps, crowding into the main 
 route from a hundred farm-roads and by-paths, all hasten 
 ing toward the border, and the air of desertion in the 
 present scene could not but strike him by the contrast. 
 It was with a heart less light and a step less free than they 
 were an hour before that he now wended his way among 
 the shrubbery in approaching the door of the Hawksnest. 
 The sound of music came from an open window in the 
 wing which was nearest to him, and his heart thrilled in 
 recognition of the voice of the singer as he paused to listen 
 to a mournful air which was singularly in unison with his 
 feelings at the moment. The words, which were Grey- 
 slaer's own, had, indeed, no allusion to his own story, but 
 they had been thrown off in one of those melancholy 
 moods when the imprisoned spirit of sadness will borrow 
 any guise from fancy to steal out from the heart ; and 
 coming from the lips they did, they were now not less 
 apposite to the passing tone of his mind than in the mo 
 ment they were written. 
 
 i. 
 
 We parted in sadness, but spoke not of parting ; 
 
 We talked not of hopes that we both must resign, 
 I saw not her eyes, and but one teardrop starting 
 
 Fell down on her hand as it trembled in mine : 
 Each felt that the past we could never recover, 
 
 Each felt that the future no hope could restore ; 
 She shuddered at wringing the heart of her lover, 
 
 / dared not to say I must meet her no more.
 
 380 GREYSLAER; 
 
 2. 
 
 Long years have gone by, and the springtime smiles ever, 
 
 As o'er our young loves it first smiled in their birth. 
 Long years have gone by, yet that parting, oh ! never 
 
 Can it be forgotten by either on earth. 
 The note of each wild-bird that carols toward heaven, 
 
 Must tell her of swift-winged hopes that were mine, 
 "While the dew that steals over each blossom at even, 
 
 Tells me of the tear-drop that wept their decline. 
 
 The song had ceased, but Greyslaer, before it was 
 finished, had approached near enough to hear the sigh 
 with which it ended ; for how much of the past did not 
 that single sigh repay him, even if his long account of 
 affection had not been already balanced by the true heart 
 that breathed it ! In another moment Alida was folded 
 
 to his bosom. 
 
 ft * * 4 * # 
 
 " My own Alida was hard to win, but most truly does 
 she wear. Do I not know who was in your thoughts, 
 beloved, in the moment that my rustling footsteps made 
 you rush to the verandah to greet me ?" 
 
 "I heard not your footsteps, I felt your presence, dear 
 est Max ; yet was I strangely sad in the instant before 
 you came." 
 
 " And I, too, Alida, was sad, I scarce know why, save 
 from that mysterious sympathy of soul with soul you 
 have almost taught me to believe in. But now " 
 
 " Now I know there should be no place for gloom, yet 
 why, Max, should melancholy thoughts in the heart of 
 either herald a moment of so much joy to both ?" 
 
 Max, who had often playfully philosophized with her 
 upon the tinge of superstition with which the highly ima 
 ginative mind of Alida was imbued, now attempted to
 
 A ROMANCE OF THE MOHAWK. 381 
 
 smile away her apprehensive forebodings. But as she 
 knew, in anticipation, that he was on his way to the seat 
 of war, and could only have snatched this brief interview 
 in passing to the post of peril, the task of cheering her 
 spirits was^a difficult one. 
 
 " Not," said she, rising and pacing the room, while her 
 tall figure and noble air seemed to gather a still more 
 queenly expression from the feelings which agitated her, 
 " not that I would have the idle fears of a weak woman 
 dwell one moment among your cares for your mind, 
 Max, must be free even of the thought of me when you 
 go where men are matched in war or counsel against 
 each other but something whispers that this meeting, 
 that this parting is is what your own words, which I 
 sung but now, may in spirit be prophetic of." 
 
 "Nay, nay, Alida," said Max, smiling, "that foolish song 
 has already more than answered its purpose in serving to 
 while away a lonely moment of yours, and I protest 
 against my rhymes being perverted to such dismal uses. 
 You may change your true knight into a faithful trouba 
 dour or humble minstrel of your household, if you will ; 
 but I protest against your making him play the musty part 
 of old 'Thomas the Rhymer,' merely because he has once 
 or twice offended by stringing verses together." 
 
 <ci Why will you always jest so when I feel gravest ?" 
 said Alida, half reproachfully, as she placed her hand in 
 that which gently drew her back to the seat which she had 
 left by Greyslaer's side. 
 
 " It is gravity of mood, and not of thought, dearest, that 
 I would fain banter away ; for surely my Alida would not 
 call these vain and idle fancies thoughts? Why should 1 
 deal daintily with things so troublous of her peace ? Out
 
 382 GREYSLAER; 
 
 upon them all, I say. The future has no cloud for us, save 
 that which will continue to hover over thousands till peace 
 return to the land ; why should we study to appropriate 
 more than our proper share of the general gloom ? As 
 for this Barry St. Leger," said Max, with increasing ani 
 mation, " St. Leger is a clever fellow to have pushed his 
 brigand crew thus far into the country; but gallant Gan- 
 sevoort still holds him stoutly at bay, and if Herkimer and 
 his militia fail to bring him to a successful account, we have 
 fiery Arnold and his Continentals already on the march 
 to beat up his quarters and drive the Tories back to 
 Canada." 
 
 As the young soldier spoke, Alida caught a momentary 
 confidence not less from the tone of his voice than from 
 the look of his eye. The proud affection with which she 
 now gazed upon the manly mien of her lover seemed more 
 akin to her natural character than did the anxiety of feel 
 ing which again resumed its influence in her bosom ; an 
 anxiety which continually, throughout the evening, lent a 
 shade of sadness to her features, and which Greyslaer, 
 remembering long months afterward, had but too much 
 reason to think proceeded from one of those unaccounta 
 ble presentiments of approaching evil which all have at 
 some time known. 
 
 Since the memorable night when Greyslaer's 'providen 
 tial discovery of the real position in which Alida stood 
 toward Bradshawe had won from her the first avowal of 
 her regard, this painful subject had been rarely alluded to 
 by either ; nor, closely as it mingled with the story of their 
 loves, will it seem strange that a matter so delicate should 
 be avoided by both in an interview like the present. 
 
 The joy of their first meeting had banished it alike from
 
 A ROMANCE OF THE MOHAWK. 383 
 
 the hearts of either ; and Alida, as the painful moment of 
 parting grew nigh, could not bring herself to add to her 
 present sorrows by recalling those which seemed all but 
 passed away entirely, though their memory still existed as 
 a latent cause of disquiet to herself. As for Max, his 
 spirits seemed to have imbibed so much vigor and elasticity 
 from the stirring life he had lately led, that it was almost 
 impossible for Alida not to catch a share of the confidence 
 which animated him. But though the state of the times 
 and the duties which called Greyslaer to the field, and 
 which might still for a longer period defer their union, 
 seemed, as they conversed together, the only difficulties 
 that obstructed their mutual path to happiness, there was 
 in the heart of Alida a vague apprehension of impediments 
 yet undreamed of and far less easy to be surmounted. 
 
 The moments of their brief converse were sweet, delic- 
 iously sweet to either ; but the banquet of feeling was to 
 Alida like the maiden's feast of the Iroquois legend. Her 
 bosom was the haunted lodge, where ever and anon a dim 
 phantom flitted around the board, and withered, with his 
 shadow, the fruits and flowers which graced it. 
 
 In the mean time there was one little circumstance, 
 which, calling up a degree of thoughtfulness, if not of pain 
 in the mincLof Greyslaer, would alone have impaired the 
 full luxury of the present hour. Some household concerns 
 had called Alida for a few minutes from the room in which 
 they were sitting, and Max, to amuse himself in her ab 
 sence, turned over a portfolio of her drawings which 
 chanced to be lying upon a table near. The sketches 
 were chiefly landscape views of the neighboring scenery 
 of the Mohawk, which is so rich in subjects for the pencil; 
 but there were several studies of the head of a child inter-
 
 384 GREYS LAER; 
 
 spersed among the rest, which, after the recurrence of the 
 same features sketched again and again with more or less 
 freedom and lightness, finally arrested the earnest gaze of 
 Max as he viewed them at last in a finished drawing, 
 which was evidently intended for a portrait. He felt cer 
 tain that he had seen the face of that young boy before, 
 yet when or where it was impossible for him to remember. 
 There was an Indian cast in the physiognomy, which for 
 a moment made him conceive that it must have been dur 
 ing his captivity among the Mohawks that he had seen 
 the child. Yet, though a close observer of faces, he could 
 recall no such head among the bright-eyed urchins he had 
 often seen at play around his wigwam. 
 
 " I am puzzling myself, Alida," said he, as Miss de 
 Roos returned to the room, " to remember where it is 
 that I have seen the original of this portrait ; for certain 
 it is, the style of the features, if not the whole head, is 
 perfectly familiar to me ;" and Max, shading the picture 
 partly with his hand, looked up for a moment as Alida ap 
 proached him while speaking. "Good heavens!" he added, 
 in a tone of surprise, " how much it resembles yourself as 
 the light now falls on your countenance." 
 
 "Do you think so?" cried Alida; "that is certainly very 
 odd. for I have always thought that poor little Guise bore 
 a wonderful resemblance to my brother Derrick, notwith 
 standing his straight black Indian locks are so different from 
 Dirk's bright curls. Your remark confirms the truth of 
 the likeness I discovered between them ; for Derrick and 
 I, you know, were always thought to resemble each 
 other." 
 
 " And who, if I may ask," rejoined Greyslaer, gravely,
 
 A ROMANCE OF THE MOHAWK. 335 
 
 "is this ' poor little Guise,' who is so familiar a subject of 
 interest to you ?" 
 
 '' Oh ! I should have told you before of our little pro 
 tege, but my thoughts have been so hurried to-night," re 
 plied Alida, blushing. " You must know, then, that Der 
 rick takes a vast interest in this forlorn little captive, who 
 is neither more nor less than a grandson of Joseph Brant, 
 that was left behind in an Indian foray when Derrick's 
 band had driven back or dispersed his natural protect 
 ors." 
 
 "What, a childlike that accompany an expedition of 
 warriors across the border ! a child of Isaac Brant, too ; 
 for he, I believe, is the only married son of the chief! 
 Who gave you this account, Alida ?" 
 
 " Dear Max, you look grave as well as incredulous. I 
 tell only what Derrick imparted to me when he brought 
 that friendless boy hither, and begged me to assume the 
 charge of him for a short season. I conjured my brother 
 to return him to his people, but he would not hear of it. 
 He only answered that, as the boy was an orphan whose 
 mother had perished in the fray in which her child was 
 taken, and whose father was off fighting on another part 
 of the frontier, it was a mercy to keep him here. I saw 
 Derrick for scarcely an hour at the time he made the re 
 quest. He came galloping across the lawn with the child 
 on the pommel of his saddle Before him ; scarcely entered 
 the house, except to exchange a joke or two with the old 
 servants who crowded around him ; took Guise with him 
 to the stable to look at the horses, and then hurried off to 
 join his troop, which, he said, had made a brief halt while 
 passing through the country toward Lake George." 
 
 " And has he given you no further particulars since ?"
 
 386 G-REYSLAER; 
 
 " Not a word. He has written once or twice, inquir 
 ing how I liked his dusky pet, as he calls him ; but he 
 says not a word of his ultimate intentions in regard to 
 him. It was only the other day that, in marching through 
 from the Upper Hudson toward Fort Stanwix, he paid 
 me a visit ; but he stopped only to breakfast, and came 
 as suddenly and disappeared almost as quickly as before ; 
 and though he caressed and fondled the child while here, 
 yet, when I attempted to hold some sober talk with him 
 about his charge, he only ran on in his old rattling man 
 ner, and said there was time enough to think of this when 
 the St. Leger business was over." 
 
 " Can I see the child ?" said Greyslaer, with difficulty 
 suppressing an exclamation of impatience at the levity of 
 his friend. 
 
 "He sleeps now, dear Max. He has been ill to-day, 
 and when I left the room it was only to see whether or 
 not the restlessness of my little patient had subsided into 
 slumber." 
 
 " Does this picture bear a close resemblance to his fea 
 tures ?" rejoined Max, taking up the drawing once more 
 from the table. 
 
 " I cannot say that ; yet I have tried so often, for my 
 amusement, to take them, thut I ought at least to have 
 partially succeeded in my last effort. The wild, winning 
 little creature is so incessantly in motion, though, that a 
 far more skilful hand than mine might be foiled in the 
 undertaking. But, Max, if you really feel such a curiosity 
 about my charge, I must show him to you ; wait but an 
 instant till I return." 
 
 Alida, taking one of the lights from the table as she 
 glided out of the room, reappeared with it, a moment
 
 A ROMANCE OF THE MOHAWK. 387 
 
 afterward, in her hand. " Tread lightly, now," she said, 
 " while following me, for he still sleeps most sweetly, and 
 I would not have him disturbed for the world." 
 
 Greyslaer, who seemed to be actuated by some more 
 serious motive than mere curiosity for holding this in 
 quisition over the sleeping urchin, followed her steps 
 without speaking. Alida, entering the dressing-room 
 into which, as the reader nmy remember, the eyes of her 
 lover had once before penetrated made a quick step or 
 two in advance, and closed the door leading into the 
 chamber beyond ; then turning round, she pointed to a 
 little cot-bedstead which seemed to have been tempora 
 rily placed there for greater convenience in attending 
 upon her patient. 
 
 Max took the candle from her hand, and, shading the 
 eyes of the infant sleeper with his broad-leaved beaver, 
 bent over, as if in close scrutiny of its placid features ; 
 while Alida, touched by the sympathizing interest which 
 her lover displayed in her charge, and dreaming not of 
 the cause which prompted that interest, gazed on with a 
 countenance beaming with sensibility. At first the deep 
 sleep in which the child was plunged left nothing but the 
 lovely air of infantile repose in its expression ; but 
 whether from being stirred inwardly by dreams, or dis 
 turbed by the light which penetrated its fringed lids from 
 without, or touched, perhaps, by the drooping plume with 
 which the soldier shaded its brow it soon began to 
 move, to grasp the coverlet in its tiny lingers, and, 
 turning over petulantly even in its slumbers, to work its 
 features into something more of meaning. 
 
 It was a child of the most tender years ; but, though 
 scarcely four summers could have passed over its inno-
 
 388 GREYSLAER; 
 
 cent head, the lineaments of another, less pure than it, 
 were strongly charactered in its face. Something there 
 was of Alida there, but far more of her wild and almost 
 lawless brother. There seemed, indeed, what might be 
 called a strong family resemblance to them both ; but 
 while the darker hue of Alida's hair might have aided in 
 first recalling her image to him who gazed upon the sable 
 locks of the Indian child, yet her noble brow was wanting 
 beneath them ; and the mouth, which earliest shows the 
 natural temper, and which most nearly expresses the 
 habitual passions at maturity the mouth was wholly 
 that of her wayward and reckless brother. The fea 
 tures were so decidedly European, that the tawny skin 
 and the eyes, which were closed from Greyslaer's view, 
 were all, he thought, that could proclaim an Indian origin 
 for this true scion of the Mohawk chieftain's line, as Der 
 rick had represented him to his sister. 
 
 " It is the mysterious instinct of blood, then, as well as 
 the natural promptings of her sex's kindness, which has 
 elicited Alida's sympathy for this wild offshoot of her 
 house. But she should have a more considerate pro 
 tector than this giddy brother, who, even in assuming the 
 most sacred responsibility, must needs risk mixing up a 
 sister's name with his own wild doings." 
 
 " You do not tell me what you think of my protege," 
 said Alida, as Greyslaer, musing thus, was silent for a 
 moment or two after they returned to the sitting-room. 
 " I declare your indifference quite piques me. You have 
 no idea of the interest poor forlorn little Guise excited 
 when I took him with me to Albany on my last visit to 
 our family friends there." 
 
 Max had it upon his tongue to ask her in reply if she
 
 A ROMANCE OF THE MOHAWK. 339 
 
 thought that the child bore any resemblance to Isaac 
 Brant, its reputed father, whom Alida must have seen in 
 former years ; but, at once remembering how closely that 
 individual was connected with Bradshaw r e's misdeeds, he 
 stifled the question, and, passing by her last observation 
 as lightly as possible, changed the subject altogether. 
 The whole matter, however, left a disagreeable impres 
 sion upon him, and he was provoked at the importance it 
 assumed in his thoughts, when, after the thrilling emotions 
 of a lover's parting had passed away, it recurred again 
 and again to his mind during his long walk back to the 
 inn where he was to pass the night. 
 
 The dawn of the next morning found Greyslaer again 
 upon the road toward Fort Dayton, where a pleasurable 
 meeting w r ith more than one old comrade awaited him, 
 and where a military duty devolved upon him which, 
 slight in its character as it first appeared, was destined, 
 in its fulfilment, to have a most serious bearing upon his 
 own happiness and that of Alida.
 
 390 GREYSLAER; 
 
 CHAPTER III. 
 
 THE CONSPIRATORS. 
 
 " Euphion. It now remains 
 
 To scan our desperate purpose. Senators, 
 Let us receive your views in this emergence ; 
 Only remember, moments now are hours. 
 
 Colons. For me, I hold no commerce with despair. 
 Your chances of success are multiplied ; 
 Even now, while they expect your suppliant suit, 
 Pour out a flood of war upon their camp, 
 And crush them with its weight. Meanwhile, perhaps, 
 The imperial forces may fresh succor bring." 
 
 THE reader has perhaps gathered from the interview 
 between Greyslaer and Alida last described, that the 
 characters of both had undergone no slight change since 
 the period when they were first introduced into our story: 
 that Max, as the successful wooer and the travelled sol 
 dier who had seen the world, was a somewhat different 
 being from the visionary student, the fond-drearning and 
 willow-wearing lover, whose romantic musings have 
 heretofore, perhaps, called out, at times, a pitying smile 
 from the reader: that Alida, the once haughty empress 
 of his heart, whose pride, though utterly removed from 
 ordinary selfishness, had still a species of self-idolatry as 
 its basis, had been not less affected in her disposition by 
 the softening influences of love and sorrow, and that pa-
 
 A ROMANCE OF THE MOHAWK. 391 
 
 tient realization of hope deferred which tameth alike the 
 heart of man or woman. Yet these changes were merely 
 those which time and circumstance will work in all of 
 us, and Max and Alida were still the same in every essen 
 tial of character. 
 
 The change in Greyslaer was one that all men more 
 or less undergo as the sobering influence of riper years 
 steals over them, and their minds are brought more in 
 contact with the practical things of life ; when, having 
 tested their powers in the world of action, the frame of 
 the mind becomes, as it were, more closely knit and sin 
 ewy, and seeks objects to grapple with more substantial 
 than the shadowy creations of the ideal world in which 
 erst they dwelt. Now, while the success which had 
 hitherto crowned the early career of Max Greyslaer alike 
 in love and arms, was one of the most active elements in 
 rapidly effecting this change from wild, visionary youth, 
 to dignified, consummate manhood, the emotions and cares 
 of Alida were precisely those which would dash the Ama 
 zonian spirit and humble the arrogance of self-sustainment 
 in a proud and beautiful woman, once the petted inmate 
 of a bright and happy home, and intrenched in all the 
 advantages that family and station could confer. 
 
 The half-insane idea of righting in person the wrongs 
 which she had received at the hands of Bradshawe, had 
 been long since dispelled by the realization of more irre 
 mediable sorrows in the death of her nearest relations ; 
 and as her woman's heart awoke for the first time to the 
 graces of woman's tenderness, and her spirit grew more 
 and more feminine as it learned to lean upon another, she 
 even shuddered at remembering the strange fantasy of 
 revenge that was the darling dream of her girlhood. It
 
 392 GREYSLAER; 
 
 is true, that in the hour of her betrothal to Greyslaer she 
 had listened with the kindling delight of some stern hero 
 ine of romantic story to the deep-breathed vengeance of 
 her lover against the man who had plotted her ruin. But 
 as time wore on, and the fulfilment of the vow grew less 
 probable from the prolonged exile of Bradshawe, which 
 might ultimately result in total banishment from his na 
 tive land ; and as Max, who was soon afterward called 
 away by his military duties to a distant region, grew 
 more and more dear to her in absence, she gradually 
 learned to shrink as painfully from the idea of a deadly 
 personal encounter between him and Bradshawe, as she 
 lately had from her own unfeminine dream of vengeance. 
 Nor had the views of Greyslaer, though affected by 
 different causes from those which swayed Alida, altered 
 less in this respect. Max, though his well-ordered mind 
 was in the main governed by high religious principle, 
 was certainly not in advance of those opinions of his day 
 which held a fairly-fought duel as no very serious offence 
 against Heaven; and indeed he had betrayed, upon more 
 than one occasion, while serving with the hot-headed spir 
 its of the South, that no scruple of early education inter 
 fered to prevent him from calling an offender to account 
 after the most punctilious fashion of the times. But, since 
 he had mingled more among men of the world, he had 
 learned enough of its customs to know that Bradshawe 
 was rather a subject for the punishment of the criminal 
 laws than for the chastisement of a gentleman's sword ; 
 and that, while wiping away an insult with blood was a 
 venial offence according to the fantastic code to which, as 
 a military man, he was now subject, to spill the same 
 blood in cutting off a felon was unofficer-like in deed, as
 
 A ROMANCE OF THE MOHAWK. 393 
 
 it was unchristian-like in spirit to thirst after it. These 
 sentiments, which his camp associations had gradually, 
 and almost unknowingly to himself, infused into the young 
 soldier, were more than redeemed from trivial-minded- 
 ness by those more extended views of action which, grow 
 ing up at the same time with them, merged the recollec 
 tion of personal grievances in the public wrongs, to whose 
 redress his sword was already devoted. 
 
 The scenes he was now about revisiting served to re 
 call the distempered counsels of former times : when, 
 after his betrothal to Alida, he had meditated throwing 
 up his commission, and dogging Bradshawe with the foot 
 steps of an avenger until the death of one of them were 
 wrought; and when his being ordered unexpectedly upon 
 dangerous duty to a remote district happily interposed 
 the point of honor as a stay to such mad procedure. But 
 these scenes, with their attendant associations, revived no 
 feeling in Max's bosom nearer akin to personal hostility 
 toward Bradshawe than any earnest and honest mind 
 might entertain toward a low-lived and desperate adven 
 turer, whose mischievous career would be shortened with 
 benefit to the community. If, then, either the fortune of 
 war or a higher Providence should seem at any time to 
 single him out as the appointed instrument of Bradshawe's 
 punishment, let it bring no reproach to the chivalrous 
 nature of Greyslaer if he should fulfil his stern office with 
 the methodical coldness of the mere soldier. 
 
 The order which Captain de Roos had received to 
 hurry forward with his comrades was prompted by intel 
 ligence which had been received at Fort Dayton of a 
 secret movement among the disaffected in the neighbor 
 hood. The rapid advance of Barry St. Leger into the 
 18
 
 GBEYSLAER; 
 
 Valley of the Mohawk, together with his formidable in 
 vestiture of Fort Stanwix, while far and wide it called out 
 the valor and activity of the patriots to resist the invasion, 
 was viewed with very opposite feelings by the remains 
 of the royalist party which were still scattered here and 
 there throughout Tryon county. These disaffected fami 
 lies, taught, by the events which followed Schuyler's 
 march upon Johnstown in the earlier days of the war, 
 that their lives were held by rather a precarious tenure, 
 and that both their property and their personal safety de 
 pended upon their abstaining from all political agitation, 
 hesitated long to venture upon any new overt acts of 
 treason. 
 
 The Johnsons and their refugee adherents, however, 
 had not, in the mean time, been idle in scattering the 
 proclamations of the British ministry, and attempting, by 
 every means in their power, to keep up an intimate con 
 nection with their political friends who were within the 
 American lines. The provincial government was fully 
 aware of the existence of these intrigues, which were so 
 daringly set on foot and indefatigably followed up by the 
 Tories ; and a military force, consisting of the first New 
 York regiment and other troops, had at an early day been 
 posted at Fort Dayton on the Mohawk, in order to over 
 awe the loyalists, and prevent any sudden rising among 
 them. 
 
 So bold a Tory as Walter Bradshawe, however, was 
 not to be paralyzed in his plans by such impediments to 
 their success. His emissary, Valtmeyer, whom we have 
 Already recognized under his disguise at the roadside inn, 
 had appeared among his old haunts on the very day that 
 St. Leger sat down before Fort Stanwix ; and, bv the
 
 A ROMANCE OF THE MOHAWK. 395 
 
 aid of letters and vouchers both from Bradshawe and his 
 superiors, had successfully busied himself in leaguing the 
 Tories together for sudden and concerted action. But, 
 before openly committing themselves in arms, it was 
 deemed necessary that a meeting should be held at the 
 house of one of their number for the purposes of general 
 consultation. 
 
 Within a few miles of Fort Dayton resided a Mr. Schoon- 
 macker, a disaffected gentleman, who, previously to the 
 breaking out of the war, had been in his majesty's com 
 mission of the peace. This individual, a man of extensive 
 means and influential connections, had of late exerted 
 himself effectually in rekindling the spirits and hopes of 
 his party in the neighborhood. The address with which 
 he managed his intrigues for a long time preserved him 
 from all suspicion of taking an active part in the affairs of 
 the times, though his political tenets were well known in 
 the country round. Grown rash by long impunity, how 
 ever, or rather, perhaps, incited by the blustering procla 
 mations with which St. Leger flooded the country to give 
 confidence to the king's friends, Schoonmacker now ven 
 tured to commit himself completely by offering his house 
 for the accommodation of the clandestine meeting. His 
 generous zeal was warmly praised by the loyalists, al 
 ready in arms under St. Leger ; and their commander 
 promised that an officer of the crown should be present 
 at the assemblage to represent his own views, and aid 
 and encourage Schoonmacker's friends in their under 
 taking. Walter Bradshawe, who was now in command 
 of one of the companies of refugees enrolled with the 
 forces that beleaguered Fort Stanwix, eagerly volunteered 
 upon this perilous agency, stipulating only that, n small
 
 396 GREYSLAER; 
 
 detachment should accompany him to the place of ren 
 dezvous, in order to cut his way back to the besieging 
 army in case the projected rising should prove a failure. 
 
 Taking with him a dozen soldiers and the like number 
 of Indians, the Tory captain withdrew from the lines of 
 Fort Stanwix and approached the rendezvous of the con 
 spirators upon the appointed evening. His white follow 
 ers, though they had been mustered in St. Leger's army 
 as regular soldiers, consisted chiefly of those wild border 
 characters who, throughout the war, seem to have fought 
 indifferently upon either side, as the hope of booty or the 
 dictates of private vengeance prompted them to adopt a 
 part in the quarrel. One of these last, a man whose pow 
 erful frame seemed of yet more gigantic proportions, clad 
 as he was in the loose hunting-shirt of the border, arid 
 armed to the teeth with knife and tomahawk, two brace 
 of pistols, and a double-barrelled fusee, presented the ap 
 pearance of a walking armory as he strode along in ear 
 nest conversation with his leader. 
 
 " Well, Valtmeyer,"said Bradshawe,as they approached 
 their destination, "I do not order you upon this duty, 
 which I think one of my light-armed Indians could perform 
 better, perhaps, than yourself; but, if you choose to recon 
 noitre the fort while we are engaged in counsel, you have 
 full liberty to do so, only " 
 
 But, before he could add the precautions he was about 
 to utter, Valtmeyer, simply exclaiming " Enough !" turn 
 ed shortly into an adjacent thicket, where the sound of 
 his footsteps upon the rustling leaves was soon lost to the 
 ear of his officer. 
 
 Though the hour was late, yet the party collected at 
 Schoonmacker's were still seated at. table when Brad-
 
 A ROMANCE OF THE MOHAWK. 397 
 
 shawe, having stationed his sentries, prepared to join 
 them. The carousing royalists had evidently drunk deep 
 during the evening. The health of "The King" was 
 pledged again and again ; and their favorite toast of 
 "Confusion to the Rebels" was floating upon a bumper 
 near each one's lips when Bradshawe entered the apart 
 ment. 
 
 "You are loud in your mirth, gentlemen," cried the 
 Tory officer, returning their vociferous greeting with some 
 sternness, and impatiently waving from him the glass that 
 was eagerly proffered by more than one of the conspira 
 tors. "Do I see all of our friends, Mr. Schoonmacker, or 
 have these loyal gentlemen brought some retainers with 
 them ?" added Bradshawe, with more blandness, bowing 
 at the same time politely to three or four of the company, 
 as he recognized them individually either as influential 
 characters well known in the county, or as old personal 
 acquaintances of his own. "I was told, Major MacDon- 
 ald," continued he, turning to a noble-looking, gray-headed 
 man of fifty, " I was told that you, at least, could bring 
 some twenty-five or thirty of your friends and dependants 
 to strengthen our battalion of Royal Rangers." 
 
 "Twenty-six, sir, is the number of followers which I 
 have promised to add to the royal levies ; but, in lending 
 my poor means to aid the cause of the king, I was not 
 aware that my recruits were to be mustered under the 
 command of a stranger ; nor did I understand from Gene 
 ral St. Leger that we were to serve in the Rangers. 
 There are certain forms, young sir, to be observed in such 
 proceedings as those in which we are engaged ; and it 
 may be well for you to produce certain missives, with
 
 398 GREYSLAER; 
 
 which you are doubtless furnished, before we proceed 
 directly to business." 
 
 Bradshawe who, by the way, was hardly of an age to 
 be addressed as " young sir " without some offence to his 
 dignity bit his lip while observing the coolness with 
 which the worthy major knocked the ashes from his segar 
 while tranquilly thus delivering himself. He, however, 
 repressed the insolent language which rose to his lips in 
 reply, and, placing his hand in his bosom, contented him 
 self with flinging contemptuously upon the table a bundle 
 of papers which he drew forth, exclaiming, at the same 
 time, 
 
 " You will find there my warrant, gentlemen, for busy 
 ing myself in these matters." 
 
 As he spoke he threw himself into a chair and poured 
 out a glass of wine, with whose hue and flavor he tried 
 to occupy his attention for the moment ; but he could not 
 conceal that he was somewhat nettled by the coolness 
 with which the veteran turned over and examined the 
 documents one after another, passing the captain's com 
 mission of Bradshawe, with the other papers, successively 
 to those who sat near him. Bradshawe moved uneasily 
 in his chair as this examination, which seemed to be need 
 lessly minute and protracted, was going forward ; and it 
 is impossible to say what might have been the result of so 
 severely testing the patience of his restless and overbear 
 ing spirit, if the phlegmatic investigation of the worthy 
 major had not been interrupted by a noisy burst of merri 
 ment from another part of the house, which instantly 
 called the partisan captain to his feet. 
 
 " For God's sake, Mr. Schoonmacker, what means this 
 revelry ? Do those sounds come from the rebels, who lie
 
 A ROMANCE OF THPJ MOHAWK. 399 
 
 near enough and in sufficient force to crush us in a mo 
 ment, or is it our own friends who play the conspirator 
 after such a fashion ? Who the dev " 
 
 " Your zeal is too violent pardon me, my worthy 
 friend,'' interrupted the amiable host. " The revellers you 
 hear are only the good country people whom our friends 
 have brought with them to honor my poor house, and who 
 are making themselves a little merry over a barrel of ci 
 der in the kitchen. We could not, you know, Mr. Brad- 
 sliawe," he added, in an insinuating, deprecatory tone, as 
 the other raised his eyebrows with a look of utipleased 
 surprise, " we could not but give them the means of drink 
 ing the health of the king, and all are so well armed that 
 we dread no surprise from Colonel Weston." 
 
 A shade of chagrin and vexation passed over the 
 haughty features of Bradshawe as he compared in "his mind 
 more than one orderly and stern assemblage of the Whigs, 
 to which he had managed to gain access, with the carous- 1 
 ing crew with whom he had now to deal. " The fools, 
 too !" he muttered, " sending my countrymen to drink 
 with their servants ! Do they think that is the way to 
 confirm the loyalty of American yeomen?" Then ad-' 
 
 99 V 
 
 dressing himself to the company with that urbane and 
 candid air which he knew so well how to assume, and by 
 which he had often profited when before a jury in other 
 days, he said, " I was too hasty, gentlemen ; but I was 
 afraid, from the noise I heard, that a body of Indians that 
 I have brought with me had in some way got access to 
 liquor ; and, to prevent the possibility of so dangerous a 
 circumstance, I think we had better at once call our 
 friends together, and let the proclamation of General St. 
 Leger, with the accompanying letter from Sir John John-
 
 400 GEETSLAEB; 
 
 son, both of which lie before you, be read aloud for the 
 benefit of all." 
 
 The suggestion, which could not but have weight with 
 all parties, was instantly adopted. A meeting was soon 
 organized by calling Major MacDonald to the chair, and 
 appointing Mr. Schoonmacker secretary ; and the more 
 humble adherents of the royal cause being summoned 
 from the other parts of the house, the proclamation and 
 letter were duly read by the latter. 
 
 The appeal of Sir John to the timid and disaffected in 
 habitants of Tryon county to follow his example, and, 
 abandoning their present neutral position, take up arms 
 for their lawful sovereign, was received with warm ap 
 probation. Nor was there less enthusiasm upon hearing 
 the proclamation from St. Leger read, inviting all true 
 subjects of the king, and all violaters of the laws, who 
 hoped pardon for past offences from his majesty's good 
 ness, to come and enroll themselves with his army now 
 before Fort Stanwix. Bradshawe then moved a resolu 
 tion, beginning with the customary preamble : " At a 
 meeting of the loyal gentry and yeomanry of Tryon coun 
 ty, convened," &c., and by way of clinching matters while 
 they seemed in such capital train, he mounted a chair and 
 commenced haranguing the assemblage, urging the im 
 portance of immediate action in the cause to which every 
 man present had now fully committed himself. 
 
 His adroit, and withal, impassioned eloquence, was ad 
 dressed chiefly to the common people ; and the generous 
 boldness with which he committed his and their property 
 to the chances of a civil war, in which either had but lit 
 tle or nothing to lose, elicited their rapturous admiration ; 
 particularly when he set forth, in glowing terms, how
 
 A ROMANCE OF THE MOHAWK. 4Q1 
 
 much they were to expect from the exhaustless bounty of 
 their sovereign. In the midst of his harangue, however, 
 and while all parties were warmed up to the highest pitch 
 of loyal enthusiasm, he met with an interruption, the cause 
 of which may be best explained by looking back a few 
 pages in our narrative. 
 
 1ft*
 
 402 GREYSLAER; 
 
 CHAPTER IV. 
 
 THE SPY. 
 
 " On him did passion fasten, not to roam, 
 And love and hate alike might find a home ; 
 And burning, bounding, did their currents flow 
 From the deep fountain of the heart below. 
 Many a year had darkly flown 
 Since passion made this heart its own ; 
 Fit dwelling for the scorpion 
 Revenge, to breathe and riot on ; 
 Fit, while the deep and deadly sting 
 Of baffled love was festering." BROOKS. 
 
 THE outlaw Valtmeyer, after parting with his officer in 
 the manner already described, had proceeded at once, 
 agreeably to the permission he had obtained, toward Fort 
 Dayton, which had been for some time garrisoned by a 
 battalion of Continental troops under the command of 
 Colonel Weston, but where several detachments of other 
 corps had recently taken up their temporary quarters. 
 The object of Valtmeyer was partly to reconnoitre the 
 out- works of the fort for future attack, and partly to spy 
 out any movement upon the part of Weston and his peo 
 ple which might indicate that Bradshawe's mission in the 
 neighborhood was suspected, and give him and his friends 
 timely warning of the danger. 
 
 A well-trained Indian warrior would, as Bradshawe
 
 A ROMANCE OF THE MOHAWK. 403 
 
 had hinted, have better performed this duty than the wild 
 borderer to whom it was now intrusted ; for the charac 
 ter of Valtmeyer, whose vindictive daring and brutal 
 courage has made his name terrible in the tradition of this 
 region, was even less suited than that of a wild Indian to 
 the duties and responsibilities of a regular soldier. The 
 Indian warrior, though he insists upon encountering his 
 enemy wholly after his own fashion, is still amenable to 
 certain rude laws of discipline, for whose observance he 
 may be relied upon ; but the white frontiersman who has 
 led the life of a free hunter, perhaps of all other men 
 shrinks most from every form of military subordination. 
 And, indeed, Valtmeyer, though to answer his own selfish 
 purposes, he had so often been a mere tool in the hands of 
 Bradshawe, already regretted having taken service with 
 the Royal Rangers, and consenting to act under the com 
 mand of any person save that of Wolfert Valtmeyer. 
 
 Being now wholly withdrawn from the surveillance of 
 his officer, the worthy Wolfert, somewhat oblivious of his 
 military duties, bethought himself how he could turn the 
 occasion to the best account, by what a similar combatant 
 in the battle of Bennington afterward called making war 
 on his own hook. In other words, he determined to amuse 
 himself for an hour or so within the purlieus of Fort Day 
 ton, by carrying off or slaying some of the sentinels ; a 
 species of entertainment in which he thought there would 
 be no difficulty in indulging himself. This seizing of op 
 posite partisans, and holding them to ransom, was always 
 a favorite feat with Valtmeyer and his compeer Joe Bet 
 tys; and the annals of the period make it of so common 
 occurrence in the province of New York, that one would
 
 404 GREYSLAER; 
 
 almost think that man-stealing was the peculiar forte of its 
 inhabitants. 
 
 Had Wolfert, in approaching the fort, got his eye upon 
 any of the picket-guard, he might very possibly have suc 
 cessfully effected his purpose. But, ill-practised as he was 
 in the regulations of a well-ordered garrison, the adventur 
 ous hunter had not the least idea how far the line of out 
 posts extended ; and, like many a cunning person, he over 
 reached himself while trying to circumvent others. In a 
 word, he got completely within the line of defences, with 
 out being at all aware of their position. 
 
 With the stealthy art of a practised deer-stalker, he 
 managed to creep, alike unobserved by others and him 
 self unobserving, within the outer line of pickets, which 
 was posted in the deep shadow of a wood, to a thicket of 
 briers, where he paused. The gleam of a sentinel's 
 musket above the bushes had lured him thus far, and he 
 halted to see if the sentinel himself were now visible. It 
 seemed that he could make out nothing satisfactory as yet ; 
 for now, throwing himself upon his chest, he continued 
 lowly to advance, crawling through the long grass until 
 he gained a copse of dog- wood and sumach bushes within 
 half pistol-shot of his victim. The soldier was now fully 
 displayed to view ; Valtmeyer could see his very buttons 
 gleam in the light of the moon as the planet from time to 
 time shone through the clouds which traversed her face. 
 Another moment, and the seizure was fully accomplished. 
 The brigand, crumpling his worsted sash in his hands, 
 leaped upon the sentinel just as he was turning in his 
 monotonous walk, and bore him to the ground, while 
 adroitly gagging his mouth before he could utter a cry. 
 "Pshaw! what a cocksparrow !" muttered Wolfert,
 
 A ROMANCE OF THE MOHAWK. 405 
 
 when, having dragged his captive within the bushes, he 
 for the first time observed that it was but a stripling re 
 cruit of some sixteen or eighteen years. " I must carry 
 away with me something better than a boy." 
 
 With these words he hastily secured the lad to a sapling 
 by the aid of a thong which he cut from his leather hunt 
 ing-shirt, and then prepared to make a similar onset upon 
 the next sentinel in the same line. 
 
 This man had paused for a moment at the end of his 
 walk, waiting for a glimpse of moonlight to reveal his 
 comrade, whom he had missed in his last turn. A strag 
 gling beam fell at last upon the path before him, and the 
 soldier, resting on his musket, leaned forward, as if trying 
 to pierce the gloom. The side of his person was turned 
 toward Valtmeyer, and his head only partially averted ; 
 but Wolfert preferred seizing the present moment rather 
 than to wait for a more favorable one, which might not 
 come. Clasping his hands above his head, he leaped for 
 ward with a sudden bound, and threw them like a noose 
 over the neck of the other, slipping them down below the 
 elbows, which were thus pinioned to the side of his pris 
 oner, whose musket dropped from his hands. 
 
 " Wolfert Valtmeyer, by the Etarnal !" ejaculated the 
 man, instantly recognizing his assailant from the well- 
 known trick which they had often practised upon each 
 other in the mock-wrestling of former days. 
 
 " Exactly the man, Bait ; and you must go with him." 
 
 "Not onless he's a better man than ever I proved him," 
 said Bait, struggling in the brawny arms of his brother 
 borderer, who held him at such disadvantage. 
 
 " Donder und blixem, manny, you would not have me 
 kill a brother hunter, would ye ?" growled Valtmeyer*
 
 406 GREYSLAER; 
 
 whose voice thickened with anger as he felt himself com 
 pelled to use every effort to maintain his grip. 
 
 " There's no brother hood atween us in this 
 quar'l," panted forth the stout-hearted Bait, without an 
 instant relaxing his endeavor. 
 
 " Then die the death of a rebel fool," muttered the 
 other, hastily drawing his knife, and raising it to strike. 
 The blow, as driven from behind by so powerful a hand, 
 must have cut short the biography of the worthy Bait, had 
 it fairly descended into the neck at which it was aimed. 
 But the intent of the Tory desperado was foreseen in the 
 very instant that the former released his grip with one 
 hand in order to draw his knife with the other; and Bait, 
 dropping suddenly upon his knees as Valtmeyer, who was 
 full a head taller than his opponent, threw the whole 
 weight of his body into the blow, the gigantic borderer 
 was pitched completely over the head of his antagonist, 
 and measured his length upon the sod. The clanging of 
 his arms as he fell raised an instant alarm among those 
 whom the deep-breathed threatenings of these sturdy foes 
 had not before aroused. But Valtmeyer was upon his feet 
 before Bait or the other sentinel, who rushed to the spot, 
 could seize him. Indeed, he brought the former to the 
 ground with a pistol-shot, stunning, but happily not wound 
 ing him, as he himself was in the act of rising. The other 
 sentinel, who ought to have fired upon the first alarm, 
 made a motion to charge upon him, and then threw away 
 his shot by firing just at the instant when Valtmeyer par 
 ried the thrust of the bayonet with his knife, and, of 
 course, simultaneously averted the muzzle of the gun from 
 his body. 
 
 While this was passing, the guard turned out; but
 
 A ROMANCE OF THE MOHAWK. 407 
 
 though Valtmeyer received their fire unharmed as he rush 
 ed toward the wood, he escaped one danger only to fall 
 into another. Ignorant of the existence of the outer line of 
 sentinels, he was seized by the picket-guard in the moment 
 that, thinking he had escaped all dangers, he relaxed his 
 efforts to make good his advantage. 
 
 The prisoner being brought before Colonel Weston, that 
 sagacious officer lost no time in a fruitless examination of 
 so determined a fellow taken under such circumstances. 
 The redoubtable Valtmeyer was well known to him by 
 fame, and Bait fully established his identity. Weston 
 was before aware that the noted outlaw had taken ser 
 vice with one of the different corps of Butler's Rangers, 
 and he readily conceived that he had been but now acting 
 as the scout for some predatory band of Tories. Captain 
 de Roos, who, as an active and efficient partisan officer, 
 had been summoned to the fort for the very purpose of 
 scouring the country for such offenders, was sent off with 
 his command to make the circuit of the neighborhood, 
 and another detachment of troops was instantly despatch 
 ed to the suspected house of Mr. Schoonmacker. The 
 latter duty was one of some delicacy, and requiring a cool 
 er judgment than that of De Roos; and Weston selected 
 Major Greyslaer as the officer to whom it might best be 
 intrusted. 
 
 De Roos, rashly insisting that he could squeeze some 
 thing out of the sulky villain, was permitted to take Valt 
 meyer with him as a guide to the whereabout of his 
 friends ; and Valtmeyer, after fooling with him for a sea 
 son, and leading his party in every direction but the right 
 one, finally succeeded in saving his own neck from the
 
 408 GREYSLAER; 
 
 gallows by giving them the slip entirely. The expedition 
 of Greyslaer had a different issue. 
 
 Ever cool and steady in his purposes when duty called 
 upon him to collect his energies, this officer advanced with 
 speed and secrecy to the goal he had in view. The 
 grounds around Schoonmacker's house were crossed, and 
 every door beset by a party of armed men in perfect 
 quietness. Bait who had soon recovered from the stun 
 ning effects of the pistol-shot that grazed his temple 
 availed himself of the lesson in soldier-craft which he had 
 just received from his brother woodsman, and secured the 
 only sentinel that was upon his post. The temptation of 
 the cider-barrel in the kitchen proved too strong for the 
 Indians and their newly-levied white comrades to permit 
 of their keeping a better watch. The house was, in fact, 
 fairly surrounded by the Whig forces before a sound was 
 heard to interrupt the harangue which Bradshawe was 
 perorating within. MacDonald alone sprang from his 
 seat, and, darting into an adjacent closet, made his escape 
 through an open window in the moment that Greyslaer 
 entered the room with a file of bayonets. 
 
 " In the name of the Continental Congress, I claim you 
 all as my prisoners," cried Max, advancing to the table, 
 and with great presence of mind, seizing all the papers 
 upon it, including the commission of Bradshawe. 
 
 That officer, who had stood for the moment astonished 
 at the scene, now made a fiery movement to clutch the 
 papers from Greyslaer as the latter quietly ran his eye 
 over their superscription ; but he instantly found himself 
 pinioned by two sturdy fellows behind him. 
 
 " See that you secure that spy effectually, my men." 
 
 " Spy, sir !" cried Bradshawe, with a keen look of anx-
 
 A ROMANCE OF THE MOHAWK. 
 
 ious inquiry, while he vainly tried to give his voice the 
 tone of indignant disclaimer to the imputed character. 
 
 " Spy was the word, sir," answered Max, gravely ; 
 " nnd, unless these documents speak falsely, as such you 
 will probably suffer by dawn to-morrow. This paper 
 purports to be the commission of Walter Bradshawe as 
 criptain in Butler's regiment of Royal Rangers ; and the 
 promised promotion in this note, for certain service to 
 ho rendered this very night, leaves no doubt of the char 
 acter in which Cnptain Bradshawe has introduced himself 
 into an enemy's country. Lansingh, remove your pris 
 oner to the room on the other side of the hall, and see 
 that he be \ve!l guarded !" 
 
 It is astonishing how invariably the success of an indi 
 vidual, whether in good or evil undertakings, affects his 
 character with the vulgar ; a term which, both in its 
 conventional as well as its primitive sense, includes, 
 perhaps, the majority of mankind. Certain it is, that, 
 in this instance, the very associates and complotters of 
 the prisoner, who but an hour before had hailed his 
 appearance among them with such cordial greetings, 
 now slunk from his side as if he had been a convicted 
 felon. Indeed, some of the meaner minds present even 
 attempted to conciliate the successful party by exhibiting 
 the strongest, signs of personal aversion to Bradshawe, 
 and of coarse gratification at the mode in which his 
 career seemed suddenly about to be brought to a close. 
 
 These miscreants were scattered among others of both 
 parties who were collected in the hall and grouped 
 around the open door of the apartment in which Brad 
 shawe, guarded by a couple of sentinels, was pacing to 
 and fro. And while Mr. Schoonmacker and others of the
 
 410 GREYSLAER; 
 
 leading Tories in the opposite room were listening in 
 dignified dejection to the measures which Greyslaer 
 stated, in the most courteous terms, it was his painful 
 duty to adopt in regard to them, their followers were 
 exchanging tokens of recognition with old neighbors and 
 former comrades of the opposite party. 
 
 " Jim, you've done the darn thing agin us to-night, and 
 no mistake," said one. " But if the Injuns hadn't got as 
 drunk as fiddlers, you couldn't have popped in upon us as 
 you did." 
 
 The Congress soldier made no reply ; but the de- 
 mare gravity of him and his comrades did not prevent 
 others of the Tory militia from attempting a conversation 
 with them. 
 
 " Well, Mat," said a second, " if I'm to be taken by the 
 Whigs, I'm only glad that you happened to come up from 
 the fort along with them ; for you are just the man to say 
 a good word for an old friend. All this muss is of Wat 
 Bradshawe's cooking." 
 
 " Yes," cried a third, "the friends of the king only met 
 to drink his health and have a little social junketing 
 together ; and if bully Bradshawe had not come among 
 us, things would have gone off as quietly as possible. 
 All the harm I wish him is, that he may get paid off for 
 his old scrapes with a halter, and rid the country of such 
 a pest ; there's the affair, now, of old De Roos's daughter, 
 for which he ought to have swung ei^rht vears since." 
 
 o o / 
 
 " Eight years !" rejoined the other. " No, the scrape 
 you speak of is hardly a matter of six years by gone. 
 But give the devil his due. The few folks that knowed 
 of it talked hard about wild Wat for his share in that 
 business. But things could not have gone so far, after
 
 A ROMANCE OF THE MOHAWK. 4H 
 
 all, or the Rooses would never have refused to appear 
 against him, much less would the gal herself have reject 
 ed his offer when he wanted to make an honest woman 
 of her." 
 
 Bradshawe betrayed no agitation during this discus 
 sion, which took place so near to him that, though the 
 speakers lowered their voices somewhat, it must have 
 been at least partially overheard by himself as well as by 
 others. But when another of the rustic gossippers point 
 ed significantly toward the room in which Major Grey- 
 slaer was engaged, while whispering that Miss de Roos 
 had now " a real truelove of her own, and no mistake," 
 the features of the Tory captain writhed with an expres 
 sion almost fiendish. 
 
 " Yes ! I must live," he muttered internally. " I can 
 not, I will not die. I have too many stakes yet in the 
 game of life to have the cards dashed thus suddenly from 
 my hands. My scheme of existence is too intimately in 
 terwoven with that of others to stop here, and stop singly. 
 I know, I feel that Alida's fate and that of this moonstruck 
 boy is interwoven with mine. / only can redeem her 
 name, or blast it with utter infamy ; and their peace or 
 my revenge whichever is ultimately to triumph were 
 both a nullity if I perish now." Alas! Walter Brad 
 shawe, dost thou think that Providence hath but one 
 mode of accomplishing its ends, if innocence is to be vin 
 dicated, and that only through so foul an instrument as 
 thou ! 
 
 Thus thought, or " thought he thought," this iron-heart 
 ed desperado. But there were other distracting feelings 
 in his bosom which it was impossible for him to ano.lyze. 
 Though hatred had long since predominated over love
 
 412 GKEYSLAER, 
 
 in the warring passions of his stormy breast, yet that 
 hatred was born only of the indignation and horror with 
 which his attempts to control Alida's inclinations had 
 been received, and his admiration had increased from the 
 very circumstances which chilled his love ; but now the 
 subtle workings of jealousy infused a new element among 
 his conflicting passions, which quickened both love and 
 hatred into a more poignant existence. 
 
 Few, even of the most ignoble natures, are wholly base ; 
 and Bradshawe, though he could not imagine, much less 
 realize, one generous emotion that belongs to those dis 
 positions which the world terms chivalrous, still possessed 
 some of the qualities that keep a man from becoming 
 despicable either to himself or to others. He had both 
 bravery and ability, and he knew it. Incapable of one 
 magnanimous thought, in deed he might still be great ! 
 And determined in purpose as he was loose in principle, 
 he believed that he was a man born for the very time 
 and country in which his lot was cast ; for, regarding all 
 others as senseless zealots, he deemed that every man of 
 abilities engaged in the present political struggle was an 
 adventurer like himself, having his own selfish views as 
 the ultimate objects of his dangers and hia-toils. 
 
 If the aspiring aims, then, of a reckless ambition, backed 
 by no ordinary talent and courage the most unflinching, 
 can redeem from ignominy a mind otherwise contracted, 
 coarse, and selfish, Bradshawe may be enrolled upon the 
 same list with many a hero, not less mean of soul, whom 
 the world has consented to admire ; for the majority of 
 mankind always look to the deeds of those who distin 
 guish themselves beyond the herd, without much regard 
 to the feeling which actuated or the moral end which
 
 A ROMANCE OF THE MOHAWK. 413 
 
 those deeds were intended to promote ; and one brilliant 
 invading campaign of Napoleon is more dazzling to the 
 mind than the whole military career of HIM who fought 
 only to preserve his country ! whose Heaven-directed 
 arms triumphed ultimately over thousands as brave as 
 Walter Bradshawe in the field ; whose godlike counsels 
 discomfited thousands more gifted, if not more unprinci 
 pled, in the cabinet. 
 
 But, awarding whatever credit we may to Bradshawe 
 for his aspirations after fame, let us leave him now to 
 awaken from the vague dream which, almost unknown to 
 himself, had at times passed through his brain the dream 
 of sharing his future renown with Alida ; and, while wip 
 ing ofF, in honorable marriage, the reproach which he had 
 attached to her name, of gratifying, at last, the passion 
 which was rooted in his heart. Let us leave the search 
 ing pang of jealousy to reveal to him first the existence of 
 this lingering touch of tenderness amid feelings which he 
 himself thought had become only those of hatred. Let 
 us leave him with that utter desolation of the heart's best 
 earthly hope, which would prompt most men to welcome 
 the grave upon whose brink he stood, but from which he, 
 fired with a burning lust of vengeance, shrunk as from a 
 dungeon where the plotting brain and relentless hand of 
 malignity would lie helpless for ever. 
 
 How little they read the man who deemed that terror 
 of his fate had stupefied him, when, obedient to the order 
 of his captor, he moved off, with stolid and downcast look, 
 amid the guard which conducted him to durance at the 
 quarters of the patriots.
 
 414 GREYSLAER; 
 
 CHAPTER V. 
 
 THE FIELD OF ORISKANY. 
 
 . 
 
 " Strike till the last armed foe expires, 
 Strike for your altars and your fires, 
 Strike for the green graves of your sires, 
 
 God ! and your native land !" 
 
 HALLECK. 
 
 " It shouted to the mountain and the -wave, 
 That fetterless were left the wild old woods, 
 And the free dweller there to winds that go 
 And wist no bidding. 'Twas the uncurbed voice 
 Of Nature calling fiercely for her own. 
 It was the beating of the human mind 
 Against the battlements of power. 
 Then were ye marshalled forth !'' 
 
 MRS. E. OAKES SMITH. 
 
 THE doom which Greyslaer had, with military stern 
 ness, predicted, was formally, by a military court, pro 
 nounced upon Bradshawe that very night ; but \vhen the 
 hour of execution arrived on the morrow, events were at 
 hand which, postponing it for the present, gave him, in 
 fact, the advantages of an indefinite reprieval. 
 
 Some Continental officers, of a rank superior to tliat 
 of the commandant, who arrived at Fort Dayton during 
 the night, suggested doubts as to the policy of thus sum 
 marily executing martial law upon the prisoner. In the 
 morning a message arrived from the beleaguered garri-
 
 A ROMANCE OF THE MOHAWK. 415 
 
 son of Fort Stanwix, urging the Whig forces to press for 
 ward to the scene of action, and attempt raising the siege 
 at once, or their succor would come too late to save their 
 compatriots. All was then bustle and motion. The 
 greater part of the troops at once hurried forward to join 
 Herkimer's forces, which had already taken up their line 
 of march for Oriskany, while a detachment was sent down 
 the river to speed on those who still loitered on the road 
 to the border. When this last was about to depart, the 
 opportunity was deemed a good one of getting rid of 
 Bradshawe, by sending him to head-quarters at Albany, 
 where his sentence could either be enforced or remitted, 
 as a higher military authority should decide ; and he was 
 accordingly marched off, strictly guarded by the detach 
 ment. 
 
 Of the use that Walter Bradshawe made of this reprieve 
 to carry into effect his meditated vengeance against Alida 
 and her lover, we shall see hereafter. We must now re 
 turn to other personages of our story, who have been, per 
 haps, too long forgotten. 
 
 It has been already incidentally mentioned that Brant 
 and his followers were playing a conspicuous part in the 
 bold invasion which now threatened to give the royal 
 ists possession of at least two-thirds of the fair province 
 of New York, if, indeed, they should not succeed in over 
 running the whole. Brant, who had brought nearly a 
 thousand Iroquois warriors to the standard of St. Leger, 
 was indeed the very soul of the expedition ; for, if there 
 be a doubt of his devising the scheme itself, he certainly 
 planned some of its most important details ; and the zeal 
 with which he executed his share of the undertaking 
 proved how thoroughly hi* heart was engaged in it. The
 
 416 GREYSLAEB; 
 
 Johnsons, indeed, had come back to struggle once more 
 for a noble patrimony which had been wrested from them, 
 and many of their refugee friends were animated by the 
 hope of recovering the valuable estates they had forfeited ; 
 but Brant fought to recover the ancient seats of his peo 
 ple, whose name as a nation was in danger of being blot 
 ted out from the land. 
 
 When, therefore, he learned, through his scouts, that 
 Herkimer was approaching by forced marches to break 
 up the encampment of St. Leger, relieve Fort Stanwix, 
 and repel the advance of the invaders through the valley 
 of which it was the portal, he instantly suggested meas 
 ures for his discomfiture, and planned that masterly am 
 buscade which resulted in the bloody field of Oriskany. 
 
 There is, within a few miles of Fort Stanwix, a deep 
 hollow or ravine which intersects the forest road by which 
 Herkimer and his brave but undisciplined army of parti 
 san forces were approaching to St. Leger's lines. The 
 ravine sweeps toward the east in a semicircular form, 
 either horn of the crescent thus formed bearing a north 
 ern and southern direction, and inclosing a level and 
 elevated piece of ground upon the western side. The 
 bottom of the ravine was marshy, and the road crossed it 
 by means of a causeway. This was the spot selected by 
 Brant for attacking the column of Herkimer ; and hither 
 St. Leger had sent a large force of royalists to take post 
 with his Indians on the morning of the fatal sixth of Au 
 gust. 
 
 The white troops, consisting of detachments from 
 Claus's and Butler's Rangers and Johnson's Greens, with 
 a battalion of Major Watts's Royal New Yorkers, dis 
 posed themselves in the form of a semicircle, with a swarm
 
 A IIOMANCE OF THE MOHAWK. 417 
 
 of' red warriors clustering like bees upon either extremity ; 
 and it would seem as if nothing could save Herkimer's 
 column from annihilation, should it once push fairly within 
 the horns of the crescent thus formed. The fortunes of 
 war, however, turn upon strange incidents ; and in the 
 present instance, the very circumstance which hurried 
 hundreds of brave men among the patriots upon their fate 
 was a cause of preservation to their comrades. 
 
 The veteran General Herkimer, who was a wary and 
 experienced bush-fighter, aware of the character of this 
 ground, had ordered a halt when within a few hundred 
 yards of the spot where the battle was ultimately joined ; 
 but irritated by the mutinous remonstrances of some of 
 his insubordinate followers, several of whom flatly charged 
 the stout old general with cowardice, he gave the order 
 to "march on" while his ranks were yet in confusion; 
 and eagerly was the order obeyed by the rash gathering 
 of border yeomanry. 
 
 ' March on," shouted the fiery Cox and ill-fated Eisen- 
 lord. " March on," thundered the herculanean Gardinier 
 and Samson-like Dillenback, whose puissant deeds at 
 Oriskany have immortalized their names in border story. 
 " March on," echoed the patriotic Billington and long- 
 regretted Paris, and many another brave civilian and 
 gallant gentleman, whom neither rank, nor station, nor 
 want of skill in arms had prevented from volunteering 
 upon this fatal field the first and last they ever saw ! 
 " March on," shouted the hot-headed De Roos, catching 
 up the cry as quickly it ran from rank to rank, and dash 
 ing wildlv forward, he scarce knew where. 
 
 o 
 
 And already the foremost files had descended into the 
 
 in
 
 418 GREYSLAER; 
 
 hollow, and others, pressing from behind, were pouring in 
 a living tide to meet the opposing shock below. 
 
 The impatience of Brant's warriors did not allow them 
 to wait until the Whig forces had all descended into the 
 ravine ; but, raising their well-known war-cry, the Mo 
 hawks poured a volley, which nearly annihilated half of 
 Herkimer's foremost division, and wholly cut off the 
 remainder from the support of their comrades. Uprising 
 then among the bushes, they sprang with tomahawk and 
 javelin upon the panic-stricken corps, already broken and 
 borne down by that first onslaught. The refugees pushed 
 forward with their bayonets to share in the massacre of 
 their countrymen. But now fresh foes were rushing upon 
 them in turn. Headstrong and impetuous themselves, or 
 urged on by the fiery masses that pressed upon them from 
 behind, they descended like an avalanche from the plain 
 above, and filled that little vale with carnage and destruc 
 tion ; now swooping down to be dispersed in death, and 
 now bearing with them a resistless force that hurled hun 
 dreds who opposed it into eternity. 
 
 The leaders of both parties soon began to see that this 
 indiscriminate melee could result in no positive advantage 
 to either, while involving the destruction of both ; and, in 
 a momentary pause of the conflict, the voices of Herki 
 mer's officers and of the opposing leaders were simultane 
 ously heard calling upon their men to betake themselves 
 to the bushes and form anew under their cover. And 
 now the fight was somewhat changed in its character. 
 Major Greyslaer, seeing the causeway partially cleared 
 of its struggling combatants, rallied a compact band of 
 well-disciplined followers, and charged the thickets in ad 
 vance. But. the throng through which he opened a pas-
 
 A ROMANCE OF THE MOHAWK. 419 
 
 sage closed instantly behind him, and with the loss of half 
 his men, he was obliged to cut his way back to his com 
 rades, where the chieftain Teondetha, with his Oneida 
 rifles, covered the shattered band till Greyslaer could take 
 new order. 
 
 The Whig yeomanry, in the mean time, had for the 
 most part taken post behind the adjacent trees, where each 
 man, as from a citadel of his own, made war upon the 
 enemy by keeping up an incessant firing. But Brant, 
 whose Indians were chiefly galled by these sharpshooters, 
 gave his orders, and the Mohawks, wherever they saw 
 the flash of a rifle, would rush up, and, with lance or 
 tomahawk, despatch the marksman before he could gain 
 time to reload. Bait, whose unerring rifle had already 
 made many a foernan bite the dust, had ensconced himself 
 behind a shattered oak, a little in advance of a thicket of 
 birch and juniper, from which Christian Lansingh, with 
 others of Greyslaer's followers, kept up a steady fire, and 
 thus covered Bait's position. The worthy hunter abso 
 lutely foamed with rage when he saw several of his 
 acquaintance, who were less protected than himself, thus 
 falling singly beneath the murderous tomahawks of Brant's 
 people ; but his anger received a new turn when he beheld 
 Greyslaer breaking his cover and rushing with clubbed 
 rifle after one of the retreating Mohawks, who had des 
 patched an unfortunate militia-man within a few paces of 
 him. 
 
 " Goody Lordy !" he exclaimed, " the boy's mad ! He'll 
 spoil the breaching or bend the bar'l of the best rifle in 
 the county. Tormented lightning ! though, how he's 
 buried the brass into him." 
 
 Greyslaer. as Bait spoke, drove the angular metal with
 
 420 GREYSLAER; 
 
 which the stock of the weapon was shod, deep into the 
 brain of the flying savage, while Bait himself, in the same 
 moment, brought down a javelin man who was flying to 
 the assistance of the other. 
 
 " Aha ! ain't that the caper on't, you pizen copperhead ! 
 Down, major, down," shouted the woodsman, as his quick 
 ear caught the click of a dozen triggers in the opposite 
 thicket, and Max, obedient to the word, threw himself 
 upon his face, while the fire of a whole platoon of Tory 
 rangers, that was instantly answered by a volley from his 
 own men, passed harmlessly over him. 
 
 The dropping shots now became less frequent, for the 
 borderers on either side were so well protected by wood 
 land cover, that, though the clothes of many were riddled 
 with bullets, yet the grazing of an elbow or some slight 
 flesh-wound in the leg was all the execution done by those 
 who were as practised in avoiding exposure to the aim of 
 an enemy, as in availing themselves with unerring quick 
 ness of each chance of planting a bullet. 
 
 General Herkimer, who had already seen Greyslaer's 
 spirited effort to cut his way through the enemy with a 
 handful of men, deemed this the fitting time to execute 
 the movement upon a larger scale. The fatal causeway 
 was again thronged by the patriots in the instant they 
 heard the voice of their leader exhorting his troops to force 
 the passage in which their bravest had already fallen. 
 But, even before they could form, and in the moment that 
 those closing ranks exposed themselves, a murderous fire 
 was poured in upon them on every side ; every tree and 
 bush seemed to branch out with flame. 
 
 Thrice, with desperate valor, did Herkimer cross the 
 causeway and charge the thronged hillside in front ; and
 
 A ROMANCE OF THE MOHAWK. 431 
 
 thrice the files who rushed into the places of the fallen 
 were mowed down by the deadly rifles from the thickets, 
 or beaten back by the cloud of spears and tomahawks 
 that instantly thickened in the path before them. In the 
 third charge the veteran fell, a musket-ball, which killed 
 his horse, having shattered his knee while passing through 
 the body of the charger. 
 
 But the fall of their general, instead of disheartening 
 seemed only to nerve his brave followers with new deter 
 mination of spirit, as placed on his saddle beneath a tree, 
 the stout old soldier still essayed to order the battle. His 
 manly tones, heard even above the din of the conflict, gave 
 system and efficacy to the brave endeavor of his broken 
 ranks. The tree against which he leaned became a cen 
 tral point around which they rallied, fighting now, not for 
 conquest hardly for self-preservation but only in stub 
 born resistance of their fate. Arid now, as the enemy, 
 impatient of this long opposition, concentrated round them, 
 they formed in circles, and received in silence the furious 
 charge of their hostile countrymen. Bayonet crossed 
 bayonet, or the clubbed rifle battered the opposing gun- 
 stock as they fought hand to hand and foot to foot. Again 
 and again did the royalists recoil from the wall of iron 
 hearts against which they had hurled themselves. But 
 though the living rampart yielded not, it began to crum 
 ble with these successive shocks ; the ranks of the patriots 
 grew thinner around their wounded general, where brave 
 men strewed the ground like leaves when the autumn is 
 serest. 
 
 The Indian allies upon either side had in the mean time 
 suspended their firing. In vain did the voice of Brant en 
 courage his Mohawks to strike a blow which should at
 
 GREYSLAER; 
 
 once decide this fearful crisis. In vain did the gallant 
 shout of Teondetha cheer on the Oneidas to rescue his 
 friends from the destruction that hedged them in. Not 
 an Indian would move in that greenwood. The warriors 
 of the forest upon both sides had paused to watch this ter- 
 ble death-struggle between white men of the same country 
 and language. They had already ceased to fire upon each 
 other ; and now, gazing together upon the well-matched 
 contest of those who involved them in this family quarrel, 
 they would not raise an arm to strike for either party. 
 
 A storm, a terrific midsummer tempest, such as often 
 marks the sudden vicissitudes of our climate, was the 
 Heaven-directed interposition which stayed the slaughter 
 of that battle-field. The breath of the thunder-gust swept 
 the rain in sheets of foam through the forest, and the hail 
 burst down in torrents upon those warring bands, whose 
 arms now flashed only as they glinted black the light 
 ning's glare. 
 
 There was a pause, then, in the bloody fight of Oriska- 
 ny ; but the battle, which seemed but now nearly ended 
 in the overthrow of the patriots, was soon to be resumed 
 under different auspices. The royalists had withdrawn 
 for the moment to a spot where a heavier forest-growth 
 afforded them some protection from the elements. The 
 republicans had conveyed their wounded general to an 
 adjacent knoll, from which, exposed as it was to the fire 
 of the enemy, he insisted on ordering the battle, when it 
 should be resumed ; and here, in the heat of the onslaught 
 which succeeded, the sturdy old border chief was ob 
 served, with great deliberation, to take his flint and tinder- 
 box from his pocket, light his pipe, and smoke with per 
 fect composure. The veteran bush-fighter, who missed
 
 A ROMANCE OF THE MOHAWK. 423 
 
 many an officer around him, grieved not the less for more 
 than one favorite rifle-shot who had perished among his 
 private soldiers ; and, in order to counteract the mode of 
 warfare adopted by Brant, when, in the early part of the 
 battle, the Indian spears and tomahawks made such dread 
 ful havoc among the scattered riflemen, Herkimer com 
 manded his sharpshooters to station themselves in pairs 
 behind a single tree, and one always to reserve his fire 
 till the Indians should rush up to despatch his comrade 
 when loading. 
 
 In the mean time, while the different dispositions for 
 attack and defence were thus making by their leaders, the 
 rude soldiers on either side, hundreds of whom were mu 
 tually acquainted, exchanged many a bitter jeer with each 
 other, while ever and anon, as some taunting cry would 
 rise among the young warriors of Brant's party, it was 
 echoed by the opposing Oneidas with a fierce whoop of de 
 fiance that would pierce wildly amid the peltings of the 
 storm. 
 
 An hour elapsed before an abatement of the tempest al 
 lowed the work of death to commence anew. A move 
 ment on the part of the royalists by Major Watts's bat 
 talion, first drew the fire of the patriots ; and then the 
 Mohawks, cheered on by the terrible war-whoop of Brant, 
 and uttering yell on yell to intimidate their foes, com 
 menced the onslaught, tomahawk in hand. But the cool 
 execution done by the marksmen whom Herkimer had so 
 wisely planted to sustain each other, made them quickly 
 recoil ; and the Oneidas, eagerly pressing forward from 
 the republican side, drove them back upon a large body 
 of Butler's rangers. Many of this corps had been so se 
 verely handled by Greyslaer's men in the first part of the
 
 424 GREYSLAER; 
 
 battle, that they had fallen back to take care of their 
 wounded. But Bradshawe's company, which had suffered 
 least, was now in advance. These fierce men brooked no 
 control from the young subaltern who was now nominally 
 their commander. Headed by the terrible Valtmeyer, 
 whose clothes were smeared with the gore from a dozen 
 scalps which dangled at his waist, they broke their ranks, 
 rushed singly upon the Oneidas, who had intruded into 
 their lair, and, driving them back among their friends, be 
 came the next moment themselves mixed up in wild me 
 lee with partisans of the other side. This onslaught served 
 as a signal for a rival corps in another part of the field ; 
 and Claus's Rangers broke their cover to battle with their 
 foemen hand to hand. 
 
 This corps of refugee royalists consisted of men enlisted 
 chiefly from the very neighborhood where they were now 
 fighting. They had come back to their former homes, 
 bearing with them the hot thirst of vengeance against 
 their former friends and neighbors ; and when they heard 
 the triumphant shout of the Whigs at a momentary recoil 
 of their friends, and perhaps recognized the voices of 
 some who had aided in driving them from their country, 
 their impatience could not be restrained ; they rushed for 
 ward with a fiendish yell of hatred and ferocity, while the 
 patriots, instead of awaiting the charge, in obedience to 
 the commands of their officer, sprang like chafed tigers 
 from their covert, and met them in the midst. Bayonets 
 and clubbed muskets, made the first shock fatal to many; 
 but these were quickly thrown aside as the parties came 
 in grappling contact, drawing their knives and throttling 
 each other, stabbing, and literally dying in each other's 
 embrace.* 
 
 * Stone, Campbell, Gouverneur Morris.
 
 A ROMANCE OF THE MOHAWK. 425 
 
 And thus, for five long hours, raged this ruthless con 
 flict. All military order had been lost in the moment 
 \vhen the wild bush-fighters first broke their cover and 
 rushed forward to decide the battle hand to hand. Men 
 fought with the fury of demons ; or if, by chance, a squad 
 or party of five or six found themselves acting together, 
 these 'would quickly form, rush forward, and, charging 
 into the thickest of the fight, soon be lost amid the crowd 
 of combatants. At one moment, the tomahawk of some 
 fierce red warrior would crash among the bayonets and 
 spears of whites and Indians as he hewed his way to res 
 cue some comrade that was beset by clustering foes ; at 
 another, the shattering of shafts and clashing of steel 
 would be heard where a sturdy pioneer, with his back to 
 a tree, stood, axe in hand, cleaving down a soldier at 
 every blow, or matching the cherished tool of his craft 
 with the ponderous mace of some brawny savage. Now 
 the groans of the dying, mixed with imprecations deep 
 and foul, rose harshly above the din of the battle, and now 
 the dismal howl or exulting yell of the red Indian was 
 mocked by a thousand demoniac voices, screeching wild 
 through the forest, as if the very fiends of hell were let 
 loose in that black ravine. 
 
 The turmoil of the elements has long since subsided. 
 The sky is clear and serene above. Happily, the forest 
 glooms interpose a veil between its meek, holy eye, and 
 this dance of devilish passions upon the earth.
 
 426 GREYSLAER; 
 
 CHAPTER VI. 
 
 THE ISSUES OF THE BATTLE. 
 
 " Let me recall to your recollection the bloody field where Herkimer 
 fell. There were found the Indian and the white man, born on the banks 
 of the Mohawk, their left hand clenched in each other's hair, the right 
 grasping in the gripe of death the knife plunged in each other's bosom. 
 Thus they lay frowning." Discourse of Gouvcrneur Morris before the New 
 York Historical Society, 1812. 
 
 AN accomplished statesman and eloquent writer has, 
 in the passage which heads this chapter, well depicted 
 the appearance which the field of Oriskany presented 
 when the fight was over. The battle itself, while the 
 most bloody fought during the Revolution, is remarkable 
 for having been contested exclusively between Ameri- 
 crms, or at least between those who, if not natives of the 
 soil, were all denizens of the province in which it was 
 fought. And though its political consequences were of 
 slight moment, for both parties claimed the victory, yet, 
 from the character of the troops engaged in it from the 
 number of Indian warriors that were arrayed upon either 
 side the protracted fierceness of the action, and the ter 
 rible slaughter which marked its progress, it must be 
 held the most memorable conflict that marked our seven 
 years' struggle for national independence. 
 
 Of the field officers that fell, it is true that most, like
 
 A ROMANCE OF THE MOHAWK. 427 
 
 the brave Herkimer himself, were only militia-men, and 
 of no great public consideration beyond their own coun 
 ty ; but with these gallant gentlemen were associated as 
 volunteers more than one military man of rank and repute 
 that had been won upon other fields ; and many a civilian 
 of eminence, who, at the call of patriotism, had shouldered 
 a musket and met his death as a private soldier. The 
 combatants upon either side consisting almost exclusively 
 of inhabitants of the Mohawk Valley, there were so many 
 friends and neighbors, .kinsmen, and even brothers arrayed 
 against each other, that the battle partook of the nature 
 of a series of private feuds, in which the most bitter feel 
 ings of the human heart were brought into play between 
 the greater part of those engaged. And when the few 
 who were actuated by a more chivalric spirit like the 
 gallant Major Watts of the Royal New Yorkers, and 
 others who might be designated among his hostile com 
 patriots met in opposing arms, they too fought with a 
 stubborn valor, as if the military character of their native 
 province depended equally upon the dauntless bearing of 
 either party. The annalist has elsewhere preserved so 
 many minute and thrilling details of Herkimer's last field,* 
 that it hardly becomes us to recapitulate them here, 
 though we would fain recall some of those traits of chiv 
 alrous gallantry and generous daring which redeem the 
 brutal ferocity of the contest. 
 
 The deeds of the brave Captain Dillenback, though his 
 name is not intermingled with the thread of our story, are 
 so characteristic of the times in which its scenes are laid, 
 
 * See Stone's Border Wars of the American Revolution.
 
 428 GREYSLAER; 
 
 that they can hardly be passed over. This officer had 
 his private enemies among those who were now arrayed 
 in battle as public foes ; and Wolfert Valtmeyer, with 
 three others among the most desperate of the refugees, 
 determined to seize his person in the midst of the fight, 
 and carry him off for some purpose best known to them 
 selves. Watching their opportunity, these four despera 
 does, when the tumult of the conflict was at the highest, 
 cut their way to the spot where Dillenba^k was standing; 
 and one of them succeeded in mastering his gun for a 
 moment. But Dillenback, who caught sight of Valt- 
 meyer's well-known form pressing forward to aid his 
 comrades in the capture, knew better than to trust himself 
 to the tender mercies of his outlaw band. He swore that 
 he would not be taken alive, and he was not. Wrenching 
 his gun from the grasp of the first assailant, he felled him 
 to the earth with the breech, shot the second dead, and 
 plunged the bayonet into the heart of the third. But in 
 the moment of his last triumph the brave Whig was 
 himself laid dead by a pistol-shot from Valtmeyer, who 
 chanced to be the fourth in coming up to him. 
 
 But perhaps as true a chevalier as met his fate amid all 
 that host of valiant hearts was a former friend of Bait the 
 woodsman, an old Mohawk hunter, who bore the un 
 couth Dutch name of Bronkahorlst. 
 
 It was in the heat of the fight, when Brant's dusky fol 
 lowers, flitting from tree to tree, had at one time almost 
 surrounded Greyslaer's small command, that Bait, in the 
 thickest of the fire, heard a well-known voice calling him 
 by name from behind a large tree near ; and, looking out 
 from the huge trunk which sheltered his own person, he 
 recognized the only Indian with whom his prejudices
 
 A ROMANCE OF THE MOHAWK. 409 
 
 against the race had ever allowed him to be upon terms 
 of intimacy. 
 
 "Come, my brother," said the Iroquois warrior, in his 
 own tongue. " come and escape death or torture by sur 
 rendering to your old friend, who pledges the word of a 
 Mohawk for your kind treatment and protection." 
 
 "Rather to you than to anybody, my noble old boy; 
 but Bait will be prisoner this day to no mortal man. My 
 name is Nozun Dofji he that never shirks." 
 
 " And my name," .cried the Indian, " is The Killer of 
 Brave Men; so come on; we are happily met." With 
 these words both parties threw down their rifles, and, 
 drawing their knives, rushed upon each other. 
 
 The struggle was only a brief one ; for Time, who had 
 nerved the brawny form of the white borderer into the 
 full maturity of manly strength, had dealt less leniently 
 with the aged Indian, who was borne at once to the 
 ground as they closed in the death-grapple. It was in 
 vain that Bait, mindful of other days and kinder meetings 
 in the deep woodlands, attempted to save his opponent's 
 life by making him a prisoner ; for, in the moment that 
 he mastered the scalping-knife of the Indian and pinioned 
 his right arm to the ground, the latter, writhing beneath 
 his adversary with the flexibility of a serpent, brought up 
 his knee so near to his left hand as to draw the leg-knife 
 from beneath the garter, and dealt Bait a blow in his side 
 which nothing but his hunting-shirt of tough elk-hide pre 
 vented from being fatal. Even as it was, the weapon, 
 after sliding an inch or two, cut through the arrow-proof 
 garment that ere now had turned a sabre ; while Bait, 
 feeling the point graze upon his ribs, thought that his cam 
 paigning days were over, and, in the exasperation of the
 
 430 GREYSLAER; 
 
 moment, buried his knife to the hilt in the bare bosom of 
 Bronkahorlst. 
 
 " We are going together, old boy," he cried, as he sank 
 back with a momentary faintness. " I only hope we'll 
 find the game as plenty in your hunting-ground of spirits 
 as we have on the banks of the Sacondaga ; God forgive 
 me for being sich a heathen !" 
 
 But while this singular duel, with personal encounters 
 of a similar nature, were taking place in one part of the 
 field, others more eventful in their consequences were 
 transpiring elsewhere. The puissant deeds of Captain. 
 Gardinier, like those of Dillenback, have given his name a 
 place upon the sober page of history ; but, as they involved 
 the fate of more than one of the personages of our story, 
 we have no hesitation in recapitulating them here. 
 
 One principal cause, perhaps, why the Whigs maintained 
 their ground with such desperate tenacity, was the hope 
 that, so soon as the sound of their fire-arms should reach 
 the invested garrison of Fort Stanwix, a sally would be 
 attempted by the besieged to effect a diversion in their 
 favor. That sally, so famous in our Revolutionary his 
 tory, and which gave to WILLET, who conducted it, the 
 name of " the hero of Fort Stanwix," did, in fact, take place 
 before the close of the battle of Oriskany, and was, as we 
 all know, attended with the most brilliant success. But, 
 long before the performance of that gallant feat of Willet's, 
 the Tory partisan, Colonel Butler, aware of the hopes 
 which animated his Whig opponents at Oriskany, essayed 
 a ruse de guerre, which had well nigh eventuated in their 
 complete destruction. 
 
 This wily officer, withdrawing a large detachment of 
 Johnson's Greens from the field of action, partially dis-
 
 A ROMANCE OF THE MOHAWK. 431 
 
 guised them as Republican troops by making them change 
 their hats for those of their fallen enemies ; and then adopt 
 ing the patriot colors and other party emblems so far as 
 they could, they made a circuit through the woods, and 
 turned the flank of the Whigs in the hope of gaining the 
 midst of them by coming in the guise of a timely rein 
 forcement sent from the fort. 
 
 The hats of these soldiers appearing first through the 
 bushes, cheered Herkimer's men at once. The cry was 
 instantly raised that succor was at hand. Many of the 
 undisciplined yeomanry broke from their stations, and ran 
 to grasp the hands of their supposed friends. 
 
 " Beware ! beware ! 'tis the enemy ; don't you see their 
 green coats?" shouted Captain Gardinier, whose company 
 of dismounted rangers w r as nearest to these new-comers. 
 But, even as he spoke, one of his own soldiers, a slight 
 stripling, recognizing his own brother among the Greens, 
 and supposing him embarked in the same cause with him 
 self, rushed forward to embrace him. His outstretched 
 hand was seized with no friendly grasp by his hostile kins 
 man ; for the Tory brother, fastening a ferocious gripe 
 upon the credulous Whig, dragged him within the oppos 
 ing lines, exclaiming only, as he flung him backwards amid 
 his comrades, " See, some of ye, to the d d young rebel, 
 will ye ?" 
 
 " For God's sake, brother, let them not kill me ! Do you 
 not know me?" shrieked the youthful patriot, as he clutched 
 at one of those amid whom he fell, to shield -him from the 
 blows that were straightway aimed at his life. 
 
 But his brother had other work to engage him at this 
 instant ; for the gallant Gardinier, observing the action and 
 its result, seized a partisan from a corporal who stood
 
 432 GREYSLAER; 
 
 near, and wielding the spear like a quarter staff, dealt his 
 blows to the right and left so vigorously that he soon beat 
 back the disordered group and liberated his man, who, 
 clubbing his rifle as he sprang to his feet, instantly levelled 
 his treacherous brother in the dust. But Gardinier and 
 his stripling soldier were now in the midst of the Greens, 
 unsupported by any of their comrades ; and the sturdy 
 Major MacDonald. who this day had taken duty with a 
 detachment of Johnson's men, rushed forward sword in 
 hand to cut down Gardinier in the same moment that two 
 of the disguised Greens sprang upon him from behind. 
 Struggling with almost superhuman strength to free him 
 self from their grasp, the spurs of the Whig Ranger be 
 came entangled in the clothes of his adversaries, and he 
 was thrown to the ground. Both of his thighs were in 
 stantly transfixed to the earth by the bayonets of two of 
 his assailants, while MacDonald, presenting the point of 
 his rapier to his throat, cried out to " Yield himself, rescue 
 or no rescue." But Gardinier did not yet dream of yield 
 ing. 
 
 Seizing the blade of the sword with his left hand, the 
 trooper, by a sudden wrench, brought the Highlander down 
 upon his own person, where he held him for a moment as a 
 shield against the assault of others. At this moment, Adam 
 Miller for the first time saw the struggle of Gardinier 
 against this fearful odds. His sword was already out and 
 crimson with blood of more than one foe ; and now, rush 
 ing forward, he laid about him so industriously, that the 
 Greens were compelled to defend themselves against their 
 new adversary. Gardinier, raising himself to a sitting pos 
 ture, bore back MacDonald ; but the gallant Scot, still 
 clinching the throat of his foe with his left hand, braced
 
 A ROMANCE OF THE MOHAWK. 433 
 
 himself firmly on one knee, and turned to parry the 
 frenzied blows of Miller with his right. Gardinier had 
 but one hand at liberty, and that was lacerated by the 
 rapier which he had grasped so desperately; yet, quick as 
 light, he seized the spear which was still lying near him, 
 and planted the barb in the side of MacDonald. The 
 chivalric Highlander expired without a groan. 
 
 The Greens, struck with dismay at the fate of this vete 
 ran officer, the near friend of Sir John Johnson, fell back 
 upon those of their comrades who had not yet broken their 
 ranks; while those lookers-on, stung with grief for the loss 
 of such an officer, rallied instantly to the charge, and poured 
 in a volley upon the Whigs, who had jnst succeeded in 
 dragging the wounded Gardinier out of the melee. Several 
 fell, but their death was avenged on the instant ; yet dearly 
 avenged, for the blow which followed, while it terminated 
 the battle, concluded the existence of one of the most gal 
 lant spirits embarked in it. 
 
 Young Derrick de lloos on that day had enacted won 
 ders of prowess. And though the rashness he exhibited 
 made his early sobriquet of " Mad Dirk" remembered by 
 more than one of his comrades, yet he seemed to bear a 
 charmed life while continually rushing to and fro wherever 
 the fight was hottest. At the very opening of the con 
 flict, when most of the mounted Rangers threw themselves 
 from their saddles and took to the bushes with their rifles,* 
 
 * The horses of mounted riflemen are generally, during a frontier fight, 
 secured to a tree in some hollow or behind some knoll, Avhich protects them 
 from the enemy's fire. Not infrequently, however, the sagacious animal is 
 trained, in obedience to the order of his master, to crouch among the loaves, 
 or couch down like a dog behind some fallen tree, while the rider, protected 
 by the same natural rampart, fires over his body.
 
 434: GREYSLAER; 
 
 De Roos, with but a handful of troopers to back him, drew 
 his sword and charged into the thickets from which came 
 the first fire of the ambushed foe. 
 
 " It is impossible for cavalry to act upon such ground,' 
 exclaimed an officer, seeing him about to execute this mad 
 movement. De Roos, who, on the march, was leading his 
 horse, did not heed the remark as he threw himself into 
 the saddle. "Your spurs where are your spurs, man?" 
 cried another, as the horse, flurried by the first fire, rose 
 on his hinder legs instead of dashing forward. " Charge 
 not without your spurs, captain!" 
 
 " I'm going to win my spurs," shouted Mad Dirk strik 
 ing the flanks of the steed with the flat of his sabre, which 
 the next moment gleamed above his head as the spirited 
 animal, gathering courage from his fiery rider, bounded 
 forward in the charge. 
 
 In the instant confusion that followed, De Roos was no 
 more seen ; the smoke, indeed, sometimes revealed his 
 orange plume floating like a tongue of flame amid its 
 wreaths; and his " Carry on, carry on, men," for a few 
 moments cheered the ears of the friends who could dis 
 tinguish his gay and reckless voice even amid the earnest 
 shouts of the white borderers, mingled as they were with 
 the wild slogan of the Indian warriors. But De Roos 
 himself appeared no more until, in the pause of the battle 
 already mentioned, he presented himself among his com 
 patriots, exclaiming, 
 
 " I've used up all my men ! Is there no handful of 
 brave fellows here who will rally under Dirk de Roos 
 when we set-to again ?" 
 
 The fearful slaughter which, as is known, took place 
 among Herkimer's officers at the very outset of the fight,
 
 A ROMANCE OF THE MOHAWK. 435 
 
 and almost with the first volley from Brant's people, yet 
 left men enough among these undisciplined bands to fur 
 nish forth a stout array of volunteers, who were eager to 
 fight under so daring a leader ; and when the battle was 
 renewed, the wild partisan went into it with a train more 
 numerous than before. But his horse had long since been 
 killed under him ; the followers upon whom he was in the 
 habit of relying had fallen, either dead or disabled, by his 
 side ; and Derrick, somewhat sobered in spirit, became 
 more economical of his resources. And, though still ex 
 posing his own person as much as ever, he was vigi 
 lant in seeing that his men were well covered, while he 
 hoarded their energies to strike some well-directed blow 
 which might terminate the battle. 
 
 With the last volley of the Greens he thought the fitting 
 moment had come. His bugle sounded a charge, and on 
 rushed his band with the bayonet. 
 
 '* Carry on, carry on !" shouted De Roos, who charged, 
 sword in hand, a musket's length ahead of his foremost 
 files. 
 
 It seemed impossible for the weary royalists to stand 
 up against this column ; for small in number as were the 
 men who composed it, they were comparatively fresh, 
 from a short breathing spell which they had enjoyed ; 
 while their spirits were excited to the utmost by their 
 having been kept back by their officer, as he waited for 
 the approaching crisis before permitting a man to move. 
 But the line of the royalists, though broken and uneven, 
 was still so much longer than that of the patriots, that, out 
 flanking their assailants as they did, they had only to per 
 mit their headlong foe to pass through, and then fall up.m 
 his rear.
 
 433 GREYSLAER; 
 
 This movement the Greens effected with equal alacrity 
 and steadiness. Their ranks opened with such quickness 
 that they seemed to melt like a wave before De Roos's im 
 petuous charge ; but, wavelike too, they closed again be 
 hind his little band, which was thus cut off from the patriot 
 standard. Furious at being thus caught in the toils, the 
 fierce republicans wheeled again, and madly endeavored 
 to cut their way back to their friends ; but the equally 
 brave royalists far outnumbered them, and their fate 
 for the moment seemed sealed, when suddenly another 
 player in this iron game presented himself. 
 
 Max Greyslaer, who, from a distance, had watched the 
 movement of his friend with the keenest anxiety, saw the 
 unequal struggle upon which the fortunes of the whole 
 battle were turning. He had fought all day on foot, and 
 wounded and weary, he seemed too far from the spot upon 
 which all the chances of the fight were now concentered 
 to reach it ere they were decided. He looked eagerly 
 around for assistance ; he shouted madly to those who 
 were closer to De Roos to press forward ; and, bounding 
 over a fallen tree near him, he stumbled upon the trained 
 horse of a rifleman, which had been taught to crouch in the 
 thickets for safety. The couchant steed but now so 
 quiet when masterless rose with a grateful winnow as 
 Max seized his bridle ; and, gladly yielding his back to so 
 featly a rider, he tossed his head with proud neighing as 
 he felt himself no longer a passive sharer in the dangers 
 of the field. On came the gallant horse. The rider gath 
 ered new life from the fresh spirits of his steed. He 
 swept 'twas thus the warlike saints of old swept before 
 the eyes of the knightly combatants he swept meteor-
 
 A ROMANCE OF THE MOHAWK. 437 
 
 like across the field, and charged with his flashing brand, 
 singly against the royal host. Down went the green ban 
 ner of the Johnsons ; down went the sturdy banner-man, 
 shorn to the earth by that trenchant blade. 
 
 The Greens, attacked thus impetuously in their rear, 
 turned partly round to confront this bold assailant ; but 
 Greyslaer had already cloven his way through their line, 
 and Christian Lansingh, with a score of active borderers, 
 had rushed tumultuously into his wake. The royalists 
 were broken and forced back laterally on either side of 
 the pathway thus made ; but either fragment of the dis 
 joined band still struggled to reunite with desperate valor. 
 The republicans, concentrating their forces upon one at a 
 time, charged both parties alternately. Thrice, wheeling 
 with the suddenness of a falcon in mid air, had Greyslaer 
 hurled himself upon their crumbling ranks; and now, as 
 one division was nearly annihilated by that last charge, De 
 Roos, emulous of his friend, headed the onslaught against 
 the remaining fragment of the royalists. His orange 
 plume again floated foremost ; and loud as when the fight 
 was new, his cheering voice was heard, 
 
 " Carry on, men, carry o "* 
 
 An Indian whoop the last that was heard upon the 
 field of Oriskany followed the single shot which hushed 
 that voice and laid that orange plume in the dust. 
 
 Both Mohawks and royalists had already mostly with 
 drawn from the field ; and the remainder of the Greens, 
 
 * In the action in which the United States Frigate President, was cap 
 tured by a British squadron, off Sandy Hook, Lieut. Hamilton expired with 
 this catch phrase upon his lips. It was his cant expression, at " feast or 
 frav."
 
 438 - GREYSLAER; 
 
 who had contested it to the last so stubbornly, retired 
 when they saw De Roos fall.* 
 
 * Brant and his Tory confederates carried off so many prisoners with 
 them from the field of Oriskany, that the battle is often spoken of as a de 
 feat of the Whigs. But as these prisoners were taken in the early part of 
 the action, and during the first confusion of the ambuscade, the meed of vic 
 tory must be accorded to the patriots, who were left in possession of the 
 battle-field ; fearful, however, as was the general slaughter, the loss of life 
 upon the Royalist side seems to have been chiefly among the Indian war 
 riors, while on the Republican side the whites suffered far more than did 
 their Oneida allies.
 
 A ROMANCE OF THE JVIOHAWK. 439 
 
 CHAPTER VII. 
 
 THE DOUBTFUL PARENTAGE. 
 
 ; True joy, still born of heaven, is blessed with wings, 
 And, tired of earth, it plumes them back again : 
 And so we lose it. A sad change came o'er 
 The fortunes of that pair, whose loves have been 
 Our theme of story a sad change, that oft 
 Comes o'er love's fortunes in all lands and homes." SIMMS. 
 
 THEY were busy making rude litters for the wounded 
 upon that field of slaughter. The brave Herkimer, who 
 so soon died of his injury, was already borne off; but 
 most of his surviving followers yet remained. There 
 were groups of mournful faces around the dying, and here 
 and there a desolate-looking man was seen stalking over 
 the field, pausing from time to time in his dreary quest, 
 looking around now with quick and painful glances, and 
 now, with a half-fearful air, stooping over some gory corse, 
 as if seeking some near friend or kinsman among the fallen. 
 
 By the root of a dusky tamarack lay a bleeding officer, 
 whose pale features showed that he was yet young in 
 years ; while another of similar age was busied in stanch 
 ing the blood which oozed in torrents from his side. A 
 kneeling soldier offered a vessel of water ; a grizzly hunter 
 held the feet of the dying man in his bosom ; as if to 
 cherish the extremities that were rapidly growing cold.
 
 440 GREYSLAER. 
 
 A grave Indian stood mutely looking on. If he indeed 
 sorrowed in heart like the others, his smooth cheek and 
 quiet eye betrayed not the agitation which painted their 
 faces with emotion. 
 
 It was of no avail, the kindness of that ministering 
 group of friends. The dying man, indeed, once opened 
 his eyes, and he seemed to murmur something, which the 
 other officer bent forward with the most earnest solicita 
 tion to hear. He seemed to have some charge or bequest 
 of wishes to make to his friend ; but his thoughts could 
 not syllable themselves into connected utterance. His 
 wound seemed to gather virulence from each successive 
 effort ; yet still he squandered his remaining strength in 
 futile attempts to communicate with his friends. Alas ! 
 why did he not speak before, that luckless soldier, if life's 
 last moments were so precious so him ? 
 
 "I know I know it is of Guise, the Indian child, you 
 would speak," cried the agonized friend, as the sudden 
 thought started into his mind. " It is the mystery of his 
 birth it is your wishes about your own offspring that 
 you would declare. God of heaven, pardon and spare 
 him for a moment. Press my hand, Derrick, if I have 
 guessed truly that the child is yours ; make any the 
 least, the feeblest sign, and your boy shall be as dear to 
 Greyslaer as his own." 
 
 But Derrick died and gave no sign ! His last breath 
 went out in the moment that his agitated friend, for the 
 first time, conjectured what he intended to reveal. 
 
 They buried him beneath that dusky tamarack ; and 
 there let him lie. a gallant, frank-hearted soldier, whose 
 bravery and generosity of disposition were remembered 
 in his native valley long after the blemishes, or, rather.
 
 A ROMANCE OF THE MOHAWK. 441 
 
 the inherent defects of his character were forgotten ; a 
 character not altogether inestimable, far less unloveable, 
 at that graceful season of life when the wildest sallies of 
 youth are forgotten in the generous impulses which seem 
 to prompt them, but which, unregulated by one steadfast 
 principle, was, perhaps, of all others, the most likely to 
 degenerate into utter profligacy and selfishness when age 
 should have chilled the social flow of its feelings, and 
 habit confirmed the reckless indulgence of its own hu 
 mors. 
 
 It was well, then, perhaps, for the memory of the gay 
 and high-spirited De Roos, that his career closed when it 
 did ; but the sorrowing group who were now retiring 
 from his hastily-made grave, would have spurned the sol 
 ace which such a reflection might have imparted. The 
 three white men scattered twigs and tufts of grass over 
 the spot before they left it ; and they turned to see why 
 the Indian still lingered behind them ; an exclamation of 
 displeasure, as at beholding some heathen rite, burst from 
 the lips of Greyslaer as he saw a column of smoke arise 
 from a pile of brush which Teondetha had already heaped 
 together. 
 
 " The pagan redskin, what is he doing ?" muttered 
 Christian Lansingh. 
 
 " Teondetha is wise," said Bait, sadly, in the only words 
 of kindness he had ever spoken to the young chief. " He 
 has preserved all that remains of poor Captain Dirk ; for 
 the wild beasts will never scratch through the ashes to 
 disturb him." 
 
 The Indian replied not, and they all left the battle-field 
 in silence. 
 
 Tradition tells of the horrid spectacle which that field 
 20
 
 442 GREYSLAER; 
 
 exhibited three days afterward, when the wolves, the 
 bears, and the panthers, with which the adjacent forests 
 at that time abounded, had been busy among the graves 
 of the slain ; but the simple precaution of Teondetha pre 
 served from violation the last resting-place of the friend 
 of his boyhood. 
 
 Of the others that fell in this ensanguined conflict, it be 
 longs to history rather than to us to speak. The annalist 
 of Tryon county* tells us, that in the whole Valley of the 
 Mohawk, there was scarcely a family which had not lost 
 some member ; scarcely a man, woman or child who had 
 not some relative to deplore after the fatal field of Oris- 
 kany. Brant's warriors had suffered so severely, that his 
 immediate band of Mohawks was nearly all cut to pieces ; 
 but, deeply as the chieftan grieved for the loss of his brave 
 followers, he had still room in his heart to lament his 
 friend MacDonald. At this point we shall probably take 
 leave of the famous sachem whose career, though it grows 
 more and more thrilling in interest through the successive 
 scenes of the civil war along this border, is haply no far 
 ther interwoven with the thread of our narrative. 
 
 Teondetha, too, though he may possibly again flit across 
 our page, we must now dismiss with his Oneidas to the 
 ancient seats of his people, where they finally halted after 
 cruelly harassing the rear of the flying St. Leger. That 
 officer, as is known, broke up his lines before Fort Stan- 
 wix upon Arnold's approach to Fort Dayton, and effected 
 a most disastrous retreat to the wilds from which he had 
 emerged with such boastful anticipations. Of the offi- 
 
 * Campbell.
 
 A ROMANCE OP THE MOHAWK. 443 
 
 cers to whom the arduous duty of pursuing him into the 
 wilderness was intrusted, few were more distinguished 
 for zeal and efficiency than Major Greyslaer, whose 
 knowledge of forest life enabled him to co-operate with 
 the greatest advantage with the Oneida allies of the pa 
 triot cause. 
 
 Returning from this arduous and perilous service, Grey 
 slaer, when halting to refresh his men at the Oneida Cas 
 tle, had an opportunity of witnessing the wedded happi 
 ness of " The Spreading Dew," who was long since 
 united to her true warrior, and who welcomed him with 
 proud feelings of gratification to her husband's lodge. 
 He sympathized with the fortunate issue of their simple 
 loves, even while he sighed to think that the course of his 
 own, which had never run too smoothly, was still far from 
 bright. 
 
 It was impossible for him to be near Alida in the first 
 days of her grief, when the tidings should reach her that 
 her only brother, the last male of her family, the last near 
 relation she had on earth, had been taken away ; but he 
 had promised himself that many weeks should not elapse 
 before she should find a comfort in the society of one 
 who would leave no means untried that kindness could 
 suggest to alleviate her sorrows ; who would in all things 
 endeavor to supply the place of him who could return no 
 more. And, truly, if the ever-watchful consideration, the 
 tender and fostering care, the minute and gentle offices of 
 affection suggested by a heart of inborn delicacy and feel 
 ing if these cherishing ministrations at the hands of a 
 stranger to our blood can ever supply the loss of a natu 
 ral tie, Max Greyslaer was the man of all others whose 
 sympathies would be most balmful at. such a season.
 
 444 GREYS LAER; 
 
 Alida herself, though in the first agony of her grief she 
 would have shrunk from communion even with Greyslaer, 
 yet, when the paroxysm had passed away, looked natu 
 rally to her lover the earliest and closest friend of the 
 brother she had lost as her best consoler ; and she 
 yearned for his appearance by her side with that impa 
 tience of disappointment or delay which, though chiefly 
 characteristic of poor Derrick's impetuous and irrestrain- 
 able disposition, was in no slight degree shared as a fam 
 ily trait by his sister. But the day was far distant when 
 the lovers were again to meet ; and destiny had strange 
 things in store for them ere that meeting, now so eagerly 
 desired by both, was to be brought about. 
 
 The greater part of the patriot troops employed against 
 St. Leger had been marched off to oppose Burgoyne, 
 whose invasion along the Hudson was destined to be 
 equally unsuccessful with that upon the Mohawk. The 
 fate of Major Greyslaer did not lead him to have a share 
 in the glorious operations of Schuyler and Gates ; while 
 the large force which had thus been withdrawn from the 
 Valley of the Mohawk, rendering the utmost vigilance 
 necessary in those who were left to guard it, made it im 
 possible for an officer of his standing and importance to 
 be absent on furlough at such a season. 
 
 As the autumn came on, he found himself posted at 
 Fort Stanwix, where new works were to be erected to 
 strengthen a frontier position which late events had 
 proved to be all-important to the preservation of the 
 province. 
 
 The winter set in, and his prospect of seeing Alida was 
 still further postponed. The spring arrived at last ; and 
 what were the hopes it brought with its blossoms, when
 
 A ROMANCE OF THE MOHAWK. 445 
 
 Greyslaer was about to avail himself at last of a long- 
 promised furlough ? 
 
 The letters of Alida, meanwhile, had long breathed a 
 spirit which filled him with anxiety. They had become 
 more and more brief; and, though not cold precisely, 
 there was yet something formal in their tenor, as if their 
 writer were gradually falling back upon the old terms of 
 friendship which had so long been their only acknowl 
 edged relation of regard. It seemed as if some new and 
 deeper sorrow had fixed upon her heart ; some weight of 
 misery which even he could not remove. She did not 
 complain ; she made no mention of any specific cause of 
 grief, but she spoke as one whose hopes were no longer 
 of this world. 
 
 At first Greyslaer thought that it was the death of her 
 brother which had thus preyed upon her spirits ; and his 
 replies to her letters bore the tenderest sympathy with 
 her sorrows as he united in mourning over the early- 
 closed career of his gallant and high-spirited friend. But, 
 dearly as she loved Derrick, his name now was never 
 mentioned by Alida ! Could it be that her health was 
 failing ? Was the grave, then, about to yawn between 
 Greyslaer and his hopes, to swallow them up for ever ? 
 And did Alida wish thus gradually to wean him from the 
 wild idolatry which had been the passion of his life ? to 
 prepare him for the passing away of his idol 1 
 
 He thought, with terror, that it must be so. There was 
 a tone of serious religious sentiment, a character of meek 
 ness and humility in some of her letters, wholly foreign to 
 her once proud and fervid spirit. It was the tone of one 
 who had ceased to struggle with and rebel against her 
 lot ; who had yielded her spirit to the guidance of Him
 
 446 GREYSLAER; 
 
 who gave it, and who waited in humble patience for the 
 moment of its recall. 
 
 " Yes," said Greyslaer on the day that he was at last 
 to be relieved from his military duties, as he read one of 
 those passages in an agony of emotion, with which some 
 thing of solace was still intermingled, "yes, she feels her 
 self fading into the grave. Consumption yet Alida's is 
 not the soul to crumble beneath disease! This new-born 
 gentleness can only have been imparted from above. Her 
 bright spirit is gathering from on high the only grace it 
 lacked to fit it for that blessed sphere. She is fading 
 fading away from me for ever." His eyes were strained 
 on vacancy as he spoke, and he stood with arms wildly 
 outstretched, as if to arrest some beloved phantom which 
 seemed melting before them. 
 
 The starting tears had scarcely filled those eyes, when 
 a comrade, abruptly breaking into his quarters, told a 
 tale which congealed them with horror where they stood. 
 The whole nature of Max Greyslaer, the gentle, the high- 
 minded, was changed within him from that very moment. 
 
 And what was the monstrous tale that wrought this 
 change upon a mind so well attempered, a soul so stead 
 fast, a heart so true in all that can approve its worth as 
 was that of Greyslaer 1 Had fortune still a test in store 
 to prove the love that never wavered ? Had fate, from 
 her black quiver, thrown a shaft that even love itself, in 
 all its panoply, could not repel ? 
 
 We are now approaching a part of our story that w r e 
 would fain pass over as rapidly as possible, for the de 
 tails are most painful ; so painful, so revolting, in fact, 
 that we cannot bring ourselves to do more than touch
 
 A ROMANCE OF THE MOHAWK. 447 
 
 upon them while hurrying on to the catastrophe which 
 they precipitated. 
 
 Walter Bradshawe, as we have seen, was convicted as 
 a spy, and received sentence of death ; but a mistaken 
 lenity prompted his reprieve before the hour of execution 
 arrived. When removed to Albany, he was at first 
 closely imprisoned for several months ; but the secret 
 Tories, with whom the capital of the province at that 
 time abounded, found means of mitigating the rigor of 
 his confinement, and even of enlisting a strong interest 
 in his behalf among some of the most influential inhabi 
 tants. Bradshawe, before the Revolution, had mingled 
 intimately in the society of the place, and his strongly- 
 marked character had made both friends and enemies 
 in the social circle. His present political situation in 
 creased the number of both, and both were now equally 
 active in the endeavor to preserve or crush him. The 
 royalists, willing to keep politics entirely out of view, 
 appealed only to private and personal feelings of old asso 
 ciation in pleading for his safety. Some of the patriots 
 sternly rejected all reference to a state of things which 
 had passed away, and would see only a Tory malignant 
 and detected spy in their former neighbor. But others 
 accepted the issue which was offered by the friends of 
 the criminal, and indignantly insisted that there was 
 nothing in his private character which should make him 
 a fit subject for mercy. The whole career of his life 
 was ripped up from the time when, as a law student at 
 Albany, he was known as one of the most riotous and 
 reckless youths of the period through the opening 
 scenes of the Revolution, when his insolent and scan 
 dalous conduct, on more than one occasion, had exas-
 
 448 GREYSLAEK; 
 
 perated the minds of men against the official profligate 
 through those which followed the outbreak of civil dis 
 cord, when his aid or connivance was more than suspect 
 ed to many a deed of ruthless violence, of midnight 
 burning, of bloodshed and cruelty down to the present 
 time, when he stood a convicted criminal, whose life had 
 been most justly forfeited. 
 
 Men stop at nothing when their minds are once excited 
 in times so frenzied as these ; and the whole story of the 
 abduction of Miss de Roos was brought up as testimony 
 against Bradshawe's character, with every particular ex 
 aggerated, and the outrage painted in every color which 
 could inspire horror at its enormity. 
 
 Rumors of Greyslaer's approaching nuptials with the 
 unhappy lady who was thus made the general subject of 
 conversation, reached the ears of Bradshawe while chafing 
 beneath these charges, and the thought of the misery they 
 would inflict upon his victims might have been sufficient 
 even for his revengeful spirit ; but he determined, with a 
 hellish ingenuity, to fling the imputation of the outrage 
 from himself, and, at the same time, to plant its stigma in 
 an aggravated form upon her whose name had been so 
 recklessly dragged in by his persecutors. He first set 
 afloat insinuations in regard to the parentage of the half- 
 blood Indian boy who had long been an inmate of the 
 family at the Hawksnest, and who had more than once 
 visited Albany under the care of Alida, whom the child 
 so much resembled ! And then he boldly proclaimed, 
 that, so far from instigating the alleged abduction of Miss 
 de Roos, he had only, out of respect for her connections, 
 aided in withdrawing her from the protection of Isaac 
 Brant, to whom she had fled from her father's halls !
 
 A ROMANCE OF THE MOHAWK. 449 
 
 A conviction of the nature of the feelings the tortured 
 and blasted feelings which had prompted the tone of Ali- 
 da's letters, flashed electric upon the mind of her lover 
 at this horrid recital ; and at thought of his betrothed 
 that soul-stricken and cruelly injured girl that lady, 
 most deject and wretched his noble and most sovereign 
 reason to which religion had ever been the handmaid 
 was quite o'erthrown. The soldier's, scholar's eye, tongue, 
 sword, quite quite down. 
 
 In a word, Max Greyslaer, as we have already said 
 Max, the gentle, the high-minded, became changed in soul 
 on the instant. The prayerful spirit of one short hour ago 
 vanished before the new divinity that usurped its place 
 upon the altar of his heart. His dream of submission to 
 the will of Providence the tearful resignation which his 
 belief in Alida's illness inspired, was over, lost, swallowed 
 up, obliterated in the wild tempest of his passions. The 
 fierce lust of vengeance shot through his veins and agi 
 tated every fibre of his system ; a horrid craving seized 
 his heart the craving for the blood of a human victim ! 
 And had Bradshawe stood near, gifted with a hundred 
 lives, Greyslaer could, one by one, have torn them all 
 from out his mortal frame. 
 
 The object of his vengeance was far away, but Max 
 Greyslaer from that moment was not less in thought a 
 
 MUKDRERER 
 
 20*
 
 BOOK SIXTH 
 
 RETRIBUTION. 
 
 " Think my former state a happy dream 
 From which awaked the truth of what we are 
 Shows me but this. I am sworn brother now 
 To grim necessity, and he and I 
 Must keep a league with death." SHAKSPEARE. 
 
 " Miserable creature, 
 If thou persist in this 'tis damnable. 
 Dost thou imagine thou canst slide on blood 
 And not be tainted with a shameful fate ? 
 Or, like the black and melancholy yew tree, 
 Dost hope to root thyself in dead men's graves 
 And yet to prosper ?" WEBSTER. 
 
 " Prosper me now my fate, some better genius 
 Than such as wait on troubled passions, 
 Direct my courses to a noble issue. 
 
 * * * I am punished 
 In mine own hope by her unlucky fortune." FORD. 
 
 ' A sin ! a monstrous sin ! Yet with it many 
 That did prove good men often have been tempted ; 
 And though I'm crooked now, 'tis in your power 
 To make me straight again." MASSINGEE.
 
 BOOK SIXTH 
 
 RETRIBUTION. 
 
 CHAPTER I. 
 
 THE AVENGER'S JOURNEY. 
 
 " His face was calmly stern, and but a glare 
 Within his eyes there was no feature there 
 That told what lashing fiends his inmates were, 
 Within there was no thought to bid him swerve 
 From his intent ; but every strained nerve 
 Was settled and bent up with terrible force 
 To some deep deed far, far beyond remorse ; 
 No glimpse of mercy's light his purpose cross'd, 
 Love, nature, pity, in its depths were lost ; 
 Or lent an added fury to the ire 
 That seared his soul with unconsuming fire." 
 
 DRAKE. 
 
 AN acute observer of human nature has remarked, 
 that there are seasons when a man differs not less from 
 himself than he does at other times from all other men ; 
 and certain it is that passion will often, with the magic of 
 a moment, work a change in the character which the blind 
 pressure of circumstances throughout long years the 
 moulding habits of an ordinary lifetime, with all their plas 
 tic power above the human heart, could never have 
 wrought in the same individual who undergoes this sud 
 den transformation.
 
 454 GREYSLAER 
 
 An hour had passed away with Greyslaer ; an hour 
 of frenzied emotion. And one such hour is enough, 
 with a man of deep, intense, and concentrated feelings, 
 for the gust of passion to subside into the stern calmness 
 of resolve. The soldier who was sent to summon him to 
 the mess-table reported that Major Greyslaer's quarters 
 were vacant. The soldier had passed the major's servant 
 on his way thither to pack up and put away his things, as 
 if his master were likely to be long absent. The servant 
 himself came the next moment to say, that his master, 
 being suddenly called away from the post, would not dine 
 with the mess that day. His brother officers, though 
 knowing that their popular comrade had lately received 
 a long-expected furlough, were still surprised at this ab 
 rupt departure ; and one or two of them left their seats 
 and hurried out to the stables. Greyslaer stood there 
 with a cloak and valise over his arm, superintending in 
 person the equipment of his horse for a long journey. His 
 cheek was pale, his eye looked sunken, and his aspect 
 altogether was that of one who had for the first time ven 
 tured forth after a long and serious illness ; yet there was 
 no fever about his eyes ; they were rather, indeed, dull, 
 cold, and glassy. 
 
 The officers, who simultaneously uttered a cry of sur 
 prise at the strange alteration in the appearance of their 
 friend since the morning, were they hardly knew why 
 instantly silenced by Greyslaer's manner as he turned 
 round to answer their salutation. They had come there, 
 impelled by motives of friendly curiosity, to ask why he 
 broke away so suddenly from their society. They now 
 stood as if they had forgotten their errand ; mute lookers- 
 on, whom some mvsterious influence withheld from ex-
 
 A ROMANCE OF THE MOHAWK. 455 
 
 pressing their emotions even by a sympathetic glance with 
 each other. When all was ready, Greyslaer threw him 
 self into the saddle, murmured something about his having 
 already taken his leave of the colonel, and, as the two 
 officers thought they remembered afterward, left some 
 words of kind farewell for others of the mess. But the 
 ghastly appearance of Greyslaer, the icy coldness of the 
 hand he gave them to shake, and his strangely unnatural 
 and statue-like appearance as he slowly moved off unat 
 tended, struck a chilling amazement into the hearts of his 
 friends, that left them perfectly stupefied for the moment. 
 They had broken away from the table to take a cordial 
 farewell of one whose generous, soldierly temperament, 
 not less than his brilliant social qualities, had made him 
 the pride and delight of the mess. The marble figure 
 with which they but now parted wore, indeed, the linea 
 ments of their friend, but was a perfect stranger to their 
 hearts. The very voice, they swore, never did belong to 
 Max Greyslaer. As for the soldiers, many of whom were 
 recruited from among the superstitious Scotch and Ger 
 man settlers of the neighboring mountains, they fully be 
 lieved that some evil spirit of the heathenish Indians had 
 wrought this sudden and mysterious change in the whole 
 look and bearing of their favorite officer ; and, alas ! it 
 was but too true that the direst of pagan deities had taken 
 up her abode in the heart of Max Greyslaer. 
 
 In the mean time, the horseman who furnished so earn 
 est a theme for those whom he had left behind, slowly but 
 steadily pursued his journey. His horse, from the regular, 
 mechanical gait he adopted, seemed to know that a long 
 road was before him. The patient roadster and his mo 
 tionless rider were long seen from the battlements of Fort
 
 556 GREYSLAER; 
 
 Stanwix, though the evening shadows of the adjacent 
 woods snatched them more than once from view before 
 they finally glided like an apparition into the silent forest. 
 
 There was no moon, but the stars shone brightly above 
 him as Greyslaer crossed the fatal field of Oriskany. His 
 horse snuffing the air, which, in the warm, moist night of 
 teeming springtime, stole out from the tainted earth, first 
 reminded him of the scene of slaughter over which he 
 was riding. He passed the tree beneath which the remains 
 of DeRoos had been laid. He did not shudder. He gave 
 no tear to the recollection of the past, neither did one 
 thought arise to rebuke the memory of his early friend for 
 present sorrows. He did not even envy him the repose of 
 his woodland grave. He only looked coldly upon the spot 
 as a mere landmark of Fate, where one breathing being, 
 warm with life and intelligence, had found his allotted 
 bourne ; and why ponder upon a doom common to all 
 fixed, predetermined, and to which he himself, as he be 
 lieved, was then moving at such a cold, passionless pace ? 
 
 It was long after midnight before Greyslaer halted, and 
 it was then only for the purpose of refreshing his steed. 
 The dawn found him again upon his journey, and, by 
 changing his horse for a fresher one, he reached the 
 Hawksnest before evening. His original determination 
 led him direct to Albany, where Bradshawe was still un 
 der durance ; but when he found himself in the neighbor 
 hood of his homestead, and obliged to halt for a few hours 
 from the impossibility of getting another relay, he felt 
 himself irresistibly prompted to make a secret visit to the 
 premises. He did not intend to have an interview with 
 A.lida, but he must look upon the house which held her. 
 
 He approached the domain, and all was silent. It was
 
 A ROMANCE OF THE MOHAWK. 457 
 
 too early yet, perhaps, for lights to show through the case 
 ment ; but, if there had been any there, Greyslaer could 
 not have seen them, for every shutter was closed. 
 There was no smoke from the chimneys, around which the 
 swallows clustered, as huddling there to an unmolested 
 roost. Max had never seen the home of his fathers look 
 so desolate. With quickening pace he advanced to the 
 hall door and tried the latch ; but in vain, for the bolts had 
 been drawn within. He knocked, and the sound came 
 hollowly to his ears, as we always fancy it does from an un- 
 tenanted mansion. He walked to the end of the verandah, 
 and, glancing rapidly round among the outhouses, which 
 stood off at one wing of the main building, observed some 
 poultry at roost among a cluster of pear and locust trees 
 which nearly encircled the kitchen. Their presence sug 
 gested him to apply to the only spot where these feathered 
 dependants could now look for their food. He approached 
 the kitchen a small, Dutch-built building of brick and 
 rapped against the window before trying the door. A 
 gray-headed negress, protruding her head through a nar 
 row window in one of the gables, at length greeted his 
 ears with the sound of a human voice. 
 
 " Who's dere ?" she cried, in a quick tone of alarm. 
 
 "It is I Master Max, Dinah." 
 
 " Lorrah, massy, be't you for sartain, or only your 
 spook ?" 
 
 " No spook, my good Dinah, but my living self. Come 
 down and let me in." 
 
 " Me mighty glad to see you, massy," said the negress, 
 lighting a candle, after she had unbolted the door to Grey 
 slaer ; " for Dinah go to bed when they leib her all alone, 
 so that she not see the spook. But. Lorrah, Mass Max,
 
 458 GREYSLAER; 
 
 how berry old he look. He pale, too, as spook," added 
 the slave, shading the candle partly with her hand as she 
 peered into her young master's features. 
 
 " But where are all my people ? Where is Miss " 
 
 "De boys all de boys, massy, has gone to de village to 
 hold a corn-dance for seed-time. De house-keeper, you 
 know, lib at de oberseer's down in the lane eber since she 
 shut up the great house after Miss Alida went away." 
 
 "And where has Miss Alida gone?" said Greyslaer, 
 with unnatural calmness, as he caught hold of the back of 
 a chair to steady himself; for, of a truth, he for a moment 
 feared that Alida, stung to madness by the cruel nature of 
 her sorrows, might have hurried upon some tragic fate, he 
 scarcely knew what. 
 
 The answer of the old servant took an instant load from 
 his bosom. Miss Alida, she said, had taken the little boy 
 with her and gone to Albany near a month since. " She 
 grew thin and looked mighty sorrowful before she went, 
 and it made our hearts bleed to see her, Mass Max," said the 
 faithful black ; " and, though we were all cast down like 
 when we saw her pack up her things to go away, yet we 
 thought it might be better for young missus to go where 
 there were more white folks to cheer her up." 
 
 Greyslaer made no answer, but, asking for the key of 
 the house, lighted a stable-lantern, and telling Dinah that 
 he should not want her attendance, entered the deserted 
 house. He gained the parlor, which had beheld the last 
 ill-omened parting of the lovers, so sad yet so sweet with 
 al. The room looked much the same as when last he left 
 it, save that there were no fresh-gathered flowers upon the 
 mantel-piece, and some few slight articles belonging to 
 Alida had been removed. He placed the lantern upon a
 
 A ROMANCE OF THE MOHAWK. 459 
 
 _ . 
 
 table and opened its door ; for the flickering light, dancing 
 upon one or two portraits with which the walls were 
 hung, gave them a sort of fitful life that was aanoying. 
 He wished to renlize fully that he was alone. He looked 
 around to see if there were no memento or trace of the 
 last hours which Alida had passed in the same chamber. 
 A little shawl, thrown carelessly across the arm of a sofa, 
 met his eye. He took it up, looked at it, and knew it to 
 be Alida's. It had probably been flung there and forgot 
 ten in the hasty moment of departure. Greyslaer had 
 never been what, in modern parlance, is called " a lady's 
 man ;" and though he could sometimes tell one article of 
 dress from another, he was wholly unskilled in the effemi 
 nate knowledge and toilet-like arts which distinguish that 
 enviable class of our sex. It was curious, therefore, to 
 see him stand and fold this scarf with the utmost nicety 
 and neatness. He handled it, indeed, like something pre 
 cious ; and, from the delicacy with which he pressed it to 
 his lips before placing it in his bosom, he seemed to imag 
 ine the senseless fabric imbued with life ; but all his mo 
 tions now were like those of one who moves in a dream. 
 
 At last he took up the lantern to retire from the apart 
 ment, so desolate in itself, yet peopled with so many haunt 
 ing memories. A letter, which had been unobserved when 
 he placed it there, lay beneath it. Max read the super 
 scription ; it was addressed to himself, and in the hand 
 writing of Alida. He broke the seal, and read as follows : 
 
 "You will probably, before reading this, have surmised 
 the cause why I have withdrawn from beneath a roof 
 which has never sheltered dishonor. Oh ! my friend if 
 so the wretched Alida may still call you you cannot 
 dream of what I have suffered while delaying the execu-
 
 460 GREYSLAER; 
 
 tion of a step which I believe to be due alike to you and 
 to myself; but the state of my health would not sooner 
 admit of putting my determination into execution, and I 
 knew there would be full time for me to retire before you 
 could come back to assume the government of your house 
 hold. That determination is never to see you more. Yes, 
 Greyslaer, we are parted, and for ever. The meshes of 
 villainy which have been woven around me it is impossible 
 to disentangle. My woman's name is blasted beyond all 
 hope of retrieval, and yours shall never be involved in its 
 disgrace. I ask you not to believe me innocent. I have 
 no plea, no proof to offer. I submit to the chastening hand 
 of Providence. I make no appeal to the love whose tried 
 and generous offices might mitigate this dreadful visitation. 
 I would have you think of me and my miserable concerns 
 no more. God bless you, Max ! God bless and keep you ; 
 keep you from the devices of a proud and arrogant spirit, 
 which Heaven, in its wisdom, hath so severely scourged 
 in me ; keep you from that bitterest of all reflections, the 
 awful conviction that your rebellious heart has fully mer 
 ited the severest judgment of its Maker. God bless and 
 keep you, dearest, dearest Max. A. D. R." 
 
 The features of Greyslaer betrayed no emotion as he 
 read this letter the first, the second, and even the third 
 time, for thrice did he peruse it before he became fully 
 master of its contents; and even then, from the vacant 
 gaze which he fixed upon its characters, it would seem as 
 if his mind were by no means earnestly occupied with 
 what it contained. He laid it down upon the table, paced 
 to and fro leisurely through the chamber, paused, took up 
 some trivial article from the mantelpiece, examined it, and 
 replaced it as carefully as if his thoughts were intent only
 
 A ROMANCE OF THE MOHAWK. 461 
 
 upon the trifles of the moment. He returned to the table, 
 yet again took up the letter, and slightly shivering as he 
 came to the close of it, turned his eyes upward, while the 
 paper, which he held at arm's length, trembled in his hands, 
 as if he were suddenly seized with an ague-fit. " God of 
 Heaven !" he cried, " I cannot, I dare not pray ; yet thou 
 only " he paused, and shuddered still more frightfully, as 
 his lips seemed almost unwittingly about to syllable the 
 prayerful thoughts which, rising from a heart tenanted 
 as his was by a murderer's vow, would be a mockery, an 
 insult to Heaven. Tears the first resource of woman, 
 the last relief of man burst that moment from his eyes, 
 and alleviated a struggle so powerful as to threaten instant 
 madness to its half-convulsed subject. The sufferer buried 
 his face in his hands, and, throwing himself on the sofa, 
 wept long and passionately. Let no man sneer at his 
 weakness, unless he has once loved as did Greyslaer ; un 
 less that love has been blasted as his was ; unless he has 
 felt himself the victim of an iron destiny, when the heart, 
 softened by years of unchanging tenderness, was least fit 
 ted to bear up under the doom to which he must yield ! 
 Greyslaer knew the singular firmness, the inflexible deter 
 mination of Alida's character. He believed, as she did, 
 that it was now impossible to wipe away the reproach 
 that attached to her name. She had declared her resolu 
 tion. He felt that he would see her no more. 
 
 And was there, then, it may be asked, no doubt in the 
 mind of Max, no shadowy but still poignant doubt, no 
 latent and subtle suspicion of the truth of his mistress ? 
 No momentary weighing of testimony as to what might 
 be the real circumstances of Alida's story ? 
 
 Not one ! even for a moment not one disloyal thought
 
 462 GREYSLAER; 
 
 to the majesty of her virtue ; not one blaspheming doubt 
 to the holiness of her truth ; no, never never for the 
 breath of an instant, had an unhallowed suspicion of Ali- 
 da's maiden purity crossed the mind of her lover ! Grey- 
 slaer himself was all truth and nobleness ! How could so 
 mean and miserable a thought have found entrance into a 
 soul like his, regarding one as high-strung as itself, and 
 with which it had once mingled in full and rich accord ? 
 Besides, the love of a feeling and meditative mind ; the 
 love that, born in youth, survives through the perilous 
 trials of early manhood, with all the warm yet holy flush 
 of its dawn tincturing its fondness, and all the soberer and 
 fuller light of its noontide testing without impairing its 
 esteem such a love becomes as much a part of a man's 
 nature, mingles as intimately with his being, as the very 
 life-blood that channels through his veins ; and to doubt 
 the purity of her who inspires it were as deathful as to 
 admit a poison into the vital fluids of his system. Such 
 love may languish in hopelessness, may wither in despair, 
 may die at last like the winter-starved bird of Indian 
 fable, who melted into a song, which, they say, is still 
 sometimes heard in his accustomed haunts but it never 
 can admit one moment's doubt of the worthiness of its ob 
 ject. 
 
 The gush of passionate emotion to which the unhappy 
 Max had abandoned himself, had at last its end. And as 
 these were the first tears which he had shed in years 
 for his frenzied ravings in the hour when he first received 
 the cruel blow to his happiness had had no such relief 
 they were followed by a calmness of mind far more natu 
 ral than that which he had recently known. Even the 
 old negress, who had sat up watching for him, pipe in
 
 A ROMANCE OF THE MOHAWK. 463 
 
 mouth, by the kitchen fire, where she had raked a few 
 embers together, could not but observe the difference in 
 his appearance while commenting upon the fixed air of 
 sadness which her young master still wore. Greyslaer, 
 who, even at such a time, was not forgetful of the humble 
 dependants upon his bounty, handed the old woman a few 
 shillings to replenish her store of tobacco, the only luxury 
 left to her age and infirmity ; and, leaving a trifle or two 
 for the other servants, took a kind leave of old Dinah, and 
 returned to the inn where he had left his horse. The 
 gray of the morning found him once more upon the road ; 
 and before sunset the spires of Schenectady, the last vil 
 lage he was to pass through before reaching Albany, rose 
 to his view. But we must now leave him to look after 
 other personages of our story.
 
 464 GREYSLAER; 
 
 CHAPTER II. 
 
 THE NIGHT ATTEMPT. 
 
 ' This rope secures the boat. Be still, 
 Though sounds should rise the heart to chill 
 If coming feet should meet thine ear, 
 And I am silent, do not fear ; 
 For I've another task in view." 
 
 J. K. MITCHELL. 
 
 WALTER BRADSHAWE, whose long incarceration at Al 
 bany has been already commemorated, had, through the 
 intercession of friends and the clemency of those in power, 
 been transferred from the common jail of the town where 
 he was first imprisoned, to a sort of honorary durance in 
 the guarded chamber of an ordinary dwelling-house. 
 
 The building in which he was now confined was situated 
 near the water-side, in the upper part of the town, having 
 a garden in the rear running down to the quay. The room 
 appropriated to Bradshawe was in the second story, at the 
 back of the house, and immediately at the head of the first 
 flight of stairs. At the foot of this staircase, and within 
 a few yards of the outer door, which opened upon the 
 street, was posted a sentinel. 
 
 As month after month flew by, and still greater indul 
 gences were granted to Bradshawe with the prolongation 
 of his imprisonment, the duty of this sentinel became at
 
 A ROMANCE OF THE MOHAWK. 465 
 
 last so much a matter of mere form, that it was customary 
 often to place a new recruit with a musket in his hands in 
 the place which was, in the first instance, occupied by 
 some veteran soldier of trust and confidence. This re 
 laxation of vigilance was, of course, not unobserved by 
 the friends of the prisoner, if, in fact, it was not procured 
 by their agency; and, upon intelligence being conveyed 
 to Valtmeyer how things were situated, he immediately 
 planned the escape of Bradshawe, and selected a shrewd 
 and trusty follower (an old acquaintance of the reader) 
 to assist him in the project. 
 
 Syl Stickney, therefore, according to previous arrange 
 ment, succeeded in making his way into the city of Albany 
 in the guise of a Helderberg peasant ; and, after lounging 
 about the streets for a few days, he allowed himself to be 
 picked up by a sergeant's patrol, and carried to a recruit 
 ing station, where, without much difficulty, he was per 
 suaded to enlist in the patriot army. Valtmeyer, in the 
 mean time, hovered around the outskirts of the town, and 
 was advised of all Stickney's movements through the 
 agency of several disaffected persons of condition, who, 
 though in secret among the most active partisans of the 
 royal cause, still kept up appearances sufficiently to enjoy 
 an easy position in society, and who had almost daily ac 
 cess to the prisoner upon the mere footing of former 
 general acquaintance. 
 
 Many days had not passed before the Helderberg recruit 
 was placed as sentinel before the door of Bradshawe's 
 quarters, and it was easily ascertained when his tour of 
 4uty would come round a second time. Valtmeyer was 
 on the alert to avail himself of the opportunity. 
 
 Entering the city of Albany by the southern suburbs, 
 21
 
 466 GREYSLAER; 
 
 this daring partisan succeeded one night in throwing him 
 self, with a party of followers as desperate as himself, into 
 a stable which stood near the edge of the river, where 
 they lay concealed in the hayloft through the whole of the 
 following day. With the approach of the next evening 
 the time fixed upon for the proposed rescue a canoe, pad 
 dled by a single negro, crept along the bank of the river 
 from the islands below, and was moored within a few 
 yards of the stable. This canoe was appropriated to the 
 escape of Bradshawe ; but the plotting brain of Valt- 
 meyer, which could not remain idle during the long hours 
 that he was obliged to lie quiet in his lurking-place, con 
 trived a still further use for it. 
 
 The stable in which he chanced to have taken post was 
 situate at the foot of a garden upon the premises occupied 
 by a zealous Whig, and one of the most efficient members 
 of the Albany Council of Safety, being a man, indeed, 
 whose firmness, vigilance, and unwearied activity in the 
 Whig cause made him second only to General Schuyler 
 among the most valuable citizens of Albany in those times. 
 Mr. Taylor for that energetic Revolutionary partisan 
 and subsequently distinguished civilian was the person in 
 question was particularly obnoxious to the Johnson family 
 for the part he had acted in expelling some of its members 
 from the province : and the daring genius of Valtmeyer 
 kindled with the idea of conveying him off a captive to 
 Sir John. In fact, though the success of Bradshawe's 
 escape must be endangered by connecting it with such an 
 attempt, yet Valtmeyer, when, from his lurking-place, he 
 several times throughout the day caught sight of the Whig 
 councillor moving about, unconscious of danger, over his 
 own grounds, could not resist the temptation.
 
 A ROMANCE OF THE MOHAWK. 467 
 
 The famous Joe Bettys, who had associated himself with 
 this expedition, did his best to dissuade his daring comrade 
 from this project until they got the head of Bradshawe 
 fairly out of the lion's mouth ; but Valtmeyer insisted that 
 no time was so fit as the present; for, the moment Brad 
 shawe was missed, such precautions would be taken that 
 they could not venture into so perilous a neighborhood 
 again. He knew, he said, that Bradshawe would damn 
 him if he let such a chance go by. It was agreed, there 
 fore, that Bettys should go alone to guide Bradshawe 
 down to the boat, where Valtmeyer promised that he 
 would meet him with his prisoner when the turning of the 
 tide should enable them to drop down the stream most 
 easily. 
 
 The attempt to seize Mr. Taylor as we know from the 
 annals of the period failed through one of those incidents 
 which, seeming so trivial in themselves, are still so im 
 portant in their consequences that they cannot but be con 
 sidered providential. But the results of that failure are 
 most intimately connected with the course of our story. 
 
 The clock of the old Dutch church which stood in the 
 centre of State street, struck the hour of midnight when 
 Bettys departed to attend to his share in the perilous ope 
 rations of the night. Leaving him, for the present, to 
 make his way to the quarters of Bradshawe. we must in 
 the meanwhile attend to the proceedings of his brother 
 brigand. 
 
 It was the intention of Valtmeyer to effect an entrance 
 into Mr. Taylor's house with as little disturbance as possi 
 ble, and to seize and bear away the master of the house 
 hold to the canoe at the foot of his garden. But, though 
 the family hnd. from appearances, alroady retired for the
 
 468 GREYSLAER; 
 
 night, he meant to defer the attempt until Bettys had made 
 good his retreat to the water-side with Bradshawe. It 
 chanced, however, that scarcely ten minutes after Bettys 
 had left his comrades, their attention was excited by a 
 noise at the door in the rear of the house which precipi 
 tated their movements. 
 
 A chain falling, the clanging of an iron bar, and the 
 grating of a heavy bolt as it was withdrawn, showed that 
 the only door through which they could hope for ingress 
 was guarded and secured by precautions which, though 
 not unusual in private buildings at that period, seem not to 
 have been anticipated by Valtmeyer in the present instance. 
 There was evidently some one about to come out into the 
 yard. Valtmeyer hoped that it might be the councillor 
 himself; if not, he determined, in any event, that the occa 
 sion must not be lost of effecting an entrance through the 
 open door. 
 
 Age or caution seemed to make the forthcoming person 
 very slow in his movements ; but the door moved at last 
 upon its hinges, and the dull light of a stable lantern fall 
 ing across the threshold, revealed only the form of an old 
 black servant, who, with creeping step, was moving for 
 ward into the yard. 
 
 The Tories, thinking the moment for action had arrived, 
 sprang impetuously forward to seize the negro. But, 
 though the sudden rush had nearly effected their object, 
 the movement was premature ; for the negro, startled at 
 the first noise of their onset, dropped his lantern, scuttled 
 back across the threshold, and shot the bolt of the door just 
 as the foremost assailant reached it. Valtmeyer gnashed 
 his teeth with rage as he heard the faithful fellow tugging 
 at the chain and bar, still further to secure it within, while
 
 A ROMANCE OF THE MOHAWK. 469 
 
 his cries at the same time summoned the family to his aid. 
 The next moment there came a pistol-shot from a window ; 
 and the Tories, seeing now that the whole neighborhood 
 would be alarmed, retreated to their boat as rapidly as 
 possible. 
 
 The canoe was easily gained ; but now what to do in 
 the predicament in which he had placed himself puzzled 
 even the fertile brain of Valtmeyer. To remain where 
 he was, exposed all his party to seizure, for the whole town 
 must be alarmed in a very few moments ; yet to depart at 
 once must jeopard, fatally perhaps, the lives of both Brad- 
 shawe and Bettys, not to mention that of the false senti 
 nel, who, it was supposed, would come off with them. 
 Valtmeyer did not hesitate long; and his decision, though 
 attended with no benefit to his absent allies, was still the 
 best that could be made in the premises. He determined to 
 lighten his canoe, and, at the same time, effect a diversion 
 in case of pursuit, by sending all his followers, save him 
 self, to make their retreat along the river's bank by land, 
 in the same way they had entered the town. He then, 
 with wary paddle, commenced creeping along shore up 
 the river, so as to approach the place of Bradshawe's 
 confinement, which was toward the other extremity of the 
 town. 
 
 Let us now follow the doughty Joe Bettys upon his 
 mission. 
 
 The duty of this worthy confrere of Valtmeyer, though 
 perilous, was sufficiently plain. He had only to ascertain 
 that the Tory sentinel was at his post, and make him aware 
 that he himself was near, when Bradshawe, who knew 
 the minutest arrangement of the plot for his relief, would 
 at once emerge from his quarters and follow Bettys' guid-
 
 470 IrREYSLAER: 
 
 ance. Their first movement would be to make for the 
 river; for there lay their means of escape, and there the 
 piles of timber, of which Albany was ever a great mart, 
 afforded the best opportunity for present concealment, if 
 it should be necessary. 
 
 And thus, indeed, every circumstance, like those of a 
 well rehearsed play, might have succeeded each other, 
 were it not for the intrusion of a most unexpected actor 
 upon the scene. 
 
 The first intimation which Bettys had of such interfer 
 ence was from the stupid exclamation of surprise which 
 his appearance drew from the disguised sentinel as he en 
 countered him upon entering the hall. Stickney, who 
 might have just awakened from a nap upon a bench which 
 stood near, was supporting his staggering limbs against the 
 bannister, and seemed to be listening, half awake, to some 
 noise in the room at the head of the stairs. Upon the en 
 trance of Bettys, he turned round sharply, and, catching 
 at his musket, which leaned against the wall, seemed dis 
 posed to dispute the passage with him. 
 
 " Softly, Syl," cried the wary Joe ; " you needn't act 
 the drunken man so far as to run me through by mistake. 
 Why, zounds ! the infernal rascal's dead drunk in earnest ; 
 sewed up completely, by" he added, with an angry oath, 
 as he advanced and collared him. 
 
 * Aint in liquor more than my duty requires," 
 hiccoughed Sylla ; " for didn't I see you with my 
 eyes shut come in that door and go up stairs but ten 
 minutes ago ?" 
 
 " Me me, you lying, drunken rascal ! Saw me ? An 
 swer quickly, or I'll shake the life out of you." 
 
 "If I didn't, may I never touch adropof g>od liquor
 
 A ROMANCE OF THE MOHA'VTK. 471 
 
 again. By Goy !" ejaculated Stickney, finishing his as 
 severations with a stupid stare,"! believe I am drunk; 
 for, if this be raaly Leftenant Joe Bettys, I've seen double 
 at least once to-night. The fellow that went up stair " 
 Bettys waited to hear no more, but hurled his sottish 
 follower from him with a force that sent him reeling to 
 the farther end of the hall. The noise the man made in 
 falling brought the owner of the mansion instantly to his 
 door ; but he only opened it far enough to thrust out his 
 head, and cast a furtive and anxious glance at Bettys as 
 the latter rushed up the stairs, when, seeming to think for 
 the moment that all was right, he drew back and locked 
 his apartment. And we too must now leave Bettys upon 
 the threshold of Bradshawe's room, to look after another 
 of those who were most deeply concerned in the deeds 
 of this eventful night.
 
 472 GEEYSLAEB; 
 
 CHAPTER III. 
 
 T HE RENCONTRE. 
 
 ' Ay, curse him but keep 
 
 The poor boon of his breath 
 Till he sigh for the sleep 
 
 And the quiet of death ! 
 Let a viewless one haunt him 
 
 With whisper and jeer, 
 And an evil one daunt him 
 "With phantoms of fear." 
 
 WHITTIER. 
 
 IT chanced, then, that, in the very hour appointed for 
 carrying into execution the bold project which we have 
 thus far traced, Max Greyslaer, bent on his errand of 
 murderous vengeance, entered the city of Albany by the 
 Schenectady road, and, leaving his horse at a wagoner's 
 inn in the suburbs, penetrated on foot into the heart of the 
 town. He had possessed himself, while at Schenectady, 
 of every particular relating to the place of Bradshawe's 
 imprisonment, and of the nature of the guard that was 
 kept over him ; and fevered with impatience to accomplish 
 the one fatal object which had brought him hither, he pro 
 ceeded at once to reconnoitre the prisoner's quarters. 
 Greyslaer, in all his movements that night, acted like one 
 who was impelled in a dream by some resistless power
 
 A ROMANCE OF T.HE MOHAWK. 473 
 
 within him ; and he was spell-bound if the icy wand of 
 demon passion hath aught in it of magic power above the 
 human heart. 
 
 He approached the house, and discovered, by the glim 
 mer of a dull lamp within the entry, that the street door 
 was ajar. He reached the door itself, and, opening it still 
 further with a cautious hand, beheld the sentinel stretched 
 upon a bench in the hall, and snoring so obstreperously, 
 that, if his slumbers were not feigned, they must be the 
 effect of deep intoxication. An empty flagon, which lay 
 on the floor just where it had rolled from the drunken hand 
 of the sleeper, seemed sufficiently to prove that the latter 
 must be the case ; and, indeed, we may here mention, in 
 passing, that Stickney, who played the part of the Helder- 
 berg recruit so successfully, subsequently escaped the ex 
 treme penalty of military law by pleading that his neglect 
 of duty arose from intoxication produced by a drugged 
 mixture administered by the family upon whom the 
 prisoner and his sentinel were alike quartered their real 
 connivance in the escape of Bradshawe being known only 
 to Stickney's superiors. 
 
 Greyslaer paused a moment to discover if there were 
 no greater obstacle to his ingress to the premises than 
 those which had hitherto presented themselves. Sud 
 denly he heard a step in the room nearest to the street 
 door ; it showed that the family which occupied the lower 
 floor of the house had not yet retired. Greyslaer started 
 slightly, (did the guilty soul of a murderer make him thus 
 tremulous ?) and, turning round at the noise, the scabbard 
 of his sword rattled against the bench whereon reposed 
 the sleeping soldier. A light flashed momentarily through 
 21*
 
 474 GREYSLAER; 
 
 the keyhole of the door opposite ; and then, as it was 
 straightway extinguished, all became still as before. 
 
 Had Max's mind not been wholly preoccupied by one 
 subject, his suspicions must now have been fully aroused, 
 that the occupants of the mansion were quietly colluding 
 in the escape of the prisoner. But now he had ascended 
 the staircase, and, pausing yet a moment to loosen his ra 
 pier in its sheath, he gave a low tap at the door of the 
 room in which Bradshawe was quartered. 
 
 " Enter, my trusty Joseph, most adroit and commend 
 able of burglars," said Bradshawe, scarcely looking up 
 from the table at which he was writing by the fickle light 
 of a shabby taper. " Hold on but a single instant, Bet 
 tys," he continued ; " I am only scratching off some lines 
 to exculpate my worthy host from any share in this night's 
 business, in case the wise rebels should think fit to seize 
 him. There, ' Walter Bradshawe,' that signature will be 
 worth something to an autograph-hunter some of these 
 days ; and now " 
 
 "And now," echoed a voice near him, in tones so freez 
 ing, that even the heart of Bradshawe was chilled within 
 him at the sound ; "and now prepare yourself for a mis 
 creant's death upon this very instant." 
 
 Bradshawe looked up in stupefied amazement. 
 
 " Do you know me, Walter Bradshawe ?" cried Grey- 
 slaer, raising his hat from his brow, and making a stride 
 toward the table. 
 
 4i We're blown, by G d !" ejaculated the captive Tory. 
 " Know you ? to be sure I do. You're the rebel Grey- 
 si aer, who, having got wind of this night's attempt, have 
 come mousing here after further evidence to hang me. 
 But you'll find it devilish hard to prove that I meant to
 
 A ROMANCE OF THE MOHAWK. 475 
 
 abuse the clemency of Lafayette," added the prisoner, 
 tearing to pieces the note he had just written. 
 
 " I come on no such business," said Greyslaer, smiling 
 bitterly. " I come " 
 
 " And if you are not here in an official capacity, sir, 
 how dare you intrude into my private chambers ?" cried 
 Bradshawe, springing to his feet and confronting Max 
 with a look of brutal insolence. 
 
 " Bradshawe, you cannot distemper me by such a tone 
 of insult. Your own heart must suggest the errand which 
 brought me hither." (The countenance of Bradshawe for 
 the first time fell.) " I might have slain you as I entered ; 
 murdered you as you sat but now with your eyes bent 
 upon the paper that you have since torn ; but my ven 
 geance were incomplete, unless you knew by whose hand 
 you fell." 
 
 The passionless, icy tone in which Greyslaer spoke, 
 seemed to unnerve even the iron heart of Bradshawe. 
 He tried to return the steadfast gaze of that fixed and 
 glassy eye, but his glances involuntarily wandered, his 
 cheek grew pale, his -soul wilted before the marble looks 
 of his mortal foe. "He must have the strength as well 
 as the look of a maniac," he murmured, catching at the 
 back of a chair which stood near him whether to seize it 
 as a weapon of defence or merely to steady himself by 
 its support, we know not. But Max seemed to put the 
 last construction upon the act, as, with a discordant laugh, 
 he cried, 
 
 " Aha ! he shrinks then, this truculent scoundrel " 
 
 " I'm unarmed, I'm defenceless a prisoner. If it's sat 
 isfaction you seek of me, Major Greyslaer," cried Brad-
 
 476 GREYSLAER; 
 
 shawe, hurriedly, as, holding the chair before him, he 
 backed toward a corner of the apartment 
 
 " Satisfaction, felon ?" thundered Max, interrupting the 
 appeal by springing furiously across the room. The 
 strength of Bradshawe seemed to wither beneath the 
 touch of the icy fingers that were instantly planted in his 
 throat. "Oh! felon damned felon! what satisfaction 
 can you make to man to God, for driving me to an ac 
 cursed deed like this?" 
 
 His sword leaped from its scabbard as he spoke, and 
 Bradshawe involuntarily closed his eyes as the gleaming 
 blade seemed about to be sheathed in his bosom. 
 
 But suddenly the hand of Greyslaer was arrested by 
 an iron grip from behind ; he turned to confront the as 
 sailant who had thus seized him, when Bradshawe, quickly 
 recovering himself, dealt a blow with the chair of which 
 he had not yet released his hold a blow that brought 
 Greyslaer instantly to the ground. Wounded, but not 
 stunned, Max quickly regained his feet, and made a pass 
 at the intruder, which only inflicted a slight flesh wound, 
 but not before Bradshawe had thrown open a window, 
 through which, followed by Bettys, he leaped upon a shed 
 and dropped into the garden below. Greyslaer hesitated 
 not to follow ; but the mutual assistance which the fugi 
 tives rendered each other, enabled them to scale the 
 garden-wall more quickly than their pursuer, and their 
 receding forms were swallowed up in the surrounding 
 darkness, before Greyslaer had gained the quay to which 
 they had retreated. 
 
 The reviving air of night, the inspiring consciousness 
 of freedom after so long incarceration, brought back at 
 once to Bradshawe his wonted energy and hardihood
 
 A ROMANCE OF THE MOHAWK. 477 
 
 of character ; and when Bettys provided him with a 
 weapon to use in any extremity to which they might 
 be reduced in accomplishing the final steps of their es 
 cape, the bold Tory could scarcely resist the impulse to 
 turn back and take signal vengeance upon the man who 
 had momentarily humbled his haughty spirit ; but every 
 instant was precious, and the fugitives paused not in 
 making their way to the point where they expected to 
 find Valtmeyer's boat waiting them. 
 
 They followed down the water's edge nearly to State 
 street, as it is now called, and must have been within a 
 few hundred yards of the canoe for the garden of Mr. 
 Taylor, near which it was moored, lay close upon the 
 south side of this broad avenue when suddenly the re 
 port of a pistol fired from the house arrested their steps. 
 
 They faltered and turned back. Bradshawe, hurriedly 
 telling his companion to leave him to his fate, turned the 
 angle of a street, and struck up from the river toward the 
 heart of the town. He approached Market street, which 
 runs parallel with the Hudson, and, hearing the tramp of 
 an armed patrol upon its side-walks, concealed himself 
 behind a bale of merchandise, which afforded the only 
 shelter near. It seemed an age before the city guard had 
 passed by ; and Bettys, who, in the mean time, had thrid- 
 ded the piles of staves and lumber upon the quay, and 
 visited the place where he expected to find the canoe, 
 returned to Bradshawe's side just as the patrol had passed 
 the head of the street, and whispered that the boat was 
 gone. Not an instant was to be lost if they would now 
 make their way to the suburbs, through which was their 
 only hope of escape into the open country beyond. They 
 crossed Market street though at the widest part fled
 
 478 ' GREYSLAER; 
 
 up the dark and narrow passage of Maiden Lane, and 
 gained the outskirts of the town near the top of the hill, 
 where the old jail, till within a few years, stood frowning. 
 The sight of the grated cells in which he had been im 
 mured for so many long months, lent new life to the 
 exertions of Bradshawe ; and, with the agile Bettys, he 
 soon reached the nodding forests, which at that time still 
 in broad patches crowned the heights in the rear of the 
 ancient city of Albany. 
 
 Let us now return to Greyslaer, whom we left groping 
 his way among the midnight shadows upon the river's 
 bank when the fugitives escaped from his pursuit, and flit 
 ted along the water-side while he was scaling the walls 
 of the garden. 
 
 The escape of Bradshawe, under all the circumstances 
 which attended his imprisonment, wrought up his pursuer 
 to a pitch of frenzy that completely bewildered him. It 
 was not merely that he was thus foiled in his meditated 
 vengeance on the instant when the cruel slanderer of Alida 
 seemed placed by fate completely in his hands, but the 
 idea that Bradshawe should make good his retreat within 
 the lines of the royalists, and thus triumphantly leave the 
 stigma which he had planted to work its dire conse 
 quences, when he himself was secure and far away from 
 his victims, made Greyslaer frantic ; and Max, scarce 
 knowing whither he hurried or what he could hope for in 
 this wild pursuit, darted hither and thither amid the laby 
 rinth of lumber which was heaped up along all the busy 
 quays of Albany. 
 
 Now it chanced that, at the very moment that Bettys 
 was, with whispered curses, deploring to Bradshawe the 
 absence of the canoe, upon which the safety of all seemed
 
 A ROMANCE OF THE MOHAWK. 479 
 
 to depend, Valtmeyer, whom the intervening piles of 
 boards upon the shore had alone screened from the view 
 of Bettys, was stealthily gliding around the head of the 
 pier at the foot of the street where the two fugitives had 
 halted until the patrol should pass by. The outlaw, too, 
 as well as they, heard the tramp of armed men in the 
 silent streets of the city ; and, pausing for a moment until 
 the sounds of alarm swept further toward the northern 
 part of the town, he plied his paddle with fresh industry 
 until he could run his shallop into a slip or dock near the 
 foot of the garden where Max had first lost sight of the 
 fugitives. Here he landed, in the hope of still being in 
 time to prevent Bradshawe and his comrade from seeking 
 the boat at a point further down the quay, and taking them 
 off from the shore the moment they should make good 
 their escape from the rear of the house. 
 
 In the mean time, the darkness of the night, and the 
 other obstructions to pursuit already mentioned, soon cut 
 short the frantic search of Greyslaer, who, emerging from 
 the heavy shadows of the place, thought that he again had 
 caught sight of the fugitives as Valtmeyer suddenly con 
 fronted him in his path. 
 
 " Dunder und blixem, capting, I was afeard you were a 
 goon coon, and was on the point of shoving off without 
 you. Where's Bettys ? We must be off in haste ! A 
 rebel luderf" he exclaimed, as Max sprang forward and 
 attempted to collar him. " Der Henker schlag herein ! 
 The hangman strikes in it, but Red Wolfert's rope is not 
 yet spun." 
 
 And, muttering thus, the giant, quick as light, shook off 
 the grasp of the young officer, and leaping backward a 
 pace or two, presented a pistol at his head.
 
 480 GREYSLAER; 
 
 " Miss me, you scoundrel, and your fate is certain," 
 cried the undaunted Max ; but Valtmeyer had no idea of 
 further compromising the escape of himself and his friends 
 by the report of arms at such a moment ; and, seeing that 
 the attempt to awe his foeman into silence had failed, he 
 drew his hanger and rushed upon Greyslaer ; the sword 
 of Max was already out, and the ruffian strength of Valt 
 meyer found an admirable match in the skill, the steadi 
 ness, and alertness of movement of his opponent, though 
 the darkness amid which they fought deprived Greyslaer 
 of much of his superiority as a fencer. 
 
 Thrice did the outlaw attempt, by beating down the 
 guard of his opponent, to fling his huge form upon Max 
 and bear him to the earth; and thrice did the sword of 
 Greyslaer drink the blood of the brawny borderer as he 
 thus essayed a death-grapple with his slender foe. 
 
 And now Greyslaer, who had hitherto yielded ground 
 before the furious onslaught of the other, began to press 
 him backward foot by foot, until the edge of the quay, 
 upon which Valtmeyer stood, permitted him to retreat no 
 further. He ground his outlandish oaths more savagely 
 between his teeth as he felt his life-blood failing him, and, 
 conscious that his hour had come, seemed bent alone upon 
 bearing his gallant foeman with him to destruction. He 
 heard the sullen dashing of the waves at his feet, and 
 glared furtively around ; whether from now first realizing 
 the double danger near, or to distract for a moment the 
 attention of his antagonist, it mattered not ; for now, 
 quickly dropping his weapon, he sprang forward and 
 clutched Max in his arms in the same moment that a final 
 thrust passed through his own body. The wound was 
 mortal, but still the bold outlaw struggled. He had borne
 
 A ROMANCE OF THE MOHAWK. 481 
 
 his foeman to the ground, and, pierced through as he was, 
 with the steel still quivering in his vitals, he floundered with 
 his grappled burden toward the water's edge. The life 
 of Greyslaer hung upon a hair, as with knee planted 
 against the breast of Valtmeyer and one hand at his throat, 
 he clung with the other to the topmost timber of the 
 pier ; when, suddenly, the mortal grip of the dying ruf 
 fian was relaxed. There was a heavy plashing in the 
 dark-rolling river, and now its current swept away the 
 gory corse of Valtmeyer. 
 
 But the perils of this eventful night were not yet over 
 for Max Greyslaer. 
 
 The town, as we have already noted, had been alarmed 
 by the scene near Mr. Taylor's premises, and the streets 
 were now patrolled in every direction, either by a military 
 guard or by the bold burghers, who rushed armed from 
 their houses at the first sound of danger. Amid the ex 
 citement of a fight so desperate, neither Max nor his re 
 doubted foe had noticed the turmoil that was rising near. 
 But the clashing of their swords had not escaped the ears 
 of the patrol, who hurried toward the spot whence came 
 the sounds just as the conflict was terminating; Greyslaer 
 had scarcely regained his feet before he was in the hands 
 of the guard a prisoner.
 
 482 GREYSLAER; 
 
 CHAPTER IV. 
 
 THE DUNGEON T E X A N T . 
 
 ' Daughter of grief! thy spirit moves 
 In every whL-tling win-. I that roves 
 
 Across my prison grates. 
 
 It bids my soul majestic bear, 
 
 And with its sister spirit soar 
 
 Aloft to Heaven's gates." 
 
 J. 0. BEAUCIIAMP. 
 
 MAX GREYSLAER the tenant of a dungeon? and placed 
 there, too, as the murderer of Walter Bradshawe ? It 
 was but too true! The fatality was a strange one; yet 
 there are turns in human destiny far more singular. 
 
 Had Greyslaer been recognized in the moment that, 
 covered with dust and gore, he rose breathless from the 
 embrace of the dying Valtmeyer, and was seized by the 
 party of Whig soldiery, the charges that were that very 
 night preferred against him by the Tory friends of Brad 
 shawe, in order to conceal their share in the escape of 
 that partisan, had never been listened to ; nor could their 
 successful attempt at criminating him have made the head 
 it did. But, now, before the Whig officer could call 
 upon a single friend to identify his character, the suspi- 
 
 * Vi/l" a Winter in the AVeU, vol. ii.
 
 A ROMANCE OF THE MOHAWK. 483 
 
 cion of murder had been fixed upon him, and, by the time his 
 name and rank became known, his enemies were prepared 
 with evidence which made that name a still further proof 
 of his guilt. 
 
 The disaffected family to whose care Bradshawe was 
 intrusted, deposed to the fact of a muffled stranger having 
 passed into his quarters at midnight. The head of the 
 household averred that it was a man of Greyslaer's height < 
 and general appearance. He had heard his step in the 
 entry, unlocked his door, and looked out to see who it 
 might be ; but the stranger having already reached the 
 staircase and begun ascending, his face was averted from 
 deponent, who could see only the general outline of the 
 stranger's figure. The deponent did not call upon the 
 stranger to stop, nor address him in any way ; for he took 
 it for granted that the stranger had been challenged by 
 the sentinel, and must therefore be provided with a permit 
 or pass to visit the prisoner at that unusual hour. He had 
 himself already retired for the night. The deponent had 
 subsequently heard a tumult, as of men struggling to 
 gether, in the room above. He leaped from his bed, and, 
 hastening to ascend the stairs, stumbled over the sentinel 
 who lay stretched at their foot, as if struck down and 
 stunned a moment before. As he stooped a moment to 
 raise the man, he heard a noise, as of a heavy body falling, 
 in the room above. He hurried onward to the room, but 
 its occupant had already disappeared. There was blood 
 upon the floor ; a broken chair, and other signs of despe 
 rate conflict. A window that looked into the garden stood 
 open, and there was fresh blood upon the window sill. 
 
 Other members of this deponent's family here supplied 
 the next link in the testimony, by stating that they had
 
 484 GREYSLAEK; 
 
 heard the window above them thrown open with violence, 
 and the feet of men trampling rapidly over the shed be 
 neath it, as if one were in ferocious pursuit of the other. 
 
 As for the sentinel, he seemed ready to swear to 
 anything that would get himself out of peril. He could 
 not account for the stranger making his way into the 
 house unnoticed by himself, save by the suspicion that his 
 evening draught must have been drugged by somebody. 
 He certainly was not sleeping upon his post, but his per 
 ceptions were so dulled that he was not aware of the 
 presence of an intruder until he felt himself suddenly 
 struck from behind, and cast nearly senseless upon the 
 ground. But he too, when raised to his feet by the first 
 witness, had followed him to the chamber already de 
 scribed, of whose appearance at the time the former de 
 ponent had given a true description. 
 
 The testimony of the night patrol less willingly given 
 proved the condition in which Greyslaer was found, 
 with dress disordered and bloodstained, as if fresh from 
 some deadly encounter. The marks of blood, too, were 
 found spotted over the timbers of the pier, while the foot 
 prints leading down to the water's edge ; the steps dashed 
 here and there in the blood-besprinkled dust ; the light soil 
 beaten down and flattened in one place, and scattered in 
 others, as if some heavy body had been drawn across it 
 all marked the spot as the scene of some terrible strug 
 gle, whose catastrophe the black-rolling waves at hand 
 might best reveal. 
 
 There was but one circumstance which suggested 
 another agency than that of Greyslaer in the doings of 
 this eventful night, and that was the attack on Mr. Tay 
 lor's premises, which had first alarmed the town. But
 
 A ROMANCE OF THE MOHAWK. 485 
 
 this, again, took place at the opposite side of the city, and 
 could have had no connection with Bradshawe ; for Mr. 
 Taylor's people had seen the ruffians flying off in a con 
 trary direction from that where Bradshawe resided. 
 
 But, then, what motive could have hurried on a man 
 of Greyslaer's habits and condition of life to a deed so foul 
 as that of murder ? 
 
 His habits, his condition ? Why ! was not the supposed 
 murderer no other than the wild enthusiast, who, in some 
 besotted hour of passion, had betrothed himself to the 
 abandoned offcast of an Indian profligate? And had not 
 Bradshawe been compelled, by the venomous assaults 
 which had been made upon his own character, to rip up 
 that hideous story, and publish to the world the infamy of 
 Greyslaer's mistress ? Was it not, too, through the very 
 instrumentality of this unhappy person that Bradshawe's 
 life had, under color of law, been previously endangered ; 
 that the felon charge of acting as a spy had been got up 
 and enforced against the much-injured royalist ? a charge 
 which, even after sentence of death had been pronounced 
 upon the Tory partisan, the stanchest of the faction hesi 
 tated to acknowledge was sufficiently sustained to war 
 rant his execution. No, the murderer of Bradshawe could 
 be no other than the betrothed lover of Alida ! Such was 
 the testimony and such the arguments which had lost 
 Greyslaer his personal liberty, and which now threatened 
 him with a felon's fate upon the scaffold ! 
 
 And where now was that unhappy girl, whose sorrows 
 had so strangely reacted upon her dearest friend ? whose 
 blighted name carried with it a power to blast even the 
 life of her lover ? 
 
 It is the dead hour of midnight, and she has stolen out
 
 486 GREYSLAER; 
 
 from the house of the relative who had given her shelter 
 and privacy, to visit the lonely prisoner in his dungeon. 
 The prisoner starts from his pallet as the door grates on 
 its hinges, and that pale form now stands before him. 
 
 Let the first moments of their meeting be sacred from 
 all human record. It were profane to picture the hal 
 lowed endearments of two true hearts thus tried, thus 
 trusting each other till the last. 
 
 "Oh, Max," murmured Alida, when the first moments 
 of their meeting were over, " oh, how little did I dream, 
 when I wrote that you should see me no more, that love 
 and duty again might lead me to you ; that God's provi 
 dence would place you where no woman's doubt could 
 prevent me from " 
 
 " God's providence ! Speak not those words to me," 
 said Greyslaer, withdrawing from her as if some shudder 
 ing recollection hurried over his soul. 
 
 Alida answered only with a look of perplexed, wildly 
 appealing anxiety ; while the features of her lover became 
 set and moody, as if from some suddenly occurring inter 
 nal consciousness that their identities of sympathy were no 
 longer the same. 
 
 " You loved me once, Alida," said Greyslaer, his stolid 
 look not changing. 
 
 " Oh God ! he's mad, he's mad ! Loved you once, 
 dearest ! When could those days be, time gone by ? 
 Loved you once, Max!" She wept bitterly. 
 
 Greyslaer looked on unmoved. " Was I worthy of 
 your love ? Did my devotion satisfy the imperious needs 
 of a soul like yours ?" he asked with mechanical coldness. 
 
 " Did it satisfy ? Oh Heaven, what means this, Grey 
 slaer? my life, my more than life ! Thou knowest, thou
 
 A ROMANCE OF THE MOHAWK. 487 
 
 knowest thy love has been to me more than fancy had 
 conceived more than hope had whispered. Have I not 
 lived in the atmosphere of thy exhaustless tenderness, 
 when thou wert near; and when defrauded of thee 
 when shut from thy dear presence, has not my spirit still 
 drank from the unfathomable depths of thine? Satisfy? 
 My own, my proud, my noble Greyslaer, is not thy nature 
 as wildly affluent, as burning, as headstrong as my own 
 and have I not witnessed thy high will in curbing it, and 
 then adored thee for thy nobleness ? Loved thee once, 
 Greyslaer ? ever, ever. Thou dost satisfy the restless 
 cravings of thought ; thou dost content the spiritualism of 
 sentiment ; thou dost gratify the dreams of imagination ; 
 thou dost fill the sense of the manly and the beautiful ; thou 
 dost flood with content all yearnings of affection ; all crav 
 ings of tenderness ; all rapturous dreams of sympathy the 
 mightiest ! Thy love not satisfy me, Max ? Oh, if I had 
 died and left this doubt upon thy soul ! this dreadful skep 
 ticism of faith in me and in thyself " and the impassioned 
 being wrung her hands in anguish at the thought she had 
 conjured up ; " but I would not I could not have died 
 without thee, Max. Max, I deceived myself when I left 
 thee. I am a woman, a poor weak woman. I am no 
 heroine at the call of duty, as I thought myself. If not 
 thy wife, thy mistress then, thy thrall ; I would nestle 
 in thy bosom, I would share thy councils, I would comfort, 
 I would sustain thee ; or if not that, I would sit at thy 
 feet, clasp thy dear hand, and look into thy noble face, and 
 read all of heaven there. Thou wert made for worship, 
 for me to worship, and when my heart overflows in its 
 fullness of love for thee, we would kneel down and bless 
 God each for the gift of the other. Speak to me, speak
 
 488 GREYSLAER; 
 
 to me now now, my noble, my beautiful, my grand 
 speak to me, and say thou believest I am so wrapped in 
 thy being I would be absorbed into thy very self. Tell 
 me, oh, tell me, but that my love has been worthy of thine 
 own, as deep, as boundless, as unutterable." 
 
 It was a terrible joy that which thrilled the bosom of 
 that dungeon prisoner as his betrothed the next in 
 stant throbbed against his delirious heart. ButGreyslaer's 
 concentrated passion supplied no terms of rhapsody 
 through which to pour itself. " Alida," said he, speaking 
 at last, and the cold drops stood on his forehead as he 
 pronounced the words, and his voice was hard and husky, 
 as if delivering the doom of his worldly honor " Alida, 
 wert thou as base as Bradshawe \vould make thee out to 
 be, ere accepting my love, mine thou shouldst be mine. 
 I would still uphold thee, peerless in womanhood, oh most 
 angelic in thy devotedness heeding not, believing not, 
 recking not how, or when, or where mine only, mine 
 all thy glorious soul did fall from its appointed sphere of 
 purity and reverence, I would pluck thee from the scorn- 
 ers, and buckler thy name with mine against a world of 
 obloquy most loved, most dear, most radiant one, as 
 Heaven hears me now, I would !" . 
 
 Ashen pale was the cheek of Alida, as thus he spoke. 
 " Thou shouldst NOT, Greyslaer," was her firm reply. 
 " My pride in thee is at the root of all my love. Never 
 shouldst thou bate thine honor one jot to share my sor 
 rows or console me in despair." 
 
 " Honor !" said Max bitterly " Alida, Alida, know you 
 not that, in the eye of Heaven, I am this moment the 
 thing that men would make me out to be ?" 
 
 " Oh, no, no, no !" she shrieked, starting back with fear
 
 A ROMANCE OF THE MOHAWK. 489 
 
 tares which, for a single instant convulsed with horror, 
 were changed to more than woman's tenderness as again 
 she caught the hands of Max in both hers, " you are not, 
 you cannot be a a no, Greyslaer, no, you cannot be 
 a murderer. You fought with him, you met him singly 
 sinfully, in the eye of Heaven, but not with brutal in 
 tent of murder you did in single combat 'twas in a 
 duel he fell." 
 
 " Hear me, hear me, my loved one ; it was " 
 
 " No, no, I will not hear ; I know 'twas so ; and I / 
 was the one whose guilty dream of vengeance first quick 
 ened such intention into being, and sharpened your sword 
 against his life." 
 
 " Alas ! Alida, why torture yourself by recalling the 
 memory of that wild hallucination of your early years ? 
 That shadowy intention of avenging your own wrongs 
 was but the darkly romantic dream of an undisciplined 
 mind preyed upon and perverted by disease and sorrow ; 
 and many a prayerful hour has since atoned to Heaven 
 for those sinful fancies. But my conscience is loaded far 
 more heavily, and with a burden that none can share ; a 
 burden," he added, smiling with strange meaning on his 
 lip, " that mayhap it hardly wishes to shake off." 
 
 " You slew him not at vantage ; he fell not an unresist 
 ing victim to your vengeful passions," gasped Alida. 
 
 " The man that I slew yesternight fell in fair and open 
 fight, Alida. There is no stain upon my soldier's sword 
 for aught that happened then." The words had not 
 passed the lips of her lover ere Alida was on her knees. 
 " Nay," cried Max, catching her clasped hands in his, 
 "blend not my name in your prayer of thankfulness to 
 Heaven ; 'twill weigh it down and keep it from ascend- 
 22
 
 490 GRETSLAER; 
 
 ing ; for, surely as thou kneelest there, I am in heart a 
 murderer. 'Twas Bradshawe's life at which I aimed ; 
 'twas Bradshawe's death, his murder that I sought, when 
 Valtrneyer crossed my path and fairly met the punish 
 ment of his crimes. A mysterious Providence made me 
 the instrument of its justice in exacting retribution from 
 him ; and the same Providence now punishes in me the 
 foul intention which placed me there to do its bidding." 
 
 If there was something of bitterness in the tone in which 
 Max spoke these words, which gave a double character 
 to what he said, Alida did not notice it, as passionately 
 she cried, 
 
 " Kneel, then, Greyslaer, kneel here with me ; kneel in 
 gratitude to the Power that preserved thee from the per 
 petration of this wickedness, and so mysteriously foiled 
 the contrivings of thy heart ; kneel in thankfulness to the 
 chastening hand that hath so soon sent this painful trial 
 to punish this lapse from virtue to purge thy heart from 
 its guilty imaginings ; kneel in prayer that this cloud 
 which we have brought upon ourselves may in Heaven's 
 own time pass away ; or, if not, ITS will be done !" 
 
 " I may not, I cannot kneel, Alida," said Max, in gloomy 
 reply to her impetuous appeal. " No ! though I own 
 the chastening hand which is even now stretched out 
 above me, my heart still refuses to cast out the design 
 that brought me hither. I will not, I must not kneel in 
 mockery to Heaven !" 
 
 " And thou thou wouldst still murder him !" shrieked 
 Alida. 
 
 " Leave me, distract me not thus," cried her agonized 
 Jover, leaning against the wall as if to steady himself, and 
 covering his face with his hands to shut out the earnest 
 gaze she fixed upon him.
 
 A ROMANCE OF THE MOHAWK. 941 
 
 " Speak to me, look at me, Max," implored Alida, in 
 tones of wild anguish, as she sprang forward and caught 
 his arm. " Thou wouldst thou wouldst !" 
 
 A cold shiver seemed to tremble through the frame of 
 her lover ; but his voice, though low and husky, had an 
 almost unearthly calmness in it, as dropping his hands 
 and fixing his looks full upon her, he said, 
 
 " I would, though hell itself were gaping there to swal 
 low both of us ! Hear me, Alida ; it is the hand of Fate 
 it is some iron destiny that works within my heart that 
 knots together and stiffens the damned contrivances it 
 will not forego. Why should I deceive you when I can 
 not deceive myself? Why insult Heaven with this vain 
 lip-worship when no holy thought can inhabit here ? 
 here," he repeated, striking his hand upon his bosom, 
 " here, where one horrid craving rages to consume me 
 the lust of that man's blood !" 
 
 " Oh God ! this is too horrible !" gasped Alida, as, shud 
 dering, she sank upon the prisoner's pallet and buried her 
 face in her hands. 
 
 Max made no movement to raise her, but his was the 
 mournful gaze of the doom -stricken, as, standing aloof, his 
 lips moved with some half-uttered words, which could 
 scarcely have reached the ears of Alida. 
 
 " Weep on," he said, " weep on, my love my first, 
 last, my only love. Those bursting tears do well become 
 her, a child of sorrow from her earliest youth. Those 
 tears ! Mine is not the hand to stay them, mine the heart 
 to mingle with them in sympathetic flow ; for I I can 
 weep no more !" 
 
 " Alida, sweet Alida,'' said he, advancing at last toward 
 her ; " Alida, my best, my loveliest she hears me not ;
 
 492 GREYSLAER; 
 
 she will not listen to me. Oh God ! why shudder you so, 
 and withdraw your hand from my touch ?" 
 
 But Alida has sprung to her feet, has dashed the tears 
 from her eyes, and her clear voice thrills in the ears of 
 her lover as thus she speaks to him : 
 
 " Hear me, Greyslaer : 'twas I first infused these fell 
 thoughts into your bosom ; 'twas I, in the besotted season 
 of youth, and folly, and girlish fantasy / that taught you 
 this impious lesson of murderous retribution. It is my 
 wrongs, my individual and personal injuries, whose recent 
 aggravation has revived the mad intent, and stamped it 
 with a character of blackness such as before you never 
 dreamed of. Now, by the God whom I first learned to 
 worship in full, heart-yielded reverence, from you, Max 
 Greyslaer by HIM I swear, that, if you persist in this, I 
 I myself, woman as I am will be the first to tread the 
 path of crime, to which you point the way, and forestall 
 you in perdition of your soul. I am free to move where 
 I list, and work my will as best I may ; your will is but 
 that of a dungeon prisoner, and Bradshawe's life, if it de 
 pend upon the murderous deed of either, shall expire at 
 my hand before you pass these doors." 
 
 The fire of her first youth flashed in the eyes of Alida 
 as she spoke, and there was a determination seated on 
 her brow, such as even in her haughtiest mood of that 
 arrogant season it had never worn. But the next mo 
 ment all this had passed away entirely, and it was only 
 the broken-hearted, the still loving, the imploring Chris 
 tian woman that kneeled at the feet of Greyslaer. 
 
 " Max Max dearest Max," she said, while sobs half 
 suffocated her utterance, " it is Alida, your own, your 
 once fondly loved Alida, that pleads to you, that kneels
 
 A ROMANCE OF THE MOHAWK. 493 
 
 here imploring you to rend this wickedness from your 
 breast, and ask Heaven for its pardon. It is she who has 
 no friend, no relative, no resting-place in any heart on 
 earth save that from which you would drive her to make 
 room for images so dreadful. Surely you did love me 
 once ; surely you have pity for my sorrows ; you will 
 not, you cannot persist in thus trebling their burden. 
 Ah ! now you weep ; it is Heaven, not I, dearest Max, 
 that softens your heart toward your own Alida. Blessed 
 be those tears, and nay, raise me not yet not till you 
 
 have knelt beside me." 
 
 * * # # * * 
 
 The cell is narrow, the walls are thick. There is no 
 sound of human voice, no shred of vital air can pass through 
 the vaulted ceiling which shuts in those kneeling lovers ! 
 Can, then, the subtle spirit of prayer pierce the flinty rock, 
 mount into the liberal air, and, spreading as it goes, fill the 
 wide ear of Heaven with the appeal of those two lonely 
 human sufferers ? 
 
 The future may unfold.
 
 494 GREYSLAER 
 
 CHAPTER V. 
 
 WAYFARERS IN THE FOREST. 
 
 " Now stay, thou ghostly traveller, stay ; 
 
 Why haste in such a mad career ? 
 Be the guilt of thy bosom as dark as it may, 
 'Twere better to purge it here." 
 
 The Dead Horseman, by MRS. SIGOURNEY. 
 
 THE mingled yarn of our story is now becoming so com 
 plex, that, to follow out its details with clearness, we must 
 pause to take up a new thread which at this moment be 
 comes interwoven with the rest. 
 
 The faithful Bait had been almost the only visitor admit 
 ted to the Hawksnest during the last few months that im 
 mediately preceded the withdrawal of Miss de Roos from 
 her home. The old forester seemed to have conceived a 
 kind of capricious liking for little Guise, the half-blood 
 child ; and as his visits were really paid to that ill-omened 
 urchin, though his excuse for coming was to ask after the 
 health of Miss Alida, and to inquire if she had any news of 
 the major, Miss de Roos never thought it worth while to 
 deny herself to her humble friend, even while practising 
 the strictest seclusion in regard to her other neighbors. 
 
 Bait, in the mean time, was too observing a character 
 not to notice that some secret grief must be preying upon 
 Alida; and his new-sprung interest in little Guise soon be-
 
 A ROMANCE OF THE MOHAWK. 495 
 
 came secondary to the feelings of concern which her fast 
 fading health awakened in the worthy woodsman. 
 
 It chanced one day that Alida, who not infrequently 
 took occasion to employ his services in some slight task, 
 which, while remunerating his trouble, would give him 
 occupation while lounging about the premises, pointed out 
 a magnolia which she wished removed to another part of 
 the shrubbery, in the hope that a more favorable situation 
 might revive its drooping condition. Bait readily under 
 took the task of transplanting it, while Alida looked on to 
 direct him during the operation. 
 
 " Now, Miss Alida." said the woodsman, striking his 
 spade into the earth, " I don't know much of the natur of 
 this here little tree, seeing as I never happened on one in 
 any woods I've hunted over ; but I rayther mistrust the 
 winds have but little to do with its getting kinder sickly 
 as it were, in its present situation, I do." 
 
 "And why, Bait?" 
 
 " Why. you see now, ma'am, if the tree were attackted 
 from the outside, it's the outside would first feel it ; the 
 edges of the leaves would first crumple up and turn brown 
 ish like, while the middle parts of them might long remain 
 as sleekly green and shiny as the edges be now. There's 
 something, Miss Alida, at the heart, at the root, I may 
 rayther say, of that tree ; something that undermines it 
 and withers it from below. And these sort o' ailings, 
 whether in trees or in human beings, are mighty hard to 
 get at, I tell ye." As the woodsman spoke he leaned upon 
 his spade, and looked steadfastly at Miss de Roos, who 
 felt conscious of changing color beneath the earnest but 
 respectful gaze of her rude though well-meaning friend. 
 
 She did not answer, but only motioned him to go on
 
 496 GREYSLAER; 
 
 in his digging ; and Bait, seeing that he had in some way 
 offended, resumed his work with diligence. But the next 
 moment, forgetful wholly of the figurative use he had made 
 of his skill in arboriculture, and speaking merely in literal 
 application to the task before him, he exclaimed trium 
 phantly, 
 
 " There, you see, now, it's jist as I told ye, Miss Alida ; 
 there has been varmint busy near the roots of this little 
 tree. Look but where I put my spade, and see how the 
 field-mice have more than half girdled it. The straw and 
 other truck which that book-reading Scotch gardener put 
 around the roots, has coaxed the mice to make their nests 
 there in the winter, and they've lived upon the bark till 
 only two or three fingers' breadths are left." 
 
 " I hope there's bark enough left yet to save it," said 
 Alida, now only intent upon preserving the shrub. 
 
 " There's life there, Miss Alida green life in that nar 
 row strip ; and, while there's life, there's hope; and old Bait, 
 when he once knows whence comes the ailing, is jist the 
 man to stir himself and holp it from becoming fatal." 
 
 As the woodsman spoke he again ventured an earnest 
 though rapid glance at the face of the young lady ; but 
 this time she had turned away her head, and, hastily sig 
 nifying to Bait that he might deal with the magnolia 
 according to the best of his judgment, she strolled off as 
 if busied for the moment in examining some other plants 
 and soon afterward withdrew into the house, without 
 again speaking to him. 
 
 The worthy fellow, who, on his subsequent visits to little 
 Guise, had never again an opportunity of seeing the pro 
 tectress of the child alone, was deeply hurt at the idea o 
 this conversation having put Ali-J.i upon her guard agains
 
 A ROMANCE OF THE MOHAWK. 497 
 
 listening to more of these hinted suspicions that she needed 
 his sympathy. His natural good sense, however, pre 
 vented honest Bait from apologizing for his officious kind 
 ness, or showing in any way that he was conscious of 
 having offended. He was, however, from this moment 
 fully convinced that some mysterious sorrow was the 
 latent cause of Miss de Roos's rapidly failing health, and 
 he determined to leave no proper means untried to get at 
 the real source of her mental suffering. 
 
 His first desire was to communicate instantly with 
 Greyslaer ; but he had never been taught to write, and 
 his mother wit suggested the impropriety of trusting mat 
 ters so delicate to a third party by employing an aman 
 uensis. In the mean time, the cruelly slanderous story 
 of Bradshawe reached at last the sphere in which Bait 
 was chiefly conversant. The first mysterious affair about 
 Miss de Roos had, as we have seen, been known almost 
 exclusively to the simpler class of her country neighbors ; 
 but the dark tale, as now put forth by Bradshawe and his 
 Albany friends, originating in the upper classes of society, 
 soon descended to the lowest, and became alike the theme 
 of the parlor and the kitchen, the city drawing-room and 
 the roadside ale-house. 
 
 A heartless female correspondent of Alida had first dis 
 closed it to that unhappy lady, when alleging it as an ex 
 cuse for breaking off their further intercourse; but it was 
 not till after her departure from the Hawksnest that Bait 
 heard the tale, as told in all its horrid enormity among the 
 coarse spirits of a village bar-room. His first impulse 
 was to shake the life out of the half-tipsy oracle of the 
 place, who gave it as "the latest news from Albany ; but, 
 upon some one exclaiming, " Why, man, this is fiddler's 
 22*
 
 498 GREYSLAER; 
 
 news, that we've all known for a month or more," while 
 others winked and motioned toward Bait, as if the subject 
 should be dropped for the present, he saw that the scan 
 dal had gone too far to be thus summarily set at rest. 
 There was but one other move which suggested itself to 
 him, and that was to take instant counsel with the party 
 chiefly interested in the fair fame of Alida. And Bait, 
 within the hour, had borrowed a horse from a neighbor, 
 and started for Fort Stanwix. 
 
 Pressing forward as rapidly as possible, he continued 
 his journey through the night, and thus passing Greyslaer 
 on the road, arrived at his quarters just four-and-twenty 
 hours after Max had so hurriedly started for Albany. 
 Bait surmised at once what must be the cause for his ab 
 rupt departure, and, as soon as possible, took horse again 
 and retraced his steps ; borrowed a fresh nag from the 
 same farmer who had lent him the first, and pushed for 
 ward toward Albany. 
 
 His journey was wholly uneventful until he had passed 
 Schenectady and entered upon the vast pine plains which 
 extend between that city and the Hudson. But, fitly to 
 explain what here occurred, we must go back to Brad- 
 shawe and his comrade Bettys, and trace their adventures 
 from the place where last we left them in the immediate 
 suburbs of Albany. 
 
 To enter a farmer's stable and saddle a couple of his 
 best horses was a matter of little enterprise to two such 
 characters as Bradshawe and his freebooter ally ; and 
 now the pine plains, that reach away some fifteen miles 
 toward Schenectady, had received the adventurous fugi 
 tives beneath their dusky colonnade's. 
 
 The remains of this forest are still visible in a stunted
 
 A ROMANCE OF THE MOHAWK. 499 
 
 undergrowth, which, barely hiding the sandy soil from 
 view, gives so monotonous and dreary an appearance to 
 the continuous waste. But at the time of which we write, 
 and even until the steam-craft of the neighboring Hudson 
 had devoured this, with a hundred other noble forests in its 
 greedy furnaces, there was a gigantic vegetation upon 
 those plains which now seem so barren. 
 
 The scrub oak, which is fast succeeding to the shapely 
 pine, had not made its appearance; and the pale poplar, 
 whose delicate leaves here and there quivered over the 
 few runnels which traversed the thirsty soil, was almost 
 the only deciduous tree that reared its head among those 
 black and endless arcades of towering trunks, supporting 
 one unbroken roof of dusky verdure. 
 
 Bold and expert horsemen as they were, Bradshawe 
 and his comrade soon found it impossible to pick their 
 path amid this cavernous gloom in the deep hour of mid 
 night. They were soon conscious of wandering from the 
 highway, which, from the impossibility of seeing the skies 
 through the overarching boughs above it, as well as from the 
 absence of all coppice or undergrowth along its sides, was 
 easily lost. They therefore tethered their steeds and 
 "camped down," as it is called in our hunter phrase, upon 
 the dry soil, fragrant with the fallen cones of the pine- 
 trees which it nourished. 
 
 So soon as the morning light permitted them to move, 
 they discovered, as they had feared, that they had lost the 
 highway without the hope of recovering it, save by de 
 voting more time to the search of a beaten path than it 
 were safe to consume. They knew the points of the 
 compass, however, from the hemlocks which were here 
 and there scattered through the forest whose topmost
 
 500 GREYSLAER; 
 
 branches, our woodsmen say, point always towards the 
 rising sun, and resumed their journey in a direction due 
 west from the city of Albany. 
 
 An occasional ravine, however, which, though at long 
 intervals, deeply seamed this monotonous plateau of land, 
 turned them from their course, and thus delayed their pro 
 gress ; and, with appetites sharp-set by their morning 
 ride, they were glad to arrive, about noon, at the earthen 
 hovel of one of that strange, half-gipsy race of beings 
 known by the name of Yansies, which, even within the 
 last twelve or fifteen years, still had their brute-like bur 
 rows in this lonely wild. Even Bettys, little fastidious as 
 he was, recoiled from the fare which these " Dirt Eaters," 
 as the Indians called them, placed before him. But Brad- 
 shawe, while declining their hospitality with a better 
 grace, procured an urchin to guide him to the highw r ay, 
 which he was glad to learn was not far from the hovel. 
 
 They emerged, then, once more upon the travelled road 
 within a few miles of Schenectady, and at a point where 
 they would soon be compelled to leave it to make the cir 
 cuit of that town. Their horses were weary and in need 
 of refreshment ; and, with their various windings through 
 the forest, they had spent nearly twelve hours in accom 
 plishing a journey which, by a direct route, the time-con 
 quering locomotive now performs in one. 
 
 The Yansie boy had left them ; for the red hues of the 
 westering sun, streaming upon the sandy road, made their 
 way sufficiently plain before them. Their jaded horses 
 labored through the loose and arid soil, but still they urged 
 them forward to escape from the forest before the coming 
 twilight. They had ridden thus for some time in perfect 
 silence, when, upon a sudden exclamation from Bettys, his
 
 A ROMANCE OF THE MOHAWK. 501 
 
 comrade raised his eyes and looked anxiously forward in 
 the long vista before him. The road at this place ran 
 perfectly straight over a dead level for a mile or more. 
 The setting sun poured a flood of light upon the yellow 
 sand, from which a warm mist, that softened every object 
 near, seemed to be called out by its golden beams. Brad- 
 shawe shaded his eyes with his hand to see if he could 
 descry an approaching object, while Bettys, who had al 
 ready drawn his bridle, motioned impatiently for him to 
 retire among the trees. 
 
 " Give me one of your pistols, Joe," cried Bradshawe. 
 " It is but a single mounted traveller ; I can make him out 
 now clearly, and I'm determined to put a question or two 
 to the fellow." 
 
 " Well, captain, you know best ; only I thought it might 
 be a pity to slit the poor devil's throat to prevent his car 
 rying news of us to Albany ; and that, you know, we 
 must do if we once come to speech of him." 
 
 " How know you but what he may be a king's man, and 
 assist us or a mail-rider, and give us some rebel news of 
 value? Draw off, Joe, and leave me to fix him." But 
 Bettys had already trotted aside into the wood, where he 
 managed to keep nearly a parallel route with Bradshawe, 
 who, clapping Bettys' pistol in his bosom, and loosing in 
 its scabbard the sword with which that worthy had pro 
 vided him in the first hour of his escape, now jogged easily 
 forward to meet the traveller. 
 
 As they approached each other more nearly, and Brad 
 shawe got a closer survey of the coming horseman, there 
 seemed something about him which promised that he 
 might not be quite so easily dealt with as the Tory cap 
 tain had at first anticipated.
 
 502 GREYSLAER; 
 
 His drab hat and leather hunting-shirt indicated only 
 the character of a common hunter of the border or fron 
 tiersman of the period. But though he carried neither 
 rifle on his shoulder nor pistol at his belt, and while the 
 light cutlass or couteau de chasse by his side seemed feebly 
 matched with the heavy sabre of the Tory captain, there 
 was a look of compact strength and vigor a something 
 of military readiness and precision about the man, which 
 stamped him as one who might often have borne an ani 
 mated share in the fierce personal struggles of the times ; 
 a man to whom, in short, an attack like that meditated by 
 Bradshawe could bring none of the confusing terrors of 
 novelty. 
 
 The stranger, who seemed so occupied with his own 
 thoughts as scarcely to notice Bradshawe in the first in 
 stance, now eyed him with a curious and almost wild 
 gaze of earnestness as they approached each other. 
 
 Bradshawe, on the other side, surveyed the borderer's 
 features with a stern and immovable gaze, till his own 
 kindling suddenly with a strange gleam of intelligence, he 
 plucked forth his pistol and presented it within a few feet 
 of the other horseman. 
 
 " The rebel Bait, by G d !" he cried. " Dismount, or 
 die on the instant." 
 
 The back of the woodsman was toward the sun, and 
 his broad-brimmed hat so shaded his features that his 
 assailant could scarcely scan them to advantage ; but if 
 the suddenness of the assault did in any way change the 
 evenness of his pulse, not a muscle or a nerve betrayed 
 the weakness. 
 
 " I know ye, Lawyer Wat Bradshawe," said he, calmly,
 
 A EOMANCE OF THE MOHAWK. 503 
 
 " bat I don't know what caper ye'd be at in trying to scare 
 an old neighbor after this fashion I don't noways." 
 
 A grim smile played over the harsh features of Brad- 
 shawe, as if even his felon heart could be touched by ad 
 miration at finding a foeman as dauntless as himself. 
 
 " Real pluck, by heavens !" he ejaculated. " Bait, you're 
 a pretty fellow, and no mistake ; had you trembled the 
 vibration of a hair, I should have shot you dead ; but it's 
 a pity to spoil such a true piece of man's flesh if one can 
 help it. Give me that fresh gelding of yours, my old cock, 
 and you shall go free." 
 
 " Tormented lightning ! Give you Deacon Yates's six- 
 year-old gray ? That indeed ! And who in all thunder, 
 squire, would lend Uncle Bait another horse, if I gin up 
 this critter for the asking?" 
 
 " Pshaw, pshaw ! Don't think, old trapper, you can 
 come over me with your mock simplicity. I don't want 
 to make a noise here with my fire-arms, so save me the 
 trouble of blowing you through by dismounting instantly." 
 
 As Bradshawe spoke thus, the pistol, which, ready 
 cocked, he had hitherto kept steadily pointed at the breast 
 of his opponent, suddenly went off. The ball grazed the 
 side of the woodsman with a force which, though it did 
 not materially injure him, yet fairly turned him round in 
 the saddle. 
 
 The swords of both were out on the instant, while their 
 horses, plunging with affright, simultaneously galloped 
 along the road in the direction in which Bait was travelling. 
 With two such riders, however, they were soon made 
 obedient to the rein. Bait, in fact, had his almost instantly 
 in hand, whL Bradshawe's tired steed was easily con 
 trolled. But their training had never fitted them for
 
 504 GREYSLAER; 
 
 such encounters ; and the gleaming of weapons so terri 
 fied the animals, that it was almost impossible for their 
 riders to close within striking distance of each other. 
 
 Bait, who had the advantage of spurs in forcing his 
 horse forward and keeping his front to his opponent, had 
 twice an opportunity of plunging his sword into the back 
 of Bradshawe, as the ploughman's nag of the latter reared 
 and wheeled each time their blades clashed above his 
 head ; and it is probable that the wish to make prisoner 
 of Bradshawe, rather than any humane scruple upon the 
 part of the worthy woodsman, alone prevented his using 
 the unchivalrous advantage. 
 
 But now Bait, if he would keep his life, must not again 
 forego such vantage. A third horseman gallops out from 
 the wood, and urges forward to the aid of the hard-pressed 
 Bradshawe ; and shrewdly does the Tory captain require 
 such aid ; for his horse, backed against a bank where the 
 road has been worn down or excavated a foot or more in 
 depth, stands with his hind legs planted in a deep rut, and, 
 unable to wheel or turn, must needs confront the stouter 
 and more active steed of the opposing horseman, whose 
 fierce and rapid blows are with the greatest difficulty par 
 ried by his rider. But the third combatant is now within a 
 few yards of the woodsman, who, as he hears the savage 
 cry of this new assailant behind him, wheels so quickly 
 that he passes his sword through the man in the same 
 instant that a pistol-shot from the other takes effect in 
 the body of his charger. 
 
 "Oh ! captain, the d d rebel has done for me," cried 
 Bettys, tumbling from his horse in the same r. oraent that 
 Bait gained his feet, unhurt by the fall of !i;s own char 
 ger, and sprang forward to grasp the bit of Bradshawe's
 
 A ROMANCE OF THE MOHAWK. 505 
 
 horse ; but that doughty champion had already extricated 
 himself from the ground where he fought to such disad 
 vantage. He met the attempt of Bait with one furious 
 thrust, which happily failed in its effect ; and, seeing a 
 teamster approaching in the distance, darted into the 
 woods, and was soon lost to the eyes of his dismounted 
 opponent. 
 
 "Are you much hurt, .Mr. Bettys?" said Bait, not un 
 kindly, as he now recognized the wounded man while ap 
 proaching him. 
 
 "Hurt?" groaned Bettys. "I'm used up completely. 
 That cursed iron has done for me in this world, Uncle 
 Bait." 
 
 'And I fear," said the woodsman, gravely, "you've 
 done for yourself in the other." 
 
 " No ! by Heaven," said the stout royalist ; " there's not 
 a rebel life that I grieve for having shortened. No ! as a 
 true man, there's but one deed that sticks in my gizzard to 
 answer for, and that, old man, is a trick I played long be 
 fore Joe Bettys thought of devoting himself to the king's 
 lawful rights God save him." 
 
 " Pray God to save yourself, rayther, while your hand's 
 in at praying, poor benighted critter," said Bait, in a tone 
 of commiseration, even while an indignant flush reddened 
 his swarthy brow. " Let every man paddle his own 
 canoe his own way, is always my say, Mr. Bettys ; but 
 you had better lighten yours a little while making a por 
 tage from this life to launch upon etarnity." 
 
 " Yet I meant it not I meant it not," said the wounded 
 man, unheeding Bait. " Wild Wat swore it was but a 
 catch to serve for a season ; that he would make an honest
 
 506 GREYSLAER; 
 
 woman of her afterward. But this infernal story that 
 boy too oh " 
 
 Bait, with wonderful quickness, seemed instantly to 
 light upon and follow out the train of thought which the 
 broken words of the wounded man thus partially betray 
 ed ; and yet his aptitude in seizing them is hardly strange, 
 when we remember that it was the full preoccupation of 
 his thoughts with the affairs of Alida which enabled Brad- 
 shawe to take him at disadvantage so shortly before. He 
 saw instantly, or believed he saw, that Bettys' revelation 
 referred to her; but having as yet only the feeblest clew 
 to her real story, it behooved him to be cautious in betray 
 ing the extent of what he knew. He did not attempt, 
 therefore, to question the wounded man as to what he had 
 first said, but only to lead him forward in his confession. 
 
 " Yes, the boy the poor boy and his father " said 
 he, partly echoing the words of Bettys as he bent over 
 him. 
 
 " His father ? Yes, Dirk de Roos left mischief enough 
 behind him to punish his memory for that wild business. 
 But we were all gay fellows in those days " some pleas 
 ant memories seemed to come over Bettys as he paused 
 for a moment ; but he groaned in spirit as he resumed, 
 " And Fenton, too, Squire Fenton, who took the deposition 
 of the squaw they're gone both of them they are both 
 gone now, and I I too am going where where " 
 
 The loss of blood here seemed to weaken Bettys so 
 suddenly that he could say no more. The approaching 
 wagoner had by this time reached the spot ; and when 
 Bait had lifted the fainting form of the wounded Tory 
 into his wagon, and bound up his wounds as well as he
 
 A ROMANCE OF THE MOHAWK. 507 
 
 was able, the teamster willingly consented to carry Bet 
 tys to the nearest house on the borders of the forest. 
 
 In a few moments afterward, Bait, having caught Bet 
 tys' horse, which was cropping the herbage near, threw 
 himself into the saddle, made the best of his way back to 
 Schenectady, got a fresh nag, and hurried with all speed 
 to the Hawksnest.
 
 508 GREYSLAER; 
 
 CHAPTER VI. 
 
 THE TRIAL. 
 
 " Loredano. Who would have thought that one so 
 
 widely trusted, 
 
 A hero in our wars, one who has borne 
 Honors unnumbered from the generous state, 
 Could prove himself a murderer ? 
 
 Padoero. We must look 
 More closely ere we judge 
 
 Be it ours to weigh 
 
 Proofs and defence. We may not spill the blood 
 Of senators precipitately, nor keep 
 The axe from the guilty, though it strike the noblest." 
 
 MRS. ELLET. 
 
 AT this distant day, when we can calmly review all 
 the facts which led to Max Greyslaer's being put upon 
 trial for his life, there would hardly seem to be sufficient 
 evidence against him even to warrant the indictment 
 under which he was tried. It must be recollected, how 
 ever, that the force of circumstantial evidence is always 
 much enhanced by the state of public opinion at the time 
 it is adduced against a culprit; nor should we, whose 
 minds are wholly unbiassed by the fierce political preju 
 dices which clouded the judgment and warped the opin 
 ions of men in those excited times, pass upon their actions 
 without making many charitable allowances for the con 
 dition of things which prompted those actions.
 
 A ROMANCE OF THE MOHAWK. 5Q9 
 
 The clemency which the noble-hearted Lafayette who, 
 being then in charge of the northern department of the 
 army of the United States, had his headquarters at Al 
 bany the clemency which this right-minded leader and 
 statesman exercised toward Walter Bradshawe, by ame 
 liorating the rigors of his confinement, and even (if tradi 
 tion may be believed) permitting him to be present at his 
 levees, affords sufficient proof how public opinion may be 
 perverted in favor of a criminal by the subtle arts and in 
 defatigable labors of a zealous faction working in his be 
 half. If one so keenly alive to everything that was just 
 and honorable as Lafayette, could be blinded as to the 
 real character and deserts of a detected spy like Brad 
 shawe, is it wonderful that the intrigues of the same fac 
 tion which reprieved his name from present infamy, should 
 for the time awaken the popular clamor against the be 
 sotted admirer of a woman whose fair fame was already 
 blasted by its association \vith that of an Indian para 
 mour ? 
 
 How far the grand jury which returned the indictment 
 against Greyslaer were influenced by that clamor, and 
 what underhand share the great portion of its members 
 may have had in first raising it, we shall not now say. 
 Those men, with their deeds, whether of good or evil, 
 have all passed away from the earth ; it is not our duty 
 to sit in judgment upon them here, nor is it necessary for 
 us to examine into the feelings and principles, whether 
 honest or otherwise, by which those deeds were actuated. 
 
 Something is due, however, to the leading Whigs of 
 Albany, who allowed the issue of life and death to be 
 joined under the circumstances which we have detailed ; 
 something to extenuate the cold indifference with which
 
 510 GREYSLAER; 
 
 they appear to have permitted the proceedings to be hur 
 ried forward, and the life and character of one of their 
 own members, not wholly unknown for his patriotic ser 
 vices, to be thus jeoparded ; and, happily, their conduct 
 upon the occasion is so easily explained that a very few 
 words will possess the reader of everything we have to 
 say upon the subject. 
 
 The horrid crime of assassination was in those days of 
 civil discord but too common, while each party, as is well 
 known, attempted to throw the stigma of encouraging 
 such enormities upon the other. The life of General 
 Schuyler, of Councillor Taylor, and of several other 
 Whig dignitaries of the province of New York, had been 
 repeatedly attempted ; and when the outrage was charged 
 upon the Tory leaders, their reply was ever that these 
 were only retaliatory measures for similar cruelties prac 
 tised by the patriot party ; though the cold-blooded mur 
 der of a gallant and regretted British officer by a wild 
 bush-fighter on the northern frontier was the only instance 
 of this depravity that is now on record against the Repub 
 licans. Still, as the Whigs had always claimed to be 
 zealous supporters of all the laws which flow from a free 
 constitution, they were galled by this charge of their op 
 ponents ; and the desire to wipe off the imputation from 
 themselves, and fix the stigma where alone it should 
 attach, rendered them doubly earnest in seeking to bring 
 an offender of their own party to justice. They were 
 eager to prove to the country that they were warring 
 against despotism and not against law ; and that, wher 
 ever the Whig party were sufficiently in the ascendency 
 to regulate the operation of the laws, they should be en 
 forced with the most impartial rigor against all offenders.
 
 A ROMANCE OF THE MOHAWK. 511 
 
 In the present instance, these rigid upholders of justice, 
 as old Bait the hunter used afterward to say, " stood so 
 straight that they rayther slanted backwards." 
 
 The appearance of Greyslaer upon the eventful morn 
 ing of his trial was remembered long afterward by more 
 than one of the many females who crowded the court 
 room on the occasion ; but when long years and the inter 
 vention of many a stirring theme among the subsequent 
 scenes of the Revolution had made his story nearly for 
 gotten, the antiquated dame who flourished at that day 
 would still describe to her youthful hearers the exact ap 
 pearance of "young Major Max" as his form emerged 
 from the crowd, which gave way on either side, while he 
 strode forward to take his place in the prisoner's box. 
 
 The gray travelling suit in which he came to Albany, 
 and which he now wore, offering no military attraction to 
 dazzle the eye, the first appearance of the prisoner disap 
 pointed many a fair gazer, who had fully expected to see 
 the victim of justice decked out with all the insignia of 
 his rank as a major in the Continental army. But his 
 closely-fitting riding dress revealed the full proportions of 
 his tall and manly figure far better, perhaps, than would 
 the loose habiliments, whose broad skirts and deep flaps 
 gave such an air of travestie to the unsoldier-like uniforms 
 of that soldierly day. And the most critical of the giddy 
 lookers-on acknowledged that it would be a pity that the 
 dark brown locks, which floated loosely upon the shoulders 
 of the handsome culprit, should have been cued up and 
 powdered after the fashion which our Revolutionary 
 heroes copied from the military costume of the great 
 Frederic. But, however, these trifling traditional details 
 may interest some, we are dwelling perhaps too minutely
 
 512 GREYSLAER; 
 
 upon them, when matters of such thrilling moment press 
 so nearly upon our attention. 
 
 Before the preliminary forms of the trial were entered 
 upon, it was observed by the officers of the court that the 
 prisoner at the bar seemed wholly unprovided with 
 counsel ; and the presiding judge, glancing toward an 
 eminent advocate, seemed about to suggest to Major 
 Greyslaer that his defence had better be intrusted to a 
 more experienced person than himself. Greyslaer rose, 
 thanked him for his half-uttered courtesy, and signified that 
 he hfid already resisted the persuasions of the few friends 
 who were present to adopt the course which was so kindly 
 intimated; but that he was determined that no means but 
 his own should be used to extricate him from the painful 
 situation in which he was placed. His story was a plain 
 one ; and when once told, he should throw himself upon 
 God and his country for an honorable acquittal. 
 
 The words were few, and the tone in which the prisoner 
 spoke was so low, that nothing but the profound silence 
 of the place, and the clear, silvery utterance of the speaker, 
 permitted them to be audible. Yet they were heard in 
 the remotest corner of that crowded court ; and the im 
 pression upon the audience was singularly striking, con 
 sidering the commonplace purport which those few words 
 conveyed. 
 
 There is, however, about some men a character of re 
 finement, that carries a charm with it in their slightest 
 actions. It is not that mere absence of all vulgarity, which 
 may be allowed to constitute the negative gentleman, but 
 a positive spiritual influence, which impresses, more or 
 less, even the coarsest natures with which they are brought 
 in contact.
 
 A ROMANCE OF THE MOHAWK. 
 
 Max Greyslaer was one of the fortuate few who have 
 possessed this rare gift of nature, and its exercise availed 
 him now ; for, ere he resumed his seat, every one present 
 felt, as by instinct, that it was impossible for that man to 
 be guilty of the brutal crime of murder! 
 
 The trial proceeded. The jury were impannelled with 
 out delay, for there was no one. to challenge them in behalf 
 of the prisoner; and he seemed strangely indifferent as 
 to the preliminary steps of his trial. The distinguished 
 gentleman who at that time filled the office of attorney- 
 general for the State of New York, was absent upon ofecial 
 duty in another district. But his place was supplied by 
 one of the ablest members of the Albany bar, who, though 
 he had no professional advocate to oppose him, opened his 
 cause with a degree of cautiousness which proved his 
 respect for the forensic talents of the prisoner at the bar. 
 His exordium, indeed, which was conceived with great 
 address, consisted chiefly of a complimentary tribute to 
 those talents; and he dwelt so happily upon the mental 
 accomplishments of the gentleman against whom a most 
 unpleasant public duty had now arrayed his own feeble 
 powers, that Greyslaer was not only made to appear a sort 
 of intellectual giant, who could cleave his way through 
 any meshes of the law ; but the patriotic character, the 
 valuable military services, and all the endearing personal 
 qualities of the prisoner, which might have enlisted public 
 sympathy in his favor, were lost sight of in the bright but 
 icy renown which was thrown around his mental abilities. 
 
 In a word, the prisoner was made to appear as a man 
 
 who needed neither aid, counsel, nor sympathy from any 
 
 one present ; and the jury were adroitly put on their guard 
 
 'inst the skilful defence of one so able, that nothing 
 
 23
 
 514 JEYSLAER; 
 
 but the excellence of his cause would have induced the 
 speaker, with all the professional experience of a life passed 
 chiefly in the courts of criminal law, to cope with him. 
 He (the counsel for the prosecution) would, in fact, have 
 called for some assistance in his own most difficult task, 
 in order that the majesty of the laws might be asserted by 
 some more eloquent servant of .the people than himself, 
 but that some of his most eminent brethren at the bar, 
 upon whom he chiefly relied, were absent from the city ; 
 and, though the evidence against the prisoner was so plain 
 that he who runs may read, still his duty was so very pain 
 ful that he felt that he might not set forth that evidence 
 with the same force and circumspection that might attend 
 his efforts under lass anxious circumstances. 
 
 Having succeeded thus in effecting a complete revolu 
 tion as to the different grounds occupied by himself and 
 the unfortunate Max, the wily lawyer entered more boldly 
 into his subject. And if Greyslaer, who as yet had hardly 
 surmised the drift of his discourse, blushed at the compli 
 ments which had been paid to his understanding, he 
 now reddened with indignation as the cunning tongue of 
 detraction became busy with his character; but his ire 
 .instantly gave way to contempt when the popular pleader 
 .came to a part of his speech in which, with an ill-judged 
 .reliance upon the sordid prejudices of his hearers, he had 
 the audacity to attempt rousing their political feelings by 
 .painting the young soldier as by birth and feeling an aris 
 tocrat, the son and representative of a courtier colonel, 
 who in his lifetime had always acted with the patrician 
 party ia the colony. The allusion, which formed the 
 climax of a well-turned period, brought Greyslaer in 
 stantly to his feet ; nnd he stretched out his arm as if about
 
 A ROMANCE OF THE MOHAWK. 515 
 
 to interrupt the speaker. But his look of proud resentment 
 changed suddenly into one of utter scorn as he glanced 
 around the court. His equanimity at once returned to 
 him; and he resumed his place, uttering only, in a calm 
 voice, the words, " You may go on, sir." 
 
 The shrewd lawyer became fully aware of his mistake 
 from the suppressed murmur which pervaded the room 
 before he could resume. He had, by these few last words, 
 undone all that he had previously effected. He had caused 
 every one present to remember who and what the prisoner 
 was up to the very moment when he stood here upon trial 
 for his life. 
 
 The experienced advocate did not, however, attempt to 
 eat his words, or flounder back to the safe ground he had 
 so incautiously left, but hurried on to the next branch of 
 the subject as quickly as possible ; and now came the 
 most torturing moment for Greyslaer. The speaker 
 dropped his voice to tones of mystic solemnity ; and al 
 most whispering, as if he feared the very walls might 
 echo the hideous tale he had to tell if spoken louder, 
 thrilled the ears of all present with the relation of the- 
 monstrous loves of Alida and Isaac Brant, even as the 
 foul lips of Bradshawe had first retailed the scandal. 
 
 The cold drops stood upon the brow of Greyslaer ; and 
 as the low, impassioned, and most eloquent tones of the 
 speaker crept into his ears, he listened shuddering. Fain 
 would he have shut up his senses against the sounds that 
 were distilled like blistering dew upon them, but his fac 
 ulty of hearing seemed at once sharpened and fixed with 
 the same involuntary intenseness which rivets the gaze of 
 ' tlio spell-bound bird upon its serpent-charmer. And 
 when the speaker again paused, ho drew the long breath
 
 516 GRETSLAER; 
 
 which the chest of the dreamer will heave when some 
 horrid fiction of the night uncoils itself from his laboring 
 fancy. 
 
 The advocate ventured then to return once more to the 
 character of the prisoner himself ere he closed this most 
 unhappy history. He now, though, only spoke of him as 
 the luckless victim of an artful and most abandoned wo 
 man. But he had not come there, he said, to deplore the 
 degradation which, amid the unguarded passions of youth, 
 might overtake a mind of virtue's richest and noblest pro 
 mise. The public weal, alas ! imposed upon him, and 
 upon the intelligent gentlemen who composed the jury be 
 fore him, a far sterner duty a duty which, painful as it 
 was, must still be rigidly, impartially fulfilled. And no 
 matter what accidents of fortune may have surrounded 
 the prisoner no matter what pleading associations, con 
 nected with his youth and his name, might interpose them 
 selves no matter what sorrowful regrets must mingle 
 with the righteous verdict the evidence would compel 
 them to give in, they were answerable alike to God and 
 their country for that which they should this day record 
 ns the f ruth. 
 
 The testimony, as we have already detailed it, was then 
 entered into ; and, as the reader is in possession of the 
 evidence, it need not be recapitulated here. 
 
 Greyslaer seemed to have no questions to put in cross- 
 examination of the witnesses for the prosecution, and this 
 part of the proceedings was soon disposed of. The im 
 pression made by the testimony was so strong, that the 
 prosecuting attorney scarcely attempted to enforce it by 
 any comments, and now the prisoner for the first time 
 opened his lips in his own defence.
 
 A ROMANCE OF THE MOHAWK. 5i7 
 
 " I come not here," said Greyslaer, " to struggle for a 
 life which is now valueless ; and, though there are flaws 
 in the evidence just given which the plain story I might 
 tell would, I think, soon make apparent to all who hear 
 me, I am willing to abide by the testimony as it stands. 
 I mean," said he, with emphasis, " the testimony immedi 
 ately relating to the* transaction which has placed me 
 where I am. But, regardless as I may be of the issues of 
 this trial as respects myself, there is another implicated in 
 its results whom that gentleman I thank him for the kind 
 ness, though God knows he little meant it as such has 
 given me the opportunity of vindicating before the com 
 munity where she has been so cruelly maligned. Death 
 for me has no terrors, the scaffold no shame, if the pro 
 ceedings by which I shall perish shall providentially, in 
 their progress, make fully clear her innocence." 
 
 The counsel for the prosecution here rose, and sug 
 gested that the unfortunate prisoner had better keep to 
 the matter immediately before the court. He saw no 
 necessity for making a double issue in the trial, &c., &c. 
 The spectators, who were already impressed by the few 
 words which Greyslaer had uttered, murmured audibly 
 at the interruption. But Max only noticed the rudeness 
 by a cold bow to the opposite party, as, still addressing 
 the court, he straightway resumed: 
 
 " The learned advocate, who has given such signal 
 proofs of his zeal and his ability in this day's trial, has di 
 rected his chief efforts to prove a sufficient motive for the 
 commission of the act with which I am charged. In the 
 attempt to accomplish this, the name of a most unfortu 
 nate lady has been dragged before a public court in a 
 manner not less cruel than revolting. I have a right to
 
 518 GREYSLAER; 
 
 disprove, if I can, the motive thus alleged to criminate 
 me ; and the vindication of that lady's fame is thus insep 
 arably connected with my own. But, to wipe off the as 
 persions on her character, I must have time to send for 
 the necessary documents. The court will readily believe 
 that I could never have anticipated the mode in which 
 this prosecution has been conducted, and will not, there 
 fore, think I presume upon its lenity in asking for a sus 
 pension of the trial for two days only." 
 
 The court looked doubtingly at the counsel for the state, 
 but seemed not indisposed to grant the privilege which 
 the prisoner asked with such confidence ; but the keen 
 advocate was instantly upon his feet, and, urging that the 
 prisoner had enjoyed every opportunity of choosing such 
 counsel as he pleased, insisted that it was too late to put 
 in so feeble a plea, merely for the purpose of gaining time, 
 in the vain hope of ultimately defeating justice. The 
 calmness of Greyslaer, the apparent indifference to his 
 fate which had hitherto been most remarkable, vanished 
 the instant the bench had announced its decision against 
 him ; and his voice now rang through the crowded cham 
 ber in an appeal that stirred the hearts and quickened the 
 pulses of everyone around him. 
 
 "What !" he said, " is the life of your citizens so value 
 less that the hollow forms of the law the law, which was 
 meant to protect the innocent, shall thus minister to their 
 undoing ? Does the veil of justice but conceal a soulless 
 image, as deaf to the appeal of truth as she is painted blind 
 to the influence of favor ? Sir, sir, I warn you how you 
 this day wield the authority with which you sit there in 
 vested. You, sir, are but the servant of the people ; and 
 I, though standing here accused of felony, am still one of
 
 A ROMANCE OF THE MOHAWK. 
 
 the people themselves, until a jury of my peers has passed 
 upon my character. An hour since, and irregular, violent, 
 and unjust as I knew these precipitate proceedings to be, 
 an hour since, and I was willing to abide by their result, 
 whatever fatality to me might attend it. I cared not, 
 recked not for the issue. But I have now a new motive 
 for resisting the doom which it seems predetermined shall 
 be pronounced upon me ; a duty to perform to my coun 
 try, which is far more compulsory than any I might 
 to myself. Sir, you cannot, you shall not, you dare not thus 
 sacrifice me. It is the judicial murderof an American citi 
 zen against which I protest. I denounce that man as the in 
 strument of a political faction, hostile to this government, 
 and plotting the destruction of one of its officers. I charge 
 you, sir, with aiding and abetting in a conspiracy to take 
 away my life. I call upon you to produce the evidence 
 that Walter Bradshawe is not yet living. I assert that 
 that man and his friends know well that he has not fallen 
 by my hands, and that they, the subtle and traitorous 
 movers of this daring prosecution, have withdrawn him 
 for a season only to effect my ruin. Let the clerk swear 
 the counsel for the prosecution ; I demand him to take his 
 place on that stand as my first witness in this cause." 
 
 Had a thunderbolt crashed in the midst of that assem 
 blage, it could not have produced a greater sensation than 
 did this master-stroke of intellectual audacity. There 
 was none of the grimacing impudence of vulgar villainy 
 facing down truth, in the heroic assurance of the man who 
 thus, in haughty strength, challenged and drnggod down 
 his persecutors into the lists prepared for his immolation. 
 The act sprung only from the instant resolve of a d.i; 
 a direct, and powerful mind, confident that if w;ts sur-
 
 520 GKEYSLAEK; 
 
 rounded with an atmosphere of duplicity, and roused to a 
 sublime self-reliance, a Samson-like antagonism against 
 the monstrous odds of a vile, an unscrupulous, and seem 
 ingly overwhelming opposition ; and the look, not less 
 than the voice, of Greyslaer, was majestic, as he stood 
 there defiant. 
 
 As we have said, then, the effect of this brief and bold 
 appeal upon every one present was perfectly astounding. 
 But its influence in our time can only be appreciated by 
 remembering how generally the taint of disaffection 
 attached to the upper classes of society in the province of 
 New York, and how -withering to character was the 
 charge of Toryism, unless the suspicion could be instantly 
 wiped away. It would seem, too though Greyslaer 
 had only ventured upon this desperate effort to turn the 
 tables upon his persecutors from instinctive conviction 
 that in a general way he was unfairly dealt with it would 
 seem that there was really some foundation for the specific 
 charge of secret disaffection which he so boldly launched 
 against his wily foe. For the lawyer turned as pale as 
 death at the words wherewith the speech of Max con 
 cluded ; and he leaned over and whispered to the judge 
 with a degree of agitation which was so evident to every 
 one who looked on, that his altered demeanor had the 
 most unfavorable effect for the cause of the prosecution. 
 What he said was inaudible, but its purport might readily 
 be surmised from the bench announcing, after a brief col 
 loquy, "that the prisoner wasindeeperrorin supposing that 
 the counsel for the prosecution was animated by any feel 
 ing of personal hostility toward him. That learned gen 
 tleman had only attempted to perform the painful duty 
 which had devolved on him, to the best of his ability, as
 
 A ROMANCE OF THE MOHAWK. 
 
 the representative of a public officer now absent, who was 
 an immediate servant of the people. As an individual 
 merely, the known benevolence of that gentleman would 
 induce him to wish every indulgence granted to the pris 
 oner ; and, even in his present capacity, he had but now 
 interceded with the bench for a suspension of the trial 
 until time might be given for the production of the docu 
 ments which the accused deemed essential to his defence. 
 The court itself was grieved to think that the prisoner at 
 the bar had forfeited all title to such indulgence by the 
 unbecoming language he had just used in questioning the 
 fairness with which it came to sit upon this trial ; but the 
 situation of the prisoner, his former patriotic services, and 
 his general moderation of character, must plead in excus 
 ing this casual outbreak of his feelings, if no intentional 
 indignity or disrespect to the court was intended. These 
 documents, however, it is supposed, will be forthcoming 
 as soon as - " 
 
 " Jist as soon, yere honor axing yere honor's pardon 
 jist as soon as those powdered fellows with long white 
 poles in their hands will make room for a chap to get 
 through this 'tarnal piling o' people and come up to yon 
 der table." 
 
 " Make way, there, officer, for that red-faced man with 
 a bald head, who is holding up those papers over the 
 heads of the crowd at the door," cried the good-natured 
 judge to the tipstaff, the moment he discovered the source 
 whence came the unceremonious interruption. 
 
 "Stand aside, will ye, rnanny ?" said Bait, now elbow 
 ing his way boldly through the crowd ; "don't ye see it's 
 the judge himself there that wants me? Haven't ye kept 
 me long enough here, bobbing up and down to catch the
 
 522 GREYS LAER; 
 
 eye of the major ? Make way, I say, feller citerzens. I'm 
 Mowed if I wouldn't as lief run the gauntlet through as 
 many wild Injuns. Lor ! how pesky hot it is," concluded 
 the countryman, wiping his brow as he got at last within 
 the railing which surrounded the bar. 
 
 "Come, come, my good fellow," said the judge, "I saw 
 you holding up some papers just now at the door ; why 
 don't you produce them, and tell us where they came 
 from?" 
 
 "Came from? Why, where else but out of the brass 
 beaufet where I placed 'em myself, I should like to know ! 
 and where I found this pocket-book of the major's, which I 
 thought it might be well to bring along with me, seeing I 
 had to break the lock, and it might, therefore, be no longer 
 safe where I found it." 
 
 " The pocket-book ! That contains the very paper I 
 want," cried Greyslaer. 
 
 " It doesn't hold all on 'em you'd like to see though, I 
 guess, major," said Bait, handing him a packet, which Max 
 straightway opened before turning to the pocket-book, and 
 ran his eye over the papers : 
 
 " Memorandum of a release granted by Henry Fenton 
 to the heirs of, &c. ; notes of land sold by H. F. in town 
 ship No. 7, range east," &c. &c., murmured Max ; and 
 then added aloud, " these appear to be merely some pri 
 vate papers of the late Mr. Fenton, with which I have no 
 
 concern ; but here is a document " said he, opening 
 
 the pocket-book. 
 
 " One moment, one moment, major," cried Bait, anx 
 iously ; " I can't read written-hand, so I brought 'em all 
 to yc to pick out from ; but I mistrust it must be there if 
 you look carefully, for I made out the word Max, with a
 
 A ROMANCE OF THE MOHAWK. 593 
 
 big G after it, when I first took those papers from the 
 clothes of Mr. Fenton." 
 
 Greyslaer turned over the papers again with a keener 
 interest, and the next moment read aloud : 
 
 " In the matter of Derrick de Roos, junior, and Annatie, 
 the Indian woman ; deposition as to the parentage of 
 Guise or Guisebert, their child, born out of wedlock, taken 
 before Henry Fenton, justice of the peace, &c., certified 
 copy, to be deposited with Max Greyslaer, Esquire, in 
 testimony of the claim which the said child might have 
 upon his care and protection as the near friend and ward 
 of Derrick de Roos, senior, who, while living, fully ac 
 knowledged such claim, in expiation of the misdeeds of 
 his son. Witness, HENRY FENTON. 
 
 " N. B. The mother of the child has, with her infant, 
 disappeared from the country since this deposition was 
 taken. She is believed, however, to be still living among 
 the praying Indians of St. Regis, upon the Canada border. 
 
 "H. F." 
 
 The deposition, whose substance was given in this en 
 dorsement, need not be here recapitulated ; and the reader 
 is already in possession of the letter from Bettys to Brad- 
 shawe, sufficiently explaining their first abduction of Miss 
 de Roos,* which letter Greyslaer straightway produced 
 from the pocket-book, and read aloud in open court. The 
 strong emotion which the next instant overwhelmed him 
 as he sank back into his seat, prevented Max from adding 
 any comment to this unanswerable testimony, which so 
 
 * See chapter vii. book iv
 
 GREYSLAEll; 
 
 instantly wiped every blot from the fair fame of his be 
 trothed. 
 
 As for Bait, he only folded his arms, and looked sternly 
 around to see if one doubting look could be found among 
 that still assemblage ; but the next moment, as he rightly 
 interpreted the respectful silence which pervaded the 
 place, he buried his face in his hat, to hide the tears which 
 burst from his eyes and coursed down his rude and fur 
 rowed cheeks. 
 
 The counsel for the prosecution who, with an air of 
 courtesy and feeling, at once admitted the authenticity of 
 these documents was the first that broke the stillness of 
 the scene. And his voice rose so musically soft in a beau 
 tiful eulogium upon the much-injured lady, whose story 
 had for the moment concentrated every interest, that his 
 eloquence was worthy of a far better heart than his ; 
 but, gradually changing the drift of his discourse, he 
 brought it back once more to the prisoner, and reminded 
 the jury that the substantial part of the evidence upon 
 which he had been arraigned was as forcible as ever. The 
 motive for Bradshawe's destruction at the hands of the 
 accused was proved even more strongly than before. 
 There was no man present but must feel that the prisoner 
 had been driven to vengeance by temptation, such as the 
 human heart could scarcely resist. But, deep as must be 
 our horror at Bradshawe's villainy, and painfully as we 
 must sympathize with the betrothed husband of that cru 
 elly outraged lady, there was still a duty to perform to 
 the law. The circumstances which had been proved 
 might induce the gentlemen of the jury to recommend the 
 prisoner to the executive for some mitigation of a mur 
 derer's punishment, but they could not otherwise affect
 
 A ROMANCE OF THE MOHAWK. f>;>5 
 
 the verdict which it was their stern and sworn duly to 
 render. 
 
 ''And you don't mean to let the major go, arter all '?" 
 said Bait, addressing himself to the lawyer with little show 
 ot respect, as the latter concluded his harangue. 
 
 " Silence, sir, silence ; take your seat," said a tipstaff, 
 touching Bait on the shoulder. 
 
 " And why haven't,! as good a right to speak here as 
 that smooth-tongued chap ?" 
 
 " You must keep silence, my worthy fellow," said the 
 judge. " I shall be compelled to order an officer to re 
 move you if you interrupt the proceedings by speaking 
 again." 
 
 " But I will speak again," said Bait, slapping his hat 
 indignantly upon the table. " I say, you Mister Clark 
 there, take the Bible and qualify me. I'm going into that 
 witnesses' box. You had better find out whether Wat 
 Bradshawe is dead or no afore you hang the major for 
 killing on him." 
 
 But the relation which Bait had to give is too impor 
 tant to come in at the close of a chapter, and it may 
 interest the reader sufficiently to have it detailed with 
 somewhat more continuity than it was now disclosed by 
 the worthy woodsman.
 
 526 GREYSLAER; 
 
 CHAPTER VII. 
 
 CONCLUSIOJSf. 
 
 " And thus it was with her, 
 The gifted and the lovely 
 And yet once more the strength 
 Of a high soul sustains her ; in that hour 
 She triumphs in her fame that he may hear 
 Her name with honor. 
 
 Oh let the peace 
 Of this sweet hour be hers." 
 
 LUCY HOOPER. 
 
 LEAVING Bait to tell the court in his own way the par 
 ticulars of his first encounter in the forest, we will take 
 up his story from the moment when the broken revelation 
 of the wounded Bettys prompted the woodsman to hurry 
 back to the Hawksnest, where he had deposited the 
 papers of the deceased Mr. Fenton, as mentioned in the 
 fifth chapter of the fourth book of this authentic history. 
 
 As Bait approached the neighborhood of the Hawks- 
 nest, he found the whole country in alarm. A runner 
 had been dispatched from Fort Stanwix, warning the 
 people of that bold and extraordinary inroad of a handful 
 of refugees which took place early in the summer of 1778, 
 when, swelling their ranks by the addition to their number 
 of more than one skulking outlaw and many secret Tories.
 
 A ROMANCE OF THE MOHAWK. 527 
 
 who had hitherto continued to reside upon the Mohawk, 
 the royalists succeeded in carrying off both booty and 
 prisoners to Canada, disappearing from the valley as sud 
 denly as they came. 
 
 Teondetha was the agent who brought the news of the 
 threatened incursion, but the movements of the refugees 
 were so well planned that they managed to strike only 
 those points where the warning came too late. They 
 were heard of at one settlement, when they had already 
 slaughtered the men, carried off the women and children, 
 and burned the dwellings of another ; and, indeed, so 
 rapid were their operations, that the presence of these 
 destroyers was felt at a dozen different points almost 
 simultaneously. They were first seen in their strength 
 near Fort Hunter ; they desolated the farm-houses be 
 tween there and " Fonda's Bush," swept the remote set 
 tlements upon either side of their northern progress, and 
 finally disappeared at the " Fish-house " on the Sacon- 
 daga. 
 
 The historian seems to have preserved no trace of their 
 being anywhere resisted, so astounding was the surprise 
 of the country people at this daring invasion ; but tradition 
 mentions one instance at least where their inroad received 
 a fatal check. 
 
 Bait, who, as we have said, was hurrying to the 
 Hawksnest to procure the papers which, while clearing 
 the fair fame of Alida, have already given so important 
 a turn to the trial of Greyslaer, instantly claimed the aid 
 of Teondetha to protect the property of his friend in the 
 present exigence ; and, with Christian Lansingh and two 
 or three others, these experienced border warriors threw
 
 528 OltEYyLAER; 
 
 themselves into the mansion, and prepared to defend it 
 until the storm had passed by. 
 
 Nor was the precaution wasted ; for their preparations 
 for defence were hardly completed, and the lapse of a single 
 night passed away, when, with the morrow's dawn, a 
 squad of Tory riders was seen galloping across the pas 
 tures by the river-side, with no less a person than Walter 
 Bradshawe himself, now well mounted and completely 
 armed, riding at their head. He had fallen in with these 
 brother partisans while trying to effect his escape across 
 the frontier, obtained the command of a dozen of the most 
 desperate among them, and readily induced his followers, 
 by the hope of booty, to make an attack upon the Hawks- 
 nest. Whether the belief that Alida was still dwelling 
 there induced him to make one more desperate effort to 
 seize her person, or whether he only aimed at striking 
 some daring blow ere he left the country in triumph .a 
 blow which would make his name a name of terror long 
 upon that border it is now impossible to say. But 
 there, by the cold light of early dawn, Bait soon distin 
 guished him at the head of his gang of desperadoes. 
 
 Early as was the hour, Teondetha had already crept 
 out to scout among the neighboring hills ; and Bait, 
 aware of his absence, felt now a degree of concern about 
 his'fate which he was angry with himself at feeling for a 
 " Redskin," though somehow, almost unknowingly, he had 
 learned to love the youth. He had, indeed, no appre 
 hension that the Oneida had been already taken by these 
 more than savage men ; but as the morning mist, which 
 rolled up from the river, had most probably hitherto pre 
 vented Teondetha from seeing their approach, Bait feared 
 that he might each moment present himself upon the lawn
 
 A ROMANCE U F T II E MO 11 A W X . 
 
 in returning to the house, and catch the eye of Bradshawe's 
 followers while unconscious of the danger that hovered 
 
 O 
 
 near. 
 
 The scene that followed was, however, so quickly over, 
 that the worthy woodsman had but little time for further 
 reflection. 
 
 Bradshawe had evidently expected to obtain possession 
 of the house before any of the family had arisen or warn 
 ing of his approach was received ; and, dividing his band 
 as he neared the premises, a part of his men circled the 
 dwelling and galloped up a lane which would lead them 
 directly across the lawn toward the front door of the 
 house, while the rest, wheeling off among the meadows.. 
 presented themselves at the same time in the rear. 
 
 The force of Bait was too small to make a successful 
 resistance against this attack, had the Tories expected 
 any opposition, or had they been determined to carry the 
 house even after discovering that it was defended. His 
 rifles were so few in number that they were barely suffi 
 cient to defend one side of the house at a time ; and, 
 though both doors and windows were barricaded, the 
 woodsman and his friends could not long have sustained 
 themselves under a simultaneous assault upon each sepa 
 rate point. 
 
 Bait, however, did not long hesitate how to receive the 
 enemy ; his only doubt seemed to be, for the moment, 
 which party would soonest come within reach of his lire. 
 
 " Kit Lansigh," he cried, the instant he saw the invi'- 
 inent from his look-out place in the giiblc, "Ionic ye from 
 the front windows, and see if the gate that opens from the 
 lane upon the lawn be closed or no. Quick, as yi- love 
 vere life, Kit."
 
 530 UREYSLAER; 
 
 " The gate's shut. They slacken their pace they draw 
 their bridles they fear to leap," shouted Kit the next 
 instant in reply. "No they leap; ah! it's only one of 
 them Bradshawe ; but he has not cleared it ; the gate 
 crashes beneath his horse; his girths are broken ; and now 
 they all dismount to let their horses step over the broken 
 bars." 
 
 "Enough, enough, Kit. Spring now, lads, to the back 
 windows, and each of you cover your man as the riders 
 from the meadow come within shot. But. no ! never mind 
 taking them separately," cried Bait, as his party gained 
 the windows. "Not yet, not yet ; when they double that 
 corner of the fence. Now, now, as they wheel, as they 
 double, take them in range. Are you ready? Let them 
 have it- 1 " 
 
 A volley-from the house as Bait spoke instantly emptied 
 several saddles ; and the on-coming troopers, recoiling in 
 confusion at the unexpected attack, turned their backs and 
 gained a safe distance as quickly as possible. 
 
 "Now, lads," shouted Bait, "load for another pepper 
 ing in the front ;" and already the active borderers have 
 manned the upper windows on the opposite side of the 
 house. 
 
 But the assailants here, startled by the sound of fire-arms 
 and the rolling smoke which they saw issuing from the 
 rear of the house, hung back, and would not obey the be 
 hests of their leader, who vainly tried to cheer them on 
 to the attack. In vain did Bradshawe coax, conjure, and 
 threaten. His followers caught sight of their friends 
 drawing off with diminished numbers toward the end of 
 the house. They saw the gleaming- rifle-barrels protrud 
 ing through the windows. The} 7 clustered together, and
 
 A ROMANCE OF THE MOHAWK. ;331 
 
 talked eagerly for a moment, unheeding the frantic ap 
 peals of their leader ; and now, with less hesitation than 
 before, they leaped the broken barrier of the gate, and 
 were in full retreat down the lane. 
 
 " One moment, one moment, boys ; it's a long shot, but 
 we'll let them have a good-bye as they turn off into the 
 pasture. Ah, I feared it was too far for the best rifle 
 among us," added Bait, as the troopers, apparently un 
 touched by the second volley, still galloped onward. 
 
 "God's weather! though, but that chap on the roan 
 horse has got it, uncle," cried Lansingh, the next moment, 
 as he saw a horseman reel in the saddle, while others 
 spurred to his side, and upheld the wounded man. " My 
 rifle against a shot-gun that that chap does not cross the 
 brook!" 
 
 " To the window in the gable, then, boys, if you would 
 see the Tory fall," exclaimed Bait, as the flying troopers 
 became lost to their view from the front windows. " Tor 
 mented lightning! you've lost your rifle, Kit ; they are all 
 over the brook." 
 
 " No, there's a black horse still fording it," cried Lan 
 singh, eagerly. " 'Tis Bradshawe's horse ; I know it from 
 the dangling girths he drags after him. He has gained 
 the opposite bank ; his horse flounders in the slippery 
 clay ; no, he turns and waves his hand at something. He 
 sees us ; he waves it in scorn. Oh ! for a rifle that would 
 bring him now." 
 
 And, even as Lansingh spoke, the sharp report of a rifle, 
 followed by a sudden howl of pain and defiance, r:in^ out 
 on the still morning air. The trooper again n>so in his 
 saddle and shook his clenched fist at son sn <i>jf-t 
 
 in the bushes. The next moment he disappeared in a
 
 i>'32 GKEYSLAER; 
 
 thicket beyond ; and now, again, the black horse emerged 
 once more into the open fields ; but he scoured along the 
 slope beyond, bare-backed and masterless ; the saddle had 
 turned, and left the wounded rider at the mercy of that 
 unseen foe ! 
 
 Not five minutes could have elapsed before Bait and 
 his comrades had reached the spot where Bradshawe dis 
 appeared from their view ; but the dying agonies of the 
 wounded man were already over ; and, brief as they were, 
 yet horrible must have been the exit of his felon soul. 
 The ground for yards around him was torn and muddled 
 with his gore, as if the death-struggles of a bullock had 
 been enacted there. His nails were clutched deep into 
 the loamy soil, and his mouth was filled with the dust 
 which he had literally bitten in his agony. The yeomen 
 gazed with stupid wonder upon the distorted frame and 
 muscular limbs so hideously convulsed when the strong 
 life was leaving them and one of them stooped to raise 
 and examine the head, as if still doubtful that it was the 
 terrible Bradshawe who now lay so helpless before them. 
 But the crown of locks had been reft from the gory 
 skull, and the face (as is said to be the case with a scalped 
 head) had slipped down, so that the features were no longer 
 distinguishable. 
 
 The next moment the Oneida emerged from the bushes 
 with a couple of barbarous Indian trophies at his belt ; and 
 subsequent examination left not a doubt that both Brad 
 shawe and the other wounded trooper had been dispatched 
 by the brave but dean-savage Teondetha. 
 
 Such were the essential particulars of Bradshawe's real 
 fate, as now made known by him who beheld his fall. 
 
 The court had given an order for the instant release of
 
 A ROMANCE OF THE MOHAWK. 533 
 
 the prisoner, and the clerk had duly made it out long be 
 fore the narrative of the worthy woodsman was conclu 
 ded ; but the relation of Bait excited a deep sensation 
 throughout that crowded chamber, and the presiding judge 
 for some moments found it impossible to repress the up 
 roarious enthusiasm with which this full exculpation of the 
 prisoner at the bar was received by the spectators. Those 
 who were nearest to the prisoner the members of the 
 bar and other gentlemen the whole jury in a body, rose 
 from their seats and rushed forward to clasp his hand ; 
 and it was only Greyslaer himself who could check the ex 
 citement of the multitude and prevent them from bearing 
 him off in triumph upon their shoulders. His voice, how 
 ever, at last stilled the tumult, so that a few words from 
 the bench could be heard. They were addressed, not to 
 the prisoner, but to Bait himself. 
 
 " And pray tell me, my worthy fellow," said the judge, 
 with moistened eyes, " why you did not, when first called 
 to the stand, testify at once to the impossibility of this 
 Bradshawe having fallen by the hand of our gallant 
 friend, for whose unmerited sufferings not even the tri 
 umphant joy of this moment can fully compensate ? Why 
 did you not arrest these most painful proceedings the mo 
 ment it was in your power?" 
 
 " And yere honor don't see the caper on't raaly ? You 
 think I might have got Major Max out of this muss a little 
 sooner by speaking up at onct, eh ? Well, I'll tell ye the 
 hull why and wherefore, yere honor ;" and the worthy 
 woodsman, laying one brown and brawny hand upon the 
 rail before him, looked round with an air of pardonable 
 conceit at finding such a multitude of well-dressed people
 
 534 GREYSLAER; 
 
 hanging upon his words, cleared his throat once or twice, 
 and thus bespoke himself: 
 
 " I owned a hound onct, gentlemen, as slick a dog as 
 ever you see, any on ye, for the like o' that brute was 
 not in old Tryon ; and one day, when hunting among the 
 rocky ridges around Konnedieyu,* or Canada Creek, as 
 some call it, I missed the critter for several hours. I 
 looked for him on the hathes above, and I clomb down into 
 the black chasm ' where the waters pitch, and leap, and 
 fling about so sarcily, and sprangle into foam agin the 
 walls on airy side. It was foolish, that's a fact, to look for 
 him there ; for the eddies are all whirlpools ; and if by 
 chance, he had got into the stream, why, instead of being 
 whirled about and chucked on shore, as I hoped for, the 
 poor critter would have been sucked under, smashed on 
 the rocky bottom, and dragged off like all natur. And so 
 I thought when I got near enough 'for my eyes to look 
 fairly into those black holes, with a twist of foam around 
 them, that seemed to screw, as it were, right down through 
 the yaller water of Konnedieyu. 
 
 " But now I hears a whimper in the bushes above me. 
 I looks up to the top of the precipice against which I'm 
 leaning, and there, on a ledge of rock about midway, what 
 do I see but the head of the very hound I was in search 
 of peering out from the stunted hemlocks that grew in the 
 crevices. To holp him from below was impossible; so I 
 went round and got to the top of the hathe. The dog 
 was now far below, and it was a putty risky business to 
 let myself down the face of the cliff to the ledge where he 
 
 * Now Trenton Falls.
 
 A ROMANCE OF THE MOHAWK. 535 
 
 was. The critter might get up to me full as easily as I 
 could get down to him ; for here and there were little 
 sloping zigzag elects of rock broad enough for the footing 
 of a dog, but having no bushes near by which a man could 
 steady his body while balancing along the face of the 
 cliff. They leaned over each other, too, with breadth 
 enough for a dog to pass between, but not for a man to 
 stand upright, 
 
 " I whistled to the dog : ' Why in all thunder does the 
 old hound not come up when I call T says I to myself, 
 says I. ' By the everlasting hokey, if he hasn't got one 
 foot in a painter* trap,' said I the next moment, as I caught 
 sight of the leather thong by which some Redskin had 
 fixed the darned thing to the rock. I ups rifle at onct, 
 and had hand on trigger to cut the string with a bullet. 
 ' Stop, old Bait, what are ye doing T says I agin, afore I 
 let fly. 'The dumb brute, to be sure, will be free if you 
 clip that string at onct, as you know you can. But the 
 teeth of the trap have cut into his flesh already ; will you 
 run the chance of its further mangling him, and making 
 the dog of no valw to any one by letting him drag that 
 cursed thing after him when he gets away ? No ! rayther 
 let him hang on there a few moments as he is, till you can 
 go judgmatically to work to free him.' With that I let 
 the suffering critter wait until I had cut down a tivf. 
 slanted it from the top of the cliff to the ledge where he 
 lay, got near enough to handle him, uncoiled the leather 
 thong that had got twisted round him, sprung the trap 
 from his bleeding limb, and holped him to some purpose. 
 
 * PnnHtpr
 
 53G GREYSLAER; 
 
 " Now, yere honor, think ye that, if I had not waited 
 patiently till all this snarl about Miss Alida had been disen 
 tangled afore Major Max got free, he would not have gone 
 away from this court with something still gripping about 
 his heart, as I may say ; something to which the steel 
 teeth of that painter trap, hows'ever closely they might 
 set, were marciful, as I may say ? Sarting ! sarting he 
 would. But now every one has heard here all that man, 
 woman, and child can say agin her. And here, in open 
 court, with all these book-larnt gentlemen, and yere honor 
 at their head, to sift the business, we've gone clean to the 
 bottom of it, and brought out her good name without a 
 spot upon it." 
 
 We will leave the reader to imagine the effect which 
 this homely but not ineloquent speech of the noble-minded 
 woodsman produced upon the court, upon the spectators, 
 and upon him who was most nearly interested in what the 
 speaker said. 
 
 The reader must imagine, too, the emotions of Alida 
 when Max and she next met, and Greyslaer made her lis 
 ten to the details of the trial from the lips of his deliverer ; 
 while Bait, pausing ever and anon as he came to some 
 particular which he scarcely knew how to put in proper 
 language for her ears, would at last get over the difficulty 
 by flatly asserting that he " disremembered exactly what the 
 bloody lawyer said jist at this part, but the major could 
 tell her that in by-times." 
 
 Those by-times, as Bait so quaintly called them, those 
 sweet and secret interchanges of heart with heart, and 
 that full and blessed communion of prosperous and happy 
 love, came at last for Max and Alida. 
 
 Thev were wedded in the autumn, at that delicious sea-
 
 A ROMANCE OF THE MOHAWK. 537 
 
 son of our American climate when a second spring, less 
 fresh, less joyous than that of the opening year, but gen 
 tler, softer, and though the herald of bleak winter less 
 changeable and more lasting, smiles over the land ; when 
 the bluebird comes back again to carol from the cedar 
 top, and the rabbit from the furze, the squirrel upon the 
 chestnut bough, prank it away as merrily as when the 
 year was new ; when the doe loiters in the forest walk as 
 the warm haze hides her from the hunter's view, and the 
 buck admires his antlers in the glassy lake which the 
 breeze so seldom ripples ; when Nature, like her own wild 
 creatures, who conceal themselves in dying, covers her 
 face with a mantle so glorious that we heed not the parting 
 life beneath it. They were wedded, then, among those 
 sober but balmy hours, when love like theirs might best 
 receive its full reward. 
 
 Thenceforward the current of their days was as calm 
 as it had hitherto been clouded, and both Max and Alida, 
 in realizing the bounteous mercies which brightened their 
 afterlives, as well as in remembering the dark trials they 
 had passed through ; the fearful discipline of the charac 
 ter of the one, the brief but bitter punishment of a single 
 lapse from virtue in the other that Heaven-sent punish 
 rnent, which but heralded a crowning mercy both re 
 mained henceforth among those who acknowledge 
 
 " THERE is A DIVINITY THAT SHAPES OUR ENDS. 
 
 ROUGH HEW THEM HOW WE WILL." 
 
 Our story ends here. The fate of the oth-r chnracters 
 who have been principally associated in its progress is 
 24
 
 538 GREYSLAER; 
 
 soon told. Isaac Brant, as is related in the biograpy of 
 his father, perished ultimately by the hand of that only 
 parent, whose life he had several times attempted, and 
 who thus most singularly wrought out the curse which 
 the elder De Roos had pronounced against him in dying. 
 Of Thayendanagea, or Brant himself, we need say nothing 
 further here, as the full career of that remarkable person 
 is sufficiently commemorated elsewhere. The two John 
 sons must likewise at this point be yielded up to the chari 
 ties of the historians who have recorded their ruthless 
 deeds throughout the Valley of the Mohawk in the subse 
 quent years of the war. The redoubtable Joe Bettys did 
 not close his career quite so soon as might have been ex 
 pected from the disastrous condition in which we last left 
 him ; but, recovering from his wound under the care of 
 the presumed teamster to* whom Bait had intrusted him, 
 and who turned out to be a secret partisan of the faction to 
 which Bettys belonged, the worthy Joe made his escape 
 across the frontier. He lived for some years afterward, 
 and, after committing manifold murders and atrocities, he 
 finally finished his career upon the scaffold at the close of 
 the war. The striking incidents of his capture are told 
 elsewhere with sufficient minuteness.* Old Wingear was 
 attainted as a traitor, and died of mortification from the 
 loss of his property. Syl Stickney, the only Tory, we be 
 lieve, yet to be disposed of, attempted once or twice to 
 desert to his old friends, considering himself bound for the 
 time for which he had enlisted, though both Bradshawe, his 
 leader, and Valtmeyer, who had enlisted him, were dead. 
 
 * See Stone's Life of Brant, vol. ii., p. 212.
 
 A ROMANCE OF THE MOHAWK. 539 
 
 When the term expired, however, he did not hesitate to 
 join the Whigs, with whom he fought gallantly till the 
 close of the war, and received a grant of land in the west 
 ern part of the State for the active services he rendered 
 in Sullivan's famous campaign against the Indian towns. 
 It was doubtless this Sylla and his brother Marius, who, 
 calling each a settlement after themselves, set the exam 
 ple of giving those pedagogue classic names to our western 
 villages, which have cast such an air of ridicule over that 
 flourishing region of the State of New York. 
 
 It remains only to speak of the affectionate-hearted 
 Bait, whose only foible, if so it may be called, was, that 
 he never could abide a Redskin. His nephew, Christian 
 Lansingh, marrying the gentle Tavy Wingear, succeeded 
 to the public-house of her father after the attainder of the 
 hypocritical deacon had been reversed in his favor. And 
 there, by the inn fire-side, long after the war was over, 
 old Bait, with his pipe in his mouth, used to delight to 
 tight his battles over for the benefit of the listening travel 
 ler. The evening of his days, however, was spent chiefly 
 at the Hawksnest. Greyslaer, soon after his marriage, 
 had embraced the tender of a mission to one of the south 
 ern courts of Europe, with which government honored 
 him. The health of Alida had been seriously impaired 
 by her mental sufferings ; and though loth to relinquish 
 the active part he had hitherto taken in the great struggle 
 of his country, Max was glad to be able to devote himself 
 in a different way to her interests, where Alida would have 
 the benefit of a more genial clime. But in the peaceful 
 years that followed his return, many was the pleasant 
 hunt, many the loitering tour that he and old Bait had to 
 gether among the romantic hills and bright trout-streum>
 
 5 10 GREYSLAER; 
 
 to the north of his demesnes ; and many the token of 
 kindness from Alida to the Spreading Dew, which Max 
 carried with him on these excursions, when the rapid dis 
 appearance of game in his own level country induced 
 Teondetha to shift his wigwam to these mountain soli 
 tudes. 
 
 THE END.
 
 VALUABLE BOOKS, 
 
 PUBLISHED AND FOR SALE BY 
 
 BAKER & SCRIBNER, 
 
 BRICK CHURCH CHAPEL, 
 
 FRONTING ON 145 NASSAU ST. AND 36 PARK ROW, 
 NEW YORK 
 
 CHARLOTTE ELIZABETH'S WORKS. 
 
 Uniform Edition, 13 vols. 12mo. $6 50. 
 
 CHARLOTTE ELIZABETH'S JUVENILE WORKS. 
 
 (Not included in the above 13 vols.) 8 vols. I8mo. $3 00. 
 
 We have received numerous commendatory notices at 
 our edition of Charlotte Elizabeth's Works, from the religiou* 
 papers of all denominations of Christians in this country, 
 and for the benefit of those who have not supplied themselves 
 with her books, we insert here a few which are believed to 
 be a fair specimen of the opinions of the secular press. 
 
 M:<xrucr LUU iiiuuu tu B;I^, iii.u BIIO i LUU iivitiui iiuimaii iii'jiej vf to pr6~ 
 
 diet that her works will be as extensively and profitably read, as those 
 of the most delightful female writer of the last generation. All her 
 
 " Charlotte Elizabeth's works have become so universally known, and 
 are so highly and deservedly appreciated in this country, that it nan be 
 come almost superfluous to mention them. We doubt exceedingly 
 whether there has been* any female writer since Mrs. Hannah More, 
 whose works are likelv to be so extensively and so profitably n&d a 
 hers, i^he thinks deeply and accurately, is a great aualysist of the hu 
 man heart, and withal eiothM fii'r thoughts in most appropriate and elo 
 quent language." Albany Argus. 
 
 " These productions constitute a bright relief to the corrupting literv 
 ture in which our age is so prolific, full of practical instruction, illustra 
 tive of the beauty of Protestant Christianity, and not the leso abounding 
 In ntrtaining description and narrative." Journal qf Commerce.
 
 Charlotte Elizabeth's Works. 
 
 PERSONAL RECOLLECTIONS, 1 "L 
 
 HELEN FLEETWOOD, 
 
 JUDAH*S LION, 
 
 Jt'D/CA CAP' 
 
 THE SIEGE OF DERRY, 
 
 LETTERS FROM IRELAND, 
 
 THE ROCK 
 
 FLORAL BIOGRAPHY. 
 
 PRINCIPALITIES AND POWERS, 50 
 
 PAS: so 
 
 CC\-C~"- - \ 50 
 
 THE CONVENT BELL.Tik.J 
 
 39 
 
 PHILIP AND HIS GARDEN, 
 
 FLOWER OF JNNOCEK: 38 
 
 SIMPLE FLOV. . 36 
 
 38 
 
 FEMALE MARTYRS, 38 
 
 AND ILLUSTRATIONS, 
 DRESSMAKERS AND MILLINERS, 
 
 -ORSAKEN HOME. 
 THE LITTLE PiN-HEADEBS 
 THE LACE RUNNERS, 
 LETTER WRJT1NC, 
 BACK BITING, 
 PROM! S S3 AND PERFORMING, 
 
 THE PEEP OF DAY. 
 
 Or a Series of tke earliest Rriiffioas iustrorJno. tbe 
 MM is capabir of receiving, wi'b rerses iiiiist' 
 
 - 
 
 LIME UPON LINE, 
 
 . secoci series, SO :& 
 
 BT 
 
 Br dhe 
 
 b evci 
 
 Tie poWisfaers refer with the 
 to aH iiarents and fcjcLeis who hare 
 
 wffl testlfr a> to die
 
 THE BETHEL FLAG- 
 
 A SEKIKI OP 1HOBT OUCOtrUKl TO IZAXX3T. 
 
 By Gardiner Spring, D.D. 1 roL, 12n. 
 
 TALES FOR THE RICH AND POOR. 
 By T. S. Arthur. 6 vols., 18mo. 
 
 KEEPING UP APPEA.RAXCE3 
 HJCHES H 
 
 WORLD. 
 
 MAKING HAsTE TO BE RICH. 
 DEBTOR AND CREDITOR. 
 BETLRING FROM E 
 
 THE POWER OF THE FULPIT, 
 
 Or Plain Thoughts addressed to Christian Minis 
 ters, and those who hear tko% on the Inf voice at 
 a Preacheti Gospel. 1 TO!., 12mo. By Rev. Gar 
 diner Spring, D. D., with 2 beautiful steel portrait 
 of the author. 
 
 LECTURES ON SHAKSPEARE. 
 2 rols- 12mo. Bv H. N. Hadsom. 
 
 LIFE OF OLIVER CROMWELL. 
 
 1 TO!., 12mo. By J. T. Headier, author of u Napoleon 
 
 and kis Marshals." &c., with portrait. (Ready early 
 in May.) 
 
 NAPOLEON AND HIS MARSHALS. 
 
 2 rols^ 12xno. By J. T. Headley. Seventeenth edition. 
 
 WASHINGTON AND HIS GENERALS. 
 2 voK, 12mo. By J. T. Headley. Fifteatk cdkioa. 
 
 May lt IW8.
 
 TEACHING A SC1ENCE-THE TEACHER AN ARTIST. 
 
 By Rev. Baynnrd R. Hall, A.M., author of " Something 
 for Everybody," &c. 1 vol., 12mo. 
 
 " The author of this work has a strong claim on his readers' at 
 tcntion. He speaks from experience, having been engaged in the 
 business of teaching for a quarter of a century. He has been prin 
 cipal of schools various in their character ; has taught mathematics, 
 sciences, languages, and the lower and higher branches of the Kng- 
 lish. His pupils have been of different States, nations, sexes, ant 
 ages, thus obliging him to practise different modes of instructing 
 and governing. Kor these, and similar reasons, he seems led to sup 
 pose that the world will give him a favorable hearing ; and we honor 
 his judgment, being persuaded his book will be read with absorbing 
 interest. Christian Intelligencer. 
 
 " A vigorous pen is employed in the work, in setting forth clearly 
 and eloquently advocating important truths, which all teachers 
 should ponder." Protestant Cliuichman. 
 
 " His perceptions are acute, his mind logical, his judgment sound, 
 his language terse and pointed, and his sarcasms cutting to the root 
 and branch of error. His work before us will live, and perform its 
 mission The Spectator. 
 
 " An army of such teachers as Mr. Hall pictures in this work, 
 -vould do more for the advancement of a country in all that is en 
 :iobling and exalting in its character, than mere legislation, how 
 ever wise, or science and art, however extensive, could possibly 
 accomplish." The Episcopal Recorder. 
 
 THE OWL CREEK LETTERS, AND OTHER COR 
 RESPONDENCE- 
 
 By W. 1 vol., 12mo. 
 
 " They exhibit some masterly traits of authorship, and present 
 truths and sentiments of no little worth in a garb unusually attrac 
 tive. '' New YorA Evangelist. 
 
 "They are written with taste and true feeling, and many of them 
 are of touching beauty." The Observer. 
 
 "Rural life and scenes, summer adventures and home-bred plea 
 iiures, the sports of the field and the family, the watering-place, and 
 the farm house, in our own beloved America, are here exhibited in a 
 series of desultory, but charming sketches, characterized by free 
 dom, grace, and genial feeling." The Newark Sentinel. 
 
 " Very agreeable and sketchy, picturing to the eye the forest and 
 lake scenery, the excitement of the hunter, and the eager devotion 
 of the fly-fisher, together with little domestic incidents of the plea 
 sant and mournful kind, with various et ceteras. to which an agree 
 able letter-writer knows how to impart an interest which attrsxcti 
 the reader." Presbyterian. 
 
 " Some passages in this book equal in power of description any 
 thing we have ever met with." The Constitution.
 
 BAKER AND SCRIBNER 
 
 HAVE RECENTLY PUBLISHED : 
 THE CZAR: HIS COURT AND PEOPLE, 
 
 Including a tour in Norway and Sweden. By John S. 
 Maxwell, pp. 368. 1 vol., 12mo 
 
 " A volume of uncommon excellence, upon a region of the earth, 
 Litherto not much treated by Americans. Mr. Maxwell's diplomatic 
 position gave him remarkable opportunities for observing men and 
 things in Russia ; and his scholarship and sound judgment, have 
 given to these observations a shape which must secure high esteem 
 for the book. It is full of information, and exempt from every sus 
 picion of tediousness or egotism. The picture of the noble Scandi 
 navian countries, with which the volume opens, is fascinating to a 
 degree for which, we confess, we were unprepared." Princeton 
 Rtview. 
 
 " Seldom have we received a more agreeable or instructive vol 
 ume of travels. The author visited Russia in a diplomatic capacity, 
 and enjoyed remarkable opportunities for observation. He passed 
 through several of the northern countries of Kurope, and a consi 
 derable portion of the Russian empire, including Moscow and 
 I'etersburgh ; and the results of his observations are given with re 
 markable ease and naturalness. His account of the Scandinavian 
 countries is a delightful picture of an orderly, moral people, enjoy 
 ing the blessings of good government and regulated liberty." - 
 Newark Daily .Advertiser. 
 
 " The description of the present state of Norway is a delightful 
 and graphic picture of the habits and manners' of the people of this 
 primitive country. Nor are the details of Russian Society and psr- 
 lonal recollections of Nicholas and his court, less worthy of com 
 mendation. The style is remarkably free from exaggeration and 
 iickly sentiment qualifications we consider to bo invaluable in a 
 modern tourist." The Albion. 
 
 " The sterling bullion of the book, which we heartily commend 
 to our readers, is very much enhanced by the elegant strip in which 
 it is detailed ; and its merits, in every respect, ought to secure to 
 this volume a place in every library. Thp whole is exceedingly 
 well-written, and contains a ma*s of valuable infm malion uilh'oult to 
 be found in any other publication." Home Jnurnnl. 
 
 "The writer of this book seems to us to have shown himself intel 
 ligent, observing, judicious, and impartial; and t 1 1- the 
 volt important requisites for an au'.i.o; oi a i;o >L i i ,n<-N. He
 
 has had many predecessors in the same route, who have chronicled 
 their observations and adventures as he has done ; hut there is a 
 freshness and good temper and point in what he has written that will, 
 notwithstanding, deservedly secure to his work, a more than com 
 mon share of public favor." American Literary Magazine. 
 
 ' It is so condensed as not to be tedious, but sufficiently detailed to 
 give a fair view of men. manners, and things in those parts of F.urope 
 which have not been written to utter sterility by the travelling 
 book-makers. He has done well ; and we believe that a discerning 
 public will seek his book, and be pleased with it." The Observer 
 
 'It is a clever book by an intelligent American tourist, a New 
 Jforker, who visited Russia with every advantage for seeing ths 
 country and its people, and "seeing it well." to use a phrase ol 
 Madame de Sevigny. His sketches of the social life of the Russians, 
 of the habits of the nobility and their serfs, are well drawn, and his 
 notes of the political and moral condition of Russia are instructive." 
 The Evening Post. 
 
 THE ORATORS OF FRANCE, 
 
 By Cormenin. Illustrated with portraits. 1 vol., 12mo 
 Third edition. 
 
 "Every one, at the present time, is anxious to become acquainted 
 
 ' With the men who are figuring in the transactions of the Revolution 
 
 cow in progress in France We commend this book to our readers, 
 
 as the best clue which they can possibly take up for the acquire 
 
 ment of the knowledge they are desirous to obtain. 
 
 "This book was written by Cormenin, two years ago ; and the 
 truthfulness of his estimates may be seen in the parts which have 
 since been played by the great men whom he then portrayed. We 
 regard this as a very superior production, and have read it with 
 deep interest." Alliance and Visittr. 
 
 " This work is a translation of the famous ' Oratorical Portraits' of 
 Timon. the publication of which created an enthusiasm in the poli 
 tical world quite equal to that caused by the famous ' Junius.' Eve 
 ning Herald. 
 
 " For discriminating views of the characters of the times and the 
 men of which it treats, and for vigor and elegance of style, this work 
 is not surpassed by anything that has yet appeared." Daily Af- 
 vcrtiser. 
 
 " Timon wields a masterly pen : terse, graphic, and spirited, he 
 never for a moment suffers our interest to flag , and we close the 
 book with as keen a relish as when we commenced. Though he has 
 devoted but a brief space to each orator, so condensed are his 
 thoughts, so nervous his language, and so clear and distinct his iimn- 
 ings, that we obtain a vivid idea of their most striking characteris 
 tics." New Yorfc Evening Post. 
 
 " Remarkable for rapidity of transition, sudden flashes of brilliant 
 fmagery, bold and direct perception of motives and actions, profound 
 observation, sententious, picturesque and eloquent, the book is all 
 that is requisite for great and deserved popularity." Evening Tran- 
 \eript.
 
 HOME STORIES, 
 
 BY CHARLES BITRDETT. 
 
 THE ADOPTED CHILD, 
 
 5>r the- necessity of Early Piety, by Charles Burdett, the 
 author of "Emma, or the Lost Found." 1 voL 8m 
 31 cents. 
 
 LILLA HART, 
 
 A Talo of New York, by diaries Burdett, author of the 
 "Adopted Child," "Chances and Changes," &c., &c. 
 1 vol. 18rno. 50 cents. 
 
 THE CONVICT'S CHILD, 
 
 By Charles Burdutt, author of " Lilla Hart," "Adopted 
 Child," fee., &c. 1 vol. I8mo. 50 cents. 
 
 " It is c!ear that "ilr. Hurflett baa told many a tale were it other^iis* 
 he could not have. t"M tin- tale of the Cunvict's Cliilil in trie way thai he 
 lias (lon it. We w.niltl not lelieve that this book is a narrative- of Uctg 
 if .-so credible a man as the author had not assured HR it is even s.>, and 
 were we not ronvincc'l that ' truth is st'iinjrcr tlian fi'.'ti >n.' Those who 
 want to enjoy a luxury of tearc may realize their wi.-hes liv following 
 the f irtune.1 of Ali<la. tlie Convict's Child. The strry makes an unj re- 
 teuJing little volume " Southern Cl.i <-tc. 
 
 " The moral of this little story is highly <viiniiipmlab>, and its style ifl 
 cJiaracterizod by sini|'licity and absence of pretension, lllnstr live of 
 some of the crying evils of Ki>cial life tfrowinj? out of ili-f iiimli'd pre 
 judices galnittta otTsjiriiiK of wir::,cd parents, its plain but touching 
 exposition of the snbjtct must tend to correct so .u-n-at a wn>n;r. Such 
 \\orks induce a In-tte" sjiirit in society for those unfortunates who are 
 either eiidanir^red in their tender jc.irs by th. ' ;1 care which 
 
 Providence derfffMd for n -i-e left without any watchful eye 
 
 to discover, and carcfi'l hand to tiard them against the threatening 
 Inroad* of T ; C6 " Protestant Churchman
 
 THE CONVICT'S CHILD. BY CHARLES BURDETT. 
 
 ' : This little volume partakes of the general character of the series 
 It* special aim is to show the consequences of the general tendency o 
 the part of the public to ' visit the sins and crimes ot parents upon chil 
 dren, no matter how innocent, DO matter how pure or virtuous.' Tha' 
 this tendency is general, that it causes an immense amount of suffer 
 ing, entirely unmerited, and that it should be remedied, all readily 
 admit; and we certainly know no way in which a better state of public 
 feeling upon the subject can be more effectually produced, than by the 
 circulation and perusal of such volumes as this. It is exceedingly in 
 teresting. well written, and will certainly be widely read. We cordially 
 commend it to the attention of all our readers. It will well repay the 
 attention which it so strongly attracts. It is very neatly published by 
 Messrs. Baker & Scribner, at 145 Nassau street." N. S. Courier and 
 Enquirer. 
 
 " Messrs. Baker & Scribner, New York, have published a smalj 
 volume, neatly bound in embossed muslin, entitled The Convict's 
 Child. The author is Charles Burdett, Esq., who has for sometime past 
 devoted his attention to the production of a very excellent series of little 
 works, the object of which is mainly to inspire a better feeling in the 
 community towards those whose poverty or want of proper instruction 
 leads them to the commission of errors, of which they would undoubt 
 edly be guiltless if the smallest helping hand were extended towards 
 them by those whose condition of life is more elevated. The stories ot 
 ' Lilla Hart,' ' The Adopted Child,' &c., by this benevolent writer, were 
 well received by the public ; and it is hoped the present volume will 
 meet with similar favor. The occupation of the author that of Re 
 porter to one of the best newspapers in the country-- has brought him 
 oftentimes to witness occurrences to which others wre strangers. The 
 scenes which he describes are drawn from life, and the incidents true, 
 although they may seem strange." Baltimore American. 
 
 CLEMENT OF ROME, 
 
 A Legend of the Sixteenth Century, with an introduction by 
 Prof. Taylor Lewis. 1 vol. 18mo. 63 cents. 
 
 " This is a story of marked and continued interest, and presents some 
 fine traits of early Christian character, rendered more brilliant by being 
 associated with contemporary Grecian and Roman life. It is introduced 
 to public notice by Taylor Lewis. He regards it as a correct and beau 
 tiful delineation of the Christianity of the first century, and besides ag 
 valuable, for the faithful representation it gives of Roman manners." 
 Albany Spectator. 
 
 " In saying that this is a work of fiction we must explain ourselves. 
 In order to realize to the mind the interestins occurrences of the first 
 century, Mrs. J. has attempted to eke out, by a fruitful imagination, the 
 facts which are barely glanced at in the New Testament and other early 
 writing*; and has accomplished her daring task with such .an air of 
 probability and such a dramatic effect, as cannot fail to involve the 
 reader in the utmost interest. The author had doubtless read cer'ain of 
 Bulwers novels and Shakspeare's Historical Tragedies she is certainly 
 familiar with Tacitus and Suetonius, and also with Eusebius, Socrates, 
 and other early Christian writers. From these authors she derives 
 the historical facts that constitute the main building, which she adorns 
 o tastefully with th3 beautiful festoonery of her inventive genius," 
 6>Cvthern Christian Altocatc.
 
 THE ANTIQUITIES OF THE CHRISTIAN CHURCH, 
 
 Translated and compiled from the works of Augu&ti, with 
 numerous additions from Rheinwald, Siegel, and others; 
 By the Rev. Lyman Coleman, 1vol. 8vo. $2 50. 
 
 COMPLETE WORKS OF REV. DANIEL A. CLARK. 
 idited by his son James Henry Clark, M.D., with a bio 
 graphical sketch, and an estimate of his powers as a 
 preacher, by Rev. George Shepard, A.M., Professor of 
 Sacred Rhetoric, Bangor Theological Seminary, 2 vols. 
 8vo. $4 00. 
 
 D'AUBIGNE AND HIS WRITINGS, 
 
 With a Sketch of the Life of the Author, by Rev. Robert 
 Baird, D.D., 1 vol. I2mo. half bound. SO 50. 
 Do. do. do. cloth. $0 63. 
 
 " The widespread and deserved popularity of the great work of D'Au- 
 bigne, on the Reformation, has very naturally created an Interest in 
 everything which has proceeded from his pen, or relates to him person 
 ally. His discourses and smaller works, which have been translated and 
 republished in this country, bear evident marks of a common paternity 
 with the Great Reformation; and that is praise enough. There is the 
 same purity and high order of thought the same engrossing interest 
 and the same directness and vigor of expression." Ithaca Chronicle, 
 
 THE LIVES OF THE APOSTLES OF JESUS CHRIST. 
 By D. Francis Bacon, 1 vol. 8vo. S3 00. 
 
 " This work has now been for more than ten years before the public ; 
 and, although many thousand copies have been scattered abroad, yet 
 thousands have never seen it, to whom, if possessed by them, it could 
 not but prove of inestimable value. It is the result of many year* of 
 deep research, and patient investigation of works of various kinds, in 
 different languages, which bear upon the liveg of the Apostles. Inde 
 pendent of containing a clear and vivid delineation of the lives of mem 
 bers of the Apostolic college, this volume has other claims upon us. It 
 presents not only a complete history of the early Church, but throw* 
 much light on the meaning of the sacred text; the whole written with 
 out mbiguitv. and in so simple a style, as to adapt itxelf to every class 
 of readers. The edition before us. by Baker and Scribner, is a beautiful 
 one, and must command an extensive sale. It can be obtained at any of 
 ur bookstores." Albany Spectator. 
 
 OBLIGATIONS OF THE WORLD TO THE BIBLE. 
 
 By Gardiner Spring, D. D. 1 vol. 12 mo. $1.
 
 ESSAYS ON THE PROGRESS OF NATIONS, 
 
 In productive Industry, Civilization, Population, and 
 Wealth; illustrated by Statistics of Mining, Agriculture, 
 Manufactures, Commerce, Banking, Revenues, Internal 
 Improvements, Emigration, Mortality and Population, by 
 Ezra C. Seaman. 
 
 " We have already spoken quite fully in commendation of thia work, 
 yet havs. said less than its merits deserve. It is a most truthful and in 
 structive work, which should lind a place in our Village and Schoel 
 Libraries, and be studied l>v every lireside. Ail men in a republic shoulj 
 possess some knowledge of at least, the elements of Political Economy, 
 ami yet how few really do possess it! A vagiin instinct of self-interest, 
 a few cherished viewsaud some rude notion ot what experience has taught 
 these compose the sum of what is known of I'oliiieal Kr'.iininy by the 
 vast majority. The ponderous volume h. which the science (.') is taught 
 are usually iuac-essible to the mass of readers, and scarcely intelligible, 
 if at hand : to say nothing of the radical e'T>is which run through most 
 Oi them. Mr. teamen's work wiil be readily understood by any one, and 
 nove can read it without acquiring broader and juster views of national 
 policy ar.d a wise public economy." N. Y. \'i ibunc. 
 
 ' Ihe work so justly characterized in the r\bove, copied from the Tri 
 bune, i.i i'jr sale by [.Messrs. Baker . Scribner.j 'it is in truth a work 
 of great research, honest and convincing in its expressions of opinion. 
 and admirably calculated by its array of incontrovertible facts, to dis 
 pel tne nnr.y e.Tineous and mischievous nti >.is of mere theorizing 
 political eco.'ic mists. We warmly commend it to public favor, as a buok 
 of great intere.-:t a.Mj utility." Cummcrcial Advertiser, Buffalo. 
 
 A Letter t ' 'he Author from Hon. Millard Fitimorc. 
 
 BUFFALO, SEPTEMBER 23, 1816. 
 
 DEAR SIR : I hart only found time, amidst tht pressure of profes 
 gional engagements, to rwd a few chapters of your " tl.tsai/s on the Pro 
 grets of Nations," but I have read enough to satisfy me that it is a 
 very valuable publication and that it bring.? within tLe roach of every 
 man a vast store of useful information, as to the progros^ if agriculture 
 and the arts among mankind, which can be found nowhen. tlse in so con 
 densed and cheap a form. Your sound views of politico; -nioiny are 
 sustained by statistical details which serve at once to illustrate the sub 
 ject and carry conviction to the mind. 
 
 I am also gratified to perceive that the book is free from pol't'ial cant 
 and partizan bias, and wish a cony i.iht be placed in the hands Oi' every 
 enligi-tened citizen. l(epectully yours, 
 
 E. C. SEAMAN, Esa. JMILLAUD FILLMOKK. 
 
 THE ELEMENTS OF ASTRONOMY, 
 Designed as an Introduction tc the Study. 1 vol IPrco. 
 25 cents. 
 
 REFLECTIONS ON Fl OWF.RS, 
 
 By James Hervey, author of " M^Jita/.ions among thf 
 Tombs." 1 vol. I8mo. 31 cts. 
 
 EMANUEL ON THE CROSS AND <>' THE GARDEN, 
 
 By R. P. Buddicom. 1 vol. ICmo. 63 cts.
 
 SLAVERY DISCUSSED IN OCCASIONAL ESSSAYS, 
 From 1833 to 181G, by the Rev. Leonard Bacon, D. D., 
 Pastor of the first Congregational church, New Haven, 
 Conn. 1 vol I2tno, 75 cents. 
 
 " This volume contains some of the calmest and ablest essays on the 
 vexed question of Slavery we have ever met with. The writer is one 
 of the happy few who have been able to examine it dispassionately, and 
 the general circulation of his views cannot fail to d .> much good among 
 all cla-ses of readers. As Will be seen from the title, the essays lover a 
 sufficient spac<> to embrace nearly all the phases the question has un 
 dergone, and of course, being written honestly, display some diversity 
 of opinion, but as a whole they are remarkably congruous." Buffalo 
 Commercial Advertiser. 
 
 THE LIFE AND VOYAGES OF AMERICUS VESPUCIUS, 
 
 With illustrations concerning the Navigator and Discovery 
 of the New World, by C. E. Lester and Andrew Foster. 
 1 vol. 8vo. $2 50. 
 
 ' The subject of this work is sufficient of itself to attract and interest 
 every American. The man who gave name to this great western con 
 tinent can never be forgotten. The volume before us is not the produc 
 tion of a few short days ; it has occupied months of labor and research. 
 Many old manuscripts in Italian, Spanish and German bearing on his 
 life and voyages, have been carefully examined ; and all the large libra 
 ries in thia country have been searched fur collections relative to 
 the great discoverer a title which many will not award to him. For 
 much of the value of the work, and lor the translations of interesting 
 letters, the public are indebted to Mr. Foster, of Boston, to whom the 
 original foreign M.~S. and letters were committed lor translation. It ii 
 written in that flowing and attractive style which characterizes all Mr. 
 Lester's productions, and cannot fail to have an extensive circulation." 
 Albany Spectator. 
 
 THE ARTISTS OF AMERICA, 
 
 Illustrated with nine engravings on steel, and containing 
 sketches of the lives of Washington Alston, Henry 
 Inman, Benjamin West, Gilbert Charles Stuart, John 
 Trumbull, James DeVeaux, Rembrandt Peale and 
 Thomas Crawford. 1 vol. 8vo. $2. 
 
 u Its object is to give us sketches of the eminent Artists of America 
 in successive numbers, beautifully printed, and accornpMiiied with an 
 engraved likeness of each. This is u worthy project, and should b 
 largely patronized by all our citizens. We i-re flooded \vith light, 
 flimsy, sentimental periodicals this is something different, and will add 
 to our knowledge of our own land." A''. II. Herald. 
 
 " A b<x>k which will fill a long-felt-vacancy on the shelves of our 
 librarians, and one that if deserving to receive the encouragement of 
 very l:T*r of fin art* in our country." Brooklyn Daily Mvtrtiter
 
 THE PURITANS AND THEIR PRINCIPLES, 
 
 By the Rev. EDWIN HALL, Pastor of the First Congrega 
 
 tional Church, Norwalk, Conn., 1 vol. 8ro. $2 50. 
 
 " The appearance of an able and standard work on an important sub 
 jeet is an event to be hailed with pleasure. Such a work hag lately ap 
 peared under the title, ' The Puritans and their Principles ' It is from 
 the pen of Rev. Edwin Hall, of Norwalk, Conn. The author handles hi 
 great subject with all the ease of conscious strength and skill. H 
 wields his ponderous sledge so lightly, that we are deceived as to it* 
 weight, till we hear the crushing blow, and see the sparkling shower, a 
 the instrument rings on the sounding anvil. It is then that we admire 
 the vigor of the stalwart arm. 
 
 " Rather more than half of his well printed octavo iu historical, and 
 gives a condensed, but thorough account of the origin, history, opinions, 
 sufferings, enterprises, reverses and successes of the admirable class of 
 men, of whom David Hume has testified that ' the precious spark of liberty 
 had been kindled by the Puritans alone,' and that it is to them that 
 ' the English owe the whole freedom of their constitution.' To them 
 the people of America are, even more than the English, indebted for their 
 best social institutions and their noblest traits of national character. 
 To them the Christian world is destined toeoniract a growing debt of ob 
 ligation and gratitude.' 
 
 " Having given a masterly sketch of the character and ' mighty 
 deeds' of the men, Mr. Hall proceeds to state and to vindicate their 
 their principles. Himself a Puritan in spirit aud sentiment, he is 'at 
 home,' in this discussion. He clearly exhibits the church-polity of our 
 fathers from foundation to pinnacle, and proves that it is fashioned faith 
 fully 'according to the pattern in the Mount.' Here he comes into col 
 lision with the prelatical faction whose hierarchal zeal has ever hotly 
 persecuted the Puritans, either in their persons or their memory. The 
 Episcopal divines of our day, dissatisfied with the arguments relied upon 
 in olden times, have sought to rest their claims on new foundations. 
 But Mr. Hall has demolished the new masonry, as well as the old, and 
 his work is especially valuable, as a triumphant confutation of the most 
 recent methods of defending the assumptions of prelacy Without 
 pomp and without ornament, he marches through the field of debate, like 
 a champion who cannot be stopped, and will not be drawn aside. He fol 
 lows close upon the retreating foe, till the adverary, able to recede no 
 further, ' dies in the last ditch.' 
 
 This book ought to be in the hands of all who wish to learn, easily 
 f.iid accurately, what the Puritans thought and did. It ought to have a 
 place on the shelves of every minister, who desires to be furnished with 
 fitting materials for his 'Thanksgiving Sermons.' It would make an 
 appropriate text-book for any who love to stndy those times whereof 
 Hugh Peters said, ' This is an age to make examples and precedent? 
 in" It should be perused by any degenerate son of the Pilgrims, wno 
 may be meditating filial treason and impiety, and who may be parleying 
 with the Philistines about deserting to their camp, where he will be 
 forced to prove the sincerity of his conversion by being foremost to 
 delile the sepulchres of his sires. This book might be given with good 
 effect, to the ' born and bred' prelatist, were it not the common tendency 
 of such an one, in these unheroic times, to slide still further dfiwn the 
 hill by the power of moral gravitation, rather than climb the elevated 
 summit of truth, where the air is freest, the prospect widest and the 
 heavens brightest. 
 " These lines are from one who has no acquaintance with the author,
 
 except through his book ; and who has no interest in the b.'ok, except 
 that which is awakened by a grateful perusal of ' The Puritans and their 
 Principles.' This notice is written as a slight tribute to meritorious in 
 dustry, and in the hope of aiding the circulation of a truly valuabl* 
 Tolume." New England Puritan. 
 
 " This is an elaborate, learned, and exceedingly interesting work. Its 
 Bubject is one of absorbing Interest to the statesman and the Christian. 
 Mr. Hall discusses the causes which brought the Pilgrims to then* 
 shores, and their principles; and vindicates them from the aspersion* 
 which have been cast upon them They were the most remarkable men 
 that ever reached the continent; and their monument is Civil and 
 Religious Liberty in tlie Earth. This book should have its place in 
 every library, and be in the bauds of every descendant of the 
 Puritans." N. J. Journal. 
 
 " The design of the work is to set forth the causes which brought the 
 Pilgrims to these shores; to exhibit their pr nciplcs ; to show what 
 these principle* are wor h. and what it costs to maintain thorn ; to vin 
 dicate the character of the Puritans from the as] crsions which have 
 been cast UIKJII them, and to show the PURITANIC SYSTEM OF CHURCH 
 POLITY, as distinguished from the Prelatie, broadly and solidly 
 ba-edon the Word of God; inseparable from religious Purity and Reli 
 gious Freedom ; and of immense permanent importance to the best 
 interests of mankind. 
 
 " The publication is intended to bring together such historical informa 
 tion concerning the Puritans as is now HC ,tt red through many 
 volumes, and cannot be obtained bnt with much labor and research, and 
 an outlay beyond.'' A'cic Haven Courier. 
 
 uacea me ciicuia 01 LII.IL .iieji uu tue MIX 1 1 m ii'ii> <uiu religiuun unai auiiri 
 
 of the people of both continents, and then enters into an analysis of both 
 prelatical and Puritanical church polity, and warmly and eloquently 
 defends the latter. The style of ihe work is vigorous and clothes a 
 subject on which much has been already written with new attractions, 
 co7iibiuing succinctness of historical detail with elegance of diction." 
 N. Y. Commercial Advertiser. 
 
 " After an introduction, oontainins a glance at the condition of Eng- 
 land before the days of Wickliffe, we are presented with a 1 istory of 
 Wicldifie and his times, the reign of Henry VIII., and the rise of -he 
 Puritans, from whence we trace them in their conflicts, visit them in 
 their prisons follow them in their wan erinjrs. and come with them to 
 their first rnde dwellings in th American wilderness. We behold the 
 foundation here rising under their hands, until the wilderness became 
 transformed into a fair and fruitful field. The principles of these uohle 
 men are exhibited and explained. The matter of C'hu'ch Poli y is dis 
 cussed, and th claims of Prelacy are brought to the test of reason, o 
 history, and of the Word of God." 
 
 Hartford Clnishan Secretary. 
 
 "We cannot forbear to. express our conviction that it is a work of 
 (Treat merit, and hag no common claims, especially upon the regard of 
 those who have tlie blood of the Puritans flowing in their veins. lt 
 historical details evince the most diligent re-earch, and its vigorous and 
 masterly disrussion of important principles, shows a judicious, discrimi 
 nating, and thoroughly tr.iined mind. As the subjcetn t which it 
 treat-;, have to a great extent, a controversial bearing, it cannot be 
 txpetfed that all will judge in the taut* manner of the merits of the
 
 book, but we think all wno possess ordinary cr.ndor niust agree that it 
 is written with no common ability, and contains u great amount of USB 
 ful iiiformation." Albanij American Citizen. 
 
 " This is a neatly printed octavo, of l>etween 400 and 500 pages, from 
 the pen of one who has proved himself muster of his subject. It give? tha 
 history of the Puritans, embracing the most of its material and interest 
 ing facts ; and also makes these facts subserve a defence of the charac 
 ter and principles of our ancestors. The work is ably and thoroughly 
 executed, and it ought to furnish a part of the library of every descend 
 aut of the Puritans." New England Puritan. 
 
 " The work before us is the fruit of much research and thought, and 
 will stand, in our opinion, as a noble defence of the character and prin 
 ciples of men whose monument is civil and religious liberty in the 
 earl/i. 
 
 This volume is richly worthy of a place in the library of every colleie, 
 ami of every man wh.j wi-in-s to understand the true greatness of the 
 Puritans. We presume that it will be very generally sought after and 
 extensively read. A'. Y. Observer.'' 
 
 " After an Introduction, containing a glance at the condition of Eng 
 land before the days of Wickliffe, we are presented with a history if 
 WieUliffe and his times, the reign of Henry VIII., and the rise of th<s 
 Puritans, from whence we trace them in their conflicts, visit them in 
 their pris i;s. fjllnw them in their wanderings, and cume with them to 
 their first rude dwellings in the American wilderness. We behold the 
 foundation here rising under their hands, until the wilderness becama 
 transformed into a fair and fruitful field. The principles c/f these noble 
 men are exhibited and explained. The matter of Church Polity is dis 
 cussed, and the claims of Prelacy are brought to the test of reason, of 
 history, and of the Word of God." Hartford Christian Secretary. 
 
 AN EXPOSITION OF THE LAW OF BAPTISM, 
 
 As it regards the mode and the subject, by the Rev. EDWIN 
 HALL, Pastor of the first Congregational Church, Nor walk, 
 Conn., third edition, revised and enlarged. 75. 
 
 " This is a new edition of a work first published in 1840. It ha? met 
 with great fav.. r from those whose views on the subject discussed are 
 those of the Author It is an able and learned treatise; and upon the 
 points inairly treated, leaves but little to be said either in the way of ad 
 dition or objection. It is worthy of a place in every Theological Libra 
 ry. N. Y. Journal. 
 
 THEOPNEUSTY, 
 
 Or the Plenary Inspiration of the Holy Scriptures, by S. R. 
 L. Gaussen. Professor of Theology in the new Theologi 
 cal School of Geneva, Switzerland. Third American, 
 from the second French edition, revised and enlarged by 
 the Au:hor. Transited by the Rev. Edward Norris Kirk, 
 1 vol. I2mo. $0 75.
 
 THE FAMILY OF DETHANY, 
 
 Ry L. Bonnet , with an Introductory Essay, by the Rev. 
 Hugh White. 1 vol. I8mo. 38 cts. 
 
 THE CHRISTIAN POCKET COMPANION, 
 
 Selected from the works of President Edwards and others. 
 1 vol. 18mo. 25 cts. 
 
 THE STORY OF GRACE, 
 
 The Little Sufferer. 1 vol. I8mo. 31 cts. 
 
 ADOLPHUS AND JAMES, 
 
 By the Rev. Napoleon Roussel, translated from the French* 
 1 vol. I8mo. 31 cts. 
 
 THE LILY OF THE VALLEY, by Mrs. Sherwood. Slots. 
 SHANTY, THE BLACKSMITH, by Mrs. Sherwood. SO eta 
 
 THE TRAVELLER, 
 Or the Wonders of Art, 1 vol. iSmo. 38 cts. 
 
 FLOWER FADED. 
 
 By the Rev. John Angell James, I8mo. 38 cts. 
 
 ROCKY ISLAND, 
 
 And other Parables, by Samuel Wilberforce, M.A. 1 voL 
 18mo. 38 cts. 
 
 THE LITTLE WANDERERS, 
 By Samuel Wilberforce, M.A. 1 vol. I8mo. 25 cts 
 
 THE KING AND HIS SERVANTS, 
 By Samuel Wiberforce, M.A. 1 vol. 18mo. 25 cts. 
 
 THE PROPHET'S GUARD, 
 
 By Samuel Wilberforce, M.A. 1 vol. I8mo. 25 cts. 
 
 COUNSELS TO THE YOUNG. 
 
 By the Rev. A. Alexander, D.D. 25 cts. 
 
 SELF-CULTIVATION, by Tryon Edwards. 
 EARLY PIETY, by Kev. Jacob Abbott. 25 cts. 
 
 TRANSPLANTED FLOWERS, 
 
 Or Memoir of Mrs. Rurnpff, and the Duchess dc Broglie, 
 with an appendix, by the Rev. Robert Baird. 1 vol 
 I8mo. 38 cts. 
 
 MURRAY'S ENGLISH READER, ISmo., large type. 50 cU. 
 MURRAY'S INTRODUCTION, 12mo., large type. 25 cts. 
 
 MURRAY'S SEQUEL TO THE ENGLISH READER, 
 
 I2mo .urge type. 63 cents.
 
 NAPOLEON AND HIS MARSHALS, 
 By J. T. HEADLEY, illustrated with 12 engravings on steel, 
 2 vols. 12mo. &2 50. 
 
 " The brilliant pen of our friend and correspondent has been tasked 
 for its highest and happiest efforts in these descriptions of-men and 
 scenes whose names are illustrious in the annals of history. The de 
 fence of Napoleon in the first volume has not been successfully im 
 peached by the critics, and we are pleased with the evidence that Mr. 
 Headley observes with the eye of a philosopher, while poetry distils aa 
 the dew from his flowing pen." JV. Y. Observer. 
 
 " Mr. Headley's peculiarities as an author are universally known. He 
 Is one of the most vigorous and spirit-stirring writers of the day espe 
 cially graphic and powerful in narratives of exciting events. In battle 
 scenes he has succeeded better than any other writer of the day; and he 
 has therefore very wisely given the most of his etforts to this class of 
 writings. No one can fail to get from his descriptions, most graphic, 
 Vivid and lasting impressions of the scenes of which he speaks. 
 
 The two volumes in which Mr. Headley has sketched the lives, charac 
 ters, and leading exploits of Napoleon and the band of unrivalled war 
 riors by whom he was surrounded, are among the most readable recently 
 issued from the press, and in the spirit of interest they arouse in the 
 great events with which they are connected, will be found a source of 
 great profit as well as pleasure and interest. They are very handsomely 
 printed, and contain a number of very fine outline portraits of the most 
 prominent characters. The work will form a valuable accession to every 
 public and private library." JV. Y. Courier $ Enquirer. 
 
 " NT. Headley is a clear and powerful writer, and seems to catch more 
 and more of the spirit of enthusiasm as he advances in his work. There 
 is no slacking of energy or abatement of interest to the very last; and 
 you arise from the perusal of the volumes, with new and more reasonable 
 views of the life and character of Napoleon, and with greater admira 
 tion of his brave Marshals, than you had ever been able to gather 
 from the one-eyed writings of prejudiced Englishmen." Albany Spec 
 tator. 
 
 " With a subject ever the same in its general features, the Author has 
 accomplished the difficult task of giving individuality to the different 
 battle scenes, and each Chieftain is marked by characteristics which 
 distinguish him from his fellows. No one can read these terrific de 
 scriptions without being greatly moved and feeling more deeply than 
 ever the horrors and misery of war. Alison has obtained a great reputa- 
 tioj as a painter of battles, but it seems to us that he is really surpassed 
 by Headley. As an American writer with an American heart, we com 
 mend him to the Western public." Cincinnati Paper. 
 
 " A spirit stirring, trumpet-toned description of the most distinguished 
 men and scenes of this interesting portion of modern history, when 
 written by one of the most accomplished descriptive writers of the age, 
 will form a valuable addition to any library. In describing battle scenes 
 and military exploits. Mr. H. has Rucceeded better than any writer of 
 the day ; and no one can read this work without carrying away with him 
 a clear and lasting impression a sort of Daguerreotype of the brilliant 
 scenes and passages at arms, which he has attempted to portray." Nev> 
 Haven Herald. 
 
 " The fifth edition of this work is before us. Mr. Headley is a bril 
 liant writer, and sustains his high reputation in the graphic biographies 
 of ta ' Great Captain ' and his illustrious Marshals. It ig almost toj
 
 late for us to say n word iu commendation of these volumes ; we only say 
 that if yet unread by any who desire a liberal view of the character ai.J 
 course of Napoleon, there is a delightful entertainment before them of 
 which they should partake as s<ion as possible. They are amongst the 
 most interesting volumes we have ever read. "A". J. Jourjial. 
 
 ''Tuisvrork has placed Mr. Head'ey in a high rank as a strong and 
 clear writer, and a sound thinker. His accounts of Napoleon and hig 
 Officers -see m to us to be the most faithful ever yet written; and his 
 descriptions of various battles and exciting events are remarkably 
 graphic, glowing and picturesque. Mr Headicy is a talented man; and 
 we place implicit confidence in his opinion, at the same time that w 
 admire his style." Cincinnati Chroncle. 
 
 " Indeed the work is one of remarkable power, and will add much to 
 the already well earned reputation of the author. It is written in a 
 brilliant a'>d animated style; and the reader ceases to be a critic in ad 
 miration of the splendid achievements of Napoleon and his Marshals 
 so graphically and vividly portrayed, that each sentence seems a picture: 
 and the whole book but a magnificent panorama of the battle-fields of 
 Mareiv.o, Au.-terlitz, Waterloo, etc. 
 
 " No author, observes a contemporary, has a quicker appreciation of 
 the prominent points in the character he is describing, nr a happier 
 faculty of setting them before his readers than Mr. Headley. His 
 sketch of Napoleon, we will venture to say, gives a bett.fr defined and 
 truer idea of ' tin- Man of Destiny.' than any biography in the language. 
 It relieves Napoleon from the misrepresentations of English writers, 
 and -hows that for the long and bloody wars in which he was engaged, 
 Ejgland was directly responsible." Cincinnati Alias. 
 
 " We commend ihis work to our readers as one of unusual interest, 
 written with force rather than elegance with honest warmth, rather 
 than cold discrimination. The pictures which it contains are drawn 
 with masculine and startling vigor, and although jTetfi!d ; ng to be de 
 scriptive of individuals, are connected with vivid accounts of the glorious 
 campaigns in which they were the actors." 1'cnniylTuniun. 
 
 "The abi i;y and graphic power which Mr. Headley has evinced in 
 these delineations, will not only not be questioned, but place him in the 
 first, rank of descriptive writers. Whether the same deference will be 
 pafd to the soundness of his reasoning, or the justm ss of hi* views, is 
 doubtful. His ardent love of freedom, and his onerous appreciation of, 
 and sympathy with, whatever is noble in character or action, give a 
 charm to these volumes and invest them with a good moral influence 
 The reader will not only find interest and excitement, nnd considerable 
 additions to the minuteness and accuracy of his historical knowledge, 
 but many of the mo.-t elevated sentiments, in the perusal of the work. 
 It is finely executed, and embellished with spirited etchings on steel." 
 N. Y. Evangelist. 
 
 e ii'lllior nah presenien me iuuv prominent nuns ji. me vumrwmmt 01 
 
 ach of his subjects so forcibly, that the man stands boldly forth on the 
 nL'c. and \ mi seem alm.ist to be th companion of the gallant heroes who 
 
 . 
 unrounded the .Man of Destiny.' 
 
 " We cannot undertake to condense these sketches, or extract jvortions
 
 WASHINGTON AND HIS GENERALS. 
 
 By. J. T. Headley, author of " Napoleon and his Marshals," 
 " The Sacred Mountains," &c. In two volumes. I2mo. 
 pp. 348. 
 
 " We have read it with an unwonted decree of pleasure and admira 
 tion. Many people complain that American history lacks romance; that 
 it has in it nothing stirring or striking ; and is. therefore, dull and spirit 
 less, beside the annals of Europe. Mr. HKADLEY has given to this 
 objection the most thorough an.l conclusive refutation it could possibly 
 receive; and it-.is not likely to be heard again. He has given to the 
 incidents of our Revolution, by his graphic and spirited descriptions, an 
 intensity of interest not surpassed in the gran lest achievments of Na 
 poleon's troops. Instead of giving simply the naked details of what waa 
 done, like most of those who have written upon the same subject, he 
 h is brrathe.l into them the breath of life ; he brings his reader into the 
 immediate presence of the act he describes ; his words have a burning, 
 rushing pjwer; and you can no more doubt the reality of his pictures, 
 than you could have doubted the reality of the original scenes, had you 
 been in the midst of them." Courier and Inquirer. 
 
 '' Unlike all the histories of the American Revolution, which aim to 
 give the causes and the results of the war, Mr. Headley presents the 
 eventful part of that Revolution, and describes the scenes wtiich trans 
 pired seventy y:ars ago with such nervous precision and accurate detail, 
 that the reider fancies himself on the spots where the prucipal battles 
 occurred, and feels th-it he is living in ' the times that tri J men's souls." 
 No author ever possessed the power to present a battle, or any other 
 scene, in the glowing life-like descriptions of HeaJley." Christian 
 Secretary. 
 
 " We are much pleased with this book, and question whether any offer 
 ing could be more acceptable to the American reader. Washington sur 
 rounded by his heroic band of Generals, and all moving amid the great 
 events of the American Revolution, is the grandest spectacle in history; 
 and the masterly pen of Headley has succeeded to admiration in present 
 ing it in all its own intensify of interest. ' Washington ami his Gene 
 rals," li'ie " Napoleon and his Marshals,'' seems to us more like a master 
 piece of painting, than a mere work of letters, so matchless are the de 
 scriptions of the most exciting scenes, so perfect are the delineations ol 
 character." Daily IleniU. 
 
 " There is no difficulty in understanding the secret of the great popu 
 larity which the writings of Mr. Headley have so rapidly obtained. He 
 speaks heartily, earnestly, truthfully, and the warm heart answers to 
 his voice. In his Washington he has exceeded himself, producing a 
 noble portrait of the noblest man: and weaving such a garland as patri 
 otism and reverence love to place on the brow of the Father of his Coun 
 try"- N. Y. Observer 
 
 " Every page has some graphic picture of the stiring scenes in which 
 Washington and his Generals were actors. The characteristics of these 
 raliant champions their stern patriotism their noble sacrifices, and 
 their indomitable energy and cour.ige are portrayed with great beauty, 
 and present the men and their times to the re \der with more than pic 
 torial strength and clearness." Albany Evening Journal. 
 
 "Th ugh we are necessarily familiar with much of the historical mat 
 ter cimprise-l in M". Ha.illey's book, yet his admirable sty;e of narra-
 
 tire, and vivid coloring of the more stirring scenes Invest these memolrr 
 with a peculiar interest, and give them a freshness that is very accepta 
 ble. Familiar as we were, with the battle of Bunker Hill, we yet 
 derived a more vivid conception of it from Mr. Headley's graphic pen, 
 than we ever before realized, and this is only one among many occa 
 sions in the pru<al of his work, where we felt the powerful, and we may 
 say, resistless influence of his exciting eloquence." The Courier. 
 
 ''We might particularize instances which have thrilled us in the 
 perusal ; but they are scattered over the volumes. Mr. Headley hag 
 undertaken a difficult work, in the production of these sketches. It is a 
 work only of an artist a genius ; and to be accomplished only by labo 
 rious, tedious investigation." Tlie Ohio Observer. 
 
 No writer has delineated the,thrilling scenes and events of the Revo 
 lutionary struggle with such graphic power. He places one as it were 
 upon the very theatre of action and bloody conflict; the surrounding 
 incidents, under the influence of his magic pen, assuming the reality of 
 visible objects, and impressing themselves upon the mind with the 
 vividness of personal observation. This work fills a place in American 
 Literature occupied by no other. Tt is sui generis. And we know of 
 none so likely to beget in the youthful mind a keen and permanent relish 
 for the history of his country, as this." Onondago Detnocrat. 
 
 "These sketches, orwhvever they may be called, are certainly sur 
 prising productions. We are all of us more or less familiar with the 
 heroes and the bittles of the Revolution History and the faltering 
 tonjfir-s of the few: decayed survivors of those trying times, have fought 
 over and over our battle* for liberty. They have all been carefully, 
 minutely and accurately described by the most veritable historians of 
 the times. Those thrilling scenes in which our fathers suffered and 
 died, that we misht live, have been painted in all their lights and shades ; 
 but they wanted a master's hand to finish them. Headley has brought 
 down fire from heaven, and .given life to the whole. We had all the fea 
 tures before, but comparatively lifeless. Headley has given them ani 
 mation and soul, and the work now under consideration is equal in point 
 of interest to any other relating to the great moral, civil and political 
 Revolution of 1776V' Saratoga Republican. 
 
 " We welcome Mr. Headly to American ground, and to a work for 
 which he of all our writers is best fitted the presentation of the im- 
 in<irtal achievements of our revolution as they present themselves to 
 the popular heart, and not to the dry historian in his search for details. 
 The various published lives of the generals of '76, though carefully 
 written and filled with interesting facts, have, we venture to say, im 
 pressed themselves but little on the national mind, and been compara 
 tively litile read th s because the writer did not become fired with the 
 heat of the times they wrote of, and thus by their imagination reproduce 
 the feeling and recall the tone of the great struggle for freedom and 
 independence. Yet it is morally important that such a work should be 
 written because thereby the spirit of the great founders of our nation 
 may be made part of our spirit, and pass into our national life and cha 
 racter. Mr. Headley has, we think, done this most successfully, and 
 w have read his sketches an he modestly terms them in his preface, 
 with strong interest and satisfaction. We should, however, come short 
 of d^itig him justice, if we should not refer to a difficulty he has had to 
 contend with, and which he mentions the barrenness of personal inci 
 dents in the accounts of the battles owing probably to the want of & 
 newspaper press in those times, aiid also to the dignity of manner and 
 language that then prevniled which did not encourage a familiar knjw- 
 led^e of public chamcteri." Cm. Inrjuirtr
 
 IRELAND'S WELCOME TO THE STRANGER: 
 
 Or, an Excursion through Ireland in 1844 and 1845, for 
 the purpose of personally investigating the condition of 
 the poor. By A. Nicholron. Baker & Scribner. 
 
 Letter from lion. "\Vm. H. Seward, to ttie Publishers. 
 
 Auburn. September 30th, 1847. 
 GKNTLEMF.X : 
 
 The hook of Mrs. Nicholson which you kindly sent to me has 
 teen receive!, and read with deep interest. 
 
 It has many blemishes, and yet 1 sincerely believe it to be one of the 
 best Books of Travel ever written. Indeed 1 never read one concern 
 ing which 1 could feel assured that it gave the naked truth, and the 
 whole of it. No one can doubt the scrupulous truthfulness and fulness 
 of Mrs. Nicholson's account of Life in Ireland. As I think no people 
 have been more wrongfully or more severely oppressed in .Modern 
 Europe than the Irish, so i know of none who have so just a claim on 
 our sympathy. Mis. Nicholson's book is an argument for that 
 claim', derived from the very best source, the actual condition of the 
 Irish People. I hope it may find a broad circulation. No one can 
 read it without thinking more justly of the People of Ireland, and 
 without being improved by the perusal. 
 
 With many thanks for your courtesy. I am. 
 
 Gentlemen, vour humble servant, 
 
 WILLIAM H. SEWARD. 
 
 Messrs Baker &. Scribner. 
 
 " Mrs. Nicholson is a woman of talents, genius, and of most unques 
 tionable benevolence. of noble purposes, and never weary in her 
 efforts to achieve them, a reformer, and wondering that the wheels 
 of reformation move so tandily towards the goal. In 1344. she felt 
 called to a mission to Ireland, for the purpose of investigating per 
 sonally the condition of the 1 rish poor. Of course she went. Some 
 times in stages, and sometimes in fly-boats, sometimes in the pea 
 sant's car, and sometimes on foot. sometimes with money, and 
 sometimes without. sometimes spurned from the mansions of the 
 great and sheltered in the hut of poverty, and sometimes refused ad 
 mission to the hut, and welcomed to the castle, she traversed Ire 
 land, and here is the record of her wanderings, in 1S44 and 1S45 
 The interest of somo of its passages is intense. you are move* 
 sometimes to pity, sometimes to indignation.- now you laugh, ana 
 the next moment you are moved to tears. We confess that we havt 
 
 " The author is a female of striking peculiarities and eccentricities. 
 Alone she visited Ireland on a tour of exploration, and mainly rely 
 ing on her own resources, without the aid of influential friends, 
 and. as it would seem, with a slender purse she travels over the 
 greater portion of the Island, sometimes on foot, and sometimes in 
 the Irish jaunting-car. Her mission, whatever might be its definite 
 de-igii. was principally to the poor, and we find her evorywheie in 
 the hovels of poverty partaking of the hospitality of those who 
 could otter her no better fare than a potato anil a *tiflM bed. 'I lies.*
 
 risits sne describes in her own peculiar style, and gives the con 
 versations she had with the wretched and oppressed inhabitants. 
 Many of her sketches are highly graphic, sometimes amusing, and 
 often touching. The general picture of the condition of the poor is 
 gloomy indeed, and bears the marks of truth. Irish character ia 
 also well portrayed." Presbyterian. 
 
 " Her heart is indeed warm with her theme. She bears you with 
 breathless inteiest from cabin to cabin, and from mountain top und 
 valley, to mountain top and valley. She makes you a party in 
 ever} thing. Her bold and graphic descriptions charm you her 
 glowing pictures, revealing the secret woi kings of humanity, live 
 in men-ory her simple and touching delineations of the life of Ire 
 land's poor, melt you to tevs, and command your sympathy ; and 
 you arise from the perusal of the work, with better views of life, 
 new and deeper feelings for your kind, and with a constrained de 
 sire to follow her in the walks of Christian travel and benevo 
 lence." Albany Spectator. 
 
 " She has tii/elled among the people, and has seen them in their 
 cottages and hovels, and tells us all she saw with a sprightliness 
 which prevents our interest from flagging Those who feel an in 
 terest in this noble but oppressed people, will consider this work of 
 much value." Jersey City Telegraph. 
 
 1 "As the spirit of benevolence dictated the purpose in which this 
 book originated, so it breatltes through every page of its contents. 
 It is the production ol one of our countrywomen, who, partly from 
 an admiration of th Irish character, and partly from sympathy with 
 Irish suffering, adventured in the heroic enterprise of going single- 
 handed and alone, to ascertain for herself the actual condition of the 
 peasantry of that ill-fated country. She has made a book that 
 speaks well both for her head and heart. Her details of what sho 
 witnessed and experienced are exceedingly minute and graphic, 
 and display as much of true Irish character as we have met with 
 anywhere wilhin the same limits." Albany Argus. 
 
 This work will probably create considerable interest at the pre 
 sent day. connected as it is with the recent famine and sickness in 
 unhappy Ireland. It is the tiansciipt of views and impressions 
 made upon a disinterested (though not uninterested^ yet benevolent 
 lady, who went among the low est clashes. f,n- the purpose of per 
 sonally investigating their condition, and relieving it. as far as laid 
 in her power. The narrative is linely written, and the scenes de 
 picted aie both affecting and amusing. The work presents a scene 
 of human misery almost too painful to read, yet so interspersed with 
 relations characteristic of the Irish, as to piescut an interesting and 
 instructing book." Christian Intelligencer. 
 
 'The heroic fidelity with which this unenviable, but most useful 
 mission, was performed ; the gentle symputhy. the kind advice and 
 assistance which she bestouod ; and mom than all. the faithful but 
 startling picture of Irish poveity which she has brought above 
 ground, the volume will disclose to the reader. .\nd no one. ue 
 are sure, can icad it uithout being agitated with the profoundest 
 l>ity for the poor, siai ving. degiaded In.sh, or without admiration for
 
 the practical, energetic philanthropy of tn woman who could d 
 all this. The style of the work is straight-forward, simple, truth 
 fill, and therefore eloouent ; and of all the books on that much-be- 
 Written country, we have never met one half so interesting, instruc 
 tive, or suggestive. At the present time, when thousands of Irish 
 men are coming to claim our compassion, we wish that America* 
 chanty might receive the impulse that this book is so admirably 
 adapted to give." N. Y. Evangelist. 
 
 " The hook will be found deeply interesting. In fact it could 
 scarcely be expected otherwise, when it is remembered that a lady 
 of refined feelings, blended with deep and ardent piety, and a very 
 graceful writer withal is the author ; and that this lady actually 
 travelled through Ireland, stopping at the low mud cabins, by the 
 wayside, and wherever she found an object of charity to whom she 
 could minister consolation. We have never met with a book in 
 which the condition of Ireland appeared to be so faithfully pic 
 tured." Christian Secretary. 
 
 "Ireland's Welcome to a Stranger, is the resvtlt of a bold novelty 
 in our travelling annals. A lady of mind, heart and education visit 
 ed Ireland in the most unpretending way, and with the intention 
 of searching out the very pith of the matter as she explored the 
 fountain of Irish woes and Irish hopelessness. No visitor she of lordly 
 halls and stately institutions ; her time and sympathies were given to 
 the suffering and down-cast in-dweller in lowly cabins by the way 
 side. The story of her wanderings among the poor are told in one 
 of the most vivid, earnest, heart-reaching volumes of the day. The 
 writer is a woman in feeling, an American in sentiment, and a true 
 missionary in conduct. Some of the aneadotes so simply, yet so 
 effectively told are worth more than any missionary sermon ever 
 
 fiven from a pulpit, and no one who takes up the book will lay it 
 own willingly before he comes to the end. When he does it will 
 be with a cordial acknowledgment that he has learned much that it 
 is well to know, and that Messrs. Baker & Scribner have given the 
 
 r'jlic a most interesting book in Mrs. Nicholson's recital of'Ire- 
 d's Welcome to the Stranger.' " JV. Y. Sun. 
 
 ''Over three years ago Mrs. Nicholson set sail for Ireland, deter 
 mined to make herself thoroughly acquainted with the denizens ol 
 its cabins and hovels, so as to qualify herself to judge what are the 
 true causes of the squalid wretchedness there so prevalent, and ol 
 the practicability and proper means of alleviating it. In this spirit 
 he has since travelled over a great part of the unhappy kingdom, 
 mainly on foot and often alone, stopping to rest at the lowliest 
 habitations, and grudging no inconvenience nor rebuff, so that she 
 was enabled to see clearly and report truly the condition of the 
 Irish people. A stern Protestant, she was not likely to be misled 
 by religious sympathy. And she has given us an instructive, 
 plain-spoken, unpretending book, full of facts which will prove 
 useful in the progress of the struggle for the emancipation not ol 
 Ireland's millions only ; but of the oppressed and famished every 
 where."-- N. Y. Tribune.
 
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