JAMES A WO BAYNARD RUSH HALL First Professor of Indiana Seminary 1824 THE NEW PURCHASE OR, SEVEN AND A HALF YEARS IN THE FAR WEST BY ROBERT CARLTON, Esq. (BAYNARD RUSH HALL) INDIANA CENTENNIAL EDITION EDITED BY JAMES ALBERT WOODBURN PROFESSOR OF AMERICAN HISTORY INDIANA UNIVERSITY PRINCETON UNIVERSITY PRESS PRINCETON LONDON: HUMPHREY MILFORD OXFORD UNIVERSITY PRESS 1916 Copyright 1916, by PRINCETON UNIVERSITY PRESS Published, October, 1916 534 INTRODUCTION The Princeton University Press offers a worthy contribution to the centennial celebration of Indiana's admission to statehood by issuing a Centennial Edition of the "New Purchase" by Baynard R. Hall. This work has been pronounced "one of the best books ever written concerning life in the West." Its reproduction will be appreciated by all who are interested in western history. It makes available a handsome reprint of a volume long since out of print, the original edition being now very difficult to find and expensive to buy. This reprint contains the original copy without modification or expurgation. There is certainly no more valuable book on early Indiana. Judge D. D. Banta, himself very thoroughly informed on early Indiana life, has called it "the best and truest history of pioneer life and pioneer surroundings in Indiana that can anywhere be found. Hall evidently entered with zest into the life and scenes about him, and he writes graphically of all he sees and hears." It is my privilege in this Introduction to speak of the man and his work the man who has realized his youthful ambition to be enrolled among the earliest literary pioneers of the romantic west and the book which has' long since been recognized of such acknowledged excellence and historic value. In 1818 the United States Government obtained by treaty with several tribes of Indians what is known in the history of the Middle West as the "New Purchase". In that year Governor Jennings, of Indiana, Benjamin Parke, then Federal Judge for the District of Indiana, and General Lewis Cass, Territorial Gov- ernor of Michigan, acting as a commission of the Federal Gov- ernment, met the representatives of the Indian tribes at St. Marys, Ohio. The Weas, the Kickpoos, the Pottawattomies and the Miamis were there in the persons of their chieftains and their spokesmen. The Pale Face Commission succeeded in purchasing nearly all the land east and south of the Wabash iv INTRODUCTION not previously relinquished by the Indians. This new acquisi 7 tion may be described as the tract of land bounded on the north and west by the Wabash river, on the south and west by what is known as the "ten o'clock line", a line going in the direction a shadow would fall at ten o'clock forenoon, running from a point in Jackson County, Indiana, to a point on the Wabash in Yermillion county. The eastern line of the Purchase was the uneven boundary line of the counties already formed in the State in the White Water region. The Delawares agreed to take a grant of land west of the Mississippi, and the other tribes, all having claims to the ceded territory, agreed to withdraw to the north of the Wabash. The Delawares were to have three years in which to gather up their property and leave the State. "In the fall of 1820 the remnants of this once powerful tribe whose ancestors had received Henry Hudson (1610) took up their western march, the disheartened train passing through Koskaskia about the middle of October." 1 Thirty-seven new counties were made, in whole or in part, from the lands embraced in the New Purchase. As the Indians went out the pioneer settlers came in. When the Indian titles were extinguished and the new lands were opened to settlement the immigrant tide of humanity began to pour in. The Govern- ment land was offered at $2.00 an acre. It was lowered to $1.25 an acre after 1820 which proved to be quite a step for the encouragement of western settlement. The preemption system had been put into operation in 1801, by which a settler who could not pay cash for his land might "preempt" it and pay for it by installments after he had settled on it and begiun to work it. The homestead policy, instituted later, was even more liberal to the home-seeker, but the fact that one could preempt good, cheap land and have a chance to own it in fee simple brought many enterprising and hopeful men to a region which was heralded in the East as an Eldorado of rich and productive lands. Some shiftless and worthless "movers" and "squatters" came; many came who had not much of worldly goods; and some came who had once lived a favored life under Fortune's smile but who had lost their all in the contraction and hard 1 Esarey, History of Indiana, p. 229. INTRODUCTION v times following the war of 1812. Among the latter were the Halls and their relatives. (See p. 56). There were others like them, cultivated people, some imbued with the missionary spirit, some moved by spirit of adventure, and some endowed with a fair amount of worldly goods, who, while seeking new homes and better fortunes for themselves in a new country, were capable and desirous of helping to build the new common- wealths for the American Union in the promising west. True, most of these western settlers were poor, and most of them were ignorant; but most of them, also, were men and women of the fundamental virtues, courage, honesty, hospitality, and of self-reliant manly independence. Hall was sensitive to these noble qualities, and he was unstinted in his tribute in honor of the backwoodsmen, "the open-hearted native-born westerner." "Ay, the native Corncracker, Hoosier or Buckeye, and all men and women born in a cane-brake and rocked in a sugar trough, all born to follow a trail and cock an old fashioned lock rifle, all such are open-hearted, fearless, generous, chivalric!" (P- 369). When Hall came into the midst of this backwoods life, Indiana was but a little over four years old. It had a population of about 150,000 souls, by far the greater number of these being below the Old National Road. The greater part of Hall's life in Indiana was to be given to education, and in that noble service he was certainly one of the earliest of our pioneers. In 1820, two or three years before he came, the Legislature at Corydon created what was named in the act as "The Indiana Seminary." This in 1828 became the "Indiana College" and in 1838 the "Indiana University", by legal title. The Constitu- tion of 1816 had decreed that the State should provide, as soon as circumstances should permit, "for a general system of education ascending in a regular gradation from township schools to a State University, wherein tuition should be gratis and equally open to all." The act creating the "Seminary" in 1820 was saved in the State Senate only by the casting vote of the Lieutenant Governor Ratliff Boon and it was signed by the first Governor of the State, Jonathan Jennings. S.ix Trustees were appointed and they selected a site for the Seminary, a vi INTRODUCTION quarter of a mile due south of the little village of Bloomington, then but a clearing in the woods only two years old. Log cabins, whether of hewed logs or round, could be put up in short order by the pioneers of the early days, but it was more than three full years before there could be completed the two small brick buildings with which the "Seminary" began, one a house for a professor at a cost of $891, the other the Seminary building itself, at the elaborate cost of $2400! This old State Seminary opened its doors for students in May 1824. In the fall of 1823, as the buildings were nearing completion, the first professor was elected. This was the author of our book and the hero of our story. It was altogether likely that it was the prospect of this new State Seminary that had influenced Hall to come to the New Purchase. There was an advantage of being at hand when a new teacher was needed. Mrs. Hall's mother was living with her son, John M. Young, near Gosport. Besides these relatives, Hall had another brother-in-law living near Bloomington, and serving the various settlements round about as a missionary. This was Rev. Isaac Reed, one of the early pioneer Presbyterian ministers of Indiana. Dr. Maxwell, one of the founders and a devoted friend of the Seminary and the President of its Board of Trustees, was also an ardent Presbyterian. Reed recommend- ed Hall to Maxwell, and these connections may fairly account for Hall's election as the first professor of the Seminary. Presby- terian ministers were likely to be educated men even in those days and there were not many men in the Indiana woods so well educated as to be deemed qualified for a professorship. For a Princeton man to be on the ground was, indeed, a decided advantage. So when the time came for the opening, Hall was here ready to be placed in charge. Baynard Rush Hall was born in Philadelphia in 1793. He died in Brooklyn, N. Y. in 1863. In his childhood he was left an orphan and he had to hew out his own way in the world with what assistance could be afforded him by friends and distant relatives. He became a type-setter in his youth and worked at the printer's trade. He was one of "the boys of ink and long primer," working at the printer's desk, still in his teens, INTRODUCTION vii when he first heard of Harrison at Tippecanoe. It was then his soul "was stirred to phrensy and swelled with burnings and longings after fame!" (p. 354). The stories of western battle and adventure stirred in his soul, no doubt, a longing to see the unknown western land. He made his way through school, graduated at Union College and at Princeton Theological Semi- nary. He became a Presbyterian clergyman. He followed his childhood sweetheart of many years, after years of separation, to Danville, Ky., where (p. 320) he was married. 2 He re- turned to Philadelphia where he suffered deep domestic affliction in the loss of two of his children in their infancy. He then set out with his wife to join some relatives in the New Purchase. He had encountered disappointment in the crushing of some of his high hopes and purposes, so he turned to the New West as an opportunity for a new life. Weary of a prosaic life in the East, he sought a life "of poetry and romance amid the rangers of the wood." He found poetry here as well as a mission. In his day-dreams he heard the call of the wild, and he felt the "resistless" invitation to an enchanting land in what was then known as the "Far West." He affirms that he came influenced by disinterested motives, fired with enthusiasm for advancing solid learning, desirous of seeing western institutions rival those of the East, willing to live and die in the new country, to sacrifice eastern tastes and prejudices, and to become in every proper way a "Western man", hopes and expectations which college jealousies and quarrels were destined to cut short before many years. The Halls came, lured partly by the spirit of romance and adventure, persuaded to exchange "the tasteless and crowded solitude of Philadelphia for the entrancing and real loneliness of the wilds, the prom- enade of dead brick for the living carpet of the natural meadow." When Hall was chosen to become the Principal of the new Indiana Seminary in the fall of 1823, he had been living for more than a year on the edge of the New Purchase, with his 2 "I was married in Danville, Ky., by Rev. Mr. Nelson, brother of 'Infidelity' 'Nelson. Perhaps that may sell some books there. Dr. Breckenridge is my friend." Hall's letter to his New Albany publisher, viii INTRODUCTION brother-in-law, John M. Young, and other friends, at "Glenville" near White River about four miles north of Gosport. In that first long winter in the woods he worked at various occupations including carpentry and cabinet making. He made a closet for his study, two scuttles for the loom, putting in and taking out pieces and thus becoming adept in the mysteries of woof and warp, of hanks and reels and cuts. He "mended water-sleds, hunted turkeys, missed killing two deer for want of a rifle, played the flute, practiced the fiddle, and ever so many other things and what-nots." But his "grand employment" was a review of all his college studies, and he, therefore, claimed to be "the very first man since the creation of the world that read Greek in the "New Purchase" a somewhat doubtful claim, since other Presbyterian ministers and some Jesuit Fathers had set foot in these parts before Hall came. It is certain, however, that during this year and in the years immediately following, Hall entered with spirit and sym- pathy into all the life of the backwoods. He became a skilled marksman with the rifle; he enjoyed the shooting matches; he learned the art of rolling logs ; he became a skilled and practiced hand at the wood choppings ; he learned the manners of the quilting parties; he became an interested spectator but never a participant at the pioneer camp-meetings; he clerked in a country store, ground bark in a tannery, driving "Old Dick" on the tread-mill; he preached often, ministering to the sick and dying, and with two of his fellow preachers Isaac Reed and George Bush, he organized the Wabash Presbytery in Reed's cabin in the woods, and as a Presbyter he went horse-back on long journeys to attend church councils, fording the swamps and rivers and following the traces through the forests. Indeed, his life in early Indiana gave him a rich story to tell. That story is found in the pages of this book. One of Hall's forest horse-back journeys took him from Bloomington to LaFayette, and some one has said that "for the author's fine description of the Tippecanoe battle ground and for his poem on the battle of Tippecanoe, Indiana must ever owe him gratitude". He stood at Tippecanoe "some twelve years after the battle." He had power to express his soul's INTRODUCTION ix emotions and appreciations. He saw the Battle Ground in ''its primitive and sacred wilderness, unfenced, unscathed by the ax, unshorn by the scythe, unmarked by roads." He felt himself standing and walking among the slain warriors. Here was reality. No longer was he beholding Tippecanoe as he had beheld it in his youthful dreams. "Here mouldering are trunks of trees that formed the hasty rampart. Here are scars and seams in the trees torn by balls. Ay! here is the narrow circle of skeletons of let me count again yes, of four- teen war horses ! But where are the, riders ? Here under this beech see the record in the bark we stand on the earth over the dead, 'rider, horse, friend and foe in one' red burial blent " (p. 355). Such are some of the themes of this volume. This young rr*an of college culture, of "book larnin," as his neighbors would say, lived in this new country almost a decade of years, and after he had gone back to his home in the East, he wrote this book about what he had seen and heard. He called it "The New Purchase, or Seven and a Half Years in the Far West," the author appearing under the pseudonym Robert Carleton. It deserves to be called an immortal book. Dr. Samuel W. Fisher, of Cincinnati, called it that in 1855. It will prove to be so, at any rate to Indianians, since among Hoosiers this work will be a memorial to the name of its author as long as interest in Indiana history lives, and we are entitled to believe that that interest will be immortal. This may be said, not because of the literary excellence nor because of any special human interest attaching to its stories, but because it contains the most valuable history of this Hoosier land in its early beginnings ; because it relates in graphic and racy style personal adventures, western scenes and characters, college jealousies and dissensions, the state of popular culture or lack of culture, and the social conditions in a large part of this new country in its early days. Here are found vivid descriptions of the varied aspects of frontier life that Hall witnessed and of which he was a part, the modes of travel, the roads, the cabin homes and inns, the settler's hospitality, his food, his clothing, the games, the weddings, the barbecues, the rifle- matches, the stump speeches, the college exhibitions, the court x INTRODUCTION trials, the "shiv-ar-ree", the pigeon shooting. Here is history, not of wars and dynasties and states, but of the life of a people. Hall was a lover of nature. Amid the mire and the briars of the field, the wallows and the mudholes in the road, amid the pawpaws, the sassafras and the sycamores, he saw not only the homely sides of life but he had an eye and a heart for the grandeur and beauty of his primeval surroundings, the warbling birds, the bounding deer, the racing squirrels, the giant trees, the everlasting shades, the gleaming sun-light by day, the clear blue sky at night over the camp-meeting tents like a dome radiant with golden stars. In his eyes "no artificial dyes could rival the scarlet, the crimson, the orange, the brown, of the sylvan dresses, giant robes and scarfs hung with in- describable grandeur and grace over the rough arms and rude trunks of the forest." Here was a young man, who had eyes to see, with a cultured background, with a power to discriminate and to distinguish the significant; and above all, he had the virtue of intent and industry (for which Heaven be praised) to write down what he saw and understood, to preserve it for us, for posterity and for history. For this we shall ever be his debtor. The schools and libraries and readers that are cooperating in the revival of interest in Indiana history will give a responsive welcome to the generosity and enterprise of Hall's University, whose Press has made the "New Purchase" again easily available. Over sixty years ago, in 1855, a New Albany publisher was given unstinted praise for redeeming so deserving a work from oblivion by bringing out a second edition. The New Purchase was then generally recognized as a book that "ought to find its way into every Western domicile, especially into the home- steads of Indiana." The book was originally published by the Appletons. The first edition of 1000 copies, in two volumes, sold chiefly in the East, only few copies finding their way to the West. This was, as the author says, "in the middle of the cheap literature age when English works were selling for a shilling". The Appletons were pleased with the circulation of the work and suggested a second edition of 6000 copies; INTRODUCTION xi but the elder Appleton died while the contract was pending, his sons lost sight of it, and in 1855 when the book had been nearly twelve years out of print, Mr. John R. Nunemacher, of New Albany, Indiana, stimulated by inquiries for the book, opened negotiations with the author with a view to bringing out a new edition. Professor Hall was then living in Brooklyn, N. Y., preaching twice every Sunday and teaching at Park In- stitute five hours a day during the week. 3 Hall gave a ready ear to the proposal to reprint the New Purchase. His friend, Pro- fessor Bush, who had been one of the characters of the book encouraged the venture and was sanguine of its success, saying that "not a copy can be obtained anywhere for love or money" and that he ''had in vain looked over all the old bookstores for a stray copy." Nunemacher, had to search diligently in the West before he could find one. The author and publisher had sanguine hopes for the success of the new edition. There had been many fulsome reviews of the first edition and the second one was also favorably re- viewed by the press. But it created no excitement in the book market Its sales were disappointing and in July 1856 Hall wrote to Nunemacher, "Our book appears to be dead." The book however, sold slowly and it continued to sell for half a centuiy and now a copy of the second edition is about as difficult to obtain as is one of the original edition of 1843. The second edition was published in one volume with fanciful illus- trations of "Old Dick at the "Tread-mill," the "Young Doctor" running through the river to escape from "Hunting Shirt Andy," and "Mizraim Ham 'doing' David and Goliath", etc. The second edition also omitted about 130 pages, all the chap- ters relating to President Wylie and the college quarrel. 4 These parts of the book had a personal and local color rather yellow and they attracted attention beyond their merits, as if they were the chief features of the book, so much so that the Indianapolis Sentinel said of the book when the second edition appeared, "the original design of the work was principally to hold up to public indignation and ridicule the 3 His daughter sang in Dr. Cheever's church. 4 See Note pages 481-511 and accompanying Notes. xii INTRODUCTION late Rev. Dr. Wylie, President of the University, with whom the author had a disagreement which led to his leaving the col- lege, and, also, the late Governor Whitcomb, General Lowe, and others." While Hall's strictures on Whitcomb and Wylie are by no means unbiased nor truly historic, and while it may be thought best by some to let the account of this unseemly quarrel drop from the record and be utterly forgotten, yet the publishers and editors of the present edition are convinced that they should allow the readers of the New Purchase to have it exactly as it came from the press in the original edition of 1843. That edition is therefore reprinted, college quarrel, personalities and all, with- out change or expurgation. The author in his preface to the second edition said that, perhaps, "in time a 'Key' may be forged for the Lock." We think that time has come after the lapse of nearly a hundred years. The "Key" here offered is made up largely from manuscript letters of Hall himself, and from a comparison with "Keys" in early copies of the work, and from manuscripts of Judge Banta and Dr. James D. Max- well. It is believed that the "Key" here presented is as complete and as correct as any "Key" extant or as can be made from information now available. There was at first some Indiana resentment at what was considered unjust caricature of the early settlers in the "New Purchase" but this has long since passed away. Hall claimed that he had truthfully described the life that he had seen and of which he was a part. The general truthfulness of the book, the integrity and sincerity of its author and the great value to history of Hall's descriptions and portraitures are now recognized by all and I do not hesitate to say that his book will ever remain what Hall richly deserved that it should prove to be, an imperishable Indiana classic. JAMES A. WOODBURN. KEY TO CHARACTERS AND PLACES IN BAYNARD RUSH HALL'S THE NEW PURCHASE Persons ALLHEART, VULCANUS, AUSTIN W. SEWARD/'OHC of kindest of men," Hall's letter to pub- lisher of the 2nd edition. Aug. 14, 1855. BALTIMORE, LORD BISHOP, DR. R. BRECKENRIDGE. BLODUPLEX, DR PRESIDENT ANDREW WYLIE, of Indiana University. "BLUE FIRE," RED FIRE OR BIG FIRE, a Pottawattomie Indian Chief, p. 223. BROWN, MR MR. BROWN, of Ireland. BROMPTON, SQUIRE SQUIRE HARDIN, OR JONA- THAN NICHOLS. BRASIER, MR was the man who denied the shape of the earth. BRUSHWOOD, STURGIS HUCKBERRY. CARLTON, ROBERT, BAYNARD R. HALL. Hall was also Rev. Charles Clarence, and also the Mr. Merry who gave the touching , sermon in Forsters' saw-mill. CHARILLA, Miss CHARILLA DURKEE, of Tippecanoe Co. CLARENCE, REV. CHARLES, PROF. BAYNARD R. HALL. CRABSTICK, FELIX HIGHT. COMPTON, COL. RETCHEM. CUTSWELL, INSIDIAS Gov. JAMES WHITCOMB. In the second edition of the New Pur- chase (1855) Hall changed "Insidias" to "William," saying that "Poor Whitcomb became a religious man before he died." CRAVINGS, LAWYER C. P. HESTER. DOMORE, PETER BATTERTON. FAT MODEST ENGLISHMAN, THE THOMAS HEWSON. FINISHED YOUNG LADIES, THE MISSES OWEN. GLENVILLE, Miss EMILY, . . MARTHA YOUNG. xiv KEY TO CHARACTERS GLENVILLE, JOHN JOHN M. YOUNG. After- wards moved to Jersey City, N. J. Mrs. Glenville was buried near the Tannery. Mr. Young had a store in Gosport. In his store Brasier and Hall talked about the earth's shape. There the "yellow buttons" were sold. GEORGE JAMES DUNN, a favorite pupil of Hall's, who re-wrote his compo- sition thirty-six times. HAM, REV. MIZRAIM, UNCLE AARON WALLACE (colored). HARLEN, MR., JOHN ORCHARD. HARWOOD, PROF., PROF. J. H. HARNEY, of Louisville, Ky., afterwards editor of the Louisville Democrat. HILLSBURY, REV., REV. ISAAC REED, broth- er-in-law of the Author. HENRY, Gov. JOSEPH A. WRIGHT. The boy who dug the author's well and went after his cow. In the old record of the State Seminary is this entry : "Ordered that Joseph A. Wright be al- lowed for ringing the college bell, mak- ing fires, etc., in the college building dur- ing the last session of the State Semi- nary the sum of sixteen dollars and twenty-five cents." JACOBUS, BRIG. GEN'L GEN'L. JACOB LOWE. JAMES JIMMY BEVERLY W. JAMES, School Teacher. JOSEY JACKSON THE POSTMASTER, JAMES ALLISON, P. M. at Spencer. KITTY, AUNT, MRS. HALL'S aunt, "lives with us, aged 84." (In Brooklyn, 1855.) KETCHUM, PEGGY ("Mrs. Compton") "MRS MARY ANN KET- CHEM who thought "a piano was as far afore a fiddle as a fiddle is afore a jusharp." LIEBUG, MENDAX, ........ LEE. LEATHERLUNG, EOLUS, JOSEPH BERRY, Preacher. LOBELIA JOSEPH BERRY, Preacher. MENNIWATER, REV., REV. MAYFIELD, Cumber- land Presbyterian. KEY TO CHARACTERS xv "MERCATOR," pp. 13-14 Vol. I DELANY R. ECKLES (probably). MERRY, REV., PROF. BAYNARD R. HALL. Novus, THE REV. REMARKABLE, REV. I. STRANGE, OR REV. JAS. ARMSTRONG. "NEVY," THE "DOCTOR'S NEVY" JAMES MAXWELL, nephew of Dr. David H. Maxwell, who was a medical student under Dr. Maxwell. He afterwards lived at Grand Gulph, Miss. PARSONS, REV., Rsv. WILLIAM MARTIN, Chap. X. PAUNCH, BISHOP, JOHN HENDERSON, "Uncle Johny." PILLBOX, PROF., DR. JOSLIN, OR JOCELYN, of Spencer. RAPID, WILLIAM, JAMES BATTERTON. REDWHITE, MR., JOHN CONNER, Indian Trader and Agent. ROBINSON, TOM (the chopper) THOMAS ROBINSON, of Owen County, Indiana. ROWDY SCHOOL MASTER, MR. MILLS, who taught school south of Woodville, in the Ketchem neighborhood, and had himself reported as drowned in Lost River, in Orange county. SYLVAN, DR., DR. DAVID H. MAXWELL. SECOND FIDDLER, ALBERT LITTRELL. SEYMOUR, UNCLE JOHN UNCLE JOHN HOLMES, he died at age of 80, at Hanover, Indiana. SMITH, MR., MR. DARRAH MAYER, Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania. "SOLOMON RAPID," Commonly known as JIM BATTERTON or SAGE BATTERTON. SPRIGHTLY, REV. ELDER, REV.WILLIAM ARMSTRONG. SEYMOUR, THOMAS, THOMAS HOLMES. SCRAPE, DAN, COL. SAM'L CRAVENS. STRANGE, ELDER, REV. JOHN NEVENS. STANLEY, NED, JAMES BORLAND. SHRUB, BISHOP, REV. GEORGE BUSH, of Brooklyn, formerly of Indianapolis, then became a Swedenborgian minister. THORNTREE, HAMILTON STOCKWELL OR LEROY GREGORY. WOOLLEY, BEN, NOBLE BAKER. xvi KEY TO CHARACTERS WILMER, COL. GEN. JOHN MCCALLA, of Washington City, and of Lexington, Ky. "WHACKUM," School teacher, SHIELDS. WESTLAND, MAJ. BILLY, WILLIAM ALEXANDER, brother-in-law of Dr. D. H. Maxwell. YOUNG DOCTOR PARIS C. DUNNING, who splashed across White River to escape the Indians who were avenging the dese- cration of Chief Redfire's grave, later elected Lieut. Gov. and became Governor of the States, 1848-49. UNCLE TOMMY, brother of John Holmes, (Uncle 'John Seymour'). Uncle Tom- my died in Michigan, aged 86. Places. ASHFORD SETTLEMENT ASHBAUGH SETTLEMENT. BIG POSSUM CREEK, BIG RACCOON. CAVE, THE TRUIT'S CAVE, later called Mayfield's - Cave, six miles west of Bloomington. GLENVILLE, "two or three miles above" Gosport. Mr. Hall in his letters to Mr. Nunemacher, his second publish- er in New Albany, says the Glenville settlement was "in Monroe county about three miles from Gosport." In this he was in error as the Glenville settlement is known to be in Owen county about three and a half miles north of Gosport on the west side of White river. See Note p. 224. GUZZLETON, GOSPORT. MOXVILLE, MARTINSVILLE. NUT CREEK BIG WALNUT. SHINING RIVER, OR "THE SHINEY," WHITE RIVER. SLIPPERY RUN, EEL RIVER. SPICEBURGH, SPENCER. SPROUTSBURGH .LAFAYETTE. SUGARTOWN, CRAWFORDSVILLE. TIMBEROPOLIS, INDIANAPOLIS. TIPPECANOE, BATTLE GROUND. WELDEN SETTLEMENT, PAYNE SETTLEMENT, west of Gosport. WOODVILLE, BLOOMINGTON, the site of an Indian wigwam village. PREFACE. BEFORE my friend, ROBERT CARLTON, Esq., left* he handed me the MS. of "THE NEW PURCHASE," with a request to get it published: in which case I promised to write the Preface. The best Preface will be, perhaps, a part of our conversation at the time: " But, Robert, I cannot call the book a History." "Why not, Charles?" "It contains Fiction." "Granted: but is that not the case with other Histories?" "To some extent: yet your Fictions will be taken for Truths, and your Truths for Fictions." "Maybe so yet that sometimes happens with other Histories." "Well, what shall I say, Robert?" "Oh! say what you know is the fact: that the substratum is Truth; nay, that the Truth is eight parts out of ten, the Fiction only two : that the Fiction is mainly in the colouring and shading and perspective, in embodying the Genus Abstract in the Indi- vidual Concrete ; in the aggregation and concentration of events, acts, actors, like let us see like flowers culled in many places and bound in one bouquet: that the Chronology of the whole and the parts is in need of some rectification, and so on." "May I not say, however, that places, persons, things, &c. are essentially as you found them?" "Well, Charles, I do not know that it is important. Let the *Took Yankee leave. xvii XV111 PREFACE book pass for what it is worth: if taken for History, it will be thought I had a somewhat remarkable experience, if for Fiction, that I have tolerable Invention ; and then my scull will be in the market for the booksellers in my lifetime, and the Phrenolo- gists afterwards. And yet, on second thought, you may say, that had I not told, sometimes, less than the truth, the undiminished Truth would have seemed more like Fiction than ever." "Robert, may I not alter or suppress" "No Charles no: I know your modesty and timidity. But let the blame of dragging you forward be on me. As Editor you may correct grammar, rhetoric, and so on but do not meddle with the text. If necessary, you may add notes." "Well, what shall I call or name the book?" "I can give a title but it is as long as your arm: 'Where- abouts? or Seven and a Half Years in a New Purchase of the Far West; being a Poetic Dream at Sun Rise, with a Prosaic Reflection at Sun Set a Novel-History, and a Historic-Novel, with' "- "Stop! stop! Robert, that will never do. Suppose we call It simply The New Purchase, or Seven and a Half Years in the Far West : by Robert Carlton, Esq' ?" "That will do ; with a Latin sentence or two" "The Latin age is past; people read now by intuition; it will hurt the sale in warm weather; and, in the winter the days are too short to be wasted in puzzling out meanings." "Still, Charles, let us have in a little scrap ; for instance alter et idem" "Oh ! Robert yet if you do not care / do not ; it shall go in." "And suppose you add, per multas aditum, &c. ?" PREFACE xix "That would be honest; but folks do not want to be got at, and you must not put them on guard: if all readers were in- genuous, and wished to be profited as well as entertained" "Ah! dear Charles, let us hope enough of the proper sort may be found to reward a publisher." "Yes, dear Robert, but perhaps even such may say, after reading the book, they are disappointed and wish to have their money back." "Oh! that would be very unpleasant, indeed! Do you think that might happen, Charles ?" "I hope not; but what if the honest and ingenuous we disappointed ?" "Why, that is a thing to be considered you have taken me unawares let us see why, really; and yet, to be honest and candid myself, if the good, and the honest, and the frank-hearted, all say, after reading and understanding my book, that they are very sorry I ever wrote it." "You appeal then, dear Robert, to the good, the ingenuous, the merry, and even the religious?" "I do." "Then to such, if we can find a publisher, you shall go." CHARLES CLARENCE. Somwhersburgh, 1843. CONTENTS JOURNEY. CHAPTER I. Reasons of some for going West, prosaic; of others, poetic: the latter the Author's Day dreaming Injurious to Dilworth's spelling- book how dispelled What was hoped in early manhood.... Prepared I CHAPTER II. How long once a journey to Pittsburg Antiquated one wheeled car .... Stage-office, imposition, who could it be ? Stages, wore no boots .... Exercise in Etymology. . . . Mysterious disappearance. . . . Believing spirit How to fill a stage with tiers Mr. Brown enters. ... .Dialogue between Foote and Put Democrats made. . . . Solo talker, and wonderful history iCurious' effect of nodding ....Making up Interesting scene at washing faces A dis- covery Apology. 3 CHAPTER III. A horn What to do with a new bonnet. . . . Space for fut, and other articles Introductions Mr. C., and his reasons for We-ing, &c Mr. Smith Mr. Brown, and his ignorance Col. Wil- mar haracter Gen. Winchester. . . .River Raisin Ad- ventures Story interrupted What Jacob and little Peggy could do Mr. Brown repairing breach of a battering ram Wilmar's narrative Charles Clarence, how, he went to Niagara, what he was going to Kentucky after, recommended to ladies. . . . .Sudden flash. . . .Lancaster. . . .Caoutchouc stages Reader yawns 9 CHAPTER IV. How to set out Ribbon of fice Slower Growling Why ended Very interesting talk Answers . . . .Consequences Rref reshments .... Evil spirits Danger of pocket pistols Effect of music on an extra driver, his ballad Earthquake Geometrical Twelve and a half cents worth of sleep Sleep by the job Sleep off hand Exclamation 15 CHAPTER V. Departure from What we have said, though we should not Ascent Usual feat Waiting 'Bonnet in and out Not afraid of robbers at a distance Still going up Reflections up there Dreams .... Interruption . . . .Descent. . . . Peril .... Cau- tion and effect of it How to hold up a stage View over ear- tips Look! look! What is it?.... Data for calculation Dreadful fall ! Not ready either Why 'Described as a model 18 xxi xxii CONTENTS CHAPTER VI. Greek imitated. .. .Col. Wilmar's adventure Mr. Smith's remark, and interesting narrative Miss Wilmar begs Clarence to tell something His compliance And throat nearly cut.... Ex- clamation Story resumed. Cool bed Bad words Clar- ence ends by beginning, and is prevented A deer Conse- quences Wonderful adventure at night by Mr. and Mrs. C Gallant action A long skip owing to the reader's impatience 24 PITTSBURG. CHAPTER VII. Iron age and musical hexameters Milton's devils did not load scien- tifically.. . .Scenes when the wind blows Folly of rash judg- ment Beautiful womem What takes from adds to Coelebs Tribute to Mr. Smith 35 VOYAGE CHAPTER VIII. Spit-fire Ark How built Captain His affection All aboard Poetical burst Rude interruption Curious result of "the slue.".. . .Farewell! An apostrophe Wilmar's pro- position Meeting constituted The chair 'Brown not elected Debate Officers Orders Stores and furniture Fixing A tie .... Figurative grammar Dangers Sleep- on system. .. .Whistling against.. ..A. fix. . . .Expisode during an embargo Untying Planter Snag Sawyer Curious male Slick feller Palinurus Beats Sings, and leaps Grand flotilla Superior to Romance Old fashioned shower. . . .Witchery. . . . Echo and Muses. . . .Indignant lament. . . . Seventh day Hard spelling "Halloo !" Going over an old lesson Liberal proposal to reader Broke up Farewell. . . 36 THE SEARCHING CHAPTER IX. A question no reply First lessons Travelling in Autumn and Spring Why, and : how Instincts of Hoosiers and Corn>- crackers, &c First night The fan Second night A rite-dite! Poetry cooling.. A description and inventory Poetic justice for a ghost Shifting Talk between a woman and a lady Two things done at once Bending according to nature Shorter by position The "set-up" performed .... Half-and-half Answer to Mr. Nice Ditto to Miss Call- ing names 49 CHAPTER x. Agrees with the reader Whither Great peril Vengeance.... Two sorts of oases Reception Why the children were mod- est Humanities Tribute to the Clergy No pay taken Episode about 50 cents A very novel and useful society proposed Contrast between preaching fortunately interrupted at Bishop Baltimore's 55 CHAPTER XI. Woodville capital of New Purchase A halt Strange animals Dr. Sylvan Doubt about class Dress and undress Sweat CONTENTS xxiii rag Adroit manipulations Governor Leaden casket.... Aborigines Arrows Grand buildings Wizard's box how not to get in Churches. . . . Steeple saints Household churches Elocution Scenes Inscription Anecdotes "who keeps house ?".... "Put on the pat,". . . .Taverns. .. .Private houses .... Dr. Sylvan's Red fire Doctor as a hunter House proper and L Lamp-lighters. . . .Expostulation Mys- terious perforations in a wall "O fye" retaliated Hydrau- lics Diplomas A regret Hint to Uncle Sam Hark 61 CHAPTER XII. Solemn league broken Generosity Start again First snake story . . . .Path to Glenville Legislative road Stumps Straddling Exercises of taste and fancy Auxiliaries. . . . whither they do not go (Curious illumination of roads Corner tree Enormous Serpent coiled Mr. C. rushes for- ward in a phrenzy and seizes it by the tail Screeching Es- capes unhurt Third snake hit on the tail, but the author does not venture to seize Error detected in< a mathematical axiom Neighbourhood roads in actue in posse Wide bottom Sun caught at last in an out of the way place poetry reviving Apparition of a hamadryad poetry dying again Difference between halloa! and "holler !"... .Elocutional lesson gratis to all who buy the book Perspicuous directions to Glenville Poetry of the whale Getting into bed a mystery how Mrs. Major Billy Westland did and our "Jess" Good night 72 THE FINDING CHAPTER XIII. What the Brushwoods thought Straight directions Thrilling accident. . ..great snortings A rational conjecture an abrupt ending Suburbs slipping down uproar looking out what Mr. C. and his consort tumbled into Dear reader hugged over. . . . Tenderness .... Thanksgiving 81 FIRST YEAR CHAPTER XIV. In the woods .... Reader overcome by entreaties, and introduced to the Settlement. .. .Terms explained origin of "absquatulate" and cognates What names a Settlement Patriarchal cabin Mr. Hillsbury's Tannery Squatteree of a Leatherstocking Other Settlements Ranges. .. .Praises of semi-wild boars S. East of Glenville West N. East Timberopolis seat of two evils Ins and Outs Map-towns Snail shell towns Compressi- bility of elastic families History of the Seymours Mr. iCarl- ton/'s courtship Why here and wider awake! Disagreeable visitor what the woman did what Mr. C. did with the end of a tail fair offer for a box of rosin! Enormous expense.... Cabin architecture 1 Rough Scotched Double Composite, &c. &c Way to hang a door, and have it eaten off C-liding to next chapter 84 CHAPTER XV. Thrifty housewives 289 feet Puncheoned area grand divisions sub-dividings Adroitness Imaginary lines Potato xxiv CONTENTS Carlton's study Kitchen proper and improper Plunder.... History of a waiter and a cake of sugar Great peril of Mrs. Seymour remarkable escape of something else the old pier- glass what mistaken for packed away alas ! 94 CHAPTER XVI. Two arts learned . . . .Grinding and kindred topics Graecian bark Curious round thing described Old Dick named perpetual motion, and e pluribus unum. .. .Instrument of torture recom- mended for the spread of the gospel New mode of calculat- ing the contents of a circular area another last word puncheons ! Old Dick trots up his age apprenticeship, and how stunted, &c. &c His practical jokes moral character how many he would carry how steered, &c His idosyncracy Blackboard brass band Hogarth 99 CHAPTER XVII. A secret whispered Making believe Scene on meeting a curious person his incredulity and surprise How skill is acquired Squirrel killed by concussion Why Western folks use rifles what was done at the Tannery Captivating offer to the reader ....The author refuses "to bore" with a rifle Sequel contains the story of something in behalf of the Temperance Society, which commenced will be read through by all cold watermen and members of the Peace Society Gathering quadrupeds 105 CHAPTER XVIII. Meetings little and big Riding twice Dick's cargo advantage of heavy loads.... How "crkturs" are hung and how they dance . . . .Advertisements Mistakes of some missionaries Character of missionaries 'hardships zeal poverty, &c "Half a loaf" applied ecclesiastically Salaries Paul Luke. . . . Cruel logic Recommendation to some at ease in Zion Something very wet Apropos! of buckskin breeches Inci- dents Glenville's Leatherstocking's Peggy's panthers Mission- ary's bears 'Cries Danger and escape 117 CHAPTER XIX. A Bishop's whisper The salam Talk about " 'mense heap of woods, &c." Breaking ice freezing and thawing. .. .Copy of remarkable writing Giving the "invite" .... Episode about a bride elect and her friends Mr. Ashmore and his "idees" dia- logues about tiie earth the sun two pennies Susan rose of wilderness lovers Day arrives Glenville folks, in several di- visions, march Old Dick and a hurricane defence of his non- sense 'Place reached a change dead calm a descent Mrs. Ashford at the foot of a ladder what was seen how to hook a women Solemnization Terror with an appendix .... Put- ting out and chasing. .. .Noon and ferment Holiday in a clearing Old Dick can't stand it any longer What happened to three chaps on his back Story telling "tarrifying a ba'r" "gobbling a turkey," snake affair 'Uncle Tommy's long story Dinner "eating twice". .. .Inversion of matrimonial chord a short prayer Amazing pot pie ! Fried leather ! other deli- cacies Natural curiosity Hint taken Volunteers Pulling up and stopping a frolic 130 CONTENTS xxv CHAPTER XX. Occupation merry time treadles versus pedals. .'. .closet shuttle Flute and Fiddle Greek and Latin "Tyture tu pat" Hebrew Evenings and crackings. .. .Family lamp. .. .Axe-craft Tom Robinson Fire making back log puffs and jumping back hipping a log 'puncheons wriggling Fire bursting out com- bustion not supported by a bladder, of gas A tong Bah !. . . . Hurraw-aw 157 CHAPTER XXI. Monotony interrupted by a cow .... Story of the skins A deer hunt, in which are introduced two, and the theory of opinion and in- stincts .... Uncle Tommy's cabin, inside, outside and all around, and the way to get water Sabbaths Neighbour Sturgis answer to a crack question .... Description a pulpit, and how to handle it inspiration, suckspiration and expiration Awful storm, effect on two bounds Logic, cause and effect Advan- tage to a preacher of the modern chemical nomenclature.... Happy escape 165 SECOND YEAR CHAPTER XXII. Campaign candidates. . .. Grounds of electioneering. . . .Consequen- ces of laughing in meeting Defences of laughing Certificates Poor Philip's logic spouted .... Price of Liberty Pure Democracy what boys do Stump speeches, action in oratoy Isam Greenbriar's cart Sam Dreadnought's wagon Munificence and meanness of some candidates .... Nobleness of others. .. .Political baptism no dry joke A history called for, and treated in next three chapters 175 CHAPTER XXIII. Sameness of age Born and educated Difference between Quaker school and quackery one Duff Green How to see the World Party 50 miles beyond white settlement Visit returned, a rich breakfast, and a reflection like Unole Tommy's De gusti- bus non ? Encountered ; scene between a little and a big man A pet dream ; savage propensities Peril in Missouri ; moral courage affection of a hunter for a rifle anxiety tenderness ....heroism escape Rifle lost Squatter's hut.. ..Hospi- tality 181 CHAPTER XXIV. Rendezvous Bee tree Roundabout-abilitudiness ! .... English tourists Biggest tree in the world! Bees again How to get fruit contrary to a proverb.. . .How a mighty heart was broken What the sun saw after a Millenium! Honour sublimity and littleness i 190 CHAPTER XXV. Return home Produce Medical recipe Out of frying pan Episode what's in our dark forests.. "18 injins 15 wites &c." Interlude a farce between tragedies encouraging to humble Democrats A stock vanishing a robber a lynching, commended to canting infidels and puling moralists Prepar- xxvi CONTENTS ing for peril incident on the way robbers' retreat a scene, in which is shown the efficacy of powder and ball editors that recommend firing on mcbs and abolishing capital punishments "Well! we might have had better luck!" and "Well what next ?" 193 CHAPTER XXVI. Hardness of a politician's way Directions about eating brimstone and so forth Hints to Tract Societies Benefit of young lawyers consulted Rabblerousing intentions of Mr. C Nig- gering off Copy book sentence illustrated Martyrdom How to make candidates work to some useful end Our first speech, and whence none before was, and never can be again ! political balance, recommended to Fence people Gratitude for favours not received Tempest of Fire ! 200 CHAPTER XXVII. Courteous dialogue.. Post-office famished mail diluted news Mutual indifference Going to office alarm 'wheel-about wonderment and wonderful downfall ! . . . . Dissertation on thing- amies Spiceburg catching a postmaster Dialogues Uncle Sam's Cabinet a search there what was buried alive resuscitated defence of buyers and how to circulate a wood- chopper. .. .Dialogue between Sam and Mr. Johnson. .. .How to spend a fip How to do justice by gulling a man Sam and Mr. C. start for home melancholy interruption and how Sam used irreverent words. .. .Gratitude, with an offer to row a man up a certain creek Mistake in "katter-korner'd like." 208 CHAPTER XXVIII. The grave Surprised there by the Indians Story about Red Fire and two young doctors. . . .Hunting-shirt Andy Remark- able interruption of the story Andy's request puts off per- forms several parts 'Doubtful gender 221 CHAPTER XXIX. Miscalculation. .. .Disappointed. .. .Dick scampers off and brings back a wonderful little man and another horse No. 6 and No. I Modus loquendi Effect of an "acquotical solution." Terror occasioned by "dental surgery and principal molares." Infallible inferences from external symptoms .... Blameable negligence of Mr. C. in not "exhibiting." Amazing power of a 'Republican Legislature Journal of the House 229 CHAPTER XXX. A court constituted. .. .Difference between "Mister" and "Brother." ....Brother Hillsbury his labours and perils. .. .Bishop Shrub of Timberopolis. . . .Mr. Merry. .. .Decrees. .. .Expedition. ... Coming to a mill Solitude sweetened, but not with sugar "Come, let's have that preaching," &c Mr. Merry prepares The saint end of a log What scratches next to a large saw and what deserves it.... Mr. M. begins and quits, and be- gins again Sudden shot with its consequences Deserted Indian town- Preaching at Mr. Redwhite's his history his wife's, with massacre at Wyoming Supper 234 CONTENTS xxvii CHAPTER JOXXI. Sets out alone.. A family in bed in the day time Thanks to the reader The author seized at first laughs exposes hypocrisy is visited again by Monsheer Tonson Serious yet tells an anecdote of Dr. Sylvam in kicking an enemy off Delirious Jet black mammoth! A frail canoe! A visit bold practice curious paper how to say "oohh !" Advice The author receives an appointment from Legislature writes to Charles Clarence Three ends 249 THIRD YEAR CHAPTER XXXII. Sad event A character An angel of beauty A funeral 255 CHAPTER XXXIII. Changes Speculations Separation Imitation of Dr. Pillbox. . . Surprise of Hoosierina Ah! come now Parting with an old friend Indignant flourish Melancholy ending Relief for the reader. .. .Sixteen reasons for an advertisement First Piano ever "heern tell of" Notes of invitation to soirees "Them' are little jumpers !" Man of the Woods with a soul A respectable lady "Encore !" A profitable study for certain religious people Study for young gentlemen about to marry A concentrated Moral 257 CHAPTER XXXIV. The reader will remember something Mr. C., a Trustee and Com- mitteeman Surprise Kind offer to find a chair and fill it Charles Clarence Competition Mr. Jimmey Dia- logues on "cream" on Algebra. .. .Offer to black shoes to boot, and cherry bitters. .. .Mr. Rapid .... Dialogue on learning three or four of the dead languages Meeting of the Board Disappointment "Darnations." 264 CHAPTER XXXV. Visitation Sacred Phrenology and Mesmerism Bulls of Bashan and bronchitis Amazing effects of a very simple machine Difference between Barton Stone and Peter Stone Persever- ance. .. .Power of pressure in conversion. .. .Pomelling better than switching Importance of accuracy in names Fanaticism always fatal to morals Lawyer Insidias Cntswell appearance in full dress. .. .pinch of snuff performed Bishop's prayer against catgut A venture 2/0 CHAPTER XXXVI. Allheart a master a "Lyon" and recommended to all Blacksmiths, learned and unlearned His skill in rifle making Mr. C. takes fire and challenges Returns to Vulcanus what his "left eye ketch'd a glimpse of" once Curious experiment in optics An offer A rule of grammar A musical blacksmith Paga/nini Handling fingers in flute-playing A painter Rare art Worth the price of the book to portrait-painters A chef d'ceuvre American goddess Mr. C. regrets not hav- ing studied composition Gutswell's speech on the "hoss-block !" . . Woodville House 277 xxviii CONTENTS CHAPTER XXXVII. Flying visit Fording Evil report confirmed. . . .Dear old politi- cal friends absquatulated Desolation Farewells Bishop Shrub, Uncle John and Mr. C. set out First glimpse of the prairie world Stopping to hold meeting getting into an x odd scrape Wanting to, and not daring Mr. C. laughs, whether the reader does or not Led by an abrupt question into a very undignified ending 286 CHAPTER XXXVIII. Vincennes Light and darkness Puritanical views dangerous to the religion of the 01 roXXoi Baleful effects of reading history forbidden by Mother Mystery Meeting of Suckers, Pukes, and other natives House of Bishops Dialogue on Swearing Grave of a Soldier 292 CHAPTER XXXIX. Going to Ilinois with a Mister Patriarchal Sucker. .. .Arabian Nights .... Preface to a*i odd talk, during which Uncle John shuffles out His unchristian revenge for the razor business Solemn league of offence and defence Attack on the enemy how we conquered, and beat ourselves A sin to be scourged. . . . Homeward trail 297 CHAPTER XL. Razorville Aboriginal Egyptian or Greek colony met with A non-descript pony described. . . .The way to drive one.... What's better than to live in clover Starting The way to follow two trails at once Led into it advantage of equal reasons Echo to the sense Getting further in Advantage of the precise sort of Phrenology Bursting through to an adventure Temptation resisted Escape from danger Old man Staffords .... Getting into and out of it Prairie late at night. . . .Lone Woman. . . .How two beds were "tuk up.". . . .Dis- agreement between Uncle John and Mr. C Dialogue in two places at once Mr. C. begs for information in fashionable grammar Four meals devoured at once among the stars Snug 301 CHAPTER XLI. Change Christmas joy in the morning a messenger at night Woman as she was and should be A nobleman Homer's heroes imitated in spite of modern critics 314 FOURTH YEAR CHAPTER XLII. Augustan age of the Purchase New actor. .. .Chastisement Character Uncle Sam Big and Little recalled to memory, with a piece of Mr. Carlton's mind An opening in 1800, and so f orth .... Master arrives Sprinkle of boy. ... .Speech nat- urally interrupted resumed Fixing Growlings Liberty and equality Compliments Dialogue on "trousers," and con- sequence different from the reader's fears A Yankee trick Getting used to it 319 CONTENTS xxix CHAPTER XLIII. A favourite doctrine badly understood from theory Paper models The People universal general special peculiar, &c. &c. ....What the special people did for the general people, and what the particular people said and did about it The people's people advance A Grand Dignity with eight tails! Board in ses- sion his Rowdy Royalty's speech Dr. Sylvan's compound.... Why the Conscript Fathers do bullyism naturally and grace- fully. .. .History struts in new moccasins or buskins, and ends in a hell-a-blow ! 327 CHAPTER XLIV. "What now?" Girls. .. .Eleven persons ten and a half horses.... Contrast Ready mounted off ! Screechings ! flappings Slower talking eating Slippery river '^Girls ! and all !" yes Dr. Hexagon Hey! Crossing forgetting the legs Chattering "Where's pony ?". . . . Passage of Nut creek in a new line dizzy Neptune Crocket Preparing to digress 334 CHAPTER XLV. Big possum "Do you want to see, &c, &c. ?". . ..Whip ! start! go-o "Well done, &c." Amazing effect of praise. . . . A true Indian trace. .. .Course by sunshine, yet not by the sun Sub- limity. .. ."Ay ! ay! go on !".... A new road, and new grammars, &c The dry world All safe 344 CHAPTER XLVI. Fresh start One young lady.. ..A number of things told, but not narrated. . . .Romantic curtain Wha dispelled, and yet formed part of a dream ... .Robert Dale Owen and diagrams Path to Tippecanoe ! Picturesque Sprotttsburg and Indian Blind path .... Getting out the right side of a slough Funeral tree! First glimpse of the field How the author forgets him- self, and turns out only a common man. . . .Where the dead?. . . . What is this? with the squatter's tale Tippecanoe descirbed Squatter's story of the sentinel The departed President "Joe Davis," an old story revived how he died ! Farewell to .... Poetry up to fever heat at last, and breaks out in a battle . . . 348 CHAPTER XLVII. Return to the Doctor's Setting out for home Detail before a skip, TOO yards wide and more plausibility circumnaviga- tion Skip performed unexpectedly Remarkable coincidence in opinion of Aunt Kitty with the reader 362 CHAPTER XLVIII. Doubts dissipated Dialogue about "bonnit." Character of Mr. Carlton resolves to imitate the Vicar Camp-meeting some prosaic poetry reasoning and inferences Amount of spiritual labour Master spirits Sprightly Novus anec- dotes and sermons, which the reader may skip if he can, and go on to the prayer on "moonshine". .. .Mizraim Ham and his mellow-drama Venerable old warrior, and the way to fire at the Devil Mr. Carlton almost knocked down himself! xxx CONTENTS Terrific fight between two, and the way one made the Devil let go a grip The author goes away unconverted himself, but gives a favourable testimony to the efficacy of camp-meetings 364 CHAPTER XLIX. Love and matrimony! His "galling" expeditions How he was once caugiht in a trap Miss Brown Dialogue between Carlton and Glenville a double compound plot. . . .Letter to Miss Stnythe letter to Miss Brown's papa "What luck?". . . .Catas- trophe properly deferred by a Composition on Hunting Letter and something else "I told you so " A difficulty and a promise 390 FIFTH YEAR. CHAPTER L. Clarence versus the Commonwealth A march and other patent things. . . .Fortunate times !. . . .Letter from Clarence to the author recommended to trustees of levelling schools Reminiscences of Clarence's Lectures Foreign Amazing utility of colleges and churches ! Take care, pedagogue ! A star in the ascendant mistake in the nature of the Vox Squally Tom-cat Haw-Buck Carlton's head-quarters why Condensation and filtration of talks and dialogues Ned Stanley introduced in. a "bust," < 397 CHAPTER LI. Arrival of the Major Danger to the State Castle-building in- terrupted ... .A monster seen Large crescit eundo A procession through a ot TO\\OI .... Dead-calm speech Trial in- terrupted by a "hurra w !" Major disconcerted A proposal followed by "busf'-'mgs Clarence makes a god speak thunder on the proper quarter Mr. Liebug A question and answer "Huh! haw," Talk, between Ned and Carlton Ned in parlour Consequence of administering patent twaddle in edu- cating Mr. Brass, Sen., and Prof. Harwood how settled Quietude 406 CHAPTER LII. Exhibition Mr. C. busy Fixings Loss on shoes. .. .Signals Orchestral Blaze Exclamations ! Cow-bell shaken inaudible fiddles Primo Secundo Triangle Speech interrupted exhibition goes on Contrast in seven particulars between young men and young gentlemen, with threat of farther infliction Two young men Fixed and wandering stars A heavy bet on one side 415 CHAPTER LIII. How to spend a vacation in the Purchase An abstract embodied and seen marching by the author !... .Grand party to explore a cave invitations ready starting dignity let down Solemn advice to persons, made up nicely by milliners and other artists Things growing bigger, and why.... Mrs. Hunter's directions Found Domore's report Refusals Why Polly wouldn't, although Peggy would Backing one another before the rest What was not seen Squall prevented. . . ."Hark ! CONTENTS xxxi what's that?". .. .Going down deeper, and coming back quicker Retreat Dpmore's policy his apology What came down quick writing What retarded civilization a whole year. 428 CHAPTER LIV. Learning to spell 441 CHAPTER LV. Married at last Incipient refinement consequences. . . .Grand affair determined on why how effect The time room company misgivings "Shiver- ree" Inside versus Outside Per- formers human, inhuman, and superhuman Something squealy in a parlor True hog superior to all others. .. .Piggy- back Scalp taken Danger "knock 'em down !" Rescue Difference between Hoosier-mobs and scum-mobs Orpheus 442 SIXTH YEAR CHAPTER LVI. How to oversee White crow A committee A party Curi- ous cloud sneer away ! . . . .Horseback. . . . Churches. . . .Council of Nice Another party The Great-North-American-Re- publican-Horsefly ! Mrs. Troll ope wanted Scene sticking on sticking to it wading out. . . . Alone. . . . Dreams. . . . Set over . . . .Wilderness. . . .Dialogues with Kate Mrs. King Some- thing nice to eat Off again Lost-like Praise 451 CHAPTER LVII. A petition What Ned and Domore did Insidias Cutswell, Esq., ad hoosierandum 463 CHAPTER LVIII. Wild pigeons Ned's opinion of shot-guns They make their own shot Accidents. . . .Alarm and excitement A question evaded A bag and string Puzzled Enlightened Belittled Dialogues, and execration of shot-guns Melancholy 466 CHAPTER LDC The King of Terror. . . .The dying one The two coffin^, Funeral train Reader ! 475 SEVENTH YEAR. CHAPTER LX. Something new and prodigious ! Mystic letters branding Hard riding blotted puff s! (nervous) a conversation Suspi- cious Resolved on a believing spirit Leaky Faces and consciences Cow-bells crotch of a tree cows and procession .... Episodial about biggest college Lights omens. . . . Dreams not accounted for 477 CHAPTER LXI. Particular introduction History and character Story about a t donkey. . . jHow to roll up and down at once Fiction acknowl- edged 486 xxxii CONTENTS CHAPTER LXII. Mystery defended Conjectures How to use professors What Professor Spunk would have done (Note) A letter Several dialogues and two or three scenes.... A resignation.... Refreshments in the next chapter 488 CHAPTER LXIII. The Guzzleton barbecue Preface. . . . Description plateau table seats arcade kitchen curious iron artillery processions flags music "the set-up" performed Uses of a barbecue, and talks about cost Domore and others clenching rifles A deep sigh 496 CHAPTER LXIV. Verification Preface to thrilling scenes "Hark the bell" The celebrated Saturday's show Court of appeals and repeals Speeches, talks, and interruptions Something excessively tender and touching Terror knife drawn assassination wrath big words voting dividing and taking sides Grand Jury Ecclesiastical Court Body Guard 502 CONCLUDING SIX MONTHS CHAPTER LXV. Ha! I see! I see! Reader calls out three times Mr. C. comes back Firm of Glenville & Carlton. . . .Some very deep water Literary topics resumed Board met Deeply interest- ing A long speech that did nothing, and a short one that did all things Polyphemus and his two meals Curtain falls 511 CHAPTER LXVI. Farewells A church full A house empty A rainy morning Domore and Ned ***** Pinnacle of a mountain.... Soliloquy * * * A lesson 519 MAP OF NEW PURCHASE 1818 THE NEW PURCHASE. CHAPTER I. THE JOURNEY. "Westward, ho!" THE ordinary causes of seeking new homes in the West are well known. There, it is sometimes expected, a broken fortune may be repaired, or one here too narrow, become, by change of circumstances, ample enough for a growing family, or a larger ambition. Indolence leads some thither, a distaste of conventional trammels others ; while not a few hope to find a theatre, where small talents and learning may figure to better advantage. But some are led away to the West by poetical inducements. To persons of tender sensibilities and ardent enthusiasm, that is a land of beautiful visions ; and its gorgeous clouds, like drapery around the golden sunsets, are a curtain veiling other and more distant glories. Such persons are not insensible to worldly ad- vantages, yet they abandon not the East from the love of gain. They are rather evoked and charmed away by a potent, if an imaginary spirit, resident in that world of hoary wilds. From the prairie spreading its grassy and flowery plains to meet the dim horizon, from the river rolling a flood across half a continent, from the forest dark and venerable with the growth of many cen- turies, come, with every passing cloud and wind, the words of resistless invitation ; till the enchanted, concealing the true causes, or pretending others, depart for the West. They are weary of a prosaic life; they go to find a poetic one. To much of this day-dreaming spirit is the world indebted for the author's sojourn of seven and a half years in a part of what was, at the time of this journey, the FAR WEST. In early boyhood, 2 THE JOURNEY Mr. Carlton was no ordinary dreamer : nay, in the sunshine, as by moonlight, shadows of branching antlers and flint-headed arrows caused many a darkness in his path, as visionary deer bounded away before the visionary hunter. At school a boy of kindred soul occupied the adjacent seat; and this boy's father had left him, as was then believed, countless acres of rough mountains and woods undesecrated by civilized feet. How far away this sylvan territory may have been, was never asked, but it was near enough and easy of access to day-dreamers ; for we had actually devised a plan to steal off secretly at some favourable moment and find a joyous life in that forest elysium. Before the external eye lay, indeed, Dilworth, his columns of spelling in dreadful array of single, double, and treble files, surrounded by dog-ears curling up from the four corners of the dirt-stained page ; but the inner eye saw them not. And if our lips moved, it was not to call over the names of the detested words, no, it was in mysterious whispers: we were wrapt in a vision, and talked of bark huts and bows and arrows ay, we were setting dead- falls and snares, and arranging the most feasible plans for the woods and the mountains. Such talks would, indeed, begin, and for a while, continue so like the inarticulate buzz and hum of an old-fashioned school-boy "getting by heart," as to awaken no suspicion in Master Strap. As enthusiasm, however, kindled, tones became better defined and words more and more articulate. Then ensued, first a very ominous and death-like stillness in all parts of the school-room except ours, and then the sudde"h touch of a wand came that broke a deep spell, and alas ! alas ! awoke us to our spelling ! Poor children! we cried then for pain and disappointment! The hour came when we shed more bitter tears at sorer disappointments, and in a severer school! Even as I write there is a thrill of boyhood in my soul, and in despite of philosophy tears are trembling in my eyes ; as if the man wept for the crushed hopes of the boy! Experience may curb our yearning towards the earth, yet even amidst the longings after immortality and the things that eye hath not seen, there do remain hungerings and thirstings after a possi- ble and more perfect mundane state. At the dawn, therefore, of manhood Mr. Carlton still hoped to meet in the Far West visions THE JOURNEY 3 embodied although pictured now in softer lights and graver colours. Shortly, then, after our marriage in the first quarter of the present century, after the honey-moon, indeed, but still within the "love and cottage" period, Mrs. Carlton was persuaded to exchange the tasteless and crowded solitude of Philadelphia for the entrancing and real loneliness of the wilds, and the promenade of dead brick for the living carpet of the natural meadow. Having no immoveables, and our moveables being easily trans- muted into baggage, preparation was speedily made; and then hands were grasped and cheeks kissed, alas! for a long adieu: for when we returned with sober views and chastened spirits, these, our first and best loved friends, were sought, but "they were not." CHAPTER II. "Who goes there? A friend." FROM Philadelphia to Pittsburgh was formerly a journey of days. Hence, to avoid travelling on the Sabbath it was arranged by us to set out at three o'clock A. M., on Monday. A porter t however, of the stage-office aroused us at one o'clock; when, hurrying on our garments, we were speedily following our baggage trundled by the man, in that most capacious of one-wheeled car- riages an antiquated wheel-barrow. Arrived at the office, then kept by the Tomlinsons, the agent affected to consider me and my wife as only one person, and hence while I paid for two seats, he forced me to pay for all my wife's baggage as extra; an imposition only submitted to, because in running my eye over the names booked as passengers, while the vexatious record of the baggage was making, travelling associates were seen written there who were too delightful to be lost for a trifle. These names were Colonel Wilmar of Kentucky and his cousin, Miss Wilmar, of Philadelphia. In addition were three strange names booked for Pittsburgh, a Mr. Smith and a Mr. Brown, and also a name hardly legible, but which, if I had 4 THE JOURNEY decyphered correctly, seemed very like Clarence strange, indeed, and yet familiar; surely it had been known to me once Clar- ence ? who could it be ? None of these persons had yet reached the office (the stage, however, being ready and waiting only their arrival), and when they did come, owing to the dim light of the room and the bustle of an immediate movement towards the stage, countenances could not be distinguished ; and even the Wilmars could not have been recognised without the premonition of the way-bill. The stages of that day wore no boots. In place of that leathern convenience, was a cross-barred ornament projecting in the rear to receive the baggage or at least half of it. This receptacle was called the "Rack." Perhaps from its wonderful adaptation for the utter demolition of what it received, it was originally named "Wrack;" and this word, in passing through the ordeal of vulgar pronunciation, where it was called first "Wreck," having lost its "W," remained what indeed it so much resembled the Rack. In binding Mrs. Carlton's trunk to this curious engine, the porter broke the rope, and her trunk falling down, the articles within, in spite of an old lock and a rotten strap, burst from their confine- ment and were scattered over the street. The porter was very prompt in his aid in gathering the articles and securing the lid, and as some compensation for his blunder and its consequences, he refused the usual fee of the wheel-barrow service. Of course he received now thanks for generosity instead of rebukes for negli- gence: but on inspecting afterwards our trunk, the absence of a purse containing seven dollars and of a silver cup worth twice as much, awakened suspicions of less honourable cause for the porter's conduct. Here then were, at the outset, extortion and theft, and felt, too, as evils; but there was present a believing spirit mingling sweetness with the wormwood. Ay ! were we not actually on our way to the land of vision ! Surely no such baseness is there ! The sanctity of that Far West is inviolate ! Inside, our stage was most judiciously filled with three tiers. The lower tier was composed of saddle-bags, valises, small trunks and carpet-bags ; the second, of human beings supported upright by an equal squeeze on all sides ; and then, on the condensed laps THE JOURNEY 5 of the living tier, rested the third tier, made up of extra cloaks, some band-boxes and work-baskets, several spare hats in paste- board cases, half a dozen canes and umbrellas, and one fowling- piece done up in green baize. Notwithstanding the great felicity of this arrangement, the inquietude of the upper and lower tiers when the stage first started, occasioned in the sentient tier some inarticulate growling and a little half-smothered cursing; which crusty symptoms, however, presently yielded to a good-natured laugh at the perseverance with which Mr. Brown remained on a French gentleman's foot, through a misapprehension of a very polite and indirect request not to stand there a laugh in which the parties themselves joined. Our driver had, at the office, seated between two way-passengers with the curtain behind them dropped, given the signal, when away dashed the horses; and then commenced the incon- siderate restlessness of the internal baggage and the ill-concealed surliness of the passengers. But at the end of a few squares the stage suddenly stopped at a hotel, when the door of the vehicle being instantly opened, the space was filled with the head and shoulders of Mr. Brown, who began as follows : "Ladies and gentlemen, you seem to be full in here, I suppose it is no use to be looking for my seat in the dark " "Sare" responded, evidently by the accent, a Frenchman, and in a most complaisant and supplicatory tone "Sare, do not you know my foote is under yours ? "No, sir," replied Mr. Brown standing up as well as he could in the stage, and feeling about for some space. "Sare, do not you know my foote is under yours?" voice higher and quicker. "No, sir, I don't" surprised, but not budging. "Sare, do you not know my foote is under yours?" on the octave, and getting higher and more emphatic. "O ! I beg your pardon, sir, do you mane I'm raelly treading on your fut?" without, however, moving off, but generously waiting for information. "Yes! sare! I do!" "Oh ! I beg pardon, sir raelly I thought I was standing on a carpet-bag" when, satisfied he was wrong in his conjecture, and 6 THE JOURNEY that it was "raelly the fut," Mr. Brown instantly removed the aggravating pressure. Our friends thus introduced by the "foote" and the "fut" as the gentleman from France and the gentleman from Ireland were welcomed by no inaudible laughter, in which they also participated, while at the moment the door was violently slammed, and that instantly followed by a startling crack of the impatient whip. This was of great advantage to Mr. Brown, as it helped him to a seat somewhere; although from some peevish expressions, he must have alighted on other quarters as well as his own. All outcries and growlings, however, occasioned by hats and bonnets innocently dashed into neighbouring faces, or by small trunks unable to keep their gravity, and elastic sticks and umbrellas that rubbed angrily against tender ancles or poked smartly into de- fenceless backs, all were drowned in the rattling thunder of the rolling wheels ; and the tiers, rather loosely packed at first, were soon, by the ferocious and determined jerking and plunging of the vehicle, shaken into one compact quiescent and democratical mass. Unsuccessful attempts then came to sustain a general talk on the weather, the time of reaching the breakfast, the hour of the night, and the like novel and interesting topics ; the questions being com- monly put, and the replies hazarded by six or eight voices together, and in as many intervals of pitch, from the grumbled bass to the most tremulous and piteous treble. To these succeeded equally abortive efforts to sustain duos and trios, till the whole perform- ance of the talk remained a solo. This performer, when day peeped in upon us, proved to be a middle-aged and corpulent lady, who sang out in a very peculiar and most penetrating tone ; herself both asking and answering, often categorically, but for the most part in the "guess and may be" style of recitative. Encouraged by the silence of the company, the lady at length in the same lofty strains sang out portions of her own history, introducing the pleasing variations of "may-be-it-would" and "may-be-it-wouldn't" "I guessed and he guessed" and "says and says he," &c. The burden, however, of the piece was this: it was her first trip to the city, although from a little girl she had lived within thirty miles but her mother could never spare her and when she THE JOURNEY 7 married Jacob, her and him could never leave home together, and Jacob, he would never let her go alone by herself, being "right down sarten she'd never come back again alive or without some of her bones broken." Soon, however, we began to go "slowly and sadly" over the Schuylkill bridge, when something not unlike snoring admonished the lady of our seeming inattention and her musical narrative sud- denly ceased, like the sudden holding up of a hard rain ; and then all were quickly either practising sleep at random, or with troubled thoughts wandering to the absent or indulging fitful dreams of the future. Morning revealed by degrees the incumbents, and in very im- posing attitudes. For instance, there was the Frenchman, his head on the Irishman's shoulder, and keeping pretty tolerable time to the music of the jolting carriage; while the Irishman revived now and then by a desperate lurch extra, as in atonement for his fault, made no attempt to be rid of his burden, but slowly closing his eyes, nodded away with his own head in the direction of our solo. But all noddings in this book will be indulged by the classic reader, who knows well enough : "Aliquando bonus dormitat Homerus." "The excellent 'Homer takes a nap now and then." Fronting myself was a person with hands holding to a strap pendent from the roof, his head inclined towards his breast, and his hat fallen off, but intercepted by Col. Wilmar, his sleeping neighbour. This stranger, on several elevations 01 his head, pre- sented a countenance that set me to recalling past scenes and as- sociates, and I was in a fair way of making some discovery, when all were fiercely jerked into wakefulness by a most unnatural and savage plunge of the stage, followed on the instant, like severe lightning, by an explosion; the tiers becoming all vocal with "bless my soul's" "my goodnesses !" and vulgar "ouches !" Above all, however, sounded this pathetic remonstrance in our talking lady's inimitable style: "La! Mister! if you aint nodded agin this here right bran new bonnit of mine, till I vow if it aint as good as spiled!" To this no reply was permitted as the horses suddenly halted, and a venerable and decent landlord hav- 8 THE JOURNEY ing opened the door of the carriage, requested us to alight, adding that "the stage breakfasts here." The live stock accordingly was unpacked and extricated from the dead, no important damage being visible, except in "the bran new bonnit;" and sure enough it was curiously sloped contrary to nature, with an irregular concave in the front and suitable enlargements sideways. Sceptics like Hume would doubtless have raised a query, if the width was entirely owing to the noddings of the Irish gentleman, or the very ample rotundity of the cherry- cheeked and good-humoured face expanded within the bonnet; but Mr. Brown himself at once admitted his inconsiderate butting as the cause, and with every appearance of concern he busied himself with assisting the matron to alight and looking after her baskets and boxes. This so won on her, that when at the first opportunity Mr. Brown attempted an apology and condolence, he was interrupted by her saying "Oh! never mind it, Mister, it aint no odds no how, and I guess we can soon fix it." During our ablutions I caught the eye of the young stranger already named, fixed with an inquiring look on my face ; and then we both, towel in hand, gradually advanced, yet embarrassed and hesitating as if both recollected the incident, "you thought it was me and I thought it was you, and faith its nather of us," till, ar- rived at proper distance, he extended his hand and hazarded the affirmative inquiry: "If I mistake not this is Robert Carlton !" My reply showed it was each of us : "Clarence! Charles Clarence! is it possible! is this you!" Reader, this Charles Clarence was the identical boy of the adjacent seat, whose enthusiasm for bark cabins and forest life, like my own, had beguiled us of many a hateful lesson, and gained for us many a smart application of birch and leather in parts left defenceless by scant patterns of primitive roundabouts Shortly after this, in the parlour of the Warren tavern, a general introduction took place among the Pittsburgh travellers: viz. Mr. Brown, Mr. Smith, Col. Wilmar and Miss Wilmar, Mr. Clarence and Mr. and Mrs. Carlton ; who all, in due season, shall be more particularly introduced to our readers, as the Party. At present we must obey the signal for breakfast; that meal being THE JOURNEY 9 really prepared for the passengers, although, by metonomy, it was in old times said to be for the stage. CHAPTER III. "Hominem pagina nostra sapit.".. "Our page describes some gentlemen.' WHEN summoned to the stage by the driver's horn, it seemed we had lost some way-passengers, room being thus obtained for the lady of the bonnet; who, however, appeared wearing the old article, having, with a corrected judgment, consigned the damaged one to the band-box. So, also, greater space was found for the French gentleman's foot, who had, from apprehension of cold or from gout, so encased his pedalic appendages in socks of carpet-stuff as to lead a careless observer, even by day-light, to mistake his feet for two of the many travelling bags on the floor. Opportunity also was afforded now of a more judicious disposal of various rubbing, poking and punching articles, so that, aided by a good breakfast and a morning cold but bright, we were soon engaged in a 'conversation, general, easy, and animated. And now we may properly proceed to introduce the gentlemen of the party. Please then, reader, notice first that pleasant-looking personage bowing so profoundly, and evidently r.nxious to win your favour. That is hem! that is Robert Carlton, Esq. He takes the opportunity of soliciting your company not only for the journey but all the way through his two volumes. He would also say, it is his purpose to imitate Julius Caesar occasionally, and use the third instead of the first person singular, and to adopt now and then, too, the regal style, in employing nominative we, pos- sessive our or ours, objective MS. These imitations, it is supposed, will give a very pleasing variety to the book, enable the author to utter complimentary things about Mr. Carlton and his lady with greater freedom, and not run so hard upon capital I's, or, in technical phrase, not exhaust the printer's sorts. io THE JOURNEY This next gentleman is my friend Mr. Smith. Like so many of the name, he was in all respects a worthy man, and honoured, at the time, with a high station in the magistracy of Pittsburgh. Our party shared his liberal hospitality there, and since that hour we have been quite partial in our regard of the Smiths, and their relatives the Smythes. Happy partiality this ; for if all classed and sorted under that grand-common-proper-noun take a correspond- ing liking for our author, where will be the limit to the number of copies and editions? Ladies and gentlemen, this is Mr. Brown. He was an Irish gentleman, had travelled extensively in Europe, and had the manners of the best society. At present he was at the commence- ment of a tour, to be extended over most of the United States. Among his oddities, not the least was his odd person, entitling him to Noah Webster's word, lengthy, he appearing alternately all body, when one looked up, and all legs when one looked down : a peculiarity I am led the more to notice, as I found his elonga- tion very unfavourable to skiff navigation afterwards on the Ohio river; and indeed it put us in jeopardy, if not of life, yet of immersion. In spite of all his reading (Mr. Boz, however, had not then published his American notes) Mr. Brown was re- markably ignorant of our country, expressing unfeigned surprise that our road, only twenty miles from Philadelphia, in place of leading into dark forests filled with wild beasts and naked savages, did really run amid open farms and smiling scenery, abounding with domestic animals and civilized agriculturalists. Pittsburgh was his Ultima Thule, beyond which he expected to find no place, or even something worse. Distinguished, however, for his agree- able manners and frank disposition, cheerfully confessing and laughing at his own mistakes, he became of course a universal favourite. Col. Wilmar was, however, my beau ideal of a gentleman. To a manly beauty he had added the qualities of good education and the grace of many accomplishments. He was courteous, brave and even chivalrous ; his attention to others resulting from benev- olence and not from prudence. Ladies under his care (and that, from a knowledge of his character, was often the case), were re- garded by him more as sisters having claims on a brother's atten- THE JOURNEY 11 tions, than as strangers committed to his trust. With pleasure we thought such a specimen of our citizens could be contemplated by Mr. Brown; and Mr. Carlton rejoiced that he knew one worthy to live in the land of poetry and dreams : for the colonel was an inhabitant of the West. In the last war with Great Britain, Col. Wilmar, then a very young man, commenced his military career as a volunteer, and after being actively engaged in many skirmishes and other war- like enterprises, he served finally as an aid to Gen. Winchester in the disastrous battle of the river Raisin. 1 Taken prisoner he es- caped the massacre made of his associates by the Indians, and was then marched to Fort Maiden; whence, after a detention of some months, he was restored to his home. Here, his military feelings being yet dominant, he was soon honoured with an im- portant command among the militia and volunteers of Kentucky his native State. When we became, as a party, the sole occupants of the stage, and, in the ascent of the mountains, had opportunities for pro- longed narratives, among other matters the colonel gave, at our request, a sketch of his military adventures. And one story may properly find a place here by way of episode in the description of my companions. But hark ! some one hails our driver, and the stage stops. "Law ! bless my senses, if there aint Jacob in his cart come out for me at the end of our road !" was the immediate exclamation that burst from our heroine. The unexpected sight of her hus- band and the thoughts of home (where we learned she expected to see "little Peggy"), were too powerful for the prudent resolves or secret awe that had, for the last hour, kept our dame silent ; and out rushed nature's feelings as above described. Nor did the torrent exhaust itself at one gushing it paused and then continued : "I vow I thought he'd a met one at the tavern in Dowington 1 In Michigan just north of Toledo, Ohio. On Jan. 22, 1813, the British General Proctor, commanding 1,000 whites and Indians, defeated the Americans under General Winchester. The 500 American prisoners, left without a sufficient guard, were massacred by the Indians. "Remember the Raisin" became the battle cry of the western frontiersmen. Ft. Maiden is in Canada across the Detroit river below Windsor. 12 THE JOURNEY but Jacob's so monstrous afeard of a body's gittin hurt, that he's staid out here I do wonwer how he left them all at home ?" In the meantime, Mr. Brown, pleased with her self-satisfaction, good nature, and forgiving temper, had got out and stood receiv- ing first the band-box containing the pummelled bonnet, and then aiding its owner to alight; for which he received a cordial "thankee, sir," and pressing invitation to call and see her and Jacob if ever he should be travelling that way again. All that could be heard of the conjugal dialogue was "Well I vow, Jacob, who'd a thought of seeing you at our road!" to which was answered "And so, Peggy," the rest being lost in the renewed thunder of our wheels. Jacob was evidently pleased to receive Peggy safe; and his calm quaker-life dress and counte- nance seemed to look and say, he was by no means the Mercury or chief speaker in the domestic circle. Return we to our episode, Col. Wilmar's narrative. "Among our volunteers was a young man, a tailor I believe, but in all respects decidedly our best soldier. He was tall, well pro- portioned, and fit for any feat of strength and dexterity ; besides, he was observant of every duty, and ready at any time for either parade or battle. Without being myself a member of the church, I believe the many excellences of his brave, benevolent, and self- sacrificing spirit were owing mainly to religious principles. He was, I know, a professor of religion. "In one battle at the Raisin, he was slightly wounded a knowl- edge of which must have led to the tragedy that followed our capture. Turner, for that was the soldier's name, did, indeed, try to conceal his wound from the Indians ; and I well know it did not retard his progress : but unless our captors were determined to avoid even the possibility of any hinderance, we never could conjecture any other plausible reason for what followed. "My friend was in the same division of prisoners with myself, the assistant surgeon and several of our townsmen ; and at night when we halted, Turner was seated near me at the fire in the woods, while the Indians dealt us out a little bread and beef. On my left, and nearly opposite the poor fellow, I saw, for some time, an Indian who kept his eye on Turner, with an expression that THE JOURNEY 13 looked like mischief ; and then I saw the savage, as if by stealth, grasp his tomahawk and move round without any noise, till he came up immediately behind us. Why, I cannot tell, but perhaps Turner, too, had noticed all this ; he sprang, however, suddenly to his feet and with the most amazing activity, arrested the blow of the weapon with his arm, receiving a deep gash in his shoulder, and thus warding off the blow from his head. And then, gentle- men, that wounded man darted upon that Indian, and actually wrested the hatchet from his hand, and in the next instant raised it to aim a deadly blow at his enemy's head ay, gentlemen, I saw the hatchet tremble in his grasp I saw, as I think, the weapon almost descending with its fatal stroke and yet, at that very moment, it was stayed and the next it was thrown down upon the ground. "For on the instant our surgeon, who had noticed the Indians drawing their knives and hatchet for our massacre, cried out "Turner! Turner for God's sake, don't kill him!" And then, Turner, our noble, godlike comrade, comprehending at a glance our danger, looked up a moment, as if in prayer flinging, at the same time, the weapon on the earth. And there he stood! his arms calmly folded across his breast, and with such a look of self-devotion and Christian resignation, until the demon-like sav- age having picked up the hatchet, approached his victim, and buried it, with one terrific blow, deep in his head !" A tear trembled in the colonel's eye as he concluded; and al- though many years have passed since I heard him tell this story, I am moved when I think of that godlike warrioi so dying ! but then the story was better told. Charles Clarence my new found friend was an orphan. His parents both had died, he being scarcely three years old, leaving him however, heir nominally to large and valuable tracts of land. But he succeeded to nothing, at last, more valuable than a very large mass of useless papers; unless we except some trinkets in- dicative of an ancient and wealthy family : and even these the sole mementos of departed parents were sacrificed to supply the urgent necessities of Clarence, when he found himself a deserted boy. Some relatives did not then know of his existence and some only found it out when he did not need either recognition or as- 14 THE JOURNEY sistance. A maternal uncle, however, in the far South, prevented by sudden death from adopting my friend as a son, had left him a legacy: and from this he had been liberally educated, with many interruptions, however, and many distressing inconveniences, owing to the interception of his small dividends on some occa- sions by dishonest agents. Still the apparent neglect of some relatives, the want of a guardian and other seeming evils had been of service to Clarence in giving stamina to his character, wanting, naturally, in bone and sinew. Even the interruption of his studies had led to several voyages and journeys with peril indeed, to life and health, but with advantage to his mind and manners. His fondness, too, for adventure was indulged, and he was rendered thus a more in- teresting and instructive companion friend. Sobered, it is true, by disappointment and grief, my friend was; yet I found him now sufficiently sanguine and confident to venture on enterprises con- sidered praiseworthy, if one succeed, but not so, if unsuccessful. Indeed but lately had he returned from a visit to the Falls of Niagara, in which from want of money, he had been induced to use the vulgar mare that required only rest and no oats in other words, with a knapsack on his back he had, in company with two associates, made a tour of three hundred miles on foot. He had also travelled many thousand miles in various directions and in various capacities, so that he abounded in anecdotes and incidents, which he could so relate as to make himself a companion for a journey by no means undesirable. At this very time Clarence was going to Kentucky on a very grand adventure : he was on his way to be married. When only sixteen years of age he became affianced to a maiden, whose family shortly after emigrating to the West, thus, for a long time, had separated the lovers. But now at the end of seven years, during which the parties had never met, Clarence was going as he pretended to see the family ; but in reality, reader, to marry his sweetheart. Ladies! will you please note this as an offset to instances of faithlessness in our sex? And were not these specimens of long cherished love and unbroken faith worthy the poetical land ? But what lights in the distance? Oh! that is Lancaster, THE JOURNEY 15 and there we eat supper and change stages: excuse me, then, reader, we have no time to introduce our ladies. Supper ended, we found a new stage, if by new is understood another, for old enough it was and a size (?) less than our old stage; which after all was nearly a new one. True, excepting monsieur, we had before stopping let out all our way passengers ; but fortunately on attempting to get in ourselves now, we dis- covered enough new way passengers not only to take the seats of the former ones, but our seats also so remarkably accommodat- ing were the old-fashioned accommodation stages and stage own- ers! Alas! for us that night! that it was before the era of caoutchouc or gum elastic ! stages' bodies of that could have so easily become, almost at will, a size larger and a size less, expand- ing and contracting as passengers got in or out! Oh! the cram- ming the jamming the bumping about of that night! How we practiced the indirect style of discontent and cowardice, in giving it to the intruders over the shoulders of stage owners, and agents, and drivers, and horses ! And how that crazy, rattling, rickety, old machine rolled and pitched and flapped its curtains and walloped us for the abuse, till we all were quashed, bruised, and mellowed into a quaking lump of passive, untalking, sullen victims ! CHAPTER IV. "Pshaw !" DASHED away from the hotel the stage with such vengeance and mischief in the speed that the shops ran backward in alarm and lights streamed mere ribbons of fire, as when urchins whirl an ig- nited stick! Discontent, therefore, found a present alleviation in the belief that such driving, by landing us in Harrisburg speed- ily, would soon terminate our discomforts. But the winged horses, once beyond Lancaster, turned again into hoofy quadrupeds mov- ing nearly three miles per hour ! And then the watering places ! the warming places the letting out places! the letting in 16 THE JOURNEY places! the grog stations! and above all! the post-offices! and oh ! the marvellous multiplication of extra drivers ! and extra driver's friends and extra hostlers! it was like the sud- den increase of bugs that wait for the darkness before they take wing! And then the flavour of the stable considerately tempered with the smell of ginseng and apple whiskey! both odours oc- casionally overpowered by the fragrance of cigars bought six for a penny. At first, so decided a growl arose from the imprisoned travellers whenever a cigar was lighted, that the smoking tobacco was at once cast away ; but the rising of the numberless other gases, soon taught us "of two evils to bear the least," and the cigars were finally tolerated to the last puff. And then the talk on the driver's seat! how interesting and refreshing! For instance, the colloquies about Jake! and Ike! and Nance! and Poll! The talk, too, first about the horses, and then the talk with the horses ; on which latter occasions the four legged people were kindly addressed by their Christian names and complimented with an encomiastic flourish and cut of the lash. To these favours the answer was commonly an audible and impatient swing of the horse tails; sometimes, however, it came in form of a sudden and malicious, dislocating jerk of the stage; and sometimes, I am sorry to add, the answer was alto- gether disrespectful, indicating an indulged and pampered favourite. Within the den, the ominous pop, at irregular intervals (but not like angel's visits in the number and length), and the smell of fresh brandy, intimated dealings with evil spirits, and that some carried bacchanalian pocket -pistols more fatal even and much nastier than the powder and bullet machines used in other murders and suicides. Olfactories were regaled also with essence of peppermint, spicy gingerbread, and unctuous cold sausage; such and other delicacies being used by different inmates to beguile hunger and tedium. At length a jew pedlar with a design of selling the article as well as gratifying a musical penchant, exhibited not to our eyes, it was an Egyptian night within but to our ears, a musical snuff box, if not enchanting yet certainly enchanted, as it possessed the THE JOURNEY 17 art of self-winding, to judge from the endless and merciless repetitions and alternations of the Copenhagen Waltz and Yankee Doodle. Its tinkling, however, was ultimately drowned by a more powerful musician on the driver's seat. His was an extra driver, so wrought up by the pedlar's box, that his feelings could be no longer controlled, but suddenly exploded with the most startling effect in the following exquisite lyric or ballad. Perhaps the words were not extempore, yet from the variations of the won- drous hum-drum fitted to them, and the prolongation and shorten- ing of notes, and a peculiar slurry way to bring in several syllables to one note, it may be supposed our songster chose not to halt or stump from any defect of memory. THE EXTRA-DKJVER'S SONG. "Come all ye young people, I'm going for to sing, Concarnin Moolly Edwards and her lovyer Peter King, How this young woman did break her lovyer's heart, And when he went and hung hisself how hern did in her smart. "This Molly Edwards she did keep the turnpike gate, And travilyers allowed her the most puttiest in our state, But Peter for a 'livin he did f oiler the drovyer's life, And Molly she did promise him she'd go and be his wife. "So Peter he to Molly goes as he cums through the gate, And says, says he, oh ! Molly, why do you make me wait, I'm done a drovin hossis and come a courtin you, Why do you sarve me so, as I'm your lovyer true? "Then Molly she toss'd up her nose and tuk the drovyer's toll, But Pete he goes and hangs hisself that night unto a pole, And Molly said, says she, I wish I'd been his wife, And Pete he come and hanted her the rest of all her life." The performance, rapturously encored ex animo by the drivers and some cognate spirits within, but mischievously, it is to be feared, by Mr. Carlton, Col. Wilmar and the gentlemen of the party, was handsomely repeated and then succeeded by other poems and tunes equally affecting, but which we shall not record. So passed the memorable night, till at long, very long last we reached the suburbs of Harrisburgh. Here, whether the horses smelled oats, or the road was better, or the driver would eradicate i8 THE JOURNEY doubts about his team, expressed by us every half mile lately, here we commenced going not like thunder but certainly in thunder and earthquake, till in a few moments the carriage stopped at the hotel. And this was where the stage was to sleep but, alas! it lacked now only one hour of the time when we must proceed on our journey anew! The vehicle, however, disgorged its cramming over the pavement; and then, how all the people, with countless bags, boxes, cloaks, sticks, umbrellas, baskets, bandboxes, hatboxes, valises, &c., &c., had been or could be again stowed in that humming-bird's nest of a stage, seemed to require a nice geometrical calculation. Pack the inhabitants of our globe stage-fashion by means of dishonest agents and greedy owners, and be assured, a less number of acres would serve for our ac- commodation than is generally supposed. It was arranged now that our two ladies should share one bed at 25 cents, and take each i2 l / 2 cents worth of sleep in an hour, the gentlemen to snooze gratuitously on the settees in the bar room; and it is wonderful how much sleep can be accomplished in a short time if it be done by the job! Oh! it seemed cruelty to summon us from that deep repose to renew the journey; yet, as all our innumerable way passengers but one had swarmed off, we had more room, and so were able to nurse the ladies during the day into some uneasy slumbers and to sleep off hand ourselves, or in other words, without a rest. Pshaw ! CHAPTER V. " 'Tis distance lends enchantment to the view." WE left Chambersburgh in good spirits after a comfortable night's rest, the sole occupants of the stage too; and by a rare chance we remained sole occupants during the remainder of our journey. And "though we say it that shouldn't" never was a more agreeable party in all respects than ours the present com- pany, viz., the reader and author excepted. Among other excellences, none of the party chewed tobacco, smoked tobacco, spit tobacco, drank alcoholic liquors, or used profane language THE JOURNEY 19 evils that may be separated, but which still are often united. Of course no one took snuff, all being then greatly too young for powdered tobacco: that very appropriately belongs to "the sere and yellow leaf" time. Not long after sun-rise we were at the ascent of the grand mountain a frowning rampart shutting by its rocky wall from the east that world beyond! From the base to the apex the road here ascends about four miles; which ascent the gentlemen resolved to walk up: a feat usually achieved at the first moun- tain, especially if the first one has ever seen. To be sure people afterwards will walk when politely requested by a good natured driver, out of pity to the poor brute horses: but (shame on his poetry and romance), Mr. Carlton having in subsequent years passed and repassed the mountains twenty-four times, used to remain in the stage and sleep up the ascents ! Yet not infrequently would he be musing on the past, and recalling with smiles and tears, that delightful party and that delightful walk on that sweet morning, and all the glorious visions and castle buildings of that entrancing day! gone, gone, "like the baseless fabric of a dream !" We soon left the stage behind us, and sometimes out of sight and hearing. Then, under pretext of concern for the ladies, but really I fear to have a pretext for resting, we called a halt, where we could sit on a rock and blow, till the noise of wheels and the sight of a bonnet peeping from the stage gave us liberty to proceed ; or rather took away the excuse for sitting still. At the same time the bonnet would disappear, lest it should be construed as a token of fear robbery in those times not only of solitary travellers but of whole stage companies often happening. How- ever we had a host in Col. Wilmar, and even thought with a peculiar thrill of the poetry of an attack from bandits ; although when in after years we encountered the danger it was not so poetical as romance writers make it, but simply a very disagree- able affair better to read about than transact. The time of the present journey was late in April, the nights being often very cold, but the days only moderately cool and sometimes even warm. Snow was yet in spots near the summit of the mountains, although, in places lying towards the south and 20 THE JOURNEY east vegetation was in rapid progress: so that nothing could be more in unison with our feelings than the renovated world amid the Alleghanies. Hope was springing so fresh and green from the decayed hope of boyhood ! and nature so budding forth from the deadness of winter ! but alas ! if buds and flowers burst forth, they die again and soon! And renovated hope is renewed only for blighting. We stood now on the pinnacle of the great Cove mountain and were gazing on the mingled grandeur and beauty of the scene. Few are unmoved by the view from that top ; as for my- self I was ravished. Was I not on the dividing ridge between two worlds the worn and faded East, the new and magic West ? And yet I now felt and painfully felt, that we were bidding adieu to home and entering on the untried: still, hope was superior to fear, and I was eager to pass those other peaks, some near as if they might be touched and glorious with the new sun- beams, and some sinking down away off till the dim outline of the farthest visible tops melted into blue and hazy distance! Years after I stood on that pinnacle alone and the two worlds were seen again but no hopes swelled then into visions of glory, at sight of the dim peaks ; no consolations awaited me in my native valleys of the East ! Death had made East and West alike to me a wilder- ness ! Poor Clarence ! did he ever stand again, where I noticed him standing that morning? How buoyant his heart! and so melted with tender thoughts, so raptured with imaginings ! Could it be? after years of separation is he now hastening to one dearer to him than the whole world beside ! Will they know one another? Both have changed from childhood to maturity but why so speak ? Our lovers ever thought each the other unchanged in size, in look, in voice; and when they did meet at last, they shed tears, for while both were in all respects improved, both were altered, and they were no more to love as boy and girl, but as man and woman ! Clarence saw no dark spectres in the bright visions of that morning! Upon Smith, long ago the scenes of that other life opened^ and doubtless they were of an undying glory, for But here comes the stage to hurry us onward; and so the THE JOURNEY 21 bustle of life interrupts serious meditations with the whirl of cares and enterprises. We were all once more seated in the vehicle, which instantly darted upon the descent with a velocity alarming, and yet ex- hilarating to persons unusued to the style of a mountain driver. The danger is with due care less, indeed, than the appearance ; yet the sight of places where wagons and stages are said to have tumbled gigantic somersets over miniature precipices, will force one involuntarily to say in a supplicatory tone to Jehu, "Take care driver, here's where that stage went over, and poor Mr. Bounce was killed!" To this caution Jehu replied "Oh! no danger besides he wan't killed he only smashed his ribs 'gin that rock there, and got his arm broke:" and then to quiet our fears, he sends forth his endless lash to play a curve or two around the ears of the prancing leaders, and with a pistol-like crack that kindles the fire of the team to fury; and away they all bound making the log crowning the rampart of wall tremble and start from its place as the wheels spin round within eight inches of the dreaded brink. Thundering down thus, our stage dashed up the small stones as if they leaped from a volcano, and awaked the echoes of the grim rocks and the woody caverns : while ill-stifled "Oh ! my's " and a tendency of the ladies to counteract, by opposite motions, the natural bias of the stage body for the sideway declivity, were consoled with the usual asseverations "O don't be afraid no danger no danger!" But when the horses, on approaching a sudden turn of the road, seemed, in order to secure a good offing, to shy off towards the deep valley, and nothing could be seen over the tips of their erect and quivering ears, save blue sky and points of tall trees, then the ladies, spite of rebukes and con- solations (and one at least of the gentlemen) would stand tip-toeish, labouring, indeed, to keep a kind of smile on the lips, but with an irepressible "good gracious me!" look out of the eyes. And But oh! what a beautiful village belows us! How neat and regular the houses ! See ! there's one spun and woven like a Dutch woman's petticoat! yes, petticoat is the word only the stripes of the petticoat do not run horizontally, and those of the 22 THE JOURNEY house do. I declare if there are not brick houses! and stone ones! and how the smoke curls up to us we can smell break- fast! What noiseless streets! What green meadows! Do you ever see any thing so picture like so like patchwork! It would be so pleasant to live in that nice, quiet snug, picturesque village ! Mr. Smith, what place is it? Mr. Smith smiling replied McConnelstown." McConnelstown ! oh! what a beauty there it is hid no there look through there where ? there ino 'tis gone! We soon had reached the valley three miles below the point of descent; and as Jehu said it was done at the rate of twelve miles to the hour, the reader being skilled in the modern knowl- edges, can calculate our time for himself. "There is the town," said Mr. Smith. Yes! there it was sure enough, as it had never budged from its site since we had first spied it; but "Quantum mutatus ab illo !" "What a fall! was there! my countrymen!" Is that jumble of curious frame, brick, log, and stone habitations our picture-town ! Ay ! truly, there is the petticoat-house, with a petticoat as a curtain before the door, and an old hat or so in the glassless sash, and fire light gleaming between the logs. There ! the door opens to see us pass just see the children one, two, three nine at least, and one in very deed at the breast ! but how dirty and uncombed ! Did you ever see such a set as the scamps lounging about that tavern ? and one reeling off drunk, the morn- ing so fresh yet ! See ! that duck puddle and swine wallow full of vile looking mud and water certainly it must be sickly here, "Driver, what noise is that?" "Dogs fighting." "Dreadful! Mr. Smith what are you laughing at?" "Oh, nothing only I should not like to live here as well as some ladies and gentlemen." And yet, reader, while a near view had dispelled the illusion of a distant prospect, good and excellent, and even learned and talented people lived there, and yet live in McConnelstown. At all events we shall have a good breakfast at this fine looking stage-house. But whether we had arrived too soon, or the folks usually began preparation after counting the number of mouths, or the wood was green or we most vulgarly hungry and sharp set, very long was it, very long indeed, before we were sum- THE JOURNEY 23 moned. And then the breakfast ! Perhaps it was all accidental, but the coffee ( ?) was a libel on a diluted soot, made by nurses to cure a baby's colic: the tea ( ?) for we had representatives of both beverages the tea, was a perfect imitation of a decoction of clover hay, with which in boyhood we nursed the tender little calves, prematurely abstracted from the dams, the silly innocents believing all the while that the finger in the mouth was a teat! Eggs, too ! it may have been unlike Chesterfield but it certainly was not without hazard to put them in the mouth before putting them to the nose: the oval delicacies mostly remained this morning to feast such as prefer eggs ripe. Ay! but here comes a monster of a sausage coiled up like a great greasy eel ! Such often in spite of being over-grown or over-stuffed are yet palatable: this rascal, however, had rebelled against the cook, and salaman- der-like, had passed the fiery ordeal unscorched. Hot rolls came, a novelty then, but much like biscuits in parts of the Far West, viz., a composition of oak bark on the outside, and hot putly with- in the true article for invalids and dyspeptics. We had also bread and butter, and cold cabbage and potatoes, like oysters, some fried and some in the shell; and green pickles so bounti- fully supplied with salt as to have refused vinegar and beets and saltsellars in the shape of glass hats and a mustard pot like a salve-box, with a bone spoon glued in by a potent cement of a red-brown-yellow colour and a light-green bottle of vinegar dammed up by a strong twisted wadding of brown paper. Reader, what more could we wish? "Nothing." Let us go then to a new chapter. CHAPTER VI. "hair-breadth escapes in the imminent deadly breach " "Is that a dagger that I see before me?" "Fee! faw! fum! I smell the blood of an Englishman!" IN imitation of the ingenious Greek, with his specimen brick, we have given bits of our roads, drivers and so forth, to stand for the whole of such matters: but as the reader, unless he skips, must have something to cheat him of the tedium during the re- maining journey, we shall here give parts of conversations, after we had abandoned walks up mountains and dreams on their summits. ****** "I shall never forget that spot," said Col. Wilmar, one day. "Why, Colonel?" "I was so near shooting a fellow we mistook for a highway- man." "Indeed! why how was that?" "My wife," proceeded the Colonel, in answer, "is a native of the South. Directly after our marriage, we sailed from Phila- delphia, there spending some weeks prior to our going home to Lexington. When the visit was over, having purchased a carriage, we prevailed on our cousin, the sister of Miss Wilmar here, to go with us to the West: and then set out, the two ladies and myself, with a hired coachman. I need hardly say I then travelled with weapons, and as we entered the mountainous country, a brace of pistols was kept loaded usually in a pocket of the carriage. Perhaps I may with propriety add, that we were worth robbing and that our travelling 'fixins' excited some interest along the road the fact is, I was just married, and you all know what young fellows do in the way of extra then. Hence I do confess I felt more anxiety than I chose to exhibit, and looked upon it as more than possible that we might light on disagreeable company. "The road was most execrable, except on occasional section of the turnpike then making and partially completed. We na- turally, therefore, entered on any chance section of this new road not only in good spirits from the exchange, but with a kind 24 THE JOURNEY 25 of confidence as to our safety: for I believe one looks out for bad fellows in bad roads and places more than in the good ones. Well, just off there you see where that old road ran that deep narrow gulley there we emerged into a piece of superb turnpike ; or, in fact, we were compelled to take it, an impediment being manifestly placed in the old road to turn travellers into the new : and as I knew the turnpike would give out in a mile or two, I ordered the coachman to go ahead as fast as possible. This he did for about half a mile, when suddenly a loud and gruff voice called out 'Stop !' which order was obeyed by our coach- man in an instant. "With a hand instinctively on a pistol, I looked out of the carriage-window, and there, fronting the horses stood a stout fellow with a formidable sledge hammer, raised, as in the very act of knocking down a horse; while several other rough chaps advanced towards us with bludgeons and axes from the side of the road! "Drawing the pistol from the pocket, as I spoke, I demanded 'What do you mean?' " 'A dollar for trav'lin the new road and buggur your eyes if you'll git on till you pay and blast my soul if your man tries it, if I don't let drive at a horse's head.' "To lean out cock the pistol, and level straight at the fellow's head, was the work of a moment and I then said 'Out of the road, you rascal! only shake that sledge again, and I'll shoot you dead on the spot.' "The instant I spoke my wife threw an arm around my neck, and my cousin hung on my other arm, and both screamed out "Oh. colonel, don't kill him oh ! don't " and then to the fellow "Oh! do! do! do! go away! he'll kill you! oh! go!" "How far the gang had designed to proceed, I was then doubtful nor do I know, if the ladies would not have destroyed the accuracy of my aim yet, when that fellow caught sight of the muzzle directed at his head, and heard the frantic cries of the ladies, he dropped the sledge hammer as if his arms were paralyzed ; and the whole company suddenly, but quickly, retreating, our driver went ahead. The ladies had interfered involuntarily from instinc- 26 THE JOURNEY tive horror at seeing a sudden and violent death, and partly for fear the leader's fall would be the signal for our massacre but then I had you know, the other pistol ; and beside I depended on a stout dirk, worn under my vest, and some little on the alarm of the gang and the assistance of the driver. That, however, is the adventure." "Had you made no resistance," observed Mr. Smith, "you would at least have paid a dollar and perhaps have been insulted with foul language: but the fellows were not robbers in the worst sense. A number of workmen, it was said, had been de- frauded of their wages, and to make up the losses, they decoyed passengers into the turnpike and then exacted toll. Your affair, by the way, colonel, reminds me of a narrow escape I once made in returning from New Orleans " "Ay! what was it?" "I had gone," resumed Mr. Smith, "down the river with a load of produce, and having turned both cargo and boat into bills and cash, I was obliged to venture back alone. Accordingly, I bought a fine horse, provided weapons, and stowed my money and a few articles of apparel into my saddle-bags, which at night were put under my head and made fast round my person with a strap. One day, when I had nearly reached the state of Tennessee, I found myself at sunset, by some miscalculation or wrong direction, about fifteen miles from the intended halting-place, but was pre- vented from camping out by coming unexpectedly on a two story log-house lately built, and of course, for a tavern. The landlord took my saddle-bags and led the way into the house, where a couple of suspicious-looking men were standing near the fire. I called for something to eat, and pretty quick after supper I took up my plunder, under pretence of being very sleepy, and went up to a small room furnished with only one bed ; but I did not really intend to go to bed, for the conviction kept haunting me, that some attempt would be made on my property may be on my life. Of course, I barricaded the door as well as possible, and, without noise, examined my pistols and got out my dirk and after a while blew out the light and made a noise as if getting into bed but I only sat on the edge and waited the result. THE JOURNEY 27 "Between one and two hours after, I heard other persons enter the house below ; and then, amidst a sort of premeditated bustle, I could plain enough distinguish a lower tone, a gentler stepping up and down, and once or twice a very cautious attempt or two to open my door, till at last the landlord came up and hailed me " 'Hullow ! stranger in thare ?' " 'Well ! hullow ! what's wanting? " 'Won't you take in another traveller ? all's full but you.' " 'No there's only one bed in here, and that's a plaguy narrow one.' "The landlord, after some unavailing entreaty, went away, but soon returned with the pretended traveller; and although they meant I should believe only two persons were outside, I knew from the whispering there were more, and that confirmed me in my suspicions of mischief. "The traveller, however, now opened the conference: " 'Hullow ! I say, mister, in thare, won't you 'commodate ?' " 'Gentlemen,' said I, in a decided tone, 'nobody can come into this room to-night with .my consent.' " 'Well, d n me, then, if I won't come in whether you like it or no : I've as much right to half a bed as you or any other man.' " 'If you attempt it, stranger, you may take what comes.' "The only answer was a long strain at the door till at last the door was forced a little open, and the rascal got his whole hand in and would soon have worked in all his arm ; when, with a single thrust, I dashed my dirk right through his hand and pinned him that way to the door-cheek. "He screamed out, you may be sure, in agony; but it was in vain, I held him fixed as fate: and when the others found it im- possible either to relieve him or get at me, they willingly agreed and with the most solemn and energetic promises to let me alone if I would release their comrade. I took them at their word and drew out the dirk, and strange as it may seem, the fellows kept their promise and although, for a day or two I travelled in fear of an ambuscade, I was never molested, and by the Divine favour, reached home not long after in safety." "Mr. Clarence," said Miss Wilmar, "I have heard that you had 28 THE JOURNEY some alarming adventures in the South, and as we are quite in the robber vein to-day, may we not hear a story from you ?" "It would be difficult, Miss Wilmar," replied Clarence, "to refuse after such an invitation : but only one part of the story to which you probably allude is certainly true that I was pretty well scared; when possibly there was no good reason for alarm. However, here is the adventure, and you can judge of probabilities for yourselves. "On my last visit to South Carolina, being sick of seasickness, I determined, winter as it was and contrary to advice, to return to Philadelphia by land: in which mode of travelling, however, if the endless and deep lagoons, and bayous, and swamps of the lower or coast-road, are considered, there was nearly as much of navigation and hazard of wrecking and drowning as in the other way, by sea. Indeed, more than once our narrow triangular stage, with its two horses, harnessed tandem, did really float a moment : and by night as by day, did we ford the middle of submerged roads between drains and ditches, where the water must have been four or five feet deep. "From Charleston we had not only a new but a new order of stage, which though crowded at starting, lost, by the time we reached Georgetown, all the passengers but myself and two others. These unfortunately were slave-dealers, and of that very sort that John Randolph, or my friend here the colonel, would not have greatly scrupled to shoot down like any other blood-thirsty brutes. Their diversion often was, to entice dogs near the stage and then to fire pistol-balls at them usually, however, without effect, owing to the motion of the stage and the sagacity of the dogs. Of all wretches, these were superlatively pre-eminent in pro- fanity : and this I once had the temerity to tell them, but with no good result. Had the ancient persecutors chained Christians to such reprobates, the torture to a good and pious man would have been the most exquisitely fiendish if the tormentors could have cursed all the time like these demons. "Just before leaving Georgetown, I was not a little alarmed, on their learning that I was going North, by an abrupt query if I had not Philadelphia or New- York money: and then, as this could not be denied nor even evaded, by their immediate offer to THE JOURNEY 29 give me Virginia paper for it all and at an enormous premium in my favour. From their whole manner I conjectured their Virginia notes were counterfeit; which, added to their open and reckless wickedness, rendered me uneasy and disposed to interpret their subsequent conduct in accordance with my fears. "Late at night in a violent storm of snow and sleet we left Georgetown. The driver, pretending it was solely for our com- fort, had, in order to carry food for his horses, crowded the stage body even above the seats with cornblades, like a farm-wagon with a load of fodder. I, slender and powerless, of course kept still, but the two did not hush down to their muttering state of quiescence till after the usual tempest of raving curses ; and then we all three crawled in and mixed ourselves with the fodder as we best could. Within an hour the driver lay back, and with the reins somehow secured in his hands went to sleep at all events, his hat was over his eyes and he snored. And then the men-steal- ers, supposing me to be asleep also, began a whispering and rather inarticulate colloquy, in which I at length clearly distinguished the ominous words 'Cut his throat!' "Good gracious ! Mr. Clarence, and were you not greatly terri- fied?" "Yes, greatly at first ; but keeping wide awake and listening with my mouth open, I ascertained that the scoundrels did verily intend to cut a throat, although not mine : it was the throat of a poor slave that had just given them the slip. Yet dreading lest men who could coolly resolve to cut one throat for revenge, might cut another for money, I squeezed nearer the driver, and whenever he snored, nestled and moved about in the fodder till it waked him. So passed most of the night, till shortly before day-break, we halted on the edge of a river perhaps the Pedee where the driver said our journey was at an end till to-morrow ; as the other contractor had failed to be there with his stage ! At the same time he pointed to a miserable and solitary hut on the bank, where we should be well accommodated till the stage arrived! And so I had before me a very agreeable prospect twenty-four hours with my precious associates almost alone in the woods and on the bank of a deep and rapid stream ! But the fury of these fellows, when the driver's meaning was fully comprehended! (who had, 30 THE JOURNEY at first, uttered himself in a saucy and indistinct mutter, as he untackled his team and we crawled out of the hay-mow) it baffles description And yet, even in the very tempest height and rage of their godless words, up stepped my imperturbable man of the whip, and with the most invincible gravity and assurance demanded, with outstretched and open palm, twenty-five cents each! " 'Twenty-five damnations! what for?' roared one of them in unaffected surprise. ' 'What for? echoed and mimicked the driver, as if amazed at a silly question 'What for! !' why, the nice bed I made you last night out of that 'are fodder thare! "This matchless impudence, fun or earnest it was in fact a little of both was so preposterously ridiculous to me at least, that I laughed fairly out in spite of fear and chagrin ; nor was the laughter abated by the attitude and amazement of the two slavers. Figure them accosted by the driver with his demand in the very midst of outrageous cursings and frantic gestures the pause the call for explanation it given; and there the wretches standing a few seconds speechless, not from fear, but dumb with a madness that was really unutterable! But then, when they could speak, out came the unholy torrent as if the prince of darkness had be- come incarnate and was spouting forth brimstone and blasphemy ? And all this time my wonderful driver, cool, grave, unflinching (on his guard evidently, and he was a very athletic fellow) kept at suitable intervals repeating the demand for twenty-five cents each for the fodder bed ! till our heroes closed their profane exhi- bition, by consigning driver stage horses fodder contractors and all the Carolinas and the whole pine barren world to the swearer's own diabolical father, and his red-hot furnaces, and finally hoping and praying that they themselves might be damned three or four times over 'if ever they travelled that road again!' To all this Satanic rhetoric my nonpareil of impudence only re- plied, and with the most astonishing coolness 'We never expect nobody to travel this way but once!' "This ended the affair our heroes were used up. "At the hut however we found a man who gave us a few sweet potatoes and some rice, and then offered to take us over the THE JOURNEY 31 river in a scow, that we might get to the stage-house about two miles across the opposite forest. Here then was a situation any thing but pleasant : and the behaviour of the chaps, after we were left alone in the woods, did not render it any more so. Among other things, they lagged behind together seemingly engaged, whenever I looked around, in an earnest and low conversation, their eyes occasionally on me then they would come up on each side of me one going ahead as if to reconnoitre till at last they evidently had resolved on something of which I suspected I was the subject, and advanced to execute it when, unexpectedly to my great relief, a negro man, the first and the only person we met that morning, came in sight, driving a horse and cart! I hurried up to the poor negro, and learned that a plantation was on our left, and that the stage-tavern was scarcely half-a-mile dis- tant. After this the slavers' conduct was less alarming towards me; yet I never felt at ease till we reached Fayetteville, where they took another road into Virginia and left me sole occupant of the stage. "This, Miss Wilmar, is, I confess," continued Clarence, "not a very tragic conclusion but I had rather be here to tell the story as it was, than to have Carlton here to tell it in a book as it might have been; and yet perhaps the rascals only meant to terrify me as did the wag, on meeting a traveller " "How was that, Mr. Clarence?" Before Clarence could reply, Mr. Brown exclaimed "Look there ! look there !" and below us, in the meadows bordering the Juniata, was a hunted deer bounding away for life! The timid creature ere long leaped into the water, swam some hundred feet down the stream, and emerging speeded away to the mountain. No pursuers were in sight, and from appearances the poor crea- ture escaped for that time: it certainly had our wishes in its favour. This incident naturally introduced stories about hunting and Indians, with numberless episodial remarks on dogs, rifles, shot-guns, tomahawks and the like; so that when the shadows of the mountain began at the decline of day to darken the valleys, and silence and thoughtfulness pervaded the party, fancy easily brought back the red-man to his ancient haunts and made robbers crouch in ambush in every thicket and behind every tree. Yet 32 THE JOURNEY we reached our lodging place in safety, where, late at night, w( severally retired to bed; and then, if the day had brought Mr Carlton and his amiable wife no danger, they were destined tc find a somewhat curious adventure at night. And this we shal contribute to the chapter as our share of its accidents. Our sleeping room was on the first floor, and opened by three windows into a piazza; which circumstances, together with the stories just narrated to the reader and other matters of the sort inclined us to examine the fastenings before going to bed. Th< bolts were faultless, but the shutters or slappers were so warpec and swollen that no efforts could induce them to come together anc be bolted; hence, our only course was to jump into bed, and ii any thing happened, to do like children put our heads under the covers. In about an hour I was cautiously awakened by Mrs Carlton who whispered in a low and agitated voice : "Oh! my dear! what's that? listen!" Instead of pulling up the bed-clothes, I sat up to listen; anc strange a solemn and peculiar and thrilling note was filling the room, swelling and dying away, and changing now to one spol and then to another! What could it be? The sound resemblec nothing I had ever heard except once, and that was in a theatrical scene, in which a huge iron wheel turned at the touch of a magi- cian and slowly raised the heavy trap door of an enchanted cavern I sprang out of bed and began a search yet all in % vain I fell along the walls, crawled under the bed, poked my head up the chimney, and even ventured into the closets and all the while thai mysterious noise playing as wild and frightful as ever! At lasl I pushed open the shutters and looked into the piazza; still nothing was visible either there or within the room, while the strange tones swelled Jouder than ever ! Puzzled, but less alarmed, we at last retreated to bed I say we, for Mrs. C. had been trotting after me during the whole search, being too cowardly to stay in bed alone even with the covers ovei her head, we retreated to bed, and after a while, I, at least, fell asleep; but soon I was suddenly and violently awakened by my good lady, who in attempting to leap away from something on her side, had in extra activity accomplished too much, and landed clear over me and out of bed entirely on the floor ! THE JOURNEY 33 "Why, Eliza Eliza ! what ? what is the matter !" "Oh! Robert! listen!" said my wife; in bed again, however, and be assured, on the safe side. A basin of water we knew stood near Mrs. Carlton's side of the bed, and on a small table : and now into that basin, drop by drop, something was trickling! Could it be blood from some crack in the floor over us ! With Mrs. C. clinging to me, I went to the table, and seizing the basin, carried it hastily to a window, and pushing open its shutter, we plainly perceived by the dim light that blood it really was not "Well, what was it, then ?" Reader! it was a little mouse dead enough now, but which, having by accident tumbled into the water, had, by its struggles for life, caused what to us then seemed like the trickling down of some liquid or fluid substance. Day now dawning, and Mrs. C. being willing to stay alone, I went into the yard to discover the cause of the mysterious music, satisfied that it lay there somewhere; and no sooner did I reach the corner of the house than I was fortunate enough to catch the very ghost in the act of performing on the extraordinary in- strument that had puzzled us with its strange noise. Against the house had been nailed part of an iron hoop to support a wooden spout; but the spout had rotted away and fallen down, and the projecting hoop was alone. This iron had on it some saline sub- stance pleasant to the taste of a quiet old cow ; and there stood the matron-like quadruped licking away with very correct time at the hoop, and whenever her tongue finished a stroke, and according to its intensity, the instrument vibrated, and thus discoursed the wondrous music of the enchanter's wheel and trap! Indeed, I even tried the performance myself (not with my tongue) and succeeded, my wife says, and she is a judge of music, succeeded as well as the cow herself. And so, dear reader, if this is not "a cock and bull story" it most certainly is a mouse and a cow one. Adventures, like misfortunes, are sometimes in clusters. The next morning after the descent from some mountain, as our stage was entering a small village, we were met by a noble-looking young man, mounted on a spirited horse, scarcely broken, and 34 THE JOURNEY certainly not "bridle-wise" and met exactly on the middle of a bridge. This bridge crossed a stream not ordinarily wide or deep, but swollen by melting snows it now was foaming and thundering along almost a river: it was truly formidable. The horse, as we met, stopped, and with ears erect and pointed, with nostrils dilated, and eyes fierce and staring, he answered every effort to urge him forward only with trembling and fitful starting; while the horseman himself sat indifferent to conse- quences, and with ease and grace. The man and horse were one. At length the rider unable to compel the creature to pass us, at- tempted to wheel when, instead of obeying the bridle, the spirited animal reared, and at one superb bound cleared the barrier of the bridge, and both rider and horse in an instant disappeared under the foaming waters. But scarcely had fright among us uttered its exclamations, when up rose that horse, and up rose, too, seated on his back, that rider, ay seated as though he had never moved and the whole performance had been done expressly for exhibi- tion ! In a few moments the horseman landed below the bridge, then galloping across the meadow he passed the fence at a flying leap, and advancing to the stage now over the bridge, this match- less rider taking off his hat and bowing to the party, asked, as if the affair had not been purely accidental : "Gentlemen ! which of you can do that ?" We most heartily congratulated him on his miraculous preser- vation, and, as he rode gallantly off, gave him three loud cheers for kis unsurpassed coolness and intrepidity. Reader! it is yet a long way to Pittsburgh, and I cannot get you properly there without telling my own robber story a pet adventure; or without we skip but I should like to tell the story "Well, Mr. Carlton, we should very much like to hear the story but, perhaps, just now we had better skip." Skip it is, then, and all the way to PITTSBURGH. CHAPTER VII. "Ferrum exercebant vasto Cyclopes in antro Brontesque Steropesque et nudus membra Pyracmon. ******** * alii ventosis follibus auras. "Accipiunt redduntque : alii stridentio tingunt Aera lacu: gemit impositis incudibus antrum. Illi inter sese nrulta vi brachia tollunt In numerum, versantque tenaci forcipe massam." AND be assured, reader, it is not "all smoke" you now see there is some fire here too. This black place reminds us of the iron-age of Jupiter too, and Vulcan and Mount ^Etna. Virgil would here have found Cyclops and pounders of red-hot thunder- bolts sonorous enough to set at work in his musical hexameters. And some here make tubes of iron, with alternate and spiral "lands and furrows," better by far to shoot than Milton's grand and unpatent blunder-busses; into which his heroic devils put unscientifically more powder than probably all burned but that was before the Lyceum age. Whenever that soot-cloud is driven before a wind, long streets are revealed lined with well-built and commodious dwellings, with here and there a stately mansion, and even the dusky palace be- longing to some lord of coal-pits and ore-beds. Hark! how enterprise and industry are raging away! while steam and water-power shake the hills to their very foundation ! and every spot is in a ferment with innumerable workmen as busy, and as dingy too, as the pragmatical insects in Virgil's poetic ant-hill! Every breeze is redolent with nameless odours of factories and work-shops ; and the ear is stunned by the cease- less uproar from clatter and clang of cog and wheel the harsh grating of countless rasps and files the ringing of a thousand anvils the spiteful clickings of enormous shears biting rods of iron into nails the sissing of hot-tongs in water and the deep earthquaking bass of forge-hammers teaching rude masses how to assume the first forms of organic and civilized metal ! Mr. Brown said he was not yet fully awake, but that he was in a dream amid scenes of Birmingham and Sheffield; and that in- 35 36 THE VOYAGE stead of astonishing the natives, th natives had surprised and astonished him. Why do some speak disparagingly of Pittsburgh complexion? Is it ordinarily seen ? The citizens move enveloped in cloud like ^neas entering Carthage and hence are known rather by their voice than their face. Their voice is immutable, but their face changes hourly : hence if the people here are loud talkers, it arises from the fact just alluded to, and because loud talking is neces- sary to cry down the din of a myriad mingled noises. In very civilized districts, ladies owe their sweet looks to what is put on their faces ; in this Cyclopean city, sweet looks are owing to what is taken off their faces. Instead, therefore, of advising bachelors before popping the question, to catch the inamorata "in the suds," we advise to catch her in the soot. If beautiful, then let Ccelebs bless himself, for he has a gem which water, unlike its baleful effect on some faces, will only wash brighter and brighten As to hearts and manners, if our Mr. Smith be a correct speci- men, go reader, live in Pittsburgh. He was a Christian gentle- man : and in those two words is condensed all praise. When, as was necessary, our party proceeded on the voyage without this friend, so great was the vacancy, we seemed alone alas ! he is no more! CHAPTER VIII. THE VOYAGE. "facilis descensus Averni, sed revocare gradum " "Easy is it to float down the Ohio try to float up once !" AT the time of the voyage, a steamboat was a very rara ains on the Ohio river; at least such a smoke-belcher and spit-fire could not be found at any hour of the day and night ready to walk off with passengers like "the thing of life." 1 The usual mode then 1 Navigation by steam on the Ohio was being introduced from 1811 to 1814. (Turner, F. J., Rise of the New West, p. 73.) Nicholas J. Roose- velt made a voyage by steam down the Ohio and Mississippi in 1809. (McMaster, U. S. Vol. IV, p. 401.) But several years elapsed before the THE VOYAGE 37 of going down (getting up again was quite another affair) was in arks, broad-horns, keel-boats, batteaux, canoes and rafts. Col. Wilmar, who knew the way of doing business in these great waters, decided in favour of the ark ; and into the ark, therefore, we went : viz. Col. Wilmar and his cousin, Mr. Clarence and Mr. Brown, and Mr. and Mrs. Carlton, and also the two owners eight souls. Noah's stock of live animals went in to be fed, ours went in to be eaten and we had also smoked hams so that the likeness between us and that remarkable navigator principally failed after the number of the sailors was compared. Our captain and mate being gone after their own stores, let us in the meanwhile examine the mechanique of our ark. And first, its foundation, for the structure is rather a house than a boat, its foundation. This is rectangular and formed of timbers each fifteen cubits long, tied by others each eight cubits long; the tim- bers being from three to four hands-breadths thick. The side beams are united by sleepers, on which is a floor pinned down, and as tight as possible, so that when swollen by the water, water itself could not get in except at the cracks, and then it could not be got out without the aid of science. Above the first flooring, at an interval of a foot, was laid on other joist (jictrate on is Sam Little's cleren, till you come to the Ingin grave and after that the path's a sort a blind but then it ain't more nor a mile to ole man Sturgisses, and he lives rite fornence the tan house over the run." Of course, reader, the above and most other directions and speeches in this book like the above, are the filtered condensation of our own translation : the full vernacular you could not under- stand and perhaps might not relish. But interrogation only ren- dered our labyrinthical direction more implicated; and so, not wishing to seem less sagacious than little Jim, off we splashed for the bayou, and here we succeeded so well in "a sort-er turn to the left but not quite," that we soon lost sight of all roads, paths, and blazes ; and then we, hearing the sound of an axe still more to the left, travelled that direction by ear, through a won- derous wilderness of spice-wood, papaw, and twenty unknown bushes, briars, and weeds, till we fell suddenly into a clearing, supposed to be our neighbour's, Sam Little's. Happily it proved to be Squire Brushwood's. For Sam Little's, it seems, was nothing save a clearing destitute of any cabin; 80 THE SEARCHING while Brushwood's was adorned with a double cabin and all sorts of out-houses : and but for the lucky loss of our blaze, we should here be recording a night in the woods, to us then as deplorable as the prophet's loding, thus poetically lamented in some ancient version : "Jonah was three days and nights in the whale's belly, Without fire or candle! And nothing had he all the time But cold fish g ts to handle!" Whereas, now we were comfortably shedded and had more corn- bread and bacon than we could devour. And instead of being alone, our wife had, in addition to us and the driver, a guard in her bed-room, or rather around her very bed, a guard of four other men the squire, the squire's two sons, and a journeyman chopper, whose axe had invited and guided us to the clearing; add women and girls too numerous to mention so that Mrs. Carl- ton never felt the least lonesome the livelong night. How getting to bed was managed could not be told, as Mrs. C. made an extemporary screen by hanging something "what" oh ! a utility on a rope or grape vine stretched near our quarters : only no one went out to see about the weather, and from first to last a very animated talk went on in voices of opposite genders, and even amid the creaking of ricketty bedsteads and after the dying of the fire light. Great adroitness is acquired by women- bodies especially in going to repose amidst company. For in- stance, we were at Major Billy Westland's in Woodville, once in company with several male magnates, when the major's lady with- drew from our circle at the fire, as for some domestic duty ; but on my accidentally looking around, three minutes after, lo ! there was a night-cap peering above the "kiver-lid," and Mrs. Major Billy Westland's head in it ! Men- folks oversleeping themselves often find, on opening their eyes, the girls fixing the table for breakfast ; and then they con- trive to put on their indispensables under the cover and in bed. Hence, on one memorable occasion, when we were at a wedding, our groom having overslept the early morn, made this covert ar- rangement with his inexpressibles, and then most courageously thrust out among us his invested limbs. But woful ingenuity ! THE FINDING 81 just then was entering at the opposite door, our groom's brother, a gawkey young gentleman, with a green gosling countenance, who seeing first the pantalooned limbs, suddenly exclaimed in utter amazement at such conduct: "Hey ! if our Jess didn't sleep in his breeches !" ****** Reader ! good night ! we are sleepy. CHAPTER XIII. THE FINDING. "Ilionea petit dextra laevaque " "A shaking with both hands " YEARS had passed since Mrs. C. parted with her nearest rela- tives, and among these her mother. We were naturally in haste then to leave Brushwood in the morning, Glenville being only two miles distant. What was thought of us at Brushwood could now be only conjectured; but we learned afterwards, that the screen made by Mrs. C. was deemed "powerful proud doings of stuck-up folks." And sorry am I to say that in the Purchase, as in some other places, such opinion is formed and similarly expressed about extra cleanliness, decency, modesty, learning, and the like : if these things exceed your neighbour's they subject you to suspicion, often to dislike, and not infrequently to rancorous persecution. Perhaps the thoughts about you in a New Purchase are boldly uttered, yet still, in an Old Purchase, scorn, envy, hatred, are felt for your real or supposed excellences, and acted out at the first fair opportunities. However, Mr. Carlton himself got so far rubbed down in time as to need considerable rubbing up after- wards ; for he at last, in the Purchase, earned the appellation of a "most powerful clever feller, what could lay down ahind an ole-log and hide raw bakin like the best on 'em as naturally, too, as if brung up to it." Receiving very straight directions for a very crooked path, we set out for Home ! The path was rarely ever travelled by wheels and indeed unblazed; and hence we proceeded partly by instinct 82 THE FINDING and partly by trace of ruts seen usually by the eye, but often felt after by the feet one of us always walking before the dearborne, while the other drove. This path I had always great difficulty in finding. And once the whole Glenville community nearly, having to deviate from its direction on account of high waters, were actually lost in the bottom for three long hours! To imprint the affair more deeply we met, too, an accident at that time. Endeavouring then to drive along a slippery and very steep in- clination, away suddenly pitched horse and wagon, and away also Mr. and Mrs. Carlton, and one young lady, and two little babies, all in an indescribable and mixed succession of somersets, down into the ravine ; and yet, strange to tell ! no one was hurt, nothing important broken, although when about half way to the bottom of the hill, the vehicle was caught by sapling and bush, the wagon there sticking, wheels uppermost and the horse on his back with the whole four legs turning their shod hoofs into thin air instead of thick earth ! What it was, in such a false position, I cannot tell ; but so did the two dumb things look, so patient, so resigned, appealing so touchingly with outstretched limbs for help, that it was long before laughter would permit Mr. Glenville and myself to restore wheels and legs to the order of nature. And when restored to a proper standing in society, never surely did horse and wagon move with more unanimity! never did a horse before so snort, so toss his head, so shake mane and tail, till by practising all parts of his body he was convinced it was only a very curious dream, just passed, and he was truly himself again! Consequently after that I preferred the better path of Sam Little's clearing and the Indian grave. But on the present morning of the Finding, Brushwood had directed us "the short cut" to Glen- ville Settlement. The reader will of course conjecture what happened to novices we lost our way. What with turning aside for logs-unstrad- dleable, brush impenetrable, briars intolerable, and for holes we cared not to fathom, we made the short path considerably longer than the long one, till all at once on clambering up a steep hill, farther progress was barred by a lofty and tortuous fence, worm- ing around a clearing! At the unwonted noise of cracking brush and bush in this quarter, soon, however, came forth from a good THE FINDING 83 log-house in the centre, an almost gigantic yet venerable old gentle- man, who, to our great surprise, said he was the Mr. Sturgis i. e. "ole-man Sturgis fornence" the tannery in the very suburbs of Glenville! Very near! Reader! After helping to extricate and get our carriage in front of his settlement, the' old man advised, that, instead of now going away round by a very obscure path, we had better proceed right down the hill in the direction of the tan-house: especially as to drive down the hill would, after all, be not much worse, than the way up the hill just come. Accordingly we prepared to alight in Glenville : not indeed by flying, but by slipping and sliding down on them from our sylvan summit. And this was accomplished as follows: our historian and his lady advanced in pedibus (Latin is more ancient than French,) or more vulgarly, on foot, some yards before the wagon; then the author judiciously presented one side towards the bottom of the declivity, and the other towards its top; and then the author's wife did ditto's; after which her lower hand in his upper, the happy couple commenced the glide in that pictur- esque attitude and series of linked cadences, he with his dextral and unimpeded hand retarding the velocity, when becoming peri- lous, by seizing, at suitable intervals, bushes and saplings, until, without accident, Mr. and Mrs. Carlton had almost alighted on the border of a delightful and pellucid little creek. While above, on foot too, and holding his horse near the bit of the bridle, and his wagon, were tearing and crashing and thundering down, the man partly on his knees, and the horse in a sitting posture like a pet-dog at dinner-time, till all seemed like an avalanche of horses and wagons from the clouds or at least, in western parlance, "a right smart sprinkle"of the articles. At all events, the unwonted uproar and shouts, and voices and merriment, had announced that some wonder was raining down on the settlement and hence, they rushed from the tannery to see what was descending lo! dear reader we, Mr. and Mrs. Carlton, now ended our descent by gliding into the open arms of uncle John Seymour and his nephew John Glenville! And was not that stumbling upon luck? 84 FIRST YEAR Did you ever go away off, when travelling was the work of months away off, a thousand miles, in search of the nearest and dearest kindred and then, unexpectedly, on a bright and-fragrant May morning, find those dear ones in the dark depths of an almost impervious wilderness? Then did, at that moment, thoughts of the past happiness homes comforts ay! of a thousand nameless past things rush like a torrent to your heart then you know how we met and rejoiced and wept! How we crossed the creek I never knew all were shaking hands right and left some asking questions some answering some sobbing and how could one see with eyes full of tears? But still I do believe we were both hugged over ! But see ! all Glenville is coming and the daughter is once more upon the bosom of her mother! yet the voice of weeping are not tears of lamentation they are tears of joy! That morning thanksgiving prayers went up to heaven from three households united, and hymns of praise resounded amid the wilds : for these families were Christian and wherever, in their many wanderings, they halted as pilgrims for a day or a year, there rose the domestic altars. God is every where! CHAPTER XIV. FIRST YEAR. " locus est et pluribus umbris." " a shady place for several friends." WELL! this is Glenville. Has any body accompanied our for- tunes thus far? that body may as well see us also "out of the woods." A sojourn for a few years amid the privations and hardships of the New Purchase will fit you better for a home in the East in case, we mean, you stay not so long as to be for- gotten by the time you go back. And even then after the first bitter feelings of natural sorrow, of surprise, and perhaps of chagrin believe me, such a force and independence will have been added to the character, so much self-reliance gendered, as FIRST YEAR 85 to furnish an almost perpetual and complete substitute in your own resources. One perhaps, after a sojourn of the proper kind in the New Purchase, is rather in danger of too great a contempt for the things of the old : at all events, one, whose spirit is not naturally bad, is very much inclined to feel and say, with the good humor of Bernadotte, when he finds on his return that the world "does not care a fig" for him, "well, tell the world, I do not care a fig for it." The man who has practised doing with little, and is fully satisfied with it, and for years has been very happy with it, is really superior to the man even of large fortune, and of many wants. Can he be vexed for the want of grand houses, fine furniture, sumptuous food, gay equipage, costly apparel and the like, who, if he despise not such matters, is soberly and philosophically indifferent to them? He has really so schooled himself amid rough huts, rude furniture, coarse food, and home- spun clothes, as, in his very heart, to prefer them with their freedom and independence, to the wearisome and silly, and end- less anxiety and toil of living for mere show. On your return, if you have your health, in what can any one, who fancies himself superior, excel you? He knows not as much he can eat no more see no more drink no more sleep no better live no longer. Can he drive a gig? you can drive it where he dares not venture. Suppose he outrides you you can outwalk him. Does the chap shoot a double-barrelled gun ? so can you, if you would but you transcend him, oh ! far enough with that man's weapon, that in your hands deals, at your will, certain death to one selected victim, without scattering useless wounds at a venture in a little innocent feathered flock. Stay with us, then, reader; and when you do return, you will certainly enjoy some plain every-day conveniences at home, once undervalued, perhaps despised, but which belong to the tenor of life ; you will bear, with good humour, a thousand petty dis- quietudes of civilized life, that once kept you, and still keep the self-indulged, undisciplined, fashionable vulgar in "a stew." Yes ! you will be cured of a very common and dreadful malady, rendering one miserable in himself and hateful to others "the fidgets." Nay you will be purged of the "struts and swaggers" 86 FIRST YEAR the emptiness of a puffy, self-important inflation, generated by too long an acquaintance among brick and mortar houses, and medicated wooden pavements. In a word, if you become not quite as great a man as you formerly designed to be (and as city and town folks all at one time intend) you will unques- tionably, if disposed to learn by a few years residence in a bran New Purchase, become a better and a happier man. Come, then, I will introduce our settlement. And first, this term is applied to a place where one or more families having bought lands at the government price from Uncle Samuel, have actually located on it; and, not to a place merely bought for speculation, or merely trespassed upon by any of that nondescript and original race the squatters. Indeed, to these a settlement is so odious, that they either pay for land and turn into settlers, or, as in the more frequent, they become indignant at the legal invasion of their domain, and hastily absquatulate; that is, translated they go and squat in another place. And such is the effect of settlements often in here, up north, down east, and so on, where well looking and fine dressed gentlemen become so offended at the impertinence of neighbors, that they too absquat- ulate: and perhaps better so, as a civilized squatter would rarely make a good neighbour, either in or upon a settlement. Out there, a settlement usually takes its name from the person that first "enters the land," i. e. buys a tract at the land office. Often it takes the name from the family first actually settling or owning the largest number of acres ; and very frequently from the person that establishes a ferry, a smifhery, a mill, a tannery, and, above all, a Store. Hence, whilst our brother-in-law was no patriarch in looks or age, owned no boundless territory, and was, in stature, "the least in his father's house," yet because he tanned hides (for shoes we mean) and intended soon to sell tape by the yard, and buy pork by the cwt. we were The Glen- ville Settlement. And this colony had, within its territories, as many as three human habitations; two occupied by actual set- tlers, and one by a very special sort of a squatter the Leather- stocking of our tribe. 1 1 In Cooper's novel, "The Pioneers," Leatherstocking was the nick- name of Natty Bumpo, a half civilized chevalier of wild American life. FIRST YEAR 87 On an eminence between the others and, provided you knew how "to holler" within hearing of both, but owing to inter- vening trees, not within sight stood the primitive and patriarchal cabin the capitol. South-west, distant a quarter of a mile was the cabin of the Reverend Mr. Hilsbury, lately married to one of Mr. Carlton's sisters ; and directly south of the episcopal resi- dence, was the tannery, to which John Glenville, of Glenville, owed the honour of giving his name to the colony. Due east from the capitol about a furlong, was the squateree of uncle Tommy Seymour, our Leatherstocking. So much of his long life had passed in the wild woods, and among the Indians, that he had thoroughly imbibed their feelings and their senti- ments, and had adopted some of their habits; and therefore he had not only acquired an utter distaste, but even a sovereign contempt for most usages and trammels of civilization. And Uncle Tommy was also a preacher hence Glenville was two- thirds sacred and only one secular! Around, were a few other settlements, Sturgis' Hackberry's Undergrowth's Brushwood's, and some more: all distant from us and one another some one mile, some ten. The un- entered and unsettled tracts between, were our commons, called the Range used for hunting, swine-feeding, and the like. The range had, however, inhabitants innumerable : viz., deer, wolves, foxes blue, gray, and black squirrels ditto, ground-swine, vul- garly called ground-hogs, and wild turkeys, wild ducks, wild cats, and wild all the wild what-y'-callums : opposums too, up, down, in, and under gum trees: snakes, with and without rattles, of all colours, from copper to green and black, and of all sizes, from ever so little to ever so big. Add "the neighbours' hogs," so wild and fierce, that when pork-time arrives, they must be hunted and shot, like other independent beasts. Especially is this the case if mast (nuts and acorns) is abundant; when swiney becomes wholly savage, and loses all reverence for corn-cribs and swill-tubs. Ay, gentle reader, our semi-wild boar is a fellow something different in look, and rather worse to encounter, when saucy or angry, than the vile mud-hole wallower of the Atlantic ! If one would understand the wild-boar hunts of Cyrus, or the feudal barons go, get acquainted with the semi-wild fellow of 88 FIRST YEAR the Purchase. The range is perambulated by cattle horned and unhorned; by cows, belled and unbelted; and by horses, some with yokes and some without : but notice, yokes are not to pre- vent jumping out of inclosures, but into them. In the range are also wonderful colts with cunning saucy faces, shaggy manes done up with burrs, and with great long tails, so tangled that Penelope herself could never disentangle creatures almost un- catchable, and, if caught, nearly untameable. Nearly south of Glenville was the grand town our Woodville. And nearly west, some eight or nine miles and a piece, was Spiceburgh at least in dry times; for the town being on the bottom of Shining River was, in hard rains, commonly under water, so that a conscientious man dared not then to affirm with- out a proviso, where, Spiceburgh was, precisely. North-east from us, some fifty long lonesome miles, was the capital of the State Timberopolis ; the seat of the legislature and of mortality. 2 But death in later times there domineered less. Whether the legis- lature reformed and refrained from common mischief is not so easy to say. Parties are to this hour, I am informed, themselves, divided on that subject the opposite partizans, however, exactly agreeing in this : viz. that the Ins are a set of ignorant, selfish, truckling, snivelling humbuggers, while the Outs are the men to save the state mutatis mutandis. In different directions, from Glenville were also Mapville, Map- borough and Maptown: in all which the difficulty in seeing the towns was not owing to the houses, but the trees. A skillful woodsman could, indeed, sometimes find a single house the whole village : but as the citizens were all absent hoeing corn or the like, except one or more dirty bare-legged babies fastened inside, the lucky hunter, except for the name of being in town, might nearly as well be in the country. Unexpectedly, too, would a traveller sometimes come into a town of thirty or forty habita- tions but without a solitary inhabitant the cabins all standing cold and empty like snail-abandoned shells ! For, know, reader, that genuine agues out there are often so powerful and vindictive 2 In the early days of the settlement of Indiana, amid the dampness of the uncleared forests and especially on the river-bottom lands, there was heavy mortality from malaria and "milk sickness." Indianapolis on the White River bottom was in the heart of this region of maladies. FIRST YEAR 89 as to shake, not only individuals out of their skins, but whole communities out of their towns and villages ! In this latter case the folks swarm like bees and re-settle where the legislature appoints a new seat, passing at the time a law that the ague shall shake them out no more. This, then, is Glenville, its suburbs, its environs, its neighbour- hoods, its ranges all on that grand scale belonging to Nature in the Far West, where we have grand woods, grand prairies, grand caves, grand rivers, grand bears, grand swine grand everything! except, maybe, grand rascals, in which we doubtless excel here in the East. Let us next enter the patriarchal cabin. Here we become ac- quainted with Uncle John Seymour and his two sisters, widows, Mrs. Glenville and Aunt Kitty Littleton. Here are also encabin- ed John Glenville and Miss Emily Glenville, the youngest of the family. Here too is a young woman for help in fact "the gal ;" and here are to abide Mr. and Mrs. Carlton "All in one cabin?" All in one cabin. But a family you know is the most com- pressible and yet the most expansive of bodies. Yes! here we two and a half families endured the compression and lost no breath, and even seemed to have a few spare inches of room! And yet many years after, in a different part of the world, did Mr. Carlton's own single family expand and spread, and without any violent effort whatever, their importance through a mansion containing fourteen apartments, with cellars, and garrets, and kitchens and all and still fret for the want of room ! "But what led to the formation of your colony, Mr. Carlton? what induced gentlemen and ladies of your education and en- dowments to settle in so remote an obscurity?" Thank you, Sir the reasons alluded to in the commencement of this history operated in our case as in the cases of a thousand others; but it was mere accident that turned our folks to their location in the New Purchase. The Seymours at the close of the last war with Great Britain resided in Philadelphia. Like others they risked their capital during the war in the manufactories of that era ; and like others, 90 FIRST YEAR when peace was proclaimed, the Seymours were ruined. 3 John Seymour familiarly known among us as Uncle John on his arrival from the South, where, during a residence of many years he had acquired a handsome fortune, found his sisters Mrs. Glen- ville and Mrs. Littleton, in great distress, their husbands being recently dead; and having not long before his return buried his wife (who however had borne him no children), he immediately took under his protection the two widowed ladies, his sisters, together with the four children of Mrs. Glenville. Fearing his means were not sufficient to sustain the burden providentially cast upon him, at least in the way that was desirable, he resolved to remove to Kentucky. Accordingly, the newly organized family all removed to the West ; with the exception of Miss Eliza Glen- ville, who was left to complete her education with the excellent and justly celebrated Mr. Jaudon. With this amiable and in- teresting creature.* Mr. Carlton, who somehow or other always had a taste for sweet and beautiful faces, became acquainted "Oh! Mr. Carlton! do tell all about this" Not now, young ladies, something must be reserved for future works. But after the usual courtships, lovers' quarrels, scenes and walks in the garden (Pratt's,) versifications, notes on gilt- edged, flame-coloured paper, ornamented with cooing doves and little fat dumpling cupids in short, after the most approved meltings, misgivings, misapprehensions and so forth, came the customary Miss-taking and with the consent of friends east and west we were married. It had been part of the arrangement that Mr. and Mrs. Carlton should join the family in Kentucky, and that we should establish there a Boarding School for Young Ladies ; but now came a let- ter from John Glenville that Uncle John unfortunate, not in 3 The experience of the Seymours as related here was similar to that of the many others in the East following the War of 1812. The hard times and panic of 1817-19 sent jobless workmen and landless and bankrupt debtors to the West in droves and the New Purchase received its share of the hardy and adventurous pioneers who were coming West to seek out new fortunes and to grow up with the country. The author here indi- cates an economic influence of prime importance leading to the settlement of the West. 4 The young lady. FIRST YEAR 9I selling a very valuable property at a fair price, but in receiving that price in worthless notes of Kentucky banks (which, like most banks every twenty or thirty years, had failed), had with his remaining funds, as his only resort, bought a tract of govern- ment lands in the New Purchase; and, that, if I could join him with a few hundred dollars in a little tanning, store-keeping, and honest speculation, we might gain, if not riches, at least indepen- dence. He added that maybe something could be done in the school line. Sorry so good a man as Uncle John and the world boasts none nobler should be the victim of fraud, yet strange! I found mingled with the feeling of distress a secret joy that so plausible an inducement existed for a life in the genuine, far away, almost unfindable backwoods ! Less poetic indeed than her husband, yet Mrs. C. earnestly wished to see her relatives; and so off we started, as the reader knows, in Chapter Second, and here we are waking up a little from a curious dream, in Chapter Fourteenth. Some folks dream all the way through to the very last chapter! Here we found our new relative the Rev. James Hilsbury, who had married Sarah Glenville in Kentucky, and was now a missionary in the Purchase, in order to look up "a few sheep scattered in the wilderness." And to our great amazement here we found too, Uncle Leatherstocking ; for about him Glenville in his letter had been silent, willing us to be, as all had been, taken by surprise ; because the family on removing to their new world had found the old gentleman comfortably squatted in a little nook of their territories, when he was supposed all the time to be yet among the Indians on Lake Michigan! At the time of our arrival Uncle John was barely recovered from a very serious hurt received in the early settlement of the colony. In order to prepare a cabin he left the family in Ken- tucky and went to the Purchase alone; it being arranged that the family under the care of John Glenville should join him as soon as information came that things were ready. But one day Mr. Seymour, being with his guide in the woods, and in the act of mounting a restive horse, the animal scared at the near and sudden leap of a deer, plunged and knocked down Mr. Seymour, causing the fracture of one arm and several ribs. For 92 FIRST YEAR six dreadful weeks he there lay in consequence, under a shantee of poles and bark actually built over him as he lay unable to be moved, by some neighbours called by the guide. And these set the bones and dressed the wounds, according to Mr. Seymour's directions, as well as they could; and then leaving the sufferer alone most of the day, as was unavoidable, they brought his victuals at iregular intervals, and slept near him by turns at night. On one occasion, however, our wounded friend would have re- ceived a very disagreeable visitor, but for the fortunate arrival at the moment of a neighbour woman with his dinner who exclaimed, "Grammins ! neighbour Seymour, if there ain't a powerful nasty varmint coming to see you !" The nature of the visitor was soon revealed to Uncle John; for alarmed at the approach of the woman, the "nasty varmint" close to the patient's head but behind his camp, raising his terrific head, made at the same time the whole woods tremulously vocal with that rattle so peculiar and so startling even to the accustom- ed ear. But scarcely had Uncle John time for alarm before the fearless woman had stopped the music; and then dragging his dying snakeship in front of the camp, she first measured his length, more than five and a half feet, and secondly pulled off what she called "a right smart chance of rattles" and gave them to Mr. Seymour. And this memento of his escape, Uncle John one day as he narrated the affair, handed over to me to hang to the sounding post of my fiddle such being the western secret of converting common violins into cremonas. I tried the ex- periment of course; but not being willing to take out a patent, I now offer the said rattles to any ingenious Yankee (who wishes to try the thing) , for a box of clarified rosin ! the rattles count sixteen and a button; just sixteen semi, and part of a demisemi- quaver to every shake ! As soon as Mr. Seymour could be carried, he was conveyed to Mr. Sturgis' house, and then he wrote for his family; who has- tening on through many inconveniences and perils, all arrived in safety and found Uncle John just able to walk without assistance. But as to the cabin it was as yet unchinked, undaubed, and with- out its stack chimney; yet into that deplorable hovel all were' FIRST YEAR 93 forced to remove and complete it at their leisure! Ay, folks that knew all about three story brick houses in Philadelphia! and who had ridden in their own carriages, in the settlements of the Old Purchase! and promenaded Chestnut-street, some of them haughtily, and proudly, and delicately! Ye that have paid $20,000 for a dwelling, what do you think of a dwelling that cost 20,000 cents? for that our cabin cost .and experienced woodmen said that was too much that Uncle John had been cheated and that our cabin could have been finished off for $10! from the laying of the first stick to the topping of the chimney ! ! Our cabin was in truth a cabin of the Rough Order; for reader, the orders of cabin architecture are various like those of the Greek; for instance the Scotched Order. In this, logs are hacked longitudinally and a slice taken from one side, the primitive bark being left on the other sides. The scotching, however, is usually done for pastime by the boys and young women, while the men are cutting or hauling other timbers. The Hewed Order in which logs, like the stones for Solomon's Temple, are dressed on purpose. The Stick-out-Corner Order the logs left to project at the corners; and the reverse of this, the Cut-off-Corner Order. I might name too, the Doubtful or Double Order. In this, two cabins are built together, but until the addition of chimneys, it is doubtful whether the structure is for men or brutes ; and also the Composite Order i. e. loggeries with stone or brick chimneys. But our abode was, from necessity, of the Rough Order its logs being wholly unhewed and unscotched its corners project- ing and hung with horse collars, gears, rough towels, dish cleaners and calabashes ! 5 it had moreover a very rude puncheon floor, a clapboard roof, and a clapboard door; while for window a log in the erection had been skipped, and through this longitudinal aperture came light and also wind, it being occasionally shut at first with a blanket, afterwards with a clapboard shutter. Neither nail nor spike held any part of the cabin together; and even the door was hung not with iron, but with broad hinges of 5 The usual water dippers in the pioneer cabin homes were made from the calabashes, or gourds. 94 FIRST YEAR tough bacon skin. These, however, our two dogs, (of whom more hereafter,) soon smelled and finally gnawed clean off, when we pinned on thick half tanned leather, which swagging till the door dragged on the earth, we at last manufactured wooden hinges; and these remained till the dissolution of our colony. The en- tire structure was, in theory, twenty feet square, as measured by an axe-handle having set off on itself two feet from the store keeper's yardstick, where the cabin builder bought his handle at Woodville. But I ever believed the yardstick itself must have shrunk in seasoning, because our carpets stretched inside, as will be described in the next Chapter, made the gross length only nineteen feet two inches, and the neat length inside, an average about seventeen feet one inch. As our arrival caused a new ar- rangement of the interior cabin, we shall start on this subject afresh in CHAPTER XV. " Qui miscuit utile dulci." " Which mixes soap and sugar." THRIFTY housewives in cutting little boys' roundabouts and trowsers always contrive out of a scant pattern of pepper and salt stuff, to leave enough for patches ; but for the Glenvillians it re- mained to subdivide two hundred and eighty nine square feet of internal cabin into all the apartments of a commodious man- sion. Hence ours became the model cabin in the Purchase. And first, the puncheoned area was separated into two grand parts, by an honest Scotch carpet hung over a stout pole that ran across with ends rested on the opposite wall plates; the woollen portion having two-thirds of the space on one side and the remaining third on the other. Secondly, the larger space was then itself subdivided by other carpets and buffalo robes into chambers, each containing one bed and twelve nominal inches to fix and unfix in ; while trunks, boxes and the like plunder were stationed under the bed. Ar- ticles intended by nature to be hung, frocks, hats, coats, &c., FIRST YEAR 95 were pendent from hooks and pegs of wood inserted into the wall. To move or turn around in such a chamber without mis- chief done or got was difficult; and yet we came at last to the skill of a conjuror that can dance blindfolded among eggs we could in the day without light and at night in double darkness, get along and without displacing, knocking down, kicking over, or tearing! The chambers were, one for Uncle John and his nephew ; one for the widow ladies and Miss Emily, who, being the pet, nestled at night in a trundle bed, partly under the large one ; and one very small room for the help, which was separated from the Mistress' chamber by pendulous petticoats. Our apprentices slept in an out-house. These chambers were all south of the grand hall of eighteen inches wide between the suites ; on the north, being first our room and next it the stranger's a room into which at a pinch were several times packed three bodies of divinity or cler- ical dignitaries. Beyond the hospitality chamber was the toilette room, fitted with glasses, combs, hair-brushes, &c., and after our arrival, furnished with the first glass window in that part of the Purchase. The window was of domestic manufacture, be- ing one fixed sash containing four panes, each eight by ten's, by whose light in warm weather we could not only fix but also read in retirement. Thirdly, the smaller space, east of the Scotch wall, was sub- divided, but like zones and tropics, with mere imaginary lines. Front of the fire-place was the parlour. Into it were ushered visitors, mainly, however, to prevent curiosity or awkwardness from meddling with the corners and their uses; but against which we were forced finally to place a table or two as pre- ventives. The right hand corner was the ladies' private sitting room. It was fitted with clap-board shelves, and on these were arranged work-bags, boxes, baskets, paint-boxes, machinery for sewing, knitting, &c. The left side and whole corner was the library, or as usually styled Carlton's study. Our artificial rooms were indeed connected with some anom- alies: for instance, under the parlour, was the Potato Hole! And that held about twenty bushels. The descent into this 96 FIRST YEAR spacious vault, was accomplished by raising a puncheon and vaulting down on the vegetables ; the ascent, by resting the hands on the edges of the parlour floor and weighing the body up. Again, Carlton's study had in it a species of dresser-closet, in- vented and constructed by the author himself. It was construct- ed of clap-boards dressed with a hatchet, and held on some shelves, books in several languages, writings, plates, knives, fid- dle, pepper-box, flute, mustard-box, and box of rosin, and so on; while some modest and light cooking utensils were lodged in the basement story shelves. To conceal the structure was hung over as much of its front as could be covered, an invalid table cloth, very white and very patched. The kitchen proper had, about ten yards from the mansion house, a whole cabin to itself. Here were all the vulgar pots, kettles, frying-pans, homminy-block, and the like; here the com- mon cooking, the washing and ironing, and weaving, and oh! ever so many common and uncommon common things besides. Pickling, preserving, cake-baking, clear-starching, sugar-refining, ruffle-ironing, candy-making, and all such polite affairs were commonly honoured with attention in the parlour. Like most grandee people brought low and "flitting" to the West, our plunder was, like the Vicar's Family Picture, too large for the house. We had also no small quantum of envy and jealousy exciting articles, "the like of which had never been seen growing among corn," at least in the Purchase and such, policy required should be hid. Many things, therefore, were left packed and deposited in lofts and outhouses. Still some impolitic articles were unpacked, being, however, kept concealed behind the curtain like sacred mysteries from the eyes and hands of the profane. But an accident soon after our arrival delivered the colony from part of these. A large, antique, and elegantly Japanned waiter had been nicely balanced on a shelf in the toilette chamber; and on this grand affair were tastefully set numerous anti-tee-total glasses, jelly glasses, remains of a gilded French china tea set, and ever so many Reliquiae Danaum all regarded, I fear, with half repress- ed elation, as shining remembrances of departed glory and great- ness. Anyhow, more than once on my sudden appearance behind FIRST YEAR 97 the woolly rampart, there was Mrs. C, ay, and even Aunt Kitty herself, a handling, and a dusting, and a refixing the relics, as devout as if all had been saints' bones often with smiles of complacency but sometimes with tears! And, after all, per- haps, that was not so very unreasonable : friends far away now yes some no more on earth dear friends had once surrounded that very waiter sipped tea from those very cups and in the fashion of bygone days, had drunk healths from those glasses. Reader! may be you have shed secret tears yourself over such things? We think of friends then, do we not? Mournful shad- ows of the past are in the vision ! But the Genius of the Woods was incensed : and mark the consequences. One day Mrs. Seymour entered the parlour with a cake of sugar-tree sugar in her hands, and nearly as large and heavy as she could conveniently carry. After our unanimous admiration of its size, and breaking off lumps to taste, the dear old lady dis- appeared to deposit the saccharine treasure on the great store shelf constructed immediately over the waiter of idols. Now oak pins are very strong, tough and tenacious, and of most Job-like endurance but the creatures will not bear every thing; hence the two enormous pins under the store shelf had repeatedly sighed forth remonstrances, as extra pound after pound of hard soap, sugar, tallow, and jugs of vinegar and molasses, and what nots, were cruelly and inconsiderately added to the already almost insupportable weight. But to-day, when that hugeous lump of sugar was suddenly added to the grievance, the indignant pins would stick to it no longer: in a moment without one further premonitory creak, off they both snapped simultaneously and down came the soap and sugar and tallow down came the store tea and the true coffee-coffee, and the rye-coffee, and the ocra, and the spices in brown paper bags, and the pepper, red and black in exiled tea cups! Ah! yes! alas! alas! and down came that japanned waiter and its gilded cups, and conical glasses for wine, and bell-mouthed ones for ices and jellies! and, moreover, down went the dear old lady of the crimped cap, all rolling, heaped, mixed higgledee-piggledee, into one bushel and a peck of yellow corn meal reposing in a wash tub, and thirty-one and a half pounds of wheat flour in a half-bushel measure, below! So 98 FIRST YEAR much can a big lump of unclarified backwoods sugar do! Ah! had it been double rectified loaf, in blue paper, of a conical form and neatly bound with hard twisted twines, dividing off circles and parabolas! But a lump of uncivilized sweetness just turned out of a pot! Mrs. Seymour, however, was soon extricated amid the almost endless oh's ah's who-could-have-thought-it's and similar ex- clamations, queries, reproaches and extenuations, pertaining to ac- cidents created by ourselves; and happily she had sustained no injury whatever, although the outer woman was considerably well sugared, well mealed, well vinegared, and not a little soaped ! But the glory of the brittle ware shone only in pieces multiplied but not increased ! Not an idol escaped, save a little punch goblet belonging to the Carlton ancestry, and at the time considerably more than a century old! and whether the sagacity of age was the cause or not, this ancient relic contrived to roll by itself into an untouched part of the meal tub, where after the pell-mell ended, it was discovered, whole and sound. If any one is in- credulous we will show him when he calls, the venerable article yet preserved in cotton ! About the time of the accident just told, the venerable old pier glass, suspended opposite the only door of the cabin was threat- ened with a very great danger. A neighbour having ended a morning call, that, according to the etiquette of the Purchase, had lasted from a short time after breakfast till past noon, rose to depart with the farewell formula, "Well, I allow I must be a sort a-goin," and then off he started with great activity in the di- rection of the door visible but not real. In other words mistaking the open door reflected in the glass for the true door, he began kicking his heavy shod feet towards the mirror ; but as he ducked his head to clear the lintel of the scant door, he naturally en- countered a rough looking personage seemingly butting against himself from the apparent door when round he wheeled, con- fused indeed, but just in time, (and before we could have ar- rested him) to avoid stepping into the very bosom of the old reflector. Such risk was too great for the glass to encounter again, and so it was carefully re-packed and put away 'till we removed some FIRST YEAR 99 years after to Woodville; where, as it could be placed so as to imitate neither door nor window, it was brought again into the light and permitted to renew its reflections. Alas ! then, however, a dear face that had been familiar to the old mirror for nearly three-fourths of a century, was seen pictured there no more! Young and joyous, and pleasant faces, have often since peeped from its bosom; but never one so mild, so resigned, so radiant even on earth with beams from the heavenly world, as that venerable and venerated countenance gazing now and with out a medium upon the resplendent and ravishing scenes ! Pulvis et umbra sumus ! CHAPTER XVI. "Quadrupedante putrem quatit ungula canipum." "A horse a 'horse ! my kingdom for a horse !" J. GLENVILLE and myself, not being able to complete certain arrangements immediately, my first summer and autumn were spent in learning two arts, the one tending to the preservation of hides, the other, to the destruction of hides : grinding bark, and rifle-shooting. The present chapter is devoted to the former, the subsequent one, to the latter art. Our bark-house was of the Grecian architecture in its infancy, being almost wholly upright poles as columns, on which reposed, (when the grinding ceased,) the calm moonlight horizontals, kept from falling off by the crotches of the perpendiculars. On the horizontals were laid other poles, and on these the roof, the latter being with due regard itself made of bark. Under this shelter was our store of bark, mostly oak and chestnut, with here and there a pile of beech; and here, at one end, was our ay! what shall it be called;? Ye tanners and curriers, and all ye other hide dressers! Shall ye say our bark-masher or breaker or mill or pounder or tritterer? However, I will describe, and you name. First, was a hexagonal beam. This stood up nearly perpen- dicular, its iron pivots at each inserted into iron sockets fastened above and below ; and by means of these pivots the beam could, ioo FIRST YEAR when required, circulate with entire freedom. Next, into this hexagonal, was fixed at right angles an hexagonal axis, yet free to move at the end inserted; while its other end, passing first the nominal centre of a wheel (the axis there being wedged in theory immoveable) , it continued beyond the lateral surface of said wheel far enough to admit fixtures for Old Dick a quadruped pre- sently to be introduced, not fashionably and formally by the tip of a hat and the tip of a finger, but in detail, i. e. from head to tail. But the wheel! ah! had we that wheel and dear Old Dick in here to grind bark as a show! It came nearer perpetual motion, that is, when Dick was harnessed, and I had the rake in my hand, nearer than anything I have ever known since Redheifer's. The article was composed of eight large white-oak blocks; the four interior ones being parallelogramic, the four circumferential, plano-convex ; and all bound by long wooden pins driven from the circumference, and by enormous clamps on the lateral surfaces. In this state of e pluribus unum, the affair was as near a circle as is the earth to a sphere ; and when art so closely resembles nature wheelwrights should be satisfied. But when motion began, the sections and segments not moving unanimously, circles were evolved whose circumferences did not obey the definition, in preserving equal distances from the centre nor did the centre stick exactly to its own point. Especially were these irregularities visible, if old Dick became fidgetty, or "suspicioned" I was going to rake him when he would jerk the whole concern with so sud- den a vengeance, as not only to displace the central wedges in- tended to confine the axis in the wheel, but to threaten the disso- lution of the whole bark house. The wheel (by courtesy), was fourteen inches thick; and its circumference was pierced with many holes by an inch-and-quarter auger to the depth of eight inches in towards the centre ; and these holes were armed with strong pegs or wooden teeth, driven to the entire depth, and left projecting from the circumference about four inches each: the whole thus forming as tremendous and effective an engine of torture as the best inquisitors could desire for the extension of the Church. Indeed, if any saint, after his Holiness shall have converted our pagan countries, shall wish FIRST YEAR I0 i with young Doctor Oxford to break ungodly heretics, either on or under the wheel, for offences against the State, ours would be the very dandy. But let no Mr. Dominick think Old Dick could have been either persuaded or goaded to pull the wheel over human beings: hardly could he be frightened or coaxed to pull it over lifeless bark ! No ! no ! godly people must work the wheel them- selves, unless they prefer to turn it into a treadmill, or employ steam. Lastly, the floor. This had the perpendicular, hexagonal rotary shaft first described, as its centre, or thereabouts; whence ex- tended imaginary radii, some five, others nearly six feet, render- ing it doubtful if three times the diameter was precisely equal to the circumference. Still the circumference being bounded by a border rising above the floor an average of ten inches, the con- tents of the area could easily be known by the wheelbarrow loads of ground bark carried thence to the vats near enough at least for a popular lecture before some institute of practical science. Another last word, however, seems necessary here, about our floor. It was of puncheons. Not, my friend, the puncheons of brandy stores, distilleries, or other alcoholic abodes, but back- wood puncheons. And these are a species of Robinson Crusoe board, being planks from three to ten feet long, and from two to five inches thick ; and wide as the size of the trees whence they are severally hewed by the means of axe and adze. On such gigantic flooring do primitive Buckeyes, Hoosiers and the like tread and sleep, after the departure of the red aboriginals. But come, Dick, my nonpareil of "hoss beasts," trot up, for thy history and portrait. When this remarkable quadruped was foaled is uncertain. No satisfaction on this point could be gained even from his own mouth: not that Dick would utter a deliberate falsehood that was impossible but still the answers he gave by his mouth, to different experienced jockeys, made some say he was sixteen, and others twenty-six years old ! I have known some even insist he must be at least thirty ! and some even forty ! I incline to the opinion, however, that, like certain human bachelors, Dick was of no particular age. It is agreed by all that he was foaled, however, and in Penn- 102 FIRST YEAR sylvania, among the mountains about the Bear Gap. Here he was brought up to the wagoning business, having served his ap- prenticeship with the famous teamster, Mr. Conestoga Dutchy. Acting in his tender years as wheel-horse, he was so constantly squeezed between the wagon pushing him forward from his tail, and his master pulling him backward from his head, that his longitudinal growth was very greatly impeded, and it could be said, not that Dick was longer than any other brief horse, but only not quite so short. Happily, what was wanting to the fellow's longitude was added to his latitude ; and after all, he had as much weight of character as longer horses, and, like a French bullet, more too in a lump. On emergencies, although Dick was edu- cated as a wheel-horse, he could act in the lead, and well under- stood the difference between the line jerked and the line pulled indeed, better, I must confess, than Mr. Carlton himself, who often managed the line wrong, to the great jeopardy of his load; only Dick, out of generosity, would usually go the way the driver meant, but for which in ignorance, he had given the improper signal. At the earnest recommendation of their mutual friends, Dick was bought as a family horse by Uncle John, when in Northum- berland. Accordingly the fellow, after performing wonders on the journey from Philadelphia to the West, in hawing and geeing, and in pulling right dead ahead up one side a mountain and hold- ing back down the other; and after having ploughed, and har- rowed, and thrashed, &c. in Kentucky, came at last with the family to the Purchase, where at our arrival he was cherished as no unimportant member of the Glenville community. Here he hauled logs for cabins and fires, bark for the tannery, went to mill both with and without the cart, and sometimes to meeting and sometimes to Woodville. In going to mill without the cart he usually carried one man and two bags, bag No. i, full of wheat, bag No. 2, full of corn, and this was always the case in freshets, for Dick forded creeks like a sea-horse; although the things on his back might keep dry if they could, his own being under water: as to being floated away phoo! preposterous! ' Dick could stay a creek like a dam! He could grind bark too; carry raw hides and hides tanned, having no fears either about FIRST YEAR 103 his own ! It was almost like that of a rhinoceros, and would have resisted every process to transmute it into leather, patent or un- patent and we used both. But nothing so endeared Dick to his friends as his mental and moral qualities. He was for these worthy of the fairy age; and had he lived in the days of Beauty and the Beast, I do think he would have talked right out as well as the best of the brutes belonging to the era. He was, among other matters, the only horse that had a relish for practical jokes. Let any one leave a nice flitch of fat bacon in the sun till the pot was ready, under the notion too, that greasing a horse's teeth will stop his eating oats, the rascal was sure to smell out and devour it! Let the girl set out a swill for Sukey, and turn away a few moments you might catch sight of the tip of Dick's ear as he peeped from behind the smoke house till the coast was clear, and the next instant he would be gobbling the mess, lifting his black-brown head to grin at the stupid cow, and with a keen twinkling eye watching the re- turn of the girl. And when the help came in a whirlwind of wrath not indeed on but with a broomstick bah ! how he would heel it snorting and showing his teeth equivalent with him to saying "catch a duck asleep!" Or when Dick was regaling on his own allowance of corn on the ear, in the front of the inclined cart, and swiney ran grunting up for a chance grain or so dropped on the ground, our wag would on a sudden with his teeth seize the unschooled creature just back of the shoulders, and then lift- ing him up, shake him so as to fill all Glenville with the squealings of terror or pain ; making it evident to all untutored beasts that Dick himself had lived when the schoolmaster was abroad. He was kind to men ; but to women he was specially kind. For fun he would carry males double and even treble; but females might be packed from stem to stern and the kind soul would trot away with an evident care. True, he would now and then turn his quizzical head with a make-believe snap at the dangling feet, but it was manifest all was sham from his peculiar grin (his way of laughing) when any not acquainted with the trick would scream or jump down. When thus used for sport, no saddle or bridle was needed, the passengers on the forecastle holding by the mane, those on the poop, by the helm, and those amidships sitting, 104 FIRST YEAR a la squaw, with ancles on both sides. The steering was, how- ever, done at the prow by boxing his ears ; when he turned at right angles with the slap, and if fun was to be made, which was always indicated to him by a peculiarity in the slapping, he turned so suddenly as to occasion the rise, the fall, and the flourish of petti- coats. And indeed this was the grand recreation and sport in the whole affair ! and a ride on old Dick was one of the inducements to the young ladies from the neighbourhoods to visit Glenville! Ay! you may suspend all this on your nose: but, believe me, in no way is the fear of the East before people's eyes out there ; secondly, folks will play ; and thirdly, remember "de gustibus nori" i. e. literally translated "some love hog and homminy." But I must not make too large a picture ; so with the mention of Dick's idyosyncracy (for since the birth of Phrenology that disease is quite fashionable) we shall for the present suffer him to trot away. Like other celebrated persons he had then his antipathies: he never could bear the sight of a dead owl! and, unless blindfolded, would never carry on his back the carcass of a dead deer ! And this, after carrying barn-hill fowls a dozen at a time tied by the legs and dangling against his sides ! and tanned and raw hides innumerable! Hence his enemies may suppose it was all affectation but it was no such thing it was real and un- controllable idyosyncracy as real as Dr. Reverence's towards a live cat, or Col. Butcher's towards a drawn sword ! Such then was our barkery, our bark, and our bark grinder and, such was old Dick. But all in motion! Can one without a black board and diagrams exhibit the cycloids of that uncircular roundity the wheel ? Can we without brass bands and bad play- ers make audible the skreaking of the ungreased pivots? the curious moaning and growling of the axis? and the dreadful cracking and crashing of the bark under the miniature Jugger- naut? And who has skill to catch and fix on paper, or canvas, the look and manner of that more than half reasoning horse? after resting the full hour I had been in chase of a playful squirrel, starting off at the crack of the rifle, and trying to prove by his manner that he had been going all the time! If any one is Hogarth enough when he undertakes this work with "picters to match," let him not fail to illustrate old Dick and the Bark Mill. CHAPTER XVII. "Omne tulit punctum," "Centre every time." READER, were you ever fired with the love of rifle shooting? If so, the confidence now reposed in your honour will not be abused, when told my love for that noble art is unabated : nay, let me whisper in your ear "What yet?" Yes in the corner of my bed chamber a genuine New Purchase rifle ! And all the forest equipments, otter skin bullet pouch with a tail gracefully pendent a scalping knife in a sheath adorned with porcupine quills a savage little hatchet a powder horn, and its loader of deer-horn, tied on with a deer sinew and holding enough to prime a shot gun a mould running three hundred and twenty-five to the pound wipers an iron hook to tote squirrels and some hundred and fifty patches all strung and fast- ened to the leather strap of the pouch ay ! and a pair of mocca- sins and pair of green leggins, and "Do you ever yet go a gunning?' Gunning ! alas ! is that degrading appellation to be applied to hunting ! but how should they know ? Yes, I do steal off some- times and try to fancy myself in the woods. But what are these scrawney little trees fenced in to prevent cattle from eating them down ? Where is a squirrel, or a raccoon, or a fox, or a turkey to hide? And where can one lose himself and camp out? No grand and centurial trees here reaching up to heaven and sending roots to the centre of the earth ! No hollow caverns in enormous trunks, where wolves and bears may lurk ! No vast sheltering ex- panse of tops where panthers and wild cats may find security How vain to think of crawling through a thicket of undergrowth to the leeside of a deer, stopping with moccasined foot stirring no leaves cracking no twig shaking no bushes till one can get within the magical distance, a hundred yards. Nothing, nothing here, to excite dread, call forth skill, reward toil, and show the independence of the hunter. True, I make-believe, like little girls, playing baby house; I 105 io6 . FIRST YEAR say to myself, "Now Carlton, 'spose that old log away off there was a bear? or that tame turkey a wild one? or that cream- coloured calf a deer or that sharp eared dog a wolf?" And instinctively I catch myself with my side that way, drawing a bead with one eye into the hind sight and fixing the other on the may-fee game, and then, clicks goes the trigger. Fortunate, the rifle is not cocked. Indeed, these rehearsals are always without a load; if not, farewell to the integrity of the little knot in the old log and to the gambols of calf and dog good night to the eyes of farm turkies and dunghill roosters ! In vain do flocks of black-birds and robbins, and torn-tits rise ! they might perch on my shoulders: for who but a wretched dandy and shot-gun driveller, with a double-barrelled gun, a whole pound of powder! and four pounds of shot! will fire at a flock, killing two and wounding twenty? To be sure a curious stranger will sometimes meet us and politely request to see "a rifle discharged!" and with an incredulous smile wonder if a man can really hit a solitary single bird with so "minute" a ball ! And then we cannot but show off, and so we begin with amazing condescension : "Sir! do you see that little blue bird?" "Oh ! yes ! that tiny creature on the next tree." " Tut, no ! that to your right, on the post." "What! that away there? too far, Sir, too far." "Too far ! forty-five yards in a straight line ! !" Reader, we hit at any height or in any direction ; but a horizon- tal or a little below is our preference. The rifle is better balanced, and the light, especially in opposition to the sun, is thus less dazzling and makes the cleanest bead. Hence I select, if possible, on occasions like the present a bird so placed as to render the affair more like our target firing. "Now, Sir." we continue "I shall hit that bird." "If you do, I will eat it." "Then you will have your supper in a second or two." And with that I set triggers toss down my hat feel for a level with my feet cock rifle turn left side to the mark raise the piece with my thumb on the cock incline shoulders back with knees bending outward till the mass of man and gun rest on FIRST YEAR 107 the base let fall the rifle a little below object and then, ceasing to breathe and stopping my pulse, and bringing into the hind sight a silver bead like a pin's head, I rapidly raise that bead till dark- ened by the feathers under the throat and the next you see is a gentle flutter of spread wings as if the poor little creature was flying down for a worm or a crumb. "Ah! Sir, you've only inflicted a severe wound; but really this is wonderful ! I could hardly believe in this skill unless I saw it." "Well, sir, please pick it up; the poor tit is dead enough, and never knew what hurt him." And of course, reader, it must be so, for the bird's head is off. Such skill was of course not the work of a day. Ounces of powder and pounds of lead were spent in vain first, and many a squirrel, at the crack of the rifle, would remain chattering or eating a nut, imagining somebody was shooting somewhere ; until conjecturing by the third or fourth ball pealing bark some two or three feet from him, that the firing was rather in his direction, away he would scud for fear a chance bullet should maybe hit him ! But my heart was in the matter in those days. Hence it is no great marvel if in due time my rifle dealt out certain death second to none in the Purchase. What avail then concealment in the topmost branches; there was the dark spot of a body or a head amid the green leaves. What ! a retreat behind crotches or into holes; there was yet the tip of an ear or point of a nose, or twinkle of an eye. Or did a squirrel expand on a small limb till his body above was a mere line of fur on the bark like feathery hair on a caterpillar? in vain, "the meat" was mine. A squirrel once so stretched himself as to create a doubt whether a squirrel was above the branch or not; tout firing secundum artem down he came, and, as was necessary, dead. Yet wound external had he none; he had been killed, as is often the case, although it occurred but once with me, by concussion; the ball having struck the limb of the tree exactly under his heart. Let none think we western people follow rifle shooting, however, for mere sport; that would be nearly as ignoble) as shot gun idleness The rifle procures, at certain seasons, the only meat we ever taste ; it defends our homes from wild animals io8 FIRST YEAR and saves our corn fields from squirrels and our hen-roosts from foxes, owls, opossums and other "varments." With it we kill our beeves and our hogs, and cut off our fowls' heads : do all things in fact, of the sort with it, where others use an axe, or a knife, or that far east savagism, the thumb and finger. The rifle is a woodman's lasso. He carries it everywhere as (a very degrading comparison for the gun, but none other occurs), a dandy a cane. All, then, who came to our tannery or store came thus armed ; and rarely did a customer go, till his rifle had been tried at a mark, living or dead, and we had listened to achievements it had done and could do again. No wonder, in these circumstances, if I should practice ; especially when it needed but the flash of a rifle pan to set off our in-bred magazine of love and tendencies towards bullet moulds and horn loaders! No wonder, that, after many, failures, even in hitting a tree, Mr. Carlton could be seen in his glory at last, standing within lines of beholders right and left, and at forty-five yards off-hand planting bullet after bullet into the same auger hole ! Reader ! may you live a thousand years ; but if you must die, unless somebody will save your life by splitting an apple on your head (William Tell size) at fifty yards off-hand with a rifle ball, send for me shut your eyes for fear of flinching and at the crack go, your life is your own. Old Dick is one hobby often mounted literally and maybe now too often, metaphorically, the rifle is my other: But with this by no means must we bore you; and, therefore, after narrating my famous shots in behalf of the Temperance Society, we shall for the present put the gun on the rack over the fireplace. Glenville and myself were once, on some mercantile affairs, travelling in an adjoining county, when we came suddenly on a party preparing to shoot at a mark; and from the energy of words and gestures it was plain enough a prize of unusual im- portance was proposed. We halted a moment, and found the stake to be a half-barrel of whiskey. If ever, then and there was to be sharp-shooting; and without question, then and there was present every chap in the settlements that could split a bullet on his knife blade or take the rag off the bush. "Glenville," said I, seized with a sudden whim, "lend me fifty cents; I mean to shoot." FIRST YEAR 109 "Nonsense ! Carlton ; you can't win here ; and if you could, what does the president of a temperance society want with a barrel of whiskey ?" "John, if I can find a gun here anything like my own, I can win. And although I have never before won or lost a penny, I shall risk half a dollar now for the fun of the thing, and to have the satisfaction of knocking yonder barrel in the head and letting out the stuff into the branch here." After some further discussion Glenville acquiesced, and we drew near the party; where dismounting, I made the following speech and proposal : "Well, gentlemen, I think I can outshoot any man on the ground, if you will let us come in and any neighbour here will allow me to shoot his gun, in case I can find one to my notion; and here's my fifty cents for the chance. But, gentlemen and fel- low citizens, I intend to be right out and out like a backwoods- man ; and so you must all know we are cold water men, and don't believe in whiskey; and so, in case we win, the barrel is, you know, ours, and then I shall knock the article in the head. But then we are willing to pay either in money or temperance tracts the amount of treat every gentleman will get if anybody else wins." To this a fine, hardy looking farmer apparently some sixty years old and evidently the patriarch of the settlement, replied : "Well, stranger, come on; you're a powerful honest man any how; and here's my hand to it; if you win, which will a sort a tough you though, you may knock the stingo in the head. And stranger, you kin have this here gun of mine, or Long Jake's thare ; or any one you have a notion on. How do you shoot ?" "Off-hand, neighbour; any allowance?" "Yes; one hundred yards with a rest; eighty-five yards off- hand." "Agreed." "Agreed." Arrangements and conditions, usual in grand contests like that before us, were these: ist. A place level as possible was selected and cleared of all intervening bushes, twigs, &c. 2d. A large tree was chosen. I io FIRST YEAR Against this the target shingles were to be set, and from its roots or rather trunk, were measured off towards the upper end of the cleared level, the two distances, eighty-five and one hundred yards. A pair of very fine natural dividers were used on this occasion; viz. a tall young chap's legs, who stepped with an elastic jerk, counting every step a yard ; a profitable measure if one was buy- ing broadcloth; but here the little surpluses on the yards were equally to the advantage of all. 3d. Cross lines at each distance, eighty-five and one hundred yards, were drawn on the measured line ; and on the first the marksman stood who fired off-hand, while on the second the rests were placed or constructed. Rests de- pended on taste and fancy ; some made their own some used their own some used their comrades' and some rested the rifle against the side of a tree on the line : and of all the rests this is the best, if one is careful to place the barrel near its muzzle against the tree and not to press hard upon the barrel. Some drive in two forked stakes and place on them a horizontal piece; and some take a chair, and then seated on the ground, they have the front of the chair towards them and its legs between their feet, resting the whole gun thus upon the seat of the chair. Again, many set a small log or stone before them, and then lying down flat on their bellies, they place the muzzle on the rest and the butt of the gun on the ground near their face ; and then the rifle seems as move- less as if screwed in a vice. In this way Indians and woodsmen often lie in ambuscade for deer at the licks, or enemies in war. 4th. Every man prepared a separate target. This was a poplar single, having near its middle a spot blackened with powder or charcoal as a ground ; and on this ground was nailed at its four corners a piece of white paper about an inch square and its centre formed by a diamond hole ; two corners being perpendicularly up and down. From the interior angles of the diamond were scratched with a knife point two diagonals, and at their inter- section was the true centre. With a radius of four inches from this centre was then circumscribed a circle : if beyond this circum- ference any one of the allotted shots struck, ay! but a hair's breadth, all other shots, even if in the very centre, were nugatory the unlucky marksman lost. 5. Each man had three shots. And provided the three were FIRST YEAR in within the circle, each was to be measured by a line from the centre of the diamond to the near edge of the bullet hole except a ball grazed the centre, and then the line went to the centre of the hole and then, the three separate lengths added were esti- mated as one string or line, the shortest securing the prize. This is called line shooting. 6th. Each one fixed, or had fixed, his target against the tree as he pleased ; and then, each man was to fire his three shots in succession, without being hurried or retarded. We occupied on an average to-day every man about fifteen minutes. More than thirty persons were assembled, out of whom had been selected seven as the best marksmen ; but these, induced by the novelty, having good-naturedly admitted me, we were now eight. Of the eight, five preferred to shoot with a rest; but the old Achates, the sapling 1 woodman that had stepped off the dis- tances, and myself, were to fire off hand. All the rifles were spontaneously offered for the stranger's use. I chose, however, Tall Jake's; for although about a pound too heavy, it sighted like my own, and went as easy on the triggers, and carried one hundred and eighty to the pound only five more than mine which carried one hundred and seventy-five. Auditors and spectators now formed the double lines, standing, stooping, and lying in very picturesque attitudes, some fifteen feet each side the range of the firing, and that away down towards the target tree even, behind which several chaps as usual, planted themselves to announce at each crack the result of the shot. All this seems perilous; and yet accidents rarely happen. In all my sojourn in the Purchase we had but two. The first happened to a fine young fellow, who impatient at some delay, peeped out it is supposed, to ascertain the cause, when at the instant the rifle was fired, and its ball glancing entered his head and he fell dead in his tracks. The next happened to an elderly man, who was stationed behind a large tree awaiting the report, and who at the flash of the gun, fell from behind with one piercing cry of agony, bleeding and dying: the trunk was hollow and in and opposite the place where our neighbour stood in apparent safety, was a mere shell, through which the ball had gone and entered his heart ! 1 Tall Jake. 112 FIRST YEAR Well, the firing at length began. I have no distinct recollection of every shot. Now and then, a central ball was announced, and that followed by two others a full inch or may be an inch and an eighth even from the centre; and once, where two successive balls were within the diamond, the third, by some mischance of the rest depended on, struck on the very edge of the grand circle. Balls, too, were sometimes planted in three different corners of the paper very good separate shots yet proving want of steady and artistical sighting, or even a little experimenting with the edges of the hind sight; which was owing doubtless to drawing the bead to the edge and not the bottom. A smart young fellow having made two very fair shots, boasted so grandly about his new rifle, that a grave, middle-aged hunter offered to bet a pound of lead, that if the young chap would al- low him after the gun was rested for the shot, to rub his hand from the lock to the muzzle, he would so bewitch the rifle that she should miss the big tree. This was all agreed to ; and then, such as knew how to bewitch rifles rapidly retreated to our rear, and such as did not, were beckoned and called till they came. All ready, the young man on the ground, and his rifle on its rest, our conjuror ran his hand slowly along the barrel, pausing an instant at the muzzle, and uttering an incantation, and then going behind the marksman, he bade him fire when he liked. This he did ; and marvellous enough it was the ball not only missed the shingle, but struck no where in the tree ! Great was the astonishment and mortification of the youth ; but as we magnanimously allowed him a shot extra and without witchcraft, his countenance brightened and especially when his ball now spoiled the inner edge of his diamond. Perhaps you are curious, and wish to learn how to bewitch a rifle? I will tell on one condition: all the spectators when a rifle is bewitched must be made to come to the rear of the firing party. Here is the recipe : let the rifle-doctor conceal in his hand a bullet small enough for the purpose, and on rubbing as far as the muzzle, let him as adroitly as possible deposit said bullet just within the said muzzle safely betting any number of pounds of lead, that whatever else the marksman may hit, he cannot hit his shingle. N.B. See that the rifle to be bewitched has no triggers- FIRST YEAR 113 set, and is not on cock, otherwise two tartars of a very unpleasant character may be caught by the rifle-doctor instead of one. One man only took to his belly (the technical term was to fire on his belly), but as his log-rest turned a little at the third shot, the unerring bullet, following the guidance of the barrel, stuck itself plump outside the circumference named, and thus nullify- ing one true central ball, and one in the lower interior point or angle of his diamond. Another man was still more unfortunate. After two most excellent shots, his gun hanging fire at the third, he bawled out, "No shot!" which being a notification before the shot could be examined and reported, entitled him to another trial ; but alas! the ball thus tabooed had grazed the centre! Again his gun hung fire; but now he did not veto; and his bullet was found sticking in the tree an honest foot above the top even of his shingle ! And now we, who fired off-hand, and thereby professed to be "crack" shots (yet most marksmen make a noise there) we began to make ready. We higgled a little as to who should lead off; not to show politeness as well bred folks in entering rooms and carriages, but because all were, the least bit however, cowed, and each wished to see what his neighbour could do first. When that kind of spirit comes crawling over a body in rifle-shooting, it must be banished in an instant. The effect in oratory may be a very good speech (unless you stump) but in our art, it is always a very bad shot. Our noble art demands calmness and the most imperturbable self-possession ; and that, at the beginning, the middle, the ending of the exercises. And so I said : "Well, gentlemen, if you want to see where to plant your balls, I'm the one, I think, to show you" "Why no; stranger" replied the old Achates "I allow that aint fair nither, to let you lead off. We're all neighbour-like here, and 'tis only right you should see what we kin do fust. I sort a suppose maybe it will save you the trouble of shootin anyhow. So come, Long Jake, crack away and I'll foller and arter, you, stranger, may shoot or not jist as you like best." "Agreed, grandaddie," responded Long Jake, "so here goes." And then Jake, after returning from the old beech, where he had put up his target, took his rifle, left a moment leaning against 114 FIRST YEAR a tree, and with firmness and grace stepped on the line. Two things and only two gave me hopes, viz., he shut his left eye and held on the diamond without rising or falling perpendicularly to it : but then he held that rifle as if it were the true horizon and then click snap but no report. Lucky snap for me 2 I knew it must have been a central ball ; but still better for me Jake was embarrassed a little. Shaking out the damp powder he primed afresh, and again began his aim. Now, however, a very slight vibration seemed to glimmer on his barrel, and when he did fire, I was not disappointed nor greatly displeased at the cry from the fellows that leaped from behind the target tree "rite hand corner, grazin the dimind !" Again Jake loaded, raised his piece, and fired at first sight, and the cry now came "centre!" This increased my neighbour's confidence, and happily lessened his carefulness; for sighting, as he himself afterwards confessed, "a leetle bit coarseish like," the cry now was "line shot, scant quarter 'bove centre !" "Come, grandaddie," said Jake to the old gentleman as he walked up to the line from adjusting his shingle, "you must do a little better nor that, or maybe we'll lose our stingo, for I know by the way this stranger here handles my rifle, he's naturally a hard chap to beat." This speech was occasioned by my handling the gun, taking aim, setting triggers, &c., in order to get better acquainted with the piece ; and which experiments resulted in a secret and hearty wish for my own gun. "Well, Jake, I allow yours kin be beat a bit," replied our veteran taking his position on the line. At a glance towards his "toot en sembell," Mr. Carlton too, allowed he had met his match and, perhaps even with his own gun. How grand the calmness as if in no battle! How alive muscle and feature as if in the midst of enemies ! There he is dropping his bead ay, his eyes both wide awake, and he raises the piece till that bead dims on the lower point of his diamond a flash and from the tree "centre !" He 2 I am sorry to say it, but nobody in rifle-shooting is an Emmonite, or even a Hopkinsian; he wishes his neighbour to make good shots but not too good. And where perfect first-rate marksmen contend, an accident only can give any of them the victory. FIRST YEAR 115 was soon again ready, and at his second flash, came the cry ' "upper edge, fust hole!" and that cry was answered along the gradually narrowing and crowded lines, by the whole company "hurraw for grandaddie hurraw-aw !" His third shot, brought from the tree "lee-e-tle tor'ds rite corner of dimind jeest grazed centre!" and was answered by "grandaddie forever, hur- raw-aw-aw !" "Carlton," maliciously whispered Glenville, "the stingo is safe anti-temperance beats !" I felt honour demanded, however, a trial; and so requesting Glenville to fix as I should direct my target, I stood on the line of firing, sighting several times with open pan and no priming; until the mark exactly suited, when I cried out "stand clear!" And now, supposing Jake's rifle sighted like my own, and threw its ball a little above its head (as indeed is best), I drew up as usual, with rapidity, and fly just as the bead caught the lower tip of my diamond, the report instantly returned being "inside lower pint of dimind, scant quarter, b'low -centre !" "Blame close, stranger," said the old hero, "but I allow you'll have to mend it to beat me." "Praise from you, my old friend, is worth something I'll try my best to satisfy you." Jake's rifle was now understood: she sent balls exactly where she aimed, and not as mine, and most good rifles, an eighth of an inch above. Making, therefore, my front sight a hair thicker and fuller in the hind sight, and coming full on the lower angle of my diamond "Centre!" was echoed from the tree and along the lines "hurraw-aw ! for the stranger !" "You're most powerful good at it," said the old gentleman, "but my line's a leetle the shortest yet." "Well, my good old friend, here goes to make yours a little the longest" and away, along between the unflinching lines of excited spectators, whistled my third and last ball, bringing back the cry "lee-e-tle b'low the centre broke in first hole !" But, while all rushed to the examination and measurements, confined to our two shingles, no exultation burst forth, it being doubtful, or, as the hunters said, "a sort of dubus whether the stingo was grandaddie's, or the stranger's." In a few moments, however, and by the most ii6 FIRST YEAR honourable and exact measurements, it was decided that the old Achates had "the shortest string by near about half the brenth of his bullit!" And then such uproar rose of mingled hurraws, screams, shrieks, yells, and outcries ! an uproar none but true honest-hearted far westers, unadulterated by foreign or domestic scum, ever did or can make. The hurricane over, the victor mounting a log made the following speech : "Well, naburs, it's my sentimental opinyin this stranger's acted up, clean up, to the notch, and is most powerful clever. And I think if he'd a fired his own gun as how he mought a come out even, and made up the lettle matter of diff'runce atween us and that would be near about shootin a little bit the closest of any other chap, young or old, in these 'are diggins and so, says I, let's have three cheers for the stranger, and three more for his friend." Oh! dear reader! could you have heard the old, dark woods ring then ! I struggled hard, you may be sure ; but what was the use, the tears would come ! We both made replies to the compliment; and in concluding, for I mounted the log last, I touched on the wish we really had to do good, and that nothing was better for hardy, brave, and noble woodsmen than temperance. "Well, strangers, both on you," replied that very grand old man, "you shan't be disapinted. You depended on our honour and so, says I, if these 'are naburs here aint no objection, let them that want to, first take a suck of stingo for a treat, and then, says I, lets all load up and crack away at the cask, and I'll have fust shot." "Agreed ! agreed ! hurraw for grandaddie Tomsin hurraw for strangers! hurraw for the temperance society! load up, boys, load up! nobody wants a suck crack away, grandaddie crack away, we're all ready !" And crack went old Brave's rifle crack, long Jake's crack the brave Gyas, and the brave Cloanthus and crack every rifle in the company: and there rolled the wounded half-barrel, pouring its own death-dealing contents through its perforated heads and sides, till soon the stingo was all absorbed in the moist earth of the forest. Glenville and I now "gathered hossis and put out," highly FIRST YEAR 117 pleased with the events : and a few weeks after we were still more pleased, at hearing that all the company at the prize shooting that day had become members of the temperance society. If, there- fore, any old fashioned temperance society (such as it was before fanaticism ruled it,) wishes champions to shoot, provided "gran- daddie Tomsin" will be one, I know where can be found another. CHAPTER XVIII. "Thou shalt not muzzle the ox when he treadeth out the corn." (Obsolete since the use of patent threshing machines.) From the time of our arrival in and at Glenville (it being both a big and a little place), we commenced forming acquaintance with our neighbours. And this business was promoted by the many "little and big meetings" held by Mr. Hilsbury in all direc- tions, over and above the regular monthly ones in Glenville, and on three successive Sabbaths in old man Welden's settlement for everybody, man, woman and child, was found at meeting. Nor does it interfere with attendance, if it be rainy or shiney, or mighty cloudy, or powerful skyey ; but in all weathers and seasons, and from all quarters of the woods, along roads, traces, paths, or short cuts, come horses to the preaching ; some with single riders of any sex, bursting, at a gallop, into view, through underwood thickets of spicewood and papaw, or clearing log after log, in a kind of hop, skip and jump gait. Many horses indeed have two riders, a mode of horsemanship called in the Purchase "riding twice/.' And some horses come with folks riding even twice and a half, or may be thrice : for instance, with a man and his wife, the latter holding in her lap a two year old child, although the child is very often carried by the father ; or with three girls ; or with one beau, having two sun-bonnetted damsels behind. Dick always figured on such occasions with a cargo on his back that doubtless made a lively impression on his feelings of past times, and of the loads he had in his earlier days seem crammed into a Conestoga wagon: and never, in fact, did he look so like a family horse as on Sundays, when he usually carried so much of our family on his back. ii8 FIRST YEAR In fording swollen waters, if the water came up no higher than the saddle skirts, and if depending articles (legs and so on) could be crooked up or neatly packed on the mane, in plunged all, whether riding once, twice, or mo re fold: nay, it was contended that the more riders the better ; the heavier weight preventing the horse from being floated or losing his foothold in a strong cur- rent. But if it was certain that the creek was ''swimming high," then the riders crossed on a log, the horse swimming by its side and the bridle being held by the rider. Afterwards the furniture (saddle and so on) was transported over the natural bridge. Arrived at meeting "the critters" (alias the horses, or "hoss beasts") are hung to a swinging branch of some tree; for. such, yielding to the inquietude of the horses, prevents the snapping of reins, and yet affords ample space for the curvilinear play of the hind quarters. Nor are the horses at all backward in using their ecclesiastical privileges; especially if we are favoured with "a powerful smart preacher, that is, a fellow with a very glib tongue, who preaches by inspiration, and has the wonderful power of say- ing nothing, or something worse, over and over again, for hours. Then the hung animals, impatient maybe, begin and carry on extra dancings, rump-rangings, branch shakings, and other exercises. They champ bits! snap their teeth at neighbouring horses! kick, as quadrupeds should, in quadruple time! and stamp, squeak, and squeal ! In fact, they make as much noise and behave as foolishly as if they held a fanatical meeting themselves ! Often too, among the horses, are a few knowing old codgers (and Dick, I am sorry to say, cultivated their acquaintance), who have slipped their own bridles, and are now misspending the time in eating off the bridle reins of quiet animals, or in kicking and biting, with most provoking sang-froid, fastened horses, already furious and indignant. Most horses when liberated usually start home at full speed, inconsiderately leaving folks that rode once or twice to meeting, to walk away in single or double file, or to get a lift from a neighbour. Dick, however, never ran home: he pre- ferred, like luke-warm Christians, Sunday visiting; and so went to see his neighbours in settlements directly opposite the way to Glenville. Yet I must say he never made the least objection to be caught and bridled again provided you could find him. FIRST YEAR 119 Let none understand me to say that religious meetings in the wooden world are not by very many attended from serious and devout motives : yet there, as elsewhere, many attend such meet- ings from secular motives, and some from very improper ones. Numbers go to see their neighbours or to hear the news, and not a few to electioneer. A very frequent cause is to "advertise strays." Dignity is given to our pulpit gazetteering by confining the business to the clergy ; but in the Purchase, lay members, and even "a worldling" give out notices : and that, not by reading the ad- vertisement in the reverential manner of the civilized churches, but extemporaneously and orally. Sometimes the affair assumes the form of the question implied, as thus : "Neighbour Bushwhack, livin down the lower end of Sugar Holler, would like to hear if any body in this here settlement has heern or seed a stray critter of hissin, as his hoss-beast, a three year old black geldin, come next spring, with a switch tail, but a kind a eat off by his other colt, slipt his bridle on Hick'ry Ridge last big meetin, and he aint heern or seen nothin of him sense." To which indirect query one or more neighbours rising up will answer in this style ; "Well, I allow the critter didn't come over here, as he'd been heern on or seed by some of us but if any body hears or sees sich a stray, we'll put him up, and let neighbour Bushwhack know of it." Perhaps a notice thus given and answered in a city church would do as much to discountenance Sabbath advertising, as the rebukes of the religious press. Try it. A big meeting is often held in the woods in our delicious autumns. And nothing is more welcome to our young people hard at work till then, and needing a holiday, than such a gath- ering. Then is the grand sparking time, and young men go ex- pressly as they say, to find "a most powerful heap of gals!" Nor is this curious heap of sun-bonnets and calico frocks adverse to a little extra attention; and hence, compound parties steal away at intervals to the springs, where they contrive accidentally to have a little meeting of their own, whose merry and loud notes return as strange echoes to the voice of psalmody and prayer. 120 FIRST YEAR A small meeting extra, is often held at night in a friend's cabin. Then it sometimes happens, by reason of a storm or very long sermon, or both, that the folks conclude to stay all night; and then if the author's memory is faithful, we used to see what was called "a leetle fun." Nothing immoral or gross ever takes place ; but certainly we had something more lively than praying and singing. It was, therefore, with some surprise we used to read reports from new missionaries, in which "the large numbers that came in all weathers and from great distances to attend protracted meetings, and who seemed unable to tear themselves away from the exercises, &c. &c." was considered as conclusive evidence that we New Purchase people had uncommon anxieties to hear the truth. Now, the result of all our experience, and we had a pretty rich one, is and was that unregenerate hearts are pretty much out there as in here that men born of log cabins and stick chimneys, and men born of silks and broadcloths, are all equally "born of the flesh" and "are flesh." Maybe the German popula- tion about central Pennsylvania are exceptions, as a certain learned young Doctor of Divinity seems to think ; but then, they are the sole exceptions. The occasion offers to say a few words about the missionaries themselves. But while we profess to be very good-natured and social, we are not, reader, so charitable as to extend our term beyond pretty well educated, talented and evangelical mission- aries. We made Glenville head-quarters for missionaries and we ever found uneducated preachers and even small talented gentlemen, an inconvenience and an evil more than a blessing; and as to the unevangelical sort, learned or unlearned, they were a nuisance and a pest. As a body, then, the true missionaries in the New Purchase were very excellent men; eminent in self-denial, in ardent zeal, in endless labours, in disinterestedness. They were considered Domestic Missionaries ; but they endured as much as their breth- ren in the foreign field, and that without the incidental excite- ment and support derived from the eclat of a mission : especially when the wood's preacher comes to depend for his entire susten- ance on two or more weak settlements, the aid of the missionary FIRST YEAR 121 society being declined or withdrawn. For a year or two an approximate salary may be paid, a few shillings in cash and the balance in "trade." Still, educated men need a few other articles beyond pork, corn, tow-linen, leather, &c. a few books for instance. And they are forced to go a few journeys; wish to educate their children; pay doctor's fees, and the like. Nor is it, maybe, an unpardonable sin to aspire after furniture one de- gree above rough cabin apparatus. Hence the missionary must have a little hard cash ; and hard enough for them, poor fellows, it is by the time they handle it. The outposts, therefore, must be either wholly abandoned to profoundly ignorant, vain, empty, conceited, self-confident, and snarling fanatical preachers; or proper preachers must do some things that are secular. And if the New Purchasers are abandon- ed, then must they be cursed out there with inspired clergy, such as we have heard thus reciting their apostolic creed : "Yes, bless the Lord, I am a poor, humble man and I doesn't know a single letter in the A B C's, and couldn't read a chapter in the Bible no how you could fix it, bless the Lord ! I jist preach like old Peter and Poll, by the Sperit. Yes, we don't ax pay in cash nor trade nither for the Gospel, and arn't no hirelins like them high-flow'd college-larned sheepskins but as the Lord freely give us, we freely give our fellow critturs." Hence a few of the true preachers betake themselves to teach- ing as the least uncanonical avocation. And all would gladly do this, if scholars were plenty enough; and, if after all the extra labour in teaching, pay came not also in the shape of fat- flitch, cord-wood, eggs, and butter. Most true preachers and pastors are, therefore, compelled to enter some land; and then after long and arduous toils they contrive to barter some pro- duce at the settlement store for sugar, tea, coffee and paper. But to jingle a few silver dollars, the person must sell a cow, or calf, or even a horse! The proverb, "half a loaf better than no bread," applies here ; for if proper ministers out West do not, in very many places, in a great measure maintain themselves, settlements now half served by those noble men would not and could not be served at all. True, the folks out there might have husks from fanatical fel- 122 FIRST YEAR lows; but Christ's sheep ought to have pastors and proper food they are not hogs to be fed by the Devil's swine-herds. Very nice and classic essays used to find their way sometimes to Glenville, which were full of very proper rhetorical words against secular clergy, and commanding them to reform and give them- selves wholly to the work of God and the ministry: essays no doubt well intended, but written, we apprehend, by inexperienced young gentlemen, just married, and seated in the parsonage in the midst of a well furnished library. Sometimes, too, such essays were penned by learned gentlemen, with sons and daughters at good boarding schools ; and the writers, maybe, received so much hard silver per page, especially if a prize essay; and our far east censors not only had the pleasure of pelting our poor frogs, but found it profitable too. In such essays the Proton Pseudos was, "all pastors and preachers must give up secular employments their schools their farms their merchandise their trades and imitate the Apostles, &c." In extraordinary times men are sustained by the providence of God in extraordin- ary ways, and purse, scrip, and books in the Apostles' time were not needed ; and few then had the care and expense of a family, except Pope Peter! and he, unlike some Unholinesses, was wicked enough to prefer a Wife to a Harlot ! And even in those days Paul, whilst aiding to erect a spiritual tabernacle, supported himself at secular tent-making! It is not improbable that Luke, the beloved and benevolent physician, pre- scribed and took fees in emergencies. May, then, modern ministers in no cases do secular things, without being subjected to unkind suspicions, and not rarely denounced as merchants, farmers, speculators, and even jockies? Nay, many thus stig- matized are among the best of men; and that, however warned by hasty young clerks and clergy to look out for the doom of unfaithful stewards to bid to expect, after a life of toil for the gospel and after bestowing the spiritual without reaping the carnal, bid to look out for banishment into the outer darkness ! ! Ah! ye hasty censors! God will never forget labours of love in that far West or elsewhere ; even if a preacher, to put bread into the mouths, and garments on the bodies of his family, do work secularly with his own hands! FIRST YEAR 123 It is even granted by hasty writers, too, that the penuriousness and dishonesty of congregations may drive the minister to secular labour ; and that surely is ample and sufficient apology, one would think, for the minister's irreverent conduct. Why then this per- petual cannonade against the Clergy? Does it never occur, that the niggardly Mr. Miser, the close-fisted Mr. Grip, the narrow- minded Miss Snarl, and the dishonest Mr. and Mrs. Finepromise, may, at the grand assize, have to appear as defendants and show cause why the preacher was driven to be secular? Strange? passing strange, if a hunted, defrauded, broken-spirited man, who, because he wishes yet to preach, maintains himself, should, in addition to all his sufferings, be decried and rebuked as faithless and money-loving! as needing reform! as passing to a severe doom and vengeance in the life to come! Oh! you that in one sense, at least, are "at ease in Zion," and have, therefore, so much time to buffet, go, visit a New Purchase ! and then write "Mr. Carlton ! ! keep cool." Well, then, I will go on to say that meetings in the Purchase were not always dry affairs. Once, this very autumn, a two days' meeting was to come off on Saturday and Sunday in the Welden settlement. At the close of the first day, while Glen- ville and Carlton were "settin the toone for them,* a heavy shower began suddenly to fall; and as we clerks could not get out to secure our saddles they became well soaked. Many, indeed, hurried out to secure their own accoutrements and those of the "wimmin folks's," but they forgot the clerks and the rector's: hence after service we found seats cool and refreshing as a wet sponge. We had been invited to spend the night at a chieftain's x in the settlement: and as we were without umbrellas or cloaks, and the rain kept mizzling away, we had a very agreeable ride of it, receiving too, from overhanging branches and thick bushes frequent "baby-sprinklings" until the whole amounted to "be- liever's baptism" a thorough immersion. However, we were neither salt nor sugar. On we splattered and splashed, laughing and talking, while our saddle-seats added to the noise very hearty and peculiar notes or sounds, which may be called soggings; and we comforted one another with mutual 1 White, of course. 124 FIRST YEAR promises of a dry house and a drying fire. But ah! me! our dear good landlady, and expressly to honour her guests, had de- termined to have ''things fixed !" and a wet fix it was. First and foremost, the puncheon-floor had undergone a deluge of scrub- bing, effected by pouring over it forty great calabashes of water, or one great calabash forty times emptied! Then the floor had been violently assaulted with stiff brooms, till its dirt was raked and floated away to form an alluvion in the cellar below; but much of the flood having eluded the swabbing process that fol- lowed, there remained many Lilliputian lakes of muddy water in the cavities and gulleys of the puncheons. Secondarily, chairs, tables, benches, and even bedsteads had undergone Pharisaical ablutions: and although things did dry in process of time, yet, as the good woman remarked, "Things were a leetle dampish, to be sure!" Indeed, chairs and benches on which persons of a sanguine temperament sat, exhibited, on their rising, a decided Mosaic of dark and light shades. Thirdly, when we washed before supper and dinner in one, we were offered a wet towel to dry on ! the lady apologizing for the anomaly by saying, "Thar'd been sich a rite down smart chance of rain that their wash wouldn't dry." Of course this apology accounted for the undried table-cloth at the meal ; where, by the way, we recognized, in the midst of other good things, and full of milk, the republican bowl that a few moments before had enacted the part of wash-basin. In anticipation of its complex and yet desultory character, we of Glenville, instead of dipping at the time our hands into the bowl had poured from it the water over the hands. All the guests, we must say, were not so considerate. But a most sumptuous fire was roaring away for our comfort ; and, be satisfied, in no sense was it cold comfort. And soon all, and at a very respectable distance, were steaming away, and, in the midst of haze and vapour, snuffling the savoury odours of ham fried in lard of venison and wild-turkey in ditto and of chickens in cream and butter! Generally, meats of every sort in the Purchase were fried, and that so perfectly as to be not only done, but actually done up; till the pieces curled at the edges, and the taste of one kind of flesh could not be distinguished from another, like like oh like the carcasses of one horse and FIRST YEAR 125 two cows burnt to death in the conflagration of Mr. Forgethis- name's * livery stables in the Northern Liberties. And yet a cookery of squirrels or chickens, a la Kaintuc, in cream, butter, and dusted flour, excels any fry in the world. By bed-time affairs had become dryish. Still, much vapour hung in our atmosphere; and towards the arctic regions of the cabin, matters were puddly. However, ten of the company were accommodated in the beds, and as many others, indeed, I do not know where : yet we all retired ; when a spirited and general confabulation was maintained till most of the trebles, tenors, and basses grew, some flat and others muttering, and there was a subsidence into a colloquy between two. At last, one of these returning a mumbling kind of response, Mr. Holdon, despairing to extract any more talk, cried out, "Well! good night:" which signal was followed by a farewell crackling of bedsteads, and an audible rustling of "kivers;" and then all lately so active and chatty, was turned into sleeping and snoring. Bah! tell me not about the sleep of innocence! nothing comes up to the sleep of a backwoodsman ; and as to his snoring, beat it if you can ! Well, I dreamed a dream. Methought old Dick was harnessed to our bedstead, and was pulling us through showery bushes and nettles, and that I had the tooth-ache, and so uncomfortable all seemed that I determined, as is the case in some dreams, to wake myself. Happy resolution! for whilst Dick had vanished, and we were safe enough in the cabin, yet the interpretation of the dream was present: a gentle stream was trickling from above through a hole in the clapboard roof, the eau d'esprit having al- ready saturated my rag-pillow, and more than a foot of the adjoining covers! and, what was very remarkable! I had the toothache ! ! "Indeed!" "Yes ! indeed. I whipped out of bed ; quietly worked the bed- stead from under the unelectric water spout; doubled my end of the bolster in place of the pillow removed ; got once more into bed, and began to lull the grumbling tooth by holding my mouth shut and breathing through the nose, and occasionally counting slowly and deliberately as high as a hundred. And in this 1 Said accident happened once upon a time, when we was a boy. 126 FIRST YEAR laudable work I had at last succeeded, and was sinking away into dryer dreams, when I was suddenly aroused to my last and severest "trial by water" by a rude shake from Glenville, who also thus addressed me : "Carlton ! are you going to sleep all day ? get up if you don't want your boots full of water " "My boots! my boots!! man alive! don't let them get any wetter I shall never get them on never!" "Up then or Tom Hilton will clean yours as he has mine he'll dip them in the rain-trough." Fortunately all were up and out but myself and yet it would have been the same if Queen Victoria had been there my boots were not to be trifled with, even when dry; what! if provoked by such a ducking ! I thought, therefore, of neither man, woman, nor child I thought only of my boots and I leaped out of bed without regard to the ordinary precautions and slipping on the limbs- of the indispensables (anglice, jerking on my breeches) and holding up and buttoning as I moved, I rushed to the door! and in the very nick of time to witness the catastrophe. Yes ! there on the muddy earth stood, sad and sullen, boot the first, clean and soaked as a scrubbed puncheon! and there descended into the rain-trough boot the second, up to the strap-stiches ! ! "Tom! Tom! why didn't you let my boots alone! you've fixed me now I shan't get them on to-day!" "Well, sir, I was only a sort of cleanin them they was most powerful muddy like hope no harm done, Mr. Carltin?" "Well, Tom, thank you but I am afraid we have tight work now please let's have the articles, any how." And our fear, reader, was not unfounded. Never, since the origin of boots, and the abolition of sandals, was there such a tugging at straps! It did seem as if, at last, the grand philos- ophical achievement would be effected, and with a leetle harder pull we should, boots and all, be raised clean up from the punch- eons! nearly equal to lifting one's self over a fence! And oh! what soaping of heels! what numerous and contradictory sug- gestions and advices from commiserating and laughing friends! tears in all eyes! Oh; the rubbing of insteps! the contortions of the os sublime! And then, withal, when a boot had reached FIRST YEAR 127 a certain point, the creature could be neither pulled on nor pulled off! But there limped Mr. Carlton, his two limbs glued, some- where about the junction of ancle and foot, in two remorseless leathers; a very "odd fellow," indeed, hobbling with four feet, two of his own treading downward, and two of the boots treading sideways and all with vain hopes of stretching, and thus coax- ing further on or off the half-tanned conveniences! At last it seemed necessary to cut the articles, as all ordinary and extraordinary attempts to move them up or down had failed, when, at the crisis, in came a Goliah-like woods-man, who, un- derstanding the fix, declared; "if them 'are straps thare would a sort a hold, he allow'd he'd pull on Mr. Carltin's boots." We agreed to a new trial. Accordingly, Mr. Goliah placed himself behind the patient, with his own back to the wall, and then work- ing two fingers apiece into each strap (all he could get in) he did pull the boots on, sure enough ! ! Ay ! and that he would have done if both of Mr. Carlton's legs had been in the same boot, in- stead of one leg per boot ! King William was of opinion that thumkins was logic enough to make him confess to a lie what, if he had tried the logic of my boots ! If the iron boot is any more forcible I cannot stand it at all I should scream out my belief in the Pope or the Devil, or any other dogma of the particular catholic church! The holy church will of course canonize a man who has already discovered two efficacious ways to make Christians our bark-wheel and now our boots! Apropos! de botte, this reminds me of the Kentuckian saved from the massacre, at the Blue Licks, by a pair of wet buckskin breeches. He was pursued by two Indians, and on reaching the river, was forced to plunge in and swim over. Emerging, he soon discovered that to run with his former speed, his buckskins must be left for booty: hence, he halted an instant to unskin himself, whilst his nimble foes had now reached the opposite bank of the stream. But now the wet unmentionables, half-way off, became obstinately adhesive, and could be drawn neither up nor down and the enemy coming nearer and nearer. "Poor fellow ! what a dreadful situation !" Very ; and so he made up his mind, like a gallant man, to die 128 FIRST YEAR in his breeches. And yet, being a Presbyterian, his predestined time had not come: for, to his amazement, his red friends, on arriving, burst into loud laughter, and, instead of knocking him on the head, they only spanked him on the antipodes and took him prisoner; and the Kentuckian, being ransomed, got home to tell his adventure and was one of the very few brave gentlemen that survived the battle of the Blue Licks. "Yes but, Mr. Carlton, what has this deliverance to do with the Pope or the Devil?" "Oh! nothing it was owing to the Indians: other torturers do not let off folks so easily. But talking of one thing, you know, makes us think of another." However, after the second edition of wet towels, wet table- cloths, and other dampers, we all went to church or, by courtesy, the dissenters' conventicle where seats and floor were also dampish: yet none of these little affairs killed us then, and even now, most of the Glenvillians live and talk, occasionally, of Carl- ton's Wet Time." During the present summer and fall, others of our colony had little adventures. For instance, John Glenville, in moving a piece of bark to throw under the wheel, was bitten in the wrist by a copper head coiled under the bark ; but, by a timely applica- tion of proper remedies, he escaped very serious injury. Uncle Leatherstocking also came something nearer being killed than Sir Roger's ancestor, that had a narrow escape from being slain in a battle by arriving on the field the very day after the fight : for our uncle, stooping to examine a fine cabbage in his patch, dis- covered a rattlesnake ready to salute him, and yet time enough to leap 'back and avoid the favour. And then a young woman coming from Welden, by herself, to return a call due to Glen- ville Settlement, just as she had reached the outskirts of our ter- ritory, was gratified by the sight, a little way from her, of a lady panther, affectionately sporting with two rampant pantherines each as big as a pair of domestic tom-cats. "La! and did she not scream?" Scream! Miss Peggy Whatmore scream! Fortunate for the quadrupeds, Peggy was within reach of no rifle ! No, no ! to use her own language, she only "a sort a skued round towards ole- PRKSIDENT ANDRKVV WYLIE First President of Indiana College 1828 FIRST YEAR 129 man Ashmoresis and didn't say nuthin to them, as they didn't seem like wantin to say nuthin to her yet it was a leetle skary as they was powerful nasty lookin varmints." A missionary, also, coming to fulfill an appointment among us saw in the edge of our clearing "three barr" i. e., three bears ; there being, in western phrase, "a powerful sprinkle" of such shaggy coats in our borough. At this information, all our domestic and neighbourhood forces being mustered, we succeeded in overtaking and killing the growling trio; and in due time, the largest skin, properly prepared at our tannery, was presented to the missionary who ever after, till the day of his death, used it as a bruin-saddle cover. Perhaps we may here say, that at night, on many occasions, were around invisible serenaders, that gave exact imitations of wolves howling, foxes barking, and owls screaming, hooting and screeching, with interruptions now and then from sudden cries and growls so strange that we could not say what bird or beast precisely was designed or represented. The whole, however, riveted the conviction that we were no longer dreaming about the woods, but were actually living there; and, to be candid, I had never in visions seen single serpent, and could not have guessed the wild beasts would turn out so very wild. But to all things I got used, except snakes. To the very last of my sojourn in the Purchase, I was slow to crawl through dark thickets ; and never did step over or off a log, till satisfied no serpent was there to be tramped upon: and, that it was necessary so to ponder our ways, may be believed by the incident with which we now end the chapter. One night Mr. and Mrs. C. were on a visit at Mr. Hilsbury's; and, though pressed to remain till morning, and warned of the danger in walking in the dark at that season of the year, we de- cided on returning to Uncle John's. The path between the cabins was only a few inches wide, and running through high grass and tall weeds, was pretty invisible in the day : yet having travelled it some half dozen times daily, I was familiar with every stone, stick and root, lying in or across the path ; and any thing new there would be sure to arrest my attention. Furnished with a light in a small glass lantern, we proceeded homeward, myself in front 130 FIRST YEAR and my wife following, till at the end of about two hundred yards, an unexpected root presented itself, running seemingly from the nearest beach : but as the root ought not to be there, be- fore taking the next step I stooped to examine, holding the light down towards the root which turned not into, but was in reality nothing more nor less than the head and neck of an enormous rattlesnake ! Perhaps a novice, as I then was in backwood life, may be pardoned for feeling a momentary sickness when the glare of the serpent's eye fell on mine, as the rays of the lamp disclosed and struck on his ! The distance between us was only eighteen inches; another step, therefore, would have carried me over or upon the reptile: in the former case / should have been safe, in the latter, one; or both Mrs. C. and myself would have been wounded, perhaps killed! And no sooner had I said It is a snake! than Mrs. C. too alarmed to reflect, instantly from behind clasped me, holding down both my arms; and thus allowing me neither to advance, nor retreat, nor stir, she at the same time began a series of most piercing shrieks, to which as nothing better could be done, Mr. C. added loud cries of "Hullow-ow! down there ! hullow-ow ! !" Of course, this uproar brought them all up from down there, and a clerical visitor among the rest Bishop Shrub of Timber- opolis. In the meantime the snake had retreated or passed on ; and as there was too great risk in poking after him amid the weeds and grass at night, and the central cabin was the farthest away, our whole party returned, and all spent the night at the parsonage. CHAPTER XIX. "Ab ovo Usque ad mala " "From the cackle to the cluckle." I was sitting one day, towards the end of September, with Bishop Hilsbury, when, through his modest little sash were seen two young men riding up ; who tying their horses, after a short FIRST YEAR 131 consultation, advanced, to the door. On this the Bishop whisper- ing "a wedding without doubt," hastened to receive his visitors, who yet administered the usual rap to the door, and entered with the universal salaam "Well ! who keeps house ?" Evidently the parson had been supposed alone; and my pres- ence seemed to disperse the courage mustered by the youngsters, and they stumbled into seats in manifest distress. But we soon engaged them in conversation on land, timber, corn, swine, muddy roads, dry ridges, high waters, and all sylvan topics: and on all and each, our friends rung the changes of all the powerfuls, big and little ; and all the chances and sprinkles, the smarts and right smarts and right down smarts, till they were talked, not out of countenance, but into it; nay, till they had more than a dozen times (while the clatter lasted) seemingly collected brass suffi- cient for their special affair to be introduced at the next pause. Yet alas ! with the calm, returned the sheepishness ; and there sat our rustics red as boiled lobsters, not at any thing said, but at what was to be said, and grinning a smileless kind of contortion at each other, equal to asking "Won't you begin?" Then they gnawed their spice wood riding whips wriggled on their seats crossing leg after leg, as if the legs were all equally opposed to being undermost, till convinced nothing by way of expose was coming this gap, off set afresh on the circle of old topics thus: "Immense forests here, sir!" "Yes most powerful 'mense heap of woods. Allow woods is most considerable cut off in them 'are settlements you come from, Mr. Carltin? They say you've no barr no turkey out thare, in Filledelfy?" "No : no bears on four legs. But still we've a smart sprinkle of dandy out our way" "Huh! haw! them's the fellers with hair on their faces and what goes gallin all the time powerful heap a fun in that, Mr. Hilsbury, though." Here the speaker stopt short; for what he had said about our hairy creatures was out of no disrespect for the animals, but only to lighten his own load ; but then he had found it still too heavy, and broke down at the lift. Retreat, however, did not offer, and so suddenly rising and winking to the parson, they both went 132 FIRST YEAR together into the yard, leaving myself and the other young man in the cabin. When outside, the groom for he it was, thus commenced : "Well hem Mr. Hilsbury hern !" "Yes Joseph I think I understand don't I ?" "Well allow, maybe you do." "I was down in the Welden settlement, and I heard something about our losing neighbour Ashford's Susan." "He! he! yes! well I*am a sort a goin to git married and Susan's the very gal. Well now, Mr. Hilsbury, Billy Welden's come along for a groomsman and he's got the invite I'll just call him out and git it." Billy accordingly was now summoned, and taking off his new fur hat, he extracted the "invite" from the lining and handed it over to the preacher. As the Bishop allowed me to see the docu- ment as a specimen of New Purchase literature, I took the fol- lowing exact and literal copy: "Rev. Mr. Hilsbury asqr., you are pertikurly invited to atend the house of mr. Abrim Ashford asq. to injine upon i the yoke of konjegal mattrimunny with his dater miss Susan Ashford as was thersday mornin next 10 aklok before dinner a. m. mr. Joseph Redden your humbell sarv't, mr. William Welden, groomsman." "p. s. dont say nuthin about this 'ere weddin that's to be as its to be sekrit and to morrer Billy Welden's goin to ride round and give the invites and all your settlemint's to be axed." The reader will err if he think this the worst specimen of our New Purchase authorship. It was, in fact, the best our literati, near Glenville at least, could furnish, (and like Andrews and Stoddard's Grammar,) it was a joint reproduction; it was done by Joseph Redden and William Welden, both aided by the school- master of the Welden settlement. And it was got up with great care and done in the very best round hand. Few persons around us at this time, could even read, much less write ; and the ladies of Glenville were regarded with wonder as soon as it was known that they could not only read and write, but even "sifer, and cast FIRST YEAR 133 'counts !" We men of Glenville had from the first been deemed "powerful smart," and the above note had been got up and per- formed expressly to show us that other folks had learning too, *nd could do a thing up to Gunter. Next day Mr. Welden appeared in the edge of the woods, be- ing too much in a hurry to dismount and let down the bars, and according to etiquette in such cases, he exclaimed, "Hullow! the house!" Upon this, Mr. Seymour proceeded to the fence, and on his return to the house announced that we all had the anticipated invite. And now as it is sometimes before we go to the wedding, we may properly in the interval introduce the bride elect and her family. Abraham Ashford, the father, was the patriarch of the Ashford settlement, which joined Glenville on the north-west. Af- ter a life of some years in a cabin of the roughest order, the family had, within the past year, removed into a good two story log-house of the hewed order ; and hence, he himself being a very tall man and having sons tending rapidly upward to his summit level, and having a two story house, neighbour Ashford is to be regarded as an eminent man. He had, too, scraped a spelling acquaintance with easy reading, and that made him affect the company of the Glenvillians not so much I fear to increase his knowledge as to display it. For instance, once on bringing his stock of ginseng to our tannery, where we bought the article on speculation, Mr. Ashford on laying it on a dry hide thus began : "Well, Johnny, my buck, what do you allow sang's (ginseng) done with out thare in Chi-ne?" "Oh ! probably the Chinese smoke it, or chew it !" "Well, that's your idee ; but I knows better nor that comes to, according to my idee." "What is your opinion ?" "Well, I'll tell you. A sailor-man was once out here in sang time a buying up long afore you come out and he'd been in all them parts about Chi-ne in a ship or the like and he told me all about what them fellers done with it." "Indeed!" "Yes and he told me as how they biled the sang up, and put it in to clarify chany tea cups and sassers." 134 FIRST YEAR Neighbour Ashford was, moreover, a philosopher; but as his views may perhaps expose him to a visit from the Inquisition, I shall give no greater insight into his physical creeds, than by a narration of our talk on the shape of the earth. "Mr. Ashford," said Glenville, one day I was present, "I wish you would let Carlton here understand your idea about the shape of the earth; he's just from college and don't think as you do." "Well, Johnny, my buck, I'm willing to talk with Mr. Carlton, or any larn'd man; and I've no idee this here world of ourn is round. Them's my sentiments, Mr. Carlton." "I do not quite agree with you there, Mr. Ashford; I have been taught that our earth is an oblate spheroid !" "Oh ! I don't know nuther consarnin high-flow'd diksionary shapes ; all my idee is the world's not ublate, nor no sort of round, and I kin prove it straight as a rifle." "I only meant to say I was taught to think the world was a sort of roundish; but I'm ready to give up if you can prove as you say." "Well, I'm powerful glad to see, Mr. Carlton, you aint proud for all your high larnin and so I'll jist tell you how I kim to find it out. 1 You see, sir, I was one day a ploughing with them two brown mares, to put in corn, and as we ploughed along, I gets into a solelo'que on this diffikilt pint, and so sez I to myself, sez I, what's the use in filloserfers a sayin our world's round. Don't my ole-womin's dry apples git off the plank and then role rite down, smack down the pitch of the ruf ? 'Cos why? Why 'cos it aint flat. And so I argefied the pint agin this way ; sez I, kin a feller go spang up the round of a big punkun? And then I stops the mares; and sez, wouldn't this here plough and them 'are hoss- beasts role down like the dry apples if this here world was round like a big punkun and aint it more powerful harder to go up and stick on a big round thing nor a little one? And then I jist minded and I slapped agin my head so, (action to word,) and I hollows out aloud, so that the mares started to go but I cries "woh! won't you?" and they stops agin and I kept on a hol- lowin "I've got it ! I've got it " and slaps rite off to make tracks home and when I gets in, sez I to the ole womun, "Molly," 1 Speech only translated and contracted and improved. FIRST YEAR 135 sez I, "hand us the ole book I've got it!" "Got what, Abrum?" sez she. "Why hand us the ole book, I tell you," sez I. (Dur- ing the progress of his lecture, 2 Mr. Ashford had taken up our family bible ; and now with his finger resting on the third verse of Genesis, he did, on a sudden for me, what he had previously done for his wife.) And so she hands me the ole book, and I lays it out afore her jist so, (opening and spreading the book before me,) "thare sir, thare, read that thare varse its proved from the Bible, sir thare read that are !" viz : "And the earth was with- out FORM ! sir." Here we held down our head as close to the page as possible, as if absorbed in thought and inspecting the words most closely, till with an unsteady voice we could reply : "I confess, Mr. Ashford, I never did see the passage in that light before; and it only proves that plain men, if left to them- selves, will often discover what learned folks never can ; but what shape is the earth do you say ?" "Do / say! why doesn't the ole book itself say the earth aint no shape at all? its got no form its nuthin but a grate stretched along place like a powerful big prararee without any ind yes, sir, and as flat as a pancake." "True, Mr. Ashford, and the Bible says also the earth is VOID! empty, sir, and hollow as a nut shell!" For a moment Mr. Ashford was staggered at so unexpected an addition to his theory; he seemed alarmed at the utter empti- ness of a shapeless earth! Yet at the very next log-rolling, he proclaimed both Glenville and Carlton to be converts to his "idee," adding in the latter gentleman's praise, "he wan't nere so stuck up a feller as folks said." And so, reader, we are Amorphorites ; with more belief, however, in the emptiness of the world, than in its want of shapes. As to the sun, Mr. Ashford had a very peculiar and original theory; "I am," said he, "sentimentally of opinion that the sun, after all, is nothing but a great shine !" Like many other forest patriarchs, our neighbour often did his own preaching; being in advance of this age, when we all do our own doctoring, write our own poetry, tales, essays, and every man is his own lawyer; and 2 Could not some Lyceum send for Mr. Ashford ? 136 FIRST YEAR of course in theology, like people in an enlightened era, he had his own notions. Hence, in one discourse about the good Samari- tan, he took occasion to illuminate us as to its "Speretil meaning ;" and among other things said, "some folks think that the two pennies left the Jerickoo man, was nuthin but cash pennies but my friends, there's a speretil and bettersome idee: one penny is the law, and tother's the gospel." The Ashfords were, however, remarkable for nice housekeep- ing, and for cleanliness of person. They all were, too, thrifty and ingenious. Unable in the early times of their settlement to obtain hemp or flax, they gathered a peculiar species of nettle, (called there nettleweed,) which they succeeded in dressing like flax, and in weaving it into cloth. By some accident, they had been then destitute of food for several days, and during that time they had lived on squirrels and elm-bark. But the rose of our wilderness was Susan Ash ford, the intended bride. Ignorant, indeed, she was of all things out of the woods ; but she was of good natural capacity, merry disposition, lofty notions, and withal a very pretty and modest maiden. From the first, she took a strong liking for the Glenville people; and was evidently glad to find friends able and willing to teach her many important matters of which she frankly and voluntarily would confess her ignorance. And as far as her mother would permit, Susan by degrees conformed their own domestic economy and fixtures to ours, defending us when- ever her mother would object and intimate that the "Glenville folks were, maybe, a leetle prouder nor they should be." Susan had, of course, many offers ; yet as she told Emily Glen- ville, her confidante "she'd no idea of marrying any rough body without no more manners than a barr ; and for her part she'd have somebody that know'd how to dress up on Sundays in store cloth and yaller buttins, a sort a gentleman like." Now Susan did not really think that dress made the man ; she did only think, and properly think, that no decent young fellow would on proper occasions boorishly neglect his dress, and espe- cially when he came a courting. One answering externally became a suitor. He was morally, however, unworthy Susan ; and her escape was owing to his per- sonal dirtiness with which a curious accident made her ac- FIRST YEAR 137 quainted. She caught sight of his naked feet, as he in a moment of f orgetf ulness took off his shoes and stockings in her presence ; upon which she declared next day to Emily Glenville, "that she never would have sich a dirty feller, if he did wear store cloth and yaller buttins." This fellow, a pretty well educated Scotch- man, had courted some by letters, which the Ashfords not fully comprehending had now and then brought to Emily to be de- ciphered, especially the letter in which the suitor said, "he had a predilection for his mistress !" On this occasion, Susan remarked, "there was sich a powerful heap of diksenery words, she could'nt quite see the drift on 'em. Happily the above accident saved our protege from a disastrous union with an atheist and a distiller. But now Joseph Redden was accepted; a very honest, indus- trious, and upright young man ; and who not only dressed up to Susan's rule, but more than that, he kept, about twenty-five miles distant, a small store himself, and sold store cloth and yellow buttons to others. And thus Susan, and all her old friends, and we her new ones, were well satisfied. Having no occasion to mention our young folks after the wedding, we think the reader will be glad to know, that when we re-emigrated from the west, Mr. and Mrs. Redden were living in comfortable circumstances, respected and beloved. In due time the wedding-day came. Mr. Hilsbury, however, had not yet got home from a distant missionary tour, and we of Glenville were forced to set out without the bishop ; in hopes in- deed, he would be yet in time at Mr. Ashford's. Between our settlement and his, the distance was little more than two miles; and for want of conveyances enough for all, it was concluded in a general assembly of our colony the day before, that the ladies and helps of the borough, should ride to the wedding, and the gentlemen walk. And so we took up the line of procession thus : 1. Uncles John and Tommy in the van. Their business was to keep the true course through the woods, clear away brush and let down fences. 2. Mrs. Glenville and Aunt Kitty riding twice on Kate, the celebrated grey mare queen of horses (genus.) 3. The Rev. Mistress Hilsbury on a borrowed nag; the lady with an infant in her arms, and a little girl for nurse behind. 138 FIRST YEAR 4. Mrs. Carlton, Miss Emily and Aunt Nancy on our spotted mare, called Freckled Ginney. 5. Last of the cavalry, Old Dick, with all the help of the colony i. e. three gals riding thrice. 6. Glenville and Carlton closed the rear. Our business was to put up fences, see the ladies get along in safety, and, above all, to keep Dick from lagging. For like grave personages familiar with Chesterfield, Dick was rarely in a hurry ; on the contrary he usually stepped with a very solemn swing, as conscious men's eyes were upon him and of his weight in society. And yet after a very long sermon he would sometimes hasten home with an irreverent impatience; and always on rounding a certain sink hole, whence could be caught a glimpse of the stable, our hero, and without consulting the friends who were kindly backing him, would sud- denly pitch into a gait compounded of every pace and shuffle ever learned in his youth or since taken up extemporaneously. Once Dick had been loaned to the Bishop's wife; and on our return from church all persuasives from the lady's heel and Mr. Carlton's toe all stripes from beech rods and leather whip all cherrups and get-ups and even old-rascals-you all snapping of bridle reins to bring to his recollection Conestogo whip-crackings all, all were in vain! Dick only grinned or gave a double flourish with his tail, crawling along and dragging leg after leg, till they seemed always in motion and yet always stock-still ! But unexpectedly to us he reached the favourite sink hole; when, giving a sudden sneeze and slapping my beast in the face with his tail, away he darted into the nondescript gait named but very much as if the caco-demons dislodged from the swine had some- how got possession of his carcase. The dry leaves of autumn were then plenty, and the fellow got them into such a lively, ex- cited and noisy state, that we riders, only ten feet apart, could hear nothing said by one another: hence, after use- less efforts to be heard in answer to the lady's voice coming to me in a high screech-key, I kept only at last rising in my stirrups, opening the mouth very wide and supporting the jaw with one hand, so that with a distorted face I seemed in the agony and effort of loud and earnest delivery but yet uttered not a word. And in this interesting attitude we sustained an instructive con- FIRST YEAR 139 versation, till the lady guessing at the pantomime, we both added a chorus of cachination to the rattling harmony of shuffling horse-heels, and came in a tempestuous whirlwind of careering leaves to the last bars; where Dick stopped and the hurricane subsided. "Nonsense! Mr. Carlton " Granted, my dear Mr. Graves : but are we back-woods' people to have no fun? And if we are to have any, how shall we have it unless we create it? You have concerts, and balls, and popular lectures till they become unpopular and jest books Lady's Book Gentleman's Book Boy's Book and organs in churches, and candy shops and oysters and what not? And we are to mope to death in the woods hey? Believe me, we learn out there to make our own sports and contrive to extract something pleasant from the empty roar of autumnal leaves shuffled and kicked into harmless tempest by old Dick's horse-heels. And further, dear Mr. Strutell, all this requires more ingenuity, and even a calmer conscience, than every body has: an ill-natured, an ignorant, a conceited, a wicked person will be very miserable in the solitudes of a New Purchase. "But you started for the wedding." We did; but we had two miles and more to go and here is the place and we shall resume the narrative. The wedding party were all assembled and expecting our ar- rival. And now Mr. Ashford came to meet us, expressing his regret at the failure of Mr. Hilsbury to be present ; but as several other preachers were present, he suggested that it would now be best to proceed with the ceremony. In this we coincided, and so preparation was made for it, the Rev. Diptin Menniwater being selected in place of Bishop Hilsbury. And soon then we were all paraded in the large rooms, in which the company was compactly rowed along upon benches, as noiseless and solemn as in "meetin :" and hence we men of Glenville went squeezing around, and among, and into, shaking hands with all that could be got at, and nodding and smiling and winking at such as could not be felt and handled, till places were found if not to sit in, yet to stand in, and where we waited in laudable patience for the descent of the bridal party to destroy I 4 o FIRST YEAR the oppressive and dead calm that succeeded. The solemn still- ness was indeed, now and then broken by some lagger who admin- istered the usual slap to the door and uttered the visiting formula already named but that was only an interruption like pitching a pebble into a smooth deep lake. At very long last Mrs. Ashford going to foot of the steps a compound of ladder and stairs called to those in the upper room : "Well if any body up thare's got a sort of notion to get married to-day, I allow thare's no time to lose, no how." This was answered with a species of giggle-sniggering by par- ties in both stories ; and in the midst commenced above a shuffle movement, as if something might be expected below pretty quick. And soon was placed in descending order, first, a pair of shiney new calf-skin boots with thin soles; then, secondly, only a step higher, a pair of bran new morocco slippers, with ancles in white stockings ; and then, thirdly, at suitable intervals, second pairs of shiney dittos and moroccos and ancles. These omens were in- stantly succeeded by coat tails hooked on men's arms, and white frocks held aloof from soiled stairs (all which matters were plain enough to us behind the stair way, it having no flooring or back for the convenience of sweeping and scrubbing) till the principal actors had all descended bodily, and stood among us propria persona i. e. as large as life. Whether from ignorance or etiquette, the groom and his attendant, instead of being leaned upon, rested their own arms on those of the two ladies, the bride and her maid as if each man had hooked a woman and was determined to hold her fast for a wife after the trouble of catching. The Rev. Mr. Menniwater, a piteous looking personage, hum- ble as a drowned rat, was now seen to emerge from behind one of the back benches, whither he had slunk away, to nurse his courage for the grand duty ; but unable to come near the parties at the foot of the stair-ladder, he remained where he was and began to cry out his part as if engaged in out-door preaching, only with unusual rapidity, lest his speech should be forgotten before it could all be delivered thus : "Well are you going for to take Sir that womin Sir a holdin by the hand Sir for a lawful covenint wife, Sir?" FIRST YEAR 141 To this question direct the groom and groomsman both re- tured nods ; although the real man added an audible "Yes I am," giving, too, a visible pinch to Susan's arm; equivalent to an ex- hortation and admonition that it was next her turn. "Well are you going for to liave hem ! Ma'am ! that thare man Ma'am! a holdin on your arm for to be your lawful covenint man hem ! husband, Ma'am ?" Here both ladies made a courtesy, (kurtshee,) but Susan added the affirmative; upon which the parson repeated the following closing form: "Well, I say then by authority of this here license from the dark of our court, as how you're both now man and woman that is hem ! as how both of you are married, young folks, and no body's no right to keep you asunder." Upon which, greatly terrified, our preacher instantly demanded something to drink ; not that he needed any thing from thirst, but from embarrassment, and to cover his retreat. And this request was, at the very word, answered by a potation or grog, of whiskey, water and maple sugar. Indeed, in those days out there, we have been in church, when, at the amen to the benediction, forth came Deacon Giles, with a wash-basin-bowl full of whiskey and some water, sweet- ened as above and flavoured with nutmeg ; and of this sipped first the man of God for form's sake: and after that it was all swallowed by the congregation, in mouth fuls sufficient to elevate the mind, if dejected by the sermon. But the Rev. D. Menniwater's call for drink, was the signal that the matrimonial meeting was out; and the kissing of the bride was set going by the ladies of Glenville, who, (for mere example's sake, however,) were followed by the gentlemen of Glenville. And two of these gentlemen, I think, extended their salutation to the bridesmaid, which was so encouraging to the groomsman, and other shy chaps, that they with one consent be- gan to salute the brides that were to be : so that affairs were soon as completely uproarious and screechery as in a fashionable, high- bred evening party, with one good piano and some three dozen vocalists, professors and amateurs of singing and talking. At last the girls put out, followed by the beaux, and none were left in the room but we old folks, (married people,) and the young couple. 142 FIRST YEAR And then came on all the old. racy and original jokes and sayings on such occasions, with some new ones in regard to the "man and woman," made by Mr. M. ; whose inveterate habit of "old manning," &c. had forced him to substitute man and woman for husband and wife, in concluding the ceremony. One very smart neighbour body so persisted in calling the whole no ceremony at all, that poor Susan was half persuaded she was hardly married ; and had we of Glenville fomented the affair, and Mr. Hilsbury been present, Susan, I do think, would have had the marriage ceremony over again. It was now noon, and dinner the grand affair was not to be till near 3 o'clock p. M. although every body, man, woman, boy, girl, help, domestic, hired and volunteer, hands and legs, were all ferment in hastening this catastrophe of our drama: and truly drama it was, if action and motion pertain to its essence. Here a boy was ferociously cutting wood there one toting wood : here a man and two women getting a fire in full blast out of doors there two men and one girl blowing up one within: and then rushed by a whirlwind of petticoats, with one featherless turkey, or two featherless hens, affectionately hugged along to dutch ovens and skillets! Some carried and fixed tables, pushing and kicking and jamming at them till they consented to stay fixed, and not to coggle ! Some fixed rattling plates, clattering knives, and ringing bowls on stout table covers ; which were at the same moment jerked by others, till they "came a sorter strate!" And there was Mr. Ashford, Jun. with his rifle, decapitating extra fowls, the company proving much larger than had been expected ! For on these hearty and solemn occasions every body is wel- come, who comes as an umbra to a neighbour, or acts as his own shadow and shade ; and every body is stuffed with as much as he will hold; so that all sorts of feathered creatures suffer for the wedding dinner, and in great numbers, it being long before a wholesome backwoodsman ever cries, "Ohe! jam satis!" about the same as the classic reader knows as crying out, "Well ! I've a belly full !" The whole clearing evidently enjoyed a saturnalia. Wagons and carts and sleds rested from rolling and screeching; gears of leather and gears of elm-bark hung crooked and unstretched on FIRST YEAR 143 fences and projections of cabin outhouses; and ploughs lay peace- ful, with polished shares gleaming in sunshine. The animals manifestly enjoyed the affair; hens of maternal character clucked mid late broods, and some wallowed in dust ; geese hissed ; ducks quacked; and dogs in all quarters, ran, barked, and wagged their very tails for gladness ; while shaggy horses peeped in wonder over bars, or hung tenderly about the barn and corn cribs. Adjacent the house was a yard ; and this being swept daily with wooden brooms and tramped, had become denuded of grass, and hard and clean as a puncheon floor. Here 3 we now walked, ran, jumped, joked, told tales, made brags and belts tickled folk's ears with timothy heads quizzed chaps about marrying chased girls going to the spring for water, or to the milk house, and ever so many funny things besides. And, what was wonderful! the girls went every five minutes to the spring or milk house; and came, too, through the front yard, when, if they had thought, the way out of the back door was much shorter and more direct! And then such a sprinkling of water from little calabashes and tin cups and ox horns ! And such a hanging of dish-cloths and milk-strainers on the "yaller buttins" of the hinder man! And the laughing! and the rifle-shooting! in a word, we, (author now included,) were most decidedly, and most vulgarly happy, joyous, and chock full of fun and frolic. Of course all this was too much for Old Dick to stand and look at all day : hence, contriving to ease off his bridle and then to work over the fence, or may be under it, there, sure enough, in the midst of our sacred enclosure, suddenly stood his impu- dence, and as if we were his "feller critturs." He was no stranger, however, to the company, and his self-introduction was hailed with more than three cheers ; it being well known he would contribute his share to the entertainment. Accordingly, like a favourite dog, he was fed with bits of bread, both corn and wheat, and with slices of fat pork and pieces of fresh beef ; which latter he would only chew awhile, like tobacco, and then eject. He was then smoothed and slapped and called names then pulled by the tail pinched on the ears made to grin and then jumped on and jumped over ; till at last girls were packed and 3 We, here belongs to the company, not the author. 144 FIRST YEAR stowed upon him, and nothing was visible of the favourite but four horse-legs, moving under frocks, and a tail wagging and flourishing happily among chinz and morrocco the whole a most grotesque feminine centaur ! But when we packed the fellow with men and boys, he would either shake or bite them off ; and if these failed he would suddenly lie down, and then the compound rollings were uncommonly entertaining. Three chaps now mounted Dick, and fully resolved to make him ford the creek, here about ten yards wide and some feet deep. By dint of coaxing and kicking and pulling and pushing, by the riders and the company, Dick was got into the water, when he splashed on voluntarily to the middle but farther than that, not an inch. No there he halted, and stood fixed as a river- horse that had grown up on the spot! And vain all entreaties, curlings, kickings! vain all combined hallooings! vain all pelting with clods and stones all latherings with long bean poles! he was wholly unbudgable! At last, however, he did move; and so did his riders, who hastily slipped off into water more than knee deep, preferring that to the roll in the creek Dick having exhibited the premonitory symptom of performing that ceremony ; and then they, amid no small uproar of laughter from the whole assembled "weddeners," waded to the bank. "But Dick, what did he?" Ay, sure enough why he speedily betook himself to the farther side, where he wandered about and eat twigs and bushes, till he was caught for our return. Reader, was all this instinct or reason? After this we told adventures. Among others, one hard feat- ured old worthy gave the following account about his "old womin's tarrifying a barr," angelice, terrifying a bear. "When we was fust settled" said he "down on Higginsis bottim, there was no mills in these parts and so we pack'd all our bread stuffs from out thare at Wool'll about once a month or thare-abouts, me going one day and coming back agin next day and my ole womin a stayin in the cabin till I gits back. The In- jins was mostly gone, but straglin ones kept comin on and off, but tho' they was harmless like, folks was a little dubus and didn't want thare company; and my ole womin she always shot the door at night, and a sort a draw'd the bedstid agin it. Well, FIRST YEAR 145 so one night I was away for meal and she bethought as how she'd render off her fat; and so she ons with the grate pot that one you're old womin neighbour Ashford borrered last year to bile sugar in and she puts in her fat and begins a heatin it; when what does she hear all at once on a sudden but a powerful trampin round the cabin ! "Maybe," says she to herself, "its some poor Injin wants in" when all at once the trampin stopt and somethin begins a scratchin up outside the chimbly, and she spies through a crack, and if it want a powerful barr that was arter the fat! And she know'd the varmint wasn't going to rest till he klim down the inside of the chimbly; and then she'd have to put out and maybe lose all her fat ! Well, my ole womin was to be sure, a leetle skur'd but she did'nt lose her presentiment of mind she only let the fellow back down as near as was con- venient and then she jerks a handful of dry grass out of our tick, and set fire to the whole on the fat! "And she says, 'twas most powerful laffy to hear the barr go up chimbly agin and how he was still heern a growlin and makin tracts for the timbers! And that's the way she tarrifyed the barr and a sort of a scorched his brichis." "That makes me, grandaddy," said a young Hecules "think how near I was to bein skur'd last week, with a wild cat over on Acorn Ridge. I was out huntin turkey, but had no luck, and didn't see the fust one till I comes toward's Inglissis and there I heerd a feller goblin. So I crawls into the brush near a beech and begins a goblin, and he begins a anserrin and a comin up but jist then I hears somethin a nuther in the beech above but I was a f card to move my head lest the turkey ketch sight of me and so I gives another gobble, and then hears him a coming up rite smart, and I was only waitin to git sight of him when what should I hear but a sudden shakin rite over my head and so I looks out of the tail of my eye so (turning his eye for illustration) and I'll be dogg'd if thare warn't a wild cat jist goin to spring, as I'd gobled him up like a gineine cock myself. So, you see I give up the turkey and killed the varmint and that's his skin, grandaddy, you see tother day at our house." This reminded Uncle John of an adventure of his own some- what similar, and he went on thus : 146 FIRST YEAR "One day when hunting in Georgia I got into a pine thicket, where I sat down on a log to rest. Happening to look in a cer- tain direction for nothing of the sort was expected I saw a fine buck coming slowly towards the thicket, either not seeing me or to reconnoitre. I had put off my shoes to cool my feet, but now without thinking about it, I rose to my feet ready to fire as soon as the deer should be near enough: but as I stood about this way (way exhibited, the legs apart) I felt some- thing very cold glide upon one of my bare feet, and on glancing my eye that way, what was it but a rattlesnake crawling from un- der the log across my foot! I had providentially presence of mind to remain immovable as a rock till the snake had actually crawled his whole length over my foot; and when fairly beyond I suddenly jumped away, and then killed him: but of course I lost my buck." "Brother John" said uncle Tommy "that makes me think of my being lost twenty years ago but dinner, I reckon, is most ready "Oh! no, uncle Tommy" said Mr. Ashford "we've time for that 'venture of yours." This was enough for Uncle Leatherstocking ; for no man so delighted in telling adventures. Indeed, few men ever en- countered more; and still fewer could orally relate them so well. He was not an educated man, or even a good English scholar; still he had read much and conversed much with intel- ligent persons : and so he was fluent in natural English, and could aptly coin words and pronunciations to suit new ideas and cir- cumstances. I shall try and preserve his manner and spirit : but to enjoy his stories, one should sit in his lonely cabin of a winter's night away in the howling wilderness, and see his countenance and action, and hear his tones. "Prehaps" said uncle Tommy "you know my wife's father had considerable land on the Blue Fox River in Ohio ; so as we two wanted a leetle more elbow room, I says one day to Nancy/'Nancy," says I, "I dad 'spose we put out and live there. Game's mighty plenty there, and there's fine water and plenty a fish, and plenty a wood ; and we kin lay in stores enough at Squattertown to last more nor six months on a streech." And sure enough, as I'm FIRST YEAR 147 a livin man, off we sets and puts up a cabin in the centre of the track, and that give us room for the present : for the nearest white settlement warnt nearer nor four mile, and Squattertown, the county seat, was nigh on to twelve mile off. The Ingins, poor critturs, kim a huntin over our track, albeit, there was no reglar town of theirn nearer nor twenty miles: but they never did us harm no, not a halt (little bit) and Nancy got so used to their red skins that she never minded them. There's bad Ingins that will steal and maybe massurkree: but most when they find a rale sinserity-hearted white, would a blame sight sooner scalp themselves than him. And I do believe me and Nancy was beliked by them : and many's the ven'sin and turkey they fotch'd as a sort of pres- ent, and maybe a kind of pay for breadstuffs and salt Nancy used to give them. Sartin, indeed, a white would now and then be killed: but when all the circumstansis was illusterated, it was generally found the white was agressur, and was kotch'd doing something agin their laws and me and Nancy had a secret con- science that the white deserved his fate: and sometimes I felt like takin sides with the red skins myself, and shootm down the whiskey devils that made them drunk but I'll not enter on that now. "Well, I hunted and fish'd about whole days, the livelong blessed day, while Nancy she'd stay alone a readin Scott's Family Bible: so that she got three times right spang through it, from kiver to kiver the whole three volumes, notes, practical ob- servations, marginal references, and all! And, I dad, if she didn't read clean through all our church histories, Milnursis, and Mush-heemisis, and history of the Baptisis and Methodisis, and never so many more books besides, for we always toted our books wherever we went. And when I fished I used to larn sarmins by heart out of Christmas Evans, and president Davy's and Mr. Walker's and that was a kind of help in preachin." Uncle Tommy usually made the dead speak when he preached, and sometimes he would echo Bishop Shrub and Bishop Hilsbury, and other living apostles. And in this he acted wisely, not being competent to the concoction of his own sermons; and besides, when fully excited he could do Christmas Evans' celebrated al- manac sermon nearly as well as Christmas himself : thence among 148 FIRST YEAR the "Baptistis," as he always called them, Uncle Tommy was greatly venerated, and was heaped up with titles like an English Bishop, being styled: "a mighty smart and most powerful big preacher!" Let not Uncle Tommy's pulpit preparation be de- spised; even "high larned sheepskins," it is said, do sometimes lay both the living and the dead under heavy contribution, and that, too, when not endowed with our buck-eye-preacher's pathos and unction. We, indeed, of Glenville, always preferred that uncle Tommy should represent Davies and Walker and even Evans and not to give his own. But to the story ; "Well" continued he "one morning early in December, I says to Nancy, "Nancy, I dad, says I, I do believe I'll jist take old Bet (a rifle) as we are out of meat, and go where I seen the turkeys roosting last night: you mind the morning, Nancy, my dear, don't you ?" "Bless you, Tommy Seymour, I'll never forget it I was near losing you then, Tommy." "Well, Nancy, I'll go on with the story." This was one of the interlocutories that always varied and interrupted Uncle Tommy's narratives, and nothing could excel the intense interest that most affectionate and devoted wife (wife and child to him) took in the stories, though heard the hundredth time. But uncle Tommy went on: "And so I slips out of bed it wasn't day quite and slips on my clothes, and fixes my old gun by the fire and then opens the door to set out, when I dissarned a leetle sprinkle of snow and a likelihood for a snow storm. Howsomever, this did'nt faze me, only I steps back for my old camlit cloak little thinking, as I fixed it on, how I'd need the thing afore I'd git back agin. "Well, I starts for where I'd seen the turkeys, and gitting near, sneaked round a bit, but soon found the critturs had been too quick, and like Paddy's flea, wasn't there. I heerd them, how- somever, fly, and so on I kept creeping slowly along till I'd got from home, mayhap, a matter of two miles; but the snow was so thick in the air that I never could dissarn the birds, and away they kept going flurry-wurry about seventy yards a head till I give up the hunt and turn'd to go home for fear Nancy might be waiting breakfast " FIRST YEAR 149 "Yes, Tommy Seymour, I did wait breakfast for you " "Never mind, Nancy, my dear child, I got back at last you know" replied uncle Tommy, and continued "Well, I turn'd to go back, but I dad if I could jist exactly tell where I was precise- ly, the snow had so teetolly kivered my tracks, and it was now snowing so bodaciously fast as to kiver as fast as I made them, but I took a sharp look at the timber, and fixing on a course, I kept my line for near two mile yet, I dad, if I could strike the cabin and couldn't tell whether it was too high or too low; and so up I went a short quarter, and down a short quarter, as near as could be guessed circumlocating for three hours, but no cabin was to be seen. Well, says I, I dad, if I aint about as good as lost ; and so sits down in a tree top to reconsiderate, and take a fresh start but soon starts up and hallows like the ole Harry but nothing gives no answer and all was snow! snow! snow! not a smite of noise, only my breathing and a sort of pittinpattin sound of my heart! I found it wouldn't do to stand still as the scarces begin to crawl in a leetle, and so off I sets a f a venture; for the cabin must be, says I, somewhere near; and sometimes I conceited it to be ahead of me, but all at once it vanished, and I seed it was only a case of fantis-magery and that I, Tommy Seymour, was actially lost " "Yes! Tommy, and I couldn't give you any help!" "Nancy! child, I wouldn't a had you there for the universal world." "Well," resumed he, "there I was teetotally lost ! I couldn't stay still yet what use to walk on? And if I fired my gun, and Nancy heerd it, and I didn't git back, mayhap she'd think the Injins had killed me, and then she'd come out and git lost too! and with that idea, thinks I, may be she's out now ! and then I gits bodaciously sker'd and hollows agin like the very ole Harry ! and walks and runs this way and that way the snow blinding my eyes but all was of no use I was lost! lost! lost! But it was only about Nancy here, I thought at this time; and I dad, if I din't ketch myself a crying like a child, and wished to be lost by myself without her coming out in such a storm! (We here stole a look at Aunt Nancy I could not catch her eye as she had her work-bag over her face: but "I dad," as uncle Tommy used 150 FIRST YEAR to say, if we didn't feel a leetle tender ourselves. And so, gen- erous reader, would you have felt, hearing the tremulous thrill of the venerable old man's voice and seeing his eye affectionately turned towards that dear old lady that for so many years had shared his wanderings and sorrows.) "Well, I must 'a become crazy, running round and hollowing and crying and all of no use when all at once it quit snowing, and I was sperited up, hoping the sun would shine out next, and I could take a course for Squattertown or the Injin settlement. But it kept dark and cloudy and I begins to feel weak from fatigue and hunger (albeit I war'nt sker'd on that pint, as I had old Bet along) and so allowing it was about one o'clock, I determined to strike the Blue Fox, and keep down stream to the settlement on its bank thirty miles down. Well, off I sets to strike the river, and in about four miles comes to a little pond with a couple of ducks swimming about. I stopp'd in my tracks knock'd out damp primin puts in fresh and slams away and kills one duck; and the other flies away. And I gits the duck to land by pitching sticks in, but not wanting to lose time, I kept on going; and so picked off the feathers and sucked a little of it raw, till it 'most made me sick, and I thought it would be better to keep and cool it at night which was now coming on black as thunder. Well, it was time to look out for a camp; and just about dark I come across a tree what had been twisted off by a harrikin, and was lodged to the butt ind on the stump; and the top on the ground was puttee much of a dry brush heap. For all the world ! there never was sich a place! Providence seemed to have blow'd it down jist for me! I could have camp'd there a week! And so we brushes away the snow and makes a fire in the top ! and near the stump under the trunk, makes a comfortable bed out of chunks and brush wood : and then I goes to the fire and sits down to cook my duck. "But, I dad, if I could help thinking about our cabin and every time I think of Nancy! I ; but I know'd there was a divine Providence and a heavenly Father and so I prayed, and then eat one half of my duck, keeping the other; as game was mighty skerse and no human beings was in that direction till I struck the Blue Fox. And then, making a little fire near my bed FIRST YEAR 151 for my feet, and kivering my powder-horn with a handkerchief to put under my head for fear of damp and sparks, I raps up in the ole-camlit, and laid down, and was soon fast asleep. "Well, after a while I gits to dreaming I was lost in a prararee, and that the grass had tuck fire, and that I was a kind of suf- focated and scorch'd ; and I dreamed I heerd the awful roaring of flames, and seen a burning whirlwind coming towards me, and that so sker'd me that I woke right up and, I dad! as I'm a livin man! if the woods all around me wasn't as light as day! And my tree was all a living blaze and burning splinters was tumblin on my ole camlit ay ! and my cotton handkerchief round my powder-horn was jist beginning to smoke and scorch ! I dad ! my friends and bruthrin" (Here, Uncle T. insensibly glided into his preaching tone and manner) "but this was a most mur- rakulous dream!! and show'd the nature of Providence and his care or I'd 'a soon been burnt to death or blow'd up! And I didn't sleep no more 'but kneeled down and thank'd God for the deliverance; and then kept sitting near the fire till day, and then I once more started for the river. "Howsomever, to make a long story short, I walked on and on the live-long blessed day, and never heerd or seen a living crittur; and I never came to any river but at night I comes to a log that had been chopp'd off and this give me courage. And so I makes a fire, and eats now the other half of my duck for I was somehow sartain I'd find a settlement in the morning. Well, I slept the second night along side this log, and by daybreak I ' jumps up and feels something a kind of moving in my old camlit and, I dad! if it wasn't a snake what the fire had smoked out of the log and what had crept into me to be warm ! But I only shook out the reptile and never killed him, thinking only of some, settlemint (Although it was the snake, brother John told about, that made me think of my adventure) for the sarcumstance of the chopp'd log satisfied me, some was near, as it was no tommy- hawk cut, but was done with a white man's axe. Well, I starts off puttee considerable peert and brisk, considerin I was weak, and, all at once, as I'm a livin man, if I didn't hear a bark ! And so I stops and listens and there was another and another and I was sartain it wasn't no fox or wolf but a dog and then, 152 FIRST YEAR I dad ! if I didn't streak off that way like greased lightnin ! and begun and holler'd and fired! and the dog bark'd louder and louder, and kept on coming nearer and nearer! and I a running and hollerin till all at once right in sight of me was a human cabin!! If I live a thousand years, (and none of us, my bruthren will live half that long,) I'll never forget that moment and if ever I thank'd God with a rale sinserity-heart, 'twas then. But while I was reconsidering whose settlemint it was, for things looked a kind of familiar, the dog what had kept on barkin, now bust out of the bushes, a yelpin and a prancin around me ! and why do you think ? because the poor feller had found his lost master and it was Nancy's little dog Ruff ! And would you believe it? my eyes was suddenly opened and like a pro- phit's, and I found I was on my own trampin ground, and the cabin was ours ! and there stood my dear child Nancy, a lookin our way out of the cabin door! I dad! if I didn't snatch up Ruff and kiss him! and the poor little crittur (he's dead now) Hck'd my face with his tongue and in that way I run over to Nancy." (Here the emotion of the old man and the agitation of his wife made a momentary pause it was, indeed, as solemn as church.) "Well, after all was explained and illusterated, we kneel'd down and thank'd God: and then Nancy, she told how she thought I was killed and then maybe only lost, till she was jist goin to start for the next settlemint; and if I'd a come ten minits later, she'd been off after help ! "So that's one of my scrapes ; and it illusterates the fillosof ee that makes a man keep going round and round when he's lost ; for albeit I must a walked more nor fifty mile in the two days, I wasn't never over seven mile from the cabin; and that's the pond where the duck was ; and when I come back again, I didn't know at fust my own cabin nor the chopp'd log, though I'd cut down the tree myself. And " Here dinner was fortunately announced; for nothing else then could have stopped Uncle Tommy and we weddeners had a lucky escape from a long sermon on Providence ; Uncle Tommy greatly delighting in improvements, and "speretilizing" his ad- ventures, and indeed, all other matters, and usually winding up his land-yarns with notes and practical observations, in the man- FIRST YEAR 153 ner of Henry and Scott. The truth is we were half starved, and had very natural hankerings after "beggarly elements carnal meats and drinks, and such like observances." The dinner table was set in the diagonal of the room, and could accommodate about thirty persons; but as our company was twice that number, we were "to eat twice." As usual the new married persons were seated at one end, and the groomsman and bridesmaid at the other: and then were seated all the married men, and after that as many as possible of the married women; preference on such occasions being shown to the worthier gender. 4 This inversion of the matrimonial chord arises mainly from the fact, that out there women reserve themselves to attend to the table ; and, therefore, when the "set up" is ordered, the gentlemen instantly seat themselves alongside, and partly under the table. Sheepish young chaps usually hang back, however hungry, and say, "Oh! there's no 'casion:" after which they give an ac- quiescing cough or two, or more commonly go to the door, and give a twang with the nose and finger instrument, (in place of fashionable phrases,) and then drop, as if shot down, into a seat, jerking the seat under the table, till the mouth comes to its level, and is thus fixed for convenient feeding. All Glenville had a seat at the first table, except John Glen- ville, who partly out of policy, but more out of true and gentle- manly feeling, preferred coming with the young people to the second table. And when the company were fixed and fixed it was till one could barely stir a hand or foot Uncle Tommy "asked a blessing;" when he made amends for a long story by a very short prayer. But even in that prayer, which certainly lasted no longer than two minutes, he contrived, among other things, to ask a blessing on the young folks, praying especially, "for them as had jist been married, according to the divine appointment in the garden of Edin, that they might both of them live to a good old age, and be fruitful and multiply and replenish the earth, and see their children's children to the third and fourth giner- ation, and that other young folks present might soon settle and have families, and become an honour and a blessin in their day and gineration." *This is according to a rule of Latin grammar. 154 FIRST YEAR Many young gentlemen of "the second table" waited on us of "the first table," and among them John Glenville: and this was taken so kindly, that before we went home declarations were heard about "taking him up for the legislature, fall come a year" a hint not lost on us, and of which more hereafter. I am sorry the reader can only taste our goodies in imagination ; and yet are we cruel enough to let him see what he lost. And first, notice, all eatables, from "the egg to the apple," were on our table at once. Thus a single glance disclosed what amount of labour was expected: our whole work was there, and no other jobs of eating by way of appendix. Nor were we plagued with changing knives, whipping on and away of plates, and brushing or removing cloths ; no, no, we kept right dead ahead with the work from the start to the finish ; the sole labour of the attendants being to keep the plates "chuckfull" of some- thing, and ours, to eat! eat! eat! The dishes next. First, then, and middlemost, an enormous pot-pie, and piping hot, graced our centre, overpowering, with its fragrance and steam, the odours and vapours of all other meats: and the pot-pie was the wedding dish of our Purchase, par excellence! The pie to-day was the doughy sepulchre of at least six hens, two chanticleers, and four pullets, if it be logical to reason upward from legs and wings to bodies ! What pot could have contained the pie is inconceivable, unless the one used for "tarrifying the barr." Why, among other unknown contributors, it must have received one half peck of onions ! And yet it is to be feared that they who came after us were potpieless ; for potpie is the favourite, and woodmen sharp set are awful eaters. Around the pie were wild turkeys, (tame enough now,) with wonderful necks stretched out in search of their heads, and stupendous limbs and wings ready for flight, the instant the head should be discovered, or heard from ! The poor birds, however, were so done, over and under too, that all native juices were evaporated, and the flesh was dry as cork : but by way of amends quarts of gravy were judiciously emptied on our plates from the wash-basin-bowls. That also moistened the "stuffnin," com- posed of Indian meal and sausages. FIRST YEAR 155 These two were the grand dishes: but sprinkled and scattered about were plates of fried venison, fried turkey, fried chicken, fried duck, fried pork, and, for any thing I could know, even fried leather; for so complete and impartial the frying, that dis- tinctive tastes were obliterated, and it could only be guessed, by the shape, size, legs, &c., which was what, and the contrary. But who can tell of the "sasses ?" for we had 'biled petaturs !" and "smashed petaturs !" and "petatursis !" i. e. potatoes rolled into balls as big as marbles, and baked brown. And there were "bil'd ingins!" "fried ingins!" and "ingins out of this here pie !" Yes, and beets of all known colours and unknown tastes ! all pickled in salt and vinegar and something else ! And there were pickled cucumbers, as far as salt and water could go; and "punkun-butter !" and "punkun-jelle!" and corn bread in all its glory! Scientifically inserted and insinuated among the first course, was the second; every crevice and space being wedged up: and had the plates and saucers been like puzzlemaps. ao table cloth would have been visible through the interstices. And fortunate ! the table itself was strong and masculine ; otherwise it must have been crushed under the combined weight of elbows and dishes! This second course was chiefly custard; and that stood in bowls and teacups of cadaverous white, encircled by unknown flowers. A pitcher of milk was gracefully adorned by the artist with the pattern of an entrail, taken doubtless out of some school book on physiology. But we had also custard-pies! and made with both upper and under crusts ! And also maple molasses, (usually called "them 'ere molassisis,") and preserved apples, preserved water melon-rinds, and preserved red peppers and tomatoes all termed, for brevity's sake, (like words in Webster's diction- ary,) " 'sarves." A few under crusts, or shells, were filled with stewed peaches and apples; an idea borrowed by Susan from Glenville: but so much was this like conformity to the pomps and vanities of life, that the careful mother had that very morning rebuked her daughter, and earnestly advised her not "to take to quality ways, but naturally bake pies with uppermost crusts's." And yet Mrs. Ashford soon got over her miff, and, won by the marked and 156 FIRST YEAR uncondescending attention paid to her daughter and her daughter's husband by us, she was heard not long after the rebuke to say "Well, arter all, they're a right down clever sort of folks, and that 'are Mr. Carltin is naterally addicted to fun." Among the curiosities were the pound cakes, as numerous as apple dumplings, and about as large. These were compounded of some things found in pound cakes every where, and of some not found, maple sugar being, evidently from the taste, the master ingredient; but their shape that was the beauty! All were baked in coffee-cups! and after being disencupped, each was iced all over, till it looked for all the world, exactly like an ill-made snow ball! The icing, or snowing, was a composition of egg, starch, and a species of double-rectified maple sugar, as fine and white as table salt. In addition to all these matters tea and coffee were severally handed, while the girls in attendance asked each guest "Do you take sweet'nin? If the reply was affirmative the same sized spoonful was put into every sized cup; and then, to save you the trouble, the young lady stirred the beverage with her own fair hand, and with as much energy and good will as if she was mixing molasses and water. Now, we do hope no reader will think we of Glenville turned up our noses at all this. No, no verily ; but we ate as much and as long, laughing, talking, joking all the time too, as if native born. As for Mr. Carlton, he stuck mainly to pot-pie, the marbled- potatoes, the custard and the maple molasses; which last, by the way, is indeed as superior to all far east and down east molasses and syrups as cheese is to chalk. The eventful day was, however, now closing, and some had already taken French leave, while many were rigging their horses for departure: hence we also began assembling our party to go homeward. But at the request of some young fellows, who of- fered to catch Dick and see the "gals" home, we left our helps, to have some fun after the graver people should be gone away. About a dozen volunteer groomsmen and bridesmaids remained to "see it out ;" viz, to torment Susan and Joseph : but Mrs. Ash- ford, a very watchful and discreet woman, told us afterward, she "took care to stop all goins on, and made ev'ry livin soul and body of 'em go to bed an hour before herself and her man went." FIRST YEAR 157 A different but no less effectual preventive was used by another new-married couple in the Purchase, where we had the honour of an invitation. The loft had been assigned as the bridal chamber, the sole access to which was a light ladder ; and up this some of the "weddeners" intended to steal and upset the bed of the sleepers but alas! for the fun! the groom, in anticipation of the favour, it was found, liad drawn up the ladder! CHAPTER XX. "Parva leves capitant animos." "Various, that the mind of desultory man." THE ladies of Glenville, in addition to various other matters, paid special attention in the winter to needle-work: and that was bestowed on gowns, coats, overalls, inexpressibles, and in short, on the whole tribe of unmentionables ; and also on various tasteful and fancy articles. In the kitchen was a loom, not for laces, but for measuring out, yard after yard of tow-linen and Kentucky jeans; and on this piano forte our ladies played many a merry tune, the burden of which was "our days are swifter than a weaver's shuttle;" which yet proved that a short span is rendered by a swift shuttle. Indeed, in our circumstances, the use of the treadles was more important than the use of the pedals. Our ladies this winter spent much time in reading: and, not a little in longing after the flesh-pots of Egypt! And yet there was much in the wild and rough wilderness; much in the men and women of the woods, so in contrast with the culture of the city, that when the novelty passed, and we had time to reflect that in our day the neighbours could never be like us, nor we like them that we were tolerated, rather than cherished and were far away from sympathy it was then that we seemed to awake to a sad and bitter remembrance of the past yes, and that past in no way, to some of us, ever to be restored, to be revisited ! In the far east were the graves of their fathers! (the graves of mine, I cannot find) for the Seymours were ancient, and in their day men of substance and renown. And Indians are not the 158 FIRST YEAR only ones that love to linger among the graves of their fathers : not the only wanderers that see in vision the swelling mounds over their dead, and see, with melting hearts and dimming eyes! Mournful world ! before we left the woods, graves of ours had consecrated two lonely spots in the wilds, and our dust was com- mingling with the dust of the red men : so that lonely now amid the graves in the east, we here sigh and weep for the graves in those western solitudes! ****** As for myself, this winter, I made the closet for Carlton's study, and the one in Bishop Hilsbury's cabin; also two skuttles for the loom, one too light however, the other, too heavy: and I aided in putting in and taking out "a piece," becoming thus adept in the mysteries of woof and warp, of hanks, reels and cuts. I mended likewise, water sleds, hunted turkeys, missed killing two deer for want of a rifle, played the flute, practised the fiddle, and ever so many other things and what-nots. But my grand em- ployment was a review of all my college studies ; and hence, I was the very first man since the creation of the world that read Greek in the New Purchase ! And it was I that first made the apos- tles talk out there in their own language! that first made the primal woods resonant with "Tyture tu patulae recubans sub tegmine fagi!" or thunder with Demosthenes ! that first addressed the revereful trees in the majestic words of Plato words that Jupiter himself would have used for the same purpose aye, that first taught those listening trees the names of the Hebrew and Chaldaic alphabets, or made them roar like the sea with the popupholosboio thalasses ! And, hence from the renown of all this, I was finally made a trustee of the State College at Woodville ; which appointment af- terwards brought me in contact with some adventures, to be narrated in their proper place. The appointment, however, was not given till Mr. J. Glenville took his seat in our legislature in 182 . 1 1 Hall was never a Trustee of the State College. John M. Young (Genville) served in the Indiana legislature in 1828-29. The legislative session under the constitution of 1816 began on the first Monday in De- cember. The election was held on the first Monday in August. The reader should remember that Hall represents several characters in the volume, probably for the sake of disguise. This renders certain passages confusing and apparently inconsistent with the facts. Hall's trusteeship FIRST YEAR 159 Our evenings were devoted to cracking nuts and jokes, visiting Uncle Tommy, and Bishop H., to planning, to hearing adventures or reading aloud; but, as it was not possible to have a centre- table, the grand family lamp was suspended in the centre of the parlour ; and then around this we either sat as an Iceland family, or raising the carpet-barriers, we lolled on the nearest beds in couch and sofa, and ottoman style. The lamp in its primitive times was a patty-pan; but having spent its youth in different sorts of hot ovens, its tin had entirely shone out, and nothing remained save the oxydated iron ; yet, to this it owed its present elevated station in Glenville humility be- fore exaltation! In the edges were three holes punched with a tenpenny nail, and into these were put and fastened three several wires, which united eighteen inches above the patty-pan, were joined by a strong twine, tied to a hook in a pole: and then the whole affair, when released from the hand, could, and did swing with a very regular irregularity over the middle parlour. The illuminator filled with lard or bear's oil, 2 and supplied with a piece of cloth for wick, was touched with flame from a burning brand; and then away it blazed in glory, filling all things, even eyes and noses, with light and soot! But we soon got used to suffocation ; and many were our pleasant nights around the pendulum lamp, spite of inconveniences within, and the cries of prowling beasts without, or the demon-like shrieks and howls of wintry tempests! Calm consciences in rude and lone huts bid defiance to most evils and dangers ! Besides, who has not known the delight of lying in bed and under an unceiled roof, and of being lulled to slumber by the music of a pattering rain! So our delight arose often from a sense of entire security : and yet the dangers and evils of the dark and howling wilderness so near ! separated by a slight barrier ! During the day, this winter, I took lessons in axecraft; for, in addition to the "niggering-off," 8 it became necessary as the cold increased, to chop off logs, especially as our fire-place de- voured wood at the rate of half-a-cord per diem. Niggering consisted in his being appointed by the Trustees as the first teacher in "the State College at Woodville." 2 We of Glenville burned lard many years prior to the late discoveries in swine light. 8 To be described hereafter. 160 FIRST YEAR belongs mainly to very large timber, and pertains rather to the science of log-rolling than of preparing fuel; but chopping is essential to nearly every branch of a woodsman's life, and must be learned by all who aspire to respectability and independence. Awkward indeed, were my first essays, and my strength in- artificially bestowed on every blow, was soon exhausted ; but when we had "larned the sling o' the axe," then could we as easily execute a cord a day, as at first the fourth of the measure. Nay, we could at last mount a prostrate beech and take the butt end two feet in diameter: and then, with feet apart, the exact width of the intended chip, could we cut away, within one inch of the cowhide boots, and that neatly and regularly all the way to the centre : and then, turning round, accomplish the same on the other side, till cuttings matched and almost met, when we would make the final and flourishing cut, and then in a moment lay two logs out of one ! But oh! the way Tom Robinson could flourish the axe! And proud am I to call Tom my master; indeed, all Glenville were indebted to his lessons. Tom was a fellow of gigantic propor- tions, longer than six feet three inches, and with enormous width of breast, about "the girth" like a columnar beech. He had also legs and arms to match. His face was as mild as a full moon's, and nearly as big, and in temper he was as good-natured and harmless as a chubby baby ! Tom rarely bragged ; although he could shoot well, drive wagon well, ride horses wild and tame, and walk as fast and nearly as far as an elephant : still he would boast a little about his chopping, being indeed as an axeman, the envy and admiration of all that part of the Purchase. Oh! I do wish we could paint Tom's smile of benevolent scorn as he took the axe from my awkward hands, to "larn me the sling!" when he saw me puffing at every ineffectual blow, striking every time in a new place, till a little weak amorphous chip was at long last haggled out with hashed edges it was really sublime. "Jeest * do it so like Mr. Carlton a sort of hold your left hand here, allowin you're goin to strike right hand licks; and your tother hand so fashion, a toward the helf but a sort a loose: 4 Jist becomes jeest, and little, Icetle out there, when tenderness and affection or diminution, &c., is to be designated. FIRST YEAR 161 then swing the axe out so, lettin the loose hand run up agin tother this away" and here Tom's axe finished the sentence or speech by gleaming down and burying itself nearly to its back in the log: but next instant it was again quivering in the air, and changing its direction was gleaming and burying itself as at first, till out leaped elastic chips light as a feather, although these chips were twelve inches long, and two thick ! And then the log would show two inclined planes as if wrought with a chisel! and all the time Tom talking and laughing away, like a fellow whittling poplar with a dirk-knife. Oh ! it was really delicious to see such cutting ; and it was surprising anybody should call wood-chopping hard work it was nothing but cutting butter with a hot knife. Reader, Tom had actually done in axery, what Horace pro- nounces in writing, the perfection of the art, viz. ravishing and yet beguiling the reader into an opinion that he can write as well. Tom therefore was a master. Aye, the axe in his hand, was like the bow in Paganini's and in the Purchase vastly more service- able. In short, Tom could cut wood like lightning; and whilst some things can be done before a fluent tongue (female of course) can say Jack Robison, we defy any body to do the same things before Tom Robison could chop a stick off! We shall now describe our firemaking, not indeed to be imitated in here to the utter ruin of all moderate fortunes, but to show the grand scale on which we do even small matters out there. To build a New Purchase fire, a cabin must first be builded or built for the fire, with a fireplace, constituting nearly one whole end of the cabin ; then we must have wood, not by the cord, but by the acre ; and thirdly, we must have active, robust, honest-hearted fel- lows to cut and carry in, unless one niggers-off, as some do, and drags logs into the cabin by horse-power. The foundation of our fire was laid every day very early and required all hands. We men hem ! we men rose before sun-up ; and then uncle John hauled out the relics of yesterday's fire coals plenty and lively the unconsumed centre of the back-log and chunks of foresticks ; while Glenville and Carlton issued forth to select a new back-log. This was usually of beech, the greener the better, and about seven feet long and two in diameter. It was rolled to the door with handspikes, where, with the aid of uncle 162 FIRST YEAR John, it was next rolled, lifted, pushed and coaxed into the centre of the parlour : and here we rested and blowed, uttering between the puffs "plaguey heavy !" "a'most too long " and the like. But directly, with a few united efforts the back-log was rolling and crushing over the coals and soon lodged with a thundering noise in its bed of hot ashes, and against the stone back of the inner chimney ; we, during this process, alternately lifting our scorched shins, and then at the noise of the thunder, nimbly leaping back and rubbing them; till we could nearly have ventured at last to try the ordeal of the burning plowshares. The log was now cov- ered with ashes to prevent too rapid a consumption ; and then two delicate andirons in the shape of pig iron, were pushed by a stick into proper position, being always, any time in the winter, too hot to be touched with the hand or even kicked with the foot. In case a cabin has opposite doors, much labour and many sprains may be saved and avoided, by tackling a horse to an end of the back-log and hauling it into the cabin; it is, however, rather a slovenly practice, and used mostly by women in the absence of the men. Next in order were the second-story back-log, and the fore stick equal in length, but different in diameter and material : the former being of beech and one foot thick, the latter of sugar tree and about eight inches thick. Each is often carried by two per- sons; but still oftener each is hipped. And hipping is done by one man who has some strength and more dexterity ; who adroitly whips up the log on his hip, and trots off with it like the youngest quill-driver of a shop will do with Miss Troublesome's small bundle of silk under his arm. These timbers are also frequently shouldered but I regret to say that a certain friend of ours when his turn came, used to roll his stick as far as the door, and then hitch it. Hitching is performed by getting the article on an end (no odds which) and then working it along by alternate cor- ners: an operation that impressed on our puncheons numerous indented mementos of our friend's lazy ingenuity. The plane beauty of poplar or pine floors it would have marred forever ! The puncheons, however, thought little of the matter, although they wriggled and "screeched" like like let's see. Oh! like all the world ! FIRST YEAR 163 Meanwhile uncle John carried in brush enough to make a Jersey load of oven faggots ; and the girl, baskets full of all sized chips, from the Tommyrobison kind down to the Carlton sort; and so when the upper back-log and fore-stick had been arranged, there were present all the kindling and burning materials. An infant sapling, some three inches thick, lay between the back log proper and the fore-stick, forming thus a chasm for a bushel of burning coals ; while other coals remained under and above the pile ; and then across the upper coals were placed bits of small trees inter- mingled with hot chunks and cold chips, the whole being capped and climactirized with a brush heap. Now issued, first, volumes of smoke, then a spiteful snap or two, becoming soon, however, a loud and decided crackling; and then appeared several fierce curly blazes, white, red, and blue, verifying the vulgar saying about smoke and fire ; till the tempera- ture of things getting to the scientific point out burst simultane- ously from all parts of the structure a wide, pure, living roaring flame chasing soot-clouds up the stick-chimney, dispersing fire- builders as far as the carpet barrier, and lighting the interior cabin with the blaze of a volcano ! Combustion (hem!) was supported during the day on the most philosophic principles ; by supplying fuel; not a small bladder of gas ; not even an old fashioned Philadelphia iron fore stick and stone black log; but real backwood's fuel, chips, brush, bits of saplings and miniature timber. The fire was constructed regu- larly once only in twenty- four hours ; although some back logs will last nearly twice that period. Each firemaker had a tong of green timber an inch thick and six feet long ; hence two persons lifting or poking in concert were equivalent to a pair of tongs. Usually we operated with only one tong ; but by dexterity all can be accomplished with that one, that in here is commonly done with "tongses" and shovel to boot. True, our practice was incessant ; since no man, woman, nor child in the Purchase ever stood, sat, or lay near a fire without poking at it! Hence my determined and ineradicable hostility to a fire of coal, bituminous or anthracite the thing won't be poked ! And what's a fire for, if it aint to be poked ? Our young woman now, in here, keeps every thing in the shape of poker, and scraper, and 1 64 FIRST YEAR tong, single or double, out of my way; and, when the grate or stove needs a little tussling, in comes she with some iron article or other: but always on going out takes the article with her "for fear Mr. Carlton will spile her fire!!" Bah! don't lecture me about furnaces and flues, and patent grates and ranges, and no-burns and all-saves, of this pitiful age ! Give me my all-burn and no-save fire of beech and sugar and chip and brush hand back my tong let me poke once more ! Oh ! let me hear and see once more before I die a glorious flame roaring up a stick-chimney ! There let me, on this celebrated cold Thurs- day, thermometer two and a half inches below zero, there let me stand by my cabin fire and be heated once more through and through ! Oh ! the luxury of lying in bed and looking from behind our Scotch wall on that fire! Oh ! ye poor frozen, starving wretches of our blind and horrible alleys, and dark and loathsome cellars ; ye, I now see buying two- penneth of huckstered sticks to heat your water gruel for one more mouthful before ye die ; ye, that are shivering in rags, beg- ging of that red-faced carter in the pea jacket a small, knotty, four- foot-stick of sour, sappy scrub oak just fallen from his cart, to hear it sob, sob, on the foodless hearth of your dungeon like holes away! for heaven's sake, if you starve not before, away next summer to the woods ! Go; squat on Congress land! Go; find corn and pork and turkeys and squirrels and opossums and deer to eat ! Go ; and in the cold, cold, cruel winter like to day, you shall sit and lie and warm you by such a fire ! Go ; squalid slaves ! beg an axe put out make tracks for the tall timber Go; taste what it is to be free! Away! run! leap! and shout "Hurraw aw! the ranges for ever ! !" CHAPTER XXI. "Thy hounds shall make the welkin answer them, And fetch shrill echoes from the hollow earth." WE had this year a very merry Christmas. For first and fore- most we devoted the holidays to hog killing and all its accom- paniments, lard rendering, spare-rib cooking, sausage making, and the like. And secondly, our cow Sukey performed a very wonderful thing in the eating and drinking line: she devoured a whole sugar trough full of mast- fed rendered lard ! The blame, at first, attached to Dick ; but he could clearly prove an alibi, and besides Sukey had very greasy chops, and got horrid sick, as much so as she had swallowed a box of Quackenborg's pills: and when she did again let us have milk it was actually oily! And then, thirdly, there was aunt Kitty's mishap about the sausages. Aunt Kitty was intended by nature for a dear delightful old maid ; and she greatly mistook her vocation by marrying, although nothing but her being a great favourite with the beaux of the last century hindered the fulfilment of her destiny. She was the most amiable and kind-hearted woman but a leetle too modest ; so that, in her circumlocutions and paraphrases to get round the tough places of plain English, she often made us uneasy lest she stump, or, perhaps light on some unlucky word or phrase worse than the one she shyed at. She denominated the chanticleer chickbidde or, he-bidde or, old-rooster; and the braying gentleman she styled donkey; although she would venture as far as Jack. Ancle, with her, was any part from the knee downward, and limbs were of course, her what-y callums. She milked the cow's dugs, and greased, not her bag, but her udder. From all which it maybe conjectured what ingenious contrivances in strange cab- ins were necessary before Aunt Kitty could get into bed or out of it : indeed, setting all backwood scorn and ridicule at defiance, she would take the very coverlet and fork it up for a curtain ! Well, Aunt Kitty called things prepared for the reception of sausages, skins; and so this Christmas having prepared the skins by the scraping process, she laid them away in salt and water till the stuffing was to take place; but when the hour for that 165 166 FIRST YEAR curious metamorphose of putting swine into their own skins came, behold! the skins could not be found "What ! had Dick devoured them?" Oh ! no, the girl had accidentally thrown them all away. And this, indeed, was too bad; and no housekeeper can blame Aunt Kitty for being greatly provoked : but alas ! for delicacies, anger permitted no choice of words: (and by that it may be seen how angry Aunt Kitty was;) for on learning the cause and manner of the irreparable loss she exclaimed : "Why, you careless you! Have you really gone and thrown out all my g ts ! that I was keeping for skins ! !" Fourthly, we had a deer hunt, not only somewhat remarkable in itself, but memorable for the change it caused in the relations of Brutus and Caesar the dogs of Glenville. Of these, Brutus was the elder, and hence, though smaller and weaker, he managed to govern Caesar : proof that among brutes opinion has much to do with mastership and reverence. An intimate acquaintance with old Dick and the two canine gentlemen has unsettled my early theories about instinct and reason: and as to the first-named worthy, the theory that the power of laughing is distinctive of human beings must be received with limitation; for Dick, if he never indulged in a rude boisterous horse-laugh, could and did most decidedly and repeatedly grin and that is all some very sober and sensible persons ever attain to. As to the others, Brutus had possession of the premises before Caesar was even a whelp ; and though only Caesar's foster-sire, he had trained him in his puppyhood in all the arts of doggery ; show- ing him how to worry infant pigs, then saucy shoats, and finally true hogs, and without regard of size or sex. He taught him how to chase poultry, and suck eggs ; how to hang at a cow's tail and yet avoid both horn and heel ; how to hunt squirrels, opossums and racoons ; and how even to shake a venomous snake to death and not be bit. And to his indefatigable care and example was owing the loss of our original bacon-skin hinges, and the ruin of sundry raw hides. But when the cold meat, or potatoes, or buttermilk, &c., was set out in the dogs' sugar-trough, how instructive the dignity of Brutus as he walked up solus, and with no ravenous and indelicate FIRST YEAR 167 haste to eat his fill! And how revereful the mammoth and lub- berly Caesar, standing at a distance till his step-father had finished and retired! Caesar, when very hungry or smelling something extra, would indeed crawl up with an imploring eye and piteous whine : but then the awful look and cautionary growl he received from the wiser dog sent him away in a moment with a trailed tail and even to a greater distance than ever! And yet Caesar was equal in strength and size to one Brutus and a half! Carlyle's theory of opinion, must be extended to dogs : and our deer hunt will confirm it. One day during Christmas week Uncle John went a hunting. About two o'clock, however, he returned, having wounded a deer a mile beyond our clearing, and wishing after dinner (now on the table) to take the two dogs to put on its trail; when we should soon find the deer and in all probability dead. Accord- ingly, on reaching the spot, and blood being here and there visible, the dogs were placed on the trail, and we soon came in sight of the poor deer. It was not dead, as had been conjectured, but was lying down sorely wounded, on a little island in the creek, hoping there, after baffling pursuit by the intervening water, to sob away its life unseen and undisturbed by its relentless enemies ! Poor creature ! mere accident led us to look towards its retreat ; where, alarmed, it had incautiously moved, and no moving thing ever is unseen by the wary and stationary hunter and then, at our shouts, up sprang the terrified animal, wounded, but bounding away as though unharmed! And away in pursuit leaped the yelping dogs ; but in the excitement Caesar, forgetful of all rever- ence, in the lead. Following the uproar, I ran up on this side the creek about two hundred yards ; and then the deer was seen recrossing the water a few rods higher, Caesar close on the flank, the most noble Brutus panting far enough in the rear ! The poor hunted victim, blind and expiring, staggered in its last agony towards my station ; and then, as Caesar leaped to seize its throat, it fell stone dead at my feet; for the rifle ball had passed nearly through its body, and the chase had happily but accelerated death. The two brothers, for Uncle Tommy had joined us, now came up ; and then, the feet of the dead deer tied i68 FIRST YEAR in pairs, and a sappling, cut and prepared with a tomahawk, in- serted longitudinally under the thongs, we shouldered our prey and marched homeward triumphant : i. e. we three rationals and the now opinionated and consequential Caesar, who (or which?) strutted near, every few paces leaping up and smelling at the carcass. But Brutus, the hitherto lord of the woods and clearing, alas! dejected, lagged away behind, both crest fallen and tail fal- len! yes, both, for he hung his head and kept his tail dangling without one triumphant flourish! He evidently felt his impor- tance lessened, his dignity diminished by such a palpable and utter natural not to say moral inability to be in at the death. Yes, opinion was changed ! And he saw plain enough that Caesar entertained notions of dog authority now very inconsistent with peaceable subjection ay! as different as when slaves first wake to the full perception of their powers and rights and opportunities ; their masters having injudiciously allowed them to discover them- selves to be really men and to have souls ! Yes, yes, opinion had changed ; and these dogs read it in one another's eyes, for that very day the instant the entrails of the slain-deer were thrown out as the dogs' reward, up rushed the unceremonious Caesar; and when Brutus tried the experiment of the old cautionary growl, Caesar instead of modestly retiring as usual, leaped ferociously upon his venerated stepfather, and so bit and gored and pitched and rolled and tossed him, that away, away ran the elder dog at the first fair interval howling with rage, vexation and pain ! And ever after that memorable deer hunt Caesar continued to eat at the first trough and Brutus at the second. Part of the venison fell to Uncle Tommy's share, which I aided him to take home ; and, in return, he insisted on my spending the evening at his cabin and then the reader may be sure we had many a long story on hunting ; but he would rather have described the squatteree itself than hear all our stories and adventures. The squatteree was a cabin just fourteen feet by ten, and most ac- curately built of small round saplings, very much alike in dia- meter and looks, and nicely dressed at the corners. It was, in- deed, a darling little miniature cabin, and would have done to a tittle for rabblerousing in the late presidential campaign. 1 Old 1 The notable "log cabin and hard cider" campaign of 1840, so re- markable for its "hullabaloo and claptrap." FIRST YEAR 169 Dick could easily have drawn it, and Uncle Tommy, whose heart was the old General's would have driven! A large space inside was occupied by a bed-apparatus con- structed as follows : uprights, at their lower ends, were nailed to elects on the floor, and on the uprights were pegged a side and foot piece; the logs of the cabin making unnecessary a second rail and head piece. Next was a sacking of clapboards pinned down ; and then a very thick straw bed, and over that a sumptuous feather bed; the whole very comfortable for the good old folks, especially as Uncle Tommy used to say of themselves, that they were "old and tough." Opposite the bed stood the bureau; the door opening into the cabin between the two, and a narrow aisle or passage being left to the cooking and eating end of the nest. Adjoining the bureau was the puncheon table with its white oak legs; and which served for eating, sewing, reading, and indeed, all domestic uses ; whilst opposite the table, and at the foot of the bed, were shelves for crockery and every article of squatter house-keeping. Over the fire-place was an extraordinarily wide mantel, sustaining can- ister, and bowl upon bowl, and bags, some of linen and some of paper; and having above itself two racks, one supporting an enormously long duck gun, and the other, "Old Bet" a black, surly looking rifle, with the appurtenances of horns, pouches, loaders, tomahowks and knives pendant from the hooks. There hung, also, several pairs of moccasins, and two sets of leggings ; an old pair of green baize, and a new pair of blue cloth. Over the table and bureau were shelves, but mainly for the library. The books were principally books of divinity and church history, and also of prayer and devotion; but yet were on the shelves Don Quixotte, Robinson Crusoe, Paradise Lost, Border Tales, Cooper's Works, Thomson's Seasons, and Young's Night Thoughts. The bureau top was consecrated to Bibles and Hymn Books; and here was piled the famous Scott's Commentary, in five volumes quarto, and so often read, from "kiver to kiver I" Indeed, from their appearance, one would almost have judged them to have been read clean through "the kivers !" The neatness, the quiet, the cleanliness, the comfort, the wild independence of this nest of a cabin; the hunt of the day; 1 70 FIRST YEAR the stories; all, all were so like the dreams of my boyhood! How happy Uncle Tommy, now more than seventy years old! and Aunt Nancy, now more than sixty ! Happy in themselves, in one another, in their home, and in their scriptural hopes of the future life ! ****** But the arangement for getting water, when the old lady should be alone, and in wet weather, without leaving the cabin! that was the nicety. The nest was a few yards below a beautiful fountain, and over its running stream; then in the floor a light puncheon was fixed as a trap, so that with a calabash at the end of a proper pole Aunt Nancy could dip as from an artificial re- servoir ! and all without a water tax ! Our supper to-night was of coffee, corn bread, butter, eggs, short-cakes, and venison steaks! Yes, venison steaks! Away with your Astor House, and Merchants' Hotel, and Dandies' Tav- erns ; if you do want to know how venison steaks do taste go to Aunt Nancy ! We feel tempted to give Uncle Tommy's "murakalus" escape in fire-hunting! how he levelled his rifle at a "beasts's eyes," and found in time it was light streaming through a negro hut, where, on Christmas eve, the merry rascals were dancing away to a cornstalk fiddle and a calabash banjo. But we must hasten to our Fifth and last amusement during the holidays. Usually on the Sabbath we attended our own meeting in the Welden Settlement; but bad roads and some other accidents often kept us at home; when our three families assembled at Uncle John's, where he read the Scriptures, and made or read a prayer with occasional help from Uncle Tommy, while Glenville and Carlton conducted the choir and read sermons and tracts. Sometimes, however, we attended meeting at Mr. Sturgis', out of compliment to our neighbour and Uncle Tommy; never, indeed, for fun, although we usually were more amused than profited ; and always came back more and more convinced that a learned, talented and pious ministry was, after all, not quite so great a curse as many deem it. But of this the reader may, after reading the ecclesiastical parts and chapters of this History, judge for himself. And here we beg leave to affirm that our FIRST YEAR 171 accounts of certain sacred matters is reduced and very much below the truth; for while truthfulness is important in some writings, if on these matters ours were truth-/w//, we should hardly be credited. We dare not do our pictures up to life : and hence, while they are by no means truthless, they are yet less than the truth. Neighbour Sturgis, it will be remembered, lived opposite the tannery, and on the top of a bluff rising from our creek. Com- pared with most cabins his was good and spacious ;. and to ac- commodate some pet swine and a flock of tame geese, openings under his house were left, whither the favourites could retire for sleep, or as a retreat from unusual sun, rain, or wind. Here, whilst swine and geese were content with their several limits, gruntings and cacklings were modest and expressive of enjoy- ment: although joy itself would often squeal and scream too boisterously for some congregations. But if wantonness induced either piggy or goosy to pass the border; or if the dogs playfully ran in nosing up the pigs, slapping a tail against a strutty gander or a silly goose, then would the commingled din of bark, howl, grunt, squawk, squeal and cackle, furnish a better answer than the jest book itself to the question, "What makes more noise than a she-swine caught in a gate?" Answer, "Old man Sturgis' pet- pen in a riot." Now, in the room exactly over the pet-pen, "meetins was held !" The seats were long benches with very ricketty limbs, expanded two a piece at each end, and double planks resting on rude chunks all wishing to obey at once the great law of gravity, but prevented by their own inequalities, and those of the floor. Hence during "sarvice," as folks were constantly shifting centres of motion and gravity, no despicable noise of chunks and bench-legs was maintained, in addition to all other noises rational and instinctive. The pulpit was neither marble nor mahogany, being a tough chair with two upright back pieces like plough handles, and cross bars to suit : and its seat was (or were) laced hickory withes, and wonderfully smooth and glistening from the attrition of linsey garments, tow inexpressibles, and oily buckskin unmentionables. And not in, but behind this pulpit stood the preacher, placing his 172 FIRST YEAR hymn book on its polished seat, and holding on to the two handles to squeeze by, in his energy or embarrassments. Hence he never thumped his pulpit in the manner of the Rev. Doctor Slapfist ; but when necessary he raised the pulpit itself, and with it thumped the floor making of course just four times the impression with its four legs that the Doctor does with his single hand. The Rev. Diptin Menniwaters usually preached here; but on New-Year's Sabbath all Glenville went by invitation to hear a new preacher: although in the Purchase, where preachers of a sort are plenty as acorns or beach nuts, a new one frequently held forth, and held on too, greatly to the wonder of the hearers, and the disturbance of the pet-pen, at our neighbour's of the bluff. The new preacher to-day, doubtless apprised of the strangers' coming, in order to create confidence, and ward off any false shame and unworthy fear of man, struck off, after prayer and singing, with an open avowal of enmity to all learning and learned preachers, thus: "Brethurn and sisturn, it's a powerful great work, this here preaching of the gospel, as the great apostul hisself allows in them words of hissin what's jist come into my mind; for I never know'd what to preach about till I riz up them words of hissin, 'who is sufficient for all these here things,' as near about as I recollect them. "Thare's some folks (glancing towards us) howsomever, what thinks preachers must be high larn'd, afore they kin tell sinners as how they must be saved or be 'tarnally lost; but it ain't so I allow (chair thumped here and answered by a squawk below) no, no! this apostul of ourn what spoke the text, never rubbed his back agin a collige, nor toted about no sheepskins no, never! (thump! thump! squawk and two grunts.) No, no, dear brethurn and sisturn (squeak) larnin's not sufficient for them things; as the apostul says, 'who is sufficient for them.' Oh worldlins ! how you'd a perished in your sins if the fust preachers had a stay'd till they got sheepskins. No ! no ! no ! I say, gim me the sperit. (Squeals and extra gruntings in the swine's territory, and more animated squawks and cackles, as the preacher waxed warmer.) No! I don't pretend to no larnin whatsomever, but de- pends on the sperit like Poll; (squee-e-el;) and what's to hinder FIRST YEAR 173 me a sayin, oh! undun worldlins! that you must be saved or 'tarnally lost yes, lost for ever an dever! (things below evi- dently getting on to their legs and flapping.) No ! no ! no ! oh ! poor lost worldlins, I can say as well as the best on them sheepskins, if you don't git relijin and be saved, you'll be lost, teetolly and 'tarnally forever an deverah! I know's I'm nuthen but poor Philip, and that I only has to go by the sperit-ah ! but as long as I live, I kin holler out; (voice to the word) and cry aloud and spare not, (squ-aw-awk.) O! no, brethurn and sisturn-ah! and all evin high larn'd folks that's in the gaul, and maybe won't thank me for it no how-ah! O! ho! o-ah! I poor Philip-ah, what's moved to cry out and spare not-ah! (sque-e-el;) what was takin from tendin critturs like David-ah, and ain't no prophet, nor no son of a prophet-ah. O ! ho-o-ah, how happy I am to raise my poor feeble-ah, rying-ah, voice-ah, and spendin my last breath, in this here blessed work; a warnin, and crying aloud; o-oh!-o-ah! repent, repent, poor worldlins and be saved, or you'll all be lost, and perish for-ever-an-dever-ah." Here the storm above was getting to its height, although poor Philip kept on ten minutes more, waxing louder and hoarser, with endless repetitions and strong aspirations in a hundred places occasioned by his catching breath, and which we have several times marked with an -ah! 2 He also began spanking one thigh with a hand, and ever and anon battering the floor with his pulpit, until he was compelled at last to place one hand under his jaw, and partly up his cheek to support his "jawing tackle." And, in the meanwhile, the fra- ternity below, after much irregular outcrying, had at length joined all their instruments and voices, and to so good a purpose as at times nearly to overwhelm the preacher. Two dogs also, half wolf and half cur, now presented themselves at the door, and with elevated brows and cocked ears, stood wistfully looking at the parson, to know what he wished them to attack or hunt : but on finding he was not halloing for them, and being now too excited 2 The more frequent this syllable or such aspiration occurs in a torrent of boisterous words, the more is the preaching supposed to be from the heart, and, therefore, inspired: for nobody, it is supposed, would make such a fool of himself if he could help it. 174 FIRST YEAR to be still, away they sprang towards the forest yelping and howling and determined to hunt for themselves. And shortly after the first hurricane ending, Poor Philip hitting a favorite vein, went on with a train of reasoning (designing to show that native wit was as good as college logic) about cause and effect: but while he was again cheered from below in the manner of an English audience clapping an abolitionist, we shall not, by re- cording the applause, interrupt the narrative. "No no: nobody can make nuthin. Thare's only one what makes, and he made these here woods ; he made these here trees ; and them bushes ; he made wonders sun and yonders moon and all them 'are stars what shines at night in the firmanint above our heads like fires ; and and he made yes he made them powerful big rivers a runnin down thare to Orleans and the sea, and all the fishes, and the one what a sorter swallowed the prophit what was chuck'd out and swallered and and yes and all them 'are deer, and them 'are barr, and them hossis what's tied out thare. (Had Dick been there he would now unquestion- ably have slipped his bridle.) And so you understand, worldlins, how no man could a ever made anything. And haven't we proof from nater that they are made, and didn't come as high larn'd folks' sez, and grow of theirselves out of forty atims by chance. "No no, worldlins, you couldn't, the most high larn'd ither, couldn't make any of them thare things you couldn't make woods you couldn't make trees you couldn't make fishes no, you couldn't make airth you couldn't make air you couldn't make fire you couldn't make hem! no you couldn't make water." (Sorry are we to record, but Mr. Carlton here was guilty of sniggering; and even Uncle John, in spite of his official dignity, did look as if he would laugh when meeting was out. Poor Philip, however, quickly emerged and went on.) "No not one of you could make a spring branch nor the like." Ah ! poor Philip had you only had a little of the learning you despised ! Had you, at least, only seen Miss Carbon's Chemistry for Boarding Schools of Young Ladies! But did not Philip make us sweat for our sins, for he went on: "Yes! yes! some folks laff in meetin, but wait till they gits to h 1, and maybe they'll laff tother side of their mouth. The fire FIRST YEAR 175 down thare's hot, I allow, and will scorch off folk's ruffles and melt their goold buttins, and the devel and his angils pelt them with red hot balls of brimrock and fire !" But the two dogs had just now returned from an unsuccessful hunt, and forthwith they plunged headlong into the pit below; and then, the barking and yelping of the dogs; the scampering and squealing of the pigs ; the flapping of screaming geese's wings, and the squawking of insulted ganders, together with the hoarse and continued roaring of the preacher, produced a tempest rarely equalled in the best organized fanatical assemblies here, and never surely excelled. And the instant meeting was over, we of Glenville hurried away glad to escape from the noise of bedlam and the almost papistical curses of poor Philip. CHAPTER XXII. SECOND YEAR. "Go to them, with this bonnet in thy hand Or, say to them Thou art their soldier, and being bred in broils, Hast not the soft way, which thou dost confess Were fit for thee to use, as they to claim, In asking their good loves ; but thou wilt frame Thyself, forsooth, hereafter theirs, so far As thou hast power, and person." OUR second summer opened with the electioneering campaign of Mr. Glenville, the people's candidate for a seat in the next legislature. 1 His opponent, in all intellectual respects, was un- qualified for the seat, being destitute of important knowledges, void of tact and skill, and having indeed for he had been our representative before only exposed himself and us to perpetual ridicule. He could read and write, and perhaps cipher a little, and therefore, was all along considered a smart fellow, till it was discovered we had one in the district, "a powerful heap smarter" 1 John M. Young was elected to the legislature from the counties of Owen and Green in August 1828. I find no record of his having been a member of an> earlier legislature. This could not have been Hall's "second summer" in Indiana; it was more nearly his fifth or sixth. i;6 SECOND YEAR John Glenville, Esq., of Glenville. For John read without spelling the hard words, wrote like engraving, and could "kalkilate in his head faster nor Jerry Simpson with chalk or coal, although Jerry had been a schoolmaster." And our neighbor Ash ford offered to stake five barrels of corn, that "Johnny was jist the powerfullest smartest feller in the hole universal county, and could out sifer Jerry or other men all to smash." Glenville's ability, however, would have prejudiced our cause, had any doubt existed as to his moral integrity; for, a bad man out there was very properly dreaded in proportion to his clever- ness, 2 and therefore, power to harm. Indeed, we always pre- ferred an ignorant bad man to a talented one ; and hence attempts were usually made to ruin the moral character of a smart can- didate ; since unhappily smartness and wickedness were supposed to be generally coupled, and incompetence and goodness. Our opponents, therefore, neither insisted that Jerry was smarter than John, nor attacked John's character: but they con- tended that "Jerry could do no harm if he did no good, but that John could if he would, and would if he took a bad turn; also, that Jerry had been tried once and did no harm, but that John had never been tried and so no one could exactly tell what he would be till he was tried." To this was answered, that "J err y could do no good if he would, and had often voted so as to keep others from doing us any good, and so had prevented good if he had done no evil ; that John if able to do harm, was also able to do good and so he had never done harm in private life, it was reasonable to believe he would do none in public life; and that as Jerry had a trial and did no good, so John ought to have one too, and if he did harm, we could send Jerry the year after." John was then attacked on the score of pride and aristocracy; and, as usual, all the sins of his family were laid at Glenville's door, especially his sisters' ruffles our metal buttons the carpet wall; and above all, Carlton's irreverent sniggering in meeting. But then, most who had met us at Susan Ashford's wedding said "we warnt so stuck up as folks said; and that mammy Ashford herself thought it was not a bit proud to have a carpet wall, or 2 In the English sense. SECOND YEAR .177 the like, and that Mr. Carltin was a right down clever feller, powerful funny, and naterally addicted to laffin." And to crown all, Mr. Ashford himself, and belonging to poor Philip's sect, publicly avowed that "he hisself had actially laff'd in meetin for the water came so sudden like only he kept his face kivered with his hat, and nobody hadn't seen him." The enemy then affirmed that Glenville himself had laughed: but he procured certificates from every body at church to this point that "nobody had seen or heard John Glenville laughing; and these were read wherever Jerry's party had made the charge. 3 For any silly charge, if uncontradicted out there, and maybe in here defeats an election ; either because the charge is deemed an offset against the candidate, or people like to see their candidate in earnest, and his rebutting allegations looks like zeal for their interest, and shows a due sense in his mind of popular favour. Beside, if any one neglects a trifling charge, his enemies will soon bring larger and more plausible ones whereas his alertness scares them. At last it was boldly alleged that "John would have laughed if he had not expected to be a candidate!" But to this it was triumphantly replied that "Jerry would have laughed if he had been at meetin" for Squire Chippy and Col. Skelpum gave two separate certificates, that "Jerry Simpson had laughed when he heard tell of it ! !" Hence poor Philip's sermon was celebrated over all our district ; and everywhere was spoken and even spouted the sentence "no one couldn't make airth," and so through all the four old-fashioned chemical elements : till all men were asham- ed to bring even against "poor Carltin" a charge, to which all plainly showed, if they had been at meeting, they would have been equally liable themselves. And so our party triumphed over what once seriously threatened to defeat us. The price of liberty, eternal vigilance, is well paid in a New Purchase. With us it was watched by all classes, and through- out the year: it was indeed the universal business. Our offices all, from Governor down to a deputy constable's deputy and 3 However, since it can do no harm now, Glenville did laugh ; but nobody either saw or heard him but myself and of course I did not sign any certificate. 178 SECOND YEAR fence-viewer's clerk's first assistant, were in the direct gift of the people. We even elected magistrates, clerks of court, and the judges presiding and associate! And some who knew better, yet for rabblerousing purposes, gravely contended that trustees of colleges, and all presidents, professors, and teachers should be elected directly by the people! 4 Our social state, therefore, was for ever in ferment; for ever was some election, doing, being done, done or going to be done; and each was bitterly contested as that of president or governor. In all directions candidates were perpetually scouring the country with hats, saddle-bags, and pockets crammed with certificates, de- fending and accusing, defaming and clearing up, making licentious speeches, treating to corn whiskey, violating the Sabbath, and cursing the existing administration or the administration's wife and wife's father ! And every body expected at some time to be a candidate for something ; or that his uncle would be ; or his cousin, or his cousin's wife's cousin's 'friend would be ; so that every body, and every body's relations, and every body's relations' friends, were for ever electioneering, till the state of nasty, pitiful intrigues and licentious slanders and fierce hostility, was like a rotten carcass where maggots are, each for himself and against his neighbour, wriggling and worming about! Men were turned into mutual spies, and watched and treasured and reported and commented upon, looks, words and actions, even the most trifling and innocent ! And we were divided, house against house! and man against man; and settlements, politically considered, were clannish and filled with animosity. The sov- ereign people was, indeed, feared by the candidate who truckled to-day, and most heartily despised when he ruled to-morrow. The very boys verging on manhood were aware of their future political importance ; and even several years before voting, they were feared, petted, courted and cajoled, becoming of course conceited, unmannerly and disrespectful. Their morals were consequently often sadly hurt; and boys then voted frauduently. Standing either over the No. 21 pasted in the shoe, or between No. 21 in 4 This would seem to indicate an excess of a certain kind of democracy in the West an-d the need of the "short ballot." Hall was evidently of the opinion that elective offices were altogether too numerous. SECOND YEAR 179 the hat, and No. 22 in the shoe, they would sometimes deliberately swear, when challenged as to age, that they were over 21, or between 21 and 22!! Such depraved lads, destitute of reverence, will talk loud and long, and confidently, in any company, con- tradicting and even rebuking their betters and all the time a rabblerouser 5 affects to listen and admire such firmness and independence of spirit!! Get out! you scornful puppy! and do not prate to me about religious cant; can any thing come up to the cant and whine of a selfish, godless rabblerouser? And dare such a one say that evangelical missionaries are not safer guides, and better friends to the people than He ! Out with you, atheist. We had of course in the Purchase a passion for stump-speech- ing. But recollect, we often mount the stump only figuratively: and very good stump-speeches are delivered from a table, a chair, a whiskey barrel, and the like. Sometimes we make our best stump speeches on horse-back. In this case, when the horse is excited by our eloquence, or more commonly by the mischievous boys, more action goes with the speech than even Demosthenes in- culcated often it became altogether circumambulatory. Once a candidate stood near the tail of Isam Greenbriar's ox cart at Woodville, when some of his opponents, (perhaps some of his own friends, for the joke was tempting) noiselessly drew out the forward pins, when at the most unexpected instant, aye, in the very climax of his most ferocious effervescence, Mr. Rhodomontade was canted into the dirt! Again, our candidate for fence-viewer, with some half dozen friends, was once hard at work with certificates and speeches in Sam Dreadnought's wagon; when Sam, having several miles to drive before dark, and having already waited two good hours for matters to end, suddenly leaped on his saddle horse, and then, at a word and a crack, away dashed the team loaded with politits, very much to the amusement of the people, but much to the discomfiture of our candidate. Nothing surpasses the munificent promises and at the same time the external and grovelling humility of a genuine rabble- rouser, just before an election. He shakes hands with every body, friend and foe; he has agents to treat at his expense at B New Purchase name for a demagogue. i So SECOND YEAR every doggery ; 6 and in his own person he deals out whiskey and gingerbread, as we have seen, to a long line of independent voters marching past him with drum and fife to the polls ; and he drinks out of any drunken vagabond's bottle, laughing at his beastly jokes, putting his arm around his filthy neck, and allows himself thus to be slobbered upon, while patting the brute on the back and being patted in turn ! Yet have we noble gentlemen who, when candidates, are cour- teous indeed, but who will not do base things, nor make absurd and wicked promises, and who when defeated back out with manly scorn of licentious opponents. One such high minded individual in order to show the folly of great promises, came out the year after a defeat, saying he had altered his purposes, and now was a candidate again, and would if elected exert his utmost efforts to force the legislature "to abolish the fever and ague, and to pass a bill to find a gold mine on every poor man's quarter section." I forget whether he was now elected ; but he deserved to be. Glenville, though full of tact, was independent; although we did give credit for kip and neats-leather, even where it was doubt- ful whether our political friends would pay, and bought raw hides at higher prices than we paid at Spiceburg and Woodville. And Glenville did submit to, or rather he could not prevent a party with him in a canoe from upsetting the boat in the middle of Shining River; and who thus gave the candidate what they called a "political baptising:" but whilst this was no dry joke, our friend still, on swimming to land with the others, joined in the laugh. This too was a fair type of his immersion into the troubled waters of political life; and the way he endured the ducking so established his reputation above Jerry's, that at the ensuing election a few weeks after, Mr. G. was successful by a clean majority of 171 votes! Politicians, even in here, I am informed, are also very frequently immersed and into puddles; from which they rarely ever do flounder out, and when they do, it is said, they look nasty and soiled, and have dirty ways, all the rest of their lives! But maybe the less said on this point the sooner mended; and there- 8 New Purchase term for a grog shop or low tavern. SECOND YEAR 181 fore, as Mr. Glenville is now the people's man, the world expects his history, and we proceed to treat of the same in three chapters. CHAPTER XXIII. "I'll read you matter deep and dangerous, "As full of peril, and advent'rous spirit, As to o'erwalk a current, roaring loud, On the unsteadfast footing of a spear." Mr. Glenville was about my age, or rather I was about his age ; or to be as definite as a down east school book, we were both about the same age, and were born in A.D. 179 j 1 and hence have already lived part of two centuries, being as old as the cur- rent added to the fraction of the other. He was born, and educated for some years, in Philadelphia. His principal teacher was Mr. Moulder, who superintended an old-fashioned orthodox quaker school; in which morals were far better and more successfully cultivated than in modern quackery schools, where morals is made a separate matter. And in this primitive school John imbibed much of the Yea and Nay in his character, or his right-up-and-downedness ; a compound conduc- ing greatly to his safety and happiness in the strifes, dangers and perplexities of the wilderness. He had been destined to the counting house, but the removal of his friends to the west, changed his destiny ; and hence, being a good elementary mathe- matician and well acquainted with theoretical surveying, he was invited by Gen. Duff Green, then of Kentucky, to accompany a party to the Upper Missouri as assistant surveyor; which in- vitation was accepted. This suited our hero's love of adventure and gave an opportu- nity of seeing the world. Not the world as seen by a trip to Paris or London, but the world natural and proper; the world in its native convexity, its own ravines and mountains, its virgin soil, its primitive wilds, its unworn prairies ! to float in birch-bark canoes on the swelling bosom of free waters ! waters never de- 1 1793. See Introduction. 1 82 SECOND YEAR graded with bearing loads of merchandise, or prostituted in a part diverted to turn mills, or fill canals, or in any way to be a slave, and then to be let go discoloured with coal, or saw dust, or flour, or dyestuffs, marks of bondage that they may hurry away, sullen and indignant to hide their dishonoured waves in the ocean ! He went to see the world as the Omnipotent made it and the deluge left it! He went to hear the thunder-tramp of the wild congregations the horse and the buffalo, shaking the prairie- plains that heaved up proud to bear on their free heart the un- tamed, free, bounding, glorious herds! He went to look at the sun rising and setting on opposite sides of one and the same field ; and where the rain-bow spans half a continent and curves round the terrestrial semicircle! He went to see the smoke of a wig- wam where death flies on the wing of a stone-headed arrow, and the Indian is in the drapery of untouched forests and midst the fragrance of the ungardened, many coloured, ever-varied flowers ! What change from the smokes and smells of a city! the out- cry, war, confusion of anxious, crowded, jostled, envious, jealous, rivalous population! its contrasts of moneyed conse- quence and poverty smitten dependence! its rolling vehicles of travelling ennui and hobbling crutch of rheumatic beggary! and its saloons of boisterous mirth adjoining the sad enclosure of silent tombstones! Oh! the change from dark, damp, stifling pent holes of alleys and courts, where filth exhales its stench without the sun ! to walk abroad, run, leap, ride, hunt and shout, amid the unwrought, unsubdued, boundless world of primitive forest, flood, and prairie ! After a few weeks, Glenville was detached from the General's party, and sent with the principal surveyor and one hunter to complete a survey, with directions to rejoin the main body some two hundred miles down the Missouri, after the accomplishment of the work. The trio, therefore proceeded to the scene of their labour, which was more than fifty miles beyond the white settle- ments, and boarding on the hunting grounds of the Indians. One morning, when preparing breakfast on the bank of a river tributary to the Missouri, a large party of Indians appeared on the opposite bank, who, on espying our surveyors, came over to visit their camp, warriors and warriors' squaws, all wading with SECOND YEAR 183 red and bare legs ; and then, pleased with their reception and some small presents, they insisted that our friends should now go and take breakfast on the other side ; a request that could not be de- clined without engendering distrust. Accordingly, our trio mounted their horses and followed their wading friends across the river. Happy that the appetite is often strong! and yet strong as it was, it was almost too weak for the occasion. The breakfast be- gan with a drink of whiskey and complimentary smoking, after which came the principal viand, to wit : a soup, or hash, or swill, made of river water and deer-meat and deer-entrails all poured from a large iron kettle and smoking hot into "an earthern dish?" No. "A calabash?" No: but into a sugar trough a wooden trough ! ! and about as large as piggy uses in his early days, when fattening for a roast. Had the thing been as clean, our surveyors would never have flinched; but the trough was coated with oleaginous matter both within and without; and a portion of the interior coat, now melted by the absorption of free caloric, was contributing a yellow oily richness and flavour to the savoury mess ! And on the crust more remote from the heat frolicked larvae 2 with nice white bodies and uncouth dark heads, careless of comrades floating lifeless in the boiling gulf be- low! Had Uncle Tommy been now narrating, he would have improved the occasion to animadvert on the beastliness of a drunken riot, where some are torpid under the table, and others flourishing glasses above it ; nay, he would have gone on to insist that grubs and such like are to be found even in the most fash- ionable places : but we content ourselves with furnishing the text. From this aboriginal mess both red and white men fished up pieces of vension, with sharp sticks, and with tin cups and greasy gourds they ladled out broth till all was exhausted, except some lifeless things in a little puddle of liquid matter at the bottom and a portion of entrail lodged on the side of the trough. Our folks, who had, indeed, seen "a thing or two" in cabin cookery, were nearly sickened now; for spite of clenching the teeth in sucking broth, they were confident more than once, that articles designed to be excluded, had wormed through the enclosure. It 2 Little elfs or hob-goblins. 184 SECOND YEAR required a pint of whiskey extra during the day, quids innumer- able, and countless cigars to do away with the odor and the taste : and Glenville used to say the memory of that Indian breakfast would serve him for ever! And yet why not apply de gustibus non, to this breakfast ? The classic Romans delighted in snails ; the sacred Jews in grasshoppers. The Celestials eat rats and dogs, and the elastic Parisians devour frogs, and sometimes cats. And may not American Indians eat, without disparagement, en- trails, brown and yellow grease, and fly-blows! Depend on it, reader, this eating, is, after all, a mere matter of taste. Not many days after this breakfast, our people met in a prairie a party of Osages, and mostly mounted on small, but very active horses. The chief ordered his troop to halt, and all dismounting, he made signs for the whites to advance; upon which he stepped up to Glenville the Mercury of the three, and began an unintel- ligible gabble of English and Osage. At length he felt about Glenville's person, with his hands, and even into his bosom and pockets, till our friends became a little alarmed: when Glenville, remembering what he had heard, that nothing so quickly disarms and even makes a friend of a hostile Indian, as the show of cour- age, began to look angry, uttered words of indignation and even jerked away the chief's hand. Upon this the warrior stepping back, laughed long and loud, and with manifest contempt looked at the dwarf dimensions of the white but with approbation at his spunk; both natural feelings, when he beheld a little white man, five feet seven, and weighing nearly 120 Ibs. avoirdupois boldly resisting and repelling a big red one, more than six feet three, and weighing about 235 Ibs ! In a few moments, however, the Indian again advanced, but with the greatest good-nature; and while he now patted Glenville with one hand on the back, with the other he felt in our hero's side pocket, whence he soon abstracted a small knife and immediately transferred the same to his own pouch. After that, going to his pony, he returned with a magnificent buffalo robe wrought with rude outlines of beasts and Indians; which, throwing down before Glenville as a fair exchange of presents, he once more went to his horse, and then leaping on the animal's back, the chieftain gave the sign, and away the free spirits of the brave were again galloping towards the hazy line of the horizon ! SECOND YEAR 185 The robe, during my sojourn in Glenville, was in the winter the outer cover of our bed. And to that was owing, one of my curious dreams: a vast buffalo bull stripped of his skin and charging with his horns upon a gigantic Indian in an open prairie, while the Indian kept the bull at bay with a sugar trough in one hand, and a great dirk knife in the other. Indeed, if, when in a young gentleman's debating society at the discussion of the original and novel question, whether the savage life be prefer- able to the civilized, if then, I am irresistibly impelled to vote in the affirmative, it is owing to my constitutional tendencies, hav- ing been strengthened by sleeping two entire winters under the buffalo robe. Only think! reader, to sleep two winters, in a log cabin, in a bran New Purchase, near a chieftain and a war- rior's grave enclosed with logs and marked by a stake painted red; and under the hairy hide of an enormous prairie bull! a bull killed by a gigantic Osage chief a hide dressed by his squaw, the queen, of his papooses, the princesses ! a robe bestowed as a king's reward for my brother-in-law's courage!! Take care. I feel the effect even now hurra waw-aw for the savage life. It is carried in the affirmative by acclamation let me go. I must go, and at least draw a bead on something with my rifle! flash! bang! The surveyor's party, having in a few weeks finished their work, commenced descending the Missouri in a canoe, intending to reach the place where they had left their horses ; after which they would proceed by land to the rendezvous. One night as they were borne down rapidly by a very strong current, after having by the dim starlight barely escaped many real snags, planters, drifts and the like, and after having imagined a hundred others, they were at length driving towards a dark mass ; whether real or not could at first be only conjectured. Alas! it was no fancy; but before the direction of the canoe could be altered, it was driven violently against a drift-island, and upsetting, was carried directly under it, and so effectually hid or destroyed as never to be seen again. One man at the in- stant of collision, leaped upon the island : the others were thrown into the water; but they succeeded, although torn and bruised in the attempt, and with much difficulty, in gaining the floating mass and getting on it. All their property, provisions, clothes, 186 SECOND YEAR surveying instruments, guns, &c. were lost, except the rifle which the hunter always kept in his hand, the clothes on their persons, and the notes and records of the surveys which Mr. Glenville had accidentally put early that evening into his hat and pockets ! This, reader, was what is termed out there "a nasty fix ;" and yet our friends were still moving, not indeed very fast, for extem- poraneous islands move at all times sullenly, and often come to an anchor suddenly, and there remain for a week, a year, and sometimes they never float again. Still, it deserves to be called a fix; for first they were fixed absolutely on the drift, and relatively as to the banks; again, it was now late in the fall, and a very cold night was fixing their clothes into ice or ice upon them ; and lastly, they were fixed by their sudden unfix from the canoe, and by being hungry, wet, and cold, and yet destitute of all affixes, suffixes and "fixins." And so this curious fixation of our heroes may aid Webster in his subsequent attempts to fix the American-English by unfixing the English-English. The comrades now made a survey of their territory, and found they owned an island of logs, tree-tops and brush, matted and laced every way, with an alluvion of earth, sand, and weeds ; the whole running, at present, due north and south, one hundred yards, with easting and westing of nearly fifty yards. No sign of human habitation was visible nor trace of living animal; and it soon became morally certain the island was desert: and hence our friends began to devise means of abandoning the involuntary ownership. But the sole means appeared to be by swimming : and in that was great hazard, yet it must be done, unless they should wait for accidental deliverance; or till the party below disap- pointed at their non-arrival, should ascend the river to search for them. After a gloomy council it was unanimously decided to swim away from their island. The hunter immediately and voluntarily offered to adventure the first, promising, on reaching the shore, to stand at the best landing point, and there shout at intervals as a guide to the others. Contrary to all entreaties and dehortations, he was resolved to swim with his rifle that weapon being, in fact, always in his hands like an integral part of his body. His only reply was "She's (rifles in natural grammar are she's; to a true woodsman SECOND YEAR 187 a rifle is like a beloved sister ; and he no more thinks of he-ing and himr-ing, or even it-ing the one than the other) "she's bin too long in the family, boys, to be desarted without no attempt to save her ; no, no, it's not the fust time she's been swimm'd over a river; uncle Bill, arter that bloody fight with the Injins, jumped down the cliff with her and swimm'd her clean over the Ohio in his hand, and I kin outrassel and outswim uncle Bill any day no no we sink or swim together : so good bye, boys, here goes, I'll holler as soon as I git foothold." The splashing of the water drowned the rest; and away with his heavy rifle in one hand, and striking out with the other, swam the bold hunter, till borne down by the fierce current he had soon passed out of sight and hearing. With intense anxiety the remaining two waited for their com- rade's promised shout; but no noise came save the rushing of the boiling and angry waters past and under the drift-wood. Twenty long minutes had elapsed, and yet no voice ten more and all silence, except the waters! Could it be, as they had all along dreaded, that the hunter was indeed sunk with his fav- ourite gun ! or had he been carried one or more miles down be- fore he could land? The force of the current rendered this probable; and, therefore, they would wait an hour, to give him time to walk up the bank opposite the island and shout. But when that long and dreadful hour had elapsed, and no voice of the living comrade yet came across the dark and tumultuous waves, the agony of the hunter's only brother (for such was the surveyor on the drift with Glenville,) became irrepressible, and he said, "I must see what's become of poor Isaac I can't stand it any longer, here's my hand, Glenville, my poor boy farewell ! if I reach the shore I'll holler, if not, why we must all die fare- well." The next instant the surveyor was borne away; and the noise of his swimming becoming fainter and fainter was soon imperceptible, and John Glenville stood alone ! Reader, my brother-in-law was then, compared with men, only a boy ; and yet he stood there alone and without fear ! And was there nothing of the morally sublime in that? a very young man thus alone in the middle of the Missouri, on a dark and cold night; beyond the outskirts of civilized life; far enough away 1 88 SECOND YEAR from his mother's home, and affectionate sisters; and listening for the shouts of that second swimmer and without fear? Could any body old or young be in such circumstances, and not be alarmed? Where was that noble hunter? was he drowned? Would the second swimmer reach the shore? And if hardy and strong woodsmen escaped not, could he, a boy, expect to reach the shore? True, thoughts of his mother now rushed in un- called ; but these only nerved his purpose, and he resolved, with God's aid, to use his art and skill for their sakes ; or, if he must perish in the tumultuating flood of the wilderness, to die putting forth his best exertions to live hark! what comes like a dying echo! can it be! yes, hark! it comes again, the voice of the second swimmer there it is again ! Thank God one is safe, but where is the other. Thus encouraged, Glenville prepared for his conflict with the waves. He was an expert swimmer, and often in early boyhood had swum from Philadelphia to the op- posite island in the Delaware. Could he, therefore, now pre- serve his self-possession, why might he not accomplish a less dis- tance in the Missouri ; for the shore he knew could not be more than a quarter of a mile from the drift. Accordingly he divested himself of all clothes, except shirt and pantaloons, made up the garments taken off into a small bundle, in the midst of which, securing the papers of the survey, he fastened it together with his hat between his shoulders : and then, wading out to the end of a projecting tree, he earnestly implored God for help, cast himself boldly into the turbid waters of the dark and eddying flood. And never did he seem to float more buoyant or swim with greater ease, without any perturbation permitting the river to bear him down- ward on its bosom: and yet directing his efforts as much as possible, towards the point whence at intervals was borne to his ears the shouting of his comrade ; till, in some fifteen minutes he landed unhurt and not greatly wearied about one hundred yards below the voice, whither he instantly hastened, and to his heart- felt joy, was soon shaking hands not only with the surveyor, but also with the hunter. Yes! poor fellow he had found his favourite too heavy, and one arm, powerful as it was, too weak for his long battle with a king of floods. Long, long, very long had he held to his gun; but half-suffocated, his strength failing, SECOND YEAR 189 and he whirling away at times from the shore almost reached, to save his life he had at last slowly relaxed his grasp, and his rifle sank. Yet even then repenting, he had twice gone down to the bottom to recover the weapon : and happily, failing in finding it his strength never would have sufficed incumbered again with a gun to reach the land. Indeed, when he gained the bank he was barely able to clamber up, and could scarcely speak or even walk, when discovered by his brother: who had easily reached the shore himself, and, after shouting once or twice to Glenville, had gone down on the bank a full quarter of a mile before finding the hunter. By the aid of the surveyor, the hunter then had walked up till they had reached the spot where they were both now met by Glenville; and thus by the goodness of Providence, our three friends were delivered from their peril. Upon reconnoitering, it was conjectured that they must be near the squatter's hut, with whom had been left their horses; and hence taking a course, partly by accident and partly by observa- tion, not long after they were cheered by the distant bark of his dogs, and next by the gleam of fire through the chinks of his cabin. Here, of course, the party was welcomed, and supplied with whatever was in the squatter's power to afford for their refreshment; principally, however, a hearty dram of whiskey, some corn bread and jerked vension, but above all, a bed of dry skins, and a heap of blazing logs. In the morning they obtained supplies of skins and blankets, agreeing to pay their host if he would go with them to the rendez- vous; which he did, and was suitably and cordially rewarded. It was now perceived that if the poor hunter had left his rifle on the drift-island, she could have been regained by means of a raft : but to tell where she had been abandoned in the river was impossible. Otherwise our hunter would have made many a dive for the rescue of his "deer slayer ;" as it was, he came away disconsolate, and, indeed, as from the grave of a comrade almost in tears! CHAPTER XXIV. "Ac veluti summis antiquam in montibus ornum Cum ferro accisam crebrisque bipennibus instant Eruere agricolae certatim: ilia usque minatur, Et tremef acta comam concusso vertice nutat : Vulneribus donee paulatim evicta, supremum Congemuit, traxitque jugis avulsa ruinam." OUR party reached the rendezvous only a few hours beyond the appointed time. Here, as a bee-tree had been just reported, it was unanimously determined to commemorate the deliverance and safe arrival of our three friends by a special jollification. In other words, it was voted to obtain the wild honey ; and then, in a compound of honey, water and whiskey, to toast our undrowned heroes and their presence of mind and bravery : no small honour, if the trouble of getting the honey is considered. For, on follow- ing the aerial trail of the bees, the hive was ascertained to be in a hollow limb of the largest patriarchal sire of the forest a tree more than thirty feet in circumference! and requiring six men at least, touching each other's hands, to encircle the trunk! And this is a fair chance to say a word about the enormous circumambitudialitariness ( /) of many western trees. It is com- mon to find such from six to seven feet in diameter ; and we have more than once sat on stumps and measured across three lengths of my cane, nearly ten feet; and found, on counting the con- centric circles, that these monsters must have been from seven to eight hundred years old an age greater than Noah's, and almost as venerable as that of Methusaleh ! Shall we feel no sublimity in walking amid and around such ancients? Trees that have tossed their branches in the sun light and winds for eight cen- turies! that have scorned the tempests and torandoes, whose fury ages ago prostrated cities and engulfed navies! that have sheltered wildfowl in their leaves, and hid wild beasts in their caverns from the dooms-day looking gloom of many total solar eclipses ! and have gleamed in the disastrous light of comets re- turning in the rounds of centenary cycles ! Such trees, but for the insidious and graceless axe, that in its powerlessness begged a small handle of the generous woods, such SECOND YEAR 191 would yet stand for other centuries to come, at least .decaying, if not growing: they are herculean even in weakness and dying! And dare finical European tourists say we have no antiquity! Poor souls! poor souls! -our trees were fit for navies, long years before their old things existed! Ay, when their oldest castles and cities were unwrought rock and unburnt clay! Our trees belong to the era of Egyptian architecture they are coeval with the pyramids ! Near the junction of the White River of Indiana and the Wabash, stands a sycamore fully ninety feet in circumference! Within its hollow can be stabled a dozen horses ; and if a person stand in the centre of the ground circle, and hold in his hand the middle of a pole fifteen feet long, he may twirl the pole as he pleases, and yet touch no part of the inner tree ! He may, as did Bishop Hilsbury, mounted on a horse, ride in at a natural opening, canter round the area, and trot forth to the world again ! But to the bee-tree. It is a proverb, "He that would eat the fruit must first climb the tree and get it :" but when that fruit is honey, he that wants it must first cut the tree down. And that was the present necessity. No sooner was this resolved, however, than preparation was made for execution; and instantly six sturdy fellows stood with axes, ready for the work of destruction. They were all divested of garments excepting shirts and trowsers ; and now, with arms bared to the shoulders, they took distances around the stupendous tree. Then the leader of the band, glancing an eye to see if his neighbour was ready, stepped lightly forward with one leg, and swinging his weapon, a la Tom Robison, he struck; and the startled echoes from the "tall timber" of the dark dens, were telling each other that the centuries of a wood-monarch were numbered! That blow was the signal for the next axe, and its stroke for the next; till cut after cut brought it to the leader's second blow : and thus was completed the circle of rude har- mony ; while the lonely cliffs of the farther shores, and the grim forests on this, were repeating to one another the endless and regular notes of the six death-dealing axes! And never before had the music of six axes so rung out to enliven the grand soli- tudes and a smaller number was not worthy to bid such a tree fall! 192 SECOND YEAR Long was it, however, before the tree gave even the slightest symptom of alarm. What had it cared for the notchings of a hundred blows! Yet chip afteil chip had leaped from the wounded body each a block of solid wood and the keen iron teeth were beginning to gnaw upon the vitals! Alas! oh! noble tree, you tremble ! Ah ! it is not the deep and accustomed thunder of the heavens, that shakes you now ! no mighty quaking of the earth! That is a strange shivering it is the chill shivering of death! But what does death mean where existence was deemed immortal! Why are those topmost branches, away off towards the blue heavens, so agitated ! Tree ! tree ! no wind stirs them so they incline towards the earth away ! hunter, away ! away ! Hark! the mighty heart is breaking! And now onward and downward rushes yon broad expanse of top, with the cataract roar of eddying whirlwinds; and the far-reaching arms have caught the strong and stately trees; and all are hurrying and leaping and whirling to the earth, in tempest and fury! Their fall is heard not. In the overwhelming thunder of that quiver- ing trunk, and the thousand crushings of those giant limbs, and the deep groan of the earth, are lost all other noises, as the slight crack of our rifles and the sudden bursting of the electric cloud ! There lies the growth of ages ! Once more the sun pours the tide of all his rays over an acre of virgin soil, barely discerned by him for centuries! Well might Glenville feel rewarded and honoured, when for his sake such a tree lay prostrate at his feet! And yet in all this was fulfilled the saying, the sublime and ridiculous are separated by narrow limits ; for, could any thing be grander than such a tree and such an overthrow? Could any be meaner than the purpose for which it fell ? viz : To get a gallon of honey to sweeten a keg of whiskey! CHAPTER XXV. "Provide the proper pal fries, black as jet To hale thy vengeful wagon swift away, And find out murderers in their guilty caves." AFTER many other trials and adventures Glenville returned safe to his home in Kentucky. Here with his wages he loaded a boat with "produce," and set float for New Orleans; intending with the cash realized by the trip, on his return, to go into Illinois with a stock of goods and "keep store." But at Orleans he was seized with the yellow fever, and was finally given over by his physician, and orders issued, in anticipation of death, for his interment. That very night, however, in delirium, and while his kind yet weary nurse slumbered in a chair, he arose and finding a basin of water brought to wash him in the morning, he instantly seized and swal- lowed the whole contents the only thing deemed wanting to kill him ! And yet when put again into bed, he fell into a calm and delicious slumber; perspired freely, and when he awoke the fever was gone, and my friend saved. Let careful persons, there- fore, who keep a memorandum book put this along side the celebrated Scotch-herring-recipe, "Cure for Orleans fever: two quarts of cold water, and cover up in bed." Glenville did, indeed, get home and with some money from a successful sale ; but he was worn and emaciated, and many months passed, before he could cross the Ohio and set up his store. His cup of bitterness was not drained ; and evil came now in a form demanding stout heart and steady nerves. Ay! our dark and illimitable forests then hid men of lion hearts, of iron nerves, of sure and deadly weapons! Perhaps such dwell there yet; if so, wo! to the enemy that rashly arouses them from their lairs and challenges, where civilized discipline avails not ! and where battle is a thousand conflicts man to man, rifle to rifle, knife to knife, hatchet to hatchet ! And Glenville, boy as he was, proved himself worthy a name among the lion-hearted ! We stood once on a solemn spot in the wilderness and leaned against the very tree where the bloody knife of the only survivor had rudely and briefly carved the tale of the tragedy. It stood nearly thus: 194 SECOND YEAR "18 injins 15 wites injins all kill'd and buried here 14 wites kill'd and buried too P. T." Laugh away, men of pomatum and essence, at Hoosiers, and Corncrackers, and Buckeyes : ay ! lace-coats, mow them down in an open plain with canister and grape, you safely encased behind bulwarks ; or cut them to pieces with pigeon breasted, mailed and helmed cuirassiers, but seek them not as enemies in their native and adopted woods ! The place of your graves will be notched in their trees, and you will never lie under polished marble, in a fashionable and decorated cemetery! But Glenville, in store keeping witnessed a farce before his tragedy. Among his earthen and sham-Liverpool, were found some articles, similar to things domesticated in great houses, and which, although not made unto honour, were in the present case very unexpectedly elevated in the domestic economy. These modesties occupied a retired and rather dusky part of the store; when one day an honest female Illinois (i. e. a Sucker's wife) in her travels around the room in search of crocks suddenly ex- claimed: "Well! I never! if them yonder with the handles on, aint the nicest I ever seen! Johhny, what's the price? but I must have three any how ; here Johnny do up this white one (rapping it with her knuckles) and them two brown ones up thare." A large purchase, to be sure, of the article ; but curiosity asked no questions : and in due time the trio were packed and hanging in a meal bag from the horn of the lady's saddle ; who, on taking leave, thus addressed our marvelling shopkeeper: "Mr. Glenville, next time you go gallin, jist gimme and my ole- man a call, we've got a right down smart chance of a gall to look at good bye." Our hero, who had early discovered, that store keeping is none the worse when the owner is in favour with the softer sex, did not forget this invitation, and in due season made his kind friends a visit : and when supper was placed on the table by the smiling maid and her considerate mother, what do you think was there? "Corn bread?" Hold your ear this way (a whisper.) SECOND YEAR 195 "No! he! he! he!" Yes, indeed, and doubledeed ! the white one full of milk ! ! And after that you know our humblest democrat, may well look up to the presidency. It had become about this time necessary for Mr. G. to visit Louisville. For that purpose, he left his store in charge of a young man; the latter promising among other things to sleep in the store, instead of which, however, he always slept at a neigh- bouring cabin. Hence what was feared happened, the store was robbed. Not truly in the eastern style, of small change in the desk, some half dozen portable packages, or paltry three dozen yards of something; no, no, the robbery was on the wholesale principle commensurate with the vastness of our woods and prai- ries. The entire stock in trade was carried off bales, boxes, bags, packages, and even yard-sticks and scales to sell by yes, ! and hardware, and software, and brittleware, ay! crocks with and without handles, and whatever may have been their standing in society, all, all were taken! so that when the clerk came in the morning to retail to the Suckers, there was indeed, a beg- garly account not of empty boxes, these being mostly carried away but of empty shelves, and empty desks, and empty store. His occupation was even more completely gone than Othello's. On the river bank x were, indeed, traces enough of a mysterious departure of merchandise ; but whether the embarkation had been in skows, or "perogues," and other troughlike vessels, was uncer- tain. Nor could it even be conjectured, for what port the store had been spirited away ; or for what secret cove or recess of tall weeds matted into texture with sharp briars and thorny bushes ! Previous to Glenville's return, a fellow that had been noticed lurking in the woods near the store for two days before the rob- bery, was recognised in a small village, the day after, and in sus- picious circumstances. He was, therefore apprehended ; when, after a short imprisonment, he confessed having been employed by some strangers to steer a flat boat loaded with something or other from Glenville's landing. On his return, our merchant went to the sheriff, who indignant at villainy that had so com- pletely ruined a very young man after years of toil and danger Big-Fish-River. 196 SECOND YEAR passed in acquiring his little property, did himself suggest and offer voluntarily to aid in a scheme to compel the prisoner to dis- close, at least, where the goods were concealed, and before they should be removed from the country or ruined by the damp. We are not advocates for lynching, but we do know that where laws cannot and do not protect backwoodsmen, they fall back on reserved rights and protect themselves. Nay, such, in- stead of laying aside defensive weapons, after legislators shall have been wheedled, or frightened, or bribed into vile plans by puling or fanatical moralists to nurse the wilful and godless mur- derer on good bread, wholesome water and occasional soups, all the remainder of his forfeited days we know that such woodmen will go better armed, to slay and not unrighteously on the spot every unholy apostate that maliciously and wilfully strikes down and stamps on God's image ! And when the day comes that the avenger of a brother's blood wakes in our land let no canting infidel or universalist blame those that now resist the abrogation of divine laws! but let him blame hypocritical juries, rabble- rousing governors, and all that are now deserting the weak, the innocent, the unwary, the defenceless, and crying "God pity and defend and save and bless the murderer !" 2 and "Shame on the dead poor lifeless, victim!" The sheriff and Glenville with two fearless and voluntary asso- ciates prevailed on the jailor to loan them the prisoner for a day or two, making known their scheme and giving suitable pledges for his redelivery. The loan was made, and then, on reaching a fit place, the prisoner was dismounted, and Glenville proposed to him the following: "My friend, we know very well you helped to rob my store, and that you know well enough where your comrades are and how the goods can be recovered; now, if you will tell, not only will we get you out of jail, provided you will leave the country, 2 Some politicians plead strenuously for the abolishing of Capital Punishment in all cases, who yet insist op the right of self-defence, de- fensive -wars, and the propriety of firing on mobs with powder and ball! Of course, it is very proper to kill any number of persons intending either to rob or murder ; but very wicked and impolitic to put any body to death after his crimes shall have been committed! SECOND YEAR 197 but I will give you also ten dollars ; tout if you won't tell, why then we'll flog you into it come, what do you say ?" "Well, he be some-thing'd if he know'd; and if he did, he wasn't going to be lick'd into tellin and he'd sue them for salt and battery." Peril, indeed, was in this illegal process; but the party had good reasons for believing the fellow a desperate robber, and so they seemed to be preparing for a severe flaggellation, when he supposing all was solemn earnest, said he was ready to confess, and, provided Mr. G. would forgive and not prosecute, he would conduct the present party to the plunder, or a part of it. The promise was readily given and the fellow was unbound and re- mounted without any trammel, but with this comfortable assur- ance, that if he tried to escape or to betray them into any rendez- vous of robbers, he should be instantly shot down, and that whether they died themselves for it or not. 3 Accordingly, away all started through the woods, where the prisoner yet rode, confident, as if following a blaze, and stopping only at intervals to look at the sun, or the moss, or to examine a tree or branch, and shewing if he had one hundred yards fair start, it would be no easy matter either to catch or shoot him. At last, a wild turkey was seen trotting across their course, fully eighty yards off, and then Glenville, nearly as good shot as the writer, merely stopping his horse, levelled and fired from his sad- dle, when to his own surprise, as well as that of the others, the bird fell dead in his tracks! After this the guide would check his own horse, if he voluntarily stepped faster than the others, lest he should seem meditating an escape ; for if a moving turkey could be shot, so he seemed to think could more easily be a mov- ing man. The fellow, however, led at length into a deep ravine on Big Wolf Creek ; and there, sure enough, some in a cave and some in a hollow tree were portions of the merchandise it being evident also that within a very few hours a still larger portion had been removed to some other depot ! By the force of additional threats, promises and entreaties, the rascal named the other robbers, he be- 3 It was intended only to frighten the man, unless he did actually betray the party to the robbers when, of course, it would be life for life. 198 SECOND YEAR ing merely a subordinate; but as no small hazard would be en- countered in attacking the temporary cabin, where the principal robber and the remaining goods were, it was determined first to get additional volunteers and make more suitable preparation. Packing the damaged and soiled goods on their horses, the sher- iff's party returned with their prisoner to the village of Shante- burg, and redelivered him to the jailor, intending if his informa- tion proved substantially correct to have the fellow not only liberated, but otherwise rewarded. Here, also, two others volunteered to join in the robber hunt; upon which all, with loaded rifles, and knives and hatchets in their belts, soon mounted, and were plunging again into the darkness of the forest, now black from a moonless night. Early on the next morning they came in sight of the cabin. When within fifty yards, the robber stepping to the door let his rifle fall in that peculiar manner that belongs to a practiced marksman, at the same time warning off his visitors, and solemnly swearing he would kill the man that first approached his barricade. At the instant, however, of the man's appearance and even before he had faily uttered a word, our friends had "treed" in a twinkling, and now stood with pointed weapons and keen eyes towards the bold thief. Glenville, on leaping from his horse, instead of treeing, stood boldly out and thus exclaimed loud enough to be heard by all : "Sheriff, you are all running this risk for me 'tis my duty to lead. I'll attack the scoundrel; if he shoots me avenge my death!" With that he fearlessly advanced with his levelled rifle and then halting, called to the villain : "Throw down your gun in ten seconds one of us is a dead man one, two, three :" and so the two stood, each with his bead darkened by the other's breast the sheriff's men, also unwilling to shed blood ; yet with a finger every man on his set trigger till Glenville called "seven" when the robber suddenly threw up his muzzle, and cried out, "surren- dered I" The next instant he was seized and bound. This was the leader. His main accomplices were not discovered, and only another portion of the stolen goods, which, together with the robber, were now conveyed in triumph to Shanteburg. That after- noon the fellow was lodged in jail, and of necessity in the same room with the subordinate thief: yet, while all possible care was SECOND YEAR 199 used to prevent escape, in less than forty-eight hours both con- trived to get out ! and from that hour to the present, neither they, nor the remainder of the merchandize was ever seen or recovered. It was, indeed ascertained that they belonged to a small foraging party from the grand gang of outlaws, whose head-quarters then were among the islands and cane-breakers of the Missouri : and so doubtless they escaped by the aid of concealed comrades and all got safe off with Mr. Glenvile's balance in trade, to the army of the confederates. Perhaps they lived to rob again may be to murder; and for which latter service our modern pseudo-philan- thropists would pity and feed theme' Many neighbours out there will always physic such with lead pills at least till Reformers have prisons prepared to hold their pets longer than a few hours ! This pleasant adventure, terminated Mr. G's first essay at store- keeping. It gained him, however, a character, and no one would have become popular in the New Purchase, 4 but for mistaken opinions in the neighbours about "Mr. Carlton's bigbuggery and stuckupness." As it was, Glenville nearly went over Simpson rough shod. And all these little affairs aided our firm in sore disappointments and losses ; for then the senior would say "Well! we might have had better luck." And the junior reply, "Why, yes and another consolation: this is not the first dis- appointment, and it wont be the last!" We, in short, thus learned to imitate the sailor, who, in witness- ing a conjuror's tricks, was pitched into the yard by the accidental blowing up of some gunpowder; but which supposing to be one of the tricks, he held on to his bench, and exclaimed : "Well ! what next?" 4 Our part of it CHAPTER XXVI. O Cromwell ! Cromwell ! Had I but served my God with half the zeal I serv'd my King, he would not in mine age Have left me naked to mine enemies." Is the way of a transgressor hard? that of a politician is not much easier. He is usually a slave first, and a timeserver after- wards. In the Purchase the sovereign people are the most un- compromising task masters ; and he that wishes to serve them, had better first take a trip to Egypt and learn the art of doing brick without straw. In certain districts, fitness, mental, and moral is a secondary qualification in a candidate; he must be a clever fellow in the broad republican sense. For instance, he must lend his saddle to a neighbor, and ride himself, bareback ; he must buy other people's produce for cash, and sell his own for trade or on credit ; and, on certain solemn occasions, he must appear without a coat, and in domestic muslin shirt-sleeves : his overalls hung by half a suspender, and a portion of the above named muslin curiously pouched between his vest and inexpressibles. His face must wreathe, or wrinkle, with endless smiles ; and his ungloved hand be ready for a pump-handle shake with friend and foe alike : because a foe often presents his hand to ascertain if "the fellow aint too darn'd proud to shake hands with a poor man !" Is the man of honour invited to eat? he asks no questions for conscience's sake, or the stomach's the two things being in many people the same. Is he asked to stay all night? he never wonders where they will find him a bed there being only three in the room, and the family consisting of one old man, and one old woman, two grown sons, three daughters, and some little folks he naturally lies down on the puncheons with his certifi- cate wallet for a bolster. Or does he share a bed with two others ? then he recollects it is a free country, and if one man needs votes, another needs brimstone. And why turn up a nose at an oderiferous blanket? has a bed any right, natural or political, to more than one sheet ? and why should not the sheet be under and the blanket above you? Let go your nose! has not a long suc- 200 SECOND YEAR 201 cession of "your dear fellow-citizens" slept in the same bed, and between the same articles; and what, pray, are you better than they to wish clean things? "Yes but I'm nearly stifled." Tut man ! you'll never mind it when you get to sleep. "But it cer- tainly will kill me!" Not it: men of honour are not so easily destroyed. Would a candidate cough? he puts no hand up, nor turns aside his head. Must the nose be blown? he draws out no handkerchief. Would he spit? he neither goes to the door, nor uses a perfumed cambric, like a first-rate clergyman. Why? because all such observances are regarded as signs of pride, and if you despise them not, your election is hopeless. "But, Mr. Carlton, we might transmit something offensive to a gentleman's garments." "Well, what then ! he will certainly some time or other return your favour. Be satisfied, my dear Mr. Eastman, it is only by giving and taking all sorts of matters out there, you can, in some districts, ever secure your election." "And do any politicians endure all this !" Certainly: and persons who aspire to rule ought surely first to serve. Many remarkable men in Congress, be it known, had a long training in some Purchase their meannesses are not of toadstool growth, if they are of toadstool flavour. Reader ! are you religious ? Then do write a tract to be scat- tered any where on election days ; and here is your text or theme : "Give diligence to make your calling and election sure." Among other matters, set forth how it requires not one fourth the labour, toil, anxiety, watchfulness and none of the base sacrifices of time, comfort, and independence to save a man's soul as to win an elec- tion; and, how the worldly honour is not worth after all even the worldly price paid for it, and much less, the immortal soul usually thrown in with the rest to boot. We, of course, did not do some things, and hence Mr. Glenville was soon permitted to remain in private life; still we were com- pelled, for electioneering objects, to attend this summer, several Log-Rollings. Folks in the Purchase had no special days for political gatherings, or at most, not more than two dozen in a whole year; for, in lieu of such, every militia muster, cabin- 202 SECOND YEAR raising, scow-launching, shooting-match, log-rolling and so forth, was virtually a political assembly, where our great men and their partisans made stump speeches, and read certificates. For the benefit of our surplus young lawyers, and other ambitious gentle- men who have neither trades nor stores, and who are desirous of rising above the political horizon, and are meditating to emigrate to the west, we shall here give a full account of one Grand Log- Rolling, which Glenville and Co., attended this season. On reaching the place, we found a large and motley assembly of fellow-creatures men, women, boys, girls, horses, oxen, dogs all of whom, and which, came either to aid or listen, except the dogs, and these came simply out of philanthropy. They spent the time mainly in wagging their tails, barking at rolling logs, and thrusting in their noses wherever there was a pretext for seeming busy while others were so hard at work ; and yet, excepting some three dozen snakes, four skunks, two opossums and a score or two of insignificant field rats and mice and ground squirrels, the dogs caught nothing the whole blessed day. Indeed, some secretly thought it would have been just as well if the musk-cats had been allowed to escape, for, after their capture, the dogs were not altogether so agreeable ; yet no candidate or candidate's friends or even their enemies kicked or whipped a favourite wag-tail. It was hardly politic to curl your nose. What was a fellow fit for, that minded such things ? was he the man to go to the legislature and carry skins 1 to a bear. The whole intended field, however, was resounding with all kinds of cries, noises, and echoes, such as shouts orders counterorders encouragements reproaches whoas, gees and haws hold-on's and let-go's, and that's your sort's up-with- him's to male logs, pull her this way, to female ones, and down- with-it to neutrals; with clatter of axes and tomahawks; the thunder of rolling trunks; the crash of brush; the crackling of flames : and, over all, agreeably to the "Music of Nature," 2 were heard the shrill outcries of females; the screeching of boys; the snorting and winnowing of horses; and the howling and barking of dogs! Never was scene more exciting ; and our appearance in 1 Sausage sort. 2 Gardiner's. .SECOND YEAR 203 working trim, was hailed with the most enthusiastic cheering; which compliment being suitably returned, we speedily joined the nearest working party. As for myself, surely I never did haloa (holler) louder in my life: and I certainly never did work harder for a whole entire hour, dressed en costume, to wit: in tow- trousers, cow-hide boots, and unbleached hemp linen shirt, but without coat or vest, and with shirt sleeves rolled above the elbows. We did not attend the gathering purely out of rabblerousing feelings ; we wanted to hear the speech of ours John intended to let off at Jerry; for something was expected today of Glenville, and he was only a novice in stump elocution, and so we had, being "high larn'd" and a "leetle" of a politician, made John's first speech ourselves! Had John been as great a nincompoop as Jerry, he could just as readily have spoken nonsense off hand; but he knew too much to speak sense without preparation : and so Mr. Carlton had prepared the maiden speech. This, however, our friend, like some manuscript preachers, delivered more than once, yet always with variations and additions, till at last the very theme and text were both changed, and our stump orator gave towards the end of the campaign a much better speech than he had commenced with. Our historian, as has been hinted, did not figure a very long time with the handspike, having luckily discovered some pretext for soon joining a squawking and frolicsome squad of boys, girls and young women, engaged in the 'niggerin-off." Where it is de- signed to make "a clearing," the owner has all the trees, except some six or eight on an acre, cut down, the others being "dead- ened;" that is girdled by a deep cut two inches wide. If the majority of the trees are thus girdled, the field is called "a deadening," otherwise it is a clearing. Now, it is to a clearing the log-rolling, or, for brevity's sake, "a rolin," pertains. In order to the rolling the owner has had all prostrate trunks cut into suitable lengths, and the bushy tops preserved for fuel to the log-heaps ; still many trees remain to be prepared even on the grand rolling day; and such of course require the neighbours' axes and hatchets. In fifty or more places of the clearing, and in many parts of the 204 SECOND YEAR same trunk, logs are making, and with wonderful celerity by another process an almost noiseless process, too, and requiring, like Yankee factories, only women, girls, and children. And this is the niggering-off. It is thus performed. A small space is hacked into the upper side of the trunk, and in that for awhile is maintained a fire fed with dry chips and brush; then at right angles, with the prostrate timber is laid in the fire a stick of some green wood, dry fuel being yet added at intervals, till the incumbent stick, sinking deeper and deeper into the burning spot, in no very long time, if properly attended, divides or niggers the trunk asunder. The terms of this art are derived from the marvellous resem- blance the ends of charred logs have to a negro's head another fact on which abolitionists may dilate with great pathos in the next batch of popular lectures, on the wickedness of our preju- dices : although it must be remembered that our black rascals out there invented the terms themiselves ! The axe is truly a mighty agent in the civilization of new countries. Fire is a greater and only in a New Purchase and in the niggering operation is the famous copy-book sentence illus- trated properly "Fire is a bad master, but a good servant'" its mastership belongs to our log-burnings. Without the aid of fire, the stoutest heart must be appalled at the thought of hewing out with the axe a farm from our forests; and yet with the aid of fire even females may achieve that enterprise. When the logs are all cut or niggered, they are then rolled, but often dragged together, in different parts of the. clearing; and usually to the vicinity of some huge tree deadened, or perhaps living, and waving its melancholy arms over the mutilated bodies and mangled limbs of its slain children and friends. Ah ! happy if the tree be dead; for it is destined, if not dead, to a dreadful end to be burned alive ! Oh ! poor tree ! thy former friends are compelled to become thy worst enemies their severed trunks are gigantic fagots! Alas! the pile rising up, as log after log rolls heavily against thy quivering column, amid our labour, and shout- ing, and uproar, that pile, now surrounded, and crowned with a tangled world of brushwood, is thy sumptuous and magnific pyre! Monarch! of a thousand years, thou shalt die a SECOND YEAR 205 kingly death ! Nor would'st thou be spared only to sigh among strange harvests soon to spring around to sigh for the shades and shadows and touching branches and kissing leaves of departed trees ! No thou would'st not choose to survive thy race ! The piles are sometimes lighted at the end of the rolling; oftener by the settler's family at their leisure. To-day, however, as we were a very large party, and had, therefore, finished the rolling early in the afternoon, it was resolved that immediately after the candidates should have done speaking, all the heaps and piles should be kindled at once. Now to their praise be it forever 3 recorded, that both John and Jerry had, as their friends allowed, "worked most powerful hard and steady :" but their ene- mies must determine whether this diligence was out of disinter- ested love to the settler, or with a single eye to the vote of the settler's eldest son, who, as his father accidentally remarked, would be entitled to a vote at the next election. Indeed, as the zealous partizans had closely imitated their respective candidates, more unfigurative, practical and innocent log-rolling was done to- day than was ever witnessed ; and I secretly made up my mind that our next log-rolling in Glenville should happen just before the fall election; when we could get the opposing candidates to lead the work. It is not improbable that our host to-day had had the same thought ; at all events our candidates certainly sweat for their expected honours ; and if John did gain them he worked for them but Jerry! alas! he toiled in vain! and alas! it blistered my hands! but then after this, I was unanimously voted "a right down powerful clever sort of a feller!" and more than one very pretty young woman, "allowed she'd be Mr. Carltin's second wife, when his old woman died ! !" After all, candidates are of some use ; and the great majority can do more good in natural log-rolling than in the metaphorical sorts common among the dirk and pistol law-givers of deliberative as- semblies. Nay, a very few hundreds of rival and zealous candi- dates would, in a year or so, if judiciously driven under proper task-masters, clear a very considerable territory. The candidate 4 to-day stood not on a stump to make his address, 3 In a finite sense the life of this book. 4 Mr. Jerry Simpson declined speaking. 206 SECOND YEAR but on a very large log heap, sustained by a living oak more than three hundred years old ! an incident to me full of interest. Our first speech, the first of the sort I ever wrote the first he ever uttered, our first speech was poured forth over the ruins of greatness a prostrate wilderness! The youthful speaker, the dear friend of many years, stood on a funeral pyre! while above him waved the sheltering branches of the tree, soon to be sacri- ficed and writhe in a tempest of fire ! And ours was the first, the last, the only oration ever made by a Christian under its protec- tion! the grand old tree seeming to wonder at the semi-civiliza- tion that had wrought such havoc in its domain while it knew not that the ceasing of Glenville's voice would be a signal for lighting the fires ! The speech need not be described. It was, of course, rather ad-captandumish ; well written, however, but still better delivered and handsomely varied. Hence, if it gained no new votes, it secured the old ones. And that is no light praise, where a word, a look, a gesture, or even a smile changes votes; not to lose is then to gain. The new settlers acted with the strictest impar- tiality they divided their interest. The father had "know'd Jerry's father, and often heern tell of Jerry himself and so he would never d'sart an old friend; but the son, "darn'd-his eyes (a peculiar kind of stitching) if he wouldn't go for Glenville ; as cos he hisself was a young man, and so was tother and as cos he'd give him a sort of start in his clearing, he's give him a sort of start as a public funkshune'er." And thus the balance of the power was adjusted to a nicety; and thus, also, if the new comers did neither party any good they did them no harm: pay enough for a hard day's work, considering. For, certainly, a wide difference must appear between having nothing in your favour and two somethings against you, and so it was now ; hence John and Jerry felt (or at least said so) as much gratitude as if they had received not a negative quantity, but a positive favour. Complacent reader, I hope you never sneer at sovereignty? Be well assured it can sneer at you, and always will, if you descend in any way to be a slave. Save yourself for a crisis acquire reputation for honour and integrity and the people will then call upon you. The present is the age of small bugs. SECOND YEAR 207 The speech ended, and we were divided into Firing Committees to light the different piles : after which was to be a grand supper previous to going home. Very soon then at each heap, were assembled about half a dozen men, which in all directions were tearing, scampering, screeching, and yelling women, boys, girls, dogs and puppies some carrying fire on clap-board shingles some with remnants of burning niggering sticks others with dry and blazing wood and the canine helps, some with sticks and chips in their mouths, and some with the dead snakes and pole- cats, so that almost instantly and simultaneously fires were kindled in several parts of each, and every heap and pile throughout the whole clearing. Combustibles had been built in with the piles; and now a gentle wind was fanning all into devouring flames. Yet, after the first sudden and crackling blaze, the fires sub- siding became, at a short distance, barely visible; save in parts where dry logs had become quickly ignited, and there a taper- pointed intense flame, shooting up, would remain fixed a few seconds, and then trembling from its own gathering fury, it would rise higher and higher, and ever expanding its base as it elevated the apex. But by the time our feast was ended, and the shadows length- ening from the forest told the coming reign of darkness, a hundred- hundred fierce points of taper flame gleamed in wrath from every crevice, or darted from the dense clouds of black smoke ; and in many places, several points had united their bases, and were now in one broad fiery mass, careering in spiral columns of mingled darkness and light. Now fiercer winds were rushing into the vacuum. The equilibrium disturbed through an aerial cir- cumference of many leagues diameter, the storm spirits aroused and excited, came flying on the wings of a sudden earth born tempest! 5 This augmented the number and intensity of the flames ; and these, augmented, invoked in their madness more furious winds, till a broad, deep and awful tide of air poured through the clearing, with the force and revengeful roar of the hurricane! and up leaped all the fires in frightful columns of pyramids of living flames quivering with wild wrath, and coiling, 5 The very kind in which the Philadelphia Storm-king delights: but he did not raise ours. 208 SECOND YEAR like demon-serpents, around and up the mighty trees that sustained the pyres! Here and there sheets of flame thrown forth horizontally, and seemingly by an intervening body of smoke, detached from the mass of fire, resembled clouds on fire and burning up from their own lightning! No breath of life could any longer be drawn in that field of fire ! It was abandoned as a wide tumultuating flood, where un- seen and dreadful spirits held a terrific revel amidst the roar, and crash, and thunder of flaming whirlwinds ! Far and wide the forest was grandly illuminated; and in re- turning home I often looked back and saw the noble trees at the pyres, tossing their mighty arms and bowing their spreading tops for mercy and succour ay! like beings sending forth cries of agony unheard in that fiery chaos ! Our home was several miles from this clearing, but the next night, on ascending the bluff on the creek, we could yet see in that quarter a lurid sky, and now and then fitful gleams of brightness ; and even a week after, as I passed that clearing, the arena was yet smoking, although nothing remained of that part of the primeval forest, save heaps of ashes and a few blackened upright masses that for so many centuries had been the living bodies of the lately martyred trees ! CHAPTER XXVII. "A merrier man Within the limit of becoming mirth I never spent an hour's talk withal, So sweet and voluble is his discourse." READER, will you be asked a question? "Certainly." Do you ever go to the post-office? "What a question!" Well, but are you thankful for a daily mail? ' "Pshaw! I never think about it." Just as I supposed. I was such a thoughtless person myself, once. Now, however, I am thankful to Uncle Samuel every time I walk to the post-office. SECOND YEAR 209 In our part of the Purchase the nearest office to Glenville was at Spiceburgh, always nine miles off, sometimes two or three more. To that office the mail if such may be called a dirty, famished, flapping, scrawny pair of little saddlebags, containing three or four letters in one end, and half a dozen newspapers in the other the mail came regularly (in theory) once a month, till the Hon. J. Glenville exerted himself in favour of his constituents, and then it came very irregularly once in two weeks. Sometimes there was an entire failure in the saddlebags' arrival. And this was occasioned by the clerk at Woodville office, who, whenever he discovered no letters for Spiceburgh retained the papers for private edification, and to be forwarded next mail : at least Josey Jackson, our post-master, said so. Sometimes our mail failed because of high waters; although our post-boy, Jack Adams, a spunky little chap, would often in such cases swim over: but then the half-starved wallet was twice washed away, and when recovered, the news in both letters and papers was too diluted and washy for any practical purpose. Reader, it was truly sickening, after waiting four endless weeks with the most exemplary impatience, and after toiling, not over, but through a road always nearly impassable, and when passable full of peril to learn that no mail would arrive till next month ; or what was even worse, that it had indeed come, but with only one letter, and that maybe for the Big-Bear-wallow settlement ! 1 The faint hope that sustained one in the lonely and wearisome path now became despair ! and yet, all that wet, long, tangled way to repass ! and no mail again for four other hateful weeks ! No wonder we finally ceased from all correspondence, contenting ourselves with hiring a man, with a remnant of sole leather, to bring our newspapers when he could get them : which luckily he did as often as once in three months ! No wonder during all our western sojourn, if the world never heard of us: although in this we had a very ample revenge, as in that time, we heard nothing of the world, and I think, even cared less. But this autumn, I expected a letter from my old friend Clar- ence; and so, on a delightful September morning, off I started, 1 All things out there are big : if two things of the same name are to be distinguished, one is called big, and the other powerful big. 210 SECOND YEAR confident of finding his letter. The road, also, was less bad, and with diligence we should get home about the middle of the after- noon. And Dick, too, was in high spirits; for he always re- garded as a holiday, the exchange of the bark mill for such a jaunt; and he now trotted among the bottomland with voluntary and most uncommon speed till of a sudden the old fellow scented, or sa'w, or heard something which made him very fidgetty and uneasy. What could it be ? Dick, it was known, had some finical ways, but he was now manifestly alarmed, and made some desperate attempts to wheel when, sure enough, a strange figure emerged from the tall rank weeds into the road before us, and continued to move in front, and apparently never having noticed our ap- proach. This figure was undeniably human; and yet at bottom it seemed a man, for there were a man's tow-linen breeches; at top, a woman ; for there was the semblance of a short gown, and, indeed, a female kerchief on the neck, and a sun-bonnet on the head! Then again the apparition wore enormous masculine leather boots, and under one arm carried a club; although both of the hands seemed to be holding above the hips, rolls of woollen cloth, very much like a furled petticoat! Whether the affair would turn out a man dressed in woman's upper articles, or a woman, in man's lower ones, was yet to be discovered. The suspense, however, was not long; for at the noise of Dick's sneezing (who saw how matters stood, and gave warning by way of delicacy), the hands of the figure instantly relaxed their hold on the linsey rolls and down dropped a sudden curtain all around over breeches and boots, in the shape of a veritable petticoat ! and before us walked a genuine daughter of the woods ! The universally favourite attire of females (indescribables) is not, we presume, to be traced to French milliners, male or female. It originated in the necessities of a new country, where women must hunt cows hid in tall weeds and coarse grass, in dewy or frosty mornings. And to that is owing brief frocks; although out there, such when allowed to fall to the natural hang of the articles, shut from view the indescribables or very nearly so. Dressed thus in the husband's boots as well as his thingamies (the limbs of which are worn as our fathers wore them within, SECOND YEAR 211 and not without the boots), our fair lady this morning, bade de- fiance to wet grass, running briars, snake-bites, ticks, and all and every evil incident to cow-hunting! Of course we exchanged compliments on passing; but Dick was so dumb-founded at the miraculous transformation on the sudden fall of the screen, that he shyed and passed without a word: the truth is, I was all but frightened myself! I need not tell all the silly things that entered my mind at the thought of such an exhibition in certain places and assemblies but I was fairly recovered on reaching Spiceburgh; and the event had perhaps rather increased my good-nature, and encour- aged the hope of finding a long-expected letter. On approaching the cabin-office, and while hanging Dick to a gate post, a glimpse caught of Josey trying to escape out of a back door into the woods gave me a sudden pang; for this was Josey's way of getting off, when there was no letters for his friends, and leaving the matter of explanation to his wife as he "naterally hated," he said, "to see folks so powerful disapinted." But I was too quick, and so hailed: "Hillo! the house, Josey!" "Ah! hillo; how are you? come walk in I was a sort of steppin round the other way powerful fine day." "Very Well, Josey, anything this time" ? "Well there was three letters and some papers kim day afore yesterday but I wan't in and Polly, she put them away and I ain't heern her say that thare was anything for your settlement up thare." "Why, Josey, one must be for me; it can't be possible the let- ter, that a month ago was to be here, is not come this mail !" "Well I should a sort a think one of them mought be the letter. Glenville's goin a-head most powerful in this part of the district Jerry's a clever feller but we go tother way down here: if Glenvile gits in, we'll try old Uncle Sam, and have the mail twice a month in these here diggins." "Yes, but if they manage no better at Woodville or some other place, we shall only be disappointed twice a month instead of once." "He! he! he! yes well, let's go back, Mr. Carltin, and take a look." 212 SECOND YEAR Josey's wife now appeared en dishabille, 2 being occupied with her wash-tub in the space between the cabin and the kitchen; when Josey, to prepare and smooth the way to my disappointment, said to his lady: "See here, Polly! don't you think one of them thare three letters mought be for Mr. Carltin?" "Nan!" (she heard well enough.) "Don't you think one of them thare three letters what kirn day afore yesterday, mought be for Mr. Carltin?" "Well, no, I don't jist exactly mind (remember) but I a sorter allow maybe perhaps two's for the Snake Run Sittlemint's folks" (washing away as if the article was very hard to get clean) "and tother was tuk out more nor an hour ago." "Which way, Mrs. Jackson," said I, eagerly, as a glimmer of hope arose "which way did the person come perhaps it was Tommy Robison, as I asked him the other day to call here, and - "Well I kind a sorter think as maybe perhaps the man said the letter was hissin and I actially seed him a readin on it !" "Well," said Josey, very tenderly "let's go into the back room anyhow, and overhaul the bureau maybe some how or nother we mought a overlooked last month or may be arter all one of the two's yourn." The back room was a closet boxed off with poplar boards, its junctures pasted over with strips of deceased newspapers; and it held a bed for the postmaster and mistress, and a bureau, of which two drawers were Uncle Sam's Cabinet, the top drawer for living letters and papers, the second (descending), for dead ones. Into this sanctum I was now invited out of compassion, with the privilege of rummaging for myself. First, then, the live drawer was jerked out, and Josey and myself began our search with great system and good judgment, collecting, as a preparatory step, all the living newspapers into one corner, and which amounted to nearly two dozens, two or three with envelopes and directions : the rest, naked, and thumbed and dying: all destined I fear to the dead drawer. This com- 2 French, for being caught "in the suds." SECOND YEAR 213 pleted, one letter only remained, instead of two, and that sure enough for "Missus Widder Dolly Johnsin, head at Snake-Run kere of her brother near Spiceburg" (on one corner) "case he's gone to Orleens, p. m., send it to the Widder herself." But what had become of the other letter? Josey here was much disturbed, as he knew it had not been called for. At my suggestion, a shaking of each newspaper was commenced, when pretty soon out tumbled the second one, and that too, for Snake Run. A very scrutinizing search was next instituted under, and into, and around a half-knit stocking, and some little calico bags nearly full of squash or calabash, or cucumber seeds ; and even a square box half full of roasted store coffee but no chance letter for me could be discovered. I was about, therefore, to go away much chagrined, when it occurred, that as a living letter had been concealed in a dying paper, maybe, a letter might have been buried alive among the defunct articles of the next drawer: and accord- ingly a request was made for a peep into that tomb. To this, Josey, after a momentary hesitation, replied : "Oh ! it's no use no how still, if it will satisfy a feller crittur, let's have the over- haul :" and with that forth came the repository of departed news written and printed, and with such a vengeance (for it stuck a little) that the dead things, many of them, bounced into the middle of the room, like criminals' carcasses when galvanized. Ah! painful sight! that drawer like other graves (in some cities) was too full! it contained more than the living world! And the frightful way that papers and letters were huddled, must soon have killed a delicate and sensitive thing a love letter, for instance, if by any mischance it had come down from the upper drawer alive! Well, we rummaged and sftook and tossed and pitched for a good quarter of an hour, till out leaped a letter, a real living letter folded in a civilized way and actually susperscribed : "Robert Carlton, Esq. 'Glenville Settlement, &c. &c." and post-marked "Princeton, N. J." Josey was, of course, completely mystified, and began twenty awkward apologies ; but, although not a little provoked, I was so rejoiced at the resurrection of my letter, and Josey was so 214 SECOND YEAR sorry, and after all, so clever a fellow, that he was cordially forgiven : 3 and that, reader, argues me not spiteful. I now prepared to return home: and just then, a young chap rode by on his way to Johnson's store ; for Spiceburg was a large village, containing, first, Mr. Johnson's Store; second, a black- smith's establishment : and third, Josey Jackson's post-office, which last was also a tavern, and now becoming a kind of opposition store : although an opposition post-office would have been more serviceable, both to town and country. The chap named, im- mediately hailed me, and made a proposal for me to wait till he had done his purchases, when we could ride home in company. As Sam lived in an adjoining settlement, and I really wanted company (to say nothing of political news), I readily agreed to wait, although we well knew it would be some hours before the bargains were concluded. In a New Purchase country, "going to store" is as much for recreation as business, and preparation is made as for any other treat or amusement. The store is, too, the place for news, re- cent and stale for gymnastics, wrestling, pitching quoits, run- ning, for rifle shooting for story-telling, &c. and hence, a purchaser's stay is not in direct ratio to his intended bargains, but rather in the inverse ; a fellow having only six cents to spend, will sometimes lounge in and around a store for six hours ! Nor must even that be wholly imputed to the fellow's idleness. It is in part, owing to his unwillingness to part with cash ; and when it is considered how very difficult it was then, and maybe now, in the New Purchase to get hold of "silver," then it will appear that to lay out even a fippenny-bit must have become a matter for very solemn reflection, and very lengthy chaffering. In my time, rarely indeed, could two cash dollars be seen circulating together ; and having then no banks, and being suspicions of all foreign paper, we carried on our operations almost exclusively by trade. For goods, store-keepers received the vast bulk of their pay in produce, which was converted into cash at Louisville, Cincinnati, or more frequently at New-Orleans. The great house of Glen- ville and Carlton paid for all things in leather. Hence, oc- 3 My friend, R. Carlton, was not at all influenced by the consideration that Josey intended" to vote for Glenville. C. CLARENCE. SECOND YEAR 215 casionally when a wood-chopper must have shoes and yet had no produce, but offered to pay in "chopping," we, not needing that article, and being indebted to several neighbours who did, used to send the man and his axe as the circulating medium in demand among our own creditors, to chop out the bills against us. In- deed, it was out there some wise statesmen of hard currency memory, learned to do without banks, and therefore, wished to let the neighbours in here have a taste of their experience : although cash seems difficult to find anywhere, for we of the New Pur- chase supposed the scarcity owing to the non-existence of banks, while we of the Old Purchase, attribute the scarcity to their existence. For my part, I must ever think the leather currency better than the mere paper one ; and that the latter although not so often tramped under foot as the other, yet still more de- serves it. My friend Sam to-day had come to town with two silver-fip- penny-bits, and a roll of tow linen; and he intended to buy four panes of glass, 8 by ID'S, half a pound of store-coffee, eighth of a pound of store-tea, one quarter pound of gunpowder, and a pound of lead: also, if they could be got cheap, a string of button moles and a needle. Sam prided himself on being a hard hand at a bargain, and Mr. Johnson, I well knew, although an honest man, was a prudent dealer and, therefore, I determined to remain in the store and witness the trading. The colloquy opened thus, after Sam had deposited his roll of linen on the counter: "Well, Johnson, you don't want no tow linen to-day, I allow do you?" "If 'tis good. What do you want for it?" "I allow to take half trade and half silver as near about as we can fix it." "Sam, you're joking we don't give cash for anything but pork and lard." "That's powerful stingy well, what's this piece worth it's powerful fine." "This;" (examining) 'tis pretty good 'tis worth ten cents in silver. We give twelve in trade." "Ketch a duck asleep ! if that 'ere tow linen thare aint worth fifteen cents in store-tea or coffee ither, I'll bet old Nan (his 216 SECOND YEAR rifle) again two-shot gun! Howe'er I'll track round a little I wants any how to go over to the post-office, maybe thare's a paper come." Now this, reader, was all gum; Sam could not read a word. He intended this as a threat to deal in the opposition store, and Mr. Johnson so understood it : in fact he had anticipated such a move, and for that purpose had underrated the linen, intending to raise the true value as if induced so to by Sam's superior dexterity, by which the linen would be secured and his customer pleased. And therefore, Mr. J. thus answered: "Sam ! Sam ! you're a hard Christian : but I've large payments at Louisville, and you've been a pretty good customer, and a cent or so aint much and rather than let you go to Josey's, I'll give you thirteen cents." Now this Sam thought just one cent higher than the linen was worth; yet it was in reality precisely half a cent less and that other half cent Johnson intended finally to give him. Hence when Sam replied, "Well! I raythur allow as maybe perhaps Josey would a sorter give fourteen cents; but I don't like to d'sart old friends, and so says I, jist gimme thirteen and a half cents, and it's trade!" it was what Mr. Johnson was prepared to hear. Accordingly, after affecting to consult a book of prices, (I think it was an old counting-house almanac) and after figur- ing away at the double rule of three in vulgar fractions, at all which Sam stared as at a magical operation, Johnson at last looked up, and scratching his head, said : "Let's see eight-sixteenths is four-eighths, and that is one half and half is two-fourths and five per cent and tow linen at a discount why, Sam, you'll break a fellow some day or other still I can't lose more than a fraction of a cent on a yard, and I must not let you go to Josey's. Well, I'll give thirteen and a half, and it's a bargain. Now, what will you have?" "Well, I'm goin to see how the new skew's comin on and you may measure the linen till I get back, and then we'll take it out in something or nuther." And with that away went Sam, leaving Mr. Johnson to meas- ure off the piece; for while he affected to fear the storekeeper would cheat him in price, he never dreamed that he would either SECOND YEAR 217 lessen the number of yards or miscalculate the sum in his own favour. Nor was his confidence abused, for Johnson was an honest man, and had only used indirection to come at the true price, because of Sam's perverse sagacity in bargains. I did not, however, stay to watch the measurement, but buying a sheet of foolscap, I retired to a back room where I answered Clarence's letter, so unexpectedly rescued from the dead, giving him among other matters a condensed statement of its resuscitation. It was a full hour before Sam's return ; and then the quantum suff. of tea, coffee, glass, &c. being furnished, the balance of trade was found against him, and he owed the store precisely nine and a quarter cents. In lieu of this Mr. J. offered to take one of Sam's silver fips, which although a liberal discount in Sam's favour he regarded as right down Jewish usury ; and the storekeeper was obliged to book the nine and a quarter cents, to be paid in ''sang." Nor was this conduct of Sam's so very surprising, when it is recollected that for one hundred and twenty-five cents could be bought a whole acre of land! bottom land! trees! spice bush! papaws! and all: hence to ask for six and a fourth cents, was asking a pretty good slice off an acre ! Sam was, therefore, really indignant. He now was getting ready to start home, when spying a spring of button-moles, he remembered he was to buy a fip'sworth ; and supposing a prime bargain was to be had for cash, he proposed to pay right down one of his silver pieces for the half of the string, worth in all twenty-five cents. "Come now," said he, "Mr. Johnson, here's the silver cash money, right slam smack down, for one half jist of that 'ere leetle bit of a string " "Oh! no, Sam, we can't go that I'll give you so far," replied Johnson, measuring a minor third. "Well I've traded a most powerful piece of linin here this mornin and I'll be teetotally darned if I won't try Josey, and see if he won't give me more moles for silver cash money." Our storekeeper well knew Josey had no moles, and so after a feint to retain a customer, he let him go; but no sooner had he got out of hearing, than our merchant took down his string of moles, and laughing as he slipped off nearly half into a drawer, he 218 SECOND YEAR said to me, ''Sam will be back directly, and then I mean to sell him a little more than the worth of his fip." He then suspended the diminished string in its former place, and shortly after Sam came back, and began : "Well, I don't like, arter all, to d'sart old friends, and so says I, jist gimme one half of that darn'd leetle string for it's time me and Mr. Carltin was making tracks home." "Ah! Sam, how shall we live these hard times? but I suppose if I must, I must so down with your dust. And here's a full half and now take which end you like." Sam chose ; and then the dealer stripped off the half, amount- ing to a good eight cents' worth; while our man of cash pulled out a small dirty deer skin pouch, and untying its mouth, he emptied all the contents on the counter, viz : two silver fips, three "chaw'd bullits," a damaged rifle wiper, four inches of pigtail tobacco, and three worn gun-flints. But he was evidently yet scarcely determined to part with his cash; for he took up first one and then the other fip, apparently more than once about to return both to the pouch, and offer more "sang:" till at length, believing he had got nearly double as many moles as he could obtain for "trade," he handed over, with the air of one making another's fortune, the worse looking and more worn fippenny bit and then the other articles, 'together with the button-holes, being put into the pouch along with the widowed fip, he was ready to ride, and we in a few moments more were on our way home. My comrade was in high glee at the way in which he "had make it off o' Johnson," i. e., the way he had just got the worth of his money, and which the storekeeper would have readily given him at once, without so much plague to his customer's wits, if Sam's own dexterity had not seemed to make the indirection necessary. I too was in high glee, hoping to secure an additional vote for our candidate; and we, therefore, jogged along very harmoniously. Nay, as it was now becoming dark, I yielded to a proposal for the sake of company, to go all the way round by the Indian grave, that being the proper path to Sam's settlement. This reminds me of my promised tale of the Indian grave; to which, after ending the present chapter with a pleasant little ad- venture of our own this night, the next chapter will be devoted. SECOND YEAR 219 Not long after our quitting the three blazes, and turning into the unblazed trace at the grave, it became quite dark; and we were compelled to ride in Indian file, Dick and myself in the van, Sam and his quadruped in the rear. Be it remembered, part of his purchase was (or were ?) four small panes of glass, intended to illuminate their new cabin, and make its native darkness visible in the day. A sort of window had, indeed been made by skipping a log in the erection ; but our friends had begun to be richer, and it had been lately voted to have a sash of four lights at ten cents each, it being most specially for this, the twelve yards of tow- cloth had been woven, and this very day sold at Spiceburgh. And, even now, Sam, the eldest son, twenty-one years old last Spring, was actually riding homeward with the long coveted glass, done up in two sheets of coarse demi-paper, and tied across two ways, with strong pack-thread yes, all safe under his arm ! More than once during the afternoon had he introduced the subject of glass and windows and every conversation would be- gin and end with a self-complacent, and rather lofty look at the articles under his arm the glass by which their cabin was to be elevated in the scale of architecture, 4 and the family established among the forest aristocracy ! Once or twice as we passed an old cabin without a sash window, Sam would commence "Mr. Carltin, I allow this here glass here of ourn's near about the right size aint it?" "I think so." "Well it will look a sort a powerful hey?" "Very we had a sash made last summer and it helps matters powerful." "He! he! he!" (a giggle of exquisite satisfaction like the cackle of a hen that has laid a new egg, or the mild squawking of geese just emerging into the dusty road from a hole in a grain field fence) "he! he! he! Mr. Carltin, ain't it a sort a funny them ere settlers what's been in the Purchus longer nor us ain't got no sashes? I allow, it looks a sort a idle in 'em." But now as we rode in the dark a fire suddenly gleamed from 4 Cabins are at first dark, like Grecian temples : afterwards, when sashed, they enjoy a religious and dim light like Gothic cathedrals especially if two glasses are oiled paper. 220 SECOND YEAR the crevices of a cabin, upon which, Sam with wonderful anti- cipative exultation halloed from the rear "Hillow ! Mr. Carltin that's Bill Tomsin's cabin! what a most powerful heap of shine his 'ere fire would make through this here glass of ourn if they was all in a winder " To this Mr. C. made no reply, for, at the instant his neigh- bour's thoughtless, blundering brute 5 of a horse tripped over a root on his nose! and away went his rider, not indeed out of the saddle, but off from the blanket, his only saddle! and alas! alas ! away went the brittle eight by ten's ! and in spite of the forty cents paid in tow linen, in spite of Sam's chagrin and almost super- human efforts to save them, in spite of the woful disappointment of the expectants at home, the whole four panes, were all and each, and every, so cracked and broken as to defy all emenda- tions from dough or putty! Yes! in one short moment, and that a moment of triumph, all visions were dissipated visions of a window from without, and visions through one from within ! Poor Sam ! he was not hurt by the fall : although, I do believe for a moment he wished it had been his arm and not the glass. And certainly, had I not been present, he would have abused his unlucky horse in very irreverent terms, calling him as it was : "A most powerful rottin darn'd ole carrin for to go to stumblin and smashin glass that 'are away ! !" I tried to console my neighbor in the most approved way, by telling misfortunes of my own, and at last did bring on a faint laugh (much like one person makes in trying not to cry) by narrating the fall of our waiter of glasses but still, forty cents worth of good tow-linen was no trifle for folks in my comrade's humble circumstance to lose; and I did so pity him to say if he would ride home with me, we would give him an extra pane pro- cured to mend our own sash in case of accident, and also, three sheets of paper, which, when oiled and fixed according to direc- tions, would answer almost as well as glass itself. This cheered him up a good deal ; and on reaching Uncle John's, a search was instituted, and to our great satisfaction two panes were discovered, which were both cordially bestowed on our friend ; and also two sheets of foolscap, with directions how to oil or grease and paste 6 Terms applicable to common horses not to Dick. SECOND YEAR 221 them on the sash, and to secure, by two strings diagonally fas- tened, or as he better understood it "katterkorner'd-like." Sam never forgot this small kindness. Hence, as you may easily think, reader, not only did he vote our way, but he became an active and rather violent partizan in electioneering, every- where giving, too, a magnific version of the glass and paper story. Nay, on the election day he overheard a person saying to another "Yes, John Glenville's well enough if he hadn't stuck up folks around him and that brother-in-law of hissin, Carltin's a reel 'ristekrat and hates poor folks like pisin:" upon which what does Sam do, but forthwith strip off his coat and break in with his doubled fists as follows: "See! here, I say, mister! you're a most powerful darn'd liar! now jist shut up 'cos case you jist go for to say that say agin if I don't row you up salt crick in less nor no time, my name's not Sam Townsend." Happily, my complimentary neighbour had no wish for that pleasant little excursion "up crick," and no further disturbance ensued. I would merely add, that passing Sam's cabin a few days after his mishap, I had the pleasure of seeing the sash in its place, with two glasses in the lower tier and two papers in the upper: and to be sure the papers were sufficiently greased; indeed, so well, as to keep out light as well as water and air; although, in spite of our use of "diagonal," and its being rendered into popular language, "katterkorner'd-like," the strings were inclined to perpendiculars to the sides, and crossed each other almost at right angles, and not very far from the centre. CHAPTER XXVIII. " neque semper arcum Tendit Apollo." "Pleasure after Pain." WHEN the Indian tribe were departing from the New Pur- chase, a distinguished chieftain had suddenly died, and been buried in aboriginal style in the spot known in our settlements as the Indian grave. That spot I could never pass without feeling 222 SECOND YEAR myself on hallowed ground, often contemplating the scene with indescribable emotion ay, more than once with unbidden tears. The burial place itself was a beautiful natural mound, abrupt on the side towards the county road, but otherwise of a regular shape and gradual swell, being hardly indeed supposed a mound on the approach by the Glenville path. On the summit of this mound was the grave. It was inclosed by a fence of small logs covered with poles : while a rough post carved with Indian hier- oglyphics and its point or top painted red, marked with the warrior's head rested. This place was too far from Glenville for a walk, and we never hunted in that direction, but, even when hurrying on a journey, as I rode by, I could not pass till I paused some moments to gaze, and with a melancholy soul, on this resting place of the savage king; and with the most profound sadness and shame, after learning that this wild and lonely and regal grave had been violated ! Around that grave had stood a band of exiles and houseless wanderers children of the forest ! Trusting to the white man's faith, they had asked a few yards of earth, where but the day before the whole mighty wilderness had been theirs a few yards where they might lay in his rest their chief, their lawgiver, their father! Yes! yes! their bitter agony of the soul had been felt, although proudly, perhaps sternly concealed. Mournful enough to bury a king and a patriarch in a borrowed grave yet was it some alleviation that he was to lie in no dishonoured ground! If there was sadness, there was grandeur too, in the thought, that his was the only grave, and that it made venerable and sanctuary-like so large a forest space! ay, that for long years to come white men's children would point and say, "Behold" that little mound yonder! that is the grave of Blue Fire! the mighty Indian warrior and chief !" That grave would remain a monument, speaking to successive generations of the pale faces and saying "This was all once the red man's land!" What would that tribe of mourning warriors have felt? what would they not have done, had some fierce and proud apparition from their spirit-land, revealed that the base sons of white men would despoil that grave of its treasure, even before the impress SECOND YEAR 223 of the departing exiles' feet should be covered by the fall of the coming autumn's leaves? Yet so it was. Reader! the poor Indian is often cursed for his indiscriminate massacres has he no provocation? Do not civilized and nominal Christian men, with deadly weapons, watch near the sepulchres of their fathers and sons to wreck sudden vengeance on the robbers of the tomb ? And dare we condemn the poor, hunted, defrauded Indian, who, finding his father's grave desecrated and rifled, cools the phrenzy rage of his burning soul in a bath of white man's blood ? Once on my way to Timberopolis, I sat gazing and dreaming on my horse, near that sad mound ; when, not without an emotion of fear, I saw appear a large party of mounted Indians, going, as it afterwards was discovered, to visit the Potawatamies living on a reservation in the north. The party did not halt at the grave, as probably they would have done, if no pale face had been there to notice: if they had, although no sign apparently could lead to the discovery that the sacred deposit was gone, yet should I have felt, if not afraid, yet truly ashamed. Our way being for several hours in their direction, we often passed and repassed one an- other, and occasionally I rode among the party, and held a con- versation with a half breed that could use a little English till at last, they encamping on the bank of the beauteous and silvery river, once their own! we parted my way leading across the stream and their path still further up on its bank. I felt a strange wish to plunge with them into the dark, tangled wilds of that vast forest, where no white man yet lived so strong is the love of the uncivilized in some hearts ! But to our story. Several years prior to our arrival in the Purchase, two young men, whose youth and ignorance is their best apology, students of Dr. Sylvan's, on hearing of the burial of Blue Fire, determined so soon as the Indians should resume their march for the Mississippi, to take up the body; partly for anatomical purposes and partly out of rash boldness: for some nerve was necessary to the work, while many lagging Indians were yet straggling in the woods. And unhappily for our honour they succeeded but not until after a very remarkable interruption and temporary defeat. And that defeat is my story. It shall be given, however, in the words of the renowned "Hunting-Shirt- 224 SECOND YEAR Andy," the leader of the party that terrified the resurrectionists, and almost to insanity, and from whose lips we ourselves received the narrative. Be it premised, that at the time of our story, not more than three cabins were between Woodville and the river; that on their side the river, the nearest house from the grave (on our side), was more than three miles, and beyond a wide bayou and marsh, it being absolutely necessary in passing and repassing to and from Woodville to cross the river. 1 In many places were fords, and near them also dangerous holes from four to six feet deep; and into these, not only inexperienced travellers, but even we neighbourhood people often plunged; and hence escape from them to a terrified man running from savages would be almost miraculous. On our side, the cabin nearest the grave was two miles up the river, so that if any Indians came unexpectedly upon the young fellows, they would be in hazard of meeting a pretty summary vengeance and not, I must say, wholly un- undeserved. Our narrator was called Hunting-Shirt-Andy, mainly because he lived like an Indian, and always wore a very wonderful leather 1 In his letters to Nunemacher, the New Albany publisher, in 1855, when the second edition of the New Purchase was being negotiated, Hall speaks of the Glenville settlement as being "about three miles east of Gosport in Monroe county." If that were the case, White River (the "Shiney") would not be between Woodville (Bloomington) and Glen- ville, as this passage seems to indicate. According to this passage, "our side" of the river (Glenville) must have been north or west of Gosport in Owen county. John M. Young (Glenville) was elected to the legisla- ture for the counties of Owen and Green., and this fact would seem to prove that Glenville Settlement was in Owen county west of the river. From Bloomington to White river is a distance of sixteen miles and it is difficult to believe that at so late a period only three cabins could have been found within that distance. But it is to be remembered that this story came down from an earlier period than Hall's residence in the Purchase and that the first settlers, amid dangers from the Indians, lived in settlements and not on isolated farms, though isolated cabin squatters were found here and there, remote from all other dwellers. The events narrated in "Hunting-Shirt-Andy's" story, however, could not have been earlier than 1819 when Dr. David H. Maxwell moved to Bloomington. Gov. P. C. Dunning and James Maxwell, the Doctor's "nevy," (see the Key) could not have been his medical students earlier than that. SECOND YEAR 225 hunting shirt (his second hide or skin) most curiously frilled, and elaborately ornamented with bits of skin, birds' and beasts' claws, and porcupine quills dyed red, and green, and yellow; and also to distinguish him from his second cousin White- Andy, so named because he lived like the rest of us civilized woodsmen in a cabin. The story was given in Uncle John's cabin, at the united request of myself and the others, and is as follows : HUNTING-SHIRT-ANDY'S STORY. "Well, Mistur Carltin, if you reely wants to hear about them two young fellers, I don't kere to tell about that Blue Fire scrape ; but case you put it in your book, don't let on about thare namses as the doctor's nevy is a most powerful clever feller and tended me arter in the agy, and charged me most nuthin at all, although he kim more nor once all the way over more nor twenty miles and the tother one what got most sker'd, is a sort of catawampus, (spiteful) and maybe underhand wouldn't stick to do you a mis- chief if he thought you made a laff on him. albeit, he's been lafTed at a powerful heap afore. "Well, we heern the two was a comin to git up Blue Fire, and bile him for a natumy, as they call'd it ; and all us neighbours was powerful mad about it; as cos couldn't they allow the poor Injin to lay in his grave; and as cos the Injins still a sort a squattin and campin round, mought hear on it, and it mought n't be so good for folk's consarns then. And so we talks over the thing, and allowed we'd make the chaps let Blue Fire lay ; and so, says I to Bill Roland, Bill, says I, let's you and me make on to be Injins, and skere them doctur fellers ; and don't let them go for to bile the poor red savage for the natumy. Agreed, says Bill, and then we goes and gits ole man Ashford, and fixes up like reel gineine Injins, and paints our faces red and clean up our arms, away up here (showing), and all on us gits on blankits and leggins and moksins, and teetotally greases our hair back so slick-like, and I gits a bit of tin round my hat, and we takes our tomhoks and rifles and puts off and lies hid near the grave. 'Twas just thare, Mr. Carltin, along by the black walnut stump what I cut down the very next day arter for rails for Bill Tomsin's yard. Well, thare we all on us lays down in the bushes on our bellies, a little 226 SECOND YEAR over fifty yards from the grave ; for we know'd the young fellers was to come at sich a time ; cos they kim to Squire Brushwood's the night afore; and the Squire he sends up his little gal to ole man Ashford's afore sun-up to sort a let us know : and so we was all ready when what should we spy a comin but the two young doctor chaps with a couple of hossis, and a meal-bag, and a spade, and a hoe. "Well, we lays teetotally still, and they goes fust and fassens their hossis to the swinging branch of that thare sugar west o' the place, and then goes and begins a takin down the pen, and when they gits it down, they off's coats and begins a diggin like the very divil. 2 And jist then we raises up a sort a on our knee- ses ; and all draws a bead at that knot in that thare beech at the tail ind of the grave ; I'll show you the knot any day, and you'll see its more nor half a foot good above their heads when they stood up agin the beech, although they arterwards tried to make the knot out only two inches above their heads ; and then I gives a leetle bark, like a growling Injin and up they pops both on 'em, right under the beech, and looks about most powerful skittish, and then we lets fly three balls crack-wack right into the knot, and makes bark peel right sharp in that 'are quarter; and then out jumps we and raises the yell, with tomhoks agoin to fling " At this very moment our narrator was interrupted by a terrific burst of thunder, which shook our cabin with much violence, and caused the dry clay of the chinking to curl up in dust around us like smoke ! To persons shut up from the view of the horizon, it had seemed a very fair afternoon early in July ; but while we listened to Andy, a single cloud surcharged with lightning came over our clearing, and using a tall tree within a few yards of our cabin as conductor, it had darted its fiery bolt, which shivered the tree into pieces, and filled us with a momentary, yet very in- tense fear: and then, it rapidly passing, our few rods of sky was clear and brilliant as before. After a short and revereful pause, Andy resumed: "That's a most mighty powerful big clap of thunder, and most mighty near ! but it's not a bit more skery than our bullits above them two young doctors' heads and the reel Injiny yells us three 2 Soft way of swearing out there. SECOND YEAR 227 screeched out! The way they drops tools and made tracks was funny, Mr. Carltin, I tell you! You see! I've seed runnin in my days that's sartin but if them chaps didn't git along as if old Sattin was ahind 'em, then I allow I never killed no deer, and that would be a wapper! "Well they divides, and the doctor's nevy, he tuk strate up stream ; and ole man Ashf ord and Bill, they pretends they was a follerin him howsom'er they couldn't a ketch'd up no how and so the nevy he runs clare up two miles and gits safe into Pete's shanty on the bottum, and sker'd Pete hisself so powerful he was afeer'd to come down, till we sends up and lets Pete into the secret. "But tother chap, he was so sker'd he didn't see where he runn'd, and kept right study ahead slash through weeds and briars to the river and me slam smack arter him, as cos I was af reed he'd run in and git drownded ; for thar's where the water is deepish, and jist about where you swim'd your hoss, Mr. Carl- tin and so I runs and hollers like a screechowl 'stop! doctur! staw-u-up !' But the more I hollers, the more he legs it; case he was more nor ever sker'd to hear a Injin holler Inglish Graminy! Mr. Carltin, if he didn't make brush crack and streak off like a herd of buffalo ! and me all the time a keepin arter, as I was sentimentally afeer'd now he'd git drownded; but, darn my leather shirt! (Andy would put this profane stitch into his shirt when he was excited) darn my leather shirt, if arter all I could make him stop; and in he splasht'd kerslush, like a hurt buffalo bull, and waded and swim'd and splash'd and scrabbled even ahead rite strate across and up tother bank when he stops for the furst time to blow and takes a look back! And then he sees me a standin on our side and without no gun, a bekenin on him to stop; for I was too powerful weak a laffin to holler any more but darn my leather shirt, if the blasted fool didn't set off agin like a tarrified barr, and wades clean in all through the bio ! and the buttermilk slash tother side ! and never stopt again till he kim to the three mile cabin ! and thare he tells them as how the In j ins had all got back agin, and had killed tother doctur and tuk his skulp!! And you may naterally allow, Mr. Carltin, the hull settlement over thare was a sort a sker'd and sent out scouts and 228 SECOND YEAR hunters to see: but when it was found how it all was ezactly, then if they warn't a mighty powerful heap of laffin, I never kill'd no deer. "Howsever the Doctor's nevy was good pluck; for he gits an- other chap to help, and two days arter when we warn't a watchin, he digs out the poor Ingin and tootes him over to Woodville, and biled him up for a natumy for their shop arter all and so that's the hull story, Mr. Carltin; but I must be a sorter goin. I'll fetch that jerked vensin about next week and them 'are deer skins: but afore I starts, wont you jist play us a toone on that flute of yourn, Mr. Carltin?" "Most certainly, Andy I'll play you a dozen if you can stay, what will you have?" "Well ! let's see thare's one I don't mind it's name now but a powerful toone ; I heard Mr. Johnsin fiddlin on it at Spiceburgh but there's somethin about river in it, and it was talkin of the young doctur's splunge, made me think of the toone." "Was it this, Andy?" (Mr. C. plays.) "That's him ! that's the dentikul toone ! let's see what do you call him?" "Over the river to Charlie." And accordingly this "powerful toone" was done now in first rate double-shuffle style, with very curious extempore variations, and very alarming embellishments ; while all the time Andy patted the puncheons with his moccasin'd feet, and seemed barely able to refrain from leaping up and danc- ing; till the music ending, he remarked: "le! lo! darn my leather shirt if I didn't know 'twas river somethin! and by jingo, Mr. Carltin, if you don't jist about know the sling of it, about as good as Mr. Johnsin and maybe a leetle bit better and the way he makes it hum on the fiddle ! I tell you what ! ! Well, well, I must be goin, but I should like to stay and git you to play that 'ere meetin toone, Pisger, (Pisgah, a great favourite then with our religious world, but which had better been named, Gumsnorter 8 ) but I can't stop I'm off good-bye, folks." And off he was sure enough; while I treated him during his exit with Yankee-doodle. And this compliment Andy felt so- 3 Unless classic musicians prefer that, or a like term for the genus. SECOND YEAR 229 much, that he began capering, and yelping, and tossing his legs and arms, till he reached our bars, which he cleared like a bounding buck at a flying leap : but within the bushes beyond he paused a moment, and gave first, an Indian grunt and bark, and then such a yell ! it rung in my ears for twenty- four hours? Then once more he leaped away, shaking the bushes, scattering old leaves, making brush crack, and at the same time screaming out "Sta-up, doctur! sta-a-aup!" in all which he designed a scenic exhibition of his late story; playing like other celebrated actors different parts, first, his own Indian character, and secondly, the flight of the young doctor. Reader ! do you believe life is all moping in the West ? Now be well assured we have other recreations there than going to church the only one certain hie vel haec English tourists grant to us and never use themselves ! CHAPTER XXIX. "Quack! Quack!! Quack ! !" Vide Voices of Natural History. VOL. X. NOT many weeks after Hunting-shirt-Andy's visit, a very great and yet very little stranger, for some time expected, arrived at Glenville. Her name not before, but after this arrival, was Eliza- beth Carlton : and she bounced in among us, after all, by surprise, and about two o'clock one morning. A curious figure somewhere had been missed, and the young lady gave an unexpected notice in some mysterious way of her intention to join our colony, precise- ly one week too soon : a common case I am informed with all that have the right of primogeniture ; others, are better arithmeticians. It had been arranged that our worthy friend Dr. Sylvan of Woodville, should honour Glenville with a visit on this occasion : but now, about nine o'clock, p. M., Dick was scampering away at the nominal rate of six miles per hour, towards Spiceburgh, with a pressing invitation for the company of the learned Professor Pillbox, a member of the faculty, and who boarded with our friend Josey, P. M. 1 This change of medical gentlemen arose 1 Let no one think Josey was P. M. in both senses : the sentence might have been altered to prevent this injurious mistake, but it was found easier to add a note. 230 SECOND YEAR from the urgency of the case, as Spiceburgh was not so far as Woodville. No one in this very enlightened era can possibly think we trusted Dick to deliver the request (although if a four-legged being could have done so, Dick was he or it) but still, to prevent misapprehension and the sarcasm of the increas- ing critical acumen of the times, we now state that John Glen- ville went with Dick ; and hence, about three o'clock in the morn- ing, they returned, having secured the professor and another horse. This person (of course, the doctor) not being honoured with any other skin or parchment than the one he was born in, we, like the Great Unknown, the North American College of Health of Yankeysville, do, by the native right of every white-born American, our ownselves dignify with the title of Professor. And never was title more appropriate, as he professed even more than Brandreth's Pills! He could cure warts! eradicate corns! remove pimples ! and obliterate moles and freckles. He knew how to destroy beards so as to prevent shaving and how to fertilize the most barren skull till it would produce a large crop of black hair, in case you preferred that to red, yellow, or flaxy ! Ay, he had never-failing remedies for fevers of every type, grade, and colour intermittent, remittent, nonitent, bilious, antibilious, rebellious, red, saffron and yellow ! Hence, the Professor utterly and most indignantly scouted Thompsonianism and all other loud- screaming quackeries of our quacking epoch: and setting the highest value on number one, he cared not for number six. His language, in bold contrast to his figure, was by that very comparison heightened in its magniloquence ; we mean his medi- cal diction, for other he rarely indulged in, because language about common affairs was too small for his large utterance. His were lofty words, and demanded a lofty subject ; and that his profession was, and admitted an amazing technical grandiloquence. Pro- fessor Pillbox, M.D., was exactly one yard, one foot and ten inches low. The Professor's horse, on the contrary, was re- markably high, large and spirited. When, therefore, the Pro- fessor was seated on his saddle, and safely ensconced between two hugeous leathern cartouch-boxes made for bottles, barks, lint, forceps, &c., and above all, for the pills and powders, and the like SECOND YEAR 231 cartridges, for his principal execution, he seemed not dissimilar to a monkey-shaped excrescence growing to the back of the steed ! Now his modus loquendi was truly gigantic ! and not only did he always spout forth the hardest technicalities, but even these laden with additimentalities and elongated elaborifications of sesqui- pedalia: which last he would freely have bought of us if not for silver, yet for trade and in exchange for what he always styled his "medicamentums !" Poultices, with Professor Pillbox, were always cataplasms and the patient who had only barked his shins, was always greatly terrified on hearing that "there was manifest symptomatic mani- festations through the outer exterior epidermis of his having in- fracted the tibia !" for the poor wretch at once gave over his legs as ruined after that awful sentence on them! Doses of salts were never mixed with water and swallowed in our Professor's prac- tice, but he "prepared an aquatical solution of the sulphate of magnesia, and then exhibited it !" i. e. made the patient look at it before he drank. In this way the disagreeable taste was properly increased, and so, to speak in style, the "medicamentum seemed to act with still greater potential efficacity:" for in- deed, some robustious stomachs out there that would never have budged at the plain dose, were pretty well stirred by "an aquatical solution!" proving the virtue of words. Our friend never bled a man he only "opened a vein!" nor did he ever feel a pulse without parading a huge silver watch, and seemingly, with the care-worn and ominous brow of Jupiter, (in Virgil,) to be counting the motions of the second hand: a curious contrast to Death with an hour-glass ! although to some nervous patients nearly as frightful. One of our neighbour women, who was often ailing, used to send for Aunt Kitty to tell her what the Doctor means; whence Aunt Kitty came to be regarded as "high larn'd as the little doctur hisself," and was elsewhere in demand as "the little doctur's intarpretur :" but she always resisted persuasions "to set up docterin" herself, telling the folks "one old woman was enough in the Purchase." An honest woodsman went once with a severe tooth-ache to Spiceburgh, when the Professor, after a long examination of the 232 SECOND YEAR patient's mouth, declared with a very solemn little phiz that, "an operation in dental surgery seemed necessary in order to extract two of the principal molares!" At which the affrighted sufferer said, "he was in powerful pain, and didn't kere to let the Doctur pull out a couple of his darn'd rottin back teeth but he'd rather bear the tooth-ache a hull year nor have the dental suggery or the principal mol'lerees ither done on his mouth." 2 The Professor did not rely on symptoms in the morbid body itself: for instance, he rested not satisfied with the inspection of the tongue, which he always had protuded instead of vulgarly put-out of the mouth ; but he wisely kept two keen eyes on the watch for external symptoms, being well disposed to that way of judging, which determines, if a saddle is under the bed, that the person in the bed is sick, or dead, from eating the horse. Hence, on the present occasion, he came at once to a very infal- lible judgment of the case, wholly by external symptoms; for on hearing an infantile cry, which had commenced just an hour before his arrival, and broken out at intervals since, he instantly concluded, and without feeling any body's pulse, or inspecting any body's tongue, or asking a question, but with a very grand and imposing air, said "that the lady was as well as could be expected!" But he learned, however, a very useful piece of knowledge, viz. that there is at least another thing beside time and tide that waits for nobody. Still, it was quite edifying to witness the anxious bustling, and to hear the learned remarks of our dwarf Esculapius ; who among other things, was constrained to acknowledge that "unassisted nature had yet mighteous potential efficacity of her own intrinsic internal force, and that she sometimes required only the co- elaborate aid of a skillful practitioner to conduct to a felicitary tendency her wonderful designs !" Hence "he would only order now the exhibition of a few grains of his soporific sleep-producing powder, to induce a state of somnorific quiescence ! !" because he was decidedly of opinion that "with proper care and no misfor- tunate reactions, the lady would without dubiety become con- valescent in the ordinary time ! ! !" 2 Finally, one tooth was pulled, the other broken off and half and half, as all Steam doctoring does cures one and kills another ! SECOND YEAR 233 And, would you believe it, dear reader? all came to pass precisely as he predicted! and stranger yet to tell, without the aid of the soporific powder! For that, by a blameable negligence, Mr. C. himself, who was charged with the exhibition, never mixed!! But then to atone and for fear some living creature might accidentally swallow the exhibition all at once, and so sleep too long, we very considerately the next day put the whole paper of somnorific quiescence into the fire. In the morning after a very early breakfast, Professor Pillbox, having received the usual fee for his invaluable aid in enlivening the western solitudes, leaped with amazing agility on his moun- tainous horse; which he, indeed, styled "a quadrupedal convey- ancer;" and was quickly peering over his cartouch-boxes on the way to Spiceburgh. But reader! beware of calling this mighty little personage a quack: for he had, if not a diploma from a college, a regular license from the State ! 3 Oh ! the potential efficacity of a true Republican legislature ! What can it not achieve ? By a mere vote, or a legal wish and volition, it can out of nothing yes, ex-nihilo ! or next to nothing create any and every man a lawyer a physician! a teacher! or even a Jack-ass!! And these creations all become the greatest of their sorts! greater even 3 The progress of Indiana within a hundred years has been marked in no way more than in the changed standards of the medical profession. It is now required of the regular medical practitioner that he shall have had a high school course, two years of collegiate training, and he must hold a certificate of training from a reputable medical school of accepted stand- ing. He must, in addition to these requirements, undergo an extensive and rigid examination by a State Medical Board. But it is still true in Indiana, under the Constitution of 1851, that the only qualification required for membership in the legal profession is the same as that required of the shyster and the quack in Hall's day, the same as that now required of the saloon-keeper, "a good moral character." Repeated attempts have been made to amend the Constitution in this respect, but the "lawyers' amendment" has always failed, owing to the indifference of the voters and the extreme difficulty of amending the Constitution. A favorable vote of the majority of all the electorate is required. Since there is in the Constitution of the State no restriction on the Legislature with reference to the requirements for the medical profession, quackery has been success- fully attacked by legal enactments. 2,34 SECOND YEAR than the very legislators that first made them! streams getting higher than their fountain! No, no, reader, our Professor, like others of the kind, had so great an abhorrence of quackery, that he would not allow Josey Jackson, his landlord, to keep a single duck! And two years after the Hon. J. Glenville's services ended, when Profes- sor Pillbox himself was sent to the House, he had influence suffi- cient to procure by a unanimous vote the passage of the follow- ing resolution, and which remained in full force when we left the Purchase : viz. "Resolved : that no quacks but those that are licensed, shall recover the amount of their medical fees by law." Vide Journals of the House, VI. Fol. p. 95. CHAPTER XXX. "Instant in season and out of season." THE future historian of the Western church may learn, from this chapter, that the company of believers of which Mr. Hilsbury was a bishop, whenever about three or four such can be found, form an ecclesiastical court, with spiritual jurisdiction over a given district. A court of this kind was constituted this autumn in Glenville at the episcopal residence. The smallest legitimate number of clergy composed it, and every reverend gentleman was honoured with an office: Mr. Hilsbury was made President, Mr. Shrub, of Timberopolis, Clerk, and Mr. Merry (a bishop, in transitu), Treasurer. And thus was shown, after all, the prac- ticability of Locke's celebrated Fundamental Constitution of Carolina, found impracticable in Sayle's province, the offices and dignities requiring every man in the colony. Mr. Welden, Sen., and some other excellent old woodsmen, had seats as lay delegates. These, however, managed only the secular business of the Assembly; for instance, such as to bring in a pitcher of water, keep a small fire alive on the hearth, and contribute each twenty-five cents cash to the sub-treasury. Far- ther east, I am told, lay delegates are even more useful, volun- SECOND YEAR 235 teering to let down bars, open gates and the like, between the lodgings of the clergy and the chapel where the court is in ses- sion. Normally, it is said, the lay and clerical delegates are on equal footing in the House, both having a right to talk either sense or nonsense as long as they see fit ; and yet, in practice, the lay members are not considered as on a par with the clerical ones. For instance, in debates, discussions and so forth, the commoners are never called brother, except collectively under the appellation, brethren; and even then prime reference is in- tended to the clergy. But the commoners are termed variously, as "the worthy person or member" "the good old man that has just spoken" "Esquire Cleverly" "Lawyer Counselton," &c., &c. : yet mostly they are all spoken to and about as plain "Mister." In my wanderings I have, indeed, stumbled into assemblies of their sort composed of Misters and Brothers, where qualified lay gentlemen chose freely to exercise their privileges, and where "the person" or "the worthy old man" has so spoken and argued a subject as to lead the assembly to adopt measures much more common-sense-like and democratical than some, and especially the "younger brethren" at first contemplated. Nay, an acute and eloquent Mister occasionally would be seen to demolish a rash brother; or in our parlance out there to use him up. Hence, being myself a reformed democrat, this admixture of Misters and Brothers in ecclesiastical Houses, did upon the whole then strike me as the best and very best form of religious associations for our republican institutions ; and then it occurred that if the lay delegates would always qualify themselves properly and use judiciously and boldly all their ecclesiastical privileges, that both State and Church would even be more benefited than ever by these true republican bodies. 1 We beg leave now to introduce more especially to the reader, 1 The clergy of such bodies do earnestly insist on all this in their lay delegates, both for religious, and secular and state reasons ; and, it may be added, that when the reader ascertains what ecclesiastical bodies have done most for civil liberty and universal freedom, he can venture to guess at the body in our text, Hall's note. The ecclesiastical court here referred to was that of the Wabash Pres- bytery constituted in Rev. Isaac Reed's cabin in 1822 or 1823 by Reed, Bush, and Hall. Here "Mr. Merry" plays the part of Hall. J. A. W. 236 SECOND YEAR the President of the Court, the Rt. Rev. Brother Bishop Hilsbury. Besides being pastor of the Welden Parish, he was missionary bishop over a vast diocese, through which he was ever riding, preaching, lecturing, praying and catechising, and beyond which he often made excursions, to bestow gratuitous and extra labour on the Macedonians i.e. wilderness folks that had no bishop to care for them. His public discourses averaged, therefore, one a day, to say nothing of baptisms, visits to sick, funeral services, cum multis aliis : and the miles he rode were about one hundred each week, or somewhere near five thousand annually! indeed, like other laborious missionaries in the West, he lived on horse- back. And when at home, a few days each month, he retired not to his study, as he fain would have done, but he betook himself to his cornfield : and not rarely he wielded an axe in his clearing or deadening working, in short, not like "a nigger," but a galley slave. Negroes, under kind and judicious masters, work only little more than half of every day; a western bishop works all day and part of the night. Brother Hilsbury was in many perils in the wilderness in the flood and among false brethren ; we subjoin a specimen of each sort : and Firstly we are to discourse of the Wilderness. Part of an unsettled forest was once to be crossed by him to reach a new settlement where he had engaged to bestow some extra clerical labour. The path was nearly impassable; and at sunset he was alone in the wilds, and more than fourteen miles from the in- tended place. About dark, he came to a deserted Indian hovel, where he resolved to "put up," rather than "camp-out" or travel in the dark; and accordingly he dismounted, stripped his horse and secured him by halter and bridle; and then had barely time to get under the shelter of the half-roofless shantee, before a tempest, long gathering its pitchy blackness, burst around in floods of rain and flashes of keen fire with its appalling thunder. By the glare, however, of the lightning, a rude clap-board bed- stead was discerned fastened to a side of the hut, and on this fixture, after feeling with the end of his whip if any chance snake was coiled in that nest, our primitive bishop laid his saddle and other gears; and then on and surrounded by these, passed that dreary night as comfortably as possible; and hungry, wet, and SECOND YEAR 237 melancholy. Having thus spoken briefly to our first head, we pass to the consideration of the second thing proposed, which was Peril by Flood. Here, by way of preface, it may be remarked, that reverend gentlemen intended for New Purchase bishoprics, ought unto all their Christian gifts and graces to add the art of swimming. For want of this, Bishop H. was in jeopardy oft of his life. Indeed, considering his inability to swim, he was, my dear brethren, a little rash ; for in his company we have several times come to creeks broad and muddy with "back-water" from a neighbouring river, where the speaker, although a swimmer, refused to enter; but our bishop either having more faith or more courage, would, spite of all remonstrances, plunge in, horse foremost, venturing on till the turbid waves reached his saddle skirts and the tail (of his horse) began to float! And that being symptomatic of a swimming head nay, 1 of a whole body our friend would return but still reluctant : and we would then proceed up the stream till beyond the influence of the back water. At the time of his perilous-peril, Mr. H. was in company with the Rev. Mr. Widdersarch, who also could not swim. A large creek was raging with its swollen waters across their way, ren- dering it necessary to cross or return; unless like ^Esop's wise man they should wait the subsidence of the flood. But that might be a long time yet, the waters still rising; and beside it was absolutely necessary to go on as it always is when people are going anywhere, especially a western minister, who usually, after riding many long miles, and fording and swimming many dan- gerous creeks, to keep with punctuality a gratutious appointment, finds at the preaching cabin a large congregation of six : viz. the man and his -wife, with three little children and a help. For, of course this thimbleful of folks would be too disappointed, if the minister came not! And hence, valuable men feel bound to be punctual out there, always at the risk of their health, and not rarely their very lives. 2 2 These pages bring out very vividly the perils of the early wilderness life and the sacrifices which the early Christian ministers on the forest frontier had to undergo, and the courage and devotion with which they met the dangers confronting them. 238 SECOND YEAR The discussion in the present emergency soon ended by the plunging of both brethren into the water; deeper, indeed, than had been presumed! How deep was difficult to say, the horses for some reason or other beginning to swim immediately on en- tering the creek perhaps, however, unlike Dick, they could not resist a bloated stream till the water went over their backs ! Every thing proper and customary was done with the ministerial legs to keep the limbs dry ; yet at the first souse those important ap- pendages were unpacked, all their capabilities being required to hold on the riders and nothing was now visible above the turbid waters save two snorting horse heads, followed by two human heads and busts. And now the saddle-bags of Mr. Widdersarch, not being rightly secured to the stirrup-leathers, floated off the saddle, and like hard ridden demagogues, went down with the stream; upon which the owner not only made a very desperate and very unsuc- cessful effort to arrest the articles, but was, alas! by that very effort himself soused headlong into the boiling waters! How, Mr. Widdersarch could never tell, yet at the moment of his fall (like Palinurus grasping part of a helm in a fall from another poop) he felt and clutched with drowning energy, the floating tail of his horse ! and holding to that he was carried safely till his feet rested on the bottom. During all this Mr. Hilsbury was in advance ; but while he heard the fall and the cry of his friend, he could render no assistance, having the greatest difficulty to retain even his own seat; and by the time he had reached the opposite bank in safety, his friend could stand on the earth with his head above water ; seeing then the saddle bags whirling in an eddy, Mr. H. hurried with a long pole to a point whence it was thought the leathery apparatus could be arrested. In his eager- ness to hook the bags he leaned over the bank, that treacherous bank gave way, and our excellent bishop himself was now strug- gling for life in the whirlpool ! He was a man more than six feet high ; yet in vain did he try to stand on the bottom of this maelstrom, and hold up his head in the world ! until driven violently against the bank he managed with coolness certainly, if not presence of mind, to clutch in one hand some roots in its side and with the other and his feet to SECOND YEAR 239 stick to its mud, till Mr. Widdersach, now landed, hastened to his assistance. In the meantime, the saddle-wallets despairing of all rescue had taken fresh start for some other port; but our involuntary baptists running with poles to the next headland, were there successful with their baitless bobbing, and had the satisfaction of rescuing, and maybe from a watery grave, the well-soaked conveniences! And so ends our second lesson. The last trial was one of equanimity and patience more diffi- cult to endure, however, than the other sorts. Our friend, as has been intimated, was forced to work literally with his own hands. On one occasion he was ploughing ; when, to save his feet from in- jury, he had encased or buried them in a pair of ungainly cow- hide shoes, with exterior seams, like those of a hose (viz; a leather fire-engine), such as no primitive apostle ever wore, and most modern eastern parsons certainly never saw. They had, indeed, been made at our tannery by a volunteer shoe-maker (such as a legislature will create some of these days, when.it is determined by them that every man may be his own shoemaker,) so that they looked for all the world as if they were vegetables and had grown on a shoe-tree! Mtorever, our clerical plough- man, like Cincinnatus, had on no toga, and was in the state boys call, barelegged, or to speak with modesty and taste, his limbs were destitute of hose (or hoses.) Now, in this "fix," will any man of broadcloth and French calf-skin, conjecture that our Rector's outer man exhibited signs of worldly pride? And yet, my dear brethren, the keen eyes of a parishioner saw pride in those shoes ! "Impossible ! unless it was deemed a pharisaical humility, or a papistical penance." No, no! but on the contrary, the penance was not deemed severe enough: for this Christian mister on finding his bishop thus ploughing, reported through the whole diocese that "Mr. Hilsbury was a most powerful proud man, as he actially ketch'd him a ploughing with his shoes on!" I conclude, therefore, this discourse by asking you, dear breth- ren, what would have happened if the Rt. Rev. Bishop Hilsbury had in preaching sported a white handkerchief and black silk gloves? or, horrible dictu (i.e. tell it not in Gath) had he worn 240 SECOND YEAR ruffles? Be assured we had some rough and hard Christians out there who would have deemed him an emissary of Satan, and one that deserved burning on a log-heap! Permit me next to introduce the clerk of the court Bishop Shrub. Of this gentleman we shall merely say, that if a pro- found and an extensive acquaintance with all the important and various subjects of ecclesiastical learning, together with uncom- mon research in most other kinds ; if the command of elegant style in writing, and the power of rich and copious elocution in preaching; if a pious and a conscientious mind, an ardent zeal in the service of his Master, and incessant labours for the good of men; if the most engaging and winning manners in conver- sation; if all these and similar excellences, possess charms, then would the reader have rejoiced to know Bishop Shrub, and would have classed and cherished him among the most highly estimated friends. As Mr. Merry will speak for himself in this chapter, the reader may say what he thinks of this person after reading his Buckeye Sermon, delivered at Forster's Mill. Among the dogmata of the New Purchase Council, it was ordained that Brothers Shrub and Merry should perform a mis- sionary tour of some weeks between 41 and 42 N. latitude, and in a region destitute of any spiritual instruction ; a region indeed almost destitute, it proved, of inhabitants too, the thin "sprinkle" having, in all probability sought a place free from all trammels, political as well as ecclesiastical. The brethren took neither purse nor scrip, and expected no present reward farther than the pleasure of doing good; and yet they laboured as if in expecta- tion of being at the end of the tour, thrown into a modern 3 bishop's see not of glass, but of silver and gold and other clink- ing evils. Having myself long desired to visit the country now laid out as missionary ground, I begged permission to join the party ; 4 which request being cheerfully granted, away we started as missionaries hem! See then, reader, "how we apples swim !" During the excursion, three discourses were delivered daily, 8 A real rite-dity church and state bishop. 4 "Merry" was Hall. The author here, as in other places, speaks in a. way to lead to disguise. SECOND YEAR 241 the ministers alternately preaching, and the time being usually 10 o'clock, A.M., 2 o'clock, P.M., and 5 o'clock in the evening. In proceeding up the river (the Big Gravelly) appointments were left for our return, and also sent on before us, by any chance person found going towards the polar circle. Nor even did any one show reluctance to bear the message ; although on overtaking once a woodsman, and begging him to name some place where we could preach next day, at 10 o'clock, he replied: "Well, most sartinly, I'll give out preachin for any feller-crit- turs whatsever and Forster's saw-mill is jist about the best place in all these parts but I sorter 'taint no use no how much, as folks in them diggins isn't powerful gospel greedy." And then, excusing himself from hearing Bishop Shrub that same evening, he rode suddenly down an abrupt bank of the river, and plunged into water, barely admitting his large horse to go over without swimming, yet he faithfully made the appointment for his "feller- critturs" at the mill, although of our neighbour himself we never saw more. Our churches of course, were usually cabins, our pulpits chairs ; but the church at Forster's saw-mill deserves special commem- oration from the odd oddity of the place, the audience, and the sermon by Brother Merry. The church was literally in the mill; nor was this a frame building painted red, with flocks of pigeons careering round, or perched on its dormer windows, or strutting and billing and cooing and pouting along the horizontal spout ; while on a neigh- bouring elevation stood a commodious stone house, the owner's and mason's names handsomely done on a smooth stone near the summit of its gable ; and smiling meadows stretched away along the dancing waters concomitants rendering a mill so enchanting in old countries ! no : no : here was a naked, unplanked, saw- mill! a roof of boards twisted, warped and restless, on the top of a few posts; the prominent objects being the great wheel, the saw itself, and the log in the very act of transition into plank and scantling! No human dwelling was in sight, and it was afterwards found that the owner and his men lived three miles from the mill ; that they went home but once or twice in the week, eating during the day, when hungry, of cold corn and pork, and sleeping during 242 SECOND YEAR the night in the smuggest corner of the mill-shed, and drinking both day and night when thirsty or otherwise, freely of water and whiskey. For prospect around was an ugly, half-cleared clearing, with piles of huge logs, not to be burned, however, but sawed. The dam was invisible. A large trough conducted a portion of the Big Gravelly river to its scene of paltry labour; and there the water, after leaping angrily from the end of its wooden channel, and indignantly whirling a great lubberly, ill- made, clattering wheel, as in derision of its architect, hurried im- patient along a vile looking ditch, half choked with weeds and grass, to remingle with the sparkling, free stream below! Meeting, then, was to be held on a few loose planks, con- stituting the floor, laid ad capsisum! The pulpit was to be the near end of the log, arrested for a time in its transformation to lumber ; while at the far end was to be the congregation at least the sinners, who might sit, or lean, or recline, or stand, as suited convenience. The congregation was big of its size, consisting of the saw-miller, Mr. Forster, and Mr. Forster's two men and also, three hunters, who accidentally hunting in the neighbour- hood, had chanced to stop just now at the mill in all six sinners ; more, however, than are allowed in a Puseyite cathedral, where conversions are unfashionable! As we rode up, a few minutes before ten o'clock, the saw was gnashing away its teeth at the far end of the log, nor did it cease till we had entered the shed; and then, the owner unwill- ingly stopped the performance, seeming by his manner to say "Come, let's have your preaching powerful quick, the saw wants to be cutting agin." This was far from encouraging, yet Mr. Merry, whose turn was to preach, began his preparations, ob- serving in a conciliatory way, that he would not hinder his friends very long, but that we felt it would not be right to pass any settle- ment where the neighbours were kind enough to give us an op- portunity of preaching. The preacher's manner so far won on our sullen congregation, that Mr. Forster and two others took seats in a row on their end of the log; while two leaned them- selves against the saw-frame, and one against an adjoining post: Brother Shrub and Mister Carlton sat among the saints at the pulpit-end of the log, like good folks and penitents in churches with altars. SECOND YEAR 243 In this combination of adverse circumstances, great as was our confidence in Mr. Merry, who was as used to this sort of matters as are eels to skinning, we feared for his success to-day. Yet he began seemingly unembarrassed, holding a small testa- ment, in which was concealed a piece of paper, size of a thumb, and pencilled with some half a dozen words constituting the parson's notes! And notes in the New Purchase and the ad- jacent parts are always concealed by preachers who use them; for the use of such argues to most hearers there is a want of heart religion ; beside that no place is found in our pulpits to spread out written discourses. To have used in Forster' s mill-meeting to- day, any other than the thumb-paper just named, would have been considerably worse than ridiculous it would have deserved a scratch or so from Mr. Forster's saw-teeth ; or what is next to it, a scourging from Lord Bishop Baltimore. Brother Merry quickly perceived that even the plainest and almost child-like topics with suitable language and illustrations failed to preserve his spectators' attention. One man began to look at the ditch where now the water was trickling along with a subdued voice; another, to cut a clapboard with his scalping knife; and Mr. Forster looked wistfully at his saw, evidently more desirous to hear its music than both our preachers' voices together. Something desperate must then be attempted to arrest attention, or hope of doing good at present abandoned. For while true that men cannot hear without a preacher, it does i?ot follow that they will always hear with one : and hence Mr. Merry, after some vain attempts to convert spectators into auditors, sud- denly stopped as if done preaching, and as if talking, commenced thus : "My friends and neighbours don't you all shoot the rifle in this settlement?" That shot woj central: it even startled the Rev. Shrub and myself. The man using up the clap-board looked like an excited dog his very ears seeming on full cock; and Mr. Forster was so interested that he answered in the affirmative by a nod. "So I thought. No hardy woodsman is ignorant of that weapon the noble death-dealing rifle. Ay! with that and the bold hearts and steady hands and sharp eyes of backwoods- men, what need we fear any human enemies." (Approving 244 SECOND YEAR smiles from all accompanied with nods and winks) "And no doubt you all go to shooting matches?" (Assent by a unanimous nod and wink) "Yes ! yes ! it would be strange if you never went. Now, my dear friends, I have no doubt some of you are first-rate marksmen, and can drive the centre off-hand a hundred honest yards." (Here one man on the congregational end of the log stood right up, and with a look and manner equivalent to "I'm jist the very feller what can do that." Ay! I see it in your looks. I'm fond of shooting a little myself; 'tis very exciting and when I indulge in shooting, I have to keep a powerful guard over my heart and temper. For don't we feel ourselves, neigh- bours, a right smart chance better than persons that can't shoot at all? Perhaps we feel a sort of glad when a neighbour makes worse shots than ourselves perhaps we even secretly hope the man firing against us may miss, or that something may happen to spoil his chance ? And then, when we make good shots, don't we walk about sometimes and brag a little even while we hate to hear any body else bragging ? Come, my honest friends, don't we all on such occasions do some things, and say some things, and wish some things, that when we get home, and are alone, and be- gin to think over the day, make us feel sorry about our conduct at the shooting? Come, we are all friends and neighbours here, to-day ain't it so?" (Several nods in assent but no smiles as at first with fixed attention, and a go-on-Mr. Preacher-look, at the far end of the log) "Yes, yes, my dear friends, it is so that is honest and noble in us to confess: now there is a rule in this Book you all know what it is a rule saying, that we ought to do to others, what we, in the same circumstances, would wish them to do to us. And surely, that is a most glorious and excel- lent rule! Well, don't we often forget this rule at a shooting match? and in more ways than one! And again, every sensible man well knows how mean pride is, and we all despise the proud and yet, ain't we guilty ourselves of something like pride at a shooting match? "Well, it seems, then by our own allowing, we may be se- cretly guilty of some bad and mean things, even when we are not openly wicked and guilty, say of swearing (shot at a venture) or maybe drunkenness (one of the sinners stole a look at the SECOND YEAR 245 whiskey jug) or any other bad practice; and we see, a man in his heart may be very proud like, and hate his neighbour, even if we do wear homespun and live in a cabin. (The brethren were neatly, but very plain clad). Ah! dear friends, our hearts, mine as well as yours, are much worse than we usually think and a shooting match is a place to make us find out some of our sins and wickedness. You all know, how as we are going through a clearing, we sometimes see a heap of ashes at an old log heap and at first it seems cold and dead, but when we stir it about with a piece of brush, or the end of a ram-rod, up flash sparks, and smoke, too, comes out. Well, 'tis exactly so with our natural hearts. They conceal a great deal of wickedness, but when they are stirred up by any thing like a shooting-match, or when we get angry, or are determined to have money or a quarter section of land at all hazards ah! my dear friends, how many wicked thoughts we have! how many wicked words we say! how many wicked things we do!" (Winks and nods had ceased there was something in the benevolence, and earnestness, and tenderness of our preacher's voice and manner, that kept attention riveted; and it was plain enough, conscience was busy at, I believe, both ends of the log.) "Well! now, my friends and neighbours, do our own hearts condemn us and make us ashamed ? Look up to yon blue sky above us that is God's sun shining there! Hark! the leaves are moving in the trees it is God's breath that stirs them ! and that God is here ! Ay ! that God is now looking down into our very hearts ! He sees what we now think, and he knows all we have concealed there! That glorious law we spoke of in this book, that we have so often broken, is his law! Friends! would we be willing to die at this very instant? And yet die we all must at some instant; and if we repent not and seek forgive- ness through our Lord and Saviour Jesus Christ you, dear neighbours, I myself, and every one of us must perish and for ever!" 3 I shall not repeat any more of Mr. Merry's discourse. His point was gained. Attention was fixed ; salutary convictions were 8 I can never forget how that word rang out into the adjacent forest nor the echo returned, as if sent back from the invisible spirit land for ever! 246 SECOND YEAR implanted in the auditors minds; and they evidently increased in depth and intensity as the preacher proceeded. Nay, when he in a strain of peculiar and wild and impassioned eloquence, dwelled on the only way of escape from divine wrath through the blessed Son of God our poor foresters gazed on his face with tears in their eyes, and remained till the conclusion of the services, without even the smallest symptom of impatience. When meeting was out, the woodsmen cordially shook hands with us all, and especially with Mr. M. ; and expressed a unan- imous wish to have, if possible, another meeting at the Saw Mill. Bishop Shrub was so tenderly affected that as we rode away and had got beyond hearing at the Mill, he exclaimed: "Amen to that shooting, Brother Merry! we shall never in this life see again these poor men but the effect of this day's preaching must be lasting as their lives: surely we shall meet them in Heaven!" Little specially interesting occurred after this, till our return was commenced. And then early one bright morning we turned aside to visit a deserted Indian town. A few wigwams in ruins were the only habitations left for the living : but in a sequestered loneliness on the margin of the river, we found by the swelling mounds and other marks of sepulture that we walked amid the habitations of the dead ! I have ever been deeply moved by the sorrows and the injuries of the Indian ever since childhood but now so unexpectedly among their graves the sacred graves around which Indians linger till the last! which they so mourn after when exiled far away in their wanderings! when we looked on the pure white waters where the bark canoe had glided so noiseless; and heard the wind so sweet and yet so sad, like moaning spirits, over the tall grass and through the trees a feel- ing so mournful, so desolate came over the soul, that I walked hastily away to a still more lonely spot, and there sat down and cried as if my heart were breaking for its own dead ! When we rejoined one another tears were in the eyes of all! None spoke the white man's voice seemed desecration! We were true mourners over those graves. Poor Indians! at that solemn moment it was in our hearts to live, and wander and die with you in the forest home to spend life in teaching you the way of salvation! Blessed! blessed! be ye, noble band of mis- sionaries, who do all this! ye shall not lose your reward! SECOND YEAR 247 To-day the evening service was in the neighbourhood of Mr. Redwhite, for many years a trader among the Indians. He be- ing present insisted on our passing the night at his house. We consented. For forty years he had lived among the aborigines, and was master of five or six Indian languages; having adopted also-many of their opinions on political and religious points, and believing with the natives themselves and not a few civilized folks, that the Indians have had abundant provocations for most of their misdeeds. Hence, Mr. Redwhite and Mr. Carlton soon became "powerful thick" i. e. very intimate friends. The most interesting thing in Mr. Redwhite's establishment, was his Christian or white wife. She, in infancy, had escaped the tomahawk at the massacre of Wyoming, and afterwards had been adopted as a child of the Indian tribe. Our friend's heathen or red wife was a full-blooded savagess (the belle and the savage;) and had deserted her husband to live with her exiled people: and so Redwhite, poor fellow! was a widower with one wife viz. this Miss Wyoming! Much of this lady's life had passed among the Canadian French : and she was, cherefore, mis- tress of the Indian, the French, and the English ; and also of the most elegant cookery, either as regards substantial dishes or nicnacry. And of this you may judge, when we set on supper. But first be it said our host was rich, not only for that country but for this: and though he lived in a cabin, or rather a dozen cabins, he owned tracts of very valuable land presented to him by his red lady's tribe territory enough in fact to form a darling little state of his own, nearly as small as Rhode Island or Del- aware. Beside, he owned more real silver silver done into plate, and some elaborately and tastefully graved and chased, than could be found even in a pet bank, when dear old Uncle Sam* sent some of his cronies to look for it. Well, now the eatables and drinkables. We had tea, black and green, and coffee all first chop and superbly made, regaling with fragrance, and their delicacy aided by the just admixture of ap- propriate sugars, together with richest cream: the additamenta 4 This affectionate old gentleman gets into a dotage occasionally ; or at least some of his friends who undertake to be the government, so repre- sent him. But he is a "clever feller" himself. 248 SECOND YEAR being handed on a silver waiter and in silver bowls and cups. The decoctions and infusions themselves were poured from silver spouts curving gracefully from massy silver pots and urns. Wheat bread of choice flour and raised with yeast, formed, some into loaves and some into rolls, was present, to be spread with delicious butter rising in unctuous pyramids, fretted from base to apex into a kind of butyrial shell work : this resting on silver and to be cut with silver. Corn, too, figured in pone and pud- ding, and vapoured away in little clouds of steam; while at judicious intervals were handed silver plates of rich and warm flannel or blanket cakes, with so soft and melting an expression as to win our most tender regards. There stood a plate of planed vension, there one of dried beef; while at becoming distances were large china dishes partly hid under steaks of ham and veni- son done on gridirons, and sending forth most fragrant odours : so that the very hounds, and mastiffs and wolf-dogs of the colony were enticed to the door of our supper cabin by the witchery of the floating essence ! But time would fail to tell of the bunns and jumbles and sponge cake and fruit ditto and pound also and silver baskets and all these on cloth as white as snow ! Reader! was ever such a contrast as between the untutored world around and the array, and splendour, and richness of our sumptuous banquet ? And all this in an Indian country ! and pre- pared by almost the sole survivor from a massacre that extin- guished a whole Christian village! How like a dream this! And thou wast saved at Wyoming ! Do I look on thee ? upon whose innocent face of infancy years ago gushed the warm blood of the mother falling with her babe locked to her bosom! Didst thou really hear the fiendish yells of that night ? when the flames of a father's house revealed the forms of infuriate ones dancing in triumph among the mangled corpses of their victims! Who washed the congealed gore from thy cheek? And what bar- barian nurse gave strange nourishment from a breast so respon- sive to the bloody call of the warwhoop that made thee motherless ? and now so tenderly melting at the hunger cries of the orphan ! And she tied thee to a barken cradle and bore thee far, far away to her dark forest haunts! and there swinging SECOND YEAR 249 thee to the bending branches bade the wild winds rock thee! and she became thy mother and there was thy home ! Oh ! what different destiny thine in the sweet village of thy birth but for that night! And yet, reader, this hostess was now so wholly Indian and Canadian that when she talked of Wwoming it was without emotion ! while I was repressing tears ! Alas ! she 'had not one faint desire to see the land of her ancestors! Could this be Campbell's Gertrude ? CHAPTER XXXI. "Tend me to night! May be it is the period of your duty: Haply, you shall not see me more !" THE missionary party was dissolved at Timberopolis and I set out for Glenville alone. One night was to be passed on the road : and I, therefore, so ordered matters as to tarry that night with a friend, who had cordially invited me to make his house my home in case I ever should travel that way. It was early in the evening when I reached his cabin, but no one, to my surprise, appeared in answer to repeated calls; yet there being manifest signs of inhabitants, I dismounted and en- tered the house without ceremony. And of course I found the family but all in bed! Yes! the mother and every mother's son of them and daughter too: they had the ague! Two, indeed, were a sort of convalescent; yet eight were too ill to sit up voluntarily. Instead, therefore of being ministered unto, I myself became a minister, and set right to work, assisting the partly renovated son and daughter in getting wood, in boiling water, and in handling along Jesuit bark, and sulphate of quinine. We three cooked, in partnership, something for supper what, I never exactly knew it was in sad contrast with the Wyoming banquet! and that night I shared a bed with the squalid and de- jected ague-smitten son! For the accommodation of the nine others, were four other beds the sleepers averaging thus two and a quarter per bed. In our room were two beds, in the adjoining one three : an arrange- ment tending to purify the air, ten of the sleepers being sick 250 SECOND YEAR and exhaling foetid breath. Was it then so very surprising after all, that within one day after reaching Glenville, our historian, having been with missionaries in aguish districts and having had a comfortable night's repose amid this aguish household, should himself contrive to get, in the very last chapter of his first vol- ume the Fever and Ague? Alas! many a volume equally promising in its beginning becomes sickly in its close : a character perhaps of all books detailing life as it is! For what, pray, is life itself, except a progress from elastic infancy to flaccid old age! from hope to disappointment! from health to sickness! from living to dying? Reader! (supposing one is this far) perhaps you have dis- covered that the writer is disposed to laugh as well as cry: not maliciously but in a spirit of of "Good nature, Mr. Carlton?" That is it, my dear reader ; however, our delicacy and good taste preferred another to praise us. Well, we have found that such spirit, within its due bounds, is a great (help in sustaining misfor- tunes and adversities, especialy our neighbour's ; and it does seem a compensative in some natures that their melancholy states may be followed by joyous and sunny ones. And not rarely have our elastic tendencies lifted us from deep and miry "sloughs of despond;" and even yet, after the crushing of fond hopes, and the endurance of exceedingly weighty griefs, we laugh even loud although in a subdued tone; for the dear ones we laughed with in earlier days can never, never join again their merry voice with ours! but then even in our tears we smile, because we trust to smile and rejoice with these again and without danger of sin, amid serene and perfect and perpetual joys! This premised, what was more natural than that we should laugh at the Fever and Ague when our neighbours had this twin disease? Indeed, hearing the patients themselves jest about it r how was it possible not to join with them? At last I was seized with this mirth-creating malady myself : and of course you wish to know how I behaved myself. Well, at -first I laughed as heartily as ever just as I once did in the first stage of sea-sick- ness. And then I took emetics, and cathartics, and herb-teas, and barks, and bitters, and quinine, and hot toddies seasoned with pepper, oh! with such winning smiles! that the folks all said "it was quite a privilege! hem! to wait on me!" SECOND YEAR 251 Fye ! on our hypocrisy and selfishness-! all this captivating be- haviour arose fom a persuasion that it would aid a speedy cure! And for a time the enemy seemed willing to be smiled away with the "coelaboration" of the above smile-creating doses and, I do believe, we got to laughing more than ever. But one day after my cure, on returning from a little walk extra (with a rifle on my shoulder) a very gentle, but ralther chilly sensation began very ridiculously to trickle down my spine and there, would you believe it, was our Monsheer Tonson again ! Now, be it remembered, here was a surprise and a cowardly and treacherous assault, if I now for the first looked grum: besides it was evident good nature was no permanent cure for the ague. Nay, Dr. Sylvan told me that once he had the ague, and repeatedly after he was cured the thing kept sneaking back and down his back; till on the last occasion coming, after it had seem- ingly been physicked to death like some of the patients, he was so incensed at its irripudence as to set to and kick and stamp and toss and dance and wriggle about, that the fit was actually stormed out ! and from that hour no ague, dumb, vocal, or shaking had ever ventured near him ! Had I heard this in time, my insidious foe would have been treated to a similar assault and battery. But, perhaps, so violent exercise on my part might have only accel- erated and made fatal a crisis now approaching; for soon I be- came so alarmingly ill that John Glenville was posting to Wood- ville for Dr. Sylvan: but before he could have reached that place I was raging in the delirium of fever! Two things in the events of that dreadful night seem worth mentioning : first, while nothing done to or for me was known, I have to this day the most distinct remembrance of my phrenzy visions; and secondly, that hours dwindled into minutes; for seeming only to shut and open my eyes, it was said afterwards that then I had slept even two full hours! and that my counte- nance and motions indicated a state of fearful mental agitation. In that state two visions, each repeated and re-repeated with vivid intensity, and seeming to fill spaces of time like those marked by flashes of lightning, were so terrific and appalling as to force me to violent gestures and alarming outcries. One vision was this. A gigantic cuirassier, more than twenty feet high, and steel clad, was mounted on a mammoth of jet black 252 SECOND YEAR color and glistening, and moving with the grace and swiftness of an antelope. On the rider's left was couched a spear in size like a beam, and its barbed point flaming as the fires of a furnace : while in his right hand was brandished an immense sword of scimetar shape, and so intensely bright as to blind the beholders. To oppose this apparition was drawn out in battle a large army, with all the apparatus of war, swords, spears, smaller fire arms, and the 'heaviest artillery the troops being in several lines with cannon in the centre and rifles on the wings ; and all ready with levelled weapons and burning matches awaiting the onset of the terrific rider Death ! Soon came a signal flash from the heavens clothed in sackcloth looking clouds a kind of meteor sunlight and at its gleam the cuirassier on his Black Mammoth, like a tempest driven by a whirlwind, swept rushing on ! the nostrils of the strange beast dilated with fiery foam, his hoofs thundering over the rocks and streaming fire ; while the rider, upright in the stirrups, poised with one hand his spear, and with the other flashed his scimetar, and uttered a war-cry so loud and clear as to reach the very heavens and appal and confound the stoutest hearts ! At this instant would I be possessed with a strange arid invincible furor, and pouring forth shrieks and outcries in answer to the war-cry of the warrior-spirit, I would strike with my clenched hands as if armed with weapons while the army await- ing our now combined onset raised their responsive shouts of defiance, and then poured out against us stream after stream of fire, with the clatter and crash and roar of many thunders but in vain! On, on, on we rushed! the earth shook and groaned and broke asunder into yawning gulfs and sulphurous caverns ! and down, down sank the troops, smitten, dismayed, crushed! while the Black Mammoth, reeling from ten thousand balls, and spears and barbed arrows, with the fiendish voice of many demons, plunged headlong into the discomfited host, and there falling with the shock of an earthquake, crushed men, cannon, horses, spears, into one horrible, quivering mass! Then from amidst this ruin up sprang the giant-spirit with triumphant shouts, and strided away to mount another Black Mammoth, and renew with varia- tions this battle of my exhausting vision ! My other vision was as solemn to me as ever can be the very article of death. Methought I lay in a little narow frail canoe SECOND YEAR 253 and with power neither to move nor speak yet with as keen perceptions as if I were all senses. The canoe itself was at the head of a gulf, tied to its bank with a twine of thread and tremb- ling on its violent waves; the gulf being between walls of rock towering away up smooth and perpendicular for many hundred feet, and running with dark and dismal waters very swiftly to- wards a narrow opening through an adamantine rock. That open- ing was an egress into an unknown, bottomless, shoreless, chaotic and wildly tumultuating ocean! I felt myself quivering on the current of time just as it was sweeping into Eternity! I saw strange sights ! I heard unearthly sounds ! Oh ! the unutterable anguish and despair as I lay helpless and awaited the sundering of my cobweb tie in the twinkling of an eye should I pass into that vast and dread unknown! Reader! was this really sleep and did I only dream? or was it the summoning of the spirit to see in a trance what awaits us all? Aye! be assured our dreams are not always dreams! A spirit-world is round us and it is perhaps in such visions God designs we should catch faint glimpses of that other state? Sneer vile Athiest * the hour is coming when we shall sneer at thee ! for the "wicked shall rise to shame and everlasting contempt!" ****** When Glenville returned from Woodville, he was accompanied not by Doctor Sylvan, but by the Doctor's nephew one of the two young gentlemen of Indian grave memory. And he brought a long paper of written and minute directions ; and among others, the Doctor's favourite plan of changing the character of agues for making a dumb ague speak or shake. It answered well, I believe, with all patients of vigorous constitution : at all events, if one could endure it, nothing could so warily make a dumb ague not only shake, but speak, ay, and scream right out. But when that part of the prescription was read to me, I most obstinately refused to have my ague thus converted: and yet as the bare reading made me shiver, doubtless, the operation itself would have made me shake like an earthquake! Sticking, therefore, to my refusal, my dumb ague as Doctor Sylvan predicted, stuck to me ; and for twelve long cheering months! Yet, here is an extract 4 Not the reader, we hope yet in these irreligious days it might be. 254 SECOND YEAR from the Doctor's paper, so that it can be better judged whether my refusal was altogether owing to obstinacy: " and then, as the shaking ague is altogether tractable, his dumb ague must be immediately changed into the other. Carry then your patient into the passage between the two cabins, or into the open air, and strip off all his clothes that he may lie naked in the cold air and upon a bare sacking and then and there pour over and upon him successive buckets of cold spring water, and continue until he has a decided and pretty powerful smart chance of a shake." Ohhoo! ooh! (double oo in moon, with very strong aspira- tion) it makes me shake now! Well ! at long last the dumb thing left me ; so that I lived to write more books than two: but we shall not say how often we "put on a damp night-cap and relapsed," nor how apparently near what began in laughing came to ending in tears. Only let my reader draw from this case two practical resolutions : First to cultivate a fixed determination never to get any kind of an ague if he can help it : and Secondly, to indulge no unseeming pleasantry when he sees a neighbour shiver or shake unless that neighbour insist manfully that you shall laugh rather than cry with him. Shortly after my convalescence, the Hon. John Glenville de- parted for the House ; and there, among other matters, he assisted in having Robert Carlton, Esq., appointed one of the Trustees of the College at Woodville; with orders to procure as soon as possible competent professors and teachers. For this I wrote to my friend, Charles Clarence, then in the Theological School at Princeton, New Jersey; but his reply belongs to our next year, and, indeed, to a new era of the Purchase, and hence, we may very appropriately end here a Chapter a Year and a Volume. 2 2 In this as in other passages Hall's statement is inconsistent with the "Key" to the characters and with the order of events. Young (Glenville) did not become a member of the House till 1828, fully five years after Hall came to Indiana and four years after the Seminary was opened and eight years after the act providing for its foundation. "Carl- ton" is here represented as writing to "Clarence" both of whom Hall rep- resents. This "Carlton," if he became a Trustee of the Seminary, must have been some other man than Hall. See pp. 158-159. Rev. Isaac Reed, who married Mrs. Hall's sister probably wrote to Hall while the latter was completing his Seminary course at Princeton, suggesting Hall's coming to the New Purchase with a view to his obtaining an appointment as a teacher in the newly founded Seminary. See Introduc- tion, p. vi. CHAPTER XXXII. "Our dying friends come o'er us, like a cloud, To damp our brainless ardor, and abate That glare of life which often blinds the wise, Our dying friends are pioneers, to smooth Our rugged paths to death." THE commencement of our third summer was marked by an event very sad to our little self-exiled company in the woods the death of Mrs. Glenville. Were all here said affection prompts and truth warrants, a volume might be easily written, interesting to most, but specially to that comparatively small yet most excellent class known as religious people: for never had such a brighter ornament or safer pattern. No one, except the inspired person who first gave the exhortation, could more truly have said with her lips to her friends as she did by her life "Be ye followers of me as I am of Christ." But none ever was so unwilling to appropriate that or similar expressions : she was too pious, too humble and meek, and childlike ever to think her lovely temper, resigned spirit, and dis- interested goodness to be, as they were, a bright and burning light. In early life she was said to be surpassingly beautiful. But danger and temptation from beauty were soon prevented ; in the midst of her bloom her enchanting face was forever marred by the fearful traces of the small-pox. Yet spite of this, and even in advanced life, rare was it to behold a countenance more agree- able than hers; in which was the blended expression of pleasing features, benevolent feeling, pure sentiment, and heavenly temper. The original beauty of the countenance had seemingly been trans- ferred to the heart ; whence it beamed afresh from the face, re- fined, chastened, renovated. Her person was tall and finely pro- portioned ; and so imposing her mien, from a native dignity of soul, that had her original beauty remained, Mrs. Glenville must have always appeared a Grace. She was well educated and extensively read in history, and many other important secular subjects, but her chief reading had always been that best of books the Bible: indeed, to this, during 255 256 THIRD YEAR the last few years of her sorrowful life, her whole attention was given. She, however, read now one other book a book we name, although with no expectation of its obtaining favour in an unre- flecting age "Ambrose's looking unto Jesus." And these two books, in the latter months of her life, owing to the nature of her disease, she read on her knees ! That disease was an aneurism of the femoral artery, of long continuance, and towards the last exceedingly painful and which, from an early period of its ex- istence had been pronounced fatal. Yet all this created in her no alarm, produced not the slightest murmur, and abated not her cus- tomary cheerfulness and playful vivacity. Nay, she tried even to comfort and encourage our little settlement being really more joyous in anticipation of a removal to the better land, than we could have been in returning from exile to vast temporal posses- sions and a beauteous earthly home! Reason was unimpaired till within a very few moments of death ; and we all stood around her bed in the rude cabin, while she, placing her hands on the heads of her grandchildren, offered a solemn prayer for their welfare; and then, with an inter- rupted voice of the utmost tenderness, she, looking on us for the last, and smiling said "I am dying all peace!" The king of terrors was there to her an Angel of beauty to us dark and frightful! and he rudely shook that dear frail tabernacle with a severe, perhaps a painful convulsion ! But that loved heart, after one throe of agony, was still ! a deep sigh breathed from the quivering lips and she was not, for God had taken her! A blood ransomed and sanctified spirit was in its true home ! Two days after we laid her in a lone and forest grave. And there all were mourners; none walked in that procession of the dead but the people of Glenville brothers, sisters, children! In that solitary spot we laid her, far away from consecrated ground and the graves of our fathers! ****** But what ! though night after night around that spot was heard the melancholy howl of the wild beast ! what ! though the great world knows not, cares not to know of that leaf-covered grave! The dust that slumbers there shall live again and die no more ! Better far lie in an'unknown grave and rise to the resurrection of THIRD YEAR 257 the just, than under a sculptured monument amid the lofty mausoleums of kings, if one thence must rise to die the endless death ! CHAPTER XXXIII. "Why should a man, whose blood is warm within, Sit like his grandsire cut in albaster?" "Where should this music be? i* the air, or the earth?" IMPORTANT changes to the Glenville settlement soon followed the death of Mrs. Glenville. It was found necessary to connect a store with the tannery ; and hence, after due deliberation, it was decided that Mr. Carlton should now remove to Woodville and open the store ; the ex-legislator, J. Glenville, to remain and con- duct the leather department with old Dick, and also buy no pro- duce for the Orleans market, and all along shore there. He (not Dick, but Glenville) was now also a candidate for Pro- thonotary; although not from elevated and pure patriotism, as in his other campaign ; the fact is we had had honour enough and loss. An eye was now fixed on the salary ; we wished to serve the people, provided like other great patriots, we could also serve ourselves; bad men serve only themselves, good ones both them- selves and the people. Uncle John and Aunt Kitty were to stay with Glenville in the patriarchal cabin ; but Miss Emily Glenville was to go with us to Woodville, where she and Mrs. Carlton would set up an Institute for Young Ladies ! the very first ever established in the New Purchase. In due season, and after innumerable dividings and packings of goods and chattels, off we set; a good two horse wagon and its owner and driver, a robust youth of the timber world, having been hired to take us and "the plunder." Aunt Kitty insisted on going over to see us safe at our new home and to help fix; and old Dick, poor fellow! looked so wistfully at me, that I agreed to ride the honest creature to Woodville, if he would consent to come back tied to the tail of the wagon; and to that he made no objection whatever. And so he went along too. 258 THIRD YEAR Nothing important occurred on the journey, only a cv r '"ous complimentary mistake of the bustling hostess during the ni^ht we were compelled to pass on the road. This sagacious lady, seeing a baby in the party, inferred, in Pillbox's style, that some- body was married ; and as Aunt Kitty carried the little "crittur," and made an awful deal of fuss, and Mr. C. used once or twice nursery diminutives, the landlady concluded that if I was "faddy- waddy," Aunt Kitty must be "mammywammy." Hence, about bed time, she considerately said "I want to 'commodate near about as well as we can fix it, and so him (pointing to Mr. Carlton) and you ma'am (speaking to Aunt Kitty) kin have the room up loft thare; and them young folks (Mrs. Carlton, Emily C. and the driver) kin have this room down here all alone to 'emselves !" Now, reader, had I a very grave and solemn countenance in my youth, or was Aunt Kitty then just thirty-five years and six months my senior, a very pretty, youthful, looking woman ? And what could have deceived our Hoosierina? that when informed of her error, she should have exclaimed : "Well ! now ! I never seed the like on it ! Why if I didn't senti- mentally allow you was the two old folkses, and them two likely young gals, your two oldenmost daters and that leetle critter, you look'd like you was a nussin your last and youngenest !" Awh ! came now, reader, act fair ; for Aunt Kitty was after all a right down good looking body, and as lively as a young lady of plus-twenty. And do not fine, handsome young fellows sometimes marry good looking aged ladies very rich? However, spite of this, next day we came safe to Woodville. But now, alas! was to be the parting with old Dick! True, he let them tie him to the tail of the wagon but evidently, he was trotted off contrary to his secret wishes, and a good deal faster than he was accustomed to go ; for our driver, desirous of reaching the river by night, and having no return load, drove away at a Jehu gait. I, standing at our upper story back window, cried out, as he wheeled into his retrograde position "Good-bye, Dick, good bye ! and, would you have believed it ? He cocked back his ears ! rolled up his eyes ! and with head and neck almost hori- zontal, he made not only desperate efforts not to trot, but to slip THIRD YEAR 259 his halter ! In vain ! The brute horses in front, were too many for the poor fellow, and away, away they jerked him; till the party, entering the woods, turned suddenly into the road to Glenville, and he was forced round with an ample sweep of his rear quar- ters ; and the last I ever saw of my poor dear old comrade was a most indignant flourish of his venerable tail ! For, before my visit to the former home, Dick who would not grind back alone, and John could not be constantly with him, was sold to a neighbouring teamster; and then, in about a year after, he ended his earthly career as he had begun it a wheel-horse to a wagoner ! Whether from the infirmity of age, or heart-broken at quitting our family, he dropped dead, holding back in his place, on the descent of a precipitous hill ! t ***** * Poor Dick ! poor Dick! Don't pshaw at me, reader! I'm not crying, any such thing yes, he's dead now ! / shall never see him again ! and you will never hear of him. If he has plagued you some in this work, he will not, like some bipedalic and quadruple heroes in certain other books, plague you all through ! Behold us, then, one step back towards the worldly world. And so now we shall have a little backwoods town life, with an occa- sional excursion to our country seat at Glenville, like great shop- keepers of eastern cities. 1 Our first step at Woodville was to write and fasten up at the post-office, court-house, jail, doctor's office and other public places, copies of our prospectus for the Woodville young ladies' institute. This was necessary for sixteen reasons ; firstly, there was no print- ing office nearer (then) than one hundred miles ; 2 secondly, Oh ! 1 It appears to have been during his third year in Indiana in the summer of 1824, that Hall moved to Bloomington. This would fix his arrival in Indiana in the spring of 1822 instead of 1823. See note p. 70. z It was not until 1825 when the Indiana capital was moved from Corydon to Indianapolis that Jesse Brandon who had been an editor and public printer at Corydon moved his printing materials to Bloomington. Brandon then established the Bloomington Republican which lived until about 1829. The Indiana Gazette and Literary Advocate, was founded by Gen. Jacob Lowe in opposition to Brandon's paper and to aid the Jackson- ian party. When Jackson was elected President, Dr. David H. Maxwell was removed from the Bloomington post office and Lowe was appointed. When Hall moved to Bloomington in 1823 or '24 Bloomington printing was probably done at Louisville. Esarey's Indiana Journalism. 26o THIRD YEAR I see you are satisfied I'm not going on. Wonderful care, how- ever, had been used to make our notice a specimen, both of pen- manship and patriotism; and hence more was accomplished in our favour than could have been done by sixteen line pica and long primer. For instance, heading the foolscap was a superb American eagle, in red ink flourish, and holding in his bill, a rib- bon, inscribed "Young Ladies Institute." Then came the mis- tresses' names in large round hand then the location in letters, inclining backward, like old Dick when wheel-horse Oh ! pardon, he shall not hold back for us again I was off my guard ; and then the word PROPOSE that introduced the page-like matter, in capitals of German text, with heads and tails curled and crankled and inter- laced, so as nearly to bewilder the reader about the meaning! And yet, so adroitly was this word contrived, that if one perti- naciously and judiciously kept on through all the windings, he would emerge safe enough at the final flourish of the E; and be not a little triumphant at twisting unhurt and unscared through the labyrinth of "sich a most powerful hard and high larn'd hand write !" Leaving this prospectus to produce its own effects, I set out for Louisville to lay in goods, and also to bring out for our school- purposes, a piano. Now this was the very first that "was ever heern tell of in the Purchus !" 3 and hence no small sensation was created, even by the bare report of our intention. Nay, from that moment, till the instrument was backed up to our door to be removed from the wagon, expectation was on tip-toe, and conjec- ture never weary. "A pianne ! what could it be ? Was it a sort a fiddle-like only bigger, and with a powerful heap of wire strings ? What makes them call it a forty pianne? forty forty ah! yes, that's it it plays forty tunes!" Some at Woodville knew well enough what a piano was, for there, as elsewhere, in the far west, were oddly congregated, a few intelligent persons from all ends of the earth : but these did all in their power to mislead conjecture, enjoying their neighbour's mis- 8 This small piano was for many years in the home of Mr. and Mrs. James M. Howe, South College Ave., Bloomington. It was still there in 1892 when Dr. John M. Coulter, President of the University, lived in the Howe home. THIRD YEAR 261 takes. After a narrow escape of being backed, wagon and all, into the creek, already mentioned, as having the ford just seven feet deep, and notwithstanding the roughness, or as my friend, lawyer Cutswell used to say, "the asperities" of the road, the in- strument reached us, and in tune, unless our ears were lower than concert pitch. At all events, we played tunes on it, and vastly to the amazement and delight of our native visitors; who, con- sidering the notes of the piano as those of invitation, came by day or night, not only around the window, but into the entry, and even into the parlour itself, and in hosts ; Nor did such ever dream of being troublesome, as usually it was a "sorter wantin to hear that powerful pianne tune agin!" But often the more curious "a sort o' wanted the lid tuk up like to see the tune a playin, and them little jumpers (dampers) dance the wires so most mighty darn'd powerful smart!" All this was, indeed, annoying, yet it was amusing. Beside, we might as well have bolted the store, and left the Purchase, as to bolt our door, or quit playing: and beyond the ill-savour of such conduct in a backwood's republic, it would have been cynical not to afford so many simple people a great pleasure at the cost of a little inconvenience and some rusting of wires from the touches of perspiring fingers. An incident or two on this head, and our music may, for the present, be dismissed. One day, a buxom lass dismounted, and after "hanging her crittur" to my rack, walked not, as was usual, into the store first, but direct into our parlour, where she made herself at home, thus : "Well! ma'am, I'm a sort a kim to see that 'are thing thare (pointing to the piano) Jake says its powerful mought a body hear it go a leetle ma'am ?" Of course, Mrs. Carlton let it "go a leetle," and then it was rapturously encored, rubbed, patted, wondered at, asked about, &c. for one good solid hour, when our familiar made the follow- ing speech and retired : "Well! pianne tunes is great! I allow that pianne maybe perhaps cost near on to about half a quarter section, (forty acres, valued at fifty dollars.) I wish Jake and me was rich folks, and I'd make him go half as high as yourn, however, I plays the 262 THIRD YEAR fiddle, and could do it right down smart, only some how or nuther I can't make my fingers tread the strings jist ezactly right !" A very respectable woman, wife of a wealthy farmer seven miles from Woodville, having been one day in town till towards evening, thought she would step over, and for the first time hear the famous piano ; and that, although she was to ride home by herself, and by a very long and lonesome road. Our best tunes were accordingly done, and with flute accompaniments ; at which our honest-hearted neighbour, raising both hands, and with a peculiar nod of the head and wonderful naivete, exclaimed : "Compton (her husband) Compton said it was better nor the fiddle! but I'm sentimentally of opinion it's as fur afore a fiddle, as a fiddle's afore a jusarp!!" 4 Illustrious shade of Paganini ! what say'st thou to that? Once, however, a fine, yet unpolished young man came, but evidently with an impression that some invitation was necessary, as he rapped at the parlour door, and would not enter till in- vited by Mrs. Carlton. She was playing at the time, and well knowing the cause of the visit, she soon asked if he was fond of music, to which he answered: "Oh! most powerful fond, ma'am; and as I heern tell of the pianne, I made a sort a bold to step in and maybe perhaps you'd play a tune." Tune after tune was accordingly played; while the young man, who, abashed at his entrance, remained near the door, now arose and advancing, as if drawn by some enchantment, little by little, he stood at the end of the instrument, absorbed in the music, and his eyes fixed with an intense gaze on the lady's coun- tenance and at last, when the music ceased at the conclusion of some piece of Beethoven's, he heaved a profound sigh, and thus fervently said : "If I had a puttee wife and such a fixin, I'd never want nothing no more no how !" Reader ! that man had a soul ! Sweet sounds and a fair face (my mother-in-law had been a very beautiful woman, now touched chords in his heart never before so vibrated; and there 4 This was Mrs. Mary Ann Ketchem, according to a letter of Hall, 1855. THIRD YEAR 263 came ill-defined but enrapturing visions so lofty! so aerial! so unlike his cabin, his sisters, and, perhaps, his sweetheart ! Wo to the fop who then should even have looked impertinence towards the musician! Ah! sweetheart! for an instant thy image was away ! Thy lover had caught a dim glimpse of a region and at- mosphere where a more refined lady-love only could live! And so we were now fully under weigh at Woodville, selling, buying, keeping school, and playing the piano the last important affair being sadly interrupted by the duties of house-keeping. Mrs. C. began more clearly to understand an elegant phrase, addressed to her at our entrance into the wooden country "the working of one's own ash-hopper." A girl was indeed caught, (although the creatures were shy as wild turkeys) about once a month; but the success was only small relief to the mistress. It might be a kind of relief from rough scrubbing and washing; from little else, how- ever, as other work must be rectified and often re-cleaned. Did a girl fancy, too, herself undervalued? was she not asked to the 'first table with company? not included in invitations sent us from "big bug" families? not called Miss Jane or Eliza? she was off in a moment! Real malice is often mixed with the dud- geons ; dough half kneaded is deserted by the young lady clothes abandoned in the first suds batter left, and that at the instant you invite your company to sit up, and expect "the young woman that goes out to help her neighbours in a pinch" to be coming in with the first plate of flannel cakes ! But if one unfortunately catches a girl who is a mad devotee to some false form of the Christian religion, the employer will be systematically cheated, under the vile plea of higher obligations to attend the thousand and one meetings got up by self-righteous revival makers. We have by such 'been left on a sick-bed, and when it was by some supposed we were actually dying! her spiritual advisers held a fanatical meeting that hour, and off she hurried, though paid to nurse ! Such a thing would not now be thought worthy record, if we were not too well apprised that even in here, girls, gals, helps, servants, and apprentices, are but poorly instructed by some flaming religionists as to the sacred duties of their offices; and that some of these helps, although paid, fed, clothed, and nursed in sickness by the employers, are, 264 THIRD YEAR if not expressly taught, yet really encouraged, to slight their work to be impertinent and to pay no respect to proper family hours at night, or even to the solemnities of a domestic religion ! Hence a New Purchase is not the most pleasant place in the world for boarding-school young ladies or indeed for any females* who have not muscles of oak and patience of an ox. Let then, no fair lady who can remain in an old settlement, ven- ture into a new one from mere poetical reasons ; or till she has long and deeply pondered this phrase and its cognates "to work your own ash-hopper !" And if a nice young gentleman engaged to be married to a pretty delicate lily-flower of loveliness, is meditating "to flit" to a bran new settlement, let him know that out there rough men, with rare exceptions, regard wives as squaws, and as they often expressed their views to Mr. Carlton, "have no idee of sich weak, feminy, wimmin bodies as warnt brung up to sling a dinner-pot kill a varmint and make leather brichises !" MORAL. Better to marry in the Range. CHAPTER XXXIV. -quodeunque ostendis mihi sic, incredulns odi." -I am slow to believe fish stories." OUR Board of Trustees, it will be remembered, had been di- rected by the Legislature to procure, as the ordinance called it, "Teachers for the commencement of the State College at Wood- ville." That business by the Board was committed to Dr. Sylvan and Robert Carlton the most learned gentlemen of the body, and of the New Purchase ! * Our honourable Board will be * Woman. 5 5 Hall's original footnote. 1 These pages seem confusing and can hardly be consistent with his- torical facts. This comes from Hall's playing the two characters, Robert Carlton and Rev. Charles Clarence. Hall was never a member of the Board of Trustees of the Seminary. The First Board by the Act creat- ing the Seminary, January 20, 1820 consisted of the following: Charles Dewey, Jonathan Lindley, David H. Maxwell, John M. Jenkins, Jonathan THIRD YEAR 265 specially introduced hereafter; at present we shall bring forward certain rejected candidates, that like rejected prize essays, they may tie published, and thus have their revenge. None can tell us how plenty good things are till he looks for them; and hence, to the great surprise of the Committee, there seemed to be a sudden growth and a large crop of persons even in and around Woodville, either already qualified for the "Profes- sorships," as we named them in our publications, or who could "qualify" by the time of election. As to the "chair" named also in our publications, one very worthy and disinterested school- master offered, as a great collateral inducement for his being elected, "to find his own chair!" a vast saving to the State, if the same chair I saw in Mr. Whackum's school-room. For his chair there was one with a hickory bottom ; and doubtless he would have filled it, and even lapped over its edges, with equal dignity in the recitation room of Big College. The Committee had, at an early day, given an invitation to the Rev. Charles Clarence, A.M. of New Jersey, and his answer had been affirmative; yet for political reasons we had been obliged to invite competitors, or make them, and we found and created "a right smart sprinkle." Hopes of success were built on many things for instance, on poverty, a plea being entered that some thing ought to be done for the poor fellow on one's having taught a common school all his born days, who now deserved to rise a peg on political, or religious, or fanatical partizan qualifications and on pure patri- otic principles, such as a person's having been "born in a cane- brake and rocked in a sugar trough." On the other hand, a fat, dull-headed, and modest Englishman asked for a place, because he had been born in Liverpool and had seen the world beyond the woods and waters too! And another fussy, talkative, pragmatical little gentleman, rested his pretensions on his ability to draw and Nickols, and William Lowe. Maxwell and Lowe had been members of the Constitutional Convention of Corydon, 1816. On pp. 186-7 of Volume I the text asserts, "I was finally made a trustee of the State College at Wood- ville, The appointment, however, was not made till Mr. J. Glenville (John M. Young) took his seat in our legislature in 182- ." Young was a member of the legislature in 1828, and no record can be found of his having been a member of a previous legislature. 266 THIRD YEAR paint maps! not projecting them in round about scientific pro- cesses, but in that speedy and elegant style in which young ladies copy maps at first chop boarding schools ! Nay, so transcendant seemed Mr. Mercator's claims, when his show or sample maps were exhibited to us, that some in our Board, and nearly every body out of it, was confident he would do for Professor of Mathematics and even Principal. But of all our unsuccessful candidates, we shall introduce by name only two Mr. James Jimmey, A.S.S., and Mr. Solomon Rapid, A. to Z. Mr. Jimmey, who aspired to the mathematical chair, was master of a small school of all sexes, near Woodville. At the first, he was kindly, yet honestly told, his knowledge was too limited and in- accurate ; yet, notwithstanding this, and some almost rude repulses afterwards, he persisted in his application and his hopes. To give evidence of competency, he once told me he was arranging a new spelling-book, the publication of which would make him known as a literary man, and be an unspeakable advantage to "the rising generation." And this" naturally brought on the following colloquy about the work: "Ah! indeed! Mir. Jimmey?" "Yes, indeed, Mr. Carlton." "On what new principle do you go, sir?" "Why, sir, on the principles of nature and common sense. I allow school-books for schools are all too powerful obstruse and hard-like for to be understood without exemplifying illustrations." "Yes, but Mr. Jimmy, how is a child's spelling-book to be made any plainer?" "Why, sir, by clear explifications of the words in one column, by exemplifying illustrations in the other." "I do not understand you, Mr. Jimmey, give me a specimen " "Sir?" "An example " "To be sure here's a spes-a-example ; you see, for instance, I put in the spelling-column, C-r-e-a-m, cream, and here in the ex- plification column, I put the exemplifying illustration Unctious part of milk !" We had asked, at our first interview, if our candidate was an THIRD YEAR 267 algebraist, and his reply was negative; but, ''he allowed he could qualify by the time of election, as he was powerful good at figures, and had cyphered clean through every arithmetic he had ever seen, promiscuous questions and all !" Hence, some weeks after, as I was passing his door, on my way to a squirrel hunt, with a party of friends, Mr. Jimmey, hurrying out with a slate in his hand, begged me to stop a moment, and thus addressed me : "Well, Mr. Carlton, this algebra is a most powerful thing aintit?" "Indeed it is, Mr. Jimmey have you been looking into it?" "Looking into it! I have been all through this here fust part, and by election time, I allow I'll be ready for examination." "Indeed!" "Yes, sir! but it is such a pretty thing! Only to think of cyphering by letters! Why, sir, the sums come out, and bring the answers exactly like figures! Jist stop a minute look here; a stands for 6, b stands for 8, and c stands for 4, and d stands for figure 10; now if I say a-f-b c=d, it is all the same as if I said, 6 is 6 and 8 makes 14, and 4 substracted, leaves 10 ! ! Why, sir, I done a whole slate full of letters and signs ; and afterwards, when I tried by figures, they every one of them came out right and brung the answer! I mean to cypher by letters altogether." "Mr. Jimmey, my company is nearly out of sight if you can get along this way through simple and quadratic equations by our meeting, your chance will not be so bad good morning, sir." But our man of "letters" quit cyphering the new way, and re- turned to plain figures long before reaching equations ; and so he could not become our professor. Yet anxious to do us all the good in his power, after our college opened, he waited on me, a leading trustee, with a proposal to board our students, and au- thorised me to publish "as how Mr. James Jimmey will take strange students (students not belonging to Woodville) to board, at one dollar a week, and find every thing, washing included, and will black their shoes three times a week to boot, and give them their dog-zvood and cherry-bitters every morning into the bargain! The most extraordinary candidate, however, was Mr. Solomon Rapid. He was now somewhat advanced into the shaving age, and was ready to assume offices the most opposite in character; 268 THIRD YEAR although justice compels us to say Mr. Rapid was as fit for one thing as another. Deeming it waste of time to prepare for any station till he was certain of obtaining it, he wisely demanded the place first, and then set to work to become qualified for its duties, being, I suspect the very man, or some relation of his, who is recorded as not knowing whether he could read Greek, as he had never tried. And, beside, Mr. Solomon Rapid contended that all offices, from president down to fence-viewer, were open to every white American citizen; and that every republican had a blood bought right to seek any that struck his fancy ; and if the profits were less, or the duties more onerous than had been anticipated, that a man ought to resign and try another. Naturally, therefore, Mr. Rapid, thought he would like to sit in our chair of languages, or have some employment in the State college ; and hence he called for that purpose on Dr. Sylvan, who, knowing the candidate's character, maliciously sent him to me. Accordingly, the young gentleman presented himself, and without ceremony, instantly made known his business thus: "I heerd, sir, you wanted somebody to teach the State school, and I'm come to let you know I'm willing to take the place." "Yes, sir, we are going to elect a professor of languages who is to be the principal, and a professor " "Well, I don't care which I take, but I'm willing to be the principal. I can teach sifring, reading, writing, jogger-free, sur- veying, grammur, spelling, definitions, parsin " "Are you a linguist?" "Sir!" "You of course understand the dead languages?" "Well, can't say I ever seed much of them, though I have heerd tell of them; but I can soon larn them they aint more than a few of them I allow?" "Oh ! my dear sir, it is not possible we can't " "Well, I never seed what I couldn't larn about as smart as any body " "Mr. Rapid, I do not mean to question your abilities ; but if you are now wholly unacquainted with the dead languages, it is im- possible for you or any other talented man to learn them under four or five years." THIRD YEAR 269 "Pshoo foo ! I'll bet I larn one in three weeks ! Try me, sir let's have the f urst one f urst how many are there ?" "Mr. Rapid, it is utterly impossible; but if you insist, I will loan you a Latin book " "That's your sorts, let's have it, that's all I want, fair play" Accordingly, I handed him a copy of Historiae Sacrae with which he soon went away, saying, he "didn't allow it would take long to git through Latin, if 'twas only sich a thin patch of a book as that." In a few weeks, to my no small surprise, Mr. Solomon Rapid again presented himself ; and drawing forth the book began with a triumphant expression of countenance: "Well, sir, I have done the Latin." "Done the Latin!" "Yes, I can read it as fast as English." "Read it as fast as English ! !" "Yes, as fast as English and I didn't find it hard at all." "May I try you on a page?" "Try away, try away; that's what I've come for." "Please read here then, Mr. Rapid ;" and in order to give him a fair chance, I pointed to the first lines of the first chapter, viz; "In principio deus creavit caelum et terram intra sex dies ; primo die fecit lucem," &c. "That, sir?" and then he read thus, "in prinspo duse cree-vit kalelum et terum intra 2 sex dyes primmo dye f e-f e-sit looseum," &c. "That will do, Mr. Rapid " "Ah! ha! I told you so." "Yes, yes but translate." "Translate? !" (eyebrows elevating.) "Yes, translate, render it." "Render it!! how's that?" (forehead more wrinkled.) "Why, yes, render it into English give me the meaning of it." "MEANING!!" (staring full in my face, his eyes like saucers, 2 Our Yankee linguists will rejoice to know that Mr. Rapid pronounced that a just as flat and calfish as themselves; as they thus have untutored nature on their side, just as the Egyptian King had the goats and the babies on his. 270 THIRD YEAR and forehead wrinkled with the furrows of eighty) "MEANING!! I didn't know it had any meaning. I thought it was a DEAD language ! !" ****** Well, reader, I am glad you are not laughing at Mr. Rapid ; for how should any thing dead speak out so as to be understood ? And indeed, does not his definition suit the vexed feelings of some young gentlemen attempting to read Latin without any interlinear translation? and who inwardly, cursing both book and teacher, blast their souls "if they can make any sense out of it." The ancients 3 may yet speak in their own languages to a few ; but to most who boast the honour of their acquaintance, they are certainly dead in the sense of Solomon Rapid. Our honourable board of trustees at last met ; and after a real attempt by some, and a pretended one by others, to elect one and another out of the three dozen candidates, the Reverend Charles Clarence, A.M., was chosen our principal and professor of lan- guages; and that to the chagrin of Mr. Rapid and other disap- pointed persons, who all from that moment united in determined and active hostility towards the college, Mr. Clarence, Dr. Sylvan, Mr. Carlton, and, in short, towards "every puss proud aristocrat big-bug, and darn'd blasted Yankee in the New Purchase." CHAPTER XXXV. "Die mihi, si fueris tu leo, qualis eris?" "Let us play the lion too; I will roar that I will do any man's heart good to hear me ; I will roar that I will make the duke say, "Let him SCARCELY had our college excitements subsided, when we were favoured by a visit from two apostolic new lights. These holely men worked by inspiration, and had from heaven patent ways of converting folks by wholesale by towns, villages, and settle- ments; although it must be owned, the converts would not stay 8 Like the Bible, the dead languages are in bad odour in the Independent Republican Common Schools under Foreign influence. THIRD YEAR 271 converted. And yet these men did verily do wonders at Wood- ville, as much so as if by Mesmerism or Mormonism or Catholi- cism they had magnetised and stupefied all our moral and spiritual phrenological developments! If the doctrine be true, as some religious editors assert, and we suppose on good authority, that the sect which can in the shortest time convert the most is the favourite with heaven, then our new lights deserved the appella- tion they gave themselves Christians. Our priests depended on no "high larnin," set no apples of gold in frames of silver, but despised "man-hatch'd fillosof ees ;" and we may add, even harmless grammar, being as they said "poor, unlarn'd, ignorant men," and also, unshaved, uncomb'd, and fearfully dirt-begrimed close imitators, as they insisted, of primitive Christianity. All they did was "goin from house to house a eatin and drinkin sich as was set afore them," bellowing prayers, snivelling and sobbing, and slobbering over man, woman, and child, and 'a begginin and beseechinin on them to come to meetin." And as meetings were held at every hour of every day and every night, we lived on the trot in going to and from them becoming thus a very peculiar, if not a very good people. At meeting, our venerable teachers prayed as loud and perti- naciously as the priests of Baal, aided, however, by amateurs in the congregations ; yet with it all, we never advanced beyond oh !- ing and ah !-ing. Still, definite petitions were often presented, some for "onreginerit worldlins," some for "hypocrit professors," and many "for folks what believed in John Calvin's religion and hadn't never been convarted." But as it was of importance to have certain persons saved, and the divinity of the new lights might not fully understand who was meant, names were mentioned in prayer, as "dear brother Smith," or poor "dear sister Brown," and sometimes titles were added, as "dear Squire Goodman," or "dear Major Meanwell." I never had the pleasure of hearing the bulls of Bashan roar ; yet, having heard our new light preachers,' I can now form a better conjecture as to that peculiar eloquence; at all events, our two preachers foamed like a modern bull worried by boys and butchers' dogs, and never gave over till exhausted. Often what they said was unknown, as their words seemed to burst asunder 272 THIRD YEAR as soon as let out peculiar shells from wonderful mortars ! And these two personages as far excelled poor Philip in noise, grimace, and incoherence; as he excelled in those qualities, a delicate divine of the nineteenth century, who reads a sleepy second-rate didactic discourse of a warm afternoon in dog-days, in Pompous Square church; and that when the Rev. Doctor Feminit fears the bronchitis. And yet by this simple machinery, and well worked, in about two weeks our new lights had converted every man, woman, and child in Woodville, except Dr. Sylvan, Mr. Carlton, and some other half dozen hardened sinners that would 'stout it out any how !" And now, from every house, alley, grove, orchard, resounded forth curious groans, outcries, yells, and other hell-a- beloo's of private prayer! For all this was called private prayer! the Scriptures, indeed, directing otherwise; but Barton Stone, and Campbell Stone can do much more with people out there than Peter Stone the apostle; and men naturally love the fanatical Pharisaism of pseudo-inspired teachers, councils and conclaves. An opinion was held by most of our fanatics, that direct, earnest, and persevering prayer would result in the instantaneous conversion of any one in whose favour it was made; and of course to the most opposite creeds ! This naturally led to some ridiculous consequences; for it soon was argued that if an un- regenerate man could be got by any art or contrivance, or coaxing, to pray right earnestly for himself, and cry out loud and long for mercy, he would be immediately converted ; nay, it was held to be efficacious if he could be forced by physical means to pray ! Hence among other things of the sort, one of our domestic chap- lains, a very large and fat man, now stirred up and enlivened by this visit of the good men, overtook a neighbour in the woods going to meeting, and after having in vain exhorted the person "to fall right down on his knees and cry for mercy," he suddenly leaped on the incorrigible rascal, and cast him to the earth ; and then getting astride the humbled sinner, he pressed him with the weight of 225lbs. avoirdupois, till he cried out with sufficient earnestness and intensity to "get religion !" Nor did this convert made by so novel a papistical engine fall away any sooner than most other converts mechanically forced, although by differ- THIRD YEAR 273 ent contrivances he hung on some weeks. Besides, if little children in western New- York were whipped with a rod into the kingdom of heaven, why should not a stout sinner, too big for that disciplne, be pommelled into the same kingdom in the New Purchase, by Bishop Paunch? And would not more persons have been converted to Oberlinism, Finneyism, or Abolitionism, or Anyism, if, after the manner with our new lights, folks had more frequently been characterized by their entire names and employments, when prayed for? Indeed, one distinguished lawyer in Western New- York, always ascribed his non-conversion, after innumerable prayers made for him in public, and even by name, to the unfortunate omission of his middle name ! Religious reader ! do not mistake us ; we are laughing at Satan's delusions ! And we lived long enough to find true what we once heard a very learned, talented and pious minister of the Gospel say, that "all such excitements from false religions were sure to be followed by infidelity." Our evangelical churches were for a time deserted; our family altars abandoned; our domestic intercourse ruined ; the Sabbath desecrated ; the sacred name pro- faned, and his attributes sneered at; and avowed and flaming converts to fanaticism were, in two or three years after, reeling drunkards, midnight gamblers, open and unblushing atheists! Nay, assembled in a certain grog-shop (out there appropriately called "a doggery") three years after did some of the man-made converts form a horrible crew that tied up against the wall one of their party in a mock crucifixion! and setting fire to rum poured on the floor, they called it "the blazes of hell ! !" ****** But a religious incident reminds me of my friend, Insidias Cutswell, Esq. And his history adds to the many instances of self-education ^and self-elevation. His career, it was said by his political enemies, began with his being a musician to a caravan of travelling animals ; but it argues great intrinsic genius, that a man ever made the attempt to rise from such a life, and had skill and tact to use opportunities, by thousands in like circumstances suf- fered to pass unheeded. Rise, however, Mr. Cutswell did, till in all that country he stood intellectually pre-eminent, and was justly 274 THIRD YEAR celebrated for learning, enterprise, skill in his legal profession, and, as a political leader. Since then he has stood on elevated pinnacles, both east and west ; and had his spiritual man been good as the intellectual, there would he be still standing ; and perhaps higher. Contrary to the old saws, "virtue is its own reward" and "honesty is the best policy" moral excellency does not always meet with earthly rewards; but yet, the retirement of some talented men, is occasionally owing to moral causes rather than political ones. And hence, many lamented that this gentleman had not been as good as he was great. Mr. C. was a good Latin and Greek scholar, and well acquainted with antiquities and other subjects cognate with the classics. He was deeply versed in the books of law, and extensively read in history, political economy, agriculture, architecture, chemistry, natural philosophy, and metaphysics; and he was, moreover, an excellent orator, using in his speeches the best language and with the just pronunciation. But, 1 my friend had two venial faults; one in common with most politicians out (?) there, and one peculiar to himself maybe. The first of these, was selfishness, and its consequence moral cowardice. Hence, little reliance could be placed in Mr. Cutswell by his friends his enemies had in this respect the advantage of his friends. And hence, he had continual resort to log-rolling ex- pedients ; to some of doubtful morality ; and to some positively sinful, in order to acquire or retain political ascendancy. Still, he was the most sagacious man I ever knew at making political somersets; for he turned so adroitly and so noiselessly, as to cheat the eyes of beholders, and make it doubtful often whether he was on his head or his feet; indeed, he kept such a continual whirl as to seem always in the same place, and yet he was always in a different one ! Or to change figures, he never turned with the tide, but watching the symptoms of ebbs and flows he turned a little before the tide ; and thus, he always passed for a meritor-i- ous, patriotic, people-loving leader of the true and honest party i. e. the strongest, instead of a rag-tag and bob tailed follower in 1 But, is here an adversative conjunction: commonly employed after high praise of one's friends. THIRD YEAR 275 search of loaves and fishes. Yea! he so managed that the world usually said "Well, Cutswell's friends have deserted him, poor fellow!" when all the time Mr. Insidias Cutswell, poor fellow, had deserted them! The other foible of his was a grand deportment put on like a cloak when he entered elevated society, but laid aside in his chambers or among the canaille. Doubtless this arose from a mis- taken notion of what constitutes good behaviour as he was passing from the grub to the winged state ; and, maybe, to conceal that he had not always soared but sometimes creeped. For instance, nothing could transcend the pomp of his manner and dress on some occasions, when from home, unless a New Purchase "Gob- bler" in the gallanting season ; and then his style of taking snuff when in full costume and under the eye of magnates, was equal to a Lord Chamberlain's it made you sneeze to witness it! First came an attitude so grand ! it looked as if it had been studied on a cellar door under the windows of a print shop, from an engraving of Cook, or Kean, or Kemble in royal robes at the acme of his sublime! Oh! the magnificence of that look! And next, the polished box or fragrant sternutatory powder (which he took instead of snuff) would be extracted from the receptacle of an inner vest, a single finger and thumb being delicately in- sinuated for that duty ; and the box thus withdrawn with so be- witching a grace would then be held a moment or two till my lord had completed some elaborate period, or till his deep interest in the absorbing nothings you were uttering should seem suspended by your own pausing. At that instant, his eye glancing in play- ful alternation from his friend's face to the box, he would perform a scale of rapid taps on the side of the box with the index finger of the dexter hand to wake up. the sternutatory inmate; after which, modestly removing or opening the lid, he would, in the manner of Sacas, the Persian cup-bearer, first present the delicious aromatic for your touch, and then with his own finger and thumb a moment suspended in a pouncing position, he would suddenly dart on to the triturated essence and snatch hurriedly thence the tiniest portion possible. Arresting now his hand half way in its upward flight, the pinch downward yet at the tips of the finger and the thumb, he would for the last time look with an interesting 276 THIRD YEAR smile into his friend's face, and in the midst of that gay sunshine, suddenly turning the pinch under his own olfactory organ, he would inhale the perfume with the most musical sniffle imagina- ble! Retrograde motions and curves of becoming solemnity, amplitude and grace, would close the box and restore it to the inner vest and so Mr. Cutswell would have snuffed ! Impatient folks may think it takes long to describe a pinch; but, then, it took still longer to perform one. Mr. Cutswell, among other matters, was no mean performer on the violin ; and on one occasion, at a private concert at my house, forgetting his usual caution, he entertained me with an anecdote about his fiddle and his Bishop. For be it known, that like other politicians, Mr. C. was a theoretical member of a religious people, who looked on fiddle-playing as on the sin of witchcraft although I do not know whether he had ever received the rite of confirma- tion; yet nothing but his high standing saved him from an ex- communication, that out there would speedily have been visited on a poor player. Still his Bishop was a faithful shepherd's dog, and hesitated not to growl and bark, if he did to bite ; being, also, one who prayed for men sometimes by name, and at them often by description. And so he contrived once to pray at Mr. Cutswell's fiddling or rather against his fiddle; and nothing could ever so belittle that instrument as this preacher's periphrastic abuse of that curious compound of catgut, rosin, and horsehair. "I was present/' said Mr. Cutswell, laying down his fiddle and bow upon our piano, "some few evenings since, after the dis- charge of my legal duties at the court house (attitude commenc- ing for taking snuff,) present, Mr. Carlton, in the prayer-room of our chapel, a large concourse of members being congregated for the customary weekly devotions." snuff box out.} "Among others in the apartment, was our venerable Bishop." (Box tapped and opened.) "He is a good and worthy man, sir; but sub rosa not wholly exempt from prejudice. Indeed, as to music gen- erally, but more especially that of the violin, (finger and thumb pouncing) he entertains the most erroneous sentiments; (pinch going upwards) and I fear that he regards both myself and my instrument with feelings of acerbity." (Hem! pinch inhaled.) In the course of his prayer this evening, he contrived to adminis- THIRD YEAR 277 ter to myself in particular; (lid closing) but also to you, Mr. Carlton and all other gentlemen that handle the bow, (box "being" returned} the following very severe and appropriate admonition, and in the exact words I now quote : "Oh! Lord! ah! I beseech thee to have marsy on all them there poor sinners what plays on that instrumint, whose sounds is like the dying screech of that there animal out of whose intrils its strings is made !' " Amen ! at a venture ! (Pompey or Csesar.) CHAPTER XXXVI. "Forgive my general and exceptless rashness, Perpetual sober gods ! I do proclaim One honest man mistake me not but one." "What find I here! Fair Portia's counterfeit? what demi-god Hath come so near creation?" THIS chapter is devoted to a man; Mr. Vulcanus Allheart. And, although he will rap our knuckles for smiling at a few smileable things in him, Mr. Allheart will not be displeased to see that Mr. Carlton, the author, remembers his friend, as Mir. Carlton the storekeeper and tanner, always said he would, when we blew his bellows for him or fired rifles together. During a life somewhat peculiarly chequered, we have both by land and sea been more or less intimate with excellent persons in the learned professions, and in the commercial, agricultural and mechanical classes ; but never out of the circle of kinsfolk, in- cluding the agnat'v and the cognati, have I ever so esteemed, ay, so loved any one as Vulcanus Allheart. And who and what was he? He was by birth a Virginian, by trade a blacksmith, by nature a gentleman, and by grace a Christian ; if more need be said, he was a genius. Ay ! for his sake to this hour I love the very sight and smell of a blacksmith's shop; and, many a time in passing one, do I pause and steal a glance towards the anvil, vainly striv- ing to make some sooty hammerer there assume the form and look of my lame friend ! for he was lame from a wound in his thigh 278 THIRD YEAR received in early life. Oh ! how more than willing would I stand once more and blow his bellows to help him gain time for an evening's hunt, could I but see anew that honest charcoal face and that noble soul speaking from those eyes, as he rested a moment to talk till his iron arrived at the proper heat and colour ! But let none suppose Vulcanus Allheart was a common black- smith. He was master both of the science and the art, from the nailing of a horse-shoe up to the making of an axe; and to do either right, and specially the latter, is a rare attainment. Not one in a million could make an axe as Allheart made it ; and hence in a wooden country, where life, civilization, and Christianity it- self, are so dependent on the axe, my blacksmith was truly a jewel of a man. His axes, even where silver was hoarded as a miser's gold, brought, in real cash, one dollar beyond any patent flashy affairs from New England, done up in pine boxes and painted half black, while their edge-part was polished and shiney as a new razor and like that article, made not to shave but to sell; and all this his axes commanded, spite of the universal nation, all-powerful and tricky as it is. No man. in the Union could temper steel as my friend tempered ; and workmen from Birming- ham and Sheffield, who sometimes wandered to us from the world beyond the ocean, were amazed to find a man in the Pur- chase that knew and practised their own secrets. Necessity led him to attempt one thing and another out of his line, till, to accommodate neighbours, (and any man was his neighbour) he made sickles, locks and keys, augers, adzes, chisels, planes, in short, any thing for making which are used iron and steel. His fame consequently extended gradually over the West two hundred miles at least in any direction ; for from that distance came peopje to have well done at Woodville, what otherwise must have been done, or a sort of done, at Pittsburgh. Nay, liberal offers were made to Allheart to induce him to remove to Pitts- burgh ; but he loved us too much to accept them ; and beside, he was daily becoming richer, having made a very remarkable dis- covery, which, however, he used to impart to others for a con- sideration viz. he had found out the curious art of beating iron into gold. My friend was indeed the great "Lyon" of the West. 1 1 It is hoped all the "Lyon's" friends of Philadelphia will patronize this book. THIRD YEAR 279 Mr. Allheart's skill was great also in rifle-making, and also naturally enough in rifle-shooting. I have compared Pittsburgh and Eastern and Down-eastern rifles with his (for the one con- cealed in my chamber is a present from Allheart), but none are so true, and none have sights that will permit the drawing of a bead so smooth and round. Does any maker doubt this? Grant me three months to regain my former skill, and I stake my rifle against all you have on hand, that she beats the things, one and all, eighty-five yards off-hand or (as I shall only give back your articles) I'll try you for the fun and glory alone! By the way, do you shoot with both eyes open? If not, let me commend the prac- tice, both from its superiority and because it may save you from killing your own wife, as it did Mr. Allheart once. He excelled, we have intimated, as a marksman. Perhaps in horizontal shooting he could not have a superior ; for in his hands the rifle was motionless as if screwed in one of his vices; and thence would deliver ball after ball at fifty, sixty, or seventy yards, into one and the same auger hole. For him missing was even difficult ; and all I had ever heard of splitting bullets on the edge of axe or knife, hitting tenpenny nails on the head, and so forth, was accomplished by Allheart. And his sight had become like that of the lynx ; for at the crack of the gun he would himself call out where the ball had struck. Nor is all this so wonderful if we recollect that many years in proving rifles he practised daily; indeed target-shooting was a branch of his business and in it his skill became rare, ay ! even bewitching ! His place for making these daily trials was at first a large stump some seventy yards distant on the far side of a hollow, against which stump was fixed his target ; and along that ravine his wife, a pretty young woman, used to pass and repass to get water from a spring at the lower end. Her almost miraculous escape in that ravine I shall give in Mr. Allheart's own words, although his idiom was slightly inaccurate and provincial. "You say, why can't we shoot across the holler agin that ole walnut stump yander? I ain't pinted a rifle across thare for four year and never intend to no more." "Why so, Vulcanus? I'm sure 'tis a capital place for our mark." 280 THIRD YEAR "Well, Mr. Carlton, I'll tell you, and then you wont wonder. One day, about six months after we was furst married, I had a powerful big bore 2 to fix for a feller going out West ; and so I sit down just here (at the shop-door) to take it with a rest agin a clap-board standing before that stump, and where I always before tried our guns. I sit down, as I sort a suspicioned the hind sight mought be a leetle too fur to the right, and I wanted to shoot furst with allowance, and then plump at the centre without no allowance and then to try two shots afterwards off-hand. Well, I got all fixed, and was jeest drawing a fine bead, and had my finger actially forrard of the front triggur (and she went powerful easy) and was a holdin my breath when something darkened the sight, and my left eye ketch'd a glimpse of some- thing atween me and the dimind and I sort a raised up my head so and there was Molly's head (Mrs. Allheart's) with the bucket in her hand a goin for water ! She pass'd you know in a instant, almost afore I could throw up the muzzle; but, Mr. Carlton, if I hadn't a had both eyes open or no presence of mind, she'd a been killed to a dead certainty ! I unsot the triggurs and went right in ; and for more nor two hours my hand trembled so powerful I couldn't hold a hammer or use a file. And that's the reason I never fired across to that ole stump since, and why I never will agin." But another reason for shooting with both eyes open is, that a curious experiment in optics cannot conveniently be made with one eye closed an experiment taught me by Mr. Allheart. And hence I would now commend both our book and the experiment to all spectacle-makers and spectacle-wearers to all ladies and ladies' gentlemen with quizzing glasses in fact to all persons with two or more eyes, and all speculative and practical opticians. EXPERIMENT. Place over the muzzle of your loaded rifle a piece of paste- board about four inches square, and so as entirely to prevent the right eye while looking steadily on the bead in the hind sight from seeing the diamond mark in the target placed twenty yards from you; then keep the left eye fixed immoveably on the diamond, 2 A rifle of large calibre for war and buffalo. THIRD YEAR 281 and stand yourself without motion thus for a few seconds; and then will the thick paper over your muzzle disappear, and you will see or seem to see the diamond mark with your right eye and mixing with the bead touch then your "forrad" trigger and your ball is in the centre of the target. A dead rest is indispensable for this experiment. N.B. If this experiment properly done fails, I will give you a copy of this work; provided, if I myself can successfully perform it, you will purchase two copies. When it is said Mr. Allheart made rifles, be it understood as certain rules of grammar, in the widest sense; for his making was not like a watch-maker's a mere putting parts and pieces to- gether, but our artist made first all the separate parts and pieces, and then combined them into a gun. He made, and often with his own hand, the barrel the stock the lock the bullet moulds, complete ; the brass, gold, or silver mountings ; the gravings, the everything ! And each and every part and the whole was so well executed, that one would think all the workmen required to make a pin had been separately employed upon the rifle ! He even made the steel gouges for stamping names on his own work, and also for stamping type-founders' matrices; he made, moreover, tools for boring musical instruments. And this last reminds me that Allheart was the most "musical blacksmith" I ever knew more so probably than our learned blacksmiths. Not only could he play the ordinary and extraordi- nary anvil tunes with hammers of all sizes, making "sparks" and points, too, of light flash out much warmer and far more brilliant than ever sprang from the goat-strings of the Italian Maestro under the flaggellating horse-hair, but Allheart played the dulci- mer, a monotone instrument shaped like an JEolian harp, and done with a plectrum on wire strings ; and could, beyond all doubt, have easily played a sackbut, psaltery and cymbals. He soon became enamoured of the flute ; and on my proposing to give him lessons, he purchased an instrument and attended regularly at my house one or more evenings of every week for two years, till he became as great a proficient as his master, and from that to the present time (as he lately wrote me) he has been the conductor of the Woodville Band. 3 Perhaps my friend's musi- 3 The "Bloomington Brass Band" founded and led by Austin Seward 282 THIRD YEAR cal enthusiasm may be better understood from the following little incident. His hands and fingers were nearly as hard as cast- iron ; but this, while no small advantage in fingering the iron strings of a dulcimer, or in playing on the sonorous anvil, was a serious disadvantage in flute-playing; for the indurated points of his fingers stopped the holes like keys with badly formed metallic plugs, and permitted the air to leak out. On several occasions I had admired secretly the fresh and polished look of his finger- points when he came to take lessons ; till once he accidentally, and with the most delightful naivete, unfolded the cause in answer to the following indirect query : "You are quite late to-night, Allheart? "Yes ruther but some customers from Kaintuck stopped me, and after that I had to stay till I filed down my fingers!" My friend was besides all this a painter. And verily, as to the lettering of signs, the shading, the bronzing, the peppering and salting, and so forth, I defy any first-rate glazier any where to beat Allheart ; for he yet does signs for his neighbours, and more from the goodness of his heart and the love of the arts than for gain. To be sure, formerly he would mis-punctuate a little, plac- ing commas for periods and periods where no diacritical mark was needed although I do believe he sometimes, like a wag of a printer, only followed copy. One thing is certain, he never im- properly omitted a capital, though he may have put such in where it might have been omitted ; but then, this only rendered the name more conspicuous, and the sign itself altogether more capital. Lettering was not, however, his sole forte; he aspired to pic- torial devices, such as vignettes; and at last he ventured boldly upon portraits and even full-length figures. His own portrait was among the very first he took, and that by means of a mirror ; but, was an institution of many years standing in Bloomington. It was also called the "Seward Band," and later, the "iS'axehorn Band." It furnished the music for all College exhibitions and Commencement occasions. Four or five sons of Austin Seward were members of this Band. The Sewards have long been among the prominent and honored families of Blooming- ton and many direct descendants of Austin Seward are still living there. They have contributed worthily to the life and growth of the community. This pioneer progenitor of the family is remembered in Bloomington as a man of noble character and unusual talents. He lived till 1874 continu- ing till his death as the head of a large business in which 'his sons were partners and co-workers. This "Seward Foundry" was famed throughout Southern Indiana and the iron and steel goods molded and hammered there were of the kind that Hall describes. THIRD YEAR 283 whether from modesty or want of skill, or want of faithfulness in the glass, the likeness was not very flattering. And yet one thing done by our New Purchase artist ought (I speak with becoming deference) to be imitated by many eminent eastern portrait- painters. "What is that, sir?" Well, I am actuated by the best of motives, gentlemen, as it was a peculiarity in Mr. Allheart's finish, by which, however bad the mere painting, the likeness intended could always be seen at a glance if you knew how to look. "What was it, sir?" we are impatient." Why, he always painted on the frame of the picture the name of the person to whom the likeness or portrait belonged. 4 But the chef-d'oeuvre of Allheart was a full-length figure of the American Goddess, Liberty, done for the sign of the new hotel the Woodville House. He was engaged at this picture, during the intervals stolen from his smithery, one whole summer : and many were the wondering visitors, from far and near, that favoured the artist with their company and remarks. For most matters here done in private were with us then done in public, this of course being conducive to the perfection of the fine arts. And hence it is not surprising that Allheart, profiting by the endless remarks and suggestions of our democratical people, should have embodied all the best sentiment of the purest republicans in nature, and given to the Purchase the very beau ideal of American Liberty. I shall attempt no elaborate critique, but shall say enough to help intelligent readers to a fair conception of this piece. The Goddess, like a courageous and independent divinity, stood, Juno fashion, right straight up and down the canvass, and with immovable and fearless eyes fronted the spectator and looked exactly into his face; thus countenancing persecuted freemen, to the confusion of all tyrannical oppressors ! Her face, in size and feature, was a model for wholesome Dutch milkmaids to copy af- ter ; but the cheeks, instead of blushing, were, I regret to say, only painted red, like those of an actress too highly rouged. In the right hand was a flag-staff, less indeed than a liberty- 4 In this request of ours I am well satisfied hundreds of bashful folks cordially unite ; so that portrait-painters, if they have benevolent hearts, will adopt this ingenious expedient. 284 THIRD YEAR pole or Jackson-hickory, but considerably larger every way than a broom-handle; and on its top was hung, exactly in the centre, a cap thus by its perfect balance and equi-distances of all parts of the rim from^the staff, showing that liberty is justice, and is independent and impartial. The cap had, however, an ominous resemblance to one of Jack Ketch's ; 5 and no doubt foreign des- pots, ecclesiastical and secular, will pull said article over Liberty's eyes, if they succeed in apprehending and hanging her. On the left shoulder squatted a magnificant eagle in all the plenitude of stiff golden feathers, and in the act of being-a-going to drink from a good sized bowl held up by the left-hand fingers of the goddess. What was the mixture could not be seen the bowl was so high but most probably it was a sleeping-potion, as the bird seemed settled for a night's roost. Nay, this was the sentiment intended to mark a time of profound peace, like shut- ting the gates of Janus : and hence the eagle held in his claws no arrowy thunder and lightning, being evidently disposed to let kings alone to take their naps, if they would let him alone to take his. The idea was equal in sublimity to Pindar's eagle snoozing on Jupiter's sceptre at the music of Orpheus ; although my friend's bird was uncommonly big and heavy but then his goddess was hale and hearty. The drapery or dress was a neat white muslin slip then fash- ionable in Kentucky, which was the Paris whence we derived fashions; and this simple attire was tied gently under the celes- tial bosom, which was heaved far up towards the chin, as if the heart was swollen with one endless and irrepressible emotion, and threatened some day or other to sunder the tie and burst right out, breast and all, through the frail barrier of the frock! Yet doubtless the slip was high in the back, and, a Id Kaintuque, well secured between the shoulders, so that if things gave way in the front, there was still some support from behind but then it looked dangerous. The frock was, however, undeniably starched and rather too short (owing maybe to the upward heave of the bosom, as is the case sometimes with dresses from ill-made or too much tournure and bustle,) for the article stood forth, not from the canvass but from the person, and all smooth and un- A name applied to hangmen, from Richard Jaquett, to whom the manor of Tyburn once belonged. Brewer's Diet, of Phrase and Fable. THIRD YEAR 285 wrinkled as if just from under the hot smoothing-iron ! And, alas ! its great brevity (and the figure up so high too) revealed the sturdy ankles away up till they began to turn into limbs ! The feet, unlike Liberty's martyrs in the Revolution, and to in- dicate our advance in comfort and security, and perhaps in com- pliment to a ladies' shoe-maker just established next the Woodville House, were covered with a pair of red morocco slippers; while on the ankles and upwards were drawn nice white stockings so that there was no denudity of limb, as a lady-reader may have feared, and the fashionable frock was not so bad after all. Some error, perhaps, in foreshortening had happened as to the position of the feet, or rather the red moroccos ; for, while the artist de- signed to represent the right foot as stepping from the other, and the left, as pointing the shoe-toe at the spectator immediately in front, yet the right shoe was fixed horizontally with its heel at a right angle with the other, and that other, the left hung perpen- dicularly down as if broken at the instep a marvellous likeness to the two slippers on the shoe-maker's own sign, one there with its sole slap against the board, and the other up and down as if hung upon a peg. And oh ! how I do wish I had not been born before the era of composition books ! or only now could take a few lessons with the author of one! so as write with all the modern improve- ments, like the talented family of the Tailmaquers in the leading magazines and other picture books for grown up children! JE should so like to describe the putting up of our new tavern post, and the first hanging of the Goddess of Liberty ! But that's not for the like of me I'm no orator as Brutus. How can I paint the open-mouthed wonder of that crowd! How make you see the hunchings ! the winks ! the nods ! the pointings ! or hear the exclamations ! the queries ! the allowings ! the powerf uls ! the uproar? And when lawyer Insidias Cutswell, candidate for Con- gress, mounted the " hoss block" at the post, and ended his half- hour's speech oh! I never! EXTRACT. " Beautiful, indeed, fellow-citizens, vibrates above us in the free air and sunshine of Heaven, that picture! but more beautiful even is our own dear, blood-bought liberty ! Long! 286 THIRD YEAR long may her sign dance and rejoice there (pointing up) long, long may her image repose here (slapping the chest and rather low) and long, long, long live our enterprising townsman and fellow-citizen, who, untaught, has yet so ably embodied all that is substantial and solid, and upright and unflinching and stable in abstract, glorious, lovely liberty our townsman, Allheart!" But "Non possumus omnia" must be our moral and conclusion. CHAPTER XXXVII. "His tears run down his beard, like water drops From caves of reeds." EARLY this autumn, Aunt Kitty having after considerable un- fixings got us fixed, returned to Glenville, whither we all at the same time paid a flying visit. At our arrival, we found true the report that John was defeated in his views on the clerkship by a majority against him of eleven ; and that our ex-legislator had now leisure to collect the debts due Glenville & Co. debts increased by two political campaigns into "a puttee powerful smart little heap." This business would have been altogether easy and pleasant, but for two small obstacles ; most of our debtors who were very willing indeed to pay, had no visible property ; and the rest were even invisible themselves ! For, pleased with the credit system in the Purchase, they had gone to try it elsewhere, and had become suddenly so unmindful of "the powerfullest smartest man and darndest cleverest feller in the county," as to go away without one tender adieu ! The fact is, our dear old friends had absquatu- lated, and gone away off somewhere to give other candidates a sort of a lift. But important changes almost destructive of Glenville Settle- ment, were now on the eve of accomplishment. Mr. Hilsbury had, his health being ruined, resigned his bishopric with all its emoluments, and was about returning to the far east; and Uncle Tommy from an irrepressible spirit of wandering, was just start- ing to go and build a cabin on Lake Michigan. 1 And so, we had come in time to bid farewell ! 1 If still there, somebody out there can make a book. THIRD YEAR 287 How melancholy the houses already, seemed so soon to be ten- antless, and then so soon to moulder and fall into ruins; a deserted cabin quickly changes, like a body left by the vital spark ; Ah ! how dreary the forest would be without friends ! I had no spirits to hunt; although I wandered away and sat down on the bank of the creek opposite the little islet where the deer lay down to die but without my rifle it was to weep ! Reader ! if you have a soul you will not laugh at me; and if you have none, then laugh away, poor creature, why should you not enjoy yourself your own way? but dear reader with a soul, I after that went and sat down in the old bark-mill. And there I recalled the morn- ing we stumbled down the opposite cliff into Uncle John's open arms I saw the very spot where the mother had clasped the daughter to her bosom, and "lifted up her voice and wept" and the sad spot too where that mother now rested in the lonely grave ! I remembered the fresh revival of early dreams and visions real- ized in the novelty of a wild forest life! ay! I recalled the oddity of my labours and even that poor mute, but wholly irra- tional companion ! and when I felt in my soul that changes had come and were yet coming, and that I never, no, never, could be in these woods as I had been I even wept there, too, reader ! not loud indeed, but bitterly! ****** In a few days we took a mournful farewell of the two families going from Glenville; and with no expectation of ever meeting again in this life. True, some of these persons, wanderers like ourselves, we did meet for a brief space in other parts of the United States again; but others we have never seen since the morning of our separation. And at this hour we know not where Uncle Tommy lives or if dead, where his grave is! In this work, however, there will be no further mention of these two families. ****** During the past summer Uncle John had been appointed a lay delegate from the Welden Diocese to attend an ecclesiastical con- vention about to meet early this fall at Vincennes ; and he now, before our return to Woodville, obtained my promise to accom- pany him. Accordingly, a few days after our return, he, and 288 THIRD YEAR with him Bishop Shrub, called on me, and we three set out for the Convention, or as all such gatherings are there called the Big Meeting. The weather was luxurious, and the ride across the small prairies was to me, who now for the first time saw these natural meadows, indescribably bewitching; indeed, this first glimpse of the prairie world was like beholding an enchanted country ! The enchanted land in that most transcendently enchanting book, the Pilgrim's Progress, came so naturally to one's mind, that surely Bunyan must have imagined a world like this meadowy land of wild and fragrant scents wafted by balmy airs from countless myriads of blossoms and flowers ! Nothing is like the mellow light, as the sun sinks down far away behind the cloudless line of blended earth and sky as if there one could, at a step, pass from the plane of this lower world through the hazy concave into the world of the ransomed! The bosoms of these grassy lakes undulate at the slighest breeze, and are sprinkled with picturesque islets of timber, on which the trees are fancifully and regularly disposed, suggesting an arrangement by the taste of an unrecorded people of bygone centuries for pleasure and religion. The whole brought back delusive dreams we felt the strange and half- celestial thrill of a fairy scene ! But pass we to a more earthly one. Eight miles from Vincennes we stopped at a friend's house to shave and preach ; for among western folks a bishop is supposed to be made for preaching and we use him accordingly and not infrequently we use him entire- ly up. The preaching was in due season easily performed, but the shaving, ah ! there's the scrape ! Bishop Shrub was for- tunately shaved close enough to last to Vincennes ; not so Uncle John and myself. And when the old gentleman examined his saddlebags, alas ! alas ! by an unaccountable negligence our razors and concomitants had been left at Woodville! But this forget- fulness was promptly supplied, I may add, and punished also by our host ; for he offered his own razor a curious cutting tool in a wooden handle nearly as large and quite as rough as a corn-cob ! The bone handle, or make-believe-turtle one, had, in the course of ages, been worn away by the handling of grandsires and grand- sons; and so had the edge itself by the ferocious stubble on the DR. DAVID H. MAXWKLL One of the Founders of Indiana University 1820 THIRD YEAR 289 chins of woodsmen! Or perhaps it had been tritered away on a grindstone the thing so much resembled a fanner's knife done up for hog-killing! Now Uncle John's countenance ( ?) was tender as a lamb's. Hence his razors were always in prime order ; and when he and I shaved with his articles in company, he always insisted on the first shave. But to-day, the excellent old gentleman most con- descendingly gave me the precedence, internally resolving to watch my performance and success, and then to shave or not accordingly. Well, duly appreciating this unusual condescension, and thinking it a pity Uncle John should enter Vincennes with such a crop as his chin now held, we also secretly purposed viz. to go through the whole affair without one audible or visible sign of torture! For certain was it, that if Mr. Carlton whose face was just as lamb-like as Mr. Seymour's, shaved without wincing, certain was it, Uncle John, long before my complete abrasion, would be so in the suds that, for consistency's sake, he must go through the whole scrape before he would get out of it. Hence I strapped the oyster-knife, first on the instep of my boot, making there, however, an ominous scratch or two; then on the cover of a leaven-bit Testament done up in freckled leather ; and finally, although very lightly, on the palm of my hand secun- dum artem: after which I made a feint at a hair, and then laid down the tormentor with so complacent compression of my lips as to say, that notwithstanding looks, the razor after all was "jeest" the very thing! Next, with a small bundle of swine's bristles tied in the middle with a waxed thread, I applied, out of a broken blue tea-cup, as much brown soap lather to my face as would stick; and then with a genuine far-east barber's flourish, touched the vile old briar-hook to my cheek, boldly and lightly as possible. Reader! I did not swear in those days, but I could not avoid saying mentally "O-o-o-h ! go-o-od ! gramine ! !" and thinking of Job and the barrel of ale. Some profane wretches would have cursed right out as horribly as Pope Pius or Innocent, the vice-god damning and blackguarding a Calvinistic heretic ; and for which malignancy the said Pope deserves to be scraped over his whole divine carcass twice a-day with the above razor, and without the 290 THIRD YEAR alleviation of the brown soap. Happily for the success of my benevolent stratagem I kept in; for at the moment I caught a glimpse of uncle John's face peeping over my shoulder into the tiny bit of looking-glass, and with his spectacles on! But if he did detect the involuntary tear in my eye, and take the alarm, he became instantly calm again by seeing the smile on my lip ! Blood he discerned not ; the tool was guiltless of all cutting, and brought away no beard save what it pulled out by the roots. Hence uncle John was most esentially bamboozled ; and long before my beard was all plucked up, he had laid aside his coat and cravat, and according to custom and to soften his beard, he was lathering away with the hog bristles and brown soap. Had the old gentleman taken a peep now, he must have smelled the rat ; for, spite of pain and tears, my laugh was too broad for mere delectability from a good shave there was mischief and, I fear, some hypocrisy in the scarcely suppressed chuckle. However, being done, or scraped, I put down the eradicator with the air of one willing to shave all day with such a razor ; upon which Uncle John advanced and took up the thing, manifesting, indeed, a little suspicion on glancing at its edge, and yet with very com- mendable confidence too ; and then after the usual strappings and flourishings, he seized his nose with the left hand, and with the right laid the scraper sideways on a cheek, and essayed a rapid and oblique sweep towards his ear. Ah! me! if I live a thousand more years, I shall ever be haunted by the dear old gentleman's look ! Such a compound of surprise, and vexation, and pain, and fun, and humour! Such a "Carlton you rascal you! if I don't never mind!" expres- sion as met my view while I peeped over his shoulder into the frag- ment of glass against the wall ! And then as he espied me therein grinning, when he turned, and with eyes swimming in tears, uttered in a whisper, and between a cry and a laugh, his favourite expression of benevolence and amazement "Oh ! cry ! out !" Yes! yes! if one could have cried out, or even laughed out! But there was our host and all his family ; and the father kept on at very judicious intervals with praise of that razor, thus: "Powerful razor that, Mr. Carlton ! Grandaddy used to say he'd shaved with it when he was young, Mr. Seymour! and his face THIRD YEAR 291 was near on about as saft as yourn I allow. However its getting oldish now, and don't cut near as sharpish as it once did allow it wants grinding: still I wouldn't give it for are another two I ever seen." Could one dare venture to complain about such a razor ! against which no dog had even wagged a tongue or a tail for a hundred years ! So we cried in and laughed in then but when we got out of sight and hearing in the prairie ! Nobody, I fear, would have conjectured we were going to the big meeting. Poor dear, old Uncle John! I am laughing even now at thy beloved face in that most furious lather of brown soap! and with that grand swathe cut through towards thy ear by that venerable briar-hook ! ay! and at that concentration of kindness, surprise, and joke- taking embodied in "Oh! cry out!" "But, la! me! Mr. Carlton, where's the moral of this story?" My dear madam, some stories have no moral ; but the design is to warn you never to travel in new settlements if your face is tender without your own shaving apparatus. "For shame! ladies never shave." Oh! my the sentence is carlessly constructed; but none can say where beards may not grow next. Certainly they are now found? if not on girls' chins, yet on very girlish faces. And agriculture of all kinds is now better understood, and the most unpromising soils produce the most astonishing crops: and be- sides, we are evidently in the Hairy Age, and tobacco is puffed and spurted from hairy lips like black mud from a quagmire "Sir! this is offensive!" Very; therefore let us quit it. CHAPTER XXXVIII. "When holy and devout religious men Are at their beads, 'tis hard to draw them hence." "Love and meekness, lord, Become a churchman better than ambition." ON reaching Vincennes our party, as others, were quartered upon the citizens; and such kindness as belongs pre-eminently to the West and South was bestowed upon us during the week of the convention. Vincennes has been the scene of many meetings, civil, political, ecclesiastical, and military; to say nothing about Frenchified- Indian-councils and Indianised-French-dances, and other odd things produced by this amalgamation of the red and white sav- ages. But now it was the theatre of two remarkable exhibitions, the gathering of a Protestant council, and the erection of a Papistical cathedral! strange meeting of light and darkness. And both professed to be for the propagation of the religion of Jesus Christ. Now, whether the simple shining of truth in the reading and preaching of a vernacular Bible, and in the good lives and ex- amples of puritanic Christians, and without aid from the civil arm, and without a base indulgence of men's evil passions and pro- pensities, shall be more potent than a tradition, dark, bewildering, and uncertain, delivered by doctors and professors of the fagot and the thumb-screw, admits a question; but, judging from the success that has always attended the affectionate embraces of the old woman with the scarlet mantle and especially when seated amid "the wimples and crisping-pins," the roasters, and boilers, and toasters of the Inquisition, from the efficacy of sweet doses and sugared cups and intoxicating bowls of indulgen- ces granted to the saints and holy ones, it is more than likely that the great crowd of such as "love darkness" and "the wages of unrighteousness," and "prefer the pleasures of sin for a sea- son," will (and are not such the ol TroXXot) will become militant, and on earth triumphant members of the Holy ( ?) Catholic ( ??) Church (???) 292 THIRD YEAR 293 In vain, while looking at the sacred walls of the cathedral ris- ing brick by brick, did I severely chide my antagonist feelings as heretical pravity; in vain recall the oft-repeated remark, that we were in the nineteenth century, the age of courtesy, and charity, and light, and wisdom, and oh ! of ever so many first chop good things beside; in vain remember that human nature had been gradually refining ever since the days of Judas Iscariot, till it was now ten per cent, per annum better and more spiritual and heavenly-minded ; yea, poor sinner that I was, in vain I said this is the march of mind, and that I was, poor sneaking doubter, in danger of falling into the rear of my age ! Nothing would do but my historic readings kept intruding in the most impertinent and unbecoming manner ; and I was abominably harassed with the fables of the Vaudois and Huguenots and Jerome and Huss St. Bartholomew's, and Irish, and other massacres, and all such ridiculous things! Nay, I was plunged most unreasonably into nasty dungeons, and saw racks, and halters, and augers, and, silly creature, I imagined an auto da fe! and heard shouts and groans! and smelled incense, faggots and gunpowder! and even Te Deums for the death of ungodly heretics wickedly killed by the state, contrary to the entreaties of the Holy Church ! Alas ! reprobate that I was, for reading books proscribed by that Church ! and all those books got up by folks worthy of no credit ene- mies of the Church and of the Pope, and who would wickedly tell when they were tortued, and refused to be damned for ever by escaping from prison, gibbets and stakes! And then I said, Oh ! you unreasonable man, has not the Holy Catholic Church long since given up her bloody persecuting prin- ciples, and resolved never to do so again, if we will only take on her yoke until she gets the power? Alas! I thought of political mottos used as ornaments 1 to secular newspapers, such as "Power steals from the many to the few;" and of that narrow, bigotted puritanical sentiment, "The heart is deceitful above all things and desperately wicked ;" and so I turned to contemplate. 1 Ornaments since most such papers watch only their Protestant friends who do not need it. 294 THIRD YEAR THE PROTESTANT CONVOCATION. And I could not but feel grateful to the rightful Head of the spiritual Church, that here was a little band hated of Rome and Oxford. 2 For with the men of this conference the true light had travelled thus far westward, and we hoped it might shine out far and wide over the noble plains, and dispel the gloom of the grand forests since the march of the mind is only an evil without the march of the Bible. This Protestant assembly was a gathering of delegates princi- pally from the land of Hoosiers and Suckers; but with a smart sprinkling of Corn-crackers, and a small chance of Pukes 8 from beyond the father of floods, and even one or two from the Buck- eye country. These were not all eminent for learning, and polish, and dress, wearing neither gowns nor cocked-hats; although some there were worthy seats in the most august assemblies any where, and however distinguished for wit, learning, and good- ness. Most of them, indeed, carried to excess a somewhat false and dangerous maxim: "better wear out than rust out." since it is better to do neither. And worn truly were they, both in apparel and body, as they entered the town on jaded horses, after many days of hard and dangerous travelling away from their cabin-homes, left far behind in dim woods beyond rivers, hills and prairies. And what came they together for ? Mainly, I believe, to preach, to pray, to tell about their successes and disappointments and en- couragements their hopes, and fears, and sorrow to rectify past errors, and form better plans for doing good for the future to see, and encourage, and strengthen one another. Business, in the semi-politico-ecclesiastical sense, they did little for of that was but little to do. And there were few causes of heart-burning and jealousy. No richly endowed professorships, no a la mode con- gregations were found in all their vast extent of dioceses no world's treasures or places to tempt to divide, to sour! Truly it was a House of Bishops, if not of Lords: if by a bishop is meant one that has the care of many congregations, an 2 The Oxford movement, 1831-33, was taking eminent divines of the English Church toward Rome shortly before Hall wrote, Cardinals Man- ning and Newman among them. 3 "Corn crackers" were Kentuckians, "Pukes" were Missourians. THIRD YEAR 295 enormous parish, abundant religious labours, and a salary of one or two hundred dollars above nothing. In the midst of so fra- ternal and cheerful a band of misters and brothers, I was con- stantly reminded of an old saying ; "Behold ! how these Christians love one another !" What could exceed their cordial and reciprocal greetings at each arrival! What their courtesy in debate? What the deep interest in each other's welfare? the lively emotions excited by their religious narratives and anecdotes? And then their tender farewells! To many the separation was final as to this life but why should that make us sad? They who find heaven begun on earth, meet beyond the grave, and there find heaven consummated! Brother Shrub and myself were entertained, during the con- vention week, at the house of a medical gentleman, eminent in his profession, but addicted, it was said, to profanity in ordi- nary conversation. Without premonition, no suspicion of so blameworthy a practice could have arisen in our minds; for no real Christian ever showed guests greater courtesy, or seemed so far from profaneness than our gentlemanly host. He did not even annoy us with lady-like mincings, putting forth the buddings of profanity in "la ! me ! good gracious !" and the like. But on Sabbath night, our conversation taking a religious turn, the subject of profane swearing was incidentally named, when I could not resist the temptation of drawing a bow at a venture ; and so I said : "Doctor, we leave you to-morrow; and be assured we are very grateful to Mrs. D. and yourself; but may I say dear sir, we have been disappointed here?" "Disappointed !" "Yes, sir, but most agreeably " "In what, Mr. Carlton?" "Will you pardon me, if I say we were misinformed, and may I name it?" "Certainly, sir, say what you wish." "Well, my dear sir, we were told that Doctor D. was not guarded in his language but surely you are misrepresented " "Sir," interrupted he, "I do honour you for candour ; yet, sir, I regret to say you have not been misinformed. I do, and, 296 THIRD YEAR perhaps, habitually use profane language; but, sir, can you think I would swear before religious people, and one of them a clergyman?" Tears stood in my eyes (the frank-heartedness of a gentleman always starts them) as I took his hand, and replied: "My dear sir, you amaze us! Can it be that Doctor D., so courteous and so intelligent a man, has greater reverence for us than for the venerable God!" "Gentlemen," replied the Doctor, and with a tremulous voice, "I never did before see the utter folly of profane swearing. I will abandon it for ever." Reader, are you profane ? Imitate the manly recantation of my estimable friend, Doctor D. "To SWEAR is neither brave, polite, nor wise; You would not swear upon the bed of death Reflect your Maker now could stop your breath !" During the week, in company with some clergymen, we visited the grave of a young man, who, unavoidably exposed to a fatal illness in discharging his missionary duties, had died at Vincennes in early manhood, and far away from his widow-mother's home. Deep solemnity was in the little company of his classmates as they stood gazing where rested the remains of the youthful hero! Dear young man, his warfare was soon ended and there he lay among the silent ones in the scented meadow-land of the far west! He heard not the voice of the wind, whether it breathed rich with the fragrance of wild sweets, or roared around in the awful tones of the hurricane, sweeping over the vastness of the measureless plains! Nor heard he the sighs of his comrades nor saw their sudden tears wiped away with the stealthy motion of a rapid hand ! To him that visit was vain; not so to us, for we departed, re- solved ourselves to be ready for an early death. And since then several of that little company of mourners in a strange land have themselves, and before the meridian of life, gone down to the sides of the pit! Are you ready, my reader? Time is a price to buy eternity ! CHAPTER XXXIX. "Tree! why hast thou doffed thy mantle of green For the gorgeous garb of an T ndian queen? With the ambered brown and the crimson stain And the yellow fringe on its 'broidered train? And the autumn gale through it branches sighed Of a long arrear, for the transient pride." SIGOURNEY. UNCLE John and I, being now very near Illinois, where resided a distant relative of ours, determined to pay him a visit. This person was much like Uncle Tommy in his leather-stocking pro- pensities, but in no other respects; except that he was, at first, a squatter, and had escaped on some occasions, being scalped by the Indians. Once, too, he escaped an ambuscade as he descended the Ohio river with several other young men in a boat. Incautiously approaching too near the bank, our relative was saved from death by being in the act of bending to his oar at the flash of the Indian rifles; for their balls, barely passing over his back, struck the breast of a comrade, who fell dead at his side. But, before the enemy could reload, the boat was rowed beyond their reach. And so our friend lived, and ever since had kept on growing till he now had become a venerable and patriarchal Sucker, counting some sixty-five concentric circles in his earthly vegetation. Our way led through successive and beautiful little prairies, separated by rich bottom lands of heavy timber and other inter- posing woody districts the trees being all magnificently glorious in the autumnal colours of their dense foliage. No artificial dyes rival the scarlet, the crimson, the orange, the brown, of the sylvan dresses giant robes and scarfs, hung with indescribable grandeur and grace, over the rough arms and rude trunks of the forest ! And voices enough of bird, and beast, and insect, and reptile, to break the solitude of the treeless plains ; but, on entering a district of wood, the uproar of tones, voices, shrieks, hisses, barkings, and a hundred other nameless cries, was deafening! It was bewilder- ing! How like the enchanted hills and groves of the Arabian Tales! Indeed, had a penalty awaited our looking around, we should have become stone, or stump, or paroquet, or squirrel, a thousand times over and over, much to our surprise and mortifi- 297 298 THIRD YEAR cation! The bewildering tumult assailing him, on entering the solemn dark of primitive oriental forests, must have suggested to the Magician of the Thousand and One Nights, some of the charms and witcheries and incantations that entranced our first years of boyhood and dreams ! To the elfish notes of four-footed and creeping goblins and winged and gay sprites, were added the rustle of fresh fallen leaves, the crackling of brush-wood, the rattling of branch and bush, the strange creaking of great trees, rubbing in amity their arms and boughs, and the wailing and moaning of fitful winds; and this formed our sinless Babel. Under the most favourable arrangement of lungs, and larynx and ears, conversation is a labour in such groves and meadows; but, ah ! my dear friend, if one's comrade is deaf ! or still worse if he is a modest man of the muttery and whispery genus ! and hearing uncommonly sharp himself, takes for granted you hear ditto ! True, if you like to do talking, and the other hearing, that is the very thing ; but alas ! our escort in this episodial trip, who was a Mr. Mealymouth, was even more desirous of talking than hearing! And what made it more awful, it was not possible to answer him in the "Amen-at-a-venture" mode; for most of Mr. Mealymouth's queries, which were numerous as a pedlar's from the land of guesses, admitted not the mere answer yes or no, but demanded explanatory replies like those of Professor Didactic. He asked to find out what you knew, and not to be answered. Uncle John quickly contrived to shuffle out of this scrape, and with a most unchristian design to take revenge for the razor affair; but then he ought not to have paid back with so terrible an interest. Nay, he lagged just in our rear, every now and then switching my creature, till the huzzy (a lady horse) feared to quit the side of the escort's horse (a horse-horse) and so kept on even a head with him, pace for pace, trot for trot, shuffle for shuffle; her eyes strained backward, her ears pointed and tremu- lous, and her heels in the paulo-ante-future tense of being-nearly- about-a-going-to-kick ; while I, completely snared and in-for-it, could be seen, all eye and ear, with my neck away out forward to catch the sense of Mr. Mealymouth muttering and whispering some half articulate question direct or indirect, thus : "Well Carlt powerful don't allow?" THIRD YEAR 299 "Si-i-i-r?" at the top of my voice to provoke him to a higher pitch. "Most powerful good meet reckon dont ?" "Oh! yes, rather lean, however, it wasn't stall fed think it was?" ( thought he alluded to the beefsteak at breakfast.) "Meetin meetin convoc hard heerin allow ?" "The leaves rattle so oh 1 yes, noble set of good men." "Mr. Carlton allow Mr. Seymour ain't he?" "Yes! no!" And turning round I bellowed out; "Hullow! Uncle John, ride up, Mr. Mealymouth wants you !" "Road too narrow 'f raid of things getting rubbed in my saddle- bags," replied Uncle J. Here I politely made a movement to fall in the rear and give up my privilege; but my skittish jade, catching sight of Uncle John's upraised switch, snorted, and cocking back her ears trotted me up again to the place of punishment while from Uncle John's face, it was plain enough he was indulging in a malicious inward laugh. Nay, although I hate to tell it, he actually put up his finger against his cheek and made signs of shaving! a pretty way for a pious man of returning good for evil ! I shall not detail all my misapprehensions nor contrivances to avoid answering at hazard, as for instance, suddenly crying out, when expected to reply to a query "See! see! that deer!" or "Hurraw! for the turkeys there!" or "Smell cowcumbers guess a rattlesnake's near ?" Nor shall I relate how, at last, I did get behind Uncle John ; and how Mr. M. fell back and rode with him; lever and anon admonishing Mr. Seymour to take care of his saddle-bags ; nor how Uncle John was attacked with a very uncommon and alarming stiffness, rendering it necessary for him to dismount and walk a whole mile ; and how he over took us at the ford of the Wabash, Mr. M. fortunately volunteering to lead his horse ; but I hasten to say that about evening we reached the house of a friend who had invited us to call on him, and that here, to crown the pleasures of the day, we found our host Mr. Softspeech was even more inarticulate in speech than Mr. Mealy- mouth himself. Uncle John now proposed to bury the hatchet, and form a league of offence and defence; hence, after due deliberation while out washing and wiping, it was concluded that we both sit together, 300 THIRD YEAR and always in front of the fire; thus keeping our innocent tor- mentors each at opposite sides of the chimney place. For first, this would do them a service by compelling them to talk out, it seeming impossible if they designed speaking to one another at all, to do it long in a mutter; and secondly, if we were assailed by either enemy right or left, we should have four ears to defend and aid us, instead of two, and so we could together compound a pretty fair answer: this judicious arrangement made us nearly equal to a Siamese twins. And yet, one important matter was found to have been over- looked the effect on our risibility. For when the two cousins of Simongosoftly began a gentle stir of murmuring lips, and both found, in despite of keen ears, that articulate language must be used; and when evident vexation from their reciprocal mutters and mistakes arose, and they looked at one another in a style like saying, "Blast you, why don't you speak louder?" Oh! dear reader, would you have believed it. Uncle John all at once laughed right out ! and then you know I couldn't help it could I? But then, the old gentleman turned it so adroitly, thus : "Mr. Carlton," said he "whenever I think of that trick you served me about the razor I can't help laughing." And of course that affair was narrated ; and we had the satis- faction of finding our two friends could laugh like Christians, if they could not talk like them. And truly man is pretty much of a laughing animal and certainly none deserves to be more laughed at; although for this vile sin of muttering, and grumbling, and whispering out words with a fixed jaw, and eyes half-shut up like a dreamy cat in the sunshine, words, that should be articulated in the sweet vocality of human speech, the whole abominable tribe of Mealymouths deserves not only to be laughed and hooted at, but actually well scourged. Well, we paid our visit to our Sucker relative; and then, after the two worthy old gentlemen had exhausted their reminiscences, and edified one another with adventures in hunting, and fishing, and camping out, and voyaging, and so on, we bade farewells ; and Uncle John and myself, but without an escort, took the homeward trail. The accidents in the path belong to the next chapter. CHAPTER XL. "Being skilled in these parts, which to a stranger Unguided and unfriended, often prove Rough and inhospitable." ON the return, our first night was passed with the host of the antediluvian razor. But going into the woods we needed now no shaving ; although we shortly became entangled in another scrape, to be estimated in comparison and contrast, according to the ten- derness of one's face, and his leggins and trousers. Let me not forget that, before reaching Razorville, we had passed through a primitive world, an antique French settlement; and in it could be discerned no trace of modern arts and inven- tions; but agriculture, architecture and other matters were so ancient that we seemed to have come among aboriginal Egyptians or Greeks. The carts or wagons were like the wain of Ceres, and moved on spokeless wheels of solid wood, without naves, and, if circumference applied to wheels must be a circle, without cir- cumference. The horse if such may be called a dwarf, shaggy pony, so dirty and earthy as to seem raised in a crop, like turnips or pota- toes this villanous and cunning horse was tied to the Cerealian vehicle by thongs of elm bark, fastened to a collar of corn blades around his neck; and he had a head-gear of elm bark ropes for halter or bridle but sometimes he had no head-gear whatever. He was driven usually by flagellation from a stick-whip, in size between a switch and a pole, yet often with a corn-stalk fourteen feet long without its tassel, and, not infrequently, by a clod or rock l thrown against his head or side. At the first hint from the persuasives, shaggy coat would merely shake his head and look up, and then, with an impudent flourish of a tail compounded of burrs and horsehair, he would pull away not, indeed, at his load but at the corn-blades and ears dang- ling in plenty about his unmuzzled mouth. On a repetition of the hint, especially if accompanied by a Canadianised-French exe- cration (and its potency may be thus judged) pony would 1 All minute pieces of granite, &c., are called rocks out there but even little things there are big. 301 302 THIRD YEAR whisk with his cart same half-dozen decided jerks, attended by the rattling of his corn-collar, the straining of bark traces, and the screeching of dry wheel and axis ; minus also a mess of corn bounced from the wain at every jerk. And thus matters pro- ceeded, with iterations of thumps, pelts, curses, and outcries on one side, and jerks ahead on the other, till the horse and wagon was clear of the corn-field and then look out ! Pony had now no more to expect in the way of mouth fuls till he reached the stack-yard, and so, go ahead was his motto and, with him, no idle sentiment! True, the machine wabbled and bounced that was owing to the inartificiality of the workmanship, and the as- perities of the ground; the load jumped over the sides or rattled from the tail that was because the sides were too low, and there was no tail-board; perhaps, even the collar broke, and little shaggy was released the collar should have been leather: his duty was plain to get to the stack-yard as speedily as possible, with or without a cart, or with it full or empty. How my nameless quadrupedal old friend would have relished and adorned this arcadian life! What a theatre for his abilities and accomplishments ! It may be something to live in clover ; but what is life in a clover-patch of a dozen rods, to life in a prairie corn-field of a thousand acres ? But this is digression, of which, indeed, other examples occurred on our way home. A friend of ours, a citizen of Woodville, returning now from Vincennes, and who travelled in a small one-horse-wagon, had told us of a short cut across the prairie ; and had stated also that, while the path was an almost imperceptible trace, being used only by a few horsemen, still we should easily follow the marks of his wheels and thus a whole hour could be gained. Passing us, therefore, on the evening we had reached Razorville, he went by the short cut to "ole man Stafford's," a distance of seven miles, intending there to stay all night and await our arrival to a very early breakfast next morning, the remainder of the journey to be made in company. Well, an hour before day-break on Tuesday morning we put out, and in half an hour came to the "blind path," into which we struck bold enough, considering we had to dismount to find it, and that from the dimness of the early morn, no wagon ruts could THIRD YEAR 303 yet be discerned. But as the light increased, we could see here and there in the grass traces of a light wagon ; and that embold- ened us to trot on very fast, in the comfortable assurance of rap- idly approaching a snug breakfast of chicken fixins, eggs, ham- doins, and corn slap-jacks. By degrees the prairie turned into timber land; but that had been expected, although the woods were rather more like thickets and swamps than ought to be encountered on entering the Stafford country. Still, every two or three rods was some mark of our friend's wagon ; and as short cuts often pass through out-of-the-way districts, and we travelled now not by stars, or sun, or compass, but by wheel-ruts, we deemed it best to stick to our guide and Uncle John's old saw " 'tis a long lane that has no turn." At last we came to the edge of a dense and dark thicket ; and here, at right angles with the ruts (for long since the six-inch horse-path had run out, or sunk, or evaporated, or something), ran a deep and wide gulley blocked with fallen trees and brush- wood ; over which of course the wagon had got somehow, and, as was natural, without leaving any visible trace. This deficiency was, however, not important, because, you know, we should find the wagon tracks on the far side of the ravine; and so over we went working, where the impediments seemed fewest, in zig-zag method, for about two hundred yards, when all at once we rose, large as life, up the opposite bank, and instantly began talking : "See any ruts ?" "No, do you?" "No let's ride to the left." "Through that papaw and spice ! no, no, try the right." "The right! look at the grape and green briar better keep straight ahead." "Straight ahead, indeed ! that's worse than the other courses." "Why, how in the name of common sense did Mr. Thorn ever get his wagon through here ! come, you go right and I'll go left, and let's see if we can't find the wheelruts." And then we separated ; but after hard "scrouging" each way some hundred yards, and halloing questions, answers, doubts, guesses, &c., &c., in a very unmealymouthed manner, till we be- v.ame hoarse, and withal finding no ruts, nor even hoof-marks, 304 THIRD YEAR we came together and held a council. The result of the delibera- tion was: 1. That we were probably (Uncle J. being a woodsman would allow only a probability) were probably lost: 2. That maybe we might have followed a wrong wagon, and maybe we might not: 3. That maybe we had better go back, and maybe we had not : 4. That as it was likely we had been spirited into the Great Thicket of the White River, it would be best to work ahead, and strike the river itself now, up or down which (I forget which Uncle J. said) was a settlement maybe. This last proposition having a decided majority of two voices, we began to work our passage into the river, Mr. Seymour as general in the van, Mr. C. as rear-guard. Now how shall our swamp be described? What language can here be an echo to the sense ? Any attempt of the sort would be so complicated an implexicity in the interwovenness of the cir- cularity, that should give the sight, and sound, and fragrance of the maziness in that most amazing of mazes, where all sorts of crookednesses made contortion worse in its interlacings, that that one would go first this way, and then some other way, and then back again once more towards the end, side, middle and be- ginning of the sentence, and yet fail to discover the the echo, and be no more able to get through with so labyrinthical un- periodical a period, in any other way than we were to get out of the thicket, and that was by bursting out so ! However, you've picked black-berries? gone after chicken- grapes or something, in your early days? You've set snares in pretty thick thickets, where you went on all-fours through prickle- bushes to save your face? Well aggregate the trifling impedi- ments of your worst entanglements; then colour matters a little, and you approximate a just conception of our thicket. In this, all sorts of trees, bushes, briars, thorns, and creepers, the very in- stant their seeds were dropped or roots set by nature, and some without staying for either root or seed, started right up and off all at once a growing with all their might, each and every strug- gling, like all creation for the ascendancy, and thus preventing one another and all others from getting too large; yet, in haste and THIRD YEAR 305 eagerness, like candidates climbing a hickery-pole, all wrapping, and interlacing, and interweaving trunks, boughs, branches, arms, roots and shoots, till no eye could tell whether, for instance, the creeper produced the thorn, or the thorn the creeper, or the vine the scrub-oak, or the oak the grapes and till the shaking, or pulling, or touching, of a single branch, vine, root, or briar shook a thousand! ay! like the casting of a pebble into a lake, till it disturbed in some degree the whole immensity of the thicket! And so all, in sheer rage, malice, and vexation, sent forth all manners, kinds and sorts of prickers and scratchers, and thorns, and scarifiers ; and began to bear all manners and kinds and sorts of flowers, and poisonous berries, and grapes ! In places, a black walnut, or hackberry, or sycamore, having like a Pelagian, an intrinsic virtue had got the start of nature by a few hours at the beginning of the swamp; and had ever since kept a head so elevated as now to be overlooking miles around of the mazy world below, and presenting a trunk and boughs so wrapped in vines and parasites as to form a thicket within a thicket, an intyerium in imperio; while coiled and wreathed there into fantastic twistings, immense serpentine grape vines seemed like boas and anacondas, ready to enfold and crush their victims ! Nay, in every labyrinth were concealed worlds of insects, reptiles, and winged creatures; and some, judging from their hisses, and growls, and mutterings, as they darted from one concealment to another at the strange invasion of their dens and lairs, were doubtless formidable in aspect, and not innoxious in bites and stings. Through this apparently impervious wilderness of the woven world twist, however, we did onward, as Uncle John said. I thought it was a vain struggle, like striving to free one's self from the meshes of a giant's net ! Yet I kept close in the rear of his horse; for Mr. Seymour insisted on being pilot, and politeness yields to elders even in wriggling through a swamp. But what need be told our contrivances to work through? Never in words can be painted the drawing up of our legs ! the shrinking of our bodies the condensation of our arms ! the bowings down of our heads, with compressed lips and shut eyes! But still we talked thus: 306 THIRD YEAR "Oh ! hullow ! stop, won't you ?" "What's the matter?" "My hat's gone." "There it is, dangling on that branch look up higher higher yet!" "Oh! yes I see: lucky the hat wasn't tied under a fellow's chin, hey? how the thing jerked!" "Ouch! what a scratch! just get out your knife and cut this green-briar." "I've cut it go on : look out, you'll lose your right leggin." "Whi-i-i-irr! what's that?" "A pheasant!" "H-i-i-ss ! what's that ?" "A snake!" "Haw! haw! haw! if your trousers aint torn the prettiest!" "Don't taste them! they ain't grapes! they are poison berries !" "Look quick ! what an enormous lizard !" And then such knocks on the head! Did I ever think heads, before the aid of phrenology, could bear such whacks ! Soft heads, surely, must have been mashed, and hard ones, cracked; and, therefore, Uncle John and I had medium sculls, and the precise developments to go through thickets. I had always disbelieved the vulgar saying, about "knocked into a cocked hat," deeming it indeed, possible to be knocked out of one; but my infidelity left me in that swamp, when I saw the very odd figures we made after our squeezings, abrasions, and denudings. The shape of a cocked hat was not at all like them ! and yet, in about three hours from the starting at the gulley, we somehow or other stood on the summit of a bold bluff, and beheld the river coolly and beauti- fully flowing beneath our feet away below ! Here we halted, first to repair apparel, wipe off perspiration, and pick out briars and thorns from the hands and other half-denuded parts; and, second- ly, to determine the next movement, when hark ! the sound of an axe ! yes ! and hark ! of human voices ! Between us and the sounds, evidently not more than two hundred yards up the river, interposed a dense and thorny ram- part ; but with coats fresh buttoned to our throats, hats half-way THIRD YEAR 307 over the face, and leggins rebound above the knee and at the ankle, we, in the saddles, and retired within ourselves, like snails, the outer man being thus contracted into the smallest possible dimension, and with heads so inclined as to render following the nose alike impossible and useless, we charged with the vengeance of living battering rams against and into the matted wall of sharp and sour vegetables ; and onward, onward, went we thus, till all at once, the impediment ceasing, we burst and tumbled through into an open circular clearing of about fifty yards diameter ! In one part was a rude shantee or temporary lodge of poles and bark, a la Indian, having in front, as cover to a door-way, a suspended blanket, perhaps to keep out mosquitoes ; for I could neither see nor imagine any other use. On one side the area, were large heaps of hoop-poles, on another, of barrel-staves ; while in several places stood gazing at us three squatter-like personages, and evidently not gratified at our unceremonious visit. The nature of their employment was manifest the preparation of some western "notions and ideas" for the Orleans market. And down the bluff was a grand fleet of flat boats, ready to float when- ever the water chose to come up to them, and convey to market a whole forest, in the shape of hoop-poles, staves, and other raw material, not only now being prepared, but which had been being prepared and was yet to be being />re-prepared in all the fashion- able modern tenses ! "Well, what of that?" Nothing! it was very correct, except in one small particular, although not a grammatical one ; this snug little swamp and thicket, some thirty miles by two in extent, and full of choice timber, hap- pened to belong to our Great Father's elder brother the venerable dear good old Uncle Sam! And these reprobate nephews, our cousins, were simply busy in taking more than their share of the common heritage in short, they were poaching and stealing! Now, kind reader, for the last three hours, we had passed through a considerable scrape ; nay, as we had shrunk up, it may be called a narrow scrape, but on comprehending the present affair, it seemed not improbable that we had only come out of the scrape literal, into the scrape metaphorical. "How so?" Why you see, a large penalty was incurred for cut- 308 THIRD YEAR ting down and stealing public timber; and the informer got a handsome share of the fine as reward; so that our industrious kinsmen taking us, at first, for spies and informers, not only looked, but talked quite growly ; and we both felt a little nervous at sight of the rifles and scalping knives in the shantee ! Here is a first-rate temptation to make a thrilling story; but I must not forget the dignity of history (although Uncle John and I both thrilled at the time without any story) and so I proceed to say, that we soon satisfied our free traders who we were; and that they condescended not only to laugh, but to sneer at us, and then pointed to a nice little wagon that one of them had driven yester- day from near Razorville, with their supplies for the current week! And that was the identical rut-making machine, that, so contrary to every body's wishes had coaxed us into the thicket ! We were then taught how to return on its trace, by a kind of opening through the maze; and received ample directions where and how to cross the ravine. We accordingly hastened away; but we never felt perfectly easy, or ventured to laugh honestly, till full two hundred yards beyond the longest rifle shot, which might very accidentally take our direction, and, maybe, hit us. The path over the ravine was, indeed, less tangled, where the wagon had passed; yet it was a quarter of a mile above our crossing place, and concealment had evidently been studied in the way the stave-maker's vehicle had put off, even at an acute angle, at the point where we had lost its trail; and in the windings we had to thread among the high grass before we again reached that point. After having thus lost a wagon in a prairie, I felt in- clined to believe in the difficulty of finding a needle in a hay- stack. But we came, finally, to a deserted cabin ; and there, after a keen look, discovered a little path laid down for us in the late verbal chart. Here, confident from experience, that this rabbit track of a road, some two inches wide was yet one of fifty similar ones leading to the grand trace, path, or way, we struck off at a rapid gait ; and in an hour came to the open wagon road, which we know conducted to Mr. Stafford's Public. Revived we now cantered on, and not long after reached our breakfast-house, just as the sun was going down having in the day's navigation with all our tackings made precisely seven miles, THIRD YEAR 309 by the short-cut, in the homeward direction. Since Monday night, we had eaten nothing, and were naturally ready now for three meals in one; and yet were we destined to wait a little longer and condense into one four repasts like ancient Persians when hunting. For, either not liking our appearance, or vexed at our not having come earlier to breakfast, we were here most pertinaciously refused any entertainment whatever, and even peremptorily ordered away; and were, indeed, compelled to put off for the nearest house, some eight miles farther at the ferry ! Half a mile from Staffords, we met a young fellow, evidently in an ill-humour at something, who did, verily condescend to direct us how to steer through a sea of grass, rolling its waves over the prairie's bosom in the haze of the approaching night; but whether the rascal sent us wrong purposely, or we had so prac- ticed getting lost as to render the thing easy, after seeming to come duly to expected points, in about six miles we could find no more points, and so began travelling at a venture ; and at ten o'clock at night, it being then profoundly dark, we resigned our reason to the horses' instinct to take us where th3y listed. We knew the creatures would follow some path and carry us, some time or other, to a human habitation, if that of a poacher or squatter; and any thing seemed then preferable to the wilds of the prairie! In about two hours my horse, now in the lead, suddenly halted, when dismounting, I tried first with my feet, and then my hands, and quickly had by these new senses a feeling sense of our situation, viz. that we stood at the diverging point of two paths running from one another at nearly a right angle! "Well, what do you say what shall we take?" "Hem! what do you say? Don't it seem damp towards the right?" "I think it does and maybe the river is that way. Don't it seem like rising ground towards the left, to you?" "It does let's try the left we've had enough of thickets for one day hark ! hark ! !" "Bow-wow-wow ! bow-wow!" on the left. "Sure enough ! a dog towards the left ! push a-head that way." The canine outcry was reduplicated and prolonged; and we 3io THIRD YEAR were soon rewarded for our sagacity in going to the left by coming whack-up against a worm-fence! But by groping our way through this impediment, a light was soon discerned gleam- ing through some crevice ; and the noise of the dog then subsided into an angry growl which growl was again exchanged into a bark, as we let out our hearty and door penetrating "Hullow!" This backwood's sonnet had soon the desired effect on the clap- board shutter; for it now creaked slowly open, and allowed to issue from the cabin the following reply in a strong soprano, yet vibratory from apprehension "Well who be you? what's a wantin?" "Strangers, ma'am, from the Big Meeting at Vincennes ; we've been lost all day in the Swamp below Stafford's and we're lost now. Will you be so kind as to let us stay the rest of the night here?" "Well, it's most powerful onconvenent couldn't you a sort a keep on to Fairplay 'taint more nor two miles no how, and you'd git mighty good 'comedashins thar?" "Oh! ma'am, we'd never find the way in the dark. Besides, our horses are nearly given out ; and we ourselves haven't touched food for nearly two days " "Well! now! if that aint amost too powerful hard like! I'm a poor lone woman body but I can't let you go on so come in. But, strangers, you'll find things right down poor here, and have to sleep on the floor, as 'cos I've no more nor two beds and them's all tuk up by me and the childurn. 'Howsever, thar's a corn heap over thar to feed your critturs; but we're now teetotally out of meal; and Bill's to start in the morning for a grist and I'm powerful sorry we've nothin to eat " "Oh! thank you, ma'am never mind us thank you never mind ! If we get corn for our poor brutes, and shelter for our- selves that will do thank you, ma'am never mind !" Having fed our jaded animals we entered the cabin, and de- positing our saddles and furniture in one corner, we sat down on two rude stools, like some modern ottomans in the city ; being so low as to force one's knees and chins into near proximity. They had indeed, no covering or cushion, unless such be con- sidered the lone woman's indescribable, lying on the one, and THIRD YEAR 311 Bill's tow-linen breeches on the other articles we considerately, however, removed for fear of soiling. The next thing we did was to poke up the slumbering fire ; by the light of which we first cast rueful looks on one another, and then some sideway glances around the apartment. In one spot, stood a barrel with an empty bag of dim whiteness, hanging partly in and partly out, while across its top was laid a kneading bowl, and in that a small washing machine; the barrel being manifestly the repository of meal, and the bag the very affair Bill was to ride, in the morning, to mill. Near us was a shelf holding a few utensils for mush and milk, several tin cups, a wooden bowl in need of scouring, and some calabashes; a large calabash we had noticed outside the door, having a small grape vine for a handle, and intended to represent a bucket for water and other wet and dry uses. In a strap of deerskin nailed under the shelf were stuck certain knives, some ornamented with buck-horn handles, one or two with corn-cob handles, and one handleless; and interspersed judiciously in the same strap were pincushions, scissors, comb, and a few other et ceteras of a hocsiery toilette. But the curiosities were "the two beds and all tuk up by the mother and the childurn." What the bedsteads were made out of was not ascertained. Ricketty they were, screeching, squirming, and wriggling at every slight motion of the sleeping household; but tough and seasoned too must have been to bear up under their respective loads, especially considering the way some that night kicked under the covers, and, occasionally over them! In one bed were the lone ( ?) woman and two children ; and in this I am confident having counted three heads, and one with a cap on. In the other were three or four bodies Uncle John insisted on four but I only counted three heads at the bolster ; yet Uncle John in his very last letter held to it, that he saw another head sticking out near the foot, and two or three legs in such direction as could come only from a head in that latitude. Strong presumptive evidence, granted; yet only presumptive, for a leal backwood's boy can twist himself all round; beside the fleas 2 that night made the bed loads twist their utmost, and legs 2 Fleas out there are very savage but while they make the folks very active in bed, they cannot wake them ; for nothing scarcely breaks a woodsman's sleep. 312 THIRD YEAR and arms became so surprisingly commingled, that no ordinary spectator could tell to what bodies they severally pertained. And never were beds so "all tuk up," nor so wonderfully slept all over, till by daylight the whole of their sleep must have been fully extracted ; and hence, it was plain enough there was no room for Uncle John or me in either bed ; and if we wanted any sleep we must get it out of the puncheons. We spread, therefore, our horse-blankets each on a puncheon, our separating line being an interstice of three inches ; and, transforming saddlebags into pillows, we essayed to sleep away our weariness and hunger. But the "sweet restorer's" balmy influences were all confined that night, to the two regular beds; and that among other causes owing to a motherly she-swine with a litter of ever so many pigs, and some other bristled gentry in the basement, whence ascended an overpowering dry hickory nut fragrance, and endless variations of grunt, squeak, and shuffle and in all likelihood the oceans of fleas disturbing us! If not thence, I leave it to such critics to ascertain, who delight in saying and finding smart things. Upon the whole it was not, then, so old that about an hour before dawn, we made ready to set out in search of Fairplay. And of course our preparations awaked the lone woman; when the "cap," already named, being elevated above the sleeping line of the other heads, and also several capless pates of dirty matted hair (gender indeterminate) being also raised and thrust forth in the other bed, we thus held our farewell colloquy : "Well, my good friend, we thank you kindly for your hospital- ity, and we are about starting now ; what shall we pay you ?" "Laws! bless you, stranger! how you talk! why do y'allow I'd axe people what's lost anything? and for sick 'comedashins ?" Oh ! ma'am but we put you to trouble " "Trouble! I don't mind trouble now no how I've had too big a share on it to mind it any more amost " "Why, ma'am you've been very kind and we really can't go away till we pay you something " "Stranger! I sees you wants to do what's right but you needn't take out that puss I'll have to be a most powerful heap poorer nor I'm now, afore I'll take anything for sich a poor shelter to feller critturs what's lost and them a comin from THIRD YEAR 313 w-eetin too! Ain't that oldermost stranger a kinder sort a preacher ?" "No. my friend, I'm only a member " "Well I couldn't axe meetin folks nothin for the best. I'm right glad you didn't take the right hand trail below our fence, you'd a got into the swamp agin. Now jist mind when you come to a big sugar what blow'd down by the haricane, and take the left, and that will git you clear of the bio and then keep rite strate on forrerd and you'll soon git to Fairplay. Farewells were then cordially exchanged, and we left the poor lone woman with emotions of pity, gratitude, and admiration; and we thought too of "the cup of water" "the two mites" of "one half the world knows not how the other lives" and "man wants but little here below" and of all similar sacred and secular sayings, till we came to the prostrate sugar-tree. There we made a judicious digression to avoid miring and suffocating in the morass, and then shortly after dismounted safe and sound, but frightfully hungry, at Fairplay. And here we rest awhile to devour two breakfasts and repair if possible the loss of dinner and supper; and in the meanwhile we shall speak of the village. Fairplay was a smart place, consisting of two entirely new log houses, built last summer, in spite and opposition to Briarton con- cealed in the bushes on the other side of the river: and also a public or tavern in futuro, however, as it was only now a- building. As yet it was not roofed entirely, nor were the second story floors laid, nor had it any chimneys. Indeed, its walls were incomplete, the daubing being ah ! what is the fashionable grammar here, for the case absolute? I do not wish to be be- hind the age too far, and am desirous of having the Fairplay hotel grammatically daubed. "Daubing being done?" No, it was not completed. "Daubing doing?" that would make mud an active agent; whereas, in the operation, it is the most passive subject in the world, and is dreadfully trampled, pounded, beat, splashed, scattered and smeared. "Daubing a-doing?" no: the work had ceased for the present, and the clay was actually dry where the work had been "being" done. Stop! I have it the daubing "being" being done'! and so all eating and sleeping were 314 THIRD YEAR in one large airy room below, with a flooring of unnailed boards, and half a dozen windows full of sashes but destitute of glass ; and having also two doors closed with sheets instead of shutters. Cooking was performed to-day out of doors ; hence while waiting for breakfast we inhaled the savory essence of fried chickens, fried bacon, roasted potatoes, herb-tea, store-coffee, and above all, of slap-jacks compounded from cornmeal, eggs and milk, and fried in a pan thus in a measure getting two breakfasts out of one. True, with the fragrance entered the smoke ; yet what great pleasure is without its concomitant pain! Beside but take care! take care! here comes the breakfast, and we are ordered: "Well, strangers! come, sit up and help yourselves. I allow you're a sorter hungry after sich a most powerful starvation." * * * * Breakfast among the Stars * * * * * "Landlord ! our horses, if you please." "They're at the door they look a right smart chance wusted but maybe they'll take you home wish you a pleasant journey and no more scrapes." The landlord's wishes were not disappointed, for in due time we were snug at home. CHAPTER XLI. "This man's brow, like the title leaf, Foretells the nature of a tragic volume." NOT long after Mr. Seymour's return to Glenville, the patri- archal cabin with its acres of clearings, deadenings and girdlings, and with all its untouched and unfenced woods, was sold to a stranger ; and then our friends- all removed to Bishop Hilsbury's late residence, near the tannery. The name, indeed, was retained, but the" glory of Glenville Settlement was fading. 3 Still visits were 8 "A man named Magennis bought our cabin and Mr. Reed's about a mile from the Indian grave. A brick house was put up by Magennis. Mrs. Young was buried near the Tannery. The R. Road must run through Glenville. Paris C. Dunning had a brother who settled in Gossport. Mr. THIRD YEAR 315 interchanged, although we of Woodville received more than we paid; and my emotions became most delightful, whenever re- turning on Saturday evenings from a short squirrel hunt, I dis- cerned at a distance Uncle John's horse tied to our rack. Often, too, would some of us, the day he was expected, sit the last hour at an upper window, and watch the leafy barrier, where our dear friend was expected momentarily to break through into the mellow light of the departing sun ay! that dear old man was so loved, we felt like hugging and kissing the very horse that brought him ! Christmas was now approaching; and all Glenville that remained was expected to spend the holiday at Woodville. For this visit, our whole house had been prepared bedrooms were arranged to render sleeping warm and refreshing fat poultry was killed mince-pies concocted, cider bought ; in short, all the goodies, vege- table, animal, and saccharine, usually congregated at this joyous season, were stored and ready. In the parlour, a compound of sitting-room, dining-room, and bed-chamber, a magnificent fire of clean white sugar-tree with a green beech back-log was warming and enlivening; while the lid of the piano was raised, with copies of favourite pieces ready, and an eight-keyed flute, and a four- stringed violin on its top all ready for a grand burst of innocent fun and frolic at the coming of the loved ones! Oh! we should be so happy! Night at length drew near; and so after an entire afternoon passed in expectation and affirmations, thus "Well, they will be here in a few minutes, now!" and after repeated visits to our observatory in the attic, we had concluded that, beyond all Young had the store there. Im his store Brasier and I talked about the earth's shape. There the buttons were sold. Bush, Reed, and myself constituted the first Wabash Presbytery, formed in Mr. Reed's cabin near the tannery. I suggested the name 'Gossport' for 'Old Man' Goss also 'Alexandria,' and 'Youngsville.' Mr. Alexander and Mr. Young owned the tract. 'Gosport' was preferred as Mr. Goss was the largest owner." Hall's Letter to Nunnemacher, Oct. 19, 1885. On January 19, 1826, Young sold to Elisha McGinnis 80 acres in Section 17-11-2. This "Glenville settlement" is still owned by a descendant of Elisha McGinnis, four miles north of Gosport. This information is- furnished by the courtesy of Mr. (Charles S. Surber, Recorder of Owen. County, Indiana. 316 THIRD YEAR doubt, within a half-hour the cavalcade would arrive. But, that half-hour elapsed, and no friends came! and then another! and still another! and even then no friends! It was then so very much later than our old folks had been wont to come, that we all sat now in the gloom of disappointment around the parlour, uneasy, and with forebodings of evil when the clatter of a horse moving rapidly over the frozen earth called us in haste to the door ; upon opening which, John Glenville was seen dismounting, who immediately entered and with a countenaonce of deep distress "Why, dear John ! what is the matter ? "Melancholy enough! poor Uncle has fallen and broken his thigh! I've come over for Sylvan, and must go back with him instantly. I left word for him to be ready in fifteen minutes." ****** Ah! dear reader! if one's happiness is wholly from the earth, what shall we do when that happiness is so marred? Our joy be- came instant mourning our pleasant apartment, cheerless our dainty food, tasteless our music, the voice of lamentation ! Dear old kind-hearted man ! after all the sore disappointments of a long life is this sad affliction added to your sorrows, and pains, and many bodily injuries! Again, in old age, must you lie in that dark forest in the anguish of broken limbs ! again sep- arated from many that so love you ! What a Christmas eve for you ! how different from those passed in our days of prosperity ! For myself, when recalling the incidents of our late journey our harmless pleasantries our solemn and serious conversations his hoary head on the floor of the lone woman's cabin his patience, hilarity, and noble heart and thought of him refused a night's lodging, who had sheltered and fed so many strangers, and of him. turned, weary, hungry and sick into a western wilderness at night ! and now that grey head on a pillow of anguish ! that pleasant face changed by pain! that often broken body again crushed and mangled But, let us change the subject. Our friends had purposed leaving home early on the morning of the 24th, but an unforeseen business having called away John Glenville, the expedition was postponed a few hours. Yet when he came not at the hour, it was then concluded that the old folks THIRD YEAR 317 should set out by themselves, with the belief that Mr. Glenville could easily overtake them on the road. To prepare the horses, Mr. Seymour descended a small hill to the stable, whilst Aunt Kitty remained in the cabin to arrange a few small matters pre- vious to the starting. But as her brother was absent a full quar- ter of an hour beyond what seemed necessary, she stepped to the cabin-door, and with the slightest possible impatience when, to her amazement, she heard a faint voice calling on her for help, and the groans of one as in great bodily pain ! She flew in alarm down the hill and at the stable-door lay Uncle John, his leg broken off at the head of the thigh bone, himself in an agony of pain, and in danger of perishing even from cold, without a speedy removal ! His horse had proved restive on being led from the stable, and in a consequent struggle Mr. S. slipping on some ice had fallen and received the hurt. Aunt Kitty quickly decided on her plan. She brought from the cabin the buffalo robe bestowed by the Osage warchief, and spreading it near her wounded brother, she managed, weak and unaided, to get him, a large and heavy man, fairly into the mid- dle of the robe. Staying, then, her tears, and raising her heart to God for fortitude and strength, she began to drag her mourn- ful load towards the cabin. But she soon found herself too weak for the task, and in despair looked around when, on her way home, and, by an unusual path near our cabin, passed now that very woman commemorated elsewhere in this work for a novel appearance in cow hunting! Catching a glimpse of this woman Aunt Kitty cried out for asistance; and the kindhearted neigh- bour was almost instantly at her side, and adding a strength superior to that of a dozen pretty ladies, she soon, with Aunt Kitty's aid, had our wounded relative hauled to the cabin-door. Here, with great difficulty and labour on their part and pain on his, the sufferer was partly lifted and partly dragged up and over the steps and sill, and finally laid on a low bed prepared for his reception. Mrs. Littleton now examined her brother's wound, and with the help of her humble friend, she forced the leg into something like a natural position, and then splintered and bandaged it, to the best of her ability. In a few minutes after this, John Glenville 318 THIRD YEAR entered the cabin, who, on learning the mournful accident, in- stantly remounted and hurried to Woodville. Dr. Sylvan was unfortunately not at home, and we obtained only one of his students; when Glenville, having refreshed himself a few moments with us, was, attended by the pupil, quickly re- plunged into the cold and darkness of a now tempestuous night and howling wilderness! They reached the cabin a short time before day-break: but the embryo surgeon, without adding or taking from, deemed it best to let all the bandages remain as Aunt Kitty had bound them! And so poor Uncle John, after lying on his bed for seventy wearisome days and nights, rose again to life and health yet not to his former shape and activity; for the leg had shrunk in the knitting of the bone, and his right side was two inches shorter than before the accident. And yet, reader, so youthful and buoyant the spirit of this noble old gentleman, that he and I hunted often together after his re- covery he walking with a crutch in one hand and a heavy rifle in the other! But so gloomy had become the cabin life to the old folks, where death might easily occur from the absence of ordinary help, and where, perhaps, Uncle John's deformity might have been lessened by prompt 1 medical aid, that our tannery was sold, and our relatives removed to Woodville. Mr. Glenville, however, chose a new site for a store several miles from the old settlement, which then, as to us, ceased to be save that sacred spot reserved in the sale, and where rest, far from us, scattered as we are, and ever in this life shall be, the ashes of the mother ! Once, but once, subsequent to this desertion, did I pass along a new road laid through that settlement, and between the two cabins. Around, for many acres, the forest was no more, but corn and grain were ripening in its place. A new brick house stood in our garden; and the cabin was changed into a stable. And yet, while all the changes were for the better, and a most joyous evening was smiling on, the coming harvest I sat on my horse and had one of my girlish fits of tears ! Yes ! I cried like Homer's heroes and that in spite of the critic who, running over the book to make an article, will say, "the author, tender-hearted soul, cries again towards the close of year the third, Chap. xli. p. 318." Yes! I cried! And FOURTH YEAR 319 since that summer's evening, I have never seen my first forest home; for I purposely ever after avoided the hateful new road through it, and that too by the Indian grave. CHAPTER XLII. FOURTH YEAR. "Sit mihi fas audita loqui." "It is the witness still of excellency. To put a strange face on his own perfection." OUR fourth year introduces an epoch, the Augustan age of the New Purchase the opening of the State College ! l And now comes on the stage, as one principal actor, my friend, the Reverend Charles Clarence, A.M., Principal and Professor of Ancient Languages. This gentleman had accepted our appoint- ment, not for the paltry stipend paid as his salary, but wholly because he longed to be in the romantic West, and among its earliest literary pioneers; and hence, early this spring, he was with us, and not merely ready, but even enthusiastically impatient to commence his labours. His wife was with him the woman of his seven years' love! They had tasted, however, the wormwood of affliction's cup, and even now wore the badges of recent bereavements. Mr. Clarence, leaving his wife and two little children, went to the South again on business; and after an absence of four months, on returning to his boarding house in Philadelphia, he was surprised at hearing and seeing no signs of his babes. His wife, instead of answer- ing in words his eager questions, suddenly threw her arms about his neck, and bursting into an agony of tears, exclaimed, "Both are dead ! come into our room I'll tell you all !" Here was a sad waking from day-dreaming! and Clarence was with us, having altered views of life, and seeing that we have something to do in it, besides to amuse or be amused. Happy 1 The (State Seminary was opened by Hall in 1824. This would place his coming to Indiana as early as 1821. It was probably his third year, not his fourth. 320 FOURTH YEAR chastisement our friend afterwards deemed it, when encountering sore disappointments and many, in his professional career: ay! he was destined to endure the utter crushing of all his high hopes and purposes. For, if ever man was influenced by disinterested motives, and fired with enthusiasm for advancing solid learning, if ever one desirous of seeing Western institutions rival, if not ex- cel others, if a person came willing to live and die with us, and to sacrifice eastern tastes and prejudices, and become, in every proper way, a Western Man, my friend Clarence was he. 2 His labours and actions proved this. Look for instance at his daily teaching his five and six hours usually spent in the recita- tion room ; at his preaching, always twice on the Sabbath, and com- monly several times during the week; at his visits to the sick and the dying, and his attendance on funerals ! And these things extended beyond his own denomination when requested, and that was often ; for rarely, even in his own sicknesses and melancholy hours, did he refuse what seemed his duty to others. When too feeble to leave his house, he heard the recitations in his bed ; and when unable to stand, he sat in his congregation and preached, his person emaciated and his face death-like. Nor did he con- fine his teaching to the routine himself had followed, but he in- troduced other branches, and also a course of Greek, unknown then in western colleges, and not common in eastern ones; and this, although it added to the severity of his private studies, and for many months kept his lamp 3 burning even till two o'clock ! His only inquiry was, how can I best promote the interests of the institution? In short, therefore, all his learning, his talents, his experience, his accomplishments, were freely and heartily em- ployed and given, in season and out of season ; and a knowledge of all the music he possessed, vocal and instrumental, was im- parted, gratuitously, to the students and also grammar, moral philosophy, and the like, gratuitously, and at extra hours, to cer- 2 In these pages Hall as Carlton is speaking of himself as Clarence. Hall was married in Danville, Kentucky (Letter to Nunemacher). He appears to have returned with his bride to Philadelphia, where he lost two children before he came to Indiana. 8 A tin lamp supplied with melted lard, an-d suspended at the end of a wooden crane, whose perpendicular shaft moved in sockets fastened to the wall. FOURTH YEAR 321 tain teachers of ordinary schools, and some of these his former opponents ! Much more could we say, if the modesty of my friend per- mitted; but he affirms positively that he will not edit the book if I do not stop here. And yet this man was no match for veteran cunning; we must not, however, anticipate and so we shall begin regularly at the beginning, and go on till we end with the end; refreshing, during the story, our spirits with the occasional pleasant matters belonging to our rather tangled road. Be it remembered, as was intimated in the early part of volume first, that Uncle Sam is an undoubted friend of public education, and that, although so sadly deficient in his own; and hence, in the liberal distribution of other folk's land, he bestowed on us several entire townships for a college or university. It was, therefore, democratically believed, and loudly insisted on, that as the State had freely received, it should freely give; and that "larnin, even the most powerfullest highest larnin," should at once be bestowed on every body! and without a farthing's ex- pense! Indeed, some gravely said and argued that teachers and professors in the "people's college ought to sarve for the honour !" or at least be content with "a dollar a day, which was more nor double what a feller got for mauling rails !" The popular wrath therefore was at once excited almost to fury when necessity com- pelled us to fix our tuition fee at ten dollars a year; and the greatest indignation was felt and expressed towards Clarence "as the feller what tuk hire for teaching and preaching, and was gettin to be a big-bug on the poor people's edicashin money." Be it recollected too, that both big and little colleges were erected by persons who, with reverence be it spoken, in all mat- ters pertaining to "high larnin," had not sufficient discrimination to know the second letter of an alphabet from a buffalo's foot. Nothing, we incline to believe, can ever make State schools and colleges very good ones; but nothing can make them so bad, we repeat, as for Uncle Sam to leave every point open to debate, especially among ignorant, prejudiced, and selfish folks in a New Purchase. For while trustees may be ninnies, nincompoops, or even ninnyhammers as to proper plans and buildings, yet are such, 322 FOURTH YEAR when masons, bricklayers and carpenters, keen-sighted enough to secure the building contracts for themselves and their friends, and curiously exorbitant in their demands on the sub-treasurers for their silly work. The mean-looking and ridiculous arrangements at Woodville cost as much, perhaps more, than suitable things, would have cost; so that when a college is to be commenced, it ought to be done, not only by honest but by wise, learned, classical men; but as such are not abundant in very new settlements, let such men at Washington (and such are at Uncle Sam's bureau) let them prescribe when, and how, and where, our new western institutions are to be ; and if rebellious democrats refuse the gift so encumbered, let it thus be given to more modest and quiet democrats. Proceed we, however, to open the college. And my narration may be depended on, as Clarence has reviewed the whole and says it is substantially correct, indeed, in some respect I was a quorum-pars. The institution was opened the first day of May, at 9^2 o'clock, A. M., anno Domini 1800 and so forth. 4 And some floors being unlaid, and the sashes all being without glass, the opening was as complete as possible nearly like that of an Irish hedge school ! When the Principal (so named in our minutes and papers, but by the vulgar called master, and by the middle sort, teacher,) appeared, a clever sprinkle of boy B was in waiting; most of which firmly believed that, by some magic art, our hero could, and being paid by government, should, and without putting any- body to the expense of books and implements, touch and transmute all, and in less than no time, into great scholars. "Boys and young gentlemen," said Mr. C. compounding the styles of a pedagogue and professor, "I am happy to see you ; and we are now about to commence our State College, or, as some call it, the Seminary. I hope all feel what an honour attends being the first students in an institution so well endowed ; and which, therefore, by proper exertions on our parts, may eventually rise to the level of eastern colleges, and become a blessing to our State and country. You have all, I suppose, procured the neces- * 1824. 5 A very lively animal anywhere but a very peculiar one out there. FOURTH YEAR 323 sary books, of which notice was given at meeting, and in several other ways, for the last four weeks." "I've got 'em " "Me too" "I've brung most on 'em " "Master Uncle Billy's to fetch mine out in his wagin about Monday nixe " "Father says he couldn't mind the names and wants them on a paper " "Books! I never heern tell of any books wont these here ones do, Master? this here's the Western Spellin one and this one's the Western Kalkelatur?" "Mr. 'Glarinse I fotch'd my copy-book and a bottle of red-ink to sit down siferin in and daddy wants me to larn bookkeepin and surveyin." "Order boys order!" (hem!) "let all take seats in front. There is a misunderstanding with some, both as to the books and the whole design and plan of the school, I perceive. This is a Classical and Mathematical School; and that fact is stated and fully explained in the trustees' public advertisements; and no person can be admitted unless one intending to enter upon and pursue the prescribed course; and that includes even at the start Latin, Greek, and Algebra. Now, first, let us see who are to study the dead languages " "I do I do me too me too," &c., &c. "Do you, then, sit there. Well now let me have your names for the roll A. Berry S. Smith C. D. &c., &c. ten names 8 I will attend to you ten directly, so soon as I have dismissed the others. I regret, my young friends, that you are disappointed but I am only doing my duty ; indeed, if I wished I have no power 6 The first ten students enrolled in the Seminary by Hall in 1824 were : Findlay Dodds, Aaron Furgason, Hamilton Stockwell, John Todd, Michael Hummer, Samuel C. Dunn, James W. Dunn, James A. Maxwell, and Joseph A. Wright. "All these lived to manhood and rendered effi- cient service to society one as a tanner, one as a merchant, three as physi- cians, two as ministers of the gospel, and three as lawyers." D. D. Banta, Sketch of Indiana Seminary, in T. A. Wylie's Indiana University, p. 44. Joseph A. Wright became Governor of Indiana (1849-1857) and later during the Civil War, was U. S. Minister to Prussia. 324 FOURTH YEAR to admit you, unless to the course of studies nay, even the trus- tees have power to do only what they have done. I hope, there- fore, you will now go home, and explain the matter to your friends " By several "Daddy says he doesn't see no sort a use in the high larn'd things and he wants me to larn Inglish only, and bookkeepin, and surveyin, so as to tend store and run a line." "I allow, Mister, we've near on about as good a right to be larn'd what we wants, as them tother fellers on that bench ; it's a free school for all." 'I am sorry, boys, for this misunderstanding; but we cannot argue the subject here. And yet every one must see one matter plainly ; for instance, any man has a right to be governor, or judge, or congressman; yet none of you can be elected before the legal age, and before having some other qualifications. It is so here, you all have a right to what we have to bestow; but you must be qualified to enter; and must be content to receive the gift of the State in the way the law provides and orders. You will please go home now." The disappointed youngsters accordingly withdrew; and with no greater rudeness than was to be expected from undisciplined chaps, full of false notions of rights, and possessed by a wild spirit of independence. Hence, Mr. C. heard some very flattering sentiments growled at him by the retiring young democrats ; but which, when they had fairly reached the entry, were bawled and shouted out frankly and fearlessly. And naturally after this he was honoured with some high sounding epithets by certain hypo- critical demagogues in rabblerousing speeches sneaking gentle- men, who aimed to get office and power by endless slanders on the college, and most pitiful and malicious slang about "liberty and equality, and rights, and tyranny, and big-bugs, and poor people, and popular education," et id omne genus! Ay ! certain small-potato-patriots publicly on the stump avowed "it was a right smart chance better to have no collidge no how, if all folks hadn't equal right to larn what they most liked best." And two second-rate pettifoggers electioneered on this principle; "that it was most consistent with the republicanism taught by the FOURTH YEAR 325 immortal Jefferson, and with the genius of our institutions, to use the college funds to establish common schools for rich and poor alike, and make the blessings of education like air, sunshine, and water !" Clarence, therefore, was now hated and villified, as the sup- posed instrument of pride and aristocracy, in drawing a line between rich and poor ; 7 and for a while his person, his family, his very house was abominated. On one occasion he was in Wood- ville when a half drunken brute thus halloed against him "thare goes that darn'd high larn'd bug what gits nine hundred and ninety-nine dollars and ninety-nine cents 8 of the people's eddeka- shin money for larnin ristekrats sons high flown words gimme that 'are stone and I'll do for him." Whether this was fun or earnest, Clarence did not care to ascertain ; for hearing the sneers and derision of the bystanders, and fearing it might become earn- est, he took shelter in my store. At another time walking with Professor Harwood in the out- skirts of the village, they heard a cry in their rear "knock 'em down" when suddenly turning, there stood a stout chap flourish- ing a bludgeon over their heads, evidently, indeed, in a sort of fun, which, was, however, an index of the popular ill-will and spite. When persons rode by his dwelling, remarks like the following would be shouted forth : "Well thar's whar the grammur man lives that larns 'em Latin and grand-like things allow we'll oust him yet he doesn't own little college any how ; he's poor as Job's turkey, if it want for that powerful sallury the trustees give him." Clarence's salary was four hundred dollars per annum ! "Well," bawled out one fellow "dog my hide if that ain't the furst time I ever seed that big man's door open ! hem ! power- ful fine carpet ! (a beautiful rag carpet made by Mrs. C.) allow, people's eddekashin money bought that!" Even Mr. C.'s gratuitous preaching could not secure him from 7 Of the ten boys who entered the college, seven or eight were poor many that would not enter were rich. 8 Hall at first received a salary of $250 a year. In 1827 this was in- creased to $400 which, if fees from an increase of students made it possible, might rise to as much as $600 in the year. 326 t FOURTH YEAR ill-natured remarks. "Well," said an occasional hearer to another once "how do y'like that sort a preachin ?" "Foo !" was the reply, "I don't want no more sich! I like a man that kin jist read, and then I know it comes from the sperit ! he tuk out his goold watch twice to show it, and was so d mnation proud he wouldn't kneel down to pray !" But the reader may wish to know how Mr. Clarence got along with "the Few." Well, as the warm weather approached, the "boys and young gentlemen" came to recitation without coats ; and, as the thermometer arose, they came without shoes "What! in the State college? Could your Mr. Clarence not have things ordered with more decency?" Softly, Mr. Dignity in a world where our presiding judge, a man of worth and great abilities, presided in court without his coat and cravat, and with his feet modestly reposed on the upper rostrum, thus showing his boot-soles to by-standers and lawyers ; where lawyers were stripped and in shirt-sleeves ; and where even Governor Sunbeam, in a stump speech, gave blast to his nose pinched between a thumb and finger, and wiped said pinchers afterwards on the hinder regions of his inexpressibles; do you, sir, think our Mr. C., or all eastern dignitaries combined, could have compelled young bushwhackers to wear coats and shoes in recitation rooms ? He indeed ventured once as follows : "Young gentlemen" (hem!) "why do you attend recita- tions without coats and shoes ?" " Tis cooler, sir !" with surprise. "Ay! so it is perhaps it would be still cooler if you came without your pantaloons." Haw ! haw ! by the whole ten. "And did they, Mr. Carlton, come without their indispensa- bles?" Oh ! dear me ! no ; on the contrary, the young gentlemen were so tickled at our professor's pleasant hint direct, that next day they not only come in their breeches, but also with shoes and coats on ! But still, many proper regulations of our friend were distaste- ful to scholars and parents equally for instance, the requirement of a written excuse for certain absences. One parent, an upper class Thompsonian doctor, did, indeed, once send a note but FOURTH YEAR 327 that was an insolent 9 and peremptory order to Clarence to believe in future his son, without a written excuse ! And another person, captain in the late war, not only refused to write a note, but he sent a verbal message by his son to the master, viz. "Charley Clarence, you needn't think of introducing your d n Yankee tricks out here !" Yes ! yes ! raise your hands, and elevate your eyebrows, good folks. Mr. C. did all that sort of thing too, at first; but he lived long enough with us to get used to matters ! The only evil was, that, like the Irish Greek's famous horse that unluckily died, just when he had learned to live without eating, 10 our pro- fessor, when he had outlived his prejudices, and abandoned his Yankee ways, fell a victim to veteran cunning and artifice ; and was forced, like Aristides, to obey the Ostracism ! CHAPTER XLIII. "This is some fellow Who, having been praised for his bluntness, doth affect A saucy roughness." * * * * "What would you have, you curs?" THE nature of our favourite doctrine the sovereignty of the people is but imperfectly understood from theory; and, truly, what importance to the vast majority to be called kings, unless opportunities are afforded to exercise the royal prerogatives? True, in the constitutions of the twenty-six States, are paper models of republican governments, the purest in nature; such as the monarchical-republic, the oligarchic, the aristocratic, the fed- eral, the democratic, ay, the cheatitive or repudiative, the despotic, the mobocratic, the anarchic, cum multis aliis: but what of all this, if the citizen kings cannot be indulged in a little visible, tangible, audible, law-making, law-judging and law-executing? Now, in the New Purchase, the people universal, the people 9 How should a steam-doctor know better ? out there. 10 That curious art has been revived lately in Great Britain, and is practiced extensively and with great success among the poor. 328 FOURTH YEAR general, the people special, of every county, town and village, of every sect, religious and irreligious, of every party, political, im- political, and non-political, were indulged in bona fide acts of real rity-dity sovereignty. And each and every part, party, and parcel, lorded it over the whole and over one another; and the whole over the parts and over itself ay, and every one that did it against the wall, ruled State and the nation, and his neighbour, and then turned round and ruled himself, not in the fear of heaven, but in the fear of the people ! The fact is, we did noth- ing else than rule one another; and none ever even obeyed for fear of disobeying; and hence our public servants (and we kept them sweating) being distracted by opposite instructions from different constituents (for candidates with us only carried up votes, wishes, &c.) from Thomas and Richard and Henry and Squire Rag and Major Tagg and Mister Bobtail, and being imperiously ordered to rob Peter to pay Paul, our pub- lic servants, poor knaves and honest rascals, would not obey, simply out of reverence and for fear of offending and hurting our feelings ! Here follows a specimen of the people ruling the college and the college ruling the people. We, the people of the Trustees, for the good of the people general, did resolve this autumn to elect a Professor of Mathe- matics and advertised accordingly. This of itself enraged the people who set no value on learning, and deemed one small salary a waste of the poor people's education money; but when rumour declared we intended to elect a man nominally a Rat, 1 (Mr. Clarence being also a Rat,) the wrath was roused of the people, religious, and irreligious, of all other sects. This, in- deed, was confined to Woodville; for from the very first, we, the people of Woodville and thereabouts, did kindly adopt the State College as ours; and we, therefore, claimed the sole right of superintending the Legislature, the Board of Visitors, the Board of Trustees, the Faculty, proper and improper, the Stu- dents, foreign and domestic, the Funds, the Buildings the every- thing ; and for some time we ordered and regulated, and turned in and out most despotically. 1 Nickname for a religious sect in the Purchase. FOURTH YEAR 329 Well, the people having united the peoples in a fixed purpose, viz. to keep out a Rat, but not having united them in any purpose of putting in anybody else, the people, now sovereign and of many kings, held a meeting up town in the court-house yard; while we, the trustee-people and sovereigns of another sort, were holding our meeting to elect a professor in the prayer-hall of Big College; and then the People's-people, formed under the com- mand of Brigadier Major General Jacobus, Esq., Clerk of Court, Chief Librarian of Woodville Library, and Deputy Post Master under his late Majesty, General Andrew Jackson, marched down in a formidable battalion to give us our orders. This grand dignitary of so many tails we have just named, was most fit head to the fit body he conducted. He was no inconsid- erable a people himself, being very fat and very saucy; nay, as in warm weather he always appeared without coat, vest, cravat, and usually with slouched hat, shoes down at heel on stockingless feet, and one "gallus" hard strained to keep up his greasy and raggy breeches; and as in this costume he strutted everywhere full of swagger and brag, he was then the best living and embod- ied personification of a mistaken, conceited, meddlesome, prag- matical people anywhere to be found. He flourished in that grand era, rotation in office : but by him it was interpreted a rota- tion out of one public office into another yea ! even now he actu- ally sustained at once seven salaried offices little and big yea! moreover to these seven tails he added and very commonly ex- hibited another the tail of his shirt! Now, one may conceive how our great father of one or more terms looks ; one can even imagine how Uncle Sam looks; but who forms approximating conceptions of that proteus sovereign the People! Believe me, his rowdy majesty, General Jacobus, is as near a likeness, in many essential respects, as can be obtained but this is digression. 1 2 Gen. Jacob Lowe was the man whose portrait is thus held up to posterity, quite true to life, in the main. Judge D. D. Banta was a youth in college when the second edition of the "New Purchase" appeared (1855). He tells of hearing from Lowe's own lips how Lowe felt when he first read the book. It seems that Gabriel M. Overstreet, of Johnson County (the county from which Judge Banta came) was a student in Bloomington in 1843 when the first edition of the "New Purchase" was issued. Overstreet says that the first knowledge the students had of the 330 FOURTH YEAR Our honourable Trustees were, as usual, sitting with open doors, and hence were, as heretofore, accommodated with num- erous lobby members ; and these kept muttering discontent at our doings, and often volunteered remarks in a play-house whisper for our correction and guidance. Dr. Sylvan, however, who antici- pated a storm, had contrived to put the vote for Mr. Harwood's election, 3 a little prior to the first faint noise of the coming book came from the interest shown by the professors in the single copy at their disposal. So interested was the professor who had it for reading within a given time that he kept it in his desk and read between recita- tions, and when classes entered the recitation room the professor would be found reading the book. The new book was in great demand, but for some reason it was not on sale. In some manner the students managed to get a copy, which, so far as Mr. Overstreet knew, was the second copy on the ground. The excitement ran high and so anxious were the boys to know the book's contents that they could not await reading by turns but they met in companies and one of the number would read aloud. To some extent the citizens of the town did likewise; Gen. Jacob Lowe ("Gen. Jacobus") was the chosen reader for a group of citizens. He had a fine sonorous voice and could make himself heard, and being thoroughly ac- quainted with the times and many of the scenes described was able to in- dicate the personages meant as he went along. It was twelve years later when Judge Banta heard Lowe describe his feelings when he first read this pen picture of himself. "I was never so mad in my life," said Lowe, "I was too mad to talk, and so I went home thinking all the way how I could have my revenge. But before I went back to town the next morn- ing I saw the ridiculous absurdity of the whole thing and that if I let any one know I was mad the whole town would laugh at me and that I would never hear the last of it, and so I made light of it from that morning on, and it was the other fellows who got laughed at." Judge D. D. Banta's manuscript Lecture on the New Purchase. How Lowe felt about it must have come to Hall, for he afterwards wrote, "I am happy the Bloomington General has been taken in and done for so well; and by this you may see how true to nature are the pictures and delineations of the New Purchase." The editor's recollection of Lowe in his old age distinctly veri- fies Hall's racy description of Lowe's dress and personal appearance. 3 John Hopkins Harney, whose election to the chair of Mathematics in Indiana College is referred to here, was born in Bourbon* County, Ky., Feb. 20, 1806. He graduated at Miami University in 1827. Soon after his graduation he walked from Oxford, Ohio, to Bloomington and applied for the position of teacher of Mathematics in the State Seminary. He was elected by the Trustees on May 15, 1827, and this election was confirmed by the Board of Visitors, of which Gov. James B. Ray was a member, on Nov. 2, 1827. Harney was a friend of Hall's and after the college FOURTH YEAR 331 cataract of turbid waters, and had succeeded in securing this gentleman's unanimous choice when a considerable hurrahing outside announced the People's-people and in a moment after, in swaggered his greasy royalty, General Jacobus, followed by as much of the ultimate sovereignty as could squeeze into the room. And then King Slouch commenced as follows: "Mr. President and gentlemen of the Board ! hem ! I have the honour to be the orgun of the people hem! and by their orders I've come in here, to forbid the election of Mr. Har- wood of Kaintuckey, as our Professor of Mathematucs hem! in the people's collidge he-e-m ! ! You'r all servunts of the people" and hain't the right no how to give away their edicashion money without thar consent I say hem! as all is not admitted to these here halls of science he-e-m ! ! And the people in the inbred, incohesive use of thar indefeesibul native rights, order me thar orgun to say they don't want two teachers of the same religion no how and I say it and I say, Mr. President, they say its better to have them of different creeds, and I say that too for they say they'll watch one another and not turn the students to thar religion and hem! Yes, the people in their plentitude have met, and they say they don't want no church and state and I say it; for thar's a powerful heap of danger to let one sect have all the power and I call on this board to let their historic recollections be be recollected and wasn't thar John Calvin, the moment he got the power, didn't he burn poor Mikul Servetis at the stake and and so ain't it plain if two men here git all the power thar's a beginning of church and state, as that immortal Jefferson says ? And who knows if you and me and the people here mayn't be tortered and burn'd yet in a conflagration of f agguts and fire ? Who then with this probability " Here Dr. Sylvan, our worthy President, interrupted the speaker, the doctor being now only recovered from his surprise ; for, veteran as he was in politics, and often as he had known the people essay small overt acts of sovereignty, this affair was so quarrel in 1831, he resigned his place in Indiana College and became Professor of Mathematics and Astronomy in Hanover College. From 1837 to 1844 he was Editor of the Louisville Democrat, a newspaper of wide influence in the West. He died in Louisville, Jan. 26, 1868. 332 FOURTH YEAR novel and so grandly impudent, that it took him the first half of the harangue to collect himself, and the other to concoct the fol- lowing judicious compound of decision, sarcasm and blarney: "It is with regret, General Jacobus and my respected fellow citizens, I interrupt the eloquent utterance of sentiments so pa- triotic and so well adapted to excite our disgust and horror at a union of Church and State; but in the present case, I do really believe the danger is not to be apprehended. In the first place, we all know the liberal sentiments of Professor Clarence towards all religious bodies; and in the second place, the gentleman just elected by us before the entrance of your honourable body and organ, is not known to be a member of any communion; and lastly, we Trustees are of six different denominations ourselves, and therefore, as we put in we can also put out, the instant danger is found to threaten the State from our present course. And, fellow-citizens, we shall, I am confident, be quite Argus-eyed over our faculty but at all events we have gone too far to retrace our steps; for Mr. Harwood is legally appointed, and for what we deemed good reasons. And surely no American citizen in this glorious land of equal rights and blood-bought liberties, where the meanest felon has a trial by jury, will contend that an hon- ourable unoffending man of another state the noble old Ken- tucky should be turned out of office and no accusation against his competency and moral character? Backwoodsmen don't ask that! and they don't think of it. Had this honourable representa- tion come fifteen minutes sooner, something might have been done or prevented ; for we are indeed servants of the people but Mr. Harwood ought now to have time to show himself, and cannot be degraded without an impeachment. And who is ready to im- peach a Kentuckian because John Calvin or John Anybody else burnt Servetus a hundred years ago? and that, when it is not even known whether Mr. Harwood himself might not have been roasted in the days of persecution for some heresy mathematical or religious! Fellow citizens, our meeting is adjourned." Our venerable Congress at Washington sometimes gets into a row, and even breaks up in a riot. And why should it not be so, when many conscript fathers have practised bullyism from early life, and have only gone to the great conservative assembly to do, FOURTH YEAR 333 on a large scale, dirty things often done before on a small one? Or why, on the other hand, if the reverend young fathers there set us, the people, the example, should any person affect to wonder that we sometimes imitate our law givers? Whether we, the New Purchase people, set or followed the example, need not be determined; but we certainly adjourned to-day in a grand kick- up; which, if described, must be in the pell-mell style of history. At the word "adjourned," ending Doctor Sylvan's speech, came a violent and simultaneous rush ; some pushing towards the door, to get out some from without into the door, to get in and some towards the clerk's seat, to seize and destroy the record ; but that wary officer, at the same word just named, had quietly slipped the sacred record into his breeches' pocket, the minutes being only recorded with a lead pencil on a quarter sheet of cap paper. Then commenced a hell-a-below, loud enough at first, but which, like a Latin Inceptive, still went on and tended to perfection ; being an explosion commingled of growl, curse, hurrah, hiss, stamp, and clap; and then and there and all through the "mass meeting," were Brigadier Major General Jacobus, and our people and the people's people and other people, all huddled and crowded and mixed, and all and every one and each were and was explaining, demanding, denying, do-telling, and wanting to know, some what thus: "Hurrah for Harwood ! damn him and Clarinse too ain't the money our'n, that's what I want to know ? I say Doctor, re- member next 'lection ! that's the pint you lie, by the lord Harry ! let me out, blast your eyes! it ain't it tis let us in, won't you ? do tell General Jacobus ought to have his nose pulled he didn't burn him don't tell me pull it if you dare he burnt hisself go to the devil no patchin' to him powerful quick on the trigger Calvin get up petition to legislature rats didn't I say we ought to get down sooner? faggots Harwood ain't gunpowder darn'd clever fellow Servetus hurrah for hie haec hoc! let's out give 'em more money let's in is the board to be forced? get out o' my way fair trial don't blast answer that I know better 'tain't 'tis hold your jaw whoo! shoo! hiss hinyow bowwow rumble grumble Sylvan Clarinse Jacobus Harwood Servetus" &c. &c., and away rolled majesty, 334 FOURTH YEAR till the noise in the distance was like the grum mutter of retiring thunder ! How awfully grand and solemn a little people in the swell of arrogated supremacy! But we saw King Mob to greater ad- vantage next year; which sight shall be duly set before our read- ers. Meanwhile we shall take a pleasant rural excursion in the the following chapter, by way of recreating after our toils in behalf of learning. CHAPTER XLIV. "We still have slept together, Rose at an instant, learn'd, play'd, eat together." ****** " Are not these woods More free from peril than the envious court?" READER ! "Well, what now?" Will you go with us ? Come, surely Tippecanoe will arouse you ; and although we have miles of dark, tangled, and, in places, almost untrodden forests to pass ; although we shall ford and swim creeks, swollen from recent rains, and where a blundering horse would plunge the rider into rapid and whirling waters; and although some inconveniences and customs will be found inconsistent with steamboats and rail road journeys, yet who will not risk all to stand on the battle field of the brave, amid the sadness of its solitary and far-distant prairie! "Very eloquent! but, Mr. Carlton, only think of the mud." Yes, dear reader, but the girls are to go along. "Girls!" Yes, and very pretty and intelligent ones too real lady Hoosiers. "Are you in earnest ? Who are they ?" The young ladies of Miss Emily Glenville's Woodville Female Institute. "Oh! ay! I had forgot your school what then?" FOURTH YEAR 335 Why, it is our vacation, and myself with one or two other gentlemen are going to escort the giils home. Seven of the pupils belong to wealthy and respectable families in the north, and one or two live very near to Tippecanoe. "Heigho ; out of compliment to the ladies we go ; but how long will you be yet?" Oh, we shall get through after a while. "No lane," you know, &c. Of course then you consent. Well, our party consisted of eleven persons the seven girls, the father and brother of one girl, and myself and young Mr. Frank, of Woodville, who, like myself, wished to see the world. To carry us were precisely ten horses and a half, the fractional creature being a dwarf pony, an article or noun, which young B k, the brother rode, like a velocipede, and which, by pressing the toes of boots against hard and hilly places in the path, could be aided by pushing. And thus, also, the rider could a sorter stand and go, like wheels in motion, at once; and all that would greatly relieve the tedium of monotonous riding. The special use of the pony was manifested in fording mudholes, quicksands, quagmires, marshes, high waters, and the like. In vain did the rider pull up his limbs ; * in vain shrink away up towards the centre of his saddle up followed the cream-coloured mud in beech swamps, the black mud and water in bayous, the black mud itself in walnut and sugar lands, or the muddy water in turbid creeks and rivers, and the rider became deeply interested in the circu- lating medium. But what a contrast to a stage coach, to say nothing of a car; ten horses and upwards to carry eleven people; And how I do wish you could have seen us set out ! Dear oh, dear ! the scamp- ering, and tearing, and winnowing, and kicking up, and cocking of ears, as the quadrupeds were "being" rid up to the rack ! and then the clapping on of horse-blankets and saddles, male and female, croopers and circingles and bridles, double and single! What a drawing of girths ! What a fixing and unfixing and re- fixing of saddle-bags! What a hanging of "fixins" themselves, done up in red handkerchiefs on the horns of the gentler sex sad- dles! And then the girls like the barbarians in Caesar's Com- 1 Lower limbs here, in contradistinction to upper ones. 336 FOURTH YEAR mentaries in one battle, they seemed to be every where at once up stairs, down stairs, on the stairs, in the closet under the stairs ! They were in the house, out of the house, in the yard, at the door, by the horses! And ah, how they did ask questions and get answers. "Where's my shawl?" "Is this it?" "Did nobody see my basket?" "I didn't." "Who's got my album?" "Mr. Frank." "Will some body fasten my fixens?" "He ain't here." "Won't nobody carry this?" and so on through all the bodies. The animals were now all harnessed, and stood comparatively quiet, except an occasional impatient stamp, or an active and venomous switch of a tail: the bustle, too, had subsided, and all had come to that silent state when no more questions can be asked, but all are waiting for some one to begin the farewell. And then came that sad word, amid gushing tears mid sobs and kisses for with some "the schooling" was finished, and "who could tell whether ever more should meet" those sprightly, happy, sweet companions ! But soon followed the uproar of mounting; and with that seem-ed to pass all sorrow ; and yet so painful had been the last few moments, that an excuse was needed for saying and doing something lively. Of course we all said a great many smart things, or what passed for such, in the way of compliment, rail- lery and repartee ; and we guessed and reckoned and allowed and foretold the most contrary matters about the weather, and the roads, and the waters, and even about our fates through the whole of our coming lives. In the meanwhile horse after horse was paraded towards the block, each receiving extra jerks, and some handsome slaps and kicks on the off flank, to make him wheel into position, when next moment away he scampered with a side- way rider, in trot, shuffle, pace, or canter, according to his fancy, till all the lady riders were on the saddles, and then Mr. B k, sen., and myself riding in advance, he shouted, "Come on, girls we're off." And off it was amidst the giggling of girls, and the laughter of neighbours, nodding good byes with their heads, or shaking them out of handkerchiefs, from doors and windows ; and also the boisterous farewells of some two dozen folks that had helped us FOURTH YEAR 337 fix. Off it was, some at a hard trot, some at a round gallop, and others at a soft pace or shuffle, the animals snorting, squeeling, and winnowing sometimes six abreast, sometimes two, sometimes all huddled like a militia cavalry training; and then all in Indian file, one by one, with yards of space between us! Oh! the squeezing of lower limbs against horse rumps! the kicking and splattering of mud! the streaming forth of ill-secured kerchiefs and capes! Oh! the screeching! shouting! laughing! shaking! What flapping of saddleskirts ! What walloping of saddle-bags ! Away with stages! steamers! cars! Give me a horse and the life, activity and health of Hoosiers and Hoosierinas let loose all at once in the whirligig storm and fury of that morning's starting ! We soon degenerated into slow trot, and finally into a fast walk, with episodial riding to scare a flock of wild turkies, or add wings to the flight of a deer; till we all became at last so shaken down and settled in our saddles as to seem each a com- pound of man ( 8@*" homo} and horse. Yet for hours we kept up talk of all kinds. Yea! we halloed we quizzed we laughed! Ay ! we talked seriously too for no one rides through our grand woods any more than he sails forth on the grand waters, and feels not solemn ! And we even talked religiously more so than most readers would care to hear! Lively, indeed, we were but God even then was in our thoughts ; and some of that happy com- pany were then, and are yet, ornaments of the Christian world some are in heaven ! Yes, then as now, we often passed, as is the case with the joyous, the frank-hearted, the middle class, 2 and, in an instant, from laughter to tears. No halt was made for dinner: it was handed round on horse- back. A piece, or half a piece of ham, boxed neatly between two boards of corn-bread, and held delicately as possible between the finger and thumb of an attendant, was thus presented for acceptance. Yet not always was it easy to take the proffered dainties; since often the horse, out of sheer affectation, or be- cause of a sly kick or switch from an unseen quarter, would, at 2 To that we belong, and hope we always shall : "Give me neither poverty nor riches." 338 FOURTH YEAR the instant of captation, jump aside, or leap forward, and verify the proverb "many a slip between the cup and lip." Towards evening it was heard that Slippery River was falling, but could not be forded ; and hence it was determined to stay all night in a cabin several miles this side, in expectation of our being able to ford in the morning. We were, of course, received by our friends with open hearts, and entertained in the most ap- proved backwoods' style, the only awkwardness being that beds could be furnished but for four of our party. As some, therefore, must sleep on the floor, it was unanimously voted that all should share alike in the hardship and frolic of a puncheon's night's rest ; and hence, in due season, all hands were piped to convert our sup- per-room into a grand bed-chamber. And first, the floor was swept; secondly, our blankets were spread on it; thirdly, over these horse-cloths was put a good rag carpet; and, lastly, in a line were ranged saddle-bags and valises, interspersed with other bolsters and pillows stuffed with feathers and rags; and then, the fire being secured, we all began to undress "Oh ! goodness ! Mr. Carlton ! girls ! and all ?" Girls and all, my dear. "I vow then, I will never marry and go to a New Purchase? But did the ladies really divest hem ! before the the " To be sure. "What ! take off all the usual " Oh! that I cannot say. Western gentlemen never peep. Be- sides the gentlemen took off only coats and boots ; and intelligent ladies everywhere always know how to act according to necessity. Our order of "reclinature," as Doctor Hexagon would here doubtless say, was as follows: Mr. B k, sen., reclined first, having on his outside next the door, his son, and on the inside, his daughter ; then the other girls, one after another, till all were finished ; then his modesty, Mr. C., who, having a wife at home, was called, by courtesy to suit the occasion, an old man ; and then, outside him, and next the other door young Mr. Frank "I never!" 8 and then after a little nearly inaudible whispering, bursting 8 What ! never read the story of Boaz and Ruth ? FOURTH YEAR 339 at short intervals into very audible giggles, the hush of the dark wilderness came upon us and an a "What?" Hey ! oh ! ah ! I beg pardon I think we must have been asleep ! ****** After breakfast our friend Mr. B k, sen., offered an earnest prayer, in which thanks were returned for past mercies and favours, and supplication made for protection during the prospec- tive perils of the day; and in an hour after we were within sight, and hearing too, of the sullen and angry flood. The waters had, indeed, fallen in a good degree, and they were still decreasing, yet no person, a stranger to the West, could have looked on that foaming and eddying river leaping impetuous over the rocky bed, and have heard the echoes of its many thun- ders calling from cliff to cliff, and from one dark cavern to another in the forest arched over the water, no inexperienced traveller, all sign of hoof and wheel leading to the ford obliterated, could have supposed that our party, and mostly very young girls, were seriously preparing to cross that stream on our horses! But either that must be, or our path be retraced ; and sobered, there- fore, although not intimidated, we made ready for the perilous task. The older and more resolute girls were seated on the sure- footed horses, and all their dresses were properly arranged, and all loose cloaks and clothes carefully tied up, that, in case of accident, nothing might entangle the hands or feet. Several little girls were to be seated behind the gentlemen, while a loose horse or two was left to follow. We gentlemen riders were also to ride be- tween two young ladies, to aid in keeping their horses right, to seize a rein on emergencies, and to encourage the ladies, in case they showed any symptoms of alarm. Things ready, we all rode boldly to the water's edge ; where a halt was called, till Mr. B. k and Mr. C. should go foremost and try the ford. And now, dear reader, it may be easy to ford Slippery River in this book, and maybe Mr. C. has contrived to seem courageous like but that morning, at first sight of that ugly water, he did secretly wish it had been bridged, and feel that is wished all safe over; and possibly had he been favoured with a 340 FOURTH YEAR few moments' more reflection, he might have been rather scared yet just then, souse went Mr. B. up to his saddle-skirts, seem- ing a man on a saddle with a tail streaming out horizontally, and and then came his voice thus : "Come on, Carlton ! come on !" "Ay! ay! sir I'm in souse splash! Oho! the water's in my boots!" "Hold up your legs ! why don't you ?" "Forgot it, Mr. B. don't care now can't get any wetter." N. B. None, save born and bred woodsmen, can keep the limbs properly packed and dry on the horse neck, in deep fords : naturalized woodmen never do it either gracefully or successfully. I have myself vainly tried a hundred times : but at the first desper- ate plunge and lurch of the quadruped, I have always had to unpack the articles and let them drop into the water otherwise I should have dropped myself. Mr. B. and myself rode around and into the deepest places, satisfying ourselves and the rest, that with due caution and for- titude the ford was practicable or nearly so: and then I re- turned for the girls, while Mr. B. rode down and stationed him- self in the middle river about twenty-five yards below the ford proper, to intercept, if possible, any article or person falling from or thrown by a blundering horse. Having myself been in the deepest water, although not the most rapid, and knowing that much depended on my firmness and care, my sense of per- sonal danger was lost in anxiety for my precious charge; and I re-entered the perilous flood with the girls with something like a determination, if necessary, to save their lives rather than my own. Several of these, from the first, utterly refused all assistance; they now sat like queens of the chivalric age seeming, occasion- ally, tiny boats trimmed with odd sails and tossing mid the foam, as their horses rose and sunk over the roughness of the rocky bottom 1 The other girls, shutting their eyes to avoid looking at the seeming dangers, and also to prevent swimming of the head, held the horn of the saddle with a tenacious grasp, and sur- rendered the horses to the guidance of the escorts. On reaching the middle of the river, here some eighty yards wide, the depth had, indeed, decreased to about two feet; but FOURTH YEAR 341 then the rocks being more, and larger and rougher, the current was raging among them a miniature of the Niagara Rapids. Here was I seized with a momentary perplexity. By way of punishing the incipient cowardice, however, I checked my own horse and that of the trembling girl next me, and thus remain- ing, forced my eyes to survey the whole really terrific scene, and to comtemplate a cataract of waters thundering in an unbroken sheet over a ledge of rocks thirty feet high, and a short distance above the ford. And having thus compelled myself in the very midst of the boiling sea, to endure its surges, we proceeded cau- tiously and lesisurely, till with no other harm than a good wetting, especially to my boots and upwards, and a little palpitation of the heart, all came safe to land. And then the chattering; and how we magnified ourselves! The charges and denials too! "Mary what makes you so pale?" "Pshaw! I'm not I was not scared a bit!" "Nor me neither " "Ha ! ha ! ha ! you had your eyes shut all the time !" "Oh! Mr. Carlton had I?" "Well" said he "we must not tell tales out of school: beside I was half afraid I should get scared myself." "You! Mr. Carlton" said Mr. B. "well it may be so; but without flattery, you brought the girls over about as well as I could have done it myself why, you were as cool as a woodsman." "Well after that praise, Mr. Blank" (for that is the name) "I mean to set up for a real genuine Hoosier." Reader ! I did not deserve such praise : but as to being "cool," there was no mistake only think of the cold water in my boots and elsewhere! Inquiry was now made about the pony : and that was answered by a general "Haw! haw! haw! hoo! hoo! hoo! he! he! he!" and so through the six cases and mingled with the exclamations "look ! look !" "down thare ! down thare !" We of course looked; and about thirty yards below the land- ing, was pony, or rather pony's head, his body and tail being invisible ; but whether hippopotamus-like he walked on the bot- tom, or was actually swimming, was uncertain. But there he was; and, by the progression of his ears, he was manifestly making headway pretty fast towards our side ; although ever and 342 FOURTH YEAR anon, by the sudden dousing of his ears, he had either plunged into water deeper than his expectation, or been momentarily up- set by the current. By this time our two young gentlemen had got opposite to pony and were wafting to assist at his toilette on his emerging; for his saddle and bridle, &c., had been all brought over on a vacated steed. The three soon rejoining us, we all, in health and with grateful hearts and good spirits, were again dashing on, wild and independent Tartars, through our own loved forests. But before we could reach our quarters this night, Nut Creek was to be passed, too deep to be forded, and having neither bridge nor scow ! it was to be done by canoe ! and travelling by the canoe line has very little amusement, although abundance of danger and trouble and excitement. The canoe, in the present case, was a log ten feet long and eighteen inches wide and hacked, burned, and scraped, to the depth of a foot: and it was tolerably well rounded to a point at each end, being however, destitute of keel or rudder. It was indeed, wholly unlike a fairy skiff found in poetry or Scott's Novels, or in the engravings of annuals bound in cloth and gold and reposing on centre tables. Nor was it either classical or Indian. It differed from a bark-canoe as a wooden shoe from a black morocco slipper! Either nature, or a native, had begun a hog-trough to hold swill and be snouted: but its capacities prov- ing better than expectation a little extra labour had chopped the thing into a log-boat! Well into this metamorphosed log was now to be packed a most precious load. To one end went first, Mr. Blank, senr. with a paddle ; then were handed along, one by one, the tremb- ling girls, who sitting instantly on the bottom of the trough and closing their eyes, held to its sides with hands clenched as for life; and then followed Mr. C. filling up the few inches of re- maining space, and for the first time in his days holding a canoe paddle ! and then at the cry "let go !" our two junior gentlemen on the bank relaxed their hands and our laden craft was at the mercy of the flood! Many a boat had I rowed on the Delaware and the Schuylkill, often a skiff on the Ohio, ay ! and poled and set over many a scow : but what avail that civilized practice, in propelling for FOURTH YEAR 343 the first time in one's life a hollow log, and with a small paddle like a large mush stick? and across a raging torrent in a gloomy wilderness? Was it so wonderful my end went round? and more than once! Could I help it? Was it even a wonder I looked solemn? grew dizzy? and at last quit paddling al- together? But it was a wonder I did not upset that vile swine thing, and plunge all into the water perhaps into death ! and yet we all reached, by the skill of Mr. Blank, our port in safety. The horses in the meanwhile had been stripped, and three or four trustworthy ones released from their bridles to swim over by themselves : and so we made ready to ferry over the remain- ing animals and all the baggage, not, indeed at one, but several trips. The trust-worthy and more sensible creatures were led by the mane, or the nose, or driven with switches, and pelted with clods to the edge of the creek; where they were partly coaxed, and partly pushed into the flood, whence rising from the plunge, they swam snorting to the far side, and landing, con- tinued cropping about till wanted. The less accommodating creatures were one at a time managed thus: Mr. Blank, senr. took a station at that end of the canoe, which when dragged round by the horse would become the stern, to guide and steer; and Mr. C. twice, and Mr. Frank and young Blank each once, was seated in the prow that was to be, and held the rope or bridle attached at the other end to the horse's head: then, all ready, the creature pulled by the person in the canoe and pelted, beat, slapped and pushed by the two on land took the "shoote;" in this case a plunge direct over head and ears into water a little over nine feet deep! If this did not drag under or upset the log, that was owing to the (hem!) dexterity and presence of mind and so forth, of the steersman and the man at the bridle end ! But when the animal arose and began to snort and swim ahead ! oh ! sirs, then was realized and enjoyed all ever fabled about Neptune and his dolphins! or Davy Crockett and his alligators ! What if you have a qualm at first ! that is soon lost in the excitement of this demi-god sailing ! It is even grand ! to cross a perilous flood on a log harnessed to a river horse ! and with the rapidity of a comet, and the whirl and splash of a steamer! No wonder our Western people do often feel contempt for the tender nurslings of the East! And is it 344 FOURTH YEAR not likely that the fables about sea-cars, and water-gods, orig- inated when men lived in the woods, dieted on acorns, and re- created themselves with this horse and log navigation ? The hint may be worth something to the editors of Tooke's Pantheon. ***** In an hour and a half we reached our second night's lodging place; and next day, at noon, the girls being committed to the junior gentlemen to escort to Sugartown, the residence of Mr. Blank, he and the author took the episodial journey, described in the following chapter. CHAPTER XLV. "Shaking his trident, urges on his steeds, Who with two feet beat from their brawny breasts The foaming billow; but their hinder parts Swim, and go smooth against the curling surge." WE parted from our young folks, at an obscure trace, leading Mr. B. and Mr. C. away to the left towards Big Possum Creek ; along which, somewhere in the woods, Mr. Blank expected to meet an ecclesiastical body, of which he was a member. The spot was found late that night ; but as yet no delegates had appeared, and when next day at three o'clock p. M., a slingle clergyman appeared, jaded and muddy, and reported the waters as too high for members in certain directions to come at all, the whole affair was postponed till the subsidence of the flood; or, it was adjourned till dry weather! Mr. Blank being an officer of the general government, and having important matters demanding his immediate attention, now took me aside, and began as follows : "Mr. Carlton, do you want to try a little more backwood's life?" "Why?" "Because, if possible, I should like to reach my house to-night." "To-night ! ! why 'tis half-past three ! and your house is at least thirty-five miles " "Yes, by the trace, up Big Possum but in a straight line through the woods 'tis not over twenty-five miles." FOURTH YEAR 345 "But there is no road?" "I don't want any; the sun is bright, and by sun-down, we shall strike a new road laid out last fall; and that I can fol- low in the night." "I have never, M*r. B. swum a horse ; and I confess I'm a leetle timid; and we cannot expect even canoes where there are no settlements " "Oh ! never fear, I'll go ahead ; beside, Big Possum is all that is very seriously in the way; and I think it will hardly swim us now come, what do you say will you go?" "Well let's see; twenty-five miles no road, no settlement, won't quite swim, maybe new road in the dark pretty fair for a tyro, Mr. Blank ; but I can't learn sooner ; I'll go, sir let us be off at once then." Our friends expressed some surprise, and used some dehorta- tion; but the bold, energetic, and cautious character of Mr. B. was well known, and hence no great fears were either expressed or felt for our safety. Accordingly, after a hasty kind of din- ner-supper, we were mounted, and started away in the fashion of boys' foot races, prefaced by the formula "are you saddled? are you bridled ? ? whip ! start ! and Go-o ! !" Big Possum was soon reached; and as there was no ford es- tablished by law or custom, it was to be forded at a venture. My friend sought, indeed, not for a place less deep apparently, but for one less impeded by bushes and briars, and then in he plunged, "accoutred as he was, and bade me follow." And so, indeed, I did boldly, and promptly; for my courage was really so modest as to need the stimulus of a blind and reckless conduct. Hence, all I knew was a "powerful heap" of water in my boots again, and an uneasy wet sensation in the saddle-seat 1 with a curious sinking of the horses "hinder parts," as if he kicked at something and could not hit it and then a hard scramble of his fore legs in the treacherous mud of a bank; and then this outcry of Mr. Blank, as he turned an instant in his saddle to watch my emersion: "Well done! Carlton! well done! You'll be a woodsman yet! Come, keep up the worst is over." 1 1 hope the Magazines won't be hard on the grammar here it is so great a help to our delicacy a double intender like. 346 FOURTH YEAR Reader ! I do think praise is the most magical thing in nature ! In this case it nearly dried my inexpressibles ! And on I followed, consoling myself for the other water in the boots, by singing "possum up a gum tree!" "Hulloo! Mr. B. how are you steering? by the moss?" "No by the shadows'' "Shadows! how's that?" "Our course is almost North East the sun is nearly West so cutting the shadows of the trees at the present angle, we'll strike the road, this rate, about sun-set." I had travelled by the moss, a good general guide, the north and north-west sides of trees, having more and darker moss than the others ; I had gone by a compass in a watch key by blazes by the under side of leaves recently upturned, a true Indian trace, as visible to the practiced eye as the warm scent to a hound's nose and by the sun, moon, or stars ; I had, in dark days, gone with comrades, who by keeping some fifty yards apart in a line, could correct aberrations ; but never had I thought of our present simple and infallible guide! Man maybe, as some think, very low in the intellectual scale, and yet he has one mark of divine resemblance he always is in search of simple agents and means, and when found, he uses them in producing the greatest effects. Witness here man's con- trivances for navigating through the air and the waters, and for crossing deserts and solitudes! Laugh if you will, but I do con- fess that as we bounded along that beautiful sunny afternoon and evening, I felt how like gods we availed ourselves of reason, in that wilderness without squatters, without blazes, without dry leaves, having no compass, and indifferent to moss; ay, and I smiled at the grim trees, while we cut athwart their black shadows at the proper angle, and heard from den and ravine and cliff the startled echoes crying out in amazement, in answering clat- ter and clang of hoofs and clamour of human voices ! For many miles the land was low and level, and mostly cov- ered with water in successive pools, seeming, at a short distance, like parts of one immense lake of the woods ! These pools were rarely more than a few inches deep, unless in cavities where trees had been torn up by their roots, and such holes were easily avoided by riding around the prostrate tops. My friend had FOURTH YEAR 347 not expected quite so much water; for he now called out at intervals "Come on! Carlton! we mustn't be caught here in the dark the sun's getting low can you keep up?" "Ay ay go on! go on!" And then, after every such exhortation and reply, as if all past trotting had been walking, away, away we splashed, not kicking up a dust, but a mimic shower of aqueous particles, and many a smart sprinkle of mud, that rattled like hail on the leaves above, and the backs and shoulders below ! Never did I believe how a horse can go! at least through mud and water! True, I did often think of "the merciful man, merciful to his beast!" but I thought in answer, that hay and oats were as scarce in the swamp as hog and hominy ; and hence, that for all our sakes we had better bestir matters a little extra for an hour or two, that all might get to "entertainment for man and horse." Hence, finally, we gave up all talking, singing humming, and whistling, and all conjecturing and wishing; and set in to plain, unostentatious hard riding, kicking and whipping, our respective "critturs" so heartily as to leave no doubt somewhere under their hides, of our earnestness and haste ; and, therefore, about half an hour after sunset, we gained or struck the expected road, where, although not yet free from the waters, we had no more appre- hension of losing the course. This road was, in truth, a new new. road; and not like some new new roads, new theatres and so forth that have had a patent for immortality and been fresh with youth for half a century. 2 And, happily, our road had never been cut up by a wagon, being only an opening twelve yards wide, full of stumps, and for a few miles ahead, full of water. Without a fixed pur- pose, therefore, we could not wander from the partially illumi- nated and comparatively unimpeded way; and hence twilight as it was, on we splattered and splashed in all the glory and pleni- tude of mud-hail, and dirt-coloured rain. At last we re-entered the dry world a high and rolling coun- try. As it was, however, then profoundly dark, our concluding 2 However, new books now-a-days are exempt from the remark being no more than literary fungi. Our fathers liked stale new things the sons prefer new things that have a smell and die. 348 FOURTH YEAR five miles were done in a walk, slow, solemn, and funereal; till at half past ten o'clock that night we dismounted or disembarked, wet, weary, and hungry, at Mr. B.'s door: and there we were more than welcomed by his family and all our boys and girls snug and safe from the late perils of woods and waters. CHAPTER XLVI. "Slowly and sadly we laid him down From the field of his fame, fresh and gory ; We carved not a line, we raised not a stone, But we left him alone with his glory." Ax the end of a week's visit we left Sugartown for Tippe- canoe: but with a very diminished party. It consisted of one young lady, the two young gentlemen, myself, and other four, horses. The lady, Miss Charille, lived twenty-five miles to the north, and within ten miles of Tippecanoe. The young fellows accompanied out of gallantry, and to visit with me the field. Being in a hurry, I shall not say how, in fording and swim- ming Sweet Creek, my head became dizzy, till my horse seemed to rush sideways up the stream and how, spite of all practice and contrary resolutions, I felt sick and let down my limbs into the water, while Mr. B., who came to see us safe over, kept crying out, "Stick to your horse don't look at the water look at the bank !" Nor shall I tell how, in crossing a prairie, we saw, oh ! I don't know how many deer! nor how we started up prairie fowls, hens and roosters, and wished we had guns ! yes, and saw prairie wolves too, a cantering from us over the plain ! And I shall not narrate how in crossing one wet prairie, we were decoyed by some pretty, rich, green grass, into a morass! and how Miss Charille's horse stuck fast, and struggling, pitched her into the mire ! and how she was more scared than hurt, and worse muddied than either! I should like to tell about the tall grass in places, but I hasten to say, that early in the evening we arrived at Mr. Charille's; that we were cordially received; that we got supper in due season, and then went to bed in western style, all in one room: the beds here nearly touching in places, FOURTH YEAR 349 buHngeniously separated by extemporary curtains of frocks and petticoats, and on a side of my bed, by two pairs of modest and respectable corduroy breeches. Fastidious folks, that smell at essences and flourish perfumed cambric, I know would have laid awake, curling their noses at the articles, but sensible ones in such cases go quietly to sleep ; while men of genius are even cap- tivated with the romance. "Romance! what, a curtain of corduroy thinging-bobs ?" Yes, corduroy breeches modestly hung as wall between ladies and gentlemen, reposing amid the solemn vastness of a prairie! If that is not romance, pray what is ? To sleep alone in a plastered chamber, with a lock on the door, blinds to the windows, wash- stand, toilette, and so on, is very comfortable very civilized but surely not very romantic. And if strangeness is a consti- tuent of romance, could any fix and fixtures be contrived stranger than ours? However like a sensible body, I went soon and quietly to sleep, and was quickly in spirit lost in the land of shadows and dreams : and having a fine capacity for dreaming, I had many visions, till at last came one of my pet dreams a winged dream! Then, lifted on pinions fastened some where about me, I went sailing in the air over the wide expanse of the meadow world ; then, ca- reering in a black tempest and hurricane, far above the bowing and crashing trees of the forest and then suddenly descending near a mighty swollen river, I was deprived in some mysterious way of the wings ! Here I lay stretched on a bed, while the form of that venerable quadruped, my dear nameless old friend, a little larger than life, backed up and became harnessed to the foot of the couch, and the dwarf pony began with his hinder parts to push against the head-board and I was just a-launching into the waters, when down dropped both the steeds, and commenced to snort with so tremendous a tempest of noise as to wake me! I rubbed my eyes and smiled but is it possible? hark! am I still dreaming? What is that beyond the corduroys in the ad- joining bed? Dear, oh dear! can that be Dr. Charille snoring? During the week spent at Mr. Blank's his lady had once said to me, "M because, the day before, I had been weighed in Mr. Retail's patent scales, and my weight was exactly One Hundred and Ninety Pounds ! and, of course, when we came together, he found himself and his hat where he informs you ! !" "Is that true, Mr. Carlton ! ?" Yes, reader, it is: and I'll take my "affidavy on it." "What meeting of your Board, was this?" A called meeting, called by the Government, v r ith a view to have his rebellious Professors instantly expelled. It was held about the middle of our final six months : but it would make too long a book to do more than run over a few outlines. After the exchange of papers, notes, and other diplomatics, the Board, the Government, and Faculty, convened; when Bloduplex began continued ay, and held on even ahead, for two long summer days, "from rise of morn to set of sun ;" and then ended, because fully blown out! But after that, for other speech or reply there was no time, and, happily, no necessity. As usual, the President read his certificates gave his religious experience, and miraculous conversion from infidelity told of his sainted mother looking down on him and sobbed, and finally roared right out, like a bull-calf forcibly held back from the cow ! From this recovering, he told us how Harwood and Clarence had even ridiculed that experience! and expressed suspicion about those tears, when he had indiscreetly given them the same history in private ! He then went over his own whole life and character did the same for Harwood, and ditto for Clarence : in all which he showed the pre-eminence of his mnemonic-system, by detailing to us every word, joke, pleasantry, tea-drinking, walk in the woods, rash-saying, silly-word, indignant-exclamation, &c. &c. 5i6 CONCLUDING SIX MONTHS and even very many improper things that "should have been" said and done by our Professors, but which never had been ! He tried his hand at irony and sarcasm, comparing himself to Dr. Johnson, and Clarence to Boswell ! He ridiculed Clarence for being a "charity scholar:" because, at Princeton, he had paid nothing for his Theological education ! He then acted the bottle story which, however, cannot be fully represented without a diagram : but he used one hand for a bottle, and the fore-finger of the other as corkscrew ; and then, holding the -bottle-and-corked- fist under an Honourable Trustee's nose, he suddenly, with cork- screw-finger jerked out the cork, and let out the whole essence, in that remarkable sentence, "Billy! you're a mighty little man!" And "this," added the facetious Government "this is what I did for the students at my house on the Saturday named, and to illustrate Professor Clarence's character; as I did not choose to employ a sledge-hammer to kill a fly !" It was now the Government, and with great complacency, spoke and acted the celebrated a posteriori mentioned in this work, and so often afterwards repeated by him. But, at length, this Great Engine ceased its emissions of steam; and we aroused to hear Clarence's reply, and yet with looks of peevishness, as dreading another long, elusive, windy tempest of words. Oh ! the delicious refreshing of his more than laconic reply thus: "Mr. Chairman, and Gentlemen of the Board, I have very much I could say but I shall make no reply !" This answer will be better appreciated from the following dialogue between Dr. Sylvan and Mr. Clarence, directly after our adjournment: Dr. S. "Never, sir, did you do a happier thing: you effected more for yourself than by a thousand speeches." Mr. C. "You saw me, Dr. Sylvan, for six hours the first day, taking notes, that I might reply to the innumerable slanders and falsehoods with which I was assailed : but, then occurred this thought, amid that torrent of ribaldry, viz : 'If these Trustees are gentlemen, they need not my reply; if they are not gentlemen, I need not make a reply.' And then, sir, you saw me crumble up my notes, and put them into my pocket: and I shall hand them over to Robert Carlton." CONCLUDING SIX MONTHS 517 Our called meeting, however, utterly declined expelling the Professors; and that, notwithstanding the President repeatedly said in his oration, that he would resign if Mr. Harwood was per- mitted to remain! We recommended, indeed, if, possible, an amicable private adjustment, and referred the whole matter to the new Board of Trustees, that were to meet in the Fall : a very cowardly behaviour, since we all privately felt and acknowledged that President Bloduplex certainly deserved to be dismissed, whatever the Professors may have merited. To Clarence, that resolution was nothing : he had resigned ; and, for weeks past, had been preparing, as all the town knew, to leave the Purchase! The attack on him now, was to have the existing contract annulled ; which would deprive him, it was sup- posed, of the residue of his salary; cripple his resources; blacken his character; and render his probable story of events less im- pressive! But Bloduplex overlooked Mr. Clarence's old crony, Robert Carlton, Esq, : and he saw not then and there "a chiel takin notes !" Beside, for ever to prevent any evil surmises in regard to Pro- fessor Clarence, our Board (and at the instance of Mr. Carlton), not only unanimously voted the full and entire acquittal of Clar- ence, but each and every one of them did personally and individ- ually over and above the official signatures, add his own name to my friend's honourable and laudatory dismissal ! Ay, and this man, after all that ingenuity and malice (and of practised cun- ning), could invent, and colour, and say of him, in a speech of two summer days! and after making no defence, nor an appeal to passion or prejudice, was acquitted! and, not only acquitted, but thanked and praised ! and by his very Judges ! ! "What do you think of that, Master Ford?" Harwood now stood alone : and Polyphemus having "a sorter" devoured one victim, took additional steps to eat the other. Sev- eral of our Board had, indeed, agreed with me in thinking and saying that "Doctor Bloduplex had behaved badly and even shamefully;" yet I warned Harwood that the New Board in the Fall, who "knew not Joseph and his brethren," would go, not ac- cording to justice and truth, but according to their ideas of interest and policy : because, too, some Trustees had told me that 5i8 CONCLUDING SIX MONTHS "they feared to dismiss Bloduplex, lest his influence might injure Woodinlle! that after such a quarrel, it would be difficult to obtain immediately another President and that the College must not be destitute of such, Mr. Clarence, the maker of the Institu- tion, being gone too !" It was now, Bloduplex, Lord Bishop of the parish church, sum- moned Harwood before his little ecclesiastical star-chamber, and had him excommunicated, for calling his Reverence a Liar: in- tending said excommunication to act like an interdict on a king- dom, and prejudice his antagonist's cause before the New Board of Trustees to meet in the Fall ! At this ecclesiastical Inquisition, Bloduplex himself sat as chief Inquisitor ! he made the charges ! he excluded the defensive testimony and all pleas of mitigation all entreaties to carry the whole at once to a higher court he directed the officials pronounced the sentence inflicted the torture ! As Nero to the primitive Christians, so did Bloduplex to Har- wood he dressed him in a wild beast's skin, and then hissed dogs on him! Ay, he was cruelly hunted like a brute! And after in vain spending his hard earned dollars in seeking redress, he in an excusable moment of bitter indignation left at last that, upon the whole, Best of Religious Denominations ! But let that Harwood, if he yet live, know there is One Bold enough to raise a voice against the vile Injustice of the Past one that knows and says Harwood was always badly, and sometimes basely and wickedly used! And let him know, too, that under better aus- pices, and but for some mere accidents, the Immense Majority of the Denomination he has left would have done him justice on his Cruel and Unrelenting Foe! ****** Reader ! here falls the curtain ! And we stand before it, not to announce a new Drama but our Farewell: We bid you adieu in the next and last chapter. CHAPTER LXVI. . "Nay then farewell ! I have touch'd the highest point of all my greatness : And from that full meridian of my glory I haste now to my setting: I shall fall Like a bright exhalation in the evening, And no man see me more." ABOUT the middle of October, a small Christian chapel was, one night, filled to overflowing ; and deeply impressive was the sadness and solemn hush of the congregation. They were listening to the farewell address of Charles Clarence! while the voice of the wind moaning in the dying woods around, came upon our hearing in fitful gusts like passionate gushings of lamentation for the fading away of their glories! Our injured and persecuted friend concluded thus : EXTRACT " But I must cease, and that with no expectation that I shall ever more preach to you ; or you ever again listen to me. This is sufficiently solemn and mournful; yet other things exist here to deepen now my sorrows. For some years this has been my home nay, why conceal it ? I had once cherished the hope it was to be my home for years to come! It was in my heart to live and die with you ! I came to be a Western Man but God forbade it. I have shared your prosperity and adversity; and in your hopes and fears, your joys and griefs. We have interchanged visits of mutual good-will; we have worshipped in the same temples ; we have solaced each other in afflictions ! We have met at the same house of feasting, alas! oftener at the same house of mourning! Yes! my children lie together, in their little graves, amidst the graves of your children that moaning wind is stirring now the leaves ever them! dust of mine is mingling with yours ! * * * Can these and other ties be so unexpectedly sundered without pain? without emotion? But the hour is come we part ! Come, fellow citizens and Christian friends, let us mutually forgive one another. If I have aught against the 520 CONCLUDING SIX MONTHS misled I have forgiven it; if any have aught against me, I pray such forgive me! Kindly do I thank many for past kindness, and more especially for the healing of their balm-like sympathy: and now let us say, not in indifference, much less in anger, but in manly, hearty good-will Farewell !" ****** In the morning his house was tenantless; Clarence had gone very early away with his family and Woodville with its pleasures and pains was to him as all other dreams of this life past! Soon after, the fragments of my shattered fortunes being col- lected, we, too, were ready to bid adieu to our home : home ! did I say ? Yes ; had we not graves there ? Alas ! we had them else- where too! ****** It was a rainy morning; but, notwithstanding, our little wagon and horses were at the door. All had been arranged and prepared for this morning, and all farewells, as we thought, had been spoken; and why should rain delay those that had endured so many storms? Emily Glenville was to go and share our fortunes 'but Aunt Kitty poor Aunt Kitty was to stay; for we were wandering forth we knew not whither, and she in her old age must remain till we found a resting-place. Home we expected to find no more (nor have we ever) and we had then the desolate hearts of pilgrims as now and often since ! Farewell! dearest Aunt Kitty! ah break not our hearts by that convulsive sobbing ! Farewell ! * * * * and then we were all in our wagon but just as we moved, a well-known, a rough, yet softened voice in a tone of melancholy reproach sounded at our side: "Bust my rifle! Mr. Carltin, you ain't a puttin off without bidden me and Domore good bye ! ?" "My honest old friends! no, never! but I could not find you yesterday when we went round bidding all the citizens good bye " "Well, we was out arter deer, for, says I to Domore, Domore says I, lets git a leg or two for Mrs. Carltin afore they goes and we've fetch'd 'em along in this here bag if you kin find room for 'em in this here waggin." CONCLUDING SIX MONTHS 521 "Thank you, my kind friends, with all our very hearts! I do wish we could make you some return we should be so glad to be remembered when we are away " "Bust my rifle if I ever forgit you and Domore wont nither " "No, indeed, Mr. Carltin and if you chance to come our way like, Domore's cabin will be open as in old times " "Yes ! Mr. Carltin and me and Domore and you'll have some more shots with the rifle good bye. Mr. Carltin God bless you good bye !" "Good bye, my friends! I have no home now but cabin or brick house, wherever you find us I say to you and all other frank-hearted honest woodsmen, as the old General said to you 'you will never find the string pulled in !' " Here I started my horses; and then the last we ever heard of Woodville was something very like : "Poor Carltin ! God bless him poor feller ! he's most powerful sorry and don't like to go back to the big-bugs!" And then through the uproar of the in- creasing storm came the voice of the two hunters united in a loud, cordial, solemn, last Farewell ! ****** Many years after this, on the pinnacle of the Great Cove Mountain of the Alleghanies, and leaning against a tree, stood a solitary traveller, who, after contemplating for some minutes the setting sun, thus broke forth into a soliloquy : "Yes! O Sun! thou art unchanged! melting away to a rest amid the same gorgeous clouds, piled on those distant mountains ! I remember thee rising in the brilliancy of that Spring morning! Here Clarence stood and looked towards the Elysium of that Far West and she was in his thoughts ! There is the rock where Brown, and Wilmar, and Smith rested a moment ! Sad remem- brances bitter emotions! O! Sun! as glorious thou as even those sumptuous curtains of woven cloud around thy pavilion as matchless ! 7 am changed alas ! how changed ! "Far West! that name has power to heave the bosom with sighs but it can call up no more forever the illusions of the dreamy days ! I know what is in thee, land of the setting Sun ! "A world of shadows is coming over yon vallies darker ones 522 CONCLUDING SIX MONTHS are on my soul ! That Spring Morning ! The comrades of that day where? The scenes! the sufferings! the disappoint- ments ! in that far away forest land ! Graves of my dead ! why need I care to weep, where there are none to mock. * * * * "World of Spirits! around and near me! No dreams no shadows there ! Sun, farewell ! thy last rays are falling across those graves in that leaf-covered resting place ! But they shall fall, to rise and set no more! Home! I have none now: but there is a home! "Awake ! from this dreamy life ! True, perfect, uninterrupted happiness is neither in the far East, nor in the far West : it is in God, in Christ, in Heaven !" Reader, dear reader! the lesson in that soliloquy is for thee! Ponder it; live according to it; and thou wilt never have read this book in vain ! University of California SOUTHERN REGIONAL LIBRARY FACILITY 405 Hilgard Avenue, Los Angeles, CA 90024-1388 Return this material to the library from which it was borrowed. 1 4 08-30-96P02:4f JAN 23 RCVD ,DOQV FACILITY A A 000018959