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THE PIONEERS

Or, The Sources of the Susquehanna

A Descriptive Tale

By J.  FENIMORE COOPER

INTRODUCTION

As this work professes, in its title-page, to be a descriptive tale,
they who will take the trouble to read it may be glad to know how much
of its contents is literal fact, and how much is intended to represent
a general picture.   The author is very sensible that, had he confined
himself to the latter, always the most effective, as it is the most
valuable, mode of conveying knowledge of this nature, he would have
made a far better book.   But in commencing to describe scenes, and
perhaps he may add characters, that were so familiar to his own youth,
there was a constant temptation to delineate that which he had known,
rather than that which he might have imagined.   This rigid adhesion to
truth, an indispensable requisite in history and travels, destroys the
charm of fiction; for all that is necessary to be conveyed to the mind
by the latter had better be done by delineations of principles, and of
characters in their classes, than by a too fastidious attention to
originals. 

New York having but one county of Otsego, and the Susquehanna but one
proper source, there can be no mistake as to the site of the tale. 
The history of this district of country, so far as it is connected
with civilized men, is soon told. 

Otsego, in common with most of the interior of the province of New
York, was included in the county of Albany previously to the war of
the separation.   It then became, in a subsequent division of
territory, a part of Montgomery; and finally, having obtained a
sufficient population of its own, it was set apart as a county by
itself shortly after the peace of 1783.   It lies among those low spurs
of the Alleghanies which cover the midland counties of New York, and
it is a little east of a meridional line drawn through the centre of
the State.   As the waters of New York flow either southerly into the
Atlantic or northerly into Ontario and its outlet, Otsego Lake, being
the source of the Susquehanna, is of necessity among its highest
lands.   The face of the country, the climate as it was found by the
whites, and the manners of the settlers, are described with a
minuteness for which the author has no other apology than the force of
his own recollections. 

Otsego is said to be a word compounded of Ot, a place of meeting, and
Sego, or Sago, the ordinary term of salutation used by the Indians of
this region.   There is a tradition which says that the neighboring
tribes were accustomed to meet on the banks of the lake to make their
treaties, and otherwise to strengthen their alliances, and which
refers the name to this practice.   As the Indian agent of New York had
a log dwelling at the foot of the lake, however, it is not impossible
that the appellation grew out of the meetings that were held at his
council fires; the war drove off the agent, in common with the other
officers of the crown; and his rude dwelling was soon abandoned.   The
author remembers it, a few years later, reduced to the humble office
of a smoke-house. 

In 1779 an expedition was sent against the hostile Indians, who dwelt
about a hundred miles west of Otsego, on the banks of the Cayuga.   The
whole country was then a wilderness, and it was necessary to transport
the bag gage of the troops by means of the rivers—a devious but
practicable route.   One brigade ascended the Mohawk until it reached
the point nearest to the sources of the Susquehanna, whence it cut a
lane through the forest to the head of the Otsego.   The boats and
baggage were carried over this “portage,” and the troops proceeded to
the other extremity of the lake, where they disembarked and encamped. 
The Susquehanna, a narrow though rapid stream at its source, was much
filled with “flood wood,” or fallen trees; and the troops adopted a
novel expedient to facilitate their passage.   The Otsego is about nine
miles in length, varying in breadth from half a mile to a mile and a
half.   The water is of great depth, limpid, and supplied from a
thousand springs.   At its foot the banks are rather less than thirty
feet high the remainder of its margin being in mountains, intervals,
and points.   The outlet, or the Susquehanna, flows through a gorge in
the low banks just mentioned, which may have a width of two hundred
feet.   This gorge was dammed and the waters of the lake collected: the
Susquehanna was converted into a rill. 

When all was ready the troops embarked, the damn was knocked away, the
Otsego poured out its torrent, and the boats went merrily down with
the current. 

General James Clinton, the brother of George Clinton, then governor of
New York, and the father of De Witt Clinton, who died governor of the
same State in 1827, commanded the brigade employed on this duty. 
During the stay of the troops at the foot of the Otsego a soldier was
shot for desertion.   The grave of this unfortunate man was the first
place of human interment that the author ever beheld, as the smoke-
house was the first ruin! The swivel alluded to in this work was
buried and abandoned by the troops on this occasion, and it was
subsequently found in digging the cellars of the authors paternal
residence. 

Soon after the close of the war, Washington, accompanied by many
distinguished men, visited the scene of this tale, it is said with a
view to examine the facilities for opening a communication by water
with other points of the country.   He stayed but a few hours. 

In 1785 the author’s father, who had an interest in extensive tracts
of land in this wilderness, arrived with a party of surveyors.   The
manner in which the scene met his eye is described by Judge Temple. 
At the commencement of the following year the settlement began; and
from that time to this the country has continued to flourish.   It is a
singular feature in American life that at the beginning of this
century, when the proprietor of the estate had occasion for settlers
on a new settlement and in a remote county, he was enabled to draw
them from among the increase of the former colony. 

Although the settlement of this part of Otsego a little preceded the
birth of the author, it was not sufficiently advanced to render it
desirable that an event so important to himself should take place in
the wilderness.   Perhaps his mother had a reasonable distrust of the
practice of Dr Todd, who must then have been in the novitiate of his
experimental acquirements.   Be that as it may, the author was brought
an infant into this valley, and all his first impressions were here
obtained.   He has inhabited it ever since, at intervals; and he thinks
he can answer for the faithfulness of the picture he has drawn. 
Otsego has now become one of the most populous districts of New York. 
It sends forth its emigrants like any other old region, and it is
pregnant with industry and enterprise.   Its manufacturers are
prosperous, and it is worthy of remark that one of the most ingenious
machines known in European art is derived from the keen ingenuity
which is exercised in this remote region. 

In order to prevent mistake, it may be well to say that the incidents
of this tale are purely a fiction.   The literal facts are chiefly
connected with the natural and artificial objects and the customs of
the inhabitants.   Thus the academy, and court-house, and jail, and
inn, and most similar things, are tolerably exact.   They have all,
long since, given place to other buildings of a more pretending
character.   There is also some liberty taken with the truth in the
description of the principal dwelling; the real building had no
“firstly” and “lastly. ” It was of bricks, and not of stone; and its
roof exhibited none of the peculiar beauties of the “composite order. ”
It was erected in an age too primitive for that ambitious school of
architecture.   But the author indulged his recollections freely when
he had fairly entered the door.   Here all is literal, even to the
severed arm of Wolfe, and the urn which held the ashes of Queen Dido. *

  * Though forests still crown the mountains of Otsego, the bear, the
    wolf, and the panther are nearly strangers to them.   Even the innocent
    deer is rarely seen bounding beneath their arches; for the rifle and
    the activity of the settlers hare driven them to other haunts.   To
    this change (which in some particulars is melancholy to one who knew
    the country in its infancy), it may be added that the Otsego is
    beginning to be a niggard of its treasures. 

The author has elsewhere said that the character of Leather-Stocking
is a creation, rendered probable by such auxiliaries as were necessary
to produce that effect.   Had he drawn still more upon fancy, the
lovers of fiction would not have so much cause for their objections to
his work.   Still, the picture would not have been in the least true
without some substitutes for most of the other personages.   The great
proprietor resident on his lands, and giving his name to instead of
receiving it from his estates as in Europe, is common over the whole
of New York.   The physician with his theory, rather obtained from than
corrected by experiments on the human constitution; the pious, self-
denying, laborious, and ill-paid missionary; the half-educated,
litigious, envious, and disreputable lawyer, with his counterpoise, a
brother of the profession, of better origin and of better character;
the shiftless, bargaining, discontented seller of his “betterments;”
the plausible carpenter, and most of the others, are more familiar to
all who have ever dwelt in a new country. 

It may be well to say here, a little more explicitly, that there was
no real intention to describe with particular accuracy any real
characters in this book.   It has been often said, and in published
statements, that the heroine of this book was drawn after the sister
of the writer, who was killed by a fall from a horse now near half a
century since.   So ingenious is conjecture that a personal resemblance
has been discovered between the fictitious character and the deceased
relative! It is scarcely possible to describe two females of the same
class in life who would be less alike, personally, than Elizabeth
Temple and the sister of the author who met with the deplorable fate
mentioned.   In a word, they were as unlike in this respect as in
history, character, and fortunes. 

Circumstances rendered this sister singularly dear to the author. 
After a lapse of half a century, he is writing this paragraph with a
pain that would induce him to cancel it, were it not still more
painful to have it believed that one whom he regarded with a reverence
that surpassed the love of a brother was converted by him into the
heroine of a work of fiction. 

From circumstances which, after this Introduction, will be obvious to
all, the author has had more pleasure in writing “The Pioneers” than
the book will probably ever give any of its readers.   He is quite
aware of its numerous faults, some of which he has endeavored to
repair in this edition; but as he has—in intention, at least—done his
full share in amusing the world, he trusts to its good-nature for
overlooking this attempt to please himself. 

CHAPTER 1. 

“See, Winter comes, to rule the varied years,
Sullen and sad, with all his rising train;
Vapors, and clouds, and storms. ”—Thomson. 

Near the centre of the State of New York lies an extensive district of
country whose surface is a succession of hills and dales, or, to speak
with greater deference to geographical definitions, of mountains and
valleys.   It is among these hills that the Delaware takes its rise;
and flowing from the limpid lakes and thousand springs of this region
the numerous sources of the Susquehanna meander through the valleys
until, uniting their streams, they form one of the proudest rivers of
the United States.   The mountains are generally arable to the tops,
although instances are not wanting where the sides are jutted with
rocks that aid greatly in giving to the country that romantic and
picturesque character which it so eminently possesses.   The vales are
narrow, rich, and cultivated, with a stream uniformly winding through
each.   Beautiful and thriving villages are found interspersed along
the margins of the small lakes, or situated at those points of the
streams which are favorable for manufacturing; and neat and
comfortable farms, with every indication of wealth about them, are
scattered profusely through the vales, and even to the mountain tops. 
Roads diverge in every direction from the even and graceful bottoms of
the valleys to the most rugged and intricate passes of the hills. 
Academies and minor edifices of learning meet the eye of the stranger
at every few miles as be winds his way through this uneven territory,
and places for the worship of God abound with that frequency which
characterize a moral and reflecting people, and with that variety of
exterior and canonical government which flows from unfettered liberty
of conscience.   In short, the whole district is hourly exhibiting how
much can be done, in even a rugged country and with a severe climate,
under the dominion of mild laws, and where every man feels a direct
interest in the prosperity of a commonwealth of which he knows himself
to form a part.   The expedients of the pioneers who first broke ground
in the settlement of this country are succeeded by the permanent
improvements of the yeoman who intends to leave his remains to moulder
under the sod which he tills, or perhaps of the son, who, born in the
land, piously wishes to linger around the grave of his father.   Only
forty years * have passed since this territory was a wilderness. 

  * Our tale begins in 1793, about seven years after the commencement of
    one of the earliest of those settlements which have conduced to effect
    that magical change in the power and condition of the State to which
    we have alluded. 

Very soon after the establishment of the independence of the States by
the peace of 1783, the enterprise of their citizens was directed to a
development of the natural ad vantages of their widely extended
dominions.   Before the war of the Revolution, the inhabited parts of
the colony of New York were limited to less than a tenth of its
possessions, A narrow belt of country, extending for a short distance
on either side of the Hudson, with a similar occupation of fifty miles
on the banks of the Mohawk, together with the islands of Nassau and
Staten, and a few insulated settlements on chosen land along the
margins of streams, composed the country, which was then inhabited by
less than two hundred thousand souls.  Within the short period we have
mentioned, the population has spread itself over five degrees of
latitude and seven of longitude, and has swelled to a million and a
half of inhabitants, who are maintained in abundance, and can look
forward to ages before the evil day must arrive when their possessions
shall become unequal to their wants. 

It was near the setting of the sun, on a clear, cold day in December,
when a sleigh was moving slowly up one of the mountains in the
district we have described.   The day had been fine for the season, and
but two or three large clouds, whose color seemed brightened by the
light reflected from the mass of snow that covered the earth, floated
in a sky of the purest blue.   The road wound along the brow of a
precipice, and on one side was upheld by a foundation of logs piled
one upon the other, while a narrow excavation in the mountain in the
opposite direction had made a passage of sufficient width for the
ordinary travelling of that day.   But logs, excavation, and every
thing that did not reach several feet above the earth lay alike buried
beneath the snow.   A single track, barely wide enough to receive the
sleigh, * denoted the route of the highway, and this was sunk nearly
two feet below the surrounding surface. 

  * Sleigh is the word used in every part of the United States to denote
    a traineau.   It is of local use in the west of England, whence it is
    most probably derived by the Americans.   The latter draw a distinction
    between a sled, or sledge, and a sleigh, the sleigh being shod with
    metal.  Sleighs are also subdivided into two - horse and one-horse
    sleighs.   Of the latter, there are the cutter, with thills so arranged
    as to permit the horse to travel in the side track; the “pung,” or
    “tow-pung” which is driven with a pole; and the “gumper,” a rude
    construction used for temporary purposes in the new countries.   Many
    of the American sleighs are elegant though the use of this mode of
    conveyance is much lessened with the melioration of the climate
    consequent to the clearing of the forests. 

In the vale, which lay at a distance of several hundred feet lower,
there was what, in the language of the country, was called a clearing,
and all the usual improvements of a new settlement; these even
extended up the hill to the point where the road turned short and ran
across the level land, which lay on the summit of the mountain; but
the summit itself remained in the forest.   There was glittering in the
atmosphere, as if it was filled with innumerable shining particles;
and the noble bay horses that drew the sleigh were covered, in many
parts with a coat of hoar-frost.   The vapor from their nostrils was
seen to issue like smoke; and every object in the view, as well as
every arrangement of the travellers, denoted the depth of a winter in
the mountains.   The harness, which was of a deep, dull black,
differing from the glossy varnishing of the present day, was
ornamented with enormous plates and buckles of brass, that shone like
gold in those transient beams of the sun which found their way
obliquely through the tops of the trees.   Huge saddles, studded with
nails and fitted with cloth that served as blankets to the shoulders
of the cattle, supported four high, square-topped turrets, through
which the stout reins led from the mouths of the horses to the hands
of the driver, who was a negro, of apparently twenty years of age. 
His face, which nature had colored with a glistening black, was now
mottled with the cold, and his large shining eyes filled with tears; a
tribute to its power that the keen frosts of those regions always
extracted from one of his African origin.   Still, there was a smiling
expression of good-humor in his happy countenance, that was created by
the thoughts of home and a Christmas fireside, with its Christmas
frolics.   The sleigh was one of those large, comfortable, old-
fashioned conveyances, which would admit a whole family within its
bosom, but which now contained only two passengers besides the driver. 
The color of its outside was a modest green, and that of its inside a
fiery red, The latter was intended to convey the idea of heat in that
cold climate.   Large buffalo-skins trimmed around the edges with red
cloth cut into festoons, covered the back of the sleigh, and were
spread over its bottom and drawn up around the feet of the travellers
- one of whom was a man of middle age and the other a female just
entering upon womanhood.   The former was of a large stature; but the
precautions he had taken to guard against the cold left but little of
his person exposed to view.   A great-coat, that was abundantly
ornamented by a profusion of furs, enveloped the whole of his figure
excepting the head, which was covered with a cap of mar ten-skins
lined with morocco, the sides of which were made to fall, if
necessary, and were now drawn close over the ears and fastened beneath
his chin with a black rib bon.   The top of the cap was surmounted with
the tail of the animal whose skin had furnished the rest of the
materials, which fell back, not ungracefully, a few inches be hind the
head.   From beneath this mask were to be seen part of a fine, manly
face, and particularly a pair of expressive large blue eyes, that
promised extraordinary intellect, covert humor, and great benevolence. 
The form of his companion was literally hid beneath the garments she
wore.   There were furs and silks peeping from under a large camlet
cloak with a thick flannel lining, that by its cut and size was
evidently intended for a masculine wearer.   A huge hood of black silk,
that was quilted with down, concealed the whole of her head, except at
a small opening in front for breath, through which occasionally
sparkled a pair of animated jet-black eyes. 

Both the father and daughter (for such was the connection between the
two travellers) were too much occupied with their reflections to break
a stillness that derived little or no interruption from the easy
gliding of the sleigh by the sound of their voices.   The former was
thinking of the wife that had held this their only child to her bosom,
when, four years before, she had reluctantly consented to relinquish
the society of her daughter in order that the latter might enjoy the
advantages of an education which the city of New York could only offer
at that period.   A few months afterward death had deprived him of the
remaining companion of his solitude; but still he had enough real
regard for his child not to bring her into the comparative wilderness
in which he dwelt, until the full period had expired to which he had
limited her juvenile labors.   The reflections of the daughter were
less melancholy, and mingled with a pleased astonishment at the novel
scenery she met at every turn in the road. 

The mountain on which they were journeying was covered with pines that
rose without a branch some seventy or eighty feet, and which
frequently doubled that height by the addition of the tops.   Through
the innumerable vistas that opened beneath the lofty trees, the eye
could penetrate until it was met by a distant inequality in the
ground, or was stopped by a view of the summit of the mountain which
lay on the opposite side of the valley to which they were hastening. 
The dark trunks of the trees rose from the pure white of the snow in
regularly formed shafts, until, at a great height, their branches shot
forth horizontal limbs, that were covered with the meagre foliage of
an evergreen, affording a melancholy contrast to the torpor of nature
below.   To the travellers there seemed to be no wind; but these pines
waved majestically at their topmost boughs, sending forth a dull,
plaintive sound that was quite in consonance with the rest of the
melancholy scene. 

The sleigh had glided for some distance along the even surface, and
the gaze of the female was bent in inquisitive and, perhaps, timid
glances into the recesses of the forest, when a loud and continued
howling was heard, pealing under the long arches of the woods like the
cry of a numerous pack of hounds.   The instant the sounds reached the
ear of the gentleman he cried aloud to the black:

“Hol up, Aggy; there is old Hector; I should know his bay among ten
thousand! The Leather-Stocking has put his hounds into the hills this
clear day, and they have started their game.   There is a deer-track a
few rods ahead; and now, Bess, if thou canst muster courage enough to
stand fire, I will give thee a saddle for thy Christmas dinner. ”

The black drew up, with a cheerful grin upon his chilled features, and
began thrashing his arms together in order to restore the circulation
of his fingers, while the speaker stood erect and, throwing aside his
outer covering, stepped from the sleigh upon a bank of snow which
sustained his weight without yielding. 

In a few moments the speaker succeeded in extricating a double-
barrelled fowling-piece from among a multitude of trunks and
bandboxes.   After throwing aside the thick mittens which had encased
his hands, there now appeared a pair of leather gloves tipped with
fur; he examined his priming, and was about to move forward, when the
light bounding noise of an animal plunging through the woods was
heard, and a fine buck darted into the path a short distance ahead of
him.   The appearance of the animal was sudden, and his flight
inconceivably rapid; but the traveller appeared to be too keen a
sportsman to be disconcerted by either.   As it came first into view he
raised the fowling-piece to his shoulder and, with a practised eye and
steady hand, drew a trigger.   The deer dashed forward undaunted, and
apparently unhurt.   Without lowering his piece, the traveller turned
its muzzle toward his victim, and fired again.   Neither discharge,
however, seemed to have taken effect,

The whole scene had passed with a rapidity that confused the female,
who was unconsciously rejoicing in the escape of the buck, as he
rather darted like a meteor than ran across the road, when a sharp,
quick sound struck her ear, quite different from the full, round
reports of her father’s gun, but still sufficiently distinct to be
known as the concussion produced by firearms.   At the same instant
that she heard this unexpected report, the buck sprang from the snow
to a great height in the air, and directly a second discharge, similar
in sound to the first, followed, when the animal came to the earth,
failing head long and rolling over on the crust with its own velocity. 
A loud shout was given by the unseen marksman, and a couple of men
instantly appeared from behind the trunks of two of the pines, where
they had evidently placed them selves in expectation of the passage of
the deer. 

“Ha! Natty, had I known you were in ambush, I should not have fired,”
cried the traveller, moving toward the spot where the deer lay—near to
which he was followed by the delighted black, with his sleigh; “but
the sound of old Hector was too exhilarating to be quiet; though I
hardly think I struck him, either. ”

“No—no——Judge,” returned the hunter, with an inward chuckle, and with
that look of exultation that indicates a consciousness of superior
skill, “you burnt your powder only to warm your nose this cold
evening.   Did ye think to stop a full-grown buck, with Hector and the
slut open upon him within sound, with that pop-gun in your hand!
There’s plenty of pheasants among the swamps; and the snow-birds are
flying round your own door, where you may feed them with crumbs, and
shoot them at pleasure, any day; but if you’re for a buck, or a little
bear's meat, Judge, you’ll have to take the long rifle, with a greased
wadding, or you’ll waste more powder than you’ll fill stomachs, I’m
thinking. ”

As the speaker concluded he drew his bare hand across the bottom of
his nose, and again opened his enormous mouth with a kind of inward
laugh. 

“The gun scatters well, Natty, And it has killed a deer before now,”
said the traveller, smiling good-humoredly.   “One barrel was charged
with buckshot, but the other was loaded for birds only.   Here are two
hurts; one through the neck, and the other directly through the heart. 
It is by no means certain, Natty, but I gave him one of the two

“Let who will kill him. ” said the hunter, rather surily. 

“I suppose the creature is to be eaten. ” So saying, he drew a large
knife from a leathern sheath, which was stuck through his girdle, or
sash, and cut the throat of the animal, “If there are two balls
through the deer, I would ask if there weren’t two rifles fired—
besides, who ever saw such a ragged hole from a smooth-bore as this
through the neck? And you will own yourself, Judge, that the buck fell
at the last shot, which was sent from a truer and a younger hand than
your’n or mine either; but, for my part, although I am a poor man I
can live without the venison, but I don’t love to give up my lawful
dues in a free country.   Though, for the matter of that, might often
makes right here, as well as in the old country, for what I can see. ”

An air of sullen dissatisfaction pervaded the manner of the hunter
during the whole of his speech; yet he thought it prudent to utter the
close of the sentence in such an undertone as to leave nothing audible
but the grumbling sounds of his voice. 

“Nay, Natty,” rejoined the traveller, with undisturbed good-humor, “it
is for the honor that I contend.   A few dollars will pay for the
venison; but what will requite me for the lost honor of a buck’s tail
in my cap? Think, Natty, how I should triumph over that quizzing dog,
Dick Jones, who has failed seven times already this season, and has
only brought in one woodchuck and a few gray squirrels. ”

“Ah! The game is becoming hard to find, indeed, Judge, with your
clearings and betterments,” said the old hunter, with a kind of
compelled resignation.   “The time has been when I have shot thirteen
deer without counting the fa’ns standing in the door of my own hut;
and for bear’s meat, if one wanted a ham or so, he had only to watch
a-nights, and he could shoot one by moonlight, through the cracks of
the logs, no fear of his oversleeping himself neither, for the howling
of the wolves was sartin to keep his eyes open.   There’s old Hector”—
patting with affection a tall hound of black and yellow spots, with
white belly and legs, that just then came in on the scent, accompanied
by the slut he had mentioned; “see where the wolves bit his throat,
the night I druv them from the venison that was smoking on the chimney
top—that dog is more to be trusted than many a Christian man; for he
never forgets a friend, and loves the hand that gives him bread,”

There was a peculiarity in the manner of the hunter that attracted the
notice of the young female, who had been a close and interested
observer of his appearance and equipments, from the moment he came
into view.   He was tall, and so meagre as to make him seem above even
the six feet that he actually stood in his stockings.   On his head,
which was thinly covered with lank, sandy hair, he wore a cap made of
fox-skin, resembling in shape the one we have already described,
although much inferior in finish and ornaments.   His face was skinny
and thin al most to emaciation; but yet it bore no signs of disease—
on the contrary, it had every indication of the most robust and
enduring health.   The cold and exposure had, together, given it a
color of uniform red.   His gray eyes were glancing under a pair of
shaggy brows, that over hung them in long hairs of gray mingled with
their natural hue; his scraggy neck was bare, and burnt to the same
tint with his face; though a small part of a shirt-collar, made of the
country check, was to be seen above the overdress he wore.   A kind of
coat, made of dressed deer-skin, with the hair on, was belted close to
his lank body by a girdle of colored worsted.   On his feet were deer-
skin moccasins, ornamented with porcupines’ quills, after the manner
of the Indians, and his limbs were guarded with long leggings of the
same material as the moccasins, which, gartering over the knees of his
tarnished buckskin breeches, had obtained for him among the settlers
the nickname of Leather-Stocking.   Over his left shoulder was slung a
belt of deer-skin, from which depended an enormous ox-horn, so thinly
scraped as to discover the powder it contained.   The larger end was
fitted ingeniously and securely with a wooden bottom, and the other
was stopped tight by a little plug.   A leathern pouch hung before him,
from which, as he concluded his last speech, he took a small measure,
and, filling it accurately with powder, he commenced reloading the
rifle, which as its butt rested on the snow before him reached nearly
to the top of his fox-skin cap. 

The traveller had been closely examining the wounds during these
movements, and now, without heeding the ill-humor of the hunter’s
manner, he exclaimed:

“I would fain establish a right, Natty, to the honor of this death;
and surely if the hit in the neck be mine it is enough; for the shot
in the heart was unnecessary—what we call an act of supererogation,
Leather-Stocking. ”

“You may call it by what larned name you please, Judge,” said the
hunter, throwing his rifle across his left arm, and knocking up a
brass lid in the breech, from which he took a small piece of greased
leather and, wrapping a bail in it, forced them down by main strength
on the powder, where he continued to pound them while speaking.   “It’s
far easier to call names than to shoot a buck on the spring; but the
creatur came by his end from a younger hand than either your’n or
mine, as I said before. ”

“What say you, my friend,” cried the traveller, turning pleasantly to
Natty’s companion; “shall we toss up this dollar for the honor, and
you keep the silver if you lose; what say you, friend?”

“That I killed the deer,” answered the young man, with a little
haughtiness, as he leaned on another long rifle similar to that of
Natty. 

“Here are two to one, indeed,” replied the Judge with a smile; “I am
outvoted—overruled, as we say on the bench.   There is Aggy, he can’t
vote, being a slave; and Bess is a minor—so I must even make the best
of it.   But you’ll send me the venison; and the deuce is in it, but I
make a good story about its death. ”

“The meat is none of mine to sell,” said Leather-Stocking, adopting a
little of his companion’s hauteur; “for my part, I have known animals
travel days with shots in the neck, and I’m none of them who’ll rob a
man of his rightful dues. ”

“You are tenacious of your rights, this cold evening, Natty,” returned
the Judge with unconquerable good-nature; “but what say you, young
man; will three dollars pay you for the buck?”

“First let us determine the question of right to the satisfaction of
us both,” said the youth firmly but respect fully, and with a
pronunciation and language vastly superior to his appearance: “with
how many shot did you load your gun?”

“With five, sir,” said the Judge, a little struck with the other’s
manner; “are they not enough to slay a buck like this?”

“One would do it; but,” moving to the tree from be hind which he had
appeared, “you know, sir, you fired in this direction—here are four of
the bullets in the tree. ”

The Judge examined the fresh marks in the bark of the pine, and,
shaking his head, said with a laugh:

“You are making out the case against yourself, my young advocate;
where is the fifth?”

“Here,” said the youth, throwing aside the rough over coat that he
wore, and exhibiting a hole in his under-garment, through which large
drops of blood were oozing. 

“Good God!” exclaimed the Judge, with horror; “have I been trifling
here about an empty distinction, and a fellow-creature suffering from
my hands without a murmur? But hasten—quick—get into my sleigh—it is
but a mile to the village, where surgical aid can be obtained—all
shall be done at my expense, and thou shalt live with me until thy
wound is healed, ay, and forever afterward. ”

“I thank you for your good intention, but I must decline your offer. 
I have a friend who would be uneasy were he to hear that I am hurt and
away from him.   The injury is but slight, and the bullet has missed
the bones; but I believe, sir, you will now admit me title to the
venison. ”

“Admit it!” repeated the agitated Judge; “I here give thee a right to
shoot deer, or bears, or anything thou pleasest in my woods, forever. 
Leather-Stocking is the only other man that I have granted the same
privilege to; and the time is coming when it will be of value.   But I
buy your deer—here, this bill will pay thee, both for thy shot and my
own. ”

The old hunter gathered his tall person up into an air of pride during
this dialogue, but he waited until the other had done speaking. 

“There’s them living who say that Nathaniel Bumppo's right to shoot on
these hills is of older date than Marmaduke Temple’s right to forbid
him,” he said.   “But if there’s a law about it at all, though who ever
heard of a law that a man shouldn’t kill deer where he pleased!—but if
there is a law at all, it should be to keep people from the use of
smooth-bores.   A body never knows where his lead will fly, when he
pulls the trigger of one of them uncertain firearms. ”

Without attending to the soliloquy of Natty, the youth bowed his head
silently to the offer of the bank-note, and replied:

“Excuse me: I have need of the venison. ”

“But this will buy you many deer,” said the Judge; “take it, I entreat
you;” and, lowering his voice to a whisper, he added, “It is for a
hundred dollars. ”

For an instant only the youth seemed to hesitate, and then, blushing
even through the high color that the cold had given to his cheeks, as
if with inward shame at his own weakness, he again declined the offer. 

During this scene the female arose, and regardless of the cold air,
she threw back the hood which concealed her features, and now spoke,
with great earnestness. 

“Surely, surely—young man—sir—you would not pain my father so much as
to have him think that he leaves a fellow-creature in this wilderness
whom his own hand has injured.   I entreat you will go with us, and
receive medical aid. ”

Whether his wound became more painful, or there was something
irresistible in the voice and manner of the fair pleader for her
father’s feelings, we know not; but the distance of the young mans
manner was sensibly softened by this appeal, and he stood in apparent
doubt, as if reluctant to comply with and yet unwilling to refuse her
request.   The Judge, for such being his office must in future be his
title, watched with no little interest the display of this singular
contention in the feelings of the youth; and, advancing, kindly took
his hand, and, as he pulled him gently toward the sleigh, urged him to
enter it. 

“There is no human aid nearer than Templeton,” he said, “and the hut
of Natty is full three miles from this— come, come, my young friend,
go with us, and let the new doctor look to this shoulder of thine. 
Here is Natty will take the tidings of thy welfare to thy friend; and
shouldst thou require it, thou shalt return home in the morning. ”
The young man succeeded in extricating his hand from the warm grasp of
the Judge, but he continued to gaze on the face of the female, who,
regardless of the cold, was still standing with her fine features
exposed, which expressed feeling that eloquently seconded the request
of her father.   Leather-Stocking stood, in the mean time, leaning upon
his long rifle, with his head turned a little to one side, as if
engaged in sagacious musing; when, having apparently satisfied his
doubts, by revolving the subject in his mind, he broke silence. 
“It may be best to go, lad, after all; for, if the shot hangs under
the skin, my hand is getting too old to be cutting into human flesh,
as I once used to, Though some thirty years agone, in the old war,
when I was out under Sir William, I travelled seventy miles alone in
the howling wilderness, with a rifle bullet in my thigh, and then cut
it out with my own jack-knife.   Old Indian John knows the time well. 
I met him with a party of the Delawares, on the trail of the Iroquois,
who had been down and taken five scalps on the Schoharie.   But I made
a mark on the red-skin that I’ll warrant he’ll carry to his grave! I
took him on the posteerum, saving the lady's presence, as he got up
from the ambushment, and rattled three buckshot into his naked hide,
so close that you might have laid a broad joe upon them all”—here
Natty stretched out his long neck, and straightened his body, as he
opened his mouth, which exposed a single tusk of yellow bone, while
his eyes, his face, even his whole frame seemed to laugh, although no
sound was emitted except a kind of thick hissing, as he inhaled his
breath in quavers.   “I had lost my bullet-mould in crossing the Oneida
outlet, and had to make shift with the buckshot; but the rifle was
true, and didn’t scatter like your two-legged thing there, Judge,
which don’t do, I find, to hunt in company with. ”

Natty’s apology to the delicacy of the young lady was unnecessary,
for, while he was speaking, she was too much employed in helping her
father to remove certain articles of baggage to hear him.   Unable to
resist the kind urgency of the travellers any longer, the youth,
though still with an unaccountable reluctance, suffered himself to be
persuaded to enter the sleigh.   The black, with the aid of his master,
threw the buck across the baggage and entering the vehicle themselves,
the Judge invited the hunter to do so likewise. 

“ No, no,” said the old roan, shaking his head; “I have work to do at
home this Christmas eve—drive on with the boy, and let your doctor
look to the shoulder; though if he will only cut out the shot, I have
yarbs that will heal the wound quicker than all his foreign
‘intments. ” He turned, and was about to move off, when, suddenly
recollecting himself, he again faced the party, and added: “If you see
anything of Indian John, about the foot of the lake, you had better
take him with you, and let him lend the doctor a hand; for, old as he
is, he is curious at cuts and bruises, and it’s likelier than not
he’ll be in with brooms to sweep your Christmas ha’arths. ”

“Stop, stop,” cried the youth, catching the arm of the black as he
prepared to urge his horses forward; “Natty—you need say nothing of
the shot, nor of where I am going—remember, Natty, as you love me. ”
“Trust old Leather-Stocking,” returned the hunter significantly; “he
hasn’t lived fifty years in the wilderness, and not larnt from the
savages how to hold his tongue— trust to me, lad; and remember old
Indian John. ”

“And, Natty,” said the youth eagerly, still holding the black by the
arm.   “I will just get the shot extracted, and bring you up to-night a
quarter of the buck for the Christmas dinner. ”

He was interrupted by the hunter, who held up his finger with an
expressive gesture for silence.   He then moved softly along the margin
of the road, keeping his eyes steadfastly fixed on the branches of a
pine.   When he had obtained such a position as he wished, he stopped,
and, cocking his rifle, threw one leg far behind him, and stretching
his left arm to its utmost extent along the barrel of his piece, he
began slowly to raise its muzzle in a line with the straight trunk of
the tree.   The eyes of the group in the sleigh naturally preceded the
movement of the rifle, and they soon discovered the object of Natty’s
aim.   On a small dead branch of the pine, which, at the distance of
seventy feet from the ground, shot out horizontally, immediately
beneath the living members of the tree, sat a bird, that in the vulgar
language of the country was indiscriminately called a pheasant or a
partridge.   In size, it was but little smaller than a common barn-yard
fowl.   The baying of the dogs, and the conversation that had passed
near the root of the tree on which it was perched, had alarmed the
bird, which was now drawn up near the body of the pine, with a head
and neck so erect as to form nearly a straight line with its legs.   As
soon as the rifle bore on the victim, Natty drew his trigger, and the
partridge fell from its height with a force that buried it in the
snow. 

“Lie down, you old villain,” exclaimed Leather-Stocking, shaking his
ramrod at Hector as he bounded toward the foot of the tree, “ lie
down, I say. ” The dog obeyed, and Natty proceeded with great rapidity,
though with the nicest accuracy, to reload his piece.   When this was
ended, he took up his game, and, showing it to the party without a
head, he cried: “ Here is a tidbit for an old man’s Christmas—never
mind the venison, boy, and remember Indian John; his yarbs are better
than all the foreign ‘intments.   Here, Judge,” holding up the bird
again, “do you think a smooth-bore would pick game off their roost,
and not ruffle a feather?” The old man gave another of his remarkable
laughs, which partook so largely of exultation, mirth, and irony, and,
shaking his head, he turned, with his rifle at a trail, and moved into
the forest with steps that were between a walk and a trot.   At each
movement he made his body lowered several inches, his knees yielding
with an inclination inward; but, as the sleigh turned at a bend in the
road, the youth cast his eyes in quest of his old companion, and he
saw that he was already nearly concealed by the trunks of the tree;
while his dogs were following quietly in his footsteps, occasionally
scenting the deer track, that they seemed to know instinctively was
now of no further use to them.   Another jerk was given to the sleigh,
and Leather-Stocking was hid from view. 

CHAPTER 2

All places that the eye of heaven visits
Are to a wise man ports and happy havens:
Think not the king did banish thee:
But thou the king. —Richard II

An ancestor of Marmaduke Temple had, about one hundred and twenty
years before the commencement of our tale, come to the colony of
Pennsylvania, a friend and co-religionist of its great patron.   Old
Marmaduke, for this formidable prenomen was a kind of appellative to
the race, brought with him, to that asylum of the persecuted an
abundance of the good things of this life.   He became the master of
many thousands of acres of uninhabited territory, and the supporter of
many a score of dependents.   He lived greatly respected for his piety,
and not a little distinguished as a sectary; was intrusted by his
associates with many important political stations; and died just in
time to escape the knowledge of his own poverty.   It was his lot to
share the fortune of most of those who brought wealth with them into
the new settlements of the middle colonies. 

The consequence of an emigrant into these provinces was generally to
be ascertained by the number of his white servants or dependents, and
the nature of the public situations that he held.   Taking this rule as
a guide, the ancestor of our Judge must have been a man of no little
note. 

It is, however, a subject of curious inquiry at the present day, to
look into the brief records of that early period, and observe how
regular, and with few exceptions how inevitable, were the gradations,
on the one hand, of the masters to poverty, and on the other, of their
servants to wealth.   Accustomed to ease, and unequal to the struggles
incident to an infant society, the affluent emigrant was barely
enabled to maintain his own rank by the weight of his personal
superiority and acquirements; but, the moment that his head was laid
in the grave, his indolent and comparatively uneducated offspring were
compelled to yield precedency to the more active energies of a class
whose exertions had been stimulated by necessity.   This is a very
common course of things, even in the present state of the Union; but
it was peculiarly the fortunes of the two extremes of society, in the
peaceful and unenterprising colonies of Pennsylvania and New Jersey,

The posterity of Marmaduke did not escape the common lot of those who
depend rather on their hereditary possessions than on their own
powers; and in the third generation they had descended to a point
below which, in this happy country, it is barely possible for honesty,
intellect and sobriety to fall.   The same pride of family that had, by
its self-satisfied indolence, conduced to aid their fail, now became a
principle to stimulate them to endeavor to rise again.   The feeling,
from being morbid, was changed to a healthful and active desire to
emulate the character, the condition, and, peradventure, the wealth of
their ancestors also.   It was the father of our new acquaintance, the
Judge, who first began to reascend in the scale of society; and in
this undertaking he was not a little assisted by a marriage, which
aided in furnishing the means of educating his only son in a rather
better manner than the low state of the common schools of Pennsylvania
could promise; or than had been the practice in the family for the two
or three preceding generations. 

At the school where the reviving prosperity of his father was enabled
to maintain him, young Marmaduke formed an intimacy with a youth whose
years were about equal to his own.   This was a fortunate connection
for our Judge, and paved the way to most of his future elevation in
life. 

There was not only great wealth but high court interest among the
connections of Edward Effingham.   They were one of the few families
then resident in the colonies who thought it a degradation to its
members to descend to the pursuits of commerce; and who never emerged
from the privacy of domestic life unless to preside in the councils of
the colony or to bear arms in her defense.   The latter had from youth
been the only employment of Edward’s father.   Military rank under the
crown of Great Britain was attained with much longer probation, and by
much more toilsome services, sixty years ago than at the present time. 
Years were passed without murmuring, in the sub ordinate grades of the
service; and those soldiers who were stationed in the colonies felt,
when they obtained the command of a company, that they were entitled
to receive the greatest deference from the peaceful occupants of the
soil.   Any one of our readers who has occasion to cross the Niagara
may easily observe not only the self importance, but the real
estimation enjoyed by the hum blest representative of the crown, even
in that polar region of royal sunshine.   Such, and at no very distant
period, was the respect paid to the military in these States, where
now, happily, no symbol of war is ever seen, unless at the free and
tearless voice of their people.   When, therefore, the father of
Marmaduke’s friend, after forty years’ service, retired with the rank
of major, maintaining in his domestic establishment a comparative
splendor, he be came a man of the first consideration in his native
colony which was that of New York.   He had served with fidelity and
courage, and having been, according to the custom of the provinces,
intrusted with commands much superior to those to which he was
entitled by rank, with reputation also.   When Major Effingham yielded
to the claims of age, he retired with dignity, refusing his half-pay
or any other compensation for services that he felt he could no longer
perform. 

The ministry proffered various civil offices which yielded not only
honor but profit; but he declined them all, with the chivalrous
independence and loyalty that had marked his character through life. 
The veteran soon caused this set of patriotic disinterestedness to be
followed by another of private munificence, that, however little it
accorded with prudence, was in perfect conformity with the simple
integrity of his own views. 

The friend of Marmaduke was his only child; and to this son, on his
marriage with a lady to whom the father was particularly partial, the
Major gave a complete conveyance of his whole estate, consisting of
money in the funds, a town and country residence, sundry valuable
farms in the old parts of the colony, and large tracts of wild land in
the new—in this manner throwing himself upon the filial piety of his
child for his own future maintenance.   Major Effingham, in declining
the liberal offers of the British ministry, had subjected himself to
the suspicion of having attained his dotage, by all those who throng
the avenues to court patronage, even in the remotest corners of that
vast empire; but, when he thus voluntarily stripped himself of his
great personal wealth, the remainder of the community seemed
instinctively to adopt the conclusion also that he had reached a
second childhood.   This may explain the fact of his importance rapidly
declining; and, if privacy was his object, the veteran had soon a free
indulgence of his wishes.   Whatever views the world might entertain of
this act of the Major, to himself and to his child it seemed no more
than a natural gift by a father of those immunities which he could no
longer enjoy or improve, to a son, who was formed, both by nature and
education, to do both.   The younger Effingham did not object to the
amount of the donation; for he felt that while his parent reserved a
moral control over his actions, he was relieving himself of a
fatiguing burden: such, indeed, was the confidence existing between
them, that to neither did it seem anything more than removing money
from one pocket to another. 

One of the first acts of the young man, on corning into possession of
his wealth, was to seek his early friend, with a view to offer any
assistance that it was now in his power to bestow. 

The death of Marmaduke’s father, and the consequent division of his
small estate, rendered such an offer extremely acceptable to the young
Pennsylvanian; he felt his own powers, and saw, not only the
excellences, but the foibles in the character of his friend. 
Effingham was by nature indolent, confiding, and at times impetuous
and indiscreet; but Marmaduke was uniformly equable, penetrating, and
full of activity and enterprise.   To the latter therefore, the
assistance, or rather connection that was proffered to him, seemed to
produce a mutual advantage.   It was cheerfully accepted, and the
arrangement of its conditions was easily completed.   A mercantile
house was established in the metropolis of Pennsylvania, with the
avails of Mr.  Effingham's personal property; all, or nearly all, of
which was put into the possession of Temple, who was the only
ostensible proprietor in the concern, while, in secret, the other was
entitled to an equal participation in the profits.   This connection
was thus kept private for two reasons, one of which, in the freedom of
their inter course, was frankly avowed to Marmaduke, while the other
continued profoundly hid in the bosom of his friend, The last was
nothing more than pride.   To the descend ant of a line of soldiers,
commerce, even in that indirect manner, seemed a degrading pursuit;
but an insuperable obstacle to the disclosure existed in the
prejudices of his father

We have already said that Major Effingham had served as a soldier with
reputation.   On one occasion, while in command on the western frontier
of Pennsylvania against a league of the French and Indians, not only
his glory, but the safety of himself and his troops were jeoparded by
the peaceful policy of that colony.   To the soldier, this was an
unpardonable offence.   He was fighting in their defense—he knew that
the mild principles of this little nation of practical Christians
would be disregarded by their subtle and malignant enemies; and he
felt the in jury the more deeply because he saw that the avowed object
of the colonists, in withholding their succors, would only have a
tendency to expose his command, without preserving the peace.   The
soldier succeeded, after a desperate conflict, in extricating himself,
with a handful of his men, from their murderous enemy; but he never
for gave the people who had exposed him to a danger which they left
him to combat alone.   It was in vain to tell him that they had no
agency in his being placed on their frontier at all; it was evidently
for their benefit that he had been so placed, and it was their
“religious duty,” so the Major always expressed it, “it was their
religions duty to have supported him. ”

At no time was the old soldier an admirer of the peaceful disciples of
Fox.   Their disciplined habits, both of mind and body, had endowed
them with great physical perfection; and the eye of the veteran was
apt to scan the fair proportions and athletic frames of the colonists
with a look that seemed to utter volumes of contempt for their moral
imbecility, He was also a little addicted to the expression of a
belief that, where there was so great an observance of the externals
of religion, there could not be much of the substance.   It is not our
task to explain what is or what ought to be the substance of
Christianity, but merely to record in this place the opinions of Major
Effingham. 

Knowing the sentiments of the father in relation to this people, it
was no wonder that the son hesitated to avow his connection with, nay,
even his dependence on the integrity of, a Quaker. 

It has been said that Marmaduke deduced his origin from the
contemporaries and friends of Penn.   His father had married without
the pale of the church to which he belonged, and had, in this manner,
forfeited some of the privileges of his offspring.   Still, as young
Marmaduke was educated in a colony and society where even the ordinary
intercourse between friends was tinctured with the aspect of this mild
religion, his habits and language were some what marked by its
peculiarities.   His own marriage at a future day with a lady without
not only the pale, but the influence, of this sect of religionists,
had a tendency, it is true, to weaken his early impressions; still he
retained them in some degree to the hour of his death, and was
observed uniformly, when much interested or agitated, to speak in the
language of his youth.   But this is anticipating our tale. 

When Marmaduke first became the partner of young Effingham, he was
quite the Quaker in externals; and it was too dangerous an experiment
for the son to think of encountering the prejudices of the father on
this subject.   The connection, therefore, remained a profound secret
to all but those who were interested in it,

For a few years Marmaduke directed the commercial operations of his
house with a prudence and sagacity that afforded rich returns.   He
married the lady we have mentioned, who was the mother of Elizabeth,
and the visits of his friend were becoming more frequent.   There was a
speedy prospect of removing the veil from their intercourse, as its
advantages became each hour more apparent to Mr.  Effingham, when the
troubles that preceded the war of the Revolution extended themselves
to an alarming degree. 

Educated in the most dependent loyalty, Mr.  Effingham had, from the
commencement of the disputes between the colonists and the crown,
warmly maintained what he believed to be the just prerogatives of his
prince; while, on the other hand, the clear head and independent mind
of Temple had induced him to espouse the cause of the people.   Both
might have been influenced by early impressions; for, if the son of
the loyal and gallant soldier bowed in implicit obedience to the will
of his sovereign, the descendant of the persecuted followers of Penn
looked back with a little bitterness to the unmerited wrongs that had
been heaped upon his ancestors. 

This difference in opinion had long been a subject of amicable dispute
between them: but, Latterly, the contest was getting to be too
important to admit of trivial discussions on the part of Marmaduke,
whose acute discernment was already catching faint glimmerings of the
important events that were in embryo.   The sparks of dissension soon
kindled into a blaze; and the colonies, or rather, as they quickly
declared themselves, THE STATES, became a scene of strife and
bloodshed for years. 

A short time before the battle of Lexington, Mr.  Effingham, already a
widower, transmitted to Marmaduke, for safe-keeping, all his valuable
effects and papers; and left the colony without his father.   The war
had, however, scarcely commenced in earnest, when he reappeared in New
York, wearing the Livery of his king; and, in a short time, he took
the field at the head of a provincial corps.   In the mean time
Marmaduke had completely committed himself in the cause, as it was
then called, of the rebel lion.   Of course, all intercourse between
the friends ceased—on the part of Colonel Effingham it was unsought,
and on that of Marmaduke there was a cautious reserve.   It soon became
necessary for the latter to abandon the capital of Philadelphia; but
he had taken the precaution to remove the whole of his effects beyond
the reach of the royal forces, including the papers of his friend
also.   There he continued serving his country during the struggle, in
various civil capacities, and always with dignity and usefulness. 
While, however, he discharged his functions with credit and fidelity,
Marmaduke never seemed to lose sight of his own interests; for, when
the estates of the adherents of the crown fell under the hammer, by
the acts of confiscation, he appeared in New York, and became the
purchaser of extensive possessions at comparatively low prices. 

It is true that Marmaduke, by thus purchasing estates that had been
wrested by violence from others, rendered himself obnoxious to the
censures of that Sect which, at the same time that it discards its
children from a full participation in the family union, seems ever
unwilling to abandon them entirely to the world.   But either his
success, or the frequency of the transgression in others, soon wiped
off this slight stain from his character; and, although there were a
few who, dissatisfied with their own fortunes, or conscious of their
own demerits, would make dark hints concerning the sudden prosperity
of the unportioned Quaker, yet his services, and possibly his wealth,
soon drove the recollection of these vague conjectures from men’s
minds.   When the war ended, and the independence of the States was
acknowledged, Mr.  Temple turned his attention from the pursuit of
commerce, which was then fluctuating and uncertain, to the settlement
of those tracts of land which he had purchased.   Aided by a good deal
of money, and directed by the suggestions of a strong and practical
reason, his enterprise throve to a degree that the climate and rugged
face of the country which he selected would seem to forbid.   His
property increased in a tenfold ratio, and he was already ranked among
the most wealthy and important of his countrymen.   To inherit this
wealth he had but one child—the daughter whom we have introduced to
the reader, and whom he was now conveying from school to preside over
a household that had too long wanted a mistress. 

When the district in which his estates lay had become sufficiently
populous to be set off as a county, Mr.  Temple had, according to the
custom of the new settlements, been selected to fill its highest
judicial station.   This might make a Templar smile; but in addition to
the apology of necessity, there is ever a dignity in talents and
experience that is commonly sufficient, in any station, for the
protection of its possessor; and Marmaduke, more fortunate in his
native clearness of mind than the judge of King Charles, not only
decided right, but was generally able to give a very good reason for
it.   At all events, such was the universal practice of the country and
the times; and Judge Temple, so far from ranking among the lowest of
his judicial contemporaries in the courts of the new counties, felt
himself, and was unanimously acknowledged to be, among the first. 

We shall here close this brief explanation of the history and
character of some of our personages leaving them in future to speak
and act for themselves. 

CHAPTER 3

“All that thou see'st is Natures handiwork;
Those rocks that upward throw their mossy brawl
Like castled pinnacles of elder times;
These venerable stems, that slowly rock
Their towering branches in the wintry gale;
That field of frost, which glitters in the sun,
Mocking the whiteness of a marble breast!
Yet man can mar such works with his rude taste,
Like some sad spoiler of a virgin’s fame. ” —Duo. 

Some little while elapsed ere Marmaduke Temple was sufficiently
recovered from his agitation to scan the person of his new companion. 
He now observed that he was a youth of some two or three and twenty
years of age, and rather above the middle height.   Further observation
was prevented by the rough overcoat which was belted close to his form
by a worsted sash, much like the one worn by the old hunter.   The eyes
of the Judge, after resting a moment on the figure of the stranger,
were raised to a scrutiny of his countenance.   There had been a look
of care visible in the features of the youth, when he first entered
the sleigh, that had not only attracted the notice of Elizabeth, but
which she had been much puzzled to interpret.   His anxiety seemed the
strongest when he was en joining his old companion to secrecy; and
even when he had decided, and was rather passively suffering himself
to be conveyed to the village, the expression of his eyes by no means
indicated any great degree of self-satisfaction at the step.   But the
lines of an uncommonly prepossessing countenance were gradually
becoming composed; and he now sat silent, and apparently musing.   The
Judge gazed at him for some time with earnestness, and then smiling,
as if at his own forgetfulness, he said:

“I believe, my young friend, that terror has driven you from my
recollection; your face is very familiar, and yet, for the honor of a
score of bucks’ tails in my cap, I could not tell your name. ”

“I came into the country but three weeks since,” returned the youth
coldly, “and I understand you have been absent twice that time. ”

“It will be five to-morrow.   Yet your face is one that I have seen;
though it would not be strange, such has been my affright, should I
see thee in thy winding-sheet walking by my bedside to-night.   What
say’st thou, Bess? Am I compos mentis or not? Fit to charge a grand
jury, or, what is just now of more pressing necessity, able to do the
honors of Christmas eve in the hall of Templeton?”

“More able to do either, my dear father. ” said a playful voice from
under the ample inclosures of the hood, “ than to kill deer with a
smooth-bore. ” A short pause followed, and the same voice, but in a
different accent, continued.   “We shall have good reasons for our
thanksgiving to night, on more accounts than one,”

The horses soon reached a point where they seemed to know by instinct
that the journey was nearly ended, and, bearing on the bits as they
tossed their heads, they rapidly drew the sleigh over the level land
which lay on the top of the mountain, and soon came to the point where
the road descended suddenly, but circuitously, into the valley. 

The Judge was roused from his reflections, when he saw the four
columns of smoke which floated above his own chimneys.   As house,
village, and valley burst on his sight, he exclaimed cheerfully to his
daughter:

“See, Bess, there is thy resting-place for life! And thine too, young
man, if thou wilt consent to dwell with us. ”

The eyes of his auditors involuntarily met; and, if the color that
gathered over the face of Elizabeth was contradicted by the cold
expression of her eye, the ambiguous smile that again played about the
lips of the stranger seemed equally to deny the probability of his
consenting to form one of this family group.   The scene was one,
however, which might easily warm a heart less given to philanthropy
than that of Marmaduke Temple. 

The side of the mountain on which our travellers were journeying,
though not absolutely perpendicular, was so steep as to render great
care necessary in descending the rude and narrow path which, in that
early day, wound along the precipices.   The negro reined in his
impatient steeds, and time was given Elizabeth to dwell on a scene
which was so rapidly altering under the hands of man, that it only
resembled in its outlines the picture she had so often studied with
delight in childhood.   Immediately beneath them lay a seeming plain,
glittering without in equality, and buried in mountains.   The latter
were precipitous, especially on the side of the plain, and chiefly in
forest.   Here and there the hills fell away in long, low points, and
broke the sameness of the outline, or setting to the long and wide
field of snow, which, without house, tree, fence, or any other
fixture, resembled so much spot less cloud settled to the earth.   A
few dark and moving spots were, however, visible on the even surface,
which the eye of Elizabeth knew to be so many sleighs going their
several ways to or from the village.   On the western border of the
plain, the mountains, though equally high, were less precipitous, and
as they receded opened into irregular valleys and glens, or were
formed into terraces and hollows that admitted of cultivation. 
Although the evergreens still held dominion over many of the hills
that rose on this side of the valley, yet the undulating outlines of
the distant mountains, covered with forests of beech and maple, gave a
relief to the eye, and the promise of a kinder soil.   Occasionally
spots of white were discoverable amidst the forests of the opposite
hills, which announced, by the smoke that curled over the tops of the
trees, the habitations of man and the commencement of agriculture. 
These spots were sometimes, by the aid of united labor, enlarged into
what were called settlements, but more frequently were small and
insulated; though so rapid were the changes, and so persevering the
labors of those who had cast their fortunes on the success of the
enterprise, that it was not difficult for the imagination of Elizabeth
to conceive they were enlarging under her eye while she was gazing, in
mute wonder, at the alterations that a few short years had made in the
aspect of the country.   The points on the western side of this
remarkable plain, on which no plant had taken root, were both larger
and more numerous than those on its eastern, and one in particular
thrust itself forward in such a manner as to form beautifully curved
bays of snow on either side.   On its extreme end an oak stretched
forward, as if to overshadow with its branches a spot which its roots
were forbidden to enter.   It had released itself from the thraldom
that a growth of centuries had imposed on the branches of the
surrounding forest trees, and threw its gnarled and fantastic arms
abroad, in the wildness of liberty.   A dark spot of a few acres in
extent at the southern extremity of this beautiful flat, and
immediately under the feet of our travellers, alone showed by its
rippling surface, and the vapors which exhaled from it, that what at
first might seem a plain was one of the mountain lakes, locked in the
frosts of winter.   A narrow current rushed impetuously from its bosom
at the open place we have mentioned, and was to be traced for miles,
as it wound its way toward the south through the real valley, by its
borders of hemlock and pine, and by the vapor which arose from its
warmer surface into the chill atmosphere of the hills.   The banks of
this lovely basin, at its outlet, or southern end, were steep, but not
high; and in that direction the land continued, far as the eye could
reach, a narrow but graceful valley, along which the settlers had
scattered their humble habitations, with a profusion that bespoke the
quality of the soil and the comparative facilities of intercourse,
Immediately on the bank of the lake and at its foot, stood the village
of Templeton.   It consisted of some fifty buildings, including those
of every description, chiefly built of wood, and which, in their
architecture, bore no great marks of taste, but which also, by the
unfinished appearance of most of the dwellings, indicated the hasty
manner of their construction, To the eye, they presented a variety of
colors.   A few were white in both front and rear, but more bore that
expensive color on their fronts only, while their economical but
ambitious owners had covered the remaining sides of the edifices with
a dingy red.   One or two were slowly assuming the russet of age; while
the uncovered beams that were to be seen through the broken windows of
their second stories showed that either the taste or the vanity of
their proprietors had led them to undertake a task which they were
unable to accomplish.   The whole were grouped in a manner that aped
the streets of a city, and were evidently so arranged by the
directions of one who looked to the wants of posterity rather than to
the convenience of the present incumbents.   Some three or four of the
better sort of buildings, in addition to the uniformity of their
color, were fitted with green blinds, which, at that season at least,
were rather strangely contrasted to the chill aspect of the lake, the
mountains, the forests, and the wide fields of snow.   Before the doors
of these pretending dwellings were placed a few saplings, either
without branches or possessing only the feeble shoots of one or two
summers’ growth, that looked not unlike tall grenadiers on post near
the threshold of princes.   In truth, the occupants of these favored
habitations were the nobles of Templeton, as Marmaduke was its king. 
They were the dwellings of two young men who were cunning in the law;
an equal number of that class who chaffered to the wants of the
community under the title of storekeepers; and a disciple of
Aesculapius, who, for a novelty, brought more subjects into the world
than he sent out of it.   In the midst of this incongruous group of
dwellings rose the mansion of the Judge, towering above all its
neighbors.   It stood in the centre of an inclosure of several acres,
which was covered with fruit-trees.   Some of the latter had been left
by the Indians, and began already to assume the moss and inclination
of age, therein forming a very marked contrast to the infant
plantations that peered over most of the picketed fences of the
village.   In addition to this show of cultivation were two rows of
young Lombardy poplars, a tree but lately introduced into America,
formally lining either side of a pathway which led from a gate that
opened on the principal street to the front door of the building.   The
house itself had been built entirely under the superintendence of a
certain Mr.  Richard Jones, whom we have already mentioned, and who,
from his cleverness in small matters, and an entire willingness to
exert his talents, added to the circumstance of their being sisters’
children, ordinarily superintended all the minor concerns of Marmaduke
Temple.   Richard was fond of saying that this child of invention
consisted of nothing more nor less than what should form the
groundwork of every clergyman’s discourse, viz. , a firstly and a
lastly.   He had commenced his labors, in the first year of their
residence, by erecting a tall, gaunt edifice of wood, with its gable
toward the highway.   In this shelter for it was little more, the
family resided three years.   By the end of that period, Richard had
completed his design.   He had availed himself, in this heavy
undertaking, of the experience of a certain wandering eastern
mechanic, who, by exhibiting a few soiled plates of English
architecture, and talking learnedly of friezes, entablatures, and
particularly of the composite order, had obtained a very undue
influence over Richard’s taste in everything that pertained to that
branch of the fine arts.   Not that Mr.  Jones did not affect to
consider Hiram Doolittle a perfect empiric in his profession, being in
the constant habit of listening to his treatises on architecture with
a kind of indulgent smile; yet, either from an inability to oppose
them by anything plausible from his own stores of learning or from
secret admiration, Richard generally submitted to the arguments of his
co-adjutor.   Together, they had not only erected a dwelling for
Marmaduke, but they had given a fashion to the architecture of the
whole county.   The composite order, Mr.  Doolittle would contend, was
an order composed of many others, and was intended to be the most
useful of all, for it admitted into its construction such alterations
as convenience or circumstances might require.   To this proposition
Richard usually assented; and when rival geniuses who monopolize not
only all the reputation but most of the money of a neighborhood, are
of a mind, it is not uncommon to see them lead the fashion, even in
graver matters.   In the present instance, as we have already hinted,
the castle, as Judge Templeton’s dwelling was termed in common
parlance, came to be the model, in some one or other of its numerous
excellences, for every aspiring edifice within twenty miles of it. 

The house itself, or the “ lastly,” was of stone: large, square, and
far from uncomfortable.   These were four requisites, on which
Marmaduke had insisted with a little more than his ordinary
pertinacity.   But everything else was peaceably assigned to Richard
and his associate.   These worthies found the material a little too
solid for the tools of their workmen, which, in General, were employed
on a substance no harder than the white pine of the adjacent
mountains, a wood so proverbially soft that it is commonly chosen by
the hunters for pillows.   But for this awkward dilemma, it is probable
that the ambitious tastes of our two architects would have left us
much more to do in the way of description.   Driven from the faces of
the house by the obduracy of the material, they took refuge in the
porch and on the roof.   The former, it was decided, should be severely
classical, and the latter a rare specimen of the merits of the
Composite order. 

A roof, Richard contended, was a part of the edifice that the ancients
always endeavored to conceal, it being an excrescence in architecture
that was only to be tolerated on account of its usefulness.   Besides,
as he wittily added, a chief merit in a dwelling was to present a
front on whichever side it might happen to be seen; for, as it was
exposed to all eyes in all weathers, there should be no weak flank for
envy or unneighborly criticism to assail.   It was therefore decided
that the roof should be flat, and with four faces.   To this
arrangement, Marmaduke objected the heavy snows that lay for months,
frequently covering the earth to a depth of three or four feet. 
Happily the facilities of the composite order presented themselves to
effect a compromise, and the rafters were lengthened, so as to give a
descent that should carry off the frozen element.   But, unluckily,
some mistake was made in the admeasurement of these material parts of
the fabric; and, as one of the greatest recommendations of Hiram was
his ability to work by the “square rule,” no opportunity was found of
discovering the effect until the massive timbers were raised on the
four walls of the building.   Then, indeed, it was soon seen that, in
defiance of all rule, the roof was by far the most conspicuous part of
the whole edifice.   Richard and his associate consoled themselves with
the relief that the covering would aid in concealing this unnatural
elevation; but every shingle that was laid only multiplied objects to
look at.   Richard essayed to remedy the evil with paint, and four
different colors were laid on by his own hands.   The first was a sky-
blue, in the vain expectation that the eye might be cheated into the
belief it was the heavens themselves that hung so imposingly over
Marmaduke’s dwelling; the second was what he called a “cloud-color,”
being nothing more nor less than an imitation of smoke; the third was
what Richard termed an invisible green, an experiment that did not
succeed against a background of sky.   Abandoning the attempt to
conceal, our architects drew upon their invention for means to
ornament the offensive shingles. 

After much deliberation and two or three essays by moonlight, Richard
ended the affair by boldly covering the whole beneath a color that he
christened “sunshine,” a cheap way, as he assured his cousin the
Judge, of always keeping fair weather over his head.   The platform, as
well as the caves of the house, were surmounted by gaudily painted
railings, and the genius of Hiram was exerted in the fabrication of
divers urns and mouldings, that were scattered profusely around this
part of their labors.   Richard had originally a cunning expedient, by
which the chimneys were intended to be so low, and so situated, as to
resemble ornaments on the balustrades; but comfort required that the
chimneys should rise with the roof, in order that the smoke might bc
carried off, and they thus became four extremely conspicuous objects
in the view. 

As this roof was much the most important architectural undertaking in
which Mr.  Jones was ever engaged, his failure produced a correspondent
degree of mortification At first, he whispered among his acquaintances
that it proceeded from ignorance of the square rule on the part of
Hiram; but, as his eye became gradually accustomed to the object, he
grew better satisfied with his labors, and instead of apologizing for
the defects, he commenced praising thc beauties of the mansion-house;
he soon found hearers, and, as wealth and comfort are at all times
attractive, it was, as has been said, made a model for imitation on a
small scale.   In less than two years from its erection, he had the
pleasure of standing on the elevated platform, and of looking down on
three humble imitators of its beauty.   Thus it is ever with fashion,
which even renders the faults of the great subjects of admiration. 

Marmaduke bore this deformity in his dwelling with great good-nature,
and soon contrived, by his own improvements, to give an air of
respectability and comfort to his place of residence.   Still, there
was much of in congruity, even immediately about the mansion-house. 
Although poplars had been brought from Europe to ornament the grounds,
and willows and other trees were gradually springing up nigh the
dwelling, yet many a pile of snow betrayed the presence of the stump
of a pine; and even, in one or two instances, unsightly remnants of
trees that had been partly destroyed by fire were seen rearing their
black, glistening columns twenty or thirty feet above the pure white
of the snow, These, which in the language of the country are termed
stubs, abounded in the open fields adjacent to the village, and were
accompanied, occasionally, by the ruin of a pine or a hemlock that had
been stripped of its bark, and which waved in melancholy grandeur its
naked limbs to the blast, a skeleton of its former glory.   But these
and many other unpleasant additions to the view were unseen by the
delighted Elizabeth, who, as the horses moved down the side of the
mountain, saw only in gross the cluster of houses that lay like a map
at her feet; the fifty smokes that were curling from the valley to the
clouds; the frozen lake as it lay imbedded in mountains of evergreen,
with the long shadows of the pines on its white surface, lengthening
in the setting sun; the dark ribbon of water that gushed from the
outlet and was winding its way toward the distant Chesapeake—the
altered, though still remembered, scenes of her child hood. 

Five years had wrought greater changes than a century would produce in
countries where time and labor have given permanency to the works of
man.   To our young hunter and the Judge the scene had less novelty;
though none ever emerge from the dark forests of that mountain, and
witness the glorious scenery of that beauteous valley, as it bursts
unexpectedly upon them, without a feeling of delight.   The former cast
one admiring glance from north to south, and sank his face again
beneath the folds of his coat; while the latter contemplated, with
philanthropic pleasure, the prospect of affluence and comfort that was
expanding around him; the result of his own enterprise, and much of it
the fruits of his own industry. 

The cheerful sound of sleigh-bells, however, attracted the attention
of the whole party, as they came jingling up the sides of the
mountain, at a rate that announced a powerful team and a hard driver. 
The bushes which lined the highway interrupted the view, and the two
sleighs were close upon each other before either was seen. 

CHAPTER 4

“How now? whose mare’s dead? what’s the matter?” - Falstaff

A large lumber sleigh, drawn by four horses, was soon seen dashing
through the leafless bushes which fringed the road.   The leaders were
of gray, and the pole-horses of a jet-black.   Bells innumerable were
suspended from every part of the harness where one of the tinkling
balls could be placed, while the rapid movement of the equipage, in
defiance of the steep ascent, announced the desire of the driver to
ring them to the utmost.   The first glance at this singular
arrangement acquainted the Judge with the character of those in the
sleigh.   It contained four male figures.   On one of those stools that
are used at writing desks, lashed firmly to the sides of the vehicle,
was seated a little man, enveloped in a great-coat fringed with fur,
in such a manner that no part of him was visible, except a face of an
unvarying red color.   There was an habitual upward look about the head
of this gentleman, as if dissatisfied with its natural proximity to
the earth; and the expression of his countenance was that of busy
care, He was the charioteer, and he guided the mettled animals along
the precipice with a fearless eye and a steady hand, Immediately
behind him, with his face toward the other two, was a tall figure, to
whose appearance not even the duplicate overcoats which he wore, aided
by the corner of a horse-blanket, could give the appearance of
strength.   His face was protruding from beneath a woollen night cap;
and, when he turned to the vehicle of Marmaduke as the sleighs
approached each other, it seemed formed by nature to cut the
atmosphere with the least possible resistance.   The eyes alone
appeared to create any obstacle, for from either side of his forehead
their light-blue, glassy balls projected.   The sallow of his
countenance was too permanent to be affected even by the intense cold
of the evening.   Opposite to this personage sat a solid, short, and
square figure.   No part of his form was to be discovered through his
overdress, but a face that was illuminated by a pair of black eyes
that gave the lie to every demure feature in his countenance.   A fair,
jolly wig furnished a neat and rounded outline to his visage, and he,
well as the other two, wore marten-skin caps.   The fourth was a meek-
looking, long-visaged man, without any other protection from the cold
than that which was furnished by a black surcoat, made with some
little formality, but which was rather threadbare and rusty.   He wore
a hat of extremely decent proportions, though frequent brushing had
quite destroyed its nap.   His face was pale, and withal a little
melancholy, or what might be termed of a studious complexion.   The air
had given it, just now, a light and somewhat feverish flush, The
character of his whole appearance, especially contrasted to the air of
humor in his next companion, was that of habitual mental care.   No
sooner had the two sleighs approached within speaking distance, than
the driver of this fantastic equipage shouted aloud

“Draw up in the quarry—draw up, thou king of the Greeks; draw into the
quarry, Agamemnon, or I shall never be able to pass you.   Welcome
home, Cousin ‘Duke— welcome, welcome, black-eyed Bess.   Thou seest,
Marina duke that I have taken the field with an assorted cargo, to do
thee honor.   Monsieur Le Quoi has come out with only one cap; Old
Fritz would not stay to finish the bottle; and Mr.  Grant has got to
put the ‘lastly’ to his sermon, yet.   Even all the horses would come—
by the-bye, Judge, I must sell the blacks for you immediately; they
interfere, and the nigh one is a bad goer in double harness.   I can
get rid of them to—”

“Sell what thou wilt, Dickon,” interrupted the cheerful voice of the
Judge, “so that thou leavest me my daughter and my lands.   And Fritz,
my old friend, this is a kind compliment, indeed, for seventy to pay
to five-and-forty.   Monsieur Le Quoi, I am your servant.   Mr.  Grant,”
lifting his cap, “I feel indebted to your attention.   Gentlemen, I
make you acquainted with my child.   Yours are names with which she is
very familiar. ”

“Velcome, velcome Tchooge,” said the elder of the party, with a strong
German accent.   “Miss Petsy vill owe me a kiss. ”

“And cheerfully will I pay It, my good sir,” cried the soft voice of
Elizabeth; which sounded, in the clear air of the hills.   Like tones
of silver, amid the loud cries of Richard.   “I have always a kiss for
my old friend.   Major Hartmann. ”

By this time the gentleman in the front seat, who had been addressed
as Monsieur Le Quoi, had arisen with some difficulty, owing to the
impediment of his overcoats, and steadying himself by placing one hand
on the stool of the charioteer, with the other he removed his cap, and
bowing politely to the Judge and profoundly to Elizabeth, he paid his
compliments. 

“Cover thy poll, Gaul, cover thy poll,” cried the driver, who was Mr. 
Richard Jones; “cover thy poll, or the frost will pluck out the
remnant of thy locks.   Had the hairs on the head of Absalom been as
scarce as thine, he might have been living to this day. ” The jokes of
Richard never failed of exciting risibility, for he uniformly did
honor to his own wit; and he enjoyed a hearty laugh on the present
occasion, while Mr.  Le Quoi resumed his seat with a polite
reciprocation in his mirth.   The clergyman, for such was the office of
Mr.  Grant, modestly, though quite affectionately, exchanged his
greetings with the travellers also, when Richard prepared to turn the
heads of his horses homeward. 

It was in the quarry alone that he could effect this object, without
ascending to the summit of the mountain.   A very considerable
excavation had been made in the side of the hill, at the point where
Richard had succeeded in stopping the sleighs, from which the stones
used for building in the village were ordinarily quarried, and in
which he now attempted to turn his team.   Passing itself was a task of
difficulty, and frequently of danger, in that narrow road; but Richard
had to meet the additional risk of turning his four-in-hand.   The
black civilly volunteered his services to take off the leaders, and
the Judge very earnestly seconded the measure with his advice. 
Richard treated both proposals with great disdain. 

“Why, and wherefore.   Cousin ‘Duke?” he exclaimed, a little angrily;
“the horses are gentle as lambs.   You know that I broke the leaders
myself, and the pole-horses are too near my whip to be restive.   Here
is Mr.  Le Quoi, now, who must know something about driving, because he
has rode out so often with me; I will leave it to Mr.  Le Quoi whether
there is any danger. ”

It was not in the nature of the Frenchman to disappoint expectations
so confidently formed; although he cat looking down the precipice
which fronted him, as Richard turned his leaders into the quarry, with
a pair of eyes that stood out like those of lobsters.   The German’s
muscles were unmoved, but his quick sight scanned each movement.   Mr. 
Grant placed his hands on the side of the sleigh, in preparation for a
spring, but moral timidity deterred him from taking the leap that
bodily apprehension strongly urged him to attempt. 

Richard, by a sudden application of the whip, succeeded in forcing the
leaders into the snow-bank that covered the quarry; but the instant
that the impatient animals suffered by the crust, through which they
broke at each step, they positively refused to move an inch farther in
that direction.   On the contrary, finding that the cries and blows of
their driver were redoubled at this juncture, the leaders backed upon
the pole-horses, who in their turn backed the sleigh.   Only a single
log lay above the pile which upheld the road on the side toward the
valley, and this was now buried in the snow.   The sleigh was easily
breed across so slight an impediment, and before Richard became
conscious of his danger one-half of the vehicle Was projected over a
precipice, which fell perpendicularly more than a hundred feet.   The
Frenchman, who by his position had a full view of their threatened
flight, instinctively threw his body as far forward as possible, and
cried

“Oh! mon cher Monsieur Deeck! mon Dieu! que faites vous!”

“Donner und blitzen, Richart!” exclaimed the veteran German, looking
over the side of the sleigh with unusual emotion, “put you will preak
ter sleigh and kilt ter horses!”

“Good Mr.  Jones,” said the clergyman, “be prudent, good sir—be
careful,”

“Get up, obstinate devils!” cried Richard, catching a bird’s-eye view
of his situation, and in his eagerness to move forward kicking the
stool on which he sat—” get up, I say—Cousin ‘Duke, I shall have to
sell the grays too; they are the worst broken horses—Mr.  Le Quoi”
Richard was too much agitated to regard his pronunciation, of which he
was commonly a little vain: “Monsieur La Quoi, pray get off my leg;
you hold my leg so tight that it's no wonder the horses back. ”

“Merciful Providence!” exclaimed the Judge; “they will be all killed!”
Elizabeth gave a piercing shriek, and the black of Agamemnon’s face
changed to a muddy white. 

At this critical moment, the young hunter, who during the salutations
of the parties had sat in rather sullen silence, sprang from the
sleigh of Marmaduke to the heads of the refractory leaders.   The
horses, which were yet suffering under the injudicious and somewhat
random blows of Richard, were dancing up and down with that ominous
movement that threatens a sudden and uncontrollable start, still
pressing backward.   The youth gave the leaders a powerful jerk, and
they plunged aside, and re-entered the road in the position in which
they were first halted.   The sleigh was whirled from its dangerous
position, and upset, with the runners outward.   The German and the
divine were thrown, rather unceremoniously, into the highway, but
without danger to their bones.   Richard appeared in the air,
describing the segment of a circle, of which the reins were the radii,
and landed, at the distance of some fifteen feet, in that snow-bank
which the horses had dreaded, right end uppermost.   Here, as he
instinctively grasped the reins, as drowning men seize at straws, he
admirably served the purpose of an anchor.   The Frenchman, who was on
his legs, in the act of springing from the sleigh, took an aerial
flight also, much in the attitude which boys assume when they play
leap-frog, and, flying off in a tangent to the curvature of his
course, came into the snow-bank head foremost, w-here he remained,
exhibiting two lathy legs on high, like scarecrows waving in a corn-
field.   Major Hartmann, whose self-possession had been admirably
preserved during the whole evolution, was the first of the party that
gained his feet and his voice. 

“Ter deyvel, Richart!” he exclaimed in a voice half serious, half-
comical, “put you unload your sleigh very hautily!”

It may be doubtful whether the attitude in which Mr.  Grant continued
for an instant after his overthrow was the one into which he had been
thrown, or was assumed, in humbling himself before the Power that he
reverenced, in thanksgiving at his escape.   When he rose from his
knees, he began to gaze about him, with anxious looks, after the
welfare of his companions, while every joint in his body trembled with
nervous agitation.   There was some confusion in the faculties of Mr. 
Jones also: but as the mist gradually cleared from before his eyes, he
saw that all was safe, and, with an air of great self-satisfaction, he
cried, “Well—that was neatly saved, anyhow!— it was a lucky thought in
me to hold on to the reins, or the fiery devils would have been over
the mountain by this time.   How well I recovered myself, ‘Duke!
Another moment would have been too late; but I knew just the spot
where to touch the off-leader; that blow under his right flank, and
the sudden jerk I gave the rein, brought them round quite in rule, I
must own myself. ” *

  * The spectators, from immemorial usage, have a right to laugh at the
    casualties of a sleigh ride; and the Judge was no sooner certain that
    no one was done than he made full use of the privilege. 

“Thou jerk! thou recover thyself, Dickon!” he said; ‘but for that
brave lad yonder, thou and thy horses, or rather mine, would have been
dashed to pieces—but where is Monsieur Le Quoi?”

“Oh! mon cher Juge! mon ami!” cried a smothered voice,” praise be God,
I live; vill you, Mister Agamemnon, be pleas come down ici, and help
me on my leg?”

The divine and the negro seized the incarcerated Gaul by his legs and
extricated him from a snow-bank of three feet in depth, whence his
voice had sounded as from the tombs.   The thoughts of Mr.  Le Quoi,
immediately on Ms liberation, were not extremely collected; and, when
he reached the light, he threw his eyes upward, in order to examine
the distance he had fallen.   His good-humor returned, however, with a
knowledge of his safety, though it was some little time before he
clearly comprehended the case. 

“What, monsieur,” said Richard, who was busily assisting the black in
taking off the leaders; “are you there? I thought I saw you flying
toward the top of the mountain just now. ”

“Praise be God, I no fly down into the lake,” returned the Frenchman,
with a visage that was divided between pain, occasioned by a few large
scratches that he had received in forcing his head through the crust,
and the look of complaisance that seemed natural to his pliable
features. 

“Ah! mon cher Mister Deeck, vat you do next? - dere be noting you no
try. ”

“The next thing, I trust, will be to learn to drive,” said the Judge,
who bad busied himself in throwing the buck, together with several
other articles of baggage, from his own sleigh into the snow; “here
are seats for you all, gentlemen; the evening grows piercingly cold,
and the hour approaches for the service of Mr.  Grant; we will leave
friend Jones to repair the damages, with the assistance of Agamemnon,
and hasten to a warm fire.   Here, Dickon, are a few articles of Bess’
trumpery, that you can throw into your sleigh when ready; and there is
also a deer of my taking, that I will thank you to bring.   Aggy!
remember that there will be a visit from Santa Claus * to-night. ”

  * The periodical visits of St.  Nicholas, or Santa Claus, as he is
    termed, were never forgotten among the inhabitants of New York, until
    the emigration from New England brought in the opinions and usages of
    the Puritans, like the “bon homme de Noel. ” he arrives at each
    Christmas. 

The black grinned, conscious of the bribe that was offered him for
silence on the subject of the deer, while Richard, without in the
least waiting for the termination of his cousin’s speech, began his
reply:

“Learn to drive, sayest thou, Cousin ‘Duke? Is there a man in the
county who knows more of horse-flesh than myself? Who broke in the
filly, that no one else dare mount, though your coachman did pretend
that he had tamed her before I took her in hand; but anybody could see
that he lied—he was a great liar, that John—what’s that, a buck?”
Richard abandoned the horses, and ran to the spot where Marmaduke had
thrown the deer, “It is a buck! I am amazed! Yes, here are two holes
in him, he has fired both barrels, and hit him each time, Egod! how
Marmaduke will brag! he is a prodigious bragger about any small matter
like this now; well, to think that ‘Duke has killed a buck before
Christmas! There will be no such thing as living with him—they are
both bad shots though, mere chance—mere chance—now, I never fired
twice at a cloven foot in my life—it is hit or miss with me—dead or
run away-had it been a bear, or a wild-cat, a man might have wanted
both barrels.   Here! you Aggy! how far off was the Judge when this
buck was shot?”

“Oh! massa Richard, maybe a ten rod,” cried the black, bending under
one of the horses, with the pretence of fastening a buckle, but in
reality to conceal the grin that opened a mouth from ear to ear. 

“Ten rod!” echoed the other; “way, Aggy, the deer I Killed last winter
‘was at twenty—yes! if anything it was nearer thirty than twenty.   I
wouldn’t shoot at a deer at ten rod: besides, you may remember, Aggy,
I only fired once. ”

“Yes, massa Richard, I ‘member ‘em! Natty Bumppo fire t’oder gun.   You
know, sir, all ‘e folks say Natty kill him. ”

“The folks lie, you black devil!” exclaimed Richard in great heat.   “I
have not shot even a gray squirrel these four years, to which that old
rascal has not laid claim, or some one else or him.   This is a damned
envious world that we live in—people are always for dividing the
credit at a thing, in order to bring down merit to their own level. 
Now they have a story about the Patent, that Hiram Doolittle helped
to plan the steeple to St.  Paul’s; when Hiram knows that it is
entirely mine; a little taken front a print of his namesake in London,
I own; but essentially, as to all points of genius, my own. ”

[footnote The grants of land, made either by the crown or the state, were but
    letters patent under the great seal, and the term “patent” is usually
    applied to any district of extent thus conceded; though under the
    crown’, manorial rights being often granted with the soil, in the
    older counties the word “manor” is frequently used.   There are many
    manors in New York though all political and judicial rights have
    ceased. ]

“I don't know where he come from,” said the black, losing every mark
of humor in an expression of admiration, “but eb’rybody say, he
wounerful handsome. ”

“And well they may say so, Aggy,” cried Richard, leaving the buck and
walking up to the negro with the air of a man who has new interest
awakened within him, “I think I may say, without bragging, that it is
the handsomest and the most scientific country church in America.   I
know that the Connecticut settlers talk about their West Herfield
meeting-house; but I never believe more than half what they say, they
are such unconscionable braggers.   Just as you have got a thing done,
if they see it likely to be successful, they are always for
interfering; and then it’s tea to one but they lay claim to half, or
even all of the credit.   You may remember, Aggy, when I painted the
sign of the bold dragoon for Captain Hollister there was that fellow,
who was about town laying brick-dust on the houses, came one day and
offered to mix what I call the streaky black, for the tail and mane;
and then, because it looks like horse-hair, he tells everybody that
the sign was painted by himself and Squire Jones.   If Marmaduke don’t
send that fellow off the Patent, he may ornament his village with his
own hands for me,” Here Richard paused a moment, and cleared his
throat by a loud hem, while the negro, who was all this time busily
engaged in preparing the sleigh, proceeded with his work in respectful
silence.   Owing to the religious scruples of the Judge, Aggy was the
servant of Richard, who had his services for a time,* and who, of
course, commanded a legal claim to the respect of the young negro. 
But when any dispute between his lawful and his real master occurred,
the black felt too much deference for both to express any opinion. 

  * The manumission of the slaves in New York has been gradual.   When
    public opinion became strong in their favor, then grew up a custom of
    buying the services of a slave, for six or eight years, with a
    condition to liberate him at the end of the period.   Then the law
    provided that all born after a certain day should be free, the males
    at twenty— eight and the females at twenty-five.   After this the owner
    was obliged to cause his servants to be taught to read and write
    before they reached the age of eighteen, and, finally, the few that
    remained were all unconditionally liberated in 1826, or after the
    publication of this tale.   It was quite usual for men more or less
    connected with the Quakers, who never held slaves to adopt the first
    expedient. 

In the mean while, Richard continued watching the negro as he fastened
buckle after buckle, until, stealing a look of consciousness toward
the other, he continued: “Now, if that young man who was in your
sleigh is a real Connecticut settler, he will be telling everybody how
he saved my horses, when, if he had let them alone for half a minute
longer, I would have brought them in much better, without upsetting,
with the whip amid rein—it spoils a horse to give him his heal, I
should not wonder if I had to sell the whole team, just for that one
jerk he gave them,” Richard paused and hemmed; for his conscience
smote him a little for censuring a man who had just saved his life. 
“Who is the lad, Aggy—I don’t remember to have seen him before?”

The black recollected the hint about Santa Claus; and, while he
briefly explained how they had taken up the person in question on the
top of the mountain, he forbore to add anything concerning the
accident or the wound, only saying that he believed the youth was a
stranger.   It was so usual for men of the first rank to take into
their sleighs any one they found toiling through the snow, that
Richard was perfectly satisfied with this explanation.   He heard Aggy
with great attention, and then remarked: “Well, if the lad has not
been spoiled by the people in Templeton he may be a modest young man,
and, as he certainly meant well, I shall take some notice of him—
perhaps he is land-hunting—I say, Aggy, maybe he is out hunting?”

“Eh! yes, massa Richard,” said the black, a little confused; for, as
Richard did all the flogging, he stood in great terror of his master,
in the main—” Yes, sir, I b’lieve he be. ”

“Had he a pack and an axe?”

“No, sir, only he rifle. ”

“Rifle!” exclaimed Richard, observing the confusion of The negro,
which now amounted to terror.   “By Jove, he killed the deer! I knew
that Marmaduke couldn’t kill a buck on the jump—how was it, Aggy? Tell
me all about it, and I’ll roast ‘Duke quicker than he can roast his
saddle—how was it, Aggy? the lad shot the buck, and the Judge bought
it, ha! and he is taking the youth down to get the pay?”

The pleasure of this discovery had put Richard in such a good humor,
that the negro’s fears in some measure vanished, and he remembered the
stocking of Santa Claus.   After a gulp or two, he made out to reply;

“You forgit a two shot, sir?”

“Don’t lie, you black rascal!” cried Richard, stepping on the snow-
bank to measure the distance from his lash to the negro’s back; “speak
truth, or I trounce you. ” While speaking, the stock was slowly rising
in Richard’s right hand, and the lash drawing through his left, in the
scientific manner with which drummers apply the cat; and Agamemnon,
after turning each side of himself toward his master, and finding both
equally unwilling to remain there, fairly gave in.   In a very few
words he made his master acquainted with the truth, at the same time
earnestly conjuring Richard to protect him from the displeasure of thc
lodge I’ll do it, boy, I’ll do it,” cried the other, rubbing his hands
with delight; “say nothing, but leave me to manage ‘Duke.   I have a
great mind to leave the deer on the hill, and to make the fellow send
for his own carcass; but no, I will let Marmaduke tell a few bounces
about it before I come out upon him.   Come, hurry in, Aggy, I must
help to dress the lad’s wound; this Yankee* doctor knows nothing of
surgery—I had to hold out Milligan’s leg for him, while he cut it off. 

  * In America the term Yankee is of local meaning.   It is thought to be
    derived from the manner in which the Indians of New England pronounced
    the word “English,” or “Yengeese. ” New York being originally a Dutch
    province, the term of course was not known there, and Farther south
    different dialects among the natives themselves probably produced a
    different pronunciation Marmaduke and his cousin, being Pennsylvanians
    by birth, were not Yankees in the American sense of the word. 

Richard was now seated on the stool again, and, the black taking the
hind seat, the steeds were put in motion toward home, As they dashed
down the hill on a fast trot, the driver occasionally turned his face
to Aggy, and continued speaking; for, notwithstanding their recent
rupture, the most perfect cordiality was again existing between them,
“This goes to prove that I turned the horses with the reins, for no
man who is shot in the right shoulder can have strength enough to
bring round such obstinate devils.   I knew I did it from the first;
but I did not want to multiply words with Marmaduke about it. —Will you
bite, you villain? —hip, boys, hip! Old Natty, too, that is the best
of it!—Well, well—’Duke will say no more about my deer—and the Judge
fired both barrels, and hit nothing but a poor lad who was behind a
pine-tree.   I must help that quack to take out the buckshot for the
poor fellow. ” In this manner Richard descended the mountain; the bells
ringing, and his tongue going, until they entered the village, when
the whole attention of the driver was devoted to a display of his
horsemanship, to the admiration of all the gaping women and children
who thronged the windows to witness the arrival of their landlord and
his daughter. 

CHAPTER 5

“Nathaniel’s coat, sir, was not fully made,
And Gabriel’s pumps were all unpink’d i’ th' heel;
There was no link to color Peter’s hat,
And Walter’s dagger was not come from sheathing;
There were none fine, but Adam, Ralph, and Gregory. ”—Shakespeare. 

After winding along the side of the mountain, the road, on reaching
the gentle declivity which lay at the base of the hill, turned at a
right angle to its former course, and shot down an inclined plane,
directly into the village of Templeton.   The rapid little stream that
we have already mentioned was crossed by a bridge of hewn timber,
which manifested, by its rude construction and the unnecessary size of
its framework, both the value of Labor and the abundance of materials. 
This little torrent, whose dark waters gushed over the limestones that
lined its bottom, was nothing less than one of the many sources of the
Susquehanna; a river to which the Atlantic herself has extended an arm
in welcome.   It was at this point that the powerful team of Mr.  Jones
brought him up to the more sober steeds of our travellers.   A small
hill was risen, and Elizabeth found herself at once amidst the
incongruous dwellings of the village.   The street was of the ordinary
width, notwithstanding the eye might embrace, in one view, thousands
and tens of thousands of acres, that were yet tenanted only by the
beasts of the forest.   But such had been the will of her father, and
such had also met the wishes of his followers.   To them the road that
made the most rapid approaches to the condition of the old, or, as
they expressed it, the down countries, was the most pleasant; and
surely nothing could look more like civilization than a city, even if
it lay in a wilderness! The width of the street, for so it was called,
might have been one hundred feet; but the track for the sleighs was
much more limited.   On either side of the highway were piled huge
heaps of logs, that were daily increasing rather than diminishing in
size, notwithstanding the enormous fires that might be seen through
every window. 

The last object at which Elizabeth gazed when they renewed their
journey, after their encountre with Richard, was the sun, as it
expanded in the refraction of the horizon, and over whose disk the
dark umbrage of a pine was stealing, while it slowly sank behind the
western hills.   But his setting rays darted along the openings of the
mountain he was on, and lighted the shining covering of the birches,
until their smooth and glossy coats nearly rivalled the mountain sides
in color.   The outline of each dark pine was delineated far in the
depths of the forest, and the rocks, too smooth and too perpendicular
to retain the snow that had fallen, brightened, as if smiling at the
leave-taking of the luminary.   But at each step as they descended,
Elizabeth observed that they were leaving the day behind them.   Even
the heartless but bright rays of a December sun were missed as they
glided into the cold gloom of the valley.   Along the summits of the
mountains in the eastern range, it is true, the light still lingered,
receding step by step from the earth into the clouds that were
gathering with the evening mist, about the limited horizon, but the
frozen lake lay without a shadow on its bosom; the dwellings were
becoming already gloomy and indistinct, and the wood-cutters were
shouldering their axes and preparing to enjoy, throughout the long
evening before them, the comforts of those exhilarating fires that
their labor had been supplying with fuel.   They paused only to gaze at
the passing sleighs, to lift their caps to Marmaduke, to exchange
familiar nods with Richard, and each disappeared in his dwelling.   The
paper curtains dropped behind our travellers in every window, shutting
from the air even the firelight of the cheerful apartments, and when
the horses of her father turned with a rapid whirl into the open gate
of the mansion-house, and nothing stood before her but the cold dreary
stone walls of the building, as she approached them through an avenue
of young and leafless poplars, Elizabeth felt as if all the loveliness
of the mountain-view had vanished like the fancies of a dream. 
Marmaduke retained so much of his early habits as to reject the use of
bells, but the equipage of Mr.  Jones came dashing through the gate
after them, sending its jingling sounds through every cranny of the
building, and in a moment the dwelling was in an uproar. 

On a stone platform, of rather small proportions, considering the size
of the building, Richard and Hiram had, conjointly, reared four little
columns of wood, which in their turn supported the shingled roofs of
the portico— this was the name that Mr.  Jones had thought proper to
give to a very plain, covered entrance.   The ascent to the platform
was by five or six stone steps, somewhat hastily laid together, and
which the frost had already begun to move from their symmetrical
positions, But the evils of a cold climate and a superficial
construction did not end here.   As the steps lowered the platform
necessarily fell also, and the foundations actually left the super
structure suspended in the air, leaving an open space of a foot
between the base of the pillars and the stones on which they had
originally been placed.   It was lucky for the whole fabric that the
carpenter, who did the manual part of the labor, had fastened the
canopy of this classic entrance so firmly to the side of the house
that, when the base deserted the superstructure in the manner we have
described, and the pillars, for the want of a foundation, were no
longer of service to support the roof, the roof was able to uphold the
pillars.   Here was, indeed, an unfortunate gap left in the ornamental
part of Richard’s column; but, like the window in Aladdin’s palace, it
seemed only left in order to prove the fertility of its master’s
resources.   The composite order again offered its advantages, and a
second edition of the base was given, as the booksellers say, with
additions and improvements.   It was necessarily larger, and it was
properly ornamented with mouldings; still the steps continued to
yield, and, at the moment when Elizabeth returned to her father’s
door, a few rough wedges were driven under the pillars to keep them
steady, and to prevent their weight from separating them from the
pediment which they ought to have supported. 

From the great door which opened into the porch emerged two or three
female domestics, and one male.   The latter was bareheaded, but
evidently more dressed than usual, and on the whole was of so singular
a formation and attire as to deserve a more minute description.   He
was about five feet in height, of a square and athletic frame, with a
pair of shoulders that would have fitted a grenadier.   His low stature
was rendered the more striking by a bend forward that he was in the
habit of assuming, for no apparent reason, unless it might be to give
greater freedom to his arms, in a particularly sweeping swing, that
they constantly practised when their master was in motion.   His face
was long, of a fair complexion, burnt to a fiery red; with a snub
nose, cocked into an inveterate pug; a mouth of enormous dimensions,
filled with fine teeth; and a pair of blue eyes, that seemed to look
about them on surrounding objects with habitual contempt.   His head
composed full one-fourth of his whole length, and the cue that
depended from its rear occupied another.   He wore a coat of very light
drab cloth, with buttons as large as dollars, bearing the impression
of a “foul anchor. ” The skirts were extremely long, reaching quite to
the calf, and were broad in proportion.   Beneath, there were a vest
and breeches of red plush, somewhat worn and soiled.   He had shoes
with large buckles, and stockings of blue and white stripes. 

This odd-looking figure reported himself to be a native of the county
of Cornwall, in the island of Great Britain.   His boyhood had passed
in the neighborhood of the tin mines, and his youth as the cabin-boy
of a smuggler, between Falmouth and Guernsey.   From this trade he had
been impressed into the service of his king, and, for the want of a
better, had been taken into the cabin, first as a servant, and finally
as steward to the captain.   Here he acquired the art of making
chowder, lobster, and one or two other sea-dishes, and, as he was fond
of saying, had an opportunity of seeing the world.   With the exception
of one or two outports in France, and an occasional visit to
Portsmouth, Plymouth, and Deal, he had in reality seen no more of
mankind, however, than if he had been riding a donkey in one of his
native mines.   But, being discharged from the navy at the peace of
‘83, he declared that, as he had seen all the civilized parts of the
earth, he was inclined to make a trip to the wilds of America We will
not trace him in his brief wanderings, under the influence of that
spirit of emigration that some times induces a dapper Cockney to quit
his home, and lands him, before the sound of Bow-bells is out of his
ears, within the roar of the cataract of Niagara; but shall only add
that at a very early day, even before Elizabeth had been sent to
school, he had found his way into the family of Marmaduke Temple,
where, owing to a combination of qualities that will be developed in
the course of the tale, he held, under Mr.  Jones, the office of major-
domo.   The name of this worthy was Benjamin Penguillan, according to
his own pronunciation; but, owing to a marvellous tale that he was in
the habit of relating, concerning the length of time he had to labor
to keep his ship from sinking after Rodney’s victory, he had
universally acquired the nick name of Ben Pump. 

By the side of Benjamin, and pressing forward as if a little jealous
of her station, stood a middle-aged woman, dressed in calico, rather
violently contrasted in color with a tall, meagre, shapeless figure,
sharp features, and a somewhat acute expression of her physiognomy. 
Her teeth were mostly gone, and what did remain were of a tight
yellow.   The skin of her nose was drawn tightly over the member, to
hang in large wrinkles in her cheeks and about her mouth.   She took
snuff in such quantities as to create the impression that she owed the
saffron of her lips and the adjacent parts to this circumstance; but
it was the unvarying color of her whole face.   She presided over the
female part of the domestic arrangements, in the capacity of
housekeeper; was a spinster, and bore the name of Remarkable
Pettibone.   To Elizabeth she was an entire stranger, having been
introduced into the family since the death of her mother. 

In addition to these, were three or four subordinate menials, mostly
black, some appearing at the principal door, and some running from the
end of the building, where stood the entrance to the cellar-kitchen. 

Besides these, there was a general rush from Richard’s kennel,
accompanied with every canine tone from the howl of the wolf-dog to
the petulant bark of the terrier.   The master received their
boisterous salutations with a variety of imitations from his own
throat, when the dogs, probably from shame of being outdone, ceased
their out- cry.   One stately, powerful mastiff, who wore round his
neck a brass collar, with “M.  T. ” engraved in large letters on the
rim, alone was silent.   He walked majestically, amid the confusion, to
the side of the Judge, where, receiving a kind pat or two, he turned
to Elizabeth, who even stooped to kiss him, as she called him kindly
by the name of “Old Brave. ” The animal seemed to know her, as she
ascended the steps, supported by Monsieur Le Quoi and her father, in
order to protect her from falling on the ice with which they were
covered.   He looked wistfully after her figure, and when the door
closed on the whole party, he laid himself in a kennel that was placed
nigh by, as if conscious that the house contained some thing of
additional value to guard. 

Elizabeth followed her father, who paused a moment to whisper a
message to one of his domestics, into a large hall, that was dimly
lighted by two candies, placed in high, old-fashioned, brass
candlesticks.   The door closed, and the party were at once removed
from an atmosphere that was nearly at zero, to one of sixty degrees
above.   In the centre of the hall stood an enormous stove, the sides
of which appeared to be quivering with heat; from which a large,
straight pipe, leading through the ceiling above, carried off the
smoke.   An iron basin, containing water, was placed on this furnace,
for such only it could be called, in order to preserve a proper
humidity in the apartment.   The room was carpeted, and furnished with
convenient, substantial furniture, some of which was brought from the
city, the remainder having been manufactured by the mechanics of
Templeton.   There was a sideboard of mahogany, inlaid with ivory, and
bearing enormous handles of glittering brass, and groaning under the
piles of silver plate.   Near it stood a set of prodigious tables, made
of the wild cherry, to imitate the imported wood of the sideboard, but
plain and without ornament of any kind.   Opposite to these stood a
smaller table, formed from a lighter-colored wood, through the grains
of which the wavy lines of the curled maple of the mountains were
beautifully undulating.   Near to this, in a corner, stood a heavy,
old-fashioned, brass-faced clock, incased in a high box, of the dark
hue of the black walnut from the seashore.   An enormous settee, or
sofa, covered with light chintz, stretched along the walls for nearly
twenty feet on one side of the hail; and chairs of wood, painted a
light yellow, with black lines that were drawn by no very steady hand,
were ranged opposite, and in the intervals between the other pieces of
furniture.   A Fahrenheit's thermometer in a mahogany case, and with a
barometer annexed, was hung against the wall, at some little distance
from the stove, which Benjamin consulted, every half hour, with
prodigious exactitude.   Two small glass chandeliers were suspended at
equal distances between the stove and outer doors, one of which opened
at each end of the hall, and gilt lustres were affixed to the frame
work of the numerous side-doors that led from the apartment.   Some
little display in architecture had been made in constructing these
frames and casings, which were surmounted with pediments, that bore
each a little pedestal in its centre; on these pedestals were small
busts in blacked plaster-of-Paris.   The style of the pedestals as well
as the selection of the busts were all due to the taste of Mr.  Jones. 
On one stood Homer, a most striking likeness, Richard affirmed, “as
any one might see, for it was blind,” Another bore the image of a
smooth-visaged gentleman with a pointed beard, whom he called
Shakespeare.   A third ornament was an urn, which; from its shape,
Richard was accustomed to say, intended to represent itself as holding
the ashes of Dido.   A fourth was certainly old Franklin, in his cap
and spectacles.   A fifth as surely bore the dignified composure of the
face of Washington.   A sixth was a nondescript, representing “a man
with a shirt-collar open,” to use the language of Richard, “with a
laurel on his head-it was Julius Caesar or Dr.  Faustus; there were
good reasons for believing either,”

The walls were hung with a dark lead-colored English paper that
represented Britannia weeping over the tomb of Wolfe, The hero himself
stood at a little distance from the mourning goddess, and at the edge
of the paper.   Each width contained the figure, with the slight
exception of one arm of the general, which ran over on the next piece,
so that when Richard essayed, with his own hands, to put together this
delicate outline, some difficulties occurred that prevented a nice
conjunction; and Britannia had reason to lament, in addition to the
loss of her favorite’s life, numberless cruel amputations of his right
arm. 

The luckless cause of these unnatural divisions now announced his
presence in the halt by a loud crack of his whip. 

“Why, Benjamin! you Ben Pump! is this the manner in which you receive
the heiress?” he cried.   “Excuse him, Cousin Elizabeth.   The
arrangements were too intricate to be trusted to every one; but now I
am here, things will go on better.   —Come, light up, Mr.  Penguillan,
light up, light up, and let us see One another’s faces.   Well, ‘Duke,
I have brought home your deer; what is to be done with it, ha?”

“By the Lord, squire,” commenced Benjamin, in reply, first giving his
mouth a wipe with the back of his hand, “if this here thing had been
ordered sum’at earlier in the day, it might have been got up, d’ye
see, to your liking.   I had mustered all hands and was exercising
candles, when you hove in sight; but when the women heard your bells
they started an end, as if they were riding the boat swain’s colt; and
if-so-be there is that man in the house who can bring up a parcel of
women when they have got headway on them, until they’ve run out the
end of their rope, his name is not Benjamin Pump.   But Miss Betsey
here must have altered more than a privateer in disguise, since she
has got on her woman’s duds, if she will take offence with an old
fellow for the small matter of lighting a few candles. ”

Elizabeth and her father continued silent, for both experienced the
same sensation on entering the hall.   The former had resided one year
in the building before she left home for school, and the figure of its
lamented mistress was missed by both husband and child. 

But candles had been placed in the chandeliers and lustres, and the
attendants were so far recovered from surprise as to recollect their
use; the oversight was immediately remedied, and in a minute the
apartment was in a blaze of light. 

The slight melancholy of our heroine and her father was banished by
this brilliant interruption; and the whole party began to lay aside
the numberless garments they had worn in the air. 

During this operation Richard kept up a desultory dialogue with the
different domestics, occasionally throwing out a remark to the Judge
concerning the deer; but as his conversation at such moments was much
like an accompaniment on a piano, a thing that is heard without being
attended to, we will not undertake the task of recording his diffuse
discourse,

The instant that Remarkable Pettibone had executed her portion of the
labor in illuminating, she returned to a position near Elizabeth, with
the apparent motive of receiving the clothes that the other threw
aside, but in reality to examine, with an air of curiosity—not unmixed
with jealousy—the appearance of the lady who was to supplant her in
the administration of their domestic economy.   The housekeeper felt a
little appalled, when, after cloaks, coats, shawls, and socks had been
taken off in succession, the large black hood was removed, and the
dark ringlets, shining like the raven’s wing, fell from her head, and
left the sweet but commanding features of the young lady exposed to
view.   Nothing could be fairer and more spotless than the forehead of
Elizabeth, and preserve the appearance of life and health.   Her nose
would have been called Grecian, but for a softly rounded swell, that
gave in character to the feature what it lost in beauty.   Her mouth,
at first sight, seemed only made for love; but, the instant that its
muscles moved, every expression that womanly dignity could utter
played around it with the flexibility of female grace.   It spoke not
only to the ear, but to the eye.   So much, added to a form of
exquisite proportions, rather full and rounded for her years, and of
the tallest medium height, she inherited from her mother.   Even the
color of her eye, the arched brows, and the long silken lashes, came
from the same source; but its expression was her father’s.   Inert and
composed, it was soft, benevolent, and attractive; but it could be
roused, and that without much difficulty.   At such moments it was
still beautiful, though it was a little severe.   As the last shawl
fell aside, and she stood dressed in a rich blue riding-habit, that
fitted her form with the nicest exactness; her cheeks burning with
roses, that bloomed the richer for the heat of the hall, and her eyes
lightly suffused with moisture that rendered their ordinary beauty
more dazzling, and with every feature of her speaking countenance
illuminated by the lights that flared around her, Remarkable felt that
her own power had ended

The business of unrobing had been simultaneous.   Marmaduke appeared in
a suit of plain, neat black; Monsieur Le Quoi in a coat of snuff-
color, covering a vest of embroidery, with breeches, and silk
stockings, and buckles—that were commonly thought to be of paste. 
Major Hartmann wore a coat of sky-blue, with large brass buttons, a
club wig, and boots; and Mr.  Richard Jones had set off his dapper
little form in a frock of bottle-green, with bullet-buttons, by one of
which the sides were united over his well-rounded waist, opening
above, so as to show a jacket of red cloth, with an undervest of
flannel, faced with green velvet, and below, so as to exhibit a pair
of buckskin breeches, with long, soiled, white top-boots, and spurs;
one of the latter a little bent, from its recent attacks on the stool. 

When the young lady had extricated herself from her garments, she was
at liberty to gaze about her, and to examine not only the household
over which she was to preside, but also the air and manner in which
the domestic arrangements were conducted.   Although there was much
incongruity in the furniture and appearance of the hall, there was
nothing mean.   The floor was carpeted, even in its remotest corners. 
The brass candlesticks, the gilt lustres, and the glass chandeliers,
whatever might be their keeping as to propriety and taste, were
admirably kept as to all the purposes of use and comfort.   They were
clean and glittering in the strong light of the apartment. 

Compared with the chill aspect of the December night without, the
warmth and brilliancy of the apartment produced an effect that was not
unlike enchantment.   Her eye had not time to detect, in detail, the
little errors which in truth existed, but was glancing around her in
de light, when an object arrested her view that was in strong contrast
to the smiling faces and neatly attired person ages who had thus
assembled to do honor to the heiress of Templeton. 

In a corner of the hall near the grand entrance stood the young
hunter, unnoticed, and for the moment apparently forgotten.   But even
the forgetfulness of the Judge, which, under the influence of strong
emotion, had banished the recollection of the wound of this stranger,
seemed surpassed by the absence of mind in the youth himself.   On
entering the apartment, be had mechanically lifted his cap, and
exposed a head covered with hair that rivalled, in color and gloss,
the locks of Elizabeth.   Nothing could have wrought a greater
transformation than the single act of removing the rough fox-skin cap. 
If there was much that was prepossessing in the countenance of the
young hunter, there was something even noble in the rounded outlines
of his head and brow.   The very air and manner with which the member
haughtily maintained itself over the coarse and even wild attire in
which the rest of his frame was clad, bespoke not only familiarity
with a splendor that in those new settlements was thought to be
unequalled, but something very like contempt also. 

The hand that held the cap rested lightly on the little ivory-mounted
piano of Elizabeth, with neither rustic restraint nor obtrusive
vulgarity.   A single finger touched the instrument, as if accustomed
to dwell on such places.   His other arm was extended to its utmost
length, and the hand grasped the barrel of his long rifle with
something like convulsive energy.   The act and the attitude were both
involuntary, and evidently proceeded from a feeling much deeper than
that of vulgar surprise.   His appearance, connected as it was with the
rough exterior of his dress, rendered him entirely distinct from the
busy group that were moving across the other end of the long hall,
occupied in receiving the travellers and exchanging their welcomes;
and Elizabeth continued to gaze at him in wonder.   The contraction of
the stranger’s brows in creased as his eyes moved slowly from one
object to another.   For moments the expression of his countenance was
fierce, and then again it seemed to pass away in some painful emotion. 
The arm that was extended bent and brought the hand nigh to his face,
when his head dropped upon it, and concealed the wonderfully speaking
lineaments. 

“We forget, dear sir, the strange gentleman” (for her life Elizabeth
could not call him otherwise) “whom we have brought here for
assistance, and to whom we owe every attention. ”

All eyes were instantly turned in the direction of those of the
speaker, and the youth rather proudly elevated his head again, while
he answered:

“My wound is trifling, and I believe that Judge Temple sent for a
physician the moment we arrived. ”

“Certainly,” said Marmaduke: “I have not forgotten the object of thy
visit, young man, nor the nature of my debt. 

“Oh!” exclaimed Richard, with something of a waggish leer, “thou owest
the lad for the venison, I suppose that thou killed, Cousin ‘Duke!
Marmaduke! Marmaduke! That was a marvellous tale of thine about the
buck! Here, young man, are two dollars for the deer, and Judge Temple
can do no less than pay the doctor.   I shall charge you nothing for my
services, but you shall not fare the worst for that.   Come, come,
‘Duke, don’t he down hearted about it; if you missed the buck, you
contrived to shoot this poor fellow through a pine-tree.   Now I own
that you have beat me; I never did such a thing in all my life. ”

“And I hope never will,” returned the Judge, “if you are to experience
the uneasiness that I have suffered; but be of good cheer, my young
friend, the injury must be small, as thou movest thy arm with apparent
freedom. 

“Don’t make the matter worse, ‘Duke, by pretending to talk about
surgery,” interrupted Mr.  Jones, with a contemptuous wave of the hand:
“it is a science that can only be learned by practice.   You know that
my grandfather was a doctor, but you haven’t got a drop of medical
blood in your veins.   These kind of things run in families.   All my
family by my father’s side had a knack at physic.   ‘There was my uncle
that was killed at Brandywine—he died as easy again as any other man
the regiment, just from knowing how to hold his breath naturally.   Few
men know how to breathe naturally. ”

“I doubt not, Dickon,” returned the Judge, meeting the bright smile
which, in spite of himself, stole over the stranger’s features, “that
thy family thoroughly under stand the art of letting life slip through
their lingers. ”

Richard heard him quite coolly, and putting a hand in either pocket of
his surcoat, so as to press forward the skirts, began to whistle a
tune; but the desire to reply overcame his philosophy, and with great
heat he exclaimed:

“You may affect to smile, Judge Temple, at hereditary virtues, if you
please; but there is not a man on your Patent who don’t know better. 
Here, even this young man, who has never seen anything but bears, and
deer, and woodchucks, knows better than to believe virtues are not
transmitted in families.   Don’t you, friend?”

“I believe that vice is not,” said the stranger abruptly; his eye
glancing from the father to the daughter. 

“The squire is right, Judge,” observed Benjamin, with a knowing nod of
his head toward Richard, that bespoke the cordiality between them,
“Now, in the old country, the king’s majesty touches for the evil, and
that is a disorder that the greatest doctor in the fleet, or for the
matter of that admiral either: can’t cure; only the king’s majesty or
a man that’s been hanged.   Yes, the squire is right; for if-so-be that
he wasn’t, how is it that the seventh son always is a doctor, whether
he ships for the cockpit or not? Now when we fell in with the
mounsheers, under De Grasse, d’ye see, we hid aboard of us a doctor—”

“Very well, Benjamin,” interrupted Elizabeth, glancing her eyes from
the hunter to Monsieur Le Quoi, who was most politely attending to
what fell from each individual in succession, “you shall tell me of
that, and all your entertaining adventures together; just now, a room
must be prepared, in which the arm of this gentleman can be dressed. ”

“I will attend to that myself, Cousin Elizabeth,” observed Richard,
somewhat haughtily.   “The young man will not suffer because Marmaduke
chooses to be a little obstinate.   Follow me, my friend, and I will
examine the hurt myself. ”

“It will be well to wait for the physician,” said the hunter coldly;
“he cannot be distant,”

Richard paused and looked at the speaker, a little astonished at the
language, and a good deal appalled at the refusal.   He construed the
latter into an act of hostility, and, placing his hands in the pockets
again, he walked up to Mr.  Grant, and, putting his face close to the
countenance of the divine, said in an undertone:

“Now, mark my words—there will be a story among the settlers, that all
our necks would have been broken but for that fellow—as if I did not
know how to drive.   Why, you might have turned the horses yourself,
sir; nothing was easier; it was only pulling hard on the nigh rein,
and touching the off flank of the leader.   I hope, my dear sir, you
are not at all hurt by the upset the lad gave us?”

The reply was interrupted by the entrance of the village physician. 

CHAPTER 6

“And about his shelves,
A beggarly account of empty boxes,
Green earthen pots, bladders, and musty seeds. 
Remnants of packthread, and old cakes of roses,
Were thinly scattered to make up a show. ”-Shakespeare. 

Doctor Elnathan Todd, for such was the name of the man of physic, was
commonly thought to be, among the settlers, a gentleman of great
mental endowments, and he was assuredly of rare personal proportions. 
In height he measured, without his shoes, exactly six feet and four
inches.   His hands, feet, and knees corresponded in every respect with
this formidable stature; but every other part of his frame appeared to
have been intended for a man several sizes smaller, if we except the
length of the limbs.   His shoulders were square, in one sense at
least, being in a right line from one side to the other; but they were
so narrow, that the long dangling arms they supported seemed to issue
out of his back.   His neck possessed, in an eminent degree, the
property of length to which we have alluded, and it was topped by a
small bullet-head that exhibited on one side a bush of bristling brown
hair and on the other a short, twinkling visage, that appeared to
maintain a constant struggle with itself in order to look wise.   He
was the youngest son of a farmer in the western part of Massachusetts,
who, being in some what easy circumstances, had allowed this boy to
shoot up to the height we have mentioned, without the ordinary
interruptions of field labor, wood-chopping, and such other toils as
were imposed on his brothers.   Elnathan was indebted for this
exemption from labor in some measure to his extraordinary growth,
which, leaving him pale, inanimate, and listless, induced his tender
mother to pronounce him “a sickly boy, and one that was not equal to
work, but who might earn a living comfortably enough by taking to
pleading law, or turning minister, or doctoring, or some such like
easy calling. ’ Still, there was great uncertainty which of these
vocations the youth was best endowed to fill; but, having no other
employment, the stripling was constantly lounging about the homestead,”
munching green apples and hunting for sorrel; when the same sagacious eye
that had brought to light his latent talents seized upon this circumstance
as a clew to his future path through the turmoils of the world. 
“Elnathan was cut out for a doctor, she knew, for he was forever digging
for herbs, and tasting all kinds of things that grow’d about the lots. 
Then again he had a natural love for doctor-stuff, for when she had left
the bilious pills out for her man, all nicely covered with maple sugar
just ready to take, Nathan had come in and swallowed them for all the
world as if they were nothing, while Ichabod (her husband) could never get
one down without making such desperate faces that it was awful to look on. ”

This discovery decided the matter.   Elnathan, then about fifteen, was,
much like a wild colt, caught and trimmed by clipping his bushy locks;
dressed in a suit of homespun, dyed in the butternut bark; furnished
with a “New Testament” and a “Webster’s Spelling Book,” and sent to
school.   As the boy was by nature quite shrewd enough, and had
previously, at odd times, laid the foundations of reading, writing,
and arithmetic, he was soon conspicuous in the school for his
learning.   The delighted mother had the gratification of hearing, from
the lips of the master, that her son was a “prodigious boy, and far
above all his class. ” He also thought that “the youth had a natural
love for doctoring, as he had known him frequently advise the smaller
children against eating to much; and, once or twice, when the ignorant
little things had persevered in opposition to Elnathan’s advice, he
had known her son empty the school-baskets with his own mouth, to
prevent the consequences. ”

Soon after this comfortable declaration from his school master, the
lad was removed to the house of the village doctor, a gentleman whose
early career had not been unlike that of our hero where he was to be
seen sometimes watering a horse, at others watering medicines, blue,
yellow, and red: then again he might be noticed lolling under an
apple-tree, with Ruddiman’s Latin Grammar in his hand, and a corner of
Denman’s Midwifery sticking out of a pocket; for his instructor held
it absurd to teach his pupil how to dispatch a patient regularly from
this world, before he knew how to bring him into it. 

This kind of life continued for a twelvemonth, when he suddenly
appeared at a meeting in a long coat (and well did it deserve the
name!) of black homespun, with little bootees, bound with an uncolored
calf-skin for the want of red morocco. 

Soon after he was seen shaving with a dull razor.   Three or four
months had scarce elapsed before several elderly ladies were observed
hastening toward the house of a poor woman in the village, while
others were running to and fro in great apparent distress.   One or two
boys were mounted, bareback, on horses, and sent off at speed in
various directions.   Several indirect questions were put concerning
the place where the physician was last seen; but all would not do; and
at length Elnathan was seen issuing from his door with a very grave
air, preceded by a little white-headed boy, out of breath, trotting
before him.   The following day the youth appeared in the street, as
the highway was called, and the neighborhood was much edified by the
additional gravity of his air.   The same week he bought a new razor;
and the succeeding Sunday he entered the meeting-house with a red silk
handkerchief in his hand, and with an extremely demure countenance. 
In the evening he called upon a young woman of his own class in life,
for there were no others to be found, and, when he was left alone with
the fair, he was called, for the first time in his life, Dr.  Todd, by
her prudent mother.   The ice once broken in this manner, Elnathan was
greeted from every mouth with his official appellation. 

Another year passed under the superintendence of the same master,
during which the young physician had the credit of “ riding with the
old doctor,” although they were generally observed to travel different
roads.   At the end of that period, Dr.  Todd attained his legal
majority.   He then took a jaunt to Boston to purchase medicines, and,
as some intimated, to walk the hospital; we know not how the latter
might have been, but, if true, he soon walked through it, for he
returned within a fortnight, bringing with him a suspicious-looking
box, that smelled powerfully of brimstone. 

The next Sunday he was married, and the following morning he entered a
one-horse sleigh with his bride, having before him the box we have
mentioned, with another filled with home-made household linen, a
paper-covered trunk with a red umbrella lashed to it, a pair of quite
new saddle-bags, and a handbox.   The next intelligence that his
friends received of the bride and bridegroom was, that the latter was
“settled in the new countries, and well to do as a doctor in
Templeton, in York State!”

If a Templar would smile at the qualifications of Marmaduke to fill
the judicial seat he occupied, we are certain that a graduate of
Leyden or Edinburgh would be extremely amused with this true narration
of the servitude of Elnathan in the temple of Aesculapius.   But the
same consolation was afforded to both the jurist and the leech, for
Dr.  Todd was quite as much on a level with his own peers of the
profession in that country, as was Marmaduke with his brethren on the
bench. 

Time and practice did wonders for the physician.   He was naturally
humane, but possessed of no small share of moral courage; or, in other
words, he was chary of the lives of his patients, and never tried
uncertain experiments on such members of society as were considered
useful; but, once or twice, when a luckless vagrant had come under his
care, he was a little addicted to trying the effects of every phial in
his saddle-bags on the strangers constitution.   Happily their number
was small, and in most cases their natures innocent.   By these means
Elnathan had acquired a certain degree of knowledge in fevers and
agues, and could talk with judgment concerning intermittents,
remittents, tertians, quotidians, etc.   In certain cutaneous disorders
very prevalent in new settlements, he was considered to be infallible;
and there was no woman on the Patent but would as soon think of
becoming a mother without a husband as without the assistance of Dr. 
Todd.   In short, he was rearing, on this foundation of sand a
superstructure cemented by practice, though composed of somewhat
brittle materials.   He however, occasionally renewed his elementary
studies, and, with the observation of a shrewd mind, was comfort ably
applying his practice to his theory. 

In surgery, having the least experience, and it being a business that
spoke directly to the senses, he was most apt to distrust his own
powers; but he had applied oils to several burns, cut round the roots
of sundry defective teeth, and sewed up the wounds of numberless wood
choppers, with considerable éclat, when an unfortunate jobber suffered
a fracture of his leg by the tree that he had been felling.   It was on
this occasion that our hero encountered the greatest trial his nerves
and moral feeling had ever sustained.   In the hour of need, however,
he was not found wanting.   Most of the amputations in the new
settlements, and they were quite frequent, were per formed by some one
practitioner who, possessing originally a reputation, was enabled by
this circumstance to acquire an experience that rendered him deserving
of it; and Elnathan had been present at one or two of these
operations.   But on the present occasion the man of practice was not
to be obtained, and the duty fell, as a matter of course, to the share
of Mr.  Todd.   He went to work with a kind of blind desperation,
observing, at the same time, all the externals of decent gravity and
great skill, The sufferer’s name was Milligan, and it was to this
event that Richard alluded, when he spoke of assisting the doctor at
an amputation by holding the leg! The limb was certainly cut off, and
the patient survived the operation.   It was, however, two years before
poor Milligan ceased to complain that they had buried the leg in so
narrow a box that it was straitened for room; he could feel the pain
shooting up from the inhumed fragment into the living members. 
Marmaduke suggested that the fault might lie in the arteries and
nerves; but Richard, considering the amputation as part of his own
handiwork, strongly repelled the insinuation, at the same time
declaring that he had often heard of men who could tell when it was
about to rain, by the toes of amputated limbs, After two or three
years, notwithstanding, Milligan's complaints gradually diminished,
the leg was dug up, and a larger box furnished, and from that hour no
one had heard the sufferer utter another complaint on the subject. 
This gave the public great confidence in Dr.  Todd, whose reputation
was hourly increasing, and, luckily for his patients, his information
also. 

Notwithstanding Dr.  Todd’s practice, and his success with the leg, he
was not a little appalled on entering the hall of the mansion-house. 
It was glaring with the light of day; it looked so imposing, compared
with the hastily built and scantily furnished apartments which he
frequented in his ordinary practice, and contained so many well-
dressed persons and anxious faces, that his usually firm nerves were a
good deal discomposed.   He had heard from the messenger who summoned
him, that it was a gun-shot wound, and had come from his own home,
wading through the snow, with his saddle-bags thrown over his arm,
while separated arteries, penetrated lungs, and injured vitals were
whirling through his brain, as if he were stalking over a field of
battle, instead of Judge Temple’s peaceable in closure. 

The first object that met his eye, as he moved into the room, was
Elizabeth in her riding-habit, richly laced with gold cord, her fine
form bending toward him, and her face expressing deep anxiety in every
one of its beautiful features.   The enormous knees of the physician
struck each other with a noise that was audible; for, in the absent
state of his mind, he mistook her for a general officer, perforated
with bullets, hastening from the field of battle to implore
assistance.   The delusion, however, was but momentary, and his eye
glanced rapidly from the daughter to the earnest dignity of the
father’s countenance; thence to the busy strut of Richard, who was
cooling his impatience at the hunter’s indifference to his assistance,
by pacing the hall and cracking his whip; from him to the Frenchman,
who had stood for several minutes unheeded with a chair for the lady;
thence to Major Hartmann, who was very coolly lighting a pipe three
feet long by a candle in one of the chandeliers; thence to Mr.  Grant,
who was turning over a manuscript with much earnestness at one of the
lustres; thence to Remarkable, who stood, with her arms demurely
folded before her, surveying, with a look of admiration and envy, the
dress and beauty of the young lady; and from her to Benjamin, who,
with his feet standing wide apart, and his arms akimbo, was balancing
his square little body with the indifference of one who is accustomed
to wounds and bloodshed.   All of these seemed to be unhurt, and the
operator began to breathe more freely; but, before he had time to take
a second look, the Judge, advancing, shook him kindly by the hand, and
spoke. 

“Thou art welcome, my good sir, quite welcome, indeed; here is a youth
whom I have unfortunately wounded in shooting a deer this evening, and
who requires some of thy assistance. ”

“Shooting at a deer, ‘Duke,” interrupted Richard— “shooting at a deer. 
Who do you think can prescribe, unless he knows the truth of the case?
It is always so with some people; they think a doctor can be deceived
with the same impunity as another man. ”

“Shooting at a deer, truly,” returned the Judge, smiling, “although it
is by no means certain that I did not aid in destroying the buck; but
the youth is injured by my hand, be that as it may; and it is thy
skill that must cure him, and my pocket shall amply reward thee for
it. ”

“Two ver good tings to depend on,” observed Monsieur Le Quoi, bowing
politely, with a sweep of his head to the Judge and to the
practitioner. 

“I thank you, monsieur,” returned the Judge; “but we keep the young
man in pain.   Remarkable, thou wilt please to provide linen for lint
and bandages. ”

This remark caused a cessation of the compliments, and induced the
physician to turn an inquiring eye in the direction of his patient. 
During the dialogue the young hunter had thrown aside his overcoat,
and now stood clad in a plain suit of the common, light-colored
homespun of the country, that was evidently but recently made.   His
hand was on the lapels of his coat, in the attitude of removing the
garment, when he suddenly suspended the movement, and looked toward
the commiserating Elizabeth, who was standing in an unchanged posture,
too much absorbed with her anxious feelings to heed his actions.   A
slight color appeared on the brow of the youth. 

“Possibly the sight of blood may alarm the lady; I will retire to
another room while the wound is dressing. ”

“By no means. ” said Dr.  Todd, who, having discovered that his patient
was far from being a man of importance, felt much emboldened to
perform the duty.   “The strong light of these candles is favorable to
the operation, and it is seldom that we hard students enjoy good
eyesight. ”

While speaking, Elnathan placed a pair of large iron-rimmed spectacles
on his face, where they dropped, as it were by long practice, to the
extremity of his slim pug nose; and, if they were of no service as
assistants to his eyes, neither were they any impediment to his
vision; for his little gray organs were twinkling above them like two
stars emerging from the envious cover of a cloud.   The action was
unheeded by all but Remarkable, who observed to Benjamin:

“Dr.  Todd is a comely man to look on, and despu’t pretty.   How well he
seems in spectacles! I declare, they give a grand look to a body’s
face.   I have quite a great mind to try them myself. ”

The speech of the stranger recalled the recollection of Miss Temple,
who started as if from deep abstraction, and, coloring excessively,
she motioned to a young woman who served in the capacity of maid, and
retired with an air of womanly reserve. 

The field was now left to the physician and his patient, while the
different personages who remained gathered around the latter, with
faces expressing the various degrees of interest that each one felt in
his condition.   Major Hartmann alone retained his seat, where he
continued to throw out vast quantities of smoke, now rolling his eyes
up to the ceiling, as if musing on the uncertainty of life, and now
bending them on the wounded man, with an expression that bespoke some
consciousness of his situation. 

In the mean time Elnathan, to whom the sight of a gun shot wound was a
perfect novelty, commenced his preparations with a solemnity and care
that were worthy of the occasion.   An old shirt was procured by
Benjamin, and placed in the hand of the other, who tore divers
bandages from it, with an exactitude that marked both his own skill
and the importance of the operation. 

When this preparatory measure was taken, Dr.  Todd selected a piece of
the shirt with great care, and handing to Mr.  Jones, without moving a
muscle, said: “Here, Squire Jones, you are well acquainted with these
things; will you please to scrape the lint? It should be fine and
soft, you know, my dear sir; and be cautious that no cotton gets in,
or it may p’izen the wound.   The shirt has been made with cotton
thread, but you can easily pick it out. ”

Richard assumed the office, with a nod at his cousin, that said quite
plainly, “You see this fellow can’t get along without me;” and began
to scrape the linen on his knee with great diligence. 

A table was now spread with phials, boxes of salve, and divers
surgical instruments.   As the latter appeared in succession, from a
case of red morocco, their owner held up each implement to the strong
light of the chandelier, near to which he stood, and examined it with
the nicest care.   A red silk handkerchief was frequently applied to
the glittering steel, as if to remove from the polished surfaces the
least impediment which might exist to the most delicate operation. 
After the rather scantily furnished pocket-case which contained these
instruments was exhausted, the physician turned to his saddle-bags,
and produced various phials, filled with liquids of the most radiant
colors.   These were arranged in due order by the side of the murderous
saws, knives, and scissors, when Elnathan stretched his long body to
its utmost elevation, placing his hand on the small of his back as if
for sup port, and looked about him to discover what effect this
display of professional skill was likely to produce on the spectators. 

“Upon my wort, toctor,” observed Major Hartmann, with a roguish roll
of his little black eyes, but with every other feature of his face in
a state of perfect rest, “put you have a very pretty pocket-book of
tools tere, and your toctor-stuff glitters as if it was petter for ter
eyes as for ter pelly. ”

Elnathan gave a hem—one that might have been equally taken for that
kind of noise which cowards are said to make in order to awaken their
dormant courage, or for a natural effort to clear the throat; if for
the latter it was successful; for, turning his face to the veteran
German, he said:

“Very true, Major Hartmann, very true, sir; a prudent man will always
strive to make his remedies agreeable to the eyes, though they may not
altogether suit the stomach.   It is no small part of our art, sir,”
and he now spoke with the confidence of a man who understood his
subject, “to reconcile the patient to what is for his own good, though
at the same time it may be unpalatable. ”

“Sartain! Dr.  Todd is right,” said Remarkable, “and has Scripter for
what he says.   The Bible tells us how things may be sweet to the
mouth, and bitter to the inwards. ”

“True, true,” interrupted the Judge, a little impatiently; “but here
is a youth who needs no deception to lure him to his own benefit.   I
see, by his eye, that he fears nothing more than delay. ”

The stranger had, without assistance, bared his own shoulder, when the
slight perforation produced by the pas sage of the buckshot was
plainly visible.   The intense cold of the evening had stopped the
bleeding, and Dr.  Todd, casting a furtive glance at the wound, thought
it by no means so formidable an affair as he had anticipated.   Thus
encouraged, he approached his patient, and made some indication of an
intention to trace the route that had been taken by the lead. 

Remarkable often found occasions, in after days, to recount the
minutiae of that celebrated operation; and when she arrived at this
point she commonly proceeded as follows:” And then the doctor tuck out
of the pocket book a long thing, like a knitting-needle, with a button
fastened to the end on't; and then he pushed it into the wound and
then the young man looked awful; and then I thought I should have
swaned away—I felt in sitch a dispu’t taking; and then the doctor had
run it right through his shoulder, and shoved the bullet out on tother
side; and so Dr.  Todd cured the young man—Of a ball that the Judge had
shot into him—for all the world as easy as I could pick out a splinter
with my darning-needle. ”

Such were the impressions of Remarkable on the subject; and such
doubtless were the opinions of most of those who felt it necessary to
entertain a species of religious veneration for the skill of Elnathan;
but such was far from the truth. 

When the physician attempted to introduce the instrument described by
Remarkable, he was repulsed by the stranger, with a good deal of
decision, and some little contempt, in his manner. 

“I believe, sir,” he said, “that a probe is not necessary; the shot
has missed the bone, and has passed directly through the arm to the
opposite side, where it remains but skin deep, and whence, I should
think, it might he easily extracted. ”

“The gentleman knows best,” said Dr.  Todd, laying down the probe with
the air of a man who had assumed it merely in compliance with forms;
and, turning to Richard, he fingered the lint with the appearance of
great care and foresight.   “Admirably well scraped, Squire Jones: it
is about the best lint I have ever seen.   I want your assistance, my
good sir, to hold the patient’s arm while I make an incision for the
ball.   Now, I rather guess there is not another gentleman present who
could scrape the lint so well as Squire Jones!”

“Such things run in families,” observed Richard, rising with alacrity
to render the desired assistance.   “My father, and my grandfather
before him, were both celebrated for their knowledge of surgery; they
were not, like Marmaduke here, puffed up with an accidental thing,
such as the time when he drew in the hip-joint of the man who was
thrown from his horse; that was the fall before you came into the
settlement, doctor; but they were men who were taught the thing
regularly, spending half their lives in learning those little
niceties; though, for the matter of that, my grandfather was a
college-bred physician, and the best in the colony, too—that is, in
his neighborhood. ”

“So it goes with the world, squire,” cried Benjamin; “if so be that a
man wants to walk the quarter-deck with credit, d’ye see, and with
regular built swabs on his shoulders, he mustn’t think to do it by
getting in at the cabin windows.   There are two ways to get into a
top, besides the lubber-holes.   The true way to walk aft is to begin
forrard; tho’f it he only in a humble way, like myself, d’ye see,
which was from being only a hander of topgallant sails, and a stower
of the flying-jib, to keeping the key of the captain’s locker. ”

Benjamin speaks quite to the purpose,’ continued Richard, “I dare say
that he has often seen shot extracted in the different ships in which
he has served; suppose we get him to hold the basin; he must be used
to the sight of blood. ”

“That he is, squire, that he is,” interrupted the cidevant steward;
“many’s the good shot, round, double-headed, and grape, that I’ve seen
the doctors at work on.   For the matter of that, I was in a boat,
alongside the ship, when they cut out the twelve-pound shot from the
thigh of the captain of the Foodyrong, one of Mounsheer Ler Quaw’s
countrymen!” *

  * It is possible that the reader may start at this declaration of
    Benjamin, but those who have lived in the new settlements of America
    are too much accustomed to hear of these European exploits to doubt
    it. 

“A twelve-pound ball from the thigh of a human being:” exclaimed Mr. 
Grant, with great simplicity, dropping the sermon he was again
reading, and raising his spectacles to the top of his forehead. 

“A twelve-pounder!” echoed Benjamin, staring around him with much
confidence; “a twelve-pounder! ay! a twenty-four-pound shot can easily
be taken from a man’s body, if so be a doctor only knows how, There’s
Squire Jones, now, ask him, sir; he reads all the books; ask him if he
never fell in with a page that keeps the reckoning of such things. ”

“Certainly, more important operations than that have been performed,”
observed Richard; “the encyclopaedia mentions much more incredible
circumstances than that, as, I dare say, you know, Dr.  Todd. ”

“Certainly, there are incredible tales told in the encyclopaedias,”
returned Elnathan, “though I cannot say that I have ever seen, myself,
anything larger than a musket ball extracted. ”

During this discourse an incision had been made through the skin of
the young hunter’s shoulder, and the lead was laid bare.   Elnathan
took a pair of glittering forceps, and was in the act of applying them
to the wound, when a sudden motion of the patient caused the shot to
fall out of itself, The long arm and broad hand of the operator were
now of singular service; for the latter expanded itself, and caught
the lead, while at the same time an extremely ambiguous motion was
made by its brother, so as to leave it doubtful to the spectators how
great was its agency in releasing the shot, Richard, however, put the
matter at rest by exclaiming:

“Very neatly done, doctor! I have never seen a shot more neatly
extracted; and I dare say Benjamin will say the same. ”

“Why, considering,” returned Benjamin, “I must say that it was ship-
shape and Brister-fashion.   Now all that the doctor has to do, is to
clap a couple of plugs in the holes, and the lad will float in any
gale that blows in these here hills,”

“I thank you, sir, for what you have done,” said the youth, with a
little distance; “but here is a man who will take me under his care,
and spare you all, gentlemen, any further trouble on my account”

The whole group turned their heads in surprise, and beheld, standing
at one of the distant doors of the hall, the person of Indian John. 

CHAPTER 7. 

“From Sesquehanna’s utmost springs,
Where savage tribes pursue their game,
His blanket tied with yellow strings,
The shepherd of the forest came.   ‘—Freneau. 

Before the Europeans, or, to use a more significant term, the
Christians, dispossessed the original owners of the soil, all that
section of country which contains the New England States, and those of
the Middle which lie east of the mountains, was occupied by two great
nations of Indians, from whom had descended numberless tribes.   But,
as the original distinctions between these nations were marked by a
difference in language, as well as by repeated and bloody wars, they
were never known to amalgamate, until after the power and inroads of
the whites had reduced some of the tribes to a state of dependence
that rendered not only their political, but, considering the wants and
habits of a savage, their animal existence also, extremely precarious. 

These two great divisions consisted, on the one side, of the Five, or,
as they were afterward called, the Six Nations, and their allies; and,
on the other, of the Lenni Lenape, or Delawares, with the numerous and
powerful tribes that owned that nation as their grandfather The former
was generally called, by the Anglo-Americans Iroquois, or the Six
Nations, and sometimes Mingoes.   Their appellation among their rivals,
seems generally to have been the Mengwe, or Maqua.   They consisted of
the tribes or, as their allies were fond of asserting, in order to
raise their consequence, of the several nations of the Mohawks, the
Oneidas, the Onondagas, Cayugas, and Senecas; who ranked, in the
confederation in the order in which they are named.   The Tuscaroras
were admitted to this union near a century after its foundation, and
thus completed the number of six. 

Of the Lenni Lenape, or as they were called by the whites, from the
circumstances of their holding their great council-fire on the banks
of that river, the Delaware nation, the principal tribes, besides that
which bore the generic name, were the Mahicanni, Mohicans, or
Mohegans, and the Nanticokes, or Nentigoes.   Of these the latter held
the country along the waters of the Chesapeake and the seashore; while
the Mohegans occupied the district between the Hudson and the ocean,
including much of New England.   Of course these two tribes were the
first who were dispossessed of their lands by the Europeans. 

The wars of a portion of the latter are celebrated among us as the
wars of King Philip; but the peaceful policy of William Penn, or
Miquon, as he was termed by the natives, effected its object with less
difficulty, though not with less certainty.   As the natives gradually
disappeared from the country of the Mohegans, some scattering families
sought a refuge around the council-fire of the mother tribe, or the
Delawares. 

This people had been induced to suffer themselves to be called women
by their old enemies, the Mingoes, or Iroquois.   After the latter,
having in vain tried the effects of hostility, had recourse in
artifice in order to prevail over their rivals.   According to this
declaration, the Delawares were to cultivate the arts of peace, and to
intrust their defence entirely to the men, or warlike tribes of the
Six Nations. 

This state of things continued until the war of the Revolution.   When
the Lenni Lenape formally asserted their independence, and fearlessly
declared that they were again men.   But, in a government so peculiarly
republican as the Indian polity, it was not at all times an easy task
to restrain its members within the rules of the nation.   Several
fierce and renowned warriors of the Mohegans, finding the conflict
with the whites to be in vain, sought a refuge with their grandfather,
and brought with them the feelings and principles that had so long
distinguished them in their own tribe.   These chieftains kept alive,
in some measure, the martial spirit of the Delawares; and would, at
times, lead small parties against their ancient enemies, or such other
foes as incurred their resentment. 

Among these warriors was one race particularly famous for their
prowess, and for those qualities that render an Indian hero
celebrated.   But war, time, disease, and want had conspired to thin
their number; and the sole representative of this once renowned family
now stood in the hall of Marmaduke Temple.   He had for a long time
been an associate of the white men, particularly in their wars, and
having been, at the season when his services were of importance, much
noticed and flattered, he had turned Christian and was baptized by the
name of John.   He had suffered severely in his family during the
recent war, having had every soul to whom he was allied cut off by an
inroad of the enemy; and when the last lingering remnant of his nation
extinguished their fires, among the hills of the Delaware, he alone
had remained, with a determination of laying his bones in that country
where his fathers had so long lived and governed. 

It was only, however, within a few months, that he had appeared among
the mountains that surrounded Templeton.   To the hut of the old hunter
he seemed peculiarly welcome; and, as the habits of the Leather-
Stocking were so nearly assimilated to those of the savages, the
conjunction of their interests excited no surprise.   They resided in
the same cabin, ate of the same food, and were chiefly occupied in the
same pursuits. 

We have already mentioned the baptismal name of this ancient chief;
but in his conversation with Natty, held in the language of the
Delawares, he was heard uniformly to call himself Chingachgook, which,
interpreted, means the “Great Snake. ” This name he had acquired in his
youth, by his skill and prowess in war; but when his brows began to
wrinkle with time, and he stood alone, the last of his family, and his
particular tribe, the few Delawares, who yet continued about the head-
waters of their river, gave him the mournful appellation of Mohegan. 
Perhaps there was something of deep feeling excited in the bosom of
this inhabitant of the forest by the sound of a name that recalled the
idea of his nation in ruins, for he seldom used it himself—never,
indeed, excepting on the most solemn occasions; but the settlers had
united, according to the Christian custom, his baptismal with his
national name, and to them he was generally known as John Mohegan, or,
more familiarly, as Indian John. 

From his long association with the white men, the habits of Mohegan
were a mixture of the civilized and savage states, though there was
certainly a strong preponderance in favor of the latter.   In common
with all his people, who dwelt within the influence of the Anglo-
Americans, he had acquired new wants, and his dress was a mixture of
his native and European fashions.   Notwithstanding the in tense cold
without, his head was uncovered; but a profusion of long, black,
coarse hair concealed his forehead, his crown, and even hung about his
cheeks, so as to convey the idea, to one who knew his present amid
former conditions, that he encouraged its abundance, as a willing veil
to hide the shame of a noble soul, mourning for glory once known.   His
forehead, when it could be seen, appeared lofty, broad, and noble. 
His nose was high, and of the kind called Roman, with nostrils that
expanded, in his seventieth year, with the freedom that had
distinguished them in youth.   His mouth was large, but compressed, and
possessing a great share of expression and character, and, when
opened, it discovered a perfect set of short, strong, and regular
teeth.   His chin was full, though not prominent; and his face bore the
infallible mark of his people, in its square, high cheek-bones.   The
eyes were not large, but their black orbs glittered in the rays of the
candles, as he gazed intently down the hall, like two balls of fire. 

The instant that Mohegan observed himself to be noticed by the group
around the young stranger, he dropped the blanket which covered the
upper part of his frame, from his shoulders, suffering it to fall over
his leggins of untanned deer-skin, where it was retained by a belt of
bark that confined it to his waist. 

As he walked slowly down the long hail, the dignified and deliberate
tread of the Indian surprised the spectators. 

His shoulders, and body to his waist, were entirely bare, with the
exception of a silver medallion of Washington, that was suspended from
his neck by a thong of buckskin, and rested on his high chest, amid
many scars.   His shoulders were rather broad and full; but the arms,
though straight and graceful, wanted the muscular appearance that
labor gives to a race of men.   The medallion was the only ornament he
wore, although enormous slits in the rim of either ear, which suffered
the cartilages to fall two inches below the members, had evidently
been used for the purposes of decoration in other days.   in his hand
he held a small basket of the ash-wood slips, colored in divers
fantastical conceits, with red and black paints mingled with the white
of the wood. 

As this child of the forest approached them, the whole party stood
aside, and allowed him to confront the object of his visit.   He did
not speak, however, but stood fixing his glowing eyes on the shoulder
of the young hunter, and then turning them intently on the countenance
of the Judge.   The latter was a good deal astonished at this unusual
departure from the ordinarily subdued and quiet manner of the Indian;
but he extended his hand, and said:

“Thou art welcome, John.   This youth entertains a high opinion of thy
skill, it seems, for he prefers thee to dress his wound even to our
good friend, Dr.  Todd. ”

Mohegan now spoke in tolerable English, but in a low, monotonous,
guttural tone;

“The children of Miquon do not love the sight of blood; and yet the
Young Eagle has been struck by the hand that should do no evil!”

“Mohegan! old John!” exclaimed the Judge, “thinkest thou that my hand
has ever drawn human blood willingly? For shame! for shame, old John!
thy religion should have taught thee better. ”

“The evil spirit sometimes lives in the best heart,” returned John,
“but my brother speaks the truth; his hand has never taken life, when
awake; no! not even when the children of the great English Father were
making the waters red with the blood of his people. ”

“Surely John,” said Mr.  Grant, with much earnestness, “you remember
the divine command of our Saviour, ‘Judge not, lest ye be judged. ’
What motive could Judge Temple have for injuring a youth like this;
one to whom he is unknown, and from whom he can receive neither in
jury nor favor?”

John listened respectfully to the divine, and, when he had concluded,
he stretched out his arm, and said with energy:

“He is innocent.   My brother has not done this. ”

Marmaduke received the offered hand of the other with a smile, that
showed, however he might be astonished at his suspicion, he had ceased
to resent it; while the wounded youth stood, gazing from his red
friend to his host, with interest powerfully delineated in his
countenance. 

No sooner was this act of pacification exchanged, than John proceeded
to discharge the duty on which he had come.   Dr.  Todd was far from
manifesting any displeasure at this invasion of his rights, but made
way for the new leech with an air that expressed a willingness to
gratify the humors of his patient, now that the all-important part of
the business was so successfully performed, and nothing remained to be
done but what any child might effect, indeed, he whispered as much to
Monsieur Le Quoi, when he said:

“It was fortunate that the ball was extracted before this Indian came
in; but any old woman can dress the wound.   The young man, I hear,
lives with John and Natty Bumppo, and it’s always best to humor a
patient, when it can be done discreetly—I say, discreetly, monsieur. ”

“Certainement,” returned the Frenchman; “you seem ver happy, Mister
Todd, in your pratice.   I tink the elder lady might ver well finish
vat you so skeelfully begin. ”

But Richard had, at the bottom, a great deal of veneration for the
knowledge of Mohegan, especially in external wounds; and, retaining
all his desire for a participation in glory, he advanced nigh the
Indian, and said: “Sago, sago, Mohegan! sago my good fellow I am glad
you have come; give me a regular physician, like Dr.  Todd to cut into
flesh, and a native to heal the wound.   Do you remember, John, the
time when I and you set the bone of Natty Bumppo’s little finger,
after he broke it by falling from the rock, when he was trying to get
the partridge that fell on the cliffs? I never could tell yet whether
it was I or Natty who killed that bird: he fired first, and the bird
stooped, and then it was rising again as I pulled trigger.   I should
have claimed it for a certainty, but Natty said the hole was too big
for shot, and he fired a single ball from his rifle; but the piece I
carried then didn’t scatter, and I have known it to bore a hole
through a board, when I’ve been shooting at a mark, very much like
rifle bullets.   Shall I help you, John? You know I have a knack at
these things. ”

Mohegan heard this disquisition quite patiently, and, when Richard
concluded, he held out the basket which contained his specifics,
indicating, by a gesture, that he might hold it.   Mr.  Jones was quite
satisfied with this commission; and ever after, in speaking of the
event, was used to say that “Dr.  Todd and I cut out the bullet, and I
and Indian John dressed the wound. ”

The patient was much more deserving of that epithet while under the
hands of Mohegan, than while suffering under the practice of the
physician.   Indeed, the Indian gave him but little opportunity for the
exercise of a forbearing temper, as he had come prepared for the
occasion.   His dressings were soon applied, and consisted only of some
pounded bark, moistened with a fluid that he had expressed from some
of the simples of the woods. 

Among the native tribes of the forest there were always two kinds of
leeches to be met with.   The one placed its whole dependence on the
exercise of a supernatural power, and was held in greater veneration
than their practice could at all justify ; but the other was really
endowed with great skill in the ordinary complaints of the human body,
and was more particularly, as Natty had intimated, “curous” in cuts
and bruises. ”

While John and Richard were placing the dressings on the wound,
Elnathan was acutely eyeing the contents of Mohegan’s basket, which
Mr.  Jones, in his physical ardor had transferred to the doctor, in
order to hold himself one end of the bandages.   Here he was soon
enabled to detect sundry fragments of wood and bark, of which he quite
coolly took possession, very possibly without any intention of
speaking at all upon the subject; but, when he beheld the full blue
eye of Marmaduke watching his movements, he whispered to the Judge:

“It is not to be denied, Judge Temple, but what the savages are
knowing in small matters of physic.   They hand these things down in
their traditions.   Now in cancers and hydrophoby they are quite
ingenious.   I will just take this bark home and analyze it; for,
though it can’t be worth sixpence to the young man’s shoulder, it may
be good for the toothache, or rheumatism, or some of them complaints. 
A man should never be above learning, even if it be from an Indian,”

It was fortunate for Dr.  Todd that his principles were so liberal, as,
coupled with his practice, they were the means by which he acquired
all his knowledge, and by which he was gradually qualifying himself
for the duties of his profession.   The process to which he subjected
the specific differed, however, greatly from the ordinary rules of
chemistry; for instead of separating he afterward united the component
parts of Mohegan’s remedy, and was thus able to discover the tree
whence the Indian had taken it. 

Some ten years after this event, when civilization and its refinements
had crept, or rather rushed, into the settlements among these wild
hills, an affair of honor occurred, and Elnathan was seen to apply a
salve to the wound received by one of the parties, which had the
flavor that was peculiar to the tree, or root, that Mohegan had used. 
Ten years later still, when England and the United States were again
engaged in war, and the hordes of the western parts of the State of
New York were rushing to the field, Elnathan, presuming on the
reputation obtained by these two operations, followed in the rear of a
brigade of militia as its surgeon!

When Mohegan had applied the bark, he freely relinquished to Richard
the needle and thread that were used in sewing the bandages, for these
were implements of which the native but little understood the use:
and, step ping back with decent gravity, awaited the completion of the
business by the other. 

“Reach me the scissors,” said Mr.  Jones, when he had finished, and
finished for the second time, after tying the linen in every shape and
form that it could be placed; “reach me the scissors, for here is a
thread that must be cut off, or it might get under the dressings, and
inflame the wound.   See, John, I have put the lint I scraped between
two layers of the linen; for though the bark is certainly best for the
flesh, yet the lint will serve to keep the cold air from the wound. 
If any lint will do it good, it is this lint; I scraped it myself, and
I will not turn my back at scraping lint to any man on the Patent.   I
ought to know how, if anybody ought, for my grandfather was a doctor,
and my father had a natural turn that way. ”

“Here, squire, is the scissors,” said Remarkable, producing from
beneath her petticoat of green moreen a pair of dull-looking shears;
“well, upon my say-so, you have sewed on the rags as well as a woman. ”

“As well as a woman!” echoed Richard with indignation; “what do women
know of such matters? and you are proof of the truth of what I say. 
Who ever saw such a pair of shears used about a wound? Dr.  Todd, I
will thank you for the scissors from the case, Now, young man, I think
you’ll do.   The shot has been neatly taken out, although, perhaps,
seeing I had a hand in it, I ought not to say so; and the wound is
admirably dressed.   You will soon be well again; though the jerk you
gave my leaders must have a tendency to inflame the shoulder, yet you
will do, you will do, You were rather flurried, I sup pose, and not
used to horses; but I forgive the accident for the motive; no doubt
you had the best of motives; yes, now you will do. ”

“Then, gentlemen,” said the wounded stranger, rising, and resuming his
clothes, “it will be unnecessary for me to trespass longer on your
time and patience.   There remains but one thing more to be settled,
and that is, our respective rights to the deer, Judge Temple. ”

“I acknowledge it to be thine,” said.   Marmaduke; “and much more
deeply am I indebted to thee than for this piece of venison.   But in
the morning thou wilt call here, and we can adjust this, as well as
more important matters Elizabeth”—for the young lady, being apprised
that the wound was dressed, had re-entered the hall—” thou wilt order
a repast for this youth before we proceed to the church; and Aggy will
have a sleigh prepared to convey him to his friend. ”

“But, sir, I cannot go without a part of the deer,” returned the
youth, seemingly struggling with his own feelings; “I have already
told you that I needed the venison for myself. ”

“Oh, we will not he particular,” exclaimed Richard; “the Judge will
pay you in the morning for the whole deer; and, Remarkable, give the
lad all the animal excepting the saddle; so, on the whole, I think you
may consider yourself as a very lucky young man—you have been shot
without being disabled; have had the wound dressed in the best
possible manner here in the woods, as well as it would have been done
in the Philadelphia hospital, if not better; have sold your deer at a
high price, and yet can keep most of the carcass, with the skin in the
bargain.   ‘Marky, tell Tom to give him the skin too, and in the
morning bring the skin to me and I will give you half a dollar for it,
or at least three-and-sixpence.   I want just such a skin to cover the
pillion that I am making for Cousin Bess. ”

“I thank you, sir, for your liberality, and, I trust, am also thankful
for my escape,” returned the stranger; “but you reserve the very part
of the animal that I wished for my own use.   I must have the saddle
myself. ”

“Must!” echoed Richard; “must is harder to be swallowed than the horns
of the buck. ”

“Yes, must,” repeated the youth; when, turning his head proudly around
him, as if to see who would dare to controvert his rights, he met the
astonished gaze of Elizabeth, and proceeded more mildly: “That is, if
a man is allowed the possession of that which his hand hath killed. 
and the law will protect him in the enjoyment of his own. ”

“The law will do so,” said Judge Temple, with an air of mortification
mingled with surprise.   “Benjamin, see that the whole deer is placed
in the sleigh; and have this youth conveyed to the hut of Leather
Stocking.   But, young man thou hast a name, and I shall see you again,
in order to compensate thee for the wrong I have done thee?”

“I am called Edwards,” returned the hunter; “Oliver Edwards, I am
easily to be seen, sir, for I live nigh by, and am not afraid to show
my face, having never injured any man. ”

“It is we who have injured you, sir,” said Elizabeth; “and the
knowledge that you decline our assistance would give my father great
pain.   He would gladly see you in the morning. ”

The young hunter gazed at the fair speaker until his earnest look
brought the blood to her temples; when, recollecting himself, he bent
his head, dropping his eyes to the carpet, and replied:

“In the morning, then, will I return, and see Judge Temple; and I will
accept his offer of the sleigh in token of amity. ”

“Amity!” repeated Marmaduke; “there was no malice in the act that
injured thee, young man; there should be none in the feelings which it
may engender. ”

“Forgive our trespasses as we forgive those who trespass against us,”
observed Mr.  Grant, “is the language used by our Divine Master
himself, and it should be the golden rule with us, his humble
followers. ”

The stranger stood a moment lost in thought, and then, glancing his
dark eyes rather wildly around the hall, he bowed low to the divine,
and moved from the apartment with an air that would not admit of
detention. 

“‘Tis strange that one so young should harbor such feelings of
resentment,” said Marmaduke, when the door closed behind the stranger;
“but while the pain is recent, and the sense of the injury so fresh,
he must feel more strongly than in cooler moments.   I doubt not we
shall see him in the morning more tractable. ”

Elizabeth, to whom this speech was addressed, did not reply, but moved
slowly up the hall by herself, fixing her eyes on the little figure of
the English ingrain carpet that covered the floor; while, on the other
hand, Richard gave a loud crack with his whip, as the stranger
disappeared, and cried:

“Well, ‘Duke, you are your own master, but I would have tried law for
the saddle before I would have given it to the fellow.   Do you not own
the mountains as well as the valleys? are not the woods your own? what
right has this chap, or the Leather-Stocking, to shoot in your woods
without your permission? Now, I have known a farmer in Pennsylvania
order a sportsman off his farm with as little ceremony as I would
order Benjamin to put a log in the stove—By-the-bye, Benjamin, see how
the thermometer stands. —Now, if a man has a right to do this on a farm
of a hundred acres, what power must a landlord have who owns sixty
thousand—ay, for the matter of that, including the late purchases, a
hundred thousand? There is Mohegan, to be sure, he may have some
right, being a native; but it’s little the poor fellow can do now with
his rifle.   How is this managed in France, Monsieur Le Quoi? Do you
let everybody run over your land in that country helter-skelter, as
they do here, shooting the game, so that a gentleman has but little or
no chance with his gun?”

“Bah! diable, no, Meester Deeck,” replied the Frenchman; “we give, in
France, no liberty except to the ladi. ”

“Yes, yes, to the women, I know,” said Richard, “that is your Salic
law.   I read, sir, all kinds of books; of France, as well as England;
of Greece, as well as Rome.   But if I were in ‘Duke’s place, I would
stick up advertisements to-morrow morning, forbidding all persons to
shoot, or trespass in any manner, on my woods.   I could write such an
advertisement myself, in an hour, as would put a stop to the thing at
once. ”

“Richart,” said Major Hartmann, very coolly knocking the ashes from
his pipe into the spitting-box by his side, “now listen; I have livet
seventy-five years on ter Mohawk, and in ter woots.   You had better
mettle as mit ter deyvel, as mit ter hunters, Tey live mit ter gun,
and a rifle is better as ter law. ”

“Ain’t Marmaduke a judge?” said Richard indignantly.   “Where is the
use of being a judge, or having a judge, if there is no law? Damn the
fellow! I have a great mind to sue him in the morning myself, before
Squire Doolittle, for meddling with my leaders.   I am not afraid of
his rifle.   I can shoot, too.   I have hit a dollar many a time at
fifty rods

“Thou hast missed more dollars than ever thou hast hit, Dickon,”
exclaimed the cheerful voice of the Judge.   “But we will now take our
evening’s repast, which I perseive, by Remarkable's physiognomy, is
ready.   Monsieur Le Quoi, Miss Temple has a hand at your service. 
Will you lead the way, my child?”

“Ah! ma chere mam’selle, comme je suis enchante!” said the Frenchman. 
“Il ne manque que les dames de faire un paradis de Templeton. ”

Mr.  Grant and Mohegan continued in the hall, while the remainder of
the party withdrew to an eating parlor, if we except Benjamin, who
civilly remained to close the rear after the clergyman and to open the
front door for the exit of the Indian. 

“John,” said the divine, when the figure of Judge Temple disappeared,
the last of the group, “to-morrow is the festival of the nativity of
our blessed Redeemer, when the church has appointed prayers and
thanksgivings to be offered up by her children, and when all are
invited to partake of the mystical elements.   As you have taken up the
cross, and become a follower of good and an eschewer of evil, I trust
I shall see you before the altar, with a contrite heart and a meek
spirit. ”

“John will come,” said the Indian, betraying no surprise; though he
did not understand all the terms used by the other. 

“Yes,” continued Mr.  Grant, laying his hand gently on the tawny
shoulder of the aged chief, “but it is not enough to be there in the
body; you must come in the spirit and in truth.   The Redeemer died for
all, for the poor Indian as well as for the white man.   Heaven knows
no difference in color; nor must earth witness a separation of the
church.   It is good and profitable, John, to freshen the
understanding, and support the wavering, by the observance of our holy
festivals; but all form is but stench in the nostrils of the Holy One,
unless it be accompanied by a devout and humble spirit. ”

The Indian stepped back a little, and, raising his body to its utmost
powers of erection, he stretched his right arm on high, and dropped
his forefinger downward, as if pointing from the heavens; then,
striking his other band on his naked breast, he said, with energy:

“The eye of the Great Spirit can see from the clouds— the bosom of
Mohegan is bare!”

“It is well, John, and I hope you will receive profit and consolation
from the performance of this duty.   The Great Spirit overlooks none of
his children; and the man of the woods is as much an object of his
care as he who dwells in a palace.   I wish you a good-night, and pray
God to bless you. 

The Indian bent his head, and they separated—the one to seek his hut,
and the other to join his party at the supper-table.   While Benjamin
was opening the door for the passage of the chief, he cried, in a tone
that was meant to be encouraging:

The parson says the word that is true, John.   If so be that they took
count of the color of the skin in heaven, why, they might refuse to
muster on their books a Christian-born, like myself, just for the
matter of a little tan, from cruising in warm latitudes; though, for
the matter of that, this damned norwester is enough to whiten the skin
of a blackamore.   Let the reef out of your blanket, man, or your red
hide will hardly weather the night with out a touch from the frost. ”

CHAPTER 8. 

“For here the exile met from every clime,
And spoke, in friendship, every distant tongue. ”—Campbell. 

We have made our readers acquainted with some variety in character and
nations, in introducing the most important personages of this legend
to their notice; but, in order to establish the fidelity of our
narrative, we shall briefly attempt to explain the reason why we have
been obliged to present so motley a dramatis personae. 

Europe, at the period of our tale, was in the commencement of that
commotion which afterward shook her political institutions to the
centre.   Louis the Sixteenth had been beheaded, and a nation once
esteemed the most refined among the civilized people of the world was
changing its character, and substituting cruelty for mercy, and
subtlety and ferocity for magnanimity and courage.   Thou sands of
Frenchmen were compelled to seek protection in distant lands.   Among
the crowds who fled from France and her islands, to the United States
of America, was the gentleman whom we have already mentioned as
Monsieur Le Quoi.   He had been recommended to the favor of Judge
Temple by the head of an eminent mercantile house in New York, with
whom Marmaduke was in habits of intimacy, and accustomed to exchange
good offices.   At his first interview with the Frenchman, our Judge
had discovered him to be a man of breeding, and one who had seen much
more prosperous days in his own country.   From certain hints that had
escaped him, Monsieur Le Quoi was suspected of having been a West-
India planter, great numbers of whom had fled from St.  Domingo and the
other islands, and were now living in the Union, in a state of
comparative poverty, and some in absolute want The latter was not,
however, the lot of Monsieur Le Quoi.   He had but little, he
acknowledged; but that little was enough to furnish, in the language
of the country, an assortment for a store. 

The knowledge of Marmaduke was eminently practical, and there was no
part of a settler's life with which he was not familiar.   Under his
direction, Monsieur Le Quoi made some purchases, consisting of a few
cloths; some groceries, with a good deal of gunpowder and tobacco; a
quantity of iron-ware, among which was a large proportion of Barlow’s
jack-knives, potash-kettles, and spiders; a very formidable collection
of crockery of the coarsest quality and most uncouth forms; together
with every other common article that the art of man has devised for
his wants, not forgetting the luxuries of looking-glasses and Jew’s-
harps.   With this collection of valuables, Monsieur Le Quoi had
stepped behind a counter, and, with a wonderful pliability of
temperament, had dropped into his assumed character as gracefully as
he had ever moved in any other.   The gentleness and suavity of his
manners rendered him extremely popular; besides this, the women soon
discovered that he had taste.   His calicoes were the finest, or, in
other words, the most showy, of any that were brought into the
country, and it was impossible to look at the prices asked for his
goods by” so pretty a spoken man,” Through these conjoint means, the
affairs of Monsieur Le Quoi were again in a prosperous condition, and
he was looked up to by the settlers as the second best man on the
“Patent. ”*

  * The term “Patent” which we have already used, and for which we may
    have further occasion, meant the district of country that had been
    originally granted to old Major Effingham by the “king’s letters
    patent,” and which had now become, by purchase under the act of
    confiscation, the property of Marmaduke Temple.   It was a term in
    common use throughout the new parts of the State; and was usually
    annexed to the landlord’s name, as “Temple’s or Effingham’s Patent,”

Major Hartmann was a descendant of a man who, in company with a number
of his countrymen, had emigrated with their families from the banks of
the Rhine to those of the Mohawk.   This migration had occurred as far
back as the reign of Queen Anne; and their descendants were now
living, in great peace and plenty, on the fertile borders of that
beautiful stream. 

The Germans, or “High Dutchers,” as they were called, to distinguish
them from the original or Low Dutch colonists, were a very peculiar
people.   They possessed all the gravity of the latter, without any of
their phlegm; and like them, the “High Dutchers” were industrious,
honest, and economical, Fritz, or Frederick Hartmann, was an epitome
of all the vices and virtues, foibles and excellences, of his race. 
He was passionate though silent, obstinate, and a good deal suspicious
of strangers; of immovable courage, in flexible honesty, and
undeviating in his friendships.   In deed there was no change about
him, unless it were from grave to gay.   He was serious by months, and
jolly by weeks.   He had, early in their acquaintance, formed an
attachment for Marmaduke Temple, who was the only man that could not
speak High Dutch that ever gained his en tire confidence Four times in
each year, at periods equidistant, he left his low stone dwelling on
the banks of the Mohawk, and travelled thirty miles, through the
hills, to the door of the mansion-house in Templeton.   Here he
generally stayed a week; and was reputed to spend much of that time in
riotous living, greatly countenanced by Mr.  Richard Jones.   But every
one loved him, even to Remarkable Pettibone, to whom he occasioned
some additional trouble, he was so frank, so sincere, and, at times,
so mirthful.   He was now on his regular Christmas visit, and had not
been in the village an hour when Richard summoned him to fill a seat
in the sleigh to meet the landlord and his daughter. 

Before explaining the character and situation of Mr.  Grant, it will be
necessary to recur to times far back in the brief history of the
settlement. 

There seems to be a tendency in human nature to endeavor to provide
for the wants of this world, before our attention is turned to the
business of the other.   Religion was a quality but little cultivated
amid the stumps of Temple’s Patent for the first few years of its
settlement; but, as most of its inhabitants were from the moral States
of Connecticut and Massachusetts, when the wants of nature were
satisfied they began seriously to turn their attention to the
introduction of those customs and observances which had been the
principal care of their fore fathers.   There was certainly a great
variety of opinions on the subject of grace and free-will among the
tenantry of Marmaduke; and, when we take into consideration the
variety of the religious instruction which they received, it can
easily be seen that it could not well be otherwise. 

Soon after the village had been formally laid out into the streets and
blocks that resembled a city, a meeting of its inhabitants had been
convened, to take into consideration the propriety of establishing an
academy.   This measure originated with Richard, who, in truth, was
much disposed to have the institution designated a university, or at
least a college.   Meeting after meeting was held, for this purpose,
year after year.   The resolutions of these as sembiages appeared in
the most conspicuous columns of a little blue-looking newspaper, that
was already issued weekly from the garret of a dwelling-house in the
village, and which the traveller might as often see stuck into the
fissure of a stake, erected at the point where the footpath from the
log-cabin of some settler entered the highway, as a post-office for an
individual.   Sometimes the stake supported a small box, and a whole
neighborhood received a weekly supply for their literary wants at this
point, where the man who “rides post’ regularly deposited a bundle of
the precious commodity.   To these flourishing resolutions, which
briefly recounted the general utility of education, the political and
geographical rights of the village of Templeton to a participation in
the favors of the regents of the university, the salubrity of the air,
and wholesomeness of the water, together with the cheapness of food
and the superior state of morals in the neighbor hood, were uniformly
annexed, in large Roman capitals, the names of Marmaduke Temple as
chairman and Richard Jones as secretary. 

Happily for the success of this undertaking, the regents were not
accustomed to resist these appeals to their generosity, whenever there
was the smallest prospect of a donation to second the request. 
Eventually Judge Temple concluded to bestow the necessary land, and to
erect the required edifice at his own expense.   The skill of Mr. , or,
as he was now called, from the circumstance of having received the
commission of a justice of the peace, Squire Doolittle, was again put
in requisition; and the science of Mr.  Jones was once more resorted
to. 

We shall not recount the different devices of the architects on the
occasion; nor would it be decorous so to do, seeing that there was a
convocation of the society of the ancient and honorable fraternity “
of the Free and Accepted Masons,’ at the head of whom was Richard, in
the capacity of master, doubtless to approve or reject such of the
plans as, in their wisdom, they deemed to he for the best.   The knotty
point was, however, soon decided; and, on the appointed day, the
brotherhood marched in great state, displaying sundry banners and
mysterious symbols, each man with a little mimic apron before him,
from a most cunningly contrived apartment in the garret of the “Bold
Dragoon,” an inn kept by one Captain Hollister, to the site of the
intended edifice.   Here Richard laid the corner stone, with suitable
gravity, amidst an assemblage of more than half the men, and all the
women, within ten miles of Templeton. 

In the course of the succeeding week there was another meeting of the
people, not omitting swarms of the gentler sex, when the abilities of
Hiram at the “square rule” were put to the test of experiment.   The
frame fitted well; and the skeleton of the fabric was reared without a
single accident, if we except a few falls from horses while the
laborers were returning home in the evening.   From this time the work
advanced with great rapidity, and in the course of the season the
Labor was completed; the edifice Manding, in all its heatity and
proportions, the boast of the village, the study of young aspirants
for architectural fame, and the admiration of every settler on the
Patent. 

It was a long, narrow house of wood, painted white, and more than half
windows; and, when the observer stood at the western side of the
building, the edifice offered but a small obstacle to a full view of
the rising sun .   It was, in truth, but a very comfortless open place,
through which the daylight shone with natural facility.   On its front
were divers ornaments in wood, designed by Richard and executed by
Hiram; but a window in the centre of the second story, immediately
over the door or grand entrance, and the “steeple” were the pride of
the building.   The former was, we believe, of the composite order; for
it included in its composition a multitude of ornaments and a great
variety of proportions.   It consisted of an arched compartment in the
centres with a square and small division on either side, the whole
incased in heavy frames, deeply and laboriously moulded in pine-wood,
and lighted with a vast number of blurred and green-looking glass of
those dimensions which are commonly called ”eight by ten. ” Blinds,
that were intended to be painted green, kept the window in a state of
preservation, and probably might have contributed to the effect of the
whole, had not the failure in the public funds, which seems always to
be incidental to any undertaking of this kind, left them in the sombre
coat of lead-color with which they had been originally clothed.   The
“steeple” was a little cupola, reared on the very centre of the roof,
on four tall pillars of pine that were fluted with a gouge, and loaded
with mouldings.   On the tops of the columns was reared a dome or
cupola, resembling in shape an inverted tea-cup without its bottom,
from the centre of which projected a spire, or shaft of wood,
transfixed with two iron rods, that bore on their ends the letters N. 
S.   E.   and W, in the same metal.   The whole was surmounted by an
imitation of one of the finny tribe, carved in wood by the hands of
Richard, and painted what he called a “scale-color. ” This animal Mr. 
Jones affirmed to be an admirable resemblance of a great favorite of
the epicures in that country, which bore the title of “lake-fish,” and
doubtless the assertion was true; for, although intended to answer the
purposes of a weathercock, the fish was observed invariably to look
with a longing eye in the direction of the beautiful sheet of water
that lay imbedded in the mountains of Templeton. 

For a short time after the charter of the regents was received, the
trustees of this institution employed a graduate of one of the Eastern
colleges to instruct such youth as aspired to knowledge within the
walls of the edifice which we have described.   The upper part of the
building was in one apartment, and was intended for gala-days and
exhibitions; and the lower contained two rooms that were intended for
the great divisions of education, viz. , the Latin and the English
scholars.   The former were never very numerous; though the sounds of
“nominative, pennaa—genitive, penny,” were soon heard to issue from
the windows of the room, to the great delight and manifest edification
of the passenger. 

Only one laborer in this temple of Minerva, however, was known to get
so far as to attempt a translation of Virgil.   He, indeed, appeared at
the annual exhibition, to the prodigious exultation of all his
relatives, a farmer’s family in the vicinity, and repeated the whole
of the first eclogue from memory, observing the intonations of the
dialogue with much judgment and effect.   The sounds, as they proceeded
from his mouth, of

“Titty-ree too patty-lee ree-coo-bans sub teg-mi-nee faa-gy

Syl-ves-trem ten-oo-i moo-sam, med-i-taa-ris, aa-ve-ny. ”

were the last that had been heard in that building, as probably they
were the first that had ever been heard, in the same language, there
or anywhere else.   By this time the trustees discovered that they had
anticipated the age and the instructor, or principal, was superseded
by a master, who went on to teach the more humble lesson of “the more
haste the worst speed,” in good plain English. 

From this time until the date of our incidents, the academy was a
common country school, and the great room of the building was
sometimes used as a court-room, on extraordinary trials; sometimes for
conferences of the religious and the morally disposed, in the evening;
at others for a ball in the afternoon, given under the auspices of
Richard; and on Sundays, invariably, as a place of public worship. 

When an itinerant priest of the persuasion of the Methodists,
Baptists, Universalists, or of the more numerous sect of the
Presbyterians, was accidentally in the neighborhood, he was ordinarily
invited to officiate, and was commonly rewarded for his services by a
collection in a hat, before the congregation separated.   When no such
regular minister offered, a kind of colloquial prayer or two was made
by some of the more gifted members, and a sermon was usually read,
from Sterne, by Mr.  Richard Jones. 

The consequence of this desultory kind of priesthood was, as we have
already intimated, a great diversity of opinion on the more abstruse
points of faith.   Each sect had its adherents, though neither was
regularly organized and disciplined.   Of the religious education of
Marmaduke we have already written, nor was the doubtful character of
his faith completely removed by his marriage.   The mother of Elizabeth
was an Episcopalian, as indeed, was the mother of the Judge himself;
and the good taste of Marmaduke revolted at the familiar colloquies
which the leaders of the conferences held with the Deity, in their
nightly meetings.   In form, he was certainly an Episcopalian, though
not a sectary of that denomination.   On the other hand, Richard was as
rigid in the observance of the canons of his church as he was
inflexible in his opinions.   Indeed, he had once or twice essayed to
introduce the Episcopal form of service, on the Sundays that the
pulpit was vacant; but Richard was a good deal addicted to carrying
things to an excess, and then there was some thing so papal in his air
that the greater part of his hearers deserted him on the second
Sabbath—on the third his only auditor was Ben Pump, who had all the
obstinate and enlightened orthodoxy of a high churchman. 

Before the war of the Revolution, the English Church was supported in
the colonies, with much interest, by some of its adherents in the
mother country, and a few of the congregations were very amply
endowed.   But, for the season, after the independence of the States
was established, this sect of Christians languished for the want of
the highest order of its priesthood.   Pious and suitable divines were
at length selected, and sent to the mother country, to receive that
authority which, it is understood, can only be transmitted directly
from one to the other, and thus obtain, in order to reserve, that
unity in their churches which properly belonged to a people of the
same nation.   But unexpected difficulties presented themselves, in the
oaths with which the policy of England had fettered their
establishment; and much time was spent before a conscientious sense of
duty would permit the prelates of Britain to delegate the authority so
earnestly sought.   Time, patience, and zeal, however, removed every
impediment, and the venerable men who had been set apart by the
American churches at length returned to their expecting dioceses,
endowed with the most elevated functions of their earthly church. 
Priests and deacons were ordained, and missionaries provided, to keep
alive the expiring flame of devotion in such members as were deprived
of the ordinary administrations by dwelling in new and unorganized
districts. 

Of this number was Mr.  Grant.   He had been sent into the county of
which Templeton was the capital, and had been kindly invited by
Marmaduke, and officiously pressed by Richard, to take up his abode in
the village.   A small and humble dwelling was prepared for his family,
and the divine had made his appearance in the place but a few days
previously to the time of his introduction to the reader, As his forms
were entirely new to most of the inhabitants, and a clergyman of
another denomination had previously occupied the field, by engaging
the academy, the first Sunday after his arrival was allowed to pass in
silence; but now that his rival had passed on, like a meteor filling
the air with the light of his wisdom, Richard was empowered to give
notice that “Public worship, after the forms of the Protestant
Episcopal Church, would be held on the night before Christmas, in the
long room of the academy in Templeton, by the Rev.   Mr.  Grant. ”

This annunciation excited great commotion among the different
sectaries.   Some wondered as to the nature of the exhibition; others
sneered; but a far greater part, recollecting the essays of Richard in
that way, and mindful of the liberality, or rather laxity, of
Marmaduke’s notions on the subject of sectarianism, thought it most
prudent to be silent. 

The expected evening was, however, the wonder of the hour; nor was the
curiosity at all diminished when Richard and Benjamin, on the morning
of the eventful day, were seen to issue from the woods in the
neighborhood of the village, each bearing on his shoulders a large
bunch of evergreens.   This worthy pair was observed to enter the
academy, and carefully to fasten the door, after which their
proceedings remained a profound secret to the rest of the village; Mr. 
Jones, before he commenced this mysterious business, having informed
the school-master, to the great delight of the white-headed flock he
governed, that there could be no school that day.   Marmaduke was
apprised of all these preparations by letter, and it was especially
arranged that he and Elizabeth should arrive in season to participate
in the solemnities of the evening. 

After this digression, we shall return to our narrative. 

CHAPTER 9. 

Now all admire, in each high-flavored dish
The capabilities of flesh—fowl—fish;
In order due each guest assumes his station,
Throbs high his breast with fond anticipation,
And prelibates the joys of mastication.   “—Heliogabaliad. 

The apartment to which Monsieur Le Quoi handed Elizabeth communicated
with the hall, through the door that led under the urn which was
supposed to contain the ashes of Dido.   The room was spacious, and of
very just proportions; but in its ornaments and furniture the same
diversity of taste and imperfection of execution were to be observed
as existed in the hall.   Of furniture, there were a dozen green,
wooden arm-chairs, with cushions of moreen, taken from the same piece
as the petticoat of Remarkable.   The tables were spread, and their
materials and workmanship could not be seen; but they were heavy and
of great size, An enormous mirror, in a gilt frame, hung against the
wall, and a cheerful fire, of the hard or sugar maple, was burning on
the hearth.   The latter was the first object that struck the attention
of the Judge, who on beholding it exclaimed, rather angrily, to
Richard:

“How often have I forbidden the use of the sugar maple in my dwelling!
The sight of that sap, as it exudes with the heat, is painful to me,
Richard, Really, it behooves the owner of woods so extensive as mine,
to be cautious what example he sets his people, who are already
felling the forests as if no end could be found to their treasures,
nor any limits to their extent.   If we go on in this way, twenty years
hence we shall want fuel. ”

“Fuel in these hills, Cousin ‘Duke!” exclaimed Richard, in derision—”
fuel! why, you might as well predict that the fish will die for the
want of water in the lake, because I intend, when the frost gets out
of the ground, to lead one or two of the spring; through logs, into
the village.   But you are always a little wild on such subject;
Marmaduke. ”

“Is it wildness,” returned the Judge earnestly, “to condemn a practice
which devotes these jewels of the forest, these precious gifts of
nature, these mines of corn- I fort and wealth, to the common uses of
a fireplace? But I must, and will, the instant the snow is off the
earth, send out a party into the mountains to explore for coal. ”

“Coal!” echoed Richard.   “Who the devil do you think will dig for coal
when, in hunting for a bushel.   he would have to rip up more of trees
than would keep him in fuel for a twelvemonth? Poh! poh! Marmaduke:
you should leave the management of these things to me, who have a
natural turn that way.   It was I that ordered this fire, and a noble
one it is, to warm the blood of my pretty Cousin Bess. ”

The motive, then, must be your apology, Dick on,” said the Judge. —”
But, gentlemen, we are waiting. — Elizabeth, my child, take the head of
the table; Richard, I see, means to spare me the trouble of carving,
by sitting opposite to you. ”

“To be sure I do,” cried Richard.   “Here is a turkey to carve; and I
flatter myself that I understand carving a turkey, or, for that
matter, a goose, as well as any man alive. —Mr.  Grant! Where’s Mr. 
Grant? Will you please to say grace, sir? Everything in getting cold. 
Take a thing from the fire this cold weather, and it will freeze in
five minutes.   Mr.  Grant, we want you to say grace.   ‘For what we are
about to receive, the Lord make, us thankful Come, sit down, sit down. 
Do you eat wing or breast, Cousin Bess?”

But Elizabeth had not taken her seat, nor Was she in readiness to
receive either the wing or breast.   Her Laughing eyes were glancing at
the arrangements of the table, and the quality and selection of the
food.   The eyes of the father soon met the wondering looks of his
daughter, and he said, with a smile:

“You perceive, my child, how much we are indebted to Remarkable for
her skill in housewifery.   She has indeed provided a noble repast—such
as well might stop the cravings of hunger. ”

“Law!” said Remarkable, “I’m glad if the Judge is pleased; but I’m
notional that you’ll find the sa’ce over done.   I thought, as
Elizabeth was coming home, that a body could do no less than make
things agreeable. ”

“My daughter has now grown to woman’s estate, and is from this moment
mistress of my house,” said the Judge; “it is proper that all who live
with me address her as Miss Temple. 

“Do tell!” exclaimed Remarkable, a little aghast; “well, who ever
heerd of a young woman’s being called Miss? If the Judge had a wife
now, I shouldn’t think of calling her anything but Miss Temple; but—”

“Having nothing but a daughter you will observe that style to her, if
you please, in future,” interrupted Marmaduke. 

As the Judge looked seriously displeased, and, at such moments,
carried a particularly commanding air with him, the wary housekeeper
made no reply; and, Mr.  Grant entering the room, the whole party were
seated at the table.   As the arrangements of this repast were much in
the prevailing taste of that period and country, we shall endeavor to
give a short description of the appearance of the banquet. 

The table-linen was of the most beautiful damask, and the plates and
dishes of real china, an article of great luxury at this early period
of American commerce.   The knives and forks were of exquisitely
polished steel, and were set in unclouded ivory.   So much, being
furnished by the wealth of Marmaduke, was not only comfortable but
even elegant.   The contents of the several dishes, and their
positions, however, were the result of the sole judgment of
Remarkable.   Before Elizabeth was placed an enormous roasted turkey,
and before Richard one boiled, in the centre of the table stood a pair
of heavy silver casters, surrounded by four dishes: one a fricassee
that consisted of gray squirrels; another of fish fried; a third of
fish boiled; the last was a venison steak.   Between these dishes and
the turkeys stood, on the one side, a prodigious chine of roasted
bear’s meat, and on the other a boiled leg of delicious mutton. 
Interspersed among this load of meats was every species of vegetables
that the season and country afforded.   The four corners were garnished
with plates of cake.   On one was piled certain curiously twisted and
complicated figures, called “nut-cakes,” On another were heaps of a
black-looking sub stance, which, receiving its hue from molasses, was
properly termed “sweet-cake ;” a wonderful favorite in the coterie of
Remarkable, A third was filled, to use the language of the
housekeeper, with “cards of gingerbread ;” and the last held a “ plum-
cake,” so called from the number of large raisins that were showing
their black heads in a substance of suspiciously similar color.   At
each corner of the table stood saucers, filled with a thick fluid of
some what equivocal color and consistence, variegated with small dark
lumps of a substance that resembled nothing but itself, which
Remarkable termed her “sweetmeats. ” At the side of each plate, which
was placed bottom upward, with its knife and fork most accurately
crossed above it, stood another, of smaller size, containing a motley-
looking pie, composed of triangular slices of apple, mince, pump kin,
cranberry, and custard so arranged as to form an entire whole,
Decanters of brandy, rum, gin, and wine, with sundry pitchers of
cider, beer, and one hissing vessel of “flip,” were put wherever an
opening would admit of their introduction.   Notwithstanding the size
of the tables, there was scarcely a spot where the rich damask could
be seen, so crowded were the dishes, with their associated bottles,
plates, and saucers.   The object seemed to be profusion, and it was
obtained entirely at the expense of order and elegance. 

All the guests, as well as the Judge himself, seemed perfectly
familiar with this description of fare, for each one commenced eating,
with an appetite that promised to do great honor to Remarkable’s taste
and skill.   What rendered this attention to the repast a little
surprising, was the fact that both the German and Richard had been
summoned from another table to meet the Judge; but Major Hartmann both
ate and drank without any rule, when on his excursions; and Mr.  Jones
invariably made it a point to participate in the business in hand, let
it be what it would.   The host seemed to think some apology necessary
for the warmth he had betrayed on the subject of the firewood, and
when the party were comfortably seated, and engaged with their knives
and forks, he observed:

“The wastefulness of the settlers with the noble trees of this country
is shocking, Monsieur Le Quoi, as doubt less you have noticed.   I have
seen a man fell a pine, when he has been in want of fencing stuff, and
roll his first cuts into the gap, where he left it to rot, though its
top would have made rails enough to answer his purpose, and its butt
would have sold in the Philadelphia market for twenty dollars. ”

“And how the devil—I beg your pardon, Mr.  Grant,” interrupted Richard:
“but how is the poor devil to get his logs to the Philadelphia market,
pray? put them in his pocket, ha! as you would a handful of chestnuts,
or a bunch of chicker-berries? I should like to see you walking up
High Street, with a pine log in each pocket!— Poh! poh! Cousin ‘Duke,
there are trees enough for us all, and some to spare.   Why, I can
hardly tell which way the wind blows, when I’m out in the clearings,
they are so thick and so tall; I couldn’t at all, if it wasn’t for the
clouds, and I happen to know all the points of the compass, as it
were, by heart. ”

“Ay! ay! squire,” cried Benjamin, who had now entered and taken his
place behind the Judge’s chair, a little aside withal, in order to be
ready for any observation like the present; “look aloft, sir, look
aloft.   The old seamen say, ‘that the devil wouldn’t make a sailor,
unless he looked aloft’ As for the compass, why, there is no such
thing as steering without one.   I’m sure I never lose sight of the
main-top, as I call the squire’s lookout on the roof, but I set my
compass, d’ye see, and take the bearings and distance of things, in
order to work out my course, if so be that it should cloud up, or the
tops of the trees should shut out the light of heaven.   The steeple of
St.  Paul’s, now that we nave got it on end, is a great help to the
navigation of the woods, for, by the Lord Harry! as was—”

“It is well, Benjamin,” interrupted Marmaduke, observing that his
daughter manifested displeasure at the major-domo’s familiarity; “but
you forget there is a lady in company, and the women love to do most
of the talking themselves. ”

“The Judge says the true word,” cried Benjamin, with one of his
discordant laughs.   “Now here is Mistress Remarkable Pettibones; just
take the stopper off her tongue, and you’ll hear a gabbling worse like
than if you should happen to fall to leeward in crossing a French
privateer, or some such thing, mayhap, as a dozen monkeys stowed in
one bag. ”

It were impossible to say how perfect an illustration of the truth of
Benjamin’s assertion the housekeeper would have furnished, if she had
dared; but the Judge looked sternly at her, and unwilling to incur his
resentment, yet unable to contain her anger, she threw herself out of
the room with a toss of the body that nearly separated her frail form
in the centre. 

“Richard,” said Marmaduke, observing that his displeasure had produced
the desired effect, “can you inform me of anything concerning the
youth whom I so unfortunately wounded? I found him on the mountain
hunting in company with the Leather-Stocking, as if they were of the
same family; but there is a manifest difference in their manners.   The
youth delivers himself in chosen language, such as is seldom heard in
these hills, and such as occasions great surprise to me, how one so
meanly clad, and following so lowly a pursuit, could attain.   Mohegan
also knew him.   Doubtless he is a tenant of Natty’s hut.   Did you
remark the language of the lad.   Monsieur Le Quoi?”

“Certainement, Monsieur Temple,” returned the French man, “he deed
convairse in de excellent Anglaise. ”

“The boy is no miracle,” exclaimed Richard; “I’ve known children that
were sent to school early, talk much better before they were twelve
years old.   There was Zared Coe, old Nehemiah’s son, who first settled
on the beaver-dam meadow, he could write almost as good .   hand as
myself, when he was fourteen; though it’s true, I helped to teach him
a little in the evenings.   But this shooting gentleman ought to be put
in the stocks, if he ever takes a rein in his hand again.   He is the
most awkward fellow about a horse I ever met with.   I dare say he
never drove anything but oxen in his life. ”

“There, I think, Dickon, you do the lad injustice,” said the Judge;
“he uses much discretion in critical moments.   Dost thou not think so,
Bess?”

There was nothing in this question particularly to excite blushes, but
Elizabeth started from the revery into which she had fallen, and
colored to her forehead as she answered:

“To me, dear sir, he appeared extremely skilful, and prompt, and
courageous; but perhaps Cousin Richard will say I am as ignorant as
the gentleman himself. ”

“Gentleman!” echoed Richard; “do you call such chaps gentlemen, at
school, Elizabeth?”

“Every man is a gentleman that knows how to treat a woman with respect
and consideration,” returned the young lady promptly, and a little
smartly. 

“So much for hesitating to appear before the heiress in his shirt-
sleeves,” cried Richard, winking at Monsieur Le Quoi, who returned the
wink with one eye, while he rolled the other, with an expression of
sympathy, toward the young lady.   “Well, well, to me he seemed
anything but a gentleman.   I must say, however, for the lad, that he
draws a good trigger, and has a true aim.   He’s good at shooting a
buck, ha! Marmaduke?”

“Richart,” said Major Hartmann, turning his grave countenance toward
the gentleman he addressed, with much earnestness, “ter poy is goot. 
He savet your life, and my life, and ter life of i’ominie Grant, and
ter life of ter Frenchman; and, Richard, he shall never vant a pet to
sleep in vile olt Fritz Hartmann has a shingle to cover his het mit. ”
“Well, well, as you please, old gentleman,” returned Mr.  Jones,
endeavoring to look indifferent; “put him into your own stone house,
if you will, Major.   I dare say the lad never slept in anything better
than a bark shanty in his life, unless it was some such hut as the
cabin of Leather-Stocking.   I prophesy you will soon spoil him; any
one could see how proud he grew, in a short time, just because he
stood by my horses’ heads.   while I turned them into the highway. ”

“No, no.   my old friend,” cried Marmaduke, “it shall be my task to
provide in some manner for the youth; I owe him a debt of my own,
besides the service he has done me through my friends.   And yet I
anticipate some little trouble in inducing him to accept of my
services.   He showed a marked dislike, I thought, Bess, to my offer of
a residence within these walls for life. ”

“Really, dear sir,” said Elizabeth, projecting her beautiful under-
lip, “I have not studied the gentleman so closely as to read his
feelings in his countenance.   I thought he might very naturally feel
pain from his wound, and therefore pitied him; but”—and as she spoke
she glanced her eye, with suppressed curiosity, toward the major-domo—
” I dare say, sir, that Benjamin can tell you something about him, He
cannot have been in the village, and Benjamin not have seen him
often. ”

“Ay! I have seen the boy before,” said Benjamin, who wanted little
encouragement to speak; “he has been backing and filling in the wake
of Natty Bumppo, through the mountains, after deer, like a Dutch long-
boat in tow of an Albany sloop.   He carries a good rifle, too, ‘the
Leather-Stocking said, in my hearing, before Betty Hollister’s bar-
room fire, no later than the Tuesday night, that the younger was
certain death to the wild beasts.   If so be he can kill the wild-cat
that has been heard moaning on the lake-side since the hard frosts and
deep snows have driven the deer to herd, he will be doing the thing
that is good.   Your wild-cat is a bad shipmate, and should be made to
cruise out of the track of Christian men,”

“Lives he in the hut of Bumppo?” asked Marmaduke, with some interest. 

“Cheek by jowl; the Wednesday will be three weeks since he first hove
in sight, in company with Leather-Stocking.   They had captured a wolf
between them, and had brought in his scalp for the bounty.   That
Mister Bump-ho has a handy turn with him in taking off a scalp; and
there’s them, in this here village, who say he l’arnt the trade by
working on Christian men.   If so be that there is truth in the saying,
and I commanded along shore here, as your honor does, why, d'ye see,
I’d bring him to the gangway for it, yet.   There’s a very pretty post
rigged alongside of the stocks; and for the matter of a cat, I can fit
one with my own hands; ay! and use it too, for the want of a better. ”

“You are not to credit the idle tales you hear of Natty; he has a kind
of natural right to gain a livelihood in these mountains; and if the
idlers in the village take it into their heads to annoy him, as they
sometimes do reputed rogues, they shall find him protected by the
strong arm of the law,”

“Ter rifle is petter as ter law,” said the Major sententiously. 

“That for his rifle!” exclaimed Richard, snapping his fingers; “Ben is
right, and I—” He was stopped by the sound of a common ship-bell, that
had been elevated to the belfry of the academy, which now announced,
by its incessant ringing, that the hour for the appointed service had
arrived.   “‘For this and every other instance of his goodness—’ I beg
pardon, Mr.  Grant, will you please to return thanks, sir? It is time
we should be moving, as we are the only Episcopalians in the
neighborhood; that is, I and Benjamin, and Elizabeth; for I count
half— breeds, like Marmaduke as bad as heretics. ”

The divine arose and performed the office meekly and fervently, and
the whole party instantly prepared them selves for the church—or
rather academy. 

CHAPTER 10. 

“And calling sinful man to pray,
Loud, long, and deep the bell had tolled. ”—Scotts Burgher

While Richard and Monsieur Le Quoi, attended by Benjamin, proceeded to
the academy by a foot-path through the snow, the judge, his daughter,
the divine, and the Major took a more circuitous route to the same
place by the streets of the village. 

The moon had risen, and its orb was shedding a flood of light over the
dark outline of pines which crowned the eastern mountain.   In many
climates the sky would have been thought clear and lucid for a
noontide.   The stars twinkled in the heavens, like the last
glimmerings of distant fire, so much were they obscured by the
overwhelming radiance of the atmosphere; the rays from the moon
striking upon the smooth, white surfaces of the lake and fields,
reflecting upward a light that was brightened by the spotless color of
the immense bodies of snow which covered the earth. 

Elizabeth employed herself with reading the signs, one of which
appeared over almost every door; while the sleigh moved steadily, and
at an easy gait, along the principal street.   Not only new
occupations, but names that were strangers to her ears, met her gaze
at every step they proceeded.   The very houses seemed changed.   This
had been altered by an addition; that had been painted; another had
been erected on the site of an old acquaintance, which had been
banished from the earth almost as soon as it made its appearance on
it.   All were, however, pouring forth their inmates, who uniformly
held their way toward the point where the expected exhibition of the
conjoint taste of Richard and Benjamin was to be made. 

After viewing the buildings, which really appeared to some advantage
under the bright but mellow light of the moon, our heroine turned her
eyes to a scrutiny of the different figures they passed, in search of
any form that she knew.   But all seemed alike, as muffled in cloaks,
hoods, coats, or tippets, they glided along the narrow passages in the
snow which led under the houses, half hid by the bank that had been
thrown up in excavating the deep path in which they trod.   Once or
twice she thought there was a stature or a gait that she recollected;
but thc person who owned it instantly disappeared behind one of those
enormous piles of wood that lay before most of the doors, It was only
as they turned from the main street into another that intersected it
at right angles, and which led directly to the place of meeting, that
she recognized a face and building that she knew. 

The house stood at one of the principal corners in the village; and by
its well-trodden doorway, as well as the sign that was swinging with a
kind of doleful sound in the blasts that occasionally swept down the
lake, was clearly one of the most frequented inns in the place.   The
building was only of one story; but the dormer-windows in the roof,
the paint, the window-shutters, and the cheerful fire that shone
through the open door, gave it an air of comfort that was not
possessed by many of its neighbors.   The sign was suspended from a
common ale-house post, and represented the figure of a horseman, armed
with sabre and pistols, and surmounted by a bear-skin cap, with a
fiery animal that he bestrode “rampant. ” All these particulars were
easily to be seen by the aid of the moon, together with a row of
somewhat illegible writing in black paint, but in which Elizabeth, to
whom the whole was familiar, read with facility, “The Bold Dragoon. ”

A man and a woman were issuing from the door of this habitation as the
sleigh was passing, The former moved with a stiff, military step, that
was a good deal heightened by a limp in one leg; but the woman
advanced with a measure and an air that seemed not particularly
regardful of what she might encounter.   The light of the moon fell
directly upon her full, broad, and red visage, exhibiting her
masculine countenance, under the mockery of a ruffled cap that was
intended to soften the lineamints of features that were by no means
squeamish.   A small bonnet of black silk, and of a slightly formal
cut, was placed on the back of her head, but so as not to shade her
visage in the least.   The face, as it encountered the rays of the moon
from the east, seemed not unlike sun rising in the west.   She advanced
with masculine strides to intercept the sleigh; and the Judge,
directing the namesake of the Grecian king, who held the lines, to
check his horse, the par ties were soon near to each other. 

“Good luck to ye, and a welcome home, Jooge,” cried the female, with a
strong Irish accent; “and I’m sure it’s to me that ye’re always
welcome.   Sure! and there’s Miss Lizzy, and a fine young woman she is
grown.   What a heart-ache would she be giving the young men now, if
there was sich a thing as a rigiment in the town! Och! but it’s idle
to talk of sich vanities, while the bell is calling us to mateing jist
as we shall he called away unexpictedly some day, when we are the
laist calkilating.   Good-even, Major; will I make the bowl of gin
toddy the night, or it’s likely ye’ll stay at the big house the
Christmas eve, and the very night of yer getting there?”

“I am glad to see you, Mrs.  Hollister,” returned Elizabeth.   “I have
been trying to find a face that I knew since we left the door of the
mansion-house; but none have I seen except your own.   Your house, too,
is unaltered, while all the others are so changed that, but for the
places where they stand, they would be utter strangers.   I observe you
also keep the dear sign that I saw Cousin Richard paint; and even the
name at the bottom, about which, you may remember, you had the
disagreement. ”

“It is the bould dragoon, ye mane? And what name would he have, who
niver was known by any other, as my husband here, the captain, can
testify? He was a pleasure to wait upon, and was ever the foremost in
need.   Och! but he had a sudden end! but it’s to be hoped that he was
justified by the cause, And it’s not Parson Grant there who’ll gainsay
that same.   Yes, yes; the squire would paint, and so I thought that we
might have his face up there, who had so often shared good and evil
wid us.   The eyes is no so large nor so fiery as the captain’s Own;
but the whiskers and the cap is as two paes.   Well, well, I'll not
keep ye in the cowld, talking, but will drop in the morrow after
sarvice, and ask ye how ye do.   It’s our bounden duty to make the most
of this present, and to go to the house which is open to all; so God
bless ye, and keep ye from evil! Will I make the gin-twist the night,
or no, Major?”

To this question the German replied, very sententiously, in the
affirmative; and, after a few words had passed between the husband of
the fiery-faced hostess and the Judge, the sleigh moved on.   It soon
reached the door of the academy, where the party alighted and entered
the building. 

In the mean time, Mr.  Jones and his two companions, having a much
shorter distance to journey, had arrived before the appointed place
some minutes sooner than the party in the sleigh.   Instead of
hastening into the room in order to enjoy the astonishment of the
settlers, Richard placed a hand in either pocket of his surcoat, and
affected to walk about, in front of the academy, like one to whom the
ceremonies were familiar. 

The villagers proceeded uniformly into the building, with a decorum
and gravity that nothing could move, on such occasions; but with a
haste that was probably a little heightened by curiosity.   Those who
came in from the adjacent country spent some little time in placing
certain blue and white blankets over their horses before they
proceeded to indulge their desire to view the interior of the house. 
Most of these men Richard approached, and inquired after the health
and condition of their families.   The readiness with which he
mentioned the names of even the children, showed how very familiarly
acquainted he was with their circumstances; and the nature of the
answers he received proved that he was a general favorite. 

At length one of the pedestrians from the village stopped also, and
fixed an earnest gaze at a new brick edifice that was throwing a long
shadow across the fields of snow, as it rose, with a beautiful
gradation of light and shade, under the rays of a full moon.   In front
of the academy was a vacant piece of ground, that was intended for a
public square.   On the side opposite to Mr.  Jones, the new and as yet
unfinished church of St.  Paul’s was erected, This edifice had been
reared during the preceding summer, by the aid of what was called a
subscription; though all, or nearly all, of the money came from the
pockets of the landlord.   It had been built under a strong conviction
of the necessity of a more seemly place of worship than “the long room
of the academy,” and under an implied agreement that, after its
completion, the question should be fairly put to the people, that they
might decide to what denomination it should belong.   Of course, this
expectation kept alive a strong excitement in some few of the
sectaries who were interested in its decision; though but little was
said openly on the subject.   Had Judge Temple espoused the cause of
any particular sect, the question would have been immediately put at
rest, for his influence was too powerful to be opposed; but he
declined interference in the matter, positively refusing to lend even
the weight of his name on the side of Richard, who had secretly given
an assurance to his diocesan that both the building and the
congregation would cheerfully come within the pale of the Protestant
Episcopal Church.   But, when the neutrality of the Judge was clearly
ascertained, Mr.  Jones discovered that he had to contend with a stiff
necked people.   His first measure was to go among them and commence a
course of reasoning, in order to bring them round to his own way of
thinking.   They all heard him patiently, and not a man uttered a word
in reply in the way of argument, and Richard thought, by the time that
he had gone through the settlement, the point was conclusively decided
in his favor.   Willing to strike while the iron was hot, he called a
meeting, through the news paper, with a view to decide the question by
a vote at once.   Not a soul attended; and one of the most anxious
afternoons that he had ever known was spent by Richard in a vain
discussion with Mrs.  Hollister, who strongly contended that the
Methodist (her own) church was the best entitled to and most deserving
of, the possession of the new tabernacle.   Richard now perceived that
he had been too sanguine, and had fallen into the error of all those
who ignorantly deal with that wary and sagacious people.   He assumed a
disguise himself—that is, as well as he knew how, and proceeded step
by step to advance his purpose. 

The task of erecting the building had been unanimously transferred to
Mr.  Jones and Hiram Doolittle.   Together they had built the mansion-
house, the academy, and the jail, and they alone knew how to plan and
rear such a structure as was now required.   Early in the day, these
architects had made an equitable division of their duties.   To the
former was assigned the duty of making all the plans, and to the
latter the labor of superintending the execution. 

Availing himself of this advantage, Richard silently determined that
the windows should have the Roman arch; the first positive step in
effecting his wishes.   As the building was made of bricks, he was
enabled to conceal his design until the moment arrived for placing the
frames; then, indeed, it became necessary to act.   He communicated his
wishes to Hiram with great caution; and, without in the least
adverting to the spiritual part of his project, he pressed the point a
little warmly on the score of architectural beauty.   Hiram heard him
patiently, and without contradiction, but still Richard was unable to
discover the views of his coadjutor on this interesting subject.   As
the right to plan was duly delegated to Mr.  Jones, no direct objection
was made in words.   but numberless unexpected difficulties arose in
the execution.   At first there was a scarcity in the right kind of
material necessary to form the frames; but this objection was
instantly silenced by Richard running his pencil through two feet of
their length at one stroke.   Then the expense was mentioned; but
Richard reminded Hiram that his cousin paid, and that he was
treasurer.   This last intimation had great weight, and after a silent
and protracted, but fruitless opposition, the work was suffered to
proceed on the original plan. 

The next difficulty occurred in the steeple, which Richard had
modelled after one of the smaller of those spires that adorn the great
London cathedral.   The imitation was somewhat lame, it was true, the
proportions being but in differently observed; but, after much
difficulty, Mr.  Jones had the satisfaction of seeing an object reared
that bore in its outlines, a striking resemblance to a vinegar-cruet. 
There was less opposition to this model than to the windows; for the
settlers were fond of novelty, and their steeple was without a
precedent. 

Here the labor ceased for the season, and the difficult question of
the interior remained for further deliberation.   Richard well knew
that, when he came to propose a reading-desk and a chancel, he must
unmask; for these were arrangements known to no church in the country
but his own.   Presuming, however, on the advantages he had already
obtained, he boldly styled the building St.  Paul’s, and Hiram
prudently acquiesced in this appellation, making, however, the slight
addition of calling it “New St.  Paul’s,” feeling less aversion to a
name taken from the English cathedral than from the saint. 

The pedestrian whom we have already mentioned, as pausing to
contemplate this edifice, was no other than the gentleman so
frequently named as Mr.  or Squire Doolittle.   He was of a tall, gaunt
formation, with rather sharp features, and a face that expressed
formal propriety mingled with low cunning.   Richard approached him,
followed by Monsieur Le Quoi and the major-domo. 

“Good-evening, squire,” said Richard, bobbing his head, but without
moving his hands from his pockets. 

“Good-evening, squire,” echoed Hiram, turning his body in order to
turn his head also. 

“A cold night, Mr.  Doolittle, a cold night, sir. ”

“Coolish; a tedious spell on’t. ”

“What, looking at our church, ha! It looks well, by moonlight; how the
tin of the cupola glistens! I warrant you the dome of the other St. 
Paul’s never shines so in the smoke of London. ”

“It is a pretty meeting -house to look on,” returned Hiram, “and I
believe that Monshure Ler Quow and Mr.  Penguilliam will allow it. ”

“Sairtainlee!” exclaimed the complaisant Frenchman, “it ees ver fine,”

“I thought the monshure would say so.   The last molasses that we had
was excellent good.   It isn’t likely that you have any more of it on
hand?”

“Ah! oui; ees, sair,” returned Monsieur Le Quoi, with a slight shrug
of his shoulder, and a trifling grimace, “dere is more.   I feel ver
happi dat you love eet.   I hope dat Madame Doleet’ is in good ‘ealth. ”

“Why, so as to be stirring,” said Hiram.   “The squire hasn’t finished
the plans for the inside of the meeting house yet?”

“No—no—no,” returned Richard, speaking quickly, but making a
significant pause between each negative—. .   “it requires reflection. 
There is a great deal of room to fill up, and I am afraid we shall not
know how to dispose of it to advantage.   There will be a large vacant
spot around the pulpit, which I do not mean to place against the wall,
like a sentry-box stuck up on the side of a fort. ”

“It is rulable to put the deacons’ box under the pulpit,” said Hiram;
and then, as if he had ventured too much, he added, “but there’s
different fashions in different Countries. ”

“That there is,” cried Benjamin; “now, in running down the coast of
Spain and Portingall, you may see a nunnery stuck out on every
headland, with more steeples and outriggers.   such as dog-vanes and
weathercocks, than you’ll find aboard of a three-masted schooner.   If
so be that a well-built church is wanting, old England, after all, is
the country to go to after your models and fashion pieces.   As to
Paul’s, thof I’ve never seen it, being that it’s a long way up town
from Radcliffe Highway and the docks, yet everybody knows that it’s
the grandest place in the world Now, I’ve no opinion but this here
church over there is as like one end of it as a grampus is to a whale;
and that’s only a small difference in bulk.   Mounsheer Ler Quaw, here,
has been in foreign parts; and thof that is not the same as having
been at home, yet he must have seen churches in France too, and can
form a small idee of what a church should be; now I ask the mounsheer
to his face if it is not a clever little thing, taking it by and
large. ”

“It ees ver apropos of saircumstance,” said the French-.   man—” ver
judgment—but it is in the catholique country dat dey build dc—vat you
call—ah a ah-ha—la grande cathédrale—de big church.   St.  Paul, Londre,
is ver fine; ver belle; ver grand—vat you call beeg; but, Monsieur
Ben, pardonnez-moi, it is no vort so much as Notre Dame. ”

“Ha! mounsheer, what is that you say?” cried Benjamin; “St.  Paul’s
church is not worth so much as a damn! Mayhap you may be thinking too
that the Royal Billy isn’t so good a ship as the Billy de Paris; but
she would have licked two of her any day, and in all weathers. ”

As Benjamin had assumed a very threatening kind of attitude,
flourishing an arm with a bunch at the end of it that was half as big
as Monsieur Le Quoi’s head, Richard thought it time to interpose his
authority. 

“Hush, Benjamin, hush,” he said; “you both misunderstand Monsieur Le
Quoi and forget yourself.   But here comes Mr.  Grant, and the service
will commence.   Let us go in. ”

The Frenchman, who received Benjamin’s reply with a well-bred good-
humor that would not admit of any feeling but pity for the other’s
ignorance, bowed in acquiescence and followed his companion. 

Hiram and the major -domo brought up the rear, the latter grumbling as
he entered the building:

“If so be that the king of France had so much as a house to live in
that would lay alongside of Paul’s, one might put up with their jaw. 
It’s more than flesh and blood can bear to hear a Frenchman run down
an English church in this manner.   Why, Squire Doolittle, I’ve been at
the whipping of two of them in one day—clean built, snug frigates with
standing royals and them new-fashioned cannonades on their quarters—
such as, if they had only Englishmen aboard of them, would have fout
the devil. ”

With this ominous word in his mouth Benjamin entered the church. 

CHAPTER 11. 

“And fools who came to scoff, remained to pray. ”—Goldsmith. 

Notwithstanding the united labors of Richard and Benjamin, the “long
room” was but an extremely inartificial temple.   Benches; made in the
coarsest manner, and entirely with a view to usefulness, were arranged
in rows for the reception of the Congregation; while a rough,
unpainted box was placed against the wall, in the centre of the length
of the apartment, as an apology for a pulpit.   Something like a
reading-desk was in front of this rostrum; and a small mahogany table
from the mansion-house, covered with a spotless damask cloth, stood a
little on one side, by the way of an altar.   Branches of pines and
hemlocks were stuck in each of the fissures that offered in the
unseasoned and hastily completed woodwork of both the building and its
furniture; while festoons and hieroglyphics met the eye in vast
profusion along the brown sides of the scratch-coated walls.   As the
room was only lighted by some ten or fifteen miserable candles, and
the windows were without shutters, it would have been but a dreary,
cheerless place for the solemnities of a Christmas eve, had not the
large fire that was crackling at each end of the apartment given an
air of cheerfulness to the scene, by throwing an occasional glare of
light through the vistas of bushes and faces. 

The two sexes were separated by an area in the centre of the room
immediately before the pulpit; amid a few benches lined this space,
that were occupied by the principal personages of the village and its
vicinity.   This distinction was rather a gratuitous concession made by
the poorer and less polished part of the population than a right
claimed by the favored few.   One bench was occupied by the party of
Judge Temple, including his daughter, and, with the exception of Dr. 
Todd, no one else appeared willing to incur the imputation of pride,
by taking a seat in what was, literally, the high place of the
tabernacle. 

Richard filled the chair that was placed behind another table, in the
capacity of clerk; while Benjamin, after heaping sundry logs on the
fire, posted himself nigh by, in reserve for any movement that might
require co-operation. 

It would greatly exceed our limits to attempt a description of the
congregation, for the dresses were as various as the individuals. 
Some one article of more than usual finery, and perhaps the relic of
other days, was to be seen about most of the females, in connection
with the coarse attire of the woods.   This wore a faded silk, that had
gone through at least three generations, over coarse, woollen black
stockings; that, a shawl, whose dyes were as numerous as those of the
rainbow, over an awkwardly fitting gown of rough brown “woman’s wear. ”
In short, each one exhibited some favorite article, and all appeared
in their best, both men and women; while the ground-works in dress, in
either sex, were the coarse fabrics manufactured within their own
dwellings.   One man appeared in the dress of a volunteer company of
artillery, of which he had been a member in the “down countries,”
precisely for no other reason than because it was the best suit he
had.   Several, particularly of the younger men, displayed pantaloons
of blue, edged with red cloth down the seams part of the equipments of
the “Templeton Light Infantry,” from a little vanity to be seen in
“boughten clothes. ” There was also one man in a “rifle frock,” with
its fringes and folds of spotless white, striking a chill to the heart
with the idea of its coolness, although the thick coat of brown” home-
made” that was concealed beneath preserved a proper degree of warmth. 

There was a marked uniformity of expression in Countenance, especially
in that half of the congregation who did not enjoy the advantages of
the polish of the village.   A sallow skin, that indicated nothing but
exposure, was common to all, as was an air of great decency and
attention, mingled, generally, with an expression of shrewdness, and
in the present instance of active curiosity.   Now and then a face and
dress were to be seen among the congregation, that differed entirely
from this description.   If pock-marked and florid, with gartered legs,
and a coat that snugly fitted the person of the wearer, it was surely
an English emigrant, who had bent his steps to this retired quarter of
the globe.   If hard-featured and without color, with high cheek-bones,
it was a native of Scotland, in similar circumstances. 

The short, black-eyed man, with a cast of the swarthy Spaniard in his
face, who rose repeatedly to make room for the belles of the village
as they entered, was a son of Erin, who had lately left off his pack,
and become a stationary trader in Templeton.   In short, half the
nations in the north of Europe had their representatives in this
assembly, though all had closely assimilated themselves to the
Americans in dress and appearance, except the English man.   He,
indeed, not only adhered to his native customs in attire and living,
but usually drove his plough among the stumps in the same manner as he
had before done on the plains of Norfolk, until dear-bought experience
taught him the useful lesson that a sagacious people knew what was
suited to their circumstances better than a casual observer, or a
sojourner who was, perhaps, too much prejudiced to compare and,
peradventure, too conceited to learn. 

Elizabeth soon discovered that she divided the attention of the
congregation with Mr.  Grant.   Timidity, therefore, confined her
observation of the appearances which we have described to stoles
glances; but, as the stamping of feet was now becoming less frequent,
and even the coughing, and other little preliminaries of a
congregation settling themselves down into reverential attention, were
ceasing, she felt emboldened to look around her.   Gradually all noises
diminished, until the suppressed cough denoted that it was necessary
to avoid singularity, and the most pro found stillness pervaded the
apartment.   The snapping of the fires, as they threw a powerful heat
into the room, was alone heard, and each face and every eye were
turned on the divine. 

At this moment, a heavy stamping of feet was heard in the passage
below, as if a new-corner was releasing his limbs from the snow that
was necessarily clinging to the legs of a pedestrian.   It was
succeeded by no audible tread; but directly Mohegan, followed by the
Leather-Stocking and the young hunter, made his appearance. 

Their footsteps would not have been heard, as they trod the apartment
in their moccasins, but for the silence which prevailed. 

The Indian moved with great gravity across the floor, and, observing a
vacant seat next to the Judge, he took it, in a manner that manifested
his sense of his own dignity.   Here, drawing his blanket closely
around him so as partly to conceal his countenance, he remained during
the service immovable, but deeply attentive.   Natty passed the place
that was so freely taken by his red companion, and seated himself on
one end of a log that was lying near the fire, where he continued,
with his rifle standing between his legs, absorbed in reflections
seemingly of no very pleasing nature.   The youth found a seat among
the congregation, and another silence prevailed. 

Mr.  Grant now arose and commenced his service with the sublime
declaration of the Hebrew prophet: “The Lord is in His holy temple;
let all the earth keep silence before Him. ” The example of Mr.  Jones
was unnecessary to teach the congregation to rise; the solemnity of
the divine effected this as by magic.   After a short pause, Mr.  Grant
proceeded with the solemn and winning exhortation of his service. 
Nothing was heard but the deep though affectionate tones of the
reader, as he went slowly through this exordium; until, something
unfortunately striking the mind of Richard as incomplete, he left his
place and walked on tiptoe from the room. 

When the clergyman bent his knees in prayer and confession, the
congregation so far imitated his example as to resume their seats;
whence no succeeding effort of the divine, during the evening, was
able to remove them in a body.   Some rose at times; but by far the
larger part continued unbending; observant, it is true, but it was the
kind of observation that regarded the ceremony as a spectacle rather
than a worship in which they were to participate.   Thus deserted by
his clerk Mr.  Grant continued to read; but no response was audible. 
The short and solemn pause that succeeded each petition was made;
still no voice repeated the eloquent language of the prayer. 

The lips of Elizabeth moved, but they moved in vain and accustomed as
she was to the service of the churches of the metropolis, she was
beginning to feel the awkwardness of the circumstance most painfully
when a soft, low female voice repeated after the priest,” We have left
undone those things which we ought to have done. ” Startled at finding
one of her own sex in that place who could rise superior to natural
timidity, Miss Temple turned her eyes in the direction of the
penitent.   She observed a young female on her knees, but a short
distance from her, with her meek face humbly bent over her book. 

The appearance of this stranger, for such she was, entirely, to
Elizabeth, was light and fragile.   Her dress was neat and becoming;
and her countenance, though pale and slightly agitated, excited deep
interest by its sweet and melancholy expression.   A second and third
response was made by this juvenile assistant, when the manly sounds of
a male voice proceeded from the opposite part of the room, Miss Temple
knew the tones of the young hunter instantly, and struggling to
overcome her own diffidence she added her low voice to the number. 

All this time Benjamin stood thumbing the leaves of a prayer-book with
great industry; but some unexpected difficulties prevented his finding
the place.   Before the divine reached the close of the confession,
however, Richard reappeared at the door, and, as he moved lightly
across the room, he took up the response, in a voice that betrayed no
other concern than that of not being heard.   In his hand he carried a
small open box, with the figures “8 by 10” written in black paint on
one of its sides; which, having placed in the pulpit, apparently as a
footstool for the divine, he returned to his station in time to say,
sonorously, “Amen. ” The eyes of the congregation, very naturally, were
turned to the windows, as Mr.  Jones entered with his singular load;
and then, as if accustomed to his “general agency,” were again bent on
the priest, in close and curious attention. 

The long experience of Mr.  Grant admirably qualified him to perform
his present duty.   He well understood the character of his listeners,
who were mostly a primitive people in their habits; and who, being a
good deal addicted to subtleties and nice distinctions in their
religious opinions, viewed the introduction of any such temporal
assistance as form into their spiritual worship not only with
jealousy, but frequently with disgust.   He had acquired much of his
knowledge from studying the great book of human nature as it lay open
in the world; and, knowing how dangerous it was to contend with
ignorance, uniformly endeavored to avoid dictating where his better
reason taught him it was the most prudent to attempt to lead, His
orthodoxy had no dependence on his cassock; he could pray with fervor
and with faith, if circumstances required it, without the assistance
of his clerk; and he had even been known to preach a most evangelical
sermon, in the winning manner of native eloquence, without the aid of
a cambric handkerchief. 

In the present instance he yielded, in many places, to the prejudices
of his congregation; and when he had ended, there was not one of his
new hearers who did not think the ceremonies less papal and offensive,
and more conformant to his or her own notions of devout worship, than
they had been led to expect from a service of forms, Richard found in
the divine, during the evening, a most powerful co-operator in his
religious schemes.   In preaching, Mr.  Grant endeavored to steer a
middle course between the mystical doctrines of those sublimated
creeds which daily involve their professors in the most absurd
contradictions, and those fluent roles of moral government which would
reduce the Saviour to a level with the teacher of a school of ethics. 
Doctrine it was necessary to preach, for nothing less would have
satisfied the disputatious people who were his listeners, and who
would have interpreted silence on his part into a tacit acknowledgment
of the superficial nature of his creed.   We have already said that,
among the endless variety of religious instructors, the settlers were
accustomed to hear every denomination urge its own distinctive
precepts, and to have found one indifferent to this Interesting
subject would have been destructive to his influence.   But Mr.  Grant
so happily blended the universally received opinions of the Christian
faith with the dogmas of his own church that, although none were
entirely exempt from the influence of his reasons, very few took any
alarm at the innovation. 

“When we consider the great diversity of the human character,
influenced as it is by education, by opportunity, and by the physical
and moral conditions of the creature, my dear hearers,” he earnestly
concluded “it can excite no surprise that creeds so very different in
their tendencies should grow out of a religion revealed, it is true,
but whose revelations are obscured by the lapse of ages, and whose
doctrines were, after the fashion of the countries in which they were
first promulgated, frequently delivered in parables, and in a language
abounding in metaphors and loaded with figures.   On points where the
learned have, in purity of heart, been compelled to differ, the
unlettered will necessarily be at variance.   But, happily for us, my
brethren, the fountain of divine love flows from a source too pure to
admit of pollution in its course; it extends, to those who drink of
its vivifying waters, the peace of the righteous, and life
everlasting; it endures through all time, and it pervades creation. 
If there be mystery in its workings, it is the mystery of a Divinity. 
With a clear knowledge of the nature, the might, and the majesty of
God, there might be conviction, but there could be no faith.   If we
are required to believe in doctrines that seem not in conformity with
the deductions of human wisdom, let us never forget that such is the
mandate of a wisdom that is infinite.   It is sufficient for us that
enough is developed to point our path aright, and to direct our
wandering steps to that portal which shall open on the light of an
eternal day.   Then, indeed, it may be humbly hoped that the film which
has been spread by the subtleties of earthly arguments will be
dissipated by the spiritual light of Heaven; and that our hour of
probation, by the aid of divine grace, being once passed in triumph,
will be followed by an eternity of intelligence and endless ages of
fruition.   All that is now obscure shall become plain to our expanded
faculties; and what to our present senses may seem irreconcilable to
our limited notions of mercy, of justice, and of love, shall stand
irradiated by the light of truth, confessedly the suggestions of
Omniscience, and the acts of an All-powerful Benevolence. ”

“What a lesson of humility, my brethren, might not each of us obtain
from a review of his infant hours, and the recollection of his
juvenile passions! How differently do the same acts of parental rigor
appear in the eyes of the suffering child and of the chastened man!
When the sophist would supplant, with the wild theories of his worldly
wisdom, the positive mandates of inspiration, let him remember the
expansion of his own feeble intellects, and pause—let him feel the
wisdom of God in what is partially concealed.   as well as that which
is revealed; in short, let him substitute humility for pride of
reason—let him have faith, and live!”

“The consideration of this subject is full of consolation, my hearers,
and does not fail to bring with it lessons of humility and of profit,
that, duly improved, would both chasten the heart and strengthen the
feeble-minded man in his course.   It is a blessed consolation to be
able to lay the misdoubtings of our arrogant nature at the thresh old
of the dwelling-place of the Deity, from whence they shall be swept
away, at the great opening of the portal, like the mists of the
morning before the rising sun .   It teaches us a lesson of humility, by
impressing us with the imperfection of human powers, and by warning us
of the many weak points where we are open to the attack of the great
enemy of our race; it proves to us that we are in danger of being
weak, when our vanity would fain soothe us into the belief that we arc
most strong; it forcibly points out to us the vainglory of intellect,
and shows us the vast difference between a saving faith and the
corollaries of a philosophical theology; and it teaches us to reduce
our self-examination to the test of good works.   By good works must be
understood the fruits of repentance, the chiefest of which is charity. 
Not that charity only which causes us to help the needy and comfort
the suffering, but that feeling of universal philanthropy which, by
teaching us to love, causes us to judge with lenity all men; striking
at the root of self-righteousness, and warning us to be sparing of our
condemnation of others, while our own salvation is not yet secure. ”

“The lesson of expediency, my brethren, which I would gather from the
consideration of this subject, is most strongly inculcated by
humility.   On the heading and essential points of our faith, there is
but little difference among those classes of Christians who
acknowledge the attributes of the Saviour, and depend on his
mediation.   But heresies have polluted every church, and schisms are
the fruit of disputation.   In order to arrest these dangers, and to
insure the union of his followers, it would seem that Christ had
established his visible church.   and delegated the ministry.   Wise and
holy men, the fathers of our religion, have expended their labors in
clearing what was revealed from the obscurities of language, and the
results of their experience and researches have been em bodied in the
form of evangelical discipline That this discipline must be salutary,
is evident from the view of the weakness of human nature that we have
already taken; and that it may be profitable to us, and all who listen
to its precepts and its liturgy, may God, in his infinite wisdom,
grant!—And now to,” etc. 

With this ingenious reference to his own forms and ministry, Mr.  Grant
concluded his discourse.   The most profound attention had been paid to
the sermon during the whole of its delivery, although the prayers had
not been received with so perfect demonstration of respect.   This was
by no means an intended slight of that liturgy to which the divine
alluded, but was the habit of a people who owed their very existence,
as a distinct nation, to the doctrinal character of their ancestors. 
Sundry looks of private dissatisfaction were exchanged between Hiram
and one or two of the leading members of the conference, but the
feeling went no further at that time; and the congregation, after
receiving the blessing of Mr.  Grant. , dispersed in Silence, and with
great decorum. 

CHAPTER 12. 

“Your creeds and dogmas of a learned church
May build a fabric, fair with moral beauty;
But it would seem that the strong hand of God
Can, only, 'rase the devil from the heart. ”—Duo. 

While the congregation was separating, Mr.  Grant approached the place
where Elizabeth and her father were seated, leading the youthful
female whom we have mentioned in the preceding chapter, and presented
her as his daughter.   Her reception was as cordial and frank as the
manners of the country and the value of good society could render it;
the two young women feeling, instantly, that they were necessary to
the comfort of each other, The Judge, to whom the clergyman’s daughter
was also a stranger, was pleased to find one who, from habits, sex,
and years, could probably contribute largely to the pleasures of his
own child, during her first privations on her removal from the
associations of a city to the solitude of Templeton; while Elizabeth,
who had been forcibly struck with the sweetness and devotion of the
youthful suppliant, removed the slight embarrassment of the timid
stranger by the ease of her own manners.   They were at once
acquainted; and, during the ten minutes that the “academy” was
clearing, engagements were made between the young people, not only for
the succeeding day, but they would probably have embraced in their
arrangements half of the winter, had not the divine interrupted them
by saying:

“Gently, gently, my dear Miss Temple, or you will make my girl too
dissipated.   You forget that she is my housekeeper, and that my
domestic affairs must remain unattended to, should Louisa accept of
half the kind offers you are so good as to make her. ”

“And why should they not be neglected entirely, sir?” interrupted
Elizabeth.   “There are but two of you; and certain I am that my
father’s house will not only contain you both, but will open its doors
spontaneously to receive such guests.   Society is a good not to he
rejected on account of cold forms, in this wilderness, sir; and I have
often heard my father say, that hospitality is not a virtue in a new
country, the favor being conferred by the guest. ”

“The manner in which Judge Temple exercises its rites would confirm
this opinion; but we must not trespass too freely.   Doubt not that you
will see us often, my child, particularly during the frequent visits
that I shall be compelled to make to the distant parts of the country. 
But to obtain an influence with such a people,” he continued, glancing
his eyes toward the few who were still lingering, curious observers of
the interview, “a clergyman most not awaken envy or distrust by
dwelling under so splendid a roof as that of Judge Temple. ”

“You like the roof, then, Mr.  Grant,” cried Richard, who had been
directing the extinguishment of the fires and other little necessary
duties, and who approached in time to hear the close of the divine’s
speech.   “I am glad to find one man of taste at last.   Here’s ‘Duke. 
now, pretends to call it by every abusive name he can invent; but
though ‘Duke is a tolerable judge, he is a very poor carpenter, let me
tell him.   Well, sir, well, I think we may say, without boasting, that
the service was as well per formed this evening as you often see; I
think, quite as well as I ever knew it to be done in old Trinity—that
is, if we except the organ.   But there is the school-master leads the
psalm with a very good air.   I used to lead myself, but latterly I
have sung nothing but bass.   There is a good deal of science to be
shown in the bass, and it affords a fine opportunity to show off a
full, deep voice.   Benjamin, too, sings a good bass, though he is
often out in the words.   Did you ever hear Benjamin sing the ‘Bay of
Biscay, 0?”

“I believe he gave us part of it this evening,” said Marmaduke,
laughing.   “There was, now and then, a fearful quaver in his voice,
and it seems that Mr.  Penguillian is like most others who do one thing
particularly well; he knows nothing else.   He has, certainly, a
wonderful partiality to one tune, and he has a prodigious self-
confidence in that one, for he delivers himself like a northwester
sweeping across the lake.   But come, gentlemen, our way is clear, and
the sleigh waits.   Good-evening, Mr.  Grant.   Good-night, young lady—
remember you dine beneath the Corinthian roof, to-morrow, with
Elizabeth. ”

The parties separated, Richard holding a close dissertation with Mr. 
Le Quoi, as they descended the stairs, on the subject of psalmody,
which he closed by a violent eulogium on the air of the “Bay of
Biscay, 0,” as particularly connected with his friend Benjamin’s
execution. 

During the preceding dialogue, Mohegan retained his seat, with his
head shrouded in his blanket, as seemingly inattentive to surrounding
objects as the departing congregation was itself to the presence of
the aged chief, Natty, also, continued on the log where he had first
placed himself, with his head resting on one of his hands, while the
other held the rifle, which was thrown carelessly across his lap.   His
countenance expressed uneasiness, and the occasional unquiet glances
that he had thrown around him during the service plainly indicated
some unusual causes for unhappiness.   His continuing seated was, how
ever, out of respect to the Indian chief.   to whom he paid the utmost
deference on all occasions, although it was mingled with the rough
manner of a hunter. 

The young companion of these two ancient inhabitants of the forest
remained also standing before the extinguished brands, probably from
an unwillingness to depart without his comrades.   The room was now
deserted by all but this group, the divine, and his daughter.   As the
party from the mansion-house disappeared, John arose, and, dropping
the blanket from his head, he shook back the mass of black hair from
his face, and, approaching Mr.  Grant, he extended his hand, and said
solemnly:

“Father, I thank you.   The words that have been said, since the rising
moon, have gone upward, and the Great Spirit is glad.   What you have
told your children, they will remember, and be good. ” He paused a
moment, and then, elevating himself with the grandeur of an Indian
chief, he added: “If Chingachgook lives to travel toward the setting
sun, after his tribe, and the Great Spirit carries him over the lakes
and mountains with the breath of his body, he will tell his people the
good talk he has heard; and they will believe him; for who can say
that Mohegan has ever lied?”

“Let him place his dependence on the goodness of Divine mercy,” said
Mr.  Grant, to whom the proud consciousness of the Indian sounded a
little heterodox, “and it never will desert him.   When the heart is
filled with love to God, there is no room for sin.   But, young man, to
you I owe not only an obligation, in common with those you saved this
evening on the mountain, but my thanks for your respectable and pious
manner in assisting in the service at a most embarrassing moment.   I
should be happy to see you sometimes at my dwelling, when, perhaps, my
conversation may strengthen you in the path which you appear to have
chosen.   It is so unusual to find one of your age and appearance, in
these woods, at all acquainted with our holy liturgy, that it lessens
at once the distance between us, and I feel that we are no longer
strangers.   You seem quite at home in the service; I did not perceive
that you had even a book, although good Mr.  Jones.   had laid several
in different parts of the room. ”

“It would be strange if I were ignorant of the service of our church,
sir,” returned the youth modestly; “for I was baptized in its
communion and I have never yet attended public worship elsewhere.   For
me to use the forms of any other denomination would be as singular as
our own have proved to the people here this evening. ”

“You give me great pleasure, my dear sir,” cried the divine, seizing
the other by the hand, and shaking it cordially.   “You will go home
with me now—indeed you must—my child has yet to thank you for saving
my life.   I will-listen to no apologies.   This worthy Indian, and your
friend, there, will accompany us.   Bless me! to think that’ he has
arrived at manhood in this country, without entering a dissenting *
meeting-house!”

  * The divines of the Protestant Episcopal Church of the United States
    commonly call other denominations Dissenters, though there never was
    an established church in their own country!

“No, no,” interrupted the Leather-Stocking, “I must away to the
wigwam; there’s work there that mustn’t be forgotten for all your
churchings and merry-makings.   Let the lad go with you in welcome; he
is used to keeping company with ministers, and talking of such
matters; so is old John, who was christianized by the Moravians abouts
the time of the old war.   But I am a plain unlarned man, that has
sarved both the king and his country, in his day, agin’ the French and
savages, but never so much as looked into a book, or larnt a letter of
scholarship, in my born days.   I’ve never seen the use of much in-door
work, though I have lived to be partly bald, and in my time have
killed two hundred beaver in a season, and that without counting thc
other game.   If you mistrust what I am telling you, you can ask
Chingachgook there, for I did it in the heart of the Delaware country,
and the old man is knowing to the truth of every word I say. ”

“I doubt not, my friend, that you have been both a valiant soldier and
skilful hunter in your day,” said the divine; “but more is wanting to
prepare you for that end which approaches.   You may have heard the
maxim, that ‘young men may die, but that old men must’”

“I’m sure I never was so great a fool as to expect to live forever,”
said Natty, giving one of his silent laughs; “no man need do that who
trails the savages through the woods, as I have done, and lives, for
the hot months, on the lake streams.   I’ve a strong constitution, I
must say that for myself, as is plain to be seen; for I’ve drunk the
Onondaga water a hundred times, while I’ve been watching the deer-
licks, when the fever-an’-agy seeds was to be seen in it as plain and
as plenty as you can see the rattle snakes on old Crumhorn.   But then
I never expected to hold out forever; though there’s them living who
have seen the German flats a wilderness; ay! and them that’s larned,
and acquainted with religion, too; though you might look a week, now,
and not find even the stump of a pine on them; and that’s a wood that
lasts in the ground the better part of a hundred years after the tree
is dead. ”

“This is but time, my good friend,” returned Mr.  Grant, who began to
take an interest in the welfare of his new acquaintance, “but I would
have you prepare for eternity.   It is incumbent on you to attend
places of public worship, as I am pleased to see that you have done
this evening.   Would it not he heedless in you to start on a day’s
toil of hard hunting, and leave your ramrod and flint behind?”

“It must be a young hand in the woods,” interrupted Natty, with
another laugh, “that didn’t know how to dress a rod out of an ash
sapling or find a fire-stone in the mountains.   No, no, I never
expected to live forever; but I see, times be altering in these
mountains from what they was thirty years ago, or, for that matter,
ten years.   But might makes right, and the law is stronger than an old
man, whether he is one that has much laming, or only like me, that is
better now at standing at the passes than in following the hounds, as
I once used to could.   Heigh-ho! I never know’d preaching come into a
settlement but it made game scarce, and raised the price of gunpowder;
and that’s a thing that’s not as easily made as a ramrod or an Indian
flint. ”

The divine, perceiving that he had given his opponent an argument by
his own unfortunate selection of a comparison, very prudently
relinquished the controversy; although he was fully determined to
resume it at a more happy moment, Repeating his request to the young
hunter with great earnestness, the youth and Indian consented to ac
company him and his daughter to the dwelling that the care of Mr. 
Jones had provided for their temporary residence.   Leather-Stocking
persevered in his intention of returning to the hut, and at the door
of the building they separated. 

After following the course of one of the streets of the village a
short distance.   Mr.  Grant, who led the way, turned into a field,
through a pair of open bars, and entered a footpath, of but sufficient
width to admit one person to walk in at a time.   The moon had gained a
height that enabled her to throw her rays perpendicularly on the
valley; and the distinct shadows of the party flitted along on the
banks of the silver snow, like the presence of aerial figures, gliding
to their appointed place of meeting.   The night still continued
intensely cold, although not a breath of wind was felt.   The path was
beaten so hard that the gentle female, who made one of the party,
moved with ease along its windings; though the frost emitted a low
creaking at the impression of even her light footsteps. 

The clergyman in his dark dress of broadcloth, with his mild,
benevolent countenance occasionally turned toward his companions,
expressing that look of subdued care which was its characteristic,
presented the first object in this singular group.   Next to him moved
the Indian, his hair falling about his face, his head uncovered, and
the rest of his form concealed beneath his blanket.   As his swarthy
visage, with its muscles fixed in rigid composure, was seen under the
light of the moon, which struck his face obliquely, he seemed a
picture of resigned old age, on whom the storms of winter had beaten
in vain for the greater part of a century; but when, in turning his
head, the rays fell directly on his dark, fiery eyes, they told a tale
of passions unrestrained, and of thoughts free as air.   The slight
person of Miss Grant, which followed next, and which was but too
thinly clad for the severity of the season, formed a marked contrast
to thc wild attire and uneasy glances of the Delaware chief; and more
than once during their walk, the young hunter, himself no
insignificant figure in the group, was led to consider the difference
in the human form, as the face of Mohegan and the gentle countenance
of Miss Grant, with eyes that rivalled the soft hue of the sky, met
his view at the instant that each turned to throw a glance at the
splendid orb which lighted their path.   Their way, which led through
fields that lay at some distance in the rear of the houses, was
cheered by a conversation that flagged or became animated with the
subject.   The first to speak was the divine. 

“Really,” he said, “it is so singular a circumstance to meet with one
of your age, that has not been induced by idle curiosity to visit any
other church than the one in which he has been educated, that I feel a
strong curiosity to know the history of a life so fortunately
regulated.   Your education must have been excellent; as indeed is
evident from your manners and language.   Of which of the States are
you a native, Mr.  Edwards? for such, I believe, was the name that you
gave Judge Temple. ”

“Of this. ”

“Of this! I was at a loss to conjecture, from your dialect, which does
not partake, particularly, of the peculiarities of any country with
which I am acquainted.   You have, then, resided much in the cities,
for no other part of this country is so fortunate as to possess the
constant enjoyment of our excellent liturgy. ”

The young hunter smiled, as he listened to the divine while he so
clearly betrayed from what part of the country he had come himself;
but, for reasons probably connected with his present situation, he
made no answer. 

“I am delighted to meet with you, my young friend, for I think an
ingenuous mind, such as I doubt not yours must be, will exhibit all
the advantages of a settled doctrine and devout liturgy.   You perceive
how I was compelled to bend to the humors of my hearers this evening. 
Good Mr.  Jones wished me to read the communion, and, in fact, all the
morning service; but, happily, the canons do not require this of an
evening.   It would have wearied a new congregation; but to-morrow I
purpose administering the sacrament, Do you commune, my young friend?”

“I believe not, sir,” returned the youth, with a little embarrassment,
that was not at all diminished by Miss Grant’s pausing involuntarily,
and turning her eyes on him in surprise; “I fear that I am not
qualified; I have never yet approached the altar; neither would I wish
to do it while I find so much of the world clinging to my heart. ”

“Each must judge for himself,” said Mr.  Grant; “though I should think
that a youth who had never been blown about by the wind of false
doctrines, and who has enjoyed the advantages of our liturgy for so
many years in its purity, might safely come.   Yet, sir, it is a solemn
festival, which none should celebrate until there is reason to hope it
is not mockery.   I observed this evening, in your manner to Judge
Temple, a resentment that bordered on one of the worst of human
passions, We will cross this brook on the ice; it must bear us all, I
think, in safety.   Be careful not to slip, my child. ” While speaking,
he descended a little bank by the path, and crossed one of the small
streams that poured their waters into the lake; and, turning to see
his daughter pass, observed that the youth had advanced, and was
kindly directing her footsteps.   When all were safely over, he moved
up the opposite bank, and continued his discourse.   “It was wrong, my
dear sir, very wrong, to suffer such feelings to rise, under any
circumstances, and especially in the present, where the evil was not
intended. ”

“There is good in the talk of my father,” said Mohegan, stopping
short, and causing those who Were behind him to pause also; “it is the
talk of Miquon.   The white man may do as his fathers have told him;
but the ‘Young Eagle’ has the blood of a Delaware chief in his veins;
it is red, and the stain it makes can only be washed out with the
blood of a Mingo. ”

Mr.  Grant was surprised by the interruption of the Indian, and,
stopping, faced the speaker.   His mild features were confronted to the
fierce and determined looks of the chief, and expressed the horror he
felt at hearing such sentiments from one who professed the religion of
his Saviour.   Raising his hands to a level with his head, he
exclaimed:

“John, John! is this the religion that you have learned from the
Moravians? But no—I will not be so uncharitable as to suppose it. 
They are a pious, a gentle, and a mild people, and could never
tolerate these passions.   Listen to the language of the Redeemer: ‘But
I say unto you, love your enemies; bless them that curse you; do good
to them that hate you; pray for them that despitefully use you and
persecute you. ’ This is the command of God, John, and, without
striving to cultivate such feelings, no man can see Him. ”

The Indian heard the divine with attention; the unusual fire of his
eye gradually softened, and his muscles relaxed into their ordinary
composure; but, slightly shaking his head, he motioned with dignity
for Mr.  Grant to resume his walk, and followed himself in silence, The
agitation of the divine caused him to move with unusual rapidity along
the deep path, and the Indian, without any apparent exertion, kept an
equal pace; but the young hunter observed the female to linger in her
steps, until a trifling distance intervened between the two former and
the latter.   Struck by the circumstance, and not perceiving any new
impediment to retard her footstep, the youth made a tender of his
assistance. 

“You are fatigued, Miss Grant,” he said; “the snow yields to the foot,
and you are unequal to the strides of us men.   Step on the crust, I
entreat you, and take the help of my arm, Yonder light is, I believe,
the house of your father; but it seems yet at some distance. ”

“I am quite equal to the walk,” returned a low, tremulous voice; “but
I am startled by the manner of that Indian, Oh! his eye was horrid, as
he turned to the moon, in speaking to my father.   But I forgot, sir;
he is your friend, and by his language may be your relative; and yet
of you I do not feel afraid. ”

The young man stepped on the bank of snow, which firmly sustained his
weight, and by a gentle effort induced his companion to follow. 
Drawing her arm through his own, he lifted his cap from his head,
allowing the dark locks to flow in rich curls over his open brow, and
walked by her side with an air of conscious pride, as if inviting an
examination of his utmost thoughts.   Louisa took but a furtive glance
at his person, and moved quietly along, at a rate that was greatly
quickened by the aid of his arm. 

“You are but little acquainted with this peculiar people, Miss Grant,”
he said, “or you would know that revenge is a virtue with an Indian. 
They are taught, from infancy upward, to believe it a duty never to
allow an injury to pass unrevenged; and nothing but the stronger
claims of hospitality can guard one against their resentments where
they have power. ”

“Surely, sir,” said Miss Grant, involuntarily withdrawing her arm from
his, “you have not been educated with such unholy sentiments?”

“It might be a sufficient answer to your excellent father to say that
I was educated in the church,” he returned; “but to you I will add
that I have been taught deep and practical lessons of forgiveness.   I
believe that, on this subject, I have but little cause to reproach
myself; it shall he my endeavor that there yet be less. ”

While speaking, he stopped, and stood with his arm again proffered to
her assistance.   As he ended, she quietly accepted his offer, and they
resumed their walk. 

Mr.  Grant and Mohegan had reached the door of the former's residence,
and stood waiting near its threshold for the arrival of their young
companions.   The former was earnestly occupied in endeavoring to
correct, by his precepts, the evil propensities that he had discovered
in the Indian during their conversation; to which the latter listened
in Profound but respectful attention.   On the arrival of the young
hunter and the lady, they entered the building.   The house stood at
some distance from the village, in the centre of a field, surrounded
by stumps that were peering above the snow, bearing caps of pure
white, nearly two feet in thickness.   Not a tree nor a shrub was nigh
it; but the house, externally, exhibited that cheer less, unfurnished
aspect which is so common to the hastily erected dwellings of a new
country.   The uninviting character of its outside was, however,
happily relieved by the exquisite neatness and comfortable warmth
within. 

They entered an apartment that was fitted as a parlor, though the
large fireplace, with its culinary arrangements, betrayed the domestic
uses to which it was occasionally applied.   The bright blaze from the
hearth rendered the light that proceeded from the candle Louisa
produced unnecessary; for the scanty furniture of the room was easily
seen and examined by the former.   The floor was covered in the centre
by a carpet made of rags, a species of manufacture that was then, and
yet continues to be, much in use in the interior; while its edges,
that were exposed to view, were of unspotted cleanliness.   There was a
trifling air of better life in a tea-table and work-stand, as well as
in an old-fashioned mahogany bookcase; but the chairs, the dining-
table, and the rest of the furniture were of the plainest and cheapest
construction, Against the walls were hung a few specimens of needle-
work and drawing, the former executed with great neatness, though of
somewhat equivocal merit in their designs, while the latter were
strikingly deficient in both,

One of the former represented a tomb, with a youthful female weeping
over it, exhibiting a church with arched windows in the background. 
On the tomb were the names, with the dates of the births and deaths,
of several individuals, all of whom bore the name of Grant.   An
extremely cursory glance at this record was sufficient to discover to
the young hunter the domestic state of the divine.   He there read that
he was a widower; and that the innocent and timid maiden, who had been
his companion, was the only survivor of six children.   The knowledge
of the dependence which each of these meek Christians had on the other
for happiness threw an additional charm around the gentle but kind
attentions which the daughter paid to the father. 

These observations occurred while the party were seating themselves
before the cheerful fire, during which time there was a suspension of
discourse.   But, when each was comfortably arranged, and Louisa, after
laying aside a thin coat of faded silk, and a gypsy hat, that was more
becoming to her modest, ingenuous countenance than appropriate to the
season, had taken a chair between her father and the youth, the former
resumed the conversation. 

“I trust, my young friend,” he said, “that the education you have
received has eradicated most of those revengeful principles which you
may have inherited by descent, for I understand from the expressions
of John that you have some of the blood of the Delaware tribe.   Do not
mistake me, I beg, for it is not color nor lineage that constitutes
merit; and I know not that he who claims affinity to the proper owners
of this soil has not the best right to tread these hills with the
lightest conscience. ”

Mohegan turned solemnly to the speaker, and, with the peculiarly
significant gestures of an Indian, he spoke:

“Father, you are not yet past the summer of life; your limbs are
young.   Go to the highest hill, and look around you.   All that you
see, from the rising to the setting sun, from the head-waters of the
great spring, to where the ‘crooked river’* is hid by the hills, is
his.   He has Delaware blood, and his right is strong. 

  * The Susquehannah means crooked river; “hannah,” or “hannock,” meant
    river in many of the native dialects.   Thus we find Rappahannock as
    far south as Virginia. 

But the brother of Miquon is just; he will cut the country in two
parts, as the river cuts the lowlands, and will say to the ‘Young
Eagle,’ ‘Child of the Delawares! take it—keep it; and be a chief in
the land of your fathers. ’”

“Never!” exclaimed the young hunter, with a vehemence that destroyed
the rapt attention with which the divine and his daughter were
listening to the Indian.   “The wolf of the forest is not more
rapacious for his prey than that man is greedy of gold; and yet his
glidings into wealth are subtle as the movements of a serpent. ”

“Forbear, forbear, my son, forbear,” interrupted Mr.  Grant.   “These
angry passions most be subdued.   The accidental injury you have
received from Judge Temple has heightened the sense of your hereditary
wrongs.   But remember that the one was unintentional, and that the
other is the effect of political changes, which have, in their course,
greatly lowered the pride of kings, and swept mighty nations from the
face of the earth.   Where now are the Philistines, who so often held
the children of Israel in bondage? or that city of Babylon, which
rioted in luxury and vice, and who styled herself the Queen of Nations
in the drunkenness of her pride? Remember the prayer of our holy
litany, where we implore the Divine Power—’that it may please thee to
forgive our enemies, persecutors, and slanderers, and to turn their
hearts.   The sin of the wrongs which have been done to the natives is
shared by Judge Temple only in common with a whole people, and your
arm will speedily be restored to its strength. ”

“This arm!” repeated the youth, pacing the floor in violent agitation. 
“Think you, sir, that I believe the man a murderer? Oh, no! he is too
wily, too cowardly, for such a crime.   But let him and his daughter
riot in their wealth—a day of retribution will come.   No, no, no,” he
continued, as he trod the floor more calmly—” it is for Mohegan to
suspect him of an intent to injure me; but the trifle is not worth a
second thought. ” He seated himself, and hid his face between his
hands, as they rested on his knees. 

“It is the hereditary violence of a native’s passion, my child,” said
Mr.  Grant in a low tone to his affrighted daughter, who was clinging
in terror to his arm.   “He is mixed with the blood of the Indians, you
have heard; and neither the refinements of education nor the
advantages of our excellent liturgy have been able entirely to
eradicate the evil.   But care and time will do much for him yet. ”

Although the divine spoke in a low tone, yet what he uttered was heard
by the youth, who raised his head, with a smile of indefinite
expression, and spoke more calmly:

“Be not alarmed, Miss Grant, at either the wildness of my manner or
that of my dress.   I have been carried away by passions that I should
struggle to repress.   I must attribute it, with your father, to the
blood in my veins, although I would not impeach my lineage willingly;
for it is all that is left me to boast of.   Yes! I am proud of my
descent from a Delaware chief, who was a warrior that ennobled human
nature.   Old Mohegan was his friend, and will vouch for his virtues. ”

Mr.  Grant here took up the discourse, and, finding the young man more
calm, and the aged chief attentive, he entered into a full and
theological discussion of the duty of forgiveness.   The conversation
lasted for more than an hour, when the visitors arose, and, after
exchanging good wishes with their entertainers, they departed.   At the
door they separated, Mohegan taking the direct route to the village,
while the youth moved toward the lake.   The divine stood at the
entrance of his dwelling, regarding the figure of the aged chief as it
glided, at an astonishing gait for his years, along the deep path; his
black, straight hair just visible over the bundle formed by his
blanket, which was sometimes blended with the snow, under the silvery
light of the moon.   From the rear of the house was a window that
overlooked the lake; and here Louisa was found by her father, when he
entered, gazing intently on some object in the direction of the
eastern mountain.   He approached the spot, and saw the figure of the
young hunter, at the distance of half a mile, walking with prodigious
steps across the wide fields of frozen snow that covered the ice,
toward the point where he knew the hut inhabited by the Leather-
Stocking was situated on the margin of the lake, under a rock that was
crowned by pines and hemlocks.   At the next instant, the wild looking
form entered the shadow cast from the over-hanging trees, and was lost
to view. 

“It is marvellous how long the propensities of the savage continue in
that remarkable race,” said the good divine; “but if he perseveres as
he has commenced, his triumph shall yet be complete.   Put me in mind,
Louisa, to lend him the homily ‘against peril of idolatry,’ at his
next visit. ”

“Surety, father, you do not think him in danger of relapsing into the
worship of his ancestors?”

“No, my child,” returned the clergyman, laying his hand affectionately
on her flaxen locks, and smiling; “his white blood would prevent it;
but there is such a thing as the idolatry of our passions. ”

CHAPTER 13. 

“And I’ll drink out of the quart pot— Here’s a health to the barley
mow.   “—Drinking Song. 

On one of the corners, where the two principal streets of Templeton
intersected each other, stood, as we have already mentioned, the inn
called the “Bold Dragoon”.  In the original plan it was ordained that
the village should stretch along the little stream that rushed down
the valley; and the street which led from the lake to the academy was
intended to be its western boundary.   But convenience frequently
frustrates the best-regulated plans.   The house of Mr. , or as, in
consequence of commanding the militia of that vicinity, he was called,
Captain Hollister, had, at an early day, been erected directly facing
the main street, and ostensibly interposed a barrier to its further
progress.   Horsemen, and subsequently teamsters, however, availed
themselves of an opening, at the end of the building, to shorten their
passage westward, until in time the regular highway was laid out along
this course, and houses were gradually built on either side, so as
effectually to prevent any subsequent correction of the evil. 

Two material consequences followed this change in the regular plans of
Marmaduke.   The main street, after running about half its length, was
suddenly reduced for precisely that difference in its width; and “Bold
Dragoon” became, next to the mansion-house, by far the most
conspicuous edifice in the place. 

This conspicuousness, aided by the characters of the host and hostess,
gave the tavern an advantage over all its future competitors that no
circumstances could conquer.   An effort was, however, made to do so;
and at the corner diagonally opposite, stood a new building that was
in tended, by its occupants, to look down all opposition.   It was a
house of wood, ornamented in the prevailing style of architecture, and
about the roof and balustrades was one of the three imitators of the
mansion-house.   The upper windows were filled with rough boards
secured by nails, to keep out the cold air—for the edifice was far
from finished, although glass was to be seen in the lower apartments,
and the light of the powerful fires within de noted that it was
already inhabited.   The exterior was painted white on the front and on
the end which was exposed to the street; but in the rear, and on the
side which was intended to join the neighboring house, it was coarsely
smeared with Spanish brown.   Before the door stood two lofty posts,
connected at the top by a beam, from which was suspended an enormous
sign, ornamented around its edges with certain curious carvings in
pine boards, and on its faces loaded with Masonic emblems.   Over these
mysterious figures was written, in large letters, “The Templeton
Coffee-house, and Traveller’s Hotel,” and beneath them, “By Habakkuk
Foote and Joshua Knapp. ” This was a fearful rival to the” Bold
Dragoon,” as our readers will the more readily perceive when we add
that the same sonorous names were to be seen over a newly erected
store in the village, a hatter’s shop, and the gates of a tan-yard. 
But, either because too much was attempted to be executed well, or
that the “Bold Dragoon” had established a reputation which could not
be easily shaken, not only Judge Temple and his friends, but most of
the villagers also, who were not in debt to the powerful firm we have
named, frequented the inn of Captain Hollister on all occasions where
such a house was necessary

On the present evening the limping veteran and his consort were hardly
housed after their return from the academy, when the sounds of
stamping feet at their threshold announced the approach of visitors,
who were probably assembling with a view to compare opinions on the
subject of the ceremonies they had witnessed. 

The public, or as it was called, the “bar-room,” of the Bold Dragoon,”
was a spacious apartment, lined on three sides with benches and on the
fourth by fireplaces.   Of the latter there were two of such size as to
occupy, with their enormous jambs, the whole of that side of the
apartment where they were placed, excepting room enough for a door or
two, and a little apartment in one corner, which was protected by
miniature palisades, and profusely garnished with bottles and glasses. 
In the entrance to this sanctuary Mrs.  Hollister was seated, with
great gravity in her air, while her husband occupied himself with
stirring the fires, moving the logs with a large stake burnt to a
point at one end. 

“There, sargeant, dear,” said the landlady, after she thought the
veteran had got the logs arranged in the most judicious manner, “give
over poking, for it’s no good ye’ll be doing, now that they burn so
convaniently.   There’s the glasses on the table there, and the mug
that the doctor was taking his cider and ginger in, before the fire
here— just put them in the bar, will ye? for we’ll be having the
jooge, and the Major, and Mr.  Jones down the night, without reckoning
Benjamin Poomp, and the lawyers; so yell be fixing the room tidy; and
put both flip irons in the coals; and tell Jude, the lazy black baste,
that if she’s no be cleaning up the kitchen I’ll turn her out of the
house, and she may live wid the jontlemen that kape the ‘Coffee
house,’ good luck to ‘em.   Och! sargeant, sure it’s a great privilege
to go to a mateing where a body can sit asy, without joomping up and
down so often, as this Mr.  Grant is doing that same. ”

“It’s a privilege at all times, Mrs.  Hollister, whether we stand or be
seated; or, as good Mr.  Whitefleld used to do after he had made a
wearisome day’s march, get on our knees and pray, like Moses of old,
with a flanker to the right and left to lift his hands to heaven,”
returned her husband, who composedly performed what she had directed
to be done.   “It was a very pretty fight, Betty, that the Israelites
had on that day with the Amalekites, It seams that they fout on a
plain, for Moses is mentioned as having gone on the heights to
overlook the battle, and wrestle in prayer; and if I should judge,
with my little larning, the Israelites depended mainly on their horse,
for it was written ‘that Joshua cut up the enemy with the edge of the
sword; from which I infer, not only that they were horse, but well
diseiplyned troops.   Indeed, it says as much as that they were chosen
men; quite likely volunteers; for raw dragoons seldom strike with the
edge of their swords, particularly if the weapon be any way crooked. ”
“Pshaw! why do ye bother yourself wid texts, man, about so small a
matter?” interrupted the landlady; “sure, it was the Lord who was with
‘em; for he always sided with the Jews, before they fell away; and
it’s but little matter what kind of men Joshua commanded, so that he
was doing the right bidding.   Aven them cursed millaishy, the Lord
forgive me for swearing, that was the death of him, wid their
cowardice, would have carried the day in old times.   There’s no rason
to be thinking that the soldiers were used to the drill. ”

“I must say, Mrs.  Hollister, that I have not often seen raw troops
fight better than the left flank of the militia, at the time you
mention.   They rallied handsomely, and that without beat of drum,
which is no easy thing to do under fire, and were very steady till he
fell.   But the Scriptures contain no unnecessary words; and I will
maintain that horse, who know how to strike with the edge of the
sword, must be well disoiplyned.   Many a good sarmon has been preached
about smaller matters than that one word! If the text was not meant to
be particular, why wasn’t it written with the sword, and not with the
edge? Now, a back-handed stroke, on the edge, takes long practice. 
Goodness! what an argument would Mr.  Whitefield make of that word
edge! As to the captain, if he had only called up the guard of
dragoons when he rallied the foot, they would have shown the inimy
what the edge of a sword was; for, although there was no commissioned
officer with them, yet I think I must say,” the veteran continued,
stiffening his cravat about his throat, and raising himself up with
tile air of a drill-sergeant, “they were led by a man who knowed how
to bring them on.   in spite of the ravine. ”

“Is it lade on ye would,” cried the landlady, “when ye know yourself,
Mr.  Hollister, that the baste he rode was but little able to joomp
from one rock to another, and the animal was as spry as a squirrel?
Och! but it’s useless to talk, for he’s gone this many a year.   I
would that he had lived to see the true light; but there’s mercy for a
brave sowl, that died in the saddle, fighting for the liberty.   It is
a poor tombstone they have given him, anyway, and many a good one that
died like himself; but the sign is very like, and I will be kapeing it
up, while the blacksmith can make a hook for it to swing on, for all
the ‘coffee-houses’ betwane this and Albany. ”

There is no saying where this desultory conversation would have led
the worthy couple, had not the men, who were stamping the snow off
their feet on the little plat form before the door, suddenly ceased
their occupation, and entered the bar-room. 

For ten or fifteen minutes the different individuals, who intended
either to bestow or receive edification before the fires of the “Bold
Dragoon” on that evening, were collecting, until the benches were
nearly filled with men of different occupations.   Dr.  Todd and a
slovenly-looking, shabby-genteel young man, who took tobacco
profusely, wore a coat of imported cloth cut with something like a
fashionable air, frequently exhibited a large French silver watch,
with a chain of woven hair and a silver key, and who, altogether,
seemed as much above the artisans around him as he was himself
inferior to the real gentle man, occupied a high-back wooden settee,
in the most comfortable corner in the apartment. 

Sundry brown mugs, containing cider or beer, were placed between the
heavy andirons, and little groups were found among the guests as
subjects arose or the liquor was passed from one to the other.   No man
was seen to drink by himself, nor in any instance was more than one
vessel considered necessary for the same beverage; but the glass or
the mug was passed from hand to hand until a chasm in the line or a
regard to the rights of ownership would regularly restore the dregs of
the potation to him who de frayed the cost. 

Toasts were uniformly drunk; and occasionally some one who conceived
himself peculiarly endowed by Nature to shine in the way of wit would
attempt some such sentiment as “ hoping that he” who treated “might
make a better man than his father;” or “live till all his friends
wished him dead;” while the more humble pot-companion contented
himself by saying, with a most composing gravity in his air, “Come,
here’s luck,” or by expressing some other equally comprehensive
desire.   In every instance the veteran landlord was requested to
imitate the custom of the cupbearers to kings, and taste the liquor he
presented, by the invitation of “After you is manners,” with which
request he ordinarily complied by wetting his lips, first expressing
the wish of “Here’s hoping,” leaving it to the imagination of the
hearers to fill the vacuum by whatever good each thought most
desirable.   During these movements the landlady was busily occupied
with mixing the various compounds required by her customers, with her
own hands, and occasionally exchanging greetings and inquiries
concerning the conditions of their respective families, with such of
the villagers as approached the bar. 

At length the common thirst being in some measure assuaged,
conversation of a more general nature became the order of the hour. 
The physician and his companion, who was one of the two lawyers of the
village, being considered the best qualified to maintain a public
discourse with credit, were the principal speakers, though a remark
was hazarded, now and then, by Mr.  Doolittle, who was thought to be
their inferior only in the enviable point of education.   A general
silence was produced on all but the two speakers, by the following
observation from the practitioner of the law:

“So, Dr.  Todd, I understand that you have been per forming an
important operation this evening by cutting a charge of buckshot from
the shoulder of the son of Leather-Stocking?”

“Yes, sir,” returned other, elevating his little head with an air of
importance.   “I had a small job up at the Judge’s in that way; it was,
however, but a trifle to what it might have been, had it gone through
the body.   The shoulder is not a very vital part; and I think the
young man will soon be well.   But I did not know that the patient was
a son of Leather-Stocking; it is news to me to hear that Natty had a
wife. ”

“It is by no means a necessary consequence, returned the other,
winking, with a shrewd look around the bar room; “there is such a
thing, I suppose you know, in law as a filius nullius. ”

“Spake it out, man,” exclaimed the landlady; “spake it out in king’s
English; what for should ye be talking Indian in a room full of
Christian folks, though it is about a poor hunter, who is but little
better in his ways than the wild savages themselves? Och! it’s to be
hoped that the missionaries will, in his own time, make a conversion
of the poor devils; and then it will matter little of what color is
the skin, or wedder there be wool or hair on the head. ”

“Oh! it is Latin, not Indian, Miss Hollister!” returned the lawyer,
repeating his winks and shrewd looks; “and Dr.  Todd understands Latin,
or how would he read the labels on his gailipots and drawers? No, no,
Miss Hollis ter, the doctor understands me; don’t you, doctor?”

“Hem—why, I guess I am not far out of the way,” returned Elnathan,
endeavoring to imitate the expression of the other’s countenance, by
looking jocular.   “Latin is a queer language, gentlemen; now I rather
guess there is no one in the room, except Squire Lippet, who can
believe that ‘Far.   Av. ’ means oatmeal, in English. ”

The lawyer in his turn was a good deal embarrassed by this display of
learning; for, although he actually had taken his first degree at one
of the eastern universities, he was somewhat puzzled with the terms
used by his companion.   It was dangerous, however, to appear to he out
done in learning in a public bar-room, and before so many of his
clients; he therefore put the best face on the matter, and laughed
knowingly as if there were a good joke concealed under it, that was
understood only by the physician and himself.  All this was attentively
observed by the listeners, who exchanged looks of approbation; and the
expressions of “ tonguey mati,” and “I guess Squire Lippet knows if
anybody does,” were heard in different parts of the room, as vouchers
for the admiration of his auditors.   Thus encouraged, the lawyer rose
from his chair, and turning his back to the fire, and facing the
company, he continued:

“The son of Natty, or the son of nobody, I hope the young man is not
going to let the matter drop.   This is a country of law; and I should
like to see it fairly tried, whether a man who owns, or says he owns,
a hundred thousand acres of land, has any more right to shoot a body
than another.   What do you think of it, Dr.  Todd?”

Oh, sir, I am of opinion that the gentleman will soon be well, as I
said before; the wound isn’t in a vital part; and as the ball was
extracted so soon, and the shoulder was what I call well attended to,
I do not think there is as much danger as there might have been. ”
“I say, Squire Doolittle,” continued the attorney, raising his voice,
“you are a magistrate, and know what is law and what is not law.   I
ask you, sir, if shooting a man is a thing that is to be settled so
very easily? Suppose, sir, that the young man had a wife and family;
and suppose that he was a mechanic like yourself, sir; and sup pose
that his family depended on him for bread; and suppose that the ball,
instead of merely going through the flesh, had broken the shoulder-
blade, and crippled him forever; I ask you all, gentlemen, supposing
this to be the case, whether a jury wouldn’t give what I call handsome
damages?”

As the close of this supposititious case was addressed to the company
generally, Hiram did not at first consider himself called on for a
reply; but finding the eyes of the listeners bent on him in
expectation, he remembered his character for judicial discrimination,
and spoke, observing a due degree of deliberation and dignity. 

“Why, if a man should shoot another,” he said, “ and if he should do
it on purpose and if the law took notice on’t, and if a jury should
find him guilty, it would be likely to turn out a state-prison
matter. ”

“It would so, sir,” returned the attorney.   “The law, gentlemen, is no
respecter of persons in a free country.   It is one of the great
blessings that has been handed down to us from our ancestors, that all
men are equal in the eye of the laws, as they are by nater.   Though
some may get property, no one knows how, yet they are not privileged
to transgress the laws any more than the poorest citizen in the State. 
This is my notion, gentlemen: and I think that it a man had a mind to
bring this matter up, something might be made out of it that would
help pay for the salve—ha! doctor!”

“Why, sir,” returned the physician, who appeared a little uneasy at
the turn the conversation was taking, “I have the promise of Judge
Temple before men—not but what I would take his word as soon as his
note of hand— but it was before men.   Let me see—there was Mounshier
Ler Quow, and Squire Jones, and Major Hartmann, and Miss Pettibone,
and one or two of the blacks by, when he said that his pocket would
amply reward me for what I did. ”

“Was the promise made before or after the service was performed?”
asked the attorney. 

“It might have been both,” returned the discreet physician; “though
I’m certain he said so before I undertook the dressing. ”

“But it seems that he said his pocket should reward you, doctor,”
observed Hiram.   “Now I don’t know that the law will hold a man to
such a promise; he might give you his pocket with sixpence in’t, and
tell you to take your pay out on’t,”

“That would not be a reward in the eye of the law, interrupted the
attorney—” not what is called a ‘quid pro quo;’ nor is the pocket to
be considered as an agent, but as part of a man’s own person, that is,
in this particular.   I am of opinion that an action would lie on that
promise, and I will undertake to bear him out, free of costs, if he
don’t recover. ”

To this proposition the physician made no reply; but he was observed
to cast his eyes around him, as if to enumerate the witnesses, in
order to substantiate this promise also, at a future day, should it
prove necessary.   A subject so momentous as that of suing Judge Temple
was not very palatable to the present company in so public a place;
and a short silence ensued, that was only interrupted by the opening
of the door, and the entrance of Natty himself. 

The old hunter carried in his hand his never-failing companion, the
rifle; and although all of the company were uncovered excepting the
lawyer, who wore his hat on one side, with a certain dam’me air, Natty
moved to the front of one of the fires without in the least altering
any part of his dress or appearance.   Several questions were addressed
to him, on the subject of the game he had killed, which he answered
readily, and with some little interest; and the landlord, between whom
and Natty there existed much cordiality, on account of their both
having been soldiers in youth, offered him a glass of a liquid which,
if we might judge from its reception, was no unwelcome guest.   When
the forester had got his potation also, he quietly took his seat on
the end of one of the logs that lay nigh the fires, and the slight
interruption produced by his entrance seemed to he forgotten. 

“The testimony of the blacks could not be taken, sir,” continued the
lawyer, “for they are all the property of Mr.  Jones, who owns their
time.   But there is a way by which Judge Temple, or any other man,
might be made to pay for shooting another, and for the cure in the
bargain.   There is a way, I say, and that without going into the
‘court of errors,’ too,”

“And a mighty big error ye would make of it, Mister Todd,” cried the
landlady, “should ye be putting the mat ter into the law at all, with
Joodge Temple, who has a purse as long as one of them pines on the
hill, and who is an asy man to dale wid, if yees but mind the humor of
him.   He’s a good man is Joodge Temple, and a kind one, and one who
will be no the likelier to do the pratty thing, becase ye would wish
to tarrify him wid the law.   I know of but one objaction to the same,
which is an over-careless ness about his sowl.   It’s neither a
Methodie, nor a Papish, nor Parsbetyrian, that he is, but just nothing
at all; and it’s hard to think that he, ‘who will not fight the good
fight, under the banners of a rig’lar church, in this world, will be
mustered among the chosen in heaven,’ as my husband, the captain
there, as ye call him, says—though there is but one captain that I
know, who desarves the name.   I hopes, Lather-Stocking, ye’ll no be
foolish, and putting the boy up to try the law in the matter; for
‘twill be an evil day to ye both, when ye first turn the skin of so
paceable an animal as a sheep into a bone of contention, The lad is
wilcome to his drink for nothing, until his shoulther will bear the
rifle agin. ”

“Well, that’s gin’rous,” was heard from several mouths at once, for
this was a company in which a liberal offer was not thrown away; while
the hunter, instead ‘of expressing any of that indignation which he
might be sup posed to feel, at hearing the hurt of his young companion
alluded to, opened his mouth, with the silent laugh for which he was
so remarkable; and after he had indulged his humor, made this reply:

“I knowed the Judge would do nothing with his smooth bore when he got
out of his sleigh.   I never saw but one smooth-bore that would carry
at all, and that was a French ducking-piece, upon the big lakes; it
had a barrel half as long agin as my rifle, and would throw fine shot
into a goose at one hundred yards; but it made dreadful work with the
game, and you wanted a boat to carry it about in.   When I went with
Sir William agin’ the French, at Fort Niagara, all the rangers used
the rifle; and a dreadful weapon it is, in the hands of one who knows
how to charge it, and keep a steady aim.   The captain knows, for he
says he was a soldier in Shirley’s; and, though they were nothing but
baggonet-men, he must know how we cut up the French and Iroquois in
the skrimmages in that war.   Chingachgook, which means ‘Big Sarpent’
in English, old John Mohegan, who lives up at the hut with me, was a
great warrior then, and was out with us; he can tell all about it,
too; though he was overhand for the tomahawk, never firing more than
once or twice, before he was running in for the scalps.   Ah! times is
dreadfully altered since then.   Why, doctor, there was nothing but a
foot path, or at the most a track for pack-horses, along the Mohawk,
from the Jarman Flats up to the forts.   Now, they say, they talk of
running one of them wide roads with gates on it along the river; first
making a road, and then fencing it up! I hunted one season back of the
Kaatskills, nigh-hand to the settlements, and the dogs often lost the
scent, when they came to them highways, there was so much travel on
them; though I can’t say that the brutes was of a very good breed. 
Old Hector will wind a deer, in the fall of the year, across the
broadest place in the Otsego, and that is a mile and a half, for I
paced it my self on the ice, when the tract was first surveyed, under
the Indian grant. ”

“It sames to me, Natty, but a sorry compliment to call your comrad
after the evil one,” said the landlady; “and it’s no much like a snake
that old John is looking now, Nimrod would be a more becomeing name
for the lad, and a more Christian, too, seeing that it conies from the
Bible.   The sargeant read me the chapter about him, the night before
my christening, and a mighty asement it was to listen to anything from
the book. ”

“Old John and Chingachgook were very different men to look on,”
returned the hunter, shaking his head at his melancholy recollections. 
“In the ‘fifty-eighth war’ he was in the middle of manhood, and taller
than now by three inches.   If you had seen him, as I did, the morning
we beat Dieskau, from behind our log walls, you would have called him
as comely a redskin as ye ever set eyes on.   He was naked all to his
breech-cloth and leggins; and you never seed a creatur’ so handsomely
painted.   One side of his face was red and the other black.   His head
was shaved clean, all to a few hairs on the crown, where he wore a
tuft of eagle’s feathers, as bright as if they had come from a
peacock’s tail.   He had colored his sides so that they looked like
anatomy, ribs and all, for Chingachgook had a great taste in such
things, so that, what with his bold, fiery countenance, his knife, and
his tomahawk, I have never seen a fiercer warrior on the ground.   He
played his part, too, like a man, for I saw him next day with thirteen
scalps on his pole.   And I will say this for the ‘Big Snake,’ that he
always dealt fair, and never scalped any that he didn’t kill with his
own hands. ”

“Well, well!” cried the landlady, “fighting is fighting
anyway, and there is different fashions in the thing; though
I can’t say that I relish mangling a body after the breath
is out of it; neither do I think it can be uphild by doctrine. 
I hope, sargeant, ye niver was helping in sich evil worrek. ”
“It was my duty to keep my ranks, and to stand or fall by the baggonet
or lead,” returned the veteran.   “I was then in the fort, and seldom
leaving my place, saw but little of the savages, who kept on the
flanks or in front, skrimmaging.   I remember, howsomever, to have
heard mention made of the ‘Great Snake,’ as he was called, for he was
a chief of renown; but little did I ever expect to see him enlisted in
the cause of Christianity, and civilized like old John. ”

“Oh! he was Christianized by the Moravians, who were always over-
intimate with the Delawares,” said Leather-Stocking.   “It’s my opinion
that, had they been left to themselves, there would he no such doings
now about the head-waters of the two rivers, and that these hills
mought have been kept as good hunting-ground by their right owner, who
is not too old to carry a rifle, and whose sight is as true as a fish-
hawk hovering—”

He was interrupted by more stamping at the door, and presently the
party from the mansion-house entered, followed by the Indian himself. 

CHAPTER 14. 

“There’s quart-pot, pint-pot.   Mit-pint,
Gill-pot, half-gill.   nipperkin. 
And the brown bowl— Here’s a health to the barley mow,
My brave boys, Here’s a health to the barley mow. ”—Drinking Song. 

Some little commotion was produced by the appearance of the new
guests, during which the lawyer slunk from the room.   Most of the men
approached Marmaduke, and shook his offered hand, hoping “that the
Judge was well;” while Major Hartmann having laid aside his hat and
wig, and substituted for the latter a warm, peaked woollen nightcap,
took his seat very quietly on one end of the settee, which was
relinquished by its former occupant.   His tobacco-box was next
produced, and a clean pipe was handed him by the landlord.   When he
had succeeded in raising a smoke, the Major gave a long whiff, and,
turning his head toward the bar, he said:

“Petty, pring in ter toddy. ”

In the mean time the Judge had exchanged his salutations with most of
the company, and taken a place by the side of the Major, and Richard
had bustled himself into the most comfortable seat in the room.   Mr. 
Le Quoi was the last seated, nor did he venture to place his chair
finally, until by frequent removals he had ascertained that he could
not possibly intercept a ray of heat front any individual present. 
Mohegan found a place on an end of one of the benches, and somewhat
approximated to the bar. 

When these movements had subsided, the Judge remarked pleasantly:
Well, Betty, I find you retain your popularity through all weathers,
against all rivals, and among all religions.   How liked you the
sermon?”

“Is it the sarmon?” exclaimed the landlady.   “I can’t say but it was
rasonable; but the prayers is mighty unasy.   It’s no small a matter
for a body in their fifty-nint’ year to be moving so much in church. 
Mr.  Grant sames a godly man, any way, and his garrel a hommble on; and
a devout.   Here, John, is a mug of cider, laced with whiskey.   An
Indian will drink cider, though he niver be athirst. 
“I must say,” observed Hiram, with due deliberation, “that it was a
tongney thing; and I rather guess that it gave considerable
satisfaction, There was one part, though, which might have been left
out, or something else put in; but then I s’pose that, as it was a
written discourse, it is not so easily altered as where a minister
preaches without notes. ”

“Ày! there’s the rub, Joodge,” cried the landlady.   “How can a man
stand up and be preaching his word, when all that he is saying is
written down, and he is as much tied to it as iver a thaving dragoon
was to the pickets?”

“Well, well,” cried Marmaduke, waving his hand for silence, “there is
enough said; as Mr.  Grant told us, there are different sentiments on
such subjects, and in my opinion he spoke most sensibly.   So, Jotham,
I am told you have sold your betterments to a new settler, and have
moved into the village and opened a school.   Was it cash or dicker?”

The man who was thus addressed occupied a seat immediately behind
Marmaduke, and one who was ignorant of the extent of the Judge’s
observation might have thought he would have escaped notice.   He was
of a thin, shapeless figure, with a discontented expression of
countenance, and with something extremely shiftless in his whole air,
Thus spoken to, after turning and twisting a little, by way of
preparation, he made a reply:

“Why part cash and part dicker.   I sold out to a Pumfietman who was
so’thin’ forehanded.   He was to give me ten dollar an acre for the
clearin’, and one dollar an acre over the first cost on the woodland,
and we agreed to leave the buildin’s to men.   So I tuck Asa Montagu,
and he tuck Absalom Bement, and they two tuck old Squire Napthali
Green.   And so they had a meetin’, and made out a vardict of eighty
dollars for the buildin’s.   There was twelve acres of clearin’ at ten
dollars, and eighty-eight at one, and the whole came to two hundred
and eighty-six dollars and a half, after paying the men. ”

“Hum,” said Marmaduke, “what did you give for the place?”

“Why, besides what’s comin’ to the Judge, I gi’n my brother Tim a
hundred dollars for his bargain; but then there’s a new house on’t,
that cost me sixty more, and I paid Moses a hundred dollars for
choppin’, and loggin’, and sowin’, so that the whole stood to me in
about two hundred and sixty dollars.   But then I had a great crop oft
on’t, and as I got twenty-six dollars and a half more than it cost, I
conclude I made a pretty good trade on’t. ”

“Yes, but you forgot that the crop was yours without the trade, and
you have turned yourself out of doors for twenty-six dollars. ”

“Oh! the Judge is clean out,” said the man with a look of sagacious
calculation; “he turned out a span of horses, that is wuth a hundred
and fifty dollars of any man’s money, with a bran-new wagon; fifty
dollars in cash, and a good note for eighty more; and a side-saddle
that was valued at seven and a half—so there was jist twelve shillings
betwixt us.   I wanted him to turn out a set of harness, and take the
cow and the sap troughs.   He wouldn’t—but I saw through it; he thought
I should have to buy the tacklin’ afore I could use the wagon and
horses; but I knowed a thing or two myself; I should like to know of
what use is the tacklin’ to him! I offered him to trade back agin for
one hundred and fifty-five.   But my woman said she wanted to churn, so
I tuck a churn for the change. ”

“And what do you mean to do with your time this winter? You must
remember that time is money. ”

“Why, as master has gone down country to see his mother, who, they
say, is going to make a die on’t, I agreed to take the school in hand
till he comes back, It times doesn’t get worse in the spring, I’ve
some notion of going into trade, or maybe I may move off to the
Genesee; they say they are carryin’ on a great stroke of business
that-a-way.   If the wust comes to the wust, I can but work at my
trade, for I was brought up in a shoe manufactory. ”

It would seem that Marmaduke did not think his society of sufficient
value to attempt inducing him to remain where he was, for he addressed
no further discourse to the man, but turned his attention to other
subjects.   After a short pause, Hiram ventured a question:

“What news does the Judge bring us from the Legislature? It’s not
likely that Congress has done much this session; or maybe the French
haven’t fit any more battles lately?”

“The French, since they have beheaded their king, have done nothing
but fight,” returned the Judge.   “The character of the nation seems
changed.   I knew many French gentlemen during our war, and they all
appeared to me to be men of great humanity and goodness of heart; but
these Jacobins are as blood thirsty as bull-dogs. ”

“There was one Roshambow wid us down at Yorrektown,” cried the
landlady “a mighty pratty man he was too; and their horse was the very
same.   It was there that the sargeant got the hurt in the leg from the
English batteries, bad luck to ‘em. ”

“Oh! mon pauvre roil” muttered Monsieur Le Quoi. 

“The Legislature have been passing laws,” continued Marmaduke, “that
the country much required.   Among others, there is an act prohibiting
the drawing of seines, at any other than proper seasons, in certain of
our streams and small lakes; and another, to prohibit the killing of
deer in the teeming months.   These are laws that were loudly called
for by judicious men; nor do I despair of getting an act to make the
unlawful felling of timber a criminal offence. ”

The hunter listened to this detail with breathless attention, and,
when the Judge had ended, he laughed in open derision. 

“You may make your laws, Judge,” be cried, “but who will you find to
watch the mountains through the long summer days, or the lakes at
night? Game is game, and be who finds may kill; that has been the law
in these mountains for forty years to my sartain knowledge; and I
think one old law is worth two new ones.   None but a green one would
wish to kill a doe with a fa’n by its side, unless his moccasins were
getting old, or his leggins ragged, for the flesh is lean and coarse. 
But a rifle rings among the rocks along the lake shore, sometimes, as
if fifty pieces were fired at once—it would be hard to tell where the
man stood who pulled the trigger. ”

“Armed with the dignity of the law, Mr.  Bumppo,” returned the Judge,
gravely, “a vigilant magistrate can prevent much of the evil that has
hitherto prevailed, and which is already rendering the game scarce.   I
hope to live to see the day when a man’s rights in his game shall be
as much respected as his title to his farm,”

“Your titles and your farms are all new together,” cried Natty; “but
laws should be equal, and not more for one than another.   I shot a
deer, last Wednesday was a fort night, and it floundered through the
snow-banks till it got over a brush fence; I catched the lock of my
rifle in the twigs in following, and was kept back, until finally the
creature got off.   Now I want to know who is to pay me for that deer;
and a fine buck it was.   If there hadn’t been a fence I should have
gotten another shot into it; and I never drawed upon anything that
hadn’t wings three times running, in my born days.   No, no, Judge,
it’s the farmers that makes the game scarce, and not the hunters. ”

“Ter teer is not so plenty as in tee old war, Pumppo,” said the Major,
who had been an attentive listener, amid clouds of smoke; “put ter
lant is not mate as for ter teer to live on, put for Christians. ”

“Why, Major, I believe you’re a friend to justice and the right,
though you go so often to the grand house; but it’s a hard case to a
man to have his honest calling for a livelihood stopped by laws, and
that, too, when, if right was done, he mought hunt or fish on any day
in the week, or on the best flat in the Patent, if he was so minded. ”

“I unterstant you, Letter-Stockint,” returned the Major, fixing his
black eyes, with a look of peculiar meaning, on the hunter: “put you
didn’t use to be so prutent as to look ahet mit so much care. ”

“Maybe there wasn’t so much occasion,” said the hunter, a little
sulkily; when he sank into a silence from which be was not roused for
some time. 

“The Judge was saying so’thin’ about the French,” Hiram observed when
the pause in the conversation had continued a decent time. 

“Yes, sir,” returned Marmaduke, “the Jacobins of France seem rushing
from one act of licentiousness to an other, They continue those
murders which are dignified by the name of executions.   You have heard
that they have added the death of their queen to the long list of
their crimes. ”

“Les monstres!” again murmured Monsieur Le Quoi, turning himself
suddenly in his chair, with a convulsive start. 

“The province of La Vendée is laid waste by the troops of the
republic, and hundreds of its inhabitants, who are royalists in their
sentiments, are shot at a time.   La Vendée is a district in the
southwest of France, that continues yet much attached to the family of
the Bourbons; doubtless Monsieur Le Quoi is acquainted with it, and
can describe it more faithfully. ”

“Non, non, non, mon cher ami,” returned the Frenchman in a suppressed
voice, but speaking rapidly, and gesticulating with his right hand, as
if for mercy, while with his left he concealed his eyes. 

“There have been many battles fought lately,” continued Marmaduke,
“and the infuriated republicans are too often victorious.   I cannot
say, however, that I am sorry that they have captured Toulon from the
English, for it is a place to which they have a just right. ”

“Ah—ha!” exclaimed Monsieur Le Quoi, springing on his feet and
flourishing both arms with great animation; “ces Anglais!”

The Frenchman continued to move about the room with great alacrity for
a few minutes, repeating his exclamations to himself; when overcome by
the contrary nature of his emotions, he suddenly burst out of the
house, and was seen wading through the snow toward his little shop,
waving his arms on high, as if to pluck down honor from the moon.   His
departure excited but little surprise, for the villagers were used to
his manner; but Major Hartmann laughed outright, for the first during
his visit, as he lifted the mug, and observed:

“Ter Frenchman is mat—put he is goot as for noting to trink: he is
trunk mit joy. ”

“The French are good soldiers,” said Captain Hollis ter; “they stood
us in hand a good turn at Yorktown; nor do I think, although I am an
ignorant man about the great movements of the army, that his
excellency would have been able to march against Cornwallis without
their reinforcements. ”

“Ye spake the trot’, sargeant,” interrupted his wife, “and I would
iver have ye be doing the same.   It’s varry pratty men is the French;
and jist when I stopt the cart, the time when ye was pushing on in
front it was, to kape the riglers in, a rigiment of the jontlemen
marched by, and so I dealt them out to their liking.   Was it pay I
got? Sure did I, and in good solid crowns; the divil a bit of
continental could they muster among them all, for love nor money. 
Och! the Lord forgive me for swearing and spakeing of such vanities;
but this I will say for the French, that they paid in good silver; and
one glass would go a great way wid ‘em, for they gin’rally handed it
back wid a drop in the cup; and that’s a brisk trade, Joodge, where
the pay is good, and the men not over-partic’lar. ”

“A thriving trade, Mrs.  Hollister,” said Marmaduke.   “But what has
become of Richard? he jumped up as soon as seated, and has been absent
so long that I am really fearful he has frozen. ”

“No fear of that, Cousin ‘Duke,” cried the gentleman himself;
“business will sometimes keep a man warm the coldest night that ever
snapt in the mountains.   Betty, your husband told me, as we came out
of church, that your hogs were getting mangy, and so I have been out
to take a look at them, and found it true.   I stepped across, doctor,
and got your boy to weigh me out a pound of salts, and have been
mixing it with their swill.   I’ll bet a saddle of venison against a
gray squirrel that they are better in a week.   And now, Mrs. 
Hollister, I’m ready for a hissing mug of flip. ”

“Sure I know’d ye’d be wanting that same,” said the landlady; “it’s
fixt and ready to the boiling.   Sargeant, dear, be handing up the
iron, will ye?—no, the one on the far fire, it’s black, ye will see. 
Ah! you’ve the thing now; look if it’s not as red as a cherry. ”
The beverage was heated, and Richard took that kind of draught which
men are apt to indulge in who think that they have just executed a
clever thing, especially when they like the liquor. 

“Oh! you have a hand.   Betty, that was formed to mix flip,” cried
Richard, when he paused for breath.   “The very iron has a flavor in
it.   Here, John, drink, man, drink! I and you and Dr.  Todd have done a
good thing with the shoulder of that lad this very night.   ‘Duke, I
made a song while you were gone—one day when I had nothing to do; so
I'll sing you a verse or two, though I haven’t really determined on
the tune yet. 

“What is life but a scene of care,
Where each one must toil in his way?
Then let us be jolly, and prove that we are
A set of good fellows, who seem very rare,
And can laugh and sing all the day. 
Then let us be jolly
And cast away folly,
For grief turns a black head to gray. ”

“There, ‘Duke, what do you think of that? There is another verse of
it, all but the last line.   I haven’t got a rhyme for the last line
yet.   Well, old John, what do you think of the music? as good as one
of your war-songs, ha?”

“Good!” said Mohegan, who had been sharing deeply in the potations of
the landlady, besides paying a proper respect to the passing mugs of
the Major and Marmaduke. 

“Bravo! pravo! Richart,” cried the Major, whose black eyes were
beginning to swim in moisture; “pravisimo his a goot song; put Natty
Pumppo has a petter.   Letter-Stockint, vilt sing? say, olt poy, vilt
sing ter song as apout ter wools?”

“No, no, Major,” returned the hunter, with a melancholy shake of the
head, “I have lived to see what I thought eyes could never behold in
these hills, and I have no heart left for singing.   If he that has a
right to be master and ruler here is forced to squinch his thirst,
when a-dry, with snow-Water, it ill becomes them that have lived by
his bounty to be making merry, as if there was nothing in the world
but sunshine and summer. ”

When he had spoken, Leather-Stocking again dropped his head on his
knees, and concealed his hard and wrinkled features with his hands. 
The change from the excessive cold without to the heat of the bar-
room, coupled with the depth and frequency of Richard’s draughts, had
already levelled whatever inequality there might have existed between
him and the other guests, on the score of spirits; and he now held out
a pair of swimming mugs of foaming flip toward the hunter, as he
cried:

“Merry! ay! merry Christmas to you, old boy! Sun shine and summer! no!
you are blind, Leather-Stocking, ‘tis moonshine and winter—take these
spectacles.   and open your eyes— So let us be jolly,

And cast away folly,

For grief turns a black head to gray. ’

—Hear how old John turns his quavers.   What damned dull music an
Indian song is, after all, Major! I wonder if they ever sing by note. ”

While Richard was singing and talking, Mohegan was uttering dull,
monotonous tones, keeping time by a gentle motion of his head and
body.   He made use of but few words, and such as he did utter were in
his native language, and consequently only understood by himself and
Natty.   Without heeding Richard, he continued to sing a kind of wild,
melancholy air, that rose, at times, in sudden and quite elevated
notes, and then fell again into the low, quavering sounds that seemed
to compose the character of his music. 

The attention of the company was now much divided, the men in the rear
having formed themselves into little groups, where they were
discussing various matters; among the principal of which were the
treatment of mangy hogs and Parson Grant’s preaching; while Dr.  Todd
was endeavoring to explain to Marmaduke the nature of the hurt
received by the young hunter.   Mohegan continued to sing, while his
countenance was becoming vacant, though, coupled with his thick, bushy
hair, it was assuming an expression very much like brutal ferocity. 
His notes were gradually growing louder, and soon rose to a height
that caused a general cessation in the discourse.   The hunter now
raised his head again, and addressed the old warrior warmly in the
Delaware language, which, for the benefit of our readers, we shall
render freely into English. 

“Why do you sing of your battles, Chingachgook, and of the warriors
you have slain, when the worst enemy of all is near you, and keeps the
Young Eagle from his rights? I have fought in as many battles as any
warrior in your tribe, but cannot boast of my deeds at such a time as
this. ”

“Hawk-eye,” said the Indian, tottering with a doubtful step from his
place, “I am the Great Snake of the Delawares; I can track the Mingoes
like an adder that is stealing on the whip-poor-will’s eggs, and
strike them like the rattlesnake dead at a blow.   The white man made
the tomahawk of Chingachgook bright as the waters of Otsego, when the
last sun is shining; but it is red with the blood of the Maquas. ”

“And why have you slain the Mingo warriors? Was it not to keep these
hunting-grounds and lakes to your father’s children? and were they not
given in solemn council to the Fire-eater? and does not the blood of a
warrior run in the veins of a young chief, who should speak aloud
where his voice is now too low to be heard?”

The appeal of the hunter seemed in some measure to recall the confused
faculties of the Indian, who turned his face toward the listeners and
gazed intently on the Judge.   He shook his head, throwing his hair
back from his countenance, and exposed eyes that were glaring with an
expression of wild resentment.   But the man was not himself.   His hand
seemed to make a fruitless effort to release his tomahawk, which was
confined by its handle to his belt, while his eyes gradually became
vacant.   Richard at that instant thrusting a mug before him, his
features changed to the grin of idiocy, and seizing the vessel with
both hands, he sank backward on the bench and drank until satiated,
when he made an effort to lay aside the mug with the helplessness of
total inebriety. 

“Shed not blood!” exclaimed the hunter, as he watched the countenance
of the Indian in its moment of ferocity; “but he is drunk and can do
no harm.   This is the way with all the savages; give them liquor, and
they make dogs of themselves.   Well, well—the- day will come when
right will be done; and we must have patience. ”

Natty still spoke in the Delaware language, and of course was not
understood.   He had hardly concluded before Richard cried:

“Well, old John is soon sewed up.   Give him a berth, captain, in the
barn, and I will pay for it.   I am rich to night, ten times richer
than ‘Duke, with all his lands, amid military lots, and funded debts,
and bonds, and mortgages

' Come, let us be jolly,
And cast awsy folly,
For grief—-’

Drink, King Hiram—drink, Mr.  Doo-nothing—-drink, sir, I say.   This is
a Christmas eve, which comes, you know, but once a year. ”

“He! he! he! the squire is quite moosical to-night,” said Hiram, whose
visage began to give marvellous signs of relaxation.   “I rather guess
we shall make a church on’t yet, squire?”

“A church, Mr.  Doolittle! we will make a cathedral of it! bishops,
priests, deacons, wardens, vestry, and choir; organ, organist, amid
bellows! By the Lord Harry, as Benjamin says, we will clap a steeple
on the other end of it, and make two churches of it.   What say you,
‘Duke, will you pay? ha! my cousin Judge, wilt pay?”

“Thou makest such a noise, Dickon,” returned Marmaduke, “it is
impossible that I can hear what Dr.  Todd is saying.   I think thou
observedst, it is probable the wound will fester, so as to occasion
danger to the limb in this cold weather?”

“Out of nater, sir, quite out of nater,” said Elnathan, attempting to
expectorate, but succeeding only in throwing a light, frothy
substance, like a flake of snow, into the fire—” quite out of nater
that a wound so well dressed, and with the ball in my pocket, should
fester.   I s’pose, as the Judge talks of taking the young man into his
house, it will be most convenient if I make but one charge on’t. ”

“I should think one would do,” returned Marmaduke, with that arch
smile that so often beamed on his face; leaving the beholder in doubt
whether he most enjoyed the character of his companion or his own
covert humor.   The landlord had succeeded in placing the.   Indian on
some straw in one of his outbuildings, where, covered with his own
blanket, John continued for the remainder of the night. 

In the mean time, Major Hartmann began to grow noisy and jocular;
glass succeeded glass, and mug after mug was introduced, until the
carousal had run deep into the night, or rather morning; when the
veteran German ex- I pressed an inclination to return to the mansion-
house.  Most of the party had already retired, but Marmaduke knew the
habits of his friend too well to suggest an earlier adjournment.   So
soon, however, as the proposal was made, the Judge eagerly availed
himself of it, and the trio prepared to depart.   Mrs.  Hollister
attended them to the door in person, cautioning her guests as to the
safest manner of leaving her premises

“Lane on Mister Jones, Major,” said she “he’s young and will be a
support to ye.   Well, it’s a charming sight to see ye, anyway, at the
Bould Dragoon; and sure it’s no harm to be kaping a Christmas eve wid
a light heart, for it’s no telling when we may have sorrow come upon
us.   So good-night, Joodge, and a merry Christmas to ye all tomorrow
morning. ”

The gentlemen made their adieus as well as they could, and taking the
middle of the road, which was a fine, wide, and well-beaten path, they
did tolerably well until they reached the gate of the mansion-house:
but on entering the Judge’s domains they encountered some slight
difficulties.   We shall not stop to relate them, but will just mention
that in the morning sundry diverging paths were to be seen in the
snow; and that once during their progress to the door, Marmaduke,
missing his companions, was enabled to trace them by one of these
paths to a spot where he discovered them with nothing visible but
their heads, Richard singing in a most vivacious strain:

“Come, let us be jolly,
And cast away folly,
For grief turns a black head to gray. ”

CHAPTER 15. 

“As she lay, on that day, in the Bay of Biscay, 0!”

Previously to the occurrence of the scene at the “Bold Dragoon,”
Elizabeth had been safely reconducted to the mansion-house, where she
was left as its mistress, either to amuse or employ herself during the
evening as best suited her own inclinations.   Most of the lights were
extinguished; but as Benjamin adjusted with great care and regularity
four large candles, in as many massive candlesticks of brass, in a row
on the sideboard, the hall possessed a peculiar air of comfort and
warmth, contrasted with the cheerless aspect of the room she had left
in the academy. 

Remarkable had been one of the listeners to Mr.  Grant, and returned
with her resentment, which had been not a little excited by the
language of the Judge, somewhat softened by reflection and the
worship.   She recollected the youth of Elizabeth, and thought it no
difficult task, under present appearances, to exercise that power
indirectly which hitherto she had enjoyed undisputed.   The idea of
being governed, or of being compelled to pay the deference of
servitude, was absolutely intolerable; and she had already determined
within herself, some half dozen times, to make an effort that should
at once bring to an issue the delicate point of her domestic
condition.   But as often as she met the dark, proud eye of Elizabeth,
who was walking up and down the apartment, musing on the scenes of her
youth and the change in her condition, and perhaps the events of the
day, the housekeeper experienced an awe that she would not own to
herself could be excited by anything mortal.   It, however, checked her
advances, and for some time held her tongue-tied.   At length she
determined to commence the discourse by entering on a subject that was
apt to level all human distinctions, and in which she might display
her own abilities. 

“It was quite a wordy sarmon that Parson Grant gave us to-night,” said
Remarkable.   “The church ministers be commonly smart sarmonizers, but
they write down their idees, which is a great privilege.   I don’t
think that, by nater, they are as tonguey speakers, for an off-hand
discourse, as the standing-order ministers. ”

“And what denomination do you distinguish as the standing-order?”
inquired Miss Temple, with some surprise. 

“Why, the Presbyter’ans and Congregationals, and Baptists, too, for-
til’ now; and all sitch as don’t go on their knees to prayer,”

“By that rule, then, you would call those who belong’ to the
persuasion of my father, the sitting-order,” observed Elizabeth. 
“I’m sure I’ve never heard ‘em spoken of by any other’ name than
Quakers, so called,” returned Remarkable, betraying a slight
uneasiness; “I should be the last to call them otherwise, for I never
in my life used a disparaging’ tarm of the Judge, or any of his
family.   I’ve always set store by the Quakers, they are so pretty-
spoken, clever people, and it’s a wonderment to me how your father
come to marry into a church family; for they are as contrary in
religion as can be.   One sits still, and, for the most part; says
nothing, while the church folks practyse all kinds of ways, so that I
sometimes think it quite moosical to see them; for I went to a church-
meeting once before, down country. ”

“You have found an excellence in the church liturgy that has hitherto
escaped me.   I will thank you to inquire whether the fire in my room
burns; I feel fatigued with my journey, and will retire. ”

Remarkable felt a wonderful inclination to tell the young mistress of
the mansion that by opening a door she might see for herself; but
prudence got the better of resentment, and after pausing some little
time, as a salve to her dignity, she did as desired.   The report was
favorable, and the young lady, wishing Benjamin, who was filling the
stove with wood, and the housekeeper, each a good-night, withdrew. 

The instant the door closed on Miss Temple, Remark able commenced a
sort of mysterious, ambiguous discourse, that was neither abusive nor
commendatory of the qualities of the absent personage, but which
seemed to be drawing nigh, by regular degrees, to a most dissatisfied
description.   The major-domo made no reply.   but continued his
occupation with great industry, which being happily completed, he took
a look at the thermometer, and then opening a drawer of the sideboard,
he produced a supply of stimulants that would have served to keep the
warmth in his system without the aid of the enormous fire he had been
building.   A small stand was drawn up near the stove, and the bottles
and the glasses necessary for convenience were quietly arranged.   Two
chairs were placed by the side of this comfortable situation, when
Benjamin, for the first time, appeared to observe his companion. 

“Come,” he cried, “come, Mistress Remarkable, bring yourself to an
anchor on this chair.   It’s a peeler without, I can tell you, good
woman; but what cares I? blow high or blow low, d’ye see, it’s all the
same thing to Ben.   The niggers are snug stowed below before a fire
that would roast an ox whole.   The thermometer stands now at fifty-
five, but if there’s any vartue in good maple wood, I’ll weather upon
it, before one glass, as much as ten points more, so that the squire,
when he comes home from Betty Hollister’s warm room, will feel as hot
as a hand that has given the rigging a lick with bad tar.   Come,
mistress, bring up in this here chair, and tell me how you like our
new heiress. ”

“Why, to my notion, Mr.  Penguillum——”

“Pump, Pump,” interrupted Benjamin; “it’s Christmas eve, Mistress
Remarkable, and so, dye see, you had better call me Pump.   It’s a
shorter name, and as I mean to pump this here decanter till it sucks,
why, you may as well call me Pump. ”

“Did you ever!” cried Remarkable, with a laugh that seemed to unhinge
every joint in her body.   “You’re a moosical creature, Benjamin, when
the notion takes you.   But, as I was saying, I rather guess that times
will be altered now in this house. ”

“Altered!” exclaimed the major-domo, eyeing the bottle, that was
assuming the clear aspect of cut glass with astonishing rapidity; “it
don’t matter much, Mistress Remarkable, so long as I keep the keys of
the lockers in my pocket. ”

“I can’t say,” continued the housekeeper, “but there’s good eatables
and drinkables enough in the house for a body’s content—a little more
sugar, Benjamin, in the glass —for Squire Jones is an excellent
provider.   But new lords, new laws; and I shouldn’t wonder if you and
I had an unsartain time on’t in footer. ”

“Life is as unsartain as the wind that blows,” said Benjamin, with a
moralizing air; “and nothing is more varible than the wind, Mistress
Remarkable, unless you hap pen to fall in with the trades, d’ye see,
and then you may run for the matter of a month at a time, with
studding-sails on both sides, alow and aloft, and with the cabin-boy
at the wheel. ”

“I know that life is disp’ut unsartain,” said Remark able, compressing
her features to the humor of her companion; “but I expect there will
be great changes made in the house to rights; and that you will find a
young man put over your head, as there is one that wants to be over
mine; and after having been settled as long as you have, Benjamin, I
should judge that to be hard. ”

“Promotion should go according to length of sarvice,” said the major-
domo; “and if-so-be that they ship a hand for my berth, or place a new
steward aft, I shall throw up my commission in less time than you can
put a pilot-boat in stays.   Thof Squire Dickon “—this was a common
misnomer with Benjamin—” is a nice gentleman, and as good a man to
sail with as heart could wish, yet I shall tel the squire, d’ye see,
in plain English, and that’s my native tongue, that if-so-be he is
thinking of putting any Johnny Raw over my head, why, I shall resign. 
I began forrard, Mistress Prettybones, and worked my way aft, like a
man.   I was six months aboard a Garnsey lugger, hauling in the slack
of the lee-sheet and coiling up rigging.   From that I went a few trips
in a fore-and-after, in the same trade, which, after all, was but a
blind kind of sailing in the dark, where a man larns but little,
excepting how to steer by the stars.   Well, then, d’ye see, I larnt
how a topmast should be slushed, and how a topgallant-sail was to be
becketted; and then I did small jobs in the cabin, such as mixing the
skipper’s grog.   ‘Twas there I got my taste, which, you must have
often seen, is excel lent.   Well, here’s better acquaintance to us. ”
Remarkable nodded a return to the compliment, and took a sip of the
beverage before her; for, provided it was well sweetened, she had no
objection to a small potation now and then, After this observance of
courtesy between the worthy couple, the dialogue proceeded. 

“You have had great experiences in life, Benjamin; for, as the
Scripter says, ‘They that go down to the sea in ships see the works of
the Lord. ’”

“Ay! for that matter, they in brigs and schooners, too; and it mought
say, the works of the devil.   The sea, Mistress Remarkable, is a great
advantage to a man, in the way of knowledge, for he sees the fashions
of nations and the shape of a country.   Now, I suppose, for myself
here, who is but an unlarned man to some that follows the seas, I
suppose that, taking the coast from Cape Ler Hogue as low down as Cape
Finish-there, there isn’t so much as a headland, or an island, that I
don’t know either the name of it or something more or less about it. 
Take enough, woman, to color the water.   Here’s sugar.   It’s a sweet
tooth, that fellow that you hold on upon yet, Mistress Prettybones. 
But, as I was saying, take the whole coast along, I know it as well as
the way from here to the Bold Dragoon; and a devil of acquaintance is
that Bay of Biscay.   Whew! I wish you could but hear the wind blow
there.   It sometimes takes two to hold one man’s hair on his head. 
Scudding through the bay is pretty much the same thing as travelling
the roads in this country, up one side of a mountain and down the
other,”

“Do tell!” exclaimed Remarkable; “and does the sea run as high as
mountains, Benjamin?”

“Well, I will tell; but first let’s taste the grog.   Hem! it’s the
right kind of stuff, I must say, that you keep in this country; but
then you’re so close aboard the West Indies, you make but a small run
of it.   By the Lord Harry, woman, if Garnsey only lay somewhere
between Cape Hatteras and the bite of Logann, but you’d see rum cheap!
As to the seas, they runs more in uppers in the Bay of Biscay, unless
it may be in a sow-wester, when they tumble about quite handsomely;
thof it’s not in the narrow sea that you are to look for a swell; just
go off the Western Islands, in a westerly blow, keeping the land on
your larboard hand, with the ship’s head to the south’ard, and bring
to, under a close-reefed topsail; or, mayhap, a reefed foresail, with
a fore-topmast-staysail and mizzen staysail to keep her up to the sea,
if she will bear it; and ay there for the matter of two watches, if
you want to see mountains.   Why, good woman, I’ve been off there in
the Boadishey frigate, when you could see nothing but some such matter
as a piece of sky, mayhap, as big as the main sail; and then again,
there was a hole under your lee-quarter big enough to hold the whole
British navy. ”

“Oh! for massy’s sake! and wa’n’t you afeard, Benjamin? and how did
you get off?”

“Afeard! who the devil do you think was to be frightened at a little
salt water tumbling about his head? As for getting off, when we had
enough of it, and had washed our decks down pretty well, we called all
hands, for, d’ye see, the watch below was in their hammocks, all the
same as if they were in one of your best bedrooms; and so we watched
for a smooth time, clapt her helm hard a weather, let fall the
foresail, and got the tack aboard; and so, when we got her afore it, I
ask you, Mistress Prettybones, if she didn’t walk? didn’t she? I’m no
liar, good woman, when I say that I saw that ship jump from the top of
one sea to another, just like one of these squirrels that can fly
jumps from tree to tree. ”

“What! clean out of the water?” exclaimed Remark able, lifting her two
lank arms, with their bony hands spread in astonishment. 

“It was no such easy matte: to get out of the water, good woman; for
the spray flew so that you couldn’t tell which was sea or which was
cloud.   So there we kept her afore it for the matter of two glasses. 
The first lieutenant he cun’d the ship himself, and there was four
quarter masters at the wheel, besides the master with six forecastle
men in the gun-room at the relieving tackles.   But then she behaved
herself so well! Oh! she was a sweet ship, mistress! That one frigate
was well worth more, to live in, than the best house in the island. 
If I was king of England I’d have her hauled up above Lon’on bridge,
and fit her up for a palace; because why? if anybody can afford to
live comfortably, his majesty can. ”

“Well! but, Benjamin,” cried the listener, who was in an ecstasy of
astonishment at this relation of the steward’s dangers, “what did you
do?”

“Do! why, we did our duty like hearty fellows.   Now if the countrymen
of Monnsheer Ler Quaw had been aboard of her, they would have just
struck her ashore on some of them small islands; but we run along the
land until we found her dead to leeward off the mountains of Pico, and
dam’me if I know to this day how we got there—whether we jumped over
the island or hauled round it; but there we was, and there we lay,
under easy sail, fore-reaching first upon one tack and then upon
t’other, so as to poke her nose out now and then and take a look to
wind’ard till the gale blowed its pipe out. ”

“I wonder, now!” exclaimed Remarkable, to whom most of the terms used
by Benjamin were perfectly unintelligible, but who had got a confused
idea of a raging tempest.   “It must be an awful life, that going to
sea! and I don’t feel astonishment that you are so affronted with the
thoughts, of being forced to quit a comfortable home like this.   Not
that a body cares much for’t, as there’s more houses than one to live
in.   Why, when the Judge agreed with me to come and live with him, I’d
no more notion of stopping any time than anything.   I happened in just
to see how the family did, about a week after Mrs.  Temple died,
thinking to be back home agin’ night; but the family was in such a
distressed way that I couldn’t but stop awhile and help em on.   I
thought the situation a good one, seeing that I was an unmarried body,
and they were so much in want of help; so I tarried. ”

“And a long time you’ve left your anchors down in the same place,
mistress.   I think yo’ must find that the ship rides easy. ”

“How you talk, Benjamin! there’s no believing a word you say.   I must
say that the Judge and Squire Jones have both acted quite clever, so
long; but I see that now we shall have a specimen to the contrary.   I
heern say thats the Judge was gone a great ‘broad, and that he meant
to bring his darter hum, but I didn’t calculate on sich carrins
on.   To my notion, Benjamin, she’s likely to turn out a desp’ut ugly
gal. ”

“Ugly!” echoed the major-domo, opening eyes that were beginning to
close in a very suspicious sleepiness, in wide amazement.   “By the
Lord Harry, woman, I should as soon think of calling the Boadishey a
clumsy frigate.   What the devil would you have? Arn’t her eyes as
bright as the morning and evening stars? and isn’t her hair as black
and glistening as rigging that has just had a lick of tar? doesn’t she
move as stately as a first-rate in smooth water, on a bowline? Why,
woman, the figure-head of the Boadishey was a fool to her, and that,
as I’ve often heard the captain say, was an image of a great queen;
and arn’t queens always comely, woman? for who do you think would be a
king, and not choose a handsome bedfellow?”

“Talk decent, Benjamin,” said the housekeeper, “Or I won’t keep your
company.   I don’t gainsay her being comely to look on, but I will
maintain that she’s likely to show poor conduct.   She seems to think
herself too good to talk to a body.   From what Squire Jones had telled
me, I some expected to be quite captivated by her company.   Now, to my
reckoning, Lowizy Grant is much more pritty behaved than Betsey
Temple.   She wouldn’t so much as hold discourse with me when I wanted
to ask her how she felt on coming home and missing her mammy. ”

“Perhaps she didn’t understand you, woman; you are none of the best
linguister; and then Miss Lizzy has been exercising the king’s English
under a great Lon’on lady, and, for that matter, can talk the language
almost as well as myself, or any native-born British subject.   You’ve
forgot your schooling, and the young mistress is a great scollard. ”

“Mistress!” cried Remarkable; “don’t make one out to be a nigger,
Benjamin.   She’s no mistress of mine, and never will be.   And as to
speech, I hold myself as second to nobody out of New England.   I was
born and raised in Essex County; and I’ve always heern say that the
Bay State was provarbal for pronounsation!”

“I’ve often heard of that Bay of State,” said Benjamin, “but can’t say
that I’ve ever been in it, nor do I know exactly whereaway it is that
it lays; but I suppose there is good anchorage in it, and that it’s no
bad place for the taking of ling; but for size it can’t be so much as
a yawl to a sloop of war compared with the Bay of Biscay, or, mayhap,
Torbay.   And as for language, if you want to hear the dictionary
overhauled like a log-line in a blow, you must go to Wapping and
listen to the Lon’oners as they deal out their lingo.   Howsomever, I
see no such mighty matter that Miss Lizzy has been doing to you, good
woman; so take another drop of your brews and forgive and forget, like
an honest soul,”

“No, indeed! and I shan’t do sitch a thing, Benjamin.   This treatment
is a newity to me, and what I won’t put up with.   I have a hundred and
fifty dollars at use, besides a bed and twenty sheep, to good; and I
don’t crave to live in a house where a body mustn’t call a young woman
by her given name to her face.   I will call her Betsey as much as I
please; it’s a free country, and no one can stop me.   I did intend to
stop while summer, but I shall quit to-morrow morning; and I will talk
just as I please. ”

“For that matter, Mistress Remarkable,” said Benjamin, “there’s none
here who will contradict you; for I’m of opinion that it would be as
easy to stop a hurricane with a Barcelony handkerchy as to bring up
your tongue when the stopper is off.   I say, good woman, do they grow
many monkeys along the shores of that Bay of State?”

“You’re a monkey yourself, Mr.  Penguillum,” cried the enraged
housekeeper, “or a bear—a black, beastly bear! and ain’t fit for a
decent woman to stay with.   I’ll never, keep your company agin, sir,
if I should live thirty years with the Judge.   Sitch talk is more
befitting the kitchen than the keeping-room of a house of one who is
well-to-do in the world. ”

“Look you, Mistress Pitty—Patty------Prettybones, mayhap I’m some such
matter as a bear, as they will find who come to grapple with me; but
dam’me if I’m a monkey— a thing that chatters without knowing a word
of what it says—a parrot; that will hold a dialogue, for what an
honest man knows, in a dozen languages; mayhap in the Bay of State
lingo; mayhap in Greek or High Dutch.   But dost it know what it means
itself? canst answer me that, good woman? Your midshipman can sing
out, and pass the word, when the captain gives the order, but just
send him adrift by himself, and let him work the ship of his own head,
and stop my grog if you don’t find all the Johnny Raws laughing at
him. ”

“Stop your grog, indeed!” said Remarkable, rising with great
indignation, and seizing a candle; “you’re groggy now, Benjamin and
I’ll quit the room before I hear any misbecoming words from you. ”
The housekeeper retired, with a manner but little less dignified, as
she thought, than the air of the heiress, muttering as she drew the
door after her, with a noise like the report of a musket, the
opprobrious terms of “drunkard,” “sot,” and “ beast. ”

“Who’s that you say is drunk?” cried Benjamin fiercely, rising and
making a movement toward Remarkable.   “You talk of mustering yourself
with a lady you’re just fit to grumble and find fault.   Where the
devil should you larn behavior and dictionary? in your damned Bay of
State, ha?”

Benjamin here fell back in his chair, and soon gave vent to certain
ominous sounds, which resembled not a little the growling of his
favorite animal the bear itself.   Be fore, however, he was quite
locked—to use the language that would suit the Della-cruscan humor of
certain refined minds of the present day—” in the arms of Morpheus,”
he spoke aloud, observing due pauses between his epithets, the
impressive terms of “monkey,” “parrot,” “picnic,” “tar pot,” and
“linguisters”

We shall not attempt to explain his meaning nor connect his sentences;
and our readers must be satisfied with our informing them that they
were expressed with all that coolness of contempt that a man might
well be supposed to feel for a monkey. 

Nearly two hours passed in this sleep before the major domo was
awakened by the noisy entrance of Richard, Major Hartmann, and the
master of the mansion.   Benjamin so far rallied his confused faculties
as to shape the course of the two former to their respective
apartments, when he disappeared himself, leaving the task of securing
the house to him who was most interested in its safety.   Locks and
bars were but little attended to in the early days of that settlement,
and so soon as Marmaduke had given an eye to the enormous fires of his
dwelling he retired.   With this act of prudence closes the first night
of our tale. 

CHAPTER 16

“Watch (aside).   Some treason, masters—
Yet stand close. ”—Much Ado About Nothing. 

It was fortunate for more than one of the bacchanalians who left the
“Bold Dragoon” late in the evening that the severe cold of the season
was becoming rapidly less dangerous as they threaded the different
mazes through the snow-banks that led to their respective dwellings. 
Then driving clouds began toward morning to flit across the heavens,
and the moon set behind a volume of vapor that was impelled furiously
toward the north, carrying with it the softer atmosphere from the
distant ocean.   The rising sun was obscured by denser and increasing
columns of clouds, while the southerly wind that rushed up the valley
brought the never-failing symptoms of a thaw. 

It was quite late in the morning before Elizabeth, observing the faint
glow which appeared on the eastern mountain long after the light of
the sun had struck the opposite hills, ventured from the house, with a
view to gratify her curiosity with a glance by daylight at the
surrounding objects before the tardy revellers of the Christmas eve
should make their appearance at the breakfast- table.   While she was
drawing the folds of her pelisse more closely around her form, to
guard against a cold that was yet great though rapidly yielding, in
the small inclosure that opened in the rear of the house on a little
thicket of low pines that were springing up where trees of a mightier
growth had lately stood, she was surprised at the voice of Mr.  Jones. 

“Merry Christmas, merry Christmas to you, Cousin Bess,” he shouted. 
“Ah, ha! an early riser, I see; but I knew I should steal a march on
you.   I never was in a house yet where I didn’t get the first
Christmas greeting on every soul in it, man, woman, and child—great
and small—black, white, and yellow.   But stop a minute till I can just
slip on my coat.   You are about to look at the improvements, I see,
which no one can explain so well as I, who planned them all.   It will
be an hour before ‘Duke and the Major can sleep off Mrs.  Hollister’s
confounded distillations, and so I’ll come down and go with you. 

Elizabeth turned and observed her cousin in his night cap, with his
head out of his bedroom window, where his zeal for pre-eminence, in
defiance of the weather, had impelled him to thrust it.   She laughed,
and promising to wait for his company re-entered the house, making her
appearance again, holding in her hand a packet that was secured by
several large and important seals, just in time to meet the gentleman. 

“Come, Bessy, come,” he cried, drawing one of her arms through his
own; “ the snow begins to give, but it will bear us yet.   Don’t you
snuff old Pennsylvania in the very air? This is a vile climate, girl;
now at sunset, last evening, it was cold enough to freeze a man’s
zeal, and that, I can tell you, takes a thermometer near zero for me;
then about nine or ten it began to moderate; at twelve it was quite
mild, and here all the rest of the night I have been so hot as not to
bear a blanket on the bed.   —Holla! Aggy—merry Christmas, Aggy—I say,
do you hear me, you black dog! there’s a dollar for you; and if the
gentle men get up before I come back, do you come out and let me know. 
I wouldn’t have 'Duke get the start of me for the worth of your head. ”

The black caught the money from the snow, and promising a due degree
of watchfulness, he gave the dollar a whirl of twenty feet in the air,
and catching it as it fell in the palm of his hand, he withdrew to the
kitchen, to exhibit his present, with a heart as light as his face was
happy in its expression. 

“Oh, rest easy, my dear coz,” said the young lady; “I took a look in
at my father, who is likely to sleep an hour; and by using due
vigilance you will secure all the honors of the season. ”

“Why, Duke is your father, Elizabeth ; but ‘Duke is a man who likes to
be foremost, even in trifles.   Now, as for myself, I care for no such
things, except in the way of competition; for a thing which is of no
moment in itself may be made of importance in the way of competition. 
So it is with your father—he loves to he first; but I only; struggle
with him as a competitor. ”

“It’s all very clear, sir,” said Elizabeth; “you would not care a fig
for distinction if there were no one in the world but yourself; but as
there happens to be a great many others, why, you must struggle with
them all—in the way of competition. ”

“Exactly so; I see you are a clever girl, Bess, and one who does
credit to her masters.   It was my plan to send you to that school; for
when your father first mentioned the thing, I wrote a private letter
for advice to a judicious friend in the city, who recommended the very
school you went to.   ‘Duke was a little obstinate at first, as usual,
but when he heard the truth he was obliged to send you. ”

“Well, a truce to ‘Duke’s foibles, sir; he is my father, and if you
knew what he has been doing for you while we were in Albany, you would
deal more tenderly with his character. ”

“For me!” cried Richard, pausing a moment in his walk to reflect. 
“Oh! he got the plans of the new Dutch meeting-house for me, I
suppose; but I care very little about it, for a man of a certain kind
of talent is seldom aided by any foreign suggestions; his own brain is
the best architect. ”

“No such thing,” said Elizabeth, looking provokingly knowing. 

“No! let me see—perhaps he had my name put in the bill for the new
turnpike, as a director. ”

“He might possibly; but it is not to such an appointment that I
allude. ”

“Such an appointment!” repeated Mr.  Jones, who began to fidget with
curiosity; “then it is an appointment.   If it is in the militia, I
won’t take it. 

“No, no, it is not in the militia,” cried Elizabeth, showing the
packet in her hand, and then drawing it back with a coquettish air;
“it is an office of both honor and emolument. ”

“Honor and emolument!” echoed Richard, in painful suspense; “show me
the paper, girl.   Say, is it an office where there is anything to do?”

“You have hit it, Cousin Dickon; it is the executive office of the
county; at least so said my father when he gave me this packet to
offer you as a Christmas-box.   Surely, if anything will please
Dickon,’ he said, ‘it will be to fill the executive chair of the
county. ’”

“Executive chair! what nonsense!” cried the impatient gentleman,
snatching the packet from her hand; “there is no such office in the
county.   Eh! what! it is, I declare, a commission, appointing Richard
Jones, Esquire, sheriff of the county.   Well, this is kind in ‘Duke,
positively.   I must say ‘Duke has a warm heart, and never forgets his
friends.   Sheriff! High Sheriff of —! it sounds well, Bess, but it
shall execute better.   ‘Duke is a judicious man after all, and knows
human nature thoroughly, I’m much obliged to him,” continued Richard,
using the skirt of his coat unconsciously to wipe his eyes; “though I
would do as much for him any day, as he shall see, if I have an
opportunity to perform any of the duties of my office on him.   It
shall be done, Cousin Bess----it shall be done, I say.   How this
cursed south wind makes one’s eyes water!”

“Now, Richard,” said the laughing maiden, “now I think you will find
something to do.   I have often heard you complain of old that there
was nothing to do in this new country, while to my eyes it seemed as
if everything remained to be done. ”

“Do!” echoed Richard, who blew his nose, raised his little form to its
greatest elevation, and looked serious.   “Everything depends on
system, girl.   I shall sit down this afternoon and systematize the
county.   I must have deputies, you know.   I will divide the county
into districts, over which I will place my deputies; and I will have
one for the village, which I will call my home department.   Let me
see—ho! Benjamin! yes, Benjamin will make a good deputy; he has been
naturalized, and would answer admirably if he could only ride on
horseback. ”

“Yes, Mr.  Sheriff,” said his companion; “and as he understands ropes
so well, he would be very expert, should occasion happen for his
services in another way. ”

“No,” interrupted the other; “I flatter myself that no man could hang
a man better than—that is—ha!—oh! yes, Benjamin would do extremely
well in such an unfortunate dilemma, if he could be persuaded to
attempt it.   But I should despair of the thing.   I never could induce
him to hang, or teach him to ride on horseback.   I must seek another
deputy. ”
“Well, sir, as you have abundant leisure for all these important
affairs, I beg that you will forget that you are high sheriff, and
devote some little of your time to gallantry.   Where are the beauties
and improvements which you were to show me?”

“Where? why, everywhere! Here I have laid out some new streets; and
when they are opened, and the trees felled, and they are all built up,
will they not make a fine town? Well, ‘Duke is a liberal-hearted
fellow, with all his stubbornness.   Yes, yes; I must have at least
four deputies, besides a jailer. ”

“I see no streets in the direction of our walk,” said Elizabeth,
“unless you call the short avenues through these pine bushes by that
name.   Surely you do not contemplate building houses, very soon, in
that forest before us, and in those swamps. ”

We must run our streets by the compass, coz, and disregard trees,
hills, ponds, stumps, or, in fact, anything but posterity.   Such is
the will of your father, and your father, you know——”

“Had you made sheriff, Mr.  Jones,” interrupted the lady, with a tone
that said very plainly to the gentleman that he was touching a
forbidden subject. 

“I know it, I know it,” cried Richard; “and if it were in my power,
I’d make ‘Duke a king.   He is a noble hearted fellow, and would make
an excellent king; that is, if he had a good prime minister.   But who
have we here? voices in the bushes—a combination about mischief, I’ll
wager my commission.   Let us draw near and examine a little into the
matter. ”

During this dialogue, as the parties had kept in motion, Richard and
his cousin advanced some distance from the house into the open space
in the rear of the village, where, as may be gathered from the
conversation, streets were planned and future dwellings contemplated;
but where, in truth, the only mark of improvement that was to be seen
was a neglected clearing along the skirt of a dark forest of mighty
pines, over which the bushes or sprouts of the same tree had sprung up
to a height that interspersed the fields of snow with little thickets
of evergreen.   The rushing of the wind, as it whistled through the
tops of these mimic trees, prevented the footsteps of the pair from
being heard, while the branches concealed their persons.   Thus aided,
the listeners drew nigh to a spot where the young hunter, Leather-
Stocking, and the Indian chief were collected in an earnest
consultation.   The former was urgent in his manner, and seemed to
think the subject of deep importance, while Natty appeared to listen
with more than his usual attention to what the other was saying. 
Mohegan stood a little on one side, with his head sunken on his chest,
his hair falling forward so as to conceal most of his features, and
his whole attitude expressive of deep dejection, if not of shame. 
Let us withdraw,” whispered Elizabeth; “ we are intruders, and can
have no right to listen to the secrets of these men. ”

“No right!” returned Richard a little impatiently, in the same tone,
and drawing her arm so forcibly through his own as to prevent her
retreat; “you forget, cousin, that it is my duty to preserve the peace
of the county and see the laws executed, these wanderers frequently
commit depredations, though I do not think John would do anything
secretly.   Poor fellow! he was quite boozy last night, and hardly
seems to be over it yet.   Let us draw nigher and hear what they say. ”

Notwithstanding the lady’s reluctance, Richard, stimulated doubtless
by his sense of duty, prevailed; and they were soon so near as
distinctly to hear sounds. 

“The bird must he had,” said Natty, “by fair means or foul.   Heigho!
I’ve known the time, lad, when the wild turkeys wasn’t over-scarce in
the country; though you must go into the Virginia gaps if you want
them now.   ‘to be sure, there is a different taste to a partridge and
a well-fatted turkey; though, to my eating, beaver’s tail and bear’s
ham make the best of food.   But then every one has his own appetite. 
I gave the last farthing, all to that shilling, to the French trader,
this very morning, as I came through the town, for powder; so, as you
have nothing, we can have but one shot for it.   I know that Billy
Kirby is out, and means to have a pull of the trigger at that very
turkey.   John has a true eye for a single fire, and, some how, my hand
shakes so whenever I have to do anything extrawnary, that I often lose
my aim.   Now, when I killed the she-bear this fall, with her cubs,
though they were so mighty ravenous, I knocked them over one at a
shot, and loaded while I dodged the trees in the bargain; but this is
a very different thing, Mr.  Oliver. ”

“This,” cried the young man, with an accent that sounded as if he took
a bitter pleasure in his poverty, while he held a shilling up before
his eyes, “this is all the treasure that I possess—this and my rifle!
Now, indeed, I have become a man of the woods, and must place my sole
dependence on the chase.   Come, Natty, let us stake the last penny for
the bird; with your aim, it cannot fail to be successful. ”

“I would rather it should be John, lad; my heart jumps into my mouth,
because you set your mind so much out; and I’m sartain that I shall
miss the bird.   Them Indians can shoot one time as well as another;
nothing ever troubles them.   I say, John, here’s a shilling; take my
rifle, and get a shot at the big turkey they’ve put up at the stump. 
Mr.  Oliver is over-anxious for the creatur’, and I’m sure to do
nothing when I have over-anxiety about it. ”

The Indian turned his head gloomily, and after looking keenly for a
moment, in profound silence, at his companions, he replied:

“When John was young, eyesight was not straighter than his bullet. 
The Mingo squaws cried out at the sound of his rifle.   The Mingo
warriors were made squaws.   When did he ever shoot twice? The eagle
went above the clouds when he passed the wigwam of Chingachgook; his
feathers were plenty with the women.   But see,” he said, raising his
voice from the low, mournful tones in which he had spoken to a pitch
of keen excitement, and stretching forth both hands, “they shake like
a deer at the wolf’s howl.   Is John old? When was a Mohican a squaw
with seventy winters? No! the white man brings old age with him—rum is
his tomahawk!”

“Why, then, do you use it, old man?” exclaimed the young hunter; “why
will one, so noble by nature, aid the devices of the devil by making
himself a beast?”

“Beast! is John a beast?” replied the Indian slowly; “yes; you say no
lie, child of the Fire-eater! John is a beast.   The smokes were once
few in these hills, The deer would lick the hand of a white man and
the birds rest on his head.   They were strangers to him.   My fathers
came from the shores of the salt lake.  They fled before rum.   They
came to their grandfather, and they lived in peace; or, when they did
raise the hatchet, it was to strike it into the brain of a Mingo. 
They gathered around the council fire, and what they said was done. 
Then John was a man.   But warriors and traders with light eyes
followed them.   One brought the long knife and one brought rum.   They
were more than the pines on the mountains; and they broke up the
councils and took the lands, The evil spirit was in their jugs, and
they let him loose.   Yes yes—you say no lie, Young Eagle; John is a
Christian beast. ”

“Forgive me, old warrior,” cried the youth, grasping his hand; “I
should be the last to reproach you.   The curses of Heaven light on the
cupidity that has destroyed such a race.   Remember, John, that I am of
your family, and it is now my greatest pride. ”

The muscles of Mohegan relaxed a little, and he said, more mildly:

“You are a Delaware, my son; your words are not heard—John cannot
shoot. ”

“I thought that lad had Indian blood in him,” whispered Richard, “by
the awkward way he handled my horses last night.   You see, coz, they
never use harness.   But the poor fellow shall have two shots at the
turkey, if he wants it, for I’ll give him another shilling myself;
though, per haps, I had better offer to shoot for him.   They have got
up their Christmas sports, I find, in the bushes yonder, where you
hear the laughter—though it is a queer taste this chap has for turkey;
not but what it is good eating, too,”

“Hold, Cousin Richard,” exclaimed Elizabeth, clinging to his arm;
“would it be delicate to offer a shilling to that gentleman?”

“Gentleman, again! Do you think a half-breed, like him, will refuse
money? No, no, girl, he will take the shilling; ay! and even rum too,
notwithstanding he moralizes so much about it, But I’ll give the lad a
chance for his turkey; for that Billy Kirby is one of the best
marksmen in the country; that is, if we except the—the gentleman. ”

“Then,” said Elizabeth, who found her strength unequal to her will, “
then, sir, I will speak. ” She advanced, with an air of determination,
in front of her cousin, and entered the little circle of bushes that
surrounded the trio of hunters.   Her appearance startled the youth,
who at first made an unequivocal motion toward retiring, but,
recollecting himself, bowed, by lifting his cap, and resumed his
attitude of leaning on his rifle.   Neither Natty nor Mohegan betrayed
any emotion, though the appearance of Elizabeth was so entirely
unexpected. 

“I find,” she said, “that the old Christmas sport of shooting the
turkey is yet in use among you.   I feel inclined to try my chance for
a bird.   Which of you will take this money, and, after paying my fee,
give me the aid of his rifle?”

“Is this a sport for a lady?” exclaimed the young hunter, with an
emphasis that could not well be mistaken, and with a rapidity that
showed he spoke without consulting anything but feeling. 
“Why not, sir? If it be inhuman the sin is not confined to one sex
only.   But I have my humor as well as others.   I ask not your
assistance, but”—turning to Natty, and dropping a dollar in his hand—”
this old veteran of the forest will not be so ungallant as to refuse
one fire for a lady. ”

Leather-Stocking dropped the money into his pouch, and throwing up the
end of his rifle he freshened his priming; and first laughing in his
usual manner, he threw the piece over his shoulder, and said:

“If Billy Kirby don’t get the bird before me, and the Frenchman’s
powder don’t hang fire this damp morning, you’ll see as fine a turkey
dead, in a few minutes, as ever was eaten in the Judge’s shanty.   I
have knowed the Dutch women, on the Mohawk and Schoharie, count
greatly on coming to the merry-makings; and so, lad, you shouldn’t be
short with the lady.   Come, let us go forward, for if we wait the
finest bird will be gone. ”

“But I have a right before you, Natty, and shall try on my own luck
first.   You will excuse me, Miss Temple; I have much reason to wish
that bird, and may seem ungallant, but I must claim my privileges. ”

“Claim anything that is justly your own, sir,” returned the lady; “we
are both adventurers; and this is my knight.   I trust my fortune to
his hand and eye.   Lead on, Sir Leather-Stocking, and we will follow. ”

Natty, who seemed pleased with the frank address of the young and
beauteous Elizabeth, who had so singularly intrusted him with such a
commission, returned the bright smile with which she had addressed
him, by his own peculiar mark of mirth, and moved across the snow
toward the spot whence the sounds of boisterous mirth proceeded, with
the long strides of a hunter.   His companions followed in silence, the
youth casting frequent and uneasy glances toward Elizabeth, who was
detained by a motion from Richard. 

“I should think, Miss Temple,” he said, so soon as the others were out
of hearing, “that if you really wished a turkey, you would not have
taken a stranger for the office, and such a one as Leather-Stocking. 
But I can hardly believe that you are serious, for I have fifty, at
this moment, shut up in the coops, in every stage of fat, so that you
might choose any quality you pleased.   There are six that I am trying
an experiment on, by giving them brick-bats with—”

“Enough, Cousin Dickon,” interrupted the lady; “I do wish the bird,
and it is because I so wish that I commissioned this Mr.  Leather-
Stocking. ”

“Did you ever hear of the great shot that I made at the wolf, Cousin
Elizabeth, who was carrying off your father's sheep?” said Richard,
drawing himself up with an air of displeasure.   “He had the sheep on
his hack; and, had the head of the wolf been on the other side, I
should have killed him dead; as it was—”

“You killed the sheep—I know it all, dear coz.   Hut would it have been
decorous for the High Sheriff of —to mingle in such sports as these?”
“Surely you did not think that I intended actually to fire with my own
hands?” said Mr.  Jones.   “But let us follow, and see the shooting. 
There is no fear of anything unpleasant occurring to a female in this
new country, especially to your father’s daughter, and in my
presence. ”

“My father’s daughter fears nothing, sir, more especially when
escorted by the highest executive officer in the county. ”

She took his arm, and he led her through the mazes of the bushes to
the spot where most of the young men of the village were collected for
the sports of shooting a Christmas match, and whither Natty and his
Companions had already preceded them. 

CHAPTER 17

I guess, by all this quaint array,
The burghers hold their sports to-day. ”—Scott. 

The ancient amusement of shooting the Christmas turkey is one of the
few sports that the settlers of a new country seldom or never neglect
to observe.   It was connected with the daily practices of a people who
often laid aside the axe or the scythe to seize the rifle, as the deer
glided through the forests they were felling, or the bear entered
their rough meadows to scent the air of a clearing, and to scan, with
a look of sagacity, the progress of the invader. 

On the present occasion, the usual amusement of the day had been a
little hastned, in order to allow a fair opportunity to Mr.  Grant,
whose exhibition was not less a treat to the young sportsmen than the
one which engaged their present attention.   The owner of the birds was
a free black, who had prepared for the occasion a collection of game
that was admirably qualified to inflame the appetite of an epicure,
and was well adapted to the means and skill of the different
competitors, who were of all ages.   He had offered to the younger and
more humble marks men divers birds of an inferior quality, and some
shooting had already taken place, much to the pecuniary advantage of
the sable owner of the game.   The order of the sports was extremely
simple, and well understood.   The bird was fastened by a string to the
stump of a large pine, the side of which, toward the point where the
marksmen were placed, had been flattened with an axe, in order that it
might serve the purpose of a target, by which the merit of each
individual might be ascertained.   The distance between the stump and
shooting-stand was one hundred measured yards; a foot more or a foot
less being thought an invasion of the right of one of the parties. 
The negro affixed his own price to every bird, and the terms of the
chance; but, when these were once established, he was obliged, by the
strict principles of public justice that prevailed in the country, to
admit any adventurer who might offer. 

The throng consisted of some twenty or thirty young men, most of whom
had rifles, and a collection of all the boys in the village.   The
little urchins, clad in coarse but warm garments, stood gathered
around the more distinguished marksmen, with their hands stuck under
their waistbands, listening eagerly to the boastful stories of skill
that had been exhibited on former occasions, and were already
emulating in their hearts these wonderful deeds in gunnery. 

The chief speaker was the man who had been mentioned by Natty as Billy
Kirby.   This fellow, whose occupation, when he did labor, was that of
clearing lands, or chopping jobs, was of great stature, and carried in
his very air the index of his character.   He was a noisy, boisterous,
reckless lad, whose good-natured eye contradicted the bluntness and
bullying tenor of his speech.   For weeks he would lounge around the
taverns of the county, in a state of perfect idleness, or doing small
jobs for his liquor and his meals, and cavilling with applicants about
the prices of his labor; frequently preferring idleness to an
abatement of a little of his independence, or a cent in his wages. 
But, when these embarrassing points were satisfactorily arranged, he
would shoulder his axe and his rifle, slip his arms through the straps
of his pack, and enter the woods with the tread of a Hercules.   His
first object was to learn his limits, round which he would pace,
occasionally freshening, with a blow of his axe, the marks on the
boundary trees; and then he would proceed, with an air of great
deliberation, to the centre of his premises, and, throwing aside his
superfluous garments, measure, with a knowing eye, one or two of the
nearest trees that were towering apparently into the very clouds as he
gazed upward.   Commonly selecting one of the most noble for the first
trial of his power, he would approach it with a listless air,
whistling a low tune; and wielding his axe with a certain flourish,
not unlike the salutes of a fencing-master, he would strike a light
blow into the bark, and measure his distance.   The pause that followed
was ominous of the fall of the forest which had flourished there for
centuries.   The heavy and brisk blows that he struck were soon
succeeded by the thundering report of the tree, as it came, first
cracking and threatening with the separation of its own last
ligaments, then threshing and tearing with its branches the tops of
its surrounding brethren, and finally meeting the ground with a shock
but little inferior to an earthquake.   From that moment the sounds of
the axe were ceaseless, while the failing of the trees was like a
distant cannonading; and the daylight broke into the depths of the
woods with the suddenness of a winter morning. 

For days, weeks, nay months, Billy Kirby would toil with an ardor that
evinced his native spirit, and with an effect that seemed magical,
until, his chopping being ended, his stentorian lungs could be heard
emitting sounds, as he called to his patient oxen, which rang through
the hills like the cries of an alarm.   He had been often heard, on a
mild summer’ evening, a long mile across the vale of Templeton; when
the echoes from the mountains would take up his cries, until they died
away in the feeble sounds from the distant rocks that overhung the
lake.   His piles, or, to use the language of the country, his logging
ended, with a dispatch that could only accompany his dexterity and
herculean strength, the jobber would collect together his implements
of labor, light the heaps of timber, and march away under the blaze of
the prostrate forest, like the conqueror of some city who, having
first prevailed over his adversary, applies the torch as the finishing
blow to his conquest.   For a long time Billy Kirby would then be seen
sauntering around the taverns, the rider of scrub races, the bully of
cock-fights, and not infrequently the hero of such sports as the one
in hand. 

Between him and the Leather-Stocking there had long existed a jealous
rivalry on the point of skill with the rifle.   Notwithstanding the
long practice of Natty, it was commonly supposed that the steady
nerves and the quick eye of the wood-chopper rendered him his equal. 
The competition had, however, been confined hitherto to boasting, and
comparisons made from their success in various hunting excursions; but
this was the first time they had ever come in open collision.   A good
deal of higgling about the price of the choicest bird had taken place
between Billy Kirby and its owner before Natty and his companions
rejoined the sportsmen It had, however, been settled at one shilling *
a shot, which was the highest sum ever exacted, the black taking care
to protect himself from losses, as much as possible, by the conditions
of the sport. 

  * Before the Revolution, each province had its own money of account
    though neither coined any but copper pieces.   In New York the Spanish
    dollar was divided into eight shillings, each of the value of a
    fraction more than sixpence sterling.   At present the Union has
    provided a decimal system, with coins to represent it. 

The turkey was already fastened at the “mark,” hut its body was
entirely hid by the surrounding snow, nothing being visible but its
red swelling head and its long neck.   If the bird was injured by any
bullet that struck below the snow, it was to continue the property of
its present owner; but if a feather was touched in a visible part, the
animal became the prize of the successful adventurer. 

These terms were loudly proclaimed by the negro, who was seated in the
snow, in a somewhat hazardous vicinity to his favorite bird, when
Elizabeth and her cousin approached the noisy sportsmen.   The sounds
of mirth and contention sensibly lowered at this unexpected visit;
but, after a moment’s pause, the curious interest exhibited in the
face of the young lady, together with her smiling air, restored the
freedom of the morning; though it was somewhat chastened, both in
language and vehemence, by the presence of such a spectator. 

“Stand out of the way there, boys!” cried the wood-chopper, who was
placing himself at the shooting-point— stand out of the way, you
little rascals, or I will shoot through you.   Now, Brom, take leave of
your turkey. ”
Stop!” cried the young hunter; “I am a candidate for a chance.   Here
is my shilling, Brom; I wish a shot too. ”
You may wish it in welcome,” cried Kirby, “but if I ruffle the
gobbler’s feathers, how are you to get it? Is money so plenty in your
deer-skin pocket, that you pay for a chance that you may never have?”

“How know you, sir, how plenty money is in my pocket?” said the youth
fiercely.   “Here is my shilling, Brom, and I claim a right to shoot. ”

“Don't be crabbed, my boy,” said the other, who was very coolly fixing
his flint.   “They say you have a hole in your left shoulder yourself,
so I think Brom may give you a fire for half-price.   It will take a
keen one to hit that bird, I can tell you, my lad, even if I give you
a chance, which is what I have no mind to do. ”

“Don’t be boasting, Billy Kirby,” said Natty, throwing the breech of
his rifle into the snow, and leaning on its barrel; “you’ll get but
one shot at the creatur’, for if the lad misses his aim, which
wouldn’t be a wonder if he did, with his arm so stiff and sore, you’ll
find a good piece and an old eye coming a’ter you.   Maybe it’s true
that I can’t shoot as I used to could, but a hundred yards is a short
distance for a long rifle. ”

“What, old Leather-Stocking, are you out this morning?” cried his
reckless opponent.   “Well, fair play’s a jewel.   I’ve the lead of you,
old fellow; so here goes for a dry throat or a good dinner. ”

The countenance of the negro evinced not only all the interest which
his pecuniary adventure might occasion, but also the keen excitement
that the sport produced in the others, though with a very different
wish as to the result.   While the wood-chopper was slowly and steadily
raising his rifle, he bawled;

“Fair play, Billy Kirby—stand back—make ‘em stand back, boys—gib a
nigger fair play—poss-up, - gobbler; shake a head, fool; don’t you see
‘em taking aim?”

These cries, which were intended as much to distract the attention of
the marksman as for anything else, were fruitless. 

The nerves of the wood-chopper were not so easily shaken, and he took
his aim with the utmost deliberation.   Stillness prevailed for a
moment, and he fired.   The head of the turkey was seen to dash on one
side, and its wings were spread in momentary fluttering; but it
settled itself down calmly into its bed of snow, and glanced its eyes
uneasily around.   For a time long enough to draw a deep breath, not a
sound was heard.   The silence was then broken by the noise of the
negro, who laughed, and shook his body with all kinds of antics,
rolling over in the snow in the excess of delight. 

“Well done, a gobbler,” be cried, jumping up and affecting to embrace
his bird; “I tell ‘em to poss-up, and you see ‘em dodge.   Gib anoder
shillin’, Billy, and halb anoder shot. ”

“No—the shot is mine,” said the young hunter; “you have my money
already.   Leave the mark, and let me try my luck. ”

“Ah! it’s but money thrown away, lad,” said Leather-Stocking.   “A
turkey’s head and neck is but a small mark for a new hand and a lame
shoulder.   You’d best let me take the fire, and maybe we can make some
settlement with the lady about the bird. ”
The chance is mine,” said the young hunter.   “Clear the ground, that I
may take it. ”

The discussions and disputes concerning the last shot were now
abating, it having been determined that if the turkey’s head had been
anywhere but just where it was at that moment, the bird must certainly
have been killed.   There was not much excitement produced by the
preparations of the youth, who proceeded in a hurried manner to take
his aim, and was in the act of pulling the trigger, when he was
stopped by Natty. 

“Your hand shakes, lad,” he said, “and you seem over eager.   Bullet-
wounds are apt to weaken flesh, and to my judgment you’ll not shoot so
well as in common.   If you will fire, you should shoot quick, before
there is time to shake off the aim. ”

“Fair play,” again shouted the negro; “fair play—gib a nigger fair
play.   What right a Nat Bumppo advise a young man? Let ‘em shoot—clear
a ground. ”

The youth fired with great rapidity, but no motion was made by the
turkey; and, when the examiners for the ball returned from the “mark,”
they declared that he had missed the stump. 

Elizabeth observed the change in his countenance, and could not help
feeling surprise that one so evidently superior to his companions
should feel a trifling loss so sensibly.   But her own champion was now
preparing to enter the lists. 

The mirth of Brom, which had been again excited, though in a much
smaller degree than before, by the failure of the second adventurer,
vanished the instant Natty took his stand.   His skin became mottled
with large brown spots, that fearfully sullied the lustre of his
native ebony, while his enormous lips gradually compressed around two
rows of ivory that had hitherto been shining in his visage like pearls
set in jet.   His nostrils, at all times the most conspicuous feature
of his face, dilated until they covered the greater part of the
diameter of his countenance; while his brown and bony hands
unconsciously grasped the snow-crust near him, the excitement of the
moment completely overcoming his native dread of cold. 

While these indications of apprehension were exhibited in the sable
owner of the turkey, the man who gave rise to this extraordinary
emotion was as calm and collected as if there was not to be a single
spectator of his skill. 

“I was down in the Dutch settlements on the Schoharie,” said Natty,
carefully removing the leather guard from the lock of his rifle, “just
before the breaking out of the last war, and there was a shooting-
match among the boys; so I took a hand.   I think I opened a good many
Dutch eyes that day; for I won the powder-horn, three bars of lead,
and a pound of as good powder as ever flashed in pan.   Lord! how they
did swear in Jarman! They did tell me of one drunken Dutchman who said
he’d have the life of me before I got back to the lake agin.   But if
he had put his rifle to his shoulder with evil intent God would have
punished him for it; and even if the Lord didn’t, and he had missed
his aim, I know one that would have given him as good as he sent, and
better too, if good shooting could come into the ‘count. ”
By this time the old hunter was ready for his business, and throwing
his right leg far behind him, and stretching his left arm along the
barrel of his piece, he raised it toward the bird, Every eye glanced
rapidly from the marks man to the mark; but at the moment when each
ear was expecting the report of the rifle, they were disappointed by
the ticking sound of the flint. 

“A snap, a snap!” shouted the negro, springing from his crouching
posture like a madman, before his bird.   A snap good as fire—Natty
Bumppo gun he snap—Natty Bumppo miss a turkey!”

Natty Bumppo hit a nigger,” said the indignant old hunter, “if you
don’t get out of the way, Brom.   It’s contrary to the reason of the
thing, boy, that a snap should count for a fire, when one is nothing
more than a fire-stone striking a steel pan, and the other is sudden
death; so get out of my way, boy, and let me show Billy Kirby how to
shoot a Christmas turkey. ”

“Gib a nigger fair play!” cried the black, who continued resolutely to
maintain his post, and making that appeal to the justice of his
auditors which the degraded condition of his caste so naturally
suggested.   “Eberybody know dat snap as good as fire.   Leab it to
Massa Jone—leab it to lady. ”

“Sartain,” said the wood-chopper; “it’s the law of the game in this
part of the country, Leather-Stocking.   If you fire agin you must pay
up the other shilling.   I b’lieve I’ll try luck once more myself; so,
Brom, here’s my money, and I take the next fire. ”

“It’s likely you know the laws of the woods better than I do, Billy
Kirby,” returned Natty.   “You come in with the settlers, with an ox-
goad in your hand, and I come in with moccasins on my feet, and with a
good rifle on my shoulders, so long back as afore the old war.   Which
is likely to know the best? I say no man need tell me that snapping is
as good as firing when I pull the trigger. ”

“Leab it to Massa Jone,” said the alarmed negro; “he know eberyting. ”
This appeal to the knowledge of Richard was too flattering to be
unheeded.   He therefore advanced a little from the spot whither the
delicacy of Elizabeth had induced her to withdraw, and gave the
following opinion, with the gravity that the subject and his own rank
demanded:

“There seems to be a difference in opinion,” he said, “on the subject
of Nathaniel Bumppo’s right to shoot at Abraham Freeborn’s turkey
without the said Nathaniel paying one shilling for the privilege. ” The
fact was too evident to be denied, and after pausing a moment, that
the audience might digest his premises, Richard proceeded: “It seems
proper that I should decide this question, as I am bound to preserve
the peace of the county; and men with deadly weapons in their hands
should not be heedlessly left to contention and their own malignant
passions.   It appears that there was no agreement, either in writing
or in words, on the disputed point; therefore we must reason from
analogy, which is, as it were, comparing one thing with another.   Now,
in duels, where both parties shoot, it is generally the rule that a
snap is a fire; and if such is the rule where the party has a right to
fire back again, it seems to me unreasonable to say that a man may
stand snapping at a defenceless turkey all day.   I therefore am of the
opinion that Nathaniel Bumppo has lost his chance, and must pay
another shilling before he renews his right. ”

As this opinion came from so high a quarter, and was delivered with
effect, it silenced all murmurs—for the whole of the spectators had
begun to take sides with great warmth—except from the Leather-
Stocking himself. 

“I think Miss Elizabeth’s thoughts should be taken,” said Natty. 
“I’ve known the squaws give very good counsel when the Indians had
been dumfounded.   If she says that I ought to lose, I agree to give it
up. ”

“Then I adjudge you to be a loser for this time,” said Miss Temple;
“but pay your money and renew your chance; unless Brom will sell me
the bird for a dollar.   I will give him the money, and save the life
of the poor victim. ”

This proposition was evidently but little relished by any of the
listeners, even the negro feeling the evil excitement of the chances. 
In the mean while, as Billy Kirby was preparing himself for another
shot, Natty left the stand, with an extremely dissatisfied manner,
muttering:

“There hasn’t been such a thing as a good flint sold at the foot of
the lake since the Indian traders used to come into the country; and,
if a body should go into the flats along the streams in the hills to
hunt for such a thing, it’s ten to one but they will be all covered up
with the plough.   Heigho! it seems to me that just as the game grows
scarce, and a body wants the best ammunition to get a livelihood,
everything that’s bad falls on him like a judgment.   But I’ll change
the stone, for Billy Kirby hasn’t the eye for such a mark, I know. ”

The wood-chopper seemed now entirely sensible that his reputation
depended on his care; nor did he neglect any means to insure success. 
He drew up his rifle, and renewed his aim again and again, still
appearing reluctant to fire, No sound was heard from even Brom, during
these portentous movements, until Kirby discharged his piece, with the
same want of success as before.   Then, indeed, the shouts of the negro
rang through the bushes and sounded among the trees of the neighboring
forest like the outcries of a tribe of Indians.   He laughed, rolling
his head first on one side, then on the other, until nature seemed
exhausted with mirth.   He danced until his legs were wearied with
motion in the snow; and, in short, he exhibited all that violence of
joy that characterizes the mirth of a thoughtless negro. 

The wood-chopper had exerted all his art, and felt a proportionate
degree of disappointment at the failure.   He first examined the bird
with the utmost attention, and more than once suggested that he had
touched its feathers; but the voice of the multitude was against him,
for it felt disposed to listen to the often-repeated cries of the
black to “gib a nigger fair play. ”

Finding it impossible to make out a title to the bird, Kirby turned
fiercely to the black and said:

“Shut your oven, you crow! Where is the man that can hit a turkey’s
head at a hundred yards? I was a fool for trying.   You needn’t make an
uproar like a falling pine-tree about it.   Show me the man who can do
it. ”

“Look this a-way, Billy Kirby,” said Leather-Stocking, and let them
clear the mark, and I’ll show you a man who’s made better shots afore
now, and that when he’s been hard pressed by the savages and wild
beasts,”

“Perhaps there is one whose rights come before ours, Leather-
Stocking,” said Miss Temple.   “If so, we will waive our privilege. ”

“If it be me that you have reference to,” said the young hunter, “I
shall decline another chance.   My shoulder is yet weak, I find. ”

Elizabeth regarded his manner, and thought that she could discern a
tinge on his cheek that spoke the shame of conscious poverty.   She
said no more, but suffered her own champion to make a trial.   Although
Natty Bumppo had certainly made hundreds of more momentous shots at
his enemies or his game, yet he never exerted himself more to excel. 
He raised his piece three several times: once to get his range; once
to calculate his distance; and once because the bird, alarmed by the
death-like stillness, turned its head quickly to examine its foes. 
But the fourth time he fired.   The smoke, the report, and the
momentary shock prevented most of the spectators from instantly
knowing the result; but Elizabeth, when she saw her champion drop the
end of his rifle in the snow and open his mouth in one of its silent
laughs, and then proceed very coolly to recharge his piece, knew that
he had been successful.   The boys rushed to the mark, and lifted the
turkey on high, lifeless, and with nothing but the remnant of a head. 
“Bring in the creatur’,” said Leather-Stocking, “and put it at the
feet of the lady.   I was her deputy in the matter, and the bird is her
property. ”

“And a good deputy you have proved yourself,” returned Elizabeth—” so
good, Cousin Richard, that I would advise you to remember his
qualities. ” She paused, and the gayety that beamed on her face gave
place to a more serious earnestness.   She even blushed a little as she
turned to the young hunter, and with the charm of a woman’s manner
added: “But it was only to see an exhibition of the far-famed skill of
Leather-Stocking, that I tried my fortunes.   Will you, sir, accept the
bird as a small peace offering for the hurt that prevented your own
success?”

The expression with which the youth received this present was
indescribable, He appeared to yield to the blandishment of her air, in
opposition to a strong inward impulse to the contrary.   He bowed, and
raised the victim silently from her feet, but continued silent. 

Elizabeth handed the black a piece of silver as a remuneration for his
loss, which had some effect in again unbending his muscles, and then
expressed to her companion her readiness to return homeward. 

“Wait a minute, Cousin Bess,” cried Richard; “there is an uncertainty
about the rules of this sport that it is proper I should remove.   If
you will appoint a committee, gentlemen, to wait on me this morning, I
will draw up in writing a set of regulations—’ He stopped, with some
indignation, for at that instant a hand was laid familiarly on the
shoulder of the High Sheriff of —. 

“A merry Christmas to you, Cousin Dickon,” said Judge Temple, who had
approached the party unperceived: “I must have a vigilant eye to my
daughter, sir, if you are to be seized daily with these gallant fits. 
I admire the taste which would introduce a lady to such scenes!”

“It is her own perversity, ‘Duke,” cried the disappointed sheriff, who
felt the loss of the first salutation as grievously as many a man
would a much greater misfortune; “and I must say that she comes
honestly by it.   I led her out to show her the improvements, but away
she scampered, through the snow, at the first sound of fire-arms, the
same as if she had been brought up in a camp, instead of a first-rate
boarding-school.   I do think, Judge Temple, that such dangerous
amusements should be suppressed, by statute; nay, I doubt whether they
are not already indict able at common law. ”

“Well, sir, as you are sheriff of the county, it becomes your duty to
examine into the matter,” returned the smiling Marmaduke, “I perceive
that Bess has executed her commission, and I hope it met with a
favorable reception. ” Richard glanced his eye at the packet which he
held in his hand, and the slight anger produced by disappointment
vanished instantly. 

“Ah! ‘Duke, my dear cousin,” he said, “step a little on one side; I
have something I would say to you. ”

Marmaduke complied, and the sheriff led him to a little distance in
the bushes, and continued: “First, ‘Duke, let me thank you for your
friendly interest with the Council and the Governor, without which I
am confident that the greatest merit would avail but little.   But we
are sisters’ children—we are sisters’ children, and you may use me
like one of your horses; ride me or drive me, ‘Duke, I am wholly
yours.   But in my humble opinion, this young companion of Leather-
Stocking requires looking after.   He has a very dangerous propensity
for turkey. ”

“Leave him to my management, Dickon,” said the Judge, “and I will cure
his appetite by indulgence.   It is with him that I would speak.   Let
us rejoin the sportsmen. ”

CHAPTER 18. 

“Poor wretch! the mother that him bare,
If she had been in presence there,
In his wan face, and sunburnt hair,
She had not known her child, ‘—Scott. 

It diminished, in no degree, the effect produced by the conversation
which passed between Judge Temple and the I young hunter, that the
former took the arm of his daughter and drew it through his own, when
he advanced from the spot whither Richard had led him to that where
the youth was standing, leaning on his rifle, and contemplating the
dead bird at his feet.   The presence of Marmaduke did not interrupt
the sports, which were resumed by loud and clamorous disputes
concerning the conditions of a chance that involved the life of a bird
of much inferior quality to the last.   Leather-Stocking and Mohegan
had alone drawn aside to their youthful companion; and, although in
the immediate vicinity of such a throng, the following conversation
was heard only by those who were interested in it. 

“I have greatly injured you, Mr.  Edwards,” said the Judge; but the
sudden and inexplicable start with which the person spoken to received
this unexpected address, caused him to pause a moment.   As no answer
was given, and the strong emotion exhibited in the countenance of the
youth gradually passed away, he continued: “But fortunately it is in
some measure in my power to compensate you for what I have done.   My
kinsman, Richard Jones, has received an appointment that will, in
future, deprive me of his assistance, and leave me, just now,
destitute of one who might greatly aid me with his pen.   Your manner,
notwithstanding appearances, is a sufficient proof of your education,
nor will thy shoulder suffer thee to labor, for some time to come. ”
(Marmaduke insensibly relapsed into the language of the Friends as he
grew warm. ) “My doors are open to thee, my young friend, for in this
infant country we harbor no suspicions; little offering to tempt the
cupidity of the evil-disposed.   Be come my assistant, for at least a
season, and receive such compensation as thy services will deserve. ”

There was nothing in the manner of the offer of the Judge to justify
the reluctance, amounting nearly to loathing, with which the youth
listened to his speech; but, after a powerful effort for self-command,
he replied:

“I would serve you, sir, or any other man, for an honest support, for
I do not affect to conceal that my necessities are very great, even
beyond what appearances would indicate; but I am fearful that such new
duties would interfere too much with more important business; so that
I must decline your offer, and depend on my rifle, as before, for
subsistence. ”

Richard here took occasion to whisper to the young lady, who had
shrunk a little from the foreground of the picture:

“This, you see, Cousin Bess, is the natural reluctance of a half-breed
to leave the savage state.   Their attachment to a wandering life is, I
verily believe, unconquerable. ”

“It is a precarious life,” observed Marmaduke, without hearing the
sheriff’s observation, “and one that brings more evils with it than
present suffering.   Trust me, young friend, my experience is greater
than thine, when I tell thee that the unsettled life of these hunters
is of vast disadvantage for temporal purposes, and it totally removes
one from the influence of more sacred things. ”

“No, no, Judge,” interrupted the Leather-Stocking, who was hitherto
unseen, or disregarded; “take him into your shanty in welcome, but
tell him truth.   I have lived in the woods for forty long years, and
have spent five at a time without seeing the light of a clearing
bigger than a window in the trees; and I should like to know where
you’ll find a man, in his sixty-eighth year, who can get an easier
living, for all your betterments and your deer laws; and, as for
honesty, or doing what’s right between man and man, I’ll not turn my
back to the longest-winded deacon on your Patent. ”

“Thou art an exception, Leather-Stocking,” returned the Judge, nodding
good-naturedly at the hunter; “for thou hast a temperance unusual in
thy class, and a hardihood exceeding thy years.   But this youth is
made of I materials too precious to be wasted in the forest—I entreat
thee to join my family, if it be but till thy arm is healed.   My
daughter here, who is mistress of my dwelling, wilt tell thee that
thou art welcome. ”

“Certainly,” said Elizabeth, whose earnestness was a little checked by
female reserve.   “The unfortunate would be welcome at any time, but
doubly so when we feel that we have occasioned the evil ourselves,”
“Yes,” said Richard, “and if you relish turkey, young man, there are
plenty in the coops, and of the best kind, I can assure you. ”

Finding himself thus ably seconded, Marmaduke pushed his advantage to
the utmost.   He entered into a detail of the duties that would attend
the situation, and circumstantially mentioned the reward, and all
those points which are deemed of importance among men of business. 
The youth listened in extreme agitation.   There was an evident contest
in his feelings; at times he appeared to wish eagerly for the change,
and then again the incomprehensible expression of disgust would cross
his features, like a dark cloud obscuring a noonday sun . 

The Indian, in whose manner the depression of self-abasement was most
powerfully exhibited, listened to the offers of the Judge with an
interest that increased with each syllable.   Gradually he drew nigher
to the group and when, with his keen glance, he detected the most
marked evidence of yielding in the countenance of his young companion,
he changed at once from his attitude and look of shame to the front of
an Indian warrior, and moving, with great dignity, closer to the
parties, he spoke. 

“Listen to your father,” he said; “his words are old.   Let the Young
Eagle and the Great Land Chief eat together; let them sleep, without
fear, near each other.   The children of Miquon love not blood: they
are just, and will do right.   The sun must rise and set often, be fore
men can make one family; it is not the work of a day, but of many
winters.   The Mingoes and the Delawares are born enemies; their blood
can never mix in the wigwam; it never will run in the same stream in
the battle.   What makes the brother of Miquon and the Young Eagle
foes? They are of the same tribe; their fathers and mothers are one. 
Learn to wait, my son, you are a Delaware, and an Indian warrior knows
how to be patient. ”

This figurative address seemed to have great weight with the young
man, who gradually yielded to the representations of Marmaduke, and
eventually consented to his proposal.   It was, however, to be an
experiment only; and, if either of the parties thought fit to rescind
the engagement, it was left at his option so to do.   The remarkable
and ill-concealed reluctance of the youth to accept of an offer, which
most men in his situation would consider as an unhoped-for elevation,
occasioned no little surprise in those to whom he was a stranger; and
it left a slight impression to his disadvantage.   When the parties
separated, they very naturally made the subject the topic of a
conversation, which we shall relate; first commencing with the Judge,
his daughter, and Richard, who were slowly pursuing the way back to
the mansion-house. 

“I have surely endeavored to remember the holy man dates of our
Redeemer, when he bids us ‘love them who despitefully use you,’ in my
intercourse with this incomprehensible boy,” said Marmaduke.   “I know
not what there is in my dwelling to frighten a lad of his years,
unless it may he thy presence and visage, Bess,”

“No, no,” said Richard, with great simplicity, “it is not Cousin Bess. 
But when did you ever know a half-breed, ‘Duke, who could bear
civilization? For that mat ter, they are worse than the savages
themselves! Did you notice how knock-kneed he stood, Elizabeth, and
what a wild look he had in his eyes?”

“I heeded not his eyes, nor his knees, which would be all the better
for a little humbling.   Really, my dear sir, I think you did exercise
the Christian virtue of patience to the utmost.   I was disgusted with
his airs, long before he consented to make one of our family.   Truly
we are much honored by the association! In what apartment is he to be
placed, sir; and at what table is he to receive his nectar and
ambrosia?”

“With Benjamin and Remarkable,” interrupted Mr.  Jones; “you sorely
would not make the youth eat with the blacks! He is part Indian, it is
true; but the natives hold the negroes in great contempt.   No, no; he
would starve before he would break a crust with the negroes. ”

“I am but too happy, Dickon, to tempt him to eat with ourselves,” said
Marmaduke, “to think of offering even the indignity you propose. ”

“Then, sir,” said Elizabeth, with an air that was slightly affected,
as if submitting to her father’s orders in opposition to her own will,
“it is your pleasure that he be a gentleman. ”

“Certainly; he is to fill the station of one.   Let him receive the
treatment that is due to his place, until we find him unworthy of it. ”

“Well, well, ‘Duke,” cried the sheriff, “ you will find it no easy
matter to make a gentleman of him.   The old proverb says that ‘it
takes three generations to make a gentleman. ’ There was my father whom
everybody knew my grandfather was an M. D. , and his father a D. D. ; and
his father came from England, I never could come at the truth of his
origin; but he was either a great mer chant in London, or a great
country lawyer, or the youngest son of a bishop. ”

“Here is a true American genealogy for you,” said Marmaduke, laughing. 
“It does very well till you get across the water, where, as everything
is obscure, it is certain to deal in the superlative.   You are sure
that your English progenitor was great, Dickon, whatever his
profession might have been?”

“To be sure I am,” returned the other.   “I have heard my old aunt talk
of him by the month.   We are of a good family, Judge Temple, and have
never filled any but honorable stations in life. ”

“I marvel that you should be satisfied with so scanty a provision of
gentility in the olden time, Dickon.   Most of the American
genealogists commence their traditions like the stories for children,
with three brothers, taking especial care that one of the triumvirate
shall be the pro genitor of any of the same name who may happen to be
better furnished with worldly gear than themselves.   But, here, all
are equal who know how to conduct themselves with propriety; and
Oliver Edwards comes into my family on a footing with both the high
sheriff and the judge. ”

“Well, ‘Duke, I call this democracy, not republicanism; but I say
nothing; only let him keep within the law, or I shall show him that
the freedom of even this country is under wholesome restraint. ”

“Surely, Dickon, you will not execute till I condemn! But what says
Bess to the new inmate? We must pay a deference to the ladies in this
matter, after all. ”

“Oh, sir!” returned Elizabeth, “I believe I am much like a certain
Judge Temple in this particular—not easily to be turned from my
opinion.   But, to be serious, although I must think the introduction
of a demi-savage into the family a somewhat startling event,
whomsoever you think proper to countenance may be sure of my respect. ”

The Judge drew her arm more closely in his own and smiled, while
Richard led the way through the gate of the little court-yard in the
rear of the dwelling, dealing out his ambiguous warnings with his
accustomed loquacity. 

On the other hand, the foresters—for the three hunters,
notwithstanding their difference in character, well deserved this
common name—pursued their course along the skirts of the village in
silence.   It was not until they had reached the lake, and were moving
over its frozen surface toward the foot of the mountain, where the hut
stood, that the youth exclaimed:

“Who could have foreseen this a month since! I have consented to serve
Marmaduke Temple—to be an inmate in the dwelling of the greatest enemy
of my race; yet what better could I do? The servitude cannot be long;
and, when the motive for submitting to it ceases to exist, I will
shake it off like the dust from my feet. ”

“Is he a Mingo, that you will call him enemy?” said Mohegan.   “The
Delaware warrior sits still, and waits the time of the Great Spirit. 
He is no woman, to cry out like a child. ”

“Well, I’m mistrustful, John,” said Leather-Stocking, in whose air
there had been, during the whole business, a strong expression of
doubt and uncertainty.   “They say that there’s new laws in the land,
and I’m sartin that there’s new ways in the mountains.   One hardly
knows the lakes and streams, they’ve altered the country so much.   I
must say I’m mistrustful of such smooth speakers; for I've known the
whites talk fair when they wanted the Indian lands most.   This I will
say, though I’m a white myself, and was born nigh York, and of honest
parents, too. ”

“I will submit,” said the youth; “I will forget who I am.   Cease to
remember, old Mohegan, that I am the descendant of a Delaware chief,
who once was master of these noble hills, these beautiful vales, and
of this water, over which we tread.   Yes, yes; I will become his bonds
man—his slave, Is it not an honorable servitude, old man?”

“Old man!” repeated the Indian solemnly, and pausing in his walk, as
usual, when much excited; “yes, John is old.   Son of my brother! if
Mohegan was young, when would his rifle be still? Where would the deer
hide, and he not find him? But John is old; his hand is the hand of a
squaw; his tomahawk is a hatchet; brooms and baskets are his enemies—
he strikes no other.   Hunger and old age come together.   See Hawk-eye!
when young, he  would go days and eat nothing; but should he not put
the brush on the fire now, the blaze would go out.   Take the son of
Miquon by the hand, and he will help you. ”

“I’m not the man I was, I’ll own, Chingachgook,” returned the Leather-
Stocking; “but I can go without a meal now, on occasion.   When we
tracked the Iroquois through the ‘Beech-woods,’ they drove the game
afore them, for I hadn’t a morsel to eat from Monday morning come
Wednesday sundown, and then I shot as fat a buck, on the Pennsylvany
line, as ever mortal laid eyes on.   It would have done your heart good
to have seen the Delaware eat; for I was out scouting and skrimmaging
with their tribe at the time.   Lord! The Indians, lad, lay still, and
just waited till Providence should send them their game, but I foraged
about, and put a deer up, and put him down too, afore he had made a
dozen jumps.   I was too weak and too ravenous to stop for his flesh,
so I took a good drink of his blood, and the Indians ate of his meat
raw.   John was there, and John knows.   But then starvation would be
apt to be too much for me now, I will own, though I’m no great eater
at any time. ”

“Enough is said, my friend,” cried the youth.   “I feel that everywhere
the sacrifice is required at my hands, and it shall be made; but say
no more, I entreat you; I can not bear this subject now. ”

His companions were silent; and they soon reached the hut, which they
entered, after removing certain complicated and ingenious fastenings,
that were put there apparently to guard a property of but very little
value.   Immense piles of snow lay against the log walls of this
secluded habitation on one side; while fragments of small trees, and
branches of oak and chestnut, that had been torn from their parent
stems by the winds, were thrown into a pile on the other.   A small
column of smoke rose through a chimney of sticks, cemented with clay,
along the side of the rock, and had marked the snow above with its
dark tinges, in a wavy line, from the point of emission to an other,
where the hill receded from the brow of a precipice, and held a soil
that nourished trees of a gigantic growth, that overhung the little
bottom beneath. 

The remainder of the day passed off as such days are commonly spent in
a new country.   The settlers thronged to the academy again, to witness
the second effort of Mr.  Grant; and Mohegan was one of his hearers. 
But, not withstanding the divine fixed his eyes intently on the Indian
when he invited his congregation to advance to the table, the shame of
last night’s abasement was yet too keen in the old chief to suffer him
to move. 

When the people were dispersing, the clouds that had been gathering
all the morning were dense and dirty, and before half of the curious
congregation had reached their different cabins, that were placed in
every glen and hollow of the mountains, or perched on the summits of
the hills themselves, the rain was falling in torrents.   The dark
edges of the stumps began to exhibit themselves, as the snow settled
rapidly; the fences of logs and brush, which before had been only
traced by long lines of white mounds, that ran across the valley and
up the mountains, peeped out from their covering, and the black stubs
were momentarily becoming more distinct, as large masses of snow and
ice fell from their sides, under the influence of the thaw. 

Sheltered in the warm hall of her father’s comfortable mansion,
Elizabeth, accompanied by Louisa Grant, looked abroad with admiration
at the ever-varying face of things without.   Even the village, which
had just before been glittering with the color of the frozen element,
reluctantly dropped its mask, and the houses exposed their dark roofs
and smoked chimneys.   The pines shook off the covering of snow, and
everything seemed to he assuming its proper hues with a transition
that bordered on the supernatural. 

CHAPTER 19. 

“And yet, poor Edwin was no vulgar boy. ”—Beattie. 

The close of Christmas Day, A. D.  1793, was tempestuous, but
comparatively warm.   When darkness had again hid the objects in the
village from the gaze of Elizabeth, she turned from the window, where
she had remained while the least vestige of light lingered over the
tops of the dark pines, with a curiosity that was rather excited than
appeased by the passing glimpses of woodland scenery that she had
caught during the day. 

With her arm locked in that of Miss Grant, the young mistress of the
mansion walked slowly up and down the hall, musing on scenes that were
rapidly recurring to her memory, and possibly dwelling, at times, in
the sanctuary of her thoughts, on the strange occurrences that had led
to the introduction to her father’s family of one whose Manners so
singularly contradicted the inferences to be drawn from his situation. 
The expiring heat of the apartment—for its great size required a day
to reduce its temperature—had given to her cheeks a bloom that
exceeded their natural color, while the mild and melancholy features
of Louisa were brightened with a faint tinge, that, like the hectic of
disease, gave a painful interest to her beauty. 

The eyes of the gentlemen, who were yet seated around the rich wines
of Judge Temple, frequently wandered from the table, that was placed
at one end of the hall, to the forms that were silently moving over
its length.   Much mirth, and that, at times, of a boisterous kind,
proceeded from the mouth of Richard; but Major Hartmann was not yet
excited to his pitch of merriment, and Marmaduke respected the
presence of his clerical guest too much to indulge in even the
innocent humor that formed no small ingredient in his character. 

Such were, and such continued to be, the pursuits of the party, for
half an hour after the shutters were closed, and candles were placed
in various parts of the hall, as substitutes for departing daylight. 
The appearance of Benjamin, staggering under the burden of an armful
of wood, was the first interruption to the scene. 

“How now, Master Pump!” roared the newly appointed sheriff; “is there
not warmth enough in ‘Duke’s best Madeira to keep up the animal heat
through this thaw? Remember, old boy, that the Judge is particular
with his beech and maple, beginning to dread already a scarcity of the
precious articles.   Ha! ha! ha! ‘Duke, you are a good, warm-hearted
relation, I will own, as in duty bound, but you have some queer
notions about you, after all.   ‘Come, let us be jolly, and cast away
folly. ”

The notes gradually sank into a hum, while the major-domo threw down
his load, and, turning to his interrogator with an air of earnestness,
replied:

“Why, look you, Squire Dickon, mayhap there’s a warm latitude round
about the table there, thof it’s not the stuff to raise the heat in my
body, neither; the raal Jamaiky being the only thing to do that,
besides good wood, or some such matter as Newcastle coal.   But, if I
know anything of the weather, d’ye see, it’s time to be getting all
snog, and for putting the ports in and stirring the fires a bit. 
Mayhap I’ve not followed the seas twenty-seven years, and lived
another seven in these here woods, for nothing, gemmen. ”

“Why, does it bid fair for a change in the weather, Benjamin?”
inquired the master of the house. 

“There’s a shift of wind, your honor,” returned the steward; “and when
there’s a shift of wind, you may look for a change in this here
climate.   I was aboard of one of Rodney’s fleet, dye see, about the
time we licked De Grasse, Mounsheer Lor Quaw’s countryman, there; and
the wind was here at the south’ard and east'ard; and I was below,
mixing a toothful of hot stuff for the captain of marines, who dined,
dye see, in the cabin, that there very same day; and I suppose he
wanted to put out the captain’s fire with a gun-room ingyne; and so,
just as I got it to my own liking, after tasting pretty often, for the
soldier was difficult to please, slap came the foresail agin’ the
mast, whiz went the ship round on her heel, like a whirligig.   And a
lucky thing was it that our helm was down; for as she gathered
starnway she paid off, which was more than every ship in the fleet
did, or could do.   But she strained herself in the trough of the sea,
and she shipped a deal of water over her quarter.   I never swallowed
so much clear water at a time in my life as I did then, for I was
looking up the after-hatch at the instant. ”

“I wonder, Benjamin, that you did not die with a dropsy!” said
Marmaduke. 

“I mought, Judge,” said the old tar, with a broad grin; “but there was
no need of the medicine chest for a cure; for, as I thought the brew
was spoilt for the marine’s taste, and there was no telling when
another sea might come and spoil it for mine.   I finished the mug on
the spot.  So then all hands was called to the pumps, and there we
began to ply the pumps—”

“Well, but the weather?” interrupted Marmaduke;

“what of the weather without doors?”

“Why here the wind has been all day at the south, and now there’s a
lull, as if the last blast was out of the bellows; and there’s a
streak along the mountains, to the northard, that, just now, wasn’t
wider than the bigness of your hand; and then the clouds drive afore
it as you’d brail a mainsail, and the stars are heaving in sight, like
so many lights and beacons, put there to warn us to pile on the wood;
and, if so be that I’m a judge of weather, it’s getting to be time to
build on a fire, or you'll have half of them there porter bottles, and
them dimmyjohns of wine, in the locker here, breaking with the frost,
afore the morning watch is called. ”

“Thou art a prudent sentinel,” said the Judge.   “Act thy pleasure with
the forests, for this night at feast. ”

Benjamin did as he was ordered; nor had two hours elapsed, before the
prudence of his precautions became very visible.   The south wind had,
indeed, blown itself cut, and it was succeeded by the calmness that
usually gave warning of a serious change in the weather.   Long before
the family retired to rest, the cold had become cuttingly severe; and
when Monsieur Le Quoi sallied c forth under a bright moon, to seek his
own abode, he was compelled to beg a blanket, in which he might
envelop c his form, in addition to the numerous garments that his
sagacity had provided for the occasion.  The divine and s his daughter
remained as inmates of the mansion-house during the night, and the
excess of last night’s merriment c induced the gentlemen to make an
early retreat to their several apartments, Long before midnight, the
whole s family were invisible. 

Elizabeth and her friend had not yet lost their senses in sleep, and
the howlings of the northwest wind were heard around the buildings,
and brought with them that exquisite sense of comfort that is ever
excited under such circumstances, in an apartment where the fire has
not yet ceased to glimmer, and curtains, and shutters, and feathers
unite to preserve the desired temperature.   Once, just as her eyes had
opened, apparently in the last stage of drowsiness, the roaring winds
brought with them a long and plaintive howl, that seemed too wild for
a dog, and yet resembled the cries of that faithful animal, when night
awakens his vigilance, and gives sweetness and solemnity to its
charms.   The form of Louis Grant instinctively pressed nearer to that
of the young heiress, who, finding her companion was yet awake, said
in a low tone, as if afraid to break a charm with her voice:

“Those distant cries are plaintive, and even beautiful.   Can they be
the hounds from the hut of Leather-Stocking?”

“They are wolves, who have ventured from the mountain, on the lake,”
whispered Louisa, “and who are only kept from the village by the
lights.   One night, since we have been here, hunger drove them to our
very door.   Oh, what a dreadful night it was! But the riches of Judge
Temple have given him too many safeguards, to leave room for fear in
this house. ”

“The enterprise of Judge Temple is taming the very forests!” exclaimed
Elizabeth, throwing off the covering, and partly rising in the bed. 
“How rapidly is civilization treading on the foot of Nature!” she
continued, as her eye glanced over not only the comforts, hut the
luxuries of her apartment, and her ear again listened to the distant. 
but often repeated howls from the lake.   Finding, how-ever, that the
timidity of her companion rendered the sounds painful to her,
Elizabeth resumed her place, and soon forgot the changes in the
country, with those in her own condition, in a deep sleep. 

The following morning, the noise of the female servant, who entered
the apartment to light the fire, awoke the females.   They arose, and
finished the slight preparations I of their toilets in a clear, cold
atmosphere, that penetrated through all the defences of even Miss
Temple’s warm room.   When Elizabeth was attired, she approached a
window and drew its curtain, and throwing open its shutters she
endeavored to look abroad on the village and the lake.   But a thick
covering of frost on the glass, while it admitted the light, shut out
the view.   She raised the sash, and then, indeed, a glorious scene met
her delighted eye. 

The lake had exchanged its covering of unspotted snow for a face of
dark ice, that reflected the rays of the rising sun like a polished
mirror.   The houses clothed in a dress of the same description, but
which, owing to its position, shone like bright steel; while the
enormous icicles that were pendent from every roof caught the
brilliant light, apparently throwing it from one to the other, as each
glittered, on the side next the luminary, with a golden lustre that
melted away, on its opposite, into the dusky shades of a background. 
But it was the appearance of the boundless forests that covered the
hills as they rose in the distance, one over the other, that most
attracted the gaze of Miss Temple.   The huge branches of the pines and
hemlocks bent with the weight of the ice they supported, while their
summits rose above the swelling tops of the oaks, beeches, and maples,
like spires of burnished silver issuing from domes of the same
material.   The limits of the view, in the west, were marked by an
undulating outline of bright light, as if, reversing the order of
nature, numberless suns might momentarily he expected to heave above
the horizon.   In the foreground of the picture, along the shores of
the lake, and near to the village, each tree seemed studded with
diamonds.   Even the sides of the mountains where the rays of the sun
could not yet fall, were decorated with a glassy coat, that presented
every gradation of brilliancy, from the first touch of the luminary to
the dark foliage of the hemlock, glistening through its coat of
crystal.   In short, the whole view was one scene of quivering
radiancy, as lake, mountains, village, and woods, each emitted a
portion of light, tinged with its peculiar hue, and varied by its
position and its magnitude. 

“See!” cried Elizabeth; “see, Louisa; hasten to the window, and
observe the miraculous change!”

Miss Grant complied; and, after bending for a moment in silence from
the opening, she observed, in a low tone, as if afraid to trust the
sound of her voice:

“The change is indeed wonderful! I am surprised that he should be able
to effect it so soon. ”

Elizabeth turned in amazement, to hear so skeptical a sentiment from
one educated like her companion; but was surprised to find that,
instead of looking at the view, the mild blue eyes of Miss Grant were
dwelling on the form of a well-dressed young man, who was standing –
before the door of the building, in earnest conversation with her
father.   A second look was necessary before she was able to recognize
the person of the young hunter in a plain, but assuredly the ordinary,
garb of a gentleman. 

“Everything in this magical country seems to border on the
marvellous,” said Elizabeth; “and, among all the changes, this is
certainly not the least wonderful, The actors are as unique as the
scenery. ”

Miss Grant colored and drew in her head. 

“I am a simple country girl, Miss Temple, and I am afraid you will
find me but a poor companion,” she said.   “I—I am not sure that I
understand all you say.   But I really thought that you wished me to
notice the alteration in Mr.  Edwards, Is it not more wonderful when we
recollect his origin? They say he is part Indian. ”

“He is a genteel savage; but let us go down, and give the sachem his
tea; for I suppose he is a descendant of King Philip, if not a
grandson of Pocahontas. ”

The ladies were met in the hall by Judge Temple, who took his daughter
aside to apprise her of that alteration in the appearance of their new
inmate, with which she was already acquainted. 

“He appears reluctant to converse on his former situation,” continued
Marmaduke “but I gathered from his discourse, as is apparent from his
manner, that he has seen better days; and I am really inclining to the
opinion of Richard, as to his origin; for it was no unusual thing for
the Indian agents to rear their children in a laudable manner, and—”

“Very well, my dear sir,” interrupted his daughter, laughing and
averting her eyes; “it is all well enough, I dare say; but, as I do
not understand a word of the Mohawk language he must be content to
speak English; and as for his behavior, I trust to your discernment to
control it. ”

“Ay! but, Bess,” cried the judge, detaining her gently by the hand,
“nothing must be said to him of his past life.   This he has begged
particularly of me, as a favor, He is, perhaps, a little soured, just
now, with his wounded arm; the injury seems very light, and another
time he may be more communicative,”

“Oh! I am not much troubled, sir, with that laudable thirst after
knowledge that is called curiosity.   I shall believe him to he the
child of Corn-stalk, or Corn-planter, or some other renowned
chieftain; possibly of the Big Snake himself; and shall treat him as
such until he sees fit to shave his good-looking head, borrow some
half-dozen pair of my best earrings, shoulder his rifle again, and
disappear as suddenly as he made his entrance.   So come, my dear sir,
and let us not forget the rites of hospitality, for the short time he
is to remain with us. ”

Judge Temple smiled at the playfulness of his child, and taking her
arm they entered the breakfast parlor, where the young hunter was
seated with an air that showed his determination to domesticate
himself in the family with as little parade as possible. 

Such were the incidents that led to this extraordinary increase in the
family of Judge Temple, where, having once established the youth, the
subject of our tale requires us to leave him for a time, to pursue
with diligence and intelligence the employments that were assigned him
by Marmaduke. 

Major Hartmann made his customary visit, and took his leave of the
party for the next three months.   Mr.  Grant was compelled to be absent
most of his time, in remote parts of the country, and his daughter
became almost a constant visitor at the mansion-house.   Richard
entered, with his constitutional eagerness, on the duties of his new
office; and, as Marmaduke was much employed with the constant
applications of adventures for farms, the winter passed swiftly away. 
The lake was the principal scene f or the amusements of the young
people; where the ladies, in their one-horse cutter, driven by
Richard, and attended, when the snow would admit of it, by young Ed
wards on his skates, spent many hours taking the benefit of exercise
in the clear air of the hills.   The reserve of the youth gradually
gave way to time and his situation, though it was still evident, to a
close observer, that he had frequent moments of bitter and intense
feeling. 

Elizabeth saw many large openings appear in the sides of the mountains
during the three succeeding months, where different settlers had, in
the language of the country “made their pitch,” while the numberless
sleighs that passed through the village, loaded with wheat and barrels
of potashes, afforded a clear demonstration that all these labors were
not undertaken in vain.   In short, the whole country was exhibiting
the bustle of a thriving settlement, where the highways were thronged
with sleighs, bearing piles of rough household furniture, studded,
here and there, with the smiling faces of women and children, happy in
the excitement of novelty; or with loads of produce, hastening to the
common market at Albany, that served as so many snares to induce the
emigrants to enter into those wild mountains in search of competence
and happiness. 

The village was alive with business, the artisans in creasing in
wealth with the prosperity of the country, and each day witnessing
some nearer approach to the manners and usages of an old-settled town. 
The man who carried the mail or “the post,” as he was called, talked
much of running a stage, and, once or twice during the winter, he was
seen taking a single passenger, in his cutter, through the snow-banks,
toward the Mohawk, along which a regular vehicle glided, semi-weekly,
with the velocity of lightning, and under the direction of a knowing
whip from the “down countries,” Toward spring, divers families, who
had been into the “old States” to see their relatives, returned in
time to save the snow, frequently bringing with them whole
neighborhoods, who were tempted by their representations to leave the
farms of Connecticut and Massachusetts, to make a trial of fortune in
the woods. 

During all this time, Oliver Edwards, whose sudden elevation excited
no surprise in that changeful country, was earnestly engaged in the
service of Marmaduke, during the days; but his nights were often spent
in the hut of Leather-Stocking.   The intercourse between the three
hunters was maintained with a certain air of mystery, it is true, but
with much zeal and apparent interest to all the parties.   Even Mohegan
seldom came to the mansion-house, and Natty never; but Edwards sought
every leisure moment to visit his former abode, from which he would
often return in the gloomy hours of night.   through the snow, or, if
detained beyond the time at which the family retired to rest, with the
morning sun .   These visits certainly excited much speculation in those
to whom they were known, but no comments were made, excepting
occasionally in whispers from Richard, who would say:

“It is not at all remarkable; a half-breed can never be weaned from
the savage ways—and, for one of his lineage, the boy is much nearer
civilization than could, in reason, be expected. ”

CHAPTER 20. 

“Away! nor let me loiter in my song,
For we have many a mountain-path to tread. ”—Byron. 

As the spring gradually approached, the immense piles of snow that, by
alternate thaws and frosts, and repeated storms, had obtained a
firmness which threatened a tiresome durability, began to yield to the
influence of milder breezes and a warmer sun .   The gates of heaven at
times seemed to open, and a bland air diffused itself over the earth,
when animate and inanimate nature would awaken, and, for a few hours,
the gayety of spring shone in every eye and smiled on every field. 
But the shivering blasts from the north would carry their chill
influence over the scene again, and the dark and gloomy clouds that
intercepted the rays of the sun were not more cold and dreary than the
reaction.   These struggles between the seasons became daily more
frequent, while the earth, like a victim to contention, slowly lost
the animated brilliancy of winter, without obtaining the aspect of
spring. 

Several weeks were consumed in this cheerless manner, during which the
inhabitants of the country gradually changed their pursuits from the
social and bustling movements of the time of snow to the laborious and
domestic engagements of the coming season, The village was no longer
thronged with visitors; the trade that had enlivened the shops for
several months, began to disappear; the highways lost their shining
coats of beaten snow in impassable sloughs, and were deserted by the
gay and noisy travellers who, in sleighs, had, during the winter,
glided along their windings; and, in short, everything seemed
indicative of a mighty change, not only in the earth, but in those who
derived their sources of comfort and happiness from its bosom. 

The younger members of the family in the mansion house, of which
Louisa Grant was now habitually one, were by no means indifferent
observers of these fluctuating and tardy changes.   While the snow
rendered the roads passable, they had partaken largely in the
amusements of the winter, which included not only daily rides over the
mountains, and through every valley within twenty miles of them, but
divers ingenious and varied sources of pleasure on the bosom of their
frozen lake.   There had been excursions in the equipage of Richard,
when with his four horses he had outstripped the winds, as it flew
over the glassy ice which invariably succeeded a thaw.   Then the
exciting and dangerous “whirligig” would be suffered to possess its
moment of notice.   Cutters, drawn by a single horse, and handsleds,
impelled by the gentlemen on skates, would each in turn be used; and,
in short, every source of relief against the tediousness of a winter
in the mountains was resorted to by the family, Elizabeth was
compelled to acknowledge to her father, that the season, with the aid
of his library, was much less irksome than she had anticipated. 

As exercise in the open air was in some degree necessary to the habits
of the family, when the constant recurrence of frosts and thaws
rendered the roads, which were dangerous at the most favorable times,
utterly impassable for wheels, saddle-horses were used as substitutes
for other conveyances.   Mounted on small and sure-footed beasts, the
ladies would again attempt the passages of the mountains and penetrate
into every retired glen where the enterprise of a settler had induced
him to establish himself.   In these excursions they were attended by
some one or all of the gentlemen of the family, as their different
pursuits admitted.   Young Edwards was hourly becoming more
familiarized to his situation, and not infrequently mingled in the
parties with an unconcern and gayety that for a short time would expel
all unpleasant recollections from his mind.   Habit, and the buoyancy
of youth, seemed to be getting the ascendency over the secret causes
of his uneasiness; though there were moments when the same remarkable
expression of disgust would cross his intercourse with Marmaduke, that
had distinguished their conversations in the first days of their
acquaintance. 

It was at the close of the month of March, that the sheriff succeeded
in persuading his cousin and her young friend to accompany him in a
ride to a hill that was said to overhang the lake in a manner peculiar
to itself. 

“Besides, Cousin Bess,” continued the indefatigable Richard, “we will
stop and see the ‘sugar bush’ of Billy Kirby; he is on the east end of
the Ransom lot, making sugar for Jared Ransom.   There is not a better
hand over a kettle in the county than that same Kirby.   You remember,
‘Duke, that I had him his first season in our camp; and it is not a
wonder that he knows something of his trade. ”

“He’s a good chopper, is Billy,” observed Benjamin, who held the
bridle of the horse while the sheriff mounted; “and he handles an axe
much the same as a forecastleman does his marling-spike, or a tailor
his goose.   They say he’ll lift a potash-kettle off the arch alone,
though I can’t say that I’ve ever seen him do it with my own eyes; but
that is the say.   And I’ve seen sugar of his making, which, maybe,
wasn’t as white as an old topgallant sail, but which my friend,
Mistress Pettibones, within there, said had the true molasses smack to
it; and you are not the one, Squire Dickens, to be told that Mistress
Remarkable has a remarkable tooth for sweet things in her nut-
grinder. ”

The loud laugh that succeeded the wit of Benjamin, and in which he
participated with no very harmonious sounds himself, very fully
illustrated the congenial temper which existed between the pair.   Most
of its point was, however, lost on the rest of the party, who were
either mounting their horses or assisting the ladies at the moment. 
When all were safely in their saddles, they moved through the village
in great order.   They paused for a moment before the door of Monsieur
Le Quoi, until he could bestride his steed, and then, issuing from the
little cluster of houses, they took one of the principal of those
highways that centred in the village. 

As each night brought with it a severe frost, which the heat of the
succeeding day served to dissipate, the equestrians were compelled to
proceed singly along the margin of the road, where the turf, and
firmness of the ground, gave the horses a secure footing.   Very
trifling indications of vegetation were to he seen, the surface of the
earth presenting a cold, wet, and cheerless aspect that chilled the
blood.   The snow yet lay scattered over most of those distant
clearings that were visible in different parts of the mountains;
though here and there an opening might be seen where, as the white
covering yielded to the season, the bright and lively green of the
wheat served to enkindle the hopes of the husbandman.   Nothing could
be more marked than the contrast between the earth and the heavens;
for, while the former presented the dreary view that we have
described, a warm and invigorating sun was dispensing his heats from a
sky that contained but a solitary cloud, and through an atmosphere
that softened the colors of the sensible horizon until it shone like a
sea of blue. 

Richard led the way on this, as on all other occasions that did not
require the exercise of unusual abilities; and as he moved along, he
essayed to enliven the party with the sounds of his experienced voice. 

“This is your true sugar weather, ‘Duke,” he cried; “a frosty night
and a sunshiny day.   I warrant me that the sap runs like a mill-tail
up the maples this warm morning.   It is a pity, Judge, that you do not
introduce a little more science into the manufactory of sugar among
your tenants.   It might be done, sir, without knowing as much as Dr. 
Franklin—it might be done, Judge Temple. ”

“The first object of my solicitude, friend Jones,” returned Marmaduke,
“is to protect the sources of this great mine of comfort and wealth
from the extravagance of the people themselves.   When this important
point shall be achieved, it will be in season to turn our attention to
an improvement in the manufacture of the article, But thou knowest,
Richard, that I have already subjected our sugar to the process of the
refiner, and that the result has produced loaves as white as the snow
on yon fields, and possessing the saccharine quality in its utmost
purity. ”

“Saccharine, or turpentine, or any other 'ine, Judge Temple, you have
never made a loaf larger than a good-sized sugar-plum,” returned the
sheriff.   “Now, sir, I assert that no experiment is fairly tried,
until it be reduced to practical purposes.   If, sir, I owned a
hundred, or, for that matter, two hundred thousand acres of land, as
you do.   I would build a sugar house in the village; I would invite
learned men to an investigation of the subject—and such are easily to
be found, sir; yes, sir, they are not difficult to find—men who unite
theory with practice; and I would select a wood of young and thrifty
trees; and, instead of making loaves of the size of a lump of candy,
dam’me, ‘Duke, but I’d have them as big as a haycock. ”

“And purchase the cargo of one of those ships that they say are going
to China,” cried Elizabeth; “turn your pot ash-kettles into teacups,
the scows on the lake into saucers, bake your cake in yonder lime-
kiln, and invite the county to a tea-party.   How wonderful are the
projects of genius! Really, sir, the world is of opinion that Judge
Temple has tried the experiment fairly, though he did not cause his
loaves to be cast in moulds of the magnitude that would suit your
magnificent conceptions. ”

“You may laugh, Cousin Elizabeth—you may laugh, madam,” retorted
Richard, turning himself so much in his saddle as to face the party,
and making dignified gestures with his whip; “but I appeal to common
sense, good sense, or, what is of more importance than either, to the
sense of taste, which is one of the five natural senses, whether a big
loaf of sugar is not likely to contain a better illustration of a
proposition than such a lump as one of your Dutch women puts under her
tongue when she drinks her tea.   There are two ways of doing
everything, the right way and the wrong way.   You make sugar now, I
will admit, and you may, possibly, make loaf-sugar; but I take the
question to be, whether you make the best possible sugar, and in the
best possible loaves. ”

“Thou art very right, Richard,” observed Marmaduke, with a gravity in
his air that proved how much he was interested in the subject.   “It is
very true that we manufacture sugar, and the inquiry is quite useful,
how much? and in what manner? I hope to live to see the day when farms
and plantations shall be devoted to this branch of business.   Little
is known concerning the properties of the tree itself, the source of
all this wealth; how much it may be improved by cultivation, by the
use of the hoe and plough. ”

“Hoe and plough!” roared the sheriff; “would you set a man hoeing
round the root of a maple like this?” pointing to one of the noble
trees that occur so frequently in that part of the country.   “Hoeing
trees! are you mad, ‘Duke? This is next to hunting for coal! Poh! poh!
my dear cousin, hear reason, and leave the management of the sugar-
bush to me.   Here is Mr.  Le Quoi—he has been in the West Indies, and
has seen sugar made.   Let him give an account of how it is made there,
and you will hear the philosophy of the thing.   Well, monsieur, how is
it that you make sugar in the West Indies; anything in Judge Temples
fashion?”

The gentleman to whom this query was put was mounted on a small horse,
of no very fiery temperament, and was riding with his stirrups so
short as to bring his knees, while the animal rose a small ascent in
the wood-path they were now travelling, into a somewhat hazardous
vicinity to his chin.   There was no room for gesticulation or grace in
the delivery of his reply, for the mountain was steep and slippery;
and, although the Frenchman had an eye of uncommon magnitude on either
side of his face, they did not seem to be half competent to forewarn
him of the impediments of bushes, twigs, and fallen trees, that were
momentarily crossing his path.   With one hand employed in averting
these dangers, and the other grasping his bridle to check an untoward
speed that his horse was assuming, the native of France responded as
follows:

“Sucre! dey do make sucre in Martinique; mais—mais ce n’est pas one
tree—ah—ah—vat you call—je voudrois que ces chemins fussent au diable
- vat you call—steeck pour la promenade?”
“Cane,” said Elizabeth, smiling at the imprecation which the wary
Frenchman supposed was understood only by himself. 
“Oui, mam’selle, cane. ”
“Yes, yes,” cried Richard, “cane is the vulgar name for it, but the
real term is saccharum officinarum; and what we call the sugar, or
hard maple, is acer saccharinum.   These are the learned names,
monsieur, and are such as, doubtless, you well understand. ”

“Is this Greek or Latin, Mr.  Edwards?” whispered Elizabeth to the
youth, who was opening a passage for herself and her companions
through the bushes, “or per haps it is a still more learned language,
for an interpretation of which we must look to you. ”

The dark eye of the young man glanced toward the speaker, but its
resentful expression changed in a moment. 

“I shall remember your doubts, Miss Temple, when next I visit my old
friend Mohegan, and either his skill, or that of Leather-Stocking,
shall solve them. ”

“And are you, then, really ignorant of their language?”

“Not absolutely; but the deep learning of Mr.  Jones is more familiar
to me, or even the polite masquerade of Monsieur Le Quoi. ”

“Do you speak French?” said the lady, with quickness. 

“It is a common language with the Iroquois, and through the Canadas,”
he answered, smiling. 

“Ah! but they are Mingoes, and your enemies. ”

“It will be well for me if I have no worse,” said the youth, dashing
ahead with his horse, and putting an end to the evasive dialogue. 

The discourse, however, was maintained with great vigor by Richard,
until they reached an open wood on the summit of the mountain, where
the hemlocks and pines totally disappeared, and a grove of the very
trees that formed the subject of debate covered the earth with their
tall, straight trunks and spreading branches, in stately pride.   The
underwood had been entirely removed from this grove, or bush, as, in
conjunction with the simple arrangements for boiling, it was called,
and a wide space of many acres was cleared, which might be likened to
the dome of a mighty temple, to which the maples formed the columns,
their tops composing the capitals and the heavens the arch.   A deep
and careless incision had been made into each tree, near its root,
into which little spouts, formed of the I bark of the alder, or of the
sumach, were fastened; and a trough, roughly dug out of the linden, or
basswood, was I lying at the root of each tree, to catch the sap that
flowed from this extremely wasteful and inartificial arrangement. 

The party paused a moment, on gaining the flat, to breathe their
horses, and, as the scene was entirely new to several of their
number, to view the manner of collecting the fluid.   A fine, powerful
voice aroused them from their momentary silence, as it rang under the
branches of the trees, singing the following words of that inimitable
doggerel, whose verses, if extended, would reach from the Caters of
the Connecticut to the shores of Ontario.   The tune was, of course, a
familiar air which, although it is said to have been first applied to
this nation in derision, circumstances have since rendered so glorious
that no American ever hears its jingling cadence without feeling
a thrill at his heart:

“The Eastern States be full of men,
The Western Full of woods, sir,
The hill be like a cattle-pen,
The roads be full of goods, sir!
Then flow away, my sweety sap,
And I will make you boily;
Nor catch a wood man’s hasty nap,
For fear you should get roily. 
The maple-tree's a precious one,
‘Tis fuel, food, and timber;
And when your stiff day’s work is done,
Its juice will make you limber,
Then flow away, etc. 

“And what’s a man without his glass. 
His wife without her tea, sir?
But neither cup nor mug will pass,
Without his honey-bee, sir!
Then flow away,” etc. 

During the execution of this sonorous doggerel, Richard kept time with
his whip on the mane of his charger, accompanying the gestures with a
corresponding movement of his head and body.   Toward the close of the
song, he was overheard humming the chorus, and, at its last
repetition, to strike in at “sweety sap,’ and carry a second through,
with a prodigious addition to the “effect” of the noise, if not to
that of the harmony. 

“Well done us!” roared the sheriff, on the same key with the tune; “a
very good song, Billy Kirby, and very well sung.   Where got you the
words, lad? Is there more of it, and can you furnish me with a copy?”
The sugar-boiler, who was busy in his “camp,” at a short distance from
the equestrians, turned his head with great indifference, and surveyed
the party, as they approached, with admirable coolness.   To each
individual, as he or she rode close by him, he gave a nod that was
extremely good-natured and affable, but which partook largely of the
virtue of equality, for not even to the ladies
did he in the least vary his mode of salutation, by touching the
apology for a hat that he wore, or by any other motion than the one we
have mentioned. 

“How goes it, how goes it, sheriff?” said the wood-chopper; “what’s
the good word in the village?”

“Why, much as usual, Billy,” returned Richard.   “But how is this?
where are your four kettles, and your troughs, and your iron coolers?
Do you make sugar in this slovenly way? I thought you were one of the
best sugar-boilers in the county. ”

“I’m all that, Squire Jones,” said Kirby, who continued his
occupation; “I’ll turn my back to no man in the Otsego hills for
chopping and logging, for boiling down the maple sap, for tending
brick-kiln, splitting out rails, making potash, and parling too, or
hoeing corn; though I keep myself pretty much to the first business,
seeing that the axe comes most natural to me. ”

“You be von Jack All-trade, Mister Beel,” said Monsieur Le Quoi. 

“How?” said Kirby, looking up with a simplicity which, coupled with
his gigantic frame and manly face, was a little ridiculous, “if you be
for trade, mounsher, here is some as good sugar as you’ll find the
season through.   It’s as clear from dirt as the Jarman Flats is free
from stumps, and it has the raal maple flavor.   Such stuff would sell
in York for candy. ”

The Frenchman approached the place where Kirby had deposited his cake
of sugar, under the cover of a bark roof, and commenced the
examination of the article with the eye of one who well understood its
value.   Marmaduke had dismounted, and was viewing the works and the
trees very closely, and not without frequent expressions of
dissatisfaction at the careless manner in which the manufacture was
conducted. 

“You have much experience in these things, Kirby,” he said; “what
course do you pursue in making your sugar? I see you have but two
kettles. ”

“Two is as good as two thousand, Judge.   I’m none of your polite
sugar-makers, that boils for the great folks; but if the raal sweet
maple is wanted, I can answer your turn.   First, I choose, and then I
tap my trees; say along about the last of February, or in these
mountains maybe not afore the middle of March; but anyway, just as the
sap begins to cleverly run—”

“Well, in this choice,” interrupted Marmaduke, “are you governed by
any outward signs that prove the quality of the tree?”

“Why, there’s judgment in all things,” said Kirby, stirring the liquor
in his kettles briskly.   “There’s some thing in knowing when and how
to stir the pot.   It’s a thing that must be larnt.   Rome wasn’t built
in a day, nor for that matter Templeton either, though it may be said
to be a quick-growing place.   I never put my axe into a stunty tree,
or one that hasn’t a good, fresh-looking bark: for trees have
disorders, like creatur’s; and where’s the policy of taking a tree
that’s sickly, any more than you’d choose a foundered horse to ride
post, or an over heated ox to do your logging?”

“All that is true.   But what are the signs of illness? how do you
distinguish a tree that is well from one that is diseased?”

“How does the doctor tell who has fever and who colds?” interrupted
Richard.   “By examining the skin, and feeling the pulse, to be sure. ”

“Sartain,” continued Billy; “the squire ain’t far out of the way. 
It’s by the look of the thing, sure enough.   Well, when the sap begins
to get a free run, I hang over the kettles, and set up the bush.   My
first boiling I push pretty smartly, till I get the virtue of the sap;
but when it begins to grow of a molasses nater, like this in the
kettle, one mustn’t drive the fires too hard, or you’ll burn the
sugar; and burny sugar is bad to the taste, let it be never so sweet. 
So you ladle out from one kettle into the other till it gets so, when
you put the stirring-stick into it, that it will draw into a thread—
when it takes a kerful hand to manage it.   There is a way to drain it
off, after it has grained, by putting clay into the pans; bitt it
isn’t always practised; some doos and some doosn’t.   Well, mounsher,
be we likely to make a trade?”

“I will give you, Mister Etel, for von pound, dix sous. ”

“No, I expect cash for it; I never dicker my sugar, But, seeing that
it’s you, mounsher,” said Billy, with a Coaxing smile, “I'll agree to
receive a gallon of rum, and cloth enough for two shirts if you’ll
take the molasses in the bargain.   It’s raal good.   I wouldn’t deceive
you or any man and to my drinking it’s about the best molasses that
come out of a sugar-bush. ”

“Mr.  Le Quoi has offered you ten pence,” said young Edwards. 

The manufacturer stared at the speaker with an air of great freedom,
but made no reply. 

“Oui,” said the Frenchman, “ten penny.   Jevausraner cie, monsieur: ah!
mon Anglois! je l'oublie toujours. ”

The wood-chopper looked from one to the other with some displeasure;
and evidently imbibed the opinion that they were amusing themselves at
his expense.   He seized the enormous ladle, which was lying on one of
his kettles, and began to stir the boiling liquid with great
diligence.   After a moment passed in dipping the ladle full, and then
raising it on high, as the thick rich fluid fell back into the kettle,
he suddenly gave it a whirl, as if to cool what yet remained, and
offered the bowl to Mr.  Le Quoi, saying:

‘Taste that, mounsher, and you will say it is worth more than you
offer.   The molasses itself would fetch the money,”

The complaisant Frenchman, after several timid efforts to trust his
lips in contact with the howl of the ladle, got a good swallow of the
scalding liquid.   He clapped his hands on his breast, and looked most
piteously at the ladies, for a single instant; and then, to use the
language oft Billy, when he afterward recounted the tale, “no
drumsticks ever went faster on the skin of a sheep than the
Frenchman’s legs, for a round or two; and then such swearing and
spitting in French you never saw.   But it’s a knowing one, from the
old countries, that thinks to get his jokes smoothly over a wood-
chopper. ”

The air of innocence with which Kirby resumed the occupation of
stirring the contents of his kettles would have completely deceived
the spectators as to his agency in the temporary sufferings of Mr.  Le
Quoi, had not the reckless fellow thrust his tongue into his cheek,
and cast his eyes over the party, with a simplicity of expression that
was too exquisite to be natural.   Mr.  Le Quoi soon recovered his
presence of mind and his decorum; and he briefly apologized to the
ladies for one or two very intemperate expressions that had escaped
him in a moment of extraordinary excitement, and, remounting his
horse, he continued in the background during the remainder of the
visit, the wit of Kirby putting a violent termination, at once, to all
negotiations on the subject of trade.   During all this time, Marmaduke
had been wandering about the grove, making observations on his
favorite trees, and the wasteful manner in which the wood-chopper
conducted his manufacture. 

“It grieves me to witness the extravagance that pervades this
country,” said the Judge, “where the settlers trifle with the
blessings they might enjoy, with the prodigality of successful
adventurers.   You are not exempt from the censure yourself, Kirby, for
you make dreadful wounds in these trees where a small incision would
effect the same object.   I earnestly beg you will remember that they
are the growth of centuries, and when once gone none living will see
their loss remedied. ”

“Why, I don’t know, Judge,” returned the man he ad dressed; “it seems
to me, if there’s plenty of anything in this mountaynious country,
it’s the trees.   If there’s any sin in chopping them, I’ve a pretty
heavy account to settle; for I’ve chopped over the best half of a
thousand acres, with my own hands, counting both Varmount and York
States; and I hope to live to finish the whull, before I lay up my
axe.   Chopping comes quite natural to me, and I wish no other
employment; but Jared Ransom said that he thought the sugar was likely
to be source this season, seeing that so many folks was coming into
the settlement, and so I concluded to take the ‘bush’ on sheares for
this one spring.   What’s the best news, Judge, consarning ashes? do
pots hold so that a man can live by them still? I s’pose they will, if
they keep on fighting across the water. ”

“Thou reasonest with judgment, William,” returned Marmaduke.   “So long
as the Old Worm is to be convulsed with wars, so long will the harvest
of America continue. ”

“Well, it’s an ill wind, Judge, that blows nobody any good.   I’m sure
the country is in a thriving way; and though I know you calkilate
greatly on the trees, setting as much store by them as some men would
by their children, yet to my eyes they are a sore sight any time,
unless I'm privileged to work my will on them: in which case I can’t
say but they are more to my liking.   I have heard the settlers from
the old countries say that their rich men keep great oaks and elms,
that would make a barrel of pots to the tree, standing round their
doors and humsteds and scattered over their farms, just to look at. 
Now, I call no country much improved that is pretty well covered with
trees.   Stumps are a different thing, for they don’t shade the land;
and, besides, you dig them—they make a fence that will turn anything
bigger than a hog, being grand for breachy cattle. ”

“Opinions on such subjects vary much in different countries,” said
Marmaduke; “but it is not as ornaments that I value the noble trees of
this country; it is for their usefulness We are stripping the forests,
as if a single year would replace what we destroy.   But the hour
approaches when the laws will take notice of not only the woods, but
the game they contain also. ”

With this consoling reflection, Marmaduke remounted, and the
equestrians passed the sugar-camp, on their way to the promised
landscape of Richard.   The wood-chop-per was left alone, in the bosom
of the forest, to pursue his labors.   Elizabeth turned her head, when
they reached the point where they were to descend the mountain, and
thought that the slow fires that were glimmering under his enormous
kettles, his little brush shelter, covered with pieces of hemlock
bark, his gigantic size, as he wielded his ladle with a steady and
knowing air, aided by the back-ground of stately trees, with their
spouts and troughs, formed, altogether, no unreal picture of human
life in its first stages of civilization.   Perhaps whatever the scene
possessed of a romantic character was not injured by the powerful
tones of Kirby’s voice ringing through the woods as he again awoke his
strains to another tune, which was but little more scientific than the
former.   All that she understood of the words were:

“And when the proud forest is falling, To my oxen cheerfully calling,
From morn until night I am bawling, Whoa, back there, and haw and gee;
Till our labor is mutually ended, By my strength and cattle
befriended, And against the mosquitoes defended By the bark of the
walnut-trees.  Away! then, you lads who would buy land; Choose the oak
that grows on the high land, or the silvery pine on the dry land, it
matters but little to me. ”

CHAPTER 21. 

“Speed! Malise, speed! such cause of haste
Thine active sinews never braced.   “—Scott. 

The roads of Otsego, if we except the principal high ways, were, at
the early day of our tale, but little better than wood-paths.   The
high trees that were growing on the very verge of the wheel-tracks
excluded the sun’s rays, unless at meridian; and the slowness of the
evaporation, united with the rich mould of vegetable decomposition
that covered the whole country to the depth of several inches,
occasioned but an indifferent foundation for the footing of
travellers.   Added to these were the inequalities of a natural
surface, and the constant recurrence of enormous and slippery roots
that were laid bare by the removal of the light soil, together with
stumps of trees, to make a passage not only difficult but dangerous. 
Yet the riders among these numerous obstructions, which were such as
would terrify an unpracticed eye, gave no demonstrations of uneasiness
as their horses toiled through the sloughs or trotted with uncertain
paces along the dark route.   In many places the marks on the trees
were the only indications of a road, with perhaps an occasional
remnant of a pine that, by being cut close to the earth, so as to
leave nothing visible but its base of roots, spreading for twenty feet
in every direction, was apparently placed there as a beacon to warn
the traveller that it was the centre of a highway. 

Into one of these roads the active sheriff led the way, first striking
out of the foot-path, by which they had descended from the sugar-bush,
across a little bridge, formed of round logs laid loosely on sleepers
of pine, in which large openings of a formidable width were frequent. 
The nag of Richard, when it reached one of these gaps, laid its nose
along the logs and stepped across the difficult passage with the
sagacity of a man; but the blooded filly which Miss Temple rode
disdained so humble a movement.   She made a step or two with an
unusual caution, and then, on reaching the broadest opening, obedient
to the curt and whip of her fearless mistress, she bounded across the
dangerous pass with the activity of a squirrel. 

“Gently, gently, my child,” said Marmaduke, who was following in the
manner of Richard; “this is not a country for equestrian feats.   Much
prudence is requisite to journey through our rough paths with safety. 
Thou mayst practise thy skill in horsemanship on the plains of New
Jersey with safety; but in the hills of Otsego they may be suspended
for a time. ”

“I may as well then relinquish my saddle at once, dear sir,” returned
his daughter; “for if it is to be laid aside until this wild country
be improved, old age will overtake me, and put an end to what you term
my equestrian feats. ”
“Say not so, my child,” returned her father; “but if thou venturest
again as in crossing this bridge, old age will never overtake thee,
but I shall be left to mourn thee, cut off in thy pride, my Elizabeth. 
If thou hadst seen this district of country, as I did, when it lay in
the sleep of nature, and bad witnessed its rapid changes as it awoke
to supply the wants of man, thou wouldst curb thy impatience for a
little time, though thou shouldst not check thy steed. ”

“I recollect hearing you speak of your first visit to these woods, but
the impression is faint, and blended with the confused images of
childhood.   Wild and unsettled as it may yet seem, it must have been a
thousand times more dreary then.   Will you repeat, dear sir, what you
then thought of your enterprise, and what you felt?”

During this speech of Elizabeth, which was uttered with the fervor of
affection, young Edwards rode more closely to the side of the Judge,
and bent his dark eyes on his countenance with an expression that
seemed to read his thoughts. 

“Thou wast then young, my child, but must remember when I left thee
and thy mother, to take my first survey of these uninhabited
mountains,” said Marmaduke.   “But thou dost not feel all the secret
motives that can urge a man to endure privations in order to
accumulate wealth.   In my case they have not been trifling, and God
has been pleased to smile on my efforts.   If I have encountered pain,
famine, and disease in accomplishing the settlement of this rough
territory, I have not the misery of failure to add to the grievances. ”

“Famine!” echoed Elizabeth; “I thought this was the land of abundance!
Had you famine to contend with?”

“Even so, my child,” said her father.   “Those who look around them
now, and see the loads of produce that issue out of every wild path in
these mountains during the season of travelling, will hardly credit
that no more than five years have elapsed since the tenants of these
woods were compelled to eat the scanty fruits of the forest to sustain
life, and, with their unpracticed skill, to hunt the beasts as food
for their starving families. ”

“Ay!” cried Richard, who happened to overhear the last of this speech
between the notes of the wood-chopper’s song, which he was endeavoring
to breathe aloud; “that was the starving-time,* Cousin Bess.   I grew
as lank as a weasel that fall, and my face was as pale as one of your
fever-and-ague visages.   Monsieur Le Quoi, there, fell away like a
pumpkin in drying; nor do I think you have got fairly over it yet,
monsieur.   Benjamin, I thought, bore it with a worse grace than any of
the family; for he swore it was harder to endure than a short
allowance in the calm latitudes.   Benjamin is a sad fellow to swear if
you starve him ever so little.   I had half a mind to quit you then,
‘Duke, and to go into Pennsylvania to fatten; but, damn it, thinks I,
we are sisters’ children, and I will live or die with him, after all. ”

  * The author has no better apology for interrupting the interest of a
    work of fiction by these desultory dialogues than that they have ref-
    erence to facts.   In reviewing his work, after so many years, he is
    compelled to confess it is injured by too many allusions to incidents
    that are not at all suited to satisfy the just expectations of the
    general reader.   One of these events is slightly touched on in the
    commencement of this chapter. 

More than thirty years since a very near and dear relative of the
writer, an elder sister and a second mother, was killed by a fall from
a horse in a ride among the very mountains mentioned in this tale. 
Few of her sex and years were more extensively known or more
universally beloved than the admirable woman who thus fell a victim to
the chances of the wilderness. 
“I do not forget thy kindness,” said Marmaduke, “nor that we are of
one blood. ”

“But, my dear father,” cried the wondering Elizabeth, “was there
actual suffering? Where were the beautiful and fertile vales of the
Mohawk? Could they not furnish food for your wants?”

“It was a season of scarcity; the necessities of life commanded a high
price in Europe, and were greedily sought after by the speculators. 
The emigrants from the East to the West invariably passed along the
valley of the Mohawk, and swept away the means of subsistence like a
swarm of locusts, Nor were the people on the Flats in a much better
condition.   They were in want themselves, but they spared the little
excess of provisions that nature did not absolutely require, with the
justice of the German character.   There was no grinding of the poor. 
The word speculator was then unknown to them.   I have seen many a
stout man, bending under the load of the bag of meal which he was
carrying from the mills of the Mohawk, through the rugged passes of
these mountains, to feed his half-famished children, with a heart so
light, as he approached his hut, that the thirty miles he had passed
seemed nothing.   Remember, my child, it was in our very infancy; we
had neither mills, nor grain, nor roads, nor often clearings; we had
nothing of increase but the mouths that were to be fed: for even at
that inauspicious moment the restless spirit of emigration was not
idle; nay, the general scarcity which extended to the East tended to
increase the number of adventurers. ”

“And how, dearest father, didst thou encounter this dreadful evil?”
said Elizabeth, unconsciously adopting the dialect of her parent in
the warmth of her sympathy.   “Upon thee must have fallen the
responsibility, if not the suffering. ”

“It did, Elizabeth,” returned the Judge, pausing for a single moment,
as if musing on his former feelings.   “ I had hundreds at that
dreadful time daily looking up to me for bread.   The sufferings of
their families and the gloomy prospect before them had paralyzed the
enterprise and efforts of my settlers; hunger drove them to the woods
for food, but despair sent them at night, enfeebled and wan, to a
sleepless pillow.   It was not a moment for in action.   I purchased
cargoes of wheat from the granaries of Pennsylvania; they were landed
at Albany and brought up the Mohawk in boats; from thence it was
transported on pack-horses into the wilderness and distributed among
my people.   Seines were made, and the lakes and rivers were dragged
for fish.   Something like a miracle was wrought in our favor, for
enormous shoals of herrings were discovered to have wandered five
hundred miles through the windings of the impetuous Susquehanna, and
the lake was alive with their numbers.   These were at length caught
and dealt out to the people, with proper portions of salt, and from
that moment we again began to prosper. ” *

  * All this was literally true. 

“Yes,” cried Richard, “and I was the man who served out the fish and
salt.   When the poor devils came to receive their rations, Benjamin,
who was my deputy, was obliged to keep them off by stretching ropes
around me, for they smelt so of garlic, from eating nothing but the
wild onion, that the fumes put me out often in my measurement.   You
were a child then, Bess, and knew nothing of the matter, for great
care was observed to keep both you and your mother from suffering. 
That year put me back dreadfully, both in the breed of my hogs and of
my turkeys. ”

“No, Bess,” cried the Judge, in a more cheerful tone, disregarding the
interruption of his cousin, “he who hears of the settlement of a
country knows but little of the toil and suffering by which it is
accomplished.   Unimproved and wild as this district now seems to your
eyes, what was it when I first entered the hills? I left my party, the
morning of my arrival, near the farms of the Cherry Valley, and,
following a deer-path, rode to the summit of the mountain that I have
since called Mount Vision; for the sight that there met my eyes seemed
to me as the deceptions of a dream.   The fire had run over the
pinnacle, and in a great measure laid open the view.   The leaves were
fallen, and I mounted a tree and sat for an hour looking on the silent
wilderness.   Not an opening was to be seen in the boundless forest
except where the lake lay, like a mirror of glass.   The water was
covered by myriads of the wild-fowl that migrate with the changes in
the season; and while in my situation on the branch of the beech, I
saw a bear, with her cubs, descend to the shore to drink.   I had met
many deer, gliding through the woods, in my journey ; but not the
vestige of a man could I trace during my progress, nor from my
elevated observatory.   No clearing, no hut, none of the winding roads
that are now to be seen, were there; nothing but mountains rising
behind mountains ; and the valley, with its surface of branches
enlivened here and there with the faded foliage of some tree that
parted from its leaves with more than ordinary reluctance.   Even the
Susquehanna was then hid by the height and density of the forest. ”

“And were you alone?” asked Elizabeth: “passed you the night in that
solitary state?”

“Not so, my child,” returned the father.   “After musing on the scene
for an hour, with a mingled feeling of pleasure and desolation, I left
my perch and descended the mountain.   My horse was left to browse on
the twigs that grew within his reach, while I explored the shores of
the lake and the spot where Templeton stands.   A pine of more than
ordinary growth stood where my dwelling is now placed! A wind—row had
been opened through the trees from thence to the lake, and my view was
but little impeded.   Under the branches of that tree I made my
solitary dinner.   I had just finished my repast as I saw smoke curling
from under the mountain, near the eastern bank of the lake.   It was
the only indication of the vicinity of man that I had then seen. 
After much toil I made my way to the spot, and found a rough cabin of
logs, built against the foot of a rock, and bearing the marks of a
tenant, though I found no one within it—”

“It was the hut of Leather-Stocking,” said Edwards quickly. 

“It was; though I at first supposed it to be a habitation of the
Indians.   But while I was lingering around the spot Natty made his
appearance, staggering under the carcass of a buck that he bad slain. 
Our acquaintance commenced at that time; before, I had never heard
that such a being tenanted the woods.   He launched his bark canoe and
set me across the foot of the lake to the place where I had fastened
my horse, and pointed out a spot where he might get a scanty browsing
until the morning; when I returned and passed the night in the cabin
of the hunter. ”

Miss Temple was so much struck by the deep attention of young Edwards
during this speech that she forgot to resume her interrogations; but
the youth himself continued the discourse by asking:

“And how did the Leather-Stocking discharge the duties of a host sir?”

“Why, simply but kindly, until late in the evening, when he discovered
my name and object, and the cordiality of his manner very sensibly
diminished, or, I might better say, disappeared.   He considered the
introduction of the settlers as an innovation on his rights, I believe
for he expressed much dissatisfaction at the measure, though it was in
his confused and ambiguous manner.   I hardly understood his objections
myself, but supposed they referred chiefly to an interruption of the
hunting. ”

“Had you then purchased the estate, or were you examining it with an
intent to buy?” asked Edwards, a little abruptly. 

“It had been mine for several years.   It was with a view to People the
land that I visited the lake.   Natty treated me hospitably, but
coldly, I thought, after he learned the nature of my journey.   I slept
on his own bear—skin, however, and in the morning joined my surveyors
again. ”

“Said he nothing of the Indian rights, sir? The Leather-Stocking is
much given to impeach the justice of the tenure by which the whites
hold the country. ”

“I remember that he spoke of them, but I did not nearly comprehend
him, and may have forgotten what he said; for the Indian title was
extinguished so far back as the close of the old war, and if it had
not been at all, I hold under the patents of the Royal Governors,
confirmed by an act of our own State Legislature, and no court in the
country can affect my title. ”
“Doubtless, sir, your title is both legal and equitable,” returned the
youth coldly, reining his horse back and remaining silent till the
subject was changed. 

It was seldom Mr.  Jones suffered any conversation to continue for a
great length of time without his participation.   It seems that he was
of the party that Judge Temple had designated as his surveyors; and he
embraced the opportunity of the pause that succeeded the retreat of
young Edwards to take up the discourse, and with a narration of their
further proceedings, after his own manner.   As it wanted, however, the
interest that had accompanied the description of the Judge, we must
decline the task of committing his sentences to paper. 

They soon reached the point where the promised view was to be seen. 
It was one of those picturesque and peculiar scenes that belong to the
Otsego, but which required the absence of the ice and the softness of
a summer’s landscape to be enjoyed in all its beauty.   Marmaduke had
early forewarned his daughter of the season, and of its effect on the
prospect; and after casting a cursory glance at its capabilities, the
party returned homeward, perfectly satisfied that its beauties would
repay them for the toil of a second ride at a more propitious season. 

“The spring is the gloomy time of the American year,” said the Judge,
“and it is more peculiarly the case in these mountains.   The winter
seems to retreat to the fast nesses of the hills, as to the citadel of
its dominion, and is only expelled after a tedious siege, in which
either party, at times, would seem to be gaining the victory. ”

“A very just and apposite figure, Judge Temple,” observed the sheriff;
“and the garrison under the command of Jack Frost make formidable
sorties—you understand what I mean by sorties, monsieur; sallies, in
English— and sometimes drive General Spring and his troops back again
into the low countries. ”

“Yes sair,” returned the Frenchman, whose prominent eyes were watching
the precarious footsteps of the beast he rode, as it picked its
dangerous way among the roots of trees, holes, log bridges, and
sloughs that formed the aggregate of the highway.   “Je vous entends;
de low countrie is freeze up for half de year. ”

The error of Mr.  Le Quoi was not noticed by the sheriff; and the rest
of the party were yielding to the influence of the changeful season,
which was already teaching the equestrians that a continuance of its
mildness was not to be expected for any length of time.   Silence and
thoughtfulness succeeded the gayety and conversation that had
prevailed during the commencement of the ride, as clouds began to
gather about the heavens, apparently collecting from every quarter, in
quick motion, without the agency of a breath of air,

While riding over one of the cleared eminencies that occurred in their
route, the watchful eye of Judge Temple pointed out to his daughter
the approach of a tempest.   Flurries of snow already obscured the
mountain that formed the northern boundary of the lake, and the genial
sensation which had quickened the blood through their veins was
already succeeded by the deadening influence of an approaching
northwester. 

All of the party were now busily engaged in making the best of their
way to the village, though the badness of the roads frequently
compelled them to check the impatience of their animals, which often
carried them over places that would not admit of any gait faster than
a walk. 

Richard continued in advance, followed by Mr.  Le Quoi; next to whom
rode Elizabeth, who seemed to have imbibed the distance which pervaded
the manner of young Edwards since the termination of the discourse
between the latter and her father.   Marmaduke followed his daughter,
giving her frequent and tender warnings as to the management of her
horse.   It was, possibly, the evident dependence that Louisa Grant
placed on his assistance which induced the youth to continue by her
side, as they pursued their way through a dreary and dark wood, where
the rays of the sun could but rarely penetrate, and where even the
daylight was obscured and rendered gloomy by the deep forests that
surrounded them.   No wind had yet reached the spot where the
equestrians were in motion, but that dead silence that often precedes
a storm contributed to render their situation more irksome than if
they were already subject to the fury of the tempest.   Suddenly the
voice of young Edwards was heard shouting in those appalling tones
that carry alarm to the very soul, and which curdle the blood of those
that hear them. 

“A tree! a tree! Whip—spur for your lives! a tree! a tree.   “

“A tree! a tree!” echoed Richard, giving his horse a blow that caused
the alarmed beast to jump nearly a rod, throwing the mud and water
into the air like a hurricane. 

“Von tree! von tree!” shouted the Frenchman, bending his body on the
neck of his charger, shutting his eyes, and playing on the ribs of his
beast with his heels at a rate
that caused him to be conveyed on the crupper of the sheriff with a
marvellous speed. 

Elizabeth checked her filly and looked up, with an unconscious but
alarmed air, at the very cause of their danger, while she listened to
the crackling sounds that awoke the stillness of the forest; but the
next instant her bridlet was seized by her father, who cried, “God
protect my child!” and she felt herself hurried onward, impelled by
the vigor of his nervous arm. 

Each one of the party bowed to his saddle-bows as the tearing of
branches was succeeded by a sound like the rushing of the winds, which
was followed by a thundering report, and a shock that caused the very
earth to tremble as one of the noblest ruins of the forest fell
directly across their path. 

One glance was enough to assure Judge Temple that his daughter and
those in front of him were safe, and he turned his eyes, in dreadful
anxiety, to learn the fate of the others.   Young Edwards was on the
opposite side of the tree, his form thrown back in his saddle to its
utmost distance, his left hand drawing up his bridle with
its greatest force, while the right grasped that of Miss Grant so as
to draw the head of her horse under its body.   Both the animals stood
shaking in every joint with terror, and snorting fearfully.   Louisa
herself had relinquished her reins, and, with her hands pressed on her
face, sat bending forward in her saddle, in an attitude of despair,
mingled strangely with resignation. 

“Are you safe?” cried the Judge, first breaking the awful silence of
the moment. 

“By God’s blessing,” returned the youth; but if there had been
branches to the tree we must have been lost—”

He was interrupted by the figure of Louisa slowly yielding in her
saddle, and but for his arm she would have sunk to the earth.   Terror,
however, was the only injury that the clergyman’s daughter had
sustained, and, with the aid of Elizabeth, she was soon restored to
her senses.   After some little time was lost in recovering her
strength, the young lady was replaced in her saddle, and supported on
either side by Judge Temple and Mr.  Edwards she was enabled to follow
the party in their slow progress. 

“The sudden fallings of the trees,” said Marmaduke, “are the most
dangerous accidents in the forest, for they are not to be foreseen,
being impelled by no winds, nor any extraneous or visible cause
against which we can guard. ”

“The reason of their falling, Judge Temple, is very obvious,” said the
sheriff.   “The tree is old and decayed, and it is gradually weakened
by the frosts, until a line drawn from the centre of gravity falls
without its base, and then the tree comes of a certainty; and I should
like to know what greater compulsion there can be for any thing than a
mathematical certainty.   I studied math—”

“Very true, Richard,” interrupted Marmaduke; “thy reasoning is true,
and, if my memory be not over-treacherous, was furnished by myself on
a former occasion, But how is one to guard against the danger? Canst
thou go through the forests measuring the bases and calculating the
centres of the oaks? Answer me that, friend Jones, and I will say thou
wilt do the country a service. ”

“Answer thee that, friend Temple!” returned Richard; “a well-educated
man can answer thee anything, sir.   Do any trees fall in this manner
but such as are decayed? Take care not to approach the roots of a
rotten tree, and you will be safe enough. ”

“That would be excluding us entirely from the forests,’ said
Marmaduke.   “But, happily, the winds usually force down most of these
dangerous ruins, as their currents are admitted into the woods by the
surrounding clearings, and such a fall as this has been is very rare. ”

Louisa by this time had recovered so much strength as to allow the
party to proceed at a quicker pace, but long before they were safely
housed they were overtaken by the storm; and when they dismounted at
the door of the mansion-house, the black plumes of Miss Temple’s hat
were drooping with the weight of a load of damp snow, and the coats of
the gentlemen were powdered with the same material. 

While Edwards was assisting Louisa from her horse, the warm-hearted
girl caught his hand with fervor and whispered:

“Now, Mr.  Edwards, both father and daughter owe their lives to you. ”

A driving northwesterly storm succeeded, and before the sun was set
every vestige of spring had vanished; the lake, the mountains, the
village, and the fields being again hidden under one dazzling coat of
snow. 

CHAPTER 22

“Men, boys, and girls
Desert the unpeopled village; and wild crowds
Spread o’er the plain, by the sweet phrensy driven. ”-Somerville. 

From this time to the close of April the weather continued to be a
succession of neat and rapid changes.   One day the soft airs of spring
seemed to be stealing along the valley, and, in unison with an
invigorating sun, attempting covertly to rouse the dormant powers of
the vegetable world, while, on the next, the surly blasts from the
north would sweep across the lake and erase every impression left by
their gentle adversaries.   The snow, however, finally disappeared, and
the green wheat fields were seen in every direction, spotted with the
dark and charred stumps that had, the preceding season, supported some
of the proudest trees of the forest.   Ploughs were in motion, wherever
those useful implements could be used, and the smokes of the sugar-
camps were no longer seen issuing from the woods of maple.   The lake
had lost the beauty of a field of ice, but still a dark and gloomy
covering concealed its waters, for the absence of currents left them
yet hidden under a porous crust, which, saturated with the fluid,
barely retained enough strength to preserve the continuity of its
parts.   Large flocks of wild geese were seen passing over the country,
which hovered, for a time, around the hidden sheet of water,
apparently searching for a resting-place; and then, on finding them
selves excluded by the chill covering, would soar away to the north,
filling the air with discordant screams, as if venting their
complaints at the tardy operations of Nature. 

For a week, the dark covering of the Otsego was left to the
undisturbed possession of two eagles, who alighted on the centre of
its field, and sat eyeing their undisputed territory.   During the
presence of these monarchs of the air, the flocks of migrating birds
avoided crossing the plain of ice by turning into the hills,
apparently seeking the protection of the forests, while the white and
bald heads of the tenants of the lake were turned upward, with a look
of contempt.   But the time had come when even these kings of birds
were to be dispossessed.   An opening had been gradually increasing at
the lower extremity of the lake, and around the dark spot where the
current of the river prevented the formation of ice during even the
coldest weather; and the fresh southerly winds, that now breathed
freely upon the valley, made an impression on the waters.   Mimic waves
began to curl over the margin of the frozen field, which exhibited an
outline of crystallizations that slowly receded toward the north.   At
each step the power of the winds and the waves increased, until, after
a struggle of a few hours, the turbulent little billows succeeded in
setting the whole field in motion, when it was driven beyond the reach
of the eye, with a rapidity that was as magical as the change produced
in the scene by this expulsion of the lingering remnant of winter. 
Just as the last sheet of agitated ice was disappearing in the
distance, the eagles rose, and soared with a wide sweep above the
clouds, while the waves tossed their little caps of snow in the air,
as if rioting in their release from a thraldom of five minutes’
duration. 

The following morning Elizabeth was awakened by the exhilarating
sounds of the martens, who were quarrelling and chattering around the
little boxes suspended above her windows, and the cries of Richard,
who was calling in tones animating as signs of the season itself:

“Awake! awake! my fair lady! the gulls are hovering over the lake
already, and the heavens are alive with pigeons.   You may look an hour
before you can find a hole through which to get a peep at the sun . 
Awake! awake! lazy ones’ Benjamin is overhauling the ammunition, and
we only wait for our breakfasts, and away for the mountains and
pigeon-shooting. ”

There was no resisting this animated appeal, and in a few minutes Miss
Temple and her friend descended to the parlor.   The doors of the hall
were thrown open, and the mild, balmy air of a clear spring morning
was ventilating the apartment, where the vigilance of the ex-steward
had been so long maintaining an artificial heat with such unremitted
diligence.   The gentlemen were impatiently waiting for their morning’s
repast, each equipped in the garb of a sportsman.   Mr.  Jones made many
visits to the southern door, and would cry:

“See, Cousin Bess! see, ‘Duke, the pigeon-roosts of the south have
broken up! They are growing more thick every instant, Here is a flock
that the eye cannot see the end of.   There is food enough in it to
keep the army of Xerxes for a month, and feathers enough to make beds
for the whole country.   Xerxes, Mr.  Edwards, was a Grecian king, who—
no, he was a Turk, or a Persian, who wanted to conquer Greece, just
the same as these rascals will overrun our wheat fields, when they
come back in the fall.   Away! away! Bess; I long to pepper them. ”

In this wish both Marmaduke and young Edwards seemed equally to
participate, for the sight was exhilarating to a sportsman; and the
ladies soon dismissed the party after a hasty breakfast. 

If the heavens were alive with pigeons, the whole village seemed
equally in motion with men, women, and children.   Every species of
firearm, from the French ducking gun, with a barrel near six feet in
length, to the common horseman's pistol, was to be seen in the hands
of the men and boys; while bows and arrows, some made of the simple
stick of walnut sapling and others in a rude imitation of the ancient
cross-bows, were carried by many of the latter. 

The houses and the signs of life apparent in the village drove the
alarmed birds from the direct line of their flight, toward the
mountains, along the sides and near the bases of which they were
glancing in dense masses, equally wonderful by the rapidity of their
motion and their incredible numbers. 

We have already said that, across the inclined plane which fell from
the steep ascent of the mountain to the banks of the Susquehanna, ran
the highway on either side of which a clearing of many acres had been
made at a very early day.   Over those clearings, and up the eastern
mountain, and along the dangerous path that was cut into its side, the
different individuals posted themselves, and in a few moments the
attack commenced. 

Among the sportsmen was the tall, gaunt form of Leather-Stocking,
walking over the field, with his rifle hanging on his arm, his dogs at
his heels; the latter now scenting the dead or wounded birds that were
beginning to tumble from the flocks, and then crouching under the legs
of their master, as if they participated in his feelings at this
wasteful and unsportsmanlike execution. 

The reports of the firearms became rapid, whole volleys rising from
the plain, as flocks of more than ordinary numbers darted over the
opening, shadowing the field like a cloud; and then the light smoke of
a single piece would issue from among the leafless bushes on the
mountain, as death was hurled on the retreat of the affrighted birds,
who were rising from a volley, in a vain effort to escape.   Arrows and
missiles of every kind were in the midst of the flocks; and so
numerous were the birds, and so low did they take their flight, that
even long poles in the hands of those on the sides of the mountain
were used to strike them to the earth. 

During all this time Mr.  Jones, who disdained the humble and ordinary
means of destruction used by his companions, was busily occupied,
aided by Benjamin, in making arrangements for an assault of more than
ordinarily fatal character.   Among the relics of the old military
excursions, that occasionally are discovered throughout the different
districts of the western part of New York, there had been found in
Templeton, at its settlement, a small swivel, which would carry a ball
of a pound weight.   It was thought to have been deserted by a war-
party of the whites in one of their inroads into the Indian
settlements, when, perhaps, convenience or their necessity induced
them to leave such an incumberance behind them in the woods.   This
miniature cannon had been released from the rust, and being mounted on
little wheels was now in a state for actual service.   For several
years it was the sole organ for extraordinary rejoicings used in those
mountains.   On the mornings of the Fourth of July it would be heard
ringing among the hills; and even Captain Hollister, who was the
highest authority in that part of the country on all such occasions,
affirmed that, considering its dimensions, it was no despicable gun
for a salute.   It was somewhat the worse for the service it had
performed, it is true, there being but a trifling difference in size
between the touch-hole and the muzzle Still, the grand conceptions of
Richard had suggested the importance of such an instrument in hurling
death at his nimble enemies.   The swivel was dragged by a horse into a
part of the open space that the sheriff thought most eligible for
planning a battery of the kind, and Mr.  Pump proceeded to load it. 
Several handfuls of duck-shot were placed on top of the powder, and
the major-domo announced that his piece was ready for service. 

The sight of such an implement collected all the idle spectators to
the spot, who, being mostly boys, filled the air with cries of
exultation and delight The gun was pointed high, and Richard, holding
a coal of fire in a pair of tongs, patiently took his seat on a stump,
awaiting the appearance of a flock worthy of his notice. 

So prodigious was the number of the birds that the scattering fire of
the guns, with the hurling of missiles and the cries of the boys, had
no other effect than to break off small flocks from the immense masses
that continued to dart along the valley, as if the whole of the
feathered tribe were pouring through that one pass.   None pretended to
collect the game, which lay scattered over the fields in such
profusion as to cover the very ground with fluttering victims. 

Leather-Stocking was a silent but uneasy spectator of all these
proceedings, but was able to keep his sentiments to himself until he
saw the introduction of the swivel into the sports. 

“This comes of settling a country!” he said.   “Here have I known the
pigeon to fly for forty long years, and, till you made your clearings,
there was nobody to skeart or to hurt them, I loved to see them come
into the woods, for they were company to a body, hurting nothing
—being, as it was, as harmless as a garter-snake.   But now it gives me
sore thoughts when I hear the frighty things whizzing through the air,
for I know it’s only a motion to bring out all the brats of the
village.   Well, the Lord won’t see the waste of his creatures for
nothing, and right will be done to the pigeons, as well as others, by
and by.   There’s Mr.  Oliver as bad as the rest of them, firing into
the flocks as if he was shooting down nothing but Mingo warriors. ”
Among the sportsmen was Billy Kirby, who, armed with an old musket,
was loading, and, without even looking into the air, was firing and
shouting as his victims fell even on his own person.   He heard the
speech of Natty, and took upon himself to reply:

“What! old Leather-Stocking,” he cried, “grumbling at the loss of a
few pigeons! If you had to sow your wheat twice, and three times, as I
have done, you wouldn’t be so massyfully feeling toward the divils. 
Hurrah, boys! scatter the feathers! This is better than shooting at a
turkey’s head and neck, old fellow. ”

“It’s better for you, maybe, Billy Kirby,” replied the indignant old
hunter, “and all them that don’t know how to put a ball down a rifle-
barrel, or how to bring it up again with a true aim; but it’s wicked
to be shooting into flocks in this wasty manner, and none to do it who
know how to knock over a single bird.   If a body has a craving for
pigeon’s flesh, why, it’s made the same as all other creatures, for
man’s eating; but not to kill twenty and eat one.   When I want such a
thing I go into the woods till I find one to my liking, and then I
shoot him off the branches, without touching the feather of another,
though there might be a hundred on the same tree.   You couldn’t do
such a thing, Billy Kirby—you couldn’t do it if you tried. ”

“What’s that, old corn-stalk! you sapless stub!” cried the wood-
chopper.   “You have grown wordy, since the affair of the turkey; but
if you are for a single shot, here goes at that bird which comes on by
himself. ”

The fire from the distant part of the field had driven a single pigeon
below the flock to which it belonged, and, frightened with the
constant reports of the muskets, it was approaching the spot where the
disputants stood, darting first from One side and then to the other,
cutting the air with the swiftness of lightning, and making a noise
with its wings not unlike the rushing of a bullet.   Unfortunately for
the wood-chopper, notwithstanding his vaunt, he did not see this bird
until it was too late to fire as it approached, and he pulled the
trigger at the unlucky moment when it was darting immediately over his
head.   The bird continued its course with the usual velocity. 

Natty lowered his rifle from his arm when the challenge was made, and
waiting a moment, until the terrified victim had got in a line with
his eye, and had dropped near the bank of the lake, he raised it again
with uncommon rapidity, and fired.   It might have been chance, or it
might have been skill, that produced the result; it was probably a
union of both; but the pigeon whirled over in the air, and fell into
the lake with a broken wing At the sound of his rifle, both his dogs
started from his feet, and in a few minutes the “slut” brought out the
bird, still alive. 

The wonderful exploit of Leather-Stocking was noised through the field
with great rapidity, and the sportsmen gathered in, to learn the truth
of the report. 

“What” said young Edwards,” have you really killed a pigeon on the
wing, Natty, with a single ball?”

“Haven’t I killed loons before now, lad, that dive at the flash?”
returned the hunter.   “It’s much better to kill only such as you want,
without wasting your powder and lead, than to be firing into God’s
creatures in this wicked manner.   But I came out for a bird, and you
know the reason why I like small game, Mr.  Oliver, and now I have got
one Twill go home, for I don’t relish to see these wasty ways that you
are all practysing, as if the least thing wasn’t made for use, and not
to destroy. ”

“Thou sayest well, Leather-Stocking,” cried Marmaduke, “and I begin to
think it time to put an end to this work of destruction. ”

“Put an ind, Judge, to your clearings.   Ain’t the woods His work as
well as the pigeons? Use, but don’t waste.   Wasn’t the woods made for
the beasts and birds to harbor in? and when man wanted their flesh,
their skins, or their feathers, there’s the place to seek them.   But
I’ll go to the hut with my own game, for I wouldn’t touch one of the
harmless things that cover the ground here, looking up with their eyes
on me, as if they only wanted tongues to say their thoughts. ”
With this sentiment in his month, Leather-Stocking threw his rifle
over his arm, and, followed by his dogs, stepped across the clearing
with great caution, taking care not to tread on one of the wounded
birds in his path.   He soon entered the bushes on the margin of the
lake and was hid from view. 

Whatever impression the morality of Natty made on the Judge, it was
utterly lost on Richard.   He availed himself of the gathering of the
sportsmen, to lay a plan for one “fell swoop” of destruction.   The
musket-men were drawn up in battle array, in a line extending on each
side of his artillery, with orders to await the signal of firing from
himself. 

“Stand by, my lads,” said Benjamin, who acted as an aid de-camp on
this occasion, “stand by, my hearties, and when Squire Dickens heaves
out the signal to begin firing, d’ye see, you may open upon them in a
broadside.   Take care and fire low, boys, and you’ll be sure to hull
the flock. ”

“Fire low!” shouted Kirby; “hear the old fool! If we fire low, we may
hit the stumps, but not ruffle a pigeon. ”

“How should you know, you lubber?” cried Benjamin, with a very
unbecoming heat for an officer on the eve of battle—” how should you
know, you grampus? Haven’t I sailed aboard of the Boadishy for five
years? and wasn’t it a standing order to fire low, and to hull your
enemy! Keep silence at your guns, boys and mind the order that is
passed. ”

The loud laughs of the musket-men were silenced by the more
authoritative voice of Richard, who called for attention and obedience
to his signals. 

Some millions of pigeons were supposed to have already passed, that
morning, over the valley of Templeton; but nothing like the flock that
was now approaching had been seen before.   It extended from mountain
to mountain in one solid blue mass, and the eye looked in vain, over
the southern hills, to find its termination.   The front of this living
column was distinctly marked by a line but very slightly indented, so
regular and even was the flight.   Even Marmaduke forgot the morality
of Leather-Stocking as it approached, and, in common with the rest,
brought his musket to a poise. 

“Fire!” cried the sheriff, clapping a coal to the priming of the
cannon.   As half of Benjamin’s charge escaped through the touch-hole,
the whole volley of the musketry preceded the report of the swivel. 
On receiving this united discharge of small-arms, the front of the
flock darted upward, while, at the same instant, myriads of those in
the rear rushed with amazing rapidity into their places, so that, when
the column of white smoke gushed from the mouth of the little cannon,
an accumulated mass of objects was gliding over its point of
direction.   The roar of the gun echoed along the mountains, and died
away to the north, like distant thunder, while the whole flock of
alarmed birds seemed, for a moment, thrown into one disorderly and
agitated mass .   The air was filled with their irregular flight, layer
rising above layer, far above the tops of the highest pines, none
daring to advance beyond the dangerous pass; when, suddenly, some of
the headers of the feathered tribes shot across the valley, taking
their flight directly over the village, and hundreds of thousands in
their rear followed the example, deserting the eastern side of the
plain to their persecutors and the slain. 

“Victory!” shouted Richard, “victory! we have driven the enemy from
the field. ”

“Not so, Dickon,” said Marmaduke; “the field is covered with them;
and, like the Leather-Stocking, I see nothing but eyes, in every
direction, as the innocent sufferers turn their heads in terror.   Full
one-half of those that have fallen are yet alive; and I think it is
time to end the sport, if sport it be. ”

“Sport!” cried the sheriff; “it is princely sport! There are some
thousands of the blue-coated boys on the ground, so that every old
woman in the village may have a pot-pie for the asking. ”

“Well, we have happily frightened the birds from this side of the
valley,” said Marmaduke, “and the carnage must of necessity end for
the present.   Boys, I will give you sixpence a hundred for the
pigeons’ heads only; so go to work, and bring them into the village. ”

This expedient produced the desired effect, for every urchin on the
ground went industriously to work to wring the necks of the wounded
birds.   Judge Temple retired toward his dwelling with that kind of
feeling that many a man has experienced before him, who discovers,
after the excitement of the moment has passed, that he has purchased
pleasure at the price of misery to others.   Horses were loaded with
the dead; and, after this first burst of sporting, the shooting of
pigeons became a business, with a few idlers, for the remainder of the
season, Richard, however, boasted for many a year of his shot with the
“cricket;” and Benjamin gravely asserted that he thought they had
killed nearly as many pigeons on that day as there were Frenchmen
destroyed on the memorable occasion of Rodney’s victory. 

CHAPTER 23. 

“Help, masters, help; here’s a fish hangs in the net, like a poor
Man’s right in the law. ’—Pericles of Tyre. 

The advance of the season now became as rapid as its first approach
had been tedious and lingering.   The days were uniformly mild, while
the nights, though cool, were no longer chilled by frosts.   The whip-
poor-will was heard whistling his melancholy notes along the margin of
the lake, and the ponds and meadows were sending forth the music of
their thousand tenants.   The leaf of the native poplar was seen
quivering in the woods; the sides of the mountains began to lose their
hue of brown, as the lively green of the different members of the
forest blended their shades with the permanent colors of the pine and
hemlock; and even the buds of the tardy oak were swelling with the
promise of the coming summer.   The gay and fluttering blue-bird, the
social robin, and the industrious little wren were all to be seen
enlivening the fields with their presence and their songs; while the
soaring fish-hawk was already hovering over the waters of the Otsego,
watching with native voracity for the appearance of his prey. 

The tenants of the lake were far-famed for both their quantities and
their quality, and the ice had hardly disappeared before numberless
little boats were launched from the shores, and the lines of the
fishermen were dropped into the inmost recesses of its deepest
caverns, tempting the unwary animals with every variety of bait that
the ingenuity or the art of man had invented.   But the slow though
certain adventures with hook and line were ill suited to the profusion
and impatience of the settlers.   More destructive means were resorted
to; and, as the season had now arrived when the bass fisheries were
allowed by the provisions of the law that Judge Temple had procured,
the sheriff declared his intention, by availing himself of the first
dark night, to enjoy the sport in person. 

“And you shall be present, Cousin Bess,” he added, when he announced
this design, “and Miss Grant, and Mr.  Edwards; and I will show you
what I call fishing not nibble, nibble, nibble, as ‘Duke does when he
goes after the salmon-trout.   There he will sit for hours, in a
broiling sun or, perhaps, over a hole in the lee, in the coldest days
in winter, under the lee of a few bushes, and not a fish will he
catch, after all this mortification of the flesh.   No, no—give me a
good seine that’s fifty or sixty fathoms in length, with a jolly
parcel of boatmen to crack their jokes the while, with Benjamin to
steer, and let us haul them in by thousands; I call that fishing. ”

“Ah! Dickon,” cried Marmaduke, “thou knowest but little of the
pleasure there is in playing with the hook and line, or thou wouldst
be more saving of the game.   I have known thee to leave fragments
enough behind thee, when thou hast headed a night party on the lake,
to feed a dozen famishing families. ”

“I shall not dispute the matter, Judge Temple; this night will I go;
and I invite the company to attend, and then let them decide between
us. ”

Richard was busy during most of the afternoon, making his preparations
for the important occasion.   Just as the light of the settling sun had
disappeared, and a new moon had begun to throw its shadows on the
earth, the fisher-men took their departure, in a boat, for a point
that was situated on the western shore of the lake, at the distance of
rather more than half a mile from the village.   The ground had become
settled, and the walking was good and dry.   Marmaduke, with his
daughter, her friend, and young Edwards, continued on the high grassy
banks at the outlet of the placid sheet of water, watching the dark
object that was moving across the lake, until it entered the shade of
the western hills, and was lost to the eye.   The distance round by
land to the point of destination was a mile, and he observed:

“It is time for us to be moving; the moon will be down ere we reach
the point, and then the miraculous hauls of Dickon will commence. ”

The evening was warm, and, after the long and dreary winter from which
they had just escaped, delightfully invigorating.   Inspirited by the
scene and their anticipated amusement, the youthful companions of the
Judge followed his steps, as he led them along the shores of the
Otsego, and through the skirts of the village. 

“See!” said young Edwards, “they are building their fire already; it
glimmers for a moment, and dies again like the light of a firefly. ”

“Now it blazes,” cried Elizabeth; “you can perceive figures moving
around the light.   Oh! I would bet my jewels against the gold beads of
Remarkable, that my impatient Cousin Dickon had an agency in raising
that bright flame; and see! it fades again, like most of his brilliant
schemes. ”

Thou hast guessed the truth, Bess,” said her father; “he has thrown an
armful of brush on the pile, which has burnt out as soon as lighted. 
But it has enabled them to find a better fuel, for their fire begins
to blaze with a more steady flame.   It is the true fisherman’s beacon
now; observe how beautifully it throw s its little circle of light on
the water!”

The appearance of the fire urged the pedestrians on, for even the
ladies had become eager to witness the miraculous draught.   By the
time they reached the bank, which rose above the low point where the
fishermen had landed, the moon had sunk behind the top of the western
pines, and, as most of the stars were obscured by clouds, there was
but little other light than that which proceeded from the fire.   At
the suggestion of Marmaduke, his companions paused to listen to the
conversation of those below them, and examine the party for a moment
before they descended to the shore. 

The whole group were seated around the fire, with the exception of
Richard and Benjamin; the former of whom occupied the root of a
decayed stump, that had been drawn to the spot as part of their fuel,
and the latter was standing.   with his arms akimbo, so near to the
flame that the smoke occasionally obscured his solemn visage, as it
waved around the pile in obedience to the night airs that swept gently
over the water. 

“Why, look you, squire, said the major-domo.   You may call a lake-fish
that will weigh twenty or thirty pounds a serious matter, but to a man
who has hauled in a shovel-nosed shirk, d’ye see, it’s but a poor kind
of fishing after all. ”

“I don’t know, Benjamin,” returned the sheriff; “a haul of one
thousand Otsego bass, without counting pike, pickerel, perch, bull-
pouts, salmon-trouts, and suckers, is no bad fishing, let me tell you. 
There may he sport in sticking a shark, but what is he good for after
you have got him? Now, any one of the fish that I have named is fit to
set before a king. ”

“Well, squire,” returned Benjamin, “just listen to the philosophy of
the thing.   Would it stand to reason, that such a fish should live and
be catched in this here little pond of water, where it’s hardly deep
enough to drown a man, as you’ll find in the wide ocean, where, as
every body knows that is, everybody that has followed the seas, whales
and grampuses are to be seen, that are as long as one of the pine-
trees on yonder mountain?”

“Softly, softly, Benjamin,” said the sheriff, as if he wished to save
the credit of his favorite; “why, some of the pines will measure two
hundred feet, and even more. ”

“Two hundred or two thousand, it’s all the same thing,” cried
Benjamin, with an air which manifested that he was not easily to be
bullied out of his opinion, on a subject like the present.   “ Haven’t
I been there, and haven’t I seen? I have said that you fall in with
whales as long as one of them there pines: and what I have once said
I’ll stand to!”

During this dialogue, which was evidently but the close of much longer
discussion, the huge frame of Billy Kirby was seen extended on one
side of the fire, where he was picking his teeth with splinters of the
chips near him, and occasionally shaking his head with distrust of
Benjamin’s assertions. 

“I’ve a notion,” said the wood-chopper, “ that there’s water in this
lake to swim the biggest whale that ever was invented; and, as to the
pines, I think I ought to know so’thing consarning them; I have
chopped many a one that was sixty times the length of my helve,
without counting the eye; and I believe, Benny, that if the old pine
that stands in the hollow of the Vision Mountain just over the
village—you may see the tree itself by looking up, for the moon is on
its top yet—well, now I believe, if that same tree was planted out in
the deepest part of the lake, there would be water enough for the
biggest ship that ever was built to float over it, without touching
its upper branches, I do. ”

“Did’ee ever see a ship, Master Kirby?” roared the steward, “did’ee
ever see a ship, man? or any craft bigger than a lime-scow, or a wood-
boat, on this here small bit of fresh water?”

“Yes, I have,” said the wood-chopper stoutly; “I can say that I have,
and tell no lie. ”

“Did’ee ever see a British ship, Master Kirby? an English line-of-
battle ship, boy? Where did’ee ever fall in with a regular built
vessel, with starn-post and cutwater, gar board-streak and plank-
shear, gangways, and hatchways, and waterways, quarter-deck, and
forecastle, ay, and flush-deck?—tell me that, man, if you can; where
away did’ee ever fall in with a full-rigged, regular-built, necked
vessel?”

The whole company were a good deal astounded with this overwhelming
question, and even Richard afterward remarked that it “was a thousand
pities that Benjamin could not read, or he must have made a valuable
officer to the British marine.   It is no wonder that they overcame the
French so easily on the water, when even the lowest sailor so well
understood the different parts of a vessel. ” But Billy Kirby was a
fearless wight, and had great jealousy of foreign dictation; he had
risen on his feet, and turned his back to the fire, during the voluble
delivery of this interrogatory; and when the steward ended, contrary
to all expectation, he gave the following spirited reply:

“Where! why, on the North River, and maybe on Champlain.   There’s
sloops on the river, boy, that would give a hard time on’t to the
stoutest vessel King George owns.   They carry masts of ninety feet in
the clear of good solid pine, for I’ve been at the chopping of many a
one in Varmount State.   I wish I was captain in one of them, and you
was in that Board-dish that you talk so much about, and we’d soon see
what good Yankee stuff is made on, and whether a Varmounter’s hide
ain’t as thick as an Englishman’s. ”
The echoes from the opposite hills, which were more than half a mile
from the fishing point, sent back the discordant laugh that Benjamin
gave forth at this challenge; and the woods that covered their sides
seemed, by the noise that issued from their shades, to be full of
mocking demons. 

“Let us descend to the shore,” whispered Marmaduke, “or there will
soon be ill-blood between them.   Benjamin is a fearless boaster; and
Kirby, though good-natured, is a careless son of the forest, who
thinks one American more than a match for six Englishmen.   I marvel
that Dickon is silent, where there is such a trial of skill in the
superlative!”

The appearance of Judge Temple and the ladies produced, if not a
pacification, at least a cessation of hostilities.   Obedient to the
directions of Mr.  Jones the fishermen prepared to launch their boat,
which had been seen in the background of the view, with the net
carefully disposed on a little platform in its stern, ready for
service.   Richard gave vent to his reproaches at the tardiness of the
pedestrians, when all the turbulent passions of the party were
succeeded by a calm, as mild and as placid as that which prevailed
over the beautiful sheet of water that they were about to rifle of its
best treasures. 

The night had now become so dark as to render objects, without the
reach of the light of the fire, not only indistinct, but in most cases
invisible.   For a little distance the water was discernible,
glistening, as the glare from the fire danced over its surface,
touching it here and there with red quivering streaks; but, at a
hundred feet from the shore, there lay a boundary of impenetrable
gloom.   One or two stars were shining through the openings of the
clouds, and the lights were seen in the village, glimmering faintly,
as if at an immeasurable distance.   At times, as the fire lowered, or
as the horizon cleared, the outline of the mountain, on the other side
of the lake, might be traced by its undulations; but its shadow was
cast, wide and dense, on the bosom of the water, rendering the
darkness in that direction trebly deep. 

Benjamin Pump was invariably the coxswain and net caster of Richard’s
boat, unless the sheriff saw fit to preside in person: and, on the
present occasion, Billy Kirby, and a youth of about half his strength,
were assigned to the oars.  The remainder of the assistants were
stationed at the drag-ropes.   The arrangements were speedily made, and
Richard gave the signal to “shove off. ”

Elizabeth watched the motion of the batteau as it pulled from the
shore, letting loose its rope as it went, but it soon disappeared in
the darkness, when the ear was her only guide to its evolutions. 
There was great affectation of stillness during all these manoeuvers,
in order, as Richard assured them, “not to frighten the bass, who were
running into the shoal waters, and who would approach the light if not
disturbed by the sounds from the fishermen. ”

The hoarse voice of Benjamin was alone heard issuing out of the gloom,
as he uttered, in authoritative tones, “Pull larboard oar,” “Pull
starboard,” “ Give way together, boys,” and such other indicative
mandates as were necessary for the right disposition of his seine.   A
long time was passed in this necessary part of the process, for
Benjamin prided himself greatly on his skill in throwing the net, and,
in fact, most of the success of the sport depended on its being done
with judgment.   At length a loud splash in the water, as he threw away
the “staff,” or “stretcher,” with a hoarse call from the steward of
“Clear,” announced that the boat was returning; when Richard seized a
brand from the fire, and ran to a point as far above the centre of the
fishing-ground, as the one from which the batteau had started was
below it. 

“Stick her in dead for the squire, boys,” said the steward, “and we’ll
have a look at what grows in this here pond. ”

In place of the falling net were now to be heard the quick strokes of
the oars, and the noise of the rope running out of the boat. 
Presently the batteau shot into the circle of light, and in an instant
she was pulled to the shore.   Several eager hands were extended to
receive the line, and, both ropes being equally well manned, the
fishermen commenced hauling in with slow, and steady drags, Richard
standing to the centre, giving orders, first to one party, and then to
the other, to increase or slacken their efforts, as occasion required. 
The visitors were posted near him, and enjoyed a fair view of the
whole operation.   which was slowly advancing to an end. 

Opinions as to the result of their adventure were now freely hazarded
by all the men, some declaring that the net came in as light as a
feather, and others affirming that it seemed to be full of logs.   As
the ropes were many hundred feet in length, these opposing sentiments
were thought to be of little moment by the sheriff, who would go first
to one line, and then to the other, giving each small pull, in order
to enable him to form an opinion for himself. 

“Why, Benjamin,” he cried, as he made his first effort in this way,
“you did not throw the net clear.   I can move it with my little
finger.   The rope slackens in my hand. ”

“Did you ever see a whale, squire?” responded the steward: “ I say
that, if that there net is foul, the devil is in the lake in the shape
of a fish, for I cast it as far as ever rigging was rove over the
quarter-deck of a flag-ship. ”

But Richard discovered his mistake, when he saw Billy Kirby before
him, standing with his feet in the water, at an angle of forty-five
degrees, inclining southward, and expending his gigantic strength in
sustaining himself in that posture.   He ceased his remonstrances, and
proceeded to the party at the other line. 

“I see the ‘staffs,’” shouted Mr.  Jones—” gather in,, boys, and away
with it; to shore with her!—to shore with her!”

At this cheerful sound, Elizabeth strained her eyes and saw the ends
of the two sticks on the seine emerging from the darkness, while the
men closed near to each other, and formed a deep bag of their net. 
The exertions of the fishermen sensibly increased, and the voice of
Richard was heard encouraging them to make their greatest efforts at
the present moment. 

“Now’s the time, my lads,” he cried; “let us get the ends to land, and
all we have will be our own—away with her!”

“Away with her, it is,” echoed Benjamin!—” hurrah! ho-a-hay, ho-a-hoy,
ho-a!”

“In with her,” shouted Kirby, exerting himself in a manner that left
nothing for those in his rear to do, but to gather up the slack of the
rope which passed through his hands. 

“Staff.   ho!” shouted the steward. 

“Staff, ho!” echoed Kirby, from the other rope. 
The men rushed to the water’s edge, some seizing the upper rope, and
some the lower or lead rope, and began to haul with great activity and
zeal, A deep semicircular sweep of the little balls that supported the
seine in its perpendicular position was plainly visible to the
spectators, and, as it rapidly lessened in size, the bag of the net
appeared, while an occasional flutter on the water announced the
uneasiness of the prisoners it contained. 

“Haul in, my lads,” shouted Richard—” I can see the dogs kicking to
get free.   Haul in, and here’s a cast that will pay for the labor. ”
Fishes of various sorts were now to be seen, entangled in the meshes
of the net, as it was passed through the hands of the laborers; and
the water, at a little distance from the shore, was alive with the
movements of the alarmed victims.   Hundreds of white sides were
glancing up to the surface of the water, and glistening in the fire
light, when, frightened at the uproar and the change, the fish would
again dart to the bottom, in fruitless efforts for freedom. 
Hurrah!” shouted Richard: “one or two more heavy drags, boys, and we
are safe. ”

“Cheerily, boys, cheerily!” cried Benjamin; “I see a salmon-trout that
is big enough for a chowder. ”

“Away with you, you varmint!” said Billy Kirby, plucking a bullpout
from the meshes, and casting the animal back into the lake with
contempt.   “Pull, boys, pull; here’s all kinds, and the Lord condemn
me for a liar, if there ain’t a thousand bass!”

Inflamed beyond the bounds of discretion at the sight, and forgetful
of the season, the wood-chopper rushed to his middle into the water,
and began to drive the reluctant animals before him from their native
element. 

“Pull heartily, boys,” cried Marmaduke, yielding to the excitement of
the moment, and laying his hands to the net, with no trifling addition
to the force.   Edwards had preceded him; for the sight of the immense
piles of fish, that were slowly rolling over on the gravelly beach,
had impelled him also to leave the ladies and join the fishermen. 

Great care was observed in bringing the net to land, and, after much
toil, the whole shoal of victims was safely deposited in a hollow of
the bank, where they were left to flutter away their brief existence
in the new and fatal element. 

Even Elizabeth and Louisa were greatly excited and highly gratified by
seeing two thousand captives thus drawn from the bosom of the lake,
and laid prisoners at their feet.   But when the feelings of the moment
were passing away, Marmaduke took in his hands a bass, that might have
weighed two pounds, and after viewing it a moment, in melancholy
musing, he turned to his daughter, and observed:

“This is a fearful expenditure of the choicest gifts of Providence. 
These fish, Bess, which thou seest lying in such piles before thee,
and which by to-morrow evening will be rejected food on the meanest
table in Templeton, are of a quality and flavor that, in other
countries, would make them esteemed a luxury on the tables of princes
or epicures.   The world has no better fish than the bass of Otsego; it
unites the richness of the shad * to the firmness of the salmon. ”

  * Of all the fish the writer has ever tasted, be thinks the one in
    question the best. 

“But surely, dear sir,” cried Elizabeth, “they must prove a great
blessing to the country, and a powerful friend to the poor. ”

“The poor are always prodigal, my child, where there is plenty, and
seldom think of a provision against the morrow.   But, if there can be
any excuse for destroying animals in this manner, it is in taking the
bass.   During the winter, you know, they are entirely protected from
our assaults by the ice, for they refuse the hook; and during the hot
months they are not seen.   It is supposed they retreat to the deep and
cool waters of the lake, at that season; and it is only in the spring
and autumn that, for a few days, they are to be found around the
points where they are within the reach of a seine.   But, like all the
other treasures of the wilderness, they already begin to disappear
before the wasteful extravagance of man. ”

“Disappear, Duke! disappear!” exclaimed the sheriff “if you don’t call
this appearing, I know not what you will.   Here are a good thousand of
the shiners, some hundreds of suckers, and a powerful quantity of
other fry.   But this is always the way with you, Marmaduke: first it’s
the trees, then it’s the deer; after that it’s the maple sugar, and so
on to the end of the chapter.   One day you talk of canals through a
country where there's a river or a lake every half-mile, just because
the water won’t run the way you wish it to go; and, the next, you say
some thing about mines of coal, though any man who has good eyes like
myself—I say, with good eyes—can see more wood than would keep the
city of London in fuel for fifty years; wouldn’t it, Benjamin?”

“Why, for that, squire,” said the steward, “Lon’on is no small place. 
If it was stretched an end, all the same as a town on one side of the
river, it would cover some such matter as this here lake.   Thof I
dar’st to say, that the wood in sight might sarve them a good turn,
seeing that the Lon’oners mainly burn coal. ”

“Now we are on the subject of coal, Judge Temple,” interrupted the
sheriff, “I have a thing of much importance to communicate to you; but
I will defer it -until tomorrow.   I know that you intend riding into
the eastern part of the Patent, and I will accompany you, and conduct
you to a spot where some of your projects may be realized.   We will
say no more now, for there are listeners; but a secret has this
evening been revealed to me, ‘Duke, that is of more consequence to
your welfare than all your estate united,”

Marmaduke laughed at the important intelligence, to which in a variety
of shapes he was accustomed, and the sheriff, with an air of great
dignity, as if pitying his want of faith, proceeded in the business
more immediately be fore them.   As the labor of drawing the net had
been very great, he directed one party of his men to commence throwing
the fish into piles, preparatory to the usual division, while another,
under the superintendence of Benjamin, prepared the seine for a second
haul. 

CHAPTER 24. 

“While from its margin, terrible to tell,
Three sailors with their gallant boatswain fell. ” —Falconer. 

While the fishermen were employed in making the preparations for an
equitable division of the spoil, Elizabeth and her friend strolled a
short distance from the group, along the shore of the lake.   After
reaching a point to which even the brightest of the occasional gleams
of the fire did not extend, they turned, and paused a moment, in
contemplation of the busy and lively party they had left, and of the
obscurity which, like the gloom of oblivion, seemed to envelop the
rest of the creation. 

“This is indeed a subject for the pencil!” exclaimed Elizabeth. 
“Observe the countenance of that woodchopper, while he exults in
presenting a larger fish than common to my cousin sheriff; and see,
Louisa, how hand some and considerate my dear father looks, by the
light of that fire, where he stands viewing the havoc of the game.   He
seems melancholy, as if he actually thought that a day of retribution
was to follow this hour of abundance and prodigality! Would they not
make a picture, Louisa?”

“You know that I am ignorant of all such accomplishments, Miss
Temple. ”

“Call me by my Christian name,” interrupted Elizabeth; “this is not a
place, neither is this a scene, for forms. ”

“Well, then, if I may venture an opinion,’ said Louisa timidly, “I
should think it might indeed make a picture.   The selfish earnestness
of that Kirby over his fish would contrast finely with the—the—
expression of Mr.  Edwards’ face.   I hardly know what to call it; but
it is—a—is— you know what I would say, dear Elizabeth. ”

“You do me too much credit, Miss Grant,” said the heiress; “I am no
diviner of thoughts, or interpreter of expressions. ”

There was certainly nothing harsh or even cold in the manner of the
speaker, but still it repressed the conversation, and they continued
to stroll still farther from the party, retaining each other’s arm,
but observing a pro found silence.   Elizabeth, perhaps conscious of
the improper phraseology of her last speech, or perhaps excited by the
new object that met her gaze, was the first to break the awkward
cessation in the discourse, by exclaiming:

“Look, Louisa! we are not alone; there are fishermen lighting a fire
on the other side of the lake, immediately opposite to us; it must be
in front of the cabin of Leather-Stocking!”

Through the obscurity, which prevailed most immediately under the
eastern mountain, a small and uncertain light was plainly to be seen,
though, as it was occasionally lost to the eye, it seemed struggling
for existence.   They observed it to move, and sensibly to lower, as it
carried down the descent of the bank to the shore.   Here, in a very
short time, its flame gradually expanded, and grew brighter, until it
became of the size of a man’s head, when it continued to shine a
steady ball of fire.   Such an object, lighted as it were by magic,
under the brow of the mountain, and in that retired and unfrequented
place, gave double interest to the beauty and singularity of its
appearance.   It did not at all resemble the large and unsteady light
of their own fire, being much more clear and bright, and retaining its
size and shape with perfect uniformity. 

There are moments when the best-regulated minds are more or less
subjected to the injurious impressions which few have escaped in
infancy; and Elizabeth smiled at her own weakness, while she
remembered the idle tales which were circulated through the village,
at the expense of the Leather-Stocking.   The same ideas seized her
companion, and at the same instant, for Louisa pressed nearer to her
friend, as she said in a low voice, stealing a timid glance toward the
bushes and trees that overhung the bank near them:

“Did you ever hear the singular ways of this Natty spoken of, Miss
Temple? They say that, in his youth, he was an Indian warrior; or,
what is the same thing, a white man leagued with the savages; and it
is thought he has been concerned in many of their inroads, in the old
wars. ”

“The thing is not at all improbable,” returned Elizabeth; “he is not
alone in that particular. ”

“No, surely; but is it not strange that he is so cautious with his
hut? He never leaves it, without fastening it in a remarkable manner;
and in several instances, when the children, or even the men of the
village, have wished to seek a shelter there from the storms, he has
been known to drive them from his door with rudeness and threats. 
That surely is singular to this country!”

“It is certainly not very hospitable; but we must remember his
aversion to the customs of civilized life.   You heard my father say, a
few days since, how kindly he was treated by him on his first visit to
his place. ” Elizabeth paused, and smiled, with an expression of
peculiar arch ness, though the darkness hid its meaning from her
companion, as she continued: “Besides, he certainly admits the visits
of Mr.  Edwards, whom we both know to be far from a savage. ”

To this speech Louisa made no reply, but continued gazing on the
object which had elicited her remarks.   In addition to the bright and
circular flame, was now to be seen a fainter, though a vivid light, of
an equal diameter to the other at the upper end, but which, after
extending downward for many feet, gradually tapered to a point at its
lower extremity.   A dark space was plainly visible between the two,
and the new illumination was placed beneath the other, the whole
forming an appearance not unlike an inverted note of admiration.   It
was soon evident that the latter was nothing but the reflection, from
the water, of the former, and that the object, whatever it might be,
was advancing across, or rather over the lake, for it seemed to be
several feet above its surface, in a direct line with themselves.   Its
motion was amazingly rapid, the ladies having hardly discovered that
it was moving at all, before the waving light of a flame was
discerned, losing its regular shape, while it increased in size, as it
approached. 

“It appears to be supernatural!” whispered Louisa, beginning to
retrace her steps toward the party. 

“It is beautiful!” exclaimed Elizabeth,

A brilliant though waving flame was now plainly visible, gracefully
gliding over the lake, and throwing its light on the water in such a
manner as to tinge it slightly though in the air, so strong was the
contrast, the darkness seemed to have the distinctness of material
substances, as if the fire were imbedded in a setting of ebony.   This
appearance, however, gradually wore off, and the rays from the torch
struck out, and enlightened the atmosphere in front of it, leaving the
background in a darkness that was more impenetrable than ever. 

“Ho! Natty, is that you?” shouted the sheriff.   “Paddle in, old boy,
and I’ll give you a mess of fish that is fit to place before the
governor,”

The light suddenly changed its direction, and a long and slightly
built boat hove up out of the gloom, while the red glare fell on the
weather-beaten features of the Leather-Stocking, whose tall person was
seen erect in the frail vessel, wielding, with the grace of an
experienced boatman, a long fishing-spear, which he held by its
centre, first dropping one end and then the other into the water, to
aid in propelling the little canoe of bark, we will not say through,
but over, the water.   At the farther end of the vessel a form was
faintly seen, guiding its motions, and using a paddle with the ease of
one who felt there was no necessity for exertion.   The Leather-
Stocking struck his spear lightly against the short staff which up
held, on a rude grating framed of old hoops of iron, the knots of pine
that composed the fuel, and the light, which glared high, for an
instant fell on the swarthy features and dark, glancing eyes of
Mohegan. 

The boat glided along the shore until it arrived opposite the fishing-
ground, when it again changed its direction and moved on to the land,
with a motion so graceful, and yet so rapid, that it seemed to possess
the power of regulating its own progress.   The water in front of the
canoe was hardly ruffled by its passage and no sound betrayed the
collision, when the light fabric shot on the gravelly beach for nearly
half its length, Natty receding a step or two from its bow, in order
to facilitate the landing. 

“Approach, Mohegan,” said Marmaduke; “approach, Leather-Stocking, and
load your canoe with bass.   It would be a shame to assail the animals
with the spear, when such multitudes of victims lie here, that will be
lost as food for the want of mouths to consume them. ”

No, no, Judge,” returned Natty, his tall figure stalking over the
narrow beach, and ascending to the little grassy bottom where the fish
were laid in piles; “I eat of no man’s wasty ways.   I strike my spear
into the eels or the trout, when I crave the creatur’; but I wouldn’t
be helping to such a sinful kind of fishing for the best rifle that
was ever brought out from the old countries.   If they had fur, like
the beaver, or you could tan their hides, like a buck, something might
be said in favor of taking them by the thousand with your nets; but as
God made them for man’s food, and for no other disarnable reason, I
call it sinful and wasty to catch more than can be eat. ”

“Your reasoning is mine; for once, old hunter, we agree in opinion;
and I heartily wish we could make a convert of the sheriff.   A net of
half the size of this would supply the whole village with fish for a
week at one haul. ”

The Leather-Stocking did not relish this alliance in sentiment; and he
shook his head doubtingly as he answered;

“No, no; we are not much of one mind, Judge, or you’d never turn good
hunting-grounds into stumpy pastures.   And you fish and hunt out of
rule; but, to me, the flesh is sweeter where the creatur’ has some
chance for its life; for that reason, I always use a single ball, even
if it be at a bird or a squirrel.   Besides, it saves lead; for, when a
body knows how to shoot, one piece of lead is enough for all, except
hard-lived animals. ”

The sheriff heard these opinions with great indignation; and when he
completed the last arrangement for the division, by carrying with his
own hands a trout of a large size, and placing it on four different
piles in succession, as his vacillating ideas of justice required,
gave vent to his spleen. 

“A very pretty confederacy, indeed! Judge Temple, the landlord and
owner of a township, with Nathaniel Bumppo a lawless squatter, and
professed deer-killer, in order to preserve the game of the county!
But, ‘Duke, when I fish I fish; so, away, boys, for another haul, and
we’ll send out wagons and carts in the morning to bring in our
prizes. ”

Marmaduke appeared to understand that all opposition to the will of
the sheriff would he useless, and he strolled from the fire to the
place where the canoe of the hunters lay, whither the ladies and
Oliver Edwards had already preceded him. 

Curiosity induced the females to approach this spot; but it was a
different motive that led the youth thither.   Elizabeth examined the
light ashen timbers and thin bark covering of the canoe, in admiration
of its neat but simple execution, and with wonder that any human being
could he so daring as to trust his life in so frail a vessel.   But the
youth explained to her the buoyant properties of the boat, and its
perfect safety when under proper management; adding, in such glowing
terms, a description of the manner in which the fish were struck with
the spear, that she changed suddenly, from an apprehension of the
danger of the excursion, to a desire to participate in its pleasures. 
She even ventured a proposition to that effect to her father, laughing
at the same time at her own wish, and accusing herself of acting under
a woman’s caprice. 

“Say not so, Bess,” returned the Judge; “I would have you above the
idle fears of a silly girl.   These canoes are the safest kind of boats
to those who have skill and steady nerves.   I have crossed the
broadest part of the Oneida in one much smaller than this. ”

“And I the Ontary,” interrupted the Leather-Stocking; “ and that with
squaws in the canoe, too.   But the Delaware women are used to the
paddle, and are good hands in a boat of this natur’, If the young lady
would like to see an old man strike a trout for his breakfast, she is
welcome to a seat.   John will say the same, seeing that he built the
canoe, which was only launched yesterday; for I’m not over-curious at
such small work as brooms, and basket-making, and other like Indian
trades. ”

Natty gave Elizabeth one of his significant laughs, with a kind nod of
the head, when he concluded his invitation but Mohegan, with the
native grace of an Indian, approached, and taking her soft white hand
into his own swarthy and wrinkled palm, said:

“Come, granddaughter of Miquon, and John will be glad.   Trust the
Indian; his head is old, though his hand is not steady.   The Young
Eagle will go, and see that no harm hurts his sister. ”

“Mr.  Edwards,” said Elizabeth, blushing slightly, “your friend Mohegan
has given a promise for you.   Do you redeem the pledge?”

“With my life, if necessary, Miss Temple,” cried the youth, with
fervor.   “ The sight is worth some little apprehension; for of real
danger there is none, I will go with you and Miss Grand, however, to
save appearances. ”

“With me!” exclaimed Louisa.   “No, not with me, Mr.  Edwards; nor,
surely, do you mean to trust yourself in that slight canoe. ”

“But I shall; for I have no apprehensions any longer,” said Elizabeth,
stepping into the boat, and taking a seat where the Indian directed. 
“Mr.  Edwards, you may remain, as three do seem to be enough for such
an egg shell. ” “

“It shall hold a fourth,” cried the young man, springing to her side,
with a violence that nearly shook the weak fabric of the vessel
asunder.   “Pardon me, Miss Temple, that I do not permit these
venerable Charons to take you to the shades unattended by your
genius. ”

“Is it a good or evil spirit?” asked Elizabeth. 
“Good to you. ”

“And mine,” added the maiden, with an air that strangely blended pique
with satisfaction.   But the motion of the canoe gave rise to new
ideas, and fortunately afforded a good excuse to the young man to
change the discourse. 

It appeared to Elizabeth that they glided over the water by magic, so
easy and graceful was the manner in which Mohegan guided his little
bark.   A slight gesture with his spear indicated the way in which
Leather-Stocking wished to go, and a profound silence was preserved by
the whole party, as the precaution necessary to the success of their
fishery.   At that point of the lake the water shoaled regularly. 
differing in this particular altogether from those parts where the
mountains rose nearly in perpendicular precipices from the beach. 
There the largest vessels could have lain, with their yards
interlocked with the pines; while here a scanty growth of rushes
lifted their tops above the lake, gently curling the waters, as their
bending heads waved with the passing breath of the night air.   It was
at the shallow points only that the bass could he found, or the net
cast with success. 

Elizabeth saw thousands of these fish swimming in shoals along the
shallow and warm waters of the shore; for the flaring light of their
torch laid bare the mysteries of the lake, as plainly as if the limpid
sheet of the Otsego was but another atmosphere.   Every instant she
expected to see the impending spear of Leather-Stocking darting into
the thronging hosts that were rushing beneath her, where it would seem
that a blow could not go amiss; and where, as her father had already
said, the prize that would be obtained was worthy any epicure.   But
Natty had his peculiar habits, and, it would seem, his peculiar tastes
also. 

His tall stature, and his erect posture, enabled him to see much
farther than those who were seated in the bottom of the canoe; and he
turned his head warily in every direction, frequently bending his body
forward, and straining his vision, as if desirous of penetrating the
water that surrounded their boundary of light.   At length his anxious
scrutiny was rewarded with success, and, waving his spear from the
shore, he said in a cautious tone:

“Send her outside the bass, John; I see a laker there, that has run
out of the school.   It’s seldom one finds such a creatur’ in shallow
water, where a spear can touch it. ”

Mohegan gave a wave of assent with his hand, and in the next instant
the canoe was without the “ run of the bass,” and in water nearly
twenty feet in depth.   A few additional knots were laid on the
grating, and the light penetrated to the bottom, Elizabeth then saw a
fish of unusual size floating above small pieces of logs and sticks. 
The animal was only distinguishable, at that distance, by a slight but
almost imperceptible motion of its fins and tail.   The curiosity
excited by this unusual exposure of the secrets of the lake seemed to
be mutual between the heiress of the land and the lord of these
waters, for the “ “salmon-trout” soon announced his interest by
raising his head and body for a few degrees above a horizontal line,
and then dropping them again into a horizontal position. 

“Whist! whist!” said Natty, in a low voice, on hearing a slight sound
made by Elizabeth in bending over the side of the canoe in curiosity;
“‘tis a skeary animal, and it’s a far stroke for a spear.   My handle
is hut fourteen foot, and the creator’ lies a good eighteen from the
top of the water: but I’ll try him, for he's a ten—pounder. ”

While speaking, the Leather-Stocking was poising and directing his
weapon.   Elizabeth saw the bright, polished tines, as they slowly and
silently entered the water, where the refraction pointed them many
degrees from the true direction of the fish; and she thought that the
intended victim saw them also, as he seemed to increase the play of
his tail and fins, though without moving his station.   At the next
instant the tall body of Natty bent to the water’s edge, and the
handle of his spear disappeared in the lake.   The long, dark streak of
the gliding weapon, and the little bubbling vortex which followed its
rapid flight, were easily to be seen: but it was not until the handle
snot again into the air by its own reaction, and its master catching
it in his hand, threw its tines uppermost, that Elizabeth was
acquainted with the success of the blow.   A fish of great size was
transfixed by the barbed steel, and was very soon shaken from its
impaled situation into the bottom of the canoe. 

That will do, John,” said Natty, raising his prize by one of his
fingers, and exhibiting it before the torch; “ I shall not strike
another blow to-night. ”

The Indian again waved his hand, and replied with the simple and
energetic monosyllable of:

“Good. ”

Elizabeth was awakened from the trance created by this scene, and by
gazing in that unusual manner at the bot tom of the lake, be the
hoarse sounds of Benjamin’s voice, and the dashing of oars, as the
heavier boat of the seine-drawers approached the spot where the canoe
lay, dragging after it the folds of the net. 

“Haul off, haul off, Master Bumppo,” cried Benjamin, “your top-light
frightens the fish, who see the net and sheer off soundings.   A fish
knows as much as a horse, or, for that matter, more, seeing that it’s
brought up on the water.   Haul oil, Master Bumppo, haul off, I say,
and give a wide berth to the seine. ”

Mohegan guided their little canoe to a point where the movements of
the fishermen could be observed, without interruption to the business,
and then suffered it to lie quietly on the water, looking like an
imaginary vessel floating in air.   There appeared to be much ill-humor
among the party in the batteau, for the directions of Benjamin were
not only frequent, but issued in a voice that partook largely of
dissatisfaction. 

“Pull larboard oar, will ye, Master Kirby?” cried the old seaman;
“pull larboard best.   It would puzzle the oldest admiral in their
British fleet to cast this here net fair, with a wake like a
corkscrew.   Full starboard, boy, pull starboard oar, with a will. ”

“Harkee, Mister Pump,” said Kirby, ceasing to row, and speaking with
sonic spirit; “I'm a man that likes civil language and decent
treatment, such as is right ‘twixt man and man.   If you want us to go
hoy, say so, and hoy I'll go, for the benefit of the company; but I m
not used to being ordered about like dumb cattle. ”

“Who’s dumb cattle?”” echoed Benjamin, fiercely, turning his
forbidding face to the glare of light from the canoe, and exhibiting
every feature teeming with the expression of disgust.   “If you want to
come aft and cun the boat round, come and be damned, and pretty
steerage you’ll make of it.   There’s but another heave of the net in
the stern-sheets, and we’re clear of the thing.   Give way, will ye?
and shoot her ahead for a fathom or two, and if you catch me afloat
again with such a horse-marine as your self, why, rate me a ship's
jackass, that’s all. ”

Probably encouraged by the prospect of a speedy termination to his
labor, the wood-chopper resumed his oar, and, under strong excitement,
gave a stroke that not only cleared the boat of the net but of the
steward at the same instant.   Benjamin had stood on the little
platform that held the seine, in the stern of the boat, and the
violent whirl occasioned by the vigor of the wood-chopper’s arm
completely destroyed his balance.   The position of the lights rendered
objects in the batteau distinguishable, both from the canoe and the
shore; and the heavy fall on the water drew all eyes to the steward,
as he lay struggling, for a moment, in sight. 

A loud burst of merriment, to which the lungs of Kirby contributed no
small part, broke out like a chorus of laughter, and ran along the
eastern mountain, in echoes, until it died away in distant, mocking
mirth, among the rocks and woods.   The body of the steward was seen
slowly to disappear, as was expected; but when the light waves, which
had been raised by his fall, began to sink in calmness, and the water
finally closed over his head, unbroken and still, a very different
feeling pervaded the spectators. 

“How fare you, Benjamin?” shouted Richard from the shore. 

“The dumb devil can’t swim a stroke!” exclaimed Kirby, rising, and
beginning to throw aside his clothes. 

“Paddle up, Mohegan,” cried young Edwards, “the light will show us
where he lies, and I will dive for the body. ”

“Oh! save him! for God’s sake, save him!” exclaimed Elizabeth, bowing
her head on the side of the canoe in horror. 

A powerful and dexterous sweep of Mohegan's paddle sent the canoe
directly over the spot where the steward had fallen, and a loud shout
from the Leather-Stocking announced that he saw the body. 

“Steady the boat while I dive,” again cried Edwards. 

“Gently, lad, gently,” said Natty; “ I’ll spear the creatur’ up in
half the time, and no risk to anybody. ”

The form of Benjamin was lying about half-way to the bottom, grasping
with both hands some broken rushes.   The blood of Elizabeth curdled to
her heart, as she saw the figure of a fellow-creature thus extended
under an immense sheet of water, apparently in motion by the
undulations of the dying waves, with its face and hands, viewed by
that light, and through the medium of the fluid, already colored with
hues like death. 

At the same instant, she saw the shining tines of Natty’s spear
approaching the head of the sufferer, and entwinning themselves,
rapidly and dexterously, in the hairs of his cue and the cape of his
coat.   The body was now raised slowly, looking ghastly and grim as its
features turned upward to the light and approached the surface.   The
arrival of the nostrils of Benjamin into their own atmosphere was
announced by a breathing that would have done credit to a porpoise. 
For a moment, Natty held the steward suspended, with his head just
above the water, while his eyes slowly opened and stared about him, as
if he thought that he had reached a new and unexplored country. 

As all the parties acted and spoke together, much less time was
consumed in the occurrence of these events than in their narration. 
To bring the batteau to the end of the spear, and to raise the form of
Benjamin into the boat, and for the whole party to regain the shore,
required but a minute.   Kirby, aided by Richard, whose anxiety induced
him to run into the water to meet his favorite assistant, carried the
motionless steward up the bank, and seated him before the fire, while
the sheriff proceeded to order the most approved measures then in use
for the resuscitation of the drowned. 

“Run, Billy,” he cried, “to the village, and bring up the rum-hogshead
that lies before the door, in which I am making vinegar, and be quick,
boy, don’t stay to empty the vinegar, and stop at Mr.  Le Quoi’s, and
buy a paper of tobacco and half a dozen pipes; and ask Remarkable for
some salt, and one of her flannel petticoats; and ask Dr.  Todd to send
his lancet, and to come himself; and— ha! ‘Duke, what are you about?
would you strangle a man who is full of water, by giving him rum? Help
me to open his hand, that I may pat it. ”

All this time Benjamin sat, with his muscles fixed, his mouth shut,
and his hands clinching the rushes which he had seized in the
confusion of the moment and which, as he held fast, like a true
seaman, had been the means of preventing his body from rising again to
the surface.   His eyes, however, were open, and stared wildly on the
group about the fire, while his lungs were playing like a blacksmith’s
bellows, as if to compensate themselves for the minute of inaction to
which they had been subjected.   As he kept his lips compressed, with a
most inveterate determination, the air was compelled to pass through
his nostrils, and he rather snorted than breathed, and in such a
manner that nothing but the excessive agitation of the sheriff could
at all justify his precipitous orders. 

The bottle, applied to the steward’s lips by Marmaduke, acted like a
charm.   His mouth opened instinctively; his hands dropped the rushes,
and seized the glass; his eyes raised from their horizontal stare to
the heavens; and the whole man was lost, for a moment, in a new
sensation.   Unhappily for the propensity of the steward, breath was as
necessary after one of these draughts as after his submersion, and the
time at length arrived when he was compelled to let go the bottle. 

“Why, Benjamin!” roared the sheriff; “you amaze me! for a man of your
experience in drownings to act so foolishly! Just now, you were half
full of water, and now you are—”

“Full of grog,” interrupted the steward, his features settling down,
with amazing flexibility, into their natural economy.   “But, d’yesee,
squire, I kept my hatches chose, and it’s but little water that ever
gets into my scuttle-butt.   Harkee, Master Kirby! I’ve followed the
salt-water for the better part of a man’s life, and have seen some
navigation on the fresh; but this here matter I will say in your
favor, and that is, that you’re the awk’ardest green 'un that ever
straddled a boat’s thwart.   Them that likes you for a shipmate, may
sail with you and no thanks; but dam'me if I even walk on the lake
shore in your company.   For why? you’d as lief drown a man as one of
them there fish; not to throw a Christian creature so much as a rope’s
end when he was adrift, and no life-buoy in sight! Natty Bumppo, give
us your fist.   There’s them that says you’re an Indian, and a scalper,
but you’ve served me a good turn, and you may set me down for a
friend; thof it would have been more ship shape like to lower the
bight of a rope or running bowline below me, than to seize an old
seaman by his head-lanyard; but I suppose you are used to taking men
by the hair, and seeing you did me good instead of harm thereby, why,
it’s the same thing, d'ye see?”

Marmaduke prevented any reply, and assuming the action of matters with
a dignity and discretion that at once silenced all opposition from his
cousin, Benjamin was dispatched to the village by land, and the net
was hauled to shore in such a manner that the fish for once escaped
its meshes with impunity. 

The division of the spoils was made in the ordinary manner, by placing
one of the party with his hack to the game, who named the owner of
each pile.   Bill Kirby stretched his large frame on the grass by the
side of the fire, as sentinel until morning, over net and fish ; and
the remainder of the party embarked in the batteau, to return to the
village. 

The wood-chopper was seen broiling his supper on the coals as they
lost sight of the fire, and when the boat approached the shore, the
torch of Mohegan’s canoe was shining again under the gloom of the
eastern mountain.   Its motion ceased suddenly; a scattering of brands
was in the air, and then all remained dark as the conjunction of
night, forest, and mountain could render the scene. 

The thoughts of Elizabeth wandered from the youth, who was holding a
canopy of shawls over herself and Louisa, to the hunter and the Indian
warrior; and she felt an awakening curiosity to visit a hut where men
of such different habits and temperament were drawn together as by
common impulse. 

CHAPTER 25. 

“Cease all this parlance about hills and dales. 
None listen to thy scenes of boyish frolic. 
Fond dotard! with such tickled ears as thou dost
Come to thy tale. ”—Duo. 

Mr.  Jones arose on the following morning with the sun, and, ordering
his own and Marmaduke’s steeds to be saddled, he proceeded, with a
countenance big with some business of unusual moment to the apartment
of the Judge.   The door was unfastened, and Richard entered, with the
freedom that characterized not only the intercourse between the
cousins, but the ordinary manners of the sheriff. 

“Well, ‘Duke, to horse,” he cried, “and I will explain to you my
meaning in the allusions I made last night.   David says, in the
Psalms—no, it was Solomon, but it was all in the family—Solomon said
there was a time for all things; and, in my humble opinion, a fishing-
party is not the moment for discussing important subjects.   Ha! why,
what the devil ails you, Marmaduke? Ain't you well? Let me feel your
pulse; my grandfather, you know—”

“Quite well in the body, Richard,” interrupted the Judge, repulsing
his cousin, who was about to assume the functions that rightly
belonged to Dr.  Todd; “ but ill at heart.   I received letters by the
post last night, after we returned from the point, and this among the
number. ”

The sheriff took the letter, but without turning his eyes on the
writing, for he was examining the appearance of the other with
astonishment.   From the face of his cousin the gaze of Richard
wandered to the table, which was covered with letters, packets, and
newspapers; then to the apartment and all it contained.   On the bed
there was the impression that had been made by a human form, but the
coverings were unmoved, and everything indicated that the occupant of
the room had passed a sleepless night.   The candles had burned to the
sockets, and had evidently extinguished themselves in their own
fragments Marmaduke had drawn his curtains, and opened both the
shutters and the sashes, to admit the balmy air “ of a spring
morning; but his pale cheek, his quivering lip, and his sunken eye
presented altogether so very different an appearance from the usual
calm, manly, and cheerful aspect of the Judge, that the sheriff grew
each moment more and more bewildered with astonishment.   At length
Richard found time to cast his eyes on the direction of the letter,
which he still held unopened, crumpling it in his hand. 

“What! a ship-letter!” he exclaimed; “and from England, ha! ‘Duke,
there must be news of importance! indeed!”

“Read it,” said Marmaduke, pacing the floor in excessive agitation. 

Richard, who commonly thought aloud, was unable to read a letter
without suffering part of its contents to escape him in audible
sounds.   So much of the epistle as was divulged in that manner, we
shall lay before the reader, accompanied by the passing remarks of the
sheriff:

“‘London, February 12, 1793. ’ What a devil of a pas sage she had! but
the wind has been northwest for six weeks, until within the last
fortnight.  Sir, your favors of August 10th, September 23d, and of
December 1st, were received in due season, and the first answered by
return of packet.   Since the receipt of the last, I’ “—here a long
passage was rendered indistinct by a kind of humming noise by the
sheriff—” ‘I grieve to say that ‘—hum, hum, bad enough to be sure—’
but trusts that a merciful Providence has seen fit’—hum, hum, hum
seems to be a good, pious sort of a man, ‘Duke; belongs to the
Established Church, I dare say; hum, hum—’ vessel sailed from Falmouth
on or about the 1st September of last year, and’—hum, hum, hum, ‘If
anything should transpire on this afflicting subject shall not fail’—
hum, hum; really a good-hearted man, for a lawyer—’but Can communicate
nothing further at present’—hum, hum.   “ The national convention ‘—
hum, hum—’ unfortunate Louis’—hum, hum—’example of your Washington’—a
very sensible man, I declare, and none of your crazy democrats.   Hum,
hum—’our gallant navy’—hum, hum—’under our most excellent monarch’—ay,
a good man enough, that King George, but bad advisers: hum, hum—’I beg
to conclude with assurances of my perfect respect. ’—hum, hum—’Andrew
Holt.   ‘—Andrew Holt, a very sensible, feeling man, this Mr.  Andrew
Holt—but the writer of evil tidings.   What will you do next, Cousin
Marmaduke?”

“What can I do, Richard, but trust to time, and the will of Heaven?
Here is another letter from Connecticut, but it only repeats the
substance of the last.   There is but one consoling reflection to be
gathered from the English news, which is, that my last letter was
received by him before the ship sailed,”

“This is bad enough, indeed! ‘Duke, bad enough, indeed! and away go
all my plans, of putting wings to the house, to the devil.   I had made
arrangements for a ride to introduce you to something of a very
important nature.   You know how much you think of mines—”

“Talk not of mines,” interrupted the Judge: “there is a sacred duty to
be performed, and that without delay, I must devote this day to
writing; and thou must be my assistant, Richard; it will not do to
employ Oliver in a matter of such secrecy and interest,”

“No, no, ‘Duke,” cried the sheriff, squeezing his hand, “ I am your
man, just now; we are sister’s children, and blood, after all, is the
best cement to make friendship stick together.   Well, well, there is
no hurry about the silver mine, just now; another time will do as
well.   We shall want Dirky Van, I suppose?”

Marmaduke assented to this indirect question, and the sheriff
relinquished all his intentions on the subject of the ride, and,
repairing to the breakfast parlor, he dispatched a messenger to
require the immediate presence of Dirck Van der School. 

The village of Templeton at that time supported but two lawyers, one
of whom was introduced to our readers in the bar-room of the “Bold
Dragoon. ” and the other was the gentleman of whom Richard spoke by the
friendly yet familiar appellation of Dirck, or Dirky Van.   Great good-
nature, a very tolerable share of skill in his profession, and,
considering the circumstances, no contemptible degree of honesty, were
the principal ingredients in the character of this man, who was known
to the settlers as Squire Van der School, and sometimes by the
flattering though anomalous title of the “Dutch” or “honest lawyer. ”

We would not wish to mislead our readers in their conceptions of any
of our characters, and we therefore feel it necessary to add that the
adjective, in the preceding agnomen of Mr.  Van der School, was used in
direct reference to its substantive.   Our orthodox friends need not be
told that all the merit in this world is comparative; and, once for
all, we desire to say that, where anything which involves qualities or
characters is asserted, we must be understood to mean, “under the
circumstances. ”

During the remainder of the day, the Judge was closeted with his
cousin and his lawyer; and no one else was admitted to his apartment,
excepting his daughter.   The deep distress that so evidently affected
Marmaduke was in some measure communicated to Elizabeth also; for a
look of dejection shaded her intelligent features, and the buoyancy of
her animated spirits was sensibly softened.   Once on that day, young
Edwards, who was a wondering and observant spectator of the sudden
alteration produced in the heads of the family, detected a tear
stealing over the cheek of Elizabeth, and suffusing her bright eyes
with a softness that did not always belong to their expression. 

“Have any evil tidings been received, Miss Temple?” he inquired, with
an interest and voice that caused Louisa Grant to raise her head from
her needlework, with a quick ness at which she instantly blushed
herself.   “I would offer my services to your father, if, as I suspect,
he needs an agent in some distant place, and I thought it would give
you relief. ”

“We have certainly heard bad news,” returned Elizabeth, “ and it may
be necessary that my father should leave home for a short period;
unless I can persuade him to trust my cousin Richard with the
business, whose absence from the country, just at this time, too,
might be inexpedient. ”

The youth paused a moment, and the blood gathered slowly to his
temples as he continued:

“If it be of a nature that I could execute-”

“It is such as can only be confided to one we know— one of ourselves,”

“Surely, you know me, Miss Temple!” he added, with a warmth that he
seldom exhibited, but which did some times escape him in the moments
of their frank communications.   “Have I lived five months under your
roof to be a stranger?”

Elizabeth was engaged with her needle also, and she bent her head to
one side, affecting to arrange her muslin; but her hand shook, her
color heightened, and her eyes lost their moisture in an expression of
ungovernable interest, as she said:

“How much do we know of you, Mr.  Edwards?”

“How much!” echoed the youth, gazing from the speaker to the mild
countenance of Louisa, that was also illuminated with curiosity; “ how
much Have I been so long an inmate with you and not known?”

The head of Elizabeth turned slowly from its affected position, and
the look of confusion that had blended so strongly with an expression
of interest changed to a smile. 

“We know you, sir, indeed; you are called Mr.  Oliver Edwards.   I
understand that you have informed my friend Miss Grant that you are a
native—”

“Elizabeth!” exclaimed Louisa, blushing to thc eyes, and trembling
like an aspen ; “ you misunderstood me, dear Miss Temple; I—I—it was
only a conjecture.   Besides, if Mr.  Edwards is related to the natives
why should we reproach him? In what are we better? at least I, who am
the child of a poor and unsettled clergyman?”

Elizabeth shook her head doubtingly, and even laughed, but made no
reply, until, observing the melancholy which pervaded the countenance
of her companion, who was thinking of the poverty and labors of her
father, she continued:

“Nay, Louisa, humility carries you too far.   The daughter of a
minister of the church can have no superiors.   Neither I nor Mr. 
Edwards is quite your equal, unless,” she added, again smiling, “he is
in secret a king “

“A faithful servant of the King of kings, Miss Temple, is inferior to
none on earth,” said Louisa; “but his honors are his own; I am only
the child of a poor and friendless man, and can claim no other
distinction.   Why, then, should I feel myself elevated above Mr. 
Edwards, because—because—perhaps he is only very, very distantly
related to John Mohegan?”

Glances of a very comprehensive meaning were exchanged between the
heiress and the young man, as Louisa betrayed, while vindicating his
lineage, the reluctance with which she admitted his alliance with the
old warrior; but not even a smile at the simplicity of their companion
was indulged in by either. 

“On reflection, I must acknowledge that my situation here is somewhat
equivocal,” said Edwards, “though I may be said to have purchased it
with my blood. ”

“The blood, too, of one of the native lords of the soil!” cried
Elizabeth, who evidently put little faith in his aboriginal descent. 

“Do I bear the marks of my lineage so very plainly impressed on my
appearance? I am dark, but not very red—not more so than common?”

“Rather more so, just now. ”

“I am sure, Miss Temple,” cried Louisa, “you cannot have taken much
notice of Mr.  Edwards.   His eyes are not so black as Mohegan’s or even
your own, nor is his hair. ”

“Very possibly, then, I can lay claim to the same de scent It would be
a great relief to my mind to think so, for I own that I grieve when I
see old Mohegan walking about these lands like the ghost of one of
their ancient possessors, and feel how small is my own right to
possess them. ”

“Do you?” cried the youth, with a vehemence that startled the ladies

“I do, indeed,” returned Elizabeth, after suffering a moment to pass
in surprise; “but what can I do—what can my father do? Should we offer
the old man a home’ and a maintenance, his habits would compel him to
refuse us.   Neither were we so silly as to wish such a thing, could we
convert these clearings and farms again into hunting grounds, as the
Leather-Stocking would wish to see them. ”

“You speak the truth, Miss Temple,” said Edwards.   “What can you do
indeed? But there is one thing that I am certain you can and will do,
when you become the mistress of these beautiful valleys—use your
wealth with indulgence to the poor, and charity to the needy; indeed,
you can do no more. ”

“And That will be doing a good deal,” said Louisa, smiling in her
turn.   “But there will, doubtless, be one to take the direction of
such things from her hands. ”

am not about to disclaim matrimony, like a silly girl, who dreams of
nothing else from morn till night; but I am a nun here, without the
vow of celibacy.   Where shall I find a husband in these forests?”

“There is none, Miss Temple,” said Edwards quickly; “there is none who
has a right to aspire to you, and I know that you will wait to be
sought by your equal; or die, as you live, loved, respected, and
admired by all who know you. ”

The young man seemed to think that he had said all that was required
by gallantry, for he arose, and, taking his hat, hurried from the
apartment.   Perhaps Louisa thought that he had said more than was
necessary, for she sighed, with an aspiration so low that it was
scarcely audible to herself, and bent her head over her work again. 
And it is possible that Miss Temple wished to hear more, for her eyes
continued fixed for a minute on the door through which the young man
had passed, then glanced quickly toward her companion, when the long
silence that succeeded manifested how much zest may be given to the
conversation of two maidens under eighteen, by the presence of a youth
of three-and-twenty. 

The first person encountered by Mr.  Edwards, as he rather rushed than
walked from the house, was the little square-built lawyer, with a
large bundle of papers under his arm, a pair of green spectacles on
his nose, with glasses at the sides, as if to multiply his power of
detecting frauds by additional organs of vision. 

Mr.  Van der School was a well-educated man, but of slow comprehension,
who had imbibed a wariness in his speeches and actions, from having
suffered by his collisions with his more mercurial and apt brethren
who had laid the foundations of their practice in the Eastern courts,
and who had sucked in shrewdness with their mother’s milk.   The
caution of this gentleman was exhibited in his actions, by the utmost
method and punctuality, tinctured with a good deal of timidity; and in
his speeches, by a parenthetical style, that frequently left to his
auditors a long search after his meaning. 

“A good-morning to you, Mr.  Van der School,” said Edwards; “it seems
to be a busy day with us at the mansion-house. ”

“Good-morning, Mr.  Edwards (if that is your name for, being a
stranger, we have no other evidence of the fact than your own
testimony, as I understand you have given it to Judge Temple), good-
morning, sir.   It is, apparently a busy day (but a man of your
discretion need not be told having, doubtless, discovered it of your
own accord, that appearances are often deceitful) up at the mansion-
house”

“Have you papers of consequence that will require copying? Can I be of
assistance in any way?”

“There are papers (as doubtless you see for your eyes are young by
the outsides) that require copying. ”

“Well, then, I will accompany you to your office, and receive such as
are most needed, and by night I shall have them done if there be much
haste. ”

“I shall always be glad to see you, sir, at my office (as in duty
bound not that it is obligatory to receive any man within your
dwelling (unless so inclined), which is a castle, according to the
forms of politeness), or at any other place; but the papers are most
strictly confidential (and, as such, cannot be read by any one),
unless so directed (by Judge Temple’s solemn injunctions), and are
invisible to all eyes; excepting those whose duties (I mean assumed
duties) require it of them. ”

“Well, sir, as I perceive that I can be of no service, I wish you
another good-morning; but beg you will remember that I am quite idle
just now, and I wish you would intimate as much to Judge Temple, and
make him a ten der of my services in any part of the world, unless—
unless—it be far from Templeton. ”

“I will make the communication, sir, in your name (with your own
qualifications), as your agent.   Good morning, sir.   But stay
proceedings, Mr.  Edwards (so called), for a moment.   Do you wish me to
state the offer of travelling as a final contract (for which
consideration has been received at former dates by sums advanced,
which would be binding), or as a tender of services for which
compensation is to be paid (according to future agreement between the
parties), on performance of the conditions?”

“Any way, any way,” said Edwards; “he seems in distress, and I would
assist him. ”

“The motive is good, sir (according to appearances which are often
deceitful] on first impressions), and does you honor.   I will mention
your wish, young gentleman (as you now seem), and will not fail to
communicate the answer by five o’clock P. M.   of this present day (God
willing), if you give me an opportunity so to do. ”

The ambiguous nature of the situation and character of Mr.  Edwards had
rendered him an object of peculiar suspicion to the lawyer, and the
youth was consequently too much accustomed to similar equivocal and
guarded speeches to feel any unusual disgust at the present dialogue. 
He saw at once that it was the intention of the practitioner to
conceal the nature of his business, even from the private secretary of
Judge Temple; and he knew too well the difficulty of comprehending the
meaning of Mr.  Van der School, when the gentleman most wished to be
luminous in his discourse, not to abandon all thoughts of a discovery,
when he perceived that the attorney was endeavoring to avoid anything
like an approach to a cross-examination.   They parted at the gate, the
lawyer walking with an important and hurried air toward his office,
keeping his right hand firmly clinched on the bundle of papers. 

It must have been obvious to all our readers, that the youth
entertained an unusual and deeply seated prejudice against the
character of the Judge; but owing to some counteracting cause, his
sensations were now those of powerful interest in the state of his
patron’s present feelings, and in the cause of his secret uneasiness. 
He remained gazing after the lawyer until the door closed on both the
bearer and the mysterious packet, when he returned slowly to the
dwelling, and endeavored to forget his curiosity in the usual
avocations of his office. 

When the Judge made his reappearance in the circles of his family, his
cheerfulness was tempered by a shade of melancholy that lingered for
many days around his manly brow; but the magical progression of the
season aroused him from his temporary apathy, and his smiles returned
with the summer. 

The heats of the days, and the frequent occurrence of balmy showers,
had completed in an incredibly short period the growth of plants which
the lingering spring had so long retarded in the germ; and the woods
presented every shade of green that the American forests know.   The
stumps in the cleared fields were already hidden beneath the wheat
that was waving with every breath of the sum mer air, shining and
changing its hues like velvet. 

During the continuance of his cousin’s dejection, Mr.  Jones forebore,
with much consideration, to press on his attention a business that
each hour was drawing nearer to the heart of the sheriff, and which,
if any opinion could he formed by his frequent private conferences
with the man who was introduced in these pages by the name of Jotham,
at the bar-room of the Bold Dragoon, was becoming also of great
importance. 

At length the sheriff ventured to allude again to the subject; and one
evening, in the beginning of July, Marmaduke made him a promise of
devoting the following day to the desired excursion. 

CHAPTER 26. 

“Speak on, my dearest father!
Thy words are like the breezes of the west. ”—Milman. 

It was a mild and soft morning, when Marmaduke and Richard mounted
their horses and proceeded on the expedition that had so long been
uppermost in the thoughts of the latter; and Elizabeth and Louisa
appeared at the same instant in the hall, attired for an excursion on
foot. 

The head of Miss Grant was covered by a neat little hat of green silk,
and her modest eyes peered from under its shade, with the soft languor
that characterized her whole appearance; but Miss Temple trod her
father’s wide apartments with the step of their mistress, holding in
her hands, dangling by one of its ribbons, the gypsy that was to
conceal the glossy locks that curled around her polished fore head in
rich profusion. 

“What? are you for a walk, Bess?” cried the Judge, suspending his
movements for a moment to smile, with a father’s fondness, at the
display of womanly grace and beauty that his child presented. 
“Remember the heats of July, my daughter; nor venture further than
thou canst retrace before the meridian.   Where is thy parasol, girl?
thou wilt lose tine polish of that brow, under this sun and southern
breeze, unless thou guard it with unusual care. ”

“I shall then do more honor to my connections,” returned the smiling
daughter.   “Cousin Richard has a bloom that any lady might envy.   At
present the resemblance between us is so trifling that no stranger
would know us to be ‘sisters’ children.   ‘ “

“Grandchildren, you mean, Cousin Bess,” said the sheriff.   “But on,
Judge Temple; time and tide wait for no man; and if you take my
counsel, sir, in twelve months from this day you may make an umbrella
for your daughter of her camel’s-hair shawl, and have its frame of
solid silver.   I ask nothing for myself, ‘Duke; you have been a good
friend to me already; besides, all that I have will go to Bess there,
one of these melancholy days, so it’s as long as it’s short, whether I
or you leave it.   But we have a day’s ride before us, sir; so move
forward, or dismount, and say you won’t go at once. ”

“Patience, patience, Dickon, “returned the Judge, checking his horse
and turning again to his daughter.   “If thou art for the mountains,
love, stray not too deep into the forest.   I entreat thee; for, though
it is done often with impunity, there is sometimes danger. ”

“Not at this season, I believe, sir,” said Elizabeth; “for, I will
confess, it is the intention of Louisa and myself to stroll among the
hills. ”

“Less at this season than in the winter, dear; but still there may be
danger in venturing too far.   But though thou art resolute, Elizabeth,
thou art too much like thy mother not to be prudent. ”

The eyes of the parent turned reluctantly from his child, and the
Judge and sheriff rode slowly through the gateway, and disappeared
among the buildings of the village. 

During this short dialogue, young Edwards stood, an attentive
listener, holding in his hand a fishing-rod, the day and the season
having tempted him also to desert the house for the pleasure of
exercise in the air.   As the equestrians turned through the gate, he
approached the young females, who were already moving toward the
street, and was about to address them, as Louisa paused, and said. 
quickly:

“Mr.  Edwards would speak to us, Elizabeth. ”

The other stopped also, and turned to the youth, politely but with a
slight coldness in her air, that sensibly checked the freedom with
which he had approached them,

“Your father is not pleased that you should walk unattended in the
hills, Miss Temple.   If I might offer my self as a protector—”
“Does my father select Mr.  Oliver Edwards as the organ of his
displeasure?” interrupted the lady. 

“Good Heaven! you misunderstood my meaning; I should have said uneasy
or not pleased.   I am his servant, madam, and in consequence yours.   I
repeat that, with your consent, I will change my rod for a fowling-
piece, and keep nigh you on the mountain,”

“I thank you, Mr.  Edwards; but where there is no danger, no protection
is required.   We are not yet reduced to wandering among these free
hills accompanied by a body guard.   If such a one is necessary there
he is, however. — Here, Brave—Brave——my noble Brave!”
The huge mastif that has been already mentioned, appeared from his
kennel, gaping and stretching himself with pampered laziness; but as
his mistress again called:

“Come, dear Brave; once you have served your master well; let us see
how you can do your duty by his daughter”—the dog wagged his tail, as
if he understood her language, walked with a stately gait to her side,
where he seated himself, and looked up at her face, with an
intelligence but little inferior to that which beamed in her own
lovely countenance. 

She resumed her walk, but again paused, after a few steps, and added,
in tones of conciliation:

“You can be serving us equally, and, I presume, more agreeably to
yourself, Mr.  Edwards, by bringing us a string of your favorite perch
for the dinner-table,”

When they again began to walk Miss Temple did not look back to see how
the youth bore this repulse; but the head of Louisa was turned several
times before they reached the gate on that considerate errand. 

“I am afraid, Elizabeth,” she said, “ that we have mortified Oliver. 
He is still standing where we left him, leaning on his rod.   Perhaps
he thinks us proud. ”

“He thinks justly,” exclaimed Miss Temple, as if awaking from a deep
musing; “he thinks justly, then.   We are too proud to admit of such
particular attentions from a young man in an equivocal situation. 
What! make him the companion of our most private walks! It is pride,
Louisa, but it is the pride of a woman. ”

It was several minutes before Oliver aroused himself from the
abstracted position in which he was standing when Louisa last saw him;
but when he did, he muttered something rapidly and incoherently, and,
throwing his rod over his shoulder, he strode down the walk through
the gate and along one of the streets of the village, until he reached
the lake-shore, with the air of an emperor.   At this spot boats were
kept for the use of Judge Temple and his family.   The young man threw
himself into a light skiff, and, seizing the oars, he sent it across
the lake toward the hut of Leather-Stocking, with a pair of vigorous
arms.   By the time he had rowed a quarter of a mile, his reflections
were less bitter; and when he saw the bushes that lined the shore in
front of Natty’s habitation gliding by him, as if they possessed the
motion which proceeded from his own efforts, he was quite cooled in
mind, though somewhat heated in body.   It is quite possible that the
very same reason which guided the conduct of Miss Temple suggested
itself to a man of the breeding and education of the youth; and it is
very certain that, if such were the case, Elizabeth rose instead of
falling in the estimation of Mr.  Edwards. 

The oars were now raised from the water, and the boat shot close in to
the land, where it lay gently agitated by waves of its own creating,
while the young man, first casting a cautious and searching glance
around him in every direction, put a small whistle to his mouth, and
blew a long, shrill note that rang among the echoing rocks behind the
hut.   At this alarm, the hounds of Natty rushed out of their bark
kennel, and commenced their long, piteous howls, leaping about as if
half frantic, though restrained by the leashes of buckskin by which
they were fastened. 

“Quiet, Hector, quiet,” said Oliver, again applying his whistle to his
mouth, and drawing out notes still more shrill than before.   No reply
was made, the dogs having returned to their kennel at the sound of his
voice. 

Edwards pulled the bows of the boat on the shore, and landing,
ascended the beach and approached the door of the cabin.   The
fastenings were soon undone, and he entered, closing the door after
him, when all was as silent, in that retired spot, as if the foot of
man had never trod the wilderness.   The sounds of the hammers, that
were in incessant motion in the village, were faintly heard across the
water; but the dogs had crouched into their lairs, satisfied that none
but the privileged had approached the forbidden ground. 

A quarter of an hour elapsed before the youth reappeared, when he
fastened the door again, and spoke kindly to the hounds.   The dogs
came out at the well-known tones, and the slut jumped upon his person,
whining and barking as if entreating Oliver to release her from
prison.   But old Hector raised his nose to the light current of air,
and opened a long howl, that might have been heard for a mile. 
“Ha! what do you scent, old veteran of the woods?” cried Edwards.   “If
a beast, it is a bold one; and if a man, an impudent. ”

He sprang through the top of a pine that had fallen near the side of
the hut, and ascended a small hillock that sheltered the cabin to the
south, where he caught a glimpse of the formal figure of Hiram
Doolittle, as it vanished, with unusual rapidity for the architect,
amid the bushes. 

“What can that fellow be wanting here?” muttered Oliver.   “He has no
business in this quarter, unless it be curiosity, which is an endemic
in these woods.   But against that I will effectually guard, though the
dogs should take a liking to his ugly visage, and let him pass. ” The
youth returned to the door, while giving vent to this soliloquy, and
completed the fastenings by placing a small chain through a staple,
and securing it there by a padlock.   “He is a pettifogger, and surely
must know that there is such a thing as feloniously breaking into a
man’s house. ”

Apparently well satisfied with this arrangement, the youth again spoke
to the hounds; and, descending to the shore, he launched his boat, and
taking up his oars, pulled off into the lake. 

There were several places in the Otsego that were celebrated fishing-
ground for perch.   One was nearly opposite to the cabin, and another,
still more famous, was near a point, at the distance of a mile and a
half above it, under the brow of the mountain, and on the same side of
the lake with the hut.   Oliver Edwards pulled his little skiff to the
first, and sat, for a minute, undecided whether to continue there,
with his eyes on the door of the cabin, or to change his ground, with
a view to get superior game.   While gazing about him, he saw the
light-colored bark canoe of his old companions riding on the water, at
the point we have mentioned, and containing two figures, that he at
once knew to be Mohegan and the Leather-Stocking.   This decided the
matter, and the youth pulled, in a very few minutes, to the place
where his friends were fishing, and fastened his boat to the light
vessel of the Indian. 

The old men received Oliver with welcoming nods, but neither drew his
line from the water nor in the least varied his occupation.   When
Edwards had secured his own boat, he baited his hook and threw it into
the lake, with out speaking. 

“Did you stop at the wigwam, lad, as you rowed past?” asked Natty. 

“Yes, and I found all safe; but that carpenter and justice of the
peace, Mr. , or as they call him, Squire, Doolittle, was prowling
through the woods.   I made sure of the door before I left the hut, and
I think he is too great a coward to approach the hounds. ”

“There's little to be said in favor of that man,” said Natty, while he
drew in a perch and baited his hook.   “He craves dreadfully to come
into the cabin, and has as good as asked me as much to my face; but I
put him off with unsartain answers, so that he is no wiser than Solo
mon.   This comes of having so many laws that such a man may be called
on to intarpret them. ”

“I fear he is more knave than fool,” cried Edwards; “he makes a tool
of, that simple man, the sheriff; and I dread that his impertinent
curiosity may yet give us much trouble. ”

“If he harbors too much about the cabin, lad, I’ll shoot the
creatur’,” said the Leather-Stocking, quite simply. 

“No, no, Natty, you must remember the law,” said Edwards, “or we shall
have you in trouble; and that, old man, would be an evil day and sore
tidings to us all. ”

“Would it, boy?’ exclaimed the hunter, raising his eyes, with a look
of friendly interest, toward the youth.   “You have the true blood in
your veins, Mr.  Oliver; and I’ll support it to the face of Judge
Temple or in any court in the country.   How is it, John? Do I speak
the true word? Is the lad stanch, and of the right blood?”

“He is a Delaware,” said Mohegan, “and my brother.   The Young Eagle is
brave, and he will be a chief.   No harm can come. ”

“Well, well,” cried the youth impatiently, “say no more about it, my
good friends; if I am not all that your partiality would make me, I am
yours through life, in prosperity as in poverty.   We will talk of
other matters. ”

The old hunters yielded to his wish, which seemed to be their law. 
For a short time a profound silence prevailed, during which each man
was very busy with his hook and line, but Edwards, probably feeling
that it remained with him to renew the discourse, soon observed, with
the air of one who knew not what he said:

“How beautifully tranquil and glassy the lake is! Saw you it ever more
calm and even than at this moment, Natty?”

“I have known the Otsego water for five-and-forty years,” said
Leather—Stocking, “ and I will say that for it, which is, that a
cleaner spring or better fishing is not to be found in the land.   Yes,
yes; I had the place to myself once, and a cheerful time I had of it. 
The game was plenty as heart could wish; and there was none to meddle
with the ground unless there might have been a hunting party of the
Delawares crossing the hills, or, maybe, a rifling scout of them
thieves, the Iroquois.   There was one or two Frenchmen that squatted
in the flats further west, and married squaws; and some of the Scotch-
Irishers, from the Cherry Valley, would come on to the lake, and
borrow my canoe to take a mess of parch, or drop a line for salmon-
trout; but, in the main, it was a cheerful place, and I had but little
to disturb me in it.   John would come, and John knows. ”
Mohegan turned his dark face at this appeal; and, moving his hand
forward with graceful motion of assent, he spoke, using the Delaware
language:

“The land was owned by my people; we gave it to my brother in council—
to the Fire-eater; and what the Delawares give lasts as long as the
waters run.   Hawk-eye smoked at that council, for we loved him. ”

“No, no, John,” said Natty I was no chief, seeing that I knowed
nothing of scholarship, and had a white skin.   But it was a
comfortable hunting-ground then, lad, and would have been so this day,
but for the money of Marmaduke Temple, and the twisty ways of the
law. ”

“It must have been a sight of melancholy pleasure in deed,” said
Edwards, while his eye roved along the shores and over the hills,
where the clearings, groaning with the golden corn, were cheering the
forest with the signs of life, “to have roamed over these mountains
and along this sheet of beautiful water, without a living soul to
speak to, or to thwart your humor. ”

“Haven’t I said it was cheerful?” said Leather-Stocking.   “Yes, yes,
when the trees begain to be covered with leaves, and the ice was out
of the hake, it was a second paradise.   I have travelled the woods for
fifty-three years, and have made them my home for more than forty, and
I can say that I have met but one place that was more to my liking;
and that was only to eyesight, and not for hunting or fishing. ”

“And where was that?” asked Edwards. 

“Where! why, up on the Catskills.   I used often to go up into the
mountains after wolves’ skins and bears; once they paid me to get them
a stuffed painter, and so I often went.   ‘there’s a place in them
hills that I used to climb to when I wanted to see the carryings on of
the world, that would well pay any man for a barked shin or a torn
moccasin.   You know the Catskills, lad; for you must have seen them on
your left, as you followed the river up from York, looking as blue as
a piece of clear sky, and holding the clouds on their tops, as the
smoke curls over the head of an Indian chief at the council fire. 
Well, there’s the High-peak and the Round-top, which lay back like a
father and mother among their children, seeing they are far above all
the other hills.   But the place I mean is next to the river, where one
of the ridges juts out a little from the rest, and where the rocks
fall, for the best part of a thousand feet, so much up and down, that
a man standing on their edges is fool enough to think he can jump from
top to bottom. ”

“What see you when you get there?” asked Edwards,

“Creation,” said Natty, dropping the end of his rod into the water,
and sweeping one hand around him in a circle, “all creation, lad.   I
was on that hill when Vaughan burned ‘Sopus in the last war; and I saw
the vessels come out of the Highlands as plain as I can see that lime-
scow rowing into the Susquehanna, though one was twenty times farther
from me than the other.   The river was in sight for seventy miles,
looking like a curled shaving under my feet, though it was eight long
miles to its banks.   I saw the hills in the Hampshire grants, the
highlands of the river, and all that God had done, or man could do,
far as eye could reach—you know that the Indians named me for my
sight, lad ; and from the flat on the top of that mountain, I have
often found the place where Albany stands.   And as for ‘Sopus, the day
the royal troops burnt the town, the smoke seemed so nigh, that I
thought I could hear the screeches of the women. ”

“It must have been worth the toil to meet with such a glorious view. ”

If being the best part of a mile in the air and having men’s farms and
houses your feet, with rivers looking like ribbons, and mountains
bigger than the ‘Vision seeming to be hay-stacks of green grass under
you, gives any satisfaction to a man, I can recommend the spot.   When
I first came into the woods to live, I used to have weak spells when I
felt lonesome: and then I would go into the Catskills, and spend a few
days on that hill to look at the ways of man; but it’s now many a year
since I felt any such longings, and I am getting too old for rugged
rocks.   But there’s a place, a short two miles back of that very hill,
that in late times I relished better than the mountains: for it was
more covered with the trees, and nateral. ”

“And where was that?” inquired Edwards, whose curiosity was strongly
excited by the simple description of the hunter. 

“Why, there’s a fall in the hills where the water of two little ponds. 
that lie near each other, breaks out of their bounds and runs over the
rocks into the valley.   The stream is, maybe, such a one as would turn
a mill, if so useless thing was wanted in the wilderness.   But the
hand that made that ‘Leap’ never made a mill.   There the water comes
crooking and winding among the rocks, first so slow that a trout could
swim in it, and then starting and running like a creatur’ that wanted
to make a far spring, till it gets to where the mountain divides, like
the cleft hoof of a deer, leaving a deep hollow for the brook to
tumble into.   The first pitch is nigh two hundred feet, and the water
looks like flakes of driven snow afore it touches the bottom; and
there the stream gathers itself together again for a new start, and
maybe flutters over fifty feet of flat rock before it falls for
another hundred, when it jumps about from shelf to shelf, first
turning this-away and then turning that-away, striving to get out of
the hollow, till it finally comes to the plain. ”

“I have never heard of this spot before; it is not mentioned in the
books. ”

“I never read a book in my life,” said Leather-Stocking; “and how
should a man who has lived in towns and schools know anything about
the wonders of the woods? No, no, lad; there has that little stream of
water been playing among the hills since He made the world, and not a
dozen white men have ever laid eyes on it.   The rock sweeps like
mason-work, in a half-round, on both sides of the fall, and shelves
over the bottom for fifty feet; so that when I’ve been sitting at the
foot of the first pitch, and my hounds have run into the caverns
behind the sheet of water, they’ve looked no bigger than so many
rabbits.   To my judgment, lad, it’s the best piece of work that I’ve
met with in the woods; and none know how often the hand of God is seen
in the wilderness, but them that rove it for a man’s life,”

“What becomes of the water? In which direction does it run? Is it a
tributary of the Delaware?”

“Anan!” said Natty. 

“Does the water run into the Delaware?”

“No, no; it’s a drop for the old Hudson, and a merry time it has till
it gets down off the mountain.   I’ve sat on the shelving rock many a
long hour, boy, and watched the bubbles as they shot by me, and
thought how long it would be before that very water, which seemed made
for the wilderness, would be under the bottom of a vessel, and tossing
in the salt sea.   It is a spot to make a man solemnize.   You go right
down into the valley that lies to the east of the High Peak, where, in
the fall of the year, thousands of acres of woods are before your
eyes, in the deep hollow, and along the side of the mountain, painted
like ten thousand rainbows, by no hand of man, though without the
ordering of God’s providence. ”

“You are eloquent, Leather-Stocking,” exclaimed the youth. 

“Anan!” repeated Natty. 

“The recollection of the sight has warmed your blood, old man.   How
many years is it since you saw the place?”

The hunter made no reply; but, bending his ear near the water, he sat
holding his breath, and listening attentively as if to some distant
sound.   At length he raised his head, and said:

“If I hadn’t fastened the hounds with my own hands, with a fresh leash
of green buckskin, I’d take a Bible oath that I heard old Hector
ringing his cry on the mountain. ”

“It is impossible,” said Edwards; “it is not an hour since I saw him
in his kennel. ”

By this time the attention of Mohegan was attracted to the sounds;
but, notwithstanding the youth was both silent and attentive, he could
hear nothing but the lowing of some cattle from the western hills.   He
looked at the old men, Natty sitting with his hand to his ear, like a
trumpet, and Mohegan bending forward, with an arm raised to a level
with his face, holding the forefinger elevated as a signal for
attention, and laughed aloud at what he deemed to be imaginary sounds. 

“Laugh if you will, boy,” said Leather-Stocking, “ the hounds be out,
and are hunting a deer, No man can deceive me in such a matter.   I
wouldn’t have had the thing happen for a beaver’s skin.   Not that I
care for the law; but the venison is lean now, and the dumb things run
the flesh off their own bones for no good.   Now do you hear the
hounds?”

Edwards started, as a full cry broke on his ear, changing from the
distant sounds that were caused by some intervening hill, to confused
echoes that rang among the rocks that the dogs were passing, and then
directly to a deep and hollow baying that pealed under the forest
under the Lake shore.   These variations in the tones of the hounds
passed with amazing rapidity; and, while his eyes were glancing along
the margin of the water, a tearing of the branches of the alder and
dogwood caught his attention, at a spot near them and at the next
moment a noble buck sprang on the shore, and buried himself in the
lake.   A full-mouthed cry followed, when Hector and the slut shot
through the opening in the bushes, and darted into the lake also,
bearing their breasts gallantly against the water

CHAPTER 27. 

“Oft in the full descending flood he tries
To lose the scent, and lave his burning sides. ”—Thomson. 

“I knowed it—I knowed it!” cried Natty, when both deer and hounds were
in full view; “ the buck has gone by them with the wind, and it has
been too much for the poor rogues; but I must break them of these
tricks, or they’ll give me a deal of trouble.   He-ere, he-ere—shore. 
with you, rascals—shore with you—will ye? Oh! off with you, old
Hector, or I'll hackle your hide with my ramrod when I get ye. ”

The dogs knew their master’s voice, and after swimming in a circle, as
if reluctant to give over the chase, and yet afraid to persevere, they
finally obeyed, and returned to the land, where they filled the air
with their cries. 

In the mean time the deer, urged by his fears, had swum over half the
distance between the shore and the boats, before his terror permitted
him to see the new danger.   But at the sounds of Natty’s voice, he
turned short in his course and for a few moments seemed about to rush
back again, and brave the dogs.   His retreat in this direction was,
however, effectually cut off, and, turning a second time, he urged his
course obliquely for the centre of the lake, with an intention of
landing on the western shore.   As the buck swam by the fishermen,
raising his nose high into the air, curling the water before his slim
neck like the beak of a galley, the Leather-Stocking began to sit very
uneasy in his canoe. 

“‘Tis a noble creatur’!” he exclaimed; “what a pair of horns! a man
might hang up all his garments on the branches.   Let me see—July is
the last month, and the flesh must be getting good. ” While he was
talking, Natty had instinctively employed himself in fastening the
inner end of the bark rope, that served him for a cable, to a paddle,
and, rising suddenly on his legs, he cast this buoy away.   and cried;
“Strike out, John! let her go.   The creatur’s a fool to tempt a man in
this way. 

Mohegan threw the fastening of the youth’s boat from the canoe, and
with one stroke of his paddle sent the light bark over the water like
a meteor. 

“Hold!” exclaimed Edwards.   “ Remember the law, my old friends.   You
are in plain sight of the village, and I know that Judge Temple is
determined to prosecute all, indiscriminately, who kill deer out of
season. ”

The remonstrance came too late; the canoe was already far from the
skiff, and the two hunters were too much engaged in the pursuit to
listen to his voice. 

The buck was now within fifty yards of his pursuers, cutting the water
gallantly, and snorting at each breath with terror and his exertions,
while the canoe seemed to dance over the waves as it rose and fell
with the undulations made by its own motion.   Leather-Stocking raised
his rifle and freshened the priming, but stood in suspense whether to
slay his victim or not. 

“Shall I, John or no?” he said.   “It seems but a poor advantage to
take of the dumb thing, too.   I won’t; it has taken to the water on
its own natur’, which is the reason that God has given to a deer, and
I’ll give it the lake play; so, John, lay out your arm, and mind the
turn of the buck; it’s easy to catch them, but they’ll turn like a
snake. ”

The Indian laughed at the conceit of his friend, but continued to send
the canoe forward with a velocity’ that proceeded much more from skill
than his strength.   Both of the old men now used the language of the
Delawares when they spoke. 

“Hugh!” exclaimed Mohegan; “the deer turns his head.   Hawk-eye, lift
your spear. ”

Natty never moved abroad without taking with him every implement that
might, by possibility, be of service in his pursuits.   From his rifle
he never parted; and although intending to fish with the line, the
canoe was invariably furnished with all of its utensils, even to its
grate This precaution grew out of the habits of the hunter, who was
often led, by his necessities or his sports, far beyond the limits of
his original destination.   A few years earlier than the date of our
tale, the Leather-Stocking had left his hut on the shores of the
Otsego, with his rifle and his hounds, for a few days’ hunting in the
hills; but before he returned he had seen the waters of Ontario.   One,
two, or even three hundred miles had once been nothing to his sinews,
which were now a little stiffened by age.   The hunter did as Mohegan
advised, and prepared to strike a blow with the barbed weapon into the
neck of the buck. 

“Lay her more to the left, John,” he cried, “lay her more to the left;
another stroke of the paddle and I have him. ”

While speaking he raised the spear, and darted it front him like an
arrow.   At that instant the buck turned, the long pole glanced by him,
the iron striking against his horn, and buried itself harmlessly in
the lake. 

“Back water,” cried Natty, as the canoe glided over the place where
the spear had fallen; “hold water, John. ”

The pole soon reappeared, shooting up from the lake, and, as the
hunter seized it in his hand, the Indian whirled the light canoe
round, and renewed the chase.   But this evolution gave the buck a
great advantage; and it also allowed time for Edwards to approach the
scene of action. 

“Hold your hand, Natty!” cried the youth, “hold your hand; remember it
is out of season. ”

This remonstrance was made as the batteau arrived close to the place
where the deer was struggling with the water, his back now rising to
the surface, now sinking beneath it, as the waves curled from his
neck, the animal still sustaining itself nobly against the odds,

“Hurrah!” shouted Edwards, inflamed beyond prudence at the sight;
“mind him as he doubles—mind him as he doubles; sheer more to the
right, Mohegan, more to the right, and I’ll have him by the horns;
I'll throw the rope over his antlers. ”

The dark eye of the old warrior was dancing in his head with a wild
animation, and the sluggish repose in which his aged frame had been
resting in the canoe was now changed to all the rapid inflections of
practiced agility.   The canoe whirled with each cunning evolution of
the chase, like a bubble floating in a whirlpool; and when the
direction of the pursuit admitted of a straight course the little bark
skimmed the lake with a velocity that urged the deer to seek its
safety in some new turn. 

It was the frequency of these circuitous movements that, by confining
the action to so small a compass, enabled the youth to keep near his
companions.   More than twenty times both the pursued and the pursuer
glided by him, just without the reach of his oars, until he thought
the best way to view the sport was to remain stationary, and, by
watching a favorable opportunity, assist as much as he could in taking
the victim. 

He was not required to wait long, for no sooner had he adopted this
resolution, and risen in the boat, than he saw the deer coming bravely
toward him, with an apparent intention of pushing for a point of land
at some distance from the hounds, who were still barking and howling
on the shore.   Edwards caught the painter of his skiff, and, making a
noose, cast it from him with all his force, and luckily succeeded in
drawing its knot close around one of the antlers of the buck. 

For one instant the skiff was drawn through the water, but in the next
the canoe glided before it, and Natty, bending low, passed his knife
across the throat of the animal, whose blood followed the wound,
dyeing the waters.   The short time that was passed in the last
struggles of the animal was spent by the hunters in bringing their
boats together and securing them in that position, when Leather-
Stocking drew the deer from the water and laid its lifeless form in
the bottom of the canoe.   He placed his hands on the ribs, and on
different parts of the body of his prize, and then, raising his head,
he laughed in his peculiar manner. 

“So much for Marmaduke Temple's law!” he said, “This warms a body’s
blood, old John: I haven’t killed a buck in the lake afore this, sin’
many a year.   I call that good venison, lad: and I know them that will
relish the creatur’s steaks for all the betterments in the land. ”

The Indian had long been drooping with his years, and perhaps under
the calamities of his race, but this invigorating and exciting sport
caused a gleam of sunshine to cross his swarthy face that had long
been absent from his features.   it was evident the old man enjoyed the
chase more as a memorial of his youthful sports and deeds than with
any expectation of profiting by the success.   He felt the deer,
however, lightly, his hand already trembling with the reaction of his
unusual exertions, and smiled with a nod of approbation, as he said,
in the emphatic and sententious manner of his people:

“Good. ”

“I am afraid, Natty,” said Edwards, when the heat of the moment had
passed, and his blood began to cool, “that we have all been equally
transgressors of the law.   But keep your own counsel, and there are
none here to betray us.   Yet how came those dogs at large? I left them
securely fastened, I know, for I felt the thongs and examined the
knots when I was at the hunt. ”

“It has been too much for the poor things,” said Natty, “to have such
a buck take the wind of them.   See, lad, the pieces of the buckskin
are hanging from their necks yet.   Let us paddle up, John, and I will
call them in and look a little into the matter. ”

When the old hunter landed and examined the thongs that were yet fast
to the hounds, his countenance sensibly changed, and he shook his head
doubtingly. 

“Here has been a knife at work,” he said; “this skin was never torn,
nor is this the mark of a hound’s tooth.   No, no—Hector is not in
fault, as I feared. ”

“Has the leather been cut?” cried Edwards. 

“No, no—I didn’t say it had been cut, lad; but this is a mark that was
never made by a jump or a bite. ”

“Could that rascally carpenter have dared!”

“Ay! he durst do anything when there is no danger,” said Natty; “he is
a curious body, and loves to be helping other people on with their
consarns.   But he had best not harbor so much near the wigwam!”

In the mean time, Mohegan had been examining, with an Indian’s
sagacity, the place where the leather thong had been separated.   After
scrutinizing it closely, he said, in Delaware:

“It was cut with a knife—a sharp blade and a long handle—the man was
afraid of the dogs. ”

“How is this, Mohegan?” exclaimed Edwards; “you saw it not! how can
you know these facts?”

“Listen, son,” said the warrior.   “The knife was sharp, for the cut
was smooth; the handle was long, for a man’s arm would not reach from
this gash to the cut that did not go through the skin; he was a
coward, or he would have cut the thongs around the necks of the
hounds. ”
On my life,” cried Natty, “John is on the scent! It was the carpenter;
and he has got on the rock back of the kennel and let the dogs loose
by fastening his knife to a stick.   It would be an easy matter to do
it where a man is so minded. ”

“And why should he do so?” asked Edwards; “who has done him wrong,
that he should trouble two old men like you?”

“It’s a hard matter, lad, to know men’s ways, I find, since the
settlers have brought in their new fashions, But is there nothing to
be found out in the place? and maybe he is troubled with his longings
after other people’s business, as he often is”

“Your suspicions are just.   Give me the canoe; I am young and strong. 
and will get down there yet, perhaps, in time to interrupt his plans. 
Heaven forbid that we should be at the mercy of such a man!”

His proposal was accepted, the deer being placed in the skiff in order
to lighten the canoe, and in less than five minutes the little vessel
of bark was gilding over the glassy lake, and was soon hid by the
points of land as it shot close along the shore. 

Mohegan followed slowly with the skiff, while Natty called his hounds
to him, bade them keep close, and, shouldering his rifle, he ascended
the mountain, with an intention of going to the hut by land. 

CHAPTER 28. 

“Ask me not what the maiden feels, Left in that dreadful hour alone:
Perchance, her reason stoops, or reel!;
Perchance, a courage not her own
Braces her mind to desperate tone. ”—Scott. 

While the chase was occurring on the lake, Miss Temple and her
companion pursued their walk on the mountain.   Male attendants on such
excursions were thought to be altogether unnecessary, for none were
even known to offer insult to a female who respected herself.   After
the embarrassment created by the parting discourse with Edwards had
dissipated, the girls maintained a conversation that was as innocent
and cheerful as themselves. 

The path they took led them but a short distance above the hut of
Leather-Stocking, and there was a point in the road which commanded a
bird’s-eye view of the sequestered spot. 

From a feeling that might have been, natural, and must have been
powerful, neither of the friends, in their frequent and confidential
dialogues, had ever trusted herself to utter one syllable concerning
the equivocal situation in which the young man who was now so
intimately associated with them had been found.   If judge Temple had
deemed it prudent to make any inquiries on the subject, he had also
thought it proper to keep the answers to him self; though it was so
common an occurrence to find the well-educated youth of the Eastern
States in every stage of their career to wealth, that the simple
circumstance of his intelligence, connected with his poverty, would
not, at that day and in that country, have excited any very powerful
curiosity.   With his breeding, it might have been different; but the
youth himself had so effectually guarded against surprise on this
subject, by his cold and even, in some cases, rude deportment, that
when his manners seemed to soften by time, the Judge, if he thought
about it at all, would have been most likely to imagine that the
improvement was the result of his late association.   But women are
always more alive to such subjects than men; and what the abstraction
of the father had overlooked, the observation of the daughter had
easily detected.   In the thousand little courtesies of polished life
she had early discovered that Edwards was not wanting, though his
gentleness was so often crossed by marks of what she conceived to be
fierce and uncontrollable passions.   It may, perhaps, be unnecessary
to tell the reader that Louisa Grant never reasoned so much after the
fashions of the world.   The gentle girl, however, had her own thoughts
on the subject, and, like others, she drew her own conclusions. 

“I would give all my other secrets, Louisa,” exclaimed Miss Temple,
laughing, and shaking back her dark locks, with a look of childish
simplicity that her intelligent face seldom expressed, “to be mistress
of all that those rude logs have heard and witnessed. ”

They were both looking at the secluded hut at the instant, and Miss
Grant raised her mild eyes as she answered:

“I am sure they would tell nothing to the disadvantage of Mr. 
Edwards. ”

“Perhaps not; but they might, at least, tell who he is. ”

“Why, dear Miss Temple, we know all that already.   I have heard it all
very rationally explained by your cousin—”

“The executive chief! he can explain anything.   His ingenuity will one
day discover the philosopher’s stone.   But what did he say?”

“Say!” echoed Louisa, with a look of surprise; “why, everything that
seemed to me to be satisfactory, and I now believed it to be true.   He
said that Natty Bumppo had lived most of his life in the woods and
among the Indians, by which means he had formed an acquaintance with
old John, the Delaware chief. ”

“Indeed! that was quite a matter-of-fact tale for Cousin Dickon.   What
came next?”

“I believe he accounted for their close intimacy by some story about
the Leather-Stocking saving the life of John in a battle. ”

“Nothing more likely,” said Elizabeth, a little impatiently; “but what
is all this to the purpose?”

“Nay, Elizabeth, you must bear with my ignorance, and I will repeat
all that I remember to have overheard for the dialogue was between my
father and the sheriff, so lately as the last time they met, He then
added that the kings of England used to keep gentlemen as agents among
the different tribes of Indians, and sometimes officers in the army,
who frequently passed half their lives on the edge of the wilderness. ”

“Told with wonderful historical accuracy! And did he end there?”

“Oh! no—then he said that these agents seldom married; and—and—they
must have been wicked men, Elizabeth! but I assure you he said so. ”

“Never mind,” said Miss Temple, blushing and smiling, though so
slightly that both were unheeded by her companion; “skip all that. ”

“Well, then, he said that they often took great pride in the education
of their children, whom they frequently sent to England, and even to
the colleges; and this is the way that he accounts for the liberal
manner in which Mr.  Edwards has been taught; for he acknowledges that
he knows almost as much as your father—or mine—or even himself. ”

“Quite a climax in learning’.   And so he made Mohegan the granduncle
or grandfather of Oliver Edwards. ”

“You have heard him yourself, then?” said Louisa. 

“Often; but not on this subject.   Mr.  Richard Jones, you know, dear,
has a theory for everything; but has he one which will explain the
reason why that hut is the only habitation within fifty miles of us
whose door is not open to every person who may choose to lift its
latch?”

“I have never heard him say anything on this subject,” returned the
clergyman’s daughter; “but I suppose that, as they are poor, they very
naturally are anxious to keep the little that they honestly own.   It
is sometimes dangerous to be rich, Miss Temple; but you cannot know
how hard it is to be very, very poor. ”

“Nor you, I trust, Louisa; at least I should hope that, in this land
of abundance, no minister of the church could be left in absolute
suffering. ”

“There cannot be actual misery,” returned the other, in a low and
humble tone, “where there is a dependence on our Maker; but there may
be such suffering as will cause the heart to ache. ”

“But not you—not you,” said the impetuous Elizabeth— “not you, dear
girl, you have never known the misery that is connected with poverty. ”

“Ah! Miss Temple, you little understand the troubles of this life, I
believe.   My father has spent many years as a missionary in the new
countries, where his people were poor, and frequently we have been
without bread; unable to buy, and ashamed to beg, because we would not
disgrace his sacred calling.   But how often have I seen him leave his
home, where the sick and the hungry felt, when he left them, that they
had lost their only earthly friend, to ride on a duty which could not
be neglected for domes tic evils! Oh! how hard it must be to preach
consolation to others when your own heart is bursting with anguish!”

“But it is all over now! your father’s income must now be equal to his
wants—it must be—it shall be—”

“It is,” replied Louisa, dropping her head on her bosom to conceal the
tears which flowed in spite of her gentle Christianity—” for there are
none left to be supplied but me. ”

The turn the conversation had taken drove from the minds of the young
maidens all other thoughts but those of holy charity; and Elizabeth
folded her friend in her arms, when the latter gave vent to her
momentary grief in audible sobs.   When this burst of emotion had
subsided, Louisa raised her mild countenance, and they continued their
walk in silence. 

By this time they had gained the summit of the mountain, where they
left the highway, and pursued their course under the shade of the
stately trees that crowned the eminence.   The day was becoming warm,
and the girls plunged more deeply into the forest, as they found its
invigorating coolness agreeably contrasted to the excessive heat they
had experienced in the ascent.   The conversation, as if by mutual
consent, was entirely changed to the little incidents and scenes of
their walk, and every tall pine, and every shrub or flower, called
forth some simple expression of admiration. 

In this manner they proceeded along the margin of the precipice,
catching occasional glimpses of the placid Otsego, or pausing to
listen to the rattling of wheels and the sounds of hammers that rose
from the valley, to mingle the signs of men with the scenes of nature,
when Elizabeth suddenly started, and exclaimed:

“Listen! there are the cries of a child on this mountain! Is there a
clearing near us, or can some little one have strayed from its
parents?”

“Such things frequently happen,” returned Louisa.   Let us follow the
sounds; it may be a wanderer starving on the hill. ”

Urged by this consideration, the females pursued the low, mournful
sounds, that proceeded from the forest, with quick and impatient
steps.   More than once, the ardent Elizabeth was on the point of
announcing that she saw the sufferer, when Louisa caught her by the
arm, and pointing behind them, cried:

“Look at the dog!”

Brave had been their companion, from the time the voice of his young
mistress lured him from his kennel, to the present moment.   His
advanced age had long before deprived him of his activity; and when
his companions stopped to view the scenery, or to add to their
bouquets, the mastiff would lay his huge frame on the ground and await
their movements, with his eyes closed, and a listlessness in his air
that ill accorded with the character of a protector.   But when,
aroused by this cry from Louisa, Miss Temple turned, she saw the dog
with his eyes keenly set on some distant object, his head bent near
the ground, and his hair actually rising on his body, through fright
or anger.   It was most probably the latter, for he was growling in a
low key, and occasionally showing his teeth, in a manner that would
have terrified his mistress, had she not so well known his good
qualities. 

“Brave!” she said, “be quiet, Brave! What do you see, fellow?”

At the sounds of her voice, the rage of the mastiff, instead of being
at all diminished, was very sensibly increased.   He stalked in front
of the ladies, and seated himself at the feet of his mistress,
growling louder than before, and occasionally giving vent to his ire
by a short, surly barking. 

“What does he see?” said Elizabeth; “there must be some animal in
sight. ”

Hearing no answer from her companion, Miss Temple turned her head and
beheld Louisa, standing with her face whitened to the color of death,
and her finger pointing upward with a sort of flickering, convulsed
motion.   The quick eye of Elizabeth glanced in the direction indicated
by her friend, where she saw the fierce front and glaring eyes of a
female panther, fixed on them in horrid malignity, and threatening to
leap. 

“Let us fly,” exclaimed Elizabeth, grasping the arm of Louisa, whose
form yielded like melting snow. 

There was not a single feeling in the temperament of Elizabeth Temple
that could prompt her to desert a companion in such an extremity.   She
fell on her knees by the side of the inanimate Louisa, tearing from
the person of her friend, with instinctive readiness, such parts of
her dress as might obstruct her respiration, and encouraging their
only safeguard, the dog, at the same time, by the sounds of her voice. 

“Courage, Brave!” she cried, her own tones beginning to tremble,
“courage, courage, good Brave!”

A quarter-grown cub, that had hitherto been unseen, now appeared,
dropping from the branches of a sapling that grew under the shade of
the beech which held its dam.   This ignorant but vicious creature
approached the dog, imitating the actions and sounds of its parent,
but exhibiting a strange mixture of the playfulness of a kitten with
the ferocity of its race.   Standing on its hind-legs, it would rend
the bark of a tree with its fore-paws, and play the antics of a cat;
and then, by lashing itself with its tail, growling, and scratching
the earth, it would at tempt the manifestations of anger that rendered
its parent so terrific. 

All this time Brave stood firm and undaunted, his short tail erect,
his body drawn backward on its haunches, and his eyes following the
movements of both dam and cub.   At every gambol played by the latter,
it approached nigher to the dog, the growling of the three becoming
more horrid at each moment, until the younger beast, over-leaping its
intended bound, fell directly before the mastiff.   There was a moment
of fearful cries and struggles, but they ended almost as soon as
commenced, by the cub appearing in the air, hurled from the jaws of
Brave, with a violence that sent it against a tree so forcibly as to
render it completely senseless.   Elizabeth witnessed the short
struggle, and her blood was warming with the triumph of the dog, when
she saw the form of the old panther in the air, springing twenty feet
from the branch of the beech to the back of the mastiff.   No words of
ours can describe the fury of the conflict that followed.   It was a
confused struggle on the dry leaves, accompanied by loud and terrific
cries.   Miss Temple continued on her knees, bending over the form of
Louisa, her eyes fixed on the animals with an interest so horrid, and
yet so intense, that she almost forgot her own stake in the result. 
So rapid and vigorous were the bounds of the inhabitant of the forest,
that its active frame seemed constantly in the air, while the dog
nobly faced his foe at each successive leap.   When the panther lighted
on the shoulders of the mastiff, which was its constant aim, old
Brave, though torn with her talons, and stained with his own blood,
that already flowed from a dozen wounds, would shake off his furious
foe like a feather, and, rearing on his hind-legs, rush to the fray
again, with jaws distended, and a dauntless eye.   But age, and his
pampered life, greatly disqualified the noble mastiff for such a
struggle.   In everything but courage.   he was only the vestige of what
he had once been.   A higher bound than ever raised the wary and
furious beast far beyond the reach of the dog, who was making a
desperate but fruitless dash at her, from which she alighted in a
favorable position, on the back of her aged foe.   For a single moment
only could the panther remain there, the great strength of the dog
returning with a convulsive effort.   But Elizabeth saw, as Brave
fastened his teeth in the side of his enemy, that the collar of brass
around his neck, which had been glittering throughout the fray, was of
the color of blood, and directly that his frame was sinking to the
earth, where it soon lay prostrate and helpless.   Several mighty
efforts of the wild-cat to extricate herself from the jaws of the dog
followed, but they were fruitless, until the mastiff turned on his
back, his lips collapsed, and his teeth loosened, when the short
convulsions and stillness that succeeded announced the death of poor
Brave. 

Elizabeth now lay wholly at the mercy of the beast.   There is said to
be something in the front of the image of the Maker that daunts the
hearts of the inferior beings of his creation; and it would seem that
some such power, in the present instance, suspended the threatened
blow.   The eyes of the monster and the kneeling maiden met for an
instant, when the former stooped to examine her fallen foe; next, to
scent her luckless cub.   From the latter examination it turned,
however, with its eyes apparently emitting flashes of fire, its tail
lashing its sides furiously, and its claws projecting inches from her
broad feet. 

Miss Temple did not or could not move.   Her hands were clasped in the
attitude of prayer, but her eyes were still drawn to her terrible
enemy—her cheeks were blanched to the whiteness of marble, and her
lips were slightly separated with horror. 

The moment seemed now to have arrived for the fatal termination, and
the beautiful figure of Elizabeth was bowing meekly to the stroke,
when a rustling of leaves behind seemed rather to mock the organs than
to meet her ears. 

“Hist! hist!” said a low voice, “stoop lower, gal; your bonnet hides
the creatur’s head. ”

It was rather the yielding of nature than a compliance with this
unexpected order, that caused the head of our heroine to sink on her
bosom; when she heard the report of the rifle, the whizzing of the
bullet, and the enraged cries of the beast, who was rolling over on
the earth, biting its own flesh, and tearing the twigs and branches
within its reach.   At the next instant the form of the Leather-
Stocking rushed by her, and he called aloud:

“Come in, Hector! come in, old fool; ‘tis a hard-lived animal, and may
jump agin. ”

Natty fearlessly maintained his position in front of the females,
notwithstanding the violent bounds and threatening aspect of the
wounded panther, which gave several indications of returning strength
and ferocity, until his rifle was again loaded, when he stepped up to
the enraged animal, and, placing the muzzle close to its head, every
spark of life was extinguished by the discharge. 

The death of her terrible enemy appeared to Elizabeth like a
resurrection from her own grave.   There was an elasticity in the mind
of our heroine that rose to meet the pressure of instant danger, and
the more direct it had been, the more her nature had struggled to
overcome them.   But still she was a woman.   Had she been left to
herself in her late extremity, she would probably have used her
faculties to the utmost, and with discretion, in protecting her
person; but, encumbered with her inanimate friend, retreat was a thing
not to be attempted.   Notwithstanding the fearful aspect of her foe,
the eye of Elizabeth had never shrunk from its gaze, and long after
the event her thoughts would recur to her passing sensations, and the
sweetness of her midnight sleep would be disturbed, as her active
fancy conjured, in dreams, the most trifling movements of savage fury
that the beast had exhibited in its moment of power. 

We shall leave the reader to imagine the restoration of Louisa’s
senses, and the expressions of gratitude which fell from the young
women.   The former was effected by a little water, that was brought
from one of the thousand springs of those mountains, in the cap of the
Leather-Stocking; and the latter were uttered with the warmth that
might be expected from the character of Elizabeth.   Natty received her
vehement protestations of gratitude with a simple expression of good-
will, and with indulgence for her present excitement, but with a
carelessness that showed how little he thought of the service he had
rendered. 

“Well, well,” he said, “be it so, gal; let it be so, if you wish it—
we'll talk the thing over another time.   Come, come—let us get into
the road, for you’ve had terror enough to make you wish yourself in
your father’s house agin. ”

This was uttered as they were proceeding, at a pace that was adapted
to the weakness of Louisa, toward the highway; on reaching which the
ladies separated from their guide, declaring themselves equal to the
remainder of the walk without his assistance, and feeling encouraged
by the sight of the village which lay beneath their feet like a
picture, with its limpid lake in front, the winding stream along its
margin, and its hundred chimneys of whitened bricks. 

The reader need not be told the nature of the emotions which two
youthful, ingenuous, and well-educated girls would experience at their
escape from a death so horrid as the one which had impended over them,
while they pursued their way in silence along the track on the side of
the mountain; nor how deep were their mental thanks to that Power
which had given them their existence, and which had not deserted them
in their extremity; neither how often they pressed each other’s arms
as the assurance of their present safety came, like a healing balm,
athwart their troubled spirits, when their thoughts were recurring to
the recent moments of horror. 

Leather-Stocking remained on the hill, gazing after their retiring
figures, until they were hidden by a bend in the road, when he
whistled in his dogs, and shouldering his rifle, he returned into the
forest. 

“Well, it was a skeary thing to the young creatur’s,” said Natty,
while he retrod the path toward the plain.   “It might frighten an
older woman, to see a she-painter so near her, with a dead cub by its
side.   I wonder if I had aimed at the varmint’s eye, if I shouldn’t
have touched the life sooner than in the forehead; but they are hard-
lived animals, and it was a good shot, consid’ring that I could see
nothing but the head and the peak of its tail.   Hah! who goes there?”

“How goes it, Natty?” said Mr.  Doolittle, stepping out of the bushes,
with a motion that was a good deal accelerated by the sight of the
rifle, that was already lowered in his direction.   “What! shooting
this warm day! Mind, old man, the law don’t get hold on you. ”

“The law, squire! I have shook hands with the law these forty year,”
returned Natty; “for what has a man who lives in the wilderness to do
with the ways of the law?”

“Not much, maybe,” said Hiram; “but you sometimes trade in venison.   I
s’pose you know, Leather-Stocking, that there is an act passed to lay
a fine of five pounds currency, or twelve dollars and fifty cents, by
decimals, on every man who kills a deer betwixt January and August. 
The Judge had a great hand in getting the law through. ”

“I can believe it,” returned the old hunter; “ I can believe that or
anything of a man who carries on as he does in the country. ”

“Yes, the law is quite positive, and the Judge is bent on putting it
in force—five pounds penalty.   I thought I heard your hounds out on
the scent of so’thing this morning; I didn’t know but they might get
you in difficulty. ”

“They know their manners too well,” said Natty carelessly.   “And how
much goes to the State’s evidence, squire?”

“How much?” repeated Hiram, quailing under the honest but sharp look
of the hunter; “the informer gets half, I—I believe—yes, I guess it’s
half.   But there’s blood on your sleeve, man—you haven’t been shooting
anything this morning?”

“I have, though,” said the hunter, nodding his head significantly to
the other, “and a good shot I made of it. ”

“H-e-m!” ejacuated the magistrate; “and where is the game? I s’pose
it’s of a good natur’, for your dogs won’t hunt anything that isn’t
choice. ”

“They’ll hunt anything I tell them to, squire,” cried Natty, favoring
the other with his laugh.   “They’ll hunt you, if I say so.   He-e-e-re,
he-e-e-re, Hector—he-e-e-re, slut—come this a-way, pups—come this a-
way-—come hither. ”

“Oh! I have always heard a good character of the dogs,” returned Mr. 
Doolittle, quickening his pace by raising each leg in rapid
succession, as the hounds scented around his person.   “And where is
the game, Leather-Stocking?”

During this dialogue, the speakers had been walking at a very fast
gait, and Natty swung the end of his rifle round, pointing through the
bushes, and replied: “There lies one.   How do you like such meat?”

“This!” exclaimed Hiram; “why, this is Judge Temple’s dog Brave.   Take
care, Leather-Stocking, and don’t make an enemy of the Judge.   I hope
you haven’t harmed the animal?”

“Look for yourself, Mr.  Doolittle,” said Natty, drawing his knife from
his girdle, and wiping it in a knowing manner, once or twice across
his garment of buckskin; “does his throat look as if I had cut it with
this knife?”

“It is dreadfully torn! it’s an awful wound—no knife ever did this
deed.   Who could have done it?”

“The painters behind you, squire. ”

“Painters!” echoed Hiram, whirling on his heel with an agility that
would have done credit to a dancing’ master. 

“Be easy, man,” said Natty; “there’s two of the venomous things; but
the dog finished one, and I have fastened the other’s jaws for her; so
don’t be frightened, squire; they won’t hurt you. ”

“And where’s the deer?” cried Hiram, staring about him with a
bewildered air. 

“Anan? deer!” repeated Natty. 
“Sartain; an’t there venison here, or didn’t you kill a buck?”

“What! when the law forbids the thing, squire!” said the old hunter,
“I hope there’s no law agin’ killing the painters. ”

“No! there’s a bounty on the scalps—but—will your dogs hunt painters,
Natty?”

“Anything; didn’t I tell you they would hunt a man? He-e-re, he-e-re,
pups—”

“Yes, yes, I remember.   Well, they are strange dogs, I must say—I am
quite in a wonderment. ”

Natty had seated himself on the ground, and having laid the grim head
of his late ferocious enemy in his lap, was drawing his knife with a
practiced hand around the ears, which he tore from the head of the
beast in such a manner as to preserve their connection, when he
answered;

“What at, squire? did you never see a painter’s scalp afore? Come, you
are a magistrate, I wish you’d make me out an order for the bounty. ”

“The bounty!” repeated Hiram, holding the ears on the end of his
finger for a moment, as if uncertain how to proceed.   “Well, let us go
down to your hut, where you can take the oath, and I will write out
the order, I sup pose you have a Bible? All the law wants is the four
evangelists and the Lord’s prayer. ”

“I keep no books,” said Natty, a little coldly; “not such a Bible as
the law needs. ”

“Oh! there’s but one sort of Bible that’s good in law,” returned the
magistrate, “and your’n will do as well as another’s.   Come, the
carcasses are worth nothing, man; let us go down and take the oath. ”

“Softly, softly, squire,” said the hunter, lifting his trophies very
deliberately from the ground, and shouldering his rifle; “why do you
want an oath at all, for a thing that your own eyes has seen? Won’t
you believe yourself, that another man must swear to a fact that you
know to be true? You have seen me scalp the creatur’s, and if I must
swear to it, it shall be before Judge Temple, who needs an oath. ”

“But we have no pen or paper here, Leather-Stocking; we must go to the
hut for them, or how can I write the order?”

Natty turned his simple features on the cunning magistrate with
another of his laughs, as he said:

“And what should I be doing with scholars’ tools? I want no pens or
paper, not knowing the use of either; and I keep none.   No, no, I’ll
bring the scalps into the village, squire, and you can make out the
order on one of your law-books, and it will he all the better for it. 
The deuce take this leather on the neck of the dog, it will strangle
the old fool.   Can you lend me a knife, squire?”

Hiram, who seemed particularly anxious to be on good terms with his
companion, unhesitatingly complied.   Natty cut the thong from the neck
of the hound, and, as he returned the knife to its owner, carelessly
remarked:

“Tis a good bit of steel, and has cut such leather as this very same,
before now, I dare say. ”

“Do you mean to charge me with letting your hounds loose?” exclaimed
Hiram, with a consciousness that disarmed his caution. 

“Loose!” repeated the hunter—” I let them loose my self.   I always let
them loose before I leave the hut. ”

The ungovernable amazement with which Mr.  Doolittle listened to this
falsehood would have betrayed his agency in the liberation of the
dogs, had Natty wanted any further confirmation; and the coolness and
management of the old man now disappeared in open indignation. 

“Look you here, Mr.  Doolittle,” he said, striking the breech of his
rifle violently on the ground; “ what there is in the wigwam of a poor
man like me, that one like you can crave, I don’t know; but this I
tell you to your face, that you never shall put foot under the roof of
my cabin with my consent, and that, if you harbor round the spot as
you have done lately, you may meet with treatment that you will little
relish. ”

“And let me tell you, Mr.  Bumppo,” said Hiram, retreating, however,
with a quick step, “that I know you’ve broke the law, and that I’m a
magistrate, and will make you feel it too, before you are a day
older. ”

“That for you and your law, too,” cried Natty, snap ping his fingers
at the justice of the peace; “away with you, you varmint, before the
devil tempts me to give you your desarts.   Take care, if I ever catch
your prowling face in the woods agin, that I don’t shoot it for an
owl. ”

There is something at all times commanding in honest indignation, and
Hiram did not stay to provoke the wrath of the old hunter to
extremities.   When the intruder was out of sight, Natty proceeded to
the hut, where he found all quiet as the grave.   He fastened his dogs,
and tapping at the door, which was opened by Edwards, asked;

“Is all safe, lad?”

“Everything,” returned the youth.   “Some one attempted the lock, but
it was too strong for him. ”

“I know the creatur’,” said Natty, “but he’ll not trust himself within
the reach of my rifle very soon——” What more was uttered by the
Leather-Stocking, in his vexation, was rendered inaudible by the
closing of the door of the cabin. 

CHAPTER 29. 

“It is noised, he hath a mass of treasure. ”—Timon of Athens. 

When Marmaduke Temple and his cousin rode through the gate of the
former, the heart of the father had been too recently touched with the
best feelings of our nature, to leave inclination for immediate
discourse.   There was an importance in the air of Richard, which would
not have admitted of the ordinary informal conversation of the
sheriff, without violating all the rules of consistency; and the
equestrians pursued their way with great diligence, for more than a
mile, in profound silence.   At length the soft expression of parental
affection was slowly chased from the handsome features of the Judge,
and was gradually supplanted by the cast of humor and benevolence that
was usually seated on his brow. 

“Well, Dickon,” he said, since I have yielded myself so far implicitly
to your guidance, I think the moment has arrived when I am entitled to
further confidence.   Why and wherefore are we journeying together in
this solemn gait?”

The sheriff gave a loud hem, that rang far in the forest, and keeping
his eyes fixed on objects before him like a man who is looking deep
into futurity:

“There has always been one point of difference between us, Judge
Temple, I may say, since our nativity,” he replied; not that I would
insinuate that you are at all answerable for the acts of Nature; for a
man is no more to be condemned for the misfortunes of his birth, than
he is to be commended for the natural advantages he may possess; but
on one point we may be said to have differed from our births, and
they, you know, occurred within two days of each other. ”

“I really marvel, Richard, what this one point can be, for, to my
eyes, we seem to differ so materially, and so often—”

“Mere consequences, sir,” interrupted the sheriff; “all our minor
differences proceed from one cause, and that is, our opinions of the
universal attainments of genius. ”

“In what, Dickon?”

“I speak plain English, I believe, Judge Temple: at least I ought; for
my father, who taught me, could speak——”

“Greek and Latin,” interrupted Marmaduke.   “I well know the
qualifications of your family in tongues, Dickon.   But proceed to the
point; why are we travelling over this mountain to-day?”

“To do justice to any subject, sir, the narrator must he suffered to
proceed in his own way,” continued the sheriff.   “You are of opinion,
Judge Temple, that a man is to be qualified by nature and education to
do only one thing well, whereas I know that genius will supply the
place of learning, and that a certain sort of man can do anything and
everything. ”

“Like yourself, I suppose,” said Marmaduke, smiling. 

“I scorn personalities, sir, I say nothing of myself; but there are
three men on your Patent, of the kind that I should term talented by
nature for her general purposes though acting under the influence of
different situations. ”

“We are better off, then, than I had supposed.   Who are these
triumviri?”

“Why, sir, one is Hiram Doolittle; a carpenter by trade, as you know—
and I need only point to the village to exhibit his merits.   Then he
is a magistrate, and might shame many a man, in his distribution of
justice, who has had better opportunities. ”

“Well, he is one,” said Marmaduke, with the air of a man that was
determined not to dispute the point. 

“Jotham Riddel is another. ”

“Who?”

“Jotham Riddel. ”

“What, that dissatisfied, shiftless, lazy, speculating fellow! he who
changes his county every three years, his farm every six months, and
his occupation every season! an agriculturist yesterday, a shoemaker
to-day, and a school master to-morrow! that epitome of all the
unsteady and profitless propensities of the settlers without one of
their good qualities to counterbalance the evil! Nay, Richard.   this
is too bad for even—but the third. ”

“As the third is not used to hearing such comments on his character,
Judge Temple, I shall not name him. ”

“The amount of all this, then, Dickon, is that the trio, of which you
are one, and the principal, have made some important discovery. ”

“I have not said that I am one, Judge Temple.   As I told you before,
say nothing egotistical.   But a discovery has been made, and you are
deeply interested in it. ”

“Proceed—I am all ears. ”

“No, no, ‘Duke, you are bad enough, I own, but not so bad as that,
either; your ears are not quite full grown. ”

The sheriff laughed heartily at his own wit, and put himself in good
humor thereby, when he gratified his patient cousin with the following
explanation:

“You know, ‘Duke, there is a man living on your estate that goes by
the name of Natty Bumppo.   Here has this man lived, by what I can
learn, for more than forty years—by himself, until lately; and now
with strange companions. ”

“Part very true, and all very probable,” said the Judge. 

“All true, sir; all true.   Well, within these last few months have
appeared as his companions an old Indian chief, the last, or one of
the last of his tribe that is to be found in this part of the country,
and a young man, who is said to be the son of some Indian agent, by a
squaw. ”

“Who says that?” cried Marmaduke, with an interest; that he had not
manifested before. 

“Who? why, common sense—common report—the hue and cry.   But listen
till you know all.   This youth has very pretty talents—yes, what I
call very pretty talents— and has been well educated, has seen very
tolerable company, and knows how to behave himself when he has a mind
to.   Now, Judge Temple, can you tell me what has brought three such
men as Indian John, Natty Bumppo, and Oliver Edwards together?”
Marmaduke turned his countenance, in evident surprise, to his cousin,
and replied quickly:

“Thou hast unexpectedly hit on a subject, Richard, that has often
occupied my mind.   But knowest thou anything of this mystery, or are
they only the crude conjectures of—”

“Crude nothing, ‘Duke, crude nothing : but facts, stub-born facts. 
You know there arc mines in these mountains; I have often heard you
say that you believed in their existence. ”

“Reasoning from analogy, Richard, but not with any certainty of the
fact. ”

“You have heard them mentioned, and have seen specimens of the ore,
sir; you will not deny that! and, reasoning from analogy, as you say,
if there be mines in South America, ought there not to be mines in
North America too?”

“Nay, nay, I deny nothing, my cousin.   I certainly have heard many
rumors of the existence of mines in these hills: and I do believe that
I have seen specimens of the precious metals that have been found
here.   It would occasion me no surprise to learn that tin and silver,
or what I consider of more consequence, good coal—”

“Damn your coal,” cried the sheriff; “ who wants to find coal in these
forests? No, no—silver, ‘Duke; silver is the one thing needful, and
silver is to be found.   But listen: you are not to be told that the
natives have long known the use of gold and silver; now who so likely
to be acquainted where they are to be found as the ancient inhabitants
of a country? I have the best reasons for believing that both Mohegan
and the Leather-Stocking have been privy to the existence of a mine in
this very mountain for many years. ”

The sheriff had now touched his cousin in a sensitive spot; and
Marmaduke lent a more attentive ear to the speaker, who, after waiting
a moment to see the effect of this extraordinary development,
proceeded:

“Yes, sir, I have my reasons, and at a proper time you shall know
them,”

“No time is so good as the present. ”

“Well, well, be attentive,” continued Richard, looking cautiously
about him, to make certain that no eavesdropper was hid in the forest,
though they were in constant motion.   “I have seen Mohegan and the
Leather-Stocking, with my own eyes—and my eyes are as good as
anybody’s eyes—I have seen them, I say, both going up the mountain and
coming down it, with spades and picks; and others have seen them
carrying things into their hut, in a secret and mysterious manner,
after dark.   Do you call this a fact of importance?”

The Judge did not reply, but his brow had contracted, with a
thoughtfulness that he always wore when much interested, and his eyes
rested on his cousin in expectation of hearing more.   Richard
continued:

“It was ore.   Now, sir, I ask if you can tell me who this Mr.  Oliver
Edwards is, that has made a part of your household since Christmas?”

Marmaduke again raised his eyes, but continued silent, shaking his
head in the negative. 

“That he is a half-breed we know, for Mohegan does not scruple to call
him openly his kinsman; that he is well educated we know.   But as to
his business here—do you remember that about a month before this young
man made his appearance among us, Natty was absent from home several
days? You do; for you inquired for him, as you wanted some venison to
take to your friends, when you went for Bess.   Well, he was not to be
found.   Old John was left in the hut alone, and when Natty did appear,
although he came on in the night, he was seen drawing one of those
jumpers that they carry their grain to mill in, and to take out
something with great care, that he had covered up under his bear-
skins.   Now let me ask you, Judge Temple, what motive could induce a
man like the Leather-Stocking to make a sled, and toil with a load
over these mountains, if he had nothing but his rifle or his
ammunition to carry?”

“They frequently make these jumpers to convey their game home, and you
say he had been absent many days. ”

“How did he kill it? His rifle was in the village, to be mended.   No,
no—that he was gone to some unusual place is certain; that he brought
back some secret utensils is more certain; and that he has not allowed
a soul to approach his hut since is most certain of all. ”

“He was never fond of intruders——--”

“I know it,” interrupted Richard; “but did he drive them from his
cabin morosely? Within a fortnight of his return, this Mr.  Edwards
appears.   They spend whole days in the mountains, pretending to be
shooting, but in reality exploring; the frosts prevent their digging
at that time, and he avails himself of a lucky accident to get into
good quarters.   But even now, he is quite half of his time in that
hut—many hours every night.   They are smelting, 'Duke they are
smelting, and as they grow rich, you grow poor. ”

“How much of this is thine own, Richard, and how much comes from
others? I would sift the wheat from the chaff. ”

“Part is my own, for I saw the jumper, though it was broken up and
burnt in a day or two.   I have told you that I saw the old man with
his spades and picks.   Hiram met Natty, as he was crossing the
mountain, the night of his arrival with the sled, and very good-
naturedly offered —Hiram is good-natured—to carry up part of his load,
for the old man had a heavy pull up the back of the mountain, but he
wouldn't listen to the thing, and repulsed the offer in such a manner
that the squire said he had half a mind to swear the peace against
him.   Since the snow has been off, more especially after the frosts
got out of the ground, we have kept a watchful eye on the gentle
man, in which we have found Jotham useful. ”
Marmaduke did not much like the associates of Richard in this
business; still he knew them to be cunning and ready expedients; and
as there was certainly something mysterious, not only in the
connection between the old hunters and Edwards, but in what his cousin
had just related, he began to revolve the subject in his own mind with
more care.   On reflection, he remembered various circumstances that
tended to corroborate these suspicions, and, as the whole business
favored one of his infirmities, he yielded the more readily to their
impression.   The mind of Judge Temple, at all times comprehensive, had
received from his peculiar occupations a bias to look far into
futurity, in his speculations on the improvements that posterity were
to make in his lands.   To his eye, where others saw nothing but a
wilderness, towns, manufactories, bridges, canals, mines, and all the
other resources of an old country were constantly presenting
themselves, though his good sense suppressed, in some degree, the
exhibition of these expectations. 

As the sheriff allowed his cousin full time to reflect on what he had
heard, the probability of some pecuniary adventure being the
connecting link in the chain that brought Oliver Edwards into the
cabin of Leather-Stocking appeared to him each moment to be stronger. 
But Marmaduke was too much in the habit of examining both sides of a
subject not to perceive the objections, and he reasoned with himself
aloud:

“It cannot be so, or the youth would not be driven so near the verge
of poverty. ”

“What so likely to make a man dig for money as being poor?” cried the
sheriff. 

“Besides, there is an elevation of character about Oliver that
proceeds from education, which would forbid so clan- destine a
proceeding. ”

“Could an ignorant fellow smelt?” continued Richard. 

“Bess hints that he was reduced even to his last shilling when we took
him into our dwelling. ”

“He had been buying tools.   And would he spend his last sixpence for a
shot at a turkey had he not known where to get more?”

“Can I have possibly been so long a dupe? His manner has been rude to
me at times, but I attributed it to his conceiving himself injured,
and to his mistaking the forms of the world. ”

“Haven’t you been a dupe all your life, ‘Duke, and an’t what you call
ignorance of forms deep cunning, to conceal his real character?”

“If he were bent on deception, he would have concealed his knowledge,
and passed with us for an inferior man. ”

“He cannot.   I could no more pass for a fool, myself, than I could
fly.   Knowledge is not to be concealed, like a candle under a bushel,”

“Richard,” said the Judge, turning to his cousin, “there are many
reasons against the truth of thy conjectures, but thou hast awakened
suspicions which must be satisfied.   But why are we travelling here?”

“Jotham, who has been much in the mountain latterly, being kept there
by me and Hiram, has made a discovery, which he will not explain, he
says, for he is bound by an oath; but the amount is, that he knows
where the ore lies, and he has this day begun to dig.   I would not
consent to the thing, ‘Duke, without your knowledge, for the land is
yours; and now you know the reason of our ride.   I call this a
countermine, ha!”

“And where is the desirable spot?” asked the Judge with an air half
comical, half serious. 

“At hand; and when we have visited that, I will show you one of the
places that we have found within a week, where our hunters have been
amusing themselves for six months past. ”

The gentlemen continued to discuss the matter, while their horses
picked their way under the branches of the trees and over the uneven
ground of the mountain.   They soon arrived at the end of their
journey, where, in truth, they found Jotham already buried to his neck
in a hole that he had been digging. 

Marmaduke questioned the miner very closely as to his reasons for
believing in the existence of the precious metals near that particular
spot; but the fellow maintained an obstinate mystery in his answers. 
He asserted that he had the best of reasons for what he did, and
inquired of the judge what portion of the profits would fall to his
own share, in the event of success, with an earnestness that proved
his faith.   After spending an hour near the place, examining the
stones, and searching for the usual indications of the proximity of
ore, the Judge remounted and suffered his cousin to lead the way to
the place where the mysterious trio had been making their excavation. 

The spot chosen by Jotham was on the back of the mountain that
overhung the hut of Leather-Stocking, and the place selected by Natty
and his companions was on the other side of the same hill, but above
the road, and, of course, in an opposite direction to the route taken
by the ladies in their walk. 

“We shall be safe in approaching the place now,” said Richard, while
they dismounted and fastened their horses; “for I took a look with the
glass, and saw John and Leather-Stocking in their canoe fishing before
we left home, and Oliver is in the same pursuit; but these may be
nothing but shams to blind our eye; so we will be expeditious, for it
would not be pleasant to be caught here by them. ”

“Not on my own land?” said Marmaduke sternly.   “If it be as you
suspect, I will know their reasons for making this excavation. ”

“Mum,” said Richard, laying a finger on his lip, and leading the way
down a very difficult descent to a sort of natural cavern, which was
found in the face of the rock, and was not unlike a fireplace in
shape.   In front of this place lay a pile of earth, which had
evidently been taken from the recess, and part of which was yet fresh. 
An examination of the exterior of the cavern left the Judge in doubt
whether it was one of Nature’s frolics that had thrown it into that
shape, or whether it had been wrought by the hands of man, at some
earlier period.   But there could be no doubt that the whole of the
interior was of recent formation, and the marks of the pick were still
visible where the soft, lead-colored rock had opposed itself to the
progress of the miners.   The whole formed an excavation of about
twenty feet in width, and nearly twice that distance in depth.   The
height was much greater than was required for the ordinary purposes of
experiment, but this was evidently the effect of chance, as the roof
of the cavern was a natural stratum of rock that projected many feet
beyond the base of the pile.   Immediately in front of the recess, or
cave, was a little terrace, partly formed by nature, and partly by the
earth that had been carelessly thrown aside by the laborers.   The
mountain fell off precipitously in front of the terrace, and the
approach by its sides, under the ridge of the rocks, was difficult and
a little dangerous.   The whole was wild, rude, and apparently
incomplete; for, while looking among the bushes, the sheriff found the
very implements that had been used in the work. 

When the sheriff thought that his cousin had examined the spot
sufficiently, he asked solemnly:

“Judge Temple, are you satisfied?”

“Perfectly, that there is something mysterious and perplexing in this
business.   It is a secret spot, and cunningly devised, Richard; yet I
see no symptoms of ore. ”

“Do you expect, sir, to find gold and silver lying like pebbles on the
surface of the earth?—dollars and dimes ready coined to your hands?
No, no—the treasure must be sought after to be won.   But let them
mine; I shall countermine. ”

The Judge took an accurate survey of the place, and noted in his
memorandum-book such marks as were necessary to find it again in the
event of Richard’s absence; when the cousins returned to their horses. 

On reaching the highway they separated, the sheriff to summon twenty-
four “good men and true,” to attend as thc inquest of the county, on
the succeeding Monday, when Marmaduke held his stated court of “common
pleas and general sessions of the peace,” and the Judge to return,
musing deeply on what he had seen and heard in the course of the
morning. 

When the horse of the latter reached the spot where the highway fell
toward the valley, the eye of Marmaduke rested, it is true, on the
same scene that had, ten minutes before, been so soothing to the
feelings of his daughter and her friend, as they emerged from the
forest; but it rested in vacancy.   He threw the reins to his sure
footed beast, and suffered the animal to travel at his own gait, while
he soliloquized as follows:

“There may be more in this than I at first supposed.   I have suffered
my feelings to blind my reason, in admitting an unknown youth in this
manner to my dwelling; yet this is not the land of suspicion.   I will
have Leather-Stocking before me, and, by a few direct questions,
extract the truth from the simple old man. ”

At that instant the Judge caught a glimpse of the figures of Elizabeth
and Louisa, who were slowly descending the mountain, short distance
before him.   He put spurs to his horse, and riding up to them,
dismounted, and drove his steed along the narrow path.   While the
agitated parent was listening to the vivid description that his
daughter gave of her recent danger, and her unexpected escape, all
thoughts of mines, vested rights, and examinations were absorbed in
emotion; and when the image of Natty again crossed his recollection,
it was not as a law Less and depredating squatter, but as the
preserver of his child. 

CHAPTER 30. 

“The court awards it, and the law doth give it. ”—Merchant of Venice. 

Remarkable Pettibone, who had forgotten the wound received by her
pride, in contemplation of the ease and comforts of her situation, and
who still retained her station in the family of judge Temple, was
dispatched to the humble dwelling which Richard already styled “The
Rectory,” in attendance on Louisa, who was soon consigned to the arms
of her father. 

In the mean time, Marmaduke and his daughter were closeted for more
than an hour, nor shall we invade the sanctuary of parental love, by
relating the conversation.   When the curtain rises on the reader, the
Judge is seen walking up and down the apartment, with a tender
melancholy in his air, and his child reclining on a settee, with a
flushed cheek, and her dark eyes seeming to float in crystals. 

“It was a timely rescue! it was, indeed, a timely rescue, my child!”
cried the Judge.   “Then thou didst not desert thy friend, my noble
Bess?”

“I believe I may as well take the credit of fortitude,” said
Elizabeth, “though I much doubt if flight would have availed me
anything, had I even courage to execute such an intention.   But I
thought not of the expedient. ”

“Of what didst thou think, love? where did thy thoughts dwell most, at
that fearful moment?”

“The beast! the beast!” cried Elizabeth, veiling her face with her
hand.   “Oh! I saw nothing, I thought of nothing but the beast.   I
tried to think of better things, but the horror was too glaring, the
danger too much before my eyes. ”

“Well, well, thou art safe, and we will converse no more on the
unpleasant subject.   I did not think such an animal yet remained in
our forests; but they will stray far from their haunts when pressed by
hunger, and—”

A loud knocking at the door of the apartment interrupted what he was
about to utter, and he bid the applicant enter.   The door was opened
by Benjamin, who came in with a discontented air, as if he felt that
he had a communication to make that would be out of season. 

“Here is Squire Doolittle below, sir,” commenced the major-domo.   “He
has been standing off and on in the door-yard for the matter of a
glass; and he has summat on his mind that he wants to heave up, d’ye
see; but I tells him, says I, man, would you be coming aboard with
your complaints, said I, when the judge has gotten his own child, as
it were, out of the jaws of a lion? But damn the bit of manners has
the fellow, any more than if he was one of them Guineas down in the
kitchen there; and so as he was sheering nearer, every stretch he made
toward the house, I could do no better than to let your honor know
that the chap was in the offing. ”

“He must have business of importance,” said Marmaduke: “something in
relation to his office, most probably, as the court sits so shortly. ”

“Ay, ay, you have it, sir,” cried Benjamin; “it’s summat about a
complaint that he has to make of the old Leather-Stocking, who, to my
judgment, is the better man of the two.   It’s a very good sort of a
man is this Master Bumppo, and he has a way with a spear, all the same
as if he was brought up at the bow-oar of the captain’s barge, or was
born with a boat-hook in his hand. ”

“Against the Leather-Stocking!” cried Elizabeth, rising from her
reclining posture. 

“Rest easy, my child; some trifle, I pledge you; I believe I am
already acquainted with its import Trust me, Bess, your champion shall
be safe in my care.   Show Mr.  Doolittle in, Benjamin”

Miss Temple appeared satisfied with this assurance, but fastened her
dark eyes on the person of the architect, who profited by the
permission, and instantly made his appearance. 

All the impatience of Hiram seemed to vanish the instant he entered
the apartment.   After saluting the Judge and his daughter, he took the
chair to which Marmaduke pointed, and sat for a minute, composing his
straight black hair, with a gravity of demeanor that was in tended to
do honor to his official station.   At length he said:

“It’s likely, from what I hear, that Miss Temple had a narrow chance
with the painters, on the mountain. ”

Marmaduke made a gentle inclination of his head, by way of assent, but
continued silent. 

“I s’pose the law gives a bounty on the scalps,” continued Hiram, “in
which case the Leather-Stocking will make a good job on’t. ”

“It shall be my care to see that he is rewarded,” returned the Judge. 

“Yes, yes, I rather guess that nobody hereabouts doubts the Judge’s
generosity.   Does he know whether the sheriff has fairly made up his
mind to have a reading desk or a deacon’s pew under the pulpit?”
“I have not heard my cousin speak on that subject, lately,” replied
Marmaduke. 
“I think it’s likely that we will have a pretty dull court on't, from
what I can gather.   I hear that Jotham Riddel and the man who bought
his betterments have agreed to leave their difference to men, and I
don’t think there’ll be more than two civil cases in the calendar. ”

“I am glad of it,” said the judge; “nothing gives me more pain than to
see my settlers wasting their time and substance in the unprofitable
struggles of the law.   I hope it may prove true, sir. ”

“I rather guess ‘twill be left out to men,” added Hiram, with an air
equally balanced between doubt and assurance, but which judge Temple
understood to mean certainty; “I some think that I am appointed a
referee in the case myself; Jotham as much as told me that he should
take me.   The defendant, I guess, means to take Captain Hollister, and
we two have partly agreed on Squire Jones for the third man. ”

“Are there any criminals to be tried?” asked Marmaduke. 

“There's the counterfeiters,” returned the magistrate, “as they were
caught in the act, I think it likely that they’ll be indicted, in
which case it’s probable they’ll be tried. ”

“Certainly, sir; I had forgotten those men.   There are no more, I
hope. ”
“Why, there is a threaten to come forward with an assault that
happened at the last independence day; but I’m not sartain that the
law'll take hold on’t.   There was plaguey hard words passed, but
whether they struck or not I haven’t heard.   There’s some folks talk
of a deer or two being killed out of season, over on the west side of
the Patent, by some of the squatters on the ‘Fractions. ’”

“Let a complaint be made, by all means,” said the Judge; “I am
determined to see the law executed to the letter, on all such
depredators. ”

“Why, yes, I thought the judge was of that mind; I came partly on such
a business myself. ”

“You!” exclaimed Marmaduke, comprehending in an instant how completely
he had been caught by the other’s cunning; “and what have you to say,
sir?”

“I some think that Natty Bumppo has the carcass of a deer in his hut
at this moment, and a considerable part of my business was to get a
search-warrant to examine. ”

“You think, sir! do you know that the law exacts an oath, before I can
issue such a precept? The habitation of a citizen is not to be idly
invaded on light suspicion. ”

“I rather think I can swear to it myself,” returned the immovable
Hiram; “and Jotham is in the street, and as good as ready to come in
and make oath to the same thing. ”

“Then issue the warrant thyself; thou art a magistrate, Mr.  Doolittle;
why trouble me with the matter?”

“Why, seeing it’s the first complaint under the law, and knowing the
judge set his heart on the thing, I thought it best that the authority
to search should come from himself.   Besides, as I’m much in the
woods, among the timber, I don’t altogether like making an enemy of
the Leather Stocking.   Now, the Judge has a weight in the county that
puts him above fear. ”

Miss Temple turned her face to the callous Architect as she said’ “And
what has any honest person to dread from so kind a man as Bumppo?”

“Why, it’s as easy, miss, to pull a rifle trigger on a magistrate as
on a painter.   But if the Judge don’t conclude to issue the warrant, I
must go home and make it out myself. ”

“I have not refused your application, sir,” said Marmaduke, perceiving
at once that his reputation for impartiality was at stake; “go into my
office, Mr.  Doolittle, where I will join you, and sign the warrant. ”
Judge Temple stopped the remonstrances which Elizabeth was about to
utter, after Hiram had withdrawn, by laying his hand on her mouth, and
saying:

“It is more terrible in sound than frightful in reality, my child.   I
suppose that the Leather-Stocking has shot a deer, for the season is
nearly over, and you say that he was hunting with his dogs when he
came so timely to your assistance.   But it will be only to examine his
cabin, and find the animal, when you can pay the penalty out of your
own pocket, Bess.   Nothing short of the twelve dollars and a half will
satisfy this harpy, I perceive; and surely my reputation as judge is
worth that trifle. ”

Elizabeth was a good deal pacified with this assurance, and suffered
her father to leave her, to fulfil his promise to Hiram. 

When Marmaduke left his office after executing his disagreeable duty,
he met Oliver Edwards, walking up the gravelled walk in front of the
mansion-house with great strides, and with a face agitated by feeling. 
On seeing judge Temple, the youth turned aside, and with a warmth in
his manner that was not often exhibited to Marmaduke, he cried:

“I congratulate you, sir; from the bottom of my soul, I congratulate
you, Judge Temple.   Oh! it would have been too horrid to have
recollected for a moment! I have just left the hut, where, after
showing me his scalps, old Natty told me of the escape of the ladies,
as the thing to be mentioned last.   Indeed, indeed, sir, no words of
mine can express half of what I have felt “—the youth paused a moment,
as if suddenly recollecting that he was overstepping prescribed
limits, and concluded with a good deal of embarrassment—” what I have
felt at this danger to Miss—Grant, and—and your daughter, sir,”

But the heart of Marmaduke was too much softened to admit his
cavilling at trifles, and, without regarding the confusion of the
other, he replied:

“I thank thee, thank thee, Oliver; as thou sayest, it is almost too
horrid to be remembered.   But come, let us hasten to Bess, for Louisa
has already gone to the rectory. ”

The young man sprang forward, and, throwing open a door, barely
permitted the Judge to precede him, when he was in the presence of
Elizabeth in a moment. 

The cold distance that often crossed the demeanor of the heiress, in
her intercourse with Edwards, was now entirely banished, and two hours
were passed by the party, in the free, unembarrassed, and confiding
manner of old and esteemed friends.   Judge Temple had forgotten the
suspicions engendered during his morning’s ride, and the youth and
maiden conversed, laughed, and were sad by turns, as impulse directed. 

At length, Edwards, after repeating his intention to do so for the
third time, left the mansion-house to go to the rectory on a similar
errand of friendship. 

During this short period, a scene was passing at the hut that
completely frustrated the benevolent intentions of Judge Temple in
favor of the Leather-Stocking, and at once destroyed the short-lived
harmony between the youth and Marmaduke. 

When Hiram Doolittle had obtained his search-warrant, his first
business was to procure a proper officer to see it executed.   The
sheriff was absent, summoning in person the grand inquest for the
county; the deputy who resided in the village was riding on the same
errand, in a different part of the settlement; and the regular
constable of the township had been selected for his station from
motives of charity, being lame of a leg.   Hiram intended to accompany
the officer as a spectator, but he felt no very strong desire to bear
the brunt of the battle.   It was, however, Saturday, and the sun was
already turning the shadows of the pines toward the east; on the
morrow the conscientious magistrate could not engage in such an
expedition at the peril of his soul and long before Monday, the
venison, and all vestiges of the death of the deer, might be secreted
or destroyed.   Happily, the lounging form of Billy Kirby met his eye,
and Hiram, at all time fruitful in similar expedients, saw his way
clear at once.   Jotham, who was associated in the whole business, and
who had left the mountain in consequence of a summons from his
coadjutor, but who failed, equally with Hiram, in the unfortunate
particular of nerve, was directed to summon the wood-chopper to the
dwelling of the magistrate. 

When Billy appeared, he was very kindly invited to take the chair in
which he had already seated himself, and was treated in all respects
as if he were an equal. 

“Judge Temple has set his heart on putting the deer law in force,”
said Hiram, after the preliminary civilities were over, “and a
complaint has been laid before him that a deer has been killed.   He
has issued a search-warrant, and sent for me to get somebody to
execute it. ”

Kirby, who had no idea of being excluded from the deliberative part of
any affair in which he was engaged, drew up his bushy head in a
reflecting attitude, and after musing a moment, replied by asking a
few questions,

“The sheriff has gone out of the way?”

“Not to be found. ”

“And his deputy too?”

“Both gone on the skirts of the Patent. ”

“But I saw the constable hobbling about town an hour ago. ”

“Yes, yes,” said Hiram, with a coaxing smile and knowing nod, “but
this business wants a man—not a cripple. ”

“Why,” said Billy, laughing, “ will the chap make fight?” “He’s a
little quarrelsome at times, and thinks he’s the best man in the
country at rough and tumble. ”

“I heard him brag once,” said Jotham, “that there wasn’t a man ‘twixt
the Mohawk Flats and the Pennsylvany line that was his match at a
close hug. ”

“Did you?” exclaimed Kirby, raising his huge frame in his seat, like a
lion stretching in his lair; “I rather guess he never felt a
Varmounter’s knuckles on his backbone-But who is the chap?”

“Why,” said Jotham, “ it’s—”

“It’s agin’ law to tell,” interrupted Hiram unless you’ll qualify to
sarve.   You’d be the very man to take him, Bill, and I'll make out a
special deputation in a minute, when you will get the fees. ”

“What’s the fees?” said Kirby, laying his large hand on the leaves of
a statute-book that Hiram had opened in order to give dignity to his
office, which he turned over in his rough manner, as if he were
reflecting on a subject about which he had, in truth, already decided;
“will they pay a man for a broken head?”

“They’ll be something handsome,” said Hiram. 

“Damn the fees,” said Billy, again laughing—” does the fellow think
he’s the best wrestler in the county, though? what’s his inches?”

“He’s taller than you be,” said Jotham, “and one of the biggest—”

Talkers, he was about to add, but the impatience of Kirby interrupted
him.   The wood-chopper had nothing fierce or even brutal in his
appearance; the character of his expression was that of good-natured
vanity.   It was evident he prided himself on the powers of the
physical man, like all who have nothing better to boast of; and,
stretching out his broad hand, with the palm downward, he said,
keeping his eyes fastened on his own bones and sinews:

“Come, give us a touch of the book.   I’ll swear, and you’ll see that
I’m a man to keep my oath. ”

Hiram did not give the wood-chopper time to change his mind, but the
oath was administered without unnecessary delay.   So soon as this
preliminary was completed, the three worthies left the house, and
proceeded by the nearest road toward the hut.   They had reached the
bank of the lake, and were diverging from the route of the highway,
before Kirby recollected that he was now entitled to the privilege of
the initiated, and repeated his question as to the name of the
offender,

“Which way, which way, squire?” exclaimed the hardy wood-chopper; “I
thought it was to search a house that you wanted me, not the woods. 
There is nobody lives on this side of the lake, for six miles, unless
you count the Leather-Stocking and old John for settlers.   Come, tell
me the chap’s name, and I warrant me that I lead you to his clearing
by a straighter path than this, for I know every sapling that grows
within two miles of Templeton. ”

“This is the way,” said Hiram, pointing forward and quickening his
step, as if apprehensive that Kirby would desert, “and Bumppo is the
man. ”

Kirby stopped short, and looked from one of his companions to the
other in astonishment.   He then burst into a loud laugh, and cried:

“Who? Leather-Stocking! He may brag of his aim and his rifle, for he
has the best of both, as I will own myself, for sin’ he shot the
pigeon I knock under to him; but for a wrestle! why, I would take the
creatur’ between my finger and thumb, and tie him in a bow-knot around
my neck for a Barcelony.   The man is seventy, and was never anything
particular for strength. ”

“He’s a deceiving man,” said Hiram, “like all the hunters; he is
stronger than he seems; besides, he has his rifle. ”

“That for his rifle!” cried Billy; “he’d no more hurt me with his
rifle than he’d fly.   He’s a harmless creatur’, and I must say that I
think he has as good right to kill deer as any man on the Patent. 
It’s his main support, and this is a free country, where a man is
privileged to follow any calling he likes. ”

“According to that doctrine,” said Jotham, “anybody may shoot a deer. ”

This is the man’s calling, I tell you,” returned Kirby, “and the law
was never made for such as he. ”

“The law was made for all,” observed Hiram, who began to think that
the danger was likely to fall to his own share, notwithstanding his
management; “and the law is particular in noticing parjury. ”

“See here, Squire Doolittle,” said the reckless woodchopper; “I don’t
care the valie of a beetlering for you and your parjury too.   But as I
have come so far, I’ll go down and have a talk with the old man, and
maybe we’ll fry a steak of the deer together. ”

“Well, if you can get in peaceably, so much the better,” said the
magistrate.   “To my notion, strife is very unpopular; I prefar, at all
times, clever conduct to an ugly temper. ”

As the whole party moved at a great pace, they soon reached the hut,
where Hiram thought it prudent to halt on the outside of the top of
the fallen pine, which formed a chevaux-de-frise, to defend the
approach to the fortress, on the side next the village.   The delay was
little relished by Kirby, who clapped his hands to his mouth, and gave
a loud halloo that brought the dogs out of their kennel, and, almost
at the same instant, the scantily-covered head of Natty from the door. 

“Lie down, old fool,” cried the hunter; “do you think there’s more
painters about you?”

“Ha! Leather-Stocking, I’ve an arrand with you,” cried Kirby; “here’s
the good people of the State have been writing you a small letter, and
they’ve hired me to ride
post. ”

“What would you have with me, Billy Kirby?” said Natty, stepping
across his threshold, and raising his hand over his eyes, to screen
them from the rays of the setting sun, while he took a survey of his
visitor.   ‘I’ve no land to clear, and Heaven knows I would set out six
trees afore I would cut down one. —Down, Hector, I say; into your
kennel with ye. ”

“Would you, old boy?” roared Billy; “then so much the better for me. 
But I must do my arrand.   Here’s a letter for you, Leather-Stocking. 
If you can read it, it’s all well, and if you can’t, here’s Squire
Doolittle at hand, to let you know what it means.   It seems you
mistook the twentieth of July for the first of August.   that’s all. ”

By this time Natty had discovered the lank person of Hiram, drawn up
under the cover of a high stump; and all that was complacent in his
manner instantly gave way to marked distrust and dissatisfaction.   He
placed his head within the door of his hut, and said a few words in an
undertone, when he again appeared, and continued:

“I’ve nothing for ye; so away, afore the Evil One tempts me to do you
harm.   I owe you no spite, Billy Kirby, and what for should you
trouble an old man who has done you no harm?”

Kirby advanced through the top of the pine, to within a few feet of
the hunter, where he seated himself on the end of a log, with great
composure, and began to examine the nose of Hector, with whom he was
familiar, from their frequently meeting in the woods, where he
sometimes fed the dog from his own basket of provisions. 

“You’ve outshot me, and I’m not ashamed to say it,” said the wood-
chopper; “but I don’t owe you a grudge for that, Natty! though it
seems that you’ve shot once too often, for the story goes that you’ve
killed a buck. ”

“I’ve fired but twice to-day, and both times at the painters,”
returned the Leather-Stocking; “see, here are the scalps! I was just
going in with them to the Judge’s to ask the bounty. ”

While Natty was speaking, he tossed the ears to Kirby, who continued
playing with them with a careless air, holding them to the dogs, and
laughing at their movements when they scented the unusual game. 

But Hiram, emboldened by the advance of the deputed constable, now
ventured to approach also, and took up the discourse with the air of
authority that became his commission.   His first measure was to read
the warrant aloud, taking care to give due emphasis to the most
material parts, and concluding with the name of the Judge in very
audible and distinct tones. 

“Did Marmaduke Temple put his name to that bit of paper?” said Natty,
shaking his head; “well, well, that man loves the new ways, and his
betterments, and his lands, afore his own flesh and blood.   But I
won’t mistrust the gal; she has an eye like a full-grown buck! poor
thing, she didn’t choose her father, and can’t help it.   I know but
little of the law, Mr.  Doolittle; what is to be done, now you’ve read
your commission?”

“Oh! it’s nothing but form, Natty,” said Hiram, endeavoring to assume
a friendly aspect.   “Let’s go in, and talk the thing over in reason; I
dare to say that the money can be easily found, and I partly conclude,
from what passed, that Judge Temple will pay it himself. ”

The old hunter had kept a keen eye on the movements of his three
visitors, from the beginning, and had maintained his position, just
without the threshold of the cabin, with a determined manner, that
showed he was not to be easily driven from his post.   When Hiram drew
nigher, as if expecting his proposition would be accepted, Natty
lifted his hand, and motioned for him to retreat. 

“Haven’t I told you more than once, not to tempt me?” he said.   “I
trouble no man; why can’t the law leave me to myself? Go back—go back,
and tell your Judge that he may keep his bounty; but I won’t have his
wasty ways brought into my hut. ”

This offer, however, instead of appeasing the curiosity of Hiram,
seemed to inflame it the more; while Kirby cried:

“Well, that’s fair, squire; he forgives the county his demand, and the
county should forgive him the fine; it’s what I call an even trade,
and should be concluded on the spot.   I like quick dealings, and
what’s fair ‘twixt man and man. ”

“I demand entrance into this house,” said Hiram, summoning all the
dignity he could muster to his assistance, “in the name of the people;
and by virtue of this war rant, and of my office, and with this peace
officer. ”

“Stand back, stand back, squire, and don’t tempt me,” said the
Leather-Stocking, motioning him to retire, with great earnestness. 

“Stop us at your peril,” continued Hiram.   “Billy! Jotham! close up—I
want testimony. ”

Hiram had mistaken the mild but determined air of Natty for
submission, and had already put his foot on the threshold to enter,
when he was seized unexpectedly by his shoulders, and hurled over the
little bank toward the lake, to the distance of twenty feet.   The
suddenness of the movement, and the unexpected display of strength on
the part of Natty, created a momentary astonishment in his invaders,
that silenced all noises; but at the next instant Billy Kirby gave
vent to his mirth in peals of laughter, that he seemed to heave up
from his very soul. 

“Well done, old stub!” he shouted; “the squire knowed you better than
I did.   Come, come, here’s a green spot; take it out like men, while
Jotham and I see fair play. ”

“William Kirby, I order you to do your duty,” cried Hiram, from under
the bank; “seize that man; I order you to seize him in the name of the
people. ”

But the Leather-Stocking now assumed a more threatening attitude; his
rifle was in his hand, and its muzzle was directed toward the wood-
chopper. 

“Stand off, I bid ye,” said Natty; “you know my aim, Billy Kirby; I
don’t crave your blood, but mine and your’n both shall turn this green
grass red, afore you put foot into the hut. ”

While the affair appeared trifling, the wood-chopper seemed disposed
to take sides with the weaker party; but, when the firearms were
introduced, his manner very sensibly changed.   He raised his large
frame from the log, and, facing the hunter with an open front, he
replied:

“I didn’t come here as your enemy, Leather-Stocking; but I don’t value
the hollow piece of iron in your hand so much as a broken axe-helve;
so, squire, say the word, and keep within the law, and we’ll soon see
who’s the best main of the two. ”

But no magistrate was to be seen! The instant the rifle was produced
Hiram and Jotham vanished; and when the wood-chopper bent his eyes
about him in surprise at receiving no answer, he discovered their
retreating figures moving toward the village at a rate that
sufficiently indicated that they had not only calculated the velocity
of a rifle-bullet, but also its probable range. 

“You’ve scared the creatur’s off,” said Kirby, with great contempt
expressed on his broad features; “but you are not going to scare me;
so, Mr.  Bumppo, down with your gun, or there’ll be trouble ‘twixt us. ”
Natty dropped his rifle, and replied:

“I wish you no harm, Billy Kirby; but I leave it to yourself, whether
an old man’s hut is to be run down by such varmint.   I won’t deny the
buck to you, Billy, and you may take the skin in, if you please, and
show it as testimony.   The bounty will pay the fine, and that ought to
satisfy any man,”

“Twill, old boy, ‘twill,” cried Kirby, every- shade of displeasure
vanishing from his open brow at the peace-offering; “throw out the
hide, and that shall satisfy the law. ”

Natty entered the hut, and soon reappeared, bringing with him the
desired testimonial; and the wood-chopper departed, as thoroughly
reconciled to the hunter as if nothing had happened.   As he paced
along the margin of the lake he would burst into frequent fits of
laughter, while he recollected the summerset of Hiram: and, on the
whole, he thought the affair a very capital joke. 

Long before Billy’ reached the village, however, the news of his
danger, and of Natty’s disrespect of the law, and of Hiram’s
discomfiture, were in circulation.   A good deal was said about sending
for the sheriff; some hints were given about calling out the posse
comitatus to avenge the insulted laws; and many of the citizens were
collected, deliberating how to proceed.   The arrival of Billy with the
skin, by removing all grounds for a search, changed the complexion of
things materially.   Nothing now remained but to collect the fine and
assert the dignity of the people; all of which, it was unanimously
agreed, could be done as well on the succeeding Monday as on Saturday
night—a time kept sacred by large portion of the settlers. 
Accordingly, all further proceedings were suspended for six-and-thirty
hours. 

CHAPTER 31. 

And dar’st thou then
To beard the lion in his den,
The Douglas in his hall “—Marmion. 

The commotion was just subsiding, and the inhabitants of the village
had begun to disperse from the little groups that had formed, each
retiring to his own home, and closing his door after him, with the
grave air of a man who consulted public feeling in his exterior
deportment, when Oliver Edwards, on his return from the dwelling of
Mr.  Grant, encountered the young lawyer, who is known to the reader as
Mr.  Lippet.   There was very little similarity in the manners or
opinions of the two; but as they both belonged to the more intelligent
class of a very small community, they were, of course, known to each
other, and as their meeting was at a point where silence would have
been rudeness, the following conversation was the result of their
interview:

“A fine evening, Mr.  Edwards,” commenced the lawyer, whose
disinclination to the dialogue was, to say the least, very doubtful;
“we want rain sadly; that’s the worst of this climate of ours, it’s
either a drought or a deluge.   It’s likely you’ve been used to a more
equal temperature?”

“I am a native of this State,” returned Edwards, coldly. 

“Well.   I’ve often heard that point disputed; but it’s so easy to get
a man naturalized, that it’s of little consequence where he was born. 
I wonder what course the Judge means to take in this business of Natty
Bumppo!”
“Of Natty Bumppo!” echoed Edwards; “to what do you allude, sir?”
“Haven’t you heard!” exclaimed the other, with a look of surprise, so
naturally assumed as completely to deceive his auditor; “it may turn
out an ugly business.   It seems that the old man has been out in the
hills, and has shot a buck this morning, and that, you know, is a
criminal matter in the eyes of Judge Temple. ”

“Oh! he has, has he?” said Edwards, averting his face to conceal the
color that collected in his sunburnt cheek.   “Well, if that be all, he
must even pay the fine. ”

“It’s five pound currency,” said the lawyer; “could Natty muster so
much money at once?”

“Could he!” cried the youth.   “I am not rich, Mr.  Lippet; far from it—
I am poor, and I have been hoarding my salary for a purpose that lies
near my heart; but, be fore that old man should lie one hour in a
jail, I would spend the last cent to prevent it.   Besides, he has
killed two panthers, and the bounty will discharge the fine many times
over. ”

“Yes, yes,” said the lawyer, rubbing his hands together, with an
expression of pleasure that had no artifice about it; “we shall make
it out; I see plainly we shall make it out. ”

“Make what out, sir? I must beg an explanation. ”

“Why, killing the buck is but a small matter compared to what took
place this afternoon,” continued Mr.  Lippet, with a confidential and
friendly air that won upon the youth, little as he liked the man.   “It
seems that a complaint was made of the fact, and a suspicion that
there was venison in the hut was sworn to, all which is provided for
in the statute, when Judge Temple granted the search warrant. ”

“A search-warrant!” echoed Edwards, in a voice of horror, and with a
face that should have been again averted to conceal its paleness; “and
how much did they discover? What did they see

“They saw old Bumppo’s rifle; and that is a sight which will quiet
most men’s curiosity in the woods. ”

“Did they! did they!” shouted Edwards, bursting into a convulsive
laugh; “so the old hero beat them back beat them back! did he?”
The lawyer fastened his eyes in astonishment on the youth, but, as his
wonder gave way to the thoughts that were commonly uppermost in his
mind, he replied:

“It is no laughing matter, let me tell you, sir; the forty dollars of
bounty and your six months of salary will be much reduced before you
can get the matter fairly settled.   Assaulting a magistrate in the
execution of his duty, and menacing a constable with firearms at the
same time, is a pretty serious affair, and is punishable with both
fine and imprisonment. ”

“Imprisonment!” repeated Oliver; “imprison the Leather-Stocking! no,
no, sir; it would bring the old man to his grave.   They shall never
imprison the Leather-Stocking. ”

“Well, Mr.  Edwards,” said Lippet, dropping all reserve from his
manner, “you are called a curious man; but if you can tell me how a
jury is to be prevented from finding a verdict of guilty, if this case
comes fairly before them, and the proof is clear, I shall acknowledge
that you know more law than I do, who have had a license in my pocket
for three years. ”

By this time the reason of Edwards was getting the ascendency of his
feelings, and, as he began to see the real difficulties of the case,
he listened more readily to the conversation of the lawyer.   The
ungovernable emotion that escaped the youth, in the first moments of
his surprise, entirely passed away; and, although it was still evident
that he continued to be much agitated by what he had heard, he
succeeded in yielding forced attention to the advice which the other
uttered. 

Notwithstanding the confused state of his mind, Oliver soon discovered
that most of the expedients of the lawyer were grounded in cunning,
and plans that required a time to execute them that neither suited his
disposition nor his necessities.   After, however, giving Mr.  Lippet to
under stand that he retained him in the event of a trial, an assurance
that at once satisfied the lawyer, they parted, one taking his course
with a deliberate tread in the direction of the little building that
had a wooden sign over its door, with “Chester Lippet, Attorney-at-
law,” painted on it; and the other pacing over the ground with
enormous strides toward the mansion-house.   We shall take leave of the
attorney for the present, and direct the attention of the reader to
the client. 

When Edwards entered the hall, whose enormous doors were opened to the
passage of the air of a mild evening, he found Benjamin engaged in
some of his domestic avocations, and in a hurried voice inquired where
Judge Temple was to be found. 

Why, the Judge has stepped into his office, with that master
carpenter, Mister Doolittle; but Miss Lizzy is in that there parlor. 
I say, Master Oliver, we’d like to have had a bad job of that panther,
or painter’s work— some calls it one, and some calls it t’other—but I
know little of the beast, seeing that it is not of British growth.   I
said as much as that it was in the hills the last winter for I heard
it moaning on the lake shore one evening in the fall, when I was
pulling down from the fishing-point in the skiff.   Had the animal come
into open water, where a man could see where and how to work his
vessel, I would have engaged the thing myself; but looking aloft among
the trees is all the same to me as standing on the deck of one ship,
and looking at another vessel’s tops.   I never can tell one rope from
another—”

“Well, well,” interrupted Edwards; “I must see Miss Temple. ”

“And you shall see her, sir,” said the steward; “she’s in this here
room.   Lord, Master Edwards, what a loss she’d have been to the Judge!
Dam’me if I know where he would have gotten such another daughter;
that is, full grown, d’ye see.   I say, sir, this Master Bumppo is a
worthy man, and seems to have a handy way with him, with firearms and
boat-hooks.   I’m his friend, Master Oliver, and he and you may both
set me down as the same. ”

“We may want your friendship, my worthy fellow,” cried Edwards,
squeezing his hand convulsively; “we may want your friendship, in
which case you shall know it. ”

Without waiting to hear the earnest reply that Benjamin meditated, the
youth extricated himself from the vigorous grasp of the steward, and
entered the parlor. 

Elizabeth was alone, and still reclining on the sofa, where we last
left her.   A hand, which exceeded all that the ingenuity of art could
model, in shape and color, veiled her eyes; and the maiden was sitting
as if in deep communion with herself.   Struck by the attitude and
loveliness of the form that met his eye, the young man checked his
impatience, and approached her with respect and caution. 

“Miss Temple—Miss Temple,” he said, “I hope I do not intrude; but I am
anxious for an interview, if it be only for a moment. ”

Elizabeth raised her face, and exhibited her dark eyes swimming in
moisture. 

Is it you, Edwards?” she said, with a sweetness in her voice, and a
softness in her air, that she often used to her father, but which,
from its novelty to himself, thrilled on every nerve of the youth;
“how left you our poor Louisa?”

“She is with her father, happy and grateful,” said Oliver, “ I never
witnessed more feeling than she manifested, when I ventured to express
my pleasure at her escape.   Miss Temple, when I first heard of your
horrid situation, my feelings were too powerful for utterance; and I
did not properly find my tongue, until the walk to Mr.  Grant’s had
given me time to collect myself.   I believe—I do believe, I acquitted
myself better there, for Miss Grant even wept at my silly speeches. ”
For a moment Elizabeth did not reply, but again veiled her eyes with
her hand.   The feeling that caused the action, however, soon passed
away, and, raising her face again to his gaze, she continued with a
smile:

“Your friend, the Leather-Stocking, has now become my friend, Edwards;
I have been thinking how I can best serve him; perhaps you, who know
his habits and his wants so well, can tell me——”

“I can,” cried the youth, with an impetuosity that startled his
companion.   “I can, and may Heaven reward you for the wish, Natty has
been so imprudent as to for get the law, and has this day killed a
deer.   Nay, I believe I must share in the crime and the penalty, for I
was an accomplice throughout.   A complaint has been made to your
father, and he has granted a search—”

“I know it all,” interrupted Elizabeth; “I know it all.   The forms of
the law must be complied with, however; the search must be made, the
deer found, and the penalty paid.   But I must retort your own
question.   Have you lived so long in our family not to know us? Look
at me, Oliver Edwards.   Do I appear like one who would permit the man
that has just saved her life to linger in a jail for so small a sum as
this fine? No, no, sir; my father is a judge, but he is a man and a
Christian.   It is all under stood, and no harm shall follow. ”

“What a load of apprehension do your declarations remove!” exclaimed
Edwards: “ He shall not be disturbed again! your father will protect
him! I have assurance, Miss Temple, that he will, and I must believe
it. ”

“You may have his own, Mr.  Edwards,” returned Elizabeth, “for here he
comes to make it. ”

But the appearance of Marmaduke, who entered the apartment,
contradicted the flattering anticipations of his daughter.   His brow
was contracted, and his manner disturbed.   Neither Elizabeth nor the
youth spoke; but the Judge was allowed to pace once or twice across
the room without interruption, when he cried:

“Our plans are defeated, girl; the obstinacy of the Leather-Stocking
has brought down the indignation of the law on his head, and it is now
out of my power to avert it. ”

“How? in what manner?” cried Elizabeth; “the fine is nothing surely—”

“I did not—I could not anticipate that an old, a friendless man like
him, would dare to oppose the officers of justice,” interrupted the
Judge, “I supposed that he would submit to the search, when the fine
could have been paid, and the law would have been appeased; but now he
will have to meet its rigor. ”

“And what must the punishment be, sir?” asked Ed wards, struggling to
speak with firmness. 

Marmaduke turned quickly to the spot where the youth had withdrawn,
and exclaimed:

“You here! I did not observe you.   I know not what it will be, sir; it
is not usual for a judge to decide until he has heard the testimony,
and the jury have convicted.   Of one thing, however, you may be
assured, Mr.  Edwards; it shall be whatever the law demands,
notwithstanding any momentary weakness I may have exhibited, because
the luckless man has been of such eminent service to my daughter. ”

“No one, I believe, doubts the sense of justice which Judge Temple
entertains!” returned Edwards bitterly. 

“But let us converse calmly, sir.   Will not the years, the habits,
nay, the ignorance of my old friend, avail him any thing against this
charge?”

“Ought they? They may extenuate, but can they ac quit? Would any
society be tolerable, young man, where the ministers of justice are to
be opposed by men armed with rifles? Is it for this that I have tamed
the wilder ness?”

“Had you tamed the beasts that so lately threatened the life of Miss
Temple, sir, your arguments would apply better. ”

“Edwards!” exclaimed Elizabeth. 

“Peace, my child,” interrupted the father; “ the youth is unjust; but
I have not given him cause.   I overlook thy remark, Oliver, for I know
thee to be the friend of Natty, and zeal in his behalf has overcome
thy discretion,”

“Yes, he is my friend,” cried Edwards, “and I glory in the title.   He
is simple, unlettered, even ignorant; prejudiced, perhaps, though I
feel that his opinion of the world is too true; but he has a heart,
Judge Temple, that would atone for a thousand faults; he knows his
friends, and never deserts them, even if it be his dog. ”

“This is a good character, Mr.  Edwards,” returned Marmaduke, mildly;
“but I have never been so fortunate as to secure his esteem, for to me
he has been uniformly repulsive; yet I have endured it, as an old
man’s whim, However, when he appears before me, as his judge, he shall
find that his former conduct shall not aggravate, any more than his
recent services shall extenuate, his crime. ”

“Crime!” echoed Edwards: “is it a crime to drive a prying miscreant
from his door? Crime! Oh, no, sir; if there be a criminal involved in
this affair, it is not he. ”

“And who may it be, sir?” asked Judge Temple, facing the agitated
youth, his features settled to their usual composure. 

This appeal was more than the young man could bear.   Hitherto he had
been deeply agitated by his emotions; but now the volcano burst its
boundaries. 

“Who! and this to me!” he cried; “ask your own conscience, Judge
Temple.   Walk to that door, sir, and look out upon the valley, that
placid lake, and those dusky mountains, and say to your own heart, if
heart you have, whence came these riches, this vale, those hills, and
why am I their owner? I should think, sir, that the appearance of
Mohegan and the Leather-Stocking, stalking through the country,
impoverished and forlorn, would wither your sight. ”

Marmaduke heard this burst of passion, at first, with deep amazement;
but when the youth had ended, he beckoned to his impatient daughter
for silence, and replied:

“Oliver Edwards, thou forgettest in whose presence thou standest.   I
have heard, young man, that thou claimest descent from the native
owners of the soil; but surely thy education has been given thee to no
effect, if it has not taught thee the validity of the claims that have
transferred the title to the whites.   These lands are mine by the very
grants of thy ancestry, if thou art so descended; and I appeal to
Heaven for a testimony of the uses I have put them to.   After this
language, we must separate.   I have too long sheltered thee in my
dwelling; but the time has arrived when thou must quit it.   Come to my
office, and I will discharge the debt I owe thee.   Neither shall thy
present intemperate language mar thy future fortunes, if thou wilt
hearken to the advice of one who is by many years thy senior. ”

The ungovernable feeling that caused the violence of the youth had
passed away, and he stood gazing after the retiring figure of
Marmaduke, with a vacancy in his eye that denoted the absence of his
mind.   At length he recollected himself, and, turning his head slowly
around the apartment, he beheld Elizabeth, still seated on the sofa,
but with her head dropped on her bosom, and her face again concealed
by her hands. 

“Miss Temple,” he said—all violence had left his manner—” Miss Temple—
I have forgotten myself—forgotten you.   You have heard what your
father has decreed, and this night I leave here.   With you, at least,
I would part in amity. ”

Elizabeth slowly raised her face, across which a momentary expression
of sadness stole; but as she left her seat, her dark eyes lighted with
their usual fire, her cheek flushed to burning, and her whole air
seemed to belong to another nature. 

“I forgive you, Edwards, and my father will forgive you,” she said,
when she reached the door.   “You do not know us, but the time may come
when your opinions shall change—”

“Of you! never!” interrupted the youth; “I—”

“I would speak, sir, and not listen.   There is something in this
affair that I do not comprehend; but tell the Leather-Stocking he has
friends as well as judges in us.   Do not let the old man experience
unnecessary uneasiness at this rupture.   It is impossible that you
could increase his claims here; neither shall they be diminished by
any thing you have said.   Mr.  Edwards, I wish you happiness, and
warmer friends,”

The youth would have spoken, but she vanished from the door so
rapidly, that when he reached the hall her form was nowhere to be
seen.   He paused a moment, in stupor, and then, rushing from the
house, instead of following Marmaduke in his “office,” he took his way
directly for the cabin of the hunters. 

CHAPTER 32. 

“Who measured earth, described the starry spheres,
And traced the long records of lunar years.   “—Pope. 

Richard did not return from the exercise of his official duties until
late in the evening of the following day.   It had been one portion of
his business to superintend the arrest of part of a gang of
counterfeiters, that had, even at that early period, buried themselves
in the woods, to manufacture their base coin, which they afterward
circulated from one end of the Union to the other.   The expedition had
been completely successful, and about midnight the sheriff entered the
village, at the head of a posse of deputies and constables, in the
centre of whom rode, pinioned, four of the malefactors.   At the gate
of the mansion-house they separated, Mr.  Jones directing his assist
ants to proceed with their charge to the county jail, while he pursued
his own way up the gravel walk, with the kind of self-satisfaction
that a man of his organization would feel, who had really for once
done a very clever thing. 

“Holla! Aggy!” shouted the sheriff, when he reached the door; “where
are you, you black dog? will you keep me here in the dark all night?
Holla! Aggy! Brave! Brave! hoy, hoy—where have you got to, Brave? Off
his watch! Everybody is asleep but myself! Poor I must keep my eyes
open, that others may sleep in safety.   Brave! Brave! Well, I will say
this for the dog, lazy as he’s grown, that it is the first time I ever
knew him to let any one come to the door after dark, without having a
smell to know whether it was an honest man or not.   He could tell by
his nose, almost as well as I could myself by looking at them.   Holla!
you Agamemnon! where are you? Oh! here comes the dog at last. ”

By this time the sheriff had dismounted, and observed a form, which he
supposed to be that of Brave, slowly creeping out of the kennel; when,
to his astonishment, it reared itself on two legs instead of four, and
he was able to distinguish, by the starlight, the curly head and dark
visage of the negro. 

“Ha! what the devil are you doing there, you black rascal?” he cried. 
“Is it not hot enough for your Guinea blood in the house this warm
night, but you must drive out the poor dog, and sleep in his straw?”

By this time the boy was quite awake, and, with a blubbering whine, he
attempted to reply to his master. 

“Oh! masser Richard! masser Richard! such a ting! such a ting! I
nebber tink a could ‘appen! neber tink he die! Oh, Lor-a-gor! ain’t
bury—keep ‘em till masser Richard get back—got a grabe dug—”
Here the feelings of the negro completely got the mastery, and,
instead of making any intelligible explanation of the causes of his
grief, he blubbered aloud. 

“Eh! what! buried! grave! dead!” exclaimed Richard, with a tremor in
his voice; “nothing serious? Nothing has happened to Benjamin, I hope?
I know he has been bilious, but I gave him—”

“Oh, worser ‘an dat! worser ‘an dat!” sobbed the negro.   “ Oh! de Lor!
Miss 'Lizzy an’ Miss Grant—walk—mountain—poor Bravy ‘—kill a lady—
painter-—Oh, Lor, Lor!—Natty Bumppo—tare he troat open—come a see,
masser Richard—here he be—here he be. ”

As all this was perfectly inexplicable to the sheriff, he was very
glad to wait patiently until the black brought a lantern from the
kitchen, when he followed Aggy to the kennel, where he beheld poor
Brave, indeed, lying in his blood, stiff and cold, but decently
covered with the great coat of the negro.   He was on the point of
demanding an explanation; but the grief of the black, who had fallen
asleep on his voluntary watch, having burst out afresh on his waking,
utterly disqualified the lad from giving one.   Luckily, at this moment
the principal door of the house opened, and the coarse features of
Benjamin were thrust over the threshold, with a candle elevated above
them, shedding its dim rays around in such a manner as to exhibit the
lights and shadows of his countenance.   Richard threw his bridle to
the black, and, bidding him look to the horse, he entered the hall. 
What is the meaning of the dead dog?” he cried. 

“Where is Miss Temple?”

Benjamin made one of his square gestures, with the thumb of his left
hand pointing over his right shoulder, as he answered:

“Turned in. ”

“Judge Temple—where is he?”

“In his berth. ”

“But explain; why is Brave dead? and what is the cause of Aggy’s
grief?”

“Why, it’s all down, squire,” said Benjamin, pointing to a slate that
lay on the table, by the side of a mug of toddy, a short pipe in which
the tobacco was yet burning, and a prayer-book. 

Among the other pursuits of Richard, he had a passion to keep a
register of all passing events; and his diary, which was written in
the manner of a journal, or log.   book, embraced not only such
circumstances as affected himself, but observations on the weather,
and all the occurrences of the family, and frequently of the village. 
Since his appointment to the office of sheriff and his consequent
absences from home, he had employed Benjamin to make memoranda on a
slate, of whatever might be thought worth remembering, which, on his
return, were regularly transferred to the journal with proper
notations of the time, manner, and other little particulars.   There
was, to be sure, one material objection to the clerkship of Benjamin,
which the ingenuity of no one but Richard could have overcome.   The
steward read nothing but his prayer-book, and that only in particular
parts, and by the aid of a good deal of spelling, and some misnomers;
but he could not form a single letter with a pen.   This would have
been an insuperable bar to journalizing with most men; but Richard
invented a kind of hieroglyphical character, which was intended to
note all the ordinary occurrences of a day, such as how the wind blew,
whether the sun shone, or whether it rained, the hours, etc.   ; and
for the extraordinary, after giving certain elementary lectures on the
subject, the sheriff was obliged to trust to the ingenuity of the
major-domo.   The reader will at once perceive, that it was to this
chronicle that Benjamin pointed, instead of directly answering the
sheriff’s interrogatory. 

When Mr.  Jones had drunk a glass of toddy, he brought forth from its
secret place his proper journal, and, seating himself by the table, he
prepared to transfer the contents of the slate to the paper, at the
same time that he appeased his curiosity.   Benjamin laid one hand on
the back of the sheriff's chair, in a familiar manner, while he kept
the other at liberty to make use of a forefinger, that was bent like
some of his own characters, as an index to point out his meaning. 

The first thing referred to by the sheriff was the diagram of a
compass, cut in one corner of the slate for permanent use.   The
cardinal points were plainly marked on it, and all the usual divisions
were indicated in such a manner that no man who had ever steered a
ship could mistake them. 

“Oh!” said the sheriff, seating himself down comfort ably in his
chair, “you’d the wind southeast, I see, all last night I thought it
would have blown up rain. ”

“Devil the drop, sir,” said Benjamin; “I believe that the scuttle-butt
up aloft is emptied, for there hasn’t so much water fell in the
country for the last three weeks as would float Indian John’s canoe,
and that draws just one inch nothing, light. ”

“Well but didn’t the wind change here this morning? there was a change
where I was. ”

“To be sure it did, squire; and haven’t I logged it as a shift of
wind?”

“I don’t see where, Benjamin—”

“Don’t see!” interrupted the steward, a little crustily; “ain’t there
a mark agin’ east-and-by-nothe-half-nothe, with summat like a rising
sun at the end of it, to show ‘twas in the morning watch?”

“Yes, yes, that is very legible; but where is the change noted?”

“Where! why doesn’t it see this here tea-kettle, with a mark run from
the spout straight, or mayhap a little crooked or so, into west-and-
by-southe-half-southe? now I call this a shift of wind, squire.   Well,
do you see this here boar’s head that you made for me, alongside of
the compass—”

“Ay, ay—Boreas—-—I see.   Why, you’ve drawn lines from its mouth,
extending from one of your marks to the other. ”

“It’s no fault of mine, Squire Dickens; ‘tis your d—d climate.   The
wind has been at all them there marks this very day, and that’s all
round the compass, except a little matter of an Irishman’s hurricane
at meridium, which you’ll find marked right up and down.   Now, I’ve
known a sow-wester blow for three weeks, in the channel, with a clean
drizzle, in which you might wash your face and hands without the
trouble of hauling in water from alongside. ”

“Very well, Benjamin,” said the sheriff, writing in his journal; “I
believe I have caught the idea.   Oh! here’s a cloud over the rising
sun—so you had it hazy in the morning?”

“Ay, ay, sir,” said Benjamin. 

“Ah it’s Sunday.   and here are the marks for the length of the sermon—
one, two, three, four—what! did Mr.  Grant preach forty minutes?”

“Ay, summat like it; it was a good half-hour by my own glass, and then
there was the time lost in turning it, and some little allowance for
leeway in not being over-smart about it. ”

“Benjamin, this is as long as a Presbyterian; you never could have
been ten minutes in turning the glass!”

“Why, do you see, Squire, the parson was very solemn, and I just
closed my eyes in order to think the better with myself, just the same
as you’d put in the dead-lights to make all snug, and when I opened
them agin I found the congregation were getting under way for home, so
I calculated the ten minutes would cover the leeway after the glass
was out.   It was only some such matter as a cat’s nap. ”

“Oh, ho! Master Benjamin, you were asleep, were you? but I’ll set down
no such slander against an orthodox divine. ” Richard wrote twenty-nine
minutes in his journal, and continued: “Why, what’s this you’ve got
opposite ten o’clock A. M. ? A full moon! had you a moon visible by day?
I have heard of such portents before now, but—eh! what’s this
alongside of it? an hour-glass?”

“That!” said Benjamin, looking coolly over the sheriff’s shoulder, and
rolling the tobacco about in his mouth with a jocular air; “why,
that’s a small matter of my own.   It’s no moon, squire, but only Betty
Hollister’s face; for, dye see, sir, hearing all the same as if she
had got up a new cargo of Jamaiky from the river, I called in as I was
going to the church this morning—ten A. M.   was it?—just the time—and
tried a glass; and so I logged it, to put me in mind of calling to pay
her like an honest man. ”

“That was it, was it?” said the sheriff, with some displeasure at this
innovation on his memoranda; “and could you not make a better glass
than this? it looks like a death’s-head and an hour-glass. ”

“Why, as I liked the stuff, squire,” returned the steward, “I turned
in, homeward bound, and took t’other glass, which I set down at the
bottom of the first, and that gives the thing the shape it has.   But
as I was there again to-night, and paid for the three at once, your
honor may as well run the sponge over the whole business. ”

“I will buy you a slate for your own affairs, Benjamin,” said the
sheriff; “I don’t like to have the journal marked over in this
manner. ”

“You needn’t—you needn’t, squire; for, seeing that I was likely to
trade often with the woman while this barrel lasted.   I’ve opened a
fair account with Betty, and she keeps her marks on the back of her
bar-door, and I keeps the tally on this here bit of a stick. ”
As Benjamin concluded he produced a piece of wood, on which five very
large, honest notches were apparent.   The sheriff cast his eyes on
this new ledger for a moment, and continued:

“What have we here! Saturday, two P. M. —Why here’s a whole family
piece! two wine-glasses upside-down!”

“That’s two women; the one this a-way is Miss ‘Lizzy, and t’other is
the parson’s young‘un. ”

“Cousin Bess and Miss Grant!” exclaimed the sheriff, in amazement;
“what have they to do with my journal?”

“They’d enough to do to get out of the jaws of that there painter or
panther,” said the immovable steward.   “This here thingumy, squire,
that maybe looks summat like a rat, is the beast, d’ye see; and this
here t’other thing, keel uppermost, is poor old Brave, who died nobly,
all the same as an admiral fighting for his king and country; and that
there—”

“Scarecrow,” interrupted Richard. 

“Ay, mayhap it do look a little wild or so,” continued the steward;
“but to my judgment, squire, it’s the best image I’ve made, seeing
it’s most like the man himself; well, that’s Natty Bumppo, who shot
this here painter, that killed that there dog, who would have eaten or
done worse to them here young ladies. ”

“And what the devil does all this mean?” cried Richard, impatiently. 

“Mean!” echoed Benjamin; “it is as true as the Boadishey’s log book—”
He was interrupted by the sheriff, who put a few direct questions to
him, that obtained more intelligible answers, by which means he became
possessed of a tolerably correct idea of the truth, When the wonder,
and we must do Richard the justice to say, the feelings also, that
were created by this narrative, had in some degree subsided, the
sheriff turned his eyes again on his journal, where more inexplicable
hieroglyphics met his view. 

“What have we here?” he cried; “two men boxing! Has there been a
breach of the peace? Ah, that’s the way, the moment my back is turned—
-. ”

“That’s the Judge and young Master Edwards,” interrupted the steward,
very cavalierly. 

“How! ‘Duke fighting with Oliver! what the devil has got into you all?
More things have happened within the last thirty-six hours than in the
preceding six months. ”
“Yes, it’s so indeed, squire,” returned the steward
“I’ve known a smart chase, and a fight at the tail of it”, where less
has been logged than I’ve got on that there slate.   Howsomnever, they
didn’t come to facers, only passed a little jaw fore and aft. ”

“Explain! explain!” cried Richard; “it was about the mines, ha! Ay,
ay, I see it, I see it; here is a man with a pick on his shoulder.   So
you heard it all, Benjamin?”

“Why, yes, it was about their minds, I believe, squire, returned the
steward; “and, by what I can learn, they spoke them pretty plainly to
one another.   Indeed, I may say that I overheard a small matter of it
myself, seeing that the windows was open, and I hard by.   But this
here is no pick.   but an anchor on a man’s shoulder; and here’s the
other fluke down his back, maybe a little too close, which signifies
that the lad has got under way and left his moorings. ”

“Has Edwards left the house?”

“He has. ”

Richard pursued this advantage; and, after a long and close
examination, he succeeded in getting out of Benjamin  all that he
knew, not only concerning the misunderstanding, but of the attempt to
search the hut, and Hiram’s discomfiture.   The sheriff was no sooner
possessed of these facts, which Benjamin related with all possible
tenderness to the Leather-Stocking, than, snatching up his hat, and
bidding the astonished steward secure the doors and go to his bed, he
left the house. 

For at least five minutes, after Richard disappeared, Benjamin stood
with his arms akimbo, and his eyes fastened on the door; when, having
collected his astonished faculties, he prepared to execute the orders
he had received. 

It has been already said that the “court of common pleas and general
sessions of the peace,” or, as it is commonly called, the “county
court,” over which Judge Temple presided, held one of its stated
sessions on the following morning.   The attendants of Richard were
officers who had come to the village, as much to discharge their usual
duties at this court, as to escort the prisoners and the sheriff knew
their habits too well, not to feel confident that he should find most,
if not all of them, in the public room of the jail, discussing the
qualities of the keeper’s liquors.   Accordingly he held his way
through the silent streets of the village, directly to the small and
insecure building that contained all the unfortunate debt ors and some
of the criminals of the county, and where justice was administered to
such unwary applicants as were so silly as to throw away two dollars
in order to obtain one from their neighbors.   The arrival of four
malefactors in the custody of a dozen officers was an event, at that
day, in Templeton; and, when the sheriff reached the jail, he found
every indication that his subordinates in tended to make a night of
it. 

The nod of the sheriff brought two of his deputies to the door, who in
their turn drew off six or seven of the constables.   With this force
Richard led the way through the village, toward the bank of the lake,
undisturbed by any noise, except the barking of one or two curs, who
were alarmed by the measured tread of the party, and by the low
murmurs that ran through their own numbers, as a few cautious
questions and answers were exchanged, relative to the object of their
expedition.   When they had crossed the little bridge of hewn logs that
was thrown over the Susquehanna, they left the highway, and struck
into that field which had been the scene of the victory over the
pigeons.   From this they followed their leader into the low bushes of
pines and chestnuts which had sprung up along the shores of the lake,
where the plough had not succeeded the fall of the trees, and soon
entered the forest itself.   Here Richard paused and collected his
troop around him. 

“I have required your assistance, my friends,” he cried, in a low
voice, “in order to arrest Nathaniel Bumppo, commonly called the
Leather-Stocking He has assaulted a magistrate, and resisted the
execution of a search-war rant, by threatening the life of a constable
with his rifle.   In short, my friends, he has set an example of
rebellion to the laws, and has become a kind of outlaw.   He is
suspected of other misdemeanors and offences against private rights;
and I have this night taken on myself.   by the virtue of my office as
sheriff, to arrest the said Bumppo, and bring him to the county jail,
that he may be present and forthcoming to answer to these heavy
charges before the court to-morrow morning.   In executing this duty,
friends and fellow-citizens, you are to use courage and discretion;
courage, that you may not be daunted by any lawless attempt that this
man may make with his rifle and his dogs to oppose you; and
discretion, which here means caution and prudence, that he may not
escape from this sudden attack—and for other good reasons that I need
not mention.   You will form yourselves in a complete circle around his
hut, and at the word ‘advance,’ called aloud by me, you will rush
forward and, without giving the criminal time for deliberation, enter
his dwelling by force, and make him your prisoner.   Spread yourselves
for this purpose, while I shall descend to the shore with a deputy, to
take charge of that point; and all communications must be made
directly to me, under the bank in front of the hut, where I shall
station myself and remain, in order to receive them. ”

This speech, which Richard had been studying during his walk, had the
effect that all similar performances produce, of bringing the dangers
of the expedition immediately before the eyes of his forces.   The men
divided, some plunging deeper into the forest, in order to gain their
stations without giving an alarm, and others Continuing to advance, at
a gait that would allow the whole party to go in order; but all
devising the best plan to repulse the attack of a dog, or to escape a
rifle-bullet.   It was a moment of dread expectation and interest. 

When the sheriff thought time enough had elapsed for the different
divisions of his force to arrive at their stations, he raised his
voice in the silence of the forest, and shouted the watchword.   The
sounds played among the arched branches of the trees in hollow
cadences; but when the last sinking tone was lost on the ear, in place
of the expected howls of the dogs, no other noises were returned but
the crackling of torn branches and dried sticks, as they yielded
before the advancing steps of the officers.   Even this soon ceased, as
if by a common consent, when the curiosity and impatience of the
sheriff getting the complete ascendency over discretion, he rushed up
the bank, and in a moment stood on the little piece of cleared
ground in front of the spot where Natty had so long lived, To his
amazement, in place of the hut he saw only its smouldering ruins. 

The party gradually drew together about the heap of ashes and the ends
of smoking logs; while a dim flame in the centre of the ruin, which
still found fuel to feed its lingering life, threw its pale light,
flickering with the passing currents of the air, around the circle—now
showing a face with eyes fixed in astonishment, and then glancing to
another countenance, leaving the former shaded in the obscurity of
night.   Not a voice was raised in inquiry, nor an exclamation made in
astonishment.   The transition from excitement to disappointment was
too powerful for Speech; and even Richard lost the use of an organ
that was seldom known to fail him. 

The whole group were yet in the fullness of their surprise, when a
tall form stalked from the gloom into the circle, treading down the
hot ashes and dying embers with callous feet; and, standing over the
light, lifted his cap, and exposed the bare head and weather-beaten
features of the Leather-Stocking.   For a moment he gazed at the dusky
figures who surrounded him, more in sorrow than in anger before he
spoke. 

“What would ye with an old and helpless man?” he said, “You’ve driven
God’s creatur’s from the wilder ness, where His providence had put
them for His own pleasure; and you’ve brought in the troubles and
diviltries of the law, where no man was ever known to disturb another. 
You have driven me, that have lived forty long years of my appointed
time in this very spot, from my home and the shelter of my head, lest
you should put your wicked feet and wasty ways in my cabin.   You’ve
driven me to burn these logs, under which I’ve eaten and drunk—the
first of Heaven’s gifts, and the other of the pure springs—for the
half of a hundred years; and to mourn the ashes under my feet, as a
man would weep and mourn for the children of his body.   You’ve rankled
the heart of an old man, that has never harmed you or your’n, with
bitter feelings toward his kind, at a time when his thoughts should be
on a better world; and you’ve driven him to wish that the beasts of
the forest, who never feast on the blood of their own families, was
his kindred and race; and now, when he has come to see the last brand
of his hut, before it is incited into ashes, you follow him up, at
midnight, like hungry hounds on the track of a worn-out and dying
deer.   What more would ye have? for I am here—one too many.   I come to
mourn, not to fight; and, if it is God’s pleasure, work your will on
me. ”

When the old man ended he stood, with the light glimmering around his
thinly covered head, looking earnestly at the group, which receded
from the pile with an involuntary movement, without the reach of the
quivering rays, leaving a free passage for his retreat into the
bushes, where pursuit in the dark would have been fruit less.   Natty
seemed not to regard this advantage, but stood facing each individual
in the circle in succession, as if to see who would he the first to
arrest him.   After a pause of a few moments Richard began to rally his
confused faculties, and, advancing, apologized for his duty, and made
him his prisoner.   The party flow collected, and, preceded by the
sheriff, with Natty in their centre, they took their way toward the
village. 

During the walk, divers questions were put to the prisoner concerning
his reasons for burning the hut, and whither Mohegan had retreated;
but to all of them he observed a profound silence, until, fatigued
with their previous duties, and the lateness of the hour, the sheriff
and his followers reached the village, and dispersed to their several
places of rest, after turning the key of a jail on the aged and
apparently friendless Leather-Stocking. 

CHAPTER 33. 

“Fetch here the stocks, ho!
You stubborn ancient knave,
you reverend bragget, We’ll teach you. ”—Lear. 

The long days and early sun of July allowed time for a gathering of
the interested, before the little bell of the academy announced that
the appointed hour had arrived for administering right to the wronged,
and punishment to the guilty.   Ever since the dawn of day, the
highways and woodpaths that, issuing from the forests, and winding
among the sides of the mountains, centred in Templeton, had been
thronged with equestrians and footmen, bound to the haven of justice. 
There was to be seen a well-clad yeoman, mounted on a sleek, switch-
tailed steed, rambling along the highway, with his red face elevated
in a manner that said, “I have paid for my land, and fear no man;”
while his bosom was swelling with the pride of being one of the grand
inquest for the county.   At his side rode a companion, his equal in
independence of feeling, perhaps, but his inferior in thrift, as in
property and consideration.   This was a professed dealer in lawsuits—a
man whose name appeared in every calendar—whose substance, gained in
the multifarious expedients of a settler’s change able habits, was
wasted in feeding the harpies of the courts.   He was endeavoring to
impress the mind of the grand juror with the merits of a cause now at
issue, Along with these was a pedestrian, who, having thrown a rifle
frock over his shirt, and placed his best wool hat above his sunburnt
visage, had issued from his retreat in the woods by a footpath, and
was striving to keep company with the others, on his way to hear and
to decide the disputes of his neighbors, as a petit juror.   Fifty
similar little knots of countrymen might have been seen, on that
morning, journeying toward the shire-town on the same errand. 

By ten o’clock the streets of the village were filled with busy faces;
some talking of their private concerns, some listening to a popular
expounder of political creeds; and others gaping in at the open
stores, admiring the finery, or examining scythes, axes, and such
other manufactures as attracted their curiosity or excited their
admiration.   A few women were in the crowd, most carrying infants, and
followed, at a lounging, listless gait, by their rustic lords and
masters.   There was one young couple, in whom connubial love was yet
fresh, walking at a respectful distance from each other; while the
swain directed the timid steps of his bride, by a gallant offering of
a thumb. 

At the first stroke of the bell, Richard issued from the door of the
“Bold Dragoon,” flourishing a sheathed sword, that he was fond of
saying his ancestors had carried in one of Cromwell’s victories, and
crying, in an authoritative tone, to “clear the way for the court. ”
The order was obeyed promptly, though not servilely, the members of
the crowd nodding familiarly to the members of the procession as it
passed.   A party of constables with their staves followed the sheriff,
preceding Marmaduke and four plain, grave-looking yeomen, who were his
associates on the bench.   There was nothing to distinguish these
Subordinate judges from the better part of the spectators, except
gravity, which they affected a little more than common, and that one
of their number was attired in an old-fashioned military coat, with
skirts that reached no lower than the middle of his thighs, and
bearing two little silver epaulets, not half so big as a modern pair
of shoulder-knots.   This gentleman was a colonel of the militia, in
attendance on a court-martial, who found leisure to steal a moment
from his military to attend to his civil jurisdiction; but this
incongruity excited neither notice nor comment.   Three or four clean-
shaved lawyers followed, as meek as if they were lambs going to the
slaughter.   One or two of their number had contrived to obtain an air
of scholastic gravity by wearing spectacles.   The rear was brought up
by another posse of constables, and the mob followed the whole into
the room where the court held its sitting. 

The edifice was composed of a basement of squared logs, perforated
here and there with small grated windows, through which a few wistful
faces were gazing at the crowd without.   Among the captives were the
guilty, downcast countenances of the counterfeiters, and the simple
but honest features of the Leather-Stocking.   The dungeons were to be
distinguished, externally, from the debtors’ apartments only by the
size of the apertures, the thickness of the grates, and by the heads
of the spikes that were driven into the logs as a protection against
the illegal use of edge-tools.   The upper story was of frame work,
regularly covered with boards, and contained one room decently fitted
up for the purpose of justice.   A bench, raised on a narrow platform
to the height of a man above the floor, and protected in front by a
light railing.   ran along one of its sides.   In the centre was a seat,
furnished with rude arms, that was always filled by the presiding
judge.   In front, on a level with the floor of the room, was a large
table covered with green baize, and surrounded by benches; and at
either of its ends were rows of seats, rising one over the other, for
jury-boxes.   Each of these divisions was surrounded by a railing.   The
remainder of the room was an open square, appropriated to the
spectators. 

When the judges were seated, the lawyers had taken possession of the
table, and the noise of moving feet had ceased in the area, the
proclamations were made in the usual form, the jurors were sworn, the
charge was given, and the court proceeded to hear the business before
them. 

We shall not detain the reader with a description of the captious
discussions that occupied the court for the first two hours, Judge
Temple had impressed on the jury, in his charge, the necessity for
dispatch on their part, recommending to their notice, from motives of
humanity, the prisoners in the jail as the first objects of their
attention.   Accordingly, after the period we have mentioned had
elapsed, the cry of the officer to “clear the way for the grand jury,”
announced the entrance of that body.   The usual forms were observed,
when the foreman handed up to the bench two bills, on both of which
the Judge observed, at the first glance of his eye, the name of
Nathaniel Bumppo.   It was a leisure moment with the court; some low
whispering passed between the bench and the sheriff, who gave a signal
to his officers, and in a very few minutes the silence that prevailed
was interrupted by a general movement in the outer crowd, when
presently the Leather-Stocking made his appearance, ushered into the
criminal’s bar under the custody of two constables, The hum ceased,
the people closed into the open space again, and the silence soon
became so deep that the hard breathing of the prisoner was audible. 

Natty was dressed in his buckskin garments, without his coat, in place
of which he wore only a shirt of coarse linen-cheek, fastened at his
throat by the sinew of a deer, leaving his red neck and weather-beaten
face exposed and bare.   It was the first time that he had ever crossed
the threshold of a court of justice, and curiosity seemed to be
strongly blended with his personal feelings.   He raised his eyes to
the bench, thence to the jury-boxes, the bar, and the crowd without,
meeting everywhere looks fastened on himself.   After surveying his own
person, as searching the cause of this unusual attraction, he once
more turned his face around the assemblage, and opened his mouth in
one of his silent and remarkable laughs. 

“Prisoner, remove your cap,” said Judge Temple. 

The order was either unheard or unheeded. 

“Nathaniel Bumppo, be uncovered,” repeated the Judge. 

Natty started at the sound of his name, and, raising his face
earnestly toward the bench, he said:

“Anan!”

Mr.  Lippet arose from his seat at the table, and whispered in the ear
of the prisoner; when Natty gave him a nod of assent, and took the
deer-skin covering from his head. 

“Mr.  District Attorney,” said the Judge, “the prisoner is ready; we
wait for the indictment. ”

The duties of public prosecutor were discharged by Dirck Van der
School, who adjusted his spectacles, cast a cautious look around him
at his brethren of the bar, which he ended by throwing his head aside
so as to catch one glance over the glasses, when he proceeded to read
the bill aloud.   It was the usual charge for an assault and battery on
the person of Hiram Doolittle, and was couched in the ancient language
of such instruments, especial care having been taken by the scribe not
to omit the name of a single offensive weapon known to the law.   When
he had done, Mr.  Van der School removed his spectacles, which he
closed and placed in his pocket, seemingly for the pleasure of again
opening and replacing them on his nose, After this evolution was
repeated once or twice, he handed the bill over to Mr.  Lippet, with a
cavalier air, that said as much as “Pick a hole in that if you can. ”

Natty listened to the charge with great attention, leaning forward
toward the reader with an earnestness that denoted his interest; and,
when it was ended, he raised his tall body to the utmost, and drew a
long sigh.   All eyes were turned to the prisoner, whose voice was
vainly expected to break the stillness of the room. 

“You have heard the presentment that the grand jury have made,
Nathaniel Bumppo,” said the Judge; “what do you plead to the charge?”

The old man drooped his head for a moment in a reflecting attitude,
and then, raising it, he laughed before he answered:

“That I handled the man a little rough or so, is not to be denied; but
that there was occasion to make use of all the things that the
gentleman has spoken of is downright untrue.   I am not much of a
wrestler, seeing that I'm getting old; but I was out among the Scotch-
Irishers—let me see—it must have been as long ago as the first year of
the old war—”

“Mr.  Lippet, if you are retained for the prisoner,” interrupted Judge
Temple, “instruct your client how to plead; if not, the court will
assign him counsel. ”

Aroused from studying the indictment by this appeal, the attorney got
up, and after a short dialogue with the hunter in a low voice, he
informed the court that they were ready to proceed. 

“Do you plead guilty or not guilty?” said the Judge. 

“I may say not guilty, with a clean conscience,” returned Natty; “for
there’s no guilt in doing what’s right; and I’d rather died on the
spot, than had him put foot in the hut at that moment. ”

Richard started at this declaration and bent his eyes significantly on
Hiram, who returned the look with a slight movement of his eyebrows. 

“Proceed to open the cause, Mr.  District Attorney,' continued the
Judge.   “Mr.  Clerk, enter the plea of not guilty. ”

After a short opening address from Mr.  Van der School, Hiram was
summoned to the bar to give his testimony.   It was delivered to the
letter, perhaps, but with all that moral coloring which can be
conveyed under such expressions as, “thinking no harm,” “feeling it my
bounden duty as a magistrate,” and “seeing that the constable was
back’ard in the business. ” When he had done, and the district attorney
declined putting any further interrogatories, Mr.  Lippet arose, with
an air of keen investigation, and asked the following questions:

“Are you a constable of this county, sir?”

“No, sir,” said Hiram, “I’m only a justice-peace. ”

“I ask you, Mr.  Doolittle, in the face of this court, put ting it to
your conscience and your knowledge of the law, whether you had any
right to enter that man’s dwelling?”

“Hem!” said Hiram, undergoing a violent struggle between his desire
for vengeance, and his love of legal fame: “I do suppose—that in—that
is—strict law—that supposing—maybe I hadn’t a real—lawful right; but
as the case was—and Billy was so back’ard—I thought I might come
for’ard in the business. ”

“I ask you again, sir,” continued the lawyer, following up his
success, “whether this old, this friendless old man, did or did not
repeatedly forbid your entrance?”

“Why, I must say,” said Hiram, “that he was considerable cross-
grained; not what I call clever, seeing that it was only one neighbor
wanting to go into the house of another. ”

“Oh! then you own it was only meant for a neighborly visit on your
part, and without the sanction of law.   Remember, gentlemen, the words
of the witness, ‘one neighbor wanting to enter the house of another. ’
Now, sir, I ask you if Nathaniel Bumppo did not again and again order
you not to enter?”

“There was some words passed between us,” said Hiram, “but I read the
warrant to him aloud. ”

“I repeat my question; did he tell you not to enter his habitation?”

“There was a good deal passed betwixt us—but I’ve the warrant in my
pocket; maybe the court would wish to see it?”

“Witness,” said Judge Temple, “answer the question directly; did or
did not the prisoner forbid your entering his hut?”

“Why, I some think—”

“Answer without equivocation,” continued the Judge sternly. 

“He did. ”

“And did you attempt to enter after his order?”

“I did; but the warrant was in my hand. ”

“Proceed, Mr.  Lippet, with your examination. ”

But the attorney saw that the impression was in favor of his client,
and waving his hand with a supercilious manner, as if unwilling to
insult the understanding of the jury with any further defence, he
replied:

“No, sir; I leave it for your honor to charge; I rest my case here. ”

“Mr.  District Attorney,” said the Judge, “have you anything to say?”
Mr.  Van der School removed his spectacles, folded them and, replacing
them once more on his nose, eyed the other bill which he held in his
hand, and then said, looking at the bar over the top of his glasses;
I shall rest the prosecution here, if the court please. ”

Judge Temple arose and began the charge. 

“Gentlemen of the jury,” he said, “you have heard the testimony, and I
shall detain you but a moment.   If an officer meet with resistance in
the execution of a process, he has an undoubted right to call any
citizen to his assistance; and the acts of such assistant come within
the protection of the law.   I shall leave you to judge, gentlemen,
from the testimony, how far the witness in this prosecution can be so
considered, feeling less reluctance to submit the case thus informally
to your decision, because there is yet another indictment to be tried,
which involves heavier charges against the unfortunate prisoner. ”

The tone of Marmaduke was mild and insinuating, and, as his sentiments
were given with such apparent impartiality, they did not fail of
carrying due weight with the jury.   The grave-looking yeomen who
composed this tribunal laid their heads together for a few minutes,
without leaving the box, when the foreman arose, and, after the forms
of the court were duly observed, he pronounced the prisoner to be “Not
guilty. ”

“You are acquitted of this charge, Nathaniel Bumppo,” said the Judge. 

“Anan!” said Natty. 

“You are found not guilty of striking and assaulting Mr.  Doolittle. ”

“No, no, I’ll not deny but that I took him a little roughly by the
shoulders,” said Natty, looking about him with great simplicity, “and
that I—”

“You are acquitted,” interrupted the Judge, “and there is nothing
further to be said or done in the matter. ”

A look of joy lighted up the features of the old man, who now
comprehended the case, and, placing his cap eagerly on his head again,
he threw up the bar of his little prison, and said, feelingly:

“I must say this for you, Judge Temple, that the law has not been so
hard on me as I dreaded.   I hope God will bless you for the kind
things you’ve done to me this day. ”

But the staff of the constable was opposed to his egress, and Mr. 
Lippet whispered a few words in his ear, when the aged hunter sank
back into his place, and, removing his cap, stroked down the remnants
of his gray and sandy locks, with an air of mortification mingled with
submission. 

“Mr.  District Attorney,” said Judge Temple, affecting to busy himself
with his minutes, “proceed with the second indictment. ”

Mr.  Van der School took great care that no part of the presentment,
which he now read, should be lost on his auditors.   It accused the
prisoner of resisting the execution of a search-warrant, by force of
arms, and particularized in the vague language of the law, among a
variety of other weapons, the use of the rifle.   This was indeed a
more serious charge than an ordinary assault and battery, and a
corresponding degree of interest was manifested by the spectators in
its result.   The prisoner was duly arraigned, and his plea again
demanded.   Mr.  Lippet had anticipated the answers of Natty, and in a
whisper advised him how to plead.   But the feelings of the old hunter
were awakened by some of the expressions in the indictment, and,
forgetful of his caution, he exclaimed:

“‘Tis a wicked untruth; I crave no man’s blood.   Them thieves, the
Iroquois, won’t say it to any face that I ever thirsted after man’s
blood, I have fou’t as soldier that feared his Maker and his officer,
but I never pulled trigger on any but a warrior that was up and awake. 
No man can say that I ever struck even a Mingo in his blanket.   I
believe there’s some who thinks there’s no God in a wilder ness!”

“Attend to your plea, Bumppo,” said the Judge; “you hear that you are
accused of using your rifle against an officer of justice? Are you
guilty or not guilty?”

By this time the irritated feelings of Natty had found vent: and he
rested on the bar for a moment, in a musing posture, when he lifted
his face, with his silent laugh, and, pointing to where the wood-
chopper stood, he said:

“Would Billy Kirby be standing there, d’ye think, if I had used the
rifle?”

“Then you deny it,” said Mr.  Lippet; “you plead not guilty?”

“Sartain,” said Natty; “Billy knows that I never fired at all.   Billy,
do you remember the turkey last winter? Ah me! that was better than
common firing; but I can’t shoot as I used to could. ”

“Enter the plea of not guilty,” said Judge Temple, strongly affected
by the simplicity of the prisoner. 

Hiram was again sworn, and his testimony given on the second charge. 
He had discovered his former error, and proceeded more cautiously than
before.   He related very distinctly and, for the man, with amazing
terseness, the suspicion against the hunter, the complaint, the
issuing of the warrant, and the swearing in of Kirby; all of which, he
affirmed, were done in due form of law.   He then added the manner in
which the constable had been received; and stated, distinctly, that
Natty had pointed the rifle at Kirby, and threatened his life if he
attempted to execute his duty.   All this was confirmed by Jotham, who
was observed to adhere closely to the story of the magistrate.   Mr. 
Lippet conducted an artful cross-examination of these two witnesses,
but, after consuming much time, was compelled to relinquish the
attempt to obtain any advantage, in despair. 

At length the District Attorney called the wood-chopper to the bar,
Billy gave an extremely confused account of the whole affair, although
he evidently aimed at the truth, until Mr.  Van der School aided him,
by asking some direct questions:

“It appears from examining the papers, that you demanded admission
into the hut legally; so you were put in bodily fear by his rifle and
threats?”

“I didn’t mind them that, man,” said Billy, snapping his fingers; “I
should be a poor stick to mind old Leather-Stocking. ”

“But I understood you to say (referring to your previous words as
delivered here in court in the commencement of your testimony) that
you thought he meant to shoot you?”

“To be sure I did; and so would you, too, squire, if you had seen a
chap dropping a muzzle that never misses, and cocking an eye that has
a natural squint by long practice I thought there would be a dust
on’t, and my back was up at once; but Leather-Stocking gi’n up the
skin, and so the matter ended. ”

“Ah! Billy,” said Natty, shaking his head, “‘twas a lucky thought in
me to throw out the hide, or there might have been blood spilt; and
I’m sure, if it had been your’n, I should have mourned it sorely the
little while I have to stay. ”

“Well, Leather-Stocking,” returned Billy, facing the prisoner with a
freedom and familiarity that utterly disregarded the presence of the
court, “as you are on the subject it may be that you’ve no—”

“Go on with your examination, Mr.  District Attorney. ”

That gentleman eyed the familiarity between his witness and the
prisoner with manifest disgust, and indicated to the court that he was
done. 

“Then you didn’t feel frightened, Mr.  Kirby?” said the counsel for the
prisoner. 

“Me! no,” said Billy, casting his eyes oven his own huge frame with
evident self-satisfaction; “I’m not to be skeared so easy. ”

“You look like a hardy man; where were you born, sir?”

“Varmount State; ‘tis a mountaynious place, but there’s a stiff soil,
and it’s pretty much wooded with beech and maple. ”

“I have always heard so,” said Mr.  Lippet soothingly.   “You have been
used to the rifle yourself in that country. ”

“I pull the second best trigger in this county.   I knock under to
Natty Bumppo, there, sin’ he shot the pigeon. ”

Leather-Stocking raised his head, and laughed again, when he abruptly
thrust out a wrinkled hand, and said:

“You’re young yet, Billy, and haven’t seen the matches that I have;
but here’s my hand; I bear no malice to you, I don’t. ”

Mr.  Lippet allowed this conciliatory offering to be accepted, and
judiciously paused, while the spirit of peace was exercising its
influence over the two; but the Judge interposed his authority. 

“This is an improper place for such dialogues,” he said; “proceed with
your examination of this witness, Mr.  Lippet, or I shall order the
next. ”

The attorney started, as if unconscious of any impropriety, and
continued:

“So you settled the matter with Natty amicably on the spot, did you?”

“He gi’n me the skin, and I didn’t want to quarrel with an old man;
for my part, I see no such mighty matter in shooting a buck!”

“And you parted friends? and you would never have thought of bringing
the business up before a court, hadn’t you been subpoenaed?”

“I don’t think I should; he gi’n the skin, and I didn’t feel a hard
thought, though Squire Doolittle got some affronted. ”

“I have done, sir,” said Mr.  Lippet, probably relying on the charge of
the Judge, as he again seated himself, with the air of a main who felt
that his success was certain. 

When Mr.  Van der School arose to address the jury, he commenced by
saying:

“Gentlemen of the jury, I should have interrupted the leading
questions put by the prisoner’s counsel (by leading questions I mean
telling him what to say), did I not feel confident that the law of the
land was superior to any ad vantages (I mean legal advantages) which
he might obtain by his art.   The counsel for the prisoner, gentlemen,
has endeavored to persuade you, in opposition to your own good sense,
to believe that pointing a rifle at a constable (elected or deputed)
is a very innocent affair; and that society (I mean the commonwealth,
gentlemen) shall not be endangered thereby.   But let me claim your
attention, while we look over the particulars of this heinous
offence. ” Here Mr.  Vain der School favored the jury with an abridgment
of the testimony, recounted in such a manner as utterly to confuse the
faculties of his worthy listeners.   After this exhibition he closed as
follows: “And now, gentlemen, having thus made plain to your senses
the crime of which this unfortunate man has been guilty (unfortunate
both on account of his ignorance and his guilt), I shall leave you to
your own consciences; not in the least doubting that you will see the
importance (notwithstanding the prisoner’s counsel doubtless relying
on your former verdict wishes to appear so confident of success) of
punishing the offender, and asserting the dignity of the laws. ”

It was now the duty of the Judge to deliver his charge.   It consisted
of a short, comprehensive summary of the testimony, laying bare the
artifice of the prisoner’s counsel, and placing the facts in so
obvious a light that they could not well be misunderstood.   “Living as
we do, gentlemen,” he concluded, “on the skirts of society, it becomes
doubly necessary to protect the ministers of the law.   If you believe
the witnesses, in their construction of the acts of the prisoner, it
is your duty to convict him; but if you believe that the old man, who
this day appears before you, meant not to harm the constable, but was
acting more under the influence of habit than by the instigations of
malice, it will be your duty to judge him, but to do it with lenity”

As before, the jury did not leave their box; but, after a consultation
of some little time, their foreman arose, and pronounced the prisoner
Guilty. 

There was but little surprise manifested in the courtroom at this
verdict, as the testimony, the greater part of which we have omitted,
was too clear and direct to be passed over.   The judges seemed to have
anticipated this sentiment, for a consultation was passing among them
also, during the deliberation of the jury, and the preparatory
movements of the “bench” announced the coming sentence. 

“Nathaniel Bumppo,” commenced the Judge, making the customary pause. 

The old hunter, who had been musing again, with his head on the bar,
raised himself, and cried, with a prompt, military tone:

“Here. ”

The Judge waved his hand for silence, and proceeded:

“In forming their sentence, the court have been governed as much by
the consideration of your ignorance of the laws as by a strict sense
of the importance of punishing such outrages as this of which you have
been found guilty.   They have therefore passed over the obvious
punishment of whipping on the bare back, in mercy to your years; but,
as the dignity of the law requires an open exhibition of the
consequences of your crime, it is ordered that you be conveyed from
this room to the public stocks, where you are to be confined for one
hour; that you pay a fine to the State of one hundred dollars; and
that you be imprisoned in the jail of this county for one calendar
month, and, furthermore, that your imprisonment do not cease until the
said fine shall be paid.   I feel it my duty, Nathaniel Bumppo—”

“And where should I get the money?” interrupted the Leather-Stocking
eagerly; “ where should I get the money? you’ll take away the bounty
on the painters, because I cut the throat of a deer; and how is an old
man to find so much gold or silver in the woods? No, no, Judge; think
better of it, and don’t talk of shutting me up in a jail for the
little time I have to stay. ”

“If you have anything to urge against the passing of the sentence, the
court will yet hear you,” said the Judge, mildly. 

“I have enough to say agin’ it,” cried Natty, grasping the bar on
which his fingers were working with a convulsed motion.   “Where am I
to get the money? Let me out into the woods and hills, where I’ve been
used to breathe the clear air, and though I’m threescore and ten, if
you’ve left game enough in the country, I’ll travel night and day but
I’ll make you up the sum afore the season is over.   Yes, yes—you see
the reason of the thing, and the wicked ness of shutting up an old man
that has spent his days, as one may say, where he could always look
into the windows of heaven. ”

“I must be governed by the law—”

“Talk not to me of law, Marmaduke Temple,” interrupted the hunter. 
“Did the beast of the forest mind your laws, when it was thirsty and
hungering for the blood of your own child? She was kneeling to her God
for a greater favor than I ask, and he heard her; and if you now say
no to my prayers, do you think he will be deaf?”

“My private feelings must not enter into—”

“Hear me, Marmaduke Temple,” interrupted the old man, with melancholy
earnestness, “and hear reason.   I’ve travelled these mountains when
you was no judge, but an infant in your mother’s arms; and I feel as
if I had a right and a privilege to travel them agin afore I die. 
Have you forgot the time that you come on to the lake shore, when
there wasn’t even a jail to lodge in: and didn’t I give you my own
bear-skin to sleep on, and the fat of a noble buck to satisfy the
cravings of your hunger? Yes, yes—you thought it no sin then to kill a
deer! And this I did, though I had no reason to love you, for you had
never done anything but harm to them that loved and sheltered me.   And
now, will you shut me up in your dungeons to pay me for my kindness? A
hundred dollars! Where should I get the money? No, no—there’s them
that says hard things of you, Marmaduke Temple, but you ain’t so bad
as to wish to see an old man die in a prison, because he stood up for
the right.   Come, friend, let me pass; it’s long sin’ I’ve been used
to such crowds, and I crave to be in the woods agin.   Don’t fear me,
Judge— I bid you not to fear me; for if there’s beaver enough left on
the streams, or the buckskins will sell for a shilling apiece, you
shall have the last penny of the fine.   Where are ye, pups? come away,
dogs, come away! we have a grievous toil to do for our years, but it
shall be done—yes, yes, I’ve promised it, and it shall be done!”

It is unnecessary to say that the movement of the Leather-Stocking was
again intercepted by the constable; but, before he had time to speak,
a bustling in the crowd, and a loud hem, drew all eyes to another part
of the room. 

Benjamin had succeeded in edging his way through the people, and was
now seen balancing his short body, with one foot in a window and the
other on a railing of the jury-box.   To the amazement of the whole
court, the steward was evidently preparing to speak.   After a good
deal of difficulty, he succeeded in drawing from his pocket a small
bag, and then found utterance. 

“If-so-be,” he said, “that your honor is agreeable to trust the poor
fellow out on another cruise among the beasts, here’s a small matter
that will help to bring down the risk, seeing that there’s just
thirty-five of your Spaniards in it; and I wish, from the bottom of my
heart, that they was raal British guineas, for the sake of the old
boy.   But ‘tis as it is; and if Squire Dickens will just be so good as
to overhaul this small bit of an account, and take enough from the bag
to settle the same, he’s welcome to hold on upon the rest, till such
time as the Leather-Stocking can grapple with them said beaver, or,
for that matter, forever, and no thanks asked,”

As Benjamin concluded, he thrust out the wooden register of his
arrears to the “ Bold Dragoon” with one hand, while he offered his bag
of dollars with the other.   Astonishment at this singular interruption
produced a profound stillness in the room, which was only interrupted
by the sheriff, who struck his sword on the table, and cried:
“Silence!”

“There must be an end to this,” said the Judge, struggling to overcome
his feelings.   “Constable, lead the prisoner to the stocks.   Mr. 
Clerk, what stands next on the calendar?”

Natty seemed to yield to his destiny, for he sank his head on his
chest, and followed the officer from the court room in silence.   The
crowd moved back for the passage of the prisoner, and when his tall
form was seen descending from the outer door, a rush of the people to
the scene of his disgrace followed. 

CHAPTER 34. 

“Ha! ha! look! he wears cruel garters!”-Lear. 

The punishments of the common law were still known, at the time of our
tale, to the people of New York; and the whipping-post, and its
companion, the stocks, were not yet supplanted by the more merciful
expedients of the public prison.   Immediately in front of the jail
those relics of the older times were situated, as a lesson of
precautionary justice to the evil-doers of the settlement. 

Natty followed the constables to this spot, bowing his head in
submission to a power that he was unable to op pose, and surrounded by
the crowd that formed a circle about his person, exhibiting in their
countenances strong curiosity.   A constable raised the upper part of
the stocks, and pointed with his finger to the holes where the old man
was to place his feet.   Without making the least objection to the
punishment, the Leather-Stocking quietly seated himself on the ground,
and suffered his limbs to be laid in the openings, without even a
murmur; though he cast one glance about him, in quest of that sympathy
that human nature always seems to require under suffering “ but he met
no direct manifestations of pity, neither did he see any unfeeling
exultation, or hear a single reproachful epithet.   The character of
the mob, if it could be called by such a name, was that of attentive
subordination. 

The constable was in the act of lowering the upper plank, when
Benjamin, who had pressed close to the side of the prisoner, said, in
his hoarse tone, as if seeking for some cause to create a quarrel:

“Where away, master constable, is the use of clapping a man in them
here bilboes? It neither stops his grog nor hurts his back; what for
is it that you do the thing?”

“‘Tis the sentence of the court, Mr.  Penguillium, and there’s law for
it, I s’pose. ”

“Ay, ay, I know that there’s law for the thing; but where away do you
find the use, I say? it does no harm, and it only keeps a man by the
heels for the small matter of two glasses”

“Is it no harm, Benny Pump,” said Natty, raising his eyes with a
piteous look in the face of the steward—” is it no harm to show off a
man in his seventy-first year, like a tame bear, for the settlers to
look on? Is it no harm to put an old soldier, that has served through
the war of ‘fifty-six, and seen the enemy in the ‘seventy-six
business, into a place like this, where the boys can point at him and
say, I have known the time when he was a spectacle for the county? Is
it no harm to bring down the pride of an honest man to be the equal of
the beasts of the forest?”

Benjamin stared about him fiercely, and could he have found a single
face that expressed contumely, he would have been prompt to quarrel
with its owner; but meeting everywhere with looks of sobriety, and
occasionally of commiseration, he very deliberately seated himself by
the side of the hunter, and, placing his legs in the two vacant holes
of the stocks, he said:

“Now lower away, master constable, lower away, I tell ye! If-so-be
there’s such a thing hereabouts, as a man that wants to see a bear,
let him look and be d—d, and he shall find two of them, and mayhap one
of the same that can bite as well as growl. ”

“But I have no orders to put you in the stocks, Mr.  Pump,” cried the
constable; “you must get up and let me do my duty. ”

“You’ve my orders, and what do you need better to meddle with my own
feet? so lower away, will ye, and let me see the man that chooses to
open his mouth with a grin on it. ”

“There can’t be any harm in locking up a creatur’ that will enter the
pound,” said the constable, laughing, and closing the stocks on them
both. 

It was fortunate that this act was executed with decision, for the
whole of the spectators, when they saw Benjamin assume the position he
took, felt an inclination for merriment, which few thought it worth
while to suppress.   The steward struggled violently for his liberty
again, with an evident intention of making battle on those who stood
nearest to him; but the key was already turned, and all his efforts
were vain. 

“Hark ye, master constable,” he cried, “just clear away your bilboes
for the small matter of a log-glass, will ye, and let me show some of
them there chaps who it is they are so merry about”

“No, no, you would go in, and you can’t come out,” returned the
officer, “until the time has expired that the Judge directed for the
keeping of the prisoner. ”

Benjamin, finding that his threats and his struggles were useless, had
good sense enough to learn patience from the resigned manner of his
companion, and soon settled himself down by the side of Natty, with a
contemptuousness expressed in his hard features, that showed he had
substituted disgust for rage.   When the violence of the steward’s
feelings had in some measure subsided, he turned to his fellow-
sufferer, and, with a motive that might have vindicated a worse
effusion, he attempted the charitable office of consolation,

“Taking it by and large, Master Bump-ho, it’s but a small matter after
all,” he said.   “Now, I’ve known very good sort of men, aboard of the
Boadishey, laid by the heels, for nothing, mayhap, but forgetting that
they’d drunk their allowance already, when a glass of grog has come in
their way.   This is nothing more than riding with two anchors ahead,
waiting for a turn in the tide, or a shift of wind, d’ye see, with a
soft bottom and plenty of room for the sweep of your hawse.   Now I’ve
seen many a man, for over-shooting his reckoning, as I told ye moored
head and starn, where he couldn’t so much as heave his broadside
round, and mayhap a stopper clapped on his tongue too, in the shape of
a pump-bolt lashed athwartship his jaws, all the same as an outrigger
along side of a taffrel-rail. ”

The hunter appeared to appreciate the kind intentions of the other,
though he could not understand his eloquence, and, raising his humbled
countenance, he attempted a smile, as he said:

“Anan!”

“‘Tis nothing, I say, but a small matter of a squall that will soon
blow over,” continued Benjamin.   “ To you that has such a length of
keel, it must be all the same as nothing; thof, seeing that I am
little short in my lower timbers, they’ve triced my heels up in such a
way as to give me a bit of a cant.   But what cares I, Master Bump-ho,
if the ship strains a little at her anchor? it’s only for a dog-watch,
and dam’me but she’ll sail with you then on that cruise after them
said beaver.   I'm not much used to small arms, seeing that I was
stationed at the ammunition- boxes, being summat too low-rigged to see
over the ham- mock-cloths; but I can carry the game, dye see, and
mayhap make out to lend a hand with the traps; and if- so-be you’re
any way so handy with them as ye be with your boat-hook, ‘twill be but
a short cruise after all, I've squared the yards with Squire Dickens
this morning, and I shall send him word that he needn’t bear my name
on the books again till such time as the cruise is over. ”

“You’re used to dwell with men, Benny,” said Leather-Stocking,
mournfully, “ and the ways of the woods would be hard on you, if——”

“Not a bit—not a bit,” cried the steward; “I’m none of your fair-
weather chaps, Master Bump-ho, as sails only in smooth water.   When I
find a friend, I sticks by him, dye see.   Now, there’s no better man
a-going than Squire Dickens, and I love him about the same as I loves
Mistress Hollister’s new keg of Jamaiky. ” The steward paused, and
turning his uncouth visage on the hunter, he surveyed him with a
roguish leer of his eye, and gradually suffered the muscles of his
hard features to relax, until his face was illuminated by the display
of his white teeth, when he “ dropped his voice, and added; “I say,
Master Leather-

Stocking, ‘tis fresher and livelier than any Hollands you’ll get in
Garnsey.   But we’ll send a hand over and ask the woman for a taste,
for I’m so jammed in these here bilboes that I begin to want summat to
lighten my upper works. ”

Natty sighed, and gazed about him on the crowd, that already began to
disperse, and which had now diminished greatly, as its members
scattered in their various pursuits.   He looked wistfully at Benjamin,
but did not reply; a deeply-seated anxiety seeming to absorb every
other sensation, and to throw a melancholy gloom over his wrinkled
features, which were working with the movements of his mind. 

The steward was about to act on the old principle, that silence gives
consent, when Hiram Doolittle, attended by Jotham, stalked out of the
crowd, across the open space, and approached the stocks.   The
magistrate passed by the end where Benjamin was seated, and posted
himself, at a safe distance from the steward, in front of the Leather-
Stocking.   Hiram stood, for a moment, cowering before the keen looks
that Natty fastened on him, and suffering under an embarrassment that
was quite new; when having in some degree recovered himself, he looked
at the heavens, and then at the smoky atmosphere, as if it were only
an ordinary meeting with a friend, and said in his formal, hesitating
way:

“Quite a scurcity of rain, lately; I some think we shall have a long
drought on’t. ”

Benjamin was occupied in untying his bag of dollars, and did not
observe the approach of the magistrate, while Natty turned his face,
in which every muscle was working, away from him in disgust, without
answering.   Rather encouraged than daunted by this exhibition of
dislike, Hiram, after a short pause, continued:

“The clouds look as if they’d no water in them, and the earth is
dreadfully parched.   To my judgment, there’ll be short crops this
season, if the rain doesn’t fail quite speedily. ”

The air with which Mr.  Doolittle delivered this prophetical opinion
was peculiar to his species.   It was a jesuitical, cold, unfeeling,
and selfish manner, that seemed to say, “I have kept within the law,”
to the man he had so cruelly injured.   It quite overcame the restraint
that the old hunter had been laboring to impose on himself, and he
burst out in a warm glow of indignation. 

“Why should the rain fall from the clouds,” he cried, “when you force
the tears from the eyes of the old, the sick, and the poor! Away with
ye—away with ye! you may be formed in the image of the Maker, but
Satan dwells in your heart.   Away with ye, I say! I am mournful, and
the sight of ye brings bitter thoughts. ”

Benjamin ceased thumbing his money, and raised his head at the instant
that Hiram, who was thrown off his guard by the invectives of the
hunter, unluckily trusted his person within reach of the steward, who
grasped one of his legs with a hand that had the grip of a vise, and
whirled the magistrate from his feet, before he had either time to
collect his senses or to exercise the strength he did really possess. 
Benjamin wanted neither proportions nor manhood in his head,
shoulders, and arms, though all the rest of his frame appeared to be
originally intended for a very different sort of a man.   He exerted
his physical powers on the present occasion, with much discretion;
and, as he had taken his antagonist at a great disadvantage, the
struggle resulted very soon in Benjamin getting the magistrate fixed
in a posture somewhat similar to his own, and manfully placed face to
face. 

“You’re a ship’s cousin, I tell ye, Master Doo-but-little,” roared the
steward; “some such matter as a ship’s cousin, sir.   I know you, I do,
with your fair-weather speeches to Squire Dickens, to his face, and
then you go and sarve out your grumbling to all the old women in the
town, do ye? Ain’t it enough for any Christian, let him harbor never
so much malice, to get an honest old fellow laid by the heels in this
fashion, without carrying sail so hard on the poor dog, as if you
would run him down as he lay at his anchors? But I’ve logged many a
hard thing against your name, master, and now the time’s come to foot
up the day’s work, d’ye see; so square yourself, you lubber, square
yourself, and we’ll soon know who’s the better man. ”

“Jotham!” cried the frightened magistrate—” Jotham! call in the
constables.   Mr.  Penguillium, I command the peace—I order you to keep
the peace. ”

“There's been more peace than love atwixt us, master,” cried the
steward, making some very unequivocal demonstrations toward hostility;
“so mind yourself! square your self, I say! do you smell this here bit
of a sledge-hammer?”

“Lay hands on me if you dare!” exclaimed Hiram, as well as he could,
under the grasp which the steward held on his throttle—” lay hands on
me if you dare!”

“If you call this laying, master, you are welcome to the eggs,” roared
the steward. 

It becomes our disagreeable duty to record here, that the acts of
Benjamin now became violent; for he darted his sledge-hammer violently
on the anvil of Mr.  Doolittle’s countenance, and the place became in
an instant a scene of tumult and confusion.   The crowd rushed in a
dense circle around the spot, while some ran to the court room to give
the alarm, and one or two of the more juvenile part of the multitude
had a desperate trial of speed to see who should be the happy man to
communicate the critical situation of the magistrate to his wife. 

Benjamin worked away, with great industry and a good deal of skill, at
his occupation, using one hand to raise up his antagonist, while he
knocked him over with the other; for he would have been disgraced in
his own estimation, had he struck a blow on a fallen adversary.   By
this considerate arrangement he had found means to hammer the visage
of Hiram out of all shape, by the time Richard succeeded in forcing
his way through the throng to the point of combat.   The sheriff
afterward declared that, independently of his mortification as
preserver of the peace of the county, at this interruption to its
harmony, he was never so grieved in his life as when he saw this
breach of unity between his favorites.   Hiram had in some degree
become necessary to his vanity, and Benjamin, strange as it may
appear, he really loved.   This attachment was exhibited in the first
words that he uttered. 

“Squire Doolittle! Squire Doolittle! I am ashamed to see a man of your
character and office forget himself so much as to disturb the peace,
insult the court, and beat poor Benjamin in this manner!”

At the sound of Mr.  Jones’ voice, the steward ceased his employment,
and Hiram had an opportunity of raising his discomfited visage toward
the mediator.   Emboldened by the sight of the sheriff, Mr.  Doolittle
again had recourse to his lungs. 

“I’ll have law on you for this,” he cried desperately; “I’ll have the
law on you for this.   I call on you, Mr.  Sheriff, to seize this man,
and I demand that you take his body into custody. ”

By this time Richard was master of the true state of the case, and,
turning to the steward, he said reproach fully:

“Benjamin, how came you in the stocks? I always thought you were mild
and docile as a lamb.   It was for your docility that I most esteemed
you.   Benjamin! Benjamin! you have not only disgraced yourself, but
your friends, by this shameless conduct, Bless me! bless me! Mr. 
Doolittle, he seems to have knocked your face all of one side. ”

Hiram by this time had got on his feet again, and with out the reach
of the steward, when he broke forth in violent appeals for vengeance. 
The offence was too apparent to be passed over, and the sheriff,
mindful of the impartiality exhibited by his cousin in the recent
trial of the Leather-Stocking, came to the painful conclusion that it
was necessary to commit his major-domo to prison.   As the time of
Natty’s punishment was expired, and Benjamin found that they were to
be confined, for that night at least, in the same apartment, he made
no very strong objection to the measure, nor spoke of bail, though, as
the sheriff preceded the party of constables that conducted them to
the jail, he uttered the following remonstrance:

“As to being berthed with Master Bump-ho for a night or so, it’s but
little I think of it, Squire Dickens, seeing that I calls him an
honest man, and one as has a handy way with boat-hooks and rifles; but
as for owning that a man desarves anything worse than a double
allowance, for knocking that carpenters face a-one-side, as you call
it, I’ll maintain it’s agin’ reason and Christianity.   If there’s a
bloodsucker in this 'ere county, it’s that very chap.   Ay! I know him!
and if he hasn’t got all the same as dead wood in his headworks, he
knows summat of me.   Where’s the mighty harm, squire, that you take it
so much to heart? It’s all the same as any other battle, d’ye see sir,
being broadside to broadside, only that it was foot at anchor,
which was what we did in Port Pray a roads, when Suff’ring came in
among us; and a suff’ring time he had of it before he got out again. ”

Richard thought it unworthy of him to make any reply to this speech,
but when his prisoners were safely lodged in an outer dungeon,
ordering the bolts to be drawn and the key turned, he withdrew. 

Benjamin held frequent and friendly dialogues with different people,
through the iron gratings, during the afternoon; but his companion
paced their narrow’ limits, in his moccasins, with quick, impatient
treads, his face hanging on his breast in dejection, or when lifted,
at moments, to the idlers at the window, lighted, perhaps, for an
instant, with the childish aspect of aged forgetfulness, which would
vanish directly in an expression of deep and obvious anxiety. 

At the close of the day, Edwards was seen at the window, in earnest
dialogue with his friend; and after he de parted it was thought that
he had communicated words of comfort to the hunter, who threw himself
on his pallet and was soon in a deep sleep.   The curious spectators
had exhausted the conversation of the steward, who had drunk good
fellowship with half of his acquaintance, and, as Natty was no longer
in motion, by eight o’clock, Billy Kirby, who was the last lounger at
the window, retired into the “Templeton Coffee-house,” when Natty rose
and hung a blanket before the opening, and the prisoners apparently
retired for the night. 

CHAPTER 35. 

“And to avoid the foe’s pursuit,
With spurring put their cattle to’t;
And till all four were out of wind,
And danger too, neer looked behind. ”—Hudibras. 

As the shades of evening approached, the jurors, wit nesses, and other
attendants on the court began to disperse, and before nine o’clock the
village was quiet, and its streets nearly deserted.   At that hour
Judge Temple and his daughter, followed at a short distance by Louisa
Grant, walked slowly down the avenue, under the slight shadows of the
young poplars, holding the following discourse:

“You can best soothe his wounded spirit, my child,” said Marmaduke;
“but it will be dangerous to touch on the nature of his offence; the
sanctity of the laws must be respected. ”

“Surely, sir,” cried the impatient Elizabeth, “those laws that condemn
a man like the Leather-Stocking to so severe a punishment, for an
offence that even I must think very venial, cannot be perfect in
themselves. ”

“Thou talkest of what thou dost not understand, Elizabeth,” returned
her father.   “Society cannot exist without wholesome restraints. 
Those restraints cannot be inflicted without security and respect to
the persons of those who administer them; and it would sound ill
indeed to report that a judge had extended favor to a convicted
criminal, because he had saved the life of his child. ”

“I see—I see the difficulty of your situation, dear sir,” cried the
daughter; “but, in appreciating the offence of poor Natty, I cannot
separate the minister of the law from the man. ”

“There thou talkest as a woman, child; it is not for an assault on
Hiram Doolittle, but for threatening the life of a constable, who was
in the performance of—”

“It is immaterial whether it be one or the other,” interrupted Miss
Temple, with a logic that contained more feeling than reason; “I know
Natty to be innocent, and thinking so I must think all wrong who
oppress him. ”

“His judge among the number! thy father, Elizabeth?”

“Nay, nay, nay; do not put such questions to me; give me my
commission, father, and let me proceed to execute it. ”

The Judge paused a moment, smiling fondly on his child, and then
dropped his hand affectionately on her shoulder, as he answered:

“Thou hast reason, Bess, and much of it, too, but thy heart lies too
near thy head, But listen; in this pocketbook are two hundred dollars. 
Go to the prison—there are none in this pace to harm thee—give this
note to the jailer, and, when thou seest Bumppo, say what thou wilt to
the poor old man; give scope to the feeling of thy warm heart; but try
to remember, Elizabeth, that the laws alone remove us from the
condition of the savages; that he has been criminal, and that his
judge was thy father. ”

Miss Temple made no reply, but she pressed the hand that held the
pocket-book to her bosom, and, taking her friend by the arm, they
issued together from the inclosure into the principal street of the
village. 

As they pursued their walk in silence, under the row of houses, where
the deeper gloom of the evening effectually concealed their persons,
no sound reached them, excepting the slow tread of a yoke of oxen,
with the rattling of j a cart, that were moving along the street in
the same direction with themselves, The figure of the teamster was
just discernible by the dim light, lounging by the side of his cattle
with a listless air, as if fatigued by the toil of the day.   At the
corner, where the jail stood, the progress of the ladies was impeded,
for a moment, by the oxen, who were turned up to the side of the
building, and given a lock of hay, which they had carried on their
necks, as a reward for their patient labor, The whole of this was so
natural, and so common, that Elizabeth saw nothing to induce a second
glance at the team, until she heard the teamster speaking to his
cattle in a low voice:

“Mind yourself, Brindle; will you, sir! will you!” The language itself
was so unusual to oxen, with which all who dwell in a new country are
familiar; but there was something in the voice, also, that startled
Miss Temple On turning the corner, she necessarily approached the man,
and her look was enabled to detect the person of Oliver Edwards,
concealed under the coarse garb of a teamster.   Their eyes met at the
same instant, and, not- t withstanding the gloom, and the enveloping
cloak of Elizabeth, the recognition was mutual. 

“Miss Temple!” “Mr.  Edwards!” were exclaimed simultaneously, though a
feeling that seemed common to both rendered the words nearly
inaudible. 

“Is it possible!” exclaimed Edwards, after the moment of doubt had
passed; “do I see you so nigh the jail! but you are going to the
rectory: I beg pardon, Miss Grant, I believe; I did not recognize you
at first. ”

The sigh which Louisa tittered was so faint, that it was only heard by
Elizabeth, who replied quickly, “We are going not only to the jail,
Mr.  Edwards' but into it.   We wish to show the Leather-Stocking that
we do not forget his services, and that at the same time we must be
just, we are also grateful.   I suppose you are on a similar errand;
but let me beg that you will give us leave to precede you ten minutes. 
Good-night, sir; I— I—am quite sorry, Mr.  Edwards, to see you reduced
to such labor; I am sure my father would—”

“I shall wait your pleasure, madam,” interrupted the youth coldly. 
“May I beg that you will not mention my being here?”

“Certainly,” said Elizabeth, returning his bow by a slight inclination
of her head, and urging the tardy Louisa forward.   As they entered the
jailer’s house, however, Miss Grant found leisure to whisper:

“Would it not be well to offer part of your money to Oliver? half of
it will pay the fine of Bumppo; and he is so unused to hardships! I am
sure my father will subscribe much of his little pittance, to place
him in a station that is more worthy of him. ”

The involuntary smile that passed over the features of Elizabeth was
blended with an expression of deep and heartfelt pity.   She did not
reply, however, and the appearance of the jailer soon recalled the
thoughts of both to the object of their visit. 

The rescue of the ladies, and their consequent interest in his
prisoner, together with the informal manners that prevailed in the
country, all united to prevent any surprise on the part of the jailer,
at their request for admission to Bumppo.   The note of Judge Temple,
however, would have silenced all objections, if he had felt them and
he led the way without hesitation to the apartment that held the
prisoners.   The instant the key was put into the lock, the hoarse
voice of Benjamin was heard, demanding:

“Yo hoy! who comes there?”

“Some visitors that you’ll be glad to see,” returned the jailer. 
“What have you done to the lock, that it won’t turn”

“Handsomely, handsomely, master,” cried the steward:
“I have just drove a nail into a berth alongside of this here bolt, as
a stopper, d’ye see, so that Master Doo-but little can’t be running in
and breezing up another fight atwixt us: for, to my account, there’ll
be but a han-yan with me soon, seeing that they’ll mulct me of my
Spaniards, all the same as if I’d over-flogged the lubber.   Throw your
ship into the wind, and lay by for a small matter, will ye? and I’ll
soon clear a passage. ”

The sounds of hammering gave an assurance that the steward was in
earnest, and in a short time the lock yielded, when the door was
opened. 

Benjamin had evidently been anticipating the seizure of his money, for
he had made frequent demands on the favorite cask at the “Bold
Dragoon,” during the afternoon and evening, and was now in that state
which by marine imagery is called “half-seas-over. ” It was no easy
thing to destroy the balance of the old tar by the effects of liquor,
for, as he expressed it himself, “he was too low-rigged not to carry
sail in all weathers;” but he was precisely in that condition which is
so expressively termed “muddy. ” When he perceived who the visitors
were, he retreated to the side of the room where his pallet lay, and,
regardless of the presence of his young mistress, seated himself on it
with an air of great sobriety, placing his back firmly against the
wall. 

“If you undertake to spoil my locks in this manner, Mr.  Pump,” said
the jailer, “I shall put a stopper, as you call it, on your legs, and
tie you down to your bed. ”

“What for should ye, master?” grumbled Benjamin; “I’ve rode out one
squall to-day anchored by the heels, and I wants no more of them. 
Where’s the harm o’ doing all the same as yourself? Leave that there
door free out board, and you’ll find no locking inboard, I’ll promise
ye. ”

“I must shut up for the night at nine,” said the jailer, “and it’s now
forty-two minutes past eight. ” He placed the little candle on a rough
pine table, and withdrew. 

“Leather-Stocking!” said Elizabeth, when the key of the door was
turned on them again, “my good friend, Leather-Stocking! I have come
on a message of gratitude.   Had you submitted to the search, worthy
old man, the death of the deer would have been a trifle, and all would
have been well———”

“Submit to the sarch!” interrupted Natty, raising his face from
resting on his knees, without rising from the corner where he had
seated himself; “d’ye think gal, I would let such a varmint into my
hut? No, no—I wouldn’t have opened the door to your own sweet
countenance then.   But they are welcome to search among the coals and
ashes now; they’ll find only some such heap as is to be seen at every
pot-ashery in the mountains. ”

The old man dropped his face again on one hand, and seemed to be lost
in melancholy. 

“The hut can be rebuilt, and made better than before,” returned Miss
Temple;” and it shall be my office to see it done, when your
imprisonment is ended. ”

Can ye raise the dead, child?” said Natty, in a sorrowful voice: “can
ye go into the place where you’ve laid your fathers, and mothers, and
children, and gather together their ashes, and make the same men and
women of them as afore? You do not know what ‘tis to lay your head for
more than forty years under the cover of the same logs, and to look at
the same things for the better part of I a man’s life.   You are young
yet, child, but you are one of the most precious of God’s creatures. 
I had hoped for ye that it might come to pass, but it’s all over now;
this, put to that, will drive the thing quite out of his mind for
ever. ”

Miss Temple must have understood the meaning of the old man better
than the other listeners; for while Louisa stood innocently by her
side, commiserating the griefs of the hunter, she bent her head aside,
so as to conceal her features.   The action and the feeling that caused
it lasted but a moment. 

“Other logs, and better, though, can be had, and shall be found for
you, my old defender,” she continued.   “Your confinement will soon
be over, and, before that time arrives, I shall have a house prepared
for you, where I you may spend the close of your long and harmless
life in ease and plenty. ”

“Ease and plenty! house!” repeated Natty, slowly.   “You mean well, you
mean well, and I quite mourn that it cannot be; but he has seen me a
sight and a laughing-stock for—”

“Damn your stocks,” said Benjamin, flourishing his bottle with one
hand, from which he had been taking hasty and repeated draughts,
while he made gestures of disdain with the other: “who cares for his
bilboes? There’s a leg that been stuck up on end like a jibboom for an
hour.  d’ye see, and what’s it the worse for’t, ha? canst tell me,
what’s it the worser, ha?”

“I believe you forget, Mr.  Pump, in whose presence you are,” said
Elizabeth. 

“Forget you, Miss Lizzy?” returned the steward; “if I do, dam’me; you
are not to be forgot, like Goody Pretty-bones, up at the big house
there.   I say, old sharpshooter, she may have pretty bones, but I
can’t say so much for her flesh, d’ye see, for she looks somewhat like
anatomy with another man’s jacket on.   Now for the skin of her face,
it’s all the same as a new topsail with a taut bolt-rope, being snug
at the leeches, but all in a bight about the inner cloths,”

“Peace—I command you to be silent, sir!” said Elizabeth. 

“Ay, ay, ma’am,” returned the steward.   “You didn’t say I shouldn’t
drink, though. ”

“We will not speak of what is to become of others,” said Miss Temple,
turning again to the hunter—” but of your own fortunes, Natty.   It
shall be my care to see that you pass the rest of your days in ease
and plenty. ”

“Ease and plenty!” again repeated the Leather-Stocking; “what ease can
there be to an old man, who must walk a mile across the open fields,
before he can find a shade to hide him from a scorching sun! or what
plenty is there where you hunt a day, and not start a buck, or see
anything bigger than a mink, or maybe a stray fox! Ah! I shall have a
hard time after them very beavers, for this fine.   I must go low
toward the Pennsylvania line in search of the creatures, maybe a
hundred mile; for they are not to be got here-away.   No, no—your
betterments and clearings have druv the knowing things out of the
country, and instead of beaver-dams, which is the nater of the animal,
and according to Providence, you turn back the waters over the low
grounds with your mill-dams, as if ‘twas in man to stay the drops from
going where He wills them to go—Benny, unless you stop your hand from
going so often to your mouth, you won’t be ready to start when the
time comes. 

“Hark’ee, Master Bump-ho,” said the steward; “don’t you fear for Ben,
When the watch is called, set me of my legs and give me the bearings
and the distance of where you want me to steer, and I’ll carry sail
with the best of you, I will. ”

“The time has come now,” said the hunter, listening; “I hear the horns
of the oxen rubbing agin’ the side of the jail. ”

“Well, say the word, and then heave ahead, shipmate,” said Benjamin. 

“You won’t betray us, gal?” said Natty, looking simply into the face
of Elizabeth—” you won’t betray an old man, who craves to breathe the
clear air of heaven? I mean no harm; and if the law says that I must
pay the hundred dollars, I’ll take the season through, but it shall be
forthcoming; and this good man will help me. ”

“You catch them,” said Benjamin, with a sweeping gesture of his arm,
“and if they get away again, call me a slink, that’s all. ”

“But what mean you?” cried thc wondering Elizabeth.   “ Here you must
stay for thirty days; but I have the money for your fine in this
purse.   Take it; pay it in the morning, and summon patience for your
mouth.   I will come often to see you, with my friend; we will make up
your clothes with our own hands; indeed, indeed, you shall be
comfortable. ”

“Would ye, children?” said Natty, advancing across the floor with an
air of kindness, and taking the hand of Elizabeth, “would ye be so
kearful of an old man, and just for shooting a beast which cost him
nothing? Such things doesn’t run in the blood, I believe, for you seem
not to forget a favor.   Your little fingers couldn’t do much on a
buckskin, nor be you used to push such a thread as sinews.   But if he
hasn’t got past hearing, he shalt hear it and know it, that he may
see, like me, there is some who know how to remember a kindness,”

“Tell him nothing,” cried Elizabeth, earnestly; “if you love me, if
you regard my feelings, tell him nothing.   It is of yourself only I
would talk, and for yourself only I act.   I grieve, Leather-Stocking,
that the law requires that you should be detained here so long; but,
after all, it will be only a short month, and——”

“A month?” exclaimed Natty, opening his mouth with his usual laugh,
“not a day, nor a night, nor an hour, gal.   Judge Temple may sintence,
but he can’t keep without a better dungeon than this.   I was taken
once by the French, and they put sixty-two of us in a block-house,
nigh hand to old Frontinac; but ‘twas easy to cut through a pine log
to them that was used to timber. ” The hunter paused, and looked
cautiously around the room, when, laughing again, he shoved the
steward gently from his post, and removing the bedclothes, discovered
a hole recently cut in the logs with a mallet and chisel.   “It’s only
a kick, and the outside piece is off, and then—”

“Off! ay, off!” cried Benjamin, rising from his stupor; “well, here’s
off.   Ay! ay! you catch ‘em, and I'll hold on to them said beaver-
hats,”

“I fear this lad will trouble me much,” said Natty; “‘twill be a hard
pull for the mountain, should they take the scent soon, and he is not
in a state of mind to run. ”

“Run!” echoed the steward; “no, sheer alongside, and let’s have a
fight of it. ”

“Peace!” ordered Elizabeth. 

“Ay, ay, ma’am. ”

“You will not leave us, surely, Leather-Stocking,” continued Miss
Temple; “I beseech you, reflect that you will be driven to the woods
entirely, and that you are fast getting old.   Be patient for a little
time, when you can go abroad openly, and with honor. ”

“Is there beaver to be catched here, gal?”

“If not, here is money to discharge the fine, and in a month you are
free.   See, here it is in gold. ”

“Gold!” said Natty, with a kind of childish curiosity; “it’s long sin’
I’ve seen a gold-piece.   We used to get the broad joes, in the old
war, as plenty as the bears be now.   I remember there was a man in
Dieskau’s army, that was killed, who had a dozen of the shining things
sewed up in his shirt.   I didn’t handle them myself, but I seen them
cut out with my own eyes; they was bigger and brighter than them be. ”

“These are English guineas, and are yours,” said Elizabeth; “an
earnest of what shall be done for you. ”

“Me! why should you give me this treasure!” said Natty, looking
earnestly at the maiden. 

“Why! have you not saved my life? Did you not rescue me from the jaws
of the beast?” exclaimed Elizabeth, veiling her eyes, as if to hide
some hideous object from her view. 

The hunter took the money, and continued turning it in his hand for
some time, piece by piece, talking aloud during the operation. 

“There’s a rifle, they say, out on the Cherry Valley, that will carry
a hundred rods and kill.   I’ve seen good guns in my day, but none
quite equal to that.   A hundred rods with any sartainty is great
shooting! Well, well— I’m old, and the gun I have will answer my time. 
Here, child, take back your gold.   But the hour has come; I hear him
talking to the cattle, and I must be going.   You won’t tell of us,
gal—you won’t tell of us, will ye?”

“Tell of you!” echoed Elizabeth.   “But take the money, old man; take
the money, even if you go into the mountains. ”

“No, no,” said Natty, shaking his head kindly; “I would not rob you so
for twenty rifles.   But there’s one thing you can do for me, if ye
will, that no other is at hand to do. 

“Name it—name it. ”

“Why, it’s only to buy a canister of powder—’twill cost two silver
dollars.   Benny Pump has the money ready, but we daren’t come into the
town to get it.   Nobody has it but the Frenchman.   'Tis of the best,
and just suits a rifle.   Will you get it for me, gal?—say, will you
get it for me?”

“Will I? I will bring it to you, Leather-Stocking, though I toil a day
in quest of you through the woods.   But where shall I find you, and
how?”

“Where?” said Natty, musing a moment—” to-morrow on the Vision; on the
very top of the Vision, I’ll meet you, child, just as the sun gets
over our heads.   See that it’s the fine grain; you’ll know it by the
gloss and the price. ”

“I will do it,” said Elizabeth, firmly. 

Natty now seated himself, and placing his feet in the hole, with a
slight effort he opened a passage through into the street.   The ladies
heard the rustling of hay, and well understood the reason why Edwards
was in the capacity of a teamster. 

“Come, Benny,” said the hunter: “‘twill be no darker to-night, for the
moon will rise in an hour. ”

“Stay!” exclaimed Elizabeth; “it should not be said that you escaped
in the presence of the daughter of Judge Temple.   Return, Leather-
Stocking, and let us retire be fore you execute your plan. ”

Natty was about to reply, when the approaching footsteps of the jailer
announced the necessity of his immediate return.   He had barely time
to regain his feet, and to conceal the hole with the bedclothes,
across which Benjamin very opportunely fell, before the key was
turned, and the door of the apartment opened. 

“Isn’t Miss Temple ready to go?” said the civil jailer; “ it’s the
usual hour for locking up. ”

“I follow you, sir,” returned Elizabeth “good-night, Leather-
Stocking. ”

“It’s a fine grain, gal, and I think twill carry lead further than
common.   I am getting old, and can’t follow up the game with the step
I used to could,”

Miss Temple waved her hand for silence, and preceded Louisa and the
keeper from the apartment.   The man turned the key once, and observed
that he would return and secure his prisoners, when he had lighted the
ladies to the street.   Accordingly they parted at the door of the
building, when the jailer retired to his dungeons, and the ladies
walked, with throbbing hearts, toward the corner. 

“Now the Leather-Stocking refuses the money,” whispered Louisa, “it
can all be given to Mr.  Edwards, and that added to—”

“Listen!” said Elizabeth; “ I hear the rustling of the hay; they are
escaping at this moment.   Oh! they will be detected instantly!”

By this time they were at the corner, where Edwards and Natty were in
the act of drawing the almost helpless body of Benjamin through the
aperture.   The oxen had started back from their hay, and were standing
with their heads down the street, leaving room for the party to act
in. 

“Throw the hay into the cart,” said Edwards, “or they will suspect how
it has been done.   Quick, that they may not see it. ”

Natty had just returned from executing this order, when the light of
the keeper’s candle shone through the hole, and instantly his voice
was heard in the jail exclaiming for his prisoners. 

“What is to be done now?” said Edwards; “this drunken fellow will
cause our detection, and we have not a moment to spare. ”

“Who’s drunk, ye lubber?” muttered the steward. 

“A break-jail! a break-jail!” shouted five or six voices from within. 

“We must leave him,” said Edwards. 

“‘Twouldn’t be kind, lad,” returned Natty; “he took half the disgrace
of the stocks on himself to-day, and the creatur’ has feeling. ”

At this moment two or three men were heard issuing from the door of
the “Bold Dragoon,” and among them the voice of Billy Kirby. 

“There’s no moon yet,” cried the wood-chopper; “but it’s a clear
night.   Come, who’s for home? Hark! what a rumpus they’re kicking up
in the jail—here’s go and see what it’s about. ”

“We shall be lost,” said Edwards, “if we don’t drop this man. ”

At that instant Elizabeth moved close to him, and said rapidly, in a
low voice:

“Lay him in the cart, and start the oxen; no one will look there. ”

“There’s a woman’s quickness in the thought,” said the youth. 

The proposition was no sooner made than executed.   The steward was
seated on the hay, and enjoined to hold his peace and apply the goad
that was placed in his hand, while the oxen were urged on.   So soon as
this arrangement was completed, Edwards and the hunter stole along the
houses for a short distance, when they disappeared through an opening
that led into the rear of the buildings. 

The oxen were in brisk motion, and presently the cries of pursuit were
heard in the street.   The ladies quickened their pace, with a wish to
escape the crowd of constables and idlers that were approaching, some
execrating, and some laughing at the exploit of the prisoners.   In the
confusion, the voice of Kirby was plainly distinguishable above all
the others, shouting and swearing that he would have the fugitives,
threatening to bring back Natty in one pocket, and Benjamin in the
other. 

“Spread yourselves, men,” he cried, as he passed the ladies, his heavy
feet sounding along the street like the tread of a dozen; “spread
yourselves; to the mountains; they’ll be in the mountains in a quarter
of an hour, and then look out for a long rifle. ”

His cries were echoed from twenty mouths, for not only the jail but
the taverns had sent forth their numbers, some earnest in the pursuit,
and others joining it as in sport. 

As Elizabeth turned in at her father’s gate she saw the wood-chopper
stop at the cart, when she gave Benjamin up for lost.   While they were
hurrying up the walk, two figures, stealing cautiously but quickly
under the shades of the trees, met the eyes of the ladies, and in a
moment Edwards and the hunter crossed their path. 

“Miss Temple, I may never see you again,” exclaimed the youth; “let me
thank you for all your kindness; you do not, cannot know my motives. ”

“Fly! fly!” cried Elizabeth; “the village is alarmed.   Do not be found
conversing with me at such a moment, and in these grounds. ”

“Nay, I must speak, though detection were certain,”

“Your retreat to the bridge is already cut off; before you can gain
the wood your pursuers will be there.   If—”

“If what?” cried the youth.   “Your advice has saved me once already; I
will follow it to death. ”

“The street is now silent and vacant,” said Elizabeth, after a pause;
“cross it, and you will find my father’s boat in the lake.   It would
be easy to land from it where you please in the hills. ”

“But Judge Temple might complain of the trespass. ”

“His daughter shall be accountable, sir. ”

The youth uttered something in a low voice, that was heard only by
Elizabeth, and turned to execute what she had suggested.   As they were
separating, Natty approached the females, and said:

“You’ll remember the canister of powder, children.   Them beavers must
be had, and I and the pups be getting old; we want the best of
ammunition. ”

“Come, Natty,” said Edwards, impatiently. 

“Coming, lad, coming.   God bless you, young ones, both of ye, for ye
mean well and kindly to the old man. ”

The ladies paused until they had lost sight of the retreating figures,
when they immediately entered the mansion-house. 

While this scene was passing in the walk, Kirby had overtaken the
cart, which was his own, and had been driven by Edwards, without
asking the owner, from the place where the patient oxen usually stood
at evening, waiting the pleasure of their master. 

“Woa—come hither, Golden,” he cried; “why, how come you off the end of
the bridge, where I left you, dummies?”

“Heave ahead,” muttered Benjamin, giving a random blow with his lash,
that alighted on the shoulder of the other. 

“Who the devil be you?” cried Billy, turning round in surprise, but
unable to distinguish, in the dark, the hard visage that was just
peering over the cart-rails. 

“Who be I? why, I’m helmsman aboard of this here craft d’ye see, and a
straight wake I’m making of it.   Ay, ay! I’ve got the bridge right
ahead, and the bilboes dead aft: I calls that good steerage, boy. 
Heave ahead. ”

“Lay your lash in the right spot, Mr.  Benny Pump,” said the wood-
chopper, “or I’ll put you in the palm of my hand and box your ears. 
Where be you going with my team?”

“Team!”

“Ay.   my cart and oxen,”

“Why, you must know, Master Kirby, that the Leather-Stocking and I—
that’s Benny Pump—you knows Ben?— well, Benny and I—no, me and Benny;
dam’me if I know how ‘tis; but some of us are bound after a cargo of
beaver-skins, d’ye see, so we’ve pressed the cart to ship them ‘ome
in.   I say, Master Kirby, what a lubberly oar you pull—you handle an
oar, boy, pretty much as a cow would a musket, or a lady would a
marling-spike. ”

Billy had discovered the state of the steward’s mind, and he walked
for some time alongside of the cart, musing with himself, when he took
the goad from Benjamin (who fell back on the hay and was soon asleep)
and drove his cattle down the street, over the bridge, and up the
mountain, toward a clearing in which he was to work the next day,
without any other interruption than a few hasty questions from parties
of the constables. 

Elizabeth stood for an hour at the window of her room, and saw the
torches of the pursuers gliding along the side of the mountain, and
heard their shouts and alarms; but, at the end of that time, the last
party returned, wearied and disappointed, and the village became as
still as when she issued from the gate on her mission to the jail. 

CHAPTER 36. 

“And I could weep “—th’ Oneida chief
His descant wildly thus begun—”
But that I may not stain with grief
The death-song of my father’s son. ”—Gertrude OF Wyoming. 

It was yet early on the following morning, when Elizabeth and Louisa
met by appointment, and proceeded to the store of Monsieur Le Quoi, in
order to redeem the pledge the former had given to the Leather-
Stocking.   The people were again assembling for the business of the
day, but the hour was too soon for a crowd, and the ladies found the
place in possession of its polite owner, Billy Kirby, one female
customer, and the boy who did the duty of helper or clerk. 

Monsieur Le Quoi was perusing a packet of letters with manifest
delight, while the wood-chopper, with one hand thrust in his bosom,
and the other in the folds of his jacket, holding an axe under his
right arm, stood sympathizing in the Frenchman’s pleasure with good-
natured interest.   The freedom of manners that prevailed in the new
settlements commonly levelled all difference in rank, and with it,
frequently, all considerations of education and intelligence.   At the
time the ladies entered the store, they were unseen by the owner, who
was saying to Kirby:

“Ah! ha! Monsieur Beel, dis lettair mak me de most happi of mans.   Ah!
ma chére France! I vill see you again. ”

“I rejoice, monsieur, at anything that contributes to your happiness,”
said Elizabeth, “ but hope we are not going to lose you entirely. ”

The complaisant shopkeeper changed the language to French and
recounted rapidly to Elizabeth his hopes of being permitted to return
to his own country.   Habit had, however, so far altered the manners of
this pliable person age, that he continued to serve the wood-chopper,
who was in quest of some tobacco, while he related to his more gentle
visitor the happy change that had taken place in the dispositions of
his own countrymen. 

The amount of it all was, that Mr.  Le Quoi, who had fled from his own
country more through terror than because he was offensive to the
ruling powers in France, had succeeded at length in getting an
assurance that his return to the West Indies would be unnoticed; and
the Frenchman, who had sunk into the character of a country shopkeeper
with so much grace, was about to emerge again from his obscurity into
his proper level in society. 

We need not repeat the civil things that passed between the parties on
this occasion, nor recount the endless repetitions of sorrow that the
delighted Frenchman expressed at being compelled to quit the society
of Miss Temple.   Elizabeth took an opportunity, during this
expenditure of polite expressions, to purchase the powder privately of
the boy, who bore the generic appellation of Jonathan.   Be fore they
parted, however, Mr.  Le Quoi, who seemed to think that he had not said
enough, solicited the honor of a private interview with the heiress,
with a gravity in his air that announced the importance of the
subject.   After conceding the favor, and appointing a more favorable
time for the meeting, Elizabeth succeeded in getting out of the store,
into which the countrymen now began to enter, as usual, where they met
with the same attention and bien seance as formerly. 

Elizabeth and Louisa pursued their walk as far as the bridge in
profound silence; but when they reached that place the latter stopped,
and appeared anxious to utter something that her diffidence
suppressed. 

“Are you ill, Louisa?” exclaimed Miss Temple; “had we not better
return, and seek another opportunity to meet the old man?”

“Not ill, but terrified.   Oh! I never, never can go on that hill again
with you only.   I am not equal to it, in deed I am not. ”

This was an unexpected declaration to Elizabeth, who, although she
experienced no idle apprehension of a danger that no longer existed,
felt most sensitively all the delicacy of maiden modesty.   She stood
for some time, deeply reflecting within herself; but, sensible it was
a time for action instead of reflection, she struggled to shake off
her hesitation, and replied, firmly:

“Well, then it must be done by me alone.   There is no other than
yourself to be trusted, or poor old Leather-Stocking will be
discovered.   Wait for me in the edge of these woods, that at least I
may not be seen strolling in the hills by myself just now, One would
not wish to create remarks, Louisa—if—if— You will wait for me, dear
girl?”

“A year, in sight of the village, Miss Temple,’ returned the agitated
Louisa, “but do not, do not ask me to go on that hill. ”

Elizabeth found that her companion was really unable to proceed, and
they completed their arrangement by posting Louisa out of the
observation of the people who occasionally passed, but nigh the road,
and in plain view of the whole valley.   Miss Temple then proceeded
alone.   She ascended the road which has been so often mentioned in our
narrative, with an elastic and firm step, fearful that the delay in
the store of Mr.  Le Quoi, and the time necessary for reaching the
summit, would prevent her being punctual to the appointment Whenever
she pressed an opening in the bushes, she would pause for breath, or,
per haps, drawn from her pursuit by the picture at her feet, would
linger a moment to gaze at the beauties of the valley.   The long
drought had, however, changed its coat of verdure to a hue of brown,
and, though the same localities were there, the view wanted the lively
and cheering aspect of early summer.   Even the heavens seemed to share
in the dried appearance of the earth, for the sun was concealed by a
haziness in the atmosphere, which looked like a thin smoke without a
particle of moisture, if such a thing were possible.   The blue sky was
scarcely to be seen, though now, and then there was a faint lighting
up in spots through which masses of rolling vapor could be discerned
gathering around the horizon, as if nature were struggling to collect
her floods for the relief of man.   The very atmosphere that Elizabeth
inhaled was hot and dry, and by the time she reached the point where
the course led her from the highway she experienced a sensation like
suffocation.   But, disregarding her feelings, she hastened to execute
her mission, dwelling on nothing but the disappointment, and even the
helplessness, the hunter would experience without her aid. 

On the summit of the mountain which Judge Temple had named the
“Vision,” a little spot had been cleared, in order that a better view
might he obtained of the village and the valley.   At this point
Elizabeth understood the hunter she was to meet him; and thither she
urged her way, as expeditiously as the difficulty of the ascent, and
the impediment of a forest, in a state of nature, would admit. 
Numberless were the fragments of rocks, trunks of fallen trees, and
branches, with which she had to contend; but every difficulty vanished
before her resolution, and, by her own watch, she stood on the desired
spot several minutes before the appointed hour. 

After resting a moment on the end of a log, Miss Temple cast a glance
about her in quest of her old friend, but he was evidently not in the
clearing; she arose and walked around its skirts, examining every
place where she thought it probable Natty might deem it prudent to
conceal him self.   Her search was fruitless; and, after exhausting not
only herself, but her conjectures, in efforts to discover or imagine
his situation, she ventured to trust her voice in that solitary place. 

“Natty! Leather-Stocking! old man!” she called aloud, in every
direction; but no answer was given, excepting the reverberations of
her own clear tones, as they were echoed in the parched forest. 

Elizabeth approached the brow of the mountain, where a faint cry, like
the noise produced by striking the hand against the mouth, at the same
time that the breath is strongly exhaled, was heard answering to her
own voice.   Not doubting in the least that it was the Leather-Stocking
lying in wait for her, and who gave that signal to indicate the place
where he was to be found, Elizabeth descended for near a hundred feet,
until she gained a little natural terrace, thinly scattered with
trees, that grew in the fissures of the rocks, which were covered by a
scanty soil.   She had advanced to the edge of this platform, and was
gazing over the perpendicular precipice that formed its face, when a
rustling among the dry leaves near her drew her eyes in another
direction.   Our heroine certainly was startled by the object that she
then saw, but a moment restored her self-possession, and she advanced
firmly, and with some interest in her manner, to the spot. 

Mohegan was seated on the trunk of a fallen oak, with his tawny visage
turned toward her, and his eyes fixed on her face with an expression
of wildness and fire, that would have terrified a less resolute
female.   His blanket had fallen from his shoulders, and was lying in
folds around him, leaving his breast, arms, and most of his body bare. 
‘The medallion of Washington reposed on his chest, a badge of
distinction that Elizabeth well knew he only produced on great and
solemn occasions.   But the whole appearance of the aged chief was more
studied than common, and in some particulars it was terrific.   The
long black hair was plaited on his head, failing away, so as to expose
his high forehead and piercing eyes.   In the enormous incisions of his
ears were entwined ornaments of silver, beads, and porcupine’s quills,
mingled in a rude taste, and after the Indian fashions.   A large drop,
composed of similar materials, was suspended from the cartilage of his
nose, and, falling below his lips, rested on his chin.   Streaks of red
paint crossed his wrinkled brow, and were traced down his cheeks, with
such variations in the lines as caprice or custom suggested.   His body
was also colored in the same manner; the whole exhibiting an Indian
warrior prepared for some event of more than usual moment. 

“John! how fare you, worthy John?” said Elizabeth, as she approached
him; “you have long been a stranger in the village.   You promised me a
willow basket, and I have long had a shirt of calico in readiness for
you. ”

The Indian looked steadily at her for some time without answering, and
then, shaking his head, he replied, in his low, guttural tones:

“John’s hand can make baskets no more—he wants no shirt. ”

But if he should, he will know where to come for it,” returned Miss
Temple.   “Indeed old John.   I feel as if you had a natural right to
order what you will from us. ”

“Daughter,” said the Indian, “listen : Six times ten hot summers have
passed since John was young tall like a pine; straight like the bullet
of Hawk-eye, strong as all buffalo; spry as the cat of the mountain. 
He was strong, and a warrior like the Young Eagle.   If his tribe
wanted to track the Maquas for many suns, the eye of Chingachgook
found the print of their moccasins.   If the people feasted and were
glad, as they counted the scalps of their enemies, it was on his pole
they hung.   If the squaws cried because there was no meat for their
children, he was the first in the chase.   His bullet was swifter than
the deer.   Daughter, then Chingachgook struck his tomahawk into the
trees; it was to tell the lazy ones where to find him and the Mingoes—
but he made no baskets. ”

“Those times have gone by, old warrior,” returned Elizabeth ; “ since
then your people have disappeared, and, in place of chasing your
enemies, you have learned to fear God and to live at peace. ”

“Stand here, daughter, where you can see the great spring, the wigwams
of your father, and the land on the crooked river.   John was young
when his tribe gave away the country, in council, from where the blue
mountain stands above the water, to where the Susquehanna is hid by
the trees.   All this, and all that grew in it, and all that walked
over it, and all that fed there, they gave to the Fire-eater——for they
loved him.   He was strong, and they were women, and he helped them. 
No Delaware would kill a deer that ran in his woods, nor stop a bird
that flew over his land; for it was his.   Has John lived in peace?
Daughter, since John was young, he has seen the white man from
Frontinac come down on his white brothers at Albany and fight.   Did
they fear God? He has seen his English and his American fathers
burying their tomahawks in each other’s brains, for this very land. 
Did they fear God, and live in peace? He has seen the land pass away
from the Fire-eater, and his children, and the child of his child, and
a new chief set over the country.   Did they live in peace who did
this? did they fear God?”

“Such is the custom of the whites, John.   Do not the Delawares fight,
and exchange their lands for powder, and blankets, and merchandise?”

The Indian turned his dark eyes on his companion, and kept them there
with a scrutiny that alarmed her a little. 

“Where are the blankets and merchandise that bought the right of the
Fire-eater?” he replied in a more animated voice; “are they with him
in his wigwam? Did they say to him, Brother, sell us your land, and
take this gold, this silver, these blankets, these rifles, or even
this rum? No; they tore it front him, as a scalp is torn from an
enemy; and they that did it looked not behind them, to see whether he
lived or died.   Do such men live in peace and fear the Great Spirit?”

“But you hardly understand the circumstances,” said Elizabeth, more
embarrassed than she would own, even to herself.   “If you knew our
laws and customs better, you would Judge differently of our acts.   Do
not believe evil of my father, old Mohegan, for he is just and good. ”

“The brother of Miquon is good, and he will do right.   I have said it
to Hawk-eye---I have said it to the Young Eagle that the brother of
Miquon would do justice. ”

“Whom call you the Young Eagle?” said Elizabeth, averting her face
from the gaze of the Indian, as she asked the question; “whence comes
he, and what are his rights?”

“Has my daughter lived so long with him to ask this question?”
returned the Indian warily.   “Old age freezes up the blood, as the
frosts cover the great spring in winter; but youth keeps the streams
of the blood open like a sun in the time of blossoms.   The Young Eagle
has eyes; had he no tongue?”

The loveliness to which the old warrior alluded was in no degree
diminished by his allegorical speech; for the blushes of the maiden
who listened covered her burning cheeks till her dark eyes seemed to
glow with their reflection; but, after struggling a moment with shame,
she laughed, as if unwilling to understand him seriously, and replied
in pleasantry:

“Not to make me the mistress of his secret.   He is too much of a
Delaware to tell his secret thoughts to a woman. ”

“Daughter, the Great Spirit made your father with a white skin, and he
made mine with a red; but he colored both their hearts with blood. 
When young, it is swift and warm; but when old, it is still and cold. 
Is there difference below the skin? No.   Once John had a woman.   She
was the mother of so many sons”—he raised his hand with three fingers
elevated—” and she had daughters that would have made the young
Delawares happy.   She was kind, daughter, and what I said she did. 
You have different fashions; but do you think John did not love the
wife of his youth—the mother of his children?”

“And what has become of your family, John—your wife and your
children?” asked Elizabeth, touched by the Indian’s manner. 

“Where is the ice that covered the great spring? It is melted, and
gone with the waters.   John has lived till all his people have left
him for the land of spirits; his time has come, and he is ready. ”

Mohegan dropped his head in his blanket, and sat in silence.   Miss
Temple knew not what to say.   She wished to draw the thoughts of the
old warrior from his gloomy recollections, but there was a dignity in
his sorrow, and in his fortitude, that repressed her efforts to speak. 
After a long pause, however, she renewed the discourse by asking:

“Where is the Leather-Stocking, John? I have brought this canister of
powder at his request; but he is nowhere to he seen.   Will you take
charge of it, and see it delivered?”

The Indian raised his head slowly and looked earnestly at the gift,
which she put into his hand. 

“This is the great enemy of my nation.   Without this, when could the
white man drive the Delawares? Daughter, the Great Spirit gave your
fathers to know how to make guns and powder, that they might sweep the
Indians from the land.   There will soon be no red-skin in the country. 
When John has gone, the last will leave these hills, and his family
will be dead. ” The aged warrior stretched his body forward, leaning an
elbow on his knee, and appeared to be taking a parting look at the
objects of the vale, which were still visible through the misty
atmosphere, though the air seemed to thicken at each moment around
Miss Temple, who became conscious of an increased difficulty of
respiration.   The eye of Mohegan changed gradually from its sorrowful
expression to a look of wildness that might be supposed to border on
the inspiration of a prophet, as he continued: “But he will go on to
the country where his fathers have met.   The game shall be plenty as
the Ash in the lakes.   No woman shall cry for meat: no Mingo can ever
come The chase shall be for children; and all just red men shall live
together as brothers. ”

“John! this is not the heaven of a Christian,” cried Miss Temple; “you
deal now in the superstition of your forefathers. ”

“Fathers! sons!” said Mohegan, with firmness. —” all gone—all gone!—!
have no son but the Young Eagle, and he has the blood of a white man. ”

“Tell me, John,” said Elizabeth, willing to draw his thoughts to other
subjects, and at the same time yielding to her own powerful interest
in the youth; “who is this Mr.  Edwards? why are you so fond of him,
and whence does he come ?”

The Indian started at the question, which evidently recalled his
recollection to earth.   Taking her hand, he drew Miss Temple to a seat
beside him, and pointed to the country beneath them. 

“See, daughter,” he said, directing her looks toward the north; “as
far as your young eyes can see, it was the land of his.   But immense
volumes of smoke at that moment rolled over their heath, and, whirling
in the eddies formed by the mountains, interposed a barrier to their
sight, while he was speaking.   Startled by this circumstance, Miss
Temple sprang to her feet, and, turning her eyes toward the summit of
the mountain, she beheld It covered by a similar canopy, while a
roaring sound was heard in the forest above her like the rushing of
winds. 

“What means it, John?” she exclaimed: “we are enveloped in smoke, and
I feel a heat like the glow of a furnace. ”

Before the Indian could reply, a voice was heard crying In the woods:
“John! where are you, old Mohegan! the woods are on fire, and you have
but a minute for escape. ”

The chief put his hand before his mouth, and, making it lay on his
lips, produced the kind of noise that had attracted Elizabeth to the
place, when a quick and hurried step was heard dashing through the
dried underbrush and bushes, and presently Edwards rushed to his side,
with horror an every feature. 

CHAPTER 37. 

“Love rules the court, the camp, the grove. ”—Lay of the Last Minstrel. 

“IT would have been sad, indeed, to lose you in such manner, my old
friend,” said Oliver, catching his breath for utterance.   “Up and
away! even now we may be too late; the flames are circling round the
point of the rock below, and, unless we can pass there, our only
chance must be over the precipice.   Away! away! shake off your apathy,
John; now is the time of need. ”

Mohegan pointed toward Elizabeth, who, forgetting her danger, had sunk
back to a projection of the rock as soon as she recognized the sounds
of Edwards’ voice, and said with something like awakened animation:

“Save her—leave John to die. ”

“Her! whom mean you?” cried the youth, turning quickly to the place
the other indicated; but when he saw the figure of Elizabeth bending
toward him in an attitude that powerfully spoke terror, blended with
reluctance to meet him in such a place, the shock deprived him of
speech. 

“Miss Temple!” he cried, when he found words; “ you here! is such a
death reserved for you!”

“No, no, no—no death, I hope, for any of us, Mr.  Edwards,” she
replied, endeavoring to speak calmly; there is smoke, but no fire to
harm us.   Let us endeavor to retire. ”

“Take my arm,” said Edwards; “there must he an opening in some
direction for your retreat.   Are you equal to the effort?”

“Certainly.   You surely magnify the danger, Mr.  Ed wards.   Lead me out
the way you came. ”

“I will—I will,” cried the youth, with a kind of hysterical utterance. 
“No, no—there is no danger—I have alarmed you unnecessarily. ”

“But shall we leave the Indian—can we leave him, as be says, to die?”

An expression of painful emotion crossed the face of the young man; he
stopped and cast a longing look at Mohegan but, dragging his companion
after him, even against her will, he pursued his way with enormous
strides toward the pass by which he had just entered the circle of
flame. 

“Do not regard him, “ he said, in those tones that de note a desperate
calmness; “he is used to the woods, and such scenes; and he will
escape up the mountain—over the rock—or he can remain where he is in
safety. ”

“You thought not so this moment, Edwards! Do not leave him there to
meet with such a death,” cried Elizabeth, fixing a look on the
countenance of her conductor that seemed to distrust his sanity. 

“An Indian born! who ever heard of an Indian dying by fire? An Indian
cannot burn; the idea is ridiculous.   Hasten, hasten, Miss Temple, or
the smoke may incommodate you. ”

“Edwards! your look, your eye, terrifies me! Tell me the danger; is it
greater than it seems? I am equal to any trial. ”

“If we reach the point of yon rock before that sheet of fire, we are
safe, Miss Temple,” exclaimed the young man in a voice that burst
without the bounds of his forced composure.   “ Fly! the struggle is
for life!”

The place of the interview between Miss Temple and the Indian has
already been described as one of those plat forms of rock, which form
a sort of terrace in the mountains of that country, and the face of
it, we have said, was both high and perpendicular.   Its shape was
nearly a natural arc, the ends of which blended with the mountain, at
points where its sides were less abrupt in their descent.   It was
round one of these terminations of the sweep of the rock that Edwards
had ascended, and it was toward the same place that he urged Elizabeth
to a desperate exertion of speed. 

Immense clouds of white smoke had been pouring over the summit of the
mountain, and had concealed the approach and ravages of the element;
but a crackling sound drew the eyes of Miss Temple, as she flew over
the ground supported by the young man, toward the outline of smoke
where she already perceived the waving flames shooting forward from
the vapor, now flaring high in the air, and then bending to the earth,
seeming to light into combustion every stick and shrub on which they
breathed.   The sight aroused them to redoubled efforts; but,
unfortunately, a collection of the tops of trees, old and dried, lay
directly across their course; and at the very moment when both had
thought their safety insured, the warm current of the air swept a
forked tongue of flame across the pile, which lighted at the touch;
and when they reached the spot, the flying pair were opposed by the
surly roaring of a body of fire, as if a furnace were glowing in their
path.   They recoiled from the heat, and stood on a point of the rock,
gazing in a stupor at the flames which were spreading rap idly down
the mountain, whose side, too, became a sheet of living fire.   It was
dangerous for one clad in the light and airy dress of Elizabeth to
approach even the vicinity of the raging element; and those flowing
robes, that gave such softness and grace to her form, seemed now to be
formed for the instruments of her destruction. 

The villagers were accustomed to resort to that hill, in quest of
timber and fuel; in procuring which, it was their usage to take only
the bodies of the trees, leaving the tops and branches to decay under
the operations of the weather.   Much of the hill was, consequently,
covered with such light fuel, which, having been scorched under the
sun for the last two months, was ignited with a touch.   Indeed, in
some cases, there did not appear to be any contact between the fire
and these piles, but the flames seemed to dart from heap to heap, as
the fabulous fire of the temple is represented to reillumine its
neglected lamp. 

There was beauty as well as terror in the sight, and Edwards and
Elizabeth stood viewing the progress of the desolation, with a strange
mixture of horror and interest.   The former, however, shortly roused
himself to new exertions, and, drawing his companion after him, they
skirted the edge of the smoke, the young man penetrating frequently
into its dense volumes in search of a passage, but in every instance
without success.   In this manner they proceeded in a semicircle around
the upper part of the terrace, until arriving at the verge of the
precipice opposite to the point where Edwards had ascended, the horrid
conviction burst on both, at the same instant, that they were
completely encircled by fire.   So long as a single pass up or down the
mountain was unexplored, there was hope: but when retreat seemed to be
absolutely impracticable, the horror of their situation broke upon
Elizabeth as powerfully as if she had hitherto considered the danger
light. 

“This mountain is doomed to be fatal to me!” she whispered;” we shall
find our graves on it!”

“Say not so, Miss Temple; there is yet hope,” returned the youth, in
the same tone, while the vacant expression of his eye contradicted his
words; “let us return to the point of the rock—there is—there must be—
some place about it where we can descend. 

“Lead me there,” exclaimed Elizabeth; “let us leave no effort
untried. ” She did not wait for his compliance, but turning, retraced
her steps to the brow of the precipice, murmuring to herself, in
suppressed, hysterical sobs, My father! my poor, my distracted
father!”

Edwards was by her side in an instant, and with aching eyes he
examined every fissure in the crags in quest of some opening that
might offer facilities for flight.   But the smooth, even surface of
the rocks afforded hardly a resting-place for a foot, much less those
continued projections which would have been necessary for a descent of
nearly a hundred feet.   Edwards was not slow in feeling the conviction
that this hope was also futile, and, with a kind of feverish despair
that still urged him to action, he turned to some new expedient. 

“There is nothing left, Miss Temple,” he said, “but to lower you from
this place to the rock beneath.   If Natty were here, or even that
Indian could be roused, their ingenuity and long practice would easily
devise methods to do it; but I am a child at this moment in everything
but daring.   Where shall I find means? This dress of mine is so light,
and there is so little of it—then the blanket of Mohegan; we must try—
we must try—anything is better than to see you a victim to such a
death!”

“And what will become of you?” said Elizabeth.   “In deed, indeed,
neither you nor John must be sacrificed to my safety. ”

He heard her not, for he was already by the side of Mohegan, who
yielded his blanket without a question, retaining his seat with Indian
dignity and composure, though his own situation was even more critical
than that of the others.   The blanket was cut into shreds, and the
fragments fastened together: the loose linen jacket of the youth and
the light muslin shawl of Elizabeth were attached to them, and the
whole thrown over the rocks with the rapidity of lightning; but the
united Pieces did not reach half-way to the bottom. 

“It will not do—it will not do!” cried Elizabeth; “ for me there is no
hope! The fire comes slowly, but certainly.   See, it destroys the very
earth before it!”

Had the flames spread on that rock with half the quick ness with which
they leaped from bush to tree in other parts of the mountain, our
painful task would have soon ended; for they would have consumed
already the captives they inclosed.   But the peculiarity of their
situation afforded Elizabeth and her companion the respite of which
they had availed themselves to make the efforts we have recorded. 

The thin covering of earth on the rock supported but a scanty and
faded herbage, and most of the trees that had found root in the
fissures had already died, during the in tense heats of preceding
summers.   Those which still retained the appearance of life bore a few
dry and withered leaves, while the others were merely the wrecks of
pines, oaks, and maples.   No better materials to feed the fire could
be found, had there been a communication with the flames; but the
ground was destitute of the brush that led the destructive element,
like a torrent, over the remainder of the hill.   As auxiliary to this
scarcity of fuel, one of the large springs which abound in that
country gushed out of the side of the ascent above, and, after
creeping sluggishly along the level land, saturating the mossy
covering of the rock with moisture, it swept around the base of the
little cone that formed the pinnacle of the mountain, and, entering
the canopy of smoke near one of the terminations of the terrace, found
its way to the lake, not by dashing from rock to rock, but by the
secret channels of the earth.   It would rise to the surface, here and
there, in the wet seasons, but in the droughts of summer it was to be
traced only by the bogs and moss that announced the proximity of
water.   When the fire reached this barrier, it was compelled to pause,
until a concentration of its heat could overcome the moisture, like an
army awaiting the operations of a battering train, to open its way to
desolation. 

That fatal moment seemed now to have arrived, for the hissing steams
of the spring appeared to be nearly exhausted, and the moss of the
rocks was already curling under the intense heat, while fragments of
bark, that yet clung to the dead trees, began to separate from their
trunks, and fall to the ground in crumbling masses.   The air seemed
quivering with rays of heat, which might be seen playing along the
parched stems of the trees.   There were moments when dark clouds of
smoke would sweep along the little terrace; and, as the eye lost its
power, the other senses contributed to give effect to the fearful
horror of the scene.   At such moments, the roaring of the flames, the
crackling of the furious element, with the tearing of falling
branches, and occasionally the thundering echoes of some falling tree,
united to alarm the victims.   Of the three, however, the youth
appeared much the most agitated.   Elizabeth, having relinquished
entirely the idea of escape, was fast obtaining that resigned
composure with which the most delicate of her sex are sometimes known
to meet unavoidable evils; while Mohegan, who was much nearer to the
danger, maintained his seat with the invincible resignation of an
Indian warrior.   Once or twice the eye of the aged chief, which was
ordinarily fixed in the direction of the distant hills, turned toward
the young pair, who seemed doomed to so early a death, with a slight
indication of pity crossing his composed features, but it would
immediately revert again to its former gaze, as if already looking
into the womb of futurity.   Much of the time he was chanting a kind of
low dirge in the Delaware tongue, using the deep and remarkable
guttural tones of his people. 

“At such a moment, Mr.  Edwards, all earthly distinctions end,”
whispered Elizabeth; “persuade John to move nearer to us—let us die
together. ”

“I cannot—he will not stir,” returned the youth, in the same horridly
still tones.   “ He considers this as the happiest moment of his life,
he is past seventy, and has been decaying rapidly for some time; he
received some injury in chasing that unlucky deer, too, on the lake,
Oh! Miss Temple, that was an unlucky chase, indeed! it has led, I
fear, to this awful scene. ”

The smile of Elizabeth was celestial.   “Why name such a trifle now?—at
this moment the heart is dead to all earthly emotions!”

“If anything could reconcile a man to this death,” cried the youth,
“it would be to meet it in such company!”

“Talk not so, Edwards; talk not so,” interrupted Miss Temple.   “I am
unworthy of it, and it is unjust to your self.   We must die; yes—yes—
we must die—it is the will of God, and let us endeavor to submit like
his own children. ”

“Die!” the youth rather shrieked than exclaimed, “no —no—no—there must
yet be hope—you, at least, must-not, shall not die. ”

“In what way can we escape?” asked Elizabeth, pointing with a look of
heavenly composure toward the fire “Observe! the flame is crossing the
barrier of wet ground—it comes slowly, Edwards, but surely.   Ah! see!
the tree! the tree is already lighted!”

Her words were too true.   The heat of the conflagration had at length
overcome the resistance of the spring, and the fire was slowly
stealing along the half-dried moss; while a dead pine kindled with the
touch of a forked flame, that, for a moment, wreathed around the stem
of the tree, as it whined, in one of its evolutions, under the
influence of the air.   The effect was instantaneous, The flames danced
along the parched trunk of the pine like lightning quivering on a
chain, and immediately a column of living fire was raging on the
terrace.   It soon spread from tree to tree, and the scene was
evidently drawing to a close.   The log on which Mohegan was seated
lighted at its further end, and the Indian appeared to be surrounded
by fire.   Still he was unmoved.   As his body was unprotected, his
sufferings must have been great; but his fortitude was superior to
all.   His voice could yet be heard even in the midst of these horrors. 
Elizabeth turned her head from the sight, and faced the valley Furious
eddies of wind were created by the heat, and, just at the moment, the
canopy of fiery smoke that overhung the valley was cleared away,
leaving a distinct view of the peaceful village beneath them,
My father!—--my lather!” shrieked Elizabeth “Oh! this—surely might
have been spared me—but I submit. ”

The distance was not so great but the figure of Judge Temple could be
seen, standing in his own grounds, and apparently contemplating, in
perfect unconsciousness of the danger of his child, the mountain in
flames.   This sight was still more painful than the approaching
danger; and Elizabeth again faced the hill. 

“My intemperate warmth has done this!” cried Edwards, in the accents
of despair.   “If I had possessed but a moiety of your heavenly
resignation, Miss Temple, all might yet have been well. ”

“Name it not—name it not,” she said.   “It is now of no avail.   We must
die, Edwards, we must die—let us do so as Christians.   But—no—you may
yet escape, perhaps.   Your dress is not so fatal as mine.   Fly! Leave
me, An opening may yet be found for you, possibly—certainly it is
worth the effort.   Fly! leave me—but stay! You will see my father! my
poor, my bereaved father! Say to him, then, Edwards, say to him, all
that can appease his anguish.   Tell him that I died happy and
collected; that I have gone to my beloved mother; that the hours of
this life are nothing when balanced in the scales of eternity.   Say
how we shall meet again.   And say,” she continued, dropping her voice,
that had risen with her feelings, as if conscious of her worldly
weakness, “how clear, how very dear, was my love for him; that it was
near, too near, to my love for God. ”

The youth listened to her touching accents, but moved not.   In a
moment he found utterance, and replied:

“And is it me that you command to leave you! to leave you on the edge
of the grave? Oh! Miss Temple, how little have you known me!” he
cried, dropping on his knees at her feet, and gathering her flowing
robe in his arms as if to shield her from the flames.   “I have been
driven to the woods in despair, but your society has tamed the lion
within me.   If I have wasted my time in degradation, ‘twas you that
charmed me to it.   If I have forgotten my name and family, your form
supplied the place of memory.   If I have forgotten my wrongs, ‘twas
you that taught me charity.   No—no—dearest Elizabeth, I may die with
you, but I can never leave you!”

Elizabeth moved not, nor answered.   It was plain that her thoughts had
been raised from the earth, The recollection of her father, and her
regrets at their separation, had been mellowed by a holy sentiment,
that lifted her above the level of earthly things, and she was fast
losing the weakness of her sex in the near view of eternity.   But as
she listened to these words she became once more woman.   She struggled
against these feelings, and smiled, as she thought she was shaking off
the last lingering feeling of nature, when the world, and all its
seductions, rushed again to her heart, with the sounds of a human,
voice, crying in piercing tones:

“Gal! where he ye, gal! gladden the heart of an old man, if ye yet
belong to ‘arth!”

“Hist!” said Elizabeth; “ ‘tis the Leather-Stocking; he seeks me!”

“Tis Natty!” shouted Edwards, “and we may yet be saved!”

A wide and circling flame glared on their eyes for a moment, even
above the fire of the woods, and a loud report followed. 

“'Tis the canister, ‘tis the powder,” cried the same voice, evidently
approaching them.   “ ‘Tis the canister, and the precious child is
lost. ”

At the next instant Natty rushed through the steams of the spring, and
appeared on the terrace, without his deerskin cap, his hair burnt to
his head, his shirt, of country check, black and filled with holes,
and his red features of a deeper color than ever, by the heat he had
encountered. 

CHAPTER 38. 

“Even from the land of shadows, now
My father’s awful ghost appears. ”—Gertrude Of Wyoming. 

For an hour after Louisa Grant was left by Miss Temple, in the
situation already mentioned, she continued in feverish anxiety,
awaiting the return of her friend.   But as the time passed by without
the reappearance of Elizabeth, the terror of Louisa gradually
increased, until her alarmed fancy had conjured every species of
danger that appertained to the woods, excepting the one that really
existed.   The heavens had become obscured by degrees, and vast volumes
of smoke were pouring over the valley; but the thoughts of Louisa were
still recurring to beasts, without dreaming of the real cause for
apprehension.   She was stationed in the edge of the low pines and
chestnuts that succeed the first or large growth of the forest, and
directly above the angle where the highway turned from the straight
course to the village, and ascended the mountain laterally. 
Consequently, she commanded a view, not only of the valley, but of the
road beneath her.   The few travellers that passed, she observed, were
engaged in earnest conversation, and frequently raised their eyes to
the hill, and at length she saw the people leaving the court house,
and gazing upward also.   While under the influence of the alarm
excited by such unusual movements, reluctant to go, and yet fearful to
remain, Louisa was startled by the low, cracking, but cautious treads
of some one approaching through the bushes.   She was on the eve of
flight, when Natty emerged from the cover, and stood at her side.   The
old man laughed as he shook her kindly by a hand that was passive with
fear. 

“I am glad to meet you here, child,” he said; “for the back of the
mountain is a-fire, and it would be dangerous to go up it now, till it
has been burnt over once, and the dead wood is gone.   There’s a
foolish man, the comrade of that varmint who has given me all this
trouble, digging for ore on the east side.   I told him that the
kearless fellows, who thought to catch a practysed hunter in the woods
after dark, had thrown the lighted pine-knots in the brush, and that
‘twould kindle like tow, and warned him to leave the hill.   But he was
set upon his business, and nothing short of Providence could move him. 
if he isn’t burnt and buried in a grave of his own digging, he’s made
of salamanders.   Why, what ails the child? You look as skeary as if
you’d seed more painters.   I wish there were more to be found! they’d
count up faster than the beaver.   But where’s the good child with a
bad father? Did she forget her promise to the old man?”

“The hill! the hill!” shrieked Louisa; “she seeks you on the hill with
the powder!”

Natty recoiled several feet at this unexpected intelligence. 

“The Lord of Heaven have mercy on her! She’s on the Vision, and that’s
a sheet of fire agin’ this.   Child, if ye love the dear one, and hope
to find a friend when ye need it most, to the village, and give the
alarm.   The men are used to fighting fire, and there may be a chance
left, Fly! I bid ye fly! nor stop even for breath. ”

The Leather-Stocking had no sooner uttered this injunction, than he
disappeared in the bushes, and, when last seen by Louisa, was rushing
up the mountain, with a speed that none but those who were accustomed
to the toil could attain. 

“Have I found ye!” the old man exclaimed, when he burst out of the
smoke; “God be praised that I have found ye; but follow—there’s no
time for talking. ”

“My dress!” said Elizabeth; “ it would be fatal to trust myself nearer
to the flames in it. ”

“I bethought me of your flimsy things,” cried Natty, throwing loose
the folds of a covering buckskin that he carried on his arm, and
wrapping her form in it, in such a manner as to envelop her whole
person; “ now follow, for it’s a matter of life and death to us all. ”

“But John! what will become of John?” cried Edwards; “can we leave the
old warrior here to perish?”

The eyes of Natty followed the direction of Edwards’ finger, where he
beheld the Indian still seated as before,  with the very earth under
his feet consuming with fire.   Without delay the hunter approached the
spot, and spoke in Delaware:

“Up and away, Chingachgook! will ye stay here to burn, like a Mingo at
the stake? The Moravians have teached ye better, I hope; the Lord
preserve me if the powder hasn’t flashed atween his legs, and the skin
of his back is roasting.   Will ye come, I say; will ye follow me?”

“Why should Mohegan go?” returned the Indian, gloomily.   “He has seen
the days of an eagle, and his eye grows dim He looks on the valley; he
looks on the water; he looks in the hunting-grounds—but he sees no
Delawares.   Every one has a white skin.   My fathers say, from the far-
off land, Come.   My women, my young warriors, my tribe, say, Come. 
The Great Spirit says, Come.   Let Mohegan die. ”

“But you forget your friend,” cried Edwards,

“‘Tis useless to talk to an Indian with the death-fit on him, lad,”
interrupted Natty, who seized the strips of the  blanket, and with
wonderful dexterity strapped the passive chieftain to his own back;
when he turned, and with a strength that seemed to bid defiance, not
only to his years, but to his load, he led the way to the point whence
he had issued.   As they crossed the little terrace of rock, one of the
dead trees, that had been tottering for several minutes, fell on the
spot where they had stood, and filled the air with its cinders. 

Such an event quickened the steps of the party, who followed the
Leather-Stocking with the urgency required by the occasion. 

“Tread on the soft ground,” he cried, when they were in a gloom where
sight availed them but little, “and keep in the white smoke; keep the
skin close on her, lad; she’s a precious one—another will be hard to
be found. ”

Obedient to the hunter’s directions, they followed his steps and
advice implicitly; and, although the narrow pas sage along the winding
of the spring led amid burning logs and falling branches, they happily
achieved it in safety.   No one but a man long accustomed to the woods
could have traced his route through the smoke, in which respiration
was difficult, and sight nearly useless; but the experience of Natty
conducted them to an opening through the rocks, where, with a little
difficulty, they soon descended to another terrace, and emerged at
once into a tolerably clear atmosphere. 

The feelings of Edwards and Elizabeth at reaching this spot may be
imagined, though not easily described.   No one seemed to exult more
than their guide, who turned, with Mohegan still lashed to his back,
and, laughing in his own manner, said:

“I knowed ‘twa the Frenchman’s powder, gal; it went so all together;
your coarse grain will squib for a minute.   The Iroquois had none of
the best powder when I went agin’ the Canada tribes, under Sir
William.   Did I ever tell you the story, lad, consarning the scrimmage
with—”

“For God’s sake, tell me nothing now, Natty, until we are entirely
safe.   Where shall we go next?”

“Why, on the platform of rock over the cave, to be sure; you will be
safe enough there, or we’ll go Into It, if you be so minded. ”
The young man started, and appeared agitated; but, Looking around him
with an anxious eye, said quickly:

“Shalt we be safe on the rock? cannot the fire reach us there, too?”

“Can’t the boy see?” said Natty, with the coolness of one accustomed
to the kind of danger he had just encountered.   “Had ye stayed in the
place above ten minutes longer, you would both have been in ashes, but
here you may stay forever, and no fire can touch you, until they burn
the rocks as well as the woods. ”

With this assurance, which was obviously true, they proceeded to the
spot, and Natty deposited his load, placing the Indian on the ground
with his back against a fragment of the rocks.   Elizabeth sank on the
ground, and buried her face in her hands, while her heart was swelling
with a variety of conflicting emotions. 

“Let me urge you to take a restorative, Miss Temple,” said Edwards
respectfully; “your frame will sink else. ”

“Leave me, leave me,” she said, raising her beaming eyes for a moment
to his; “I feel too much for words! I am grateful, Oliver, for this
miraculous escape; and next to my God to you. ”

Edwards withdrew to the edge of the rock, and shouted:

“Benjamin! where are you, Benjamin?”

A hoarse voice replied, as if from the bowels of the earth:

“Hereaway, master; stowed in this here bit of a hole, which is all the
time as hot as the cook’s coppers.   I’m tired of my berth, d’ye see,
and if-so-be that Leather Stocking has got much overhauling to do
before he sails after them said beaver I’ll go into dock again, and
ride out my quarantine, till I can get prottick from the law, and so
hold on upon the rest of my ‘spaniolas. ”

“Bring up a glass of water from the spring,” continued Edwards, “and
throw a little wine in it; hasten, I entreat you!”

“I knows but little of your small drink, Master Oliver,” returned the
steward, his voice issuing out of the cave into the open air, “and the
Jamaikey held out no longer than to take a parting kiss with Billy
Kirby, when he anchored me alongside the highway last night, where you
run me down in the chase.   But here’s summat of a red color that may
suit a weak stomach, mayhap.   That Master Kirby is no first-rate in a
boat; but he’ll tack a cart among the stumps, all the same as a Lon’on
pilot will back and fill, through the colliers in the Pool. ”

As the steward ascended while talking, by the time he had ended his
speech he appeared on the rock with the desired restoratives,
exhibiting the worn-out and bloated features of a man who had run deep
in a debauch, and that lately. 

Elizabeth took from the hands of Edwards the liquor which he offered
and then motioned to be left again to herself. 

The youth turned at her bidding, and observed Natty kindly assiduous
around the person of Mohegan.   When their eyes met, the hunter said
sorrowfully:

“His time has come, lad; see it in his eyes—when an Indian fixes his
eye, he means to go but to one place; and what the wilful creatures
put their minds on, they’re sure to do. ”

A quick tread prevented the reply, and in a few moments, to the
amazement of the whole party, Mr.  Grant was seen clinging to the side
of the mountain, and striving to reach the place where they stood. 
Oliver sprang to his assistance, and by their united efforts the
worthy divine was soon placed safely among them. 

“How came you added to our number?” cried Edwards.   “Is the hill alive
with people at a time like this?”

The hasty but pious thanksgivings of the clergyman were soon
ejaculated, and, when he succeeded in collecting his bewildered
senses, he replied:

“I heard that my child was seen coming to the mountain; and, when the
fire broke over its summit, my uneasiness drew me up the road, where I
found Louisa, in terror for Miss Temple.   It was to seek her that I
came into this dangerous place; and I think, but for God’s mercy,
through the dogs of Natty, I should have perished in the flames
myself. ”

“Ay! follow the hounds, and if there’s an opening they’ll scent it
out,” said Natty; “their noses be given them the same as man’s
reason. ”

“I did so, and they led me to this place; but, praise be to God that I
see you all safe and well. ”

“No, no,” returned the hunter; “safe we be, but as for well, John
can’t be called in a good way, unless you’ll say that for a man that’s
taking his last look at ‘arth. ”

“He speaks the truth!” said the divine, with the holy awe with which
he ever approached the dying; “I have been by too many death-beds, not
to see that the hand of the tyrant is laid on this old warrior.   Oh!
how consoling it is to know that he has not rejected the offered mercy
in the hour of his strength and of worldly temptations! The offspring
of a race of heathens, he has in truth been ‘as a brand plucked from
the burning. ’”

“No, no,” returned Natty, who alone stood with him by the side of the
dying warrior; “it is no burning that ails him, though his Indian
feelings made him scorn to move, unless it be the burning of man’s
wicked thoughts for near fourscore years; but it’s natur’ giving out
in a chasm that’s run too long. —Down with ye, Hector! down, I say!
Flesh Isn’t iron, that a man can live forever, and see his kith and
kin driven to a far country, and he left to mourn, with none to keep
him company. ”

“John,” said the divine, tenderly, “do you hear me? do you wish the
prayers appointed by the church, at this trying moment?”

The Indian turned his ghastly face toward the speaker, and fastened
his dark eyes on him, steadily, but vacantly. 

No sign of recognition was made: and in a moment he moved his head
again slowly toward the vale, and began to sing, using his own
language, in those low, guttural tones, that have been so often
mentioned, his notes rising with his theme, till they swelled so loud
as to be distinct. 

“I will come! I will come! to the land of the just I will come! The
Maquas I have slain! I have slain the Maquas! and the Great Spirit
calls to his son.   I will come! I will come to the land of the just! I
will come!”

“What says he, Leather-Stocking?” Inquired the priest, with tender
interest; “sings he the Redeemer’s praise?” “No, no—’tis his own
praise that he speaks now,” said Natty, turning in a melancholy manner
from the sight of his dying friend; “and a good right he has to say it
all, for I know every word to be true. ”

“May heaven avert such self-righteousness from his heart! Humility and
penitence are the seals of Christianity; and, without feeling them
deeply seated in the soul, all hope is delusive, and leads to vain
expectations.   Praise himself when his whole soul and body should
unite to praise his Maker! John! you have enjoyed the blessings of a
gospel ministry, and have been called from out a multitude of sinners
and pagans, and, I trust.   for a wise and gracious purpose.   Do you
now feel what it is to be justified by our Saviour’s death, and reject
all weak and idle dependence on good works, that spring from man’s
pride and vainglory?”

The Indian did not regard his interrogator, but he raised his head
again, and said in a low, distinct voice:

“Who can say that the Maqous know the back of the Mohegan? What enemy
that trusted in him did not see the morning? What Mingo that he chased
ever sang the song of triumph? Did Mohegan ever he? No; the truth
lived in him, and none else could come out of him.   In his youth he
was a warrior, and his moccasins left the stain of blood.   In his age
he was wise; his words at the council fire did not blow away with the
winds.   “

“Ah! he has abandoned that vain relic of paganism, his songs,” cried
the divine; “ what says he now? is he sensible of his lost state?”

“Lord!! man,” said Natty, “he knows his end is at hand as well as you
or I; but, so far from thinking it a loss, he believes it to be a
great gain.   He is old and stiff, and you have made the game so scarce
and shy, that better shots than him find it hard to get a livelihood. 
Now he thinks he shall travel where it will always be good hunting ;
Where no wicked or unjust Indians can go; and where he shall meet all
his tribe together agin.   There’s not much loss in that, to a man
whose hands are hardly fit for basket-making Loss! if there be any
loss, ‘twill be to me.   I’m sure after he’s gone, there will be but
little left for me but to follow. ”

“His example and end, which, I humbly trust, shall yet be made
glorious,” returned Mr.  Grant, “should lead your mind to dwell on the
things of another life.   But I feel it to be my duty to smooth the way
for the parting spirit.   This is the moment, John, when the reflection
that you did not reject the mediation of the Redeemer, will bring balm
to your soul.   Trust not to any act of former days, but lay the burden
of your sins at his feet, and you have his own blessed assurance that
he will not desert you. ”

“Though all you say be true, and you have scriptur' gospels for it,
too,” said Natty, “you will make nothing of the Indian.   He hasn’t
seen a Moravian p sin’ the war; and it’s hard to keep them from going
hack to their native ways.   I should think ‘twould be as well to let
the old man pass in peace.   He's happy now; I know it by his eye; and
that’s more than I would say for the chief, sin’ the time the
Delawares broke up from the head waters of their river and went west. 
Ah’s me! ‘tis a grevous long time that, and many dark days have we
seen together sin’ it. ”

“Hawk-eye!” said Mohegan, rousing with the last glimmering of life.   “
Hawk-eye! listen to the words of your brother. ”

“Yes, John,” said the hunter, in English, strongly affected by the
appeal, and drawing to his side, we have been brothers; and more so
than it means in the Indian tongue.   What would ye have with me,
Chingachgook?”

“Hawk-eye! my fathers call me to the happy hunting grounds.   The path
is clear, and the eyes of Mohegan grow young.   I look—but I see no
white-skins ; there are none to be seen but just and brave Indians. 
Farewell, Hawk-eye—you shall go with the Fire-eater and the Young
Eagle to the white man’s heaven; but I go after my fathers.   Let the
bow, and tomahawk, and pipe, and the wampum of Mohegan he laid in his
grave; for when he starts 'twil be in the night, like a warrior on a
war-party, and he can not stop to seek them. ”

“What says he, Nathaniel?” cried Mr.  Grant, earnestly, and with
obvious anxiety; “does he recall the promises of the mediation? and
trust his salvation to the Rock of Ages?”

Although the faith of the hunter was by no means clear, yet the fruits
of early instruction had not entirely fallen in the wilderness.   He
believed in one Cod, and one heaven; and when the strong feeling
excited by the leave-taking of his old companion, which was exhibited
by the powerful working of every muscle in his weather-beaten face,
suffered him to speak, he replied:

“No—no—he trusts only to the Great Spirit of the savages, and to his
own good deeds.   He thinks, like all his people, that he is to be
young agin, and to hunt, and be happy to the end of etarnity.   its
pretty much the same with all colors, parson.   I could never bring
myself to think that I shall meet with these hounds, or my piece, in
another world; though the thought of leaving them forever sometimes
brings hard feelings over me, and makes me cling to life with a
greater craving than beseems three-Score-and-ten. ”

“The Lord in his mercy avert such a death from one who has been sealed
with the sign of the cross!” cried the minister, in holy fervor. 
John—”

He paused for the elements.   During the period occupied by the events
which we have related, the dark clouds in the horizon had continued to
increase in numbers and multitude; and the awful stillness that now
pervaded the air, announced a crisis in the state of the atmosphere. 
The flames, which yet continued to rage along the sides of the
mountain, no longer whirled in uncertain currents of their own eddies,
but blazed high and steadily toward the heavens.   There was even a
quietude in the ravages of the destructive element, as if it foresaw
that a hand greater titan even its own desolating power, was about to
stay its progress.   The piles of smoke which lay above the valley
began to rise, and were dispelling rapidly; and streaks of livid
lightning were dancing through the masses of clouds that impended over
the western hills.   While Mr.  Grant was speaking, a flash, which sent
its quivering light through the gloom, laying bare the whole opposite
horizon, was followed by a loud crash of thunder, that rolled away
among the hills, seeming to shake the foundations of the earth to
their centre.   Mohegan raised him self, as if in obedience to a signal
for his departure, and stretched his wasted arm toward the west.   His
dark face lighted with a look of joy; which, with all other
expressions, gradually disappeared; the muscles stiffening as they
retreated to a state of rest; a slight convulsion played, for a single
instant, about his lips; and his arm slowly dropped by his side,
leaving the frame of the dead warrior reposing against the rock with
its glassy eyes open, and fixed on the distant hills, as if the
deserted shell were tracing the flight of the spirit to its new abode. 

All this Mr.  Grant witnessed in silent awe; but when the last echoes
of the thunder died away he clasped his bands together, with pious
energy, and repeated, in the full, rich tones of assured faith;

“Lord! how unsearchable are Thy judgments; and Thy ways past finding
out! ‘I know that my Redeemer liveth, and that he shall stand at the
latter day upon the earth; and though after my skin, worms destroy
this body, yet in my flesh shall I see God, whom I shall see for my
self, and mine eyes shall behold, and not another. ”

As the divine closed this burst of devotion, he bowed his head meekly
to his bosom, and looked all the dependence and humility that the
inspired language expressed. 

When Mr.  Grant retired from the body, the hunter approached, and
taking the rigid hand of his friend, looked him wistfully in the face
for some time without speaking, when he gave vent to his feelings by
saying, in the mournful voice of one who felt deeply:

“Red skin or white, it’s all over now! he's to be judged by a
righteous Judge, and by no laws that’s made to suit times, and new
ways.   Well, there’s only one more death, and the world will be left
to me and the hounds, Ah’s me! a man must wait the time of God's
pleasure, but I begin to weary of life.   There is scarcely a tree
standing that I know, and it’s hard to find a face that I was ac-
quainted with in my younger days. ”

Large drops of rain now began to fall, and diffuse them selves over
the dry rock, while the approach of the thunder shower was rapid and
certain.   ‘the body of the Indian was hastily removed into the cave
beneath, followed by the whining hounds, who missed and moaned for the
look of intelligence that had always met their salutations to the
chief. 

Edwards made some hasty and confused excuse for not taking Elizabeth
into the same place, which was now completely closed in front with
logs and bark, saying some-thing that she hardly understood about its
darkness, and the unpleasantness of being with the dead body.   Miss
Temple, however, found a sufficient shelter against the torrent of
rain that fell, under the projection of a rock which overhung them,
But long before the shower was over, the sounds of voices were heard
below them crying aloud for Elizabeth, and men soon appeared beating
the dying embers of the bushes, as they worked their way cautiously
among the unextinguished brands. 

At the first short cessation in the rain, Oliver conducted Elizabeth
to the road, where he left her.   Before parting, however, he found
time to say, in a fervent manner that his companion was now at no loss
to interpret. 

“The moment of concealment is over, Miss Temple.   By this time to-
morrow, I shall remove a veil that perhaps it has been weakness to
keep around me and my allaus so long.   But I have had romantic and
foolish wishes and weakness; and who has not, that is young and torn
by conflicting passions? God bless you! I hear your father's voice; he
is coming up the road, and I would not, just now, subject myself to
detention.   Thank Heaven, you are safe again; that alone removes the
weight of a world from my spirit!”

He waited for no answer, but sprang into the woods.   Elizabeth,
notwithstanding she heard the cries of her father as he called upon
her name, paused until he was concealed among the smoking trees, when
she turned, and in a moment rushed into the arms of her half-
distracted Parent. 

A carriage had been provided, into which Miss Temple hastily entered;
when the cry was passed along the hill, that the lost one was found,
and the people returned to the village wet and dirty, but elated with
the thought that the daughter of their landlord had escaped from so
horrid and untimely an end. *

  * The probability of a fire in the woods similar to that here described
    has been questioned.   The writer can only say that he once witnessed a
    fire in another part of New York that compelled a man to desert his
    wagon and horses in the highway, and in which the latter were
    destroyed.   In order to estimate the probability of such an event, it
    is necessary to remember the effects of a long drought in that climate
    and the abundance of dead wood which is found in a forest like that
    described, The fires in the American forests frequently rage to such
    an extent as to produce a sensible effect on the atmosphere at a
    distance of fifty miles.   Houses, barns, and fences are quite commonly
    swept away in their course. 

CHAPTER 39. 

“Selictar! unsheathe then our chief’s scimetar;
 Tambourgi! thy 'larum gives promise of war; 
Ye mountains! that see us descend to the shore,
Shall view us as victors, or view us no more. ”
Byron. 

The heavy showers that prevailed during the remainder of the day
completely stopped the progress of the flames; though glimmering fires
were observed during the night, on different parts of the hill,
wherever there was a collection of fuel to feed the element.   The next
day the woods for ‘many miles were black and smoking, and were
stripped of every vestige of brush and dead wood; but the pines and
hemlocks still reared their heads proudly among the hills, and even
the smaller trees of the forest retained a feeble appearance of life
and vegetation. 

The many tongues of rumor were busy in exaggerating the miraculous
escape of Elizabeth; and a report was generally credited, that Mohegan
had actually perished in the flames.   This belief became confirmed,
and was indeed rendered probable, when the direful intelligence
reached the village that Jotham Riddel, the miner, was found in his
hole, nearly dead with suffocation, and burnt to such a degree that no
hopes were entertained of his life. 

The public attention became much alive to the events of the last few
days ; and, just at this crisis, the convicted counterfeiters took the
hint from Natty, and, on the night succeeding the fire, found means to
cut through their log prison also, and to escape unpunished.   When
this news began to circulate through the village, blended with the
fate of Jotham, and the exaggerated and tortured reports of the events
on the hill, the popular opinion was freely expressed, as to the
propriety of seizing such of the fugitives as remained within reach. 
Men talked of the cave as a secret receptacle of guilt; and, as the
rumor of ores and metals found its way into the confused medley of
conjectures, counterfeiting, and everything else that was wicked and
dangerous to the peace of society, suggested themselves to the busy
fancies of the populace. 

While the public mind was in this feverish state, it was hinted that
the wood had been set on fire by Edwards and the Leather—Stocking, and
that, consequently, they alone were responsible for the damages.   This
opinion soon gained ground, being most circulated by those who, by
their own heedlessness, had caused the evil; and there was one
irresistible burst of the common sentiment that an attempt should he
made to punish the offenders.   Richard was by no means deaf to this
appeal, and by noon he set about in earnest to see the laws executed. 

Several stout young men were selected, and taken apart with an
appearance of secrecy, where they received some important charge from
the sheriff, immediately under the eyes, but far removed from the
ears, of all in the village.   Possessed of a knowledge of their duty,
these youths hurried into the hills, with a bustling manner, as if the
fate of the world depended on their diligence, and, at the same time,
with an air of mystery as great as if they were engaged on secret
matters of the state. 

At twelve precisely a drum beat the “long roll ' before the” Bold
Dragoon,” and Richard appeared, accompanied by Captain Hollister, who
was clad in Investments as commander of the “Templeton Light
Infantry,” when the former demanded of the latter the aid of the posse
comitatus in enforcing the laws of the country.   We have not room to
record the speeches of the two gentlemen on this occasion, but they
are preserved in the columns of the little blue newspaper, which is
yet to be found on the file, and are said to be highly creditable to
the legal formula of one of the parties, and to the military precision
of the other.   Everything had been previously arranged, and, as the
red-coated drummer continued to roll out his clattering notes, some
five-and-twenty privates appeared in the ranks, and arranged
themselves in the order of battle. 

As this corps was composed of volunteers, and was commanded by a man
who had passed the first five-and-thirty years of his life in camps
and garrisons, it was the non-parallel of military science in that
country, and was confidently pronounced by the judicious part of the
Templeton community, to be equal in skill and appearance to any troops
in the known world; in physical endowments they were, certainly, much
superior! To this assertion there were but three dissenting voices,
and one dissenting opinion.   The opinion belonged to Marmaduke, who,
however, saw no necessity for its promulgation.   Of the voices, one,
and that a pretty loud one’, came from the spouse of the commander
himself, who frequently reproached her husband for condescending to
lead such an irregular band of warriors, after he had filled the
honorable station of sergeant-major to a dashing corps of Virginia
cavalry through much of the recent war. 

Another of these skeptical sentiments was invariably expressed by Mr. 
Pump, whenever the company paraded generally in some such terms as
these, which were uttered with that sort of meekness that a native of
the island of our forefathers is apt to assume when he condescends to
praise the customs or character of her truant progeny:

“It’s mayhap that they knows summat about loading and firing, d'ye
see, but as for working ship? why, a corporal’s guard of the
Boadishey's marines would back and fill on their quarters in such a
manner as to surround and captivate them all in half a glass. ” As
there was no one to deny this assertion, the marines of the Boadicea
were held in a corresponding degree of estimation. 

The third unbeliever was Monsieur Le Quoi, who merely whispered to the
sheriff, that the corps was one of the finest he had ever seen second
only to the Mousquetaires of Le Boa Louis! However, as Mrs.  Hollister
thought there was something like actual service in the present
appearances, and was, in consequence, too busily engaged with certain
preparations of her own, to make her comments; as Benjamin was absent,
and Monsieur Le Quoi too happy to find fault with anything, the corps
escaped criticism and comparison altogether on this momentous day,
when they certainly had greater need of self-confidence than on any
other previous occasion.   Marmaduke was said to be again closeted with
Mr.  Van der School and no interruption was offered to the movements of
the troops.   At two o’clock precisely the corps shouldered arms,
beginning on the right wing, next to the veteran, and carrying the
motion through to the left with great regularity.   When each
musket was quietly fixed in its proper situation, the order was given
to wheel to the left, and march.   As this was bringing raw troops, at
once, to face their enemy, it is not to be supposed that the manoeuver
was executed with their usual accuracy; but as the music struck up the
inspiring air of Yankee-doodle, and Richard, accompanied by Mr. 
Doolittle preceded the troops boldly down the street, Captain
Hollister led on, with his head elevated to forty-five degrees, with a
little, low cocked hat perched on his crown, carrying a tremendous
dragoon sabre at a poise, and trailing at his heels a huge steel
scabbard, that had war in its very clattering.   There was a good deal
of difficulty in getting all the platoons (there were six) to look the
same way; but, by the time they reached the defile of the bridge, the
troops were in sufficiently compact order.   In this manner they
marched up the hill to the summit of the mountain, no other alteration
taking place in the disposition of the forces, excepting that a mutual
complaint was made, by the sheriff and the magistrate, of a failure in
wind, which gradually’ brought these gentlemen to the rear.   It will
be unnecessary to detail the minute movements that succeeded.   We
shall briefly say, that the scouts came in and reported, that, so far
from retreating, as had been anticipated, the fugitives had evidently
gained a knowledge of the attack, and were fortifying for a desperate
resistance.   This intelligence certainly made a material change, not
only in the plans of the leaders, but in the countenances of the
soldiery also.   The men looked at one another with serious faces, and
Hiram and Richard began to consult together, apart. 

At this conjuncture, they were joined by Billy Kirby, who came along
the highway, with his axe under his arm, as much in advance of his
team as Captain Hollister had been of his troops in the ascent.   The
wood-chopper was amazed at the military array, but the sheriff eagerly
availed himself of this powerful reinforcement, and commanded his
assistance in putting the laws in force.   Billy held Mr.  Jones in too
much deference to object; and it was finally arranged that he should
be the bearer of a summons to the garrison to surrender before they
proceeded to extremities.   The troops now divided, one party being led
by the captain, over the Vision, and were brought in on the left of
the cave, while the remainder advanced upon its right, under the
orders of the lieutenant.   Mr.  Jones and Dr.  Todd—for the surgeon was
in attendance also—appeared on the platform of rock, immediately over
the heads of the garrison, though out of their sight.   Hiram thought
this approaching too near, and he therefore accompanied Kirby along
the side of the hill to within a safe distance of the fortifications,
where he took shelter behind a tree.   Most of the men discovered great
accuracy of eye in bringing some object in range between them and
their enemy, and the only two of the besiegers, who were left in plain
sight of the besieged, were Captain Hollister on one side, and the
wood-chopper on the other.   The veteran stood up boldly to the front,
supporting his heavy sword in one undeviating position, with his eye
fixed firmly on his enemy, while the huge form of Billy was placed in
that kind of quiet repose, with either hand thrust into his bosom,
bearing his axe under his right arm, which permitted him, like his own
oxen, to rest standing.   So far, not a word had been exchanged between
the belligerents.   The besieged had drawn together a pile of black
logs and branches of trees, which they had formed into a chevaux-de-
frise, making a little circular abatis in front of the entrance to the
cave.   As the ground was steep and slippery in every direction around
the place, and Benjamin appeared behind the works on one side, and
Natty on the other, the arrangement was by no means contemptible,
especially as the front was sufficiently guarded by the difficulty of
the approach.   By this time, Kirby had received his orders, and he
advanced coolly along the mountain, picking his way with the same
indifference as if he were pursuing his ordinary business.   When he
was within a hundred feet of the works, the long and much-dreaded
rifle of the Leather-Stocking was seen issuing from the parapet, and
his voice cried aloud:

“Keep off! Billy Kirby, keep off! I wish ye no harm; but if a man of
ye all comes a step nigher, there’ll be blood spilt atwixt us.   God
forgive the one that draws it first, but so it must be. ”

“Come, old chap,” said Billy, good-naturedly, “don’t be crabb’d, but
hear what a man has got to say I’ve no consarn in the business, only
to see right ‘twixt man and man; and I don’t kear the valie of a
beetle-ring which gets the better; but there’s Squire Doolittle,
yonder be hind the beech sapling, he has invited me to come in and ask
you to give up to the law—that’s all. ”

“I see the varmint! I see his clothes!” cried the indignant Natty:
“and if he’ll only show so much flesh as will bury a rifle bullet,
thirty to the pound, I’ll make him feel me.   Go away, Billy, I bid ye;
you know my aim, and I bear you no malice. ”

“You over-calculate your aim, Natty,” said the other, as he stepped
behind a pine that stood near him, “if you think to shoot a man
through a tree with a three-foot butt.   I can lay this tree right
across you in ten minutes by any man's watch, and in less time, too;
so be civil—I want no more than what’s right. ”

There was a simple seriousness in the countenance of Natty, that
showed he was much in earnest; but it was also evident that he was
reluctant to shed human blood.   He answered the taunt of the wood-
chopper, by saying:

“I know you drop a tree where you will, Billy Kirby; but if you show a
hand, or an arm, in doing it, there’ll be bones to be set, and blood
to staunch.   If it’s only to get into the cave that ye want, wait till
a two hours’ sun, and you may enter it in welcome; but come in now you
shall not.   There’s one dead body already, lying on the cold rocks,
and there’s another in which the life can hardly be said to stay.   If
you will come in, there’ll be dead with out as well as within. ”

The wood-chopper stepped out fearlessly from his cover, and cried:

“That’s fair; and what’s fair is right.   He wants you to stop till
it’s two hours to sundown; and I see reason in the thing.   A man can
give up when he’s wrong, if you don’t crowd him too hard; but you
crowd a man, and he gets to be like a stubborn ox—the more you beat,
the worse he kicks. ”

The sturdy notions of independence maintained by Billy neither suited
the emergency nor the impatience of Mr.  Jones, who was burning with a
desire to examine the hid den mysteries of the cave.   He therefore
interrupted this amicable dialogue with his own voice;

“I command you Nathaniel Bumppo, by my authority, to surrender your
person to the law,” he cried.   “And I command you, gentlemen, to aid
me in performing my duty.   Benjamin Penguillan I arrest you, and order
you to follow me to the jail of the county, by virtue of this
warrant. ”

“I’d follow ye, Squire Dickens,” said Benjamin, removing the pipe from
his month (for during the whole scene the ex-major-domo had been very
composedly smoking); ay! I’d sail in your wake, to the end of the
world, if-so— be that there was such a place, where there isn’t,
seeing that it’s round.   Now mayhap, Master Hollister, having lived
all your life on shore, you isn’t acquainted that the world, d’ye see”

“Surrender!” interrupted the veteran, in a voice that startled his
hearers, and which actually caused his own forces to recoil several
paces; surrender, Benjamin Pengullan, or expect no quarter. ’”

“Damn your quarter!” said Benjamin, rising from the log on which he
was seated, and taking a squint along the barrel of the swivel, which
had been brought on the hill during the night, and now formed the
means of defence on his side of the works.   “ Look you, master or
captain, thof I questions if ye know the name of a rope, except the
one that’s to hang ye, there’s no need of singing out, as if ye was
hailing a deaf man on a topgallant yard.   May-hap you think you’ve got
my true name in your sheep skin; but what British sailor finds it
worth while to sail in these seas, without a sham on his stern, in
case of need, d’ye see.   If you call me Penguillan, you calls me by
the name of the man on whose hand, dye see, I hove into daylight; and
he was a gentleman ; and that’s more than my worst enemy will say of
any of the family of Benjamin Stubbs. ”

“Send the warrant round to me, and I’ll put in an alias,” cried Hiram,
from behind his cover. 

“Put in a jackass, and you’ll put in yourself, Mister Doo-but-little,”
shouted Benjamin, who kept squinting along his little iron tube, with
great steadiness. 

“I give you but one moment to yield,” cried Richard.   “Benjamin!
Benjamin! this is not the gratitude I expected from you. ”

“I tell you, Richard Jones,” said Natty, who dreaded the sheriff’s
influence over his comrade; “ though the canister the gal brought be
lost, there’s powder enough in the cave to lift the rock you stand on. 
I’ll take off my roof if you don’t hold your peace. ”

“I think it beneath the dignity of my office to parley further with
the prisoners,” the sheriff observer to his companion, while they both
retired with a precipitancy that Captain Hollister mistook for the
signal to advance. 

“Charge baggonet!” shouted the veteran; “ march!”

Although this signal was certainly expected, it took the assailed a
little by surprise, and the veteran approached the works, crying, “
Courage, my brave lads! give them no quarter unless they surrender;”
and struck a furious blow upward with his sabre, that would have
divided the steward into moieties by subjecting him to the process of
decapitation, but for the fortunate interference of the muzzle of the
swivel.   As it was, the gun was dismounted at the critical moment that
Benjamin was applying his pipe to the priming, and in consequence some
five or six dozen of rifle bullets were projected into the air, in
nearly a perpendicular line.   Philosophy teaches us that the atmos-
phere will not retain lead; and two pounds of the metal, moulded into
bullets of thirty to the pound, after describing an ellipsis in their
journey, returned to the earth rattling among the branches of the
trees directly over the heads of the troops stationed in the rear of
their captain.   Much of the success of an attack, made by irregular
soldiers, depends on the direction in which they are first got in
motion.   In the present instance it was retrograde, and in less than a
minute after the bellowing report of the swivel among the rocks and
caverns, the whole weight of the attack from the left rested on the
prowess of the single arm of the veteran.   Benjamin received a severe
contusion from the recoil of his gun, which produced a short stupor,
during which period the ex-steward was prostrate on the ground. 
Captain Hollister availed himself of this circumstance to scramble
ever the breastwork and obtain a footing in the bastion—for such was
the nature of the fortress, as connected with the cave.   The moment
the veteran found himself within the works of his enemy, he rushed to
the edge of the fortification, and, waving his sabre over his head,
shouted:

“Victory! come on, my brave boys, the work’s our own!”

All this was perfectly military, and was such an example as a gallant
officer was in some measure bound to exhibit to his men but the outcry
was the unlucky cause of turning the tide of success.   Natty, who had
been keeping a vigalent eye on the wood-chopper, and the enemy
immediately before him, wheeled at this alarm, and was appalled at
beholding his comrade on the ground, and the veteran standing on his
own bulwark, giving forth the cry of victory! The muzzle of the long
rifle was turned instantly toward the captain.   There was a moment
when the life of the old soldier was in great jeopardy but the object
to shoot at was both too large and too near for the Leather-Stocking,
who, instead of pulling his trigger, applied the gun to the rear of
his enemy, and by a powerful shove sent him outside of the works with
much greater rapidity than he had entered them.   The spot on which
Captain Hollister alighted was directly in front, where, as his feet
touched the ground, so steep and slippery was the side of the
mountain, it seemed to recede from under them.   His motion was swift,
and so irregular as utterly to confuse the faculties of the old
soldier.   During its continuance, he supposed himself to be mounted,
and charging through the ranks of his enemy.   At every tree he made a
blow, of course, as at a foot-soldier; and just as he was making the
cut “St.  George” at a half burnt sapling he landed in the highway,
and, to his utter amazement, at the feet of his own spouse.   When Mrs. 
Hollister, who was toiling up the hill, followed by at least twenty
curious boys, leaning with one hand on the staff with which she
ordinarily walked, and bearing in the other an empty bag, witnessed
this exploit of her husband, indignation immediately got the better,
not only of her religion, but of her philosophy. 

“Why, sargeant! is it flying ye are?” she cried—” that I should live
to see a husband of mine turn his hack to an inimy! and such a one!
Here I have been telling the b’ys, as we come along, all about the
saige of Yorrektown, and how ye was hurted; and how ye’d be acting the
same agin the day; and I mate ye retraiting jist as the first gun is
fired.   Och! I may trow away the bag! for if there’s plunder, ‘twill
not be the wife of sich as yerself that will be privileged to be
getting the same.   They do say, too, there is a power of goold and
silver in the place—the Lord forgive me for setting my heart on
woorldly things; but what falls in the battle, there’s scriptur’ for
believing, is the just property of the victor,”

“Retreating!” exclaimed the amazed veteran; “where’s my horse? he has
been shot under me—I——”

“Is the man mad?” interrupted his wife—” devil the horse do ye own,
sargeant, and ye’re nothing but a shabby captain of malaishy.   Oh! if
the ra’al captain was here, tis the other way ye’d be riding, dear, or
you would not follow your laider!”

While this worthy couple were thus discussing events, the battle began
to rage more violently than ever above them.   When Leather-Stocking
saw his enemy fairly under headway, as Benjamin would express it, he
gave his attention to the right wing of the assailants.   It would have
been easy for Kirby, with his powerful frame, to have seized the
moment to scale the bastion, and, with his great strength, to have
sent both of its defenders in pursuit of the veteran; but hostility
appeared to he the passion that the wood-chopper indulged the least in
at that moment, for, in a voice that was heard by the retreating left
wing, he shouted:

“Hurrah well done, captain! keep it up! how he handles his bush-hook!
he makes nothing of a sapling!” and such other encouraging
exclamations to the flying veteran, until, overcome by mirth, the
good-natured fellow seated himself on the ground, kicking the earth
with delight, and giving vent to peal after peal of laughter. 

Natty stood all this time in a menacing attitude, with his rifle
pointed over the breastwork, watching with a quick and cautions eye
the least movement of the assail ants.   The outcry unfortunately
tempted the ungovernable curiosity of Hiram to take a peep from behind
his cover at the state of the battle.   Though this evolution was
performed with great caution, in protecting his front, he left, like
many a better commander, his rear exposed to the attacks of his enemy. 
Mr.  Doolittle belonged physically to a class of his countrymen, to
whom Nature has denied, in their formation, the use of curved lines. 
Every thing about him was either straight or angular.   But his tailor
was a woman who worked, like a regimental contractor, by a set of
rules that gave the same configuration to the whole human species. 
Consequently, when Mr.  Doolittle leaned forward in the manner
described, a loose drapery appeared behind the tree, at which the
rifle of Natty was pointed with the quickness of lightning.   A less
experienced man would have aimed at the flowing robe, which hung like
a festoon half-way to the earth ; but the Leather-Stocking knew both
the man and his female tailor better; and when the smart report of the
rifle was heard, Kirby, who watched the whole manoeuvre in breath less
expectation.   saw the bark fly from the beech and the cloth, at some
distance above the loose folds, wave at the same instant.   No battery
was ever unmasked with more promptitiude than Hiram advanced from
behind the tree at this summons. 

He made two or three steps, with great precision, to the front and,
placing one hand on the afflicted part, stretched forth the other with
a menacing air toward Natty, and cried aloud:

“Gawl darn ye: this shan’t he settled so easy; I’ll follow it up from
the ‘common pleas’ to the ‘court of errors. ’”

Such a shocking imprecation, from the mouth of so orderly a man as
Squire Doolittle, with the fearless manner in which he exposed
himself, together with, perhaps, the knowledge that Natty’s rifle was
unloaded, encouraged the troops in the rear, who gave a loud shout,
and fired a volley into the tree-tops, after the contents of the
swivel.   Animated by their own noise, the men now rushed on in
earnest; and Billy Kirby, who thought the joke, good as it was, had
gone far enough, was in the act of scaling the works, when Judge
Temple appeared on the opposite side, exclaiming:

“Silence and peace! why do I see murder and blood shed attempted? Is
not the law sufficient to protect itself, that armed bands must be
gathered, as in rebellion and war, to see justice performed?”

“‘Tis the posse comitatus,” shouted the sheriff, from a distant rock,
“who-”

“Say rather a posse of demons.   I command the peace. ” “Hold shied not
blood!” cried a voice from the top of the Vision.   “ Hold, for the
sake of Heaven, fire no more! all shall be yielded! you shall enter
the cave!”

Amazement produced the desired effect.   Natty, who had reloaded his
piece, quietly seated himself on the logs, and rested his head on his
hands, while the “ Light Infantry” ceased their military movements,
and waited the issue in suspense. 

In less than a minute Edwards came rushing down the hill, followed by
Major Hartman, with a velocity that was surprising for his years. 
They reached the terrace in an instant, from which the youth led the
way, by the hollow in the rock, to the mouth of the cave, into which
they both entered, leaving all without silent, and gazing after them
with astonishment. 

CHAPTER 40. 

“I am dumb. 
Were you the doctor, and I knew you not?”-Shakespeare. 

During the five or six minutes that elapsed before the youth and Major
reappeared.   Judge Temple and the sheriff together with most of the
volunteers, ascended to the terrace, where the latter began to express
their conjectures of the result, and to recount their individual
services in the conflict.   But the sight of the peace-makers ascending
the ravine shut every mouth. 

On a rude chair, covered with undressed deer-skins, they supported a
human being, whom they seated carefully and respectfully in the midst
of the assembly.   His head was covered by long, smooth locks of the
color of snow.   His dress, which was studiously neat and clean, was
composed of such fabrics as none but the wealthiest classes wear, but
was threadbare and patched ; and on his feet were placed a pair of
moccasins, ornamented in the best manner of Indian ingenuity.   The
outlines of his face were grave and dignified, though his vacant eye,
which opened and turned slowly to the faces of those around him in
unmeaning looks, too surely’ announced that the period had arrived
when age brings the mental imbecility of childhood. 

Natty had followed the supporters of this unexpected object to the top
of the cave, and took his station at a little distance behind him,
leaning no his rifle, in the midst of his pursuers, with a
fearlessness that showed that heavier interests than those which
affected himself were to be decided.   Major Hartmann placed himself
beside the aged man, uncovered, with his whole soul beaming through
those eyes which so commonly danced with frolic and humor.   Edwards
rested with one hand familiarly but affectionately on the chair,
though his heart was swelling with emotions that denied him utterance. 

All eyes were gazing intently, but each tongue continued mute.   At
length the decrepit stranger, turning his vacant looks from face to
face, made a feeble attempt to rise, while a faint smile crossed his
wasted face, like an habitual effort at courtesy, as he said, in a
hollow, tremulous voice:

“Be pleased to be seated, gentlemen.   The council will open
immediately.   Each one who loves a good and virtuous king will wish to
see these colonies continue loyal.   Be seated—I pray you, be seated,
gentlemen.   The troops shall halt for the night. ”

“This is the wandering of insanity!” said Marmaduke: “who will explain
this scene. ”

“No, sir,” said Edwards firmly, “‘tis only the decay of nature; who is
answerable for its pitiful condition, remains to be shown. ”

“Will the gentlemen dine with us, my son?” said the old stranger,
turning to a voice that he both knew and loved.   “Order a repast
suitable for his Majesty’s officers.   You know we have the best of
game always at command,”

“Who is this man?” asked Marmaduke, in a hurried voice, in which the
dawnings of conjecture united with interest to put the question. 

“This man,” returned Edwards calmly, his voice, how ever, gradually
rising as he proceeded; “this man, sir, whom you behold hid in
caverns, and deprived of every-thing that can make life desirable, was
once the companion and counsellor of those who ruled your country. 
This man, whom you see helpless and feeble, was once a warrior, so
brave and fearless, that even the intrepid natives gave him the name
of the Fire-eater.   This man, whom you now see destitute of even the
ordinary comfort of a cabin, in which to shelter his head, was once
the owner of great riches—and, Judge Temple, he was the rightful
proprietor of this very soil on which we stand.   This man was the
father of———”

“This, then,” cried Marmaduke, with a powerful emotion, “this, then,
is the lost Major Effingham!”

“Lost indeed,” said the youth, fixing a piercing eye on the other. 

“And you! and you!” continued the Judge, articulating with difficulty. 

“I am his grandson. ”

A minute passed in profound silence.   All eyes were fixed on the
speakers, and even the old German appeared to wait the issue in deep
anxiety.   But the moment of agitation soon passed.   Marmaduke raised
his head from his bosom, where it had sunk, not in shame, but in
devout mental thanksgivings, and, as large tears fell over his fine,
manly face, he grasped the hand of the youth warmly, and said:

“Oliver, I forgive all thy harshness—all thy suspicions.   I now see it
all.   I forgive thee everything, but suffering this aged man to dwell
in such a place, when not only my habitation, but my fortune, were at
his and thy command. ”

“He’s true as ter steel!” shouted Major Hartmann; “ titn’t I tell you,
lat, dat Marmatuke Temple vas a friend dat woult never fail in ter
dime as of neet?”

“It is true, Judge Temple, that my opinions of your conduct have been
staggered by what this worthy gentle man has told me.   When I found it
impossible to convey my grandfather back whence the enduring love of
this old man brought him, without detection and exposure, I went to
the Mohawk in quest of one of his former comrades, in whose justice I
had dependence.   He is your friend, Judge Temple, but, if what he says
be true, both my father and myself may have judged you harshly. ”

“You name your father!” said Marmaduke tenderly— “was he, indeed, lost
in the packet?”

“He was.   He had left me, after several years of fruit less
application and comparative poverty, in Nova Scotia, to obtain the
compensation for his losses which the British commissioners had at
length awarded.   After spending a year in England, he was returning to
Halifax, on his way to a government to which he had been appointed, in
the West Indies, intending to go to the place where my grand father
had sojourned during and since the war, and take him with us. ”

“But thou!” said Marmaduke, with powerful interest; “I had thought
that thou hadst perished with him. ”

A flush passed over the cheeks of the young man, who gazed about him
at the wondering faces of the volunteers, and continued silent. 
Marmaduke turned to the veteran captain, who just then rejoined his
command, and said:

“March thy soldiers back again, and dismiss them, the zeal of the
sheriff has much mistaken his duty. —Dr.  Todd, I will thank you to
attend to the injury which Hiram Doolittle has received in this
untoward affair,—Richard, you will oblige me by sending up the
carriage to the top of the hill. —Benjamin, return to your duty in my
family. ”

Unwelcome as these orders were to most of the auditors, the suspicion
that they had somewhat exceeded the whole some restraints of the law,
and the habitual respect with which all the commands of the Judge were
received, induced a prompt compliance. 

When they were gone, and the rock was left to the parties most
interested in an explanation, Marmaduke, pointing to the aged Major
Effingham, said to his grand son:

“Had we not better remove thy parent from this open place until my
carriage can arrive?”

“Pardon me, sir, the air does him good, and he has taken it whenever
there was no dread of a discovery.   I know not how to act, Judge
Temple; ought I, can I suffer Major Effingham to become an inmate of
your family?”

“Thou shalt he thyself the judge,” said Marmaduke.   Thy father was my
early friend, He intrusted his fortune to my care.   When we separated
he had such confidence in me that he wished on security, no evidence
of the trust, even had there been time or convenience for exacting it. 
This thou hast heard?”

“Most truly, sir,” said Edwards, or rather Effingham as we must now
call him. 

“We differed in politics.   If the cause of this country was
successful, the trust was sacred with me, for none knew of thy
father’s interest, if the crown still held its sway, it would he easy
to restore the property of so loyal a subject as Colonel Effingham. 
Is not this plain?‘“

“The premises are good, sir,” continued the youth, with the same
incredulous look as before. 

“Listen—listen, poy,” said the German, “Dere is not a hair as of ter
rogue in ter het of Herr Tchooge. ”

“We all know the issue of the struggle,” continued Marmaduke,
disregarding both.   “Thy grandfather was left in Connecticut,
regularly supplied by thy father with the means of such a subsistence
as suited his wants.   This I well knew, though I never had intercourse
with him, even in our happiest days.   Thy father retired with the
troops to prosecute his claims on England.   At all events, his losses
must be great, for his real estates were sold, and I became the lawful
purchaser.   It was not unnatural to wish that he might have no bar to
its just recovery. ”

“There was none, but the difficulty of providing for so many
claimants. ”

“But there would have been one, and an insuperable one, and I
announced to the world that I held these estates, multiplied by the
times and my industry, a hundredfold in value, only as his trustee. 
Thou knowest that I supplied him with considerable sums immediately
after the war. ”

“You did, until—”

“My letters were returned unopened.   Thy father had much of thy own
spirit, Oliver; he was sometimes hasty and rash. ” The Judge continued,
in a self-condemning manner; “ Perhaps my fault lies the other way: I
may possibly look too far ahead, and calculate too deeply.   It
certainly was a severe trial to allow the man whom I most loved, to
think ill of me for seven years, in order that he might honestly apply
for his just remunerations.   But, had he opened my last letters, thou
wouldst have learned the whole truth.   Those I sent him to England, by
what my agent writes me, he did read.   He died, Oliver, knowing all,
he died my friend, and I thought thou hadst died with him”

“Our poverty would not permit us to pay for two passages,” said the
youth, with the extraordinary emotion with which he ever alluded to
the degraded state of his family ; “ I was left in the Province to
wait for his return, and, when the sad news of his loss reached me, I
was nearly penniless. ”

“And what didst thou, boy?” asked Marmaduke in a faltering voice. 

“I took my passage here in search of my grandfather; for I well knew
that his resources were gone, with the half pay of my father.   On
reaching his abode, I learned that he had left it in secret; though
the reluctant hireling, who had deserted him in his poverty, owned to
my urgent en treaties, that he believed he had been carried away by an
-old man who had formerly been his servant.   I knew at
once it was Natty, for my father often—”

“Was Natty a servant of thy grandfather?” exclaimed the Judge. 

“Of that too were you ignorant?” said the youth in evident surprise. 

“How should I know it? I never met the Major, nor was the name of
Bumppo ever mentioned to me.   I knew him only as a man of the woods,
and one who lived by hunting.   Such men are too common to excite
surprise. ”

“He was reared in the family of my grandfather; served him for many
years during their campaigns at the West, where he became attached to
the woods; and he was left here as a kind of locum tenens on the lands
that old Mohegan (whose life my grandfather once saved) induced the
Delawares to grant to him when they admitted him as an honorary member
of their tribe. 

“This, then, is thy Indian blood?”

“I have no other,” said Edwards, smiling—” Major Effingham was adopted
as the son of Mohegan, who at that time was the greatest man in his
nation; and my father, who visited those people when a boy, received
the name of the Eagle from them, on account of the shape of his face,
as I understand.   They have extended his title to me, I have no other
Indian blood or breeding; though I have seen the hour, Judge Temple,
when I could wish that such had been my lineage and education. ”

“Proceed with thy tale,” said Marmaduke. 

“I have but little more to say, sir, I followed to the lake where I
had so often been told that Natty dwelt, and found him maintaining his
old master in secret; for even he could not bear to exhibit to the
world, in his poverty and dotage, a man whom a whole people once
looked up to with respect. ”

“And what did you?”

“What did I? I spent my last money in purchasing a rifle, clad myself
in a coarse garb, and learned to be a hunter by the side of Leather-
Stocking.   You know the rest, Judge Temple. ”

“Ant vere vas olt Fritz Hartmann?” said the German, reproachfully;
“didst never hear a name as of olt Fritz Hartmann from ter mout of ter
fader, lat?”

“I may have been mistaken, gentlemen,” returned the youth, ‘but I had
pride, and could not submit to such an exposure as this day even has
reluctantly brought to light.   I had plans that might have been
visionary; but, should my parent survive till autumn, I purposed
taking him with me to the city, where we have distant relatives, who
must have learned to forget the Tory by this time.   He decays
rapidly,” he continued mournfully, “and must soon lie by the side of
old Mohegan. ”

The air being pure, and the day fine, the party continued conversing
on the rock, until the wheels of Judge Temple’s carriage were heard
clattering up the side of the mountain, during which time the
conversation was maintained with deep interest, each moment clearing
up some doubtful action, and lessening the antipathy of the youth to
Marmaduke.   He no longer objected to the removal of his grand father,
who displayed a childish pleasure when he found himself seated once
more in a carriage.   When placed in the ample hall of the mansion-
house, the eyes of the aged veteran turned slowly to the objects in
the apartment, and a look like the dawn of intellect would, for
moments flit across his features, when he invariably offered some use
less courtesies to those near him, wandering painfully in his
subjects.   The exercise and the change soon produced an exhaustion
that caused them to remove him to his bed, where he lay for hours,
evidently sensible of the change in his comforts, and exhibiting that
mortifying picture of human nature, which too plainly shows that the
propensities of the animal continue even after the nobler part of the
creature appears to have vanished. 

Until his parent was placed comfortably in bed, with Natty seated at
his side, Effingham did not quit him.   He then obeyed a summons to the
library of the Judge, where he found the latter, with Major Hartmann,
waiting for him. 

“Read this paper, Oliver,” said Marmaduke to him, as he entered, “and
thou wilt find that, so far from intending thy family wrong during
life, it has been my care to see that justice should be done at even a
later day. ”

The youth took the paper, which his first glance told him was the will
of the Judge.   Hurried and agitated as he was, he discovered that the
date corresponded with the time of the unusual depression of
Marmaduke.   As he proceeded, his eyes began to moisten, and the hand
which held the instrument shook violently. 

The will commenced with the usual forms, spun out by the ingenuity of
Mr.  Van der School: but, after this subject was fairly exhausted, the
pen of Marmaduke became plainly visible.   In clear, distinct, manly,
and even eloquent language, he recounted his obligations to Colonel
Effingham, the nature of their connection, and the circumstances in
which they separated.   He then proceeded to relate the motives of his
silence, mentioning, however, large sums that he had forwarded to his
friend, which had been returned with the letters unopened.   After
this, he spoke of his search for the grandfather who unaccountably
disappeared, and his fears that the direct heir of the trust was
buried in the ocean with his father. 

After, in short, recounting in a clear narrative, the events which our
readers must now he able to connect, he proceeded to make a fair and
exact statement of the sums left in his care by Colonel Effingham.   A
devise of his whole estate to certain responsible trustees followed;
to hold the same for the benefit, in equal moieties, of his daughter,
on one part, and of Oliver Effingham, formerly a major in the army of
Great Britain, and of his son Ed ward Effingham, and of his son Edward
Oliver Effingham, or to the survivor of them, and the descendants of
such survivor, forever, on the other part.   The trust was to endure
until 1810, when, if no person appeared, or could be found, after
sufficient notice, to claim the moiety so devised, then a certain sum,
calculating the principal and interest of his debt to Colonel
Effingham, was to be paid to the heirs-at-law of the Effingham family,
and the bulk of his estate was to be conveyed in fee to his daughter,
or her heirs. 

The tears fell from the eyes of the young man, as he read this
undeniable testimony of the good faith of Marmaduke, and his
bewildered gaze was still fastened on the paper, when a voice, that
thrilled on every nerve, spoke near him, saying:

“Do you yet doubt us, Oliver?”

“I have never doubted you!” cried the youth, recovering his
recollection and his voice, as he sprang to seize the hand of
Elizabeth ; “no, not one moment has my faith in you wavered. ”

“And my father—”

“God bless him!”

“I thank thee, my son,” said the Judge, exchanging a warm pressure of
the hand with the youth ; “but we have both erred: thou hast been too
hasty, and I have been too slow.   One-half of my estates shall be
thine as soon as they can be conveyed to thee; and, if what my
suspicions tell me be true, I suppose the other must follow speedily. ”
He took the hand which he held, and united it with that of his
daughter, and motioned toward the door to the Major. 

“I telt yon vat, gal!” said the old German, good-humoredly ; “if I vas
as I vas ven I servit mit his grand-fader on ter lakes, ter lazy tog
shouldn’t vin ter prize as for nottin’. ”

“Come, come, old Fritz,” said the Judge; “you are seventy, not
seventeen; Richard waits for you with a bowl of eggnog, in the hall. ”

“Richart! ter duyvel!” exclaimed the other, hastening out of the room;
“he makes ter nog as for ter horse.   vilt show ter sheriff mit my own
hants! Ter duyvel! I pelieve he sweetens mit ter Yankee melasses!”

Marmaduke smiled and nodded affectionately at the young couple, and
closed the door after them.   If any of our readers expect that we are
going to open it again, for their gratification, they are mistaken. 

The tete-a-tete continued for a very unreasonable time—-how long we
shall not say; but it was ended by six o’clock in the evening, for at
that hour Monsieur Le Quoi made his appearance agreeably to the
appointment of the preceding day, and claimed the ear of Miss Temple. 
He was admitted ; when he made an offer of his hand, with much
suavity, together with his “amis beeg and leet’, his père, his mere
and his sucreboosh. ” Elizabeth might, possibly, have previously
entered into some embarrassing and binding engagements with Oliver,
for she declined the tender of all, in terms as polite, though perhaps
a little more decided, than those in which they were made. 

The Frenchman soon joined the German and the sheriff in the hall, who
compelled him to take a seat with them at the table, where, by the aid
of punch, wine, and egg nog, they soon extracted from the complaisant
Monsieur Le Quoi the nature of his visit, it was evident that he had
made the offer, as a duty which a well- bred man owed to a lady in
such a retired place, before he had left the country, and that his
feelings were but very little, if at all, interested in the matter. 
After a few potations, the waggish pair persuaded the exhilarated
Frenchman that there was an inexcusable partiality in offering to one
lady, and not extending a similar courtesy to another.   Consequently,
about nine, Monsieur Le Quoi sallied forth to the rectory, on a
similar mission to Miss Grant, which proved as successful as his first
effort in love. 

When he returned to the mansion-house, at ten, Richard and the Major
were still seated at the table.   They at tempted to persuade the Gaul,
as the sheriff called him, that he should next try Remarkable
Pettibone.   But, though stimulated by mental excitement and wine, two
hours of abstruse logic were thrown away on this subject; for he
declined their advice, with a pertinacity truly astonishing in so
polite a man. 

When Benjamin lighted Monsieur Le Quoi from the door, he said, at
parting:

“If-so-be, Mounsheer, you’d run alongside Mistress Pettybones, as the
Squire Dickens was bidding ye, ‘tis my notion you’d have been
grappled; in which case, d’ye see, you mought have been troubled in
swinging clear agin in a handsome manner; for thof Miss Lizzy and the
parson’s young ‘un be tidy little vessels, that shoot by a body on a
wind, Mistress Remarkable is summat of a galliot fashion: when you
once takes ‘em in tow, they doesn’t like to be cast off agin. ”

CHAPTER 41. 

“Yes, sweep ye on!—We will not leave,
For them who triumph those who grieve. 
With that armada gay
Be laughter loud, and jocund shout—
—But with that skill
Abides the minstrel tale.   “—Lord of the Isles. 

The events of our tale carry us through the summer; and after making
nearly the circle of the year, we must conclude our labors in the
delightful month of October.   Many important incidents had, however,
occurred in the intervening period; a few of which it may be necessary
to  recount. 

The two principal were the marriage of Oliver and Elizabeth, and the
death of Major Effingham.   They both took place early in September;
and the former preceded the latter only a few days.   The old man
passed away like the last glimmering of a taper; and, though his death
cast a melancholy over the family, grief could not follow such an end. 
One of the chief concerns of Marmaduke was to reconcile the even
conduct of a magistrate with the course that his feelings dictated to
the criminals.   The day succeeding the discovery at the cave, however,
Natty and Benjamin re-entered the jail peaceably, where they
continued, well fed and comfortable, until the return of an express to
Albany, who brought the governor’s pardon to the Leather-Stocking.   In
the mean time, proper means were employed to satisfy Hiram for the
assaults on his person ; and on the same day the two comrades issued
together into society again, with their characters not at all affected
by the  imprisonment. 

Mr.  Doolittle began to discover that neither architecture nor his law
was quite suitable to the growing wealth and intelligence of the
settlement; and after exacting the last cent that was attainable in
his compromise, to use the language of the country he “pulled up
stakes,” and proceeded farther west, scattering his professional
science and legal learning through the land; vestiges of both of which
are to be discovered there even to the present hour. 

Poor Jotham, whose life paid the forfeiture of his folly,
acknowledged, before he died, that his reasons for believing in a mine
were extracted from the lips of a sibyl, who, by looking in a magic
glass, was enabled to discover the hidden treasures of the earth. 
Such superstition was frequent in the new settlements; and, after the
first surprise was over, the better part of the community forgot the
subject.   But, at the same time that it removed from the breast of
Richard a lingering suspicion of the acts of the three hunter, it
conveyed a mortifying lesson to him, which brought many quiet hours,
in future, to his cousin Marmaduke.   It may be remembered that the
sheriff confidently pronounced this to be no “ visionary “scheme, and
that word was enough to shut his lips, at any time within the next ten
years. 

Monsieur Le Quoi, who has been introduced to our readers because no
picture of that country would be faithful without some such character,
found the island of Martinique, and his “sucreboosh,” in possession of
the English but Marmaduke and his family were much gratified in soon
hearing that he had returned to his bureau, in Paris; where he
afterward issued yearly bulletins of his happiness, and of his
gratitude to his friends in America. 

With this brief explanation, we must return to our narrative.   Let the
American reader imagine one of our mildest October mornings, when the
sun seems a ball of silvery fire, and the elasticity of the air is
felt while it is inhaled, imparting vigor and life to the whole system
; the weather, neither too warm nor too cold, but of that happy
temperature which stirs the blood, without bringing the lassitude of
spring.   It was on such a morning, about the middle of the month, that
Oliver entered the hall where Elizabeth was issuing her usual orders
for the day, and requesting her to join him in a short excursion to
the lakeside.   The tender melancholy in the manner of her husband
caught the attention of Elizabeth, who instantly abandoned her
concerns, threw a light shawl across her shoulders, and, concealing
her raven hair under a gypsy hat, and took his arm, and submitted
herself, without a question, to his guidance.   They crossed the
bridge, and had turned from the highway, along the margin of the lake,
before a word was exchanged.   Elizabeth well knew, by the direction,
the object of the walk, and respected the feelings of her companion
too much to indulge in untimely conversation.   But when they gained
the open fields, and her eye roamed over the placid lake, covered with
wild fowl already journeying from the great northern waters to seek a
warmer sun, but lingering to play in the limpid sheet of the Otsego,
and to the sides of the mountain, which were gay with the thou- sand
dyes of autumn, as if to grace their bridal, the swelling heart of the
young wife burst out in speech. 

“This is not a time for silence, Oliver!” she said, clinging more
fondly to his arm; “everything in Nature seems to speak the praises of
the Creator; why should we, who have so much to be grateful for, be
silent?”

“Speak on!” said her husband, smiling; “I love the sounds of your
voice.   You must anticipate our errand hither: I have told you my
plans: how do you like them?”

“I must first see them,” returned his wife.   “But I have had my plans,
too; it is time I should begin to divulge them. ”

“You! It is something for the comfort of my old friend, Natty, I
know. ”

“Certainly of Natty; but we have other friends besides the Leather-
Stocking to serve.   Do you forget Louisa and her father?”

“No, surely; have I not given one of the best farms in the county to
the good divine? As for Louisa, I should wish you to keep her always
near us. ”

“You do!” said Elizabeth, slightly compressing her lips; “but poor
Louisa may have other views for herself; she may wish to follow my
example, and marry. ”

“I don’t think it,” said Effingham, musing a moment,  really don’t
know any one hereabouts good enough for her. ”

“Perhaps not her; but there are other places besides Templeton, and
other churches besides ‘New St.  Paul’s. ’”

“Churches, Elizabeth! you would not wish to lose Mr.  Grant, surely!
Though simple, he is an excellent man I shall never find another who
has half the veneration for my orthodoxy.   You would humble me from a
saint to a very common sinner. ”

“It must be done, sir,” returned the lady, with a half-concealed
smile, “though it degrades you from an angel to a man. ”

“But you forget the farm?”

“He can lease it, as others do.   Besides, would you have a clergyman
toil in the fields?”

“Where can he go? You forget Louisa. ”

“No, I do not forget Louisa,” said Elizabeth, again compressing her
beautiful lips.   “You know, Effingham, that my father has told you
that I ruled him, and that I should rule you.   I am now about to exert
my power. ”

“Anything, anything, dear Elizabeth, but not at the expense of us all:
not at the expense of your friend. ”

“How do you know, sir, that it will be so much at the expense of my
friend?” said the lady, fixing her eyes with a searching look on his
countenance, where they met only the unsuspecting expression of manly
regret. 

“How do I know it? Why, it is natural that she should regret us. ”
It is our duty to struggle with our natural feelings,” returned the
lady; “and there is but little cause to fear that such a spirit as
Louisa’s will not effect it. ”

“But what is your plan?”

“Listen, and you shall know.   My father has procured a call for Mr. 
Grant, to one of the towns on the Hudson where he can live more at his
ease than in journeying through these woods; where he can spend the
evening of his life in comfort and quiet; and where his daughter may
meet with such society, and form such a connection, as may be proper
for one of her years and character. ”

“Bess! you amaze me! I did not think you had been such a manager!”

“Oh! I manage more deeply than you imagine, sir,” said the wife,
archly smiling again; “ but it is thy will and it is your duty to
submit—for a time at least. ”

Effingham laughed; but, as they approached the end of their walk, the
subject was changed by common consent. 

The place at which they arrived was the little spot of level ground
where the cabin of the Leather-Stocking had so long stood.   Elizabeth
found it entirely cleared of rubbish, and beautifully laid down in
turf, by the removal of sods, which, in common with the surrounding
country, had grown gay, under the influence of profuse showers, as if
a second spring had passed over the land.   This little place was
surrounded by a circle of mason-work, and they entered by a small
gate, near which, to the surprise of both, the rifle of Natty was
leaning against the wall.   Hector and the slut reposed on the grass by
its side, as if conscious that, however altered, they were lying on
the ground and were surrounded by objects with which they were
familiar.   The hunter himself was stretched on the earth, before a
head-stone of white marble, pushing aside with his fingers the long
grass that had already sprung up from the luxuriant soil around its
base, apparently to lay bare the inscription.   By the side of this
stone, which was a simple slab at the head of a grave, stood a rich
monument, decorated with an urn and ornamented with the chisel. 

Oliver and Elizabeth approached the graves with a light tread, unheard
by the old hunter, whose sunburnt face was working, and whose eyes
twinkled as if something impeded their vision.   After some little time
Natty raised himself slowly from the ground, and said aloud:

“Well, well—I’m bold to say it’s all right! There’s something that I
suppose is reading; but I can’t make anything of it; though the pipe
and the tomahawk, and the moccasins, be pretty well—pretty well, for a
man that, I dares to say, never seed ‘ither of the things.   Ah’s me!
there they lie, side by side, happy enough! Who will there be to put
me in the ‘arth when my time comes?”

“When that unfortunate hour arrives, Natty, friends shall not be
wanting to perform the last offices for you,” said Oliver, a little
touched at the hunter’s soliloquy. 

The old man turned, without manifesting surprise, for he had got the
Indian habits in this particular, and, running his hand under the
bottom of his nose, seemed to wipe away his sorrow with the action. 

“You’ve come out to see the graves, children, have ye?” he said; “
well, well, they’re wholesome sights to young as well as old. ”

“I hope they are fitted to your liking,” said Effingham, “no one has a
better right than yourself to be consulted in the matter. ”

“Why, seeing that I ain’t used to fine graves,” returned the old man,
“it is but little matter consarning my taste.   Ye laid the Major’s
head to the west, and Mohegan’s to the east, did ye, lad?”

“At your request it was done,”

“It’s so best,” said the hunter; “they thought they had to journey
different ways, children: though there is One greater than all, who’ll
bring the just together, at His own time, and who’ll whiten the skin
of a blackamoor, and place him on a footing with princes. ”

“There is but little reason to doubt that,” said Elizabeth, whose
decided tones were changed to a soft, melancholy voice; “I trust we
shall all meet again, and be happy together. ”

“Shall we, child, shall we?” exclaimed the hunter, with unusual
fervor, “there’s comfort in that thought too.   But before I go, I
should like to know what 'tis you tell these people, that be flocking
into the country like pigeons in the spring, of the old Delaware, and
of the bravest white man that ever trod the hills?”

Effingham and Elizabeth were surprised at the manner of the Leather-
Stocking, which was unusually impressive and solemn; but, attributing
it to the scene, the young man turned to the monument, and read aloud:

“Sacred to the memory of Oliver Effingham Esquire, formally a Major in
his B.  Majesty’s 60th Foot; a soldier of tried valor; a subject of
chivalrous loyalty; and a man of honesty.   To these virtues he added
the graces of a Christian.   The morning of his life was spent in
honor, wealth, and power; but its evening was obscured by poverty,
neglect, and disease, which were alleviated only by the tender care of
his old, faithful, and upright friend and attendant Nathaniel Bumppo. 
His descendants rest this stone to the virtues of the master, and to
the enduring gratitude of the servant. ”

The Leather-Stocking started at the sound of his own name, and a smile
of joy illuminated his wrinkled features, as he said:

“And did ye say It, lad? have you then got the old man’s name cut in
the stone, by the side of his master’s! God bless ye, children! ‘twas
a kind thought, and kindness goes to the heart as Life shortens. ”

Elizabeth turned her back to the speakers.   Effingham made a fruitless
effort before he succeeded in saying:

“It is there cut in plain marble; but it should have been written in
letters of gold!”

“Show me the name, boy,” said Natty, with simple eagerness; “let me
see my own name placed in such honor.   ‘Tis a gin’rous gift to a man
who leaves none of his name and family behind him in a country where
he has tarried so long. ”

Effingham guided his finger to the spot, and Natty followed the
windings of the letters to the end with deep interest, when he raised
himself from the tomb, and said:

“I suppose it’s all right; and it’s kindly thought, and kindly done!
But what have ye put over the red-skin”

“You shall hear: This stone is raised to the memory of an Indian Chief
of the Delaware tribe, who was known by the several names of John
Mohegan Mohican———’”

“Mo-hee-can, lad, they call theirselves! ‘hecan. ”

“Mohican; and Chingagook—”

“‘Gach, boy; ‘gach-gook; Chingachgook, which interpreted, means Big-
sarpent.   The name should he set down right, for an Indian’s name has
always some meaning in it. ”

“I will see it altered.   ‘He was the last of his people who continued
to inhabit this country; and it may he said of him that his faults
were those of an Indian, and his virtues those of a man. ’”

“You never said truer word, Mr.  Oliver; ah’s me! if you had knowed him
as I did, in his prime, in that very battle where the old gentleman,
who sleeps by his side saved his life, when them thieves, the
Iroquois, had him at the stake, you’d have said all that, and more
too.   I cut the thongs with this very hand, and gave him my own
tomahawk and knife, seeing that the rifle was always my fav'rite
weapon.   He did lay about him like a man! I met him as I was coming
home from the trail, with eleven Mingo scalps on his pole.   You
needn’t shudder, Madam Effingham, for they was all from shaved heads
and warriors.   When I look about me, at these hills, where I used to
could count sometimes twenty smokes, curling over the tree-tops, from
the Delaware camps, it raises mournful thoughts, to think that not a
red-skin is left of them all; unless it be a drunken vagabond from the
Oneidas, or them Yankee Indians, who, they say, be moving up from the
seashore; and who belong to none of Gods creatures, to my seeming,
being, as it were, neither fish nor flesh—neither white man nor
savage.   Well, well! the time has come at last, and I must go——”

“Go!” echoed Edwards, “ whither do you go?”

The Leather-Stocking; who had imbibed unconsciously, many of the
Indian qualities, though he always thought of himself as of a
civilized being, compared with even the Delawares, averted his face to
conceal the workings of his muscles, as he stooped to lift a large
pack from behind the tomb, which he placed deliberately on his
shoulders. 

“Go!” exclaimed Elizabeth, approaching him with a hurried step; “you
should not venture so far in the woods alone, at your time of life,
Natty; indeed, it Is Imprudent, He is bent, Effingham, on some distant
hunting. ”

“What Mrs.  Effingham tells you is true, Leather-Stocking’ said
Edwards; “there can be no necessity for your submitting to such
hardships now.   So throw aside your pack, and confine your hunt to the
mountains near us, if you will go. ”

“Hardship! ‘tis a pleasure, children, and the greatest that is left me
on this side the grave. ”

“No, no; you shall not go to such a distance,” cried Elizabeth, laying
her white hand on his deer-skin pack—” I am right! I feel his camp-
kettle, and a canister of powder! He must not be suffered to wander so
far from us, Oliver; remember how suddenly Mohegan dropped away. ”

“I knowed the parting would come hard, children—I knowed it would!”
said Natty, “and so I got aside to look at the graves by myself, and
thought if I left ye the keep sake which the Major gave me, when we
first parted in the woods, ye wouldn’t take it unkind, but would know
that, let the old man’s body go where it might, his feelings stayed
behind him. ”

“This means something more than common,” exclaimed the youth.   “Where
is it, Natty, that you purpose going?”

The hunter drew nigh him with a confident, reasoning air, as If what
he had to say would silence all objections, and replied:

“Why, lad, they tell me that on the big lakes there’s the best of
hunting, and a great range without a white man on it unless it may be
one like myself.   I’m weary of living in clearings, and where the
hammer is sounding in my ears from sunrise to sundown.   And though I’m
much bound to ye both, children—I wouldn’t say it if It was not true—I
crave to go into the woods agin—I do. ”

“Woods!” echoed Elizabeth, trembling with her feelings; “do you not
call these endless forests woods?”

“Ah! child, these be nothing to a man that’s used to the wilderness. 
I have took but little comfort sin’ your father come on with his
settlers; but I wouldn’t go far, while the life was in the body that
lies under the sod there.   But now he’s gone, and Chingachgook Is
gone; and you be both young and happy.   Yes! the big house has rung
with merriment this month past! And now I thought was the time to get
a little comfort in the close of my days.   Woods! indeed! I doesn’t
call these woods, Madam Effingham, where I lose myself every day of my
life in the clearings. ”

“If there be anything wanting to your comfort, name it, Leather-
Stocking; if it be attainable it is yours. ”

“You mean all for the best, lad, I know; and so does madam, too; but
your ways isn’t my ways.   ‘Tis like the dead there, who thought, when
the breath was in them, that one went east, and one went west, to find
their heavens; but they’ll meet at last, and so shall we, children. 
Yes, and as you’ve begun, and we shall meet in the land of the just at
last. ”

“This is so new! so unexpected!” said Elizabeth, in almost breathless
excitement; “I had thought you meant to live with us and die with us,
Natty. ”

“Words are of no avail,” exclaimed her husband: “the habits of forty
years are not to he dispossessed by the ties of a day.   I know you too
well to urge you further, Natty; unless you will let me build you a
hut on one of the distant hills, where we can sometimes see you, and
know that you are comfortable. ”

“Don’t fear for the Leather-Stocking, children; God will see that his
days be provided for, and his ind happy.   I know you mean all for the
best, but our ways doesn't agree.   I love the woods, and ye relish the
face of man; I eat when hungry, and drink when a-dry; and ye keep
stated hours and rules; nay, nay, you even over-feed the dogs, lad,
from pure kindness; and hounds should be gaunty to run well.   The
meanest of God’s creatures be made for some use, and I’m formed for
the wilderness, If ye love me, let me go where my soul craves to be
agin!”

The appeal was decisive; and not another word of en treaty for him to
remain was then uttered; but Elizabeth bent her head to her bosom and
wept, while her husband dashed away the tears from his eyes; and, with
hands that almost refused to perform their office, he procured his
pocket-book, and extended a parcel of bank-notes to the hunter. 

“Take these,” he said, “at least take these; secure them about your
person, and in the hour of need they will do you good service. ”

The old man took the notes, and examined them with curious eye. 

“This, then, is some of the new-fashioned money that they’ve been
making at Albany, out of paper! It can't be worth much to they that
hasn’t larning! No, no, lad-——take back the stuff; it will do me no
sarvice, I took kear to get all the Frenchman’s powder afore he broke
up, and they say lead grows where I’m going.   it isn’t even fit for
wads, seeing that I use none but leather!—Madam Effingham, let an old
man kiss your hand, and wish God’s choicest blessings on you and
your’n”

“Once more let me beseech you, stay!” cried Elizabeth.   Do not,
Leather-Stocking, leave me to grieve for the man who has twice rescued
me from death, and who has served those I love so faithfully.   For my
sake, if not for your own, stay.   I shall see you in those frightful
dreams that still haunt my nights, dying in poverty and age, by the
side of those terrific beasts you slew.   There will be no evil, that
sickness, want, and solitude can inflict, that my fancy will not
conjure as your fate.   Stay with us, old man, if not for your own
sake, at least for ours. ”

“Such thoughts and bitter dreams, Madam Effingham,” returned the
hunter, solemnly, “ will never haunt an innocent parson long.   They’ll
pass away with God’s pleasure.   And if the cat-a-mounts be yet brought
to your eyes in sleep, tis not for my sake, but to show you the power
of Him that led me there to save you.   Trust in God, madam, and your
honorable husband, and the thoughts for an old man like me can never
be long nor bitter.   I pray that the Lord will keep you in mind—the
Lord that lives in clearings as well as in the wilderness—and bless
you, and all that belong to you, from this time till the great day
when the whites shall meet the red-skins in judgement, and justice
shall be the law, and not power. ”

Elizabeth raised her head, and offered her colorless cheek to his
salute, when he lifted his cap and touched it respectfully.   His hand
was grasped with convulsive fervor by the youth, who continued silent. 
The hunter prepared himself for his journey, drawing his belt tighter,
and wasting his moments in the little reluctant movements of a
sorrowful departure.   Once or twice he essayed to speak, but a rising
in his throat prevented it.   At length he shouldered his rifle, and
cried with a clear huntsman’s call that echoed through the woods:
He-e-e-re, he-e-e-re, pups—away, dogs, away!—ye'll be footsore afore
ye see the end of the journey!”

The hounds leaped from the earth at this cry, and scenting around the
grave and silent pair, as if conscious of their own destination, they
followed humbly at the heels of their master.   A short pause
succeeded, during which even the youth concealed his face on his
grandfather’s tomb.   When the pride of manhood, however, had sup
pressed the feelings of nature, he turned to renew his en treaties,
but saw that the cemetery was occupied only by himself and his wife. 

“He is gone!” cried Effingham. 

Elizabeth raised her face, and saw the old hunter standing looking
back for a moment, on the verge of the wood.   As he caught their
glances, he drew his hard hand hastily across his eyes again, waved it
on high for an adieu, and, uttering a forced cry to his dogs, who were
crouching at his feet, he entered the forest. 

This was the last they ever saw of the Leather-Stocking, whose rapid
movements preceded the pursuit which Judge Temple both ordered and
conducted.   He had gone far toward the setting sun—the foremost in
that band of pioneers who are opening the way for the march of the
nation across the continent. 

The End

A concluding word from Robert J.   Kuniegel

TR AMERICAN PATRIOT hopes you enjoy our books.   Theodore Roosevelt lived his life in a manner that is the only way possible to make government responsive to the people.   He has written how to make meaningful reform possible not only for his generation but for future generations, if we read what he has said.   We only need to interest others in reading what he has said to transform our government.  

Reading the books on TR AMERICAN PATRIOT DOT COM  and having others do the same, will develop citizens and leaders capable of transforming American politics into a system of government that will be honest, and responsive to “a square deal”.   A square deal has no special deals for the rich, the middle class, or the poor.   Our government today has degenerated into a system that rewards citizens for not being productive.   It promotes entitlements under the guise of helping people, when in fact it only helps politicians to protect their own royal positions.   Policies that foster a special privileged class was the type of government policies Theodore Roosevelt fought against and won.   He was a visionary.   He knew this fight would need to be fought through the ages if we were to keep our country strong.   He was an intrepid pioneer that blazed a trail through a jungle of corrupt government, so that others might follow his proven and highly successful common sense approach toward honest government.   His fearless course helped make America a beacon of hope to all that seek justice.   His endless devotion to America helped make America a super power that no just nation has needed to fear as long as our citizens value his lofty resolute square deal policy toward our fellow citizens and those of other nations.  

Theodore Roosevelt’s greatest gift to this country is before us.   It is not in the past, if we as Americans recognize that his message is not just a story from American history pages.   His message is an example, clearly defined.   It details actions that are required if we desire to do something meaningful for our country.   Join the good fight today.   You only need to read and interest others to do the same.   

David Boyd, repeating what he had read, once said, “The person we become is because of our experiences in life, the people we meet, and the books we read.  ” It is time to have others meet Theodore Roosevelt.   It is time for a Theodore Roosevelt revival, “Fear God and do your own part”.   Dare to help make Theodore Roosevelt the standard and not the exception.   America needs to adopt a wise, fearless and honest role model as the standard we revere, so that our public servants know what we expect.   The first step to honest government is no harder than setting proper standards of conduct for our public servants through the use of a proper role model.   Can you find one quality in Theodore Roosevelt that is not right in a public servant?  If you think you can, I bet your conjecture is based upon something other than truth and honest reasoning and this American would love an opportunity to debate any such conjecture.