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expand1997 (1)
1Author:  McHenry James 1753-1816Add
 Title:  The wilderness, or, Braddock's times  
 Published:  1997 
 Subjects:  University of Virginia Library, Text collection | UVA-LIB-Text | University of Virginia Library, Early American Fiction, 1789-1875 | UVA-LIB-EarlyAmFict1789-1875 
 Description: Let melancholy spirits talk as they please concerning the degeneracy and increasing miseries of mankind, I will not believe them. They have been speaking ill of themselves, and predicting worse of their posterity, from time immemorial; and yet, in the present year, 1823, when, if the one hundreth part of their gloomy forebodings had been realized, the earth must have become a Pandemonium, and men something worse than devils, (for devils they have been long ago, in the opinion of these charitable denunciators,) I am free to assert, that we have as many honest men, pretty women, healthy children, cultivated fields, convenient houses, elegant kinds of furniture, and comfortable clothes, as any generation of our ancestors ever possessed. “I am glad you are come back so soon.— My sister—your wife—was cast down in your absence. But I could not blame her—for I remember when Shanalow, my husband, went first to hunt, after our marriage, I was disconsolate, and dreamed every night of evil till he returned. He is now gone to his fathers, and shall never more return. But he died of a breast-wound fighting the Otawas, and our whole tribe has praised him. The warning which Tonnaleuka had given Charles to be circumspect in regard to the enemy, was not lost upon him. He employed Paddy Frazier as a scout to hover round the French station at Le Bœuf in order to watch their motions and give him the earliest intelligence of their design. He also kept four or five of his men constantly employed in ranging on horseback, those quarters of the country from which he could be suddenly attacked, while the whole of the remainder were busily engaged in digging trenches, and preparing long pointed stakes to fix in the ground to form their stoccade fortification. From the friendly Indians he at first rceived considerable aid in forwarding his works; but in a few days he began to perceive their ardour in his behalf to diminish; and suspecting that they had imbided some unfriendly feeling towards him, he thought proper to visit king Shingiss, and expostulate with him on the subject. “My persuading you to submit, at this time, to a residence in a dark subterraneous cell, is a proof how anxious I am for your safety. You will, no doubt, feel your situation lonely and disagreeable; but I hope the necessity for it will not be of long continuance; and, in the meanwhile, in order to relieve its tediousness as much as possible, I shall send you a supply of such books as I possess, best suited for your entertainment. You may be also assured, that our family will let you want for nothing in their power to afford you comfort. “We, the officers of the Virginia regiment, are highly sensible of the particular mark of distinction with which you have honoured us in returning your thanks for our behaviour in the late action; and cannot help testifying our grateful acknowledgments for your “high sense” of what we shall always esteem a duty to our country and the best of kings. “Dear Sir—The progress we have made in the transaction, in which your son and my niece were to be the parties disposed of, had induced me to hope for a speedy and final settlement of the affair; but I am sorry to say, that owing to some misadventure on the part of your son, the bargain is likely to fail on your side. My niece, which was the part of the concern for which I stood engaged, is still substantial and ready for delivery, when the equivalent shall be forthcoming, and the demand made.
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