University of Virginia Library

5. CHAPTER V.
AN EXCURSION ON HORSEBACK.

Soon after breakfast a number of horses were brought round to the front
entrance of the house, to a gravelled court, separated from the box-bound
flower beds before described, so as to admit horses and carriages to the very
portico of the mansion.

The horses were of various sorts and degrees; some fine generous animals,
others common cobs, while the rear was brought up by ponies and dogs in
great abundance.

This was the daily custom of the establishment, at least every fair day.
The Governor himself rode a fine imported war-horse, of fine proportions and
admirably drilled. He stood at the porch door with his high erect head, waiting
for his master, with as much pride and gaiety as if he had been a thinking
animal. Various were the jokes and rejoinders passed among the grooms and
stable boys, as they stood there, each one holding a horse by the bridle.

Any one must have visited a Virginia, family party in the country to form
any idea what an essential ingredient this morning excursion is in their
domestic pleasure, and how highly it is enjoyed by young and old. We shall
perhaps have occasion, before we part with our readers, to trace this and many
other customs, which have survived the revolution to our British ancestry.
At length the party issued from the house. Every one at liberty to consult
his own fancy as to his company, unless some previous expedition had been
such as a visit to some natural curiosity or to church on Sunday.

Accordingly Kate on a fine pacing poney and Dr. Evylin by her side, had
already set off in the direction of the fisherman's hut. The old gentleman
was quite gallant, and managed his sensible looking little poney cavalier
fashion.

It may seem strange that Bernard Moore should thus suffer the old gentleman
to monopolize the attention of a young lady, for whose favors he was generally
understood to be paying the most anxious and solicitous court; but the
fact is, she herself had sent him off cantering in an opposite direction. Let
our fair readers be not alarmed; he had not already proposed and been rejected.
The case stood thus: Kate had expressed some regret that she could
not accompany her brother a mile or two on his way to the capital, owing to
her engagement with the Doctor. Bernard, in the most self-sacrificing and disinterested
manner imaginable, proposed to be her substitute, which offer was
most thankfully accepted. He and John were old class-mates and once very
intimate, and she desired of all things to see that intimacy renewed, now that
Bernard had returned from his foreign tour, acknowledgely one of the first
young men in the colony.

Strange to say, the youth was so blinded by his self-doubting mood, as
never once to reflect that this was the very highest compliment which she
could, in the then position of affairs, pay to him.

He and John had also now cantered off in quite a different style from Kate
and her venerable old beau. They made the fire fly from their horses heels, as
they careered, like winged messengers, over the road to Yorktown and Williamsburg.

A very few moments ride at that gait brought them to the door of
the tavern in the centre of the former, and Bernard was quite surprised to see
John alight and give his bridle to the servant, for he knew not that he so purposed
on setting out. He was invited to do likewise, which of course he did;
not knowing the business which detained his friend. That was soon explained;
for John, instantly upon setting foot within the bar-room, ordered a bottle
of spirits. It was with no little astonishment that Bernard saw him pour out
and gulph down a tumbler of brandy and water, half and half, enough to have
staggered any youth at a single blow. But he was still more astonished at the
wonderful transformation, which this short and simple process effected. His
old friend was himself again: he now chatted cheerfully, rode alongside of
his companion without restraint and without effort to leave him; and above
all, he appeared the highly intellectual and gifted man he had once known
him to be. He spoke freely of European and colonial affairs, and took now
an interest in many little things which he seemed not at all to notice before.
Moore conversed with him freely, and at length fell into stories of former days
and youthful frolics, until the woods rang again with their merriment. Having
thus wrought up his subject to a proper key, as he supposed, purely by
his own address, he ventured to ask him for an explanation of his late singular
and inexplicable mood; but John passed it off in the slightingest manner
imaginable; said it was nothing but a fit of the blue-devils—a constitutional
infirmity, to which he was subject.

“But how comes it John,” said Moore, most innocently, “that you were
not subject to these when we were so long and so constantly together. I do
not recollect of your being once so afflicted; during those ever happy and
memorable school-boy days, you were the life and soul of every party. If
any two started together upon an expedition and you were left behind, it was
always—`come let's get Spotswood, there's no sport without him.' ”

“True—true Bernard, but those happy hours of idleness do not last forever,
indeed I presume that the change which you see in me is but the natural
one of thoughtless boyhood, into the higher and more care-giving responsibilities
of man's estate.”

Thus they conversed; Moore pleased and amused at the half playful—half
melancholy mood of his old friend, but not more than half convinced, by his
reasoning, backed, as it was, by the change of mood itself—then that ungodly
drink of brandy—that the son and heir of the Governor of Virginia should
alight at a common tavern and thus quaff spirits like a sailor—it was inexplicable
to him, but he finally set it down in his own mind to the effect of the
military life in which his father was now attempting to train him. He therefore
shook hands with his reanimated friend, as he supposed, with scarce
concealed impatience, and galloped back to carry news of the pleasing change
to Kate. Little did he imagine the real cause of that change and how very
short a time it would last, or he would not thus exulting have sought an opportunity
of returning his credentials. He met the Governor and Dr. Blair
riding along the road at a staid and sober gait, and seemingly engaged in a
conversation little less desponding than that from which he supposed he had
just rescued poor John. He did not pursue them to see whether they too
would be thus suddenly transformed by a glass of brandy and water. He
was rather rejoiced than otherwise, for it assured him that this Excellency
would not command his attendance, and thus detain him from the point at
which he was aiming. Alas! true love never did run smooth; and Mr.
Bernard Moore, after all his haste to join Kate and the Doctor, only arrived to
find the position he sought already occupied by another young gallant from
the capital, not less highly gifted by nature and fortune than himself. It was
Mr. Kit Carter, a scion of the genuine aristocratic stock, and heir expectant
of the splendid seat of Shirley. Moore was too highly schooled in all the

courtesies of conventional breeding to shew chagrin at such an acquisition
to the company at the mansion house, as Mr. Carter undoubtedly was; but
we may say at once that he was disappointed in not being able to communicate
the result of his diplomacy. It would have taken a shrewd and sagacious
observer of human nature to have discovered even this, beneath all the
courtly grace which they manifested. Carter and he met for the first time
since the return of the latter, and that meeting was most warm and cordial.
This was magnanimous, certainly, in Bernard; for, from their school days
they had been rivals for the favor of Kate. The good old Doctor had not felt
pulses so long and not yet be able to see a little into matters as they now
stood, accordingly the old gentleman, with a sly smile, reigned in his pony
and dropped in the rear, to muse upon one not less lovely and admired than
her whose lively chat he had surrendered. Not a lady-love, nor even a wife—
for the old gentleman was a widower—it was his lone and only daughter,
almost a recluse within the walls of his own house at Williamsburg; yet so
young, so highly cultivated, and, withal, so fascinating in every personal
grace, she was fast becoming a devotee in religion. The good Doctor did
not regret this, but he was naturally one of those calm, cheerful, philosophic
minds, that are enabled to appreciate all that is excellent in our holy religion,
without surrendering up the choicest blessing of social life—a cheerful and
happy spirit. But we anticipate, the Doctor's lone idol will be introduced to
the reader in due progress of our story.

In the meantime Kate was like powder between flint and steel; every
spark elicited, fell upon her.

An encounter of wits between two highly endowed young men, and paying
court to the same lady, is a study to those curious in psychological matters.
But we will leave the whole party to dismount and dress for dinner,
while we take a peep into other things having relation to the main thread of
our narrative; until then, we bid our readers a cheerful and hearty goodnight.