University of Virginia Library

7. CHAPTER VII.

Richard II.

That which captain Willoughby had said in seeming
pleasantry he seriously meditated. The idea of passing
another night in the Hut, supported by only six men, with
more than ten times that number besieging him, and with
all the secrets of his defences known, through the disaffection
of his retainers, was, to the last degree, painful to him.
Had his own life, alone, been at risk, military pride might
have tempted him to remain; but his charge was far too
precious to be exposed on account of considerations so vain.

No sooner, therefore, was the breakfast over, than the
captain summoned Joyce to a consultation on the contemplated
movement. The interview took place in the library,
whither the serjeant repaired, on receiving his superior's
orders. As to the party without, no apprehension was felt,
so long as the sentinels were even moderately vigilant, and
the day lasted.

“I suppose, serjeant,” commenced captain Willoughby,
“a soldier of your experience is not to be taught what is the
next resort of a commanding officer, when he finds himself
unable to make good his ground against his enemy in
front?”

“It is to retreat, your honour. The road that cannot be
passed, must be turned.”

“You have judged rightly. It is now my intention to
evacuate the Hut, and to try our luck on a march to the
rear. A retreat, skilfully executed, is a creditable thing;
and any step appears preferable to exposing the dear beings
in the other room to the dangers of a night assault.”

Joyce appeared struck with the suggestion; though, if one
might have judged from the expression of his countenance,
far from favourably. He reflected a moment ere he answered.

“Did your honour send for me,” he then inquired, “to
issue orders for this retreat, or was it your pleasure to hear
anything I might have to say about it?”

“The last — I shall give no orders, until I know your
opinion of the measure.”

“It is as much the duty of an inferior to speak his mind
freely, when he is called for an opinion, captain Willoughby,
as it is to obey in silence, when he gets nothing but orders.
According to my views of the matter, we shall do better to
stand our ground, and try to make good the house against
these vagabonds, than to trust to the woods.”

“Of course you have your reasons for this opinion,
Joyce?”

“Certainly, your honour. In the first place, I suppose it
to be against the rules of the art of war to evacuate a place
that is well provisioned, without standing an assault. This
we have not yet done. It is true, sir, that our ranks are
thinned by desertions; but I never heard of a garrisoned

town, or a garrisoned house, capitulating on account of a
few deserters; and, I take it, evacuation is only the next
step before capitulation.”

“But our desertions, Joyce, have not been few, but many.
Three times as many have left us, if we include our other
losses, as remain. It matters not whence the loss proceeds,
so long as it is a loss.”

“A retreat, with women and baggage, is always a ticklish
operation, your honour, especially if an enemy is pressing
your rear! Then we have a wilderness before us, and the
ladies could hardly hold out for so long a march as that
from this place to the Mohawk; short of which river they
will hardly be as safe as they are at present.”

“I have had no such march in view, Joyce. You know
there is a comfortable hut, only a mile from this very spot,
on the mountain side, where we commenced a clearing for
a sheep-pasture, only three summers since. The field is in
rich grass; and, could we once reach the cabin, and manage
to drive a cow or two up there, we might remain a month
in security. As for provisions and clothes, we could carry
enough on our backs to serve us all several weeks; especially
if assisted by the cows.”

“I 'm glad your honour has thought of this idea,” said
the serjeant, his face brightening as he listened; “it will be
a beautiful operation to fall back on that position, when we
can hold out no longer in this. The want of some such
arrangement has been my only objection to this post, captain
Willoughby; for, we have always seemed to me, out
here in the wilderness, like a regiment drawn up with a
ravine or a swamp in its rear.”

“I am glad to find you relishing the movement for any
cause, serjeant. It is my intention at present to make the
necessary arrangements to evacuate the Hut, while it is
tight; and, as soon as it is dark, to retreat by the gates, the
palisades, and the rivulet—How now, Jamie? You look
as if there were news to communicate?”

Jamie Allen, in truth, had entered at that instant in so
much haste as to have overlooked the customary ceremony
of sending in his name, or even of knocking.

“News!” repeated the mason, with a sort of wondering
smile; “and it 's just that I 've come to bring. Wad ye

think it, baith, gentlemen, that our people are in their ain
cabins ag'in, boiling their pots, and frying their pork, a' the
same as if the valley was in a state of tranquillity, and we
so many lairds waiting for them to come and do our pleasure!”

“I do not understand you, Jamie — whom do you mean
by `our people?”'

“Sure, just the desairters; Joel, and the miller, and Michael,
and the rest.”

“And the cabins — and the pots — and the pork — it is
gibberish to me.”

“I hae what ye English ca' an aiccent, I know; but, in
my judgment, captain Willoughby, the words may be comprehended
without a dictionary. It 's just that Joel Strides,
and Daniel the miller, and the rest o' them that fleed, the
past night, have gane into their ain abodes, and have lighted
their fires, and put over their pots and kettles, and set up
their domestic habitudes, a' the same as if this Beaver Dam
was ain o' the pairks o' Lonnon!”

“The devil they have! Should this be the case, serjeant,
our sortie may be made at an earlier hour than that mentioned.
I never will submit to such an insult.”

Captain Willoughby was too much aroused to waste many
words; and, seizing his hat, he proceeded forthwith to take
a look for himself. The stage, or gallery on the roofs, offering
the best view, in a minute he and his two companions
were on it.

“There; ye 'll be seein' a smoke in Joel's habitation,
with your own een; and, yon is anither, in the dwelling of
his cousin Seth,” said Jamie, pointing in the direction he
named.

“Smoke there is, of a certainty; but the Indians may
have lighted fires in the kitchen, to do their own cooking.
This looks like investing us, serjeant, rather more closely
than the fellows have done before.”

“I rather think not, your honour—Jamie is right, or my
eyes do not know a man from a woman. That is certainly
a female in the garden of Joel, and I 'll engage it 's Phœbe,
pulling onions for his craving stomach, the scoundrel!”

Captain Willoughby never moved without his little glass,
and it was soon levelled at the object mentioned.

“By Jupiter, you are right, Joyce” — he cried. “It is
Phœbe, though the hussy is coolly weeding, not culling the
onions! Ay — and now I see Joel himself! The rascal is
examining some hoes, with as much philosophy as if he
were master of them, and all near them. This is a most
singular situation to be in!”

This last remark was altogether just. The situation of
those in the Hut was now singular indeed. Further examination
showed that every cabin had its tenant, no one of the
party that remained within the palisades being a householder.
By using the glass, and pointing it, in succession, at the
different dwellings, the captain in due time detected the presence
of nearly every one of the deserters. Not a man of
them all, in fact, was missing, Mike alone excepted. There
they were, with their wives and children, in quiet possession
of their different habitations. Nor was this all; the business
of the valley seemed as much on their minds as had been
their practice for years. Cows were milked, the swine were
fed, poultry was called and cared for, and each household
was also making the customary preparations for the morning
meal.

So absorbed was the captain with this extraordinary scene,
that he remained an hour on the staging, watching the course
of events. The breakfasts were soon over, having been
later than common, and a little hurried; then commenced
the more important occupations of the day. A field was
already half ploughed, in preparation for a crop of winter
grain; thither Joel himself proceeded, with the necessary
cattle, accompanied by the labourers who usually aided him
in that particular branch of husbandry. Three ploughs
were soon at work, with as much regularity and order as
if nothing had occurred to disturb the tranquillity of the
valley. The axes of the wood-choppers were next heard,
coming out of the forest, cutting fuel for the approaching
winter; and a half-finished ditch had its workmen also,
who were soon busy casting up the soil, and fashioning
their trench. In a word, all the suspended toil was renewed
with perfect system and order.

“This beats the devil himself, Joyce!” said the captain,
after a half-hour of total silence. “Here are all these fellows
at work as cooly as if I had just given them their

tasks, and twice as diligently. Their unusual industry is a
bad symptom of itself!”

“Your honour will remark one circumstance. Not a
rascal of them all comes within the fair range of a musket;
for, as to throwing away ammunition at such distances, it
would be clearly unmilitary, and might be altogether useless.”

“I have half a mind to scatter them with a volley”—said
the captain, doubtingly. “Bullets would take effect among
those ploughmen, could they only be made to hit.”

“And amang the cattle, too,” observed the Scotsman,
who had an eye on the more economical part of the movement,
as well as on that which was military. “A ball
would slay a horse as well as a man in such a skairmish.”

“This is true enough, Jamie; and it is not exactly the
sort of warfare I could wish, to be firing at men who were
so lately my friends. I do not see, Joyce, that the rascals
have any arms with them?”

“Not a musket, sir. I noticed that, when Joel first detailed
his detachments. Can it be possible that the savages
have retired?”

“Not they; else would Mr. Strides and his friends have
gone with them. No, serjeant, there is a deep plan to lead
us into some sort of ambush in this affair, and we will be on
the look-out for them.”

Joyce stood contemplating the scene for some time, in
profound silence, when he approached the captain formally,
and made the usual military salute; a ceremony he had
punctiliously observed, on all proper occasions, since the
garrison might be said to be placed under martial law.

“If it's your honour's pleasure,” he said, “I will detail
a detachment, and go out and bring in two or three of these
deserters; by which means we shall get into their secrets.”

“A detachment, Joyce!” answered the captain, eyeing
his subordinate a little curiously — “What troops do you
propose to tell-off for the service?”

“Why, your honour, there's corporal Allen and old
Pliny off duty; I think the thing might be done with them,
if your honour would have the condescension to order corporal
Blodget, with the two other blacks, to form as a supporting
party, under the cover of one of the fences.”

“A disposition of my force that would leave captain Willoughby
for a garrison! I thank you, serjeant, for your offer
and gallantry, but prudence will not permit it. We may
set down Strides and his companions as so many knaves,
and—”

“That may ye!” cried Mike's well-known voice, from
the scuttle that opened into the garrets, directly in front of
which the two old soldiers were conversing — “That may
ye, and no har-r-m done the trut', or justice, or for that
matther, meself. Och! If I had me will of the blackguards,
every rogue of 'em should be bound hand and fut and laid
under that pratthy wather-fall, you at the mill, until his sins
was washed out of him. Would there be confessions then?
—That would there; and sich letting out of sacrets as would
satisfy the conscience of a hog!”

By the time Mike had got through this sentiment he was
on the staging, where he stood hitching up his nether garment,
with a meaning grin on his face that gave a peculiar
expression of heavy cunning to the massive jaw and capacious
mouth, blended with an honesty and good-nature that
the well-meaning fellow was seldom without when he addressed
any of the captain's family. Joyce glanced at the
captain, expecting orders to seize the returned run-away;
but his superior read at once good faith in the expression of
his old retainer's countenance.

“You have occasioned us a good deal of surprise, O'Hearn,
on more accounts than one,” observed the captain, who
thought it prudent to assume more sternness of manner than
his feelings might have actually warranted. “You have
not only gone off yourself, but you have suffered your prisoner
to escape with you. Then your manner of getting
into the house requires an explanation. I shall hear what
you have to say before I make up my mind as to your conduct.”

“Is it spake I will?—That will I, and as long as it plase
yer honour to listen. Och! Isn't that Saucy Nick a quare
one? Divil burn me if I thinks the likes of him is to be
found in all Ameriky, full as it is of Injins and saucy fellies!
Well, now, I suppose, sarjeant, ye've set me down
as sthriding off with Misther Joel and his likes, if ye was to
open yer heart, and spake yer thrue mind?”

“You have been marked for a deserter, O'Hearn, and
one, too, that deserted from post.”

“Post! Had I been that, I shouldn't have stirred, and
ye'd be wanting in the news I bring ye from the Majjor,
and Mr. Woods, and the savages, and the rest of the varmints.”

“My son! — Is this possible, Michael? Have you seen
him, or can you tell us anything of his state?”

Mike now assumed a manner of mysterious importance,
laying a finger on his nose, and pointing towards the sentinel
and Jamie.

“It's the sarjeant that I considers as one of the family,”
said the county Leitrim-man, when his pantomime was
through, “but it isn't dacent to be bawling out sacrets
through a whole nighbourhood; and then, as for Ould
Nick — or Saucy Nick, or whatever ye calls him — Och!
isn't he a pratthy Injin! Ye'll mar-r-ch t'rough Ameriky,
and never see his aiquel!”

“This will never do, O'Hearn. Whatever you have to
say must be said clearly, and in the simplest manner. Follow
to the library, where I will hear your report. Joyce,
you will accompany us.”

“Let him come, if he wishes to hear wonderful achaivements!”
answered Mike, making way for the captain to
descend the steps; then following himself, talking as he
went. “He'll niver brag of his campaigns ag'in to the
likes of me, seeing that I've outdone him, ten — ay, forty
times, and boot. Och! that Nick's a divil, and no har-r-m
said!”

“In the first place, O'Hearn,” resumed the captain, as
soon as the three were alone in the library — “you must
explain your own desertion.”

“Me!—Desart! Sure, it isn't run away from yer honour,
and the Missus, and Miss Beuly, and pratthy Miss Maud,
and the child, that's yer honour's m'aning?”

This was said with so much nature and truth, that the
captain had not the heart to repeat the question, though
Joyce's more drilled feelings were less moved. The first even
felt a tear springing to his eye, and he no longer distrusted
the Irishman's fidelity, as unaccountable as his conduct did
and must seem to his cooler judgment. But Mike's sensitiveness

had taken the alarm, and it was only to be appeased
by explanations.

“Yer honour's not sp'aking when I questions ye on that
same?” he resumed, doubtingly.

“Why, Mike, to be sincere, it did look a little suspicious
when you not only went off yourself, but you let the Indian
go off with you.”

“Did it?”—said Mike, musing—“No, I don't allow that,
seein' that the intent and object was good. And, then, I
never took the Injin wid me; but 'twas I, meself, that went
wid him.”

“I rather think, your honour,” said Joyce, smiling, “we'll
put O'Hearn's name in its old place on the roster, and make
no mark against him at pay-day.”

“I think it will turn out so, Joyce. We must have patience,
too, and let Mike tell his story in his own way.”

“Is it tell a story, will I? Ah!—Nick's the cr'ature for
that same! See, he has given me foor bits of sticks, every
one of which is to tell a story, in its own way. This is the
first; and it manes let the captain into the sacret of your
retrait; and how you got out of the windie, and how you
comes near to breaking yer neck by a fall becaase of the
fut's slipping; and how ye wint down the roof by a rope,
the divil a bit fastening it to yer neck, but houlding it in yer
hand with sich a grip as if 'twere the fait' of the church
itself; and how Nick led ye to the hole out of which ye
bot' wint, as if ye had been two cats going t'rough a door!”

Mike stopped to grin and look wise, as he recounted the
manner of the escape, the outlines of which, however, were
sufficiently well known to his auditors before he began.

“Throw away that stick, now, and let us know where
this hole is, and what you mean by it.”

“No”—answered Mike, looking at the stick, in a doubting
manner—“I'll not t'row it away, wid yer honour's l'ave,
'till I've told ye how we got into the brook, forenent the
forest, and waded up to the woods, where we was all the
same as if we had been two bits of clover tops hid in a haymow.
That Nick is a cr'ature at consailment!”

“Go on,” said the captain, patiently, knowing that there
was no use in hurrying one of Mike's peculiar mode of
communicating his thoughts. “What came next?”

“That will I; and the r'ason comes next, as is seen by
this oder stick. And, so, Nick and meself was in the chaplain's
room all alone, and n'ither of us had any mind to
dhrink; Nick becaase he was a prisoner and felt crass, and
full of dignity like; and meself becaase I was a sentinel;
and sarjeant Joyce, there, had tould me, the Lord knows
how often, that if I did my duty well, I might come to be a
corporal, which was next in rank to himself; barring, too,
that I was a sentinel, and a drunken sentinel is a disgrace
to a man, sowl and body, and musket.”

“And so neither of you drank?”—put in the captain, by
way of a reminder.

“For that same r'ason, and one betther still, as we had
nothin' to dhrink. Well, says Nick — `Mike,' says he —
`you like cap'in, and Missus, and Miss Beuly, and Miss
Maud, and the babby?' `Divil burn ye, Nick,' says I, `why
do ye ask so foolish a question? Is it likes ye would know?
Well — then just ask yerself if you likes yer own kith and
kin, and ye've got yer answer.' ”

“And Nick made his proposal, on getting this answer,”
interrupted the captain, “which was—”

“Here it is, on the stick. `Well,' says Nick, says he—
`run away wid Nick, and see Majjor; bring back news.
Nick cap'in friend, but cap'in don't know it—won't believe'
—Fait', I can't tell yer honour all Nick said, in his own
manner; and so, wid yer l'ave, I'll just tell it in my own
way.”

“Any way, Mike, so that you do but tell it.”

“Nick 's a cr'ature! His idee was for us two to get out
of the windie, and up on the platform, and to take the bed-cord,
and other things, and slide down upon the ground —
and we did it! As sure as yer honour and the sarjeant is
there, we did that same, and no bones broke! `Well,' says
I, `Nick, ye're here, sure enough, but how do you mane to
get out of here? Is it climb the palisades ye will, and be
shot by a sentinel?'—if there was one, which there wasn't,
yer honour, seeing that all had run away—`or do ye mane
to stay here,' says I, `and be taken a prisoner of war ag'in,
in which case ye'll be two prisoners, seein' that ye've been
taken wonst already, will ye Nick?' says I. So Nick never
spoke, but he held up his finger, and made a sign for me to

follow, as follow I did; and we just crept through the palisade,
and a mhighty phratty walk we had of it, alang the
meadies, and t'rough the lanes, the rest of the way.”

“You crept through the palisades, Mike! There is no
outlet of sufficient size.”

“I admits the hole is a tight squaze, but 'twill answer.
And then it's just as good for an inlet as it is for an outlet,
seein' that I came t'rough it this very marnin'. Och! Nick's
a cr'ature! And how d'ye think that hole comes there,
barring all oversights in setting up the sticks?”

“It has not been made intentionally, I should hope,
O'Hearn?”

“'Twas made by Joel, and that by just sawing off a post,
and forcin' out a pin or two, so that the palisade works
like a door. Och! it's nately contrived, and it manes mischief.”

“This must be looked to, at once,” cried the captain;
“lead the way, Mike, and show us the spot.”

As the Irishman was nothing loth, all three were soon in
the court, whence Mike led the way through the gate, round
to the point where the stockade came near the cliffs, on the
eastern side of the buildings. This was the spot where the
path that led down to the spring swept along the defences,
and was on the very route by which the captain contemplated
retreating, as well as on that by which Maud had
entered the Hut, the night of the invasion. At a convenient
place, a palisade had been sawed off, so low in the ground
that the sods, which had been cut and were moveable, concealed
the injury, while the heads of the pins that ought to
have bound the timber to the cross-piece, were in their holes,
leaving everything apparently secure. On removing the
sods, and pushing the timber aside, the captain ascertained
that a man might easily pass without the stockade. As this
corner was the most retired within the works, there was no
longer any doubt that the hole had been used by all the deserters,
including the women and children. In what manner
it became known to Nick, however, still remained matter
of conjecture.

Orders were about to be given to secure this passage,
when it occurred to the captain it might possibly be of use
in effecting his own retreat. With this object in view, then,

he hastened away from the place, lest any wandering eye
without might detect his presence near it, and conjecture the
cause. On returning to the library, the examination of Mike
was resumed.

As the reader must be greatly puzzled with the county
Leitrim-man's manner of expressing himself, we shall relate
the substance of what he now uttered, for the sake of brevity.
It would seem that Nick had succeeded in persuading
Mike, first, that he, the Tuscarora, was a fast friend of the
captain and his family, confined by the former, in consequence
of a misconception of the real state of the Indian's
feelings, much to the detriment of all their interests; and
that no better service could be rendered the Willoughbys
than to let Nick depart, and for the Irishman to go with
him. Mike, however, had not the slightest idea of desertion,
the motive which prevailed on him to quit the Hut being a
desire to see the major, and, if possible, to help him escape.
As soon as this expectation was placed before his eyes, Mike
became a convert to the Indian's wishes. Like all exceedingly
zealous men, the Irishman had an itching propensity
to be doing, and he was filled with a sort of boyish delight
at the prospect of effecting a great service to those whom he
so well loved, without their knowing it. Such was the history
of Michael's seeming desertion; that of what occurred
after he quitted the works remains to be related.

The Tuscarora led his companion out of the Hut, within
half an hour after they had been left alone together, in the
room of Mr. Woods. As this was subsequently to Joel's
flight, Nick, in anticipation of this event, chose to lie in
ambush a short time, in order to ascertain whether the defection
was likely to go any further. Satisfied on this head,
he quietly retired towards the mill. After making a sufficient
dêtour to avoid being seen from the house, Nick gave himself
no trouble about getting into the woods, or of practising
any of the expedients of a time of real danger, as had been
done by all of the deserters; but he walked leisurely across
the meadows, until he struck the highway, along which he
proceeded forthwith to the rocks. All this was done in a
way that showed he felt himself at home, and that he had
no apprehensions of falling into an ambush. It might have
arisen from his familiarity with the ground; or, it might

have proceeded from the consciousness that he was approaching
friends, instead of enemies.

At the rocks, however, Nick did not deem it wise to lead
Mike any further, without some preliminary caution. The
white man was concealed in one of the clefts, therefore,
while the Indian pursued his way alone. The latter was
absent an hour; at the end of that time he returned, and,
after giving Mike a great many cautions about silence and
prudence, he led him to the cabin of the miller, in the buttery
of which Robert Willoughby was confined. To this buttery
there was a window; but, as it was so small as to prevent
escape, no sentinel had been placed on the outside of the
building. For his own comfort, too, and in order to possess
his narrow lodgings to himself, the major had given a species
of parole, by which he was bound to remain in duresse,
until the rising of the next sun. Owing to these two causes,
Nick had been enabled to approach the window, and to hold
communications with the prisoner. This achieved, he returned
to the rocks, and led Mike to the same spot.

Major Willoughby had not been able to write much,
in consequence of the darkness. That which he communicated,
accordingly, had to pass through the fiery ordeal of
the Irishman's brains. As a matter of course it did not
come with particular lucidity, though Mike did succeed in
making his auditors comprehend this much.

The major was substantially well treated, though intimations
had been given that he would be considered as a spy.
Escape seemed next to impossible; still, he should not easily
abandon the hope. From all he had seen, the party was
one of that irresponsible character that would render capitulation
exceedingly hazardous, and he advised his father to
hold out to the last. In a military point of view, he considered
his captors as contemptible, being without a head;
though many of the men — the savages in particular — appeared
to be ferocious and reckless. The whole party was
guarded in discourse, and little was said in English, though
he was convinced that many more whites were present than
he had at first believed. Mr. Woods he had not seen, nor
did he know anything of his arrest or detention.

This much Mike succeeded in making the captain comprehend,
though a great deal was lost through the singular

confusion that prevailed in the mind of the messenger. Mike,
however, had still another communication, which we reserve
for the ears of the person to whom it was especially sent.

This news produced a pause in captain Willoughby's determination.
Some of the fire of youth awoke within him,
and he debated with himself on the possibility of making a
sortie, and of liberating his son, as a step preliminary to
victory; or, at least, to a successful retreat. Acquainted
with every foot of the ground, which had singular facilities
for a step so bold, the project found favour in his eyes each
minute, and soon became fixed.