University of Virginia Library

2. CHAPTER II.

Men and boys had rushed from the fortress
together, to greet the new comers, and few remained
save the women; of whom not a few,
particularly of the younger individuals, were as
eager to satisfy their curiosity as their fathers
and brothers. The disorderly spirit had spread
even among the daughters of the commandant, to
the great concern of his spouse; who, although
originally of a degree somewhat humbler even
than his own, had a much more elevated sense of
the dignity of his commission as a colonel of militia,
and a due consciousness of the necessity of
adapting her manners to her rank. She stood on
the porch of her cabin, which had the merit of
being larger than any other in the fort, maintaining
order among some half dozen or more lasses,
the oldest scarce exceeding seventeen, whom she
endeavoured to range in a row, to receive the
expected guests in state, though every moment
some one or other might be seen edging away
from her side, as if in the act of deserting her
altogether.

“Out on you, you flirting critturs!” said she,
her indignation provoked, and her sense of propriety
shocked by such unworthy behaviour:—
“Stop thar, you Nell! whar you going? You
Sally, you Phœbe, you Jane, and the rest of you!
ha'nt you no better idea of what's manners for a
Cunnel's daughters? I'm ashamed of you,—to

run ramping and tearing after the strannge men
thar, like tom-boys, or any common person's
daughters! Laws! do remember your father's a
Cunnel in the milishy, and set down in the porch
here on the bench, like genteel young ladies; or
stand up, if you like that better, and wait till your
father, Cunnel Bruce that is, brings up the captains:
one of 'em 's a rale army captain, with
epaulets and broad-sword, with a chance of
money, and an uncommon handsome sister,—rale
genteel people from old Virginnee: and I'm glad
of it,—it's so seldom you sees any body but common
persons come to Kentucky. Do behave
yourselves: thar's Telie Doe thar at the loom
don't think so much as turning her eyes around;
she's a pattern for you.”

“Law, mother!” said the eldest of the daughters,
bridling with disdain, “I reckon I know how
to behave myself as well as Telie Doe, or any
other girl in the settlement;”—a declaration
echoed and re-echoed by her sisters, all of whom
bent their eyes towards a corner of the ample
porch, where, busied with a rude loom, fashioned
perhaps by the axe and knife of the militia colonel
himself, on which she was weaving a coarse cloth
from the fibres of the flax-nettle, sat a female
somewhat younger than the oldest of the sisters,
and doubtless of a more humble degree, as was
shown by the labour in which she was engaged,
while the others seemed to enjoy a holyday, and
by her coarse brown garments, worn at a moment
when the fair Bruces were flaunting in their best
bibs and tuckers, the same having been put on not
more in honour of the exiles, whose coming had
been announced the day before, than out of compliment
to the young men of the settlement, who

were wont to assemble on such occasions to
gather the latest news from the States.

The pattern of good manners thus referred to,
was as unconscious of the compliment bestowed
upon her by the worthy Mrs. Bruce as of the
glances of disdain it drew from the daughters,
being apparently at that moment too much occupied
with her work to think of any thing else;
nor did she lift up her eyes until, the conversation
having been resumed between the mother and
daughters, one of the latter demanded `what was
the name of that army captain, that was so rich
and great, of whom her mother had been talking?'

“Captain Roland Forrester,” replied the latter;
at the sound of which name the maiden at the
loom started and looked up with an air of fright,
that caused exceeding diversion among the others.
“Look at Telie Doe!” they cried, laughing: “you
can't speak above your breath but she thinks you
are speaking to her; and, sure, you can't speak to
her, but she looks as if she would jump out of her
skin, and run away for her dear life!”

And so, indeed, the girl did appear for a moment,
looking as wild and terrified as the animal
whose name she bore, when the first bay of the
deer-hound startles her in the deep woodland pastures,
rolling her eyes, catching her breath convulsively,
shivering, and, in short, betraying a
degree of agitation that would have appeared
unaccountable to a stranger; though, as it caused
more amusement than surprise among the merry
Bruces, it was but fair to suppose that it sprung
from constitutional nervousness, or the sudden
interruption of her meditations. As she started
up in her confusion, rolling her eyes from one
laughing maiden to another, her very trepidation
imparted an interest to her features, which

were in themselves pretty enough, though not so
much so as to attract observation, when in a state
of rest. Then it was that the observer might see,
or fancy he saw, a world of latent expression in
her wild dark eyes, and trace the workings of
a quick and sensitive spirit, whose existence would
have been otherwise unsuspected, in the tremulous
movement of her lips. And then, too, one
might have been struck with the exquisite contour
of a slight figure, which even the coarse garments,
spun, and perhaps shaped, by her own
hands, could not entirely conceal. At such times
of excitement, there was something in her appearance
both striking and singular,—Indian-like,
one might almost have said. Such an epithet
might have been borne out by the wildness of her
looks, the darkness of her eyes, the simple arrangement
of her coal-black hair, which, instead
of being confined by comb or fillet, was twisted
round a thorn cut from the nearest locust-tree,
and by the smallness of her stature; though the
lightness and European tinge of her complexion
must have instantly disproved the idea.

Her discomposure dispelled from the bosoms of
her companions all the little resentment produced
by the matron's invidious comparison; and each
now did her best to increase it by cries of, “Jump,
Telie, the Indians will catch you!” “Take care,
Telie, Tom Bruce will kiss you!” “Run, Telie,
the dog will bite you!” and other expressions of a
like alarming nature, which, if they did not augment
her terror, divided and distracted her attention,
till, quite bewildered, she stared now on one,
now on the other, and at each mischievous assault,
started, and trembled, and gasped for breath,
in inexpressible confusion. It was fortunate for
her that this species of baiting, which, from the

spirit and skill with which her youthful tormentors
pursued it, seemed no uncommon infliction,
the reforming mother considered to be, at least at
that particular moment, unworthy the daughters
of a colonel in the militia.

“Do behave yourselves, you ungenteel critturs,”
said she; “Phœbe Bruce, you're old enough to
know better; don't expose yourself before stranngers.
Thar they come now; thar's Cunnel Bruce
that is, talking to Captain Forrester that is, and
a right-down soldier-looking captain he is, too. I
wonder whar's his cocked hat, and feather, and
goold epaulets? Thar's his big broad-sword,
and—but, Lord above us, ar'nt his sister a beauty!
Any man in Kentucky will be proud of her; but,
I warrant me, she'll take to nothing under a cunnel!”

The young misses ceased their sport to stare at
the strangers, and even Telie Doe, pattern of propriety
as she was, had no sooner recovered her
equanimity than she turned her eyes from the
loom and bent them eagerly upon the train now
entering through the main gate, gazing long and
earnestly upon the young captain and the fair
Edith, who, with the colonel of militia, and a
fourth individual, parted from it, and rode up to
the porch. The fourth person, a sober and substantial-looking
borderer, in a huge blanket-coat
and slouched hat, the latter stuck round with
bucks' tails, was the nominal captain of the party.
He conversed a moment with Forrester and the
commandant, and then, being given in charge by
the latter to his son Tom, who was hallooed from
the crowd for this purpose, he rode away, leaving
the colonel to do the honours to his second in
command. These the colonel executed with much
courtesy and gallantry, if not with grace, leaping

from his horse with unexpected activity, and assisting
Edith to dismount, which he effected by
taking her in his arms and whisking her from the
saddle with as little apparent effort as though he
were handling an infant.

“Welcome, my beautiful young lady,” said he,
giving her another hearty shake of the hand:
“H'yar's a house that shall shelter you; though
thar's not much can be said of it, except that it is
safe and wholesome. H'yar's my old lady too, and
my daughters, that will make much of you; and
as for my sons, thar's not a brute of 'em that
won't fight for you; but th' ar' all busy stowing
away the strangers; and, I reckon, they think it
ar'nt manners to show themselves to a young
lady, while she's making acquaintance with the
women.”

With that the gallant colonel presented the fair
stranger to his wife and daughters, the latter of
whom, a little daunted at first by her appearance,
as a being superior in degree to the ordinary
race of mortals, but quickly re-assured by her
frank and easy deportment, loaded her with caresses,
and carried her into the house, to improve
the few hours allowed to make her acquaintance,
and to assist her in changing her apparel, for
which the means were furnished from sundry bags
and packages, that the elder of the two negro-men,
the only immediate followers of her kinsmen,
took from the back of a pack-horse. The
mother of the Bruces thought it advisable to
follow them, to see, perhaps, in person, that they
conducted themselves towards their guest as a
colonel's daughter should.

None of the females remained on the porch
save Telie, the girl of the loom, who, too humble
or too timid to seek the acquaintance of the stranger

lady, like the others, had been overlooked in
the bustle, and now pursued her labour with but
little notice from those who remained.

“And now, colonel,” said the young officer, declining
the offer of refreshments made by his host,
“allow me, like a true soldier, to proceed to the
business with which you heard our commander,
Major Johnson, charge me. To-morrow we resume
our journey to the Falls. I should gladly
myself, for Miss Forrester's sake, consent to remain
with you a few days, to recruit our strength
a little. But that cannot be. Our men are resolved
to push on without delay; and as I have no
authority to restrain them, I must e'en accompany
them.”

“Well,” said Colonel Bruce, “if it must be, it
must, and I'm not the brute to say No to you. But
lord, captain, I should be glad to have you stay a
month or two, war it only to have a long talk
about my old friend, the brave old major. And
thar's your sister, captain,—lord, sir, she would
be the pet of the family, and would help my wife
teach the girls manners. Lord!” he continued,
laughing, “you 've no idea what grand notions
have got into the old woman's head about the way
of behaving, ever since it war that the Governor
of Virginnie sent me a cunnel's commission. She
thinks I ought to w'ar a cocked hat and goold
swabs, and put on a blue coat instead of a leather
shirt; but I wonder how soon I'd see the end of it,
out h'yar in the bushes? And then, as for the
girls, why thar's no end of the lessons she gives
them;—and thar's my Jenny,—that's the youngest,—came
blubbering up the other day, saying,
`she believed mother intended even to stop their
licking at the sugar-troughs, she was gitting so

great and so proud!' Howsomever, women will
be women, and thar's the end of it.”

To this philosophic remark the officer of inferior
degree bowed acquiescence, and recalling his
host's attention to the subject of most interest to
himself, requested to be informed what difficulties
or dangers might be apprehended on the further
route to the Falls of Ohio.

“Why, none on 'arth that I know of,” said
Bruce; “you 've as cl'ar and broad a trace before
you as man and beast could make—a buffalo-street[1]
through the canes; and, when thar's open woods,
blazes as thick as stars, and horse-tracks still
thicker: thar war more than a thousand settlers
have travelled it this year already. As for danngers,
captain, why I reckon thar's none to think
on. Thar war a good chance of whooping and
howling about Bear's Grass, last year, and some
hard fighting; but I h'ar nothing of Injuns thar
this y'ar. But you leave some of your people
h'yar: what force do you tote down to the Falls
to-morrow?”

“Twenty-seven guns in all; but several quite
too young to face an enemy.”

“Thar's no trusting to years, in a matter of
fighting!” said the Kentuckian. “Thar's my son
Tom, that killed his brute at fourteen; but, I remember,
I told you that story. Howsomever, I
hold thar's no Injuns on the road; and if you
should meet any, why, it will be down about
Bear's Grass, or the Forks of Salt, whar you can
keep your eyes open, and whar the settlements are
so thick, it is easy taking cover. No, no, captain,
the fighting this year is all on the north side of
Kentucky.”

“Yet, I believe,” said Roland, “there have been
no troubles there since the defeat of Captain Estill
on Little Mountain, and of Holder at that place,
—what do you call it?”

“Upper Blue Licks of Licking,” said Bruce;
“and war'nt they troubles enough for a season?
Two Kentucky captains (and one of them a south-side
man, too,) whipped in fa'r fight, and by nothing
better than brutish Injuns!”

“They were sad affairs, indeed; and the numbers
of white men murdered made them still more
shocking.”

“The murdering,” said the gallant Colonel
Bruce, “is nothing, sir: it is the shame of the
thumping that makes one feel ambitious; thar's
the thing no Kentuckian can stand, sir. To be
murdered, whar thar's ten Injuns to one white
man, is nothing; but whar it comes to being
trounced by equal numbers, why thar's the thing
not to be tolerated. Howsomever, captain, we're
no worse off in Kentucky than our neighbours.
Thar's them five hundred Pennsylvanians, that
went out in June, under old Cunnel Crawford from
Pittsburg, agin the brutes of Sandusky, war
more ridiculously whipped by old Captain Pipe,
the Delaware, thar's no denying.”

“What!” said Roland, “was Crawford's company
beaten?”

“Beaten!” said the Kentuckian, opening his
eyes; “cut off the b, and say the savages made a
dinner of 'em, and you'll be nearer the true history
of the matter. It's but two months ago; and
so I suppose the news of the affa'r had n't got
into East Virginnie when you started. Well, captain,
the long and short of it is,—the cunnel war
beaten and exterminated, and that on a hard run
from the fight he had hunted hard after. How many

ever got back safe again to Pittsburg, I never
could rightly h'ar; but what I know is, that thar
war dozens of prisoners beaten to death by the
squaws and children, and that old Cunnel Crawford
himself war put to the double torture and
roasted alive; and, I reckon, if he war'nt eaten, it
war only because he war too old to be tender.”

“Horrible!” said the young soldier, muttering
half to himself, though not in tones so low but
that the Kentuckian caught their import; “and I
must expose my poor Edith to fall into the power
of such fiends and monsters!”

“Ay, captain,” said Bruce, “thar's the thing
that sticks most in the heart of them that live in
the wilderness and have wives and daughters;—to
think of their falling into the hands of the brutes,
who murder and scalp a woman just as readily as
a man. As to their torturing them, that's not so
certain, but the brutes are n't a bit too good for
it; and I did h'ar of their burning one poor woman
at Sandusky.[2] But now, captain, if you are
anxious to have the young lady, your sister, in
safety, h'yar's the place to stick up your tent-poles,
h'yar in this very settlement, whar the Injuns
never trouble us, never coming within ten
miles of us. Thar's as good land here as on
Bear's Grass; and we shall be glad of your company.
It is not often we have a rich man to take
luck among us. Howsomever, I won't deceive
you, if you will go to the Ohio; I hold, thar's no
danger on the trace for either man or woman.”

“My good friend,” said Roland, “you seem to

labour under two errors in respect to me, which
it is fitting I should correct. In the first place, the
lady whom you have several times called, I know
not why, my sister, claims no such near relationship,
being only my cousin.”

“Why, sure!” said the colonel, “some one told
me so, and thar's a strong family likeness.”

“There should be,” said the youth, “since our
fathers were twin brothers, and resembled each
other in all particulars, in body, in mind, and, as
I may say, in fortune. They were alike in their
lives, alike also in their deaths: they fell together,
struck down by the same cannon-ball, at the
bombardment of Norfolk, seven years ago.”

“May I never see a scalp,” said the Kentuckian,
warmly grasping the young man's hand, “if I
don't honour you the more for boasting such a
father and such uncles! You come of the true
stock, captain, thar's no denying; and my brave
old major's estates have fallen into the right
hands; for, if thar's any believing the news the
last band of emigrants brought of you here, thar
war no braver officer in Lee's corps, nor in the
whole Virginnie line, than young Captain Forrester.”

“Here,” said Roland, looking as if what he said
cost him a painful effort, “lies the second error,—
your considering me, as you manifestly do, the
heir of your old major, my uncle Roland,—which
I am not.”

“Lord!” said the worthy Bruce, “he was the
richest man in Prince-George, and he had thousands
of fat acres in the Valley, the best in all
Fincastle, as I know very well, for I war a Fincastle
man myself; and thar war my old friend
Braxley,—he war a lieutenant under the major at
Braddock's, and afterwards his steward, and manger,

and lawyer-like,—who used to come over the
Ridge, to see after them. But I see how it is; he
left all to the young lady?”

“Not an acre,” said Roland.

“What!” said the Kentuckian: “he left no
children of his own. Who then is the heir?”

“Your old friend, as you called him, Richard
Braxley.—And hence you see,” continued the
youth, as if desirous to change the conversation,
“that I come to Kentucky, an adventurer and
fortune-hunter, like other emigrants, to locate
lands under proclamation-warrants and bounty-grants,
to fell trees, raise corn, shoot bisons and
Indians, and, in general, to do any thing else that
can be required of a good Virginian or good Kentuckian.”

It was evidently the captain's wish now to leave
altogether the subject on which he had thought it
incumbent to acquaint his host with so much; but
the worthy Bruce was not so easily satisfied; and
not conceiving there was any peculiar impropriety
in indulging curiosity in matters relating to
his old major, however distasteful that curiosity
might prove to his guest, he succeeded in drawing
from the reluctant young man many more particulars
of his story; which, as they have an important
connexion with the events it is our object
to narrate, we must be pardoned for briefly noticing.

Major Roland Forrester, the uncle and godfather
of the young soldier, and the representative
of one of the most ancient and affluent families
on James River, (for by this trivial name Virginians
are content to designate the noble Powhatan,)
was the eldest of three brothers, of whom
the two younger, as was often the case under the
ancien régime in Virginia, were left, at the death

of their parent, to shift for themselves; while the
eldest son inherited the undivided princely estate
of his ancestors. This was at the period when
that contest of principle with power, which finally
resulted in the separation of the American Colonies
from the parent State, first began to agitate
the minds of the good planters of Virginia, in
common with the people of all the other colonies.
Men had already begun to take sides, in feeling,
as in argument; and, as usual, interest had, no
doubt, its full share in directing and confirming
the predilections of individuals. These circumstances,—the
regular succession of the eldest-born
to the paternal estate, and the necessity imposed
on the others of carving out their own fortunes,—
had, perhaps, their influence in determining the
political bias of the brothers, and preparing them
for contention, when the increase of party feeling
and the clash of interests between the government
abroad and the colonies at home, called upon
all men to avow their principles and take their
stands. It was as natural that the one should retain
affection and reverence for the institutions
which had made him rich and distinguished, as
that the younger brothers, who had suffered under
them a deprivation of their natural rights, should
declare for a system of government and laws
more liberal and equitable in their character and
operation. At all events, and be the cause of difference
what it might, when the storm of the Revolution
burst over the land, the brothers were
found arrayed on opposite sides, the two younger,
the fathers of Roland and Edith, instantly taking
up arms in the popular cause, while nothing,
perhaps, but helpless feebleness and bodily infirmities,
the results of wounds received in Braddock's
war, throughout which he had fought at
the head of a battalion of “Buckskins,” or Virginia
Rangers, prevented the elder brother from
arming as zealously in the cause of his king.
Fierce, uncompromising, and vindictive, however,
in his temper, he never forgave his brothers the
bold and active part they both took in the contest;
and it was his resentment, perhaps, more than natural
affection for his neglected offspring, that
caused him to defeat his brothers' hopes of succession
to his estates, (he being himself unmarried,)
by executing a will in favour of an illegitimate
child, an infant daughter, whom he drew
from concealment and acknowledged as his offspring.
This child, however, was soon removed,
having been burned to death in the house of its
foster-mother. But its decease effected little or no
change in his feelings towards his brothers; who,
pursuing the principles they had so early avowed,
were among the first to take arms among the patriots
of Virginia, and fell, as Roland had said, at
Norfolk, leaving each an orphan child, Roland
then a youth of fifteen, and Edith a child of ten,
to the mercy of the elder brother. Their death
effected what perhaps their prayers never would
have done. The stern loyalist took the orphans
to his bosom, cherished and loved them, or at least
appeared to do so, and often avowed his intention
to make them his heirs. But it was Roland's ill
fate to provoke his ire, as Roland's father had
done before him. The death of that father, one
of the earliest martyrs to liberty, had created in
his youthful mind a strong abhorrence of every
thing British and loyal; and after presuming a
dozen times or more to disclose and defend his
hatred, he put the coping-stone to his audacity, by
suddenly leaving his uncle's house, two years after
he had been received into it, and galloping away,
a cornet in one of the companies of the first regiment
of horse which Virginia sent to the armies
of Congress. He never more saw his uncle. He
cared little for his wrath, or its effects; if disinherited
himself, it pleased his imagination to think
he had enriched his gentle cousin. But his uncle
carried his resentment further than he had dreamed,
or indeed any one else who had beheld the
show of affection he continued to the orphan
Edith, up to the last moment of his existence. He
died in October of the preceding year, a week before
the capitulation at York-town, and almost
within the sound of the guns that proclaimed the
fall of the cause he had so loyally espoused. From
this place of victory Roland departed to seek his
kinswoman. He found her in the house,—not of
his fathers, but of a stranger,—herself a destitute
and homeless orphan. No will appeared to pronounce
her the mistress of the wealth he had
himself rejected; but, in place of it, the original
testament in favour of Major Forrester's own
child, was produced by Braxley, his confidential
friend and attorney, who, by it, was appointed
both executor of the estate and trustee to the individual
in whose favour it was constructed.

The production of such a testament, so many
years after the death of the girl, caused no little
astonishment; but this was still further increased
by what followed, the aforesaid Braxley instantly
taking possession of the whole estate in the name
of the heiress, who, he made formal deposition,
was, to the best of his belief, yet alive, and would
appear to claim her inheritance. In support of this
extraordinary averment, he produced, or professed
himself ready to produce, evidence to show that
Forrester's child, instead of being burned to death
as was believed, had actually been trepanned and

carried away by persons to him unknown, the
burning of the house of her foster-mother having
been devised and exceuted merely to give colour
to the story of her death. Who were the perpetrators
of such an outrage, and for what purpose
it had been devised, he affected to be ignorant;
though he threw out many hints and surmises of
a character more painful to Edith and Roland
than even the loss of the property. These hints
Roland could not persuade himself to repeat to the
curious Kentuckian, since they went, in fact, to
charge his own father, and Edith's, with the crime
of having themselves concealed the child, for the
purpose of removing the only bar to their expectations
of succession.

Whatever might be thought of this singular
story, it gained some believers, and was enough
in the hands of Braxley, a man of great address
and resolution, and, withal, a lawyer, to enable
him to laugh to scorn the feeble efforts made by
the impoverished Roland to bring it to the test of
legal arbitrement. Despairing, in fact, of his cause,
after a few trials had convinced him of his impotence,
and perhaps himself almost believing the
tale to be true, the young man gave up the contest,
and directed his thoughts to the condition of
his cousin Edith; who, upon the above circumstances
being made known, had received a warm
invitation to the house and protection of her only
female relative, a married lady, whose husband
had, two years before, emigrated to the Falls of
Ohio, where he was now a person of considerable
importance. This invitation determined the course
to be pursued. The young man instantly resigned
his commission, and converting the little property
that remained into articles necessary to the emigrant,
turned his face to the boundless West, and

with his helpless kinswoman at his side, plunged
at once into the forest. A home for Edith in the
house of a relative was the first object of his desires;
his second, as he had already mentioned,
was to lay the foundation for the fortunes of both,
by locating lands on proclamation-warrants, as
they were called, (being grants of western lands
made to the colonists who had served the crown
in the provincial French wars,) which the two had
inherited from their fathers, besides the bounty-grants
earned by himself in virtue of military service
rendered in the army of his native state.

There was something in the condition of the
young and almost friendless adventurers to interest
the feelings of the hardy Kentuckian; but they
were affected still more strongly by the generous
self-sacrifice, as it might be called, which the
young soldier was evidently making for his kinswoman,
for whom he had given up an honourable
profession and his hopes of fame and distinction,
to live a life of inglorious toil in the desert. He
gave the youth another energetic grasp of hand,
and said, with uncommon emphasis,—

“Hark'ee, Captain, my lad, I love and honour
ye; and I could say no more, if you war my own
natteral born father! As to that 'ar' Richard
Braxley, whom I call'd my old friend, you must
know, it war an old custom I have of calling a
man a friend who war only an acquaintance; for
I am for being friendly to all men that are white
and honest, and no Injuns. Now, I do hold that
Braxley to be a rascal,—a precocious rascal, sir!
and, I rather reckon, thar war lying and villiany at
the bottom of that will; and I hope you'll live to
see the truth of it.”

The sympathy felt by the Kentuckian in the
story was experienced in a still stronger degree

by Telie Doe, the girl of the loom, who, little noticed,
if at all, by the two, sat apparently occupied
with her work, yet drinking in every word
uttered by the young soldier with a deep and eager
interest, until Roland by chance looking round, beheld
her large eyes fastened upon him, with a
wild, sorrowful look, of which, however, she herself
seemed quite unconscious, that greatly surprised
him. The Kentuckian observing her at the
same time, called to her,—“What, Telie, my girl,
are you working upon a holyday? You should be
dressed like the others, and making friends with
the strannger lady. And so git away with you now,
and make yourself handsome, and don't stand thar
looking as if the gentleman would eat you.”

Upon being thus accosted, the girl exhibited
much of the same terror and flurry of spirits that
she had shown on a previous occasion; but obeying
the order at last, she left the loom, and stole
timorously into the house.

“A qu'ar crittur she, poor thing!” said Bruce,
looking after her commiseratingly, “and a strannger
might think her no more nor half-witted. But she
has sense enough, poor crittur! and, I reckon, is
just as smart, if she war not so humble and skittish,
as any of my own daughters.”

“What,” said Roland, “is she not then your
child?”

“No, no,” replied Bruce, shaking his head, “a
poor crittur, of no manner of kin whatever. Her
father war an old friend, or acquaintance-like; for,
rat it, I won't own friendship for any such apostatized
villians, no how:—but the man war taken by
the Shawnees; and so as thar war none to befriend
her, and she war but a little chit no bigger
nor my hand, I took to her myself and raised her.
But the worst of it is, and that's what makes her

so wild and skeary, her father, Abel Doe, turned
Injun himself, like Girty, Elliot, and the rest of
them refugee scoundrels you've h'ard of. Now
that's enough, you see, to make the poor thing sad
and frightful; for Abel Doe is a rogue, thar's no
denying, and every body hates and cusses him, as
is but his due: and it's natteral, now she's growing
old enough to be ashamed of him, she should be
ashamed of herself too,—though thar's nothing
but her father to charge against her, poor creatur'.
A bad thing for her, to have an Injunized father;
for if it war'nt for him, I reckon my son Tom, the
brute, would take to her, and marry her.”

“Poor creature, indeed!” muttered Roland to
himself, contrasting in thought the condition of
this helpless and deserted girl with that of his own
unfortunate kinswoman, and sighing to acknowledge
that it was still more forlorn and pitiable.

His sympathy was, however, but short-lived,
being interrupted on the instant by a loud uproar
of voices from the gate of the stockade, sounding
half in mirth, half in triumph; while the junior
Bruce was seen approaching the porch, looking
the very messenger of good news.