University of Virginia Library

1. CHAPTER I.

The romance of history pertains to no human
annals more strikingly than to the early settlement
of Virginia. The mind of the reader at once
reverts to the names of Raleigh, Smith, and Pocahontas.
The traveller's memory pictures in a
moment the ivy-mantled ruin of old Jamestown.

About the year 16—, the city of Jamestown,
then the capital of Virginia, was by no means an
unapt representation of the British metropolis;
both being torn by contending factions, and alternately
subjected to the sway of the Roundheads and
Royalists.

First came the Cavaliers who fled hither after the
decapitation of their royal master and the dispersion
of his army, many of whom became permanent
settlers in the town or colony, and ever afterwards
influenced the character of the state.

These were the first founders of the aristocracy
which prevails in Virginia to this day; these were
the immediate ancestors of that generous, fox-hunting,
wine-drinking, duelling and reckless race of
men, which gives so distinct a character to Virginians
wherever they may be found.

A whole generation of these Cavaliers had
grown up in the colony during the interregnum,
and, throughout that long period, were tolerated
by those in authority as a class of probationers. The
Restoration was no sooner announced, however,
than they changed places with their late superiors
in authority. That stout old Cavalier and former
governor, Sir William Berkley (who had retired
to the shades of Accomack,) was now called by
the unanimous voice of the people, to reascend the
vice-regal chair.

Soon after his second installation came another
class of refugees, in the persons of Cromwell's veteran
soldiers themselves, a few of whom fled hither
on account of the distance from the court and
the magnitude of their offences against the reigning
powers. It will readily be perceived even by those
not conversant with the primitive history of the
Ancient Dominion, that these heterogeneous materials
of Roundheads and Cavaliers were not the best
calculated in the world to amalgamate in the social
circles.

Our story commences a short time after the death
of Cromwell and his son, and the restoration
of Charles the Second to the throne of his fathers.

The city of Jamestown was situated upon an island
in the Powhatan, about twenty leagues from
where that noble river empties its waters into those
of the Chesapeake Bay.

This island is long, flat on its surface, and
presents a semicircular margin to the view of one
approaching from the southeast; indeed it can
scarcely be seen that it is an island from the side
facing the river—the little branch which separates it
from the main land having doubtless worn its way
around by a long and gradual process.

At the period of which we write, the city presented
a very imposing and romantic appearance,
the landscape on that side of the river being shaded
in the back ground by the deep green foliage
of impenetrable forests standing in bold relief for
many a mile against the sky. Near the centre of
the stream, and nearly opposite the one just mentioned,
stands another piece of land surrounded by
water, known to this day by the very unromantic
name of Hog Island, and looking for all the
world like a nest for pirates, so impenetrable are the
trees, undergrowth, and shrubbery with which it is
thickly covered.

To prevent the sudden incursions of the treacherous
savage, the city was surrounded with a wall
or palisade, from the outside of which, at the
northwestern end, was thrown a wooden bridge, so
as to connect the first mentioned island with the
main land. A single street ran nearly parallel with

the river, extending over the upper half of the island
and divided in the centre by the public square.
On this were situated the Governor's mansion,
state house, church, and other public buildings.
Near where the line was broken by the space just
mentioned, stood two spacious tenements, facing
each other from opposite sides of the street. These
were the rival hotels of the ancient city; and, after
the fashion of that day, both had towering signposts
erected before their respective doors, shaped something
like a gibbet, upon which swung monotonously
in the wind two huge painted sign-boards.
These stood confronting each other like two angry
rivals—one bearing the insignia of the Berkeley
arms, by which name it was designated,—and the
other the Cross Keys, from which it also received
its cognomen. The Berkley Arms was the rendezvous
of all the Cavaliers of the colony, both
old and young, and but a short time preceding the
date of our story, was honoured as the place of assembly
for the House of Burgesses.

The opposite and rival establishment received its
patronage from the independent or republican
faction.

It was late in the month of May, and towards
the hour of twilight; the sun was just sinking behind
the long line of blue hills which form the
southwestern bank of the Powhatan, and the red
horizontal rays fell along the rich volume of swelling
waters dividing the city of Jamestown from

the hills beyond with a line of dazzling yet not oppressive
brilliance.

As the rich tints upon the water gradually faded
away, their place was supplied in some small degree
from large lanterns which now might be seen
running half way up the signposts of the two hotels
before mentioned, together with many lights of
less magnitude visible in the windows of the same
establishments and the various other houses within
reflecting distance of the scene. The melancholy
monotony of the rippling and murmuring waters
against the long graduated beach now also began to
give place to louder and more turbulent sounds, as
the negroes collected from their work to gossip
in the streets—Indians put off from the shore in
their canoes, or the young Cavaliers collected in
the Berkley Arms to discuss the news of the day or
perhaps a few bottles of the landlord's best. On
this occasion the long, well-scrubbed oaken table in
the centre of the “News Room” was graced by
the presence of some half dozen of the principal
youths of the city. In the centre of the table
stood the half-emptied bottle, and by each guest a
full bumper of wine, and all were eager to be
heard as the wine brightened their ideas and the
company received fresh accessions from without.

“Oh, here comes one who can give us some news
from the Governor's,” said the speaker pro tempore,
as a handsome and high-born youth of twenty-one
entered the room with a proud step and
haughty mien, and seated himself at the table as

a matter of course, calling for and filling up a wine
glass, and leisurely and carelessly throwing his cap
upon the seat and his arm over the back of the
next vacant chair, as he replied—“No, I bring
no news from the Governor's, but I mistake the
signs of the times if we do not soon hear news in
this quarter.”

All eyes were now turned upon the youth as he
tossed off his wine. He was generally known among
his companions by the familiar name of Frank
Beverly, and was a distant kinsman and adopted
son of the Governor, Sir William Berkley. News
was no sooner mentioned than our host, turning a
chair upon its balance, and resting his chin upon
his hand, was all attention.

“What is it, Frank?” inquired Philip Ludwell,
his most intimate friend and companion.

“Some mischief is brewing at the Cross Keys
to-night,” replied Frank, as the landlord moved
up his chair nearer to the table, more than ever on
the qui vive, when the Cross Keys became the subject
of discussion.

“There is no one in the Tap of the Keys, as I
can see from here,” said another of the party,
“and there is no light in any other portion of the
house except the apartments of the family.”

“They hide their lights under a bushel,” continued
Frank, with an affected nasal twang and a
smile of contempt. Taking his nearest companion
by the lappel of his doublet, and drawing him
gently to where the rival establishment was visible

through the door—“Do you not see a line of light
just perceptible along the margin of the upper window?
and if you will observe steadily for a moment,
you will see numerous dim shadows of moving
figures upon the almost impenetrable curtain
which is drawn over it.”

“Master Beverly is right, by old Noll's nose,”
said the landlord, as they all grouped together to
catch a glimpse of the objects mentioned.

“You may well swear by Noll's nose in this
case,” returned Frank, “for unless I am much
mistaken, those motions and gestures proceed from
some of his late followers; indeed I know it. I
was accidentally coming up the alley-way between
the Keys and the next house, when I saw four or
five of them cross the fence into the yard, and from
thence enter the house by the back door.”

“That's true, I'll swear,” said the host, “for
there they are, some dozen of them at least, and
I'm a Rumper if a soul has darkened his front door
this night. But couldn't you, Master Beverly, or
one of the other young gentry, just step to the
stout Sir William's, and make an affidavy to the
facts? My word for it, he'd soon be down upon
'em with a fiery facias or a capias, or some such or
another invention of the law.”

The youths all burst into a loud cachinnation at
the zeal of the landlord to unmask his rival, and
reseating themselves, called for another bottle,
which our friend of the Arms was not slow to produce,
by way of covering his retreat and hiding his

disinterested zeal. As they all refilled their glasses,
Frank waved his hand for silence. “Has any gentleman
here seen Mr. Nathaniel Bacon very
lately?”

“I have not—I have not,” replied each of the
party, and the interrogator then continued, “I
would give the best pair of spurs that ever graced
a Cavalier's heels to know whether his long absence
has had any thing to do with the getting up
of yonder dark conclave?”

Whether any of the party were Bacon's immediate
friends, or whether they suspected Frank's
motives in the case, we shall not undertake to determine
at present; but certain it is they were all
silent on the point except his intimate friend Ludwell,
who replied—“By St. George, Beverly, I
believe you are jealous of Bacon on account of the
favourable light in which he is said to stand in the
eyes of your fair little mistress.”

“If I thought that Virginia Fairfax would entertain
a moment's consideration for a person of
such doubtful parentage and more doubtful principles
as Mr. Nathaniel Bacon, the ill-advised protegé
of her father, I would forswear her for ever,
and dash this glass against the floor, with which I
now invite you all to join me in pledging her,—
What say you? Will you join me, one and all?
All rose at the invitation, and while standing with
glasses suspended midway to their lips, Ludwell
added the name of “the pretty Harriet Harrison.”
It was drunk with three times three, and then the

landlord was brought up by the collar of his jerken
between two of the liveliest of the party, and made
to tell the reckoning upon the table with his well-worn
chalk. Having settled the score, they proceeded
to decant full half the remaining bottle
into one of his own pint flagons, seized from his
shelves for that purpose. “Mine host” made sundry
equivocal contortions of the countenance, and
practised by anticipation several downward motions
of the muscles of deglutition, and then swallowed
the enormous potation without a groan.

“There now,” said Ludwell, “bear it always in
your remembrance that a like fate awaits you, whenever
your wine bears evidence of having passed
rather far into the state of acetous fermentation.”
As the party were now leaving the room in pairs,
linked arm in arm, “Stop! stop!” cried Beverly;
“I have one proposition to make before we
separate. It is this. You know that there is to be
a grand celebration the day after to-morrow, which
is the anniversary of the restoration. The whole to
conclude with a ball at the Governor's, to which I
feel myself authorized to say that you will all be
invited. Now I propose that we all go at different
hours to-morrow and engage the hand of the fair
Virginia for the first, second, third, fourth, fifth,
and sixth sets. So that when Mr. Nathaniel Bacon
returns, as he assuredly will, to claim her hand,
to which he seems to think he has a prescriptive
right, he will find no less than six different successful
competitors. What say you, gentlemen?”

The proposition was instantly acceded to by all
the party, and then the landlord of the Arms was
left to digest the pint of his own sour wine in solitude,
as he leaned his overgrown person against the
casings of the door and watched the youths as
they departed one by one in different directions to
their respective places of abode.

“Natty Bacon is a goodly youth, however,” he
muttered in soliloquy; “ha, ha, ha; but he shall
know of the plot if I can only clap eyes on him
before they see the young lady. Let me see; can
it be possible that Natty can have any thing to do
with yonder dark meeting of Noll's men? I'll not
believe it; he is too good a youth to meddle with
such a canting, snivelling set as are congregated
there. He always pays his reckoning like any
gentleman's son of them all; and a gentleman's son
I'll warrant he is, for all that no one knows his
father but Mr. Gideon Fairfax.”

The Cromwellians alluded to, who were supposed
by the youths to be assembled at the Cross
Keys, were a few of the late Protector's veteran
soldiers, and were the most desperate, reckless and
restless of the republicans who, as has been already
mentioned, had fled to Jamestown after the restoration.
These soldiers were unfitted for any kind of
business, and generally lived upon the precarious
hospitality of those of their own party who had
settled themselves as industrious citizens of the
new community.

The names of the leaders of these veteran soldiers
and furious bigots were Berkinhead, Worley,
Goodenough and Proudfit; and of these the reader
will hear more anon.