22. CHAPTER XXII.
HORSE-SHOE ENCAMPMENT.
Strange that neither the Governor or any of his subordinates in command
had yet discovered the true reason of the disastrous condition of their cavalry;
but they had so long dwelt along the sandy shores of the Chesapeake and the
alluvial soil of the rivers, that they were not aware of the effects of the hard,
stony ground upon their horses' feet. A general council of “the order,” was
summoned after breakfast to take into consideration the condition of the army
and what it behooved them to do, under the circumstances. Various opinions
were expressed. Some were for abandoning the horses altogether, and continuing
their route on foot, and some were for remaining in their present
encampment until their horses could be sufficiently recruited to prosecute the
journey. To this latter opinion the Governor was inclined. Lee, who had
been in consultation with his staunch friend and counsellor Jarvis, stated that
the latter had predicted this very state of things in his hearing, and he attributed
it entirely to the want of shoes upon their horses' feet, to protect them
from the pebbles and small stones, which made them sore by the constant
wear and friction of travel. Jarvis was summoned and required to explain
the matter. Several of the lame horses were led up before the marquee,
where they were assembled, and Joe, taking up one of the poor animal's feet,
commenced quite an erudite lecture upon the complicated structure of that
admirably contrived apparatus. True, the scout indulged in no high sounding
technicalities, nor was he acquainted with the art of farriery, as laid down in
books, but he understood the true philosophy of the subject, upon which he had
undertaken to enlarge. By way of enforcing his views he brought his own
pony which he had shod himself, and holding up his foot to the astonished
young gentlemen pointed out to them how well he could stand the pressure
of his knife handle rudely thrust against the frog, and from which all the
other animals had shrunk with pain. It now became a subject of anxious
deliberation, what they were to do? Any one could now see that little would
be gained by rest alone, for no sooner would they have recommenced the
journey, than the same difficulty would occur again with ten fold aggravation
as the route yet to be traversed was of course more stony and precipitous.
Besides they were every day approaching nearer and nearer to the country of
the hostile Indians, where the Governor's peaceful tributary and missionary
systems had scarcely penetrated.
The only alternatives left seemed either to abandon the expedition and go
home, or to abandon their horses and pursue the route on foot. In their secret
hearts many preferred the former and hoped it would be forced upon the old
chief, whether he would or not, but no one dared to make such a proposition.
He must, however, have discovered their secret leaning that way, for he told
them that any one who was home-sick, or who felt disheartened by such obstacles
as they had already encountered might return; as for himself he intended
to scale the mountain if he left his bones bleeching on the top. All responded
to his hardy perseverance, whatever some of them may have felt, while the
scout could scarcely refrain from raising his coon skin in triumph over those
of his comrades, who had confidently predicted to him their speedy return.
What was to be done? That was the question; and one which, small as it
may appear at this distant day of graduated and McAdamized roads, was of
vital interest to them. To shoe several hundred horses, without the proper
artificers to do the work seemed such a chimera of the brain, that when the
Governor proposed it, he was answered by a general shout of laughter, in
which he joined as heartily as the youngest of them. Nevertheless, he said
be would show them that it could be done, and that he would set the example
himself. Accordingly, he ordered a shed to be immediately erected for a
blacksmith shop—into which the scout was installed as chief artificer. Joe
said that his father had once bound him apprentice to the trade of a blacksmith,
but that he was always mending old gun locks and pistols on his own hook,
for which his master licked him so often, that he ran away before his time
was half out. He expressed his sorrow, that he could not foresee at the
time, that he would have the Governor and all the young gentry, one day
under him as apprentices, in which case he would have acted very differently.
However, he went manfully to work, and really turned out horse-shoes, which
would have been creditable to his old master.
During the first day, most of the youngsters stood around and watched
Jarvis teaching the Governor of Virginia, the art of horse-shoeing. Frequently
he required the assistance of the sledge hammer, which the old
veteran would suffer no one wield but himself, and most gallantly did the
old hero of many battles bare his brawny arms to wield the ponderous instrument.
More than once Joe had to let go his read hot iron, and fall back
against his rude forge, and laugh out right. He said he had never expected
to see the day when the Governor would be striker to him.
“My old master,” continued he, “used to tell me that the devil would make
me striker to him when he cotch'd me, but I reckon he missed the figure.”
By the second day, the Governor could make a very passable horseshoe,
and Jarvis nailed a set of his own making upon his old war-horse. When
the job was completed, the Governor mounted him and cantered round the
encampment, his whole face flushed with the double effects of his triumph and
his work at the forge. The young men were no longer sceptical, but turned
in, each one to shoe his own charger. Some were not gifted with mechanical
tact and ingenuity, while others fully equalled the Governor in skill. The
former were allowed to hire Jarvis, and such ingenious soldiers as he had
pressed into his service, to do the work for them, by which operation the
scout lined his pockets handsomely. He declared to Frank Lee that he had
never possessed as much money in all his life, as he made in that one week—
but we anticipate. A new difficulty now presented itself, for all the iron,
which the foresight of the scout had provided, had given out, and great numbers
of horses remained yet to be shod. In this emergency, some one luckily
remembered the wagons left at Germana, and a detachment was immediately
despatched with the horses already provided, to bring the tire from off the
wheels, and such other pieces of the metal as they could gather from them.
This expedient furnished an abundant supply, and the army was rapidly
recruiting its strength and spirits, while the horses were as fresh as the day
they left the capital. Game was found in great abundance, and the tables
of our adventurers smoked each day of their unwonted labors with haunches
of venison, which their sovereign might have envied, and truth to say, they
did not render tardy justice to the good things set before them. Celebrated
as the Cavaliers of Virginia were for their love of good eating, the members
of the Tramontane Order surpassed all the feats of their forefathers; never
were such trencher men seen; venison steaks and buffalo humps disappeared
with marvellous rapidity. Nor was the convivial glass wanting—a few bottles
here and there had been preserved from their previous wassail, which
were generously produced on these now joyful evenings. Songs and toasts
once more enlivened the festive board.
On the last night but one of the horse shoe encampment, the Governor
invited the whole of the order to sup with him, and as his stock of wines
were known to be almost untouched, most cheerfully was the summons
answered. Long tables—rude, it is true—were set out under a fine grove of
oaks, from the branches of which were hung such lamps as could be found
through the camp.
About eight o'clock the Governor gave the signal for the onslaught, taking
the head of the table himself, and assigning the second post of honor to Frank
Lee. On the right hand of the giver of the feast, sat the Rev. Hugh Jones,
“Chaplain to the General Assembly of His Majesty's Colony in Virginia,”
as he styles himself in the work which he has left behind him, and in which
he gives a short account of the “Tramontane Expedition,” though the work
was professedly written for other purposes.
[5]
The old hero felt that he had achieved a greater triumph over surrounding
obstacles, than when he led the charge at Blenheim, and he was consequently
neither chary of his wine nor his wit. After the saddles of venison, wild
turkeys, and pheasants, had all disappeared, the Governor led the way to the
festivities of the evening by his standing toast, as in duty bound, now altered
of course by the ascension of a male Sovereign to the throne. It was varied
also by the services which he supposed himself to be rendering to his royal
master. Every one rose up with him, as he filled his glass and gave, “Our
new Sovereign! may the `Tramontane Order' push the boundaries of his empire
in America to the banks of the Mississippi.”[6]
It was drunk with three times three. It must be recollected by our readers,
however, that they supposed the Mississippi to be just beyond the mountains
before them.
Strange enough, that both Columbus and Spotswood, the one the pioneer
across the ocean, and the other across the mountains, should have both been
led on to their grand achievements by a geographical illusion—the one, in
search of the Indies, discovering America—and the other, in search of the
Mississippi, discovering the fairest portion of what is now the United States.
The discoveries of the latter may fairly claim that much, for he was in reality
the great pioneer, who first led the chivalrous youths of the Old Dominion
upon those tramontane pilgrimages, which have already been so gloriously
commemorated upon the plains of San Jacinto, by one of the same peripatetie
race, and which we confidently predict will never rest this side of the gates of
Mexico. Never was there an individual so chiefly instrumental in the great
onward movements, which have since so distinguished our country and our
countrymen, and whose memory has been suffered to fall into such utter forgetfulness,
as the far-sighted soldier and statesman, to whose name we have
attempted to offer an humble tribute. How vast were the results of this expedition!
While we write, the Congress of the United States is endeavoring to
distribute those very lands to which his hardy enterprise and indomitable gallantry
first led the way. We hear of Daniel Boon, and other hardy western
pioneers of a later day, but the name of the real first conqueror and disoverer
of that vast and almost boundless country is never mentioned, except by historians,
and by them, in the most meagre and unsatisfactory manner.
It is well that the old chief could not foresee the ingratitude which awaited
him even in his life-time, and doubly fortunate that he could not see that to
which we have alluded, else the festivities of the evening might have been
marred. As it was, every thing went on swimmingly, toast succeeded toast
in rapid succession, and the conversation began now to grasp the objects of
the enterprise, as something almost within their reach. The Governor told
them that he intended to offer a brilliant prize to the gentleman who should
first plant the British standard upon the summit of the great Apalachee. This
was the first faint adumbration of the Golden Horse Shoe which we can discover.
It was received with glowing enthusiasm, and every youth professed
himself ready to die in the attempt. The old tactician knew well how to fire
the ardor of the gallant youths under his command, and having brought their
spirits and their emulation to that point which he desired, and for which the
feast was given, he retired with his reverend friend, and left the youngsters
to their unrestrained merriment.
After the veteran had withdrawn, his health was drunk with great enthusiasm,
but it is doubtful whether the toast would have gone down so unanimously
on the night of their arrival at the “horse-shoe encampment,” so
disheartened were many of the young cavaliers, and so fickle is popular
opinion. A toast to the lasses they had left behind them, was received and
drunk with much feeling. As the Chairman (Frank Lee) resumed his seat,
he discovered the scout leaning against a tree near, with his bare and brawny
arms folded, while they, as well as his face, were black with the smoke of his
smithy, which he had just deserted for the sounds of merriment in his near
neighborhood. Lee led him forward, and placed a flagon of undiluted
spirits in his hand, which he would have quaffed without much preface, but
that many youths gathered around him, and sang out for a toast. “A toast
from the scout!—A toast from the scout!” was carried by acclamation. Joe
scratched “his inheritance,” as he called his red flock, and advanced one foot,
but his ideas did not seem to flow so readily under the process, as the sparks
from under his herculean hammer. At length, however, his eye was seen to
sparkle, and his fingers to cease the cultivation of “his inheritance,” at which
demonstration the chairman thumped the table with his knife for silence and
attention. “Gents,” said Joe, “as you've drunk to the gals you have left
behind you, here's to the gals we have got before us,” slapping poor Hall upon
the back, who was just sitting before him, leaning his head upon his hand.
Hall could not resist such an appeal, especially when urged by all the company
to join the scout in a bumper. Thus passed the evening, or rather the night,
for they kept up the revelry until a late hour, and then separated in a good
humor with themselves and all the world.
