 | CHAPTER XXVI. The new purchase, or, Seven and a half years in the far West |  |
26. CHAPTER XXVI.
Had I but served my God with half the zeal
I serv'd my King, he would not in mine age
Have left me naked to mine enemies.”
Is the way of a transgressor hard? that of a politician is
not much easier. He is usually a slave first, and a timeserver
afterwards. In the Purchase the sovereign people
wishes to serve them, had better first take a trip to Egypt
and learn the art of doing brick without straw. In certain
districts, fitness, mental, and moral is a secondary qualification
in a candidate; he must be a clever fellow in the broad
republican sense. For instance, he must lend his saddle
to a neighbor, and ride himself, bareback; he must buy
other people's produce for cash, and sell his own for trade
or on credit; and, on certain solemn occasions, he must appear
without a coat, and in domestic muslin shirt-sleeves:
his overalls hung by half a suspender, and a portion of the
above named muslin curiously pouched between his vest and
inexpressibles. His face must wreathe, or wrinkle, with
endless smiles; and his ungloved hand be ready for a
pump-handle shake with friend and foe alike: because a
foe often presents his hand to ascertain if “the fellow aint
too darn'd proud to shake hands with a poor man!”
Is the man of honour invited to eat? he asks no questions
for conscience' sake, or the stomach's—the two things being
in many people the same. Is he asked to stay all night? he
never wonders where they will find him a bed—there being
only three in the room, and the family consisting of one old
man, and one old woman, two grown sons, three daughters,
and some little folks—he naturally lies down on the puncheons
with his certificate wallet for a bolster. Or does
he share a bed with two others?—then he recollects it is a
free country, and if one man needs votes, another needs
brimstone. And why turn up a nose at an oderiferous blanket?—has
a bed any right, natural or political, to more than
one sheet?—and why should not the sheet be under and
the blanket above you?—Let go your nose! has not a long
succession of “your dear fellow-citizens” slept in the
same bed, and between the same articles; and what, pray,
are you better than they to wish clean things? “Yes—
but I'm nearly stifled.” Tut man!—you'll never mind it
Not it: men of honour are not so easily destroyed.
Would a candidate cough?—he puts no hand up, nor
turns aside his head. Must the nose be blown?—he draws
out no handkerchief. Would he spit?—he neither goes to
the door, nor uses a perfumed cambric, like a first-rate
clergyman. Why?—because all such observances are regarded
as signs of pride, and if you despise them not, your
election is hopeless.
“But, Mr. Carlton, we might transmit something offensive
to a gentleman's garments.”
“Well, what then! he will certainly some time or other
return your favour. Be satisfied, my dear Mr. Eastman, it
is only by giving and taking all sorts of matters out there,
you can, in some districts, ever secure your election.”
“And do any politicians endure all this!”
Certainly: and persons who aspire to rule ought surely
first to serve. Many remarkable men in Congress, be it
known, had a long training in some Purchase—their meannesses
are not of toadstool growth, if they are of toadstool
flavour.
Reader! are you religious? Then do write a tract to
be scattered any where on election days; and here is your
text or theme:—“Give diligence to make your calling and
election sure.” Among other matters, set forth how it requires
not one fourth the labour, toil, anxiety, watchfulness
and none of the base sacrifices of time, comfort, and independence
to save a man's soul as to win an election; and,
how the worldly honour is not worth after all even the worldly
price paid for it, and much less, the immortal soul usually
thrown in with the rest to boot.
We, of course, did not do some things, and hence Mr.
Glenville was soon permitted to remain in private life;
still we were compelled, for electioneering objects, to attend
this summer, several Log-Rollings. Folks in the
most, not more than two dozen in a whole year; for, in
lieu of such, every militia muster, cabin-raising, scow-launching,
shooting-match, log-rolling and so forth, was
virtually a political assembly, where our great men and
their partisans made stump speeches, and read certificates.
For the benefit of our surplus young lawyers, and other
ambitious gentlemen who have neither trades nor stores,
and who are desirous of rising above the political horizon,
and are meditating to emigrate to the west, we shall here
give a full account of one Grand Log-Rolling, which Glenville
and Co., attended this season.
On reaching the place, we found a large and motley assembly
of fellow creatures—men, women, boys, girls, horses,
oxen, dogs—all of whom, and which, came either to
aid or listen, except the dogs, and these came simply out
of philanthropy. They spent the time mainly in wagging
their tails, barking at rolling logs, and thrusting in their
noses wherever there was a pretext for seeming busy while
others were so hard at work; and yet, excepting some
three dozen snakes, four skunks, two opossums and a score
or two of insignificant field rats and mice and ground squirrels,
the dogs caught nothing the whole blessed day.
Indeed, some secretly thought it would have been just
as well if the musk-cats had been allowed to escape, for,
after their capture, the dogs were not altogether so agreeable;
yet no candidate or candidate's friends or even their
enemies kicked or whipped a favourite wag-tail. It was
hardly politic to curl your nose. What was a fellow fit for,
that minded such things?—was he the man to go to the legislature
and carry skins[10]
to a bear.
The whole intended field, however, was resounding with all
kinds of cries, noises, and echoes, such as shouts—orders
gees and haws—hold-on's and let-go's, and that's-your sort's
—up-with-him's to male logs, pull her this way, to female
ones, and down-with-it to neutrals; with clatter of axes and
tomahawks; the thunder of rolling trunks; the crash of
brush; the crackling of flames: and, over all, agreeably
to the “Music of Nature,”[11] were heard the shrill outcries
of females; the screeching of boys; the snorting and winnowing
of horses; and the howling and barking of dogs!
Never was scene more exciting; and our appearance in
working trim, was hailed with the most enthusiastic cheering;
which compliment being suitably returned, we speedily
joined the nearest working party. As for myself, surely
I never did halloa (holler) louder in my life: and I certainly
never did work harder for a whole entire hour, dresseden
costume, to wit:—in tow-trousers, cow-hide boots, and
unbleached hemp linen shirt, but without coat or vest, and
with shirt sleeves rolled above the elbows.
We did not attend the gathering purely out of rabblerousing
feelings; we wanted to hear the speech of ours John
intended to let off at Jerry: for something was expected today
of Glenville, and he was only a novice in stump elocution,
and so we had, being “high larn'd” and a “leetle”
of a politician, made John's first speech ourselves! Had
John been as great a nincompoop as Jerry, he could just as
readily have spoken nonsense off hand; but he knew too
much to speak sense without preparation: and so Mr. Carlton
had prepared the maiden speech. This, however, our
friend, like some manuscript preachers, delivered more than
once, yet always with variations and additions, till at last
the very theme and text were both changed, and our stump
orator gave towards the end of the campaign a much better
speech than he had commenced with.
Our historian, as has been hinted, did not figure a very
long time with the handspike, having luckily discovered
some pretext for soon joining a squawking and frolicsome
squad of boys, girls and young women, engaged in the
“niggerin-off.” Where it is designed to make “a clearing,”
the owner has all the trees, except some six or eight on
an acre, cut down, the others being “deadened;” that is
girdled by a deep cut two inches wide. If the majority of
the trees are thus girdled, the field is called—“a deadning,”
—otherwise it is a clearing. Now, it is to a clearing the
log-rolling, or, for brevity's sake, “a rolin,” pertains. In
order to the rolling the owner has had all prostrate trunks
cut into suitable lengths, and the bushy tops preserved for
fuel to the log-heaps; still many trees remain to be prepared
even on the grand rolling day; and such of course
require the neighbours' axes and hatchets.
In fifty or more places of the clearing, and in many parts
of the same trunk, logs are making, and with wonderful celerity
by another process—an almost noiseless process too,
and requiring, like Yankee factories, only women, girls,
and children. And this is the niggering-off. It is thus
performed. A small space is hacked into the upper side
of the trunk, and in that for awhile is maintained a fire
fed with dry chips and brush; then at right angles, with
the prostrate timber is laid in the fire a stick of some green
wood, dry fuel being yet added at intervals, till the incumbent
stick, sinking deeper and deeper into the burning spot,
in no very long time, if properly attended, divides or niggers
the trunk asunder.
The terms of this art are derived from the marvellous resemblance
the ends of chared logs have to a negro's head
—another fact on which abolitionists may dilate with
great pathos in the next batch of popular lectures, on the
wickedness of our prejudices: although, it must be remembered
that our black rascals out there invented the terms
themselves!
The axe is truly a mighty agent in the civilization of new
countries. Fire is a greater—and only in a New Purchase
and in the niggering operation is the famous copy-book
sentence illustrated properly—“Fire is a bad master, but
a good servant:” its mastership belongs to our log-burnings.
Without the aid of fire, the stoutest heart must be appalled at
the thought of hewing out with the axe a farm from our forests;
and yet with the aid of fire even females may achieve
that enterprise.
When the logs are all cut or niggered, they are then
rolled, but often dragged together, in different parts of the
clearing; and usually to the vicinity of some huge tree
deadened, or perhaps living, and waving its melancholy
arms over the mutilated bodies and mangled limbs of its
slain children and friends. Ah! happy if the tree be dead;
for it is destined, if not dead, to a dreadful end—to be
burned alive! Oh! poor tree! thy former friends are compelled
to become thy worst enemies—their severed trunks
are gigantic faggots! Alas! the pile rising up, as log after
log rolls heavily against thy quivering column, amid our labour,
and shouting, and uproar, that pile, now surrounded,
and crowned with a tangled world of brushwood, is thy
sumptuous and magnific pyre! Monarch! of a thousand
years, thou shalt die a kingly death! Nor would'st thou be
spared—only to sigh among strange harvests soon to
spring around—to sigh for the shades and shadows and
touching branches and kissing leaves of departed trees!
No—thou would'st not choose to survive thy race!
The piles are sometimes lighted at the end of the rolling;
oftener by the settler's family at their leisure. To-day,
however, as we were a very large party, and had, therefore,
finished the rolling early in the afternoon, it was resolved
that immediately after the candidates should have done
speaking, all the heaps and piles should be kindled at once.
and Jerry had, as their friends allowed, “worked most
powerful hard and steady:” but their enemies must determine
whether this diligence was out of disinterested love to
the settler, or with a single eye to the vote of the settler's
eldest son, who, as his father accidentally remarked, would
be entitled to a vote at the next election. Indeed, as the
zealous partizans had closely imitated their respective candidates,
more unfigurative, practical and innocent log-rolling
was done to-day than was ever witnessed; and I secretly
made up my mind that our next log-rolling in Glenville
should happen just before the fall election; when we
could get the opposing candidates to lead the work. It is
not improbable that our host to-day had had the same
thought; at all events our candidates certainly sweat for
their expected honours; and if John did gain them he
worked for them—but Jerry! alas! he toiled in vain! and
alas! it blistered my hands! but then after this, I was
unanimously voted “a right down powerful clever sort of
a feller!” and more than one very pretty young woman,
“allowed she'd be Mr. Carltin's second wife, when his old
woman died!!”
After all, candidates are of some use; and the great majority
can do more good in natural log-rolling than in the
metaphorical sorts common among the dirk and pistol lawgivers
of deliberative assemblies. Nay, a very few hundreds
of rival and zealous candidates would, in a year or
so, if judiciously driven under proper task-masters, clear a
very considerable territory.
The candidate[13]
to-day stood not on a stump to make his
address, but on a very large log heap, sustained by a living
oak more than three hundred years old!—an incident to
ever wrote—the first he ever uttered,—our first speech was
poured forth over the ruins of greatness—a prostrate wilderness!
The youthful speaker, the dear friend of many years,
stood on a funeral pyre! while above him waved the
sheltering branches of the tree, soon to be sacrificed and
writhe in a tempest of fire! And ours was the first, the
last, the only oration ever made by a Christian under its
protection! the grand old tree seeming to wonder at the
semi-civilization that had wrought such havoc in its domain
—while it knew not that the ceasing of Glenville's voice
would be a signal for lighting the fires!
The speech need not be described. It was, of course,
rather ad-captandumish; well written, however, but still
better delivered and handsomely varied. Hence, if it
gained no new votes, it secured the old ones. And that
is no light praise, where a word, a look, a gesture, or even a
smile changes voters; not to lose is then to gain. The
new settlers acted with the strictest impartiality—they divided
their interest. The father had “know'd Jerry's
father, and often heern tell of Jerry himself—and so he
would never d'sart an old friend; but the son, “darn'd-his
eyes (a peculiar kind of stitching) if he wouldn't go for Glenville;
as cos he hisself was a young man, and so was
tother—and as cos he'd give him a sort of start in his clearing,
he'd give him a sort of start as a public funkshune'er.”
And thus the balance of power was adjusted to a nicety;
and thus, also, if the new comers did neither party any good
they did them no harm: pay enough for a hard day's work
considering. For, certainly, a wide difference must appear
between having nothing in your favour and two somethings
against you, and so it was now; hence John and Jerry felt
(or at least said so) as much gratitude as if they had received
not a negative quantity, but a positive favour.
Complacent reader, I hope you never sneer at sovereignty?
will, if you descend in any way to be a slave. Save yourself
for a crisis—acquire reputation for honour and integrity—and
the people will then call upon you. The present
is the age of small bugs.
The speech ended, and we were divided into Firing
Committees to light the different piles: after which was to
be a grand supper previous to going home. Very soon
then at each heap, were assembled about half a dozen men,
while in all directions were tearing, scampering, screeching,
and yelling women, boys, girls, dogs and puppies—some
carrying fire on clap-board shingles—some with remnants of
burning niggering sticks—others with dry and blazing
wood—and the canine helps, some with sticks and chips in
their mouths, and some with the dead snakes and polecats,
so that almost instantly and simultaneously fires were kindled
in several parts of each, and every heap and pile
throughout the whole clearing. Combustibles had been built
in with the piles; and now a gentle wind was fanning all
into devouring flames. Yet, after the first sudden and
crackling blaze, the fires subsiding became, at a short distance,
barely visible; save in parts where dry logs had become
quickly ignited, and there a taper-pointed intense
flame, shooting up, would remain fixed a few seconds, and
then trembling from its own gathering fury, it would rise
higher and higher, and ever expanding its base as it elevated
the apex.
But by the time our feast was ended, and the shadows
lengthening from the forest told the coming reign of darkness,
a hundred-hundred fierce points of taper flame
gleamed in wrath from every crevice, or darted from the
dense clouds of black smoke; and in many places, several
points had united their bases, and were now in one broad
fiery mass, careering in spiral columns of mingled darkness
and light. Now fiercer winds were rushing into the vacuum.
The equilibrium disturbed through an aerial cir
aroused and excited, came flying on the wings of a sudden
earth born tempest![14] This augmented the number and intensity
of the flames; and these, augmented, invoked in
their madness more furious winds, till a broad, deep and
awful tide of air poured through the clearing, with the force
and vengeful roar of the hurricane! and up leaped all the
fires in frightful columns and pyramids of living flames quivering
with wild wrath, and coiling, like demon-serpents,
around and up the mighty trees that sustained the pyres!
Here and there sheets of flame thrown forth horizontally,
and seemingly by an intervening body of smoke, detached
from the mass of fire, resembled clouds on fire and burning
up from their own lightning!
No breath of life could any longer be drawn in that field
of fire! It was abandoned as a wide tumultuating flood,
where unseen and dreadful spirits held a terrific revel
amidst the roar, and crash, and thunder of flaming whirlwinds!
Far and wide the forest was grandly illuminated; and
in returning home I often looked back and saw the noble
trees at the pyres, tossing their mighty arms and bowing
their spreading tops for mercy and succour—ay! like beings
sending forth cries of agony unheard in that fiery
chaos! Our home was several miles from this clearing, but
the next night, on ascending the bluff on the creek, we
could yet see in that quarter a lurid sky, and now and then
fitful gleams of brightness; and even a week after, as I
passed that clearing, the arena was yet smoking, although
nothing remained of that part of the primeval forest, save
heaps of ashes and a few blackened upright masses that
for so many centuries had been the living bodies of the
lately martyred trees!
| CHAPTER XXVI. The new purchase, or, Seven and a half years in the far West | |