The partisan a tale of the revolution |
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| 13. | CHAPTER XIII. |
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 | CHAPTER XIII. The partisan |  |
13. CHAPTER XIII.
The song of birds, when, in the stormy sky,
Rolls the rude thunder?”
The ladies had retired, but it was not easy for
Singleton and his uncle to resume the topic which
had previously engaged them. There was a visible
damp upon their spirits—the elastic nephew, the hesitating
colonel, the rough, honest, and direct Humphries,
all felt the passionate force of Emily's exhortation,
though its argument necessarily failed upon them.
There had been quite too much that was awing in her
speech and manner—as if death were speaking through
the lips of life. Their thoughts had been elevated by
her language to a theme infinitely beyond the hourly
and the earthly. The high-souled emphasis with
which she had insisted upon the integrity of human
life, as essential to the due preparation for the future
immortality, had touched the sensibility of those
whose vocation was at hostility with the doctrine
which she taught; and though, from the very nature
of things, they could not obey her exhortations, they
yet could not fail to meditate upon, and to feel them.
Thus impressed, silent and unobserving, it was a relief
to all, when Major Singleton reminded Humphries of
the promise which he had presumed to make him,
touching the old Madeira in his uncle's garret. He
briefly told the latter of the circumstance alluded to,
the excellence of his wines to the impartial test to
which Humphries proposed to subject them. The
lieutenant smacked his lips satisfactorily. It was not
often that his fortune had indulged him with such a
beverage. Corn whiskey, at best, had been his liquor
in the swamps; and, even in his father's tavern, the
tastes were not sufficiently high, of those who patronised
that establishment, to call for other than the
cheapest qualities. A brief dialogue about the favourite
wines—a sly reference on the part of Singleton, to the
drinking capacities of his British guests, and a hypocritical
sort of condolence upon the privations to
which his uncle must be subjected, in consequence of
the proclamation, soon brought the latter back to the
legitimate topic.
“But what news, Robert, do you bring us? What
of the continentals—is it true that we are to have an
army from Virginia, or is it mere rumour?—a thing to
give us hope, only the more completely to depress and
mortify? Speak out, man, and none of your inuendoes
—you know, well enough, that I am with you, body
and soul.”
“I believe you will be, uncle, but you certainly are
not yet. With the hope, however, to make you so
more completely, I will give you news that shall cheer
you up, if you have the heart to hope for a favourable
change of things. It is no mere rumour, sir, touching
the northern army. Congress has remembered us at
last, and the continentals are actually under way, and
by this time must be on the borders of North Carolina.”
“Indeed! that is well,” cried the colonel, chuckling,
and rubbing his hands—“this is good news, indeed,
my nephew, and may help us somewhat out of our
difficulties.”
“Not so, Colonel Walton, if it please you. It
will help you out of no difficulties, if you are not
willing to lend a hand for that purpose. Congress
for one; some fifteen hundred men at the utmost, and
but half of these continentals. We have the Delaware
and Maryland lines—brave troops, indeed—among the
very bravest that Washington commands—but few,
too few for our purposes, unless we ourselves turn
out.”
“Who commands them, Robert?”
“De Kalb on the march; but, if we need men, and
if our arms are few, the name of our commander is a
host for us. The conqueror of Burgoyne at Saratoga
has been ordered from Virginia to lead them.”
“What, Gates! that is brave news, truly—brave
news—and we shall do well to wish them success in
another glass of Madeira. Come, Mr. Humphries—
come, sir—you see Proctor has left us some of the
genuine stuff yet—enough for friends, at least.”
“Ay, sir,” said Humphries, drinking, “and this
news of the continentals promises that we have enough
also for our enemies.”
“Bravo! I hope so; I think so. Nephew, drink,
drink—and say, what has been the effect of this intelligence
upon the people? How has it wrought upon
the Santee?”
“Everywhere well, uncle, and as it should, unless
it be immediately in your neighbourhood, where you
breathe by sufferance only. Everywhere well, sir.
The people are roused, inspirited, full of hope and
animation. The country is alive with a new sentiment.
Nor is its influence confined only to the hopes of
friends; it has had its effect upon the fears of enemies.
Rawdon already feels it, and has drawn in all his outposts.
He keeps now those of Ninety Six, Camden,
and Augusta only. He is concentrating his force
against the coming of Gates, whose first blow must be
against his lordship. This concentration has given
opportunity to our people, and opportunity gives them
courage. The Santee and the Peedee countries are
full of whigs, only wanting imbodiment to prove
Carolina, with a growing troop which threatens Ninety
Six itself.”
“And Marion?”
“Ay, Marion—from him I bring you better news
yet, when I tell you that I left him on Britton's Neck,
where we stood upon the bodies of half of Gainey's
tories, whom we had just defeated with bloody slaughter.
Gainey himself wounded, and his troop for the
time dispersed.”
“Better and better, Robert; and I rejoice me that
you had a hand in the business. But what, in all this
time, of that sanguinary rider, Tarleton? What keeps
him quiet—what is he doing? Surely, with a taste like
his, the very knowledge of these risings should be
grateful.”
“Doubtless they will be, when he gets wind of
them; but he is now with the cavalry of the legion,
somewhere in the neighbourhood of Rocky Mount,
where Sumter is said to be looking after him. Thus,
you see, we are all engaged or preparing—all but you,
of the parishes. You either hug the knees of your
invaders, or sleep on, to avoid the sense of shame:
all but your Washington, who, I am told, still contrives
to keep his horse together, though sadly cut up
while under White and Baylor.”
“True, true,—our people here are but too much
disposed to submission. They have given up in
despair long since.”
“I reckon that's a small mistake, colonel—I beg
pardon, sir, but I rather think it's not exactly as you
say. I don't think our people any more willing to
submit, than the people on Black River and Pedee,
but it's all because we han't got leaders; that's the
reason, colonel. I know of my own knowledge there's
any number will turn out, if you'll only crook a finger,
and show 'em the track, but it's not reasonable to
expect poor men, who have never ruled before, to take
the lead of great people in time of danger.”
Humphries spoke up, and spoke justly for the honour
his lieutenant concluded—
“He speaks truly, Colonel Walton, as I can testify.
What if I tell you that your people—here, under your
own eye—are not only ready to take up arms, but that
many of them are in arms—more, sir—that they have
already done service in your own neighbourhood, and
are ready to do more—that a promising squad, under
my command, now lies on the Stonoe-savannah and
that, in a few days, I hope to join Colonel Marion with
a troop of fifty men gathered from among your own
parishioners! These are the people who are so willing
to submit, according to your account; pray you,
uncle, never write their history.”
“Robert, you surprise me.”
“Pleasantly, I hope, mine uncle—it is the truth.
The whole was planned by Colonel Marion, from
whom I have this duty in charge. Disguised, he has
been through your parish. Disguised, he sat at your
board, in the character of a tory commissary, and
your scornful treatment persuaded him to hope that
you might be brought into action. Are you staggered
now?”
The colonel was dumb when he heard this narrative;
and Major Singleton then proceeded to give a brief
account of the little events of recent occurrence in
the neighbourhood, as we have already narrated them,
subsequently to his assumption of command in the
Cypress Swamp. The story, though it gave him
pleasure, was a sad rebuke to Colonel Walton's patriotism.
He scarcely heard him to the end.
“Now, Heaven help me, Robert, but I take shame to
myself, that you, almost a stranger upon the Ashley,
should have thus taken the lead out of my own hand,
as I may say, and among my own people.”
“It is not too late, uncle, to amend the error. You
may yet help greatly to finish what has been tolerably
well begun.”
“No—it is not too late. I can do much with Dorchester
and Goose Creek. I have influence throughout
Acre will come out, to a man.”
Rapidly moving to and fro along the apartment,
Colonel Walton enumerated to himself, in under tones,
the various sections of country in his knowledge
which he thought might be moved at his instigation.
His nephew did not suffer the mood of his uncle to
relax.
“Now is the time, uncle—now is the time, if ever.
Your name will do every thing in this quarter; and
you may conjecture for yourself, what the shame must
be, if others achieve the work which you touched not.
You have now a glorious opportunity at this season.
Tarleton, whom they so much dread, being absent,
Wemyss in another direction, and your garrison so
weak at Dorchester that they cannot easily spare a
detachment. Besides, the approach of Gates promises
sufficient employ to all the force which Rawdon and
Cornwallis can bring up.”
“The thing looks well,” said Walton, musingly.
“Never better, if the heart be firm. Now is the
time if ever—beat up recruits—sound, stimulate your
neighbours, and dash up with as smart a force as you
can possibly muster to join with the army from Virginia.
They will receive you joyfully, and your corps must
increase with every mile in your progress.”
“Would I were on the way; but the beginning is
yet to be made, and on what plea shall I seek to persuade
others, without authority, and known as one
having taken a protection?”
“That latter difficulty is cured by the assumption of
a new character. Destroy the one accursed instrument,
and, in its place, I am proud to hand you a badge of
honour and of confidence. Look on this paper and
peruse this letter. The one is from his excellency,
Governor Rutledge—the other from Colonel Marion.
Read—read!”
Walton unfolded the envelope, and the commission
of Governor Rutledge as colonel of state militia met
his eye: the letter from Colonel Marion was an invitation
such as could only come from Marion—so calm, so
unassuming, yet so conclusive in its exhortations.
“You see, uncle,” said the major, when he saw
that the other had concluded the perusal of the documents—“you
see, I come not unprovided. Both
Rutledge and Marion hold your name of sufficient importance
to our cause to desire its influence; and they
would have you, on any terms, emancipate yourself
from the villanous bondage—for it is no less—into
which you have fallen. Here, now, you have an opportunity,
by an honourable, and, let me add, an atoning
transaction, of returning to the service of your country.
Do not let it pass you. Let me not think, my dear
uncle, that my word, pledged for you to Marion, when
I undertook and craved this commission, was pledged
in vain, and is now forfeited.”
This warm appeal of Singleton, in the utterance
of which he had discarded all that asperity which
had kept pace with much of his share in the previous
dialogue, was soothing to his uncle's spirit. He was
moved; and slowly again, though unconsciously, he
read over the letter of Marion. So high a compliment
from the gallant partisan was flattering in the extreme;
and the trust of Governor Rutledge, under his late
smitings of conscience, was healing and grateful.
For a few moments he spoke not; but at length approaching
his nephew, he seized his hand, and at
once avowed the pleasure it gave him, to avail himself
of the privileges which the commission conferred upon
him.
“I will be no longer wanting to my country, Robert.
I will do my duty. This paper gives me power to
enrol men, to form troops, and to act against the
enemy, and find my sanction in the commission of the
executive. I will do so. I will pause no longer, and,
spite of the sacrifice, will act as it requires.”
The countenance of Major Singleton, and that of
Humphries, no less, glowed with an honest pleasure,
as the former replied—
“Spoken as it should be, Colonel Walton—spoken
as it should be. The decision comes late, but not too
late. It is redeeming, and God grant that it be as
prosperous to all as it is surely proper and praiseworthy.”
“So I believe it, or I would not now adopt it: but,
Robert, know you not that such a decision makes me
a beggar? Sequestration—”
“Now, out upon it, uncle! why will you still ballast
your good works with a weight which shall for ever
keep them from heaven's sight? You are no niggard
—you live profusely—care not for money: wherefore
this reference to wealth in comparison with honour and
honourable duty?”
“The wealth is nothing, Robert; but I have a
strange love for these old groves—this family mansion,
descended to me like a sacred trust through so many
hands and ancestors. I would not that they should be
lost.”
The youth looked sternly at the speaker for a
few moments in silence, but the fierce emotion at
length found its way to his lips in tones of like indignation
with that which sparkled from his eyes.
“Now, by heaven, uncle, had I known of this—had
I dreamed that thou hadst weighed, for an instant, the
fine sense of honour in the scales against thy love of this
thy dwelling-place—my own hand should have applied
the torch to its shingles. Dearly as I have loved this
old mansion, I myself would have freely kindled the
flame which should have burned it to the ground. I
would have watched the fire as it swept through these
old trees, scathing and scattering the branches under
which I had a thousand times played—I would have
beheld their ruin with a pleasurable emotion; and as
they fell successively to the earth which they once sheltered,
I would have shouted in triumph, that I saved you
from the dishonourable bargain which you have made
for their protection so long.”
“But Kate—Kate, Robert; my sweet child—my
only child!”
It was all the father said, but it was enough, if not
to convince, at least to silence, the indignant speaker.
Her good was, indeed, a consideration; and when
Singleton reflected upon the tender care which had
kept her from privation and sorrow all her life hitherto,
he could not help feeling how natural was such a consideration
to the mind of such a father.
But the emotion had subsided—the more visible
portions of it, at least; and Colonel Walton, his
nephew and Humphries, engaged in various conversation,
chiefly devoted to the labours that lay before
them. Having gained his object, however, Major
Singleton was in no mood to remain much longer.
His duties were various; his little squad required his
attention, as he well knew how little subordination
could be had from raw militiamen, unless in the continued
and controlling presence of their commander.
The hour was growing late, and some portion of his
time was due to his sister and the ladies, who awaited
his coming in the snug back or family parlour, into
which none but the select few ever found admission.
Leaving Humphries in the charge of Colonel Walton,
our hero approached the quiet sanctuary with peculiar
emotions. There was a soft melancholy pervading
the little circle. The moral influence of such a condition
as that of Emily Singleton was touchingly felt
by all around her. The high-spirited, the proud
Katharine Walton grew meek and humble, when she
gazed upon the sufferer, dying by a protracted and a
painful death, in the midst of youth, rich in beauty,
and with a superiority of mind which might well
awaken admiration in the other, and envy in her own
sex. Yet she was dying with the mind alive, but unexercised;
a heart warm with a true affection, yet
utterly unappropriated; sensibilities touching and
charming, which had only lived, that memory might
mourn the more over those sweets of character so well
known to enjoyment, yet so little enjoying. It was a
thought to make the proud heart humble; and Kate
looked upon her cousin with tearful eyes. She sat
dying girl, taking a place beside her, lifted her head
upon his bosom, where she seemed pleased that it
should lie, while he pressed his lips fondly and frequently
to her forehead. In murmured tones, unheard
by the rest, she carried on with him a little dialogue,
half playful, half tender, in which she pressed him on
the subject of his love for her cousin. The mention
of Kate's name, a little louder than she usually spoke,
called for the latter's attention, who looked up, and a
suffusion of her cheek seemed to show a something of
consciousness in her mind of what had been the subject
between them. The eye of Emily caught the
glance, and a smile of archness played over her lips
for an instant, but soon made way for that earnest
and settled melancholy of look which was now its
habitual expression. They continued to converse
together, the others only now and then mingling in the
dialogue, on those various little matters belonging to
her old home and its associates, which a young and
gentle nature like hers would be apt to remember.
Sometimes, so feeble was her utterance that Robert
was compelled to place his ear to her lips the better to
take in what she said. It was at one of these moments
that a severe clap of thunder recalled the major to a
sense of his duties. The sudden concussion startled
the nervous maiden, and Kate came to her assistance,
so that his hand was brought once more in contact with
that of the woman he loved, in the performance of an
office almost too sacredly stern to permit of the show of
that other emotion which he yet felt—how strangely!—
in his bosom. The blood tingled and glowed in his
veins, and she, too—she withdrew her fingers the
moment her service could well be dispensed with.
Another roll of the thunder, and a message from
Humphries warned him of the necessity of tearing
himself from a scene only too painfully fascinating.
He took an affectionate leave of his aunt, and pressing
the lips of his sister fondly, her last words to him
were comprised in a whisper—
“Spare life—save life, Robert: God bless you! and
come back to me soon.”
Kate encountered him in the passage-way. Her
look was something troubled, and her visible emotion
might have been grateful to the vanity of our hero,
did he not see how unusually covered with gloom were
the features of her face.
“Dear Kate—sweet cousin—I must leave you
now.”
“I know it, Robert—I know more: you have persuaded
my father to break his protection.”
“I have done my best towards it, Kate; but if he
has resolved, the impulse was as much his own as
from me. He could not well have avoided it in the
end, situated as he was.”
“Perhaps not, Robert; still, your persuasions have
been the most immediately urgent; and though I dread
the result, I cannot well blame you for what you have
done. I now wish to know from you, what are the
chances in favour of his successful action. I would
at least console myself by their recapitulation when
he is absent, and perhaps in danger.”
Major Singleton gave a promising account of the
prospects before them; such, indeed, as they appeared
at that time to the sanguine Americans, and needing but
little exaggeration. She seemed satisfied, and he then
proceeded to entreat her upon a subject purely selfish.
“Speak not now—not now on such a matter. Have
we not enough, Robert, to trouble us? Danger and
death, grief and many apprehensions hang over us,
and will not suffer such idle thoughts,” was the reply.
“These are no idle thoughts, Kate, since they
belong so closely to our happiness. Say to me, then,
only say that you love me.”
“I love you, indeed—to be sure I do, as a cousin
and as a friend; but really you ask too much when
you crave for more. I have no time, no feeling, for
love in these moments.”
“Nay, be serious, Kate, and say. We know not
exposed in a hazardous service—I may perish; and I
would, before such an event, be secure in the hope
that I may look to you for that love which would make
me happy when living, or—”
She stopped him with a cool, sarcastic speech, concluding
the sentence for him in a manner most annoying—
“Drop a tear for me when I am dead.”
She saw that he looked displeased, and immediately
after, with an art peculiarly her own, she diverted his
anger.
“Nay, dear cousin, forgive me; but you looked the
conclusion, and so pathetically, I thought it not improbable
that its utterance would find you speechless.
Be not so tragic, I pray you; I am serious enough as it
is—soberly serious, not tragically so. Be reasonable
for a while, and reflect that these very vicissitudes of
your present mode of life, should discourage you from
pressing this matter. I do not know whether I love
you or not, except as a relation. It requires time to
make up one's mind on the subject, and trust me I shall
think of it in season. But, just now, I cannot—and
hear me, Robert, firmly and honestly I tell you, while
these difficulties last, while my father's life is in danger,
and while your sister lies in my arms helpless
and dying, I not only cannot, but will not, answer
you. Forbear the subject, then, I pray you, for a better
season; and remember, when I speak to you thus, I
speak to you as a woman, with some pretensions to
good sense, who will try to think upon her affections
as calmly as upon the most simple and domestic
necessity of her life. Be satisfied then that you will
have justice.”
Another summons from Humphries below, and a
sudden rush of wind along the casement, warned him
of the necessity of concluding the interview. He had
barely time to press her hand to his lips when she
hurried him down to her father. A few brief words at
a few moments, the two partisans were on horse,
speeding down the long avenue on the way to their
encampment.
| CHAPTER XIII. The partisan | |