University of Virginia Library

5. CHAPTER THE FIFTH.
THE MEETING BETWEEN FATHER AND SON.

“A band of twelve determined men might approach
the northern window and fire the house,”
exclaimed Washington, the moment he was rejoined
by the officers of his staff within the American
lines. “It is a work of imminent danger, however,
and every man of the band will, in all human probability,
fall a corse beneath the walls, although the
attempt to fire the brushwood and timber by the
northern window may meet with success. I despair
of inducing any twelve in the army to make the
attempt—what say you, gentlemen?”

“I will be one of the twelve!” cried Herbert
Tracy throwing himself from his steed.

“I'll be another!” shouted Harry Heft, imitating
his example.

“And I another?” echoed Sergeant Brown,
placing himself beside the captain and the lieutenant.

“And I another! and I another!” the cry went
round, until every man of the Rangers had thrown
himself from his horse and swelled the line of the
self-sacrificing band.

“Here are nineteen men, Captain Tracy,” exclaimed
Washington, and a gleam of pleasure
brightened in his eye as he gazed upon the stout
and muscular forms of the Rangers.

“The others,” replied Herbert, “have laid their
bones on the battle-field, or else I can assure your
excellency they would not be found missing!”

“Yes, yes, captain, but twelve men are sufficient,
and here are nineteen.”

“Will your excellency be pleased to divide those
those who are to remain from the others?”

“Where all are so brave,” replied Washington,
“the task is no easy one. My friends,” he continued,
“you who form the left of this brave line
be pleased to step aside.”

The seven Rangers stepped aside with the chagrin
they felt visible on each countenance.

“Now, Captain Tracy, I leave the matter to
your discretion. God be with you!”

With this exclamation Washington rode off with
his staff to another part of the field, and Captain
Tracy made his arrangements for the performance
of the desperate task, upon which the success or
defeat of the American arms might turn. In a
few minutes each man of the twelve stood ready
to start. Six of the number carried torches and
combustible materials in their hands, while the
other six, the captain and lieutenant included,
grasped their rifles, loaded in both barrels, with a

double charge, and prepared in every respect for
immediate action.

“Rangers,” exclaimed Tracy, “when we advance
from the cover of the fog, those who bear
rifles will rush forward, and fire in the very faces
of the soldiers who guard the extreme north window
in the front of the mansion. Those Rangers
who bear the torches will then advance—fire the
heap of brushwood and timber under the lower
window in the northern wall—and while they are
thus engaged, the rifles will pour a second discharge
into the window, and then the entire body will retreat.
Forward!”

Herbert Tracy led the way over the lawn,
strewed with dead and wounded, toward the mansion.
Their path was enveloped in the clouds of
battle, and the rain of bullets whistled by their ears
or tore up the earth at every footstep. It was a
dread moment, and each man of the band sent up
a prayer to that God, before whom he presently
expected to appear, and then every heart beat
firmly and regularly, and every hand was nerved
for the approaching scene of death.

“By the Continental Congress!” shouted Harry,
when they had gained their way within fifty yards
of the mansion. “Jist look there! If there aint
the old Quaker, Joab Smiley, and the darkey,
`Charles de Fust,' right in the centre of the scrimmage!
There's a vision, Rangers! Heaven help

my eyes, but I never expected to see such a
sight!”

The Rangers looked across the lawn, and beheld
at the distance of twenty paces, the Quaker kneeling
beside a wounded man, who was placed against
a tree, while the negro stood holding a flask at his
shoulder. The battle was raging around him—
men were measuring their graves within arms
reach of the spot where he knelt, troopers were
sweeping past on their way to join the contest, yet
still did that plain, unfearing Quaker tender his
kind offices to the wounded man, bathe his brow
with water, and moisten his parched tongue, while
the unsophisticated negro who stood at his shoulder,
half scared to death, by the terrors of the scene,
appeared urging him onward to Chew's house,
where his mistress was in danger, whom the negro
amid all his fears was determined to save.

“The noble Quaker is in danger,” exclaimed
Herbert as he glanced at the scene—“But we have
no time now to interpose in his behalf! We must
onward!”

Every breath was hushad, as the Rangers began
to discern the outline of Chew's Mansion, looming
through the smoke and fog.

“What mean those torches glimmering through
the mist?” exclaimed Major Tracy, as standing
amid a body of ten soldiers, placed in the extreme
north window of the front of the house, he discovered

the approach of the Rangers. “Ha!
As I live, they are rebels, engaged in the execution
of some desperate purpose. Now my men,
now—stay—wait a moment—now, now. Let
your aim be sure; pick every man of them;
NOW!”

The word of command rose to his tongue, when
he felt a hand laid lightly on his arm. He turned
and beheld the form of Marian Waltham; her blue
eyes glaring wildly, her lips apart, her cheek pale
as death, and her golden hair, flowing in disordered
masses over her neck and shoulders.

“Mr. Tracy—beware!” exclaimed the maiden,
clutching his arm convulsively. “Pause, for the
sake of Heaven, ere the blood of your son is upon
your soul!

Ere the Major could gather the meaning of the
maiden's words, the voice of the foremost Ranger
arose without—“Now, Nighthawks, now!” and the
blaze of six rifles flashed from the lawn into the
open window. Four British soldiers fell heavily
to the floor, and with a wild shriek, Marian laid
her hand upon her heart, her senses swam in wild
confusion, and she sank at the feet of Major Tracy,
insensible and motionless.

“Follow me, every man of you!” shouted Major
Tracy, leaping from the window out upon the lawn,
while the smoke of the American rifles yet hung
in heavy folds across the casement, and obscured
the vision. Follow me, every man of you!”

Scarce had the words died on the air, when
alighting upon the slight embankment in front of
the mansion, he glanced around and beheld through
the smoke, a body of the Rangers in the act of
firing the brushwood, beneath the northern window,
while the other division were moving toward the
window, raising their pieces as they advanced.

Major Tracy sprang from the embankment:
another leap and he stood within arms length of
the advancing rebels. Raising his sword in the
air, he glanced at the breast of the foremost Ranger,
and prepared to plunge it in his heart, when a slight
breath of air, wafted the smoke aside, and Major
Tracy confronted his son.

“Oh God—my father!”

“My son!”

He started back with the quick, instantaneous
movement of surprise, his right arm dropped to his
side, and with his dark, flashing eyes, starting from
their sockets, while his eye-brows were woven
together, with the sudden nervous expression, that
trembled along every line of his face, he gazed
upon the form of Herbert Tracy before him, and
perused every lineament of his countenance, as if to
assure himself that what he beheld was no phantom
or unreal creation of the agitated fancy.

And there stood the son, the same expression of
intense surprise gathering over his face, his dark
eyes flashing with the same deep glance, the same

frown upon his brow, and his right hand grasping
his good rifle drooped by his side, with the same
impulse that unnerved his father's arm.

Oh, what a wild contest was at work in that
father's heart, as he thus stood gazing upon the
child of all his hopes, now banned and cursed, by
those lips that should have spoken but the words of
blessing and the sounds of prayer; how fiercely
were tumultuous feelings sweeping over his soul;
how bitter was the struggle between nature and
pride; between the long indulged feelings of natural
affection, reviving in all the vigor and the
new-risen bitternass of worldly ambition, opposing
the remembrance of every kindly sympathy, with
the stern thought,—he has set my will at defiance
let the consequences be upon his own head; he has
sown in the storm—let him reap the harvest of his
folly in the whirlwind.

At last words came to the father's tongue, and
again the sword was poised in air.

“Rebel!” he shouted between his clenched
teeth—“Not thus did I think to meet thee, upon
the battle field, with the weapon of thy disloyalty
in thy hand—”

“Father!”—shrieked Herbert, as all the memories
of his infancy came crowding around his
heart.

“But, now, that met we are, here on this crimsoned
sod, foot to foot and hand to hand, I tell

thee, traitor, that thou or I must measure out a
grave upon this field. Thou hast a sword—draw
and defend thyself!”

“Father!” cried Herbert spreading forth his
hands, and dropping his rifle upon the earth,
“Here is my breast! I make no defence—I offer
no resistance—strike and fulfil your curse!”

“Friend Tracy, thee must not harm thy child!”
exclaimed a voice, familiar to the ears of father
and son, and the stalwart arm of the Quaker, was
thrust before the upraised hand of Major Tracy.
“I tell thee, friend Tracy, thee must not harm thy
own flesh and blood,” repeated the Quaker, as
wresting the sword from the father's hand, with a
grasp that it was vain to resist, he very coolly
shattered it into fragments upon his knee. “Major
Tracy, thee is not in thy right mind, or surely thee
would not demean theeself so unwisely. And
young man—does thee hear?—mount thy war-horse
and get thee away from the field! Seest
thou not that the Americans are fleeing around
thee? Away with thee—away with thee! Thy
own men are cut down before thee, in the very act
of firing you window shutter—Ha! verily!”

While Herbert, unheeding the scene of tumult
and blood around him, sank on his knees, and
clasped his father by the hands, the stout Quaker,
Joab Smiley, strode aside to the window, where
Harry Heft and Sergeant Brown were struggling

amid the dead bodies of their comrades, against
five of the British infantry, who had clubbed their
muskets, and were raising them over the heads of
the sinking Rangers, in the act of dealing the
death blow.

“Hold, friend, thee must not strike thy brother!”
shouted the strong armed Quaker, throwing himself
among the enraged British soldiers, wresting a musket
from each arm, at every word,—“Thee has no
business to strike thy brother, friend—what does
thee want with this mischievous weapon?” he continued,
forcing a musket from the grasp of one of
the soldiers—“Nor does thee want this—nor thee
this—(Harry Heft, get thee away and fly—thee
and thy friend.) Ha! verily! Friend, friend,
does thee resist me? Wilt not surrender thy weapon?
Then must I use force! What business
has thee a-walking about friend Chew's ground,
a-cracking people on the head in this style? Hey?
Friend? (Harry Heft, get thee away—thee and
thy friend.) Nay, friends, ye must not resist—I
am stronger than ye—away, Harry, away!”

With these and similar exclamatiens, Joab scattered
the muskets of the British soldiers, until
Harry Heft and Sergeant Brown, were enabled to
secure two horses out of the number of riderless
steeds, that were galloping along the battle-field.

“I say, Joab—uncle Joab,” cried Harry as he
leaned from his prancing horse, “if ever any body

speaks a word against a Quaker in my presence,
may I be — to — if I don't lick the lie out
of their hide, before they can say Jack Robinson!
Hey! What's that, the Sargent gone too!” continued
Harry, as the brave veteran Brown fell from
his horse, wounded by a spent ball. “This has
been a bloody day for the Rangers! Uncle—uncle
Joab, I say! Lay hold of yon horse for the Captain!
Hallo, there, captain—don't be kneelin'
there to the old gentleman, when you should be
makin' yourself missing! Captain, the day's
against us, the Rangers are all killed, and we must
be off.”

Holding the horse, from which Sergeant Brown
had just fallen, in his grasp, the Quaker approached
the father and his kneeling son.

“Father, your blessing, your blessing!” exclaimed
Herbert, as he clasped the hands of his parent, who
was gazing sternly upon him, as the Quaker drew
nigh.

“Herbert, I do not curse—I do not curse thee!
But bless thee, I cannot, my son, while thy sword
is raised in most unrighteous treason! I do not
curse, for I cannot heap a deeper curse on thee,
than the curse of loyal blood, which crimsons thy
hands! I must never see thee more—never,
never!

And with these words the stern hearted Loyalist
turned away, and his son never looked upon his
living form again.

“The day is indeed against us!” cried Herbert,
turning to Harry Heft—“The Americans fly on
every side, and yonder is Washington trying to
stem the current. Let us away—yet hold”—he
exclaimed, wheeling his plunging horse around—
“I have naught left for which to live—I will die
upon this field—I will die with my father's curse
upon my head—”

“Nay, young man,” exclaimed the Quaker,
“that would be desperate, little better than suicide!
Away with thee, away, while flight is in thy
power!”

“Fly, Herbert, fly!” cried a soft voice which
made the young captain's heart throb with a feeling
of wild surprise—“Fly, Herbert, for my sake,
if not for your own—fly!”

A fair hand was thrust from the small circular
window in the northern wing of the mansion, and
Herbert beheld the beaming face of his betrothed.
One token of recognition was exchanged, and
dashing his spurs into the flanks of his steed, side
by side with Harry Heft, Herbert joined the retreat
of the American soldiers, who swept in one wild
torrent of defeat and disorder over the ground,
where they had conquered at the break of day.

“Massa Smiley—Massa Smiley,” cried “Chawls
de Fust” issuing from the hall door of Chew's
house. “My Missa Waltham am safe—she am,
gorra-mighty—lor bless us! Dat am a fac! Sure's
my name's Chawls de Fust.”

“Verily, I must see the damsel”—exclaimed
the Quaker—“She may be in trouble and distress,
and I may comfort her. Nay, friends, look not so
sourly at me”—he continued, as he observed the
scowling brows of the British soldiers, who were
rushing by him to join in the pursuit. “I did but
take away your weapons for your good. Verify, I
must see the damsel.”

And with that he disappeared in the hall door.

Chew's house was now entirely deserted by its
late military occupants who all poured out of its
precincts, to join the current of pursuit which
thundered in the rear of the American host. Along
the Germantown Road, over the fields and enclosures
between the village and Chestnut Hill, fled
the scattered bands of the American army. In vain
did Washington endeavor to breast the tide of
retreat, in vain did Pulaski at the head of his
troopers, throw himself before the disheartened
fugitives, and urge them by all that they held dear
and sacred, to face the pursuing foe! All was in
vain! And Greene and Wayne beheld their men,
who had borne themselves so gallantly, ere the
bright prospects of the day had been blasted at
Chew's house, turn their backs to the foe, and flee
in utter despair from that field, where heaven and
earth had combined to defeat the American arms.

How the American army retreated to the wilds
of Perkiomen, how the wounded and the dying

strewed the way, how the pursuit was maintained,
and how most of the disastrous consequences of
a retreat were avoided by the care and foresight
of Washington, are all matters of historical relation,
and we turn again to the blood-stained field
of Germantown.