University of Virginia Library

CHAPTER LAST.
THE RE-UNION.—THE EXILE.—THE MYSTERY.

Autumn passed—winter, with its storms, was
over, and spring again bloomed amid the groves and
glades of the Wissahikon. The day was serene,
the air balmy, and the earth glad with the verdure
of the trees, the music of the free streams, and the
perfume of wild flowers.

Two young maidens of different stations in life,
as might be seen by their attire, were seated upon the
porch of the mansion upon the heights of the Wissahikon,
and as they gazed abroad upon the face of
nature, and drank in the wild delight of sky and
forest and stream, while the fragrant air, was playing
amid the tendrils of the wild vine that clomb
along the pillars of the porch, they forgot that the
house by which they were seated was desolate, that
its occupants were scattered aboard, and the silence
of its halls but rarely disturbed by the sounds of
human speech.

The light haired maiden glanced at her mourning
robe, and she thought of those who slept in
the church-yard; the sparkle of the ring on her

finger met her eye, and then her mind was far
away amid the scenes of battle, and her fancy wandered
with him who battled in the ranks of war,
and who fought against the gloom that was upon
his soul.

The dark haired maiden glanced at the blue sky,
at the forest sweeping in all its verdure along the
height of the opposite hill; she listened to the lulling
music of the rippling stream, and then her
thoughts were with the hardy soldier, whose frank
bearing, and rustic manliness, had won the admiration
and the affection of her young heart, in many
a ramble under that blue sky amid those green
shades, and beside the lulling murmur of the quiet
stream.

At a short distance from the porch, a tall and
robust farmer was engaged in cleaning the walks
of a small flower-garden, from the mass of weeds
and wild grass accumulated by time and neglect.
His plain Quaker coat, was resting on the pailing
of the garden fence, and with his muscular arms
unbared, the farmer plyed the spade with every
mark of alacrity and vigor. Ever and anon he
would pause in his employment, and turning his
honest visage to the heavens, he gazed at the deep
azure above, then at the forest around, and finally
his glance would rest upon the forms of the maidens
seated upon the porch, whom he regarded
with a look of quiet complacency, that told of a

mind sobered by experience, taking delight in the
calm innocence, the guileless converse, and the
ardent hopes of youth.

A little further on, a shining faced negro, with
his arms black as ebony, stripped to the elbow,
was engaged in trailing a wild vine along an arbor,
while his shrill clear whistle broke merrily upon
the air, interspersed with snatches of ditties of
every kind and order of poetical merit, which he
usually wound up with the loud “Hah-a-whah!”
peculiar to the Ethiopian race.

“This spot is more pleasant to thee, Miss Marian,”
exclaimed the black haired maiden, turning to her
fair companion. “This spot is more pleasant to
thee, Miss Marian, than the loneliness of the mansion
on the Ridge Road—is't not Miss Waltham?”

“A thousand feelings, dear Margorie, combine
to make this scene one of the saddest as well as
the loveliest I ever looked upon. I cannot turn
my eye to a flower, a spear of grass, a shrub or a
tree, without the vivid revival of the memory of
the past. Old faces, and well remembered forms,
swim in the air around me—voices that once awoke
the echoes of these walls, again sound in my ears—
friends dearly and fondly beloved, are once more
around me—and all the wo, the sorrow and care
of the world are forgotten”—

“Has thee heard of Captain Tracy lately, Miss
Marian?”

“Yes, Marjorie. But his letters are sad and
gloomy, and he seems to be warring a bitter contest
with the dark remembrance of the past. He
has not mingled with the scenes of battle since the
affray of Chew's House, and the terrible event
that so fearfully wound up a day of bloodshed and
horror.”

“'Twas a sad thing, the death of Major Tracy.
How strange! That the assassin should never be
discovered!”

“A fearful mystery is around the whole affair,
Marjorie. Who it was that fired the shot, whether
the hand of the murderer was raised in revenge of
a private wrong, or from mere partizan enmity,
has never come to light. These are times of strife
and turmoil—and all the sympathies that bind men
together in times of peace, seemed sundered and
broken apart.”

“But tell me, Miss Marian, did thy letters speak
of—of—Lieutenant Heft? Is he still with Captain
Tracy?”

“The captain is still by the side of the Commander-in-chief,
though he mingles not in the
strife of battle. His letters speak of Harry Heft
in the kindest terms. His qualities of a free, open
frankness, and a speech, perhaps somewhat too
blunt and rugged, have proved beneficent to Herbert,
and in the company of his honest friend, he
finds a frequent relief from the sorrow that weighs
upon his soul.”

A gleam of pleasure brightened in Marjorie's
black eye, and a warm glow flushed over her cheek.
She was about to reply, when a loud shout broke
from the negro “Chawls the Fust,” and he was
seen dancing about the lawn in every variety of
grotesque attitudes and fantastic postures, that his
lively imagination suggested.

“Why friend, thee is surely demented!” exclaimed
the astonished Quaker.

“Massa Smiley, Massa Smiley, d'ye hear dat ar'
laugh? A regular haw-haw! Dat am Harry
Heft's laff—sure's my name's Charles de Fust!
Massa's comin' home! Lor bless us—gorra-mighty!
Dat am a fac.”

Marian and Marjorie started up from their seats;
the Quaker leaped over the garden fence on to the
lawn, and the whole party listened eagerly to the
sounds of horses' hoofs, which came echoing through
the woods from the road among the rocks of the
precipice.

In a few moments all doubt was at an end and
two horsemen emerged from the woods and rode
over the lawn, at the top of their horses' speed.

In an instant Marian was clasped in the arms of
her lover, while Harry Heft, unheeding the presence
of the staid Quaker, was so very rude as to
inflict sundry kisses upon the pouting lips of the
black eyed Quakeress, and enfold her pretty figure
in a succession of loving embraces.

“Marian, Marian, my own beautiful Marian”—
exclaimed Herbert, as he gazed upon the fair face
of his betrothed, while her kindling blue eyes returned
his fond and ardent gaze. “Marian, we
shall never part more. I have returned again to
the scenes of our earliest love, to scenes hallowed
by memory, though darkened by many a bitter sorrow;
I will gaze once more upon the green woods
and quiet shades of the Wissahikon and then leave
these hills and vales for ever. Marian, will you
share the fate of a wanderer and an exile?”

It needed not the whispered words that came
from the maiden's lip, to tell Herbert that he was
still beloved. The maiden's beaming eye and
blushing cheek, spoke the thoughts that were fluttering
around her heart.

“Marian,” whispered Herbert, “our love has
been nursed in scenes of joy, it has grown and
flourished amid scenes of trial and wo, and now,
alone as we are in the wide and callous world, we
will be all in all to each other—we will forget in
foreign lands that ever our path was shadowed by
a single cloud.”

“Why Marjorie, you minx”—interrupted Harry
Heft—“how pretty you've grown! How your
dark eyes twinkle—how your rosy lips open with
sich a han'some pout, as though you were good
lookin' and you knew it. No, no, Marjorie—
there's no use o' poutin' your lips and shakin' your

head. We'll be married—that's certain! See—
how uncle is shakin' his sides with quiet joy there!
We'll be married for all I ain't a Quaker, and I'll
away to the wars, and fight many a hard blow for
my country yet, though the Rangers, and Dennis
and all—God help me!—are dead and gone. And
I'll come back a live man, I promise you, Marjorie,
and we'll be married right off for certain. We
will, by the Continental Congress!”

It was the last time Herbert and Marian should
gaze upon the wilds of the Wissahikon. The blue
sky was above, the forest were around, the old
mansion with its closed doors and fastened shutters,
was sleeping in the sunlight.

The arms of Herbert were entwined around
Marian's waist; her face upturned to his countenance,
seared by the lines of premature sorrow,
glowed with the happiness of the hour, and her
bosom heaved and her eyes swam in tears of joy.
A little apart stood the manly Harry Heft beside
the blushing Marjorie; in the back ground was the
negro, dancing for gladness at the joy of others;
and in the centre of the group stood the Quaker,
Joab Smiley, his honest visage heightening with
unfeigned pleasure as he regarded the love and
happiness beaming from the faces of all around him.

It was a scene of quiet joy, and one that dwelt
in the remembrance of those who shared the felicity
of the moment through the long lapse of future
years.

Herbert, entrusted with a mission of the utmost
importance to his country, departed with his blooming
bride to the gay scenes of the French metropolis,
where he remained until the American war
was terminated by the peace of Versailles.

Lieutenant Wellwood Tracy, promotod to a
Colonelcy, left America for England, and then
sailed for India, where his love of pleasure and
dissipation soon supplied him with that narrowest
and quietest of all habitations—a grave.

Harry Heft and the black-eyed Quakeress passed
the quiet and peaceful years of their rustic felicity
amid the shades of the Wissahikon, and long after
the fresh-grown turf, extending greenly along the
lawn of Chew's Mansion, had concealed all marks
of blood and carnage, the blunt soldier and his
pretty wife still lived to tell the story of the 4th
of October, 1777—Harry to describe the scenes of
the battle, the charge, the havoc and the retreat,
and Marjorie to picture the fear and consternation
that spread through the habitations of the village
on that eventful day.

Herbert Arnheim Tracy became known in
foreign lands, as an able counsellor in the cabinet
of kings, and tradition relates that after the lapse
of years had borne his fair and beautiful wife from
earth and its sorrows, a warrior whose brow was
seared by the lines of premature age, was known
among the bravest of the brave men who drew

their swords under the banner of Napoleon, and
shared in the carnage at Waterloo, by the title of
General Arnheim de Tracy, designated by courtesy
Monsieur Le Compte de La Wallingford, rather in
respect to his ancient lineage, than from any actual
possession of the estates of Wallingford, which
finally, for want of a claimant, reverted to the
British Crown. And the murderer of Major Tracy
—was he ever discovered? The hand that pealed
the shot from the graveyard wall of Germantown,
was never recognised with all the accuracy and
minute detail of circumstantial evidence. But tradition
relates, that years after the battle, when the
mansion of Major Tracy had passed into other
hands, and events of the Revolution had assumed
the venerable appearance of antiquity, an aged man,
whose frame was broken down with disease, and
whose brow was furrowed with the traces of long
indulged passions, appeared in the village of Germantown,
and sought the shelter of the village
poor-house. In his dying hour, he muttered a
dark confession of a life of crime and infamy, but
the ears of his hearers were in especial attracted
by a tale of horror, which he told of the evening
succeeding the battle-morn.

Returning from the plunder of the dead bodies
that strewed the battle-field, he sought the shelter
of the grave-yard wall, to examine his ill-gotten
acquisitions. While thus employed, he observed

approaching along the main road, an officer whom
he had seen as he prowled from army to army
during the day, prominent in the van of the British
hosts, heading the charge, and fighting in the
thickest of the melee. Seized by an uncontrolable
impulse, the vagabond raised his piece to the level
of the wall, and taking secure aim at the star on
his breast, he shot the British officer to the heart
and then fled. He knew not why he dealt the
blow, but attributed the action to a sudden feeling
to shed blood, that possessed him for the moment,
together with a dimly defined desire to revenge the
death of the Americans who strewed the battle-field.
He made this confession and died, but still
a thousand other legends exist with regard to the
matter, and point out a thousand other causes of
Major Tracy's death.

How Major Tracy died, and when and where,
was ever a matter of deep remembrance to his son,
but that he died with the curse unrevoked and the
imprecation unrecalled—that thought harrowed
the mind of Herbert Tracy until his dying hour,
and hung like a cloud of evil omen over the brightest
points of the pathway of life.

And so ends the legend of Herbert Tracy and
his gallant band of Rangers, with all its wild and
thrilling incidents, which are too much interwoven
with truth and fact, to admit of the “unity and
oneness,” that gives interest and attraction to a

story purely fictionary in incident and character.
The bones of Herbert Tracy whiten a foreign soil;
his bride, his fair and youthful bride rests far from
the friends, the valley of her childhood; a lowly
mound in a village grave-yard contains the remains
of the bluff Harry Heft and his dark-eyed dame,
and after a lapse of sixty-five long years, the memory
of the Battle has become a record of solemn
and painful history; yet still around the homes of
Germantown, and among the firesides of the quiet
Wissahikon, lingers and lives the

Legend of the Black Rangers.