University of Virginia Library

8. CHAPTER VIII.
ICHABOD: A HEBREW WORD SIGNIFYING THE GLORY HAS DEPARTED!

We shall follow Lanky.

He threaded the paths of the forest, traversed the tracts
of waste land, and hit the points where the brooks were
crossed by logs, stretched for the convenience of pedestrians
from bank to bank, with unerring precision. No doubt
those moonlight—but not sentimental—excursions discoursed
of to the Captain, had made him familiar with all
the devious ways of the country ride; and so ere long he
drew toward the school-house, which was situated in an open
glade of the forest between Williamsburg and Effingham
Hall.

The “old field school,” as these establishments have
been called from time immemorial, was a plain edifice of
logs of some size, and roofed with boards held in their places
by long poles pinned to the eaves by huge pegs. The windows
were small, and secured by shutters of oak, heavy and
creaking on their hinges. A log served for a step before

the half open door, and from the chimney, which was of
stone, and built up outside of the edifice, a slight curling
smoke rose. To these schools, as at the present day, children
of all ages and classes, and of both sexes, resorted—
for education, their parents thought, for amusement, the
youngsters were convinced.

But Lanky—sawing his head, and picking absently on
the strings of his violin—did not look at the school-house,
as he approached. His eyes were fixed upon the groups of
scholars of both sexes scattered through the glade in merry
play—and particularly upon one group, in the centre of
which stood, with laughing eyes and ruddy cheeks, half covered
by the owner's sun-bonnet, a young girl of some sixteen
summers. Lanky's sudden accession of rapidity in the
sawing operation, plainly betrayed his secret. That was the
lady of his heart, and his admiring eyes surveyed with true
lover minuteness, her neat plain dress, her careless locks of
glossy black, and the firm little foot in its plain strong shoe.

Miss Smith was, as we have said, the centre of a group
of maidens—and these maidens were gazing with delight
upon a parcel of youngsters, who, ranged in a long row with
their faces towards Lanky, listened to the oracular observations
of their chieftain, whose back was thus turned toward
our friend. The youngsters were clad in semi-military costume,
with paper hats, girdles of fluttering ribbon; and
each one carried martially erect upon his shoulder, something
to represent a gun—whether that something chanced
to be a hickory stick, a portion of a fence rail, or a cornstalk.
The corn-stalks, however, predominated, and seemed
to be the favorite weapon.

The young chieftain was clad with something more of
pretension: he wore epaulettes, at his side hung a tin sword
gracefully, and on his head was perched a conical hat made
of the paper which had once enveloped a loaf of sugar—
now decorated with ribbons, and sacred to Mars.

The chieftain held his head erect, and addressed his observations
to the company, with great importance, though
many of the troop were his elders. As we have said, the
young maidens stood looking up, and encouraging the soldiers
with their smiles;—upon the conviction, it would seem,
that being handsome, chivalric, and brave, they deserved the
approbation of the fair.

This was the state of things, as nearly as we can describe
it, when Lanky sauntered up, with his violin under his arm.
No sooner had the young maidens caught sight of the well
known pine knot head, the ornamental stockings, the huge
shoes, above all, of the battered violin, than they abandoned
the youthful disciples of the god of war, and ran precipitately
towards Lanky, crying out as they ran, for a tune and
a dance.

“Oh yes! now, Lanky!”

“Play us a tune!”

“A reel!”

“Let us have a dance.”

“Not a reel!”

“A May dance!”

“Both!”

And Lanky suddenly found himself assailed by a dozen
maidens, and ordered to strike up immediately. In proportion
to Lanky's popularity, and satisfaction therefrom, was
the neglect and excessive dissatisfaction of the youthful
soldiers. The smiles of ladies fair, are proverbially valuable
to gentlemen of the military profession; and the reader
may imagine the feelings of the cornstalk regiment, and
their proud commander, at finding themselves thus abruptly
deserted, with all their shining graces, for a common country
bumpkin, with a caricature head, a battered violin, and a
pair of feet which were beyond the power of pen or pencil
to exaggerate.

The youthful chieftain, whom we now beg leave to introduce,
as Captain William Effingham, “of the Cornstalk
Company of Virginia Volunteers,” his enemies added—Mr.
Willie Effingham was perhaps the most indignant of all. He
had just commenced a splendid and stirring oration, which
dealt in tremendous denunciation of the acts of Parliament
and King George, in relation to the colony of Virginia, and
finding himself the centre of a circle of admiring auditors,
had branched out with a vigor and splendor of rhetoric,
which was calculated to procure his arrest as a dangerous
and inflammatory rebel, when the untoward event which we
have just related, happened. To add to his mortification,
his own sweetheart, as he called Miss Donsy Smith, had
joined the deserters; she had been listening to his oration

with admiring attention, he thought: he was doing the heroic
in presence of his ladylove—and now, for all this, to be
abandoned without hesitation, for the aforesaid country
bumpkin. It was horrible!

Lanky resisted the entreaties of his maiden friends, and
sawed his head more vigorously than ever at Donsy.

“Now, Lanky!” said that young lady, with an expression
of coquettish entreaty, “I know you won't refuse me!”

“Hum!” said Lanky.

“Now, Lanky!”

“Miss Donsy, you ain't treated me well, and you know
it!” he said, touching the strings of his instrument.

“I not treated you well? My goodness!”

“You know you haven't.”

“How, Lanky?”

“Never mind!”

“Oh, it's too bad in you,” said the young lady, “to refuse
me—and I liking you so much.”

With which Donsy darted a killing glance at poor Lanky,
who felt his heart melt.

“Now, Lanky!” she added.

But our friend remained obdurate in spite of the hundred
solicitations, the cries and exclamations echoing on all
sides.

“Here comes Will Effin'um,” he said, “he'll play for
you!”

And Lanky smiled with the superiority of a great artist
in presence of a mere tyro. Master Will approached, followed
by his regiment, who had been hastily disbanded.

“What did you all run away for?” asked Will, gloomily.

“To have a dance!” cried Donsy.

“A dance?”

“Yes, Lanky's goin' to play for us.”

Lanky sawed his head.

“You are always coming to spoil fun, Lanky,” said
Will, surveying his rival, “and I won't stand it.”

Lanky fired up.

“Come now, Will!” cried Donsy, “you shan't ruin our
sport. Play on, Lanky!”

Lanky remembered the Captain's advice, and refused.

“Oh!” said Donsy, in a hurt and mortified tone.

Lanky closed his ears, and directed defiant glances toward
Will.

“You will not refuse Donsy!” continued the little maiden,
and in a whisper, “your Donsy!”

Lanky's heart began to succumb: his resolution was
oozing out at the ends of his fingers.

“You can't, after seeing how I hurt my hand with the
slate Sally Jones was drawing an ugly picture of you on!”
continued the maiden, holding out a small hand upon the
back of which a red mark was visible.

Lanky's resolution began to flow away; it no longer
oozed.

“Look how red it is!” continued the maiden, with a sly
glance at her admirer, and placing the hand in his own as she
spoke.

Lanky's knees shook as he took it in his own.

“Really now!” he said, in a murmur.

“Yes, indeed—and it's not the first time I've taken your
part—for you know how much I like you, Lanky!” said the
little maiden, throwing a deadly glance upon her beau, and
pressing his hand in her own.

Lanky forgot the Captain completely, and with a hesitating
movement tuned a string.

“Please now, dear Lanky,” said Donsy, tenderly, “a
nice May dance.”

Lanky's fiddle went to his shoulder.

“He shan't play!” cried Will, indignant at the tenderness
bestowed upon his rival, “stop!”

Lanky with a scowl struck his violin with a vigorous
hand, and making his bow fly backward and forward like
lightning, struck up an animated tune, to which the delighted
girls, and alas! the Cornstalk Regiment also, commenced
dancing, circling hand in hand around the pole on the summit
of which floated the regimental banner.

Will, we are compelled to say, did not really care a copper
for Donsy, and he bore no real ill will to Lanky: but
when he found himself thus ignominously abandoned, his
authority despised, his rival preferred, he fell into a passion
and looked around him for some means of venting his
wrath.

The means were not visible:—alas! his brave soldiers

were flying madly around the pole, hand in hand with the
merry school girls, who with bonnets thrown upon the
ground, and floating hair, and merry twinkling feet, to say
nothing of bright eyes, and ruddy cheeks, and laughing lips,
were no longer conscious of any thing upon earth, but a
sensation of excessive delight as the landscape revolved, and
danced like themselves; and the violin continued to fill the
air with its roaring, crashing, jubilant, rejoiceful laughter.

Will drew his sword and threw his cap upon the ground:
—Lanky continued to flash his bow across the strings regardless.
Willie in a rage rushed toward him:—Lanky only
raised his chin toward the sky, and shaking his head and
foot, rapturously roared on.

Will was about to charge the enemy, to vent at one fell
blow all his wrongs and hatred, when suddenly a bell rang
in the school-house, the door opened, and Lanky, with an
elegant bow, placed his violin under his arm and took off
his hat.

The master appeared upon the threshold, silent, in awful
state, and that master was no less a personage than our old
friend, Parson Tag; Parson Tag, who disgusted at the
slenderness and poverty of his Piedmont parish, had resigned;—Parson
Tag, who had abandoned the surplice for the
coat of formal cut; the prayer book for the classic; the
shovel hat and the staff for the profane cocked hat and ferrule.
The church might have got tired of him:—he forestalled
any disagreeable circumstances which might have attended
that event, by getting tired of the church:—the clergy
might have insisted on his leaving their ranks:—he avoided
that by leaving them himself. And now, like a great and
good man, the ci-devant parson bent his powerful mind to
teaching the young ideas of an old field school the art of
shooting.

The appearance of the pompous and austere gentleman,
at once silenced the fiddle, paralyzed the dance.

“What profane sound was that I heard?” asked the
parson, looking round with an air of importance and reproof.

“This here fiddle, sir,” replied Lanky, with great politeness.

“Begone you son of Belial,” said the parson, “and you

boys and girls, come into school. The period allotted to
exercise and recreation has expired.”

With which words the worthy gentleman retired into
the school-house. The scholars trooped in—Will and Donsy
coming last.

“Now,” said Donsy, “you shall not fight: ain't you
ashamed of yourself, Lanky, to refuse so long to play and
we not have half a dance!”

And the country beauty smiled on her admirer, until he
forgot the import of her words.

“You were wrong too, Will, and you know it,” said
Donsy, “to try and break up our dance! It was too bad!”

And she gave her hand to Will, with a smile—threw a
kiss with the points of her fingers to the violinist; whispered,
“Come and see me soon, dear Lanky;” and entered the
school-house.

Lanky remained staring at the door, through which the
dazzling vision had disappeared, in utter disregard of Captain
Ralph's philosophy and advice. The reason was, that
Lanky was in love.