University of Virginia Library

20. CHAPTER XX.

Leaving to the imagination of the reader the meeting
of Kate and Julia and Solo—of Charles with his father,
and Paddy with everybody—and the effect the narration
of their adventures had upon the minds of the neighbours,—
it will be necessary, without delay, to proceed to scenes of

a different nature, and to use the utmost privilege of condensation
to confine them within the limits prescribed.

One day, when Julia and Kate and Charles were sitting
under the broad boughs of the old council-tree, in the
quiet little valley where the lovers' vows had been exchanged
the preceding year, they were startled by the
sudden barking of Solo, who had been panting at their
feet. But, upon observing the faithful sentinel wag his
tail, they were satisfied no enemy lurked in the vicinity;
and, a moment after, they beheld Calvin, the young
Delaware chief, slowly and gloomily approaching. His
form was wasted, and his eyes deep sunken in his head.

“My brother!” said Charles, stepping forth and tendering
his hand to the young man. He grasped it in silence,
and then saluted the ladies in the same melancholy manner.
After this strange proceeding the young chief occupied the
seat which had been offered him, and, sighing deeply, remained
with his eyes fixed upon the ground. His affection
for the lost Thrush being known and respected, no one desired
to make allusion to the mournful catastrophe.

“You do not come as an enemy, I am sure,” said Kate,
“or else the faithful Solo would have resisted your approach.”

“No,” said the Delaware; “the Wilted Grass lies on
the silent grave. It is no longer among the dewy buds.
The spring and summer of its existence have passed away.
The blossoms have fallen, and the sweetest flower of the
forest hath faded! It can never again lift up its head.
Speak to one another, laugh, and be happy. As for me,
regard me as one perished from the earth!”

“No!” said Julia, “you must learn to forget the woes
of the past; be strong of heart and cheerful of spirit.”

“Among the men of our race,” said Kate, “with whom
you have lived and been educated, it is not usual to die of
grief when a loved object vanishes.”

“No,” said Calvin, his head still drooping; “they are
like the fowls of the barn-yard. But I am as the lonely
dove of the forest, perched upon a blasted tree, waiting in
vain for the mate whose breast has been pierced by some
cruel sportsman.”

“But you will meet in heaven,” said Julia.

“Ay—and I would go thither without delay.”

“We must submit without complaining to the will of
God,” said Charles. “But tell me, Calvin, is it true the
Mohawks believe that I or one of my party winged the
fatal messenger?”

“The Senecas say so, and Queen Esther asserts it. The
Oneidas alone deny it. Gentle Moonlight, your foster-mother,
is a raving maniac, ever calling upon you to save
the Thrush from the arrows of Queen Esther!”

“I feared so!” said Charles, sadly. “But the Senecas,
who perpetrated the deed, and their demoniac queen, who
demanded the sacrifice, shall pay the penalty! Will you
not go with me and my company into Tryon county?”

“No. I am going home to die. Or, if the Great Spirit
will not permit me to perish in my youth, I will bury myself
in the Cedar Swamp, where neither wars nor the rumours
of wars can reach me.”

“But the rest?—can you tell me what has become of my
faithful Scots and Van Wiggens and Peter Shaver?”

“There!” said Calvin, pointing in the direction of the
Delaware River. And, to the great joy of Charles, Wilted
Grass informed him that the whole party had escaped from
the Indian villages, with some twenty Oneidas, and were
then approaching the settlement. He had left them in the
morning at the river, and parted with them merely to announce
their coming.

And, having performed his mission, the stricken youth
rose up and vanished in the forest. He did not pause when
they besought him to remain, nor answered a word to their
entreaties.

The girls and Charles hastened away to announce the
tidings. The news was received with stoical indifference at
the house of Mr. Schooley, where Kate was now sojourning
with Julia. Richard was the overseer, and neither Van
Wiggens nor Peter Shaver ever managed the farm to a
better purpose than he.

But the tidings of the return of Hugh McSwine and his
little band of Caledonians afforded very great satisfaction
to the “Gentle Lochiel,” the recluse father of Charles.
Nevertheless, his bleached locks seemed to assume a more
silvery aspect and his face a more deathly pallor as he
gazed upon his son's preparations to march away again in
obedience to an order from Colonel Dayton to join him

with his company at Fort Schuyler, in Tryon county, New
York.

“Charles,” said he, “beware of the warning! It was
the same that appeared to me in Scotland. Never agree to
any capitulation with a faithless foe. Such were the
words.”

“You do not seriously believe in such things, my father,”
said Charles; “and I am sure it was but a feverish
dream.”

“Wizards are spoken of in the Bible and in the writings
of Shakspeare. I spurned the warning before the day of
blood on the field of Culloden. If I did not die, I fell.
We may doubt, but not deny. May God shield you! For
myself, my time is nearly spent.”

Charles did all he could to cheer his desponding parent,
and, prevailing on him to recount some of the romantic adventures
of Charles Edward when a fugitive, he beheld
once more the flashing eyes of the Highland chieftain.

In the afternoon the news of the approach of the returning
prisoners, accompanied by twenty Oneida Indians,
having spread for miles round, the inhabitants of the entire
neighbourhood assembled in front of Mrs. Van Wiggens's
tavern, now a famous stopping-place, to witness their
arrival.

Mrs. Van Wiggens was very nervous, sometimes apparently
gay and lively, and at others musing and abstracted.
She was doing well enough alone. She had mourned her
husband's loss without weeping, and had quite recovered
from the effects of the deprivation. But now the wound
was opened afresh, and Van Wiggens himself, having survived
amid incredible dangers, was approaching, alive and
in good health.

Julia and Kate sat in the carriage before the door of the
inn, where they had been joined by Charles. Paddy held
the reins. The drum and fife and bagpipe were heard
down in the hollow, where Murphy had marched the company
of patriots to welcome the wanderers and conduct
them to the place under a spreading oak, where an ox had
been slaughtered for their benefit. This was the contribution
of the Whigs of the vicinity.

The first individual of the returning party who made his
appearance at the inn was the little stump-tailed dog,

Watch, who was recognised and received with a burst of
laughter. He ran into the blacksmith-shop and smelt at
the knee of his master's negro.

“Is dat you, Watch?” exclaimed Sambo, his eyes
twinkling and his uplifted arm suspended over the anvil.

Watch bounded away, and was met on the steps of the
rude porch in front of the inn by Mrs. Van Wiggens's large
black tomcat, whose swollen tail and arched back indicated
the nature of the reception the dog was to have within.
But Watch had crushed the bones of too many coons and
other animals in the woods, to be easily repulsed by a domesticated
“varmint,” and that, too, on the threshold of
his own premises. So he accepted the proffered battle,
and, springing upon his foe, which was nearly as large as
himself, but not so experienced in desperate warfare, filled
the air with canine and carnivorous sounds, while the fur
flew in every direction.

“It's my cat! my poor Tom!” exclaimed Mrs. Van Wiggens,
rushing forth, broomstick in hand, and striving in vain
to part the combatants. As often as she lifted the stick to
decide the conflict, Watch shifted his position; so that, when
the instrument was about to descend, the black cat was
either uppermost or occupying the place the dog had held
the moment before.

“Mercy on us!” once cried the frightened hostess, when
she had made a determined rush upon the struggling animals,
and Watch, avoiding the broomstick, rolled over with
the cat and continued the combat under the protecting
shelter of the strong linsey-woolsey gown of his mistress.
Mrs. Van Wiggens sprang aside, and, with a glowing face,
aimed a random blow, which fell upon poor Tom's head and
terminated the battle. He was stunned, but not killed;
and Watch would have given him another shake, had he
not been prevented by his master, who stepped forward
and lifted him up in his arms.

“The nasty dog!” cried Mrs. Van Wiggens. “Do kill
him for me, Mr. Indian.”

“Tam'd if I do! Poor Vatch!”

“Why, whose voice is that?” cried Mrs. Van Wiggens,
rushing forward, and gazing in the face of her husband.
“Is this you, Mr. Van Wiggens, coming home painted and
dressed like a savage? And to bring back the impudent

dog which couldn't be killed, like yourself! Yes, it is you!
But the paint hides your blush of shame. And what did
you go off for? Why did you abandon your family—”

“Tam it, stop! Stop a minute! You said vamily—vamily!—vat
vamily's you got? My vamily never vas!”

“Oh, you needn't fire up so! And you must bring back
the nasty dog! You know how I hate him! He'll steal
the meat off the gridiron! You know I hate a dog and a
bear!”

Mrs. Van Wiggens had once been almost suffocated by a
huge pet-bear, and ever afterward that animal was the
most terrible of all others.

“Vell,” said Van Wiggens, “I've brung you von nice
bear. Lead him here, Peter.”

Peter Shaver, likewise habited as an Indian, came forward,
leading a half-grown bear, whose eyes seemed to
glisten with delight on seeing the horror-stricken hostess.
He stood up on his hind-feet, his arms asunder, as if desirous
of embracing his mistress.

Mrs. Van Wiggens screamed, and trembled violently.
She besought her lord, to whom she promised entire submission,
to send the horrid beast away.

“Vell,” said Van Wiggens, “I'll have him painted first
on de sign—and de sign shall pe te bear and te anvil.
And you mustn't take it down agin.”

And subsequently this sign became famous among travellers
in that region.

During this brief scene it may be supposed that the
young ladies in the carriage were highly entertained, and
readily espoused the side of the husband.

But the general joy was cut short by the arrival of runners
from New York and Pennsylvania, with the information
that the Butlers and Brandt, led by St. Leger, were
approaching from Canada, and, if the forts on the frontier
were not quickly manned and bravely defended, the whole
region between the Susquehanna and the Delaware, and
on both sides of those rivers, would be overrun and ravaged
by the Indians and Tories.

No time was to be lost. Disgusted at his own reception,
and the manner in which his dog had been welcomed
back, Van Wiggens was the first of the returned party who
offered to march with Charles. But, subsequently, nearly

all who had been in the wild woods with our hero, as well as
the small party of Oneidas, enrolled themselves in his company.
And, as each announced his purpose, Tim Murphy
had the occasion signalized by a grand roll of the drum.

“I am almost tempted to volunteer myself,” said Kate;
“and I believe, if I were not here to keep her company,
Julia could not be prevented from going.”

“She has been accustomed to see her defenders in the
act of fighting,” said Charles; “and no doubt her presence
has given additional vigour to many a sinewy arm. We
shall miss her. But she will—both if you will—think of
us and utter prayers for our success. We shall be defending
you still; and it is better to meet the enemy at the first
outposts than to resist them here. The forts once fallen,
this would cease to be a place of security. But we shall
probably return very soon. There will be no long sieges.”

We must now pass over many historical events in which
some of our characters were conspicuous actors, but which
are not embraced within the limited scope of this narrative.
The fall of Herkimer, the timidity of Woolsey, the venial
tardiness of Van Rensselaer, and the alternate successes
and disasters in the North, the reader must be already sufficiently
familiar with. Charles Cameron, Hugh McSwine,
and Tim Murphy, performed their duty in all the conflicts in
which they were engaged with the enemy in fort or field,
and received the commendations of their superior officers.
Nevertheless, the tide of invasion was not driven back.
Although Sullivan destroyed the Indian villages and crops
on the lakes, and although Burgoyne was under the necessity
of surrendering to Gates, yet Philadelphia had fallen,
and the enemy possessed the two principal cities in the
Colonies and commanded all the harbours.

It was at such a time, when the more densely-populated
districts were paralyzed by the presence of overwhelming
numbers of the British and Hessians, that the dark stream
of sanguinary savages poured down the Susquehanna and
Delaware valleys, and ravaged all the Western borders.

And during the absence of the Jersey volunteers from
the counties of Hunterdon, Warren, and Sussex, Bonnel
Moody, with his band of robber Tories, committed many
depredations on the unresisting inhabitants, consisting
mostly of old men, women, and children.

But the young ladies continued for some time to enjoy
an exemption from molestation at Thomas Schooley's
house.

And Paddy, with spade in hand, was content to fight
his battles in the garden; while Richard, tired of the delays
dictated by Judith Carlisle, who loved him not, and
whose father, it seemed, had other projects in view as his
fortunes rose, again sought to win the hand of Julia, to the
infinite diversion of Kate. The hum of Mary's wheel was
incessant in the parlour, and the bang of the loom, propelled
by a negro woman, vibrated from the adjoining shed
without.

Nevertheless, the repose of Mr. Schooley's household was
doomed to a sad interruption, as will be seen in the next
chapter.