University of Virginia Library

16. CHAPTER XVI.

While the mysterious occurrence narrated at the close of
the last chapter was taking place, a scene of a more quiet, but
no less significant character was in progress at a small, deserted
house, on the road a few miles to the eastward.

In the yard of that lone tenement, on the evening in question,
might have been seen through the hour of twilight, a
solitary man, in whose peculiar, fat, stumpy figure, nervous,
waddling gait, and quick, uneasy motions, no one, who had
ever seen him, need have failed to recognize one of the most
prominent personages of the fore part of our story, the noted
Deacon Mudgridge of Plymouth. He was restlessly pacing
forward and backward, with an occasional anxious glance up
the road westward, while his moving lips and pantomimic gestures
showed the passing of unspoken thoughts that seemed
laboring for utterance. And at length those thoughts, with
their accompanying anxieties, becoming apparently too intense
to be longer repressed, found vent in broken soliloquy:—

“The loitering knaves, why don't they come, or some one
of them, to report to me? It is time they had done something.
I doubt me whether they are all, put together, equal
to that old praying Wampanoog. Ah, that was rare luck!—
luck? It must be Providence that sent him to me, and I
think I can safely take the sending as heavenly sanction of
the enterprise I've now put my hand to—yea, rare luck, I do
declare, to have thus lit on such a God-sent instrument, who,

peradventure, was the only one in the whole country, who had
seen and known this man of sin both among the whites and
Indians! Rare luck, likewise, that the sharp-eyed heathen
discovered the game embarking, and learned his destination to
Newport, and so exactly conjectured what course he would
take after landing; and rarer still to have hit on his trail, and
dog him to that place so near where he had advised my rendezvous.
And what a marvelous swift runner he must be to
have come so quick to Plymouth, to notify me of his discovery—then
speed to Staunton river, follow up his game to the
cage—hie here to notify me, and then back with my men for
the capture—and all in time!

“Why, he would surpass the Amalekite runner that brought
the news of the death of his great enemy to David. But I
will not serve him as David did that runner. No, I will pay him
well, if we succeed. Succeed? Why we must succeed. Could
anything but Providence have so singularly brought about
the discovering and the tracing out of the heaven offending
wretch, who was doubtless moved by the same power to come
abroad from his lurking places in order that he might be destroyed?
And shall I, a chosen leader of the church, with the
sword of justice, as it were, put in my hand to execute its
God-suggested judgments—shall I hesitate to act on such
plain indications of duty? Who am I, that I should, by
timid doubtings, and refusing to act, thus in effect thwart the
will of heaven?

“But the private motives thereto moving, they will say—
`Who said that?' Sathan! Thou shalt not baffle me by
starting such cowardly misgivings! And suppose I had
private interest, am I who have been such an arm
of sufficiency in building up our Israel, am I to receive
no favorings in the things pertaining to private interests
—no reward for such continued holy labors, I should like
to know? Again, is it not solemn duty to lend ourselves

as instruments, on proper indications given, as in
this case, to assist in the overthrow of the apostle of the
church's enemies? I tell you, John Mudgridge, you are justified—nay,
praise-worthy, in moving in this matter thus connected
with the temporal and spiritual interests of God's heritage,
and not guilty! Guilty? Who said that too? Sathan,
once more I tell thee, avaunt! Get thee behind me, foul, meddling
fiend!

“Yea, verily I am doing a good thing. Thus I overcome all
Sathan-suggested doubts and temptations. So that is all settled.
And the thing itself whereof I have been thus foolishly
doubting, must be settled by this time, I think. Yet it is
strange they don't come,—not all, and with him, but one first
to report what is done; for Dick Swain knows, if the rest don't,
that I would not have him brought here to confront me, but be
dispatched on the way by gun-shot, when showing signs of resistance
as it were, or escaping. But I hear no gun,—perchance,
it has been silent knife-work,—or perchance they have delivered
him over bound, to my trusty Wampanoog to be taken into
the forest to be dealt with. They will doubtless be here soon,
now,—Hark! Wasn't there sounds of footsteps? Yea,—
but coming in the wrong direction,—What does that mean?
Who can it be? Can that be Dummer, I begin to discern
loping along hitherward in the dark? Why, I thought
I had put him on a mission that would have detained him all
night,—I am most sorry I brought him along with me,—yet
it seemed expedient to have him near, so that, in case of
any stir or questioning, his presence or accompanying, might
be made to throw a sort of sanction over the affair and I
think I can manage it, yet, to gain the good of his coming
and avoid the evil.”

And the desperate hypocrite at once checked the speed of
his hurried walk, smoothed his rigid brow, gave a gentle hum,

by way of reducing his harsh tones to pious mildness of voice,
and, as the Shadow came up, cheerily exclaimed,

“Ah! Dummer, is that you? Peace be with thee, my
brother,—What tidings from the army?”

“Nothing adverse, I think, revered Deacon. In fact I
left them all, both officers and men, in just that condition of
feeling, methought, which so savors of godliness and saving
faith as to invite down the needed blessing, and make them
mighty to prevail over the heathen hosts of darkness that are
so threateningly beleagureing our chosen people.”

“It truly rejoiceth me to hear your words of faith and encouragement,
brother Dummer. I doubt me not,—nor did I
when I proposed your coming here, nor when I especially
urged you this morning to repair to the army,—I doubt me
not, I say, that you have been a favored instrument in greatly
strengthening this temporal arm of our defence.”

“I thank you, Deacon, for your confidence in my faith and
acceptableness in intercession. And I trust I may truly say
that my mission has not been a vain one.”

“You were well received by the army, then?”

“Aye,—as a humble, service-seeking servant and representative
of a prayerful church should be, Deacon.”

“And you attended divine service before the troops, and
offered up for their success some of those able outpourings of
prayer which are making you, I may say without flattery,
brother Dummer, a burning light in our church?”

“I did, Deacon, I did, I may say safely, I did feel, on the
occasion, an uncommon power of prayer on me,—yea, I wrestled
mightily in calling down the blessing, and truly felt that
I had prevailed, even to the overcoming of the untoward affair
that had turned up at the outset to dampen my faith.”

“Untoward affair! What was that, my prayerful brother?”

“It was this, and I don't know when I have been so exercised

to keep from crying aloud in holy deprecation,—it was
this, Deacon Mudgridge; soon after I came up with the army,
which had halted for their mid-day meal, and by kindly permission,
was on the point of opening the services, a messenger
came post haste to hurry on the troops, affirming that the
heathen host had already assailed the threatened village of
Dartmouth. But our worthy and considerate General Cudworth
wisely decided to delay for the proposed religious exercises,
aptly remarking that prayer and provender hinder
no man. And all the troops but one company reverently
tarried.”

“All but one company? Why not all? What company
was that, who could be so perverse and irreverent as to refuse
to tarry to become partakers in such a precious privilege?”

“It was, as you might expect, that forward Captain Mosely,
of the Massachusetts volunteers, the same that bearded the
authorities at Plymouth a short time ago, and protected that
audacious young heretic, called Vane Willis; and his conduct
now was equally forward and offensive; for no sooner had the
general, nathless the message just received, made known his
decision not to move till after service, than he broke out into
a terrible passion, and profanely swore he would not tarry
one instant for prayer or anything else; when loudly calling
on his company to follow, they all rushed disorderly away
from the spot, with the beating of drums and the noise of
shouting, to the great surprise and offense of every godly-minded
man in the army. For myself, I was shocked and
scandalized, and still cannot but feel deep concern, Deacon
Mudgridge, lest the presence and connection of such men as
the two I have just named with our army, will bring down
displeasure upon us, and lead to the withholding of the blessing.”

“And well may you feel concern in the matter, brother

Dummer—I have agonized and agonized over our remissness
of duty, in not purging the land of such heaven-offending
misdoers as you have named. But they are not the only ones,
whose suffered existence is keeping back the blessings we
should otherwise receive. There is one, abroad in the colony,
lurking in disguise, so enormously apostate, heretic, and traitorous,
that I cannot but tremble for the land that is tolerating
his curse-invoking presence.”

“You startle me, Deacon, and the more, as I know you
are never prone to speak without good warrant. Who, and
where is he?”

“As a keeper of state secrets, I may not disclose his name,
if, indeed, he has any whereby he would be now known in
the colony; but we may well call him, as we do, the Man of
Sin. For years, he has been lurking in obscure and remote
haunts among the red heathen, in the wilderness, teaching
them his abominations, and instigating them to their present
warfare against the chosen. And it was supposed he was out
of the reach of earthly justice. But Providence thereunto
inciting, doubtless, to the end of punishment, he has recently
ventured abroad, been detected, and traced to one of his secret
calling places, in this section, by a shrewd praying Indian,
who luckily coming along after you left us, and while I
was about to proceed to Taunton to strengthen the leaders of
the church there, in fulfilment of my mission, gave us the
information. Whereupon my guards, fired with holy zeal,
and taking the Indian for a guide, started off in pursuit, and
I am now every minute expecting their return.”

“You surprise and rejoice me, Deacon Mudgridge. How
providential that the news came while you were here!”

“I could not but think so myself, nathless certain doubts,
the suggestions of the Vile Deceiver, it may be, crossed my
mind, whether it was strictly my province to act, lest it be said
I was taking justice and judgment out of the hands of the

proper authorities; still I could not but deem there was a
duty for me to perform.”

“Of a verity there was, and if you were troubled thus with
doubts, they must have been, indeed, the promptings of Sathana,
ever so ready to turn the faithful from duty.”

“Then you would have advised and sanctioned the action
I took in the matter?”

“Yea, surely, I would—nay, I would have esteemed myself
favored and privileged to have become a helper in the
God-bidden service.”

“I am truly glad to thus receive your confirming opinions.
You have greatly strengthened me, brother Dummer, and I now
feel I was but doing an unavoidable and required duty—I
feel—stay—what was that? Groans and outcries, with the
sounds of coming feet! It must be them, but what can have
happened?”

The hireling gang of his unscrupulous tools were indeed
approaching, but they were coming to report far different results,
and show themselves in a far different plight from what
he had anticipated. With great agitation and fierce, incoherent
mumblings, he rushed forward a few rods, hurriedly
bidding the confounded and frightened Dummer to remain
where he was, and then stopped short and began to listen.
Presently a fresh and nearer outburst of groans, mingled with
imprecations, and expressions indicating lively fears of pursuit,
assailed his ears. And the next moment, the balked
and crippled band came hurriedly limping and staggering
along in wild disorder to the spot, one holding a bruised and
nearly broken arm, one dragging a disabled leg, and another
tightly pressing with both hands a gashed and bloody head.

“What is all this?” hastily demanded the Deacon, in tones
trembling with surpressed agitation. “Where is he? that is,
where is the prisoner—What have you done with him? Why,
don't ye speak? Dick Swain? Which is Dick Swain?

That! Dick, what is the matter?—what has happened,
Dick?”

“Enough!” fiercely groaned the discomfited and smarting
minion, wiping away the blood trickling from his smitten
forhead—“in the name of all the furies in Tophet, plenty
enough has happened! Curse on the hour I undertook this
blamed business! I have got my death wound by it. Oh!
Oh!”

“That is no answer,” persisted the flurried Deacon. “What
has befel? Where is the accursed man you went after?”

“Gone back to his place or sunk into the earth,” responded
Dick recovering a little composure. “That man was no man,
but Sathan himself, or one in league with him, or he couldn't
have escaped out of our hands in that strange way.”

“Escaped out of your hands?” fiercely cried the former.
“Did you get him into your hands, and then let him escape
without shooting him down?”

“Yea, but could'nt help it, Deacon,” deprecatingly replied
Dick, cowing beneath the fierce manner of the other. “Old
Miles Standish himself had been at fault by coping with such
devilish agencies, and when you have heard all, you will say
so yourself, Deacon Mudgridge.

He then proceeded with an exaggerated account of “the
attempted seizure of the mysterious stranger, at the Leonard
Establishment, and the gallant rescue effected by the disguised
chief, already related; described the strange, unearthly
appearance of the man, when pointed out as the one, by the
Indian guide, and seen through the window standing near the
light, talking to some unseen person in the room—of the
stationing of the men behind different objects round the
house, and of himself, with cocked musket, in the road beyond
—of the sudden and unnatural swiftness with which the fugitive
burst from the house, passed through the line of the surprised
liers in wait, and came on towards him in the road,

dodging and doubling along like some great serpent running
erect on the tail, and with such amazing quickness as to make
it impossible to get any aim, and finally, of the unaccountable
manner by which he himself had been invisibly approached
and struck senseless to the earth. And one of the men, who
seemed equally troubled by smarting wounds and exercised by
superstitions apprehensions, then took up the narrative and
set forth, in vivid colors, the prompt giving chase, and the
desperate grappling of the fugitive requiring all their united
exertions to hold him, and finally the sudden apparition of
something or somebody in the shape of a big sailor, who all at
once stood at their heels, as if let down by some invisible
winged devil, and who instantly poured upon their unguarded
persons such a shower of murderous blows, that they were
compelled to relinquish their grasp and scatter to save their
lives, as they all did while having the mortification of seeing
the fugitive and his questionable rescuer escape to the woods.

“But where is the Indian?” sharply demanded the Deacon
who seemed far less disturbed at either the singular apprehensions
of his minions, or their alleged dangerous wounds,
than at the strange and unexpected failure of the great object
in view—“Where is the Indian guide that he don't come
with the rest of you?”

“Gone back and still hanging round there, I suppose,” answered
Dick lugubriously. “After assisting the feeblest of
us wounded ones along a piece of the way here, he, though
hurt himself in the affray, went back to see, as he said, if he
could not trail the unnatural enemy, or, at least ascertain the
course they took.”

“Ah, who knows but peradventure the thing will turn out
right yet,” eagerly responded the Deacon, still desperately intent
on accomplishing his dark purpose. “That friendly
Wampanoog is a fellow of exceeding craft and trust-worthiness;
and I can scarce doubt me, but he will again kennel

the game, so that we can come on him unawares and destroy
him, which, inasmuch as he has resisted, and attempted to
take life, will be in the eyes of all, an indubitably lawful act
for any one of us to perform.”

“Now prithee, Deacon Mudgridge,” rejoined the former in
a tone of deprecation, evidently not at all relishing the thought
of renewing the pursuit as hinted by the other,—“prithee,
consider our disabled and suffering condition, and the mortal
peril we have just escaped, so far as to reach this place, but
which I greatly fear me may not yet be over for us even
here.”

“Peril here?” said the other starting, and now, for the
first time, exhibiting signs of relaxing from his blood-hound
intent, at this suggestion of a personal danger,—“peril here?
What peril? What can you mean, Dick? Who is to come
here to beset us? Our brave troops have just scoured the
forests, all round this region, and driven the hostile heathen
to a distance. And touching the matter in hand,—this godless
son of Belial and his confederate, why, according to your
own story, there were but two of them.”

“True, if you call them mere men,” responded Dick, in a
doubtful, hesitating tone; “but such men! I opine they
were Legion, though assisting for the most part invisibly.
Then they may have carnal outlying confederates. I expected,
every step of the way, in our painful dragging of ourselves
hither, to have had them again light down on us.”

“So did I,” said another of the obviously fear-stricken band.
“The solemn truth is, the whole thing is too uncommon and
devilish appearing, not to give us good reason to have a fearful
looking for something out of the way and terrible, if we
tarry here much longer.”

Each of the rest of the band, then, in turn, added confirming
opinions, and manifested their anxiety to get away from
so near a vicinity to the scene of their discomfiture. And

last, the Shadow, who had drawn near and been listening to
the dialogue, and its strange development, now crowded forward
toward the silent but uneasy Deacon, and, with a perceptible
tremor of voice, said,—

“I am not wholly without misgivings myself, I confess, in
the matter of further action, nor even of abiding here to-night,
so near such a dubious locality, where we have learned
such questionable doings and appearances have been permitted
to take place. There is such a thing as the tempting of Providence,
Deacon Mudgridge.”

The Deacon was still silent: but the trepidation of his manner,
and the closeness with which he followed up the rest of
the company, as they continued to edge themselves along to
the house till they reached and huddled round the door,
plainly showed that either conscience or cowardice was fast
reducing the stock of firmness, which he first affected to display,
to a level with those who had more openly manifested
their apprehensions. Nor did the wild start he the next moment
gave, with a sudden leap towards the door, as the sounds
of footsteps reached his ear, and the form of some one dimly
seen in the starlight to be approaching, caught his eye, less
plainly betray the secret apprehensions that were beginning
to possess him. He quickly rallied, however, on discovering
that the new comer was the missing Indian guide, and summoning
a brave manner, exclaimed,—

“Ah! our trust-worthy guide returned, it is, I perceive—
I am glad he has come in so opportunely to dispel the doubtings,
I trust, which, may be, we were over much prone to indulge.
Let us hear what discoveries he has made touching the
matter. Did you get trace of them, and follow them up,
my red friend?”

“Found some trail—found where they go into the woods,”
was the demure reply.

“But didn't you follow them up then, to discover their

lurking place for the night, which must be near?” persisted
the other.

“No go in the woods to-night—no want to—no want to stay
long about there, so come here,” answered the former, in a significant
tone.

“Why?” asked the Deacon, with a quick, husky voice.
“Why? Did you discover anything dubious?”

“Don't know dubious,” gravely answered the native; “don't
know him you say dubious. But think Wampanoog warriors
there in the woods—hear Indian voice, sartain—then Wampanoog
signal—know him—think they want scalps—be out
soon—may be come here fore morning.”

The announcement of the Wampanoog produced, as may
well be supposed under the circumstances, no little commotion
among his startled listeners. The Indian had, indeed, some
reason for his statement. While stealthily creeping across
the field, over which the escaping fugitives had passed on their
way to the forest, his ear had caught the sound of Metacom's
voice, and in it detected the peculiar intonations of the vocal
organs of his race; and subsequently heard the more distinct
signal call of the chief, who, for some reason, had varied the
place of meeting agreed on, and uttered and repeated his
call to apprise his white friend of his new locality.

On this foundation, as he had not the least suspicion of the
identity of the great chief with the formidable rescuer of the
nearly secured object of the movement, he had not very unnaturally
based his ominous conjectures; nor was it, perhaps,
any more unnatural that these conjectures, as groundless as
they were, when suddenly disclosed to men already confused
and intimidated at what had befel, should have struck them
with all the force of an alarming truth, and instantly converted,
as it did, their previous undefined fears into an absolute
panic.

“The guns! the guns!” half screamed the now really

frightened Deacon, who, in the strange perturbation that had
seized him on the arrival of his discomfited party, had not
even yet noticed that they were without arms; while the latter
also, in their strange alarm and superstitious looking for
intangible enemies, had scarcely thought of the fact themselves.
“The guns! the guns! I say. Where are the
guns?”

“Our guns! There now! O Lord!” cried Dick, stammering
and twisting about in his terror and confusion.
“Why—why, I thought we had told you how we lost them
all.”

“Lost them?” fiercely vociferated the other, in a voice
quivering with the strangely mingling emotions of fear and
anger. “Lost them, stupid coward? How lost them?”

“Well, now,” said the worse and worse confounded and
trembling minion, “I—I—don't—don't know—know I had
mine safe in hand, when I was struck down and lost my
senses; but it was gone when I came to—and the rest were
then gone too—spirited away some how, weren't they, men?”
he added, appealing to his associates.

Several mouths were at the same instant opened, in mingling
jargon while attempting to confirm the strange assertions
of their comrade; but their words were the next moment
drowned in the loud, excited voice of the Shadow vehemently
ejaculating:—

“O Lord, hear and help thy servant in this his extremity.
Lord, the chosen leaders of thy church are in great strait.
The heathen enemy are encompassing us round about, and we
are in mortal peril. Help, Lord, help! Amen! And now,”
he added, in a quaking tone, “now let us flee—flee—flee,
Deacon Mudgridge—let us flee straightway.”

But neither the doughty Deacon, nor any of the supple,
though in part, blinded instruments of his dark purposes,
needed any urging to adopt the course so significantly indicated

by the terror-smitten Shadow. And with one accord they
made a rush for the road to Plymouth, and went hurrying
and hobbling along in disorderly array on their homeward
destination; the long, lithe-limbed, and fear-impelled Shadow,
with the forward lopes of a giraffe, leading the dimly seen
way, and the obese, duck-legged Deacon, puffing and wheezing
like a stranded porpoise, in his desperate efforts to keep
up with the rest, bringing up the rear.

Amidst his tribulations, however, the Deacon was, at first,
sustained by the comforting thought that he should soon have
as much of an advantage over the rest of the company, in locomotion,
as they now manifestly had over him; for, being a
bad walker, he had come into the vicinity of the rendezvous,
where we found him, on horseback, keeping along with his
party in that manner, till within a mile or two of the place,
when he left his horse in the barn of another deserted house
on the road, and passed on with the rest, on foot, to their destination.
And now, while often throwing timid glances behind
him, and struggling hard to keep from falling in the rear, he
inwardly chuckled at the thought of speedily being enabled
to turn the tables on those, who seemed to him, in his fear
and vexation, to exult in taxing his powers so severely. And
thus the pitiable wretch, agitated alike by his keen apprehensions
of pursuit, and his hot wrath at his fellow fugitives for
their desertion, having forgotten that their fears were as
great as his own, and that fear, of all human emotions, is the
least capable of sympathy. Thus he strove desperately onward
after the rest, till his longing eyes were at last greeted
by the dim outlines of the building still containing, as he supposed,
his trusty steed, which would need only to be bitted
to be ready for mounting. He now began to slacken his
pace and breathe easier, throwing contemptuous glances after
his receding associates, and with fiercely muttered anathemas,
defiantly bidding them push along now as fast as they pleased.

But contrary to his unheeded words, and now even to his wishes,
the rushing fugitives in front began to slacken their pace
also; and they soon, one after another, halted in their tracks,
being evidently thus brought to a stand by the sudden pause
and retrogade movement of their file leader, Dummer, who,
the next moment, was seen timidly peering along back towards
the Deacon, as the latter was about to turn into the
barn in quest of his horse.

“Why turn back your footsteps, all at once, brother Dummer?”
at length asked the Deacon, in a tone of ironical bitterness,
which he took little pains to conceal, as he perceived
the other to be hesitating, and evidently at a loss how to
unburthen himself of the something he appeared to have in
mind—“Why not keep straightway onward as best beseemeth
one showing himself so prone to lead in the retreat, and to be
so unmindful of those who by reason of natural disabilities
are compelled to struggle in the rear?”

“Oh, ah, yes,” responded the abashed Shadow, now obviously
getting an inkling of the state of the case, and feeling
it incumbent on him to say something in excuse for his inadvertent
neglect. “Why, I knew not but they would be
looking to me to take the lead to clear the way, as it were;
and then touching my coming back hither now, I did not
know, as I bethought me, we were passing the place where
you left the horse. I did not know but you would expect—
that is, peradventure, you will not take it amiss, that I assist
you in equipping the animal.”

“Nay, don't trouble yourself,” coldly responded the Deacon,
suspecting the other's object and hurrying on to the
barn. “I can do it myself.”

“Yea, but it were no more than fitting,” persisted the Shadow,
eagerly following after. “And now I bethink me, I
noted that this horse of yours is one of exceeding strength
and burden-bearing capacity, and would no more mind taking

two on his back than one, and if a somewhat painfully exercised
brother might ask for a favor—”

Here the unheeded speaker was cut short by successive exclamations,
first, in the tones of surprise, then soon of consternation
and despair bursting from the Deacon, who had
found the stable door beaten down, and anon made the
astounding discovery that his horse was missing, leaving evidence
in the part of a broken halter left behind, and other
appearances, which, coupled with the known home propensities
of the animal, at once convinced the amazed and troubled
owner, that the hungry and impatient brute had snapped the
tether, beat down the rickety door, clearly escaped, and was
now far on the way to Plymouth!

As terrible as was his disappointment, however, he managed
to suppress any further outbreak of feeling, and, withholding,
for secret reasons, any distinct announcement of his
misfortune, mutely hurried from the stable, and, gliding
stealthily forward to the road before his approach was hardly
perceived, fastened with desperate clutch on the coat tail of
the startled Shadow, who stood like an alarmed goose, on the
nightly approach of a fox, apprehensively poking his long neck
out into the deeper darkness intervening between him and the
shadowing barn, in his anxiety to comprehend what had happened,
his eager and repeated inquiries for that purpose having
met with no response.

“What, Deacon—what—oh what, dear Deacon, has befel?”
blustered out the confused and freshly alarmed Shadow, the
first to speak.

“The horse is gone—broke out and cleared for home,”
replied the other, in a half surly, half desperate tone.

“The horse gone?” exclaimed the other wildly. “What
shall we do? Oh, what shall we do?—Lord! Lord! we again
beseech thee—confound the counsels of the pursuing enemy
—hold back the pursuit till thy servants can escape.”

“Amen to that,” huskily responded the Deacon. “But
let us hence quickly. Thou hast marvelous foot speed, brother
Dummer, wherein haply we may find the account that
the runaway brute be not greatly missed. So, hie thee forward
quickly to the front, and lead the way as before, inasmuch
as it will throw the men as a guard, as it were, into our
rear.”

“Then prithee loose thy hold on me, Deacon, that I may
do thy bidding more effectively,” nervously expostulated the
Shadow, vainly attempting to free himself.

“Nay,” rejoined the pertinacious Deacon, now the bolder
in his persistence as he remembered that luckily he had not
betrayed to the other the secret determination he had formed
that his horse should be encumbered by no one but himself
in the flight. “Nay, I will not. Thou wast about to claim
a seat behind me on my horse; and now thou canst not refuse
to assist my more imperfect progress. But I shall not impede
thee over much. Then straightway, forward, brother
Dummer, nor tarry an instant longer in this exposed position,
lest, while thus lingering in vain disputations, those blood
thirsty sons of Belial, now perchance close on our trail, suddenly
come up and destroy us.”

Stopping to listen to no more of such ominous intimations,
the poor, frightened Shadow began a series of desperate lunges
forward, like a frantic horse jerking at a dead weight, and
after a while succeeded in pulling the clumsy and shaking
Deacon—still desperately grasping the now horizontal coattail
— into a sort of steady, quickening, elephantine motion;
which, by continued exertions, was at length so much increased
as to enable this oddly-coupled brace of church-militant
heroes to reach the coveted position in front; when, with
hurrying step and renewed effort, the straggling column again
pressed forward in their continued flight from the ill-omened
locality.

But instead of following them further, at this time, in their
harassing panic-march through the night, we will anticipate
their arrival at their first halting place next morning, and, by
change of scene, and, in part, of actors, endeavor to bring
out the now only remaining part of this chapter of singular
adventures.

It was near eight o'clock next morning when Captain
Willis, with his company of victorious rangers, attended by
the staunch Captain Mosely, with his brave volunteers, were
seen, in their march along a road from the southeastern part
of the colony, to be drawing near the point where that road
intersected the great thoroughfare leading from Taunton to
Plymouth. Before them were marching, but without any
pretence of order, a body of one hundred and fifty unarmed
Indians, who, though prisoners, yet evinced not the slightest
disposition to escape, but seemed as unreluctantly and cheerfully
pursuing their unguarded way in front as if bound on
some holiday excursion. They were the trophies of the
prompt and rapid expedition of Captain Willis—to which
allusion has already been made—to the menaced village of
Dartmouth, where, arriving at the nick of time, he rescued
the half-burned and plundered town, and, by the boldness and
vigor of his attack, had not only scattered and disheartened
the small, and, when left to themselves, not badly disposed
tribe of Dartmouth Indians, but so hotly pursued the little
band of Wampanoogs who, under the lead of Annawam,
(King Philip's great war captain,) came there to instigate the
assault, that the latter were glad to escape to their own fastnesses
in a distant forest. And when this was effected, he had
soon succeeded, by menacing attitudes, feints of surrounding
them, and skillful management in obtaining and conducting
parleys with them, in inducing the warriors of the Dartmouth
tribe to surrender themselves as prisoners of war, as at length
they very cheerfully did, on the condition and sacred promise

of Captain Willis that they should be taken only to Plymouth,
and there be fed, well treated, and set free at the close of the
war, and as much sooner as might be deemed compatible with
public safety. And in pursuance of these terms, he had started
with them the preceding afternoon; and being met on the
way by Captain Mosely vigorously pushing forward to the
rescue, that officer, rejoicing in his friend's success, at once
decided to wheel about, and for a while, at least, unite himself
with the escort.

The two captains, as was often customary with this grade
of officers on their marches, had mounted some of the horses
generally kept in attendance for that and other purposes, and
were now riding sociably along together a little in front of the
foremost of their respective companies.

“Where do you think General Cudworth and his command
are by this time, Captain Mosely?” said Willis, at the point
of their dialogue which we have occasion for noting.

“Hang me if I know, or much care,” replied Mosely; “but
probably halted again for another praying performance. I
don't think much of this idea of praying those red-skinned
devils into submission, unless by such prayers as are sent along
with the cold lead of our muskets.”

“Not that you would object to prayers on proper occasions,
I suppose, Captain Mosely?”

“Be sure not. Why, even in the pressing emergency I
told you about, when naming how I broke away from the rest,
as we were ordered to stop to hear divine services, as they
said, from a godly emissary of the church; even then, I would
say to my soldiers, Pray boys—aye, pray boys, as much as you
please, but pray upon the run. A right sensible fellow that
St. James, who said, Faith without works is dead.”

“Aye—that is it—that is it. I have as little patience as
you, Captain Mosely, with those do-nothing men of faith,
who are so certain to be always lagging, when their prompt

action is most loudly demanded. You and I will have to do
most of the fighting for them, I fancy.”

“That, for my part, I expect to do, while affairs are under
present guidance and command, friend Willis, though I find
it rather tough work to keep the old man in me down on
witnessing such outrageous shilly shallying as I saw in them
at the army yesterday, when, right in the face of the messenger
just come to urge us forward, Granny Cudworth gave
order to prolong our already too long halt, to listen to the
prayers and preachments of that long, lean, holy-faced marplot
from Plymouth.”

“From Plymouth, said you, Mosely? Why you describe
Dummer, that mouthing zealot they call the Shadow—Deacon
Mudgridge's shadow—because he is found to be a sort of echo
to that power grasping personage. But the shadow is always
near the substance,” added the speaker, after a thoughtful
pause—“May it not be, that the Deacon himself is mousing
round for some secret purpose, in this section? I have
latterly had, Captain Mosely, some strange suspicions about
that man, wholly aside from his insufferable bigotry and public
officiousness.”

“Well, the last is enough for me,” rejoined the blunt
veteran—“quite enough—nay a little more than I could stand,
as you saw, in that miserable attempt of his to get you arrested
at Plymouth. I gave him a pretty loud piece of my mind
then; and if I should catch him round here for any of his
mischief, he would be mighty apt to get a louder one. But
look you ahead there! How is that, Captain Willis?” sharply
added Mosely pointing forward to the Indians, the rear portion
of whom were leaving the road, which here turned to the
left, and were now seen to be passing directly forward into the
forest on the right—“Your prisoners are scattering into the
woods yonder. They are not trying to escape, are they?”

“No,” replied the other, after a quick, sharp glance forward

at the objects thus indicated, and then a brief pause—
“no—we are now nearly to the great road, and, between it
and us, lies a narrow point of woods, formed by this road
passing round the left extremity of the swell here in front.
And some of these hindmost Indians, doubtless happening to
remember the locality, are, according to their won't in such
cases, merely cutting across to save distance. All right, I
think, else those jogging along there in front would show signs
of complicity.”

The two officers then rode unsuspectingly on some minutes
in silence; when just as they came in sight of the great road,
and the last of prisoners, who had not passed into the woods,
were wheeling into it and disappearing in the required direction,
their ears were suddenly greeted by the sounds of some unusual
commotion, accompanied by the sharp, quick exclamations
of various voices, as of some surprised and startled company,
all proceeding from some point down the great road,
evidently near where the divided band of Indians would again
become united on their march. And the next moment, a loud,
wild outbreak of terror and alarm, in which the mingling cries
of Help! murder! mercy, and the tones of vehement ejaculation,
were distinguishable, rose in strange chorus from the
spot.

“What in the name of Babel and Beelzebub is all that
about?” exclaimed the astonished Mosely.

“Some party in trouble,—whites evidently, and closely beset,—perhaps
by our prisoners. It must be seen to instantly,”
was the calm but rapid reply of the young officer, as lashing
his horse into a gallop, and beckoning the other to follow, he
dashed furiously round the intervening point of the woods,
and, with his friend at his heels, went thundering down the
great road towards the scene of the strange, and to them still
incomprehensible outbreak. Although nothing was at first
visible to explain the mystery, yet, after speeding their course

a few hundred yards along the descending and wood-bordered
way, and reaching the level below, a sudden turn of the road
soon brought them to a small opening; when a scene, less
alarming indeed, but more singular and ludicrous than anything
they could have anticipated or imagined, at once burst
upon their view. On a grass-plat, near a cool spring, where
they had halted, stood, closely huddled together, the fleeing
party of Deacon Mudgridge, with the terror-smitten appearance
of men who suppose their last hour has come. In the midst
of the group, was seen the gaunt, out-towering form of the
Shadow, with his face turned heavenward, his bony hands
stretched high and nervously above his head, and his whole
body convulsively rising and falling with the violence of his
emotions, as he poured forth to the resounding woods the loud
torrent of his supplications for assistance from above. The
less excitable Deacon was making little outcry, but his
shrinking motions, the wild glaring of his pig eyes, and the
rapid working of his hard, warty visage, showed the extremity
of his tribulation. And the rest of the party, in their
various manifestations, were unmistakably showing themselves
to be equal sharers in the alarm; while, peering from the surrounding
bushes, on every side, was seen a crowding ring of
grinning Indians,—some in mock menace, poking, with the pretense
of taking aim, long sticks towards the affrighted group,
some shaking their fists, some making the motions of scalping,
and all appearing to be vastly amused at the scene before
them.

The whole of this unique affair now stood explained. After
fleeing all night before their imaginary foes, the redoubtable
Deacon and his precious gang, a little reassured by the
appearance of daylight, and thence their further exemption from
molestation, had thrown themselves down nearly exhausted at
this inviting spot for rest and refreshment.

But they had scarcely taken a draught from the spring and

become fairly seated on the grass, before their still often repeated
wary glances around them fell imperfectly on the main
body of the Indian prisoners coming down the road, whom
their excited apprehensions instantly converted into a formidable
array of their dreaded pursuers, about to burst upon
them with tomahawk and scalping knife. And starting up
in wild alarm, they began to flee in the opposite direction,
but were the next moment intercepted by the other division
of the Indians just emerging from the woods into the road
below; when supposing themselves entirely surrounded, and
giving themselves up as lost, they raised the outcry we have
described; while the Indians themselves, though at first surprised
and doubtful, yet, with characteristic quickness of apprehension,
soon read the true situation of affairs; and
being, like all other Indians, thorough despisers of cowardice,
they had, through the promptings of curiosity and contempt,
gathered up on all sides; when some of them could not resist
the waggish desire to enhance the terrors of the thus oddly
besieged party by feigned tokens and menaces of violence.

A glance over the ludicrous scene, with what each had
known or suspected respecting the prominent personages whom
they now recognized in the terrified group before them, was
sufficient, as it had been with the Indians, to apprise the two
officers of the immediate cause, at least, of the alarm and outcry.
And Captain Mosely, after one or two vain attempts to
speak soberly, burst out into loud and prolonged peals of obstreperous
laughter; while Captain Willis, whose merriment
was somewhat neutralized by the suspicions which he had before
intimated, and which now burst upon him afresh on seeing
the Deacon here, made little or no comment, but spurring
his horse forward, cried out to the Indians, who, conscious of
their foolish position, were now beginning to look up apologetically
towards their captor,—

“What is all this, my red friends? Why are you thus

hedging in these unarmed people? What were you thinking
to do to them?”

“O, ah! notting,” replied one of the leading Indians, who,
being the best master of English among them, at once stepped
out and assumed the office of spokesman. “Notting, most
at all, Capun, only see um so scare at Indian with no gun, no
notting, no try—no want hurt um, make much tickle. So
all come up to see—have little laugh—do queer little—have
fun—that all, now, sartain, Misser Capun.”

Another explosion of laughter burst from Mosely, so loud
and long as almost to make the forest shake with the reverberating
clamor; when as the cachinnation at last subsided to a
sort of inward rib-shaking chuckle, Captain Willis turned
to the wondering, but now evidently much relieved objects of
the rough captain's irrepressible merriment, and said:—

“You see you have been needlessly alarmed now, don't you?
These Indians have no weapons, and not the least disposition
to offer any serious molestation to any man. They are prisoners
of war whom I took yesterday near Dartmouth, and we
are now on our way with them to Plymouth, and yonder,” he
added, pointing up the road where glimpses could be had of
the sight, and the heavy tread heard of the approaching companies;
“and yonder are coming our strong escort.”

“Now the good Lord be praised for this, our timely deliverance!”
exclaimed the exulting Shadow, the first man of the
now fully reassured and overjoyed party to give utterance to
his feelings.

“A timely happening, verily,” muttered the Deacon, in
suppressed tones. “We shall now have a safe escort to Plymouth,
where I can be present to advise in these new matters.”

“And then the victory,” exultingly resumed the former.
“Ah! I felt!—I knew, when such a power of prayer and
faith fell on me yesterday at the army, I knew I had

prevailed even unto the speedy overthrowing of the heathen
enemy.”

“Now, by Jonah, if that ain't a good one!” roughly responded
Captain Mosely, aroused by the Shadow's singular
assumption of an important agency in the success of Captain
Willis. “Look here, Mr. Dum—Dum—well, Dum Shadow,
then—what time was it in the day, yesterday, when you made
that wonder-working prayer?”

“About four o'clock in the afternoon, peradventure,” replied
the Shadow with an offended air. “But what had that
to do with the matter?”

“About as much as your prayer had, I opine,” bluntly rejoined
Mosely. “The victory was obtained in the morning,
and Captain Willis had been for hours, before you made that
prayer, on his way hither with the prisoners, that is all.”

“Why! Ah! Well, now,” mumbled the Shadow, taken
somewhat aback by the captain's unexpected development; but
soon recovering himself continued—“But the carnal minded
cannot understand the things to prayer and supplication. It
is the faith, not the utterance of mere words, that worketh
the effect. And now, I bethink me, I had the power of faith
on me early that morning.”

“Ah!” said Mosely, with a droll, humorous twist of his
rough features. “Well, that is one way to figure it out—one
that I didn't know of—that's a fact. But I can't stop to argue
that point. I have other business to attend to, before I part
with such wise company, as I now must, on my return to the
army. And my business is with this Deacon here.”

“With me?” asked the latter, with a surprised and uneasy
look.

“Yes, exactly so,” resumed the captain, with increasing
sternness of look and tone. “Yes, and the upshot of what I
have to say to your Deaconship is just this, that you are to
understand that, firstly, the whole credit of rescuing Dartmouth

and capturing these Indians belongs to Captain Willis
and his company; and, secondly, that when they surrendered
themselves, they did so on the condition, and his sacred promise
of being treated and kept only as prisoners of war, to be
eventually set free—that I have endorsed that promise, and
mean to see the faith of the colony thus pledged, fully carried
out. Now, as you are said to have influence at court, which
I am sorry to believe, and as I have rather slim confidence in
your practices, I plainly tell you, that if you interfere in the
matter of these prisoners, or go to intriguing to give them any
other fate or destination than the one guaranteed them, then
you shall be made to sup sorrow, I swear to you. Do you hear
that, sir?”

“Go to now,” exclaimed the Deacon, with the confused
and spiteful air of one whose incipient scheming has been unexpectedly
detected—“Go to, now, thou forward and irreverent
man! Who thought anything about interfering in the
matter?”

“No one,” retorted the other, defiantly—“no one but you,
I presume; but of you, having seen a small touch of your
managings on a former occasion, I thought such things not
unlikely; hence my warning.”

“It were an offensive impugning,” responded the Deacon,
“yea, and moreover, a needless one. The court of Plymouth,
I wot, will not require to be instructed in their duty touching
these heathen prisoners; albeit they may not be over
ready to be driven, without proper advisement, into the ratifying
of terms imposed by those they have never commissioned
for the public service.”

“What do you mean by that, sir?” sharply demanded Mosely,
with a look of freshly aroused suspicion. “Nobody cares for
your fling at my friend, Captain Willis, here, for he has got
far above your reach; but the rest of it!—why, hell and furies!
is the man already beginning to scheme how to thwart

us? I don't know about such symptoms of wiggling. But
I can't stop to dally. Remember my warning, and see that
you profit by it, sir,” he added, looking hard at the surly
Deacon, as he wheeled his horse away to the side of Captain
Willis, and after a few private words with the latter, rode
away to put his company in motion on the countermarch, for
which he had previously ordered them to be in readiness.

On the departure of Captain Mosely and his company,
Captain Willis lost no time in starting his own oddly diversified
retinue forward on their destination in the opposite
direction, the prisoners being allowed, as before, to lead
the way, the soldiers of his company marching in order
next, and the sullen Deacon and his party, to whom but
little heed was now taken either by officers or men, being left
to follow as they best could in the rear. And nothing further
occurring on the way to delay their progress, they all,
near the close of the day, arrived safely in Plymouth; when
Captain Willis, without heeding the commotion and rejoicings,
which his arrival with such unexpected trophies, on all
sides, produced, immediately, with his lieutenant, Noel, for a
witness, waited on the governor, announced the arrival of the
Indians he had captured and brought hither for safe keeping,
and, particularly stating the terms on which they had surrendered,
earnestly urged the justice and policy of a strict observance
of the conditions by the government. He then formally
delivered over the prisoners to the town guards, and,
after a delay of an hour or so, to allow his men time for rest
and refreshment, and himself opportunity to call on some
with whom his still deferred and tantalizing hopes were associated,
he again put his company on their march out of town,
and on their way back to the seat of war; scarcely permitting
himself to doubt, notwithstanding the misgivings of his friend
Mosely, that the fate of his prisoners could possibly be otherwise

than the one he had promised them, and the one they
so evidently, and with such good reason, expected.

But how was this confidence and this just and reasonable
expectation of the gallant and honorable young officer destined
to be met and requited? Scarcely had the inveterate
Deacon allowed himself time to recover from the fatigues of
his fruitless expedition, before he was found besetting the
governor with his misrepresentations and miserable religious
sophistries, and intriguing with the magistrates, with the object
of changing the destination of the prisoners, and within
one short week, news reached the astonished and deeply exasperated
Captains Willis and Mosely, that the whole body
of the Indian captives had been shipped, and were then far on
their way to the West Indies to be sold as slaves!

Merciful heaven! is there no way by which this black page
of our early New England history can be veiled from the
sight? Must the damning record of this, and the scores of
other transactions of turpitude and wrong, that have characterised
our treatment of the children of the forest, forever be
read and blushed over by all the succeeding generations that
are destined to tread the soil of the Pilgrims? Sons of
New England! did it ever occur to you, that in view of
these things, you, too, may “tremble for your country when
you reflect that God is just?”