The Spy

“I believe I could write a better story myself!” With these words, since become famous, James Fenimore Cooper laid aside the English novel which he was reading aloud to his wife. A few days later he submitted several pages of manuscript for her approval, and then settled down to the task of making good his boast. In November, 1820, he gave the public a novel in two volumes, entitled Precaution. But it was published anonymously, and dealt with English society in so much the same way as the average British novel of the time that its author was thought by many to be an Englishman. It had no originality and no real merit of any kind. Yet it was the means of inciting Cooper to another attempt. And this second novel made him famous.

When Precaution appeared, some of Cooper’s friends protested against his weak dependence on British models. Their arguments stirred his patriotism, and he determined to write another novel, using thoroughly American material. Accordingly he turned to Westchester County, where he was then living, a county which had been the scene of much stirring action during a good part of the Revolutionary War, and composed The Spy—A Tale of the Neutral Ground. This novel was published in 1821, and was immediately popular, both in this country and in England. Soon it was translated into French, then into other foreign languages, until it was read more widely than any other tale of the century. Cooper had written the first American novel. He had also struck an original literary vein, and he had gained confidence in himself as a writer.

Following this pronounced success in authorship, Cooper set to work on a third book and continued for the remainder of his life to devote most of his time to writing. Altogether he wrote over thirty novels and as many more works of a miscellaneous character. But much of this writing has no interest for us at the present time, especially that which was occasioned by the many controversies in which the rather belligerent Cooper involved himself. His work of permanent value after The Spy falls into two groups, the tales of wilderness life and the sea tales. Both these groups grew directly out of his experiences in early life.

Cooper was born on September 15, 1789, in Burlington, New Jersey, but while still very young he was taken to Cooperstown, on the shores of Otsego Lake, in central New York. His father owned many thousand acres of primeval forest about this village, and so through the years of a free boyhood the young Cooper came to love the wilderness and to know the characters of border life. When the village school was no longer adequate, he went to study privately in Albany and later entered Yale College. But he was not interested in the study of books. When, as a junior, he was expelled from college, he turned to a career in the navy. Accordingly in the fall of 1806 he sailed on a merchant ship, the Sterling, and for the next eleven months saw hard service before the mast. Soon after this apprenticeship he received a commission as a midshipman in the United States navy. Although it was a time of peace, and he saw no actual fighting, he gained considerable knowledge from his service on Lake Ontario and Lake Champlain that he put to good use later. Shortly before his resignation in May, 1811, he had married, and for several years thereafter he lived along in a pleasant, leisurely fashion, part of the time in Cooperstown and part of the time in Westchester County, until almost accidentally he broke into the writing of his first novel. Aside from the publication of his books, Cooper’s later life was essentially uneventful. He died at Cooperstown, on September 14, 1851.

The connection of Cooper’s best writing with the life he knew at first hand is thus perfectly plain. In his novels dealing with the wilderness, popularly known as the Leatherstocking Tales, he drew directly on his knowledge of the backwoods and backwoodsmen as he gained it about Cooperstown. In The Pioneers (1823) he dealt with the scenes of his boyhood, scenes which lay very close to his heart; and in the other volumes of this series, The Last of the Mohicans (1826), The Prairie (1827), The Pathfinder (1840), and The Deerslayer (1841), he continued to write of the trappers and frontiersmen and outpost garrisons and Indians who made up the forest life he knew so well. Similarly, in the sea tales, which began with ‘The Pilot’(1823) and included ‘The Red Rover’(1828), ‘The Two Admirals’ (1842) and ‘The Wing-and-Wing’(1842), he made full use of his experiences before the mast and in the navy. The nautical accuracy of these tales of the sea could scarcely have been attained by a “landlubber”. It has much practical significance, then, that Cooper chose material which he knew intimately and which gripped his own interest. His success came like Thackeray’s and Stevenson’s and Mark Twain’s—without his having to reach to the other side of the world after his material.

In considering Cooper’s work as a novelist, nothing is more marked than his originality. In these days we take novels based on American history and novels of the sea for granted, but at the time when Cooper published ‘The Spy’ and ‘The Pilot’ neither an American novel nor a salt-water novel had ever been written. So far as Americans before Cooper had written fiction at all, Washington Irving had been the only one to cease from a timid imitation of British models. But Irving’s material was local, rather than national. It was Cooper who first told the story of the conquest of the American continent. He caught the poetry and the romantic thrill of both the American forest and the sea; he dared to break away from literary conventions. His reward was an immediate and widespread success, together with a secure place in the history of his country’s literature.

There was probably a two-fold reason for the success which Cooper’s novels won at home and abroad. In the first place, Cooper could invent a good story and tell it well. He was a master of rapid, stirring narrative, and his tales were elemental, not deep or subtle. Secondly, he created interesting characters who had the restless energy, the passion for adventure, the rugged confidence, of our American pioneers. First among these great characters came Harvey Birch in ‘The Spy’, but Cooper’s real triumph was Natty Bumppo, who appears in all five of the Leatherstocking Tales. This skilled trapper, faithful guide, brave fighter, and homely philosopher was “the first real American in fiction,” an important contribution to the world’s literature. In addition, Cooper created the Indian of literature—perhaps a little too noble to be entirely true to life—and various simple, strong seamen. His Chingachgook and Uncas and Long Tom Coffin justly brought him added fame. In these narrative gifts, as well as in the robustness of his own character, Cooper was not unlike Sir Walter Scott. He once modestly referred to himself as “a chip from Scott’s block” and has frequently been called “the American Scott.”

But, of course, Cooper had limitations and faults. When he stepped outside the definite boundaries of the life he knew, he was unable to handle character effectively. His women are practically failures, and like his military officers essentially interchangeable. His humor is almost invariably labored and tedious. He occasionally allowed long passages of description or long speeches by some minor character to clog the progress of his action. Now and then, in inventing his plots, he strained his readers’ credulity somewhat. Finally, as a result of his rapid writing, his work is uneven and without style in the sense that a careful craftsman or a sensitive artist achieves it. He is even guilty of an occasional error in grammar or word use which the young pupil in the schools can detect. Yet his literary powers easily outweigh all these weaknesses. He is unquestionably one of America’s great novelists and one of the world’s great romancers.

There is abundant reason, therefore, why Americans of the present day should know James Fenimore Cooper. He has many a good story of the wilderness and the sea to tell to those who enjoy tales of adventure. He gives a vivid, but faithful picture of American frontier life for those who can know its stirring events and its hardy characters only at second hand. He holds a peculiarly important place in the history of American literature, and has done much to extend the reputation of American fiction among foreigners.

The author has often been asked if there were any foundation in real life for the delineation of the principal character in this book. He can give no clearer answer to the question than by laying before his readers a simple statement of the facts connected with its original publication.

Many years since, the writer of this volume was at the residence of an illustrious man, who had been employed in various situations of high trust during the darkest days of the American Revolution. The discourse turned upon the effects which great political excitement produces on character, and the purifying consequences of a love of country, when that sentiment is powerfully and generally awakened in a people. He who, from his years, his services, and his knowledge of men, was best qualified to take the lead in such a conversation, was the principal speaker. After dwelling on the marked manner in which the great struggle of the nation, during the war of 1775, had given a new and honorable direction to the thoughts and practices of multitudes whose time had formerly been engrossed by the most vulgar concerns of life, he illustrated his opinions by relating an anecdote, the truth of which he could attest as a personal witness.

The dispute between England and the United States of America, though not strictly a family quarrel, had many of the features of a civil war. The people of the latter were never properly and constitutionally subject to the people of the former, but the inhabitants of both countries owed allegiance to a common king. The Americans, as a nation, disavowed this allegiance, and the English choosing to support their sovereign in the attempt to regain his power, most of the feelings of an internal struggle were involved in the conflict. A large proportion of the emigrants from Europe, then established in the colonies, took part with the crown; and there were many districts in which their influence, united to that of the Americans who refused to lay aside their allegiance, gave a decided preponderance to the royal cause. America was then too young, and too much in need of every heart and hand, to regard these partial divisions, small as they were in actual amount, with indifference. The evil was greatly increased by the activity of the English in profiting by these internal dissensions; and it became doubly serious when it was found that attempts were made to raise various corps of provincial troops, who were to be banded with those from Europe, to reduce the young republic to subjection. Congress named an especial and a secret committee, therefore, for the express purpose of defeating this object. Of this committee Mr.——, the narrator of the anecdote, was chairman.

In the discharge of the novel duties which now devolved on him, Mr.—— had occasion to employ an agent whose services differed but little from those of a common spy. This man, as will easily be understood, belonged to a condition in life which rendered him the least reluctant to appear in so equivocal a character. He was poor, ignorant, so far as the usual instruction was concerned; but cool, shrewd, and fearless by nature. It was his office to learn in what part of the country the agents of the crown were making their efforts to embody men, to repair to the place, enlist, appear zealous in the cause he affected to serve, and otherwise to get possession of as many of the secrets of the enemy as possible. The last he of course communicated to his employers, who took all the means in their power to counteract the plans of the English, and frequently with success.

It will readily be conceived that a service like this was attended with great personal hazard. In addition to the danger of discovery, there was the daily risk of falling into the hands of the Americans themselves, who invariably visited sins of this nature more severely on the natives of the country than on the Europeans who fell into their hands. In fact, the agent of Mr. —— was several times arrested by the local authorities; and, in one instance, he was actually condemned by his exasperated countrymen to the gallows. Speedy and private orders to the jailer alone saved him from an ignominious death. He was permitted to escape; and this seeming and indeed actual peril was of great aid in supporting his assumed character among the English. By the Americans, in his little sphere, he was denounced as a bold and inveterate Tory. In this manner he continued to serve his country in secret during the early years of the struggle, hourly environed by danger, and the constant subject of unmerited opprobrium.

In the year ——, Mr. —— was named to a high and honorable employment at a European court. Before vacating his seat in Congress, he reported to that body an outline of the circumstances related, necessarily suppressing the name of his agent, and demanding an appropriation in behalf of a man who had been of so much use, at so great risk. A suitable sum was voted; and its delivery was confided to the chairman of the secret committee.

Mr. —— took the necessary means to summon his agent to a personal interview. They met in a wood at midnight. Here Mr. —— complimented his companion on his fidelity and adroitness; explained the necessity of their communications being closed; and finally tendered the money. The other drew back, and declined receiving it. “The country has need of all its means,” he said; “as for myself, I can work, or gain a livelihood in various ways.” Persuasion was useless, for patriotism was uppermost in the heart of this remarkable individual; and Mr. —— departed, bearing with him the gold he had brought, and a deep respect for the man who had so long hazarded his life, unrequited, for the cause they served in common.

The writer is under an impression that, at a later day, the agent of Mr. —— consented to receive a remuneration for what he had done; but it was not until his country was entirely in a condition to bestow it.

It is scarcely necessary to add, that an anecdote like this, simply but forcibly told by one of its principal actors, made a deep impression on all who heard it. Many years later, circumstances, which it is unnecessary to relate, and of an entirely adventitious nature, induced the writer to publish a novel, which proved to be, what he little foresaw at the time, the first of a tolerably long series. The same adventitious causes which gave birth to the book determined its scene and its general character. The former was laid in a foreign country; and the latter embraced a crude effort to describe foreign manners. When this tale was published, it became matter of reproach among the author’s friends, that he, an American in heart as in birth, should give to the world a work which aided perhaps, in some slight degree, to feed the imaginations of the young and unpracticed among his own countrymen, by pictures drawn from a state of society so different from that to which he belonged. The writer, while he knew how much of what he had done was purely accidental, felt the reproach to be one that, in a measure, was just. As the only atonement in his power, he determined to inflict a second book, whose subject should admit of no cavil, not only on the world, but on himself. He chose patriotism for his theme; and to those who read this introduction and the book itself, it is scarcely necessary to add, that he took the hero of the anecdote just related as the best illustration of his subject.

Since the original publication of The Spy, there have appeared several accounts of different persons who are supposed to have been in the author’s mind while writing the book. As Mr. —— did not mention the name of his agent, the writer never knew any more of his identity with this or that individual, than has been here explained. Both Washington and Sir Henry Clinton had an unusual number of secret emissaries; in a war that partook so much of a domestic character, and in which the contending parties were people of the same blood and language, it could scarcely be otherwise.

The style of the book has been revised by the author in this edition. In this respect, he has endeavored to make it more worthy of the favor with which it has been received; though he is compelled to admit there are faults so interwoven with the structure of the tale that, as in the case of a decayed edifice, it would cost perhaps less to reconstruct than to repair. Five-and-twenty years have been as ages with most things connected with America. Among other advantages, that of her literature has not been the least. So little was expected from the publication of an original work of this description, at the time it was written, that the first volume of The Spy was actually printed several months, before the author felt a sufficient inducement to write a line of the second. The efforts expended on a hopeless task are rarely worthy of him who makes them, however low it may be necessary to rate the standard of his general merit.

One other anecdote connected with the history of this book may give the reader some idea of the hopes of an American author, in the first quarter of the present century. As the second volume was slowly printing, from manuscript that was barely dry when it went into the compositor’s hands, the publisher intimated that the work might grow to a length that would consume the profits. To set his mind at rest, the last chapter was actually written, printed, and paged, several weeks before the chapters which precede it were even thought of. This circumstance, while it cannot excuse, may serve to explain the manner in which the actors are hurried off the scene.

A great change has come over the country since this book was originally written. The nation is passing from the gristle into the bone, and the common mind is beginning to keep even pace with the growth of the body politic. The march from Vera Cruz to Mexico was made under the orders of that gallant soldier who, a quarter of a century before, was mentioned with honor, in the last chapter of this very book. Glorious as was that march, and brilliant as were its results in a military point of view, a stride was then made by the nation, in a moral sense, that has hastened it by an age, in its progress toward real independence and high political influence. The guns that filled the valley of the Aztecs with their thunder, have been heard in echoes on the other side of the Atlantic, producing equally hope or apprehension.

There is now no enemy to fear, but the one that resides within. By accustoming ourselves to regard even the people as erring beings, and by using the restraints that wisdom has adduced from experience, there is much reason to hope that the same Providence which has so well aided us in our infancy, may continue to smile on our manhood.

COOPERSTOWN, March 29, 1849.

[Illustration: MAP TO ILLUSTRATE THE STORY OF THE SPY]

[The footnotes throughout are Cooper’s own.]

And though amidst the calm of thought entire,
Some high and haughty features might betray
A soul impetuous once—’twas earthly fire
That fled composure’s intellectual ray,
As Etna’s fires grow dim before the rising day.

—Gertrude of Wyoming.

It was near the close of the year 1780 that a solitary traveler was seen pursuing his way through one of the numerous little valleys of Westchester.^[1] The easterly wind, with its chilling dampness and increasing violence, gave unerring notice of the approach of a storm, which, as usual, might be expected to continue for several days; and the experienced eye of the traveler was turned in vain, through the darkness of the evening, in quest of some convenient shelter, in which, for the term of his confinement by the rain that already began to mix with the atmosphere in a thick mist, he might obtain such accommodations as his purposes required. Nothing whatever offered but the small and inconvenient tenements of the lower order of the inhabitants, with whom, in that immediate neighborhood, he did not think it either safe or politic to trust himself.

The county of Westchester, after the British had obtained possession of the island of New York,^[2] became common ground, in which both parties continued to act for the remainder of the war of the Revolution. A large proportion of its inhabitants, either restrained by their attachments, or influenced by their fears, affected a neutrality they did not feel. The lower towns were, of course, more particularly under the dominion of the crown, while the upper, finding a security from the vicinity of the continental troops, were bold in asserting their revolutionary opinions, and their right to govern themselves. Great numbers, however, wore masks, which even to this day have not been thrown aside; and many an individual has gone down to the tomb, stigmatized as a foe to the rights of his countrymen, while, in secret, he has been the useful agent of the leaders of the Revolution; and, on the other hand, could the hidden repositories of divers flaming patriots have been opened to the light of day, royal protections would have been discovered concealed under piles of British gold.

At the sound of the tread of the noble horse ridden by the traveler, the mistress of the farmhouse he was passing at the time might be seen cautiously opening the door of the building to examine the stranger; and perhaps, with an averted face communicating the result of her observations to her husband, who, in the rear of the building, was prepared to seek, if necessary, his ordinary place of concealment in the adjacent woods. The valley was situated about midway in the length of the county, and was sufficiently near to both armies to make the restitution of stolen goods no uncommon occurrence in that vicinity. It is true, the same articles were not always regained; but a summary substitute was generally resorted to, in the absence of legal justice, which restored to the loser the amount of his loss, and frequently with no inconsiderable addition for the temporary use of his property. In short, the law was momentarily extinct in that particular district, and justice was administered subject to the bias of personal interests and the passions of the strongest.

The passage of a stranger, with an appearance of somewhat doubtful character, and mounted on an animal which, although unfurnished with any of the ordinary trappings of war, partook largely of the bold and upright carriage that distinguished his rider, gave rise to many surmises among the gazing inmates of the different habitations; and in some instances, where conscience was more than ordinarily awake, to no little alarm.

Tired with the exercise of a day of unusual fatigue, and anxious to obtain a speedy shelter from the increasing violence of the storm, that now began to change its character to large drops of driving rain, the traveler determined, as a matter of necessity, to make an application for admission to the next dwelling that offered. An opportunity was not long wanting; and, riding through a pair of neglected bars, he knocked loudly at the outer door of a building of a very humble exterior, without quitting his saddle. A female of middle age, with an outward bearing but little more prepossessing than that of her dwelling, appeared to answer the summons. The startled woman half closed her door again in affright, as she saw, by the glare of a large wood fire, a mounted man so unexpectedly near its threshold; and an expression of terror mingled with her natural curiosity, as she required his pleasure.

Although the door was too nearly closed to admit of a minute scrutiny of the accommodations within, enough had been seen to cause the horseman to endeavor, once more, to penetrate the gloom, with longing eyes, in search of a more promising roof, before, with an ill-concealed reluctance, he stated his necessities and wishes. His request was listened to with evident unwillingness, and, while yet unfinished, it was eagerly interrupted by the reply:

“I can’t say I like to give lodgings to a stranger in these ticklish times,” said the female, in a pert, sharp key. “I’m nothing but a forlorn lone body; or, what’s the same thing, there’s nobody but the old gentleman at home; but a half mile farther up the road is a house where you can get entertainment, and that for nothing. I am sure ’twill be much convenienter to them, and more agreeable to me—because, as I said before, Harvey is away; I wish he’d take advice, and leave off wandering; he’s well to do in the world by this time; and he ought to leave off his uncertain courses, and settle himself, handsomely, in life, like other men of his years and property. But Harvey Birch will have his own way, and die vagabond after all!”

The horseman did not wait to hear more than the advice to pursue his course up the road; but he had slowly turned his horse towards the bars, and was gathering the folds of an ample cloak around his manly form, preparatory to facing the storm again, when something in the speech of the female suddenly arrested the movement.

“Is this, then, the dwelling of Harvey Birch?” he inquired, in an involuntary manner, apparently checking himself, as he was about to utter more.

“Why, one can hardly say it is his dwelling,” replied the other, drawing a hurried breath, like one eager to answer; “he is never in it, or so seldom, that I hardly remember his face, when he does think it worth his while to show it to his poor old father and me. But it matters little to me, I’m sure, if he ever comes back again, or not;—turn in the first gate on your left;—no, I care but little, for my part, whether Harvey ever shows his face again or not—not I”—and she closed the door abruptly on the horseman, who gladly extended his ride a half mile farther, to obtain lodgings which promised both more comfort and greater security.

Sufficient light yet remained to enable the traveler to distinguish the improvements^[3] which had been made in the cultivation, and in the general appearance of the grounds around the building to which he was now approaching. The house was of stone, long, low, and with a small wing at each extremity. A piazza, extending along the front, with neatly turned pillars of wood, together with the good order and preservation of the fences and outbuildings, gave the place an air altogether superior to the common farmhouses of the country. After leading his horse behind an angle of the wall, where it was in some degree protected from the wind and rain, the traveler threw his valise over his arm, and knocked loudly at the entrance of the building for admission. An aged black soon appeared; and without seeming to think it necessary, under the circumstances, to consult his superiors,—first taking one prying look at the applicant, by the light of the candle in his hand,—he acceded to the request for accommodations. The traveler was shown into an extremely neat parlor, where a fire had been lighted to cheer the dullness of an easterly storm and an October evening. After giving the valise into the keeping of his civil attendant, and politely repeating his request to the old gentleman, who arose to receive him, and paying his compliments to the three ladies who were seated at work with their needles, the stranger commenced laying aside some of the outer garments which he had worn in his ride.

On taking an extra handkerchief from his neck, and removing a cloak of blue cloth, with a surtout of the same material, he exhibited to the scrutiny of the observant family party, a tall and extremely graceful person, of apparently fifty years of age. His countenance evinced a settled composure and dignity; his nose was straight, and approaching to Grecian; his eye, of a gray color, was quiet, thoughtful, and rather melancholy; the mouth and lower part of his face being expressive of decision and much character. His dress, being suited to the road, was simple and plain, but such as was worn by the higher class of his countrymen; he wore his own hair, dressed in a manner that gave a military air to his appearance, and which was rather heightened by his erect and conspicuously graceful carriage. His whole appearance was so impressive and so decidedly that of a gentleman, that as he finished laying aside the garments, the ladies arose from their seats, and, together with the master of the house, they received anew, and returned the complimentary greetings which were again offered.

The host was by several years the senior of the traveler, and by his manner, dress, and everything around him, showed he had seen much of life and the best society. The ladies were, a maiden of forty, and two much younger, who did not seem, indeed, to have reached half those years. The bloom of the elder of these ladies had vanished, but her eyes and fine hair gave an extremely agreeable expression to her countenance; and there was a softness and an affability in her deportment, that added a charm many more juvenile faces do not possess. The sisters, for such the resemblance between the younger females denoted them to be, were in all the pride of youth, and the roses, so eminently the property of the Westchester fair, glowed on their cheeks, and lighted their deep blue eyes with that luster which gives so much pleasure to the beholder, and which indicates so much internal innocence and peace. There was much of that feminine delicacy in the appearance of the three, which distinguishes the sex in this country; and, like the gentleman, their demeanor proved them to be women of the higher order of life.

After handing a glass of excellent Madeira to his guest, Mr. Wharton, for so was the owner of this retired estate called, resumed his seat by the fire, with another in his own hand. For a moment he paused, as if debating with his politeness, but at length threw an inquiring glance on the stranger, as he inquired,—

“To whose health am I to have the honor of drinking?”

The traveler had also seated himself, and he sat unconsciously gazing on the fire, while Mr. Wharton spoke; turning his eyes slowly on his host with a look of close observation, he replied, while a faint tinge gathered on his features,—

“Mr. Harper.”

“Mr. Harper,” resumed the other, with the formal precision of that day, “I have the honor to drink your health, and to hope you will sustain no injury from the rain to which you have been exposed.”

Mr. Harper bowed in silence to the compliment, and he soon resumed the meditations from which he had been interrupted, and for which the long ride he had that day made, in the wind, might seem a very natural apology.

The young ladies had again taken their seats beside the workstand, while their aunt, Miss Jeanette Peyton, withdrew to superintend the preparations necessary to appease the hunger of their unexpected visitor. A short silence prevailed, during which Mr. Harper was apparently enjoying the change in his situation, when Mr. Wharton again broke it, by inquiring whether smoke was disagreeable to his companion; to which, receiving an answer in the negative, he immediately resumed the pipe which had been laid aside at the entrance of the traveler.

There was an evident desire on the part of the host to enter into conversation, but either from an apprehension of treading on dangerous ground, or an unwillingness to intrude upon the rather studied taciturnity of his guest, he several times hesitated, before he could venture to make any further remark. At length, a movement from Mr. Harper, as he raised his eyes to the party in the room, encouraged him to proceed.

“I find it very difficult,” said Mr. Wharton, cautiously avoiding at first, such subjects as he wished to introduce, “to procure that quality of tobacco for my evenings’ amusement to which I have been accustomed.”

“I should think the shops in New York might furnish the best in the country,” calmly rejoined the other.

“Why—yes,” returned the host in rather a hesitating manner, lifting his eyes to the face of Harper, and lowering them quickly under his steady look, “there must be plenty in town; but the war has made communication with the city, however innocent, too dangerous to be risked for so trifling an article as tobacco.”

The box from which Mr. Wharton had just taken a supply for his pipe was lying open, within a few inches of the elbow of Harper, who took a small quantity from its contents, and applied it to his tongue, in a manner perfectly natural, but one that filled his companion with alarm. Without, however, observing that the quality was of the most approved kind, the traveler relieved his host by relapsing again into his meditations. Mr. Wharton now felt unwilling to lose the advantage he had gained, and, making an effort of more than usual vigor, he continued,—

“I wish from the bottom of my heart, this unnatural struggle was over, that we might again meet our friends and relatives in peace and love.”

“It is much to be desired,” said Harper, emphatically, again raising his eyes to the countenance of his host.

“I hear of no movement of consequence, since the arrival of our new allies,” said Mr. Wharton, shaking the ashes from his pipe, and turning his back to the other under the pretense of receiving a coal from his youngest daughter.

“None have yet reached the public, I believe.”

“Is it thought any important steps are about to be taken?” continued Mr. Wharton, still occupied with his daughter, yet suspending his employment, in expectation of a reply.

“Is it intimated any are in agitation?”

“Oh! nothing in particular; but it is natural to expect some new enterprise from so powerful a force as that under Rochambeau.”

Harper made an assenting inclination with his head, but no other reply, to this remark; while Mr. Wharton, after lighting his pipe, resumed the subject.

“They appear more active in the south; Gates and Cornwallis seem willing to bring the war to an issue there.”

The brow of Harper contracted, and a deeper shade of melancholy crossed his features; his eye kindled with a transient beam of fire, that spoke a latent source of deep feeling. The admiring gaze of the younger of the sisters had barely time to read its expression, before it passed away, leaving in its room the acquired composure which marked the countenance of the stranger, and that impressive dignity which so conspicuously denotes the empire of reason.

The elder sister made one or two movements in her chair, before she ventured to say, in a tone which partook in no small measure of triumph,—

“General Gates has been less fortunate with the earl, than with General
Burgoyne.”

“But General Gates is an Englishman, Sarah,” cried the younger lady, with quickness; then, coloring to the eyes at her own boldness, she employed herself in tumbling over the contents of her work basket, silently hoping the remark would be unnoticed.

The traveler had turned his face from one sister to the other, as they had spoken in succession, and an almost imperceptible movement of the muscles of his mouth betrayed a new emotion, as he playfully inquired of the younger,—

“May I venture to ask what inference you would draw from that fact?”

Frances blushed yet deeper at this direct appeal to her opinions upon a subject on which she had incautiously spoken in the presence of a stranger; but finding an answer necessary, after some little hesitation, and with a good deal of stammering in her manner, she replied,—

“Only—only—sir—my sister and myself sometimes differ in our opinions of the prowess of the British.” A smile of much meaning played on a face of infantile innocency, as she concluded.

“On what particular points of their prowess do you differ?” continued Harper, meeting her look of animation with a smile of almost paternal softness.

“Sarah thinks the British are never beaten, while I do not put so much faith in their invincibility.”

The traveler listened to her with that pleased indulgence, with which virtuous age loves to contemplate the ardor of youthful innocence; but making no reply, he turned to the fire, and continued for some time gazing on its embers, in silence.

Mr. Wharton had in vain endeavored to pierce the disguise of his guest’s political feelings; but, while there was nothing forbidding in his countenance, there was nothing communicative; on the contrary it was strikingly reserved; and the master of the house arose, in profound ignorance of what, in those days, was the most material point in the character of his guest, to lead the way into another room, and to the supper table. Mr. Harper offered his hand to Sarah Wharton, and they entered the room together; while Frances followed, greatly at a loss to know whether she had not wounded the feelings of her father’s inmate.

The storm began to rage with great violence without; and the dashing rain on the sides of the building awakened that silent sense of enjoyment, which is excited by such sounds in a room of quiet comfort and warmth, when a loud summons at the outer door again called the faithful black to the portal. In a minute the servant returned, and informed his master that another traveler, overtaken by the storm, desired to be admitted to the house for a shelter through the night.

At the first sounds of the impatient summons of this new applicant, Mr. Wharton had risen from his seat in evident uneasiness; and with eyes glancing with quickness from his guest to the door of the room, he seemed to be expecting something to proceed from this second interruption, connected with the stranger who had occasioned the first. He scarcely had time to bid the black, with a faint voice, to show this second comer in, before the door was thrown hastily open, and the stranger himself entered the apartment. He paused a moment, as the person of Harper met his view, and then, in a more formal manner, repeated the request he had before made through the servant. Mr. Wharton and his family disliked the appearance of this new visitor excessively; but the inclemency of the weather, and the uncertainty of the consequences, if he were refused the desired lodgings, compelled the old gentleman to give a reluctant acquiescence.

Some of the dishes were replaced by the orders of Miss Peyton, and the weather-beaten intruder was invited to partake of the remains of the repast, from which the party had just risen. Throwing aside a rough greatcoat, he very composedly took the offered chair, and unceremoniously proceeded to allay the cravings of an appetite which appeared by no means delicate. But at every mouthful he would turn an unquiet eye on Harper, who studied his appearance with a closeness of investigation that was very embarrassing to its subject. At length, pouring out a glass of wine, the newcomer nodded significantly to his examiner, previously to swallowing the liquor, and said, with something of bitterness in his manner,—

“I drink to our better acquaintance, sir; I believe this is the first time we have met, though your attention would seem to say otherwise.”

The quality of the wine seemed greatly to his fancy, for, on replacing the glass upon the table, he gave his lips a smack, that resounded through the room; and, taking up the bottle, he held it between himself and the light, for a moment, in silent contemplation of its clear and brilliant color.

“I think we have never met before, sir,” replied Harper with a slight smile on his features, as he observed the move ments of the other; but appearing satisfied with his scrutiny, he turned to Sarah Wharton, who sat next him, and carelessly remarked,—

“You doubtless find your present abode solitary, after being accustomed to the gayeties of the city.”

“Oh! excessively so,” said Sarah hastily. “I do wish, with my father, that this cruel war was at an end, that we might return to our friends once more.”

“And you, Miss Frances, do you long as ardently for peace as your sister?”

“On many accounts I certainly do,” returned the other, venturing to steal a timid glance at her interrogator; and, meeting the same benevolent expression of feeling as before, she continued, as her own face lighted into one of its animated and bright smiles of intelligence, “but not at the expense of the rights of my countrymen.”

“Rights!” repeated her sister, impatiently; “whose rights can be stronger than those of a sovereign: and what duty is clearer, than to obey those who have a natural right to command?”

“None, certainly,” said Frances, laughing with great pleasantry; and, taking the hand of her sister affectionately within both of her own, she added, with a smile directed towards Harper,—

“I gave you to understand that my sister and myself differed in our political opinions; but we have an impartial umpire in my father, who loves his own countrymen, and he loves the British,—so he takes sides with neither.”

“Yes,” said Mr. Wharton, in a little alarm, eying first one guest, and then the other; “I have near friends in both armies, and I dread a victory by either, as a source of certain private misfortune.”

“I take it, you have little reason to apprehend much from the Yankees, in that way,” interrupted the guest at the table, coolly helping himself to another glass, from the bottle he had admired.

“His majesty may have more experienced troops than the continentals,” answered the host fearfully, “but the Americans have met with distinguished success.”

Harper disregarded the observations of both; and, rising, he desired to be shown to his place of rest. A small boy was directed to guide him to his room; and wishing a courteous good-night to the whole party, the traveler withdrew. The knife and fork fell from the hands of the unwelcome intruder, as the door closed on the retiring figure of Harper; he arose slowly from his seat; listening attentively, he approached the door of the room—opened it—seemed to attend to the retreating footsteps of the other—and, amidst the panic and astonishment of his companions, he closed it again. In an instant, the red wig which concealed his black locks, the large patch which hid half his face from observation, the stoop that had made him appear fifty years of age, disappeared.

“My father!-my dear father!”—cried the handsome young man; “and you, my dearest sisters and aunt!—have I at last met you again?”

“Heaven bless you, my Henry, my son!” exclaimed the astonished but delighted parent; while his sisters sank on his shoulders, dissolved in tears.

The faithful old black, who had been reared from infancy in the house of his master, and who, as if in mockery of his degraded state, had been complimented with the name of Caesar, was the only other witness of this unexpected discovery of the son of Mr. Wharton. After receiving the extended hand of his young master, and imprinting on it a fervent kiss, Caesar withdrew. The boy did not reenter the room; and the black himself, after some time, returned, just as the young British captain was exclaiming,—

“But who is this Mr. Harper?—is he likely to betray me?”

“No, no, no, Massa Harry,” cried the negro, shaking his gray head confidently; “I been to see—Massa Harper on he knee—pray to God—no gemman who pray to God tell of good son, come to see old fader—Skinner do that—no Christian!”

This poor opinion of the Skinners was not confined to Mr. Caesar Thompson, as he called himself—but Caesar Wharton, as he was styled by the little world to which he was known. The convenience, and perhaps the necessities, of the leaders of the American arms, in the neighborhood of New York, had induced them to employ certain subordinate agents, of extremely irregular habits, in executing their lesser plans of annoying the enemy. It was not a moment for fastidious inquiries into abuses of any description, and oppression and injustice were the natural consequences of the possession of a military power that was uncurbed by the restraints of civil authority. In time, a distinct order of the community was formed, whose sole occupation appears to have been that of relieving their fellow citizens from any little excess of temporal prosperity they might be thought to enjoy, under the pretense of patriotism and the love of liberty.

Occasionally, the aid of military authority was not wanting, in enforcing these arbitrary distributions of worldly goods; and a petty holder of a commission in the state militia was to be seen giving the sanction of something like legality to acts of the most unlicensed robbery, and, not infrequently, of bloodshed.

On the part of the British, the stimulus of loyalty was by no means suffered to sleep, where so fruitful a field offered on which it might be expended. But their freebooters were enrolled, and their efforts more systematized. Long experience had taught their leaders the efficacy of concentrated force; and, unless tradition does great injustice to their exploits, the result did no little credit to their foresight. The corps—we presume, from their known affection to that useful animal—had received the quaint appellation of “Cowboys.”

Caesar was, however, far too loyal to associate men who held the commission of George III, with the irregular warriors, whose excesses he had so often witnessed, and from whose rapacity, neither his poverty nor his bondage had suffered even him to escape uninjured. The Cowboys, therefore, did not receive their proper portion of the black’s censure, when he said, no Christian, nothing but a “Skinner,” could betray a pious child, while honoring his father with a visit so full of peril.

[1] As each state of the American Union has its own counties, it often happens that there are several which bear the same name. The scene of this tale is in New York, whose county of Westchester is the nearest adjoining to the city.

[2] The city of New York is situated on an island called Manhattan: but it is at one point separated from the county of Westchester by a creek of only a few feet in width. The bridge at this spot is called King’s Bridge. It was the scene of many skirmishes during the war, and is alluded to in this tale. Every Manhattanese knows the difference between “Manhattan Island” and the “island of Manhattan.” The first is applied to a small District in the vicinity of Corlaer’s Hook, while the last embraces the Whole island; or the city and county of New York as it is termed in the laws.

[3] Improvements is used by the Americans to express every degree of change in converting land from its state of wilderness to that of cultivation. In this meaning of the word, it is an improvement to fell the trees; and it is valued precisely by the supposed amount of the cost.

And many a halcyon day he lived to see
Unbroken, but by one misfortune dire,
When fate had reft his mutual heart—but she
Was gone-and Gertrude climbed a widowed father’s knee.

—Gertrude of Wyoming.

The father of Mr. Wharton was a native of England, and of a family whose parliamentary interest had enabled them to provide for a younger son in the colony of New York. The young man, like hundreds of others in this situation, had settled permanently in the country. He married; and the sole issue of his connection had been sent early in life to receive the benefits of the English schools. After taking his degrees at one of the universities of the mother country, the youth had been suffered to acquire a knowledge of life with the advantages of European society. But the death of his father recalled him, after passing two years in this manner, to the possession of an honorable name, and a very ample estate.

It was much the fashion of that day to place the youth of certain families in the army and navy of England, as the regular stepping-stones to preferment. Most of the higher offices in the colonies were filled by men who had made arms their profession; and it was even no uncommon sight to see a veteran warrior laying aside the sword to assume the ermine on the benches of the highest judicial authority.

In conformity with this system, the senior Mr. Wharton had intended his son for a soldier; but a natural imbecility of character in his child interfered with his wishes.

A twelvemonth had been spent by the young man in weighing the comparative advantages of the different classes of troops, when the death of his father occurred. The ease of his situation, and the attentions lavished upon a youth in the actual enjoyment of one of the largest estates in the colonies, interfered greatly with his ambitious projects. Love decided the matter; and Mr. Wharton, in becoming a husband, ceased to think of becoming a soldier. For many years he continued happy in his family, and sufficiently respected by his countrymen, as a man of integrity and consequence, when all his enjoyments vanished, as it were, at a blow. His only son, the youth introduced in the preceding chapter, had entered the army, and had arrived in his native country, but a short time before the commencement of hostilities, with the reinforcements the ministry had thought it prudent to throw into the disaffected parts of North America. His daughters were just growing into life, and their education required all the advantages the city could afford. His wife had been for some years in declining health, and had barely time to fold her son to her bosom, and rejoice in the reunion of her family, before the Revolution burst forth, in a continued blaze, from Georgia to Massachusetts. The shock was too much for the feeble condition of the mother, who saw her child called to the field to combat against the members of her own family in the South, and she sank under the blow.

There was no part of the continent where the manners of England and its aristocratical notions of blood and alliances, prevailed with more force than in a certain circle immediately around the metropolis of New York. The customs of the early Dutch inhabitants had, indeed, blended in some measures, with the English manners; but still the latter prevailed. This attachment to Great Britain was increased by the frequent intermarriages of the officers of the mother country with the wealthier and most powerful families of the vicinity, until, at the commencement of hostilities, their united influence had very nearly thrown the colony into the scale on the side of the crown. A few, however, of the leading families espoused the cause of the people; and a sufficient stand was made against the efforts of the ministerial party, to organize, and, aided by the army of the confederation, to maintain an independent republican form of government.

The city of New York and the adjacent territory were alone exempted from the rule of the new commonwealth; while the royal authority extended no further than its dignity could be supported by the presence of an army. In this condition of things, the loyalists of influence adopted such measures as best accorded with their different characters and situations. Many bore arms in support of the crown, and, by their bravery and exertions, endeavored to secure what they deemed to be the rights of their prince, and their own estates from the effects of the law of attainder. Others left the country; seeking in that place they emphatically called home, an asylum, as they fondly hoped, for a season only, against the confusion and dangers of war. A third, and a more wary portion, remained in the place of their nativity, with a prudent regard to their ample possessions, and, perhaps, influenced by their attachments to the scenes of their youth. Mr. Wharton was of this description. After making a provision against future contingencies, by secretly transmitting the whole of his money to the British funds, this gentleman determined to continue in the theater of strife, and to maintain so strict a neutrality as to insure the safety of his large estate, whichever party succeeded. He was apparently engrossed in the education of his daughters, when a relation, high in office in the new state, intimated that a residence in what was now a British camp differed but little, in the eyes of his countrymen, from a residence in the British capital. Mr. Wharton soon saw this was an unpardonable offense in the existing state of things, and he instantly determined to remove the difficulty, by retiring to the country. He possessed a residence in the county of Westchester; and having been for many years in the habit of withdrawing thither during the heats of the summer months, it was kept furnished and ready for his accommodation. His eldest daughter was already admitted into the society of women; but Frances, the younger, required a year or two more of the usual cultivation, to appear with proper éclat; at least so thought Miss Jeanette Peyton; and as this lady, a younger sister of their deceased mother, had left her paternal home, in the colony of Virginia, with the devotedness and affection peculiar to her sex, to superintend the welfare of her orphan nieces, Mr. Wharton felt that her opinions were entitled to respect. In conformity to her advice, therefore, the feelings of the parent were made to yield to the welfare of his children.

Mr. Wharton withdrew to the Locusts, with a heart rent with the pain of separating from all that was left him of a wife he had adored, but in obedience to a constitutional prudence that pleaded loudly in behalf of his worldly goods. His handsome town residence was inhabited, in the meanwhile, by his daughters and their aunt. The regiment to which Captain Wharton belonged formed part of the permanent garrison of the city; and the knowledge of the presence of his son was no little relief to the father, in his unceasing meditations on his absent daughters. But Captain Wharton was a young man and a soldier; his estimate of character was not always the wisest; and his propensities led him to imagine that a red coat never concealed a dishonorable heart.

The house of Mr. Wharton became a fashionable lounge to the officers of the royal army, as did that of every other family that was thought worthy of their notice. The consequences of this association were, to some few of the visited, fortunate; to more, injurious, by exciting expectations which were never to be realized, and, unhappily, to no small number ruinous. The known wealth of the father and, possibly, the presence of a high-spirited brother, forbade any apprehension of the latter danger to the young ladies: but it was impossible that all the admiration bestowed on the fine figure and lovely face of Sarah Wharton should be thrown away. Her person was formed with the early maturity of the climate, and a strict cultivation of the graces had made her decidedly the belle of the city. No one promised to dispute with her this female sovereignty, unless it might be her younger sister. Frances, however, wanted some months to the charmed age of sixteen; and the idea of competition was far from the minds of either of the affectionate girls. Indeed, next to the conversation of Colonel Wellmere, the greatest pleasure of Sarah was in contemplating the budding beauties of the little Hebe, who played around her with all the innocency of youth, with all the enthusiasm of her ardent temper, and with no little of the archness of her native humor. Whether or not it was owing to the fact that Frances received none of the compliments which fell to the lot of her elder sister, in the often repeated discussions on the merits of the war, between the military beaux who frequented the house, it is certain their effects on the sisters were exactly opposite. It was much the fashion then for the British officers to speak slightingly of their enemies; and Sarah took all the idle vaporing of her danglers to be truths. The first political opinions which reached the ears of Frances were coupled with sneers on the conduct of her countrymen. At first she believed them; but there was occasionally a general, who was obliged to do justice to his enemy in order to obtain justice for himself; and Frances became somewhat skeptical on the subject of the inefficiency of her countrymen. Colonel Wellmere was among those who delighted most in expending his wit on the unfortunate Americans; and, in time, Frances began to listen to his eloquence with great suspicion, and sometimes with resentment.

It was on a hot, sultry day that the three were in the parlor of Mr. Wharton’s house, the colonel and Sarah seated on a sofa, engaged in a combat of the eyes, aided by the usual flow of small talk, and Frances was occupied at her tambouring frame in an opposite corner of the room, when the gentleman suddenly exclaimed,—

“How gay the arrival of the army under General Burgoyne will make the city, Miss Wharton!”

“Oh! how pleasant it must be,” said the thoughtless Sarah, in reply; “I am told there are many charming women with that army; as you say, it will make us all life and gayety.”

Frances shook back the abundance of her golden hair, and raised her eyes, dancing with the ardor of national feeling; then laughing, with a concealed humor, she asked,—

“Is it so certain that General Burgoyne will be permitted to reach the city?”

“Permitted!” echoed the colonel. “Who is there to prevent it, my pretty
Miss Fanny?”

Frances was precisely at that age when young people are most jealous of their station in society; neither quite a woman, nor yet a child. The “pretty Miss Fanny” was too familiar to be relished, and she dropped her eyes on her work again with cheeks that glowed like crimson.

“General Stark took the Germans into custody,” she answered, compressing her lip; “may not General Gates think the British too dangerous to go at large?”

“Oh! they were Germans, as you say,” cried the colonel, excessively vexed at the necessity of explaining at all; “mere mercenary troops; but when the really British regiments come in question, you will see a very different result.”

“Of that there is no doubt,” cried Sarah, without in the least partaking of the resentment of the colonel to her sister, but hailing already in her heart the triumph of the British.

“Pray, Colonel Wellmere,” said Frances, recovering her good humor, and raising her joyous eyes once more to the face of the gentleman, “was the Lord Percy of Lexington a kinsman of him who fought at Chevy Chase?”

“Why, Miss Fanny, you are becoming a rebel,” said the colonel, endeavoring to laugh away the anger he felt; “what you are pleased to insinuate was a chase at Lexington, was nothing more than a judicious retreat—a—kind of—”

“Running fight,” interrupted the good-humored girl, laying a great emphasis on the first word.

“Positively, young lady”—Colonel Wellmere was interrupted by a laugh from a person who had hitherto been unnoticed.

There was a small family apartment adjoining the room occupied by the trio, and the air had blown open the door communicating between the two. A fine young man was now seen sitting near the entrance, who, by his smiling countenance, was evidently a pleased listener to the conversation. He rose instantly, and coming through the door, with his hat in his hand, appeared a tall, graceful youth, of dark complexion, and sparkling eyes of black, from which the mirth had not entirely vanished, as he made his bow to the ladies.

“Mr. Dunwoodie!” cried Sarah, in surprise; “I was ignorant of your being in the house; you will find a cooler seat in this room.”

“I thank you,” replied the young man, “but I must go and seek your brother, who placed me there in ambuscade, as he called it, with a promise of returning an hour ago.” Without making any further explanation, the youth bowed politely to the young women, distantly and with hauteur to the gentleman, and withdrew. Frances followed him into the hall, and blushing richly, inquired, in a hurried voice,—

“But why—why do you leave us, Mr. Dunwoodie? Henry must soon return.”

The gentleman caught one of her hands in his own, and the stern expression of his countenance gave place to a look of admiration as he replied,—

“You managed him famously, my dear little kinswoman; never—no, never, forget the land of your birth; remember, if you are the granddaughter of an Englishman, you are, also, the granddaughter of a Peyton.”

“Oh!” returned the laughing girl, “it would be difficult to forget that, with the constant lectures on genealogy before us, with which we are favored by Aunt Jeanette; but why do you go?”

“I am on the wing for Virginia, and have much to do.” He pressed her hand as he spoke, and looking back, while in the act of closing the door, exclaimed, “Be true to your country—be American.” The ardent girl kissed her hand to him as he retired, and then instantly applying it with its beautiful fellow to her burning cheeks, ran into her own apartment to hide her confusion.

Between the open sarcasm of Frances, and the ill-concealed disdain of the young man, Colonel Wellmere had felt himself placed in an awkward predicament; but ashamed to resent such trifles in the presence of his mistress, he satisfied himself with observing, superciliously, as Dunwoodie left the room,—

“Quite a liberty for a youth in his situation; a shop boy with a bundle,
I fancy.”

The idea of picturing the graceful Peyton Dunwoodie as a shop boy could never enter the mind of Sarah, and she looked around her in surprise, when the colonel continued,—

“This Mr. Dun—Dun—”

“Dunwoodie! Oh, no—he is a relation of my aunt,” cried the young lady, “and an intimate friend of my brother; they were at school together, and only separated in England, when one went into the army, and the other to a French military academy.”

“His money appears to have been thrown away,” observed the colonel, betraying the spleen he was unsuccessfully striving to conceal.

“We ought to hope so,” added Sarah, with a smile, “for it is said he intends joining the rebel army. He was brought in here in a French ship, and has just been exchanged; you may soon meet him in arms.”

“Well, let him—I wish Washington plenty of such heroes;” and he turned to a more pleasant subject, by changing the discourse to themselves.

A few weeks after this scene occurred, the army of Burgoyne laid down their arms. Mr. Wharton, beginning to think the result of the contest doubtful, resolved to conciliate his countrymen, and gratify himself, by calling his daughters into his own abode. Miss Peyton consented to be their companion; and from that time, until the period at which we commenced our narrative, they had formed one family.

Whenever the main army made any movements, Captain Wharton had, of course, accompanied it; and once or twice, under the protection of strong parties, acting in the neighborhood of the Locusts, he had enjoyed rapid and stolen interviews with his friends. A twelvemonth had, however, passed without his seeing them, and the impatient Henry had adopted the disguise we have mentioned, and unfortunately arrived on the very evening that an unknown and rather suspicious guest was an inmate of the house, which seldom contained any other than its regular inhabitants.

“But do you think he suspects me?” asked the captain, with anxiety, after pausing to listen to Caesar’s opinion of the Skinners.

“How should he?” cried Sarah, “when your sisters and father could not penetrate your disguise.”

“There is something mysterious in his manner; his looks are too prying for an indifferent observer,” continued young Wharton thoughtfully, “and his face seems familiar to me. The recent fate of André has created much irritation on both sides. Sir Henry threatens retaliation for his death; and Washington is as firm as if half the world were at his command. The rebels would think me a fit subject for their plans just now, should I be so unlucky as to fall into their hands.”

“But my son,” cried his father, in great alarm, “you are not a spy; you are not within the rebel—that is, the American lines; there is nothing here to spy.”

“That might be disputed,” rejoined the young man, musing. “Their pickets were as low as the White Plains when I passed through in disguise. It is true my purposes are innocent; but how is it to appear? My visit to you would seem a cloak to other designs. Remember, sir, the treatment you received not a year since, for sending me a supply of fruit for the winter.”

“That proceeded from the misrepresentations of my kind neighbors,” said Mr. Wharton, “who hoped, by getting my estate confiscated, to purchase good farms at low prices. Peyton Dunwoodie, however, soon obtained our discharge; we were detained but a month.”

“We!” repeated the son, in amazement; “did they take my sisters, also?
Fanny, you wrote me nothing of this.”

“I believe,” said Frances, coloring highly, “I mentioned the kind treatment we received from your old friend, Major Dunwoodie; and that he procured my father’s release.”

“True; but were you with him in the rebel camp?”

“Yes,” said the father, kindly; “Fanny would not suffer me to go alone. Jeanette and Sarah took charge of the Locusts, and this little girl was my companion, in captivity.”

“And Fanny returned from such a scene a greater rebel than ever,” cried Sarah, indignantly; “one would think the hardships her father suffered would have cured her of such whims.”

“What say you to the charge, my pretty sister?” cried the captain gayly; “did Peyton strive to make you hate your king, more than he does himself?”

“Peyton Dunwoodie hates no one,” said Frances, quickly; then, blushing at her own ardor, she added immediately, “he loves you, Henry, I know; for he has told me so again and again.”

Young Wharton tapped his sister on the cheek, with a smile, as he asked her, in an affected whisper, “Did he tell you also that he loved my little sister Fanny?”

“Nonsense!” said Frances; and the remnants of the supper-table soon disappeared under her superintendence.

’Twas when the fields were swept of Autumn’s store,
And growing winds the fading foliage tore
Behind the Lowmon hill, the short-lived light,
Descending slowly, ushered in the night;
When from the noisy town, with mournful look,
His lonely way the meager peddler took.

—WILSON.

A storm below the highlands of the Hudson, if it be introduced with an easterly wind, seldom lasts less than two days. Accordingly, as the inmates of the Locusts assembled, on the following morning, around their early breakfast, the driving rain was seen to strike in nearly horizontal lines against the windows of the building, and forbade the idea of exposing either man or beast to the tempest. Harper was the last to appear; after taking a view of the state of the weather, he apologized to Mr. Wharton for the necessity that existed for his trespassing on his goodness for a longer time. To appearances, the reply was as courteous as the excuse; yet Harper wore a resignation in his deportment that was widely different from the uneasy manner of the father. Henry Wharton had resumed his disguise with a reluctance amounting to disgust, but in obedience to the commands of his parent. No communications passed between him and the stranger, after the first salutations of the morning had been paid by Harper to him, in common with the rest of the family. Frances had, indeed, thought there was something like a smile passing over the features of the traveler, when, on entering the room, he first confronted her brother; but it was confined to the eyes, seeming to want power to affect the muscles of the face, and was soon lost in the settled and benevolent expression which reigned in his countenance, with a sway but seldom interrupted. The eyes of the affectionate sister were turned in anxiety, for a moment, on her brother, and glancing again on their unknown guest, met his look, as he offered her, with marked attention, one of the little civilities of the table; and the heart of the girl, which had begun to throb with violence, regained a pulsation as tempered as youth, health, and buoyant spirits could allow. While yet seated at the table, Caesar entered, and laying a small parcel in silence by the side of his master, modestly retired behind his chair, where, placing one hand on its back, he continued in an attitude half familiar, half respectful, a listener.

“What is this, Caesar?” inquired Mr. Wharton, turning the bundle over to examine its envelope, and eying it rather suspiciously.

“The ’baccy, sir; Harvey Birch, he got home, and he bring you a little good ’baccy from York.”

“Harvey Birch!” rejoined the master with great deliberation, stealing a look at his guest. “I do not remember desiring him to purchase any tobacco for me; but as he has brought it, he must be paid for his trouble.”

For an instant only, as the negro spoke, did Harper suspend his silent meal; his eye moved slowly from the servant to the master, and again all remained in impenetrable reserve.

To Sarah Wharton, this intelligence gave unexpected pleasure; rising from her seat with impatience, she bade the black show Birch into the apartment; when, suddenly recollecting herself, she turned to the traveler with an apologizing look, and added, “If Mr. Harper will excuse the presence of a peddler.”

The indulgent benevolence expressed in the countenance of the stranger, as he bowed a silent acquiescence, spoke more eloquently than the nicest framed period, and the young lady repeated her order, with a confidence in its truth that removed all embarrassment.

In the deep recesses of the windows of the cottage were seats of paneled work; and the rich damask curtains, that had ornamented the parlor in Queen Street,^[4] had been transferred to the Locusts, and gave to the room that indescribable air of comfort, which so gratefully announces the approach of a domestic winter. Into one of these recesses Captain Wharton now threw himself, drawing the curtain before him in such a manner as to conceal most of his person from observation; while his younger sister, losing her natural frankness of manner, in an air of artificial constraint, silently took possession of the other.

Harvey Birch had been a peddler from his youth; at least so he frequently asserted, and his skill in the occupation went far to prove the truth of the declaration. He was a native of one of the eastern colonies; and, from something of superior intelligence which belonged to his father, it was thought they had known better fortune in the land of their nativity. Harvey possessed, however, the common manners of the country, and was in no way distinguished from men of his class, but by his acuteness, and the mystery which enveloped his movements. Ten years before, they had arrived together in the vale, and, purchasing the humble dwelling at which Harper had made his unsuccessful application, continued ever since peaceful inhabitants, but little noticed and but little known. Until age and infirmities had prevented, the father devoted himself to the cultivation of the small spot of ground belonging to his purchase, while the son pursued with avidity his humble barter. Their orderly quietude had soon given them so much consideration in the neighborhood, as to induce a maiden of five-and-thirty to forget the punctilio of her sex, and to accept the office of presiding over their domestic comforts. The roses had long before vanished from the cheeks of Katy Haynes, and she had seen in succession, both her male and female acquaintances forming the union so desirable to her sex, with but little or no hope left for herself, when, with views of her own, she entered the family of the Birches. Necessity is a hard master, and, for the want of a better companion, the father and son were induced to accept her services; but still Katy was not wanting in some qualities which made her a very tolerable housekeeper. On the one hand, she was neat, industrious, honest, and a good manager. On the other, she was talkative, selfish, superstitious, and inquisitive. By dint of using the latter quality with consummate industry, she had not lived in the family five years when she triumphantly declared that she had heard, or rather overheard, sufficient to enable her to say what had been the former fate of her associates. Could Katy have possessed enough of divination to pronounce upon their future lot, her task would have been accomplished. From the private conversations of the parent and child, she learned that a fire had reduced them from competence to poverty, and at the same time diminished the number of their family to two. There was a tremulousness in the voice of the father, as he touched lightly on the event, which affected even the heart of Katy; but no barrier is sufficient to repel vulgar curiosity. She persevered, until a very direct intimation from Harvey, by threatening to supply her place with a female a few years younger than herself, gave her awful warning that there were bounds beyond which she was not to pass. From that period the curiosity of the housekeeper had been held in such salutary restraint, that, although no opportunity of listening was ever neglected, she had been able to add but little to her stock of knowledge. There was, however, one piece of intelligence, and that of no little interest to herself, which she had succeeded in obtaining; and from the moment of its acquisition, she directed her energies to the accomplishment of one object, aided by the double stimulus of love and avarice.

Harvey was in the frequent habit of paying mysterious visits in the depth of the night, to the fireplace of the apartment that served for both kitchen and parlor. Here he was observed by Katy; and availing herself of his absence and the occupations of the father, by removing one of the hearthstones, she discovered an iron pot, glittering with a metal that seldom fails to soften the hardest heart. Katy succeeded in replacing the stone without discovery, and never dared to trust herself with another visit. From that moment, however, the heart of the virgin lost its obduracy, and nothing interposed between Harvey and his happiness, but his own want of observation.

The war did not interfere with the traffic of the peddler, who seized on the golden opportunity which the interruption of the regular trade afforded, and appeared absorbed in the one grand object of amassing money. For a year or two his employment was uninterrupted, and his success proportionate; but, at length, dark and threatening hints began to throw suspicion around his movements, and the civil authority thought it incumbent on them to examine narrowly into his mode of life. His imprisonments, though frequent, were not long; and his escapes from the guardians of the law easy, compared to what he endured from the persecution of the military. Still Birch survived, and still he continued his trade, though compelled to be very guarded in his movements, especially whenever he approached the northern boundaries of the county; or in other words, the neighborhood of the American lines. His visits to the Locusts had become less frequent, and his appearance at his own abode so seldom, as to draw forth from the disappointed Katy, in the fullness of her heart, the complaint we have related, in her reply to Harper. Nothing, however, seemed to interfere with the pursuits of this indefatigable trader, who, with a view to dispose of certain articles for which he could only find purchasers in the very wealthiest families of the county, had now braved the fury of the tempest, and ventured to cross the half mile between his own residence and the house of Mr. Wharton.

In a few minutes after receiving the commands of his young mistress, Caesar reappeared, ushering into the apartment the subject of the foregoing digression. In person, the peddler was a man above the middle height, spare, but full of bone and muscle. At first sight, his strength seemed unequal to manage the unwieldy burden of his pack; yet he threw it on and off with great dexterity, and with as much apparent ease as if it had been filled with feathers. His eyes were gray, sunken, restless, and, for the flitting moments that they dwelt on the countenance of those with whom he conversed, they seemed to read the very soul. They possessed, however, two distinct expressions, which, in a great measure, characterized the whole man. When engaged in traffic, the intelligence of his face appeared lively, active, and flexible, though uncommonly acute; if the conversation turned on the ordinary transactions of life, his air became abstracted and restless; but if, by chance, the Revolution and the country were the topic, his whole system seemed altered—all his faculties were concentrated: he would listen for a great length of time, without speaking, and then would break silence by some light and jocular remark, that was too much at variance with his former manner, not to be affectation. But of the war, and of his father, he seldom spoke and always from some very obvious necessity.

To a superficial observer, avarice would seem his ruling passion—and, all things considered, he was as unfit a subject for the plans of Katy Haynes as can be readily imagined. On entering the room, the peddler relieved himself from his burden, which, as it stood on the floor, reached nearly to his shoulders, and saluted the family with modest civility. To Harper he made a silent bow, without lifting his eyes from the carpet; but the curtain prevented any notice of the presence of Captain Wharton. Sarah gave but little time for the usual salutations, before she commenced her survey of the contents of the pack; and, for several minutes, the two were engaged in bringing to light the various articles it contained. The tables, chairs, and floor were soon covered with silks, crapes, gloves, muslins, and all the stock of an itinerant trader. Caesar was employed to hold open the mouth of the pack, as its hoards were discharged, and occasionally he aided his young lady, by directing her admiration to some article of finery, which, from its deeper contrast in colors, he thought more worthy of her notice. At length, Sarah, having selected several articles, and satisfactorily arranged the prices, observed in a cheerful voice,—

“But, Harvey, you have told us no news. Has Lord Cornwallis beaten the rebels again?”

The question could not have been heard; for the peddler, burying his body in the pack, brought forth a quantity of lace of exquisite fineness, and, holding it up to view, he required the admiration of the young lady. Miss Peyton dropped the cup she was engaged in washing, from her hand; and Frances exhibited the whole of that lovely face, which had hitherto only suffered one of its joyous eyes to be seen, beaming with a color that shamed the damask which enviously concealed her figure.

The aunt quitted her employment; and Birch soon disposed of a large portion of his valuable article. The praises of the ladies had drawn the whole person of the younger sister into view; and Frances was slowly rising from the window, as Sarah repeated her question, with an exultation in her voice, that proceeded more from pleasure in her purchase, than her political feelings. The younger sister resumed her seat, apparently examining the state of the clouds, while the peddler, finding a reply was expected, answered,—

“There is some talk, below, about Tarleton having defeated General
Sumter, on the Tiger River.”

Captain Wharton now involuntarily thrust his head between the opening of the curtains into the room; and Frances, turning her ear in breathless silence, noticed the quiet eyes of Harper looking at the peddler, over the book he was affecting to read, with an expression that denoted him to be a listener of no ordinary interest.

“Indeed!” cried the exulting Sarah; “Sumter—Sumter—who is he? I’ll not buy even a pin, until you tell me all the news,” she continued, laughing and throwing down a muslin she had been examining.

For a moment the peddler hesitated; his eye glanced towards Harper, who was yet gazing at him with settled meaning, and the whole manner of Birch was altered. Approaching the fire, he took from his mouth a large allowance of the Virginian weed, and depositing it, with the superabundance of its juices, without mercy to Miss Peyton’s shining andirons, he returned to his goods.

“He lives somewhere among the niggers to the south,” answered the peddler, abruptly.

“No more nigger than be yourself, Mister Birch,” interrupted Caesar tartly, dropping at the same time the covering of the goods in high displeasure.

“Hush, Caesar—hush; never mind it now,” said Sarah Wharton soothingly, impatient to hear further.

“A black man so good as white, Miss Sally,” continued the offended negro, “so long as he behave heself.”

“And frequently he is much better,” rejoined his mistress. “But, Harvey, who is this Mr. Sumter?”

A slight indication of humor showed itself on the face of the peddler, but it disappeared, and he continued as if the discourse had met with no interruption from the sensitiveness of the domestic.

“As I was saying, he lives among the colored people in the south”—Caesar resumed his occupation—“and he has lately had a scrimmage with this Colonel Tarleton—”

“Who defeated him, of course?” cried Sarah, with confidence.

“So say the troops at Morrisania.”

“But what do you say?” Mr. Wharton ventured to inquire, yet speaking in a low tone.

“I repeat but what I hear,” said Birch, offering a piece of cloth to the inspection of Sarah, who rejected it in silence, evidently determined to hear more before she made another purchase.

“They say, however, at the Plains,” the peddler continued, first throwing his eyes again around the room, and letting them rest for an instant on Harper, “that Sumter and one or two more were all that were hurt, and that the rig’lars were all cut to pieces, for the militia were fixed snugly in a log barn.”

“Not very probable,” said Sarah, contemptuously, “though I make no doubt the rebels got behind the logs.”

“I think,” said the peddler coolly, again offering the silk, “it’s quite ingenious to get a log between one and a gun, instead of getting between a gun and a log.”

The eyes of Harper dropped quietly on the pages of the volume in his hand, while Frances, rising, came forward with a smile in her face, as she inquired, in a tone of affability that the peddler had never witnessed from her,—

“Have you more of the lace, Mr. Birch?”

The desired article was immediately produced, and Frances became a purchaser also. By her order a glass of liquor was offered to the trader, who took it with thanks, and having paid his compliments to the master of the house and the ladies, drank the beverage.

“So, it is thought that Colonel Tarleton has worsted General Sumter?” said Mr. Wharton, affecting to be employed in mending the cup that was broken by the eagerness of his sister-in-law.

“I believe they think so at Morrisania,” said Birch, dryly.

“Have you any other news, friend?” asked Captain Wharton, venturing to thrust his face without the curtains.

“Have you heard that Major André has been hanged?”

Captain Wharton started, and for a moment glances of great significance were exchanged between him and the trader, when he observed, with affected indifference, “That must have been some weeks ago.”

“Does his execution make much noise?” asked the father, striving to make the broken china unite.

“People will talk, you know, ’squire.”

“Is there any probability of movements below, my friend, that will make traveling dangerous?” asked Harper, looking steadily at the other, in expectation of his reply.

Some bunches of ribbons fell from the hands of Birch; his countenance changed instantly, losing its keen expression in intent meaning, as he answered slowly, “It is some time since the rig’lar cavalry were out, and I saw some of De Lancey’s men cleaning their arms, as I passed their quarters; it would be no wonder if they took the scent soon, for the Virginia horse are low in the county.”

“Are they in much force?” asked Mr. Wharton, suspending all employment in anxiety.

“I did not count them.”

Frances was the only observer of the change in the manner of Birch, and, on turning to Harper, he had resumed his book in silence. She took some of the ribbons in her hand—laid them down again—and, bending over the goods, so that her hair, falling in rich curls, shaded her face, she observed, blushing with a color that suffused her neck,—

“I thought the Southern horse had marched towards the Delaware.”

“It may be so,” said Birch; “I passed the troops at a distance.”

Caesar had now selected a piece of calico, in which the gaudy colors of yellow and red were contrasted on a white ground, and, after admiring it for several minutes, he laid it down with a sigh, as he exclaimed, “Berry pretty calico.”

“That,” said Sarah; “yes, that would make a proper gown for your wife,
Caesar.”

“Yes, Miss Sally,” cried the delighted black, “it make old Dinah heart leap for joy—so berry genteel.”

“Yes,” added the peddler, quaintly, “that is only wanting to make Dinah look like a rainbow.”

Caesar eyed his young mistress eagerly, until she inquired of Harvey the price of the article.

“Why, much as I light of chaps,” said the peddler.

“How much?” demanded Sarah in surprise.

“According to my luck in finding purchasers; for my friend Dinah, you may have it at four shillings.”

“It is too much,” said Sarah, turning to some goods for herself.

“Monstrous price for coarse calico, Mister Birch,” grumbled Caesar, dropping the opening of the pack again.

“We will say three, then,” added the peddler, “if you like that better.”

“Be sure he like ’em better,” said Caesar, smiling good-humoredly, and reopening the pack; “Miss Sally like a t’ree shilling when she give, and a four shilling when she take.”

The bargain was immediately concluded; but in measuring, the cloth wanted a little of the well-known ten yards required by the dimensions of Dinah. By dint of a strong arm, however, it grew to the desired length, under the experienced eye of the peddler, who conscientiously added a ribbon of corresponding brilliancy with the calico; and Caesar hastily withdrew, to communicate the joyful intelligence to his aged partner.

During the movements created by the conclusion of the purchase, Captain Wharton had ventured to draw aside the curtain, so as to admit a view of his person, and he now inquired of the peddler, who had begun to collect the scattered goods, at what time he had left the city.

“At early twilight,” was the answer.

“So lately!” cried the other in surprise: then correcting his manner, by assuming a more guarded air, he continued, “Could you pass the pickets at so late an hour?”

“I did,” was the laconic reply.

“You must be well known by this time, Harvey, to the officers of the
British army,” cried Sarah, smiling knowingly on the peddler.

“I know some of them by sight,” said Birch, glancing his eyes round the apartment, taking in their course Captain Wharton, and resting for an instant on the countenance of Harper.

Mr. Wharton had listened intently to each speaker, in succession, and had so far lost the affectation of indifference, as to be crushing in his hand the pieces of china on which he had expended so much labor in endeavoring to mend it; when, observing the peddler tying the last knot in his pack, he asked abruptly,

“Are we about to be disturbed again with the enemy?”

“Who do you call the enemy?” said the peddler, raising himself erect, and giving the other a look, before which the eyes of Mr. Wharton sank in instant confusion.

“All are enemies who disturb our peace,” said Miss Peyton, observing that her brother was unable to speak. “But are the royal troops out from below?”

“’Tis quite likely they soon may be,” returned Birch, raising his pack from the floor, and preparing to leave the room.

“And the continentals,” continued Miss Peyton mildly, “are the continentals in the county?”

Harvey was about to utter something in reply, when the door opened, and
Caesar made his appearance, attended by his delighted spouse.

The race of blacks of which Caesar was a favorable specimen is becoming very rare. The old family servant who, born and reared in the dwelling of his master, identified himself with the welfare of those whom it was his lot to serve, is giving place in every direction to that vagrant class which has sprung up within the last thirty years, and whose members roam through the country unfettered by principles, and uninfluenced by attachments. For it is one of the curses of slavery, that its victims become incompetent to the attributes of a freeman. The short curly hair of Caesar had acquired from age a coloring of gray, that added greatly to the venerable cast of his appearance. Long and indefatigable applications of the comb had straightened the close curls of his forehead, until they stood erect in a stiff and formal brush, that gave at least two inches to his stature. The shining black of his youth had lost its glistening hue, and it had been succeeded by a dingy brown. His eyes, which stood at a most formidable distance from each other, were small, and characterized by an expression of good feeling, occasionally interrupted by the petulance of an indulged servant; they, however, now danced with inward delight. His nose possessed, in an eminent manner, all the requisites for smelling, but with the most modest unobtrusiveness; the nostrils being abundantly capacious, without thrusting themselves in the way of their neighbors. His mouth was capacious to a fault, and was only tolerated on account of the double row of pearls it contained. In person Caesar was short, and we should say square, had not all the angles and curves of his figure bid defiance to anything like mathematical symmetry. His arms were long and muscular, and terminated by two bony hands, that exhibited on one side a coloring of blackish gray, and on the other, a faded pink. But it was in his legs that nature had indulged her most capricious humor. There was an abundance of material injudiciously used. The calves were neither before nor behind, but rather on the outer side of the limb, inclining forward, and so close to the knee as to render the free use of that joint a subject of doubt. In the foot, considering it as a base on which the body was to rest, Caesar had no cause of complaint, unless, indeed, it might be that the leg was placed so near the center, as to make it sometimes a matter of dispute, whether he was not walking backwards. But whatever might be the faults a statuary could discover in his person, the heart of Caesar Thompson was in the right place, and, we doubt not, of very just dimensions.

Accompanied by his ancient companion, Caesar now advanced, and paid his tribute of gratitude in words. Sarah received them with great complacency, and made a few compliments to the taste of the husband, and the probable appearance of the wife. Frances, with a face beaming with a look of pleasure that corresponded to the smiling countenances of the blacks, offered the service of her needle in fitting the admired calico to its future uses. The offer was humbly and gratefully accepted.

As Caesar followed his wife and the peddler from the apartment, and was in the act of closing the door, he indulged himself in a grateful soliloquy, by saying aloud,—

“Good little lady—Miss Fanny—take care of he fader—love to make a gown for old Dinah, too.” What else his feelings might have induced him to utter is unknown, but the sound of his voice was heard some time after the distance rendered his words indistinct.

Harper had dropped his book, and he sat an admiring witness of the scene; and Frances enjoyed a double satisfaction, as she received an approving smile from a face which concealed, under the traces of deep thought and engrossing care, the benevolent expression which characterizes all the best feelings of the human heart.

[4] The Americans changed the names of many towns and streets at the Revolution, as has since been done in France. Thus, in the city of New York, Crown Street has become Liberty Street; King Street, Pine Street; and Queen Street, then one of the most fashionable quarters of the town, Pearl Street. Pearl Street is now chiefly occupied by the auction dealers, and the wholesale drygoods merchants, for warehouses and counting-rooms.

“It is the form, the eye, the word,
The bearing of that stranger lord,
His stature, manly, bold, and tall,
Built like a castle’s battled wall,
Yet molded in such just degrees
His giant strength seems lightsome ease.
Weather and war their rougher trace
Have left on that majestic face;
But ’tis his dignity of eye!
There, if a suppliant, would I fly,
Secure, ’mid danger, wrongs, and grief,
Of sympathy, redress, relief—
That glance, if guilty, would I dread
More than the doom that spoke me dead.”
“Enough, enough!” the princess cried,
“’Tis Scotland’s hope, her joy, her pride!”

—WALTER SCOTT.

The party sat in silence for many minutes after the peddler had withdrawn. Mr. Wharton had heard enough to increase his uneasiness, without in the least removing his apprehensions on behalf of his son. The captain was impatiently wishing Harper in any other place than the one foe occupied with such apparent composure, while Miss Peyton completed the disposal of her breakfast equipage, with the mild complacency of her nature, aided a little by an inward satisfaction at possessing so large a portion of the trader’s lace; Sarah was busily occupied in arranging her purchases, and Frances was kindly assisting in the occupation, disregarding her own neglected bargains, when the stranger suddenly broke the silence by saying,—

“If any apprehensions of me induce Captain Wharton to maintain his disguise, I wish him to be undeceived; had I motives for betraying him, they could not operate under present circumstances.”

The younger sister sank into her seat colorless and astonished. Miss Peyton dropped the tea tray she was lifting from the table, and Sarah sat with her purchases unheeded in her lap, in speechless surprise. Mr. Wharton was stupefied; but the captain, hesitating a moment from astonishment, sprang into the middle of the room, and exclaimed, as he tore off the instruments of his disguise,—

“I believe you from my soul, and this tiresome imposition shall continue no longer. Yet I am at a loss to conceive in what manner you should know me.”

“You really look so much better in your proper person, Captain Wharton,” said Harper, with a slight smile, “I would advise you never to conceal it in future. There is enough to betray you, if other sources of detection were wanting.” As he spoke, he pointed to a picture suspended over the mantel piece, which exhibited the British officer in his regimentals.

“I had flattered myself,” cried young Wharton, with a laugh, “that I looked better on the canvas than in a masquerade. You must be a close observer, sir.”

“Necessity has made me one,” said Harper, rising from his seat.

Frances met him as he was about to withdraw, and, taking his hand between both her own, said with earnestness, her cheeks mantling with their richest vermilion, “You cannot—you will not betray my brother.”

For an instant Harper paused in silent admiration of the lovely pleader, and then, folding her hands on his breast, he replied solemnly, “I cannot, and I will not.” He released her hands, and laying his own on her head gently, continued, “If the blessing of a stranger can profit you, receive it.” He turned, and, bowing low, retired, with a delicacy that was duly appreciated by those he quitted, to his own apartment.

The whole party were deeply impressed with the ingenuous and solemn manner of the traveler, and all but the father found immediate relief in his declaration. Some of the cast-off clothes of the captain, which had been removed with the goods from the city, were produced; and young Wharton, released from the uneasiness of his disguise, began at last to enjoy a visit which had been undertaken at so much personal risk to himself. Mr. Wharton retiring to his apartment, in pursuance of his regular engagements, the ladies, with the young man, were left to an uninterrupted communication on such subjects as were most agreeable. Even Miss Peyton was affected with the spirits of her young relatives; and they sat for an hour enjoying, in heedless confidence, the pleasures of an unrestrained conversation, without reflecting on any danger which might be impending over them. The city and their acquaintances were not long neglected; for Miss Peyton, who had never forgotten the many agreeable hours of her residence within its boundaries, soon inquired, among others, after their old acquaintance, Colonel Wellmere.

“Oh!” cried the captain, gayly, “he yet continues there, as handsome and as gallant as ever.”

Although a woman be not actually in love, she seldom hears without a blush the name of a man whom she might love, and who has been connected with herself by idle gossips, in the amatory rumor of the day. Such had been the case with Sarah, and she dropped her eyes on the carpet with a smile, that, aided by the blush which suffused her cheek, in no degree detracted from her native charms.

Captain Wharton, without heeding this display of interest in his sister, immediately continued, “At times he is melancholy—we tell him it must be love.” Sarah raised her eyes to the face of her brother, and was consciously turning them on the rest of the party, when she met those of her sister laughing with good humor and high spirits, as she cried, “Poor man! does he despair?”

“Why, no—one would think he could not; the eldest son of a man of wealth, so handsome, and a colonel.”

“Strong reasons, indeed, why he should prevail,” said Sarah, endeavoring to laugh; “more particularly the latter.”

“Let me tell you,” replied the captain, gravely, “a lieutenant colonelcy in the Guards is a very pretty thing.”

“And Colonel Wellmere a very pretty man,” added Frances.

“Nay, Frances,” returned her sister, “Colonel Wellmere was never a favorite of yours; he is too loyal to his king to be agreeable to your taste.”

Frances quickly answered, “And is not Henry loyal to his king?”

“Come, come,” said Miss Peyton, “no difference of opinion about the colonel—he is a favorite of mine.”

“Fanny likes majors better,” cried the brother, pulling her upon his knee.

“Nonsense!” said the blushing girl, as she endeavored to extricate herself from the grasp of her laughing brother.

“It surprises me,” continued the captain, “that Peyton, when he procured the release of my father, did not endeavor to detain my sister in the rebel camp.”

“That might have endangered his own liberty,” said the smiling girl, resuming her seat. “You know it is liberty for which Major Dunwoodie is fighting.”

“Liberty!” exclaimed Sarah; “very pretty liberty which exchanges one master for fifty.”

“The privilege of changing masters at all is a liberty.”

“And one you ladies would sometimes be glad to exercise,” cried the captain.

“We like, I believe, to have the liberty of choosing who they shall be in the first place,” said the laughing girl. “Don’t we, Aunt Jeanette?”

“Me!” cried Miss Peyton, starting; “what do I know of such things, child? You must ask someone else, if you wish to learn such matters.”

“Ah! you would have us think you were never young! But what am I to believe of all the tales I have heard about the handsome Miss Jeanette Peyton?”

“Nonsense, my dear, nonsense,” said the aunt, endeavoring to suppress a smile; “it is very silly to believe all you hear.”

“Nonsense, do you call it?” cried the captain, gayly. “To this hour
General Montrose toasts Miss Peyton; I heard him within the week, at Sir
Henry’s table.”

“Why, Henry, you are as saucy as your sister; and to break in upon your folly, I must take you to see my new home-made manufactures, which I will be bold enough to put in contrast with the finery of Birch.”

The young people rose to follow their aunt, in perfect good humor with each other and the world. On ascending the stairs to the place of deposit for Miss Peyton’s articles of domestic economy, she availed herself, however, of an opportunity to inquire of her nephew, whether General Montrose suffered as much from the gout as he had done when she knew him.

It is a painful discovery we make, as we advance in life, that even those we most love are not exempt from its frailties. When the heart is fresh, and the view of the future unsullied by the blemishes which have been gathered from the experience of the past, our feelings are most holy: we love to identify with the persons of our natural friends all those qualities to which we ourselves aspire, and all those virtues we have been taught to revere. The confidence with which we esteem seems a part of our nature; and there is a purity thrown around the affections which tie us to our kindred that after life can seldom hope to see uninjured. The family of Mr. Wharton continued to enjoy, for the remainder of the day, a happiness to which they had long been strangers; and one that sprang, in its younger members, from the delights of the most confident affection, and the exchange of the most disinterested endearments.

Harper appeared only at the dinner table, and he retired with the cloth, under the pretense of some engagement in his own room. Notwithstanding the confidence created by his manner, the family felt his absence a relief; for the visit of Captain Wharton was necessarily to be confined to a very few days, both from the limitation of his leave of absence, and the danger of a discovery.

All dread of consequences, however, was lost in the pleasure of the meeting. Once or twice during the day, Mr. Wharton had suggested a doubt as to the character of his unknown guest, and the possibility of the detection of his son proceeding in some manner from his information; but the idea was earnestly opposed by all his children; even Sarah uniting with her brother and sister in pleading warmly in favor of the sincerity expressed in the outward appearance of the traveler.

“Such appearances, my children,” replied the desponding parent, “are but too often deceitful; when men like Major André lend themselves to the purposes of fraud, it is idle to reason from qualities, much less externals.”

“Fraud!” cried his son quickly. “Surely, sir, you forget that Major André was serving his king, and that the usages of war justified the measure.”

“And did not the usages of war justify his death, Henry?” inquired Frances, speaking in a low voice, unwilling to abandon what she thought the cause of her country, and yet unable to suppress her feelings for the man.

“Never!” exclaimed the young man, springing from his seat, and pacing the floor rapidly. “Frances, you shock me; suppose it should be my fate, even now, to fall into the power of the rebels; you would vindicate my execution—perhaps exult in the cruelty of Washington.”

“Henry!” said Frances, solemnly, quivering with emotion, and with a face pale as death, “you little know my heart.”

“Pardon me, my sister—my little Fanny,” cried the repentant youth, pressing her to his bosom, and kissing off the tears which had burst, spite of her resolution, from her eyes.

“It is very foolish to regard your hasty words, I know,” said Frances, extricating herself from his arms, and raising her yet humid eyes to his face with a smile; “but reproach from those we love is most severe, Henry; particularly—where we—we think—we know”—her paleness gradually gave place to the color of the rose, as she concluded in a low voice, with her eyes directed to the carpet, “we are undeserving of it.”

Miss Peyton moved from her own seat to the one next her niece, and, kindly taking her hand, observed, “You should not suffer the impetuosity of your brother to affect you so much; boys, you know, are proverbially ungovernable.”

“And, from my conduct, you might add cruel,” said the captain, seating himself on the other side of his sister. “But on the subject of the death of André we are all of us uncommonly sensitive. You did not know him: he was all that was brave—that was accomplished—that was estimable.” Frances smiled faintly, and shook her head, but made no reply. Her brother, observing the marks of incredulity in her countenance, continued, “You doubt it, and justify his death?”

“I do not doubt his worth,” replied the maid, mildly, “nor his being deserving of a more happy fate; but I cannot doubt the propriety of Washington’s conduct. I know but little of the customs of war, and wish to know less; but with what hopes of success could the Americans contend, if they yielded all the principles which long usage had established, to the exclusive purposes of the British?”

“Why contend at all?” cried Sarah, impatiently. “Besides, being rebels, all their acts are illegal.”

“Women are but mirrors, which reflect the images before them,” cried the captain, good-naturedly. “In Frances I see the picture of Major Dunwoodie, and in Sarah—”

“Colonel Wellmere,” interrupted the younger sister, laughing, and blushing crimson. “I must confess I am indebted to the major for my reasoning—am I not, Aunt Jeanette?”

“I believe it is something like his logic, indeed, child.”

“I plead guilty; and you. Sarah, have not forgotten the learned discussions of Colonel Wellmere.”

“I trust I never forget the right,” said Sarah, emulating her sister in color, and rising, under the pretense of avoiding the heat of the fire.

Nothing occurred of any moment during the rest of the day; but in the evening Caesar reported that he had overheard voices in the room of Harper, conversing in a low tone. The apartment occupied by the traveler was the wing at the extremity of the building, opposite to the parlor in which the family ordinarily assembled; and it seems that Caesar had established a regular system of espionage, with a view to the safety of his young master. This intelligence gave some uneasiness to all the members of the family; but the entrance of Harper himself, with the air of benevolence and sincerity which shone through his reserve, soon removed the doubts from the breast of all but Mr. Wharton. His children and sister believed Caesar to have been mistaken, and the evening passed off without any additional alarm.

On the afternoon of the succeeding day, the party were assembled in the parlor around the tea table of Miss Peyton, when a change in the weather occurred. The thin scud, that apparently floated but a short distance above the tops of the hills, began to drive from the west towards the east in astonishing rapidity. The rain yet continued to beat against the eastern windows of the house with fury; in that direction the heavens were dark and gloomy. Frances was gazing at the scene with the desire of youth to escape from the tedium of confinement, when, as if by magic, all was still. The rushing winds had ceased, the pelting of the storm was over, and, springing to the window, with delight pictured in her face, she saw a glorious ray of sunshine lighting the opposite wood. The foliage glittered with the checkered beauties of the October leaf, reflecting back from the moistened boughs the richest luster of an American autumn. In an instant, the piazza, which opened to the south, was thronged with the inmates of the cottage. The air was mild, balmy, and refreshing; in the east, clouds, which might be likened to the retreating masses of a discomfited army, hung around the horizon in awful and increasing darkness. At a little elevation above the cottage, the thin vapor was still rushing towards the east with amazing velocity; while in the west the sun had broken forth and shed his parting radiance on the scene below, aided by the fullest richness of a clear atmosphere and a freshened herbage. Such moments belong only to the climate of America, and are enjoyed in a degree proportioned to the suddenness of the contrast, and the pleasure we experience in escaping from the turbulence of the elements to the quiet of a peaceful evening, and an air still as the softest mornings in June.

“What a magnificent scene!” said Harper, in a low tone. “How grand! how awfully sublime!—may such a quiet speedily await the struggle in which my country is engaged, and such a glorious evening follow the day of her adversity!”

Frances, who stood next to him, alone heard the voice. Turning in amazement from the view to the speaker, she saw him standing bareheaded, erect, and with his eyes lifted to heaven. There was no longer the quiet which had seemed their characteristic, but they were lighted into something like enthusiasm, and a slight flush passed over his features.

There can be no danger apprehended from such a man, thought Frances; such feelings belong only to the virtuous.

The musings of the party were now interrupted by the sudden appearance of the peddler. He had taken advantage of the first gleam of sunshine to hasten to the cottage. Heedless of wet or dry as it lay in his path, with arms swinging to and fro, and with his head bent forward of his body several inches, Harvey Birch approached the piazza, with a gait peculiarly his own. It was the quick, lengthened pace of an itinerant vender of goods.

“Fine evening,” said the peddler, saluting the party, without raising his eyes; “quite warm and agreeable for the season.”

Mr. Wharton assented to the remark, and inquired kindly after the health of his father. Harvey heard him, and continued standing for some time in moody silence; but the question being repeated, he answered with a slight tremor in his voice,—

“He fails fast; old age and hardships will do their work.” The peddler turned his face from the view of most of the family; but Frances noticed his glistening eyes and quivering lip, and, for the second time, Harvey rose in her estimation.

The valley in which the residence of Mr. Wharton stood ran in a direction from northwest to southeast, and the house was placed on the side of a hill which terminated its length in the former direction. A small opening, occasioned by the receding of the opposite hill, and the fall of the land to the level of the tide water, afforded a view of the Sound^[5] over the tops of the distant woods on its margin. The surface of the water which had so lately been lashing the shores with boisterous fury, was already losing its ruffled darkness in the long and regular undulations that succeeded a tempest, while the light air from the southwest was gently touching their summits, lending its feeble aid in stilling the waters. Some dark spots were now to be distinguished, occasionally rising into view, and again sinking behind the lengthened waves which interposed themselves to the sight. They were unnoticed by all but the peddler. He had seated himself on the piazza, at a distance from Harper, and appeared to have forgotten the object of his visit. His roving eye, however, soon caught a glimpse of these new objects in the view, and he sprang up with alacrity, gazing intently towards the water. He changed his place, glanced his eye with marked uneasiness on Harper, and then said with great emphasis—

“The rig’lars must be out from below.”

“Why do you think so?” inquired Captain Wharton, eagerly. “God send it may be true; I want their escort in again.”

“Them ten whaleboats would not move so fast unless they were better manned than common.”

“Perhaps,” cried Mr. Wharton in alarm, “they are—they are continentals returning from the island.”

“They look like rig’lars,” said the peddler, with meaning.

“Look!” repeated the captain, “there is nothing but spots to be seen.”

Harvey disregarded his observation, but seemed to be soliloquizing, as he said in an undertone, “They came out before the gale—have laid on the island these two days—horse are on the road—there will soon be fighting near us.” During this speech, Birch several times glanced his eye towards Harper, with evident uneasiness, but no corresponding emotion betrayed any interest of that gentleman in the scene. He stood in silent contemplation of the view, and seemed enjoying the change in the air. As Birch concluded, however, Harper turned to his host, and mentioned that his business would not admit of unnecessary delay; he would, therefore, avail himself of the fine evening to ride a few miles on his journey. Mr. Wharton made many professions of regret at losing so agreeable an inmate; but was too mindful of his duty not to speed the parting guest, and orders were instantly given to that effect.

The uneasiness of the peddler increased in a manner for which nothing apparent could account; his eye was constantly wandering towards the lower end of the vale as if in expectation of some interruption from that quarter. At length Caesar appeared, leading the noble beast which was to bear the weight of the traveler. The peddler officiously assisted to tighten the girths, and fasten the blue cloak and valise to the mailstraps.

Every precaution being completed, Harper proceeded to take his leave. To Sarah and her aunt he paid his compliments with ease and kindness; but when he came to Frances, he paused a moment, while his face assumed an expression of more than ordinary benignity. His eye repeated the blessing which had before fallen from his lips, and the girl felt her cheeks glow, and her heart beat with a quicker pulsation, as he spoke his adieus. There was a mutual exchange of polite courtesy between the host and his parting guest; but as Harper frankly offered his hand to Captain Wharton, he remarked, in a manner of great solemnity,—

“The step you have undertaken is one of much danger, and disagreeable consequences to yourself may result from it; in such a case, I may have it in my power to prove the gratitude I owe your family for its kindness.”

“Surely, sir,” cried the father, losing sight of delicacy in apprehension for his child, “you will keep secret the discovery which your being in my house has enabled you to make?”

Harper turned quickly to the speaker, and then, losing the sternness which had begun to gather on his countenance, he answered mildly, “I have learned nothing in your family, sir, of which I was ignorant before; but your son is safer from my knowledge of his visit than he would be without it.”

He bowed to the whole party, and without taking any notice of the peddler, other than by simply thanking him for his attentions, mounted his horse, and, riding steadily and gracefully through the little gate, was soon lost behind the hill which sheltered the valley to the northward.

The eyes of the peddler followed the retiring figure of the horseman so long as it continued within view, and as it disappeared from his sight, he drew a long and heavy sigh, as if relieved from a load of apprehension. The Whartons had meditated in silence on the character and visit of their unknown guest for the same period, when the father approached Birch and observed,

“I am yet your debtor, Harvey, for the tobacco you were so kind as to bring me from the city.”

“If it should not prove so good as the first,” replied the peddler, fixing a last and lingering look in the direction of Harper’s route, “it is owing to the scarcity of the article.”

“I like it much,” continued the other; “but you have forgotten to name the price.”

The countenance of the trader changed, and, losing its expression of deep care in a natural acuteness, he answered,—

“It is hard to say what ought to be the price; I believe I must leave it to your own generosity.”

Mr. Wharton had taken a hand well filled with the images of Carolus III from his pocket, and now extended it towards Birch with three of the pieces between his finger and thumb. Harvey’s eyes twinkled as he contemplated the reward; and rolling over in his mouth a large quantity of the article in question, coolly stretched forth his hand, into which the dollars fell with a most agreeable sound: but not satisfied with the transient music of their fall, the peddler gave each piece in succession a ring on the stepping-stone of the piazza, before he consigned it to the safekeeping of a huge deerskin purse, which vanished from the sight of the spectators so dexterously, that not one of them could have told about what part of his person it was secreted.

This very material point in his business so satisfactorily completed, the peddler rose from his seat on the floor of the piazza, and approached to where Captain Wharton stood, supporting his sisters on either arm, as they listened with the lively interest of affection to his conversation.

The agitation of the preceding incidents had caused such an expenditure of the juices which had become necessary to the mouth of the peddler, that a new supply of the weed was required before he could turn his attention to business of lesser moment. This done, he asked abruptly,—

“Captain Wharton, do you go in to-night?”

“No!” said the captain, laconically, and looking at his lovely burdens with great affection. “Mr. Birch, would you have me leave such company so soon, when I may never enjoy it again?”

“Brother!” said Frances, “jesting on such a subject is cruel.”

“I rather guess,” continued the peddler, coolly, “now the storm is over, the Skinners may be moving; you had better shorten your visit, Captain Wharton.”

“Oh!” cried the British officer, “a few guineas will buy off those rascals at any time, should I meet them. No, no, Mr. Birch, here I stay until morning.”

“Money could not liberate Major André,” said the peddler, dryly.

Both the sisters now turned to the captain in alarm, and the elder observed,—

“You had better take the advice of Harvey; rest assured, his opinion in such matters ought not to be disregarded.”

“Yes,” added the younger, “if, as I suspect, Mr. Birch assisted you to come here, your safety, our happiness, dear Henry, requires you to listen to him now.”

“I brought myself out, and can take myself in,” said the captain positively. “Our bargain went no further than to procure my disguise, and to let me know when the coast was clear; and in the latter particular, you were mistaken, Mr. Birch.”

“I was,” said the peddler, with some interest, “and the greater is the reason why you should get back to-night; the pass I gave you will serve but once.”

“Cannot you forge another?”

The pale cheek of the trader showed an unusual color, but he continued silent, with his eyes fixed on the ground, until the young man added, with great positiveness, “Here I stay this night, come what will.”

“Captain Wharton,” said the peddler, with great deliberation and marked emphasis, “beware a tall Virginian, with huge whiskers; he is below you, to my knowledge; the devil can’t deceive him; I never could but once.”

“Let him beware of me,” said Wharton, haughtily. “But, Mr. Birch, I exonerate you from further responsibility.”

“Will you give me that in writing?” asked the cautious Birch.

“Oh! cheerfully,” cried the captain, with a laugh. “Caesar! pen, ink, and paper, while I write a discharge for my trusty attendant, Harvey Birch, peddler, etc., etc.”

The implements for writing were produced, and the captain, with great gayety, wrote the desired acknowledgment in language of his own; which the peddler took, and carefully depositing it by the side of the image of his Catholic Majesty, made a sweeping bow to the whole family, and departed as he had approached. He was soon seen at a distance, stealing into the door of his own humble dwelling.

The father and sisters of the captain were too much rejoiced in retaining the young man to express, or even entertain, the apprehensions his situation might reasonably excite; but on retiring to their evening repast, a cooler reflection induced the captain to think of changing his mind. Unwilling to trust himself out of the protection of his father’s domains, the young man dispatched Caesar to desire another interview with Harvey. The black soon returned with the unwelcome intelligence that it was now too late. Katy had told him that Harvey must be miles on his road to the northward, “having left home at early candlelight with his pack.” Nothing now remained to the captain but patience, until the morning should afford further opportunity of deciding on the best course for him to pursue.

“This Harvey Birch, with his knowing looks and portentous warnings, gives me more uneasiness than I am willing to own,” said Captain Wharton, rousing himself from a fit of musing in which the danger of his situation made no small part of his meditations.

“How is it that he is able to travel to and fro in these difficult times, without molestation?” inquired Miss Peyton.

“Why the rebels suffer him to escape so easily, is more than I can answer,” returned the other; “but Sir Henry would not permit a hair of his head to be injured.”

“Indeed!” cried Frances, with interest. “Is he then known to Sir Henry
Clinton?”

“At least he ought to be.”

“Do you think, my son,” asked Mr. Wharton, “there is no danger of his betraying you?”

“Why—no; I reflected on that before I trusted myself to his power,” said the captain, thoughtfully. “He seems to be faithful in matters of business. The danger to himself, should he return to the city, would prevent such an act of villainy.”

“I think,” said Frances, adopting the manner of her brother, “Harvey Birch is not without good feelings; at least, he has the appearance of them at times.”

“Oh!” cried his sister, exulting, “he has loyalty, and that with me is a cardinal virtue.”

“I am afraid,” said her brother, laughing, “love of money is a stronger passion than love of his king.”

“Then,” said the father, “you cannot be safe while in his power—for no love will withstand the temptations of money, when offered to avarice.”

“Surely, sir,” cried the youth, recovering his gayety, “there must be one love that can resist anything—is there not, Fanny?”

“Here is your candle; you keep your father up beyond his usual hour.”

[5] An island more than forty leagues in length lies opposite the coasts of New York and Connecticut. The arm of the sea which separates it from the main is technically called a sound, and in that part of the country par excellence, the Sound. This sheet of water varies in its breadth from five to thirty miles.

Through Solway sands, through Taross moss,
Blindfold, he knew the paths to cross:
By wily turns, by desperate bounds,
Had baffled Percy’s best bloodhounds.
In Eske, or Liddel, fords were none,
But he would ride them, one by one;
Alike to him was time or tide,
December’s snow or July’s pride;
Alike to him was tide or time,
Moonless midnight or matin prime.

—WALTER SCOTT.

All the members of the Wharton family laid their heads on their pillows that night, with a foreboding of some interruption to their ordinary quiet. Uneasiness kept the sisters from enjoying their usual repose, and they rose from their beds, on the following morning, unrefreshed, and almost without having closed their eyes.

On taking an eager and hasty survey of the valley from the windows of their room, nothing, however, but its usual serenity was to be seen. It was glittering with the opening brilliancy of one of those lovely, mild days, which occur about the time of the falling of the leaf; and which, by their frequency, class the American autumn with the most delightful seasons of other countries. We have no spring; vegetation seems to leap into existence, instead of creeping, as in the same latitudes of the Old World; but how gracefully it retires! September, October, even November and December, compose the season for enjoyment in the open air; they have their storms, but they are distinct, and not of long continuance, leaving a clear atmosphere and a cloudless sky.

As nothing could be seen likely to interrupt the enjoyments and harmony of such a day, the sisters descended to the parlor, with a returning confidence in their brother’s security, and their own happiness.

The family were early in assembling around the breakfast table; and Miss Peyton, with a little of that minute precision which creeps into the habits of single life, had pleasantly insisted that the absence of her nephew should in no manner interfere with the regular hours she had established; consequently, the party were already seated when the captain made his appearance; though the untasted coffee sufficiently proved that by none of his relatives was his absence disregarded.

“I think I did much better,” he cried, taking a chair between his sisters, and receiving their offered salutes, “to secure a good bed and such a plentiful breakfast, instead of trusting to the hospitality of that renowned corps, the Cowboys.”

“If you could sleep,” said Sarah, “you were more fortunate than Frances and myself; every murmur of the night air sounded to me like the approach of the rebel army.”

“Why,” said the captain, laughing, “I do acknowledge a little inquietude myself—but how was it with you?” turning to his younger and evidently favorite sister, and tapping her cheek. “Did you see banners in the clouds, and mistake Miss Peyton’s Aeolian harp for rebellious music?”

“Nay, Henry,” rejoined the maid, looking at him affectionately, “much as I love my own country, the approach of her troops just now would give me great pain.”

The brother made no reply; but returning the fondness expressed in her eye by a look of fraternal tenderness, he gently pressed her hand in silence; when Caesar, who had participated largely in the anxiety of the family, and who had risen with the dawn, and kept a vigilant watch on the surrounding objects, as he stood gazing from one of the windows, exclaimed with a face that approached to something like the hues of a white man,—

“Run—Massa Harry—run—if he love old Caesar, run—here come a rebel horse.”

“Run!” repeated the British officer, gathering himself up in military pride. “No, Mr. Caesar, running is not my trade.” While speaking, he walked deliberately to the window, where the family were already collected in the greatest consternation.

At the distance of more than a mile, about fifty dragoons were to be seen, winding down one of the lateral entrances of the valley. In advance, with an officer, was a man attired in the dress of a countryman, who pointed in the direction of the cottage. A small party now left the main body, and moved rapidly towards the object of their destination.

On reaching the road which led through the bottom of the valley, they turned their horses’ heads to the north.

The Whartons continued chained in breathless silence to the spot, watching their movements, when the party, having reached the dwelling of Birch, made a rapid circle around his grounds, and in an instant his house was surrounded by a dozen sentinels.

Two or three of the dragoons now dismounted and disappeared; in a few minutes, however, they returned to the yard, followed by Katy, from whose violent gesticulations, it was evident that matters of no trifling concern were on the carpet. A short communication with the loquacious housekeeper followed the arrival of the main body of the troop, and the advance party remounting, the whole moved towards the Locusts with great speed.

As yet none of the family had sufficient presence of mind to devise any means of security for Captain Wharton; but the danger now became too pressing to admit of longer delay, and various means of secreting him were hastily proposed; but they were all haughtily rejected by the young man, as unworthy of his character. It was too late to retreat to the woods in the rear of the cottage, for he would unavoidably be seen, and, followed by a troop of horse, as inevitably taken.

At length his sisters, with trembling hands, replaced his original disguise, the instruments of which had been carefully kept at hand by Caesar, in expectation of some sudden emergency.

This arrangement was hastily and imperfectly completed, as the dragoons entered the lawn and orchard of the Locusts, riding with the rapidity of the wind; and in their turn the Whartons were surrounded.

Nothing remained now, but to meet the impending examination with as much indifference as the family could assume. The leader of the horse dismounted, and, followed by a couple of his men, he approached the outer door of the building, which was slowly and reluctantly opened for his admission by Caesar. The heavy tread of the trooper, as he followed the black to the door of the parlor, rang in the ears of the females as it approached nearer and nearer, and drove the blood from their faces to their hearts, with a chill that nearly annihilated feeling.

A man, whose colossal stature manifested the possession of vast strength, entered the room, and removing his cap, he saluted the family with a mildness his appearance did not indicate as belonging to his nature. His dark hair hung around his brow in profusion, though stained with powder which was worn at that day, and his face was nearly hid in the whiskers by which it was disfigured. Still, the expression of his eye, though piercing, was not bad, and his voice, though deep and powerful, was far from unpleasant. Frances ventured to throw a timid glance at his figure as he entered, and saw at once the man from whose scrutiny Harvey Birch had warned them there was so much to be apprehended.

“You have no cause for alarm, ladies,” said the officer, pausing a moment, and contemplating the pale faces around him. “My business will be confined to a few questions, which, if freely answered, will instantly remove us from your dwelling.”

“And what may they be, sir?” stammered Mr. Wharton, rising from his chair and waiting anxiously for the reply.

“Has there been a strange gentleman staying with you during the storm?” continued the dragoon, speaking with interest, and in some degree sharing in the evident anxiety of the father.

“This gentleman—here—favored us with his company during the rain, and has not yet departed.”

“This gentleman!” repeated the other, turning to Captain Wharton, and contemplating his figure for a moment until the anxiety of his countenance gave place to a lurking smile. He approached the youth with an air of comic gravity, and with a low bow, continued, “I am sorry for the severe cold you have in your head, sir.”

“I!” exclaimed the captain, in surprise; “I have no cold in my head.”

“I fancied it then, from seeing you had covered such handsome black locks with that ugly old wig. It was my mistake; you will please to pardon it.”

Mr. Wharton groaned aloud; but the ladies, ignorant of the extent of their visitor’s knowledge, remained in trembling yet rigid silence. The captain himself moved his hand involuntarily to his head, and discovered that the trepidation of his sisters had left some of his natural hair exposed. The dragoon watched the movement with a continued smile, when, seeming to recollect himself, turning to the father, he proceeded,—

“Then, sir, I am to understand there has not been a Mr. Harper here, within the week?”

“Mr. Harper,” echoed the other, feeling a load removed from his heart, “yes, I had forgotten; but he is gone; and if there be anything wrong in his character, we are in entire ignorance of it; to me he was a total stranger.”

“You have but little to apprehend from his character,” answered the dragoon dryly. “But he is gone—how—when—and whither?”

“He departed as he arrived,” said Mr. Wharton, gathering renewed confidence from the manner of the trooper; “on horseback, last evening, and he took the northern road.”

The officer listened to him with intense interest, his countenance gradually lighting into a smile of pleasure, and the instant Mr. Wharton concluded his laconic reply he turned on his heel and left the apartment. The Whartons, judging from his manner, thought he was about to proceed in quest of the object of his inquiries. They observed the dragoon, on gaining the lawn, in earnest and apparently pleased conversation with his two subalterns. In a few moments orders were given to some of the troops, and horsemen left the valley, at full speed, by its various roads.

The suspense of the party within, who were all highly interested witnesses of this scene, was shortly terminated: for the heavy tread of the dragoon soon announced his second approach. He bowed again politely as he reentered the room, and walking up to Captain Wharton, said, with comic gravity,—

“Now, sir, my principal business being done, may I beg to examine the quality of that wig?”

The British officer imitated the manner of the other, as he deliberately uncovered his head, and handing him the wig, observed, “I hope, sir, it is to your liking.”

“I cannot, without violating the truth, say it is,” returned the dragoon. “I prefer your ebony hair, from which you seem to have combed the powder with great industry. But that must have been a sad hurt you have received under this enormous black patch.”

“You appear so close an observer of things, I should like your opinion of it, sir,” said Henry, removing the silk, and exhibiting the cheek free from blemish.

“Upon my word, you improve most rapidly in externals,” added the trooper, preserving his muscles in inflexible gravity. “If I could but persuade you to exchange this old surtout for that handsome blue coat by your side, I think I never could witness a more agreeable metamorphosis, since I was changed myself from a lieutenant to a captain.”

Young Wharton very composedly did as was required and stood an extremely handsome, well-dressed young man. The dragoon looked at him for a minute with the drollery that characterized his manner, and then continued,—

“This is a newcomer in the scene; it is usual, you know, for strangers to be introduced; I am Captain Lawton, of the Virginia horse.”

“And I, sir, am Captain Wharton, of his Majesty’s 60th regiment of foot,” returned Henry, bowing stiffly, and recovering his natural manner.

The countenance of Lawton changed instantly, and his assumed quaintness vanished. He viewed the figure of Captain Wharton, as he stood proudly swelling with a pride that disdained further concealment, and exclaimed with great earnestness,—

“Captain Wharton, from my soul I pity you!”

“Oh! then,” cried the father in agony, “if you pity him, dear sir, why molest him? He is not a spy; nothing but a desire to see his friends prompted him to venture so far from the regular army in disguise. Leave him with us; there is no reward, no sum, which I will not cheerfully pay.”

“Sir, your anxiety for your friend excuses your language,” said Lawton, haughtily; “but you forget I am a Virginian, and a gentleman.” Turning to the young man, he continued, “Were you ignorant, Captain Wharton, that our pickets have been below you for several days?”

“I did not know it until I reached them, and it was then too late to retreat,” said Wharton sullenly. “I came out, as my father has mentioned, to see my friends, understanding your parties to be at Peekskill, and near the Highlands, or surely I would not have ventured.”

“All this may be very true; but the affair of André has made us on the alert. When treason reaches the grade of general officers, Captain Wharton, it behooves the friends of liberty to be vigilant.”

Henry bowed to this remark in distant silence, but Sarah ventured to urge something in behalf of her brother. The dragoon heard her politely, and apparently with commiseration; but willing to avoid useless and embarrassing petitions, he answered mildly,—

“I am not the commander of the party, madam; Major Dunwoodie will decide what must be done with your brother; at all events he will receive nothing but kind and gentle treatment.”

“Dunwoodie!” exclaimed Frances, with a face in which the roses contended for the mastery with the paleness of apprehension. “Thank God! then Henry is safe!”

Lawton regarded her with a mingled expression of pity and admiration; then shaking his head doubtingly, he continued,—

“I hope so; and with your permission, we will leave the matter for his decision.”

The color of Frances changed from the paleness of fear to the glow of hope. Her dread on behalf of her brother was certainly greatly diminished; yet her form shook, her breathing became short and irregular, and her whole frame gave tokens of extraordinary agitation. Her eyes rose from the floor to the dragoon, and were again fixed immovably on the carpet—she evidently wished to utter something but was unequal to the effort. Miss Peyton was a close observer of these movements of her niece, and advancing with an air of feminine dignity, inquired,—

“Then, sir, we may expect the pleasure of Major Dunwoodie’s company shortly?”

“Immediately, madam,” answered the dragoon, withdrawing his admiring gaze from the person of Frances. “Expresses are already on the road to announce to him our situation, and the intelligence will speedily bring him to this valley; unless, indeed, some private reasons may exist to make a visit particularly unpleasant.”

“We shall always be happy to see Major Dunwoodie.”

“Oh! doubtless; he is a general favorite, May I presume on it so far as to ask leave to dismount and refresh my men, who compose a part of his squadron?”

There was a manner about the trooper that would have made the omission of such a request easily forgiven by Mr. Wharton, but he was fairly entrapped by his own eagerness to conciliate, and it was useless to withhold a consent which he thought would probably be extorted; he therefore made the most of necessity, and gave such orders as would facilitate the wishes of Captain Lawton.

The officers were invited to take their morning’s repast at the family breakfast table, and having made their arrangements without, the invitation was frankly accepted. None of the watchfulness, which was so necessary to their situation, was neglected by the wary partisan. Patrols were seen on the distant hills, taking their protecting circuit around their comrades, who were enjoying, in the midst of danger, a security that can only spring from the watchfulness of discipline and the indifference of habit.

The addition to the party at Mr. Wharton’s table was only three, and they were all of them men who, under the rough exterior induced by actual and arduous service, concealed the manners of gentlemen. Consequently, the interruption to the domestic privacy of the family was marked by the observance of strict decorum. The ladies left the table to their guests, who proceeded, without much superfluous diffidence, to do proper honors to the hospitality of Mr. Wharton.

At length Captain Lawton suspended for a moment his violent attacks on the buckwheat cakes, to inquire of the master of the house, if there was not a peddler of the name of Birch who lived in the valley at times.

“At times only, I believe, sir,” replied Mr. Wharton, cautiously. “He is seldom here; I may say I never see him.”

“That is strange, too,” said the trooper, looking at the disconcerted host intently, “considering he is your next neighbor; he must be quite domestic, sir; and to the ladies it must be somewhat inconvenient. I doubt not that that muslin in the window seat cost twice as much as he would have asked them for it.”

Mr. Wharton turned in consternation, and saw some of the recent purchases scattered about the room.

The two subalterns struggled to conceal their smiles; but the captain resumed his breakfast with an eagerness that created a doubt, whether he ever expected to enjoy another. The necessity of a supply from the dominion of Dinah soon, however, afforded another respite, of which Lawton availed himself.

“I had a wish to break this Mr. Birch of his unsocial habits, and gave him a call this morning,” he said. “Had I found him within, I should have placed him where he would enjoy life in the midst of society, for a short time at least.”

“And where might that be, sir?” asked Mr. Wharton, conceiving it necessary to say something.

“The guardroom,” said the trooper, dryly.

“What is the offense of poor Birch?” asked Miss Peyton, handing the dragoon a fourth dish of coffee.

“Poor!” cried the captain. “If he is poor, King George is a bad paymaster.”

“Yes, indeed,” said one of the subalterns, “his Majesty owes him a dukedom.”

“And congress a halter,” continued the commanding officer commencing anew on a fresh supply of the cakes.

“I am sorry,” said Mr. Wharton, “that any neighbor of mine should incur the displeasure of our rulers.”

“If I catch him,” cried the dragoon, while buttering another cake, “he will dangle from the limbs of one of his namesakes.”

“He would make no bad ornament, suspended from one of those locusts before his own door,” added the lieutenant.

“Never mind,” continued the captain; “I will have him yet before I’m a major.”

As the language of the officers appeared to be sincere, and such as disappointed men in their rough occupations are but too apt to use, the Whartons thought it prudent to discontinue the subject. It was no new intelligence to any of the family, that Harvey Birch was distrusted and greatly harassed by the American army. His escapes from their hands, no less than his imprisonments, had been the conversation of the country in too many instances, and under circumstances of too great mystery, to be easily forgotten. In fact, no small part of the bitterness expressed by Captain Lawton against the peddler, arose from the unaccountable disappearance of the latter, when intrusted to the custody of two of his most faithful dragoons.

A twelvemonth had not yet elapsed, since Birch had been seen lingering near the headquarters of the commander in chief, and at a time when important movements were expected hourly to occur. So soon as the information of this fact was communicated to the officer whose duty it was to guard the avenues of the American camp, he dispatched Captain Lawton in pursuit of the peddler.

Acquainted with all the passes of the hills, and indefatigable in the discharge of his duty, the trooper had, with much trouble and toil, succeeded in effecting his object. The party had halted at a farmhouse for the purposes of refreshment, and the prisoner was placed in a room by himself, but under the keeping of the two men before mentioned; all that was known subsequently is, that a woman was seen busily engaged in the employments of the household near the sentinels, and was particularly attentive to the wants of the captain, until he was deeply engaged in the employments of the supper table.

Afterwards, neither woman nor peddler was to be found. The pack, indeed, was discovered open, and nearly empty, and a small door, communicating with a room adjoining to the one in which the peddler had been secured, was ajar.

Captain Lawton never could forgive the deception; his antipathies to his enemies were not very moderate, but this was adding an insult to his penetration that rankled deeply. He sat in portentous silence, brooding over the exploit of his prisoner, yet mechanically pursuing the business before him, until, after sufficient time had passed to make a very comfortable meal, a trumpet suddenly broke on the ears of the party, sending its martial tones up the valley, in startling melody. The trooper rose instantly from the table, exclaiming,—

“Quick, gentlemen, to your horses; there comes Dunwoodie,” and, followed by his officers, he precipitately left the room.

With the exception of the sentinels left to guard Captain Wharton, the dragoons mounted, and marched out to meet their comrades.

None of the watchfulness necessary in a war, in which similarity of language, appearance, and customs rendered prudence doubly necessary, was omitted by the cautious leader. On getting sufficiently near, however, to a body of horse of more than double his own number, to distinguish countenances, Lawton plunged his rowels into his charger, and in a moment he was by the side of his commander.

The ground in front of the cottage was again occupied by the horse; and observing the same precautions as before, the newly arrived troops hastened to participate in the cheer prepared for their comrades.

And let conquerors boast
Their fields of fame—he who in virtue arms
A young warm spirit against beauty’s charms,
Who feels her brightness, yet defies her thrall,
Is the best, bravest conqueror of them all.

—MOORE.

The ladies of the Wharton family had collected about a window, deeply interested in the scene we have related.

Sarah viewed the approach of her countrymen with a smile of contemptuous indifference; for she even undervalued the personal appearance of men whom she thought arrayed in the unholy cause of rebellion. Miss Peyton looked on the gallant show with an exulting pride, which arose in the reflection that the warriors before her were the chosen troops of her native colony; while Frances gazed with a singleness of interest that absorbed all other considerations.

The two parties had not yet joined, before her quick eye distinguished one horseman in particular from those around him. To her it appeared that even the steed of this youthful soldier seemed to be conscious that he sustained the weight of no common man: his hoofs but lightly touched the earth, and his airy tread was the curbed motion of a blooded charger.

The dragoon sat in the saddle, with a firmness and ease that showed him master of himself and horse,—his figure uniting the just proportions of strength and activity, being tall, round, and muscular. To this officer Lawton made his report, and, side by side, they rode into the field opposite to the cottage.

The heart of Frances beat with a pulsation nearly stifling, as he paused for a moment, and took a survey of the building, with an eye whose dark and sparkling glance could be seen, notwithstanding the distance. Her color changed, and for an instant, as she saw the youth throw himself from the saddle, she was compelled to seek relief for her trembling limbs in a chair.

The officer gave a few hasty orders to his second in command, walked rapidly into the lawn, and approached the cottage. Frances rose from her seat, and vanished from the apartment. The dragoon ascended the steps of the piazza, and had barely time to touch the outer door, when it opened to his admission.

The youth of Frances, when she left the city, had prevented her sacrificing, in conformity to the customs of that day, all her native beauties on the altar of fashion. Her hair, which was of a golden richness of color, was left, untortured, to fall in the natural ringlets of infancy, and it shaded a face which was glowing with the united charms of health, youth, and artlessness; her eyes spoke volumes, but her tongue was silent; her hands were interlocked before her, and, aided by her taper form, bending forward in an attitude of expectation, gave a loveliness and an interest to her appearance, that for a moment chained her lover in silence to the spot.

Frances silently led the way into a vacant parlor, opposite to the one in which the family were assembled, and turning to the soldier frankly, placing both her hands in his own, exclaimed,—

“Ah, Dunwoodie! how happy, on many accounts, I am to see you! I have brought you in here, to prepare you to meet an unexpected friend in the opposite room.”

“To whatever cause it may be owing,” cried the youth, pressing her hands to his lips, “I, too, am happy in being able to see you alone. Frances, the probation you have decreed is cruel; war and distance may separate us forever.”

“We must submit to the necessity which governs us. But it is not love speeches I would hear now; I have other and more important matter for your attention.”

“What can be of more importance than to make you mine by a tie that will be indissoluble! Frances, you are cold to me—me—from whose mind, days of service and nights of alarm have never been able to banish your image for a single moment.”

“Dear Dunwoodie,” said Frances, softening nearly to tears, and again extending her hand to him, as the richness of her color gradually returned, “you know my sentiments—this war once ended, and you may take that hand forever—but I can never consent to tie myself to you by any closer union than already exists, so long as you are arrayed in arms against my only brother. Even now, that brother is awaiting your decision to restore him to liberty, or to conduct him to a probable death.”

“Your brother!” cried Dunwoodie, starting and turning pale; “your brother! explain yourself—what dreadful meaning is concealed in your words?”

“Has not Captain Lawton told you of the arrest of Henry by himself this very morning?” continued Frances, in a voice barely audible, and fixing on her lover a look of the deepest concern.

“He told me of arresting a captain of the 60th in disguise, but without mentioning where or whom,” replied the major in a similar tone; and dropping his head between his hands, he endeavored to conceal his feelings from his companion.

“Dunwoodie! Dunwoodie!” exclaimed Frances, losing all her former confidence in the most fearful apprehensions, “what means this agitation?” As the major slowly raised his face, in which was pictured the most expressive concern, she continued, “Surely, surely, you will not betray your friend—my brother—your brother—to an ignominious death.”

“Frances!” exclaimed the young man in agony, “what can I do?”

“Do!” she repeated, gazing at him wildly. “Would Major Dunwoodie yield his friend to his enemies—the brother of his betrothed wife?”

“Oh, speak not so unkindly to me, dearest Miss Wharton—my own Frances. I would this moment die for you—for Henry—but I cannot forget my duty—cannot forfeit my honor; you yourself would be the first to despise me if I did.”

“Peyton Dunwoodie!” said Frances, solemnly, and with a face of ashy paleness, “you have told me—you have sworn, that you love me——”

“I do,” interrupted the soldier, with fervor; but motioning for silence she continued, in a voice that trembled with her fears,—

“Do you think I can throw myself into the arms of a man whose hands are stained with the blood of my only brother!”

“Frances, you wring my very heart!” Then pausing, to struggle with his feelings, he endeavored to force a smile, as he added, “But, after all, we may be torturing ourselves with unnecessary fears, and Henry, when I know the circumstances, may be nothing more than a prisoner of war; in which case, I can liberate him on parole.”

There is no more delusive passion than hope; and it seems to be the happy privilege of youth to cull all the pleasures that can be gathered from its indulgence. It is when we are most worthy of confidence ourselves, that we are least apt to distrust others; and what we think ought to be, we are prone to think will be.

The half-formed expectations of the young soldier were communicated to the desponding sister, more by the eye than the voice, and the blood rushed again to her cheek, as she cried,—

“Oh, there can be no just grounds to doubt it. I know—I knew—Dunwoodie, you would never desert us in the hour of our greatest need!” The violence of her feelings prevailed, and the agitated girl found relief in a flood of tears.

The office of consoling those we love is one of the dearest prerogatives of affection; and Major Dunwoodie, although but little encouraged by his own momentary suggestion of relief, could not undeceive the lovely girl, who leaned on his shoulder, as he wiped the traces of her feeling from her face, with a trembling, but reviving confidence in the safety of her brother, and the protection of her lover.

Frances, having sufficiently recovered her recollection to command herself, now eagerly led the way to the opposite room, to communicate to her family the pleasing intelligence which she already conceived so certain,

Dunwoodie followed her reluctantly, and with forebodings of the result; but a few moments brought him into the presence of his relatives, and he summoned all his resolution to meet the trial with firmness.

The salutations of the young men were cordial and frank, and, on the part of Henry Wharton, as collected as if nothing had occurred to disturb his self-possession.

The abhorrence of being, in any manner, auxiliary to the arrest of his friend; the danger to the life of Captain Wharton; and the heart-breaking declarations of Frances, had, however, created an uneasiness in the bosom of Major Dunwoodie, which all his efforts could not conceal. His reception by the rest of the family was kind and sincere, both from old regard, and a remembrance of former obligations, heightened by the anticipations they could not fail to read in the expressive eyes of the blushing girl by his side. After exchanging greetings with every member of the family, Major Dunwoodie beckoned to the sentinel, whom the wary prudence of Captain Lawton had left in charge of the prisoner, to leave the room. Turning to Captain Wharton, he inquired mildly,—

“Tell me, Henry, the circumstances of this disguise, in which Captain
Lawton reports you to have been found, and remember—remember—Captain
Wharton—your answers are entirely voluntary.”

“The disguise was used by me, Major Dunwoodie,” replied the English officer, gravely, “to enable me to visit my friends, without incurring the danger of becoming a prisoner of war.”

“But you did not wear it, until you saw the troop of Lawton approaching?”

“Oh! no,” interrupted Frances, eagerly, forgetting all the circumstances in her anxiety for her brother. “Sarah and myself placed them on him when the dragoons appeared; and it was our awkwardness that has led to the discovery.”

The countenance of Dunwoodie brightened, as turning his eyes in fondness on the speaker, he listened to her explanation.

“Probably some articles of your own,” he continued, “which were at hand, and were used on the spur of the moment.”

“No,” said Wharton, with dignity, “the clothes were worn by me from the city; they were procured for the purpose to which they were applied, and I intended to use them in my return this very day.”

The appalled Frances shrank back from between her brother and lover, where her ardent feelings had carried her, as the whole truth glanced over her mind, and she sank into a seat, gazing wildly on the young men.

“But the pickets—the party at the Plains?” added Dunwoodie, turning pale.

“I passed them, too, in disguise. I made use of this pass, for which I paid; and, as it bears the name of Washington, I presume it is forged.”

Dunwoodie caught the paper from his hand, eagerly, and stood gazing on the signature for some time in silence, during which the soldier gradually prevailed over the man; when he turned to the prisoner, with a searching look, as he asked,—

“Captain Wharton, whence did you procure this paper?”

“This is a question, I conceive, Major Dunwoodie has no right to ask.”

“Your pardon, sir; my feelings may have led me into an impropriety.”

Mr. Wharton, who had been a deeply interested auditor, now so far conquered his feelings as to say, “Surely, Major Dunwoodie, the paper cannot be material; such artifices are used daily in war.”

“This name is no counterfeit,” said the dragoon, studying the characters, and speaking in a low voice; “is treason yet among us undiscovered? The confidence of Washington has been abused, for the fictitious name is in a different hand from the pass. Captain Wharton, my duty will not suffer me to grant you a parole; you must accompany me to the Highlands.”

“I did not expect otherwise, Major Dunwoodie.”

Dunwoodie turned slowly towards the sisters, when the figure of Frances once more arrested his gaze. She had risen from her seat, and stood again with her hands clasped before him in an attitude of petition; feeling himself unable to contend longer with his feelings, he made a hurried excuse for a temporary absence, and left the room. Frances followed him, and, obedient to the direction of her eye, the soldier reentered the apartment in which had been their first interview.

“Major Dunwoodie,” said Frances, in a voice barely audible, as she beckoned to him to be seated; her cheek, which had been of a chilling whiteness, was flushed with a suffusion that crimsoned her whole countenance. She struggled with herself for a moment, and continued, “I have already acknowledged to you my esteem; even now, when you most painfully distress me, I wish not to conceal it. Believe me, Henry is innocent of everything but imprudence. Our country can sustain no wrong.” Again she paused, and almost gasped for breath; her color changed rapidly from red to white, until the blood rushed into her face, covering her features with the brightest vermilion; and she added hastily, in an undertone, “I have promised, Dunwoodie, when peace shall be restored to our country, to become your wife. Give to my brother his liberty on parole, and I will this day go with you to the altar, follow you to the camp, and, in becoming a soldier’s bride, learn to endure a soldier’s privations.”

Dunwoodie seized the hand which the blushing girl, in her ardor, had extended towards him, and pressed it for a moment to his bosom; then rising from his seat, he paced the room in excessive agitation.

“Frances, say no more, I conjure you, unless you wish to break my heart.”

“You then reject my offered hand?” she said, rising with dignity, though her pale cheek and quivering lip plainly showed the conflicting passions within.

“Reject it! Have I not sought it with entreaties—with tears? Has it not been the goal of all my earthly wishes? But to take it under such conditions would be to dishonor both. We will hope for better things. Henry must be acquitted; perhaps not tried. No intercession of mine shall be wanting, you must well know; and believe me, Frances, I am not without favor with Washington.”

“That very paper, that abuse of his confidence, to which you alluded, will steel him to my brother’s case. If threats or entreaties could move his stern sense of justice, would André have suffered?” As Frances uttered these words she fled from the room in despair.

Dunwoodie remained for a minute nearly stupefied; and then he followed with a view to vindicate himself, and to relieve her apprehensions. On entering the hall that divided the two parlors, he was met by a small ragged boy, who looked one moment at his dress, and placing a piece of paper in his hands, immediately vanished through the outer door of the building. The bewildered state of his mind, and the suddenness of the occurrence, gave the major barely time to observe the messenger to be a country lad, meanly attired, and that he held in his hand one of those toys which are to be bought in cities, and which he now apparently contemplated with the conscious pleasure of having fairly purchased, by the performance of the service required. The soldier turned his eyes to the subject of the note. It was written on a piece of torn and soiled paper, and in a hand barely legible, but after some little labor, he was able to make out as follows—

“The rig’lars are at hand, horse and foot.”^[6]

Dunwoodie started; and, forgetting everything but the duties of a soldier, he precipitately left the house. While walking rapidly towards the troops, he noticed on a distant hill a vidette riding with speed. Several pistols were fired in quick succession; and the next instant the trumpets of the corps rang in his ears with the enlivening strain of “To arms!” By the time he had reached the ground occupied by his squadron, the major saw that every man was in active motion. Lawton was already in the saddle, eying the opposite extremity of the valley with the eagerness of expectation, and crying to the musicians, in tones but little lower than their own,—

“Sound away, my lads, and let these Englishmen know that the Virginia horse are between them and the end of their journey.”

The videttes and patrols now came pouring in, each making in succession his hasty report to the commanding officer, who gave his orders coolly, and with a promptitude that made obedience certain. Once only, as he wheeled his horse to ride over the ground in front, did Dunwoodie trust himself with a look at the cottage, and his heart beat with unusual rapidity as he saw a female figure standing, with clasped hands, at a window of the room in which he had met Frances. The distance was too great to distinguish her features, but the soldier could not doubt that it was his mistress. The paleness of his cheek and the languor of his eye endured but for a moment longer. As he rode towards the intended battle ground, a flush of ardor began to show itself on his sunburnt features; and his dragoons, who studied the face of their leader, as the best index to their own fate, saw again the wonted flashing of the eyes, and the cheerful animation, which they had so often witnessed on the eve of battle. By the additions of the videttes and parties that had been out, and which now had all joined, the whole number of the horse was increased to nearly two hundred. There was also a small body of men, whose ordinary duties were those of guides, but who, in cases of emergency, were embodied and did duty as foot soldiers; these were dismounted, and proceeded, by the order of Dunwoodie, to level the few fences which might interfere with the intended movements of the cavalry. The neglect of husbandry, which had been occasioned by the war, left this task comparatively easy. Those long lines of heavy and durable walls, which now sweep through every part of the country, forty years ago were unknown. The slight and tottering fences of stone were then used more to clear the land for the purposes of cultivation than as permanent barriers, and required the constant attention of the husbandman, to preserve them against the fury of the tempests and the frosts of winter. Some few of them had been built with more care immediately around the dwelling of Mr. Wharton; but those which had intersected the vale below were now generally a pile of ruins, over which the horses of the Virginians would bound with the fleetness of the wind. Occasionally a short line yet preserved its erect appearance; but as none of those crossed the ground on which Dunwoodie intended to act, there remained only the slighter fences of rails to be thrown down. Their duty was hastily but effectually performed; and the guides withdrew to the post assigned to them for the approaching fight.

Major Dunwoodie had received from his scouts all the intelligence concerning his foe, which was necessary to enable him to make his arrangements. The bottom of the valley was an even plain, that fell with a slight inclination from the foot of the hills on either side, to the level of a natural meadow that wound through the country on the banks of a small stream, by whose waters it was often inundated and fertilized. This brook was easily forded in any part of its course; and the only impediment it offered to the movements of the horse, was in a place where it changed its bed from the western to the eastern side of the valley, and where its banks were more steep and difficult of access than common. Here the highway crossed it by a rough wooden bridge, as it did again at the distance of half a mile above the Locusts.

The hills on the eastern side of the valley were abrupt, and frequently obtruded themselves in rocky prominences into its bosom, lessening the width to half the usual dimensions. One of these projections was but a short distance in the rear of the squadron of dragoons, and Dunwoodie directed Captain Lawton to withdraw, with two troops, behind its cover. The officer obeyed with a kind of surly reluctance, that was, however, somewhat lessened by the anticipations of the effect his sudden appearance would make on the enemy. Dunwoodie knew his man, and had selected the captain for this service, both because he feared his precipitation in the field, and knew, when needed, his support would never fail to appear. It was only in front of the enemy that Captain Lawton was hasty; at all other times his discernment and self-possession were consummately preserved; but he sometimes forgot them in his eagerness to engage. On the left of the ground on which Dunwoodie intended to meet his foe, was a close wood, which skirted that side of the valley for the distance of a mile. Into this, then, the guides retired, and took their station near its edge, in such a manner as would enable them to maintain a scattering, but effectual fire, on the advancing column of the enemy.

It cannot be supposed that all these preparations were made unheeded by the inmates of the cottage; on the contrary, every feeling which can agitate the human breast, in witnessing such a scene, was actively alive. Mr. Wharton alone saw no hopes to himself in the termination of the conflict. If the British should prevail, his son would be liberated; but what would then be his own fate! He had hitherto preserved his neutral character in the midst of trying circumstances. The fact of his having a son in the royal, or, as it was called, the regular army, had very nearly brought his estates to the hammer. Nothing had obviated this result, but the powerful interest of the relation who held a high political rank in the state, and his own vigilant prudence. In his heart, he was a devoted loyalist; and when the blushing Frances had communicated to him the wishes of her lover, on their return from the American camp the preceding spring, the consent he had given, to her future union with a rebel, was as much extracted by the increasing necessity which existed for his obtaining republican support, as by any considerations for the happiness of his child. Should his son now be rescued, he would, in the public mind, be united with him as a plotter against the freedom of the States; and should he remain a captive and undergo the impending trial, the consequences might be still more dreadful. Much as he loved his wealth, Mr. Wharton loved his children better; and he sat gazing on the movements without, with a listless vacancy in his countenance, that fully denoted his imbecility of character. Far different were the feelings of the son. Captain Wharton had been left in the keeping of two dragoons, one of whom marched to and fro on the piazza with a measured tread, and the other had been directed to continue in the same apartment with his prisoner. The young man had witnessed all the movements of Dunwoodie with admiration mingled with fearful anticipations of the consequences to friends. He particularly disliked the ambush of the detachment under Lawton, who could be distinctly seen from the windows of the cottage, cooling his impatience, by pacing on foot the ground in front of his men. Henry Wharton threw several hasty and inquiring glances around, to see if no means of liberation would offer, but invariably found the eyes of his sentinel fixed on him with the watchfulness of an Argus. He longed, with the ardor of youth, to join in the glorious fray, but was compelled to remain a dissatisfied spectator of a scene in which he would so cheerfully have been an actor. Miss Peyton and Sarah continued gazing on the preparations with varied emotions, in which concern for the fate of the captain formed the most prominent feeling, until the moment of shedding of blood seemed approaching, when, with the timidity of their sex, they sought the retirement of an inner room. Not so Frances; she returned to the apartment where she had left Dunwoodie, and, from one of its windows, had been a deeply interested spectator of all his movements. The wheelings of the troops, the deadly preparations, had all been unnoticed; she saw her lover only, and with mingled emotions of admiration and dread that nearly chilled her. At one moment the blood rushed to her heart, as she saw the young warrior riding through his ranks, giving life and courage to all whom he addressed; and the next, it curdled with the thought that the very gallantry she so much valued might prove the means of placing the grave between her and the object of her regard. Frances gazed until she could look no longer.

In a field on the left of the cottage, and at a short distance in the rear of the troops, was a small group, whose occupation seemed to differ from that of all around them. They were in number only three, being two men and a mulatto boy. The principal personage of this party was a man, whose leanness made his really tall stature appear excessive. He wore spectacles—was unarmed, had dismounted, and seemed to be dividing his attention between a cigar, a book, and the incidents of the field before him. To this party Frances determined to send a note, directed to Dunwoodie. She wrote hastily, with a pencil, “Come to me, Peyton, if it be but for a moment”; and Caesar emerged from the cellar kitchen, taking the precaution to go by the rear of the building, to avoid the sentinel on the piazza, who had very cavalierly ordered all the family to remain housed. The black delivered the note to the gentleman, with a request that it might be forwarded to Major Dunwoodie. It was the surgeon of the horse to whom Caesar addressed himself; and the teeth of the African chattered, as he saw displayed upon the ground the several instruments which were in preparation for the anticipated operations. The doctor himself seemed to view the arrangement with great satisfaction, as he deliberately raised his eyes from his book to order the boy to convey the note to his commanding officer, and then dropping them quietly on the page he continued his occupation. Caesar was slowly retiring, as the third personage, who by his dress might be an inferior assistant of the surgical department, coolly inquired “if he would have a leg taken off?” This question seemed to remind the black of the existence of those limbs, for he made such use of them as to reach the piazza at the same instant that Major Dunwoodie rode up, at half speed. The brawny sentinel squared himself, and poised his sword with military precision as he stood on his post, while his officer passed; but no sooner had the door closed, than, turning to the negro, he said, sharply,—

“Harkee, blackee, if you quit the house again without my knowledge, I shall turn barber, and shave off one of those ebony ears with this razor.”

Thus assailed in another member, Caesar hastily retreated into his kitchen, muttering something, in which the words “Skinner,” and “rebel rascal,” formed a principal part of speech.

“Major Dunwoodie,” said Frances to her lover as he entered, “I may have done you injustice; if I have appeared harsh—”

The emotions of the agitated girl prevailed, and she burst into tears.

“Frances,” cried the soldier with warmth, “you are never harsh, never unjust, but when you doubt my love.”

“Ah! Dunwoodie,” added the sobbing girl, “you are about to risk your life in battle; remember that there is one heart whose happiness is built on your safety; brave I know you are: be prudent—”

“For your sake?” inquired the delighted youth.

“For my sake,” replied Frances, in a voice barely audible, and dropping on his bosom.

Dunwoodie folded her to his heart, and was about to speak, as a trumpet sounded in the southern end of the vale. Imprinting one long kiss of affection on her unresisting lips, the soldier tore himself from his mistress, and hastened to the scene of strife.

Frances threw herself on a sofa, buried her head under its cushion, and with her shawl drawn over her face, to exclude as much of sound as possible, continued there until the shouts of the combatants, the rattling of the firearms, and the thundering tread of the horses had ceased.

[6] There died a few years since, in Bedford, Westchester, a yeoman named Elisha H—— This person was employed by Washington as one of his most confidential spies. By the conditions of their bargain, H—— was never to be required to deal with third parties, since his risks were too imminent. He was allowed to enter also into the service of Sir Henry Clinton, and so much confidence had Washington in his love of country and discretion, that he was often intrusted with the minor military movements, in order that he might enhance his value with the English general, by communicating them. In this manner H—— had continued to serve for a long period, when chance brought him into the city (then held by the British) at a moment when an expedition was about to quit it, to go against a small post established at Bedford, his native village, where the Americans had a depot of provisions. H—— easily ascertained the force and destination of the detachment ordered on this service, but he was at a loss in what manner to communicate his information to the officer in command at Bedford, without betraying his own true character to a third person. There was not time to reach Washington, and under the circumstances, he finally resolved to hazard a short note to the American commandant, stating the danger, and naming the time when the attack might be expected. To this note he even ventured to affix his own initials, E H, though he had disguised the hand, under a belief that, as he knew himself to be suspected by his countrymen, it might serve to give more weight to his warning. His family being at Bedford, the note was transmitted with facility and arrived in good season, H—— himself remaining in New York. The American commandant did what every sensible officer, in a similar case, would have done. He sent a courier with the note to Washington, demanding orders, while he prepared his little party to make the best defense in his power. The headquarters of the American army were, at that time, in the Highlands. Fortunately, the express met Washington, on a tour of observation, near their entrance. The note was given to him, and he read it in the saddle, adding, in pencil, “Believe all that E H tells you. George Washington” He returned it to the courier, with an injunction to ride for life or death. The courier reached Bedford after the British had made their attack. The commandant read the reply, and put it in his pocket. The Americans were defeated, and their leader killed. The note of H——, with the line written on it by Washington, was found on his person. The following day H—— was summoned to the presence of Sir Henry Clinton. After the latter had put several general questions, he suddenly gave the note to the spy, and asked if he knew the handwriting, and demanded who the E H was “It is Elijah Hadden, the spy you hanged yesterday at Powles Hook.” The readiness of this answer, connected with the fact that a spy having the same initials had been executed the day before, and the coolness of H——, saved him. Sir Henry Clinton allowed him to quit his presence, and he never saw him afterwards.

The game’s afoot;
Follow your spirit.

—SHAKESPEARE.

The rough and unimproved face of the country, the frequency of covers, together with the great distance from their own country, and the facilities afforded them for rapid movements to the different points of the war, by the undisputed command of the ocean, had united to deter the English from employing a heavy force in cavalry, in their early efforts to subdue the revolted colonies.

Only one regiment of regular horse was sent from the mother country, during the struggle. But legions and independent corps were formed in different places, as it best accorded with the views of the royal commanders, or suited the exigency of the times. These were not unfrequently composed of men raised in the colonies, and at other times drafts were had from the regiments of the line, and the soldiers were made to lay aside the musket and bayonet, and taught to wield the saber and carbine. One particular body of the subsidiary troops was included in this arrange ment, and the Hessian yagers were transformed into a corps of heavy and inactive horse.

Opposed to them were the hardiest spirits of America. Most of the cavalry regiments of the continental army were led and officered by gentlemen from the South. The high and haughty courage of the commanders had communicated itself to the privates, who were men selected with care and great attention to the service they were intended to perform.

While the British were confined to their empty conquests in the possession of a few of the larger towns, or marched through counties that were swept of everything like military supplies, the light troops of their enemies had the range of the whole interior.

The sufferings of the line of the American army were great beyond example; but possessing the power, and feeling themselves engaged in a cause which justified severity, the cavalry officers were vigilant in providing for their wants, and the horse were well mounted, well fed, and consequently eminently effective. Perhaps the world could not furnish more brave, enterprising, and resistless corps of light cavalry, than a few that were in the continental service at the time of which we write.

Dunwoodie’s men had often tried their prowess against the enemy, and they now sat panting to be led once more against foes whom they seldom charged in vain. Their wishes were soon to be gratified; for their commander had scarcely time to regain his seat in the saddle, before a body of the enemy came sweeping round the base of the hill, which intersected the view to the south. A few minutes enabled the major to distinguish their character. In one troop he saw the green coats of the Cowboys, and in the other the leathern helmets and wooden saddles of the yagers. Their numbers were about equal to the body under his immediate orders.

On reaching the open space near the cottage of Harvey Birch, the enemy halted and drew up his men in line, evidently making preparations for a charge. At this moment a column of foot appeared in the vale, and pressed forward to the bank of the brook we have already mentioned.

Major Dunwoodie was not less distinguished by coolness and judgment, than, where occasion offered, by his dauntless intrepidity. He at once saw his advantage, and determined to profit by it. The column he led began slowly to retire from the field, when the youthful German, who commanded the enemy’s horse, fearful of missing an easy conquest, gave the word to charge. Few troops were more hardy than the Cowboys; they sprang eagerly forward in the pursuit, with a confidence created by the retiring foe and the column in their rear; the Hessians followed more slowly, but in better order. The trumpets of the Virginians now sounded long and lively; they were answered by a strain from the party in ambush that went to the hearts of their enemies. The column of Dunwoodie wheeled in perfect order, opened, and, as the word to charge was given, the troops of Lawton emerged from their cover, with their leader in advance, waving his saber over his head, and shouting, in a voice that was heard above the clangor of the martial music.

The charge threatened too much for the refugee troop. They scattered in every direction, flying from the field as fast as their horses, the chosen beasts of Westchester, could carry them. Only a few were hurt; but such as did meet the arms of their avenging countrymen never survived the blow, to tell who struck it. It was upon the poor vassals of the German tyrant that the shock fell. Disciplined to the most exact obedience, these ill-fated men met the charge bravely, but they were swept before the mettled horses and nervous arms of their antagonists like chaff before the wind. Many of them were literally ridden down, and Dunwoodie soon saw the field without an opposing foe. The proximity of the infantry prevented pursuit, and behind its column the few Hessians who escaped unhurt sought protection.

The more cunning refugees dispersed in small bands, taking various and devious routes back to their old station in front of Harlem. Many was the sufferer, in cattle, furniture, and person, that was created by this rout; for the dispersion of a troop of Cowboys was only the extension of an evil.

Such a scene could not be expected to be acted so near them, and the inmates of the cottage take no interest in the result. In truth, the feelings it excited pervaded every bosom, from the kitchen to the parlor. Terror and horror had prevented the ladies from being spectators, but they did not feel the less. Frances continued lying in the posture we have mentioned, offering up fervent and incoherent petitions for the safety of her countrymen, although in her inmost heart she had personified her nation by the graceful image of Peyton Dunwoodie. Her aunt and sister were less exclusive in their devotions; but Sarah began to feel, as the horrors of war were thus brought home to her senses, less pleasure in her anticipated triumphs.

The inmates of Mr. Wharton’s kitchen were four, namely, Caesar and his spouse, their granddaughter, a jet-black damsel of twenty, and the boy before alluded to. The blacks were the remnants of a race of negroes which had been entailed on his estate from Mr. Wharton’s maternal ancestors, who were descended from the early Dutch colonists. Time, depravity, and death had reduced them to this small number; and the boy, who was white, had been added by Miss Peyton to the establishment, as an assistant, to perform the ordinary services of a footman. Caesar, after first using the precaution to place himself under the cover of an angle in the wall, for a screen against any roving bullet which might be traversing the air, became an amused spectator of the skirmish. The sentinel on the piazza was at the distance of but a few feet from him, and he entered into the spirit of the chase with all the ardor of a tried bloodhound. He noticed the approach of the black, and his judicious position, with a smile of contempt, as he squared himself towards the enemy, offering his unprotected breast to any dangers which might come.

After considering the arrangement of Caesar, for a moment, with ineffable disdain, the dragoon said, with great coolness,—

“You seem very careful of that beautiful person of yours, Mr. Blueskin.”

“A bullet hurt a colored man as much as a white,” muttered the black, surlily, casting a glance of much satisfaction at his rampart.

“Suppose I make the experiment,” returned the sentinel. As he spoke, he deliberately drew a pistol from his belt, and leveled it at the black. Caesar’s teeth chattered at the appearance of the dragoon, although he believed nothing serious was intended. At this moment the column of Dunwoodie began to retire, and the royal cavalry commenced their charge.

“There, Mister Light-Horseman,” said Caesar eagerly, who believed the Americans were retiring in earnest; “why you rebels don’t fight—see—see how King George’s men make Major Dunwoodie run! Good gentleman, too, but he don’t like to fight a rig’lar.”

“Damn your regulars,” cried the other, fiercely. “Wait a minute, blackey, and you’ll see Captain Jack Lawton come out from behind yonder hill, and scatter these Cowboys like wild geese who’ve lost their leader.”

Caesar supposed the party under Lawton to have sought the shelter of the hill from motives similar to that which had induced him to place the wall between himself and the battle ground; but the fact soon verified the trooper’s prophecy, and the black witnessed with consternation the total rout of the royal horse.

The sentinel manifested his exultation at the success of his comrades with loud shouts, which soon brought his companion, who had been left in the more immediate charge of Henry Wharton, to the open window of the parlor.

“See, Tom, see,” cried the delighted trooper, “how Captain Lawton makes that Hessian’s leather cap fly; and now the major has killed the officer’s horse—zounds, why didn’t he kill the Dutchman and save the horse?”

A few pistols were discharged at the flying Cowboys, and a spent bullet broke a pane of glass within a few feet of Caesar. Imitating the posture of the great tempter of our race, the black sought the protection of the inside of the building, and immediately ascended to the parlor.

The lawn in front of the Locusts was hidden from the view of the road by a close line of shrubbery, and the horses of the two dragoons had been left, linked together, under its shelter, to await the movements of their masters.

At this moment two Cowboys, who had been cut off from a retreat to their own party, rode furiously through the gate, with an intention of escaping to the open wood in the rear of the cottage.

The victorious Americans pressed the retreating Germans until they had driven them under the protection of the fire of the infantry; and feeling themselves, in the privacy of the lawn, relieved from any immediate danger, the predatory warriors yielded to a temptation that few of the corps were ever known to resist—opportunity and horseflesh. With a hardihood and presence of mind that could only exist from long practice in similar scenes, they made towards their intended prizes, by an almost spontaneous movement. They were busily engaged in separating the fastenings of the horses, when the trooper on the piazza discharged his pistols, and rushed, sword in hand, to the rescue.

The entrance of Caesar into the parlor had induced the wary dragoon within to turn his attention more closely on his prisoner; but this new interruption drew him again to the window. He threw his body out of the building, and with dreadful imprecations endeavored, by his threats and appearance, to frighten the marauders from their prey. The moment was enticing. Three hundred of his comrades were within a mile of the cottage; unridden horses were running at large in every direction, and Henry Wharton seized the unconscious sentinel by his legs, and threw him headlong into the lawn. Caesar vanished from the room, and drew a bolt of the outer door.

The fall of the soldier was not great, and recovering his feet, he turned his fury for a moment on his prisoner. To scale the window in the face of such an enemy, was, however, impossible, and on trial he found the main entrance barred.

His comrade now called loudly upon him for aid, and forgetful of everything else, the discomfited trooper rushed to his assistance. One horse was instantly liberated, but the other was already fastened to the saddle of a Cowboy, and the four retired behind the building, cutting furiously at each other with their sabers, and making the air resound with their imprecations. Caesar threw the outer door open, and pointing to the remaining horse, that was quietly biting the faded herbage of the lawn, he exclaimed,—

“Run—now—run—Massa Harry, run.”

“Yes,” cried the youth as he vaulted into the saddle, “now, indeed, my honest fellow, is the time to run.” He beckoned hastily to his father, who stood at the window in speechless anxiety, with his hands extended towards his child in the attitude of benediction, and adding, “God bless you, Caesar, salute the girls,” he dashed through the gate with the rapidity of lightning.

The African watched him with anxiety as he gained the highway, saw him incline to the right, and riding furiously under the brow of some rocks, which on that side rose perpendicularly, disappear behind a projection, which soon hid him from view.

The delighted Caesar closed the door, pushing bolt after bolt, and turning the key until it would turn no more, soliloquizing the whole time on the happy escape of his young master.

“How well he ride—teach him good deal myself—salute a young lady—Miss Fanny wouldn’t let old colored man kiss a red cheek.”

When the fortune of the day was decided, and the time arrived for the burial of the dead, two Cowboys and a Virginian were found in the rear of the Locusts, to be included in the number.

Happily for Henry Wharton, the searching eyes of his captors were examining, through a pocket glass, the column of infantry that still held its position on the bank of the stream, while the remnants of the Hessian yagers were seeking its friendly protection. His horse was of the best blood of Virginia, and carried him with the swiftness of the wind along the Valley; and the heart of the youth was already beating tumultuously with pleasure at his deliverance, when a well-known voice reached his startled ear, crying aloud,—

“Bravely done, captain! Don’t spare the whip, and turn to your left before you cross the brook.”

Wharton turned his head in surprise, and saw, sitting on the point of a jutting rock that commanded a bird’s-eye view of the valley, his former guide, Harvey Birch. His pack, much diminished in size, lay at the feet of the peddler, who waved his hat to the youth, exultingly, as the latter flew by him. The English captain took the advice of this mysterious being, and finding a good road, which led to the highway, that intersected the valley, turned down its direction, and was soon opposite to his friends. The next minute he crossed the bridge, and stopped his charger before his old acquaintance, Colonel Wellmere.

“Captain Wharton!” exclaimed the astonished commander of the English troops, “dressed in mohair, and mounted on a rebel dragoon horse! Are you from the clouds in this attire, and in such a style?”

“Thank God!” cried the youth, recovering his breath, “I am safe, and have escaped from the hands of my enemies; but five minutes since and I was a prisoner, and threatened with the gallows.”

“The gallows, Captain Wharton! surely those traitors to the king would never dare to commit another murder in cold blood; is it not enough that they took the life of André? Wherefore did they threaten you with a similar fate?”

“Under the pretense of a similar offense,” said the captain, briefly explaining to the group of listeners the manner of his capture, the grounds of his personal apprehensions, and the method of his escape. By the time he had concluded his narration, the fugitive Germans were collected in the rear of the column of infantry, and Colonel Wellmere cried aloud,—

“From my soul I congratulate you, my brave friend; mercy is a quality with which these traitors are unacquainted, and you are doubly fortunate in escaping from their hands uninjured. Prepare yourself to grant me your assistance and I will soon afford you a noble revenge.”

“I do not think there was danger of personal outrage to any man, Colonel Wellmere, from a party that Major Dunwoodie commands,” returned young Wharton, with a slight glow on his face. “His character is above the imputation of such an offense; neither do I think it altogether prudent to cross this brook into the open plain, in the face of those Virginian horse, flushed as they must be with the success they have just obtained.”

“Do you call the rout of those irregulars and these sluggish Hessians a deed to boast of?” said the other with a contemptuous smile. “You speak of the affair, Captain Wharton, as if your boasted Mr. Dunwoodie, for major he is none, had discomfited the bodyguards of your king.”

“And I must be allowed to say, Colonel Wellmere, that if the bodyguards of my king were in yon field, they would meet a foe that it would be dangerous to despise. Sir, my boasted Mr. Dunwoodie is the pride of Washington’s army as a cavalry officer,” cried Henry with warmth.

“Dunwoodie, Dunwoodie!” repeated the colonel slowly, “surely I have met the gentleman before.”

“I have been told you once saw him for a moment, at the town residence of my sisters,” replied Wharton, with a lurking smile.

“Ah! I do remember me of such a youth; and does the most potent congress of these rebellious colonies intrust their soldiers to the leading of such a warrior!”

“Ask the commander of yon Hessian horse, whether he thinks Major
Dunwoodie worthy of the confidence.”

Colonel Wellmere was far from wanting that kind of pride which makes a man bear himself bravely in the presence of his enemies. He had served in America a long time, without ever meeting with any but new raised levies, or the militia of the country. These would sometimes fight, and that fearlessly, but they as often chose to run away without pulling a trigger. He was too apt to judge from externals, and thought it impossible for men whose gaiters were so clean, whose tread so regular, and who wheeled with so much accuracy, to be beaten. In addition to all these, they were Englishmen, and their success was certain. Colonel Wellmere had never been kept much in the field, or these notions, which he had brought with him from home, and which had been greatly increased by the vaporing of a garrisoned town, would have long since vanished. He listened to the warm reply of Captain Wharton with a supercilious smile, and then inquired,—

“You would not have us retire, sir, before these boasted horsemen, without doing something that may deprive them of part of the glory which you appear to think they have gained!”

“I would have you advised, Colonel Wellmere, of the danger you are about to encounter.”

“Danger is but an unseemly word for a soldier,” continued the British commander with a sneer.

“And one as little dreaded by the 60th, as any corps who wear the royal livery,” cried Henry Wharton, fiercely. “Give but the word to charge, and let our actions speak.”

“Now again I know my young friend,” cried Wellmere, soothingly; “but if you have anything to say before we fight, that can in any manner help us in our attack, we’ll listen. You know the force of the rebels; are there more of them in ambush?”

“Yes,” replied the youth, chafing still under the other’s sneers, “in the skirt of this wood on our right are a small party of foot; their horse are all before you.”

“Where they will not continue long,” cried Wellmere, turning to the few officers around him. “Gentlemen, we will cross the stream in column, and deploy on the plain beyond, or else we shall not be able to entice these valiant Yankees within the reach of our muskets. Captain Wharton, I claim your assistance as an aid-de-camp.”

The youth shook his head in disapprobation of a movement which his good sense taught him was rash, but prepared with alacrity to perform his duty in the impending trial.

During this conversation, which was held at a small distance in advance of the British column, and in full view of the Americans, Dunwoodie had been collecting his scattered troops, securing his few prisoners, and retiring to the ground where he had been posted at the first appearance of his enemy. Satisfied with the success he had already obtained, and believing the English too wary to give him an opportunity of harassing them further, he was about to withdraw the guides; and, leaving a strong party on the ground to watch the movements of the regulars, to fall back a few miles, to a favorable place for taking up his quarters for the night. Captain Lawton was reluctantly listening to the reasoning of his commander, and had brought out his favorite glass, to see if no opening could be found for an advantageous attack, when he suddenly exclaimed,—

“How’s this! a bluecoat among those scarlet gentry? As I hope to live to see old Virginia, it is my masquerading friend of the 60th, the handsome Captain Wharton, escaped from two of my best men!”

He had not done speaking when the survivor of these heroes joined his troop, bringing with him his own horse and those of the Cowboys; he reported the death of his comrade, and the escape of his prisoner. As the deceased was the immediate sentinel over the person of young Wharton, and the other was not to be blamed for defending the horses, which were more particularly under his care, his captain heard him with uneasiness but without anger.

This intelligence made an entire change in the views of Major Dunwoodie. He saw at once that his own reputation was involved in the escape of his prisoner. The order to recall the guides was countermanded, and he now joined his second in command, watching as eagerly as the impetuous Lawton himself, for some opening to assail his foe to advantage.

But two hours before, and Dunwoodie had felt the chance which made Henry Wharton his captive, as the severest blow he had ever sustained. Now he panted for an opportunity in which, by risking his own life, he might recapture his friend. All other considerations were lost in the goadings of a wounded spirit, and he might have soon emulated Lawton in hardihood, had not Wellmere and his troops at this moment crossed the brook into the open plain.

“There,” cried the delighted captain, as he pointed out the movement with his finger, “there comes John Bull into the mousetrap, and with eyes wide open.”

“Surely,” said Dunwoodie eagerly, “he will not deploy his column on that flat. Wharton must tell him of the ambush. But if he does—”

“We will not leave him a dozen sound skins in his battalion,” interrupted the other, springing into his saddle.

The truth was soon apparent; for the English column, after advancing for a short distance on the level land, deployed with an accuracy that would have done them honor on a field day in their own Hyde Park.

“Prepare to mount-mount!” cried Dunwoodie; the last word being repeated by Lawton in a tone that rang in the ears of Caesar, who stood at the open window of the cottage. The black recoiled in dismay, having lost all his confidence in Captain Lawton’s timidity; for he thought he yet saw him emerging from his cover and waving his sword on high.

As the British line advanced slowly and in exact order, the guides opened a galling fire. It began to annoy that part of the royal troops which was nearest to them. Wellmere listened to the advice of the veteran, who was next to him in rank, and ordered two companies to dislodge the American foot from their hiding place. The movement created a slight confusion; and Dunwoodie seized the opportunity to charge. No ground could be more favorable for the maneuvers of horse, and the attack of the Virginians was irresistible. It was aimed chiefly at the bank opposite to the wood, in order to clear the Americans from the fire of their friends who were concealed; and it was completely successful. Wellmere, who was on the left of his line, was overthrown by the impetuous fury of his assailants. Dunwoodie was in time to save him from the impending blow of one of his men, and raised him from the ground, had him placed on a horse, and delivered to the custody of his orderly. The officer who had suggested the attack upon the guides had been intrusted with its execution, but the menace was sufficient for these irregulars. In fact, their duty was performed, and they retired along the skirt of the wood, with intent to regain their horses, which had been left under a guard at the upper end of the valley.

The left of the British line was outflanked by the Americans, who doubled in their rear, and thus made the rout in that quarter total. But the second in command, perceiving how the battle went, promptly wheeled his party, and threw in a heavy fire on the dragoons, as they passed him to the charge; with this party was Henry Wharton, who had volunteered to assist in dispersing the guides. A ball struck his bridle arm, and compelled him to change hands. As the dragoons dashed by them, rending the air with their shouts, and with trumpets sounding a lively strain, the charger ridden by the youth became ungovernable—he plunged, reared, and his rider being unable with his wounded arm, to manage the impatient animal, Henry Wharton found himself, in less than a minute, unwillingly riding by the side of Captain Lawton. The dragoon comprehended at a glance the ludicrous situation of his new comrade, but had only time to cry aloud, before they plunged into the English line,—

“The horse knows the righteous cause better than his rider. Captain
Wharton, you are welcome to the ranks of freedom.”

No time was lost, however, by Lawton, after the charge was completed, in securing his prisoner again; and perceiving him to be hurt, he directed him to be conveyed to the rear.

The Virginian troopers dealt out their favors, with no gentle hands, on that part of the royal foot who were thus left in a great measure at their mercy. Dunwoodie, observing that the remnant of the Hessians had again ventured on the plain, led on in pursuit, and easily overtaking their light and half-fed horses, soon destroyed the remainder of the detachment.

In the meanwhile, great numbers of the English, taking advantage of the smoke and confusion in the field, were enabled to get in the rear of the body of their countrymen, which still preserved its order in a line parallel to the wood, but which had been obliged to hold its fire, from the fear of injuring friends as well as foes. The fugitives were directed to form a second line within the wood itself, and under cover of the trees. This arrangement was not yet completed, when Captain Lawton called to a youth, who commanded the other troop left with that part of the force which remained on the ground, and proposed charging the unbroken line of the British. The proposal was as promptly accepted as it had been made, and the troops were arrayed for the purpose. The eagerness of their leader prevented the preparations necessary to insure success, and the horse, receiving a destructive fire as they advanced, were thrown into additional confusion. Both Lawton and his more juvenile comrade fell at this discharge. Fortunately for the credit of the Virginians, Major Dunwoodie reentered the field at this critical instant; he saw his troops in disorder; at his feet lay weltering in blood George Singleton, a youth endeared to him by numberless virtues, and Lawton was unhorsed and stretched on the plain. The eye of the youthful warrior flashed fire. Riding between this squadron and the enemy, in a voice that reached the hearts of his dragoons, he recalled them to their duty. His presence and word acted like magic. The clamor of voices ceased; the line was formed promptly and with exactitude; the charge sounded; and, led on by their commander, the Virginians swept across the plain with an impetuosity that nothing could withstand, and the field was instantly cleared of the enemy; those who were not destroyed sought a shelter in the woods. Dunwoodie slowly withdrew from the fire of the English who were covered by the trees, and commenced the painful duty of collecting his dead and wounded.

The sergeant charged with conducting Henry Wharton to a place where he might procure surgical aid, set about performing his duty with alacrity, in order to return as soon as possible to the scene of strife. They had not reached the middle of the plain, before the captain noticed a man whose appearance and occupation forcibly arrested his attention. His head was bald and bare, but a well-powdered wig was to be seen, half-concealed, in the pocket of his breeches. His coat was off, and his arms were naked to the elbow; blood had disfigured much of his dress, and his hands, and even face, bore this mark of his profession; in his mouth was a cigar; in his right hand some instruments of strange formation, and in his left the remnants of an apple, with which he occasionally relieved the duty of the before-mentioned cigar. He was standing, lost in the contemplation of a Hessian, who lay breathless before him. At a little distance were three or four of the guides, leaning on their muskets, and straining their eyes in the direction of the combatants, and at his elbow stood a man who, from the implements in his hand, seemed an assistant.

“There, sir, is the doctor,” said the attendant of Henry very coolly. “He will patch up your arm in the twinkling of an eye”; and beckoning to the guides to approach, he whispered and pointed to his prisoner, and then galloped furiously towards his comrades.

Wharton advanced to the side of this strange figure, and observing himself to be unnoticed, was about to request his assistance, when the other broke silence in a soliloquy:—

“Now, I know this man to have been killed by Captain Lawton, as well as if I had seen him strike the blow. How often have I strove to teach him the manner in which he can disable his adversary, without destroying life! It is cruel thus unnecessarily to cut off the human race, and furthermore, such blows as these render professional assistance unnecessary; it is in a measure treating the lights of science with disrespect.”

“If, sir, your leisure will admit,” said Henry Wharton, “I must beg your attention to a slight hurt.”

“Ah!” cried the other, starting, and examining him from head to foot, “you are from the field below. Is there much business there, sir?”

“Indeed,” answered Henry, accepting the offer of the surgeon to assist in removing his coat, “’tis a stirring time.”

“Stirring!” repeated the surgeon, busily employed with his dressings; “you give me great pleasure, sir; for so long as they can stir there must be life; and while there is life, you know, there is hope; but here my art is of no use. I did put in the brains of one patient, but I rather think the man must have been dead before I saw him. It is a curious case, sir; I will take you to see it—only across the fence there, where you may perceive so many bodies together. Ah! the ball has glanced around the bone without shattering it; you are fortunate in falling into the hands of an old practitioner, or you might have lost this limb.”

“Indeed!” said Henry, with a slight uneasiness. “I did not apprehend the injury to be so serious.”

“Oh, the hurt is not bad, but you have such a pretty arm for an operation; the pleasure of the thing might have tempted a novice.”

“The devil!” cried the captain. “Can there be any pleasure in mutilating a fellow creature?”

“Sir,” said the surgeon, with gravity, “a scientific amputation is a very pretty operation, and doubtless might tempt a younger man, in the hurry of business, to overlook all the particulars of the case.”

Further conversation was interrupted by the appearance of the dragoons, slowly marching towards their former halting place, and new applications from the slightly wounded soldiers, who now came riding in, making hasty demands on the skill of the doctor.

The guides took charge of Wharton, and, with a heavy heart, the young man retraced his steps to his father’s cottage.

The English had lost in the several charges about one third of their foot, but the remainder were rallied in the wood; and Dunwoodie, perceiving them to be too strongly posted to assail, had left a strong party with Captain Lawton, with orders to watch their motions, and to seize every opportunity to harass them before they reëmbarked.

Intelligence had reached the major of another party being out, by the way of the Hudson, and his duty required that he should hold himself in readiness to defeat the intentions of these also. Captain Lawton received his orders with strong injunctions to make no assault on the foe, unless a favorable chance should offer.

The injury received by this officer was in the head, being stunned by a glancing bullet; and parting with a laughing declaration from the major, that if he again forgot himself, they should all think him more materially hurt, each took his own course.

The British were a light party without baggage, that had been sent out to destroy certain stores, understood to be collecting for the use of the American army. They now retired through the woods to the heights, and, keeping the route along their summits, in places unassailable by cavalry, commenced a retreat to their boats.

With fire and sword the country round
Was wasted far and wide;
And many a childing mother then,
And new-born infant, died;
But things like these, you know, must be
At every famous victory.

—SOUTHEY.

The last sounds of the combat died on the ears of the anxious listeners in the cottage, and were succeeded by the stillness of suspense. Frances had continued by herself, striving to exclude the uproar, and vainly endeavoring to summon resolution to meet the dreaded result. The ground where the charge on the foot had taken place was but a short mile from the Locusts, and, in the intervals of the musketry, the cries of the soldiers had even reached the ears of its inhabitants. After witnessing the escape of his son, Mr. Wharton had joined his sister and eldest daughter in their retreat, and the three continued fearfully waiting for news from the field. Unable longer to remain under the painful uncertainty of her situation, Frances soon added herself to the uneasy group, and Caesar was directed to examine into the state of things without, and report on whose banners victory had alighted. The father now briefly related to his astonished children the circumstance and manner of their brother’s escape. They were yet in the freshness of their surprise, when the door opened, and Captain Wharton, attended by a couple of the guides, and followed by the black, stood before them.

“Henry—my son, my son,” cried the agitated parent, stretching out his arms, yet unable to rise from his seat; “what is it I see; are you again a captive, and in danger of your life?”

“The better fortune of these rebels has prevailed,” said the youth, endeavoring to force a cheerful smile, and taking a hand of each of his distressed sisters. “I strove nobly for my liberty; but the perverse spirit of rebellion has even lighted on their horses. The steed I mounted carried me, greatly against my will, I acknowledge, into the very center of Dunwoodie’s men.”

“And you were again captured,” continued the father, casting a fearful glance on the armed attendants who had entered the room.

“That, sir, you may safely say; this Mr. Lawton, who sees so far, had me in custody again immediately.”

“Why you no hold ’em in, Massa Henry?” cried Caesar, pettishly.

“That,” said Wharton, smiling, “was a thing easier said than done, Mr. Caesar, especially as these gentlemen” (glancing his eyes at the guides) “had seen proper to deprive me of the use of my better arm.”

“Wounded!” exclaimed both sisters in a breath.

“A mere scratch, but disabling me at a most critical moment,” continued the brother, kindly, and stretching out the injured limb to manifest the truth of his declaration. Caesar threw a look of bitter animosity on the irregular warriors who were thought to have had an agency in the deed, and left the room. A few more words sufficed to explain all that Captain Wharton knew relative to the fortune of the day. The result he thought yet doubtful, for when he left the ground, the Virginians were retiring from the field of battle.

“They had treed the squirrel,” said one of the sentinels abruptly, “and didn’t quit the ground without leaving a good hound for the chase when he comes down.”

“Aye,” added his comrade dryly, “I’m thinking Captain Lawton will count the noses of what are left before they see their whaleboats.”

Frances had stood supporting herself, by the back of a chair, during this dialogue, catching, in breathless anxiety, every syllable as it was uttered; her color changed rapidly; her limbs shook under her; until, with desperate resolution, she inquired,—

“Is any officer hurt on—the—on either side?”

“Yes,” answered the man, cavalierly, “these Southern youths are so full of mettle, that it’s seldom we fight but one or two gets knocked over; one of the wounded, who came up before the troops, told me that Captain Singleton was killed, and Major Dunwoodie—”

Frances heard no more, but fell lifeless in the chair behind her. The attention of her friends soon revived her when the captain, turning to the man, said fearfully,—

“Surely Major Dunwoodie is unhurt?”

“Never fear him,” added the guide, disregarding the agitation of the family. “They say a man who is born to be hanged will never be drowned; if a bullet could kill the major, he would have been dead long ago. I was going to say, that the major is in a sad taking because of the captain’s being killed; but had I known how much store the lady set by him, I wouldn’t have been so plain-spoken.”

Frances now rose quickly from her seat, with cheeks glowing with confusion, and, leaning on her aunt, was about to retire, when Dunwoodie himself appeared. The first emotion of the agitated girl was unalloyed happiness; in the next instant she shrank back appalled from the unusual expression that reigned in his countenance. The sternness of battle yet sat on his brow; his eye was fixed and severe. The smile of affection that used to lighten his dark features on meeting his mistress, was supplanted by the lowering look of care; his whole soul seemed to be absorbed in one engrossing emotion, and he proceeded at once to his object.

“Mr. Wharton,” he earnestly began, “in times like these, we need not stand on idle ceremony: one of my officers, I am afraid, is hurt mortally; and, presuming on your hospitality, I have brought him to your door.”

“I am happy, sir, that you have done so,” said Mr. Wharton, at once perceiving the importance of conciliating the American troops. “The necessitous are always welcome, and doubly so, in being the friend of Major Dunwoodie.”

“Sir, I thank you for myself, and in behalf of him who is unable to render you his thanks,” returned the other, hastily. “If you please, we will have him conducted where the surgeon may see and report upon his case without delay.” To this there could be no objection; and Frances felt a chill at her heart, as her lover withdrew, without casting a solitary look on herself.

There is a devotedness in female love that admits of no rivalry. All the tenderness of the heart, all the powers of the imagination, are enlisted in behalf of the tyrant passion; and where all is given, much is looked for in return. Frances had spent hours of anguish, of torture, on account of Dunwoodie, and he now met her without a smile, and left her without a greeting. The ardor of her feelings was unabated, but the elasticity of her hopes was weakened. As the supporters of the nearly lifeless body of Dunwoodie’s friend passed her, in their way to the apartment prepared for his reception, she caught a view of this seeming rival.

His pale and ghastly countenance, sunken eye, and difficult breathing, gave her a glimpse of death in its most fearful form. Dunwoodie was by his side and held his hand, giving frequent and stern injunctions to the men to proceed with care, and, in short, manifesting all the solicitude that the most tender friendship could, on such an occasion, inspire. Frances moved lightly before them, and, with an averted face, she held open the door for their passage to the bed; it was only as the major touched her garments, on entering the room, that she ventured to raise her mild blue eyes to his face. But the glance was unreturned, and Frances unconsciously sighed as she sought the solitude of her own apartment.

Captain Wharton voluntarily gave a pledge to his keepers not to attempt again escaping, and then proceeded to execute those duties on behalf of his father, which were thought necessary in a host. On entering the passage for that purpose, he met the operator who had so dexterously dressed his arm, advancing to the room of the wounded officer.

“Ah!” cried the disciple of Aesculapius, “I see you are doing well; but stop; have you a pin? No! here, I have one; you must keep the cold air from your hurt, or some of the youngsters will be at work at you yet.”

“God forbid,” muttered the captain, in an undertone, attentively adjusting the bandages, when Dunwoodie appeared at the door, impatiently crying aloud,—

“Hasten, Sitgreaves, hasten; or George Singleton will die from loss of blood.”

“What! Singleton! God forbid! Bless me—is it George—poor little George?” exclaimed the surgeon, as he quickened his pace with evident concern, and hastened to the side of the bed. “He is alive, though, and while there is life there is hope. This is the first serious case I have had to-day, where the patient was not already dead. Captain Lawton teaches his men to strike with so little discretion—poor George—bless me, it is a musket bullet.”

The youthful sufferer turned his eyes on the man of science, and with a faint smile endeavored to stretch forth his hand. There was an appeal in the look and action that touched the heart of the operator. The surgeon removed his spectacles to wipe an unusual moisture from his eyes, and proceeded carefully to the discharge of his duty. While the previous arrangements were, however, making, he gave vent in some measure to his feelings, by saying,—

“When it is only a bullet, I have always some hopes; there is a chance that it hits nothing vital. But, bless me, Captain Lawton’s men cut so at random—generally sever the jugular or the carotid artery, or let out the brains, and all are so difficult to remedy—the patient mostly dying before one can get at him. I never had success but once in replacing a man’s brains, although I have tried three this very day. It is easy to tell where Lawton’s troops charge in a battle, they cut so at random.”

The group around the bed of Captain Singleton were too much accustomed to the manner of their surgeon to regard or to reply to his soliloquy; but they quietly awaited the moment when he was to commence his examination. This now took place, and Dunwoodie stood looking the operator in the face, with an expression that seemed to read his soul. The patient shrank from the application of the probe, and a smile stole over the features of the surgeon, as he muttered,—

“There has been nothing before it in that quarter.” He now applied himself in earnest to his work, took off his spectacles, and threw aside his wig. All this time Dunwoodie stood in feverish silence, holding one of the hands of the sufferer in both his own, watching the countenance of Doctor Sitgreaves. At length Singleton gave a slight groan, and the surgeon rose with alacrity, and said aloud,—

“Ah! there is some pleasure in following a bullet; it may be said to meander through the human body, injuring nothing vital; but as for Captain Lawton’s men—”

“Speak,” interrupted Dunwoodie; “is there hope?—can you find the ball?”

“It’s no difficult matter to find that which one has in his hand, Major Dunwoodie,” replied the surgeon, coolly, preparing his dressings. “It took what that literal fellow, Captain Lawton, calls a circumbendibus, a route never taken by the swords of his men, notwithstanding the multiplied pains I have been at to teach him how to cut scientifically. Now, I saw a horse this day with his head half severed from his body.”

“That,” said Dunwoodie, as the blood rushed to his cheeks again, and his dark eyes sparkled with the rays of hope, “was some of my handiwork; I killed that horse myself.”

“You!” exclaimed the surgeon, dropping his dressings in surprise, “you!
But you knew it was a horse!”

“I had such suspicions, I own,” said the major, smiling, and holding a beverage to the lips of his friend.

“Such blows alighting on the human frame are fatal,” continued the doctor, pursuing his business. “They set at naught the benefits which flow from the lights of science; they are useless in a battle, for disabling your foe is all that is required. I have sat, Major Dunwoodie, many a cold hour, while Captain Lawton has been engaged, and after all my expectation, not a single case worth recording has occurred—all scratches or death wounds. Ah! the saber is a sad weapon in unskillful hands! Yes, Major Dunwoodie, many are the hours I have thrown away in endeavoring to impress this truth on Captain John Lawton.”

The impatient major pointed silently to his friend, and the surgeon quickened his movements.

“Ah! poor George, it is a narrow chance; but”—he was interrupted by a messenger requiring the presence of the commanding officer in the field. Dunwoodie pressed the hand of his friend, and beckoned the doctor to follow him, as he withdrew.

“What think you?” he whispered, on reaching the passage. “Will he live?”

“He will.”

“Thank God!” cried the youth, hastening below.

Dunwoodie for a moment joined the family, who were now collecting in the ordinary parlor. His face was no longer wanting in smiles, and his salutations, though hasty, were cordial. He took no notice of the escape and capture of Henry Wharton, but seemed to think the young man had continued where he had left him before the encounter. On the ground they had not met. The English officer withdrew in haughty silence to a window, leaving the major uninterrupted to make his communications.

The excitement produced by the events of the day in the youthful feelings of the sisters, had been succeeded by a languor that kept them both silent, and Dunwoodie held his discourse with Miss Peyton.

“Is there any hope, my cousin, that your friend can survive his wound?” said the lady, advancing towards her kinsman, with a smile of benevolent regard.

“Everything, my dear madam, everything,” answered the soldier cheerfully. “Sitgreaves says he will live, and he has never deceived me.”

“Your pleasure is not much greater than my own at this intelligence. One so dear to Major Dunwoodie cannot fail to excite an interest in the bosom of his friends.”

“Say one so deservedly dear, madam,” returned the major, with warmth. “He is the beneficent spirit of the corps, equally beloved by us all; so mild, so equal, so just, so generous, with the meekness of a lamb and the fondness of a dove—it is only in the hour of battle that Singleton is a lion.”

“You speak of him as if he were your mistress, Major Dunwoodie,” observed the smiling spinster, glancing her eye at her niece, who sat pale and listening, in a corner of the room.

“I love him as one,” cried the excited youth. “But he requires care and nursing; all now depends on the attention he receives.”

“Trust me, sir, he will want for nothing under this roof.”

“Pardon me, dear madam; you are all that is benevolent, but Singleton requires a care which many men would feel to be irksome. It is at moments like these, and in sufferings like this, that the soldier most finds the want of female tenderness.” As he spoke, he turned his eyes on Frances with an expression that again thrilled to the heart of his mistress; she rose from her seat with burning cheeks, and said,—

“All the attention that can with propriety be given to a stranger, will be cheerfully bestowed on your friend.”

“Ah!” cried the major, shaking his head, “that cold word propriety will kill him; he must be fostered, cherished, soothed.”

“These are offices for a sister or a wife.”

“A sister!” repeated the soldier, the blood rushing to his own face tumultuously; “a sister! He has a sister; and one that might be here with to-morrow’s sun.” He paused, mused in silence, glanced his eyes uneasily at Frances, and muttered in an undertone, “Singleton requires it, and it must be done.”

The ladies had watched his varying countenance in some surprise, and
Miss Peyton now observed that,—

“If there were a sister of Captain Singleton near them, her presence would be gladly requested both by herself and nieces.”

“It must be, madam; it cannot well be otherwise,” replied Dunwoodie, with a hesitation that but ill agreed with his former declarations. “She shall be sent for express this very night.” And then, as if willing to change the subject, he approached Captain Wharton, and continued, mildly,—

“Henry Wharton, to me honor is dearer than life; but in your hands I know it can safely be confided. Remain here unwatched until we leave the county, which will not be for some days.”

The distance in the manner of the English officer vanished, and taking the offered hand of the other, he replied with warmth, “Your generous confidence, Peyton, will not be abused, even though the gibbet on which your Washington hung André be ready for my own execution.”

“Henry, Henry Wharton,” said Dunwoodie reproachfully, “you little know the man who leads our armies, or you would have spared him that reproach; but duty calls me without. I leave you where I could wish to stay myself, and where you cannot be wholly unhappy.”

In passing Frances, she received another of those smiling looks of affection she so much prized, and for a season the impression made by his appearance after the battle was forgotten.

Among the veterans that had been impelled by the times to abandon the quiet of age for the service of their country, was Colonel Singleton. He was a native of Georgia, and had been for the earlier years of his life a soldier by profession. When the struggle for liberty commenced, he offered his services to his country, and from respect to his character they had been accepted. His years and health had, however, prevented his discharging the active duties of the field, and he had been kept in command of different posts of trust, where his country might receive the benefits of his vigilance and fidelity without inconvenience to himself. For the last year he had been intrusted with the passes into the Highlands, and was now quartered, with his daughter, but a short day’s march above the valley where Dunwoodie had met the enemy. His only other child was the wounded officer we have mentioned. Thither, then, the major prepared to dispatch a messenger with the unhappy news of the captain’s situation, and charged with such an invitation from the ladies as he did not doubt would speedily bring the sister to the couch of her brother.

This duty performed, though with an unwillingness that only could make his former anxiety more perplexing, Dunwoodie proceeded to the field where his troops had halted. The remnant of the English were already to be seen, over the tops of the trees, marching along the heights towards their boats, in compact order and with great watchfulness. The detachment of the dragoons under Lawton were a short distance on their flank, eagerly awaiting a favorable moment to strike a blow. In this manner both parties were soon lost to view.

A short distance above the Locusts was a small hamlet where several roads intersected each other, and from which, consequently, access to the surrounding country was easy. It was a favorite halting place of the horse, and frequently held by the light parties of the American army during their excursions below. Dunwoodie had been the first to discover its advantages, and as it was necessary for him to remain in the county until further orders from above, it cannot be supposed he overlooked them now. To this place the troops were directed to retire, carrying with them their wounded; parties were already employed in the sad duty of interring the dead. In making these arrangements, a new object of embarrassment presented itself to our young soldier. In moving through the field, he was struck with the appearance of Colonel Wellmere, seated by himself, brooding over his misfortunes, uninterrupted by anything but the passing civilities of the American officers. His anxiety on behalf of Singleton had hitherto banished the recollection of his captive from the mind of Dunwoodie, and he now approached him with apologies for his neglect. The Englishman received his courtesies with coolness, and complained of being injured by what he affected to think was the accidental stumbling of his horse. Dunwoodie, who had seen one of his own men ride him down, and that with very little ceremony, slightly smiled, as he offered him surgical assistance. This could only be procured at the cottage, and thither they both proceeded.

“Colonel Wellmere!” cried young Wharton in astonishment as they entered, “has the fortune of war been thus cruel to you also? But you are welcome to the house of my father, although I could wish the introduction to have taken place under more happy circumstances.”

Mr. Wharton received this new guest with the guarded caution that distinguished his manner, and Dunwoodie left the room to seek the bedside of his friend. Everything here looked propitious, and he acquainted the surgeon that another patient waited his skill in the room below. The sound of the word was enough to set the doctor in motion, and seizing his implements of office, he went in quest of this new applicant. At the door of the parlor he was met by the ladies, who were retiring. Miss Peyton detained him for a moment, to inquire into the welfare of Captain Singleton. Frances smiled with something of natural archness of manner, as she contemplated the grotesque appearance of the bald-headed practitioner; but Sarah was too much agitated, with the surprise of the unexpected interview with the British colonel, to observe him. It has already been intimated that Colonel Wellmere was an old acquaintance of the family. Sarah had been so long absent from the city, that she had in some measure been banished from the remembrance of the gentleman; but the recollections of Sarah were more vivid. There is a period in the life of every woman when she may be said to be predisposed to love; it is at the happy age when infancy is lost in opening maturity—when the guileless heart beats with those anticipations of life which the truth can never realize—and when the imagination forms images of perfection that are copied after its own unsullied visions. At this happy age Sarah left the city, and she had brought with her a picture of futurity, faintly impressed, it is true, but which gained durability from her solitude, and in which Wellmere had been placed in the foreground. The surprise of the meeting had in some measure overpowered her, and after receiving the salutations of the colonel, she had risen, in compliance with a signal from her observant aunt, to withdraw.

“Then, sir,” observed Miss Peyton, after listening to the surgeon’s account of his young patient, “we may be flattered with the expectation that he will recover.”

“’Tis certain, madam,” returned the doctor, endeavoring, out of respect to the ladies, to replace his wig; “’tis certain, with care and good nursing.”

“In those he shall not be wanting,” said the spinster, mildly. “Everything we have he can command, and Major Dunwoodie has dispatched an express for his sister.”

“His sister!” echoed the practitioner, with a meaning look. “If the major has sent for her, she will come.”

“Her brother’s danger would induce her, one would imagine.”

“No doubt, madam,” continued the doctor, laconically, bowing low, and giving room to the ladies to pass. The words and the manner were not lost on the younger sister, in whose presence the name of Dunwoodie was never mentioned unheeded.

“Sir,” cried Dr. Sitgreaves, on entering the parlor, addressing himself to the only coat of scarlet in the room, “I am advised you are in want of my aid. God send ’tis not Captain Lawton with whom you came in contact, in which case I may be too late.”

“There must be some mistake, sir,” said Wellmere, haughtily. “It was a surgeon that Major Dunwoodie was to send me, and not an old woman.”

“’Tis Dr. Sitgreaves,” said Henry Wharton, quickly, though with difficulty suppressing a laugh. “The multitude of his engagements, to-day, has prevented his usual attention to his attire.”

“Your pardon, sir,” added Wellmere, very ungraciously proceeding to lay aside his coat, and exhibit what he called a wounded arm.

“If, sir,” said the surgeon dryly, “the degrees of Edinburgh—walking your London hospitals—amputating some hundreds of limbs—operating on the human frame in every shape that is warranted by the lights of science, a clear conscience, and the commission of the Continental Congress, can make a surgeon, I am one.”

“Your pardon, sir,” repeated the colonel stiffly. “Captain Wharton has accounted for my error.”

“For which I thank Captain Wharton,” said the surgeon, proceeding coolly to arrange his amputating instruments, with a formality that made the colonel’s blood run cold. “Where are you hurt, sir? What! is it then this scratch in your shoulder? In what manner might you have received this wound, sir?”

“From the sword of a rebel dragoon,” said the colonel, with emphasis.

“Never. Even the gentle George Singleton would not have breathed on you so harmlessly.” He took a piece of sticking plaster from his pocket, and applied it to the part. “There, sir; that will answer your purpose, and I am certain it is all that is required of me.”

“What do you take to be my purpose, then, sir?”

“To report yourself wounded in your dispatches,” replied the doctor, with great steadiness; “and you may say that an old woman dressed your hurts—for if one did not, one easily might!”

“Very extraordinary language,” muttered the Englishman.

Here Captain Wharton interfered; and, by explaining the mistake of Colonel Wellmere to proceed from his irritated mind and pain of body, he in part succeeded in mollifying the insulted practitioner, who consented to look further into the hurts of the other. They were chiefly bruises from his fall, to which Sitgreaves made some hasty applications, and withdrew.

The horse, having taken their required refreshment, prepared to fall back to their intended position, and it became incumbent on Dunwoodie to arrange the disposal of his prisoners. Sitgreaves he determined to leave in the cottage of Mr. Wharton, in attendance on Captain Singleton. Henry came to him with a request that Colonel Wellmere might also be left behind, under his parole, until the troops marched higher into the country. To this the major cheerfully assented; and as all the rest of the prisoners were of the vulgar herd, they were speedily collected, and, under the care of a strong guard, ordered to the interior. The dragoons soon after marched; and the guides, separating in small parties, accompanied by patrols from the horse, spread themselves across the country, in such a manner as to make a chain of sentinels from the waters of the Sound to those of the Hudson.^[7]

Dunwoodie had lingered in front of the cottage, after he paid his parting compliments, with an unwillingness to return, that he thought proceeded from his solicitude for his wounded friends. The heart which has not become callous, soon sickens with the glory that has been purchased with a waste of human life. Peyton Dunwoodie, left to himself, and no longer excited by the visions which youthful ardor had kept before him throughout the day, began to feel there were other ties than those which bound the soldier within the rigid rules of honor. He did not waver in his duty, yet he felt how strong was the temptation. His blood had ceased to flow with the impulse created by the battle. The stern expression of his eye gradually gave place to a look of softness; and his reflections on the victory brought with them no satisfaction that compensated for the sacrifices by which it had been purchased. While turning his last lingering gaze on the Locusts, he remembered only that it contained all that he most valued. The friend of his youth was a prisoner, under circumstances that endangered both life and honor. The gentle companion of his toils, who could throw around the rude enjoyments of a soldier the graceful mildness of peace, lay a bleeding victim to his success. The image of the maid who had held, during the day, a disputed sovereignty in his bosom, again rose to his view with a loveliness that banished her rival, glory, from his mind.

The last lagging trooper of the corps had already disappeared behind the northern hill, and the major unwillingly turned his horse in the same direction. Frances, impelled by a restless inquietude, now timidly ventured on the piazza of the cottage. The day had been mild and clear, and the sun was shining brightly in a cloudless sky. The tumult, which so lately disturbed the valley, was succeeded by the stillness of death, and the fair scene before her looked as if it had never been marred by the passions of men. One solitary cloud, the collected smoke of the contest, hung over the field; and this was gradually dispersing, leaving no vestige of the conflict above the peaceful graves of its victims. All the conflicting feelings, all the tumultuous circumstances of the eventful day, appeared like the deceptions of a troubled vision. Frances turned, and caught a glimpse of the retreating figure of him who had been so conspicuous an actor in the scene, and the illusion vanished. She recognized her lover, and, with the truth, came other recollections that drove her to the room, with a heart as sad as that which Dunwoodie himself bore from the valley.

[7] The scene of this tale is between these two waters, which are but a few miles from each other.

A moment gazed adown the dale,
A moment snuffed the tainted gale,
A moment listened to the cry,
That thickened as the chase drew nigh;
Then, as the headmost foe appeared,
With one brave bound the copse he cleared,
And, stretching forward free and far,
Sought the wild heaths of Uam-Var.

—Lady of the Lake.

The party under Captain Lawton had watched the retiring foe to his boats with the most unremitting vigilance, without finding any fit opening for a charge. The experienced successor of Colonel Wellmere knew too well the power of his enemy to leave the uneven surface of the heights, until compelled to descend to the level of the water. Before he attempted this hazardous movement, he threw his men into a compact square, with its outer edges bristling with bayonets. In this position, the impatient trooper well understood that brave men could never be assailed by cavalry with success, and he was reluctantly obliged to hover near them, without seeing any opportunity of stopping their slow but steady march to the beach. A small schooner, which had been their convoy from the city, lay with her guns bearing on the place of embarkation. Against this combination of force and discipline, Lawton had sufficient prudence to see it would be folly to contend, and the English were suffered to embark without molestation. The dragoons lingered on the shore till the last moment, and then they reluctantly commenced their own retreat back to the main body of the corps.

The gathering mists of the evening had begun to darken the valley, as the detachment of Lawton made its reappearance, at its southern extremity. The march of the troops was slow, and their line extended for the benefit of ease. In the front rode the captain, side by side with his senior subaltern, apparently engaged in close conference, while the rear was brought up by a young cornet, humming an air, and thinking of the sweets of a straw bed after the fatigues of a hard day’s duty.

“Then it struck you too?” said the captain. “The instant I placed my eyes on her I remembered the face; it is one not easily forgotten. By my faith, Tom, the girl does no discredit to the major’s taste.”

“She would do honor to the corps,” replied the lieutenant, with some warmth. “Those blue eyes might easily win a man to gentler employments than this trade of ours. In sober truth, I can easily imagine such a girl might tempt even me to quit the broadsword and saddle, for a darning-needle and pillion.”

“Mutiny, sir, mutiny,” cried the other, laughing. “What, you, Tom Mason, dare to rival the gay, admired, and withal rich, Major Dunwoodie in his love! You, a lieutenant of cavalry, with but one horse, and he none of the best! whose captain is as tough as a pepperidge log, and has as many lives as a cat!”

“Faith,” said the subaltern, smiling in his turn, “the log may yet be split, and grimalkin lose his lives, if you often charge as madly as you did this morning. What think you of many raps from such a beetle as laid you on your back to-day?”

“Ah! don’t mention it, my good Tom; the thought makes my head ache,” replied the other, shrugging up his shoulders. “It is what I call forestalling night.”

“The night of death?”

“No, sir, the night that follows day. I saw myriads of stars, things which should hide their faces in the presence of the lordly sun. I do think nothing but this thick cap saved me for your comfort a little longer, maugre the cat’s lives.”

“I have much reason to be obliged to the cap,” said Mason dryly. “That or the skull must have had a reasonable portion of thickness, I admit.”

“Come, come, Tom, you are a licensed joker, so I’ll not feign anger with you,” returned the captain, good-humoredly. “But Singleton’s lieutenant, I am fearful, will fare better than yourself for this day’s service.”

“I believe both of us will be spared the pain of receiving promotion purchased by the death of a comrade and friend,” observed Mason kindly. “It was reported that Sitgreaves said he would live.”

“From my soul I hope so,” exclaimed Lawton. “For a beardless face, that boy carries the stoutest heart I have ever met with. It surprises me, however, that as we both fell at the same instant, the men behaved so well.”

“For the compliment, I might thank you,” cried the lieutenant with a laugh; “but modesty forbids. I did my best to stop them, but without success.”

“Stop them!” roared the captain. “Would you stop men in the middle of a charge?”

“I thought they were going the wrong way,” answered the subaltern.

“Ah! our fall drove them to the right about?”

“It was either your fall, or apprehensions of their own; until the major rallied us, we were in admirable disorder.”

“Dunwoodie! the major was on the crupper of the Dutchman.”

“Ah! but he managed to get off the crupper of the Dutchman. He came in, at half speed, with the other two troops, and riding between us and the enemy, with that imperative way he has when roused, brought us in line in the twinkling of an eye. Then it was,” added the lieutenant, with animation, “that we sent John Bull to the bushes. Oh! it was a sweet charge—heads and tails, until we were upon them.”

“The devil! What a sight I missed!”

“You slept through it all.”

“Yes,” returned the other, with a sigh; “it was all lost to me and poor George Singleton. But, Tom, what will George’s sister say to this fair-haired maiden, in yonder white building?”

“Hang herself in her garters,” said the subaltern. “I owe a proper respect to my superiors, but two such angels are more than justly falls to the share of one man, unless he be a Turk or a Hindoo.”

“Yes, yes,” said the captain, quickly, “the major is ever preaching morality to the youngsters, but he is a sly fellow in the main. Do you observe how fond he is of the cross roads above this valley? Now, if I were to halt the troops twice in the same place, you would all swear there was a petticoat in the wind.”

“You are well known to the corps.”

“Well, Tom, a slanderous propensity is incurable—but,” stretching forward his body in the direction he was gazing, as if to aid him in distinguishing objects through the darkness, “what animal is moving through the field on our right?”

“’Tis a man,” said Mason, looking intently at the suspicious object.

“By his hump ’tis a dromedary!” added the captain, eying it keenly.
Wheeling his horse suddenly from the highway he exclaimed, “Harvey
Birch!—take him, dead or alive!”

Mason and a few of the leading dragoons only understood the sudden cry, but it was heard throughout the line. A dozen of the men, with the lieutenant at their head, followed the impetuous Lawton, and their speed threatened the pursued with a sudden termination of the race.

Birch prudently kept his position on the rock, where he had been seen by the passing glance of Henry Wharton, until evening had begun to shroud the surrounding objects in darkness. From this height he had seen all the events of the day, as they occurred. He had watched with a beating heart the departure of the troops under Dunwoodie, and with difficulty had curbed his impatience until the obscurity of night should render his moving free from danger. He had not, however, completed a fourth of his way to his own residence, when his quick ear distinguished the tread of the approaching horse. Trusting to the increasing darkness, he determined to persevere. By crouching and moving quickly along the surface of the ground, he hoped yet to escape unseen. Captain Lawton was too much engrossed with the foregoing conversation to suffer his eyes to indulge in their usual wandering; and the peddler, perceiving by the voices that the enemy he most feared had passed, yielded to his impatience, and stood erect, in order to make greater progress. The moment his body arose above the shadow of the ground, it was seen, and the chase commenced. For a single instant, Birch was helpless, his blood curdling in his veins at the imminence of the danger, and his legs refusing their natural and necessary office. But it was only for a moment. Casting his pack where he stood, and instinctively tightening the belt he wore, the peddler betook himself to flight. He knew that by bringing himself in a line with his pursuers and the wood, his form would be lost to sight. This he soon effected, and he was straining every nerve to gain the wood itself, when several horsemen rode by him but a short distance on his left, and cut him off from this place of refuge. The peddler threw himself on the ground as they came near him, and was passed unseen. But delay now became too dangerous for him to remain in that position. He accordingly rose, and still keeping in the shadow of the wood, along the skirts of which he heard voices crying to each other to be watchful, he ran with incredible speed in a parallel line, but in an opposite direction, to the march of the dragoons.

The confusion of the chase had been heard by the whole of the men, though none distinctly understood the order of Lawton but those who followed. The remainder were lost in doubt as to the duty that was required of them; and the aforesaid cornet was making eager inquiries of the trooper near him on the subject, when a man, at a short distance in his rear, crossed the road at a single bound. At the same instant, the stentorian voice of Lawton rang through the valley, shouting,—

“Harvey Birch—take him, dead or alive!”

Fifty pistols lighted the scene, and the bullets whistled in every direction round the head of the devoted peddler. A feeling of despair seized his heart, and in the bitterness of that moment he exclaimed,—

“Hunted like a beast of the forest!”

He felt life and its accompaniments to be a burden, and was about to yield himself to his enemies. Nature, however, prevailed. If taken, there was great reason to apprehend that he would not be honored with the forms of a trial, but that most probably the morning sun would witness his ignominious execution; for he had already been condemned to death, and had only escaped that fate by stratagem. These considerations, with the approaching footsteps of his pursuers, roused him to new exertions. He again fled before them. A fragment of a wall, that had withstood the ravages made by war in the adjoining fences of wood, fortunately crossed his path. He hardly had time to throw his exhausted limbs over this barrier, before twenty of his enemies reached its opposite side. Their horses refused to take the leap in the dark, and amid the confusion of the rearing chargers, and the execrations of their riders, Birch was enabled to gain a sight of the base of the hill, on whose summit was a place of perfect security. The heart of the peddler now beat high with hope, when the voice of Captain Lawton again rang in his ears, shouting to his men to make room. The order was obeyed, and the fearless trooper rode at the wall at the top of his horse’s speed, plunged the rowels in his charger, and flew over the obstacle in safety. The triumphant hurrahs of the men, and the thundering tread of the horse, too plainly assured the peddler of the emergency of his danger. He was nearly exhausted, and his fate no longer seemed doubtful.

“Stop, or die!” was uttered above his head, and in fearful proximity to his ears.

Harvey stole a glance over his shoulder, and saw, within a bound of him, the man he most dreaded. By the light of the stars he beheld the uplifted arm and the threatening saber. Fear, exhaustion, and despair seized his heart, and the intended victim fell at the feet of the dragoon. The horse of Lawton struck the prostrate peddler, and both steed and rider came violently to the earth.

As quick as thought, Birch was on his feet again, with the sword of the discomfited dragoon in his hand. Vengeance seems but too natural to human passions. There are few who have not felt the seductive pleasure of making our injuries recoil on their authors; and yet there are some who know how much sweeter it is to return good for evil.

All the wrongs of the peddler shone on his brain with a dazzling brightness. For a moment the demon within him prevailed, and Birch brandished the powerful weapon in the air; in the next, it fell harmless on the reviving but helpless trooper. The peddler vanished up the side of the friendly rock.

“Help Captain Lawton, there!” cried Mason, as he rode up, followed by a dozen of his men; “and some of you dismount with me, and search these rocks; the villain lies here concealed.”

“Hold!” roared the discomfited captain, raising himself with difficulty on his feet. “If one of you dismount, he dies. Tom, my good fellow, you will help me to straddle Roanoke again.”

The astonished subaltern complied in silence, while the wondering dragoons remained as fixed in their saddles, as if they composed part of the animals they rode.

“You are much hurt, I fear,” said Mason, with something of condolence in his manner, as they reentered the highway, biting off the end of a cigar for the want of a better quality of tobacco.

“Something so, I do believe,” replied the captain, catching his breath, and speaking with difficulty. “I wish our bonesetter was at hand, to examine into the state of my ribs.”

“Sitgreaves is left in attendance on Captain Singleton, at the house of
Mr. Wharton.”

“Then there I halt for the night, Tom. These rude times must abridge ceremony; besides, you may remember the old gentleman professed a kinsman’s regard for the corps. I can never think of passing so good a friend without a halt.”

“And I will lead the troop to the Four Corners; if we all halt there, we shall breed a famine in the land.”

“A condition I never desire to be placed in. The idea of that graceful spinster’s cakes is no bad solace for twenty-four hours in the hospital.”

“Oh! you won’t die if you can think of eating,” said Mason, with a laugh.

“I should surely die if I could not,” observed the captain, gravely.

“Captain Lawton,” said the orderly of his troop, riding to the side of his commanding officer, “we are now passing the house of the peddler spy; is it your pleasure that we burn it?”

“No!” roared the captain, in a voice that startled the disappointed sergeant. “Are you an incendiary? Would you burn a house in cold blood? Let but a spark approach, and the hand that carries it will never light another.”

“Zounds!” muttered the sleepy cornet in the rear, as he was nodding on his horse, “there is life in the captain, notwithstanding his tumble.”

Lawton and Mason rode on in silence, the latter ruminating on the wonderful change produced in his commander by his fall, when they arrived opposite to the gate before the residence of Mr. Wharton. The troop continued its march; but the captain and his lieutenant dismounted, and, followed by the servant of the former, they proceeded slowly to the door of the cottage.

Colonel Wellmere had already sought a retreat in his own room; Mr. Wharton and his son were closeted by themselves; and the ladies were administering the refreshments of the tea table to the surgeon of the dragoons, who had seen one of his patients in his bed, and the other happily enjoying the comforts of a sweet sleep. A few natural inquiries from Miss Peyton had opened the soul of the doctor, who knew every individual of her extensive family connection in Virginia, and who even thought it possible that he had seen the lady herself. The amiable spinster smiled as she felt it to be improbable that she should ever have met her new acquaintance before, and not remember his singularities. It however greatly relieved the embarrassment of their situation, and something like a discourse was maintained between them; the nieces were only listeners, nor could the aunt be said to be much more.

“As I was observing, Miss Peyton, it was merely the noxious vapors of the lowlands that rendered the plantation of your brother an unfit residence for man; but quadrupeds were—”

“Bless me, what’s that?” said Miss Peyton, turning pale at the report of the pistols fired at Birch.

“It sounds prodigiously like the concussion on the atmosphere made by the explosion of firearms,” said the surgeon, sipping his tea with great indifference. “I should imagine it to be the troop of Captain Lawton returning, did I not know the captain never uses the pistol, and that he dreadfully abuses the saber.”

“Merciful providence!” exclaimed the agitated maiden, “he would not injure one with it, certainly.”

“Injure!” repeated the other quickly. “It is certain death, madam; the most random blows imaginable; all that I can say to him will have no effect.”

“But Captain Lawton is the officer we saw this morning, and is surely your friend,” said Frances, hastily, observing her aunt to be seriously alarmed.

“I find no fault with his want of friendship; the man is well enough if he would learn to cut scientifically. All trades, madam, ought to be allowed to live; but what is to become of a surgeon, if his patients are dead before he sees them!”

The doctor continued haranguing on the probability and improbability of its being the returning troop, until a loud knock at the door gave new alarm to the ladies. Instinctively laying his hand on a small saw, that had been his companion for the whole day, in the vain expectation of an amputation, the surgeon, coolly assuring the ladies that he would stand between them and danger, proceeded in person to answer the summons.

“Captain Lawton!” exclaimed the surgeon, as he beheld the trooper leaning on the arm of his subaltern, and with difficulty crossing the threshold.

“Ah! my dear bonesetter, is it you? You are here very fortunately to inspect my carcass; but do lay aside that rascally saw!”

A few words from Mason explained the nature and manner of his captain’s hurts, and Miss Peyton cheerfully accorded the required accommodations. While the room intended for the trooper was getting ready, and the doctor was giving certain portentous orders, the captain was invited to rest himself in the parlor. On the table was a dish of more substantial food than ordinarily adorned the afternoon’s repast, and it soon caught the attention of the dragoons. Miss Peyton, recollecting that they had probably made their only meal that day at her own table, kindly invited them to close it with another. The offer required no pressing, and in a few minutes the two were comfortably seated, and engaged in an employment that was only interrupted by an occasional wry face from the captain, who moved his body in evident pain. These interruptions, however, interfered but little with the principal business in hand; and the captain had got happily through with this important duty, before the surgeon returned to announce all things ready for his accommodation in the room above stairs.

“Eating!” cried the astonished physician. “Captain Lawton, do you wish to die?”

“I have no particular ambition that way,” said the trooper, rising, and bowing good night to the ladies, “and, therefore, have been providing materials necessary to preserve life.”

The surgeon muttered his dissatisfaction, while he followed Mason and the captain from the apartment.

Every house in America had, at that day, what was emphatically called its best room, and this had been allotted, by the unseen influence of Sarah, to Colonel Wellmere. The down counterpane, which a clear frosty night would render extremely grateful over bruised limbs, decked the English officer’s bed. A massive silver tankard, richly embossed with the Wharton arms, held the beverage he was to drink during the night; while beautiful vessels of china performed the same office for the two American captains. Sarah was certainly unconscious of the silent preference she had been giving to the English officer; and it is equally certain, that but for his hurts, bed, tankard, and everything but the beverage would have been matters of indifference to Captain Lawton, half of whose nights were spent in his clothes, and not a few of them in the saddle. After taking possession, however, of a small but very comfortable room, Doctor Sitgreaves proceeded to inquire into the state of his injuries. He had begun to pass his hand over the body of his patient, when the latter cried impatiently,—

“Sitgreaves, do me the favor to lay that rascally saw aside, or I shall have recourse to my saber in self-defense; the sight of it makes my blood cold.”

“Captain Lawton, for a man who has so often exposed life and limb, you are unaccountably afraid of a very useful instrument.”

“Heaven keep me from its use,” said the trooper, with a shrug.

“You would not despise the lights of science, nor refuse surgical aid, because this saw might be necessary?”

“I would.”

“You would!”

“Yes; you shall never joint me like a quarter of beef, while I have life to defend myself,” cried the resolute dragoon. “But I grow sleepy; are any of my ribs broken?”

“No.”

“Any of my bones?”

“No.”

“Tom, I’ll thank you for that pitcher.” As he ended his draft, he very deliberately turned his back on his companions, and good-naturedly cried, “Good night, Mason; good night, Galen.”

Captain Lawton entertained a profound respect for the surgical abilities of his comrade, but he was very skeptical on the subject of administering internally for the ailings of the human frame. With a full stomach, a stout heart, and a clear conscience, he often maintained that a man might bid defiance to the world and its vicissitudes. Nature provided him with the second, and, to say the truth, he strove manfully himself to keep up the other two requisites in his creed. It was a favorite maxim with him, that the last thing death assailed was the eyes, and next to the last, the jaws. This he interpreted to be a clear expression of the intention of nature, that every man might regulate, by his own volition, whatever was to be admitted into the sanctuary of his mouth; consequently, if the guest proved unpalatable, he had no one to blame but himself. The surgeon, who was well acquainted with these views of his patient, beheld him, as he cavalierly turned his back on Mason and himself, with a commiserating contempt, replaced in their leathern repository the phials he had exhibited, with a species of care that was allied to veneration, gave the saw, as he concluded, a whirl of triumph, and departed, without condescending to notice the compliment of the trooper. Mason, finding, by the breathing of the captain, that his own good night would be unheard, hastened to pay his respects to the ladies—after which he mounted and followed the troop at the top of his horse’s speed.

On some fond breast the parting soul relies,
Some pious drops the closing eye requires,
E’en from the tomb the voice of nature cries,
E’en in our ashes live their wonted fires.

—GRAY.

The possessions of Mr. Wharton extended to some distance on each side of the house in which he dwelt, and most of his land was unoccupied. A few scattered dwellings were to be seen in different parts of his domains, but they were fast falling to decay, and were untenanted. The proximity of the country to the contending armies had nearly banished the pursuits of agriculture from the land. It was useless for the husbandman to devote his time and the labor of his hands, to obtain overflowing garners, that the first foraging party would empty. None tilled the earth with any other view than to provide the scanty means of subsistence, except those who were placed so near to one of the adverse parties as to be safe from the inroads of the light troops of the other. To these the war offered a golden harvest, more especially to such as enjoyed the benefits of an access to the royal army. Mr. Wharton did not require the use of his lands for the purposes of subsistence; and he willingly adopted the guarded practice of the day, limiting his attention to such articles as were soon to be consumed within his own walls, or could be easily secreted from the prying eyes of the foragers. In consequence, the ground on which the action was fought had not a single inhabited building, besides the one belonging to the father of Harvey Birch. This house stood between the place where the cavalry had met, and that where the charge had been made on the party of Wellmere.

To Katy Haynes it had been a day fruitful of incidents. The prudent housekeeper had kept her political feelings in a state of rigid neutrality; her own friends had espoused the cause of the country, but the maiden herself never lost sight of that important moment, when, like females of more illustrious hopes, she might be required to sacrifice her love of country on the altar of domestic harmony. And yet, notwithstanding all her sagacity, there were moments when the good woman had grievous doubts into which scale she ought to throw the weight of her eloquence, in order to be certain of supporting the cause favored by the peddler. There was so much that was equivocal in his movements and manner, that often, when, in the privacy of their household, she was about to offer a philippic on Washington and his followers, discretion sealed her mouth, and distrust beset her mind. In short, the whole conduct of the mysterious being she studied was of a character to distract the opinions of one who took a more enlarged view of men and life than came within the competency of his housekeeper.

The battle of the Plains had taught the cautious Washington the advantages his enemy possessed in organization, arms, and discipline. These were difficulties to be mastered by his own vigilance and care. Drawing off his troops to the heights, in the northern part of the county, he had bidden defiance to the attacks of the royal army, and Sir William Howe fell back to the enjoyment of his barren conquest—a deserted city. Never afterwards did the opposing armies make the trial of strength within the limits of Westchester; yet hardly a day passed, that the partisans did not make their inroads; or a sun rise, that the inhabitants were spared the relation of excesses which the preceding darkness had served to conceal. Most of the movements of the peddler were made at the hours which others allotted to repose. The evening sun would frequently leave him at one extremity of the county, and the morning find him at the other. His pack was his never-failing companion; and there were those who closely studied him, in his moments of traffic, and thought his only purpose was the accumulation of gold. He would be often seen near the Highlands, with a body bending under its load; and again near the Harlem River, traveling with lighter steps, with his face towards the setting sun. But these glances at him were uncertain and fleeting. The intermediate time no eye could penetrate. For months he disappeared, and no traces of his course were ever known.

Strong parties held the heights of Harlem, and the northern end of Manhattan Island was bristling with the bayonets of the English sentinels, yet the peddler glided among them unnoticed and uninjured. His approaches to the American lines were also frequent; but generally so conducted as to baffle pursuit. Many a sentinel, placed in the gorges of the mountains, spoke of a strange figure that had been seen gliding by them in the mists of the evening. These stories reached the ears of the officers, and, as we have related, in two instances the trader had fallen into the hands of the Americans. The first time he had escaped from Lawton, shortly after his arrest; but the second he was condemned to die. On the morning of his intended execution, the cage was opened, but the bird had flown. This extraordinary escape had been made from the custody of a favorite officer of Washington, and sentinels who had been thought worthy to guard the person of the commander in chief. Bribery and treason could not be imputed to men so well esteemed, and the opinion gained ground among the common soldiery, that the peddler had dealings with the dark one. Katy, however, always repelled this opinion with indignation; for within the recesses of her own bosom, the housekeeper, in ruminating on the events, concluded that the evil spirit did not pay in gold. Nor, continued the wary spinster in her cogitations, does Washington; paper and promises were all that the leader of the American troops could dispense to his servants. After the alliance with France, when silver became more abundant in the country, although the scrutinizing eyes of Katy never let any opportunity of examining into the deerskin purse pass unimproved, she was never able to detect the image of Louis intruding into the presence of the well-known countenance of George III. In short, the secret hoard of Harvey sufficiently showed in its contents that all its contributions had been received from the British.

The house of Birch had been watched at different times by the Americans, with a view to his arrest, but never with success; the reputed spy possessing a secret means of intelligence, that invariably defeated their schemes. Once, when a strong body of the continental army held the Four Corners for a whole summer, orders had been received from Washington himself, never to leave the door of Harvey Birch unwatched. The command was rigidly obeyed, and during this long period the peddler was unseen; the detachment was withdrawn, and the following night Birch reentered his dwelling. The father of Harvey had been greatly molested, in consequence of the suspicious character of the son. But, notwithstanding the most minute scrutiny into the conduct of the old man, no fact could be substantiated against him to his injury, and his property was too small to keep alive the zeal of patriots by profession. Its confiscation and purchase would not have rewarded their trouble. Age and sorrow were now about to spare him further molestation, for the lamp of life had been drained of its oil. The recent separation of the father and son had been painful, but they had submitted in obedience to what both thought a duty. The old man had kept his dying situation a secret from the neighborhood, in the hope that he might still have the company of his child in his last moments. The confusion of the day, and his increasing dread that Harvey might be too late, helped to hasten the event he would fain arrest for a little while. As night set in, his illness increased to such a degree, that the dismayed housekeeper sent a truant boy, who had shut up himself with them during the combat, to the Locusts, in quest of a companion to cheer her solitude. Caesar, alone, could be spared, and, loaded with eatables and cordials by the kind-hearted Miss Peyton, the black had been dispatched on his duty. The dying man was past the use of medicines, and his chief anxiety seemed to center in a meeting with his child. The noise of the chase had been heard by the group in the house, but its cause was not understood; and as both the black and Katy were apprised of the detachment of American horse being below them, they supposed it to proceed from the return of that party. They heard the dragoons, as they moved slowly by the building; but in compliance with the prudent injunction of the black, the housekeeper forbore to indulge her curiosity. The old man had closed his eyes, and his attendants believed him to be asleep. The house contained two large rooms and as many small ones. One of the former served for kitchen and sitting room; in the other lay the father of Birch; of the latter, one was the sanctuary of the vestal, and the other contained the stock of provisions. A huge chimney of stone rose in the center, serving, of itself, for a partition between the larger rooms; and fireplaces of corresponding dimensions were in each apartment. A bright flame was burning in that of the common room, and within the very jambs of its monstrous jaws sat Caesar and Katy, at the time of which we write. The African was impressing his caution on the housekeeper, and commenting on the general danger of indulging an idle curiosity.

“Best nebber tempt a Satan,” said Caesar, rolling up his eyes till the whites glistened by the glare of the fire. “I berry like heself to lose an ear for carrying a little bit of a letter; dere much mischief come of curiosity. If dere had nebber been a man curious to see Africa, dere would be no color people out of dere own country; but I wish Harvey get back.”

“It is very disregardful in him to be away at such a time,” said Katy, imposingly. “Suppose now his father wanted to make his last will in the testament, who is there to do so solemn and awful an act for him? Harvey is a very wasteful and very disregardful man!”

“Perhap he make him afore?”

“It would not be a wonderment if he had,” returned the housekeeper; “he is whole days looking into the Bible.”

“Then he read a berry good book,” said the black solemnly. “Miss Fanny read in him to Dinah now and den.”

“You are right, Caesar. The Bible is the best of books, and one that reads it as often as Harvey’s father should have the best of reasons for so doing. This is no more than common sense.”

She rose from her seat, and stealing softly to a chest of drawers in the room of the sick man, she took from it a large Bible, heavily bound, and secured with strong clasps of brass, with which she returned to the negro. The volume was eagerly opened, and they proceeded instantly to examine its pages. Katy was far from an expert scholar, and to Caesar the characters were absolutely strangers. For some time the housekeeper was occupied in finding out the word Matthew, in which she had no sooner succeeded than she pointed out the word, with great complacency, to the attentive Caesar.

“Berry well, now look him t’rough,” said the black, peeping over the housekeeper’s shoulder, as he held a long lank candle of yellow tallow, in such a manner as to throw its feeble light on the volume.

“Yes, but I must begin with the very beginning of the book,” replied the other, turning the leaves carefully back, until, moving two at once, she lighted upon a page covered with writing. “Here,” said the housekeeper, shaking with the eagerness of expectation, “here are the very words themselves; now I would give the world itself to know whom he has left the big silver shoe buckles to.”

“Read ’em,” said Caesar, laconically.

“And the black walnut drawers; for Harvey could never want furniture of that quality, as long as he is a bachelor!”

“Why he no want ’em as well as he fader?”

“And the six silver tablespoons; Harvey always uses the iron!”

“P’r’ap he say, without so much talk,” returned the sententious black, pointing one of his crooked and dingy fingers at the open volume.

Thus repeatedly advised, and impelled by her own curiosity, Katy began to read. Anxious to come to the part which most interested herself, she dipped at once into the center of the subject.

“Chester Birch, born September 1st, 1755,”—read the spinster, with a deliberation that did no great honor to her scholarship.

“Well, what he gib him?”

“Abigail Birch, born July 12th, 1757,” continued the housekeeper, in the same tone.

“I t’ink he ought to gib her ’e spoon.”

“June 1st, 1760. On this awful day, the judgment of an offended God lighted on my house.” A heavy groan from the adjoining room made the spinster instinctively close the volume, and Caesar, for a moment, shook with fear. Neither possessed sufficient resolution to go and examine the condition of the sufferer, but his heavy breathing continued as usual. Katy dared not, however, reopen the Bible, and carefully securing its clasps, it was laid on the table in silence. Caesar took his chair again, and after looking timidly round the room, remarked,—

“I t’ought he time war’ come!”

“No,” said Katy, solemnly, “he will live till the tide is out, or the first cock crows in the morning.”

“Poor man!” continued the black, nestling still farther into the chimney corner, “I hope he lay quiet after he die.”

“’Twould be no astonishment to me if he didn’t; for they say an unquiet life makes an uneasy grave.”

“Johnny Birch a berry good man in he way. All mankind can’t be a minister; for if he do, who would be a congregation?”

“Ah! Caesar, he is good only who does good. Can you tell me why honestly gotten gold should be hidden in the bowels of the earth?”

“Grach!—I t’ink it must be to keep t’e Skinner from findin’ him; if he know where he be, why don’t he dig him up?”

“There may be reasons not comprehensible to you,” said Katy, moving her chair so that her clothes covered the charmed stone, underneath which lay the secret treasures of the peddler, unable to refrain from speaking of what she would have been very unwilling to reveal; “but a rough outside often holds a smooth inside.” Caesar stared around the building, unable to fathom the hidden meaning of his companion, when his roving eyes suddenly became fixed, and his teeth chattered with affright. The change in the countenance of the black was instantly perceived by Katy, and turning her face, she saw the peddler himself, standing within the door of the room.

“Is he alive?” asked Birch, tremulously, and seemingly afraid to receive the answer.

“Surely,” said Katy, rising hastily, and officiously offering her chair.
“He must live till day, or till the tide is down.”

Disregarding all but the fact that his father still lived, the peddler stole gently into the room of his dying parent. The tie which bound the father and son was of no ordinary kind. In the wide world they were all to each other. Had Katy but read a few lines further in the record, she would have seen the sad tale of their misfortunes. At one blow competence and kindred had been swept from them, and from that day to the present hour, persecution and distress had followed their wandering steps. Approaching the bedside, Harvey leaned his body forward, and, in a voice nearly choked by his feelings, he whispered near the ear of the sick,—

“Father, do you know me?”

The parent slowly opened his eyes, and a smile of satisfaction passed over his pallid features, leaving behind it the impression of death, more awful by the contrast. The peddler gave a restorative he had brought with him to the parched lips of the sick man, and for a few minutes new vigor seemed imparted to his frame. He spoke, but slowly, and with difficulty. Curiosity kept Katy silent; awe had the same effect on Caesar; and Harvey seemed hardly to breathe, as he listened to the language of the departing spirit.

“My son,” said the father in a hollow voice, “God is as merciful as He is just; if I threw the cup of salvation from my lips when a youth, He graciously offers it to me in mine age. He has chastised to purify, and I go to join the spirits of our lost family. In a little while, my child, you will be alone. I know you too well not to foresee you will be a pilgrim through life. The bruised reed may endure, but it will never rise. You have that within you, Harvey, that will guide you aright; persevere as you have begun, for the duties of life are never to be neglected and”—a noise in the adjoining room interrupted the dying man, and the impatient peddler hastened to learn the cause, followed by Katy and the black. The first glance of his eye on the figure in the doorway told the trader but too well his errand, and the fate that probably awaited himself. The intruder was a man still young in years, but his lineaments bespoke a mind long agitated by evil passions. His dress was of the meanest materials, and so ragged and unseemly, as to give him the appearance of studied poverty. His hair was prematurely whitened, and his sunken, lowering eye avoided the bold, forward look of innocence. There was a restlessness in his movements, and an agitation in his manner, that proceeded from the workings of the foul spirit within him, and which was not less offensive to others than distressing to himself. This man was a well-known leader of one of those gangs of marauders who infested the county with a semblance of patriotism, and who were guilty of every grade of offense, from simple theft up to murder. Behind him stood several other figures clad in a similar manner, but whose countenances expressed nothing more than the indifference of brutal insensibility. They were well armed with muskets and bayonets, and provided with the usual implements of foot soldiers. Harvey knew resistance to be vain, and quietly submitted to their directions. In the twinkling of an eye both he and Caesar were stripped of their decent garments, and made to exchange clothes with two of the filthiest of the band. They were then placed in separate corners of the room, and, under the muzzles of the muskets, required faithfully to answer such interrogatories as were put to them.

“Where is your pack?” was the first question to the peddler.

“Hear me,” said Birch, trembling with agitation; “in the next room is my father, now in the agonies of death. Let me go to him, receive his blessing, and close his eyes, and you shall have all—aye, all.”

“Answer me as I put the questions, or this musket shall send you to keep the old driveler company: where is your pack?”

“I will tell you nothing, unless you let me go to my father,” said the peddler, resolutely.

His persecutor raised his arm with a malicious sneer, and was about to execute his threat, when one of his companions checked him.

“What would you do?” he said. “You surely forget the reward. Tell us where are your goods, and you shall go to your father.”

Birch complied instantly, and a man was dispatched in quest of the booty; he soon returned, throwing the bundle on the floor, swearing it was as light as feathers.

“Aye,” cried the leader, “there must be gold somewhere for what it did contain. Give us your gold, Mr. Birch; we know you have it; you will not take continental, not you.”

“You break your faith,” said Harvey.

“Give us your gold,” exclaimed the other, furiously, pricking the
peddler with his bayonet until the blood followed his pushes in streams.
At this instant a slight movement was heard in the adjoining room, and
Harvey cried,—

“Let me—let me go to my father, and you shall have all.”

“I swear you shall go then,” said the Skinner.

“Here, take the trash,” cried Birch, as he threw aside the purse, which he had contrived to conceal, notwithstanding the change in his garments.

The robber raised it from the floor with a hellish laugh.

“Aye, but it shall be to your father in heaven.”

“Monster! have you no feeling, no faith, no honesty?”

“To hear him, one would think there was not a rope around his neck already,” said the other, laughing. “There is no necessity for your being uneasy, Mr. Birch; if the old man gets a few hours the start of you in the journey, you will be sure to follow him before noon to-morrow.”

This unfeeling communication had no effect on the peddler, who listened with gasping breath to every sound from the room of his parent until he heard his own name spoken in the hollow, sepulchral tones of death. Birch could endure no more, but shrieking out,—

“Father! hush—father! I come—I come!” he darted by his keeper and was the next moment pinned to the wall by the bayonet of another of the band. Fortunately, his quick motion had caused him to escape a thrust aimed at his life, and it was by his clothes only that he was confined.

“No, Mr. Birch,” said the Skinner, “we know you too well to trust you out of sight—your gold, your gold!”

“You have it,” said the peddler, writhing with agony.

“Aye, we have the purse, but you have more purses. King George is a prompt paymaster, and you have done him many a piece of good service. Where is your hoard? Without it you will never see your father.”

“Remove the stone underneath the woman,” cried the peddler, eagerly—“remove the stone.”

“He raves! he raves!” said Katy, instinctively moving her position to a different stone from the one on which she had been standing. In a moment it was torn from its bed, and nothing but earth was seen beneath.

“He raves! You have driven him from his right mind,” continued the trembling spinster. “Would any man in his senses keep gold under a hearth?”

“Peace, babbling fool!” cried Harvey. “Lift the corner stone, and you will find that which will make you rich, and me a beggar.”

“And then you will be despisable,” said the housekeeper bitterly. “A peddler without goods and without money is sure to be despisable.”

“There will be enough left to pay for his halter,” cried the Skinner, who was not slow to follow the instructions of Harvey, soon lighting upon a store of English guineas. The money was quickly transferred to a bag, notwithstanding the declarations of the spinster, that her dues were unsatisfied, and that, of right, ten of the guineas were her property.

Delighted with a prize that greatly exceeded their expectations, the band prepared to depart, intending to take the peddler with them, in order to give him up to the American troops above, and to claim the reward offered for his apprehension. Everything was ready, and they were about to lift Birch in their arms, for he resolutely refused to move an inch, when a form appeared in their midst, which appalled the stoutest heart among them. The father had arisen from his bed, and he tottered forth at the cries of his son. Around his body was thrown the sheet of the bed, and his fixed eye and haggard face gave him the appearance of a being from another world. Even Katy and Caesar thought it was the spirit of the elder Birch, and they fled the house, followed by the alarmed Skinners in a body.

The excitement which had given the sick man strength, soon vanished, and the peddler, lifting him in his arms, reconveyed him to his bed. The reaction of the system which followed hastened to close the scene.

The glazed eye of the father was fixed upon the son; his lips moved, but his voice was unheard. Harvey bent down, and, with the parting breath of his parent, received his dying benediction. A life of privation, and of wrongs, embittered most of the future hours of the peddler. But under no sufferings, in no misfortunes, the subject of poverty and obloquy, the remembrance of that blessing never left him; it constantly gleamed over the images of the past, shedding a holy radiance around his saddest hours of despondency; it cheered the prospect of the future with the prayers of a pious spirit; and it brought the sweet assurance of having faithfully discharged the sacred offices of filial love.

The retreat of Caesar and the spinster had been too precipitate to admit of much calculation; yet they themselves instinctively separated from the Skinners. After fleeing a short distance they paused, and the maiden commenced in a solemn voice,—

“Oh! Caesar, was it not dreadful to walk before he had been laid in his grave! It must have been the money that disturbed him; they say Captain Kidd walks near the spot where he buried gold in the old war.”

“I never t’ink Johnny Birch hab such a big eye!” said the African, his teeth yet chattering with the fright.

“I’m sure ’twould be a botherment to a living soul to lose so much money. Harvey will be nothing but an utterly despisable, poverty-stricken wretch. I wonder who he thinks would even be his housekeeper!”

“Maybe a spook take away Harvey, too,” observed Caesar, moving still nearer to the side of the maiden. But a new idea had seized the imagination of the spinster. She thought it not improbable that the prize had been forsaken in the confusion of the retreat; and after deliberating and reasoning for some time with Caesar, they determined to venture back, and ascertain this important fact, and, if possible, learn what had been the fate of the peddler. Much time was spent in cautiously approaching the dreaded spot; and as the spinster had sagaciously placed herself in the line of the retreat of the Skinners, every stone was examined in the progress in search of abandoned gold. But although the suddenness of the alarm and the cry of Caesar had impelled the freebooters to so hasty a retreat, they grasped the hoard with a hold that death itself would not have loosened. Perceiving everything to be quiet within, Katy at length mustered resolution to enter the dwelling, where she found the peddler, with a heavy heart, performing the last sad offices for the dead. A few words sufficed to explain to Katy the nature of her mistake; but Caesar continued to his dying day to astonish the sable inmates of the kitchen with learned dissertations on spooks, and to relate how direful was the appearance of that of Johnny Birch.

The danger compelled the peddler to abridge even the short period that American custom leaves the deceased with us; and, aided by the black and Katy, his painful task was soon ended. Caesar volunteered to walk a couple of miles with orders to a carpenter; and, the body being habited in its ordinary attire, was left, with a sheet thrown decently over it, to await the return of the messenger.

The Skinners had fled precipitately to the wood, which was but a short distance from the house of Birch, and once safely sheltered within its shades, they halted, and mustered their panic-stricken forces.

“What in the name of fury seized your coward hearts?” cried their dissatisfied leader, drawing his breath heavily.

“The same question might be asked of yourself,” returned one of the band, sullenly.

“From your fright, I thought a party of De Lancey’s men were upon us.
Oh! you are brave gentlemen at a race!”

“We follow our captain.”

“Then follow me back, and let us secure the scoundrel, and receive the reward.”

“Yes; and by the time we reach the house, that black rascal will have the mad Virginian upon us. By my soul I would rather meet fifty Cowboys than that single man.”

“Fool,” cried the enraged leader, “don’t you know Dunwoodie’s horse are at the Corners, full two miles from here?”

“I care not where the dragoons are, but I will swear that I saw Captain Lawton enter the house of old Wharton, while I lay watching an opportunity of getting the British colonel’s horse from the stable.”

“And if he should come, won’t a bullet silence a dragoon from the South as well as from old England?”

“Aye, but I don’t choose a hornet’s nest about my ears; rase the skin of one of that corps, and you will never see another peaceable night’s foraging again.”

“Well,” muttered the leader, as they retired deeper into the wood, “this sottish peddler will stay to see the old devil buried; and though we cannot touch him at the funeral (for that would raise every old woman and priest in America against us), he’ll wait to look after the movables, and to-morrow night shall wind up his concerns.”

With this threat they withdrew to one of their usual places of resort, until darkness should again give them an opportunity of marauding on the community without danger of detection.

O wo! O woful, woful, woful day!
Most lamentable day; most woful day,
That ever, ever, I did yet behold!
O day! O day! O day! O hateful day!
Never was seen so black a day as this;
O woful day! O woful day!

—SHAKESPEARE.

The family at the Locusts had slept, or watched, through all the disturbances at the cottage of Birch, in perfect ignorance of their occurrence. The attacks of the Skinners were always made with so much privacy as to exclude the sufferers, not only from succor, but frequently, through a dread of future depredations, from the commiseration of their neighbors also. Additional duties had drawn the ladies from their pillows at an hour somewhat earlier than usual; and Captain Lawton, notwithstanding the sufferings of his body, had risen in compliance with a rule from which he never departed, of sleeping but six hours at a time. This was one of the few points, in which the care of the human frame was involved, on which the trooper and the surgeon of horse were ever known to agree. The doctor had watched, during the night, by the side of the bed of Captain Singleton, without once closing his eyes. Occasionally he would pay a visit to the wounded Englishman, who, being more hurt in the spirit than in the flesh, tolerated the interruptions with a very ill grace; and once, for an instant, he ventured to steal softly to the bed of his obstinate comrade, and was near succeeding in obtaining a touch of his pulse, when a terrible oath, sworn by the trooper in a dream, startled the prudent surgeon, and warned him of a trite saying in the corps, “that Captain Lawton always slept with one eye open.” This group had assembled in one of the parlors as the sun made its appearance over the eastern hill, dispersing the columns of fog which had enveloped the lowland.

Miss Peyton was looking from a window in the direction of the tenement of the peddler, and was expressing a kind anxiety after the welfare of the sick man, when the person of Katy suddenly emerged from the dense covering of an earthly cloud, whose mists were scattering before the cheering rays of the sun, and was seen making hasty steps towards the Locusts. There was that in the air of the housekeeper which bespoke distress of an unusual nature, and the kind-hearted mistress of the Locusts opened the door of the room, with the benevolent intention of soothing a grief that seemed so overwhelming. A nearer view of the disturbed features of the visitor confirmed Miss Peyton in her belief; and, with the shock that gentle feelings ever experience at a sudden and endless separation from even the meanest of their associates, she said hastily,—

“Katy, is he gone?”

“No, ma’am,” replied the disturbed damsel, with great bitterness, “he is not yet gone, but he may go as soon as he pleases now, for the worst is done. I do verily believe, Miss Peyton, they haven’t so much as left him money enough to buy him another suit of clothes to cover his nakedness, and those he has on are none of the best, I can tell you.”

“How!” exclaimed the other, astonished, “could anyone have the heart to plunder a man in such distress?”

“Hearts,” repeated Katy, catching her breath. “Men like them have no bowels” at all. Plunder and distress, indeed! Why, ma’am, there were in the iron pot, in plain sight, fifty-four guineas of gold, besides what lay underneath, which I couldn’t count without handling; and I didn’t like to touch it, for they say that another’s gold is apt to stick—so, judging from that in sight, there wasn’t less than two hundred guineas, besides what might have been in the deerskin purse. But Harvey is little better now than a beggar; and a beggar, Miss Jeanette, is the most awfully despisable of all earthly creatures.”

“Poverty is to be pitied, and not despised,” said the lady, still unable to comprehend the extent of the misfortune that had befallen her neighbor during the night. “But how is the old man? And does this loss affect him much?”

The countenance of Katy changed, from the natural expression of concern, to the set form of melancholy, as she answered,—

“He is happily removed from the cares of the world; the chinking of the money made him get out of his bed, and the poor soul found the shock too great for him. He died about two hours and ten minutes before the cock crowed, as near as we can say.” She was interrupted by the physician, who, approaching, inquired, with much interest, the nature of the disorder. Glancing her eye over the figure of this new acquaintance, Katy instinctively adjusting her dress, replied,—

“’Twas the troubles of the times, and the loss of property, that brought him down; he wasted from day to day, and all my care and anxiety were lost; for now Harvey is no better than a beggar, and who is there to pay me for what I have done?”

“God will reward you for all the good you have done,” said Miss Peyton, mildly.

“Yes,” interrupted the spinster hastily, and with an air of reverence that was instantly succeeded by an expression that denoted more of worldly care; “but then I have left my wages for three years past in the hands of Harvey, and how am I to get them? My brothers told me, again and again, to ask for my money; but I always thought accounts between relations were easily settled.”

“Were you related, then, to Birch?” asked Miss Peyton, observing her to pause.

“Why,” returned the housekeeper, hesitating a little, “I thought we were as good as so. I wonder if I have no claim on the house and garden; though they say, now it is Harvey’s, it will surely be confiscated.” Turning to Lawton, who had been sitting in one posture, with his piercing eyes lowering at her through his thick brows, in silence, “Perhaps this gentleman knows—he seems to take an interest in my story.”

“Madam,” said the trooper, bowing very low, “both you and the tale are extremely interesting”—Katy smiled involuntarily—“but my humble knowledge is limited to the setting of a squadron in the field, and using it when there. I beg leave to refer you to Dr. Archibald Sitgreaves, a gentleman of universal attainments and unbounded philanthropy; the very milk of human sympathies, and a mortal foe to all indiscriminate cutting.”

The surgeon drew up, and employed himself in whistling a low air, as he looked over some phials on a table; but the housekeeper, turning to him with an inclination of the head, continued,—

“I suppose, sir, a woman has no dower in her husband’s property, unless they be actually married.”

It was a maxim with Dr. Sitgreaves, that no species of knowledge was to be despised; and, consequently, he was an empiric in everything but his profession. At first, indignation at the irony of his comrade kept him silent; but, suddenly changing his purpose, he answered the applicant with a good-natured smile,—

“I judge not. If death has anticipated your nuptials, I am fearful you have no remedy against his stern decrees.”

To Katy this sounded well, although she understood nothing of its meaning, but “death” and “nuptials.” To this part of his speech, then, she directed her reply.

“I did think he only waited the death of the old gentleman before he married,” said the housekeeper, looking on the carpet. “But now he is nothing more than despisable, or, what’s the same thing, a peddler without house, pack, or money. It might be hard for a man to get a wife at all in such a predicary—don’t you think it would, Miss Peyton?”

“I seldom trouble myself with such things,” said the lady gravely.

During this dialogue Captain Lawton had been studying the countenance and manner of the housekeeper, with a most ludicrous gravity; and, fearful the conversation would cease, he inquired, with an appearance of great interest,—

“You think it was age and debility that removed the old gentleman at last?”

“And the troublesome times. Trouble is a heavy pull down to a sick bed; but I suppose his time had come, and when that happens, it matters but little what doctor’s stuff we take.”

“Let me set you right in that particular,” interrupted the surgeon. “We must all die, it is true, but it is permitted us to use the lights of science, in arresting dangers as they occur, until—”

“We can die secundem artem,” cried the trooper.

To this observation the physician did not deign to reply; but, deeming it necessary to his professional dignity that the conversation should continue, he added,—

“Perhaps, in this instance, judicious treatment might have prolonged the life of the patient. Who administered to the case?”

“No one yet,” said the housekeeper, with quickness. “I expect he has made his last will and testament.”

The surgeon disregarded the smile of the ladies, and pursued his inquiries.

“It is doubtless wise to be prepared for death. But under whose care was the sick man during his indisposition?”

“Under mine,” answered Katy, with an air of a little importance. “And care thrown away I may well call it; for Harvey is quite too despisable to be any sort of compensation at present.”

The mutual ignorance of each other’s meaning made very little interruption to the dialogue, for both took a good deal for granted, and Sitgreaves pursued the subject.

“And how did you treat him?”

“Kindly, you may be certain,” said Katy, rather tartly.

“The doctor means medically, madam,” observed Captain Lawton, with a face that would have honored the funeral of the deceased.

“I doctored him mostly with yarbs,” said the housekeeper, smiling, as if conscious of error.

“With simples,” returned the surgeon. “They are safer in the hands of the unlettered than more powerful remedies; but why had you no regular attendant?”

“I’m sure Harvey has suffered enough already from having so much concerns with the rig’lars,” replied the housekeeper. “He has lost his all, and made himself a vagabond through the land; and I have reason to rue the day I ever crossed the threshold of his house.”

“Dr. Sitgreaves does not mean a rig’lar soldier, but a regular physician, madam,” said the trooper.

“Oh!” cried the maiden, again correcting herself, “for the best of all reasons; there was none to be had, so I took care of him myself. If there had been a doctor at hand, I am sure we would gladly have had him; for my part, I am clear for doctoring, though Harvey says I am killing myself with medicines; but I am sure it will make but little difference to him, whether I live or die.”

“Therein you show your sense,” said the surgeon, approaching the spinster, who sat holding the palms of her hands and the soles of her feet to the genial heat of a fine fire, making the most of comfort amid all her troubles. “You appear to be a sensible, discreet woman, and some who have had opportunities of acquiring more correct views might envy you your respect for knowledge and the lights of science.”

Although the housekeeper did not altogether comprehend the other’s meaning, she knew he used a compliment, and as such was highly pleased with what he said. With increased animation, therefore, she cried, “It was always said of me, that I wanted nothing but opportunity to make quite a physician myself; so long as before I came to live with Harvey’s father, they called me the petticoat doctor.”

“More true than civil, I dare say,” returned the surgeon, losing sight of the woman’s character in his admiration of her respect for the healing art. “In the absence of more enlightened counselors, the experience of a discreet matron is frequently of great efficacy in checking the progress of disease; under such circumstances, madam, it is dreadful to have to contend with ignorance and obstinacy.”

“Bad enough, as I well know from experience,” cried Katy, in triumph. “Harvey is as obstinate about such things as a dumb beast; one would think the care I took of his bedridden father might learn him better than to despise good nursing. But some day he may know what it is to want a careful woman in his house, though now I am sure he is too despisable himself to have a house.”

“Indeed, I can easily comprehend the mortification you must have felt in having one so self-willed to deal with,” returned the surgeon, glancing his eyes reproachfully at his comrade. “But you should rise superior to such opinions, and pity the ignorance by which they are engendered.”

The housekeeper hesitated a moment, at a loss to comprehend all that the surgeon expressed, yet she felt it was both complimentary and kind; therefore, suppressing her natural flow of language a little, she replied,—

“I tell Harvey his conduct is often condemnable, and last night he made my words good; but the opinions of such unbelievers is not very consequential; yet it is dreadful to think how he behaves at times: now, when he threw away the needle—”

“What!” said the surgeon, interrupting her, “does he affect to despise the needle? But it is my lot to meet with men, daily, who are equally perverse, and who show a still more culpable disrespect for the information that flows from the lights of science.”

The doctor turned his face towards Captain Lawton while speaking, but the elevation of the head prevented his eyes from resting on the grave countenance maintained by the trooper. Katy listened with admiring attention, and when the other had done, she added,—

“Then Harvey is a disbeliever in the tides.”

“Not believe in the tides!” repeated the healer of bodies in astonishment. “Does the man distrust his senses? But perhaps it is the influence of the moon that he doubts.”

“That he does!” exclaimed Katy, shaking with delight at meeting with a man of learning, who could support her opinions. “If you was to hear him talk, you would think he didn’t believe there was such a thing as a moon at all.”

“It is the misfortune of ignorance and incredulity, madam, that they feed themselves. The mind, once rejecting useful information, insensibly leans to superstition and conclusions on the order of nature, that are not less prejudicial to the cause of truth, than they are at variance with the first principles of human knowledge.”

The spinster was too much awe-struck to venture an undigested reply to this speech; and the surgeon, after pausing a moment in a kind of philosophical disdain, continued,—

“That any man in his senses can doubt of the flux of the tides is more than I could have thought possible; yet obstinacy is a dangerous inmate to harbor, and may lead us into any error, however gross.”

“You think, then, they have an effect on the flux?” said the housekeeper, inquiringly.

Miss Peyton rose and beckoned her nieces to give her their assistance in the adjoining pantry, while for a moment the dark visage of the attentive Lawton was lighted by an animation that vanished by an effort, as powerful and as sudden, as the one that drew it into being.

After reflecting whether he rightly understood the meaning of the other, the surgeon, making due allowance for the love of learning, acting upon a want of education, replied,—

“The moon, you mean; many philosophers have doubted how far it affects the tides; but I think it is willfully rejecting the lights of science not to believe it causes both the flux and reflux.”

As reflux was a disorder with which Katy was not acquainted, she thought it prudent to be silent; yet burning with curiosity to know the meaning of certain portentous lights to which the other so often alluded, she ventured to ask,—

“If them lights he spoke of were what was called northern lights in these parts?”

In charity to her ignorance, the surgeon would have entered into an elaborate explanation of his meaning, had he not been interrupted by the mirth of Lawton. The trooper had listened so far with great composure; but now he laughed until his aching bones reminded him of his fall, and the tears rolled over his cheeks in larger drops than had ever been seen there before. At length the offended physician seized an opportunity of a pause to say,—

“To you, Captain Lawton, it may be a source of triumph, that an uneducated woman should make a mistake in a subject on which men of science have long been at variance; but yet you find this respectable matron does not reject the lights—does not reject the use of proper instruments in repairing injuries sustained by the human frame. You may possibly remember, sir, her allusion to the use of the needle.”

“Aye,” cried the delighted trooper, “to mend the peddler’s breeches.”

Katy drew up in evident displeasure, and prompt to vindicate her character for more lofty acquirements, she said,—

“’Twas not a common use that I put that needle to—but one of much greater virtue.”

“Explain yourself, madam,” said the surgeon impatiently, “that this gentleman may see how little reason he has for exultation.”

Thus solicited, Katy paused to collect sufficient eloquence to garnish her narrative. The substance of her tale was, that a child who had been placed by the guardians of the poor in the keeping of Harvey, had, in the absence of its master, injured itself badly in the foot by a large needle. The offending instrument had been carefully greased, wrapped in woolen, and placed in a certain charmed nook of the chimney; while the foot, from a fear of weakening the incantation, was left in a state of nature. The arrival of the peddler had altered the whole of this admirable treatment; and the consequences were expressed by Katy, as she concluded her narrative, by saying,—

“’Twas no wonder the boy died of a lockjaw!”

Doctor Sitgreaves looked out of the window in admiration of the brilliant morning, striving all he could to avoid the basilisk’s eyes of his comrade. He was impelled, by a feeling that he could not conquer, however, to look Captain Lawton in the face. The trooper had arranged every muscle of his countenance to express sympathy for the fate of the poor child; but the exultation of his eyes cut the astounded man of science to the quick; he muttered something concerning the condition of his patients, and retreated with precipitation.

Miss Peyton entered into the situation of things at the house of the peddler, with all the interest of her excellent feelings; she listened patiently while Katy recounted, more particularly, the circumstances of the past night as they had occurred. The spinster did not forget to dwell on the magnitude of the pecuniary loss sustained by Harvey, and in no manner spared her invectives, at his betraying a secret which might so easily have been kept.

“For, Miss Peyton,” continued the housekeeper, after a pause to take breath, “I would have given up life before I would have given up that secret. At the most, they could only have killed him, and now a body may say that they have slain both soul and body; or, what’s the same thing, they have made him a despisable vagabond. I wonder who he thinks would be his wife, or who would keep his house, For my part, my good name is too precious to be living with a lone man; though, for the matter of that, he is never there. I am resolved to tell him this day, that stay there a single woman, I will not an hour after the funeral; and marry him I don’t think I will, unless he becomes steadier and more of a home body.”

The mild mistress of the Locusts suffered the exuberance of the housekeeper’s feelings to expend itself, and then, by one or two judicious questions, that denoted a more intimate knowledge of the windings of the human heart in matters of Cupid than might fairly be supposed to belong to a spinster, she extracted enough from Katy to discover the improbability of Harvey’s ever presuming to offer himself, with his broken fortunes, to the acceptance of Katharine Haynes. She therefore mentioned her own want of assistance in the present state of her household, and expressed a wish that Katy would change her residence to the Locusts, in case the peddler had no further use for her services. After a few preliminary conditions on the part of the wary housekeeper, the arrangement was concluded; and making a few more piteous lamentations on the weight of her own losses and the stupidity of Harvey, united with some curiosity to know the future fate of the peddler, Katy withdrew to make the necessary preparations for the approaching funeral, which was to take place that day.

During the interview between the two females, Lawton, through delicacy, had withdrawn. Anxiety took him to the room of Captain Singleton. The character of this youth, it has already been shown, endeared him in a peculiar manner to every officer in the corps. The singularly mild deportment of the young dragoon had on so many occasions been proved not to proceed from want of resolution that his almost feminine softness of manner and appearance had failed to bring him into disrepute, even in that band of partisan warriors.

To the major he was as dear as a brother, and his easy submission to the directions of his surgeon had made him a marked favorite with Dr. Sitgreaves. The rough usage the corps often received in its daring attacks had brought each of its officers, in succession, under the temporary keeping of the surgeon. To Captain Singleton the man of science had decreed the palm of docility, on such occasions, and Captain Lawton he had fairly blackballed. He frequently declared, with unconquerable simplicity and earnestness of manner, that it gave him more pleasure to see the former brought in wounded than any officer in the squadron, and that the latter afforded him the least; a compliment and condemnation that were usually received by the first of the parties with a quiet smile of good nature, and by the last with a grave bow of thanks. On the present occasion, the mortified surgeon and exulting trooper met in the room of Captain Singleton, as a place where they could act on common ground. Some time was occupied in joint attentions to the comfort of the wounded officer, and the doctor retired to an apartment prepared for his own accommodation; here, within a few minutes, he was surprised by the entrance of Lawton. The triumph of the trooper had been so complete, that he felt he could afford to be generous, and commencing by voluntarily throwing aside his coat, he cried carelessly,—

“Sitgreaves, administer a little of the aid of the lights of science to my body, if you please.”

The surgeon was beginning to feel this was a subject that was intolerable, but venturing a glance towards his comrade, he saw with surprise the preparations he had made, and an air of sincerity about him, that was unusual to his manner when making such a request. Changing his intended burst of resentment to a tone of civil inquiry, he said,—

“Does Captain Lawton want anything at my hands?”

“Look for yourself, my dear sir,” said the trooper mildly. “Here seem to be most of the colors of the rainbow, on this shoulder.”

“You have reason for saying so,” said the other, handling the part with great tenderness and consummate skill. “But happily nothing is broken. It is wonderful how well you escaped!”

“I have been a tumbler from my youth, and I am past minding a few falls from a horse; but, Sitgreaves,” he added with affection, and pointing to a scar on his body, “do you remember this bit of work?”

“Perfectly well, Jack; it was bravely obtained, and neatly extracted; but don’t you think I had better apply an oil to these bruises?”

“Certainly,” said Lawton, with unexpected condescension.

“Now, my dear boy,” cried the doctor, exultantly, as he busied himself in applying the remedy to the hurts, “do you not think it would have been better to have done all this last night?”

“Quite probable.”

“Yes, Jack, but if you had let me perform the operation of phlebotomy when I first saw you, it would have been of infinite service.”

“No phlebotomy,” said the other, positively.

“It is now too late; but a dose of oil would carry off the humors famously.”

To this the captain made no reply, but grated his teeth, in a way that showed the fortress of his mouth was not to be assailed without a resolute resistance; and the experienced physician changed the subject by saying,—

“It is a pity, John, that you did not catch the rascal, after the danger and trouble you incurred.”

The captain of dragoons made no reply; and, while placing some bandages on the wounded shoulder, the surgeon continued,—

“If I have any wish at all to destroy human life, it is to have the pleasure of seeing that traitor hanged.”

“I thought your business was to cure, and not to slay,” said the trooper, dryly.

“Aye! but he has caused us such heavy losses by his information, that I sometimes feel a very unsophistical temper towards that spy.”

“You should not encourage such feelings of animosity to any of your fellow creatures,” returned Lawton, in a tone that caused the operator to drop a pin he was arranging in the bandages from his hand. He looked the patient in the face to remove all doubts of his identity; finding, however, it was his old comrade, Captain John Lawton, who had spoken, he rallied his astonished faculties, and proceeded by saying,—

“Your doctrine is just, and in general I subscribe to it. But, John, my dear fellow, is the bandage easy?”

“Quite.”

“I agree with you as a whole; but as matter is infinitely divisible, so no case exists without an exception. Lawton, do you feel easy?”

“Very.”

“It is not only cruel to the sufferer, but sometimes unjust to others, to take human life where a less punishment would answer the purpose. Now, Jack, if you were only—move your arm a little—if you were only—I hope you feel easier, my dear friend?”

“Much.”

“If, my dear John, you would teach your men to cut with more discretion, it would answer you the same purpose—and give me great pleasure.”

The doctor drew a heavy sigh, as he was enabled to get rid of what was nearest to the heart; and the dragoon coolly replaced his coat, saying with great deliberation as he retired,—

“I know no troop that cut more judiciously; they generally shave from the crown to the jaw.”

The disappointed operator collected his instruments, and with a heavy heart proceeded to pay a visit to the room of Colonel Wellmere.

This fairy form contains a soul as mighty,
As that which lives within a giant’s frame;
These slender limbs, that tremble like the aspen
At summer evening’s sigh, uphold a spirit,
Which, roused, can tower to the height of heaven,
And light those shining windows of the face
With much of heaven’s own radiance.

—Duo.

The number and character of her guests had greatly added to the cares of Miss Jeanette Peyton. The morning found them all restored, in some measure, to their former ease of body, with the exception of the youthful captain of dragoons, who had been so deeply regretted by Dunwoodie. The wound of this officer was severe, though the surgeon persevered in saying that it was without danger. His comrade, we have shown, had deserted his couch; and Henry Wharton awoke from a sleep that had been undisturbed by anything but a dream of suffering amputation under the hands of a surgical novice. As it proved, however, to be nothing but a dream, the youth found himself much refreshed by his slumbers; and Dr. Sitgreaves removed all further apprehensions by confidently pronouncing that he would be a well man within a fortnight.

During all this time Colonel Wellmere did not make his appearance; he breakfasted in his own room, and, notwithstanding certain significant smiles of the man of science, declared himself too much injured to rise from his bed. Leaving him, therefore, endeavoring to conceal his chagrin in the solitude of his chamber, the surgeon proceeded to the more grateful task of sitting an hour by the bedside of George Singleton. A slight flush was on the face of the patient as the doctor entered the room, and the latter advanced promptly and laid his fingers on the pulse of the youth, beckoning to him to be silent, while he muttered,—

“Growing symptoms of a febrile pulse—no, no, my dear George, you must remain quiet and dumb; though your eyes look better, and your skin has even a moisture.”

“Nay, my dear Sitgreaves,” said the youth, taking his hand, “you see there is no fever about me; look, is there any of Jack Lawton’s hoarfrost on my tongue?”

“No, indeed,” said the surgeon, clapping a spoon in the mouth of the other, forcing it open, and looking down his throat as if disposed to visit the interior in person. “The tongue is well, and the pulse begins to lower again. Ah! the bleeding did you good. Phlebotomy is a sovereign specific for southern constitutions. But that madcap Lawton absolutely refused to be blooded for a fall he had from his horse last night. Why, George, your case is becoming singular,” continued the doctor, instinctively throwing aside his wig. “Your pulse even and soft, your skin moist, but your eye fiery, and cheek flushed. Oh! I must examine more closely into these symptoms.”

“Softly, my good friend, softly,” said the youth, falling back on his pillow, and losing some of that color which alarmed his companion. “I believe, in extracting the ball, you did for me all that is required. I am free from pain and only weak, I do assure you.”

“Captain Singleton,” said the surgeon, with heat, “it is presumptuous in you to pretend to tell your medical attendant when you are free from pain. If it be not to enable us to decide in such matters, of what avail the lights of science? For shame, George, for shame! Even that perverse fellow, John Lawton, could not behave with more obstinacy.”

His patient smiled, as he gently repulsed his physician in an attempt to undo the bandages, and with a returning glow to his cheeks, inquired,—

“Do, Archibald,”—a term of endearment that seldom failed to soften the operator’s heart,—“tell me what spirit from heaven has been gliding around my apartment, while I lay pretending to sleep?”

“If anyone interferes with my patients,” cried the doctor, hastily, “I will teach them, spirit or no spirit, what it is to meddle with another man’s concerns.”

“Tut—my dear fellow, there was no interference made, nor any intended. See,” exhibiting the bandages, “everything is as you left it,—but it glided about the room with the grace of a fairy and the tenderness of an angel.”

The surgeon, having satisfied himself that everything was as he had left it, very deliberately resumed his seat and replaced his wig, as he inquired, with a brevity that would have honored Lieutenant Mason,—

“Had it petticoats, George?”

“I saw nothing but its heavenly eyes—its bloom—its majestic step—its grace,” replied the young man, with rather more ardor than his surgeon thought consistent with his debilitated condition; and he laid his hand on his mouth to stop him, saying himself,—

“It must have been Miss Jeanette Peyton—a lady of fine accomplishments, with—hem—with something of the kind of step you speak of—a very complacent eye; and as to the bloom, I dare say offices of charity can summon as fine a color to her cheeks, as glows in the faces of her more youthful nieces.”

“Nieces? Has she nieces, then? The angel I saw may be a daughter, a sister, or a niece,—but never an aunt.”

“Hush, George, hush; your talking has brought your pulse up again. You must observe quiet, and prepare for a meeting with your own sister, who will be here within an hour.”

“What, Isabella! And who sent for her?”

“The major.”

“Considerate Dunwoodie!” murmured the exhausted youth, sinking again on his pillow, where the commands of his attendant compelled him to remain silent.

Even Captain Lawton had been received with many and courteous inquiries after the state of his health, from all the members of the family, when he made his morning entrance; but an invisible spirit presided over the comforts of the English colonel. Sarah had shrunk with consciousness from entering the room; yet she knew the position of every glass, and had, with her own hands, supplied the contents of every bowl, that stood on his table.

At the time of our tale, we were a divided people, and Sarah thought it was no more than her duty to cherish the institutions of that country to which she yet clung as the land of her forefathers; but there were other and more cogent reasons for the silent preference she was giving to the Englishman. His image had first filled the void in her youthful fancy, and it was an image that was distinguished by many of those attractions that can enchain a female heart. It is true, he wanted the personal excellence of Peyton Dunwoodie, but his pretensions were far from contemptible. Sarah had moved about the house during the morning, casting frequent and longing glances at the door of Wellmere’s apartment, anxious to learn the condition of his wounds, and yet ashamed to inquire; conscious interest kept her tongue tied, until her sister, with the frankness of innocence, had put the desired question to Dr. Sitgreaves.

“Colonel Wellmere,” said the operator, gravely, “is in what I call a state of free will, madam. He is ill, or he is well, as he pleases. His case, young lady, exceeds my art to heal; and I take it Sir Henry Clinton is the best adviser he can apply to; though Major Dunwoodie has made the communication with his leech rather difficult.”

Frances smiled, but averted her face, while Sarah moved, with the grace of an offended Juno, from the apartment. Her own room, however, afforded her but little relief, and in passing through the long gallery that communicated with each of the chambers of the building, she noticed the door of Singleton’s room to be open. The wounded youth seemed sleeping, and was alone. She had ventured lightly into the apartment, and busied herself for a few minutes in arranging the tables, and the nourishment provided for the patient, hardly conscious of what she was doing, and possibly dreaming that these little feminine offices were performed for another. Her natural bloom was heightened by the insinuation of the surgeon, nor was the luster of her eye in any degree diminished. The sound of the approaching footsteps of Sitgreaves hastened her retreat down a private stairway, to the side of her sister. The sisters then sought the fresh air on the piazza; and as they pursued their walk, arm in arm, the following dialogue took place:—

“There is something disagreeable about this surgeon of Dunwoodie,” said
Sarah, “that causes me to wish him away most heartily.”

Frances fixed her laughing eyes on her sister; but forbearing to speak, the other readily construed their expression, and hastily added, “But I forget he is one of your renowned corps of Virginians, and must be spoken of reverently.”

“As respectfully as you please, my dear sister; there is but little danger of exceeding the truth.”

“Not in your opinion,” said the elder, with a little warmth. “But I think Mr. Dunwoodie has taken a liberty that exceeds the rights of consanguinity; he has made our father’s house a hospital.”

“We ought to be grateful that none of the patients it contains are dearer to us.”

“Your brother is one.”

“True, true,” interrupted Frances, blushing to the eyes; “but he leaves his room, and thinks his wound lightly purchased by the pleasure of being with his friends. If,” she added, with a tremulous lip, “this dreadful suspicion that is affixed to his visit were removed, I could consider his wound of little moment.”

“You now have the fruits of rebellion brought home to you; a brother wounded and a prisoner, and perhaps a victim; your father distressed, his privacy interrupted, and not improbably his estates torn from him, on account of his loyalty to his king.”

Frances continued her walk in silence. While facing the northern entrance to the vale, her eyes were uniformly fastened on the point where the road was suddenly lost by the intervention of a hill; and at each turn, as she lost sight of the spot, she lingered until an impatient movement of her sister quickened her pace to an even motion with that of her own. At length, a single horse chaise was seen making its way carefully among the stones which lay scattered over the country road that wound through the valley, and approached the cottage. The color of Frances changed as the vehicle gradually drew nearer; and when she was enabled to see a female form in it by the side of a black in livery, her limbs shook with an agitation that compelled her to lean on Sarah for support. In a few minutes the travelers approached the gate. It was thrown open by a dragoon who followed the carriage, and who had been the messenger dispatched by Dunwoodie to the father of Captain Singleton. Miss Peyton advanced to receive their guest, and the sisters united in giving her the kindest welcome; still Frances could with difficulty withdraw her truant eyes from the countenance of their visitor. She was young, and of a light and fragile form, but of exquisite proportions. Her eyes were large, full, black, piercing, and at times a little wild. Her hair was luxuriant, and as it was without the powder it was then the fashion to wear, it fell in raven blackness. A few of its locks had fallen on her cheek, giving its chilling whiteness by the contrast a more deadly character. Dr. Sitgreaves supported her from the chaise; and when she gained the floor of the piazza, she turned an expressive look on the face of the practitioner.

“Your brother is out of danger and wishes to see you, Miss Singleton,” said the surgeon.

The lady burst into a flood of tears. Frances had stood contemplating the action and face of Isabella with a kind of uneasy admiration, but she now sprang to her side with the ardor of a sister, and kindly drawing her arm within her own, led the way to a retired room. The movement was so ingenuous, so considerate, and so delicate, that even Miss Peyton withheld her interference, following the youthful pair with only her eyes and a smile of complacency. The feeling was communicated to all the spectators, and they dispersed in pursuit of their usual avocations. Isabella yielded to the gentle influence of Frances without resistance; and, having gained the room where the latter conducted her, wept in silence on the shoulder of the observant and soothing girl, until Frances thought her tears exceeded the emotion natural to the occasion. The sobs of Miss Singleton for a time were violent and uncontrollable, until, with an evident exertion, she yielded to a kind observation of her companion, and succeeded in suppressing her tears. Raising her face to the eyes of Frances, she rose, while a smile of beautiful radiance passed over her features; and making a hasty apology for the excess of her emotion, she desired to be conducted to the room of the invalid.

The meeting between the brother and sister was warm, but, by an effort on the part of the lady, more composed than her previous agitation had given reason to expect. Isabella found her brother looking better, and in less danger than her sensitive imagination had led her to suppose. Her spirits rose in proportion; from despondency, she passed to something like gayety; her beautiful eyes sparkled with renovated brilliancy; and her face was lighted with smiles so fascinating, that Frances, who, in compliance with her earnest entreaties, had accompanied her to the sick chamber, sat gazing on a countenance that possessed so wonderful variability, impelled by a charm that was beyond her control. The youth had thrown an earnest look at Frances, as soon as his sister raised herself from his arms, and perhaps it was the first glance at the lovely lineaments of our heroine, when the gazer turned his eyes from the view in disappointment. He seemed bewildered, rubbed his forehead like a man awaking from a dream, and mused.

“Where is Dunwoodie, Isabella?” he said. “The excellent fellow is never weary of kind actions. After a day of such service as that of yesterday, he has spent the night in bringing me a nurse, whose presence alone is able to raise me from my couch.”

The expression of the lady’s countenance changed; her eye roved around the apartment with a character of wildness in it that repelled the anxious Frances, who studied her movements with unabated interest.

“Dunwoodie! Is he then not here? I thought to have met him by the side of my brother’s bed.”

“He has duties that require his presence elsewhere; the English are said to be out by the way of the Hudson, and they give us light troops but little rest. Surely nothing else could have kept him so long from a wounded friend. But, Isabella, the meeting has been too much for you; you tremble.”

Isabella made no reply; she stretched her hand towards the table which held the nourishment of the captain, and the attentive Frances comprehended her wishes in a moment. A glass of water in some measure revived the sister, who was enabled to say,—

“Doubtless it is his duty. ’Twas said above, a royal party was moving on the river; though I passed the troops but two miles from this spot.” The latter part of the sentence was hardly audible, and it was spoken more in the manner of a soliloquy, than as if for the ears of her companions.

“On the march, Isabella?” eagerly inquired her brother.

“No, dismounted, and seemingly at rest,” was the reply.

The wondering dragoon turned his gaze on the countenance of his sister, who sat with her eye bent on the carpet in unconscious absence, but found no explanation. His look was changed to the face of Frances, who, startled by the earnestness of his expression, arose, and hastily inquired if he would have any assistance.

“If you can pardon the rudeness,” said the wounded officer, making a feeble effort to raise his body, “I would request to have Captain Lawton’s company for a moment.”

Frances hastened instantly to communicate his wish to that gentleman, and impelled by an interest she could not control, she returned again to her seat by the side of Miss Singleton.

“Lawton,” said the youth, impatiently, as the trooper entered, “hear you from the major?”

The eye of the sister was now bent on the face of the trooper, who made his salutations to the lady with ease, blended with the frankness of a soldier.

“His man has been here twice,” he said, “to inquire how we fared in the lazaretto.”

“And why not himself?”

“That is a question the major can answer best; but you know the redcoats are abroad, and Dunwoodie commands in the county; these English must be looked to.”

“True,” said Singleton, slowly, as if struck with the other’s reasons.
“But how is it that you are idle, when there is work to do?”

“My sword arm is not in the best condition, and Roanoke has but a shambling gait this morning; besides, there is another reason I could mention, if it were not that Miss Wharton would never forgive me.”

“Speak, I beg, without dread of my displeasure,” said Frances, returning the good-humored smile of the trooper, with the archness natural to her own sweet face.

“The odors of your kitchen, then,” cried Lawton bluntly, “forbid my quitting the domains, until I qualify myself to speak with more certainty concerning the fatness of the land.”

“Oh! Aunt Jeanette is exerting herself to do credit to my father’s hospitality,” said the laughing girl, “and I am a truant from her labors, as I shall be a stranger to her favor, unless I proffer my assistance.”

Frances withdrew to seek her aunt, musing deeply on the character and extreme sensibility of the new acquaintance chance had brought to the cottage.

The wounded officer followed her with his eyes, as she moved, with infantile grace, through the door of his apartment, and as she vanished from his view, he observed,—

“Such an aunt and niece are seldom to be met with, Jack; this seems a fairy, but the aunt is angelic.”

“You are doing well, I see; your enthusiasm for the sex holds its own.”

“I should be ungrateful as well as insensible, did I not bear testimony to the loveliness of Miss Peyton.”

“A good motherly lady, but as to love, that is a matter of taste. A few years younger, with deference to her prudence and experience, would accord better with my fancy.”

“She must be under twenty,” said the other, quickly.

“It depends on the way you count. If you begin at the heel of life, well; but if you reckon downward, as is most common, I think she is nearer forty.”

“You have mistaken an elder sister for the aunt,” said Isabella, laying her fair hand on the mouth of the invalid. “You must be silent! Your feelings are beginning to affect your frame.”

The entrance of Dr. Sitgreaves, who, in some alarm, noticed the increase of feverish symptoms in his patient, enforced this mandate; and the trooper withdrew to pay a visit of condolence to Roanoke, who had been an equal sufferer with himself in their last night’s somersault. To his great joy, his man pronounced the steed to be equally convalescent with the master; and Lawton found that by dint of rubbing the animal’s limbs several hours without ceasing, he was enabled to place his feet in what he called systematic motion. Orders were accordingly given to be in readiness to rejoin the troop at the Four Corners, as soon as his master had shared in the bounty of the approaching banquet.

In the meantime, Henry Wharton entered the apartment of Wellmere, and by his sympathy succeeded in restoring the colonel to his own good graces. The latter was consequently enabled to rise, and prepared to meet a rival of whom he had spoken so lightly, and, as the result had proved, with so little reason. Wharton knew that their misfortune, as they both termed their defeat, was owing to the other’s rashness; but he forbore to speak of anything except the unfortunate accident which had deprived the English of their leader, and to which he good-naturedly ascribed their subsequent discomfiture.

“In short, Wharton,” said the colonel, putting one leg out of bed, “it may be called a combination of untoward events; your own ungovernable horse prevented my orders from being carried to the major, in season to flank the rebels.”

“Very true,” replied the captain, kicking a slipper towards the bed. “Had we succeeded in getting a few good fires upon them in flank, we should have sent these brave Virginians to the right about.”

“Aye, and that in double-quick time,” cried the colonel, making the other leg follow its companion. “Then it was necessary to rout the guides, you know, and the movement gave them the best possible opportunity to charge.”

“Yes,” said the other, sending the second slipper after the first, “and this Major Dunwoodie never overlooks an advantage.”

“I think if we had the thing to do over again,” continued the colonel, raising himself on his feet, “we might alter the case very materially, though the chief thing the rebels have now to boast of is my capture; they were repulsed, you saw, in their attempt to drive us from the wood.”

“At least they would have been, had they made an attack,” said the captain, throwing the rest of his clothes within reach of the colonel.

“Why, that is the same thing,” returned Wellmere, beginning to dress himself. “To assume such an attitude as to intimidate your enemy, is the chief art of war.”

“Doubtless, then, you may remember in one of their charges they were completely routed.”

“True—true,” cried the colonel, with animation. “Had I been there to have improved that advantage, we might have turned the table on the Yankees”; saying which he displayed still greater animation in completing his toilet; and he was soon prepared to make his appearance, fully restored to his own good opinion, and fairly persuaded that his capture was owing to casualties absolutely beyond the control of man.

The knowledge that Colonel Wellmere was to be a guest at the table in no degree diminished the preparations which were already making for the banquet; and Sarah, after receiving the compliments of the gentleman, and making many kind inquiries after the state of his wounds, proceeded in person to lend her counsel and taste to one of those labored entertainments, which, at that day, were so frequent in country life, and which are not entirely banished from our domestic economy at the present moment.

I will stand to and feed,
Although my last.

—Tempest.

The savor of preparation which had been noticed by Captain Lawton began to increase within the walls of the cottage; certain sweet-smelling odors, that arose from the subterranean territories of Caesar, gave to the trooper the most pleasing assurances that his olfactory nerves, which on such occasions were as acute as his eyes on others, had faithfully performed their duty; and for the benefit of enjoying the passing sweets as they arose, the dragoon so placed himself at a window of the building, that not a vapor charged with the spices of the East could exhale on its passage to the clouds, without first giving its incense to his nose. Lawton, however, by no means indulged himself in this comfortable arrangement, without first making such preparations to do meet honor to the feast, as his scanty wardrobe would allow. The uniform of his corps was always a passport to the best tables, and this, though somewhat tarnished by faithful service and unceremonious usage, was properly brushed and decked out for the occasion. His head, which nature had ornamented with the blackness of a crow, now shone with the whiteness of snow; and his bony hand, that so well became the saber, peered from beneath a ruffle with something like maiden coyness. The improvements of the dragoon went no further, excepting that his boots shone with more than holiday splendor, and his spurs glittered in the rays of the sun, as became the pure ore of which they were composed.

Caesar moved through the apartments with a face charged with an importance exceeding even that which had accompanied him in his melancholy task of the morning. The black had early returned from the errand on which he had been dispatched by the peddler, and, obedient to the commands of his mistress, promptly appeared to give his services where his allegiance was due; so serious, indeed, was his duty now becoming, that it was only at odd moments he was enabled to impart to his sable brother, who had been sent in attendance on Miss Singleton to the Locusts, any portion of the wonderful incidents of the momentous night he had so lately passed. By ingeniously using, however, such occasions as accidentally offered, Caesar communicated so many of the heads of his tale, as served to open the eyes of his visitor to their fullest width. The gusto for the marvelous was innate in these sable worthies; and Miss Peyton found it necessary to interpose her authority, in order to postpone the residue of the history to a more befitting opportunity.

“Ah! Miss Jinnett,” said Caesar, shaking his head, and looking all that he expressed, “’twas awful to see Johnny Birch walk on a feet when he lie dead!”

This concluded the conversation; though the black promised himself the satisfaction, and did not fail to enjoy it, of having many a gossip on the subject at a future period.

The ghost thus happily laid, the department of Miss Peyton flourished; and by the time the afternoon’s sun had traveled a two hours’ journey from the meridian, the formal procession from the kitchen to the parlor commenced, under the auspices of Caesar, who led the van, supporting a turkey on the palms of his withered hands, with the dexterity of a balance master.

Next followed the servant of Captain Lawton, bearing, as he marched stiffly, and walking wide, as if allowing room for his steed, a ham of true Virginian flavor; a present from the spinster’s brother in Accomac. The supporter of this savory dish kept his eye on his trust with military precision; and by the time he reached his destination, it might be difficult to say which contained the most juice, his own mouth or the Accomac bacon.

Third in the line was to be seen the valet of Colonel Wellmere, who carried in either hand chickens fricasseed and oyster patties.

After him marched the attendant of Dr. Sitgreaves, who had instinctively seized an enormous tureen, as most resembling matters he understood, and followed on in place, until the steams of the soup so completely bedimmed the spectacles he wore, as a badge of office, that, on arriving at the scene of action, he was compelled to deposit his freight on the floor, until, by removing the glasses, he could see his way through the piles of reserved china and plate warmers.

Next followed another trooper, whose duty it was to attend on Captain Singleton; and, as if apportioning his appetite to the feeble state of his master, he had contented himself with conveying a pair of ducks, roasted, until their tempting fragrance began to make him repent his having so lately demolished a breakfast that had been provided for his master’s sister, with another prepared for himself.

The white boy, who belonged to the house, brought up the rear, groaning under a load of sundry dishes of vegetables, that the cook, by way of climax, had unwittingly heaped on him.

But this was far from all of the preparations for that day’s feast; Caesar had no sooner deposited his bird, which, but the week before, had been flying amongst the highlands of Dutchess, little dreaming of so soon heading such a goodly assemblage, than he turned mechanically on his heel, and took up his line of march again for the kitchen. In this evolution the black was imitated by his companions in succession, and another procession to the parlor followed in the same order. By this admirable arrangement, whole flocks of pigeons, certain bevies of quails, shoals of flatfish, bass, and sundry woodcock, found their way into the presence of the company.

A third attack brought suitable quantities of potatoes, onions, beets, coldslaw, rice, and all the other minutiae of a goodly dinner.

The board now fairly groaned with American profusion, and Caesar, glancing his eye over the show with a most approving conscience, after readjusting every dish that had not been placed on the table with his own hands, proceeded to acquaint the mistress of the revels that his task was happily accomplished.

Some half hour before the culinary array just recorded took place, all the ladies disappeared, much in the same unaccountable manner that swallows flee the approach of winter. But the springtime of their return had arrived, and the whole party were collected in an apartment that, in consequence of its containing no side table, and being furnished with a chintz coverlet settee, was termed a withdrawing-room.

The kind-hearted spinster had deemed the occasion worthy, not only of extraordinary preparations in the culinary department, but had seen proper to deck her own person in garments suited to the guests whom it was now her happiness to entertain.

On her head Miss Peyton wore a cap of exquisite lawn, which was ornamented in front with a broad border of lace, that spread from the face in such a manner as to admit of a display of artificial flowers, clustered in a group on the summit of her fine forehead.

The color of her hair was lost in the profusion of powder with which it was covered; but a slight curling of the extremities in some degree relieved the formality of its arrangement, and gave a look of feminine softness to the features.

Her dress was a rich, heavy silk, of violet color, cut low around the bust, with a stomacher of the same material, that fitted close to the figure, and exhibited the form, from the shoulders to the waist in its true proportions. Below, the dress was full, and sufficiently showed that parsimony in attire was not a foible of the day. A small loop displayed the beauty of the fabric to advantage, and aided in giving majesty to the figure.

The tall stature of the lady was heightened by shoes of the same material with the dress, whose heels added more than an inch to the liberality of nature.

The sleeves were short, and close to the limb, until they fell off at the elbows in large ruffles, that hung in rich profusion from the arm when extended; and duplicates and triplicates of lawn, trimmed with Dresden lace, lent their aid in giving delicacy to a hand and arm that yet retained their whiteness and symmetry. A treble row of large pearls closely encircled her throat; and a handkerchief of lace partially concealed that part of the person that the silk had left exposed, but which the experience of forty years had warned Miss Peyton should now be veiled.

Thus attired, and standing erect with the lofty grace that distinguished the manners of that day, the maiden would have looked into nothingness a bevy of modern belles.

The taste of Sarah had kept even pace with the decorations of her aunt; and a dress, differing in no respect from the one just described, but in material and tints, exhibited her imposing form to equal advantage. The satin of her robe was of a pale bluish color. Twenty years did not, however, require the screen that was prudent in forty, and nothing but an envious border of exquisite lace hid, in some measure, what the satin left exposed to view. The upper part of the bust, and the fine fall of the shoulders, were blazing in all their native beauty, and, like the aunt, the throat was ornamented by a treble row of pearls, to correspond with which were rings of the same quality in the ears. The head was without a cap, and the hair drawn up from the countenance so as to give to the eye all the loveliness of a forehead as polished as marble and as white as snow. A few straggling curls fell gracefully on the neck, and a bouquet of artificial flowers was also placed, like a coronet, over her brow.

Miss Singleton had resigned her brother to the advice of Dr. Sitgreaves, who had succeeded in getting his patient into a deep sleep after quieting certain feverish symptoms that followed the agitation of the interview. The sister was persuaded, by the observant mistress of the mansion, to make one of the party, and she sat by the side of Sarah, differing but little in appearance from that lady, except in refusing the use of powder on her raven locks, and that her unusually high forehead and large, brilliant eyes gave an expression of thoughtfulness to her features, that was possibly heightened by the paleness of her cheek.

Last and least, but not the most unlovely, in this display of female charms, was the youngest daughter of Mr. Wharton. Frances, we have already mentioned, left the city before she had attained to the age of fashionable womanhood. A few adventurous spirits were already beginning to make inroads in those customs which had so long invaded the comforts of the fair sex; and the youthful girl had ventured to trust her beauty to the height which nature had bestowed. This was but little, but that little was a masterpiece. Frances several times had determined, in the course of the morning, to bestow more than usual pains in the decoration of her person. Each time in succession, as she formed this resolution, she spent a few minutes in looking earnestly towards the north, and then she as invariably changed it.

At the appointed hour, our heroine appeared in the drawing-room, clothed in a robe of pale blue silk, of a cut and fashion much like that worn by her sister. Her hair was left to the wild curls of nature, its exuberance being confined to the crown of her head by a long, low comb, made of light tortoise shell; a color barely distinguishable in the golden hue of her tresses. Her dress was without a plait or a wrinkle, and fitted the form with an exactitude that might lead one to imagine the arch girl more than suspected the beauties it displayed. A tucker of rich Dresden lace softened the contour of the figure. Her head was without ornament; but around her throat was a necklace of gold clasped in front with a rich cornelian.

Once, and once only, as they moved towards the repast, did Lawton see a foot thrust itself from beneath the folds of her robe, and exhibit its little beauties encased in a slipper of blue silk, clasped close to the shape by a buckle of brilliants. The trooper caught himself sighing as he thought, though it was good for nothing in the stirrup, how enchantingly it would grace a minuet.

As the black appeared on the threshold of the room, making a low reverence, which has been interpreted for some centuries into “dinner waits,” Mr. Wharton, clad in a dress of drab, bedecked with enormous buttons, advanced formally to Miss Singleton, and bending his powdered head nearly to the level of the hand he extended, received hers in return.

Dr. Sitgreaves offered the same homage to Miss Peyton, and met with equal favor; the lady first pausing to draw on her gloves.

Colonel Wellmere was honored with a smile from Sarah, while performing a similar duty; and Frances gave the ends of her taper fingers to Captain Lawton with maiden bashfulness.

Much time, and some trouble were expended before the whole party were, to the great joy of Caesar, comfortably arranged around the table, with proper attention to all points of etiquette and precedence. The black well knew the viands were not improving; and though abundantly able to comprehend the disadvantage of eating a cold dinner, it greatly exceeded his powers of philosophy to weigh all the latent consequences to society which depend on social order.

For the first ten minutes all but the captain of dragoons found themselves in a situation much to their liking. Even Lawton would have been perfectly happy, had not excess of civility on the part of his host and Miss Jeanette Peyton kept him from the more agreeable occupation of tasting dishes he did want, in order to decline those he did not. At length, however, the repast was fairly commenced, and a devoted application to the viands was more eloquent than a thousand words in favor of Dinah’s skill.

Next came drinking with the ladies; but as the wine was excellent, and the glasses ample, the trooper bore this interruption with consummate good nature. Nay, so fearful was he of giving offense, and of omitting any of the nicer points of punctilio, that having commenced this courtesy with the lady who sat next him, he persevered until not one of his fair companions could, with justice, reproach him with partiality in this particular.

Long abstemiousness from anything like generous wine might plead the excuse of Captain Lawton, especially when exposed to so strong a temptation as that now before him. Mr. Wharton had been one of a set of politicians in New York, whose principal exploits before the war had been to assemble, and pass sage opinions on the signs of the times, under the inspiration of certain liquor made from a grape that grew on the south side of the island of Madeira, and which found its way into the colonies of North America through the medium of the West Indies, sojourning awhile in the Western Archipelago, by way of proving the virtues of the climate. A large supply of this cordial had been drawn from his storehouse in the city, and some of it now sparkled in a bottle before the captain, blushing in the rays of the sun, which were passing obliquely through it, like amber.

Though the meat and vegetables had made their entrance with perfect order and propriety, their exeunt was effected much in the manner of a retreat of militia. The point was to clear the board something after the fabled practice of the harpies, and by dint of scrambling, tossing, breaking, and spilling, the remnants of the overflowing repast disappeared. And now another series of processions commenced, by virtue of which a goodly display of pastry, with its usual accompaniments, garnished the table.

Mr. Wharton poured out a glass of wine for the lady who sat on his right hand, and, pushing the bottle to a guest, said with a low bow,—

“We are to be honored with a toast from Miss Singleton.”

Although there was nothing more in this movement than occurred every day on such occasions, yet the lady trembled, colored, and grew pale again, seemingly endeavoring to rally her thoughts, until, by her agitation, she had excited the interest of the whole party; when by an effort, and in a manner as if she had striven in vain to think of another, Isabella said, faintly,—

“Major Dunwoodie.”

The health was drunk cheerfully by all but Colonel Wellmere, who wet his lips, and drew figures on the table with some of the liquor he had spilled.

At length Colonel Wellmere broke silence by saying aloud to Captain
Lawton,—

“I suppose, sir, this Mr. Dunwoodie will receive promotion in the rebel army, for the advantage my misfortune gave him over my command.”

The trooper had supplied the wants of nature to his perfect satisfaction; and, perhaps, with the exception of Washington and his immediate commander, there was no mortal whose displeasure he regarded a tittle. First helping himself, therefore, to a little of his favorite bottle, he replied with admirable coolness,—

“Colonel Wellmere, your pardon; Major Dunwoodie owes his allegiance to the confederated states of North America, and where he owes it he pays it. Such a man is no rebel. Promoted I hope he may be, both because he deserves it, and because I am next in rank in the corps; and I know not what you call a misfortune, unless you deem meeting the Virginia horse as such.”

“We will not differ about terms, sir,” said the colonel, haughtily. “I spoke as duty to my sovereign prompted; but do you not call the loss of a commander a misfortune to a party?”

“It certainly may be so,” said the trooper, with emphasis.

“Miss Peyton, will you favor us with a toast?” cried the master of the house, anxious to stop this dialogue.

The lady bowed her head with dignity, as she named “General Montrose”; and the long-absent bloom stole lightly over her features.

“There is no term more doubtful than that word misfortune,” said the surgeon, regardless of the nice maneuvers of the host. “Some deem one thing a misfortune, others its opposite; misfortune begets misfortune. Life is a misfortune, for it may be the means of enduring misfortune; and death is a misfortune, as it abridges the enjoyments of life.”

“It is a misfortune that our mess has no such wine as this,” interrupted the trooper.

“We will pledge you a sentiment in it, sir, as it seems to suit your taste,” said Mr. Wharton.

Lawton filled to the brim, and drank, “A speedy peace, or a stirring war.”

“I drink your toast, Captain Lawton, though I greatly distrust your construction of activity,” said the surgeon. “In my poor judgment, cavalry should be kept in the rear to improve a victory, and not sent in front to gain it. Such may be said to be their natural occupation, if the term can be used in reference to so artificial a body; for all history shows that the horse have done most when held in reserve.”

This dissertation, uttered in a sufficiently didactic manner, was a hint that Miss Peyton did not neglect. She arose and retired, followed by her juniors.

Nearly at the same moment, Mr. Wharton and his son made an apology for their absence, which was required on account of the death of a near neighbor, and withdrew.

The retreat of the ladies was the signal for the appearance of the surgeon’s cigar, which, being established in a corner of his mouth, in a certain knowing way, caused not the slightest interruption to his discourse.

“If anything can sweeten captivity and wounds, it must be the happiness of suffering in the society of the ladies who have left us,” gallantly observed the colonel, as he resumed his seat after closing the door.

“Sympathy and kindness have their influence on the human system,” returned the surgeon, knocking the ashes from his cigar, with the tip of a little finger, in the manner of an adept. “The connection is intimate between the moral and physical feelings; but still, to accomplish a cure, and restore nature to the healthy tone it has lost from disease or accident, requires more than can flow from unguided sympathies. In such cases, the lights—” the surgeon accidentally caught the eye of the trooper and he paused. Taking two or three hasty puffs, he essayed to finish the sentence, “In such cases, the knowledge that flows from the lights—”

“You were saying, sir,” said Colonel Wellmere, sipping his wine,—

“The purport of my remark went to say,” continued Sitgreaves, turning his back on Lawton, “that a bread poultice would not set a broken arm.”

“More is the pity,” cried the trooper, “for next to eating, the nourishment could not be more innocently applied.”

“To you, Colonel Wellmere,” said the surgeon, “as a man of education, I can with safety appeal.” The colonel bowed. “You must have observed the dreadful havoc made in your ranks by the men who were led by this gentleman”; the colonel looked grave, again; “how, when blows lighted on their frames, life was invariably extinguished, beyond all hope of scientific reparation; how certain yawning wounds were inflicted, that must set at defiance the art of the most experienced practitioner; now, sir, to you I triumphantly appeal, therefore, to know whether your detachment would not have been as effectually defeated, if the men had all lost a right arm, for instance, as if they had all lost their heads.”

“The triumph of your appeal is somewhat hasty, sir,” said Wellmere.

“Is the cause of liberty advanced a step by such injudicious harshness in the field?” continued the surgeon, bent on the favorite principle of his life.

“I am yet to learn that the cause of liberty is in any manner advanced by the services of any gentleman in the rebel army,” rejoined the colonel.

“Not liberty! Good God, for what then are we contending?”

“Slavery, sir; yes, even slavery; you are putting the tyranny of a mob on the throne of a kind and lenient prince. Where is the consistency of your boasted liberty?”

“Consistency!” repeated the surgeon, looking about him a little wildly, at hearing such sweeping charges against a cause he had so long thought holy.

“Aye, sir, your consistency. Your congress of sages have published a manifesto, wherein they set forth the equality of political rights.”

“’Tis true, and it is done most ably.”

“I say nothing of its ability; but if true, why not set your slaves at liberty?” This argument, which is thought by most of the colonel’s countrymen a triumphant answer to a thousand eloquent facts, lost none of its weight by the manner in which it was uttered.

Every American feels humbled at the necessity of vindicating his country from the apparent inconsistency and injustice of the laws alluded to. His feelings are much like those of an honorable man who is compelled to exonerate himself from a disgraceful charge, although he may know the accusation to be false. At the bottom, Sitgreaves had much good sense, and thus called on, he took up the cudgels of argument in downright earnest.

“We deem it a liberty to have the deciding voice in the councils by which we are governed. We think it a hardship to be ruled by the king of a people who live at a distance of three thousand miles, and who cannot, and who do not, feel a single political interest in common with ourselves. I say nothing of oppression; the child was of age, and was entitled to the privileges of majority. In such cases, there is but one tribunal to which to appeal for a nation’s rights—it is power, and we now make the appeal.”

“Such doctrines may suit your present purposes,” said Wellmere, with a sneer; “but I apprehend it is opposed to all the opinions and practices of civilized nations.”

“It is in conformity with the practices of all nations,” said the surgeon, returning the nod and smile of Lawton, who enjoyed the good sense of his comrade as much as he disliked what he called “his medical talk.” “Who would be ruled when he can rule? The only rational ground to take is, that every community has a right to govern itself, so that in no manner it violates the laws of God.”

“And is holding your fellow creatures in bondage in conformity to those laws?” asked the colonel, impressively.

The surgeon took another glass, and hemming once, returned to the combat.

“Sir,” said he, “slavery is of very ancient origin, and it seems to have been confined to no particular religion or form of government; every nation of civilized Europe does, or has held their fellow creatures in this kind of duresse.”

“You will except Great Britain,” cried the colonel, proudly.

“No, sir,” continued the surgeon, confidently, feeling that he was now carrying the war out of his own country, “I cannot except Great Britain. It was her children, her ships, and her laws, that first introduced the practice into these states; and on her institutions the judgment must fall. There is not a foot of ground belonging to England, in which a negro would be useful, that has not its slave. England herself has none, but England is overflowing with physical force, a part of which she is obliged to maintain in the shape of paupers. The same is true of France, and most other European countries. So long as we were content to remain colonies, nothing was said of our system of domestic slavery; but now, when we are resolute to obtain as much freedom as the vicious system of metropolitan rule has left us, that which is England’s gift has become our reproach. Will your master liberate the slaves of his subjects should he succeed in subduing the new states, or will he condemn the whites to the same servitude as that in which he has been so long content to see the blacks? It is true, we continue the practice; but we must come gradually to the remedy, or create an evil greater than that which we endure at present. Doubtless, as we advance, the manumission of our slaves will accompany us, until happily these fair regions shall exist, without a single image of the Creator that is held in a state which disqualifies him to judge of that Creator’s goodness.”

It will be remembered that Doctor Sitgreaves spoke forty years ago, and
Wellmere was unable to contradict his prophetic assertion.

Finding the subject getting to be knotty, the Englishman retired to the apartment in which the ladies had assembled; and, seated by the side of Sarah, he found a more pleasing employment in relating the events of fashionable life in the metropolis, and in recalling the thousand little anecdotes of their former associates. Miss Peyton was a pleased listener, as she dispensed the bounties of the tea table, and Sarah frequently bowed her blushing countenance to her needlework, as her face glowed at the flattering remarks of her companion.

The dialogue we have related established a perfect truce between the surgeon and his comrade; and the former having paid a visit to Singleton, they took their leave of the ladies, and mounted; the former to visit the wounded at the encampment, and the latter to rejoin his troop. But their movements were arrested at the gate by an occurrence that we shall relate in the next chapter.

I see no more those white locks thinly spread
Round the bald polish of that honored head:
No more that meek, that suppliant look in prayer,
Nor that pure faith that gave it force, are there:
But he is blest, and I lament no more,
A wise good man, contented to be poor.

—CRABBE.

We have already said that the customs of America leave the dead but a short time in sight of the mourners; and the necessity of providing for his own safety had compelled the peddler to abridge even this brief space. In the confusion and agitation produced by the events we have recorded, the death of the elder Birch had occurred unnoticed; but a sufficient number of the immediate neighbors were hastily collected, and the ordinary rites of sepulture were now about to be paid to the deceased. It was the approach of this humble procession that arrested the movements of the trooper and his comrade. Four men supported the body on a rude bier; and four others walked in advance, ready to relieve their friends from their burden. The peddler walked next the coffin, and by his side moved Katy Haynes, with a most determined aspect of woe, and next to the mourners came Mr. Wharton and the English captain. Two or three old men and women, with a few straggling boys, brought up the rear. Captain Lawton sat in his saddle, in rigid silence, until the bearers came opposite to his position, and then, for the first time, Harvey raised his eyes from the ground, and saw the enemy that he dreaded so near him. The first impulse of the peddler was certainly flight; but recovering his recollection, he fixed his eye on the coffin of his parent, and passed the dragoon with a firm step but swelling heart. The trooper slowly lifted his cap, and continued uncovered until Mr. Wharton and his son had moved by, when, accompanied by the surgeon, he rode leisurely in the rear, maintaining an inflexible silence.

Caesar emerged from the cellar kitchen of the cottage, and with a face of settled solemnity, added himself to the number of the followers of the funeral, though with a humble mien and at a most respectful distance from the horsemen. The old negro had placed around his arm, a little above the elbow, a napkin of unsullied whiteness, it being the only time since his departure from the city that he had enjoyed an opportunity of exhibiting himself in the garniture of servile mourning. He was a great lover of propriety, and had been a little stimulated to this display by a desire to show his sable friend from Georgia all the decencies of a New York funeral; and the ebullition of his zeal went off very well, producing no other result than a mild lecture from Miss Peyton at his return, on the fitness of things. The attendance of the black was thought well enough in itself; but the napkin was deemed a superfluous exhibition of ceremony, at the funeral of a man who had performed all the menial offices in his own person.

The graveyard was an inclosure on the grounds of Mr. Wharton, which had been fenced with stone and set apart for the purpose, by that gentleman, some years before. It was not, however, intended as a burial place for any of his own family. Until the fire, which raged as the British troops took possession of New York, had laid Trinity in ashes, a goodly gilded tablet on its walls proclaimed the virtues of his deceased parents, and beneath a flag of marble, in one of the aisles of the church, their bones were left to molder in aristocratical repose. Captain Lawton made a movement as if he was disposed to follow the procession, when it left the highway, to enter the field which contained the graves of the humble dead, but he was recalled to recollection by a hint from his companion that he was taking the wrong road.

“Of all the various methods which have been adopted by man for the disposal of his earthly remains, which do you prefer, Captain Lawton?” said the surgeon, as they separated from the little procession. “In some countries the body is exposed to be devoured by wild beasts; in others it is suspended in the air to exhale its substance in the manner of decomposition; in other regions it is consumed on the funeral pile, and, again, it is inhumed in the bowels of the earth; every people have their own particular fashion, and to which do you give the preference?”

“All are agreeable,” said the trooper, following the group they had left with his eyes; “though the speediest interments give the cleanest fields. Of which are you an admirer?”

“The last, as practiced by ourselves, for the other three are destructive of all the opportunities for dissection; whereas, in the last, the coffin can lie in peaceful decency, while the remains are made to subserve the useful purposes of science. Ah! Captain Lawton, I enjoy comparatively but few opportunities of such a nature, to what I expected on entering the army.”

“To what may these pleasures numerically amount in a year?” said the captain, withdrawing his gaze from the graveyard.

“Within a dozen, upon my honor; my best picking is when the corps is detached; for when we are with the main army, there are so many boys to be satisfied, that I seldom get a good subject. Those youngsters are as wasteful as prodigals, and as greedy as vultures.”

“A dozen!” echoed the trooper, in surprise. “Why, I furnish you that number with my own hands.”

“Ah! Jack,” returned the doctor, approaching the subject with great tenderness of manner, “it is seldom I can do anything with your patients; you disfigure them woefully. Believe me, John, when I tell you as a friend that your system is all wrong; you unnecessarily destroy life, and then you injure the body so that it is unfit for the only use that can be made of a dead man.”

The trooper maintained a silence, which he thought would be the most probable means of preserving peace between them; and the surgeon, turning his head from taking a last look at the burial, as they rode around the foot of the hill that shut the valley from their sight, continued with a suppressed sigh,—

“One might get a natural death from that graveyard to-night, if there was but time and opportunity! The patient must be the father of the lady we saw this morning.”

“The petticoat doctor!—she with the aurora borealis complexion,” said the trooper, with a smile, that began to cause uneasiness to his companion. “But the lady was not the gentleman’s daughter, only his medico-petticoat attendant; and the Harvey, whose name was made to rime with every word in her song, is the renowned peddler spy.”

“What? He who unhorsed you?”

“No man ever unhorsed me, Dr. Sitgreaves,” said the dragoon, gravely. “I fell by mischance of Roanoke; rider and beast kissed the earth together.”

“A warm embrace, from the love spots it left on your cuticle; ’tis a thousand pities that you cannot find where the tattling rascal lies hid.”

“He followed his father’s body.”

“And you let him pass!” cried the surgeon, checking his horse. “Let us return immediately, and take him; to-morrow you shall have him hanged, Jack,—and, damn him, I’ll dissect him!”

“Softly, softly, my dear Archibald. Would you arrest a man while paying the last offices to a dead father? Leave him to me, and I pledge myself he shall have justice.”

The doctor muttered his dissatisfaction at any postponement of vengeance, but he was compelled to acquiesce, from a regard to his reputation for propriety; and they continued their ride to the quarters of the corps, engaged in various discussions concerning the welfare of the human body.

Birch supported the grave and collected manner that was thought becoming in a male mourner, on such occasions, and to Katy was left the part of exhibiting the tenderness of the softer sex. There are some people, whose feelings are of such nature that they cannot weep unless it be in proper company, and the spinster was a good deal addicted to this congregational virtue. After casting her eyes around the small assemblage, the housekeeper found the countenances of the few females, who were present, fixed on her in solemn expectation, and the effect was instantaneous; the maiden really wept, and she gained no inconsiderable sympathy, and some reputation for a tender heart, from the spectators. The muscles of the peddler’s face were seen to move, and as the first clod of earth fell on the tenement of his father, sending up that dull, hollow sound that speaks so eloquently the mortality of man, his whole frame was for an instant convulsed. He bent his body down, as if in pain, his fingers worked while the hands hung lifeless by his side, and there was an expression in his countenance that seemed to announce a writhing of the soul; but it was not unresisted, and it was transient. He stood erect, drew a long breath, and looked around him with an elevated face, that even seemed to smile with a consciousness of having obtained the mastery. The grave was soon filled; a rough stone, placed at either extremity, marked its position, and the turf, whose faded vegetation was adapted to the fortunes of the deceased, covered the little hillock with the last office of seemliness. This office ended, the neighbors, who had officiously pressed forward to offer their services in performing their solemn duty, paused, and lifting their hats, stood looking towards the mourner, who now felt himself to be really alone in the world. Uncovering his head also, the peddler hesitated a moment, to gather energy, and spoke.

“My friends and neighbors,” he said, “I thank you for assisting me to bury my dead out of my sight.”

A solemn pause succeeded the customary address, and the group dispersed in silence, some few walking with the mourners back to their own habitation, but respectfully leaving them at its entrance. The peddler and Katy were followed into the building by one man, however, who was well known to the surrounding country by the significant term of “a speculator.” Katy saw him enter, with a heart that palpitated with dreadful forebodings, but Harvey civilly handed him a chair, and evidently was prepared for the visit.

The peddler went to the door, and, taking a cautious glance about the valley, quickly returned, and commenced the following dialogue:—

“The sun has just left the top of the eastern hill; my time presses me: here is the deed for the house and lot; everything is done according to law.”

The other took the paper, and conned its contents with a deliberation that proceeded partly from his caution, and partly from the unlucky circumstance of his education having been much neglected when a youth. The time occupied in this tedious examination was employed by Harvey in gathering together certain articles which he intended to include in the stores that were to leave the habitation with himself. Katy had already inquired of the peddler whether the deceased had left a will; and she saw the Bible placed in the bottom of a new pack, which she had made for his accommodation, with a most stoical indifference; but as the six silver spoons were laid carefully by its side, a sudden twinge of her conscience objected to such a palpable waste of property, and she broke silence.

“When you marry, Harvey, you may miss those spoons.”

“I never shall marry.”

“Well, if you don’t there’s no occasion to make rash promises, even to yourself. One never knows what one may do, in such a case. I should like to know, of what use so many spoons can be to a single man; for my part, I think it is a duty for every man who is well provided, to have a wife and family to maintain.”

At the time when Katy expressed this sentiment, the fortune of women in her class of life consisted of a cow, a bed, the labors of their own hands in the shape of divers pillowcases, blankets, and sheets, with, where fortune was unusually kind, a half dozen silver spoons. The spinster herself had obtained all the other necessaries by her own industry and prudence, and it can easily be imagined that she saw the articles she had long counted her own vanish in the enormous pack, with a dissatisfaction that was in no degree diminished by the declaration that had preceded the act. Harvey, however, disregarded her opinions and feelings, and continued his employment of filling the pack, which soon grew to something like the ordinary size of the peddler’s burden.

“I’m rather timersome about this conveyance,” said the purchaser, having at length waded through the covenants of the deed.

“Why so?”

“I’m afraid it won’t stand good in law. I know that two of the neighbors leave home to-morrow morning, to have the place entered for confiscation; and if I should give forty pounds, and lose it all, ’twould be a dead pull back to me.”

“They can only take my right,” said the peddler. “Pay me two hundred dollars, and the house is yours; you are a well-known Whig, and you at least they won’t trouble.” As Harvey spoke, there was a strange bitterness of manner, mingled with the shrewd care he expressed concerning the sale of his property.

“Say one hundred, and it is a bargain,” returned the man, with a grin that he meant for a good-natured smile.

“A bargain!” echoed the peddler, in surprise. “I thought the bargain already made.”

“Nothing is a bargain,” said the purchaser, with a chuckle, “until papers are delivered, and the money paid in hand.”

“You have the paper.”

“Aye, and will keep it, if you will excuse the money. Come, say one hundred and fifty, and I won’t be hard; here—here is just the money.”

The peddler looked from the window, and saw with dismay that the evening was fast advancing, and knew well that he endangered his life by remaining in the dwelling after dark; yet he could not tolerate the idea of being defrauded in this manner, in a bargain that had already been fairly made; he hesitated.

“Well,” said the purchaser, rising, “mayhap you can find another man to trade with between this and morning, but if you don’t, your title won’t be worth much afterwards.”

“Take it, Harvey,” said Katy, who felt it impossible to resist a tender like the one before her; for the purchase money was in English guineas. Her voice roused the peddler, and a new idea seemed to strike him.

“I agree to the price,” he said; and, turning to the spinster, he placed part of the money in her hand, as he continued, “Had I other means to pay you, I would have lost all, rather than suffer myself to be defrauded of part.”

“You may lose all yet,” muttered the stranger, with a sneer, as he rose and left the building.

“Yes,” said Katy, following him with her eyes, “he knows your failing, Harvey; he thinks with me, now the old gentleman is gone, you will want a careful body to take care of your concerns.”

The peddler was busied in making arrangements for his departure, and he took no notice of this insinuation, while the spinster returned again to the attack. She had lived so many years in expectation of a termination to her hopes, so different from that which now seemed likely to occur, that the idea of separation began to give her more uneasiness than she had thought herself capable of feeling, about a man so destitute and friendless.

“Have you another house to go to?” inquired Katy.

“Providence will provide me with a home.”

“Yes,” said the housekeeper, “but maybe ’twill not be to your liking.”

“The poor must not be difficult.”

“I’m sure I’m anything but a difficult body,” cried the spinster, very hastily; “but I love to see things becoming, and in their places; yet I wouldn’t be hard to persuade to leave this place myself. I can’t say I altogether like the ways of the people hereabouts.”

“The valley is lovely,” said the peddler, with fervor, “and the people like all the race of man. But to me it matters nothing; all places are now alike, and all faces equally strange.” As he spoke he dropped the article he was packing from his hand, and seated himself on a chest, with a look of vacant misery.

“Not so, not so,” said Katy, shoving her chair nearer to the place where the peddler sat. “Not so, Harvey, you must know me at least; my face cannot be strange to you.”

Birch turned his eyes slowly on her countenance, which exhibited more of feeling, and less of self, than he had ever seen there before; he took her hand kindly, and his own features lost some of their painful expression, as he said,—

“Yes, good woman, you, at least, are not a stranger to me; you may do me partial justice; when others revile me possibly your feelings may lead you to say something in my defense.”

“That I will; that I would!” said Katy, eagerly. “I will defend you, Harvey, to the last drop; let me hear them that dare to revile you! You say true, Harvey, I am partial and just to you; what if you do like the king? I have often heard it said he was at the bottom a good man; but there’s no religion in the old country, for everybody allows the ministers are desperate bad!”

The peddler paced the floor in evident distress of mind; his eyes had a look of wildness that Katy had never witnessed before, and his step was measured, with a dignity that appalled the housekeeper.

“While my father lived,” murmured Harvey, unable to smother his feelings, “there was one who read my heart, and oh! what a consolation to return from my secret marches of danger, and the insults and wrongs that I suffered, to receive his blessing and his praise; but he is gone,” he continued, stopping and gazing wildly towards the corner that used to hold the figure of his parent, “and who is there to do me justice?”

“Why, Harvey! Harvey!”

“Yes, there is one who will, who must know me before I die! Oh! it is dreadful to die, and leave such a name behind me.”

“Don’t talk of dying, Harvey,” said the spinster, glancing her eye around the room, and pushing the wood in the fire to obtain a light from the blaze.

The ebullition of feeling in the peddler was over. It had been excited by the events of the past day, and a vivid perception of his sufferings. It was not long, however, that passion maintained an ascendency ever the reason of this singular man; and perceiving that the night had already thrown an obscurity around objects without doors, he hastily threw his pack over his shoulders, and taking Katy kindly by the hand, in leavetaking,—

“It is painful to part with even you, good woman,” he said, “but the hour has come, and I must go. What is left in the house is yours; to me it could be of no use, and it may serve to make you more comfortable. Farewell—we shall meet hereafter.”

“In the regions of darkness!” cried a voice that caused the peddler to sink on the chest from which he had risen, in despair.

“What! another pack, Mr. Birch, and so well stuffed so soon!”

“Have you not done evil enough?” cried the peddler, regaining his firmness, and springing on his feet with energy. “Is it not enough to harass the last moments of a dying man—to impoverish me; what more would you have?”

“Your blood!” said the Skinner, with cool malignity.

“And for money,” cried Harvey, bitterly. “Like the ancient Judas, you would grow rich with the price of blood!”

“Aye, and a fair price it is, my gentleman; fifty guineas; nearly the weight of that carcass of yours in gold.”

“Here,” said Katy, promptly, “here are fifteen guineas, and these drawers and this bed are all mine; if you will give Harvey but one hour’s start from the door, they shall be yours.”

“One hour?” said the Skinner, showing his teeth, and looking with a longing eye at the money.

“But a single hour; here, take the money.”

“Hold!” cried Harvey. “Put no faith in the miscreant.”

“She may do what she pleases with her faith,” said the Skinner, with malignant pleasure, “but I have the money in good keeping; as for you, Mr. Birch, we will bear your insolence, for the fifty guineas that are to pay for your gallows.”

“Go on,” said the peddler, proudly; “take me to Major Dunwoodie; he, at least, may be kind, although just.”

“I can do better than by marching so far in such disgraceful company; this Mr. Dunwoodie has let one or two Tories go at large; but the troop of Captain Lawton is quartered some half mile nearer, and his receipt will get me the reward as soon as his major’s. How relish you the idea of supping with Captain Lawton, this evening, Mr. Birch?”

“Give me my money, or set Harvey free,” cried the spinster in alarm.

“Your bribe was not enough, good woman, unless there is money in this bed.” Thrusting his bayonet through the ticking and ripping it for some distance, he took a malicious satisfaction in scattering its contents about the room.

“If,” cried the housekeeper, losing sight of her personal danger in care for her newly-acquired property, “there is law in the land, I will be righted!”

“The law of the neutral ground is the law of the strongest; but your tongue is not as long as my bayonet; you had, therefore, best not set them at loggerheads, or you might be the loser.”

A figure stood in the shadow of the door, as if afraid to be seen in the group of Skinners; but a blaze of light, raised by some articles thrown in the fire by his persecutors, showed the peddler the face of the purchaser of his little domain. Occasionally there was some whispering between this man and the Skinner nearest him, that induced Harvey to suspect he had been the dupe of a contrivance in which that wretch had participated. It was, however, too late to repine; and he followed the party from the house with a firm and collected tread, as if marching to a triumph, and not to a gallows. In passing through the yard, the leader of the band fell over a billet of wood, and received a momentary hurt from the fall; exasperated at the incident, the fellow sprang on his feet, filling the air with execrations.

“The curse of heaven light on the log!” he exclaimed. “The night is too dark for us to move in; throw that brand of fire in yon pile of tow, to light up the scene.”

“Hold!” roared the speculator; “you’ll fire the house.”

“And see the farther,” said the other, hurling the brand in the midst of the combustibles. In an instant the building was in flames. “Come on; let us move towards the heights while we have light to pick our road.”

“Villain!” cried the exasperated purchaser, “is this your friendship—this my reward for kidnapping the peddler?”

“’Twould be wise to move more from the light, if you mean to entertain us with abuse, or we may see too well to miss our mark,” cried the leader of the gang. The next instant he was as good as his threat, but happily missed the terrified speculator and equally appalled spinster, who saw herself again reduced from comparative wealth to poverty, by the blow. Prudence dictated to the pair a speedy retreat; and the next morning, the only remains of the dwelling of the peddler was the huge chimney we have already mentioned.

Trifles, light as air,
Are to the jealous confirmations strong
As proofs of holy writ.

—Othello.

The weather, which had been mild and clear since the storm, now changed with the suddenness of the American climate. Towards evening the cold blasts poured down from the mountains, and flurries of snow plainly indicated that the month of November had arrived; a season whose temperature varies from the heats of summer to the cold of winter. Frances had stood at the window of her own apartment, watching the slow progress of the funeral procession, with a melancholy that was too deep to be excited by the spectacle. There was something in the sad office that was in unison with her feelings. As she gazed around, she saw the trees bending to the force of the wind, that swept through the valley with an impetuosity that shook even the buildings; and the forest, that had so lately glittered in the sun with its variegated hues, was fast losing its loveliness, as the leaves were torn from the branches, and were driving irregularly before the eddies of the blast. A few of the Southern dragoons, who were patrolling the passes which led to the encampment of the corps, could be distinguished at a distance on the heights, bending to their pommels as they faced the keen air which had so lately traversed the great fresh-water lakes, and drawing their watch coats about them in tighter folds.

Frances witnessed the disappearance of the wooden tenement of the deceased, as it was slowly lowered from the light of day; and the sight added to the chilling dreariness of the view. Captain Singleton was sleeping under the care of his own man, while his sister had been persuaded to take possession of her room, for the purpose of obtaining the repose of which her last night’s journeying had robbed her. The apartment of Miss Singleton communicated with the room occupied by the sisters, through a private door, as well as through the ordinary passage of the house; this door was partly open, and Frances moved towards it, with the benevolent intention of ascertaining the situation of her guest, when the surprised girl saw her whom she had thought to be sleeping, not only awake, but employed in a manner that banished all probability of present repose. The black tresses, that during the dinner had been drawn in close folds over the crown of the head, were now loosened, and fell in profusion over her shoulders and bosom, imparting a slight degree of wildness to her countenance; the chilling white of her complexion was strongly contrasted with eyes of the deepest black, that were fixed in rooted attention on a picture she held in her hand. Frances hardly breathed, as she was enabled, by a movement of Isabella, to see that it was the figure of a man in the well-known dress of the Southern horse; but she gasped for breath, and instinctively laid her hand on her heart to quell its throbbings, as she thought she recognized the lineaments that were so deeply seated in her own imagination. Frances felt she was improperly prying into the sacred privacy of another; but her emotions were too powerful to permit her to speak, and she drew back to a chair, where she still retained a view of the stranger, from whose countenance she felt it to be impossible to withdraw her eyes. Isabella was too much engrossed by her own feelings to discover the trembling figure of the witness to her actions, and she pressed the inanimate image to her lips, with an enthusiasm that denoted the most intense passion. The expression of the countenance of the fair stranger was so changeable, and the transitions were so rapid, that Frances had scarcely time to distinguish the character of the emotion, before it was succeeded by another, equally powerful and equally attractive. Admiration and sorrow were however the preponderating passions; the latter was indicated by large drops that fell from her eyes on the picture, and which followed each other over her cheek at such intervals, as seemed to pronounce the grief too heavy to admit of the ordinary demonstrations of sorrow. Every movement of Isabella was marked by an enthusiasm that was peculiar to her nature, and every passion in its turn triumphed in her breast. The fury of the wind, as it whistled round the angles of the building, was in consonance with those feelings, and she rose and moved to a window of her apartment. Her figure was now hid from the view of Frances, who was about to rise and approach her guest, when tones of a thrilling melody chained her in breathless silence to the spot. The notes were wild, and the voice not powerful, but the execution exceeded anything that Frances had ever heard; and she stood, endeavoring to stifle the sounds of her own gentle breathing, until the following song was concluded:—

Cold blow the blasts o’er the tops of the mountain,
    And bare is the oak on the hill;
Slowly the vapors exhale from the fountain,
    And bright gleams the ice-bordered rill;
All nature is seeking its annual rest,
But the slumbers of peace have deserted my breast.

Long has the storm poured its weight on my nation,
    And long have her braves stood the shock;
Long has her chieftain ennobled his station,
    A bulwark on liberty’s rock;
Unlicensed ambition relaxes its toil,
Yet blighted affection represses my smile.

Abroad the wild fury of winter is lowering,
    And leafless and drear is the tree;
But the vertical sun of the south appears pouring
    Its fierce, killing heats upon me:
Without, all the season’s chill symptoms begin—
But the fire of passion is raging within.

Frances abandoned her whole soul to the suppressed melody of the music, though the language of the song expressed a meaning, which, united with certain events of that and the preceding day, left a sensation of uneasiness in the bosom of the warm-hearted girl, to which she had hitherto been a stranger. Isabella moved from the window as her last tones melted on the ear of her admiring listener, and, for the first time, her eye rested on the pallid face of the intruder. A glow of fire lighted the countenance of both at the same instant, and the blue eye of Frances met the brilliant black one of her guest for a single moment, and both fell in abashed confusion on the carpet; they advanced, however, until they met, and had taken each other’s hand, before either ventured again to look her companion in the face.

“This sudden change in the weather, and perhaps the situation of my brother, have united to make me melancholy, Miss Wharton,” said Isabella, in a low tone, and in a voice that trembled as she spoke.

“’Tis thought you have little to apprehend for your brother,” said Frances, in the same embarrassed manner. “Had you seen him when he was brought in by Major Dunwoodie—”

Frances paused, with a feeling of conscious shame, for which she could not account; and, in raising her eyes, she saw Isabella studying her countenance with an earnestness that again drove the blood tumultuously to her temples.

“You were speaking of Major Dunwoodie,” said Isabella, faintly.

“He was with Captain Singleton.”

“Do you know Dunwoodie? Have you seen him often?”

Once more Frances ventured to look her guest in the face, and again she met the piercing eyes bent on her, as if to search her inmost heart. “Speak, Miss Wharton; is Major Dunwoodie known to you?”

“He is my relative,” said Frances, appalled at the manner of the other.

“A relative!” echoed Miss Singleton; “in what degree?—speak, Miss
Wharton, I conjure you to speak.”

“Our parents were cousins,” faintly replied Frances.

“And he is to be your husband?” said the stranger, impetuously.

Frances felt shocked, and all her pride awakened, by this direct attack upon her feelings, and she raised her eyes from the floor to her interrogator a little proudly, when the pale cheek and quivering lip of Isabella removed her resentment in a moment.

“It is true! My conjecture is true! Speak to me, Miss Wharton; I conjure you, in mercy to my feelings, to tell me—do you love Dunwoodie?” There was a plaintive earnestness in the voice of Miss Singleton that disarmed Frances of all resentment, and the only answer she could make was to hide her burning face between her hands, as she sank back in a chair to conceal her confusion.

Isabella paced the floor in silence for several minutes, until she had succeeded in conquering the violence of her feelings, when she approached the place where Frances yet sat, endeavoring to exclude the eyes of her companion from reading the shame expressed in her countenance, and, taking the hand of the other, she spoke with an evident effort at composure.

“Pardon me, Miss Wharton, if my ungovernable feelings have led me into impropriety; the powerful motive—the cruel reason”—she hesitated. Frances now raised her face, and their eyes once more met; they fell in each other’s arms, and laid their burning cheeks together. The embrace was long—was ardent and sincere—but neither spoke; and on separating, Frances retired to her own room without further explanation.

While this extraordinary scene was acting in the room of Miss Singleton, matters of great importance were agitated in the drawing-room. The disposition of the fragments of such a dinner as the one we have recorded was a task that required no little exertion and calculation. Notwithstanding several of the small game had nestled in the pocket of Captain Lawton’s man, and even the assistant of Dr. Sitgreaves had calculated the uncertainty of his remaining long in such good quarters, still there was more left unconsumed than the prudent Miss Peyton knew how to dispose of to advantage. Caesar and his mistress had, therefore, a long and confidential communication on this important business; and the consequence was, that Colonel Wellmere was left to the hospitality of Sarah Wharton. All the ordinary topics of conversation were exhausted, when the colonel, with a little of the uneasiness that is in some degree inseparable from conscious error, touched lightly on the transactions of the preceding day.

“We little thought, Miss Wharton, when I first saw this Mr. Dunwoodie in your house in Queen Street, that he was to be the renowned warrior he has proved himself,” said Wellmere, endeavoring to smile away his chagrin.

“Renowned, when we consider the enemy he overcame,” said Sarah, with consideration for her companion’s feelings. “’Twas unfortunate, indeed, in every respect, that you met with the accident, or doubtless the royal arms would have triumphed in their usual manner.”

“And yet the pleasure of such society as this accident has introduced me to, would more than repay the pain of a mortified spirit and wounded body,” added the colonel, in a manner of peculiar softness.

“I hope the latter is but trifling,” said Sarah, stooping to hide her blushes under the pretext of biting a thread from the work on her knee.

“Trifling, indeed, compared to the former,” returned the colonel, in the same manner. “Ah! Miss Wharton, it is in such moments that we feel the full value of friendship and sympathy.”

Those who have never tried it cannot easily imagine what a rapid progress a warm-hearted female can make in love, in the short space of half an hour, particularly where there is a predisposition to the distemper. Sarah found the conversation, when it began to touch on friendship and sympathy, too interesting to venture her voice with a reply. She, however, turned her eyes on the colonel, and saw him gazing at her fine face with an admiration that was quite as manifest, and much more soothing, than any words could make it.

Their tête-à-tête was uninterrupted for an hour; and although nothing that would be called decided, by an experienced matron, was said by the gentleman, he uttered a thousand things that delighted his companion, who retired to her rest with a lighter heart than she had felt since the arrest of her brother by the Americans.

And let me the canakin clink, clink,
And let me the canakin clink.
A soldier’s a man;
A life’s but a span;
Why, then, let a soldier drink.

—Othello.

The position held by the corps of dragoons, we have already said, was a favorite place of halting with their commander. A cluster of some half dozen small and dilapidated buildings formed what, from the circumstance of two roads intersecting each other at right angles, was called the village of the Four Corners. As usual, one of the most imposing of these edifices had been termed, in the language of the day, “a house of entertainment for man and beast.” On a rough board suspended from the gallows-looking post that had supported the ancient sign, was, however, written in red chalk, “Elizabeth Flanagan, her hotel,” an ebullition of the wit of some of the idle wags of the corps. The matron, whose name had thus been exalted to an office of such unexpected dignity, ordinarily discharged the duties of a female sutler, washerwoman, and, to use the language of Katy Haynes, petticoat doctor to the troops. She was the widow of a soldier who had been killed in the service, and who, like herself, was a native of a distant island, and had early tried his fortune in the colonies of North America. She constantly migrated with the troops; and it was seldom that they became stationary for two days at a time but the little cart of the bustling woman was seen driving into the encampment loaded with such articles as she conceived would make her presence most welcome. With a celerity that seemed almost supernatural, Betty took up her ground and commenced her occupation. Sometimes the cart itself was her shop; at others the soldiers made her a rude shelter of such materials as offered; but on the present occasion she had seized on a vacant building, and, by dint of stuffing the dirty breeches and half-dried linen of the troopers into the broken windows, to exclude the cold, which had now become severe, she formed what she herself had pronounced to be “most illigant lodgings.” The men were quartered in the adjacent barns, and the officers collected in the “Hotel Flanagan,” as they facetiously called headquarters. Betty was well known to every trooper in the corps, could call each by his Christian or nickname, as best suited her fancy; and, although absolutely intolerable to all whom habit had not made familiar with her virtues, was a general favorite with these partisan warriors. Her faults were, a trifling love of liquor, excessive filthiness, and a total disregard of all the decencies of language; her virtues, an unbounded love for her adopted country, perfect honesty when dealing on certain known principles with the soldiery, and great good nature. Added to these, Betty had the merit of being the inventor of that beverage which is so well known, at the present hour, to all the patriots who make a winter’s march between the commercial and political capitals of this great state, and which is distinguished by the name of “cocktail.” Elizabeth Flanagan was peculiarly well qualified, by education and circumstances, to perfect this improvement in liquors, having been literally brought up on its principal ingredient, and having acquired from her Virginian customers the use of mint, from its flavor in a julep to its height of renown in the article in question. Such, then, was the mistress of the mansion, who, reckless of the cold northern blasts, showed her blooming face from the door of the building to welcome the arrival of her favorite, Captain Lawton, and his companion, her master in matters of surgery.

“Ah! by my hopes of promotion, my gentle Elizabeth, but you are welcome!” cried the trooper, as he threw himself from his saddle. “This villainous fresh-water gas from the Canadas has been whistling among my bones till they ache with the cold, but the sight of your fiery countenance is as cheery as a Christmas fire.”

“Now sure, Captain Jack, ye’s always full of your complimentaries,” replied the sutler, taking the bridle of her customer. “But hurry in for the life of you, darling; the fences hereabouts are not so strong as in the Highlands, and there’s that within will warm both sowl and body.”

“So you have been laying the rails under contribution, I see. Well, that may do for the body,” said the captain coolly; “but I have had a pull at a bottle of cut glass with a silver stand, and I doubt my relish for your whisky for a month to come.”

“If it’s silver or goold that ye’re thinking of, it’s but little I have, though I’ve a trifling bit of the continental,” said Betty, with a look of humor; “but there’s that within that’s fit to be put in vissils of di’monds.”

“What can she mean, Archibald?” asked Lawton. “The animal looks as if it meant more than it says!”

“’Tis probably a wandering of the reasoning powers, created by the frequency of intoxicating drafts,” observed the surgeon, as he deliberately threw his left leg over the pommel of the saddle, and slid down on the right side of his horse.

“Faith, my dear jewel of a doctor, but it was this side I was expicting you; the whole corps come down on this side but yeerself,” said Betty, winking at the trooper; “but I’ve been feeding the wounded, in yeer absence, with the fat of the land.”

“Barbarous stupidity!” cried the panic-stricken physician, “to feed men laboring under the excitement of fever with powerful nutriment. Woman, woman, you are enough to defeat the skill of Hippocrates!”

“Pooh!” said Betty, with infinite composure, “what a botheration ye make about a little whisky; there was but a gallon betwixt a good dozen of them, and I gave it to the boys to make them sleep asy; sure, jist as slumbering drops.”

Lawton and his companion now entered the building, and the first objects which met their eyes explained the hidden meaning of Betty’s comfortable declaration. A long table, made of boards torn from the side of an outbuilding, was stretched through the middle of the largest apartment, or the barroom, and on it was a very scanty display of crockery ware. The steams of cookery arose from an adjoining kitchen, but the principal attraction was in a demijohn of fair proportions, which had been ostentatiously placed on high by Betty as the object most worthy of notice. Lawton soon learned that it was teeming with the real amber-colored juice of the grape, and had been sent from the Locusts, as an offering to Major Dunwoodie, from his friend Captain Wharton of the royal army.

“And a royal gift it is,” said the grinning subaltern, who made the explanation. “The major gives us an entertainment in honor of our victory, and you see the principal expense is borne as it should be, by the enemy. Zounds! I am thinking that after we have primed with such stuff, we could charge through Sir Henry’s headquarters, and carry off the knight himself.”

The captain of dragoons was in no manner displeased at the prospect of terminating so pleasantly a day that had been so agreeably commenced. He was soon surrounded by his comrades, who made many eager inquiries concerning his adventures, while the surgeon proceeded, with certain quakings of the heart, to examine into the state of his wounded. Enormous fires were snapping in the chimneys of the house, superseding the necessity of candles, by the bright light which was thrown from the blazing piles. The group within were all young men and tried soldiers; in number they were rather more than a dozen, and their manners and conversation were a strange mixture of the bluntness of the partisan with the manners of gentlemen. Their dresses were neat, though plain; and a never-failing topic amongst them was the performance and quality of their horses. Some were endeavoring to sleep on the benches which lined the walls, some were walking the apartments, and others were seated in earnest discussion on subjects connected with the business of their lives. Occasionally, as the door of the kitchen opened, the hissing sounds of the frying pans and the inviting savor of the food created a stagnation in all other employments; even the sleepers, at such moments, would open their eyes, and raise their heads, to reconnoiter the state of the preparations. All this time Dunwoodie sat by himself, gazing at the fire, and lost in reflections which none of his officers presumed to disturb. He had made earnest inquiries of Sitgreaves after the condition of Singleton, during which a profound and respectful silence was maintained in the room; but as soon as he had ended, and resumed his seat, the usual ease and freedom prevailed.

The arrangement of the table was a matter of but little concern to Mrs. Flanagan; and Caesar would have been sadly scandalized at witnessing the informality with which various dishes, each bearing a wonderful resemblance to the others, were placed before so many gentlemen of consideration. In taking their places at the board, the strictest attention was paid to precedency; for, notwithstanding the freedom of manners which prevailed in the corps, the points of military etiquette were at all times observed, with something approaching to religious veneration. Most of the guests had been fasting too long to be in any degree fastidious in their appetites; but the case was different with Captain Lawton; he felt an unaccountable loathing at the exhibition of Betty’s food, and could not refrain from making a few passing comments on the condition of the knives, and the clouded aspect of the plates. The good nature and the personal affection of Betty for the offender, restrained her, for some time, from answering his innuendoes, until Lawton, having ventured to admit a piece of the black meat into his mouth, inquired, with the affectation of a spoiled child,—

“What kind of animal might this have been when living, Mrs. Flanagan?”

“Sure, captain, and wasn’t it the ould cow?” replied the sutler, with a warmth that proceeded partly from dissatisfaction at the complaints of her favorite, and partly from grief at the loss of the deceased.

“What!” roared the trooper, stopping short as he was about to swallow his morsel, “ancient Jenny!”

“The devil!” cried another, dropping his knife and fork, “she who made the campaign of the Jerseys with us?”

“The very same,” replied the mistress of the hotel, with a piteous aspect of woe; “a gentle baste, and one that could and did live on less than air, at need. Sure, gentlemen, ’tis awful to have to eat sitch an ould friend.”

“And has she sunk to this?” said Lawton, pointing with his knife, to the remnants on the table.

“Nay, captain,” said Betty, with spirit, “I sould two of her quarters to some of your troop; but divil the word did I tell the boys what an ould frind it was they had bought, for fear it might damage their appetites.”

“Fury!” cried the trooper, with affected anger, “I shall have my fellows as limber as supple-jacks on such fare; afraid of an Englishman as a Virginian negro is of his driver.”

“Well,” said Lieutenant Mason, dropping his knife and fork in a kind of despair, “my jaws have more sympathy than many men’s hearts. They absolutely decline making any impression on the relics of their old acquaintance.”

“Try a drop of the gift,” said Betty, soothingly, pouring a large allowance of the wine into a bowl, and drinking it off as taster to the corps. “Faith, ’tis but a wishy-washy sort of stuff after all!”

The ice once broken, however, a clear glass of wine was handed to Dunwoodie, who, bowing to his companions, drank the liquor in the midst of a profound silence. For a few glasses there was much formality observed, and sundry patriotic toasts and sentiments were duly noticed by the company. The liquor, however, performed its wonted office; and before the second sentinel at the door had been relieved, all recollection of the dinner and their cares was lost in the present festivity. Dr. Sitgreaves did not return in season to partake of Jenny, but he was in time to receive his fair proportion of Captain Wharton’s present.

“A song, a song from Captain Lawton!” cried two or three of the party in a breath, on observing the failure of some of the points of good-fellowship in the trooper. “Silence, for the song of Captain Lawton.”

“Gentlemen,” returned Lawton, his dark eyes swimming with the bumpers he had finished, though his head was as impenetrable as a post; “I am not much of a nightingale, but, under the favor of your good wishes, I consent to comply with the demand.”

“Now, Jack,” said Sitgreaves, nodding on his seat, “remember the air I taught you, and—stop, I have a copy of the words in my pocket.”

“Forbear, forbear, good doctor,” said the trooper, filling his glass with great deliberation; “I never could wheel round those hard names. Gentlemen, I will give you a humble attempt of my own.”

“Silence, for Captain Lawton’s song!” roared five or six at once; when the trooper proceeded, in a fine, full tone, to sing the following words to a well-known bacchanalian air, several of his comrades helping him through the chorus with a fervor that shook the crazy edifice they were in:—

Now push the mug, my jolly boys,
    And live, while live we can;
To-morrow’s sun may end your joys,
    For brief’s the hour of man.
And he who bravely meets the foe
His lease of life can never know.
        Old mother Flanagan
        Come and fill the can again!
        For you can fill, and we can swill,
        Good Betty Flanagan.

If love of life pervades your breast,
    Or love of ease your frame,
Quit honor’s path for peaceful rest,
    And bear a coward’s name;
For soon and late, we danger know,
And fearless on the saddle go.
        Old mother, etc.

When foreign foes invade the land,
    And wives and sweethearts call,
In freedom’s cause we’ll bravely stand
    Or will as bravely fall;
In this fair home the fates have given
We’ll live as lords, or live in heaven.
        Old mother, etc.

At each appeal made to herself, by the united voices of the choir, Betty invariably advanced and complied literally with the request contained in the chorus, to the infinite delight of the singers, and with no small participation in the satisfaction on her account. The hostess was provided with a beverage more suited to the high seasoning to which she had accustomed her palate, than the tasteless present of Captain Wharton; by which means Betty had managed, with tolerable facility, to keep even pace with the exhilaraton of her guests. The applause received by Captain Lawton was general, with the exception of the surgeon, who rose from the bench during the first chorus, and paced the floor, in a flow of classical indignation. The bravos and bravissimos drowned all other noises for a short time; but as they gradually ceased, the doctor turned to the musician, and exclaimed with heat,—

“Captain Lawton, I marvel that a gentleman, and a gallant officer, can find no other subject for his muse, in these times of trial, than in such beastly invocations to that notorious follower of the camp, the filthy Elizabeth Flanagan. Methinks the goddess of Liberty could furnish a more noble inspiration, and the sufferings of your country a more befitting theme.”

“Heyday!” shouted the hostess, advancing towards him in a threatening attitude; “and who is it that calls me filthy? Master Squirt! Master Popgun—”

“Peace!” said Dunwoodie, in a voice that was exerted but a little more than common, but which was succeeded by the stillness of death. “Woman, leave the room. Dr. Sitgreaves, I call you to your seat, to wait the order of the revels.”

“Proceed, proceed,” said the surgeon, drawing himself up in an attitude of dignified composure. “I trust, Major Dunwoodie, I am not unacquainted with the rules of decorum, nor ignorant of the by-laws of good-fellowship.” Betty made a hasty but somewhat devious retreat to her own dominions, being unaccustomed to dispute the orders of the commanding officer.

“Major Dunwoodie will honor us with a sentimental song,” said Lawton, bowing to his leader, with the collected manner he so well knew how to assume.

The major hesitated a moment, and then sang, with fine execution, the following words:—

Some love the heats of southern suns,
Where’s life’s warm current maddening runs,
    In one quick circling stream;
But dearer far’s the mellow light
Which trembling shines, reflected bright
    In Luna’s milder beam.

Some love the tulip’s gaudier dyes,
Where deepening blue with yellow vies,
    And gorgeous beauty glows;
But happier he, whose bridal wreath,
By love entwined, is found to breathe
    The sweetness of the rose.

The voice of Dunwoodie never lost its authority with his inferiors; and the applause which followed his song, though by no means so riotous as that which succeeded the effort of the captain, was much more flattering.

“If, sir,” said the doctor, after joining in the plaudits of his companions, “you would but learn to unite classical allusions with your delicate imagination you would become a pretty amateur poet.”

“He who criticizes ought to be able to perform,” said Dunwoodie with a smile. “I call on Dr. Sitgreaves for a specimen of the style he admires.”

“Dr. Sitgreaves’ song! Dr. Sitgreaves’ song!” echoed all at the table with delight; “a classical ode from Dr. Sitgreaves!”

The surgeon made a complacent bow, took the remnant of his glass, and gave a few preliminary hems, that served hugely to delight three or four young cornets at the foot of the table. He then commenced singing, in a cracked voice, and to anything but a tune, the following ditty:—

Hast thou ever felt love’s dart, dearest,
    Or breathed his trembling sigh—
Thought him, afar, was ever nearest,
    Before that sparkling eye?
Then hast thou known what ’tis to feel
The pain that Galen could not heal.

“Hurrah!” shouted Lawton. “Archibald eclipses the Muses themselves; his words flow like the sylvan stream by moonlight, and his melody is a crossbreed of the nightingale and the owl.”

“Captain Lawton,” cried the exasperated operator, “it is one thing to despise the lights of classical learning, and another to be despised for your own ignorance!”

A loud summons at the door of the building created a dead halt in the uproar, and the dragoons instinctively caught up their arms, to be prepared for the worst. The door was opened, and the Skinners entered, dragging in the peddler, bending beneath the load of his pack.

“Which is Captain Lawton?” said the leader of the gang, gazing around him in some little astonishment.

“He waits your pleasure,” said the trooper dryly.

“Then here I deliver to your hands a condemned traitor. This is Harvey
Birch, the peddler spy.”

Lawton started as he looked his old acquaintance in the face, and, turning to the Skinner with a lowering look, he asked,—

“And who are you, sir, that speak so freely of your neighbors? But,” bowing to Dunwoodie, “your pardon, sir; here is the commanding officer; to him you will please address yourself.”

“No,” said the man, sullenly, “it is to you I deliver the peddler, and from you I claim my reward.”

“Are you Harvey Birch?” said Dunwoodie, advancing with an air of authority that instantly drove the Skinner to a corner of the room.

“I am,” said Birch, proudly.

“And a traitor to your country,” continued the major, with sternness. “Do you know that I should be justified in ordering your execution this night?”

“’Tis not the will of God to call a soul so hastily to His presence,” said the peddler with solemnity.

“You speak truth,” said Dunwoodie; “and a few brief hours shall be added to your life. But as your offense is most odious to a soldier, so it will be sure to meet with the soldier’s vengeance. You die to-morrow.”

“’Tis as God wills.”

“I have spent many a good hour to entrap the villain,” said the Skinner, advancing a little from his corner, “and I hope you will give me a certificate that will entitle us to the reward; ’twas promised to be paid in gold.”

“Major Dunwoodie,” said the officer of the day, entering the room, “the patrols report a house to be burned near yesterday’s battle ground.”

“’Twas the hut of the peddler,” muttered the leader of the gang. “We have not left him a shingle for shelter; I should have burned it months ago, but I wanted his shed for a trap to catch the sly fox in.”

“You seem a most ingenious patriot,” said Lawton. “Major Dunwoodie, I second the request of this worthy gentleman, and crave the office of bestowing the reward on him and his fellows.”

“Take it; and you, miserable man, prepare for that fate which will surely befall you before the setting of to-morrow’s sun.”

“Life offers but little to tempt me with,” said Harvey, slowly raising his eyes, and gazing wildly at the strange faces in the apartment.

“Come, worthy children of America!” said Lawton, “follow, and receive your reward.”

The gang eagerly accepted the invitation, and followed the captain towards the quarters assigned to his troop. Dunwoodie paused a moment, from reluctance to triumph over a fallen foe, before he proceeded.

“You have already been tried, Harvey Birch; and the truth has proved you to be an enemy too dangerous to the liberties of America to be suffered to live.”

“The truth!” echoed the peddler, starting, and raising himself in a manner that disregarded the weight of his pack.

“Aye! the truth; you are charged with loitering near the continental army, to gain intelligence of its movements, and, by communicating them to the enemy, to enable him to frustrate the intentions of Washington.”

“Will Washington say so, think you?”

“Doubtless he would; even the justice of Washington condemns you.”

“No, no, no,” cried the peddler, in a voice and with a manner that startled Dunwoodie. “Washington can see beyond the hollow views of pretended patriots. Has he not risked his all on the cast of a die? If a gallows is ready for me, was there not one for him also? No, no, no, no—Washington would never say, ‘Lead him to a gallows.’”

“Have you anything, wretched man, to urge to the commander in chief why you should not die?” said the major, recovering from the surprise created by the manner of the other.

Birch trembled, for violent emotions were contending in his bosom. His face assumed the ghastly paleness of death, and his hand drew a box of tin from the folds of his shirt; he opened it, showing by the act that it contained a small piece of paper. On this document his eye was for an instant fixed—he had already held it towards Dunwoodie, when suddenly withdrawing his hand he exclaimed,—

“No—it dies with me. I know the conditions of my service, and will not purchase life with their forfeiture—it dies with me.”

“Deliver that paper, and you may possibly find favor,” cried Dunwoodie, expecting a discovery of importance to the cause.

“It dies with me,” repeated Birch, a flush passing over his pallid features, and lighting them with extraordinary brilliancy.

“Seize the traitor!” cried the major, “and wrest the secret from his hands.”

The order was immediately obeyed; but the movements of the peddler were too quick; in an instant he swallowed the paper. The officers paused in astonishment; but the surgeon cried eagerly,—

“Hold him, while I administer an emetic.”

“Forbear!” said Dunwoodie, beckoning him back with his hand. “If his crime is great, so will his punishment be heavy.”

“Lead on,” cried the peddler, dropping his pack from his shoulders, and advancing towards the door with a manner of incomprehensible dignity.

“Whither?” asked Dunwoodie, in amazement.

“To the gallows.”

“No,” said the major, recoiling in horror at his own justice. “My duty requires that I order you to be executed, but surely not so hastily; take until nine to-morrow to prepare for the awful change.”

Dunwoodie whispered his orders in the ear of a subaltern, and motioned to the peddler to withdraw. The interruption caused by this scene prevented further enjoyment around the table, and the officers dispersed to their several places of rest. In a short time the only noise to be heard was the heavy tread of the sentinel, as he paced the frozen ground in front of the Hotel Flanagan.

There are, whose changing lineaments
Express each guileless passion of the breast;
Where Love, and Hope, and tender-hearted Pity
Are seen reflected, as from a mirror’s face;
But cold experience can veil these hues
With looks, invented shrewdly to encompass
The cunning purposes of base deceit.

—Duo.

The officer to whose keeping Dunwoodie had committed the peddler transferred his charge to the custody of the regular sergeant of the guard. The gift of Captain Wharton had not been lost on the youthful lieutenant; and a certain dancing motion that had taken possession of objects before his eyes, gave him warning of the necessity of recruiting nature by sleep. After admonishing the noncommissioned guardian of Harvey to omit no watchfulness in securing the prisoner, the youth wrapped himself in his cloak, and, stretched on a bench before a fire, soon found the repose he needed. A rude shed extended the whole length of the rear of the building, and from off one of its ends had been partitioned a small apartment, that was intended as a repository for many of the lesser implements of husbandry. The lawless times had, however, occasioned its being stripped of everything of value; and the searching eyes of Betty Flanagan selected this spot, on her arrival, as the storehouse for her movables and a sanctuary for her person. The spare arms and baggage of the corps had also been deposited here; and the united treasures were placed under the eye of the sentinel who paraded the shed as a guardian of the rear of the headquarters. A second soldier, who was stationed near the house to protect the horses of the officers, could command a view of the outside of the apartment; and, as it was without window or outlet of any kind, excepting its door, the considerate sergeant thought this the most befitting place in which to deposit his prisoner until the moment of his execution. Several inducements urged Sergeant Hollister to this determination, among which was the absence of the washerwoman, who lay before the kitchen fire, dreaming that the corps was attacking a party of the enemy, and mistaking the noise that proceeded from her own nose for the bugles of the Virginians sounding the charge. Another was the peculiar opinions that the veteran entertained of life and death, and by which he was distinguished in the corps as a man of most exemplary piety and holiness of life. The sergeant was more than fifty years of age, and for half that period he had borne arms. The constant recurrence of sudden deaths before his eyes had produced an effect on him differing greatly from that which was the usual moral consequence of such scenes; and he had become not only the most steady, but the most trustworthy soldier in his troop. Captain Lawton had rewarded his fidelity by making him its orderly.

Followed by Birch, the sergeant proceeded in silence to the door of the intended prison, and, throwing it open with one hand, he held a lantern with the other to light the peddler to his prison. Seating himself on a cask, that contained some of Betty’s favorite beverage, the sergeant motioned to Birch to occupy another, in the same manner. The lantern was placed on the floor, when the dragoon, after looking his prisoner steadily in the face, observed,—

“You look as if you would meet death like a man; and I have brought you to a spot where you can tranquilly arrange your thoughts, and be quiet and undisturbed.”

“’Tis a fearful place to prepare for the last change in,” said Harvey, gazing around his little prison with a vacant eye.

“Why, for the matter of that,” returned the veteran, “it can reckon but little in the great account, where a man parades his thoughts for the last review, so that he finds them fit to pass the muster of another world. I have a small book here, which I make it a point to read a little in, whenever we are about to engage, and I find it a great strengthener in time of need.” While speaking, he took a Bible from his pocket, and offered it to the peddler. Birch received the volume with habitual reverence; but there was an abstracted air about him, and a wandering of the eye, that induced his companion to think that alarm was getting the mastery of the peddler’s feelings; accordingly, he proceeded in what he conceived to be the offices of consolation.

“If anything lies heavy on your mind, now is the best time to get rid of it—if you have done any wrong to anyone, I promise you, on the word of an honest dragoon, to lend you a helping hand to see them righted.”

“There are few who have not done so,” said the peddler, turning his vacant gaze once more on his companion.

“True—’tis natural to sin; but it sometimes happens that a man does what at other times he may be sorry for. One would not wish to die with any very heavy sin on his conscience, after all.”

Harvey had by this time thoroughly examined the place in which he was to pass the night, and saw no means of escape. But as hope is ever the last feeling to desert the human breast, the peddler gave the dragoon more of his attention, fixing on his sunburned features such searching looks, that Sergeant Hollister lowered his eyes before the wild expression which he met in the gaze of his prisoner.

“I have been taught to lay the burden of my sins at the feet of my
Savior,” replied the peddler.

“Why, yes—all that is well enough,” returned the other. “But justice should be done while there is opportunity. There have been stirring times in this country since the war began, and many have been deprived of their rightful goods I oftentimes find it hard to reconcile even my lawful plunder to a tender conscience.”

“These hands,” said the peddler, stretching forth his meager, bony fingers, “have spent years in toil, but not a moment in pilfering.”

“It is well that it is so,” said the honest-hearted soldier, “and, no doubt, you now feel it a great consolation. There are three great sins, that, if a man can keep his conscience clear of, why, by the mercy of God, he may hope to pass muster with the saints in heaven: they are stealing, murdering, and desertion.”

“Thank God!” said Birch, with fervor, “I have never yet taken the life of a fellow creature.”

“As to killing a man in lawful battle, that is no more than doing one’s duty. If the cause is wrong, the sin of such a deed, you know, falls on the nation, and a man receives his punishment here with the rest of the people; but murdering in cold blood stands next to desertion as a crime in the eye of God.”

“I never was a soldier, therefore never could desert,” said the peddler, resting his face on his hand in a melancholy attitude.

“Why, desertion consists of more than quitting your colors, though that is certainly the worst kind; a man may desert his country in the hour of need.”

Birch buried his face in both his hands, and his whole frame shook; the sergeant regarded him closely, but good feelings soon got the better of his antipathies, and he continued more mildly,—

“But still that is a sin which I think may be forgiven, if sincerely repented of; and it matters but little when or how a man dies, so that he dies like a Christian and a man. I recommend you to say your prayers, and then to get some rest, in order that you may do both. There is no hope of your being pardoned; for Colonel Singleton has sent down the most positive orders to take your life whenever we met you. No, no—nothing can save you.”

“You say the truth,” cried Birch. “It is now too late—I have destroyed my only safeguard. But he will do my memory justice at least.”

“What safeguard?” asked the sergeant, with awakened curiosity.

“’Tis nothing,” replied the peddler, recovering his natural manner, and lowering his face to avoid the earnest looks of his companion.

“And who is he?”

“No one,” added Harvey, anxious to say no more.

“Nothing and no one can avail but little now,” said the sergeant, rising to go. “Lay yourself on the blanket of Mrs. Flanagan, and get a little sleep; I will call you betimes in the morning; and from the bottom of my soul I wish I could be of some service to you, for I dislike greatly to see a man hung up like a dog.”

“Then you might save me from this ignominious death,” said Birch, springing to his feet, and catching the dragoon by the arm. “And, oh! what will I not give you in reward!”

“In what manner?” asked the sergeant, looking at him in surprise.

“See,” said the peddler, producing several guineas from his person; “these are nothing to what I will give you, if you will assist me to escape.”

“Were you the man whose picture is on the gold, I would not listen to such a crime,” said the trooper, throwing the money on the floor with contempt. “Go—go, poor wretch, and make your peace with God; for it is He only that can be of service to you now.”

The sergeant took up the lantern, and, with some indignation in his manner, he left the peddler to sorrowful meditations on his approaching fate. Birch sank, in momentary despair, on the pallet of Betty, while his guardian proceeded to give the necessary instructions to the sentinels for his safe-keeping.

Hollister concluded his injunctions to the man in the shed, by saying, “Your life will depend on his not escaping. Let none enter or quit the room till morning.”

“But,” said the trooper, “my orders are, to let the washerwoman pass in and out, as she pleases.”

“Well, let her then; but be careful that this wily peddler does not get out in the folds of her petticoats.” He then continued his walk, giving similar orders to each of the sentinels near the spot.

For some time after the departure of the sergeant, silence prevailed within the solitary prison of the peddler, until the dragoon at his door heard his loud breathings, which soon rose into the regular cadence of one in a deep sleep. The man continued walking his post, musing on an indifference to life which could allow nature its customary rest, even on the threshold of the grave. Harvey Birch had, however, been a name too long held in detestation by every man in the corps, to suffer any feelings of commiseration to mingle with these reflections of the sentinel; for, notwithstanding the consideration and kindness manifested by the sergeant, there probably was not another man of his rank in the whole party who would have discovered equal benevolence to the prisoner, or who would not have imitated the veteran in rejecting the bribe, although probably from a less worthy motive. There was something of disappointed vengeance in the feelings of the man who watched the door of the room on finding his prisoner enjoying a sleep of which he himself was deprived, and at his exhibiting such obvious indifference to the utmost penalty that military rigor could inflict on all his treason to the cause of liberty and America. More than once he felt prompted to disturb the repose of the peddler by taunts and revilings; but the discipline he was under, and a secret sense of shame at the brutality of the act, held him in subjection.

His meditations were, however, soon interrupted by the appearance of the washerwoman, who came staggering through the door that communicated with the kitchen, muttering execrations against the servants of the officers, who, by their waggery, had disturbed her slumbers before the fire. The sentinel understood enough of her maledictions to comprehend the case; but all his efforts to enter into conversation with the enraged woman were useless, and he suffered her to enter her room without explaining that it contained another inmate. The noise of her huge frame falling on the bed was succeeded by a silence that was soon interrupted by the renewed respiration of the peddler, and within a few minutes Harvey continued to breathe aloud, as if no interruption had occurred. The relief arrived at this moment.

The sentinel, who felt nettled at the contempt of the peddler, after communicating his orders, while he was retiring, exclaimed to his successor,—

“You may keep yourself warm by dancing, John; the peddler spy has tuned his fiddle, you hear, and it will not be long before Betty will strike up, in her turn.”

The joke was followed by a general laugh from the party, who marched on in performance of their duty. At this instant the door of the prison was opened, and Betty reappeared, staggering back again toward her former quarters.

“Stop,” said the sentinel, catching her by her clothes; “are you sure the spy is not in your pocket?”

“Can’t you hear the rascal snoring in my room, you dirty blackguard?” sputtered Betty, her whole frame shaking with rage. “And is it so ye would sarve a dacent famale, that a man must be put to sleep in the room wid her, ye rapscallion?”

“Pooh! Do you mind a fellow who’s to be hanged in the morning? You see he sleeps already; to-morrow he’ll take a longer nap.”

“Hands off, ye villain,” cried the washerwoman, relinquishing a small bottle that the trooper had succeeded in wresting from her. “But I’ll go to Captain Jack, and know if it’s orders to put a hang-gallows spy in my room; aye, even in my widowed bed, you tief!”

“Silence, old Jezebel!” said the fellow with a laugh, taking the bottle from his mouth to breathe, “or you will wake the gentleman. Would you disturb a man in his last sleep?”

“I’ll awake Captain Jack, you reprobate villain, and bring him here to see me righted; he will punish ye all, for imposing on a dacent widowed body, you marauder!”

With these words, which only extorted a laugh from the sentinel, Betty staggered round the end of the building, and made the best of her way towards the quarters of her favorite, Captain John Lawton, in search of redress. Neither the officer nor the woman, however, appeared during the night, and nothing further occurred to disturb the repose of the peddler, who, to the astonishment of the different sentinels, continued by his breathing to manifest how little the gallows could affect his slumbers.

A Daniel come to judgment; yea, a Daniel!
O wise young judge, how I do honor thee!

—Merchant of Venice.

The Skinners followed Captain Lawton with alacrity, towards the quarters occupied by the troop of that gentleman. The captain of dragoons had on all occasions manifested so much zeal for the cause in which he was engaged, was so regardless of personal danger when opposed to the enemy, and his stature and stern countenance contributed so much to render him terrific, that these qualities had, in some measure, procured him a reputation distinct from the corps in which he served. His intrepidity was mistaken for ferocity; and his hasty zeal, for the natural love of cruelty. On the other hand, a few acts of clemency, or, more properly speaking, of discriminating justice, had, with one portion of the community, acquired for Dunwoodie the character of undue forbearance. It is seldom that either popular condemnation or popular applause falls, exactly in the quantities earned, where it is merited.

While in the presence of the major the leader of the gang had felt himself under that restraint which vice must ever experience in the company of acknowledged virtue; but having left the house, he at once conceived that he was under the protection of a congenial spirit. There was a gravity in the manner of Lawton that deceived most of those who did not know him intimately; and it was a common saying in his troop, that “when the captain laughed, he was sure to punish.” Drawing near his conductor, therefore, the leader commenced a confidential dialogue.

“’Tis always well for a man to know his friends from his enemies,” said the half-licensed freebooter.

To this prefatory observation the captain made no other reply than a sound which the other interpreted into assent.

“I suppose Major Dunwoodie has the good opinion of Washington?” continued the Skinner, in a tone that rather expressed a doubt than asked a question.

“There are some who think so.”

“Many of the friends of Congress in this county,” the man proceeded, “wish the horse was led by some other officer. For my part, if I could only be covered by a troop now and then, I could do many an important piece of service to the cause, to which this capture of the peddler would be a trifle.”

“Indeed! such as what?”

“For the matter of that, it could be made as profitable to the officer as it would be to us who did it,” said the Skinner, with a look of the most significant meaning.

“But how?” asked Lawton, a little impatiently, and quickening his step to get out of the hearing of the rest of the party.

“Why, near the royal lines, even under the very guns of the heights, might be good picking if we had a force to guard us from De Lancey’s^[8] men, and to cover our retreat from being cut off by the way of King’s Bridge.”

“I thought the Refugees took all that game to themselves.”

“They do a little at it; but they are obliged to be sparing among their own people. I have been down twice, under an agreement with them: the first time they acted with honor; but the second they came upon us and drove us off, and took the plunder to themselves.”

“That was a very dishonorable act, indeed; I wonder that an honorable man will associate with such rascals.”

“It is necessary to have an understanding with some of them, or we might be taken; but a man without honor is worse than a brute. Do you think Major Dunwoodie is to be trusted?”

“You mean on honorable principles?”

“Certainly; you know Arnold was thought well of until the royal major was taken.”

“Why, I do not believe Dunwoodie would sell his command as Arnold wished to do; neither do I think him exactly trustworthy in a delicate business like this of yours.”

“That’s just my notion,” rejoined the Skinner, with a self-approving manner that showed how much he was satisfied with his own estimate of character.

By this time they had arrived at a better sort of farmhouse, the very extensive outbuildings of which were in tolerable repair, for the times. The barns were occupied by the men of the troop, while the horses were arranged under the long sheds which protected the yard from the cold north wind. The latter were quietly eating, with saddles on their backs and bridles thrown on their necks, ready to be bitted and mounted at the shortest warning. Lawton excused himself for a moment, and entered his quarters. He soon returned, holding in his hand one of the common, stable lanterns, and led the way towards a large orchard that surrounded the buildings on three sides. The gang followed the trooper in silence, believing his object to be facility of communicating further on this interesting topic, without the danger of being overheard.

Approaching the captain, the Skinner renewed the discourse, with a view of establishing further confidence, and of giving his companion a more favorable opinion of his own intellects.

“Do you think the colonies will finally get the better of the king?” he inquired, with a little of the importance of a politician.

“Get the better!” echoed the captain with impetuosity. Then checking himself, he continued, “No doubt they will. If the French will give us arms and money, we will drive out the royal troops in six months.”

“Well, so I hope we shall soon; and then we shall have a free government, and we, who fight for it, will get our reward.”

“Oh!” cried Lawton, “your claims will be indisputable; while all these vile Tories who live at home peaceably, to take care of their farms, will be held in the contempt they merit. You have no farm, I suppose?”

“Not yet—but it will go hard if I do not find one before the peace is made.”

“Right; study your own interests, and you study the interests of your country; press the point of your own services, and rail at the Tories, and I’ll bet my spurs against a rusty nail that you get to be a county clerk at least.”

“Don’t you think Paulding’s^[9] party were fools in not letting the royal adjutant general escape?” said the man, thrown off his guard by the freedom of the captain’s manner.

“Fools!” cried Lawton, with a bitter laugh. “Aye, fools indeed; King George would have paid them better, for he is richer. He would have made them gentlemen for their losses. But, thank God! there is a pervading spirit in the people that seems miraculous. Men who have nothing, act as if the wealth of the Indies depended on their fidelity; all are not villains like yourself, or we should have been slaves to England years ago.”

“How!” exclaimed the Skinner, starting back, and dropping his musket to the level of the other’s breast; “am I betrayed, and are you my enemy?”

“Miscreant!” shouted Lawton, his saber ringing in its steel scabbard, as he struck the musket of the fellow from his hands, “offer but again to point your gun at me, and I’ll cleave you to the middle.”

“And you will not pay us, then, Captain Lawton?” said the Skinner, trembling in every joint, for just then he saw a party of mounted dragoons silently encircling the whole party.

“Oh! pay you—yes, you shall have the full measure of your reward. There is the money that Colonel Singleton sent down for the captors of the spy,” throwing a bag of guineas with disdain at the other’s feet. “But ground your arms, you rascals, and see that the money is truly told.”

The intimidated band did as they were ordered; and while they were eagerly employed in this pleasing avocation, a few of Lawton’s men privately knocked the flints out of their muskets.

“Well,” cried the impatient captain, “is it right? Have you the promised reward?”

“There is just the money,” said the leader; “and we will now go to our homes, with your permission.”

“Hold! so much to redeem our promise—now for justice; we pay you for taking a spy, but we punish you for burning, robbing, and murdering. Seize them, my lads, and give each of them the law of Moses—forty save one.”

This command was given to no unwilling listeners; and in the twinkling of an eye the Skinners were stripped and fastened, by the halters of the party, to as many of the apple trees as were necessary to furnish one to each of the gang. Swords were quickly drawn, and fifty branches were cut from the trees, like magic; from these were selected a few of the most supple of the twigs, and a willing dragoon was soon found to wield each of the weapons. Captain Lawton gave the word, humanely cautioning his men not to exceed the discipline prescribed by the Mosaic law, and the uproar of Babel commenced in the orchard. The cries of the leader were easily to be distinguished above those of his men; a circumstance which might be accounted for, by Captain Lawton’s reminding his corrector that he had to deal with an officer, and he should remember and pay him unusual honor. The flagellation was executed with great neatness and dispatch, and it was distinguished by no irregularity, excepting that none of the disciplinarians began to count until they had tried their whips by a dozen or more blows, by the way, as they said themselves, of finding out the proper places to strike. As soon as this summary operation was satisfactorily completed, Lawton directed his men to leave the Skinners to replace their own clothes, and to mount their horses; for they were a party who had been detached for the purpose of patrolling lower down in the county.

“You see, my friend,” said the captain to the leader of the Skinners, after he had prepared himself to depart, “I can cover you to some purpose, when necessary. If we meet often, you will be covered with scars, which, if not very honorable, will at least be merited.”

The fellow made no reply. He was busy with his musket, and hastening his comrades to march; when, everything being ready, they proceeded sullenly towards some rocks at no great distance, which were overhung by a deep wood. The moon was just rising, and the group of dragoons could easily be distinguished where they had been left. Suddenly turning, the whole gang leveled their pieces and drew the triggers. The action was noticed, and the snapping of the locks was heard by the soldiers, who returned their futile attempt with a laugh of derision, the captain crying aloud,—

“Ah! rascals, I knew you, and have taken away your flints.”