The Chainbearer; Or, The Littlepage Manuscripts Read online

  CHAPTER VII.

  "Who is that graceful female here With yon red hunter of the deer? Of gentle mien and shape, she seems For civil halls design'd; Yet with the stately savage walks, As she were of his kind."--Pinckney.

  I made little stay in Albany, but, giving the direction to the patent tothe axe-men, left it the very day of our arrival. There were very fewpublic conveyances in that early day, and I was obliged to hire a wagonto transport Jaap and myself, with our effects, to Ravensnest. A sort ofdull calm had come over the country, after the struggles of the latewar; but one interest in it appearing to be alive and very active. Thatinterest, fortunately for me, appeared to be the business of"land-hunting" and "settling." Of this I had sufficient proof in Albanyitself; it being difficult to enter the principal street of that town,and not find in it more or less of those adventurers, the emblems ofwhose pursuit were the pack and the axe. Nine out of ten came from theEastern or New England States; then the most peopled, while they werenot very fortunate in either soil or climate.

  We were two days in reaching Ravensnest, a property which I had ownedfor several years, but which I now saw for the first time. Mygrandfather had left a sort of agent on the spot, a person of the nameof Jason Newcome, who was of my father the general's age, and who hadonce been a school-master in the neighborhood of Satanstoe. This agenthad leased extensively himself, and was said to be the occupant of theonly mills of any moment on the property. With him a correspondence hadbeen maintained; and once or twice during the war my father had managedto have an interview with this representative of his and my interests.As for myself, I was now to see him for the first time. We knew eachother by reputation only; and certain passages in the agency had inducedme to give Mr. Newcome notice that it was my intention to make a changein the management of the property.

  Any one who is familiar with the aspect of things in what is called a"new country" in America, must be well aware it is not very inviting.The lovers of the picturesque can have little satisfaction in lookingeven on the finest natural scenery at such moments; the labor that hasbeen effected usually having done so much to mar the beauties of nature,without having yet had time to supply the deficiencies by those of art.Piles of charred or half-burned logs: fields covered with stumps, orragged with _stubs_; fences of the rudest sorts, and filled withbrambles; buildings of the meanest character; deserted clearings; andall the other signs of a state of things in which there is a manifestand constant struggle between immediate necessity and future expediency,are not calculated to satisfy either the hopes or the tastes.Occasionally a different state of things, however, under circumstancespeculiarly favorable, does exist; and it may be well to allude to it,lest the reader form but a single picture of this transition state ofAmerican life. When the commerce of the country is active, and there isa demand for the products of new lands, a settlement often presents ascene of activity in which the elements of a thriving prosperity makethemselves apparent amid the smoke of fallows, and the rudeness ofborder life. Neither, however, was the case at Ravensnest when I firstvisited the place; though the last was, to a certain extent, itscondition two or three years later, or after the great European warbrought its wheat and ashes into active demand.

  I found but few more signs of cultivation, between the point where Ileft the great northern road and the bounds of the patent, than had beenfound by my father, as he had described them to me in his first visit,which took place a quarter of a century earlier than this of mine. Therewas one log tavern, it is true, in the space mentioned; but it affordednothing to drink but rum, and nothing to eat but salted pork andpotatoes, the day I stopped there to dine. But there were times andseasons when, by means of venison, wild-fowl and fish, a luxurious boardmight have been spread. That this was not the opinion of my landlady,nevertheless, was apparent from the remarks she made while I was attable.

  "You are lucky, Major Littlepage," she said, "in not having come amongus in one of what I call our 'starving times'--and awful times they be,if a body may say what she thinks on 'em."

  "Starvation is a serious matter at any time," I answered, "though I didnot know you were ever reduced to such difficulties in a country as richand abundant as this."

  "Of what use is riches and abundance if a man will do nothing but fishand shoot? I've seen the day when there wasn't a mouthful to eat in thishouse, but a dozen or two of squabs, a string of brook trout, and maybea deer, or a salmon from one of the lakes."

  "A little bread would have been a welcome addition to such a meal."

  "Oh! as for bread, I count that for nothin'. We always have bread andpotatoes enough; but I hold a family to be in a desperate way, when themother can see the bottom of the pork barrel. Give me the childrenthat's raised on good sound pork, afore all the game in the country.Game's good as a relish, and so's bread; but pork is the staff of life!To have good pork, a body must have good corn; and good corn needshoeing; and a hoe isn't a fish-pole or a gun. No, my children Icalkerlate to bring up on pork, with just as much bread and butter asthey may want!"

  This was American poverty as it existed in 1784. Bread, butter, andpotatoes, _ad libitum_; but little pork, and no tea. Game in abundancein its season; but the poor man who lived on game was supposed to bekeeping just as poor an establishment as the epicure in town who gives adinner to his brethren, and is compelled to apologize for there being nogame in the market. Curious to learn more from this woman, I pursued thediscourse.

  "There are countries, I have read," I continued, "in which the poor donot taste meat of any sort, not even game, from the beginning of theyear to its end; and sometimes not even bread."

  "Well, I'm no great hand for bread, as I said afore, and should eat nogreat matter of it, so long as I could get pork," the woman answered,evidently interested in what I had said; "but I shouldn't like to bewithout it altogether; and the children, especially, do love to have itwith their butter. Living on potatoes alone must be a wild animal sortof a life."

  "Very tame animals do it, and that from dire necessity."

  "Is there any law ag'in their using bread and meat?"

  "No other law than the one which forbids their using that which is theproperty of another."

  "Good land!" This is a very common American expression among thewomen--"Good land! Why don't they go to work and get in crops, so theymight live a little?"

  "Simply because they have no land to till. The land belongs to others,too."

  "I should think they might hire, if they couldn't buy. It's about asgood to hire as it is to buy--some folks (folk) think it's better. Whydon't they take land on shares, and live?"

  "Because land itself is not to be had. With us, land is abundant; wehave more of it than is necessary, or than will be necessary, for agesto come; perhaps it would be better for our civilization were there lessof it, but, in the countries of which I speak, there are more peoplethan there is land."

  "Well, land is a good thing, I admit, and it's right there should be anowner to it; yet there are folks who would rather squat than buy orhire, any day. Squatting comes nat'ral to 'em."

  "Are there many squatters in this part of the country?"

  The woman looked a little confused, and she did not answer me, until shehad taken time to reflect on what she should say.

  "Some folks call _us_ squatters, I s'pose," was the reluctant answer,"but _I_ do not. We have bought the betterments of a man who hadn't muchof a title, I think likely; but as _we_ bought his betterments fairly,Mr. Tinkum"--that was the husband's name--"is of opinion that we liveunder title, as it is called. What do you say to it, Major Littlepage?"

  "I can only say that naught will produce naught; nothing, nothing. Ifthe man of whom you purchased owned nothing, he could sell nothing. Thebetterments he called his, were not his; and in purchasing them, youpurchased what he did not own."

  "Well, it's no great shakes, if he hadn't any right, sin' Tinkum onlygi'n an old saddle, that warn't worth two dollars, and part of a set ofsingle harness, that I'd defy
a conjuror to make fit any mule, for thewhull right. One year's rent of this house is worth all put together,and that twice over, if the truth must be said; and we've been in it,now seven years. My four youngest were all born under this blessed roof,such as it is!"

  "In that case, you will not have much reason to complain, when the realowner of the soil appears to claim it. The betterments came cheap, andthey will go as cheap."

  "That's just it; though I don't call ourselves much of squatters, a'terall, seein' we _have_ paid suthin' for the betterments. They say an oldnail, paid in due form, will make a sort of title in the highest courtof the state. I'm sure the laws should be considerate of the poor."

  "Not more so than of the rich. The laws should be equal and just; andthe poor are the last people who ought to wish them otherwise, sincethey are certain to be the losers when any other principle governs. Relyon it, my good woman, the man who is forever preaching the rights of thepoor is at bottom a rogue, and means to make that cry a stalking-horsefor his own benefit; since nothing can serve the poor but severejustice. No class suffers so much by a departure from the rule, as therich have a thousand other means of attaining their ends, when the wayis left clear to them, by setting up any other master than the right."

  "I don't know but it may be so; but I don't call ourselves squatters.There is dreadful squatters about here, though, and on your lands too,by the tell."

  "On my lands? I am sorry to hear it, for I shall feel it a duty to getrid of them. I very well know that the great abundance of land that wehave in the country, its little comparative value, and the distance atwhich the owners generally reside from their estates, have united torender the people careless of the rights of those who possess realproperty; and I am prepared to view things as they are among ourselves,rather than as they exist in older countries; but I shall not toleratesquatters."

  "Well, by all I hear, I think you'll call old Andries, the Chainbearer,a squatter of the first class. They tell me the old chap has come backfrom the army as fierce as a catamount, and that there is no speaking tohim, as one used to could, in old times."

  "You are, then, an old acquaintance of the Chainbearer?"

  "I should think I was! Tinkum and I have lived about, a good deal, inour day; and old Andries is a desp'ate hand for the woods. He surveyedout for us, once, or half-surveyed, another betterment; but he proved tobe a spiteful rogue afore he got through with the business; and we havenot set much store by him ever sin' that time."

  "The Chainbearer a rogue! Andries Coejemans any thing but an honest man!You are the first person, Mrs. Tinkum, I have ever heard call inquestion his sterling integrity."

  "Sterling money doesn't pass now, I conclude, sin' it's revolutiontimes. We all know which side your family was on in the war, MajorLittlepage; so it's no offence to you. A proper sharp lookout they hadof it here, when you quit college; for some said old Herman Mordaunt hadordered in his will that you should uphold the king; and then, most ofthe tenants concluded _they_ would get the lands altogether. It is asweet thing, major, for a tenant to get his farm without paying for it,as you may judge! Some folks was desp'ate sorry when they heern tellthat the Littlepages went with the colonies."

  "I hope there are few such knaves on the Ravensnest estate as to wishanything of the sort. But, let me hear an explanation of your chargeagainst the Chainbearer. I have no great concern for my own rights inthe patent that I claim."

  The woman had the audacity, or the frankness, to draw a long, regretfulsigh, as it might be, in my very face. That sigh expressed her regretsthat I had not taken part with the crown in the last struggle; in whichcase, I do suppose, she and Tinkum would have contrived to squat on oneof the farms of Ravensnest. Having sighed, however, the landlady did notdisdain to answer.

  "As for the Chainbearer, the simple truth is this," she said. "Tinkumhired him to run a line between some betterments we had bought, and somethat had been bought by a neighbor of our'n. This was long afore thewar, and when titles were scarcer than they're gettin' to be now, someof the landlords living across the water. Well, what do you think theold fellow did, major? He first asked for our deeds, and we showed themto him; as good and lawful warrantees as was ever printed and filled upby a 'squire. He then set to work, all by himself, jobbing the whullsurvey, as it might be, and a prettier line was never run, as far as hewent, which was about half-way. I thought it would make etarnel peaceatween us and our neighbor, for it had been etarnel war afore that, forthree whull years; sometimes with clubs, and sometimes with axes, andonce with scythes. But, somehow--I never know'd _how_--but _somehow_,old Andries found out that the man who deeded to us had no deed tohimself, or no mortal right to the land, any more than that sucking pigyou see at the door there; when he gi'n right up, refusing to carry outanother link, or p'int another needle, he did! Warn't that beingcross-grained and wilful! No, there's no dependence to be put on theChainbearer."

  "Wilful in the cause of right, as glorious old Andries always is! I loveand honor him all the better for it."

  "La! Do you love and honor sich a one as him! Well, I should haveexpected suthin' else from sich a gentleman as you! I'd no idee MajorLittlepage could honor an old, worn-out chainbearer, and he a man thatcouldn't get up in the world, too, when he had hands and feet, all on'em together on some of the very best rounds of the ladder! Why, I judgethat even Tinkum would have gone ahead, if he had been born with sich achance."

  "Andries has been a captain in my own regiment, it is true, and was oncemy superior officer; but he served for his country's sake, and not forhis own. Have you seen him lately?"

  "That we have! He passed here about a twelvemonth ago, with his whullparty, on their way to squat on your own land, or I'm mistaken. Therewas the Chainbearer himself, two helpers, Dus and young Malbone."

  "Young who?" I asked, with an interest that induced the woman to turnher keen, sunken, but sharp gray eyes, intently on me.

  "Young Malbone, I said; Dus's brother, and the youngster who does allold Andries's 'rithmetic. I suppose you know as well as I do, that theChainbearer can't calkerlate any more than a wild goose, and not half aswell as a crow. For that matter, I've known crows that, in plantin'time, would measure a field in half the number of minutes that the statesurveyor would be hours at it."

  "This young Malbone, then, is the Chainbearer's nephew? And he it is whodoes the surveying?"

  "He does the 'rithmetic part, and he is a brother of old Andries'sniece. I know'd the Coejemans when I was a gal, and I've known theMalbones longer than I want to know them."

  "Have you any fault to find with the family, that you speak thus ofthem?"

  "Nothin' but their desperate pride, which makes them think themselves somuch better than everybody else; yet, they tell me, Dus and all on 'emare just as poor as I am myself."

  "Perhaps you mistake their feeling, good woman; a thing I think the moreprobable, as you seem to fancy money the source of their pride, at thevery moment you deny their having any. Money is a thing on which fewpersons of cultivated minds pride themselves. The purse-proud are,almost invariably, the vulgar and ignorant."

  No doubt this was a moral thrown away with such an auditor; but I wasprovoked; and when a man is provoked, he is not always wise. The answershowed the effect it had produced.

  "I don't pretend to know how that is; but if it isn't pride, what is itthat makes Dus Malbone so different from my da'ters? She'd no more thinkof being like one on 'em, scouring about the lots, riding bare-backed,and scampering through the neighborhood, than you'd think of cooking mydinner--that she wouldn't."

  Poor Mrs. Tinkum--or, as she would have been apt to call herself, _Miss_Tinkum! She had betrayed one of the commonest weaknesses of humannature, in thus imputing pride to the Chainbearer's niece because thelatter behaved differently from her and hers. How many persons in thisgood republic of ours judge their neighbors on precisely the sameprinciple; inferring something unsuitable, because it _seems_ to reflecton their own behavior! But by this time, I had got to hear th
e name ofDus with some interest, and I felt disposed to push the subject further.

  "Miss Malbone, then," I said, "does _not_ ride bare-back?"

  "La! major, what in natur' puts it into your head to call the gal _Miss_Malbone! There's no Miss Malbone living sin' her own mother died."

  "Well, Dus Malbone, I mean; she is above riding bare-backed?"

  "That she is; even a pillion would be hardly grand enough for her,allowing her own brother to use the saddle."

  "Her own brother! This young surveyor, then, _is_ Dus's brother?"

  "Sort o', and sort o' not, like. They had the same father, but differentmothers."

  "That explains it; I never heard the Chainbearer speak of any nephew,and it seems the young man is not related to him at all--he is the_half_-brother of his niece."

  "Why can't that niece behave like other young women? that's the questionI ask. My girls hasn't as much pride as would be good for 'em, not they!If a body wants to borrow an article over at the Nest, and that's sevenmiles off, the whull way in the woods, just name it to Poll, and she'djump on an ox, if there warn't a hoss, and away she'd go a'ter it, withno more bit of a saddle, and may be nothin' but a halter, like a deer!Give me Poll, afore all the gals I know, for ar'nds?"

  By this time, disrelish for vulgarity was getting the better ofcuriosity; and my dinner of fried pork being done, I was willing to dropthe discourse. I had learned enough of Andries and his party to satisfymy curiosity, and Jaap was patiently waiting to succeed me at the table.Throwing down the amount of the bill, I took a fowling-piece, with whichwe always travelled in those days, bade Mrs. Tinkum good-day, orderedthe black and the wagoner to follow with the team as soon as ready, andwent on toward my own property on foot.

  In a very few minutes I was quite beyond the Tinkum betterments, andfairly in the forest again. It happened that the title to a large tractof land adjoining Ravensnest was in dispute, and no attempt at a serioussettlement had ever been made on it. Some one had "squatted" at thisspot, to enjoy the advantage of selling rum to those who went and camebetween my own people and the inner country; and the place had changedhands half a dozen times, by fraudulent, or at least, by worthlesssales, from one squatter to another. Around the house, by this time adecaying pile of logs, time had done a part of the work of the settler,and aided by that powerful servant but fearful master, fire, had givento the small clearing somewhat of the air of civilized cultivation. Themoment these narrow limits were passed, however, the traveller enteredthe virgin forest, with no other sign of man around him than what wasoffered in the little worked and little travelled road. The highway wasnot much indebted to the labors of man for any facilities it affordedthe traveller. The trees had been cut out of it, it is true, but theirroots had not been extracted, and time had done more toward destroyingthem than the axe or the pick. Time _had_ done a good deal, however, andthe inequalities were getting to be smooth under the hoof and wheel. Atolerably good bridle-path had long been made, and I found no difficultyin walking in it, since that answered equally well for man and beast.

  The virgin forest of America is usually no place for the ordinarysportsman. The birds that are called game are but rarely found in it,one or two excepted; and it is a well-known fact that while thefrontier-man is certain death with a rifle-bullet, knocking the head offa squirrel or a wild turkey at his sixty or eighty yards, it isnecessary to go into the older parts of the country, and principallyamong sportsmen of the better classes, in order to find those who knockover the woodcock, snipe, quail, grouse, and plover, on the wing. I wasthought a good shot on the "plains," and over the heaths or commons ofthe Island of Manhattan, and among the rocks of Westchester; but I sawnothing to do up there, where I then was, surrounded by trees that hadstood there centuries. It would certainly have been easy enough for meto kill a blue jay now and then, or a crow, or even a raven, or perhapsan eagle, had I the proper shot; but as for anything that is ordinarilythought to adorn a game-bag, not a feather could I see. For the want ofsomething better to do, then, if a young man of three or four and twentyought thus to express himself, I began to ruminate on the charms of PrisBayard, and on the singularities of Dus Malbone. In this mood Iproceeded, getting over the grounds at a rapid rate, leaving MissTinkum, the clearing with its betterments, and the wagon, far behind me.

  I had walked an hour alone, when the silence of the woods was suddenlyinterrupted by the words of a song that came not from any of thefeathered race, though the nightingale itself could hardly have equalledthe sweetness of the notes, which were those of a female voice. The lownotes struck me as the fullest, richest, and most plaintive I had everheard; and I fancied they could not be equalled, until the straincarried the singer's voice into a higher key, where it seemed equally athome. I thought I knew the air, but the words were guttural, and in anunknown tongue. French and Dutch were the only two foreign languages inwhich one usually heard any music in our part of the woods at that day;and even the first was by no means common. But with both these languagesI had a little acquaintance, and I was soon satisfied that the words Iheard belonged to neither. At length it flashed on my mind that the songwas Indian; not the music, but the words. The music was certainlyScotch, or that altered Italian that time has attributed to the Scotch;and there was a moment when I fancied some Highland girl was singingnear me one of the Celtic songs of the country of her childhood. Butcloser attention satisfied me that the words were really Indian;probably belonging to the Mohawk, or some other language that I hadoften heard spoken.

  The reader may be curious to know whence these sounds proceeded, and whyI did not see the being who gave birth to such delicious harmony. It wasowing to the fact that the song came from out of a thicket of youngpines, that grew on an ancient opening at a little distance from theroad, and which I supposed contained a hut of some sort or other. Thesepines, however, completely concealed all within them. So long as thesong lasted, no tree of the forest was more stationary than myself; butwhen it ended, I was about to advance toward the thicket, in order topry into its mysteries, when I heard a laugh that had scarcely less ofmelody in it than the strains of the music itself. It was not a vulgar,clamorous burst of girlish impulses, nor was it even loud; but it waslight-hearted, mirthful, indicating humor, if a mere laugh _can_ do somuch; and in a sense it was contagious. It arrested my movement, inorder to listen; and before any new impulse led me forward, the branchesof the pines opened, and a man passed out of the thicket into the road.A single glance sufficed to let me know that the stranger was an Indian.

  Notwithstanding I was apprised of the near vicinity of others, I was alittle startled with this sudden apparition. Not so with him who wasapproaching; he could not have known of my being anywhere near him; yethe manifested no emotion as his cold, undisturbed glance fell on myform. Steadily advancing, he came to the centre of the road; and, as Ihad turned involuntarily to pursue my own way, not sure it was prudentto remain in that neighborhood alone, the red man fell in, with hismoccasined foot, at my elbow, and I found that we were thus strangelypursuing our journey, in the same direction, side by side.

  The Indian and myself walked in this manner, within a yard of eachother, in the midst of that forest, for two or three minutes withoutspeaking. I forbore to say anything, because I had heard that an Indianrespected those most who knew best how to repress their curiosity; whichhabit, most probably, had its effect on my companion. At length, the redman uttered, in the deep, guttural manner of his people, the commonconventional salutation of the frontier--

  "Sa-a-go?"

  This word, which has belonged to some Indian language once, passeseverywhere for Indian with the white man; and, quite likely for English,with the Indian. A set of such terms has grown up between the two races,including such words as "moccasin," "pappoose," "tomahawk," "squaw," andmany others. "Sa-a-go," means "how d'ye do?"

  "Sa-a-go?"--I answered to my neighbor's civil salutation.

  After this we walked along for a few minutes more, neither partyspeaking. I took this opportuni
ty to examine my red brother, anemployment that was all the easier from the circumstance that he did notonce look at me; the single glance sufficing to tell him all he wantedto know. In the first place, I was soon satisfied that my companion didnot drink, a rare merit in a red man who lived near the whites. This wasevident from his countenance, gait, and general bearing, as I thought,in addition to the fact that he possessed no bottle, or anything elsethat would hold liquor. What I liked the least was the circumstance ofhis being completely armed; carrying knife, tomahawk, and rifle, andeach seemingly excellent of its kind. He was not painted, however, andhe wore an ordinary calico shirt, as was then the usual garb of hispeople in the warm season. The countenance had the stern severity thatis so common to a red warrior; and, as this man was turned of fifty, hisfeatures began to show the usual signs of exposure and service. Still,he was a vigorous, respectable-looking red man, and one who wasevidently accustomed to live much among civilized men. I had no seriousuneasiness, of course, at meeting such a person, although we were socompletely buried in the forest but, as a soldier, I could not helpreflecting how inferior my fowling-piece would necessarily prove to beto his rifle should he see fit to turn aside, and pull upon me frombehind a tree, for the sake of plunder. Tradition said such things hadhappened; though, on the whole, the red man of America has perhapsproved to be the most honest of the two, as compared with those who havesupplanted him.

  "How ole chief?" the Indian suddenly asked, without even raising hiseyes from the road.

  "Old chief! Do you mean Washington, my friend?"

  "Not so--mean ole chief, out here, at Nest. Mean fader."

  "My father! Do you know General Littlepage?"

  "Be sure, know him. Your fader--see"--holding up his twoforefingers--"just like--dat him; dis you."

  "This is singular enough! And were you told that I was coming to thisplace?"

  "Hear dat, too. Always talk about chief."

  "Is it long since you saw my father?"

  "See him in war-time--nebber hear of ole Sureflint?"

  I had heard the officers of our regiment speak of such an Indian, whohad served a good deal with the corps, and been exceedingly useful, inthe two great northern campaigns especially. He never happened to bewith the regiment after I joined it, though his name and services were agood deal mixed up with the adventures of 1776 and 1777.

  "Certainly," I answered, shaking the red man cordially by the hand."Certainly, have I heard of you, and something that is connected withtimes before the war. Did you never meet my father before the war?"

  "Sartain; meet in _ole_ war. Gin'ral young man, den--just like son."

  "By what name were you then known, Oneida?"

  "No Oneida--Onondago--sober tribe. Hab plenty name. Sometime one,sometime anoder. Pale-face say 'Trackless,' cause he can't find histrail--warrior call him 'Susquesus.'"