Why, worthy father, what have we to lose?
--The law
Protects us not. Then why should we be tender
To let an arrogant piece of flesh threat us!
Play judge and executioner.
--Cymbeline.
While the Teton thus enacted his subtle and characteristic part, not a
sound broke the stillness of the surrounding prairie. The whole band
lay at their several posts, waiting, with the well-known patience of
the natives, for the signal which was to summon them to action. To the
eyes of the anxious spectators who occupied the little eminence,
already described as the position of the captives, the scene presented
the broad, solemn view of a waste, dimly lighted by the glimmering
rays of a clouded moon. The place of the encampment was marked by a
gloom deeper than that which faintly shadowed out the courses of the
bottoms, and here and there a brighter streak tinged the rolling
summits of the ridges. As for the rest, it was the deep, imposing
quiet of a desert.
But to those who so well knew how much was brooding beneath this
mantle of stillness and night, it was a scene of high and wild
excitement. Their anxiety gradually increased, as minute after minute
passed away, and not the smallest sound of life arose out of the calm
and darkness which enveloped the brake. The breathing of Paul grew
louder and deeper, and more than once Ellen trembled at she knew not
what, as she felt the quivering of his active frame, while she leaned
dependently on his arm for support.
The shallow honesty, as well as the besetting infirmity of Weucha,
have already been exhibited. The reader, therefore, will not be
surprised to learn that he was the first to forget the regulations he
had himself imposed. It was at the precise moment when we left
Mahtoree yielding to his nearly ungovernable delight, as he surveyed
the number and quality of Ishmael's beasts of burden, that the man he
had selected to watch his captives chose to indulge in the malignant
pleasure of tormenting those it was his duty to protect. Bending his
head nigh the ear of the trapper, the savage rather muttered than
whispered--
"If the Tetons lose their great chief by the hands of the
Long-knives[*], old shall die as well as young!"
[*] The whites are so called by the Indians, from their swords.
"Life is the gift of the Wahcondah," was the unmoved reply. "The
burnt-wood warrior must submit to his laws, as well as his other
children. Men only die when he chooses; and no Dahcotah can change the
hour."
"Look!" returned the savage, thrusting the blade of his knife before
the face of his captive. "Weucha is the Wahcondah of a dog."
The old man raised his eyes to the fierce visage of his keeper, and,
for a moment, a gleam of honest and powerful disgust shot from their
deep cells; but it instantly passed away, leaving in its place an
expression of commiseration, if not of sorrow.
"Why should one made in the real image of God suffer his natur' to be
provoked by a mere effigy of reason?" he said in English, and in tones
much louder than those in which Weucha had chosen to pitch the
conversation. The latter profited by the unintentional offence of his
captive, and, seizing him by the thin, grey locks, that fell from
beneath his cap, was on the point of passing the blade of his knife in
malignant triumph around their roots, when a long, shrill yell rent
the air, and was instantly echoed from the surrounding waste, as if a
thousand demons opened their throats in common at the summons. Weucha
relinquished his grasp, and uttered a cry of exultation.
"Now!" shouted Paul, unable to control his impatience any longer,
"now, old Ishmael, is the time to show the native blood of Kentucky!
Fire low, boys--level into the swales, for the red skins are settling
to the very earth!"
His voice was, however, lost, or rather unheeded, in the midst of the
shrieks, shouts, and yells that were, by this time, bursting from
fifty mouths on every side of him. The guards still maintained their
posts at the side of the captives, but it was with that sort of
difficulty with which steeds are restrained at the starting-post, when
expecting the signal to commence the trial of speed. They tossed their
arms wildly in the air, leaping up and down more like exulting
children than sober men, and continued to utter the most frantic
cries.
In the midst of this tumultuous disorder a rushing sound was heard,
similar to that which might be expected to precede the passage of a
flight of buffaloes, and then came the flocks and cattle of Ishmael in
one confused and frightened drove.
"They have robbed the squatter of his beasts!" said the attentive
trapper. "The reptiles have left him as hoofless as a beaver!" He was
yet speaking, when the whole body of the terrified animals rose the
little acclivity, and swept by the place where he stood, followed by a
band of dusky and demon-like looking figures, who pressed madly on
their rear.
The impulse was communicated to the Teton horses, long accustomed to
sympathise in the untutored passions of their owners, and it was with
difficulty that the keepers were enabled to restrain their impatience.
At this moment, when all eyes were directed to the passing whirlwind
of men and beasts, the trapper caught the knife from the hands of his
inattentive keeper, with a power that his age would have seemed to
contradict, and, at a single blow, severed the thong of hide which
connected the whole of the drove. The wild animals snorted with joy
and terror, and tearing the earth with their heels, they dashed away
into the broad prairies, in a dozen different directions.
Weucha turned upon his assailant with the ferocity and agility of a
tiger. He felt for the weapon of which he had been so suddenly
deprived, fumbled with impotent haste for the handle of his tomahawk,
and at the same moment glanced his eyes after the flying cattle, with
the longings of a Western Indian. The struggle between thirst for
vengeance and cupidity was severe but short. The latter quickly
predominated in the bosom of one whose passions were proverbially
grovelling; and scarcely a moment intervened between the flight of the
animals and the swift pursuit of the guards. The trapper had continued
calmly facing his foe, during the instant of suspense that succeeded
his hardy act; and now that Weucha was seen following his companions,
he pointed after the dark train, saying, with his deep and nearly
inaudible laugh--
"Red-natur' is red-natur', let it show itself on a prairie, or in a
forest! A knock on the head would be the smallest reward to him who
should take such a liberty with a Christian sentinel; but there goes
the Teton after his horses as if he thought two legs as good as four
in such a race! And yet the imps will have every hoof of them afore
the day sets in, because it's reason ag'in instinct. Poor reason, I
allow; but still there is a great deal of the man in an Indian. Ah's
me! your Delawares were the redskins of which America might boast; but
few and scattered is that mighty people, now! Well! the traveller may
just make his pitch where he is; he has plenty of water, though natur'
has cheated him of the pleasure of stripping the 'arth of its lawful
trees. He has seen the last of his four-footed creatures, or I am but
little skilled in Sioux cunning."
"Had we not better join the party of Ishmael?" said the bee-hunter.
"There will be a regular fight about this matter, or the old fellow
has suddenly grown chicken-hearted."
"No--no--no," hastily exclaimed Ellen.
She was stopped by the trapper, who laid his hand gently on her mouth,
as he answered--
"Hist--hist!--the sound of voices might bring us into danger. Is your
friend," he added, turning to Paul, "a man of spirit enough?"
"Don't call the squatter a friend of mine!" interrupted the youth. "I
never yet harboured with one who could not show hand and zeal for the
land which fed him."
"Well--well. Let it then be acquaintance. Is he a man to maintain his
own, stoutly by dint of powder and lead?"
"His own! ay, and that which is not his own, too! Can you tell me, old
trapper, who held the rifle that did the deed for the sheriff's
deputy, that thought to rout the unlawful settlers who had gathered
nigh the Buffaloe lick in old Kentucky? I had lined a beautiful swarm
that very day into the hollow of a dead beech, and there lay the
people's officer at its roots, with a hole directly through the 'grace
of God;' which he carried in his jacket pocket covering his heart, as
if he thought a bit of sheepskin was a breastplate against a
squatter's bullet! Now, Ellen, you needn't be troubled for it never
strictly was brought home to him; and there were fifty others who had
pitched in that neighbourhood with just the same authority from the
law."
The poor girl shuddered, struggling powerfully to suppress the sigh
which arose in spite of her efforts, as if from the very bottom of her
heart.
Thoroughly satisfied that he understood the character of the
emigrants, by the short but comprehensive description conveyed in
Paul's reply, the old man raised no further question concerning the
readiness of Ishmael to revenge his wrongs, but rather followed the
train of thought which was suggested to his experience, by the
occasion.
"Each one knows the ties which bind him to his fellow-creatures best,"
he answered. "Though it is greatly to be mourned that colour, and
property, and tongue, and l'arning should make so wide a difference in
those who, after all, are but the children of one father! Howsomever,"
he continued, by a transition not a little characteristic of the
pursuits and feelings of the man, "as this is a business in which
there is much more likelihood of a fight than need for a sermon, it is
best to be prepared for what may follow.--Hush! there is a movement
below; it is an equal chance that we are seen."
"The family is stirring," cried Ellen, with a tremor that announced
nearly as much terror at the approach of her friends, as she had
before manifested at the presence of her enemies. "Go, Paul, leave me.
You, at least, must not be seen!"
"If I leave you, Ellen, in this desert before I see you safe in the
care of old Ishmael, at least, may I never hear the hum of another
bee, or, what is worse, fail in sight to line him to his hive!"
"You forget this good old man. He will not leave me. Though I am sure,
Paul, we have parted before, where there has been more of a desert
than this."
"Never! These Indians may come whooping back, and then where are you!
Half way to the Rocky Mountains before a man can fairly strike the
line of your flight. What think you, old trapper? How long may it be
before these Tetons, as you call them, will be coming for the rest of
old Ishmael's goods and chattels?"
"No fear of them," returned the old man, laughing in his own peculiar
and silent manner; "I warrant me the devils will be scampering after
their beasts these six hours yet! Listen! you may hear them in the
willow bottoms at this very moment; ay, your real Sioux cattle will
run like so many long-legged elks. Hist! crouch again into the grass,
down with ye both; as I'm a miserable piece of clay, I heard the
ticking of a gunlock!"
The trapper did not allow his companions time to hesitate, but
dragging them both after him, he nearly buried his own person in the
fog of the prairie, while he was speaking. It was fortunate that the
senses of the aged hunter remained so acute, and that he had lost none
of his readiness of action. The three were scarcely bowed to the
ground, when their ears were saluted with the well-known, sharp,
short, reports of the western rifle, and instantly, the whizzing of
the ragged lead was heard, buzzing within dangerous proximity of their
heads.
"Well done, young chips! well done, old block!" whispered Paul, whose
spirits no danger nor situation could entirely depress. "As pretty a
volley, as one would wish to bear on the wrong end of a rifle! What
d'ye say, trapper! here is likely to be a three-cornered war. Shall I
give 'em as good as they send?"
"Give them nothing but fair words," returned the other, hastily, "or
you are both lost."
"I'm not certain it would much mend the matter, if I were to speak
with my tongue instead of the piece," said Paul, in a tone half
jocular half bitter.
"For the sake of heaven, do not let them hear you!" cried Ellen. "Go,
Paul, go; you can easily quit us now!"
Several shots in quick succession, each sending its dangerous
messenger, still nearer than the preceding discharge, cut short her
speech, no less in prudence than in terror.
"This must end," said the trapper, rising with the dignity of one bent
only on the importance of his object. "I know not what need ye may
have, children, to fear those you should both love and honour, but
something must be done to save your lives. A few hours more or less
can never be missed from the time of one who has already numbered so
many days; therefore I will advance. Here is a clear space around you.
Profit by it as you need, and may God bless and prosper each of you,
as ye deserve!"
Without waiting for any reply, the trapper walked boldly down the
declivity in his front, taking the direction of the encampment,
neither quickening his pace in trepidation, nor suffering it to be
retarded by fear. The light of the moon fell brighter for a moment on
his tall, gaunt, form, and served to warn the emigrants of his
approach. Indifferent, however to this unfavourable circumstance, he
held his way, silently and steadily towards the copse, until a
threatening voice met him with a challenge of--
"Who comes; friend or foe?"
"Friend," was the reply; "one who has lived too long to disturb the
close of life with quarrels."
"But not so long as to forget the tricks of his youth," said Ishmael,
rearing his huge frame from beneath the slight covering of a low bush,
and meeting the trapper, face to face; "old man, you have brought this
tribe of red devils upon us, and to-morrow you will be sharing the
booty."
"What have you lost?" calmly demanded the trapper.
"Eight as good mares as ever travelled in gears, besides a foal that
is worth thirty of the brightest Mexicans that bear the face of the
King of Spain. Then the woman has not a cloven hoof for her dairy, or
her loom, and I believe even the grunters, foot sore as they be, are
ploughing the prairie. And now, stranger," he added, dropping the butt
of his rifle on the hard earth, with a violence and clatter that would
have intimidated one less firm than the man he addressed, "how many of
these creatures may fall to your lot?"
"Horses have I never craved, nor even used; though few have journeyed
over more of the wide lands of America than myself, old and feeble as
I seem. But little use is there for a horse among the hills and woods
of York--that is, as York was, but as I greatly fear York is no longer
--as for woollen covering and cow's milk, I covet no such womanly
fashions! The beasts of the field give me food and raiment. No, I
crave no cloth better than the skin of a deer, nor any meat richer
than his flesh."
The sincere manner of the trapper, as he uttered this simple
vindication, was not entirely thrown away on the emigrant, whose dull
nature was gradually quickening into a flame, that might speedily have
burst forth with dangerous violence. He listened like one who doubted,
not entirely convinced: and he muttered between his teeth the
denunciation, with which a moment before he intended to precede the
summary vengeance he had certainly meditated.
"This is brave talking," he at length grumbled; "but to my judgment,
too lawyer-like, for a straight forward, fair-weather, and
foul-weather hunter."
"I claim to be no better than a trapper," the other meekly answered.
"Hunter or trapper--there is little difference. I have come, old man,
into these districts because I found the law sitting too tight upon
me, and am not over fond of neighbours who can't settle a dispute
without troubling a justice and twelve men; but I didn't come to be
robb'd of my plunder, and then to say thank'ee to the man who did it!"
"He, who ventures far into the prairies, must abide by the ways of its
owners."
"Owners!" echoed the squatter, "I am as rightful an owner of the land
I stand on, as any governor in the States! Can you tell me, stranger,
where the law or the reason, is to be found, which says that one man
shall have a section, or a town, or perhaps a county to his use, and
another have to beg for earth to make his grave in? This is not
nature, and I deny that it is law. That is, your legal law."
"I cannot say that you are wrong," returned the trapper, whose
opinions on this important topic, though drawn from very different
premises, were in singular accordance with those of his companion,
"and I have often thought and said as much, when and where I have
believed my voice could be heard. But your beasts are stolen by them
who claim to be masters of all they find in the deserts."
"They had better not dispute that matter with a man who knows better,"
said the other in a portentous voice, though it seemed deep and
sluggish as he who spoke.
"I call myself a fair trader, and one who gives to his chaps as good
as he receives. You saw the Indians?"
"I did--they held me a prisoner, while they stole into your camp."
"It would have been more like a white man and a Christian, to have let
me known as much in better season," retorted Ishmael, casting another
ominous sidelong glance at the trapper, as if still meditating evil.
"I am not much given to call every man, I fall in with, cousin, but
colour should be something, when Christians meet in such a place as
this. But what is done, is done, and cannot be mended, by words. Come
out of your ambush, boys; here is no one but the old man: he has eaten
of my bread, and should be our friend; though there is such good
reason to suspect him of harbouring with our enemies."
The trapper made no reply to the harsh suspicion which the other did
not scruple to utter without the smallest delicacy, notwithstanding
the explanations and denials to which he had just listened. The
summons of the unnurtured squatter brought an immediate accession to
their party. Four or five of his sons made their appearance from
beneath as many covers, where they had been posted under the
impression that the figures they had seen, on the swell of the
prairie, were a part of the Sioux band. As each man approached, and
dropped his rifle into the hollow of his arm, he cast an indolent but
enquiring glance at the stranger, though neither of them expressed the
least curiosity to know whence he had come or why he was there. This
forbearance, however, proceeded only in part, from the sluggishness of
their common temper; for long and frequent experience in scenes of a
similar character, had taught them the virtue of discretion. The
trapper endured their sullen scrutiny with the steadiness of one as
practised as themselves, and with the entire composure of innocence.
Content with the momentary examination he had made, the eldest of the
group, who was in truth the delinquent sentinel by whose remissness
the wily Mahtoree had so well profited, turned towards his father and
said bluntly--
"If this man is all that is left of the party I saw on the upland,
yonder, we haven't altogether thrown away our ammunition."
"Asa, you are right," said the father, turning suddenly on the
trapper, a lost idea being recalled by the hint of his son. "How is
it, stranger; there were three of you, just now, or there is no virtue
in moonlight?"
"If you had seen the Tetons racing across the prairies, like so many
black-looking evil ones, on the heels of your cattle, my friend, it
would have been an easy matter to have fancied them a thousand."
"Ay, for a town bred boy, or a skeary woman; though for that matter,
there is old Esther; she has no more fear of a red-skin than of a
suckling cub, or of a wolf pup. I'll warrant ye, had your thievish
devils made their push by the light of the sun, the good woman would
have been smartly at work among them, and the Siouxes would have found
she was not given to part with her cheese and her butter without a
price. But there'll come a time, stranger, right soon, when justice
will have its dues, and that too, without the help of what is called
the law. We ar' of a slow breed, it may be said, and it is often said,
of us; but slow is sure; and there ar' few men living, who can say
they ever struck a blow, that they did not get one as hard in return,
from Ishmael Bush."
"Then has Ishmael Bush followed the instinct of the beasts rather than
the principle which ought to belong to his kind," returned the
stubborn trapper. "I have struck many a blow myself, but never have I
felt the same ease of mind that of right belongs to a man who follows
his reason, after slaying even a fawn when there was no call for his
meat or hide, as I have felt at leaving a Mingo unburied in the woods,
when following the trade of open and honest warfare."
"What, you have been a soldier, have you, trapper! I made a forage or
two among the Cherokees, when I was a lad myself; and I followed mad
Anthony,[*] one season, through the beeches; but there was altogether
too much tatooing and regulating among his troops for me; so I left
him without calling on the paymaster to settle my arrearages. Though,
as Esther afterwards boasted, she had made such use of the pay-ticket,
that the States gained no great sum, by the oversight. You have heard
of such a man as mad Anthony, if you tarried long among the soldiers."
[*] Anthony Wayne, a Pennsylvanian distinguished in the war of the
revolution, and subsequently against the Indians of the west, for
his daring as a general, by which he gained from his followers the
title of Mad Anthony. General Wayne was the son of the person
mentioned in the life of West as commanding the regiment which
excited his military ardour.
"I fou't my last battle, as I hope, under his orders," returned the
trapper, a gleam of sunshine shooting from his dim eyes, as if the
event was recollected with pleasure, and then a sudden shade of sorrow
succeeding, as though he felt a secret admonition against dwelling on
the violent scenes in which he had so often been an actor. "I was
passing from the States on the sea-shore into these far regions, when
I cross'd the trail of his army, and I fell in, on his rear, just as a
looker-on; but when they got to blows, the crack of my rifle was heard
among the rest, though to my shame it may be said, I never knew the
right of the quarrel as well as a man of threescore and ten should
know the reason of his acts afore he takes mortal life, which is a
gift he never can return!"
"Come, stranger," said the emigrant, his rugged nature a good deal
softened when he found that they had fought on the same side in the
wild warfare of the west, "it is of small account, what may be the
ground-work of the disturbance, when it's a Christian ag'in a savage.
We shall hear more of this horse-stealing to-morrow; to-night we can
do no wiser or safer thing than to sleep."
So saying, Ishmael deliberately led the way back towards his rifled
encampment, and ushered the man, whose life a few minutes before had
been in real jeopardy from his resentment, into the presence of his
family. Here, with a very few words of explanation, mingled with
scarce but ominous denunciations against the plunderers, he made his
wife acquainted with the state of things on the prairie, and announced
his own determination to compensate himself for his broken rest, by
devoting the remainder of the night to sleep.
The trapper gave his ready assent to the measure, and adjusted his
gaunt form on the pile of brush that was offered him, with as much
composure as a sovereign could resign himself to sleep, in the
security of his capital and surrounded by his armed protectors. The
old man did not close his eyes, however, until he had assured himself
that Ellen Wade was among the females of the family, and that her
relation, or lover, whichever he might be, had observed the caution of
keeping himself out of view: after which he slept, though with the
peculiar watchfulness of one long accustomed to vigilance, even in the
hours of deepest night.