Read Ebook: The Continental Monthly Vol. 5 No. 1 January 1864 by Various

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Ebook has 773 lines and 87261 words, and 16 pages

"Glad tew meet yew, William," said the Yankee, extending a hand looking like a side of mutton. "Shake."

"Confound your impudence," said the staff officer. "It passes all belief. But come into the house and get something to eat, although I am afraid that long body will breed a famine."

"Don't yew believe it! yew give me a little hog or tew and a small beef-critter for supper, and I won't complain. I like a light meal, I dew."

"A small hog or two and a beef-critter? Do you mean to eat the provisions of the entire garrison at a single meal?"

"'Tain't much of a garrison that don't eat no more nor that! All right; then bring me a loaf of bread and a ham, and I'll show you how tew eat."

Captain Floyd laughed, and led the way into the house through the open gate of the stockade. The Yankee had picked up a stick on the bank and was whittling away dexterously, whistling in the minor clef, but keeping his eyes about him nevertheless. He shook his head when he saw the gates off the hinges, and muttered to himself. Floyd turned upon him quickly.

"What are you growling about there? Let me know at once."

"Git eout! Waal, if yew must know, I was thinking what a darned good pertection a gate is to a house when it's off the hinges, standing ag'in' the wall."

"You are inclined to be sarcastic, and are more observing than I gave you credit for. To tell the truth up to this time we have been in no danger. The Shawnees have been friendly, and Tecumseh himself has eaten in our house. The Prophet was here only last week."

"Who?"

"The Prophet; the brother of Tecumseh, who has built a town upon the upper Wabash near Tippecanoe."

"I dunno much about it, but it seems to me I did hear summers that that Prophet is a treacherous old cuss," said Seth.

"I have heard the same, but he appeared very friendly."

The Yankee said nothing more, and they entered the house. A girl, who was reading near a window, rose to receive them, looking surprised as she saw the stranger.

"Cousin Madge," said Floyd, in a bantering tone, "let me introduce to you an errant knight who has wandered from the paternal castle even to the banks of the Wabash. His ancestral name is Spink."

"How can you, Will?" said Madge, laughing. "I am sure Mr. Spink is very welcome."

She was very beautiful--a strange flower to bloom in the wilderness. She was not the daughter of Matthew Floyd by blood, but the child of a dear friend, Herbert Carlysle, who had long ago gone down into the valley of the shadow, leaving her to his care. And when the hour of trial came to her adopted father, she followed him boldly, to make a new home and fortune upon the prairies of the far west. She was, as we introduce her, a young girl, with hair banded back from a lofty brow, and rolled in great braids upon her regal head; a face a little browned by exposure to the sun, but very beautiful. She came forward immediately and greeted the Yankee with cordial ease and grace, and he looked down on her with a broad smile.

"A strange place tew bring sech a gal as this, Capting Floyd," he said. "The towns would be the safest place fur her, now."

"She will not leave my father," said Floyd. "If we could have our way she would not be here. Madge, our friend is hungry. Will you go to Phillis and ask her to get him something to eat? She probably will not do it unless you speak coaxingly to her, for a more obstinate old woman never breathed."

"W'at?" exclaimed a voice. "Who you's talking 'bout, mass' Will? You t'ink cause you's white dat dis chile gwine ter lay down so dat you can tramp on her, but she ain't; no sah! I's a nigger, but Goramity he med me black hese own self, an' all de water in Egypt can't wash me white, nohow."

"Now Phillis--" said Will.

Phillis had come up unobserved while they were talking, and stood in the doorway when Will made that allusion to her native obstinacy. She was a ponderous female, weighing very nearly three hundred pounds, being built on the model of the redoubtable Wouter Van Twiller, of famous memory, who was five feet six inches high, and six feet five inches in circumference. She held in one hand a dishcloth, and in the other a frying-pan which she had been washing when curiosity called her to the door.

"There's a sight to wake the finer feelings of our natur'," said the Yankee, looking at the negress with a grin. "A good fat, healthy female like that is a credit to human natur', she is, by Jehosaphat. She makes me think of my maternal grandmother, only the old lady had the misfortune to be white, more the pity! 'Cause the good Book teaches us thar was a good chaince of black men in Scripter times. Now, my grandmother--"

"See yer," said the old housekeeper, "you's git inter trouble one of dese days, ef you fool roun' dis chile. G'way, g'way, you's makin' mischief! Oh, gosh all to pieces, you gwine stan' dar and poke fun at me all de time? Berry well; wait till I gub you any t'ing to eat, dats all!"

"But, aunty--" said Madge, coaxingly. "How can you act so?"

"Dar, dar, chile! 'Tain't dat I valley cookin' de leastest bit, it do mek me powerful mad when dey pokes fun at me."

"Did the old lady think I was funnin'?" said the Yankee, with a solemn face. "I wa'n't, now that's a fact. My grandmother was a bu'ster, now you'd better believe! Why, ef you was to put her on one end of a beam, and this old lady on the other, you'd see this old lady fly like a bird in the air. She wouldn't weigh a feather alongside of my old lady, that gal wouldn't."

"Tole 'em I wa'n't so drefful fat," said Phillis, considerably mollified. "But, dey won't none ob 'em beliebe me, nohow. Dar; I's go an' see w'at I kin pick up for de gemman. Would you like some venison?"

"Yaas."

"Or mebbe veal would suit ye better?"

Phillis looked at him very much as she would have looked at a dangerous maniac unfit to go at large, and went slowly out into the kitchen, the floor shaking under her ponderous tread. The next moment a storm of vituperation directed at the heads of her satellites, announced that she was at work, and a savory smell was wafted to their nostrils. Seth pricked up his ears like the war-horse "that smelleth the battle afar off," and waited. When the table was set, he marched in and gave Phillis a grand exemplification of the power of a good appetite. Pone bread in huge masses leaped down his capacious maw. Slice after slice of venison followed, washed down by various cups of coffee. Phillis, appalled at his appreciation of her cookery, watched with uplifted hands, and finally fled to Will Floyd in dismay.

"You git dat wolf outer dis house jus' as quick as you kin! He stay har one week an' he eat us out ob house an' home."

WILLIMACK, THE WYANDOT.

"How many dew yew reckon in this post, boss?" he said, turning to the young soldier.

"Myself, my father, two soldiers of the rifles, and two black boys."

"Yaas. Now let me ask yew a little question. Does it look like common sense for yew tew keep yure gates off the hinges?"

"To tell you the truth, I have some doubts myself, but the Prophet seemed to think it showed confidence in the Indians on the Wabash to leave the gates open, and it was more to please him than any thing else that we did it."

"The Prophet? Now, see here, capting; I ain't bin but a little while in this kentry, but I know what the Shawnee Prophet is. He's a treacherous old fox. He's got some plot ag'in' the people of this section, and I know it, sartin sure! Jest see the raft of villains he's got round him up thar on the Wabash. Kickapoos, Winnebagoes, Micmacs, Shawnees, and the Old Scratch knows what other nations--the riff-raff and off-scourings of the tribes. They're nice fellers to live nigh, ain't they?"

"I have often thought them dangerous," said Floyd. "But what can we do?"

"Yew kan put up yure gates, anyhow. And say; hadn't yew better call in yure men, ef yew've got any outlyin', 'cause it's gittin' dark."

"I think you are right," said Floyd.

He took down a horn, and going to the door, took a long breath and blew a gallant blast, which echoed far and wide through the depths of the forest. Shortly after, the tramp of coming feet could be heard, and there emerged from the woods behind the house four men advancing at a hurried pace. As they entered the stockade the Yankee saw that two of them were common soldiers of the American army, one an Indian of the Shawnee nation, and the fourth an old man with white hair. The Yankee swung himself up on the head of a cask standing within the stockade, and, taking out a piece of pigtail tobacco, twisted off a mighty "chaw," and sat there, rolling the sweet morsel under his tongue.

"What made you so late, father?" said young Floyd, advancing.

"Willimack got puzzled in regard to the path, and if we had not heard your horn, I do not know how long we might have stumbled about in the darkness."

The Yankee uttered a long whistle and thrust his tongue into his cheek. The sound drew the attention of the old man to him, and he scanned him curiously.

"Who is this?" he said.

"A traveler, who has stopped here for shelter," replied the young man, coming forward. "What did you mean by that whistle, Spink?"

"Sho, now! Don't be so blasted inquisitive. I wouldn't, anyhow. I'll tell yew by an by; but, the fust thing yew dew is to put up them gates, do ye hear?"

The Indian had been standing just within the gates, and, as he heard the voice of the stranger, he cast a quick glance in his direction, and his hand stole to the handle of his hatchet. But, the Yankee sat upon the cask, beating time with his heels upon the sides, and muttering to himself. The Indian stalked gravely to his side, and looked fiercely into his face. The savage was a rather good-looking brave of the Wyandot tribe, whose powerful limbs, strong shoulders, and muscular hands gave promise of great strength. The down-easter endured his fixed gaze for the space of three minutes without moving a muscle of his set face, until the savage spoke.

"Who is this?" he said. "Dare you come here to sing an evil song in the ears of my father with the gray hair, to make him distrust his brethren of the Shawnees and Wyandots?"

"Oh, git eout! Who said any thing tew yew? The most cantankerous Injin I ever see in all my born days."

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