a fine way when the public peace is to be sacrificed to the whim of
some outlandish wretches."

"Anan?" said Verty.

"Sir?" asked Mr. Rushton.

"I do not know exactly what _outlandish_ means," Verty replied, with a
smile.

A grim smile came to the lips of the lawyer also.

"It means a variety of things," he said, looking at Verty; "some
people would say that _you_, sir, were outlandish."

"Me!" said Verty.

"Yes, you; where are those costumes which I presented to you?"

"My clothes, sir--from the tailor's?"

"Yes, sir."

Verty shook his head.

"I did'nt feel easy in them, sir," he said; "you know I am an
Indian--or if I am not, at least I am a hunter. They cramped me."

Mr. Rushton looked at the young man for some moments in silence.

"You are a myth," he said, grimly smiling, "a dream--a chimera. You
came from no source, and are going nowhere. But I trifle. If I am
permitted, sir, I shall institute proper inquiries as to your origin,
which has occasioned so much thought. The press of business I have
labored under during the last month has not permitted me. Wretched
life. I'm sick of it--and go to it like a horse to the traces."

"Don't you like law, sir?"

"No--I hate it."

"Why, sir?"

"'Why!'" cried Mr. Rushton, "there you are with your annoying
questions! I hate it because it lowers still more my opinion of this
miserable humanity. I see everywhere rascality, and fraud, and lies;
and because there is danger of becoming the color of the stuff I work
in, 'like the dyer's hand.' I hate it," growled Mr. Rushton.

"But you must see many noble things, sir, too,--a great deal of
goodness, you know."

"Well, sir, so I do. I don't deny it. There are _some_ men who are not
entirely corrupt,--some who do not cheat systematically, and lie by
the compass and the rule. But these are the exceptions. This life and
humanity are foul sin from the beginning. Trust no one, young man--not
even me; I may turn out a rogue. I am no better than the rest of the
wretches!"

"Oh, Mr. Rushton!"

"There you are with your exclamations!"

"Oh, I'm sure, sir--"

"Be sure of nothing; let us end this jabber. How is your mother?" said
Mr. Rushton, abruptly.

"She's very well, sir."

"A good woman."

"Oh, indeed she is, sir--I love her dearly."

"Hum! there's no harm in that, though much selfishness, I do not
doubt--all humanity is narrow and selfish. There are some things I
procured for her."

And Mr. Rushton pointed to a large bundle lying on the chair.

"For _ma mere_!" said Verty.

"Yes; I suppose that, in your outlandish lingo, means _mother_. Yes,
for her; the winter is coming on, and she will need something warm to
wrap her--poor creature--from the cold."

"Oh, how kind you are, Mr. Rushton!"

"Nonsense; I suppose I am at liberty to spend my own money."

Verty looked at the lawyer with a grateful smile, and said:

"I don't think that what you said about everybody's being selfish and
bad is true, sir. You are very good and kind."

"Flummery!" observed the cynic, "I had a selfish motive: I wished to
appear generous--I wished to be praised--I wished to attach you to my
service, in order to employ you, when the time came, in some rascally
scheme."

"Oh, Mr. Rushton!"

"Yes, sir; you know not why I present that winter wardrobe to your
mother," said the lawyer, triumphantly; "you don't even know that it
is my present!"

"How, sir?"

"May I not stop it from your salary, I should like to know, sir?"

And Mr. Rushton scowled at Verty.

"Oh!" said the young man.

"I may do anything--I may have laid a plot to have you arrested for
receiving stolen goods," said the shaggy cynic, revelling in the
creations of his invention; "I may have wrapped up an infernal
machine, sir, in that bundle, which, when you open it, will explode
like a cannon, and carry ruin and destruction to everything around!"

This terrific picture caused Verty to open his eyes, and look with
astonishment at his interlocutor.

"I may have bought them in to spite that young villain at the store. I
heard him," said Mr. Rushton, vindictively--"yes, distinctly heard
him whisper, 'There's old Rushton again, come to growl, and not buy
anything.' The villain! but I disappointed him; and when he said,
"Shall they be sent to your office, sir?" in his odious obsequious
voice, I replied, 'No, sir! I am not a dandy or fine gentleman, nor
a woman;--you, sir, may be accustomed to have your bundles _sent_--I
carry mine myself.' And so, sir, I took the bundle on my shoulder and
brought it away, to the astonishment of that young villain, who, I
predict, will eventually come to the gallows!"

And the lawyer, having grown tired of talking, abruptly went into his
sanctum, and slammed the door.

Verty gazed after him for some moments with a puzzled expression--then
smiled--then shook his head; then glanced at the bundle. It was heavy
enough for two porters, and Verty opened his eyes at the thought of
Mr. Rushton's having appeared in public, in the town of Winchester,
with such a mass upon his back.

"He's very good, though," said Verty; "I don't know why he's so kind
to me. How _ma mere_ will like them--I know they are what she wants."

And Verty betook himself to his work, only stopping to partake of his
dinner of cold venison and biscuits. By the afternoon, he had done a
very good task; and then mounting Cloud, with the bundle before him,
he took his way homeward, _via_ Apple Orchard.

CHAPTER LIX.

THE PORTRAIT SMILES.

Our fine Virginia autumn not only dowers the world with beautiful
forests, and fresh breezes, and a thousand lovely aspects of the
beautiful world--fine golden sunsets, musical dawns, and gorgeous
noontides full of languid glory;--it also has its direct influence on
the mind.

Would you dream? Go to the autumn woods; the life there is one golden
round of fancies, such as come alone beneath waning forests, where
the glories of the flower-crowned summer have yielded to a spell more
powerful, objects more enthralling--because those objects have the
charm of a maiden slowly passing, with a loveliness a thousand times
increased, and sublimated, to the holy skies.

Would you have active life? That is there too--the deer, and sound
of bugles rattling through the trees, and rousing echoes which go
flashing through the hills, and filling the whole universe with
jubilant laughter. Every mood has something offered for its
entertainment in the grand autumns of our Blue-Ridge dominated land:
chiefly the thoughtful, however, the serene and happy.

You dream there, under the boughs all gold, and blue, and crimson.
Little things which obscured the eternal landscape, pass away, and the
great stars, above the world, come out and flood the mind with a far
other light than that which flowed from earthly tapers and rushlights.
The heart is purer for such hours of thought; and as the splendid
autumn marches on with pensive smiles, you see a glory in his waning
cheek which neither the tender Spring, nor the rich, glittering Summer
ever approached--an expression of hope and resignation which is
greater than strength and victory. Ah, me! if we could always look,
like autumn, on the coming storms and freezing snows, and see the
light and warmth beyond the veil!

Verty went on beneath the autumn skies, and through the woods, the
rustle of whose leaves was music to his forest-trained ear; and so
arrived at Apple Orchard as the sun was setting brightly behind the
pines, which he kindled gloriously.

Redbud was seated at the window; and the kind eyes and lips
brightened, as the form of the young man became visible.

Verty dismounted and entered.

"I am very glad to see you!" said Redbud, smiling, and holding out her
small hand; "what a sweet evening for your ride home."

Redbud was clad with her usual grace and simplicity. Her beautiful
golden hair was brushed back from the pure, white forehead; her throat
was enveloped in a circlet of diaphanous lace, and beneath this, as
she breathed, the red beads of the coral necklace were visible, rising
and falling with the pulsations of her heart. Redbud could not have
very readily explained the reason for her fancy in wearing the
necklace constantly. It was one of those caprices which every one
experiences at times;--and so, although the girl had quite a magazine
of such ornaments, she persisted in wearing the old necklace bought
from the pedlar. Perhaps the word Providence may explain the matter.

To the girl's observation, that he had a fine evening for his ride
homeward, Verty replied--Yes, that he had; that he could not go by,
however, without coming to see her.

And as he uttered these words, the simple and tender glances of the
two young persons encountered each other; and they both smiled.

"You know you are not very well," added Verty; "and I could'nt sleep
well if I did not know how you were, Redbud."

The girl thanked him with another smile, and said:

"I believe I am nearly well now; the cold I caught the other day has
entirely left me. I almost think I might take a stroll, if the sun was
not so low."

"It is half an hour high--that is, it will not get cool until then,"
Verty said.

"Do you think I would catch cold?" asked the girl, smiling.

"I don't know," Verty said.

"Well, I do not think I will, and you shall wrap me in your coat, if I
do," she said, laughing.

In ten minutes, Redbud and Verty were strolling through the grove, and
admiring the sunset.

"How pretty it is," she said, gazing with pensive pleasure on the
clouds; "and the old grove here is so still."

"Yes," Verty said, "I like the old grove very much. Do you see that
locust? It was just at the foot of it, that we found the hare's form,
when Dick mowed the grass. You recollect?"

"Oh, yes," Redbud replied; "and I remember what dear little creatures
they were--not bigger than an apple, and with such frightened eyes.
We put them back, you know, Verty--that is, I made you," she added,
laughing.

Verty laughed too.

"They were funny little creatures," he said; "and they would have
died--you know we never could have got the right things for them to
eat--yes! there, in the long grass! How Molly Cotton jumped away."

They walked on.

"Here, by the filbert bush, we used to bury the apples to get mellow,"
Verty said; "nice, yellow, soft things they were, when we dug them
up, with a smell of the earth about 'em! They were not like the June
apples we used to get in the garden, where they dropped among the
corn--their striped, red sides all covered with dust!"

"I liked the June apples the best," Redbud said, "but I think October
is finer than June."

"Oh, yes. Redbud, I am going to get some filberts--will you have
some?"

"If you please."

So Verty went to the bushes, and brought his hat full of them, and
cracked them on a stone--the sun lighting up his long, tangled curls,
and making brighter his bright smile.

Redbud stooped down, and gathered the kernels as they jumped from the
shell, laughing and happy.

They had returned to their childhood again--bright and tender
childhood, which dowers our after life with so many tender, mournful,
happy memorials;--whose breezes fan our weary brows so often as we go
on over the thorny path, once a path of flowers. They were once
more children, and they wandered thus through the beautiful forest,
collecting their memories, laughing here, sighing there--and giving an
association or a word to every feature of the little landscape.

"How many things I remember," Verty said, thoughtfully, and smiling;
"there, where Milo, the good dog, was buried, and a shot fired over
him--there, where we treed the squirrel--and over yonder, by the run,
which I used to think flowed by from fairy land--I remember so many
things!"

"Yes--I do too," replied the girl, thoughtfully, bending her head.

"How singular it is that an Indian boy like me should have been
brought up here," Verty said, buried in thought; "I think my life is
stranger than what they call a romance."

Redbud made no reply.

"_Ma mere_ would never tell me anything about myself," the young man
went on, wistfully, "and I can't know anything except from her. I must
be a Dacotah or a Delaware."

Redbud remained thoughtful for some moments, then raising her head,
said:

"I do not believe you are an Indian, Verty. There is some mystery
about you which I think the old Indian woman should tell. She
certainly is not your mother," said Redbud, with a little smiling air
of dogmatism.

"I don't know," Verty replied, "but I wish I did know. I used to be
proud of being an Indian, but since I have grown up, and read how
wicked they were, I wish I was not.

"You are not."

"Well, I think so, too," he replied; "I am not a bit like _ma mere_,
who has long, straight black hair, and a face the color of that
maple--dear _ma mere_!--while I have light hair, always getting rolled
up. My face is different, too--I mean the color--I am sun-burned, but
I remember when my face was very white."

And Verty smiled.

"I would ask her all about it," Redbud said.

"I think I will," was the reply; "but she don't seem to like it,
Redbud--it seems to worry her."

"But it is important to you, Verty."

"Yes, indeed it is."

"Ask her this evening."

"Do you advise me?"

"Yes. I think you ought to; indeed I do."

"Well, I will," Verty said; "and I know when _ma mere_ understands
that I am not happy as long as she does not tell me everything, she
will speak to me."

"I think so, too," said Redbud; "and now, Verty, there is one thing
more--trust in God, you know, is everything. He will do all for the
best."

"Oh, yes," the young man said, as they turned toward Apple Orchard
house again, "I am getting to do that--and I pray now, Redbud," he
added, looking toward the sky, "I pray to the Great Spirit, as we call
him--"

Redbud looked greatly delighted, and said:

"That is better than all; I do not see how any one can live without
praying."

"I used to," Verty replied.

"It was so wrong."

"Yes, yes."

"And Verty gazed at the sunset with his dreamy, yet kindling eyes.

"If there is a Great Spirit, we ought to talk to him," he said, "and
tell him what we want, and ask him to make us good; I think so at
least--"

"Indeed we should."

"Then," continued Verty, "if that is true, we ought to think whether
there is or is not such a spirit. There may be people in towns
who don't believe there is--but I am obliged to. Look at the sun,
Redbud--the beautiful sun going away like a great torch dying
out;--and look at the clouds, as red as if a thousand deer had come to
their death, and poured their blood out in a river! Look at the woods
here, every color of the bow in the cloud, and the streams, and rocks,
and all! There must be a Great Spirit who loves men, or he never would
have made the world so beautiful."

Verty paused, and they went on slowly.

"We love him because he first loved us," said Redbud, thoughtfully.

"Yes, and what a love it must have been. Oh me!" said the young man,
"I sometimes think of it until my heart is melted to water, and my
eyes begin to feel heavy. What love it was!--and if we do not love in
return, what punishment is great enough for such a crime!"

And Verty's face was raised with a dreamy, reverent look toward the
sky. Youth, manhood, age--if they but thought of it!--but youth is a
dream--manhood the waking--age the return to slumber. Busy, arranging
the drapery of their couches, whether of royal purple or of beggar's
rags, they cannot find the time to think of other things--even to
listen to the grim breakers, with their awful voices roaring on the
lee!

So, under the autumn skies, the young man and the maiden drew near
home. Apple Orchard smiled on them as they came, and the bluff Squire,
seated upon the portico, and reading that "Virginia Gazette" maligned
by Roundjacket, gave them welcome with a hearty, laughing greeting.

The Squire declared that Redbud's cheeks were beginning to be
tolerably red again; that she had been pretending sickness only--and
then, with a vituperative epithet addressed to Caesar, the old
gentleman re-commenced reading.

Redbud and Verty entered; and then the young man held out his hand.

"Are you going?" said the girl.

"Yes," he said, smiling, "unless you will sing me something. Oh, yes!
let me go away with music in my ears. Sing '_Dulce Domum_' for me,
Redbud."

The young girl assented, with a smile; and sitting down at the
harpsichord, sang the fine old ditty in her soft, tender voice, which
was the very echo of joy and kindness. The gentle carol floated on
the evening air, and seemed to make the autumn twilight brighter,
everything more lovely--and Verty listened with a look more dreamy
than before.

Then, as she sung, his eye was turned to the picture on the wall,
which looked down with its loving eyes upon them.

Redbud ceased, and turned and saw the object of his regard.

"Mamma," she said, in a low, thoughtful voice,--"I love to think of
her."

And rising, she stood beside Verty, who was still looking at the
portrait.

"She must have been very good," he murmured; "I think her face is full
of kindness."

Redbud gazed softly at the portrait, and, as she mused, the dews of
love and memory suffused her tender eyes, and she turned away.

"I love the face," said Verty, softly; "and I think she must have been
a kind, good mother, Redbud. I thought just now that she was listening
to you as you sang."

And Verty gazed at the young girl, with a tenderness which filled her
eyes with delight.

"She will bless you out of Heaven," he continued, timidly; "for you
are so beautiful and good--so very beautiful!"

And a slight tremor passed over the young man's frame as he spoke.

Redbud did not reply; a deep blush suffused her face, and she murmured
something. Then the young head drooped, and the face turned away.

The last ray of sunlight gleamed upon her hair and pure white
forehead, and then fled away--the day was ended.

Verty saw it, and held out his hand.

"We have had a happy evening, at least I have," he said, in a low
voice; "the autumn is so beautiful, and you are so kind and good."

She did not speak; but a faint wistful smile came to her lips as she
placed her hand softly in his own.

"Look! the picture is smiling on you now!" said Verty; "you are just
alike--both so beautiful!"

"Oh!" murmured Redbud, blushing; "like mamma?"

"Yes," said Verty, "and I saw the lips smile when I spoke."

They stood thus hand in hand--the tender mother-eyes upon them: then
he turned and went away, looking back tenderly to the last.

Had the dim canvas smiled upon them, as they stood there hand in
hand--a blessing on them from the far other world?

CHAPTER LX.

THE LODGE IN THE HILLS.

Sitting by the crackling twigs which drove away the cool airs of the
autumn night with their inspiring warmth, the young man, whose early
fortunes we have thus far endeavored to narrate, leaned his head upon
his hand, and mused and dreamed.

Overhead the shadows played upon the rafters; around him, the
firelight lit up the wild and uncouth interior, with its sleeping
hounds, and guns, and fishing-rods, and chests; on the opposite side
of the fire-place, the old Indian woman was indulging, like Verty, in
a reverie.

From time to time, Longears or Wolf would stir in their sleep, and
growl, engaged in dreaming of some forest adventure which concerned
itself with deer or other game; or the far cry of the whip-poor-will
would echo through the forest; or the laughter of the owl suddenly
come floating on, borne on the chill autumn wind.

This, with the crackle of the twigs, was all which disturbed the
silence of the solitary lodge.

The silence lasted for half an hour, at the end of which time Verty
changed his position, and sighed. Then looking at the old woman with
great affection, the young man said:

"I was thinking who I was; and I wanted to ask you, _ma mere_--tell
me."

The old woman looked startled at this address, but concealing her
emotion with the marvellous skill of her people, replied in her
guttural accent--

"My son wants to know something?"

"Yes, _ma mere_, that is it. I want to know if I really am your son."

The old woman turned her eyes from Verty.

"The fawn knows the deer, and the bear's cub knows his fellows,"
continued Verty, gazing into the fire; "but they laugh at me. I don't
know my tribe."

"Our tribe is the Delaware," said the old Indian woman evasively--"
they came from the great woods like a river."

"Like a river? Yes, they know their source. But where did I spring
from, _ma mere_?"

"Where was my son born?"

"Yes, tell me everything," said Verty; "tell me if I am your son.
Do not tell me that you love me as a son, or that I love you as my
mother. I know that--but am I a Delaware?"

"Why does my son ask?"

"Because a bird of the air whispered to me--'You are not a Delaware,
nor a Tuscarora, nor a Dacotah; you are a pale face.' Did the bird
lie!"

The old woman did not answer.

"_Ma mere_," said Verty, tenderly taking the old woman's hand and
sitting at her feet, "the Great Spirit has made me honest and open--I
cannot conceal anything. I cannot pry and search. I might find out
this from some other person--who knows? But I will not try. Come!
speak with a straight tongue. Am I the son of a brave; am I a
Delaware; or am I what my face makes me out--a Long-knife?"

"Ough! ough! ough!" groaned the old woman; "he wants to go, away from
the nest where he was warmed, and nursed, and brought up. The Great
Spirit has put evil into his heart--it is cold."

"No, no," said Verty, earnestly--"my heart is red, not white; every
drop of my life-blood is yours, _ma mere_; you have loved me,
cherished me: when my muscles were soft and hot with fever, you laid
my head upon your bosom, and rocked me to sleep as softly as the
topmost bough of the oak rocks the oriole; you loved me always. My
heart shall run out of my breast and soak the ground, before it turns
white; yet, I love you, and you love me. But, _ma mere_, I have grown
well nigh to manhood; the bird's song is changed, and the dove has
flown to me--the dove yonder at Apple Orchard--"

"Ough!" groaned the old woman, rocking to and fro; "she is black! She
has made you bad!"

"No, no! she is white--she is good. She told me about the Great
Spirit, and makes me pure."

"Ough! ough!"

"She is as pure as the bow in the cloud," continued Verty; "and I
did not mean that the dove was the bird who whispered, that I was no
Delaware. No--my own heart says, 'know--find out.'"

"And why should the heart say 'know?'" said the old woman, still
rocking about, and looking at Verty with anxious affection. "Why
should my son seek to find?"

"Because the winds are changed and sing new songs; the leaves whisper,
as I pass, with a new voice; and even the clouds are not what they
were to me when I ran after the shadows floating along the hills, and
across the hollows. I have changed, _ma mere_, and the streams talk no
more with the same tongue. I hear the flags and water-lilies muttering
as I pass, and the world opens on me with a new, strange light. They
talked to me once; now they laugh at me as I pass. Hear the trees,
yonder! Don't you hear them? They are saying, 'The Delaware paleface!
look at him! look at him!'"

And crouching, with dreamy eyes, Verty for a moment listened to the
strange sob of the pines, swaying in the chill winds of the autumn
night.

"I am not what I was!" he continued; the world is open now, and I must
be a part of it. The bear and deer speak to me with tongues I do not
understand. _Ma mere! ma mere_! I must know whether I am a Delaware or
pale face!--whether one or the other, I am still yours--yours always!
Speak! speak with a straight tongue to your child!"

"Ough! ough! ough!" groaned the old woman, looking at him wistfully,
and plainly struggling with herself--hesitating between two courses.

"Speak!" said Verty, with a glow in his eye, which made him resemble
a young leopard of the wild--"speak, _ma mere_!--I am no longer a
child! I go into a new land now, and how shall it be? As a red face,
or a long knife--which am I? Speak, _ma mere_--say if I am a Delaware,
whose place is the woods, or a white, whose life must take him from
the deer forever!"

The struggle was ended; Verty could not have uttered words more fatal
to his discovering anything. He raised an insuperable barrier to
any revelations--if, indeed, there existed any mystery--by his
alternative. Was he a Delaware, and thus doomed to live in the forest
with his old Indian mother--or was he a white, in which case, he would
leave her? Pride, cunning, above all, deep and pure affection, sealed
the old woman's lips, if she had thought of opening them. She looked
for sometime at Verty, then, taking his head between her hands, she
said, with eyes full of tears:

"You are my own dear son--my young, beautiful hawk of the woods--who
said you were not a true Delaware!"

And the old woman bent down, and with a look of profound affection,
pressed her lips to Verty's forehead.

The young man's face assumed an expression of mingled gloom and doubt,
and he sighed. Then he was an Indian--a Delaware--the son of the
Indian woman--he was not a paleface. All the talk about it was thrown
away; he was born in the woods--would live and die in the woods!

For a moment the image of Redbud rose before him, and he sighed. He
knew not why, but he wished that he was not an Indian--he wished that
his blood had been that of the whites.

His sad face drooped; then his eyes ware raised, and he saw the old
woman weeping.

The sight removed from Verty's mind all personal considerations, and
he leaned his head upon her knee, and pressed her hand to his lips.

"Did the child make his mother weep," he said; "did his idle words
bring rain to her eyes, and make her heart heavy? But he is her child
still, and all the world is nothing to him."

Verty rose, and taking the old, withered hand, placed it respectfully
on his breast.

"Never again, _ma mere_" he said, "will the wind talk to me, or the
birds whisper. I will not listen. Have I made your eyes dark? Let it
pass away--I am your son--I love you--more than all the whole wide
world."

And Verty sat down, and gazed tenderly at the old woman, whose face
had assumed an expression of extraordinary delight.

"Listen," said Verty, taking down his old violin, with a smile,
"I will play one of the old tunes, which blow like a wind from my
childhood--happy childhood."

And the young man gazed for a moment, silent and motionless, into the
fire. Then he raised his old, battered instrument, and began to play
one of the wild madrigals of the border.

The music aroused Longears, who sat up, so to speak, upon his
forepaws, and with his head bent upon one side, gazed with dignified
and solemn interest at his master.

The young man smiled, and continued playing; and as the rude border
music floated from the instrument, the Verty of old days came back,
and he was once again the forest hunter.

The old woman gazed at him with thoughtful affection, and returned his
smile. He went on playing, and the long hours of the autumn night went
by like birds into the cloudland of the past.

When the forest boy ceased playing, it was nearly midnight, and the
brands were flickering and dying.

Waked by the silence, Longears, who had gone to sleep again, rose up,
and came and licked his master's hand, and whined. Verty caressed his
head, and laying down his violin, looked at the old Indian woman with
affectionate smiles, and murmured:

"We are happy still, _ma mere_!"

CHAPTER LXI.

MISTRESS O'CALLIGAN'S WOOERS.

It will be remembered that Mr. Jinks had summed up the probable
results of his deep laid schemes that morning when he returned from
Mistress O'Calligan's, in the strong and emphatic word-picture, "there
will be gory blood, sir!"

Now, while these words, strictly construed, are, perhaps, ambiguous,
from a certain redundancy in the arrangement, still, there is little
difficulty in determining what Mr. Jinks meant. Death and destruction
dwelt in his imagination, and held there a riotous carnival; and to
such a pitch of delight was our friend elevated by the triumphant
anticipation of revenge upon O'Brallaghan, that he stalked about
during the remaining portion of the day, talking to himself in the
heroic vein, and presenting the appearance of an imperial grasshopper,
arrived at the summit of felicity.

But Mr. Jinks was not idle; no one knew better than himself that
vigilance was the price paid for success; and to vigilance our
conspirator added cunning--in which noble trait he was by no means
deficient.

We have seen how, on returning from the heroic attack upon the
peace-bound O'Brallaghan, Mr. Jinks threw out a series of observations
which attracted the attention of the landlord at the tavern; and
we have further seen these two gentlemen retire together into the
hostelry, with significant looks and mutterings. Of the exact nature
of that interview we cannot speak, having nowhere discovered any
memoranda to guide us, in the authentic documents from which this
history is compiled.

But results define causes; and from after events it is not improbable
that Mr. Jinks made an eloquent and stirring oration, addressed after
the manner of all great orators to the prejudices of the auditor,
and indicative of Mr. Jinks' intention to overwhelm, with defeat and
destruction, the anti-Germanic league and pageant, on St. Michael's
day.

That day was very near, as we have seen; but twenty-four hours
remained for the conspirators to act in; and Mr. Jinks determined not
to lose the opportunity to perfect and render satisfactory his bloody
revenge.

Many things conspired to put him in high spirits, and arouse that
heroic confidence felt by all great men in undertaking arduous
affairs. The landlord had been so much pleased with Mr. Jinks'
patriotic ardor in the German cause, that he generously hinted at an
entire obliteration of any little score chalked up against the name
of Jinks for board and lodging at the hostelry; this was one of the
circumstances which inspirited Mr. Jinks. Another was the possession
of a steed--a donkey, it is true, but a donkey out of a thousand, _nee
pluribus impar_, and not unworthy of a knight in a great and exciting
contest.

Thus it happened that when, upon the following morning, Mr. Jinks
arose, assumed his garments, and descended, his face was radiant with
anticipated triumph, his sword clattered against his slender legs with
martial significance, and his brows were corrugated into a frown,
which indicated ruin to all those opposed to him.

Mounted upon Fodder, who was sleek and in high spirits, owing to a
good night's rest and a plentiful supply of his favorite provender,
Mr. Jinks remained for a moment irresolute before the door of the
hostelry, revolving in his mind various and conflicting thoughts of
love and war.

Should he go on his handsome animal, and enact the little drama, which
he had arranged in his mind, with Miss Sallianna at the Bower of
Nature? Should he, on this morning, advance to victory and revenge in
that direction? Or should he go and challenge his enemy, Verty, and
make his name glorious forever?

These conflicting ideas chased themselves through Mr. Jinks' mind, and
rendered him irresolute.

He was interrupted in the midst of them by a voice, laughing and
sonorous, which cried from the direction of the gateway:

"Hey, there! What now, Jinks'? What thoughts occupy your mind, my dear
fellow?"

And Ralph came out from the yard of the tavern, mounted upon his
handsome animal, as fresh and bright-looking as himself.

"I was reflecting, sir," said Mr. Jinks, "I have much to occupy me
to-day."

"Ah? Well, set about it--set about it! Don't you know that the great
element of success in life, from killing a mosquito to winning an
empress, is to strike at once, and at the right moment? Go on, Jinks,
my boy, and luck to you!"

"Thanks, sir," replied Mr. Jinks--"I hope I shall have luck."

"Of course, because you have genius! What is luck?" cried Ralph,
bending down to smooth the glossy neck of his animal, and laughing
gaily,--"why, nothing but a word! Luck, sir, is nothing--genius
everything. Luck throws her old shoe after, as says the proverb; but
genius catches it, and conquers. Come, you are good at everything, let
us have a race!"

"No, I thank you," said Mr. Jinks, drawing back; "I have business,
sir--important business, sir!"

"Have you?" said Ralph, restraining his desire to lay the lash of his
whip over Fodder's back, and so inaugurate a new Iliad of woes for Mr.
Jinks. "Then go on in your course, my dear fellow. I am going to see a
young lady, who really is beginning to annoy me."

And the mercurial young fellow passed from laughter to smiles, and
even to something suspiciously resembling a sigh.

"Farewell, my dear Jinks," he added, becoming gay again; "fortune
favors the brave, recollect. I wish I could believe it," he added,
laughing.

And touching his horse, Ralph set forward toward the Bower of Nature,
and consequently toward Miss Fanny.

"There goes a young man who is in love," said Mr. Jinks, with
philosophic dignity; "regularly caught by a pair of black eyes. Boy!"
added Mr. Jinks, after the manner of Coriolanus, "he don't know 'em as
I do. He's looking out for happiness--I for revenge!"

And Mr. Jinks scowled at a stable-boy until the terrified urchin hung
his head in awe, respect, and admiration. The great militaire was not
superior to humanity, and even this triumph elated him. He set forth,
therefore, on Fodder, feeling like a conqueror.

If this veracious history were a narrative of the life and adventures
of Mr. Jinks alone, we might follow the great conspirator in his
various movements on this eventful day. We might show how he
perambulated the town of Winchester on his noble steed, like a second
Don Quixote, mounted for the nonce upon the courser of Sancho Panza,
while Rosinante recovered from his bruises. Though the illustration
might fail if carried further, inasmuch as Mr. Jinks encountered no
windmills, and indeed met with no adventures worth relating, still
we might speak of his prying inquisition into every movement of the
hostile Irish--detail his smiling visits, in the character of spy,
to numerous domicils, and relate at length the manner in which he
procured the information which the noble knight desired. All this we
might do; but is it necessary? Not always does the great historic muse
fill up the flaws of story, leaving rather much to the imagination.
And in the present instance, we might justly be accused of undue
partiality. We are not sure that some of our kind readers might not go
further still, and declare in general terms, that none of Mr. Jinks'
adventures were worth telling--Mr. Jinks himself being a personage
wholly unworthy of attention.

To critics of this last description, we would say in deprecation of
their strictures--Friends, the world is made up of a number of odd
personages, as the animal kingdom is of singular, and not wholly
pleasant creatures. Just as the scarabaeus and the ugly insect are as
much a part of animated nature as the golden-winged butterfly, and
humming-bird, and noble eagle, so are the classes, represented
partly by our friend, as human as the greatest and the best. As the
naturalist, with laborious care, defines the characteristics of the
ugly insect, buzzing, and stinging, and preying on the weaker, so must
the writer give a portion of his attention to the microscopic bully,
braggart, and boasting coward of the human species. In the one case,
it is _science_--in the other, _art_.

But still we shall not give too much space to Mr. Jinks, and shall
proceed to detail very briefly the result of his explorations.

The great conspirator had, by the hour of eventide, procured all the
information he wished. That information led Mr. Jinks to believe that,
on the following day, the opposing races would turn out in numbers,
far exceeding those on any previous occasion. They would have a grand
pageant:--St. Patrick would meet St. Michael in deadly conflict, and
the result would undoubtedly overwhelm one of the combatants with
defeat, elevating the other to the summit of joy and victory.

It was Mr. Jinks' object to ensure the success of the worthy St.
Michael, and prostrate the great St. Patrick in the dust. But this was
not all. Mr. Jinks further desired to procure an adequate revenge upon
his friend O'Brallaghan. To overwhelm with defeat and dismay the party
to which his enemy belonged, was not enough--any common man could
invent so plain a course as that. It was Mr. Jinks' boast, privately,
and to himself be it understood, that he would arrange the details
of an original and refined revenge--a revenge which should, in equal
degree, break down the strength and spirit of his enemy, and elevate
the inventor to the niche of a great creative genius.

By the hour of nine that night all was arranged; and, after laboring
for an hour or more at some mysterious employment, in the secresy of
his apartment, Mr. Jinks descended, and ordered Fodder to be saddled.

Under his arm he carried a bundle of some size; and this bundle was
placed carefully before him on the animal.

This done, Mr. Jinks went forth cautiously into the night.

Let us follow him.

He proceeds carefully toward the western portion of the town; then
suddenly turns a corner, and goes northward; then changes his course,
and takes his way eastward. This is to throw enemies off the track.

Half an hour's ride brings him in the neighborhood of Mistress
O'Calligan's.

What does he hear? A voice singing;--the voice of no less a personage
than Mr. O'Brallaghan.

The conspirator retraces his steps for some distance--dismounts--ties
Fodder to a tree-trunk; and then, with his bundle under his arm,
creeps along in the shadow toward the cabin.

At Mrs. O'Calligan's door, sitting upon the railing, he perceives the
portly figure of Mr. O'Brallaghan, who is singing a song of his
own composition; not the ditty which has come down to modern times
connected with this gentleman's name--but another and more original
madrigal. The popular ditty, we have every reason to believe, was
afterwards written by Mr. Jinks, in derision and contempt of Mr.
O'Brallaghan.

Mr. Jinks creeps up; diabolical and gloomy thoughts agitate his soul;
and when a night-cap appears at an opening in the shutter, and a
fluttering voice exclaims, "Oh, now--really! Mr. O'Brallaghan," the
hidden spectator trembles with jealousy and rage.

A colloquy then ensues between the manly singer and the maiden,
which we need not repeat. It is enough to say, that Mr. O'Brallaghan
expresses disapprobation at the coldness of the lady.

The lady replies, that she respects and esteems Mr. O'Brallaghan, but
never, never can be his, owing to the fact that she is another's.

Mr. Jinks starts with joy, and shakes his fist--from the protecting
shadow--triumphantly at the poor defeated wooer.

The wooer, in turn, grows cold and defiant; he upbraids the lady; he
charges her with entertaining a passion for the rascal and coward
Jinks.

This causes the lady to repel the insulting accusation with hauteur.

Mr. O'Brallaghan thinks, and says, thereupon, that she is a cruel and
unnatural woman, and unworthy of affection or respect.

Mistress O'Calligan wishes, in reply, to know if Mr. O'Brallaghan
means to call her a woman.

Mr. O'Brallaghan replies that he does, and that if Mr. Jinks were
present, he would exterminate that gentleman, as some small exhibition
of the state of his feelings at being thus insulted by the worst and
most hard-hearted of her sex.

After which, Mr. O'Brallaghan clenches his hands with threatening
vehemence, and brushing by the concealed Jinks, who makes himself as
small as possible, disappears, muttering vengeance.

Mr. Jinks is happy, radiant, triumphant, and as he watches the
retreating wooer, his frame shakes with sombre merriment. Then he
turns toward the window, and laughs with cautious dignity.

The lady, who is just closing the window, starts and utters an
exclamation of affright. This, however, is disregarded by Mr. Jinks,
who draws near, and stands beneath the window.

Mistress O'Calligan considers it necessary to state that she is in
such a taking, and to ask who could have thought it. Mr. Jinks does
not directly reply to this question, but, reaching up, hands in the
bundle, and commences a whispered conversation. The lady is doubtful,
fearful--Mr. Jinks grows more eloquent. Finally, the lady melts, and
when Mr. Jinks clasps, rapturously, the red hand hanging out, he has
triumphed.

In fifteen minutes he is on his way back to the tavern, chuckling,
shaking, and triumphant.

All is prepared.

CHAPTER LXII.

VERTY MUSES.

Let us now leave the good old town of Winchester, and go into the
hills, where the brilliant autumn morning reigns, splendid and
vigorous.

In the hills! Happy is the man who knows what those words mean; for
only the mountain-born can understand them. Happy, then, let us say,
are the mountain-born! We will not underrate the glories of the
lowland and the Atlantic shore, or close our eyes to the wealth of the
sea. The man is blind who does not catch the subtle charm of the wild
waves glittering in the sun, or brooded over by the sullen storm; but
"nigh gravel blind" is that other, whose eyes are not open to the
grand beauty of the mountains. Let us not rhapsodize, or with this
little bit of yellow ore, venture to speak of the great piles of
grandeur from whose heart it was dug up. There is that about the
mountains, with their roaring diapason of the noble pines, their
rugged summits and far dying tints, purple, and gold, and azure, which
no painter could express, had the genius of Titian and Watteau, and
the atmosphere of Poussin, to speak over its creations. No! let them
speak for themselves as all great things must--happy is he, who, by
right of birth, can understand their noble voices!

But there is the other and lesser mountain life--the life of the
hills. Autumn loves these especially, and happy, too, are they who
know the charm of the breezy hills! The hills where autumn pours her
ruddy sunshine upon lordly pines--rather call them palms!--shooting
their slender swaying trunks into the golden sea of morning, and, far
up above, waving their emerald plumes in the laughing wind;--where
the sward is fresh and dewy in the shivering delicious hunter's
morning!--where the arrow-wood and dogwood cluster crimson berries,
and the maple, alder tree and tulip, burn away--setting the dewy copse
on fire with splendor! Yes, autumn loves the hills, and pours her
brawling brooks, swarming with leaves, through thousands of hollows,
any one of which might make a master-piece on canvas. Some day we
shall have them--who knows?--and even the great mountain-ranges shall
be mastered by the coming man.

We do not know the name of the "hollow" through which Verty came
on the bright morning of the day following the events we have just
related. But autumn had never dowered any spot more grandly. All the
trees were bright and dewy in the sunrise--birds were singing--and the
thousand variegated colors of the fall swept on from end to end of it,
swallowing the little stream, and breaking against the sky like a gay
fringe.

Verty knew all this, and though he did not look at it, he saw it, and
his lips moved.

Cloud pricked up his ears, and the hound gazed at his master
inquiringly. But Verty was musing; his large, dreamy eyes were fixed
with unalterable attention upon vacancy, and his drooping shoulders,
whereon lay the tangled mass of his chestnut hair, swayed regularly as
he moved. It only mingled with his musings--the bright scene--and grew
a part of them; he scarcely saw it.

"Yes," he murmured, "yes, I think I am a Delaware!--a white? to dream
it! am I mad? The wild night-wind must have whispered to me while I
slept, and gone away laughing at me. I, the savage, the simple savage,
to think this was so! And yet--yes, yes--I did think so! Redbud said
it was thus--Redbud!"

And the young man for a time was silent.

"I wonder what Redbud thinks of me?" he murmured again, with his old
dreamy smile. "Can she find anything to like in me? What am I? Poor,
poor Verty--you are very weak, and the stream here is laughing at you.
You are a poor forest boy--there can be nothing in you for Redbud to
like. Oh! if she could! But we are friends, I know--about the other,
why think? what is it? Love!--what is love? It must be something
strange--or why do I feel as if to be friends was not enough? Love!"

And Verty's head drooped.

"Love, love!" he murmured. "Oh, yes! I know what it means! They laugh
at it--but they ought not to. It is heaven in the heart--sunshine in
the breast. Oh, I feel that what I mean by love is purer than the
whole wide world besides! Yes, yes--because I would die for her! I
would give my life to save her any suffering--her hand on my forehead
would be dearer and sweeter than the cool spring in the hills after a
weary, day-long hunt, when I come to it with hot cheeks and burnt-up
throat! Oh, yes! I may be an Indian, and be different--but this is all
to me--this feeling, as if I must go to her, and kneel down and tell
her that my life is gone from me when I am not near her--that I walk
and live like a man dreaming, when she does not smile on me and speak
to me!"

Verty's head drooped, and his cheeks reddened with the ingenuous blush
of boyhood. Then he raised his head, and murmured, with a smile, which
made his face beautiful--so full of light and joy was it.

"Yes--I think I am in love with Redbud--and she does not think it
wrong, I am sure--oh, I don't think she will think it wrong in me, and
turn against me, only because I love her!"

Having arrived at this conclusion, Verty went along smiling, and
admiring the splendid tints of the foliage--drinking in the fresh,
breezy air of morning, and occasionally listening for the cries of
game--of deer, and turkey, pheasants, and the rest. He heard with his
quick ear many of these sounds: the still croak of the turkey, the
drumming of the pheasant; more than once saw disappear on a distant
hill, like a flying shadow, the fallow deer, which he had so often
chased and shot. But on that morning he could not leave his path to
follow the wild deer, or slay the lesser game, of which the copses
were full. Mastered by a greater passion even than hunting, Verty drew
near Apple Orchard--making signs with his head to the deer to go on
their way, and wholly oblivious of pheasants.

He reached Apple Orchard just as the sun soared redly up above the
distant forest; and the old homestead waked up with it. Morning always
smiled on Apple Orchard, and the brilliant flush seemed, there, more
brilliant still; while all the happy breezes flying over it seemed to
regret their destiny which led them far away to other clouds.

Verty always stopped for a moment on his way to and from Winchester,
to bid the inmates good morning; and these hours had come to be the
bright sunny spots in days otherwise full of no little languor. For
when was Daymon merry and light-hearted, separated from his love? It
is still the bright moment of meeting which swallows up all other
thoughts--around which the musing heart clusters all its joy and
hope--which is looked forward to and dreamed over, with longing,
dreamy, yet excited happiness. And this is the reason why the most
fatal blow which the young heart can suffer is a sudden warning that
there must be no more meetings. No more! when it dreams of and
clings to that thought of meeting, as the life and vital blood
of to-morrow!--when the heart is liquid--the eyes moist with
tenderness--the warp of thought woven of golden thread--at such a
moment for the blow of the wave to fall, and drown the precious argosy
with all its freight of love, and hope, and memory--this is the
supreme agony of youth, the last and most refined of tortures.

Verty lived in the thought of meeting Redbud--his days were full of
her; but the hours he passed at Apple Orchard were the brightest. The
noonday culminated at dawn and sunset!

As he approached the pleasant homestead now, his eyes lighted up, and
his face beamed with smiles. Redbud was standing in the porch waiting
for him.

She was clad with her usual simplicity, and smiled gently as he
approached. Verty threw the bundle upon Cloud's mane, and came to her.

They scarcely interchanged a word, but the hand of the girl was
imprisoned in his own; and the tenderness which had been slowly
gathering for months into love, pure, and deep, and strong, flushed
his ingenuous face, and made his eyes swim in tears.

It was well that Verty was interrupted as he essayed to speak; for we
cannot tell what he would have said. He did not speak; for just as he
opened his lips, a gruff voice behind him uttered the words:

"Well, sir! where is your business?"

CHAPTER LXIII.

HOW VERTY AND MISS LAVINIA RAN A-TILT AT EACH OTHER, AND WHO WAS
OVERTHROWN.

The young man turned round: the gruff voice belonged to Judge Rushton.

That gentleman had left his horse at the outer gate, and approached
the house on foot. Absorbed by his own thoughts, Verty had not seen
him--as indeed neither had Redbud--and the gruff voice gave the young
man the first intimation of his presence.

"Well," repeated the lawyer, leaning on his knotty stick, and scowling
at the two young people from beneath his shaggy eyebrows, "what are
you standing there staring at me for? Am I a wild beast, a rhinoceros,
or a monster of any description, that you can't speak? I asked you why
you were not in town at your work?"

Verty pointed to the horizon.

"The day has only begun," he said.

"Well, sir--"

"And I stopped for only one minute, Mr. Rushton," added Verty."

"One minute! Do you know, sir, that life is made up of minutes?"

"Yes, sir," said Verty.

"Well, if you know that, why do you trifle away your minutes? Don't
reply to me, young man," continued the shaggy bear, "I have no desire
to argue with you--I hate and despise arguing, and will not indulge
you. But remember this, Life is the struggle of a man to pay the debt
he owes to Duty. If he forgets his work, or neglects it, for paltry
gratifications of the senses or the feelings, he is disgraced--he is a
coward in the ranks--a deserter from the regiment--he is an absconding
debtor, sir, and will be proceeded against as such--remember that,
sir! A pretty thing for you here, when you have your duty to
your mother to perform, to be thus dallying and cooing with this
baby--ough!"

And the lawyer scowled at Redbud with terrible emphasis.

Redbud knew Mr. Rushton well,--and smiled. She was rather grateful to
him for having interrupted an interview which her woman-instinct told
had commenced critically; and though Redbud could not, perhaps, have
told any one what she feared, still this instinct spoke powerfully to
her.

It was with a smile, therefore, that Redbud held out her hand to Mr.
Rushton, and said:

"Please don't scold Verty--he won't stay long, and he just stopped to
ask how we all were."

"Humph!" replied the lawyer, his scowling brow relaxing somewhat as he
felt the soft, warm little hand in his own,--"humph! that's the way it
always is. He only stopped to say good morning to 'all;'--I suspect
his curiosity was chiefly on the subject of a single member of the
family."

And a grim smile corrugated--so to speak--the rugged countenance.

Redbud blushed slightly, and said:

"Verty likes us all very much, and--"

"Not a doubt of it!" said the lawyer, "and no doubt 'we all' like
Verty! Come, you foolish children, don't be bothering me with your
nonsense. And you, Mr. Verty--you need'nt be so foolish as to consider
everything I say so harsh as you seem to. You'll go next and tell
somebody that old Rushton is an ill-natured huncks, without conscience
or proper feeling; that he grumbled with you for stopping a moment to
greet your friends. If you say any such thing," added Mr. Rushton,
scowling at the young man, "you will be guilty of as base a
slander--yes, sir! as base a slander, sir!--as imagination could
invent!"

And with a growl, the speaker turned from Verty, and said, roughly, to
Redbud:

"Where's your father?"'

"Here I am," said the bluff and good-humored voice of the Squire, from
the door; "you are early--much obliged to you." And the Squire and
lawyer shook hands. Mr. Rushton's hand fell coldly to his side, and
regarding the Squire for a moment with what seemed an expression
of contemptuous anger, he said, frowning, until his shaggy, grey
eye-brows met together almost:

"Early! I suppose I am to take up the whole forenoon--the most
valuable part of the day--jogging over the country to examine
title-deeds and accounts? Humph! if you expect anything of the sort,
you are mistaken. No, sir! I started from Winchester at day-break,
without my breakfast, and here I am."

The jovial Squire laughed, and turning from Verty, with whom he had
shaken hands, said to the lawyer:

"Breakfast?--is it possible? Well, Rushton, for once I will be
magnanimous--magnificent, generous and liberal--"

"What!" growled the lawyer.

"You shall have some breakfast here!" finished the Squire, laughing
heartily; and the merry old fellow caught Miss Redbud up from the
porch, deposited a matutinal salute upon her lips, and kicking at old
Caesar as he passed, by way of friendly greeting, led the way into the
breakfast room.

Verty made a movement to depart, inasmuch as he had breakfasted; but
the vigilant eye of the lawyer detected this suspicious manoeuvre;
and the young man found himself suddenly commanded to remain, by the
formula "Wait!" uttered with a growl which might have done honor to a
lion.

Verty was not displeased at this interference with his movements, and,
obedient to a sign, followed the lawyer into the breakfast-room.

Everything was delightfully comfortable and cheerful there.

And ere long, at the head of the table sat Miss Lavinia, silent and
dignified; at the foot, the Squire, rubbing his hands, heaping plates
with the savory broil before him, and talking with his mouth full; at
the sides, Mr. Rushton, Redbud and Verty, who sedulously suppressed
the fact that he had already breakfasted, for obvious reasons,
doubtless quite plain to the reader.

The sun streamed in upon the happy group, and seemed to smile with
positive delight at sight of Redbud's happy face, surrounded by its
waving mass of curls--and soft blue eyes, which were the perfection of
tenderness and joy.

He smiled on Verty, too, the jovial sun, and illumined the young man's
handsome, dreamy face, and profuse locks, and uncouth hunter costume,
with a gush of light which made him like a picture of some antique
master, thrown upon canvas in a golden mood, to live forever. All
the figures and objects in the room were gay in the bright sunlight,
too--the shaggy head of Mr. Rushton, and the jovial, ruddy face of the
Squire, and Miss Lavinia's dignified and stately figure, solemn and
imposing, flanked by the silver jug and urn--and on the old ticking
clock, and antique furniture, and smiling portraits, and recumbent
Caesar, did it shine, merry and laughing, taking its pastime ere it
went away to other lands, like a great, cheerful simple soul, smiling
at nature and all human life.

And the talk of all was like the sunshine. The old Squire was king of
the breakfast table, and broke many a jesting shaft at one and all,
not even sparing the stately Miss Lavinia, and the rugged bear who
scowled across the table.

"Good bread for once," said the Squire, slashing into the smoking
loaf; astonishing how dull those negroes are--not to be able to learn
such a simple thing as baking."

"Simple!" muttered the lawyer, "it is not simple! If you recollected
something of chemistry, you would acknowledge that baking bread was no
slight achievement."

"Come, growl again," said his host, laughing; "come, now, indulge your
habit, and say the bread is sour."

"It is!"

"What!--sour!"

"Yes."

The Squire stands aghast--or rather sits, laboring under that
sentiment.

"It is the best bread we have had for six months," he says, at length,
"and as sweet as a nut."

"You have no taste," says Mr. Rushton.

"No taste?"

"None: and the fact that it is the best you have had for six months is
not material testimony. You may have had _lead_ every morning--humph!"

And Mr. Rushton continues his breakfast.

The Squire laughs.

"There you are--in a bad humor," he says.

"I am not."

"Come! say that the broil is bad!"

"It is burnt to a cinder."

"Burnt? Why it's underdone!"

"Well, sir--every man to his taste--you may have yours; leave me
mine."

"Oh, certainly; I see you are determined to like nothing. You'll say
next that Lavinia's butter is not sweet."

The lawyer growls.

"I have no desire to offend Miss Lavinia," he says, solemnly; "but
I'll take my oath that there's garlic in it--yes, sir, garlic!"

The Squire bursts into a roar of laughter.

"Good!" he cries--"you are in a cheerful and contented mood. You drop
in just when Lavinia has perfected her butter, and made it as fresh as
a nosegay; and when the cook has sent up bread as sweet as a kernel,
to say nothing of the broil, done to a turn--you come when this highly
desirable state of things has been arrived at, and presume to say that
this is done, that is burnt, the other is tainted with garlic! Admire
your own judgment!"

And the Squire laughs jovially at his discomfited and growling
opponent.

"True, Lavinia has had lately much to distract her attention," says
the jest-hunting Squire; "but her things were never better in spite
of--. Well we won't touch upon that subject!"

And the mischievous Squire laughs heartily at Miss Lavinia's stately
and reproving expression.

"What's that?" says Mr. Rushton; "what subject?"

"Oh, nothing--nothing."

"What does he mean, madam?" asks Mr. Rushton, of the lady.

Miss Lavinia colors slightly, and looks more stately than ever.

"Nothing, sir," she says, with dignity.

"'Nothing!' nobody ever means anything!"

"Oh, never," says the Squire, and then he adds,
mischievously,--"by-the-by, Rushton, how is my friend, Mr.
Roundjacket?"

"As villainous as ever," says the lawyer; "my opinion of Mr.
Roundjacket, sir, is, that he is a villain!"

Miss Lavinia colors to the temples--the Squire nearly bursts with
pent-up laughter.

"What has he done? A villain did you say?" he asks.

"Yes, sir!--a wretch!"

"Possible?"

"Yes--it is possible: and if you knew as much of human nature as I do,
you would never feel surprised at any man's turning out a villain and
a wretch! I am a wretch myself, sir!"

And scowling at the Squire, Mr. Rushton goes on with his breakfast.

The Squire utters various inarticulate sounds which seem to indicate
the stoppage of a bone in his throat. Nevertheless he soon recovers
his powers of speech, and says:

"But how is Roundjacket so bad?"

"He has taken to writing poetry."

"That's an old charge."

"No, sir--he has grown far worse, lately. He is writing an epic--an
epic!"

And the lawyer looked inexpressibly disgusted.

"I should think a gentleman might compose an epic poem without
rendering himself amenable to insult, sir," says Miss Lavinia, with
freezing hauteur.

"You are mistaken," says Mr. Rushton; "your sex, madam, know nothing
of business. The lawyer who takes to writing poetry, must necessarily
neglect the legal business entrusted to him, and for which he is paid.
Now, madam," added Mr. Rushton, triumphantly, "I defy you, or any
other man--individual, I mean--to say that the person who takes money
without giving an equivalent, is not a villain and a wretch!"

Miss Lavinia colors, and mutters inarticulately.

"Such a man," said Mr. Rushton, with dreadful solemnity, "is already
on his way to the gallows; he has already commenced the downward
course of crime. From this, he proceeds to breach of promise--I mean
any promise, not of marriage only, madam--then to forging, then to
larceny, and finally to burglary and murder. There, madam, that is
what I mean--I defy you to deny the truth of what I say!"

The Squire could endure the pressure upon his larynx no longer, and
exploded like a bomb-shell; or if not in so terrible a manner, at
least nearly as loudly.

No one can tell what the awful sentiments of Mr. Rushton, on the
subject of Roundjacket would have led to, had not the Squire come to
the rescue.

"Well, well," he said, still laughing, "it is plain, my dear Rushton,
that for once in your life you are not well posted up on the 'facts of
your case,' and you are getting worse and worse in your argument, to
say nothing of the prejudice of the jury. Come, let us dismiss the
subject. I don't think Mr. Roundjacket, however, will turn out a
murderer, which would be a horrible blow to me, as I knew his worthy
father well, and often visited him at 'Flowery Lane,' over yonder. But
the discussion is unprofitable--hey! what do you think, Verty, and
you, Miss Redbud?"

Verty raises his head and smiles.

"I am very fond of Mr. Roundjacket," he says.

"Fond of him?"

"Yes, sir: he likes me too, I think," Verty says.

"How does he show it, my boy?"

"He gives me advice, sir."

"What! and you like him for that?"

"Oh, yes, sir."

"Well, perhaps the nature of the advice may modify my surprise at your
gratitude, Verty."

"_Anan_, sir?"

"What advice does he give you?"

Verty laughs.

"Must I tell, sir? I don't know if--"

And Verty blushes slightly, looking at Miss Lavinia and Redbud.

"Come, speak out!" laughs the Squire. "He advises you--"

"Not to get married."

And Verty blushes.

We need not say that the wicked old Squire greets this reply of Verty
with a laugh sufficient to shake the windows.

"Not to get married!" he cries.

"Yes, sir," Verty replies, blushing ingenuously.

"And you like Mr. Roundjacket, you say, because he advises you not to
get--"

"No, oh! no, sir!" interrupts Verty, with sudden energy, "oh! no, sir,
I did not mean that!"

And the young man, embarrassed by his own vehemence, and the eyes
directed toward his face, hangs his head and blushes. Yes, the bold,
simple, honest Verty, blushes, and looks ashamed, and feels as if he
is guilty of some dreadful crime. Do. not the best of us, under the
same circumstances?--that is to say, if we have the good fortune to be
young and innocent.

The Squire looks at Verty and laughs; then at Miss Lavinia.

"So, it seems," he says, "that Mr. Roundjacket counsels a bachelor
life, eh? Good! he is a worthy professor, but an indifferent
practitioner. The rascal! Did you ever hear of such a thing, Lavinia?
I declare, if I were a lady, I should decline to recognize, among my
acquaintances, the upholder of such doctrines--especially when he
poisons the ears of boys like Verty with them!"

And the Squire continues to laugh.

"Perhaps," says Miss Lavinia, with stately dignity, and glancing at
Verty as she speaks,--"perhaps the--hem--circumstances which induced
Mr. Roundjacket to give the advice, might have been--been--peculiar."

And Miss Lavinia smooths down her black silk with dignity.

"Peculiar?"

"Yes," says the lady, glancing this time at Redbud.

"How was it, Verty?" the Squire says, turning to the young man.

Verty, conscious of his secret, blushes and stammers; for how can he
tell the Squire that Mr. Roundjacket and himself were discussing the
propriety of his marrying Redbud? He is no longer the open, frank, and
fearless Verty of old days--he has become a dissembler, for he is in
love.

"I don't know--oh, sir--I could'nt--Mr. Roundjacket--"

The Squire laughs.

"There's some secret here," he says; "out with it, Verty, or it
will choke you. Come, Rushton, you are an adept--cross-examine the
witness."

Mr. Rushton growls.

"You won't--then I will."

"Perhaps the time, and the subject of conversation, might aid you,"
says Miss Lavinia, who is nettled at Verty, and thus is guily of what
she is afterwards ashamed of.

"A good idea," says the Squire; "and I am pleased to see, Lavinia,
that you take so much interest in Verty and Mr. Roundjacket."

Miss Lavinia blushes, and looks solemn and stiff.

"Hum!" continues the Squire. "Oyez! the court is opened! First
witness, Mr. Verty! Where, sir, did this conversation occur?"

Verty smiles and colors.

"At Mr. Roundjacket's, sir," he replies.

"The hour, as near as you can recollect."

"In the forenoon, sir."

"Were there any circumstances which tend to fix the hour, and the day,
in your mind?"

"Yes, sir."

"What were they?"

"I recollect that Miss Lavinia called to see Mr. Roundjacket that day,
sir; and as she generally comes into town on Tuesday or Wednesday,
soon after breakfast it must have been--"

Verty is interrupted by a chair pushed back from the table. It is Miss
Lavinia, who, rising, with a freezing "excuse me," sails from the
room.

The Squire bursts into a roar of laughter, and leaving the table,
follows her, and is heard making numerous apologies for his wickedness
in the next room. He returns with the mischievious smile, and says:

"There, Verty! you are a splendid fellow, but you committed a
blunder."

And laughing, the Squire adds:

"Will you come and see the titles, Rushton?"

The lawyer growls, rises, and bidding Verty remain until he comes out,
follows the Squire.

CHAPTER LXIV.

THE ROSE OF GLENGARY.

Redbud rose, smiling, and with the gentle simplicity of one child to
another, said:

"Oh! you ought not to have said that about cousin Lavinia,
Verty--ought you?"

Verty looked guilty.

"I don't think I ought," he said.

"You know she is very sensitive about this."

"Anan?" Verty said, smiling.

Redbud looked gently at the young man, and replied:

"I mean, she does not like any one to speak of it?"

"Why?" said Verty.

"Because--because--engaged people are so funny!"

And Redbud's silver laughter followed the words.

"Are they?" Verty said.

"Yes, indeed."

Verty nodded.

"Next time I will be more thoughtful," he said; "but I think I ought
to have answered honestly."

Redbud shook her curls with a charming little expression of affected
displeasure.

"Oh, no! no!"

"Not answer?"

"Certainly not, sir--fie! in the cause of ladies!"

Verty laughed.

"I understand," he said, "you are thinking of the books about the
knights--the old Froissart, yonder, in four volumes. But you know
there were'nt any courts in those days, and knights were not obliged
to answer."

Redbud, training up a drooping vine, replied, laughing:

"Oh, no--I was only jesting. Don't mind my nonsense. Look at that
pretty morning-glory."

Verty looked at Redbud, as if she were the object in question.

"You will hurt your hand," he said,--"those thorns on the briar are so
sharp; take care!"

And Verty grasped the vine, and, no doubt, accidentally, Redbud's hand
with it.

"Now I have it," he said; and suddenly seeing the double meaning of
his words, the young man added, with a blush and a smile, "it is all I
want in the world."

"What? the--oh!"

And Miss Redbud, suddenly aware of Mr. Verty's meaning, finds her
voice rather unsafe, and her cheeks covered with blushes. But with
the tact of a grown woman, she applies herself to the defeat of her
knight; and, turning away, says, as easily as possible:

"Oh, yes--the thorn; it is a pretty vine; take care, or it will hurt
your hand."

Verty feels astounded at his own boldness, but says, with his dreamy
Indian smile:

"Oh, no, I don't want the thorn--the rose!--the rose!"

Redbud understands that this is only a paraphrase--after the Indian
fashion--for her own name, and blushes again.

"We--were--speaking of cousin Lavinia," she says, hesitatingly.

Verty sighs.

"Yes," he returns.

Redbud smiles.

"And I was scolding you for replying to papa's question," she adds.

Verty sighs again, and says:

"I believe you were right; I don't think I could have told them what
we were talking about."

"Why?" asks the young girl.

"We were talking about you," says Verty, gazing at Redbud tenderly;
"and you will think me very foolish," adds Verty, with a tremor in
his voice; "but I was asking Mr. Roundjacket if he thought you
could--love--me--O, Redbud--"

Verty is interrupted by the appearance of Miss Lavinia.

Redbud turns away, blushing, and overwhelmed with confusion.

Miss Lavinia comes to the young man, and holds out her hand.

"I did not mean to hurt your feelings, just now, Verty," she says,
"pardon me if I made you feel badly. I was somewhat nettled, I
believe."

And having achieved this speech, Miss Lavinia stiffens again into
imposing dignity, sails away into the house, and disappears, leaving
Verty overwhelmed with surprise.

He feels a hand laid upon his arm;--a blushing face looks frankly and
kindly into his own.

"Don't let us talk any more in that way, Verty, please," says the
young girl, with the most beautiful frankness and ingenuousness; "we
are friends and playmates, you know; and we ought not to act toward
each other as if we were grown gentleman and lady. Please do not; it
will make us feel badly, I am sure. I am only Redbud, you know, and
you are Verty, my friend and playmate. Shall I sing you one of our old
songs?"

The soft, pure voice sounded in his ears like some fine melody of
olden poets--her frank, kind eyes, as she looked at him, soothed and
quieted him. Again, she was the little laughing star of his childhood,
as when they wandered about over the fields--little children--that
period so recent, yet which seemed so far away, because the opening
heart lives long in a brief space of time. Again, she was to him
little Redbud, he to her was the boy-playmate Verty. She had done all
by a word--a look; a kind, frank smile, a single glance of confiding
eyes. He loved her more than ever--yes, a thousand times more
strongly, and was calm.

He followed her to the harpsichord, and watched her in every movement,
with quiet happiness; he seemed to be under the influence of a charm.

"I think I will try and sing the 'Rose of Glengary,'" she said,
smiling; "you know, Verty, it is one of the old songs you loved so
much, and it will make us think of old times--in childhood, you know;
though that is not such old, _old_ time--at least for me," added
Redbud, with a smile, more soft and confiding than before. "Shall I
sing it? Well, give me the book--the brown-backed one."

The old volume--such as we find to-day in ancient country-houses--was
opened, and Redbud commenced singing. The girl sang the sweet ditty
with much expression; and her kind, touching voice filled the old
homestead with a tender melody, such as the autumn time would utter,
could its spirit become vocal. The clear, tender carol made the place
fairy-land for Verty long years afterwards, and always he seemed to
hear her singing when he visited the room. Redbud sang afterwards more
than one of those old ditties--"Jock o' Hazeldean," and "Flowers of
the Forest," and many others--ditties which, for us to-day, seem like
so many utterances of the fine old days in the far past.

For, who does not hear them floating above those sweet fields of the
olden time--those bright Hesperian gardens, where, for us at least,
the fruits are all golden, and the airs all happy?

Beautiful, sad ditties of the brilliant past! not he who writes would
have you lost from memory, for all the modern world of music. Kind
madrigals! which have an aroma of the former day in all your cadences
and dear old fashioned trills--from whose dim ghosts now, in the faded
volumes stored away in garrets and on upper shelves, we gather what
you were in the old immemorial years! Soft melodies of another age,
that sound still in the present with such moving sweetness, one
heart at least knows what a golden treasure you clasp, and listens
thankfully when you deign to issue out from silence; for he finds in
you alone--in your gracious cadences, your gay or stately voices--what
he seeks; the life, and joy, and splendor of the antique day sacred to
love and memory!

And Verty felt the nameless charm of the good old songs, warbled by
the young girl's sympathetic voice; and more than once his wild-wood
nature stirred within him, and his eyes grew moist. And when she
ceased, and the soft carol went away to the realm of silence, and was
heard no more, the young man was a child again; and Redbud's hand was
in his own, and all his heart was still.

The girl rose, with a smile, and said that they had had quite enough
of the harpsichord and singing--the day was too beautiful to spend
within doors. And so she ran gaily to the door, and as she reached it,
uttered a gay exclamation. Ralph and Fanny were seen approaching from
the gate.

CHAPTER LXV.

PROVIDENCE.

Ralph was mounted, as usual, upon his fine sorrel, and Fanny rode a
little milk-white pony, which the young man had procured for her. We
need not say that Miss Fanny looked handsome and coquettish, or Mr.
Ralph merry and good-humored. Laughter was Fanny's by undoubted right,
unless her companion could contest the palm.

Miss Fanny's first movement, after dismounting, was to clasp Miss
Redbud to her bosom with enthusiastic affection, as is the habit with
young ladies upon public occasions; and then the fair equestrian
recognized Verty's existence by a fascinating smile, which caused the
unfortunate Ralph to gaze and sigh.

"Oh, Redbud!" cried Miss Fanny, laughing, and shaking gaily her ebon
curls, "you can't think what a delightful ride I've had--with Ralph,
you know, who has'nt been half as disagreeable as usual--"

"Come," interposed Ralph, "that's too bad!"

"Not for you, sir!"

"Even for me."

"Well, then, I'll say you are more agreeable than usual."

"That is better, though some might doubt whether that was possible."

"Ralph, you are a conceited, fine gentleman, and positively dreadful."

"Ah, you dread me!"

"No, sir!"

"Well, that is not fair--for I am afraid of you. The fact is, Miss
Redbud," continued Ralph, turning to the young girl, "I have fallen
deeply in love with Fanny, lately--"

"Oh, sir!" said Redbud, demurely.

"But I have not told you the best of the joke."

"What is that?"

"She's in love with me."

And Ralph directed a languishing glance toward Fanny, who cried out:

"Impudence! to say that I am in love with you. It's too bad, Ralph,
for you to be talking so!" added Fanny, pouting and coloring, "and
I'll thank you not to talk so any more."

"Why not?"

"I'll be offended."

"That will make you lovely."

"Mr. Ashley!"

"Miss Temple!"

And striking an attitude, Mr. Ashley waited for Fanny's communication.

Redbud smiled, and turning to Fanny, said:

"Come, now, don't quarrel--and come in and take off your things."

"Oh, I can't," cried the volatile Fanny, laughing--"Ralph and myself
just called by; we are past our time now. That horrid old Miss
Sallianna will scold me, though she does talk about the beauties of
nature--I wonder if she considers her front curls included!"

And Miss Fanny tossed her own, and laughed in defiance of the absent
Sallianna.

At the same moment the Squire came out with Mr. Rushton, and called to
Redbud. The young girl ran to him.

"Would you like a ride, little one?" said the Squire, "Miss Lavinia
and myself are going to town."

"Oh, yes, sir!"

"But your visitors--"

"Fanny says she cannot stay."

Fanny ran up to speak for herself; and while Redbud hastened to her
room to prepare for the ride, this young lady commenced a triangular
duel with the Squire and Mr. Ralph, which caused a grim smile to light
upon Mr. Rushton's face, for an instant, so to speak.

The carriage then drove up with its old greys, and Miss Lavinia and
Redbud entered. Before rode the Squire and Mr. Rushton; behind, Ralph
and Fanny.

As for Verty, he kept by the carriage, and talked with Redbud and Miss
Lavinia, who seemed to have grown very good-humored and friendly.

Redbud had not ridden out since her return to Apple Orchard, and the
fresh, beautiful day made her cheeks bright and her eyes brilliant.
The grass, the trees, the singing birds, and merry breezes, spoke to
her in their clear, happy voices, and her eye dwelt fondly on every
object, so old, and familiar, and dear.

Is it wonderful that not seldom her glance encountered Verty's, and
they exchanged smiles? His face was the face of her boy playmate--it
was very old and familiar; who can say that it was not more--that it
was not dear?

And so they passed the old gate, with all its apple trees, and the
spot where the great tree stood, through whose heart was bored the
aperture for the cider press beam--and through the slope beyond,
leaving the overseer's house, babies and all, behind, and issued forth
into the highway leading to the ancient borough of Winchester.

And gazing on the happy autumn fields, our little heroine smiled
brightly, and felt very thankful in her heart to Him who dowered her
life with all that beauty, and joy, and happiness; and ever and anon
her hand would be raised absently toward her neck, where it played
with the old coral necklace taken from the drawer in which it had been
laid--by accident, we should say, if there were any accident. And so
they approached the town.

CHAPTER LXVI.

THE HOUR AND THE NECKLACE.

As they entered the town, something strange seemed to be going on; the
place was evidently in commotion. A great thrill seemed to run through
the population, who were gathered at the doors and windows--such of
them as did not throng the streets; and as the hoofs of the horses
struck upon the beaten way, a drum suddenly was heard thundering
indignantly through the narrow streets.

The crowd rushed toward it--hurried, muttering, armed with nondescript
weapons, as though the Indians were come down from the mountain
fastnesses once more; and then, as the cortege from Apple Orchard
passed beyond the old fort, the meaning of all the commotion was
visible.

Marching slowly along in confused masses, a large portion of the Irish
population came toward the fort, and from their appearance, these men
seemed ripe for commotion.

They were armed with clubs, heavy canes, bludgeons, and old rusty
swords; and these weapons were flourished in the air in a way which
seemed to indicate the desire to inflict death and destruction on some
hostile party which did not appear.

But the most singular portion of the pageant was undoubtedly the
personage borne aloft by the shouting crowd. This was the Dutch St.
Michael himself--portly, redfaced, with a necklace of sour krout,
clad, as had been said by Mr. Jinks, in six pairs of pantaloons, and
resembling a hogshead.

St. Michael was borne aloft on a species of platform, supported on
the shoulders of a dozen men; and when the saint raised the huge beer
glass from his knee, and buried his white beard in it, the swaying
crowd set up a shout which shook the houses.

This was the Irish defiance of the Dutch: the Emerald Isle against
the Low Countries--St. Patrick against St. Michael. The figure of St.
Michael was paraded in defiance of the Dutch--the thundering drum and
echoing shouts were all so many ironical and triumphant defiances.

The shouting crowd came on, tramping heavily, brandishing their clubs,
and eager for the fray.

Miss Lavinia becomes terrified; the ladies of the party, by an
unanimous vote, decide that they will draw up to one side by Mr.
Rushton's office, and permit the crowd to pass. Mr. Rushton desires to
advance upon the peacebreakers, and engage in single combat with St.
Michael and all his supporters.

The Squire dissuades him--and growling contemptuously, the lawyer does
not further oppose the desire of the ladies.

Then from Mr. Rushton's office comes hastily our friend Mr.
Roundjacket--smiling, flourishing his ruler, and pointing, with
well-bred amusement, to the crowd. The crowd look sidewise at Mr.
Roundjacket, who returns them amiable smiles, and brandishes his
ruler in pleasant recognition of Hibernian friends and clients in the
assemblage.

Roundjacket thinks the ladies need not be alarmed. Still, as there
will probably be a fight soon, they had better get out and come in.

Roundjacket is the public character when he speaks thus--he is
flourishing his ruler. It is only when Miss Lavinia has descended that
he ogles that lady. Suddenly, however, he resumes his noble and lofty
carriage, and waves the ruler at his friend, St. Michael--tailor and
client--by name, O'Brallaghan.

The crowd passes on, with thundering drums and defiant shouts; and our
party, from Apple Orchard, having affixed their horses to the wall,
near at hand, gaze on the masquerade from Mr. Rushton's office.

We have given but a few words to the strange pageant which swept on
through the main street of the old border town; and this because any
accurate description is almost wholly impossible. Let the reader
endeavor to imagine Pandemonium broke loose, with all its burly
inmates, and thundering voices, and _outré_ forms, and, perhaps, the
general idea in his mind may convey to him some impression of the rout
which swept by with its shouts and mad defiances.

Some were clad in coat and pantaloons only; others had forgotten the
coat, and exposed brawny and hirsute torsos to the October sun, and
swelling muscles worthy of Athletes.

Others, again, were almost _sans-culottes_, only a remnant being left,
which made the deficiency more tantalizingly painful to the eye.

Let the reader, then, imagine this spectacle of torn garments,
tattered hats, and brandished clubs--not forgetting the tatterdemalion
negro children, who ran after the crowd in the last state of
dilapidation, and he will have some slight idea of the masquerade,
over which rode, in supreme majesty, the trunk-nosed Mr. O'Brallaghan.

We need not repeat the observations of the ladies; or detail their
exclamations, fears, and general behavior. Like all members of the
fair sex, they made a virtue of necessity, and assumed the most
winning expressions of timidity and reliance on their cavaliers; and
even Miss Lavinia reposed upon a settee, and exclaimed that it was
dreadful--very dreadful and terrifying.

Thereat, Mr. Roundjacket rose into the hero, and alluded to the crowd
with dignified amusement; and when Miss Lavinia said, in a low voice,
that other lives were precious to her besides her own--evidently
referring to Mr. Roundjacket--that gentleman brandished his ruler, and
declared that life was far less valuable than her smiles.

In another part of the room Ralph and Fanny laughed and
jested--opposite them. Mr. Rushton indignantly shook his fist in the
direction of the crowd, and vituperated the Hibernian nation, in a
manner shocking to hear.

Verty was leaning on the mantel-piece, as quietly as if there was
nothing to attract his attention. He had pushed Cloud through the mass
with the unimpressed carriage of the Indian hunter; and his dreamy
eyes were far away--he listened to other sounds than shouts, perhaps
to a maiden singing.

The little singer--we refer to Miss Redbud--had been much terrified
by the crowd, and felt weak, owing to the recent sickness. She looked
round for a seat, and saw none.

The door leading into the inner sanctum of Mr. Rushton then attracted
her attention, and seeing a comfortable chair within, she entered, and
sat down.

Redbud uttered a sigh of weariness and relief, and then gazed around
her.

The curtain was drawn back from the picture--the child's face was
visible.

She went to it, and was lost in contemplation of the bright, pretty
face; when, as had happened with Verty, she felt a hand upon her
shoulder, and started.

Mr. Rushton stood beside her.

"Well, Miss!" he said, roughly, "what are you doing?"

"Oh, sir!" Redbud replied, "I am sorry I offended you--but I saw this
pretty picture, and just come to look at it."

"Humph!" growled the lawyer, "nothing can be kept private here."

And, with a softened expression, he gazed at the picture.

"It is very pretty," said Redbud, gently; "who was she, sir?"

The lawyer was silent; he seemed afraid to trust his voice. At last he
said:

"My child."

And his voice was so pathetic, that Redbud felt the tears come to her
eyes.

"Pardon me for making you grieve, Mr. Rushton," she said, softly,
"it was very thoughtless in me. But will you let me speak? She is in
heaven, you know; the dear Savior said himself, that the kingdom of
heaven was full of such."

The lawyer's head bent down, and a hoarse sigh, which resembled the
growl of a lion, shook his bosom.

Redbud's eyes filled with tears.

"Oh, do not grieve, sir," she said, in a tremulous voice, "trust in
God, and believe that He is merciful and good."

The poor stricken heart brimmed with its bitter and corroding agony;
and, raising his head, the lawyer said, coldly:

"Enough? this may be very well for you, who have never suffered--it
is the idle wind to me! Trust in God? Away! the words are
fatuitous!--ough!" and wiping his moist brow, he added, coldly, "What
a fool I am, to be listening to a child!"

Redbud, with her head bent down, made no reply.

Her hand played, absently, with the coral necklace; without thinking,
she drew it with her hand.

The time had come.

The old necklace, worn by use, parted asunder, and fell upon the
floor. The lawyer, with his cold courtesy, picked it up.

As he did so,--as his eye dwelt upon it, a strange expression flitted
across his rugged features.

With a movement, as rapid as thought, he seized the gold clasp with
his left hand, and turned the inner side up.

His eye was glued to it for a moment, his brow grew as pale as death,
and sinking into the old chair, he murmured hoarsely:

"Where did you get this?"

Redbud started, and almost sobbing, could not reply.

He caught her by the wrist, with sudden vehemence, and holding the
necklace before her, said:

"Look!"

Upon the inside of the gold plate were traced, in almost illegible
lines, the letters, "A.R."

"It was my child's!" he said, hoarsely; "where did you get it?"

Redbud, with a tremor which she could not restrain, told how she had
purchased the necklace from a pedlar; she knew no more; did not know
his name--but recollected that he was a German, from his accent.

The lawyer fell into his chair, and was silent: his strong frame from
time to time trembled--his bosom heaved.

At last he raised his face, which seemed to have sunken away in the
last few moments, and still holding the necklace tightly, motioned
Redbud toward the door.

"We--will--speak further of this," he said, his voice charged with
tears; and with a slow movement of his head up and down, he again
desired Redbud to leave him.

She went out:--the last she saw was Mr. Rushton clasping the necklace
to his lips, and sobbing bitterly,

In the outer room they laughed and jested gaily.

CHAPTER LXVII.

HOW ST. PATRICK ENCOUNTERED ST. MICHAEL, AND WHAT ENSUED.

As Redbud entered the outer room, the talkers suddenly became silent,
and ran to the windows.

The procession has returned:--the pageant has retraced its steps:--the
swaying, shouting, battle-breathing rout has made the northern end of
the town hideous, and comes back to make the portion already passed
over still more hideous.

Hitherto the revellers have had a clear sweep--an unobstructed
highway. They have gone on in power and glory, conquering where there
was no enemy, defying where there was no adversary.

But this all changes suddenly, and a great shout roars up from a
hundred mouths.

Another drum is heard; mutterings from the southern end of the town
respond.

The followers of the maligned and desecrated Michael are in battle
array--the Dutch are out to protect their saint, and meet the Irish
world in arms.

They come on in a tumultuous mass: they sway, they bend, they leap,
they shout. The other half of Pandemonium has turned out, and
surrounding ears are deafened by the demoniac chorus.

In costume they are not dissimilar to their enemies--in rotundity they
are superior, however, if not in brawn. Every other warrior holds his
pipe between his teeth, and all brandish nondescript weapons, like
their enemies, the Irish.

And as the great crowd draws near, the crowning peculiarity of the
pageant is revealed to wondering eyes.

The Dutch will have their defiant masquerade no less than their
enemies: the Irish parade St. Michael in derision: their's be it to
show the world an effigy of St. Patrick.

Borne, like St. Michael, on a platform raised above the universal
head, in proud pre-eminence behold the great St. Patrick, and his wife
Sheeley!

St. Patrick is tall and gaunt, from his contest with the serpents of
the emerald isle. He wears a flowing robe, which nevertheless permits
his slender, manly legs to come out and be visible. He boasts a shovel
hat, adorned with a gigantic sprig of shamrock: he sits upon the
chest in which, if historical tradition truly speaks, the great boa
constrictor of Killarney was shut up and sunk into the waters of the
lake. Around his neck is a string of Irish potatoes--in his hand a
shillelah.

Beside him sits his wife Sheeley, rotund and ruddy, with a coronet of
potatoes, a necklace of potatoes, a breastpin of potatoes--and lastly,
an apron full of potatoes. She herself resembled indeed a gigantic
potatoe, and philologians might have conjectured that her very name
was no more than a corruption of the adjective mealy.

The noble saint and his wife came on thus far above the roaring crowd,
and as they draw nearer, lo! the saint and Sheeley are revealed.

The saint is personated by the heroic Mr. Jinks--his wife is
represented by Mistress O'Calligan!

This is the grand revenge of Mr. Jinks--this is the sweet morsel which
he has rolled beneath his tongue for days--this is the refinement of
torture he has mixed for the love-sick O'Brallaghan, who personates
the opposing Michael.

As the adversaries see their opponents, they roar--as they catch sight
of their patron saints thus raised aloft derisively, they thunder. The
glove is thrown, the die is cast--in an instant they are met in deadly
battle.

Would that our acquaintance with the historic muse were sufficiently
intimate to enable us to invoke her aid on this occasion. But she is
far away, thinking of treaties and protocols, and "eventualities" far
in the orient, brooding o'er lost Sebastopol.

The reader therefore must be content with hasty words.

The first item of the battle worthy to be described, is the downward
movement of the noble saints from their high position.

Once in the melee, clutching at their enemies, the combatants become
oblivious of saintly affairs. The shoulders of the platform bearers
bend--the platforms tumble--St. Patrick grapples with St. Michael, who
smashes his pewter beer-pot down upon the shamrock.

The shamrock rises--wild and overwhelmed with terror, recreant to
Ireland, and quailing before Michael, who has stumbled over Sheeley.

Mr. Jinks retreats through the press before O'Brallaghan, who pursues
him with horrible ferocity, breathing vengeance, and on fire with
rage.

O'Brallaghan grasps Jinks' robe--the robe is torn from his back, and
O'Brallaghan falls backwards: then rises, still overwhelmed with rage.

Jinks suddenly sees a chance of escape--he has intrusted Fodder to a
boy, who rides now in the middle of the press.

He tears the urchin from the saddle, seizes a club, and leaping
upon Fodder's back, brandishes his weapon, and cheers on his men to
victory.

But accidents will happen even to heroes. Mr. Jinks is not a great
rider--it is his sole weak point. Fodder receiving a blow behind,
starts forward--then stops, kicking up violently.

The forward movement causes the shoulders of Mr. Jinks to fly down on
the animal's back, the legs of Mr. Jinks to rise into the air. The
backward movement of the donkey's heels interposes at this moment to
knock Mr. Jinks back to his former position.

But his feet are out of the stirrups, he cannot keep his seat; and
suddenly he feels a hand upon his leg--his enemy glares on him; he is
whirled down to the earth, and O'Brallaghan has caught his prey.

The stormy combat, with its cries, and shouts, and blows, and
imprecations, closes over them, and all seems lost for Jinks.

Not so. When fate seems to lower darkest, sunlight comes. O'Brallaghan
has brought his stalwart fist down on Mr. Jinks' nose but once, has
scarcely caused the "gory blood" of that gentleman to spout forth from
the natural orifices, when a vigorous female hand is laid upon his
collar, and he turns.

It is Mistress O'Calligan Sheeley come to the rescue of her husband.

O'Brallaghan is pulled from Jinks--that hero rises, and attempts to
flee.

He rushes into the arms of another lady, who, in passing near the
crowd, has been caught up like a leaf and buried in the combat--Miss
Sallianna.

But fate is again adverse, though impartial. Mr. Jinks and
O'Brallaghan are felled simultaneously by mighty blows, and the rout
closes over them.

As they fall, a swaying motion in the crowd is felt--the authorities
have arrived--the worn-out combatants draw off, sullenly, and the dead
and wounded only are left upon the field.

The crowd retires--they have had their fight, and broken numerous
heads. They have vindicated the honor of their Saints--to-morrow they
are friends and neighbors again.

One beautiful and touching scene is left for aftertimes--one picture
which even the historic muse might have paused near, and admired.

Two lovely dames contend for the privilege of holding a bloody
warrior's head, whose nose is injured.

It is Mr. Jinks, Miss Judith, and Miss Sallianna.

CHAPTER LXVIII.

THE END OF THE CHAIN.

We are conscious that the description of the great battle just given
is but a poor and lame delineation, and we can only plead defective
powers in that department of art--the treatment of battle-pieces.

We cannot describe the appearance of the battle-field after the
combat, any more than the contest.

Wounded and crack-crowned, groaning and muttering heroes dragging
themselves away--this is the resumé which we find it in our power
alone to give.

One hero only seems to be seriously injured.

He is a man of forty-five or fifty, with a heavy black beard, thick
sensual lips, and dog-like face. He is clad roughly; and the few words
which he utters prove that he is a German.

The fight has taken place opposite Mr. Rushton's office, and thither
this man is borne.

Mr. Rushton growls, and demands how he had the audacity to break the
peace. The man mutters. Mr. Rushton observes that he will have him
placed in the stocks, and then sent to jail. The German groans.

Suddenly Mr. Rushton feels a hand upon his arm. He turns round: it is
Redbud.

"That is the man who sold me the necklace, sir!" she says, in a
hesitating voice. "I recognize him--it is the pedlar."

Mr. Rushton starts, and catches the pedlar by the arm.

"Come!" he commences.

The pedlar rises without assistance, sullenly, prepared for the
stocks.

"Where did you get this necklace? Speak!"

The lawyer's eyes awe the man, and he stammers. Mr. Rushton grasps him
by the collar, and glares at him ferociously.

"Where?"

In five minutes he has made the pedlar speak--he bought the necklace
from the mother of the young man standing at the door.

"From the Indian woman?"

"Yes, from her."

Mr. Rushton turns pale, and falls into a chair.

Verty hastens to him.

The lawyer rises, and gazes at him with pale lips, passes his hand
over his brow with nervous, trembling haste. He holds the necklace up
before Verty there, and says, in a husky voice--

"Where did your mother get this?"

Verty gazes at the necklace, and shakes his head.

"I don't know, sir--I don't know that it is her's--I think I have seen
it though--yes, yes, long, long ago--somewhere!"

And the young hunter's head droops, thoughtfully--his dreamy eyes seem
to wander over other years.

Then he raises his head and says, abruptly:

"I had a strange thought, sir! I thought I saw myself--only I was a
little child--playing with that necklace somewhere in a garden--oh,
how strange! There were walks with box, and tulip beds, and in the
middle, a fountain--strange! I thought I saw Indians, too--and heard a
noise--why, I am dreaming!"

The lawyer looks at Verty with wild eyes, which, slowly, very slowly,
fill with a strange light, which makes the surrounding personages keep
silent--so singular is this rapt expression.

A thought is rising on the troubled and agitated mind of the lawyer,
like a moon soaring above the horizon. He trembles, and does not take
his eyes for a moment from the young man's face.

"A fountain--Indians?" he mutters, almost inarticulately.

"Yes, yes!" says Verty, with dreamy eyes, and crouching, so to speak,
Indian fashion, until his tangled chestnut curls half cover his
cheeks--"yes, yes!--there again!--why it is magic--there! I see it
all--I remember it! I must have seen it! Redbud!" he said, turning to
the young girl with a frightened air, "am I dreaming?"

Redbud would have spoken. Mr. Rushton, with a sign, bade her be
silent. He looked at the young man with the same strange look, and
said in a low tone:

"Must have seen what?"

"Why, this!" said Verty, half extending his arm, and pointing toward
a far imaginary horizon, on which his dreamy eyes were fixed--"this!
don't you see it? My tribe! my Delawares--there in the woods! They
attack the house, and carry off the child in the garden playing with
the necklace. His nurse is killed--poor thing! her blood is on the
fountain! Now they go into the great woods with the child, and an
Indian woman takes him and will not let them kill him--he is so pretty
with his long curls like the sunshine: you might take him for a girl!
The Indian woman holds before him a bit of looking-glass, stolen from
the house! Look! they will have his life--oh!"

And crouching, with an exclamation of terror, Verty shuddered.

"Give me my rifle!" he cried; "they are coming there! Back!"

And the young man rose erect, with flashing eyes.

"The woman flies in the night," he continues, becoming calm again;
"they pursue her--she escapes with the boy--they come to a deserted
lodge--a lodge! a lodge! Why, it is our lodge in the hills! It's _ma
mere_! and I was that child! Am I mad?"

And Verty raised his head, and looked round him with terror.

His eye fell upon Mr. Rushton, who, breathing heavily, his looks
riveted to his face, his lips trembling, seemed to control some
overwhelming emotion by a powerful effort.

The lawyer rose, and laid his hand upon Verty's shoulder--it trembled.

"You are--dreaming--," he gasped. Suddenly, a brilliant flash darted
from his eye. With a movement, as rapid as thought, he tore the
clothes from the young man's left shoulder, so as to leave it bare to
the armpit.

Exactly on the rounding of the shoulder, which was white, and wholly
free from the copper-tinge of the Indian blood, the company descried a
burn, apparently inflicted in infancy.

The dazzled eyes of the lawyer almost closed--he fell into the old
leather chair, and sobbing, "my son! my son Arthur!" would have
fainted.

He was revived promptly, and the wondering auditors gathered around
him, listening, while he spoke--the shaggy head, leaning on the
shoulder of Verty, who knelt at his feet, and looked up in his eyes
with joy and wonder.

Yes! there could be no earthly doubt that the strange words uttered by
the boy, were so many broken and yet brilliant memories shining from
the dim past: that this was his son--the original of the portrait. The
now harsh and sombre lawyer, when a young and happy man, had married
a French lady, and lived on the border; and his little son had, after
the French fashion, received, for middle name, his mother's name,
Anne--and this had become his pet designation. His likeness had been
painted by a wandering artist, and soon after, a band of Delawares had
attacked the homestead and carried him away to the wilderness, and
there had remained little doubt, in his father's mind, that the
child had been treated as the Indians were accustomed to treat such
captives--mercilessly slain. The picture of him was the only treasure
left to the poor broken heart, when heaven had taken his wife from
him, soon afterwards--and in the gloom and misanthropy these tortures
inflicted upon him, this alone had been his light and solace.
Retaining for the boy his old pet name of Anne, he had cried in
presence of the picture, and been hardened in spite of all, against
Providence. In the blind convulsions of his passionate regret, he had
even uttered blasphemy, and scouted anything like trust in God; and
here now was that merciful God leading his child back to him, and
pardoning all his sin of unbelief, and enmity, and hatred; and saying
to him, in words of marvellous sweetness and goodness, "Poor soured
spirit, henceforth worship and trust in me!"

Yes! his son Arthur, so long wept and mourned, had come to him
again--was there before him, kneeling at his feet!

And with his arms around the boy, the rugged man bent down and wept,
and uttered in his heart a prayer for pardon.

And we may be sure that the man's joy was not unshared by those
around--those kind, friendly eyes, which looked upon the father and
son, and rejoiced in their happiness. The very sunshine grew more
bright, it seemed; and when the picture was brought forth, and set
in his light, he shone full on it, and seemed to laugh and bless the
group with his kind light--even the little laughing child.

CHAPTER LXIX.

CONCLUSION.

Our chronicle is ended, and we cannot detain the reader longer,
listening to those honest kindly voices, which have, perhaps, spoken
quite as much as he is willing to give ear to. Let us hope, that in
consideration of their kindness and simplicity, he may pardon
what appeared frivolous--seeing that humanity beat under all, and
kindness--like the gentle word of the poet--is always gain.

The history is therefore done, and all ends here upon the bourne of
comedy. Redbud, with all her purity and tenderness--Verty, with his
forest instincts and simplicity--the lawyer, and poet, and the rest,
must go again into silence, from which they came. They are gone away
now, and their voices sound no more; their eyes beam no longer; all
their merry quips and sighs, their griefs and laughter, die away--the
comedy is ended. Do not think harshly of the poor writer, who regrets
to part with them--who feels that he must miss their silent company
in the long hours of the coming autumn nights. Poor puppets of the
imagination! some may say, what's all this mock regret? No, no! not
only of the imagination: of the heart as well!

This said, all is said; but, perhaps, a few words of the after fate of
Verty, and the rest, may not be inappropriate.

The two kind hearts which loved each other so--Verty and Redbud--were
married in due course of time: and Ralph and Fanny too. Miss Lavinia
and the poet of chancery--Mistress O'Calligan and the knight of the
shears--Miss Sallianna and the unfortunate Jinks--all these pairs,
ere long, were united. Mr. Jinks perfected his revenge upon Miss
Sallianna, as he thought, by marrying her--but, we believe, the result
of his revenge was misery. Mistress O'Calligan accepted the hand of
Mr. O'Brallaghan, upon hearing of this base desertion; and so, the
desires of all were accomplished--for weal or woe.

Be sure, _ma mere_ lived, with Verty and Redbud all her days
thereafter; and our honest Verty often mounted Cloud, and went away,
on bright October mornings, to the hills, and visited the old hunting
lodge: and smoothing, thoughtfully, the ancient head of Longears,
pondered on that strange, wild dream of the far past, which slowly
developed itself under the hand of Him, the Author and Life, indeed,
who brought the light!

And one day, standing there beside the old hunting lodge, with Redbud,
Verty, as we still would call him, pointed to the skies, and pressing,
with his encircling arm, the young form, said, simply:

"How good and merciful He was--to give me all this happiness--and
you!"

THE END.

End of Project Gutenberg's The Last of the Foresters, by John Esten Cooke