I thought he might very naturally feel pain from his wound, and therefore pitied him; but« – and as she spoke, she glanced her eye, with suppressed curiosity, towards the major-domo – »I dare say, sir, that Benjamin can tell you something about him. He cannot have been in the village, and Benjamin not have seen him often.«

»Ay! I have seen the boy before,« said Benjamin, who wanted little encouragement to speak: »he has been backing and filling in the wake of Natty Bumppo, through the mountains, after deer, like a Dutch long-boat in tow of an Albany sloop. He carries a good rifle too. The Leather-stocking said, in my hearing, before Betty Hollister's bar-room fire, no later than the Tuesday night, that the younker was certain death to the wild beasts. If-so-be he can kill the wild cat, that has been heard moaning on the lake-side, since the hard frosts and deep snows have driven the deer to herd, he will be doing the thing that is good. Your wild cat is a bad shipmate, and should be made to cruize out of the track of christian-men.«

»Lives he in the hut of Bumppo?« asked Marmaduke, with some interest.

»Cheek by jowl: the Wednesday will be three weeks since he first hove in sight, in company with Leather-stocking. They had captured a wolf between them, and had brought in his scalp for the bounty. That Mister Bump-ho has a handy turn with him, in taking off a scalp; and there's them, in this here village, who say he larnt the trade by working on christian-men. If-so-be that there is truth in the saying, and I commanded along shore here, as your honour does, why d'ye see, I'd bring him to the gangway for it, yet. There's a very pretty post rigged alongside of the stocks, and for the matter of a cat, I can fit one with my own hands; ay! and use it too, for the want of a better.«

»You are not to credit the idle tales you hear of Natty: he has a kind of natural right to gain a livelihood in these mountains; and if the idlers in the village take it into their heads to annoy him, as they sometimes do reputed rogues, they shall find him protected by the strong arm of the law.«

»Ter rifle is petter as ter law,« said the Major, sententiously.

»That for his rifle!« exclaimed Richard, snapping his fingers; »Ben is right, and I« – He was stopped by the sounds of a common ship-bell, that had been elevated to the belfry of the academy, which now announced, by its incessant ringing, that the hour for the appointed service had arrived. »›For this, and every other instance of his goodness‹ – I beg pardon, Mr. Grant; will you please to return thanks, sir? it is time we should be moving, as we are the only Episcopalians in the neighbourhood; that is, I, and Benjamin, and Elizabeth; for I count half-breeds, like Marmaduke, as bad as heretics.«

The divine arose, and performed the office, meekly and fervently, and the whole party instantly prepared themselves for the church – or rather academy.

 

 

Chapter X

»And calling sinful man to pray,

Loud, long, and deep the bell had toll'd.«

Bürger, »The Wild Huntsman,«

ll. 11-12 (tr. Scott).

 

While Richard and Monsieur Le Quoi, attended by Benjamin, proceeded to the academy, by a foot-path through the snow, the Judge, his daughter, the Divine, and the Major, took a more circuitous route to the same place by the streets of the village.

The moon had risen, and its orb was shedding a flood of light over the dark outline of pines, which crowned the eastern mountain. In many climates, the sky would have been thought clear and lucid for a noontide. The stars twinkled in the heavens, like the last glimmerings of distant fire, so much were they obscured by the overwhelming radiance of the atmosphere; the rays from the moon striking upon the smooth white surfaces of the lake and fields, reflecting upwards a light that was brightened by the spotless colour of the immense bodies of snow.

Elizabeth employed herself with reading the signs, one of which appeared over almost every door, while the sleigh moved, steadily and at an easy gait, along the principal street. Not only new occupations, but names that were strangers to her ears, met her gaze at every step they proceeded. The very houses seemed changed. This had been altered by an addition; that had been painted; another had been erected on the site of an old acquaintance, which had been banished from the earth, almost as soon as it made its appearance on it. All were, however, pouring forth their inmates, who uniformly held their way towards the point where the expected exhibition, of the conjoint taste of Richard and Benjamin, was to be made.

After viewing the buildings, which really appeared to some advantage, under the bright but mellow light of the moon, our heroine turned her eyes to a scrutiny of the different figures that they passed, in search of any form that she knew. But all seemed alike, as, muffled in cloaks, hoods, coats, or tippets, they glided along the narrow passages in the snow, which led under the houses, half hid by the bank that had been thrown up in excavating the deep path in which they trod. Once or twice she thought there was a stature, or a gait, that she recollected, but the person who owned it instantly disappeared behind one of those enormous piles of wood, that lay before most of the doors. It was only as they turned from the main street into another that intersected it at right angles, and which led directly to the place of meeting, that she recognised a face and building that she knew.

The house stood at one of the principal corners in the village, and, by its well-trodden doorway, as well as the sign, that was swinging, with a kind of doleful sound, in the blasts that occasionally swept down the lake, was clearly one of the most frequented inns in the place. The building was only of one story, but the dormer windows in the roof, the paint, the window-shutters, and the cheerful fire that shone through the open door, gave it an air of comfort, that was not possessed by many of its neighbours. The sign was suspended from a common alehouse post, and represented the figure of a horseman, armed with sabre and pistols, and surmounted by a bear-skin cap, with the fiery animal that he bestrode ›rampant.‹ All these particulars were easily to be seen, by the aid of the moon, together with a row of somewhat illegible writing, in black paint, but in which Elizabeth, to whom the whole was familiar, read with facility, »The Bold Dragoon.«

A man and a woman were issuing from the door of this habitation, as the sleigh was passing. The former moved with a stiff, military step, that was a good deal heightened by a limp in one leg; but the woman advanced with a measure and an air, that seemed not particularly regardful of what she might encounter. The light of the moon fell directly upon her full, broad, and red visage; exhibiting her masculine countenance, under the mockery of a ruffled cap, that was intended to soften the lineaments of features that were by no means squeamish. A small bonnet, of black silk, and of a slightly formal cut, was placed on the back of her head, but not so as to shade her visage in the least. Her face, as it encountered the rays of the moon from the east, seemed not unlike a sun rising in the west. She advanced, with masculine strides, to intercept the sleigh, and the Judge, directing the namesake of the Grecian king, who held the lines, to check his horses, the parties were soon near to each other.

»Good luck to ye, and a wilcome home, Jooge,« cried the female, with a strong Irish accent; »and I'm sure it's to me that ye'r always wilcome.