USA > Connecticut > Litchfield County > Litchfield > More chronicles of a pioneer school, from 1792 to 1833, being added history on the Litchfield Female Academy kept by Miss Sarah Pierce and her nephew, John Pierce Brace > Part 31
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The ceremony over, the warriors stripped themselves of their feathers and ornaments, leaving their heads naked, with nothing but the long scalp lock to adorn them. Their rapid passage through the forest and the rough night-work of their expedition precluded all finery. Their leggins were stoutly fastened on - the blanket was left at home. The carbine was carried in the hand, and the belt around the body held nothing but the pouch for balls, the powder horn, the sharp knife betraying by its polish its French origin and a little scrip containing a small allowance of pounded, parched corn.
None but those who carried carbines were allowed to engage in this secret expedition, but each warrior had his bow and arrows at his back to use where silence was needed. The young boys rowed them in silence over the Kennebec and returned with the canoes.
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As soon as all had crossed, an experienced guide who knew the forest started due east and the rest followed in file, each treading in the same steps, while a large footed savage closed the rear, and stepped so as to leave but one track.
The sun was far down the sky when the march commenced. Silently they moved on, and unhesitatingly. The guide knew every rod of the forest and remembered every straggling rock or fallen tree or firm place among the bogs that could direct his way. The night, a clear and bright one, came upon them while they were threading the mazes of the forest.
CHAPTER XX
As the shades of evening thickened around him, the leader of the Abenakis quickened his stride as if to reach a certain point before the day light left him.
He rose a slight eminence where the pines of the low grounds had given place to heavy oaks and ancient chestnuts and then turned his steps to a low collection of rocks on the eastern slope of the hill.
"Hugh," said he, as he stooped to drink of a clear fountain that bubbled out among the rocks. "This water will lead us to the Penob- scot. We need no stars nor sun now."
Henceforth their course was on the banks of this little brook; whether it expanded in swamps, or bubbled on through alder thickets, or cast itself over rocky ledges, or slumbered in rich meadows, they followed on. Its tinklings were their guide and ordinarily their step was in its waters. It expanded its banks - grew a rivulet and then a wide stream. Suddenly, a deep, large river was seen before them, mirror- ing on its glassy surface the countless stars that gazed into it from heaven.
The guide stopped and stretching out his arm towards the silent stream, said in his guttural tones:
"Penobscot."
The Indians all collected around him, and as the last one of the file came in, he pointed over the neighboring hill.
The gesture was understood and each crept up the hill in a noise- less step, seeking some shelter as they reached the top.
Beneath them lay a village of the white settlers, all on one street with their barns in the rear; all facing the river, with their boats and canoes tied to the bank that gently sloped down from the houses to the water. A stockade made of long posts and stakes driven into the soil was their protection, and within it had they collected at night fall their flocks and cattle. They trusted, alas! too much to their stockade, and still more to the late peace with France and as they supposed, with all the Indian tribes.
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It had been a day of hard work with these unfortunate settlers, and all were steeped in the deep sleep which fatigue produces. Even the trusty dogs were quiet under the same stilling influences.
Noiselessly, the band of marauders approached the stockade. So still was their step on the dewy grass, that even the cricket did not cease its chirp. So stealthily they crept from tree to tree along the margin of the river, that even if a wakeful dog had heard the sound he would have supposed it to have been the passage of some benighted squirrel.
The stockade ran into the bed of the river to the edge of the shallow water, and then followed it down the whole front of the village, leaving only one small entrance for their own boats.
The savages saw the character of the place and the nature of the defences at a glance. Without a word, Bamazeen gave his gun and trappings to his neighbor, stripped himself of all but his leggins, re- taining his knife in his belt and silently allowed himself to float down the current, barely keeping his head above water and making no splash or disturbance as he swam down to the opening of the little path and thus gained the interior of the stockade.
Cautiously, he crept along the edge of the meadow and cornland of the enclosure, keeping the dogs to windward lest their acute smell should detect him as he moved. He was soon at the gate of the stock- ade where the cattle were admitted as the night grew near. He whistled one note of the whippoorwill as he crawled to the padlocked gate, which was responded to by a chirrup such as a ground squirrel uses in a wakeful night. Nothing could be seen from the exterior bushes, but he knew by that sound that many a savage eye was watch- ing his movements in readiness to enter.
Bamazeen carefully lifted himself in the line of the gate-post that no shadow across the bars might be seen from the houses, and felt for the fastening. It was a low gate, with picketing at the top so high that none could climb it. The fastening was a padlock. Thanks to Father Rasles's instructions, he knew its mechanism. He wasted no time in an attempt to force it, but feeling along the chain, he found a link that was not entirely closed. To force the handle of his knife in it and pry it open so as to separate from the next, was the work of but a moment to his strong fingers.
The gate was then cautiously pushed open, wide enough to admit a man, and the savages, one by one, crawled through each laying his whole length on the ground, until every one had gained the enclosure. With the same caution they separated, each choosing a barn for his snake-like attack.
Suddenly, the haystacks and barns were simultaneously in a blaze, and the affrighted inmates of the houses were awakened from their
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fated sleep, by the terrific war-whoop of the Indians beneath their very eaves.
It was in vain to hurry on clothing and seize the trusty rifle. A brand from the burning barns had been cast upon every roof, or affixed to every door, and the terrified owners only rushed from their houses to meet death from the wily foe.
Not a soul escaped. Many of the women and children were smoth- ered in the burning cottages, and the husband and the father fell dead on his own threshold without even the small consolation of fighting for the lives of those dearer to him than his own. Not a soul escaped.
A messenger from down the river, who arrived in a boat the next morning gazed at nothing but charred ruins tottering over smoking cellars, with the scalpless bodies of the dead lying in ghastliness near their burning homes. The destruction had been complete. The labors and efforts of the colonists for two years had been ruthlessly destroyed in one night and the band of savages had returned to their own river, laden with scalps and with a few articles of spoil which they had snatched from the flames when day light advanced.
The messenger affrighted turned the prow of his boat down the river and soon spread the knowledge of this work of savage destruction among every settlement along the banks.
Upon the return of the Abenakis from their expedition, Father Sebastian asked no questions about the result - that was evident from the looks of the warriors. He took no notice of the scalps they brought with them, for, he argued in his own conscience, if war was ever proper it certainly was against the natural enemies of his country and his religion.
The mode of carrying on war, each nation managed for itself. He certainly would not justify his children of the Abenakis in bringing home prisoners for the torture. Indeed, he had rescued several from them in the twenty-five years of his residence with them, and had sent them into interminable captivity at Quebec. But after their enemies were dead, he saw no great harm in carrying off their hair as a trophy. It was an Indian custom. Hence, he never made enquiries about it.
He had however induced the savages upon their return from a war- like expedition to attend High Mass, where a kind of Te Deum was sung by his choir, that often partook more of the war-whoop in its execution than would have been deemed pleasant to accomplished musicians, in consequence of the energy with which the young singers uttered their notes in view of the success of their tribe.
As soon however as the worthy Father ascertained that the return- ing warriors were near, he hurried Grace off to the forest on some errand, and High Mass was said, and the ceremonies of congratulation were over, and the scalps suspended among other trophies in each
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man's hut, before she returned. He could hardly say to himself why he did this, but he evidently felt unwilling to meet all the questions that Grace might ask respecting the long tresses and the flaxen curls that she might see hanging from the scalp-poles of the chiefs.
Nature and civilization and humanity will conquer sometimes, even when a quarter of a century has been spent among savages. Perhaps the affection of the curly-headed Violet Eye, that clung to him as a protector and a friend, sent a twinge to his conscience, as he saw on those scalp-poles locks as golden in their hue as hers.
CHAPTER XXI
The news of the destruction of the Penobscot village in a time of peace produced a prodigious excitement in all New England and especially in Massachusetts. It was universally attributed among the Puritans to Father Rasles and considered a part of his Jesuitical policy to extend the French Empire in North America, and, at the same time, to destroy those whom he considered as heretics. Nothing else was heard of than the complete annihilation of the Abenakis, and the breaking up of the Papistical establishment on the banks of the Kennebec.
To seize Father Rasles was the first object, for thus was it hoped to break up the connection between the Indians and Canada and to cut off their supplies. But such arrangements as Massachusetts made were proceeded in but slowly, as the scene of action was so remote from Boston, and it was not until winter that a party under Lieutenant Westbrook was prepared to ascend the Kennebec and seize the Jesuit's person.
The intelligence which Father Rasles received by every scout he sent into the English possessions convinced him that the colonists were determined to take the matter of reprisals into their own hands. At first, complaints had been sent to the British Government, but as no proofs could be produced that the irruption of the Indians and the destruction of the settlements on the Penobscot were instigated by the Canadian Government, the authorities of the mother country refused to interfere and left the colonists to seek their safety by their own efforts. This they were at length determined to do.
The authorities at Boston were fully convinced that the Jesuit was the instigator of all the hostilities they were experiencing and resolved therefore to seize upon him as a man dangerous to their peace.
The onslaught on the Penobscot settlement had been followed by other inroads, though comparatively of a more trifling character, and the spies of Father Rasles reported that such a spirit was raised among the English inhabitants of New England as alarmed him.
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In vain he sent messengers to Quebec for assistance of men as well as arms. The Governor General could not be brought to take such open steps of hostility in a time of profound peace. He wrote to the Father, urging him to forsake his Mission and leave the Abenakis to their fate, offering him shelter for the present and employment for the future among the French Missionaries at the West.
But no inducement could be offered that would persuade Father Sebastian to desert his post. If his time had come, he was ready to meet it. He would die as he had lived, a faithful Missionary to the Indians of the Kennebec. He would never show to his children of the Abenakis that the religion he had taught them would not support its votaries in the time of trial and in the hour of death.
"No," said he, in his reply to the solicitations of his Quebec friends, "I will not desert my flock. The connection between us is that of life. Where they are driven, there must I follow them. Where they lay their bones, there must mine repose. My time, I know, has come. I feel it in the vague alarms that fill my spirits without reason and with- out cause. I feel it in the anxious looks which my children cast upon me, as every report reaches us from the English country. Our Father in Heaven often gives his children full premonitions of the close of their pilgrimage here - not always by sensations or feelings that can be described in language, but in the weakening of the will, the clouding of the judgment, the apprehension of some unknown evil that rises like a thin mist over the clear, blue sky of the soul and obscures its light. The sun, as it rises, looks sorrowfully on my matin adorations, and illuminates but sadly my vesper orisons. The winds howl 'death' to me in the tempests that sweep in rage over the Kennebec. The gale as it breathes through the pine tops, sighs out 'death' in a mourn- ful cadence. The forest looks darker than wont as I gaze upon its thick hemlocks. The fog is gloomier than once, as it presses on the bosom of the stream. But I do not shrink or falter. My duty is plain. If Our Lady of the Wilderness calls me, I am prepared to go. But my children! my children! What will become of them? Will their religion be respected by these heretical Puritans? Will it not be blotted out with the nation, and chapel and worshippers be alike extinguished?"
Father Rasles now felt that a plan which he had long conceived for Grace must be immediately carried into operation. He had hoped that he should be spared long enough to enable Grace to reach the proper age for her admission into a convent. On this topic he had written much to Madame Vaudreuil, who had promised that his wishes should be attended to in this particular, but urged him to send the child at once to Quebec.
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To this the worthy Father had demurred. His own affections were so entwined around the child, that he could not and would not spare her as long as he lived.
Now, measures were necessary, at once, to prepare the child for her future espousals to Christ, and the management of this subject so engaged his attention as in a manner to draw off his mind from the gloomy anticipation that brooded over it.
In reading some French book of devotion to Grace, where Convent privileges were spoken of, he took occasion to paint to her imagina- tion, in those glowing terms he knew so well how to employ, the quiet- ness, the purity, the devotion, the sinlessness of a Convent life. There was no care to disturb - no sin to molest - no temptation to en- counter. There, the young mind could be kept pure from the con- taminations of the world - could be preserved unruffled from its anxieties and perplexities.
Grace listened with wrapt attention. The garden, shut out from the rest of the world, with its fruits and flowers - the crowd of con- genial spirits always surrounding her - the regular routine of reli- gious duties - all enraptured her. Never to mingle with the world only as a messenger of healing and comfort, was a beautiful concep- tion. To go out on an errand of mercy to the sick and suffering, and then to return to the friends of her cloister and to her flowers and her fountains - how delightful! What a contrast to the gloomy pine woods and dark savage faces of her present life, or to the dim remem- brance of Dave Hubbard and his geese in her former life, which now seemed a dream.
"Does God demand this, Father Rasles?"
"Certainly, my child. It is a state the most pleasant to the Deity and to the Virgin. To be the chaste bride of Christ is the most blissful condition to which a young girl can attain. Should you not like it?"
The child expressed her assent, and the Father commenced now, at once and seriously, the arrangements, even there in the wilderness. He sent for a dispensation for her to take the vows of the Novitiate at the Missionary Station, for he wished to make it an imposing cere- mony for the benefit of the savages. The proper dress and veil were soon prepared, and Grace was allowed to look at them before the ceremony could take place though absolutely forbidden to try them on, until, her vows having been taken, they became her own.
While waiting for the dispensation to arrive, the early education of the child led her still to feel some doubts.
"Dear Father Rasles," she said, one evening at her devotional hour, "will Christ be really my husband?"
"He will be the husband of your soul. You will love him entirely and he will love you."
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" Are all the good Nuns his wives?"
"Yes, in the spiritual sense."
"When he was on earth, did he marry any nuns then? I don't remember that I ever used to read about them, and you know you haven't sent to Quebec for a Bible for me as I wished and as you partly promised."
"You cannot read Latin well enough yet to give you a Bible," said Father Rasles, unwilling to enter into the controversy with her that he knew must take place if he forbade her to read that book.
"But, Father Rasles, did Christ marry any nuns on earth?"
"No, my dear; the Church had not then founded nunneries so that good women could retire from the world. Christ's first disciples were poor and could not erect the edifices and make the arrangements and furnish means for the support of the monks and the nuns. They had not even churches and chapels in which to meet. They worshipped in caves or on the sea shore or in the upper rooms of obscure houses."
Grace reflected for a long while, "Still," said she, "it seems strange that the Bible says nothing about nuns or Christ's marrying them!"
Rasles made no reply, but as he was wont to do, turned her thoughts to some other topic.
During the autumn months, the Abenakis remained around their settlement, expecting an attack from their English foes. But few of the warriors were allowed to leave the encampment at a time, upon hunting expeditions, or for any marauding purposes. Their corn was picked and shelled most expeditiously and then buried in the forest secretly. The dried venison for winter was prepared and then con- cealed. Their ammunition was husbanded, and their hunting per- formed with the bow.
Grace asked no questions, for she knew not the danger. She busied herself as usual among the huts in little attentions to the young chil- dren, but often wondered at the bustle of the village, and the anxiety manifested on Father Rasles' countenance.
The autumn passed over with no attack. The council in Boston moved slow, and the towns in Rhode Island, Connecticut and the Deerfield district objected to sending troops to that distance. Ne- gotiations were endeavored to be entered into with one of the braves of the Abenakis, who had been captured on a hunting expedition, to surrender Father Rasles as the instigator of all the existing hostilities. This proposition failed, but it occupied time.
Then efforts were made for the recovery of the captured braves by way of ransom, which was offered and paid, but did not release the prisoners. In these negotiations some part of the winter passed away, and the Abenakis and even Father Rasles himself had given up all ideas of attack and grew careless in their preparations for defence,
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though they did not recall the young scouts that were placed as sen- tinels along the river and in the defiles of the forest.
So secure did Father Sebastian feel that when the midwinter arrived he sent off the usual detachment with sleds to Quebec for the winter's supplies of ammunition, clothing, etc. A large body went, mostly of the younger members of the tribe, leaving only a few of the chiefs in the village.
CHAPTER XXII
One morning, after the departure of the detachments sent to Quebec intelligence was received from a lad who came in from his post as a scout that a large moose was entangled in a frozen morass, a few miles up the river, that he had broken through the ice and could not ex- tricate himself. The whole remaining body of men were aroused at this report and rushed up to the spot, with their guns and bows.
Father Rasles was apprehensive at what might possibly be the result of the absence of the men, and felt exceedingly uneasy. His presentiment proved true, for they had not more than reached the morass mentioned by the lad, when another sentinel rushed into the encampment with the intelligence that a body of English troops was coming up the river on the ice, and would soon attack the village.
The aged, the women and children were scattered at once and sought the defiles and the dark hemlock glens of the pine forest, and Father Rasles, seizing Grace in his arms, hurried with them. At their urgent request, for they well knew for whom Westbrooke and the English were in search, he went deeper into the recesses of the forest than they did, and concealed himself in a distant cavern far up the brook, on the broken ice of which his steps could not be traced.
When Westbrooke entered the village he found it deserted, where he expected to have met with a very warm resistance. He was sur- prised at this fact, and fearing some ambushment, he hurried through the huts belonging to the Jesuit, as rapidly as he could, seizing upon such articles as he found that might throw light on Rasles's connection with the French or with the Indian depredations, and destroying the pictures and images of the chapel.
His troops were about setting fire to the chapel and the huts, but he would not allow them time for it, as, from the entire absence of the men and the desertion of the encampment, he was apprehensive of an attack in the dense smoke, or of the formation of an ambush- ment below. Besides, his orders had been to seize Rasles and his papers if possible, without much contest with the savages. He hur- ried his men back to the smooth ice, and marched warily down the river, regretting, when he found himself out of danger, that he had not destroyed the village, now that he had been enabled to reach it.
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He carried off with him the papers of Father Rasles, which he trans- ferred to the authorities at Boston. They consisted of various letters from the Governor General at Quebec, which abundantly showed to the Colonial Magistrates of Massachusetts that Rasles had been sup- ported and encouraged by the French Government in Canada in all his intrigues among the Indian tribes, and that they had even urged him to cut off the English settlers by predatory incursions.
The future supremacy of the French in America was hoped for by these officials. It would be attempted, they said, in the next war that should break out between the nations.
In the meantime, Father Rasles was directed to keep the Indians in readiness for any outbreak, and to harass the common foe as far as he could. The interests of his religion were often appealed to, and the éclat mentioned that would spring to himself from the reputation of being the Apostle to the American Indians.
What the Father's replies had been, did not appear. But it was evident that he had disclaimed all ambitious personal motives, and had said something about his willingness to spend his life in the service of the Cross among these benighted heathen, for one letter from a high Church Dignitary at Quebec gently reproved him for his enthu- siasm, and bade him remember that the cause of the Church was as much advanced by the extirpation of heretics as by the conversion of savages and that both could be readily carried on together.
This correspondence was at once published to put all the northern colonies on their guard against the encroachment of the French, and to rouse the Puritanic feeling against the progress of Jesuitism.
Among these papers thus ruthlessly abstracted was a vocabulary of the words of the Abenakis language, showing much depth of phi- lological research, and an effort to acquire and describe the elementary rules of the dialect. That paper is still in existence.
Great was the grief of Father Sebastian upon his return from his hiding place, to see the devastations of the enemy, and to realize that the mental labor of years had thus been ruthlessly swept from his grasp. He cared little for the loss of the correspondence, for that would only confirm the Yankee authorities in that which they had strongly conjec- tured before. He cared less for the destruction of his chapel ornaments, for his own industrious and indefatigable labor could restore them.
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