USA > Indiana > Monroe County > The new purchase : or, seven and a half years in the Far West > Part 30
Note: The text from this book was generated using artificial intelligence so there may be some errors. The full pages can be found on Archive.org (link on the Part 1 page).
Part 1 | Part 2 | Part 3 | Part 4 | Part 5 | Part 6 | Part 7 | Part 8 | Part 9 | Part 10 | Part 11 | Part 12 | Part 13 | Part 14 | Part 15 | Part 16 | Part 17 | Part 18 | Part 19 | Part 20 | Part 21 | Part 22 | Part 23 | Part 24 | Part 25 | Part 26 | Part 27 | Part 28 | Part 29 | Part 30 | Part 31 | Part 32 | Part 33 | Part 34 | Part 35 | Part 36 | Part 37 | Part 38 | Part 39 | Part 40 | Part 41 | Part 42 | Part 43 | Part 44 | Part 45 | Part 46 | Part 47 | Part 48 | Part 49
Uncle John quickly contrived to shuffle out of this scrape, and with a most unchristian design to take revenge for the razor affair; but then he ought not to have paid back with so terrible an interest. Nay, he lagged just in our rear, every now and then switching my creature, till the huzzy-(a lady horse)-feared to quit the side of the escort's horse-(a horse-horse)-and so kept on even a head with him, pace for pace, trot for trot, shuffle for shuffle ; her eyes strained backward, her ears pointed and tremu- lous, and her heels in the paulo-ante-future tense of being-nearly- about-a-going-to-kick ;- while I, completely snared and in-for-it, could be seen, all eye and ear, with my neck away out forward to catch the sense of Mr. Mealymouth muttering and whispering some half articulate question direct or indirect, thus :
"Well-Carlt-powerful-don't-allow?"
-
299
THIRD YEAR
"Si-i-i-r?" at the top of my voice to provoke him to a higher pitch.
"Most powerful good meet-reckon-dont -? "
"Oh! yes, rather lean, however,-it wasn't stall fed-think it was?"-( thought he alluded to the beefsteak at breakfast.)
"Meetin-meetin-convoc-hard heerin-allow?"
"The leaves rattle so-oh ! yes, noble set of good men."
"Mr. Carlton-allow-Mr. Seymour-ain't he?"
"Yes !- no!" And turning round I bellowed out ;- "Hullow! Uncle John, ride up, Mr. Mealymouth wants you !"
"Road too narrow-'fraid of things getting rubbed in my saddle- bags,"-replied Uncle J.
Here I politely made a movement to fall in the rear and give up my privilege; but my skittish jade, catching sight of Uncle John's upraised switch, snorted, and cocking back her ears trotted me up again to the place of punishment-while from Uncle John's face, it was plain enough he was indulging in a malicious inward laugh. Nay, although I hate to tell it, he actually put up his finger against his cheek and made signs of shaving !- a pretty way for a pious man of returning good for evil !
I shall not detail all my misapprehensions nor contrivances to avoid answering at hazard, as for instance, suddenly crying out, when expected to reply to a query-"See ! see! that deer !"-or- "Hurraw! for the turkeys there!"-or-"Smell cowcumbers- guess a rattlesnake's near?" Nor shall I relate how, at last, I did get behind Uncle John; and how Mr. M. fell back and rode with him; I ever and anon admonishing Mr. Seymour to take care of his saddle-bags ;- nor how Uncle John was attacked with a very uncommon and alarming stiffness, rendering it necessary for him to dismount and walk a whole mile; and how he over took us at the ford of the Wabash, Mr. M. fortunately volunteering to lead his horse; but I hasten to say that about evening we reached the house of a friend who had invited us to call on him, and that here, to crown the pleasures of the day, we found our host Mr. Softspeech was even more inarticulate in speech than Mr. Mealy- mouth himself.
Uncle John now proposed to bury the hatchet, and form a league of offence and defence; hence, after due deliberation while out washing and wiping, it was concluded that we both sit together,
300
THIRD YEAR
and always in front of the fire; thus keeping our innocent tor- mentors each at opposite sides of the chimney place. For first, this would do them a service by compelling them to talk out, it seeming impossible if they designed speaking to one another at all, to do it long in a mutter ; and secondly, if we were assailed by either enemy right or left, we should have four ears to defend and aid us, instead of two, and so we could together compound a pretty fair answer :- this judicious arrangement made us nearly equal to a Siamese twins.
And yet, one important matter was found to have been over- looked-the effect on our risibility. For when the two cousins of Simongosoftly began a gentle stir of murmuring lips, and both found, in despite of keen ears, that articulate language must be used; and when evident vexation from their reciprocal mutters and mistakes arose, and they looked at one another in a style like saying, "Blast you, why don't you speak louder?"-Oh! dear reader, would you have believed it. Uncle John all at once laughed right out !- and then you know I couldn't help it- could I?
But then, the old gentleman turned it so adroitly, thus :
"Mr. Carlton,"-said he-"whenever I think of that trick you served me about the razor I can't help laughing."
And of course that affair was narrated; and we had the satis- faction of finding our two friends could laugh like Christians, if they could not talk like them. And truly man is pretty much of a laughing animal-and certainly none deserves to be more laughed at; although for this vile sin of muttering, and grumbling, and whispering out words with a fixed jaw, and eyes half-shut up like a dreamy cat in the sunshine, words, that should be articulated in the sweet vocality of human speech, the whole abominable tribe of Mealymouths deserves not only to be laughed and hooted at, but actually well scourged.
Well, we paid our visit to our Sucker relative; and then, after the two worthy old gentlemen had exhausted their reminiscences, and edified one another with adventures in hunting, and fishing, and camping out, and voyaging, and so on, we bade farewells; and Uncle John and myself, but without an escort, took the homeward trail. The accidents in the path belong to the next chapter.
.
CHAPTER XL.
"Being skilled in these parts, which to a stranger Unguided and unfriended, often prove Rough and inhospitable."
ON the return, our first night was passed with the host of the antediluvian razor. But going into the woods we needed now no shaving ; although we shortly became entangled in another scrape, to be estimated in comparison and contrast, according to the ten- derness of one's face, and his leggins and trousers.
Let me not forget that, before reaching Razorville, we had passed through a primitive world, an antique French settlement ; and in it could be discerned no trace of modern arts and inven- tions; but agriculture, architecture and other matters were so ancient that we seemed to have come among aboriginal Egyptians or Greeks. The carts or wagons were like the wain of Ceres, and moved on spokeless wheels of solid wood, without naves, and, if circumference applied to wheels must be a circle, without cir- cumference.
The horse-if such may be called a dwarf, shaggy pony, so dirty and earthy as to seem raised in a crop, like turnips or pota- toes-this villanous and cunning horse was tied to the Cerealian vehicle by thongs of elm bark, fastened to a collar of corn blades around his neck; and he had a head-gear of elm bark ropes for halter or bridle-but sometimes he had no head-gear whatever. He was driven usually by flagellation from a stick-whip, in size between a switch and a pole, yet often with a corn-stalk fourteen feet long without its tassel, and, not infrequently, by a clod or rock 1 thrown against his head or side.
At the first hint from the persuasives, shaggy coat would merely shake his head and look up, and then, with an impudent flourish of a tail compounded of burrs and horsehair, he would pull away -not, indeed, at his load-but at the corn-blades and ears dang- ling in plenty about his unmuzzled mouth. On a repetition of the hint, especially if accompanied by a Canadianised-French exe- cration-(and its potency may be thus judged)-pony would
1 All minute pieces of granite, &c., are called rocks out there-but even little things there are big.
301
302
THIRD YEAR
whisk with his cart same half-dozen decided jerks, attended by the rattling of his corn-collar, the straining of bark traces, and the screeching of dry wheel and axis ; minus also a mess of corn bounced from the wain at every jerk. And thus matters pro- ceeded, with iterations of thumps, pelts, curses, and outcries on one side, and jerks ahead on the other, till the horse and wagon was clear of the corn-field-and then look out! Pony had now no more to expect in the way of mouthfuls till he reached the stack-yard, and so, go ahead was his motto-and, with him, no idle sentiment! True, the machine wabbled and bounced-that was owing to the inartificiality of the workmanship, and the as- perities of the ground ; the load jumped over the sides or rattled from the tail-that was because the sides were too low, and there was no tail-board; perhaps, even the collar broke, and little shaggy was released-the collar should have been leather: his duty was plain-to get to the stack-yard as speedily as possible, with or without a cart, or with it full or empty.
How my nameless quadrupedal old friend would have relished and adorned this arcadian life! What a theatre for his abilities and accomplishments! It may be something to live in clover ; but what is life in a clover-patch of a dozen rods, to life in a prairie corn-field of a thousand acres ?
But this is digression, of which, indeed, other examples occurred on our way home.
A friend of ours, a citizen of Woodville, returning now from Vincennes, and who travelled in a small one-horse-wagon, had told us of a short cut across the prairie ; and had stated also that, while the path was an almost imperceptible trace, being used only by a few horsemen, still we should easily follow the marks of his wheels-and thus a whole hour could be gained. Passing us, therefore, on the evening we had reached Razorville, he went by the short cut to "ole man Stafford's," a distance of seven miles, intending there to stay all night and await our arrival to a very early breakfast next morning,-the remainder of the journey to be made in company.
Well, an hour before day-break on Tuesday morning we put out, and in half an hour came to the "blind path," into which we struck bold enough, considering we had to dismount to find it, and that from the dimness of the early morn, no wagon ruts could
303
THIRD YEAR
yet be discerned. But as the light increased, we could see here - and there in the grass traces of a light wagon; and that embold- ened us to trot on very fast, in the comfortable assurance of rap- idly approaching a snug breakfast of chicken fixins, eggs, ham- doins, and corn slap-jacks. By degrees the prairie turned into timber land; but that had been expected, although the woods were rather more like thickets and swamps than ought to be encountered on entering the Stafford country. Still, every two or three rods was some mark of our friend's wagon; and as short cuts often pass through out-of-the-way districts, and we travelled now not by stars, or sun, or compass, but by wheel-ruts, we deemed it best to stick to our guide and Uncle John's old saw- " 'tis a long lane that has no turn."
At last we came to the edge of a dense and dark thicket; and here, at right angles with the ruts (for long since the six-inch horse-path had run out, or sunk, or evaporated, or something), ran a deep and wide gulley blocked with fallen trees and brush- wood; over which of course the wagon had got somehow, and, as was natural, without leaving any visible trace. This deficiency was, however, not important, because, you know, we should find the wagon tracks on the far side of the ravine; and so over we went working, where the impediments seemed fewest, in zig-zag method, for about two hundred yards, when all at once we rose, large as life, up the opposite bank, and instantly began talking :--
"See any ruts?"
"No,-do you?"
"No,-let's ride to the left."
"Through that papaw and spice !- no, no, try the right."
"The right !- look at the grape and green briar-better keep straight ahead."
"Straight ahead, indeed !- that's worse than the other courses."
"Why, how in the name of common sense did Mr. Thorn ever get his wagon through here !- come, you go right and I'll go left, and let's see if we can't find the wheelruts."
And then we separated; but after hard "scrouging" each way some hundred yards, and halloing questions, answers, doubts, guesses, &c., &c., in a very unmealymouthed manner, till we be- came hoarse, and withal finding no ruts, nor even hoof-marks,
304
THIRD YEAR
we came together and held a council. The result of the delibera- tion was :
I. That we were probably-(Uncle J. being a woodsman would allow only a probability)-were probably lost :
2. That maybe we might have followed a wrong wagon, and maybe we might not:
3. That maybe we had better go back, and maybe we had not :
4. That as it was likely we had been spirited into the Great Thicket of the White River, it would be best to work ahead, and strike the river itself now, up or down which (I forget which Uncle J. said) was a settlement maybe.
This last proposition having a decided majority of two voices, we began to work our passage into the river, Mr. Seymour as general in the van, Mr. C. as rear-guard.
Now how shall our swamp be described? What language can here be an echo to the sense? Any attempt of the sort would be so complicated an implexicity in the interwovenness of the cir- cularity, that should give the sight, and sound, and fragrance of the maziness in that most amazing of mazes, where all sorts of crookednesses made contortion worse in its interlacings, that- that-one would go first this way, and then some other way, and then back again once more towards the end, side, middle and be- ginning of the sentence, and yet fail to discover the-the-echo, -and be no more able to get through with so labyrinthical un- periodical a period, in any other way than we were to get out of the thicket, and that was by bursting out-so!
However, you've picked black-berries ?- gone after chicken- grapes or something, in your early days? You've set snares in pretty thick thickets, where you went on all-fours through prickle- bushes to save your face? Well-aggregate the trifling impedi- ments of your worst· entanglements ; then colour matters a little, and you approximate a just conception of our thicket. In this, all sorts of trees, bushes, briars, thorns, and creepers, the very in- stant their seeds were dropped or roots set by nature,-and some without staying for either root or seed,-started right up and off all at once a growing with all their might, each and every strug- gling, like all creation for the ascendancy, and thus preventing one another and all others from getting too large; yet, in haste and
-
305
THIRD YEAR
eagerness, like candidates climbing a hickery-pole, all wrapping, and interlacing, and interweaving trunks, boughs, branches, arms, roots and shoots, till no eye could tell whether, for instance, the creeper produced the thorn, or the thorn the creeper, or the vine the scrub-oak, or the oak the grapes-and till the shaking, or pulling, or touching, of a single branch, vine, root, or briar shook a thousand !- ay! like the casting of a pebble into a lake, till it disturbed in some degree the whole immensity of the thicket! And so all, in sheer rage, malice, and vexation, sent forth all manners, kinds and sorts of prickers and scratchers, and thorns, and scarifiers ; and began to bear all manners and kinds and sorts of flowers, and poisonous berries, and grapes !
In places, a black walnut, or hackberry, or sycamore, having like a Pelagian, an intrinsic virtue had got the start of nature by a few hours at the beginning of the swamp; and had ever since kept a head so elevated as now to be overlooking miles around of the mazy world below, and presenting a trunk and boughs so wrapped in vines and parasites as to form a thicket within a thicket, an imperium in imperio; while coiled and wreathed there into fantastic twistings, immense serpentine grape vines seemed like boas and anacondas, ready to enfold and crush their victims! Nay, in every labyrinth were concealed worlds of insects, reptiles, and winged creatures; and some, judging from their hisses, and growls, and mutterings, as they darted from one concealment to another at the strange invasion of their dens and lairs, were doubtless formidable in aspect, and not innoxious in bites and stings.
Through this apparently impervious wilderness of the woven world twist, however, we did-onward, as Uncle John said. I thought it was a vain struggle, like striving to free one's self from the meshes of a giant's net! Yet I kept close in the rear of his horse; for Mr. Seymour insisted on being pilot, and politeness yields to elders even in wriggling through a swamp. But what need be told our contrivances to work through? Never in words can be painted the drawing up of our legs !- the shrinking of our bodies-the condensation of our arms !- the bowings down of our heads, with compressed lips and shut eyes! But still we talked thus :
1
306
THIRD YEAR
"Oh ! hullow ! stop, won't you?"
"What's the matter ?"
"My hat's gone."
"There it is, dangling on that branch-look up-higher -- higher yet !"
"Oh! yes-I see :- lucky the hat wasn't tied under a fellow's chin, hey ?- how the thing jerked !"
"Ouch !- what a scratch !- just get out your knife and cut this green-briar."
"I've cut it-go on :- look out, you'll lose your right leggin."
"Whi-i-i-irr !- what's that?"
"A pheasant !"
"H-i-i-ss !- what's that?"
"A snake!" .
"Haw! haw! haw !- if your trousers aint torn the prettiest !"
"Don't taste them !- they ain't grapes !- they are poison berries !"
"Look-quick !- what an enormous lizard !"
And then such knocks on the head! Did I ever think heads, before the aid of phrenology, could bear such whacks ! Soft heads, surely, must have been mashed, and hard ones, cracked; and, therefore, Uncle John and I had medium sculls, and the precise developments to go through thickets. I had always disbelieved the vulgar saying, about "knocked into a cocked hat,"-deeming it indeed, possible to be knocked out of one; but my infidelity left me in that swamp, when I saw the very odd figures we made after our squeezings, abrasions, and denudings. The shape of a cocked hat was not at all like them! and yet, in about three hours from the starting at the gulley, we somehow or other stood on the summit of a bold bluff, and beheld the river coolly and beauti- fully flowing beneath our feet away below! Here we halted, first to repair apparel, wipe off perspiration, and pick out briars and thorns from the hands and other half-denuded parts; and, second- ly, to determine the next movement, when-hark! the sound of an axe !- yes ! and hark !- of human voices !
Between us and the sounds, evidently not more than two hundred yards up the river, interposed a dense and thorny ram- part; but with coats fresh buttoned to our throats, hats half-way
1
-
307
THIRD YEAR
over the face, and leggins rebound above the knee and at the ankle, we, in the saddles, and retired within ourselves, like snails, the outer man being thus contracted into the smallest possible dimension, and with heads so inclined as to render following the nose alike impossible and useless, we charged with the vengeance of living battering rams against and into the matted wall of sharp and sour vegetables ; and onward, onward, went we. thus, till all at once, the impediment ceasing, we burst and tumbled through into an open circular clearing of about fifty yards diameter !
In one part was a rude shantee or temporary lodge of poles and bark, à la Indian, having in front, as cover to a door-way, a suspended blanket, perhaps to keep out mosquitoes; for I could neither see nor imagine any other use. On one side the area, were large heaps of hoop-poles, on another, of barrel-staves ; while in several places stood gazing at us three squatter-like personages, and evidently not gratified at our unceremonious visit. The nature of their employment was manifest-the preparation of some western "notions and ideas" for the Orleans market. And down the bluff was a grand fleet of flat boats, ready to float when- ever the water chose to come up to them, and convey to market a whole forest, in the shape of hoop-poles, staves, and other raw material, not only now being prepared, but which had been being prepared and was yet to be being pre-prepared in all the fashion- able modern tenses !
"Well, what of that?"
Nothing! it was very correct, except in one small particular, although not a grammatical one; this snug little swamp and thicket, some thirty miles by two in extent, and full of choice timber, hap- pened to belong to our Great Father's elder brother the venerable dear good old Uncle Sam! And these reprobate nephews, 'our cousins, were simply busy in taking more than their share of the common heritage-in short, they were poaching and stealing ! Now, kind reader, for the last three hours, we had passed through a considerable scrape; nay, as we had shrunk up, it may be called a narrow scrape, but on comprehending the present affair, it seemed not improbable that we had only come out of the scrape literal, into the scrape metaphorical.
"How so?" Why you see, a large penalty was incurred for cut-
308
THIRD YEAR
ting down and stealing public timber; and the informer got a handsome share of the fine as reward; so that our industrious kinsmen taking us, at first, for spies and informers, not only looked, but talked quite growly; and we both felt a little nervous at sight of the rifles and scalping knives in the shantee! Here is a first-rate temptation to make a thrilling story; but I must not forget the dignity of history-(although Uncle John and I both thrilled at the time without any story)-and so I proceed to say, that we soon satisfied our free traders who we were; and that they condescended not only to laugh, but to sneer at us, and then pointed to a nice little wagon that one of them had driven yester- day from near Razorville, with their supplies for the current week! 'And that was the identical rut-making machine, that, so contrary to every body's wishes had coaxed us into the thicket !
We were then taught how to return on its trace, by a kind of opening through the maze; and received ample directions where and how to cross the ravine. We accordingly hastened away ; but we never felt perfectly easy, or ventured to laugh honestly, till full two hundred yards beyond the longest rifle shot, which might very accidentally take our direction, and, maybe, hit us. The path over the ravine was, indeed, less tangled, where the wagon had passed; yet it was a quarter of a mile above our crossing place, and concealment had evidently been studied in the way the stave-maker's vehicle had put off, even at an acute angle, at the point where we had lost its trail; and in the windings we had to thread among the high grass before we again reached that point. 'After having thus lost a wagon in a prairie, I felt in- clined to believe in the difficulty of finding a needle in a hay- stack. But we came, finally, to a deserted cabin; and there, after a keen look, discovered a little path laid down for us in the late verbal chart. Here, confident from experience, that this rabbit track of a road, some two inches wide was yet one of fifty similar ones leading to the grand trace, path, or way, we struck off at a rapid gait ; and in an hour came to the open wagon road, which we know conducted to Mr. Stafford's Public.
Revived we now cantered on, and not long after reached our breakfast-house, just as the sun was going down-having in the day's navigation with all our tackings made precisely seven miles,
1
309
THIRD YEAR
by the short-cut, in the homeward direction. Since Monday night, we had, eaten nothing, and were naturally ready now for three meals in one; and yet were we destined to wait a little longer and condense into one four repasts-like ancient Persians when hunting. For, either not liking our appearance, or vexed at our not having come earlier to breakfast, we were here most pertinaciously refused any entertainment whatever, and even peremptorily ordered away; and were, indeed, compelled to put off for the nearest house, some eight miles farther at the ferry ! Half a mile from Staffords, we met a young fellow, evidently in an ill-humour at something, who did, verily condescend to direct us how to steer through a sea of grass, rolling its waves over the prairie's bosom in the haze of the approaching night; but whether the rascal sent us wrong purposely, or we had so prac- ticed getting lost as to render the thing easy, after seeming to come duly to expected points, in about six miles we could find no more points, and so began travelling at a venture; and at ten o'clock at night, it being then profoundly dark, we resigned our reason to the horses' instinct to take us where they listed. We knew the creatures would follow some path and carry us, some time or other, to a human habitation, if that of a poacher or squatter ; and any thing seemed then preferable to the wilds of the prairie !
In about two hours my horse, now in the lead, suddenly halted, when dismounting, I tried first with my feet, and then my hands, and quickly had by these new senses a feeling sense of our situation, viz. that we stood at the diverging point of two paths running from one another at nearly a right angle!
"Well, what do you say-what shall we take?"
Need help finding more records? Try our genealogical records directory which has more than 1 million sources to help you more easily locate the available records.