Eleven boys fighting, two of whom have chairs and another a broom up in the air ready to strike. One frightened boy is outside looking on through the window. Miss Loring is close by calling out to the boys, her hands up in the air by her head, as if unsure what to do. In the foreground a table lies on its side, and scattered on the floor are two hats and an opened book.“The table was overturned, chairs were flying, bedlam had broken loose.”
Dreadful moments followed, during which I could only dodge chairs and wring my hands wildly. Worse was to come, however,—when I saw Killis grab the shovel, Nucky the poker, and Keats the tongs, while Philip wrested off a table-leg, and Taulbee and others either smashed chairs to pieces for weapons, or seized remaining table-legs, then indeed I felt that death was imminent for all concerned, and, running to the door, shrieked for Howard and the big boys over the workshop. Returning, I plucked the broom from Iry, and rushed with it, straw end foremost, into the thick of the fight. I was lammed on the head by a shovel, on the shoulder by a table-leg, on the elbow by something,—it is not safe to say what might have been the outcome had not Howard opportunely arrived, snatched the broom from me, and, with the handle-end, beaten and whacked the boys mercilessly until they finally surrendered their weapons and retired, bloody but happy, from the "battle."
I lay long awake last night, not from fleas, but nursing bruises and reconstructing theories. I see now that love and gentleness need to be backed up by good muscle, and that to be a success in my undertaking here I require, not the small body I actually possess, but the physique of an Amazon. Of course it is all a mistake, and I must give it up, even sooner than I had anticipated. But I am sorry,—the boys are most attractive, and time spent with them passes with lightning swiftness,—incredible as it seems, for seven whole days I have not had a chance to think of myself, my grief, my loneliness. Undoubtedly this is the Lethe I need,—but if its waves buffet me to bits, what then?
Inspiration came when I visited the loom-house this morning, and saw Cleo Royce, the head-weaving-girl, at her work. She is so large and handsome and strong,—a young Juno, with glorious muscle. The heads are to let her come to the cottage and occupy a cot in my room,—I am determined to stay out my month.
For two days I have taken away their scanty playtime from the boys in punishment of their fighting Sunday night. Yesterday I talked to them very solemnly on the subject. "Why, it's just an accident you didn't kill one another or me," I said, "and then how should you have felt?"
"I'd hate right smart to kill a woman," replied Nucky Marrs; "but gee, Iwouldn'tmind laying out a few boys. I got to begin somewheres,—a man haint nobody till he's kilt off a few!"
To-night when I announced that regular twice-a-week baths must begin at once, and that four of the boys must get ready to wash themselves, a shout of delight went up, "Whoopee! We git to go in the creek,—git to go in Perilous!"—and every boy demanded to be one of the lucky four. When I explained that I did not mean go in the creek, but that they must heat water in the kettles in the yard, and carry it to the tubs in the wash-house, and bathe there, howls of indignation succeeded. "We haint no women!", "I'll go home first!", "Dad burn if I'll do it!", "Creeks is for men!", and Philip remarked scathingly, "Nobody but quare women would wash in a house when there's a creek handy!" It was only by Cleo's splendid strength that four were finally corralled in the wash-house.
This has been an anxious week. The ice once broken by the fight Sunday night, every boy has felt free to be himself again. Nucky has fought every boy of his size and larger at the cottage, and, I hear, most of the hundred day-school boys; Killis, though not so aggressive, is quite as warlike; and the others, with the sole exception of Geordie, are not much behind. It is almost impossible for me to get garden-work done, so much of my time must be spent breaking up fights.
Even at meals (fortunately the boys and I have a table to ourselves in the dining-room at the big house) behavior is far from being what it should. Tuesday at breakfast, when Geordie undertook to instruct the new boys in table manners, and informed Killis it was not proper to eat with his knife, he was silenced by a jab of the knife in his direction and a threat to cut out his liver; at dinner Wednesday, when Philip snatched a corn-dodger from Keats's plate, he received a spoonful of "sop" (gravy) full in the face; yesterday when Taulbee made disparaging remarks about Trigger Branch, Nucky plunged the prongs of a steel fork so deeply into his scalp that he had to receive attention from the trained nurse. It is difficult to eat with one's mind so distracted; but distraction is far better than desolation.
I have been hunting Sunday clothes in the barrels sent us by kind friends,—the garments the children bring with them must be saved for hard, every-day wear. This morning, when I eagerly exhibited the Sunday things to the boys, I was doomed to disappointment. They expressed boundless contempt for the short trousers, flouted the knickerbockers as "meal pokes," and declined to wear the pleated and belted coats. Even the little sailor suit I had found for Jason was refused with scorn, as not being "for men." White shirts most of them accepted, but collars and ties were different,—Taulbee argued that even preachers didn't wear those, so why should he?
I was non-plussed for five minutes; then my eyes chanced to rest on Killis, the noted traveller. Sending the others from the room, I handed him a dark-blue suit, very little worn, and requested him to get into my closet and put it on, just for my pleasure. He did so, and when I had fastened a collar and a soft red tie on him, I invited him to look in my glass. He was frankly delighted. "By dogs, now, did you ever see anybody look as good as me?" he inquired.
Killis in fancy old-fashioned clothes looking into a small mirror hanging above a table. Miss Loring is standing by the side of the table with a serious expression, one hand on her hip and the other touching the table. In the foreground, clothes lie about on the floor and on the chair.“'By dogs, now, did you ever see anybody look as good as me?'”
"I think I never did," I replied with entire truth.
"If these breeches was just long, I'd keep these here clothes and wear 'em," he said.
"Short breeches," I assured him, "are the very latest style out in the level country; and," I added, "a boy who has seen the world and ridden on a railroad train is the very one to set new styles here,—the others would all follow what you did."
"Dad burn my looks, then, if I don't keep these and wear 'em!"
"Very well," I said, carelessly; "go along now and let me dress."
My dress was half-way over my head when the entire dozen burst into my room without knocking. Taking refuge in the closet, I let them examine the "new-styles," and fight it out over disputed garments. Later, having pinned all the collars, tied all the ties, parted all the hair, and at the last moment washed difficult cracks in all the ears, I set forth with my family for the "church-house," swelling more and more with pride at every step. Never anywhere have I seen such an aristocratic-looking set of boys.
After dinner, made wise by experience, I took them for a long walk up Perilous, to a beautiful, retired glen where they could play, fight (without weapons) and make all the noise they needed to.
On the way back, we met several women and girls on nags, and I was pained to see that my boys did not remove their hats. When I told them they must do so, Philip demanded why.
"To show the respect you feel for women," I replied.
"But I haint got none," he answered candidly; "they never done nothing for me. I'd ruther take off my hat to a cow,—I git something back from her!"
This from the namesake of the Pattern of Chivalry! Philip is very much of a man, and a prodigious worker,—in the shop he does better work than most of the grown-up boys, and is actually permitted to make walnut furniture for the big house—but he certainly lacks minor virtues, such as courtesy and cleanliness.
After supper I happened to ask Killis about his name, and told him I thought he must be named for Achilles, a hero who lived several thousand years ago, and was the greatest fighter of his time. There were unanimous demands to hear all about him, and perforce I started in telling tales of the Trojan War. This time there was no drowsiness, but, as one great combat followed another, intense interest, and howls of remonstrance when I tried to stop.
I have found acceptable literary food for my babes,—but alas, what they want is not milk at all, but blood!
Jason, my "little pet" as the others call him, resents any allusion to the fact that he is small, and burns to play the man. In our garden work, he seizes shovels and mattocks almost as large as himself from the bigger boys, and whacks away joyously with them. To-day while we were making gravel walks, I caught him wheeling Geordie's barrow, while Geordie made feeble passes at the gravel-bank in the creek with Jason's little broken-handled pick. Geordie explained,
"That 'ere little Jason says he's aiming to leave if you give him little-boy jobs,—he wants big ones. I told him he could take my wheel-borrow awhile,—that I were willing to trade jobs with him, to favor him."
"I don't doubt you were," I said, sharply,—I begin to fear that Geordie's energy and talent reside mostly in his tongue.
"He's able to do it all right," continued Geordie, imperturbably. "By dogs, you ought to have seed him fight out two of them little day-schools at a time yesterday! Any boy can fight like that ought to labor some, and would have to if he weren't a pet!"
This evening while Keats gave me a glowing description of Nervesty's vinegar-pies (it would appear that his affection for her has no few of its roots in his stomach) and the other boys played numble-peg outside my window, what were my grief and surprise to hear the most fearful oaths I ever listened to issue from the sensitive lips of the "pure scholar." Of course all the boys swear; but this was the worst ever. Where can he have learned it, and his father such a perfect gentleman? When I called him in and rebuked him, he was much downcast,—said he didn't aim to cuss, but he had been at it so long he couldn't quit. I told him the only way was to keep on trying, and how very, very happy it would make me when he should succeed; and he promised to try andtry, "because," he added, almost in a whisper, "I like you." "And Iloveyou," I said, gathering his thin little body to my heart. How happy his words made me,—they are the first to indicate that any of the boys care for me. They have a great deal of reserve, and are hard to get acquainted with, especially Nucky. But at least they are not leaving as they did.
Mrs. Salyer came in Thursday bringing some large pokes of beans, a gift to the school, and a saddle-bag full of apples for her boys. Next morning while supervising bed-making, I happened to glance into the box on the wall where Keats had put the apples the night before, and, to my surprise, saw that they were all gone. "We et half of 'em off'n'on in the night, and Keats traded t'other half off to Geordie before we got up," explained Hen,—the three occupy the same bed.
On my idle inquiry as to what Geordie gave for them, Keats produced with pride a mangy little purse, about the size of a dollar, looking as if it had been well-chewed.
"Why, that wasn't a fair trade," I said, "one apple would have been all that purse was worth. I must speak to Geordie about that."
Of course in the rush later I forgot it. Moses and Zachariah having departed without farewells later in the day, I gave Geordie permission next morning to go to an uncle's over on Bald Eagle and bring back his elder brother, Absalom, to the school. Before leaving, he "gave me his hand" to be back "before the sun-ball draps this evening." The sun-ball drapped and rose and drapped again, however, before he returned; and last night as the boys were starting to bed, Philip asked me if I knew how much Geordie had made on those apples he traded Keats out of. "He sold seven to the day-schools for a cent apiece, and six to the manimal trainer for a dime, and three to Taulbee for a big gingercake he brung with him, and I give him a good taw for a couple more, and he traded the two little wormy ones that was left to Keats for a purse."
"What purse?" I inquired.
"That 'ere one Keats swapped him all the apples for at first,—the one you said weren't worth more'n one apple. Keats told him you said so, and he said he would prove it were by giving Keats two-down for it, if he wanted; and Keats was glad to make the trade."
"Do you mean to tell me," I asked, "that Geordie made seventeen cents, a gingercake, a tawandthe purse, out of that trade, and Keats lost everything but two wormy apples?"
Philip scratched his head thoughtfully. "By grab, he skinned the little Salyer, didn't he? Gee, I wisht I was a born trader like him, dag gone his ole soul!"
When Geordie returned to-night with Absalom, his jaw was tied up in a red bandana, he wore a look of patient suffering, and explained that he had had such a sorry time with toothache he could not return yesterday, indignantly repudiating Philip's suggestion that he had just wanted to stay and see a big time with the Yontses and drink their moonshine. Later, when, while filling a hot-water bag for him, I regretfully spoke to him on the subject of cheating in trades, he was deeply hurt, said he had traded the apples back to Keats only to favor him, and confided in me that he aimed to be a preacher when he growed up.
During the ear-washing this morning, I had another round with Philip, whose ears are always the grimiest, hair the most unkempt, clothes the most tattered. "Philip," I said, with a groan, "you could be the handsomest boy on the place if you only would!"
He replied contemptuously, "Handsome never earnt his salt; when a man steps in the door, looks flies up the chimley!"
In the midst of our altercation, Absalom sauntered into my room, took his stand before my mirror, and proceeded to give his hair a good dressing with my brush and comb.
Later, as I saw Geordie walking to church with a Bible under his arm, heard his heart-felt singing of the hymns, and watched his pious, soap-shining face, I wondered I could ever have thought he meant to cheat anybody.
The Trojan War made fine progress to-night,—it is only on Saturday and Sunday nights that we can have stories, as other evenings must be spent in study. From the first, Killis has identified himself with his famous namesake, while Nucky has as inevitably taken sides with the Trojans and Hector, so much so that the boys call him "Trojan." This evening he was scathing in his denunciation of Achilles. "Gee," he said, "I wisht them Greeks had a-had amanalong. Now if Blant had a-been there, you'd a seed some fighting! He wouldn't have sulled around in no tent none! He'd a-got the drap on Hector allus-ago, same as he done on Elhannon and Todd and Dalt Cheever when they laywayed him in April. He was riding along past the cliff where they was hid in the bushes, and heared the click of the lock when Elhannon cocked his trigger, and whirled around and poured six bullets into 'em before they could fire their guns, killing Elhannon and very nigh killing t'other two."
I expected that with Iry's abilities in the way of spelling, he would be the pride and prodigy of the school; but I am pained to learn from his teacher that he can do nothing but spell. It seems that in the five-month district school he has attended three terms over on Rakeshin, nothing was taught but reading and spelling,—two lessons a day in the former, two in the latter,—thus does our noble commonwealth do her duty when she does it at all! Iry has had to go back into the first grade to learn the rudiments of arithmetic, geography, grammar, etc.
Last night Taulbee, the eldest, who is very opinionated, took occasion to enter a general protest against innovations such as nightgowns, tooth-brushes, fine-combs and the like, and wound up by arraigning the school methods of cooking. "Them little small biscuits you-all have don't make half of a good bite," he declared: "You women," he continued, severely,"think you know so much, and lay down so many laws, and, by Ned, you don't even know how to bile beans!"
"How should beans be cooked?" I inquired.
"A pot of string beans calls for a big chunk of fat pork and about four handful' of lard throwed in, to be fitten to eat," he said; "I haint tasted a right bean sence I come here."
This afternoon arrived a solemn little man of eleven from over on Clinch, named Hosea Fields, to take the one vacant place.
When Jason came up from his bath to-night, he rolled up his gown sleeve and held out a pink arm to me. "Just feel my muscle," he said, "Oh, I'msonervy!"
Jason in his nightgown is showing off his muscles to Miss Loring, who is sitting down with an open book in her hands. Keats also in nightgown is looking at them.“'Just feel my muscle,' he said, 'Oh, I'm so nervy!'”
"I reckon he is," said Keats, "I seed him lay out three-at-a-time of them little primaries at recess to-day."
Last time it was two, now it is three. Of course these reports must be exaggerated,—such a baby could not be so warlike. Taking him in my arms and giving him a good hug, I said, "Jason, dear, I want you to remember that it is wrong for little boys to fight."
Objections to bathing have been withdrawn, and the boys for some nights have gone to the wash-house with such alacrity that my suspicions were aroused, and I found they were taking advantage of their nude condition, and freedom from interruption, to do great stunts of fighting, the bathing being entirely lost sight of. I have been compelled to make a rule that each boy must present himself in his clean gown after his bath at my door for inspection of head, ears, neck and feet.
While the boys were scrubbing their rooms after breakfast this morning, Keats sauntered in, saying he had finished his job of cleaning the chicken-yard. I went back, found it anything but clean, and called up to Hen, who was sweeping the back steps, "Tell Keats to come back here and clean this yard better!" He had just passed the word along, "Hi, son, she says for you to come back and lick your calf over!" (I am becoming used to being "she" and "her" on all occasions) when Nucky appeared in the back door, waving excitedly for me. Not knowing what battle, murder or sudden death might be in progress, I flew up the walk. The boys were all hanging out the front door. Nucky shot me through them like a catapult, saying, "Take a look at that 'ere man,—it's Asher Hardwick, from over in Bloody Boyne. He's kilt twenty-four in war, and nine in peace, and wouldn't wipe his foot on Achilles!"
A gray, venerable-looking man was passing down the road on an ambling nag. "That man wouldn't hurt a fly," I said; "you must be mistaken."
"No, I haint,—I've seed him before. Of course he wouldn't hurt nobody less'n he was driv' to it; but the Mohuns just wouldn't give him no peace at all till they was all kilt off,—same as the Cheevers does us."
"But how could he kill nine in peace?" I asked.
"Kilt them just accidental,—they was witless folk that never knowed enough to keep out of his way when he was out after Mohuns. Asher he'd feel terrible about such as that."
To-night as I related more Trojan War, there were frequent interruptions from Nucky (who, during the stories, holds the place at my right hand always) such as, "I can beat that with Asher Hardwick!", "Blant wouldn't have took no such sass from Agamemnon or nobody!", and then would follow stories which did indeed sometimes beat Greeks and Trojans.
Later, he remarked, "If Hector and Achilles and them had a-lived now-a-days, they'd have got song-ballads made up about 'em, same as Asher and Blant. There's four or five about Asher—"
"I know one," interrupted Absalom.
"And there's one about Blant's revengement on the Cheevers when they laywayed him in April,—Basil Beaumont, over on Powderhorn, he made it."
"I know that, too," said Absalom.
"Achilles and Hector," I said, "did have song ballads made up about them, the very tales I am relating to you now; and a great blind poet, named Homer, went about singing them from palace to palace."
"Same as Basil Beaumont," said Nucky; "he don't never do a lick of work,—folks gives him his bed and vittles just to set in the chimley-corner and pick and sing song-ballads."
Geordie had left the room when Absalom spoke; he now returned with a small, homemade banjo—produced, I suppose, from the mysterious locked box he keeps there—and Absalom, tuning it, began to pick and sing an indescribably bloody and doleful song, "The Doom of the Mohuns," which fairly made my blood run cold. This finished, "Blant's Revengement" was demanded and sung, the words of it being as follows:
Blant Marrs he was a fighting boy,Most handy with his gun.On Trigger Branch of PowderhornHis famous deeds were done.For thirty year' the war it ragedAll o'er a strip of bottom.Sometimes the Marrses triumphed strong,Again, the Cheevers got 'em.His paw lamed up, his uncles kilt,Five year' Blant mourned his land,Until, good-grown, beside the fenceHe took his battle-stand.Then Ben and Jeems they bit the dustAnd perished in their gore,And many Cheevers his good gunFelt sharp, and dreaded sore.Elhannon, Todd and Dalton thenPlanned Blant for to laywayAll unbeknownst, while travellingUpon a fair spring day.Beneath a cliff where Trigger bendsIn ambush they lay low.Oh, Blant, you better say your prayers!Death lurks at your elbow!Oh, Blant, I wish you was safe at home;I think you'll never be;I would not give a tallow-dipFor all your chance I see!He comes, he hears a swift lock click,And, swifter than the wind,He turns, six barrels emptyingBefore they can begin.Elhannon nevermore will seeThe sun rise o'er the peak;And Todd and Dalt, up from their wounds,Far, absent countries seek.
Blant Marrs he was a fighting boy,Most handy with his gun.On Trigger Branch of PowderhornHis famous deeds were done.
For thirty year' the war it ragedAll o'er a strip of bottom.Sometimes the Marrses triumphed strong,Again, the Cheevers got 'em.
His paw lamed up, his uncles kilt,Five year' Blant mourned his land,Until, good-grown, beside the fenceHe took his battle-stand.
Then Ben and Jeems they bit the dustAnd perished in their gore,And many Cheevers his good gunFelt sharp, and dreaded sore.
Elhannon, Todd and Dalton thenPlanned Blant for to laywayAll unbeknownst, while travellingUpon a fair spring day.
Beneath a cliff where Trigger bendsIn ambush they lay low.Oh, Blant, you better say your prayers!Death lurks at your elbow!
Oh, Blant, I wish you was safe at home;I think you'll never be;I would not give a tallow-dipFor all your chance I see!
He comes, he hears a swift lock click,And, swifter than the wind,He turns, six barrels emptyingBefore they can begin.
Elhannon nevermore will seeThe sun rise o'er the peak;And Todd and Dalt, up from their wounds,Far, absent countries seek.
During the singing, the other boys cast enviousglancesin Nucky's direction, and Philip probably voiced the sentiments of all when he exclaimed,
"Dag gone, I wisht I had a big brother as mean as Blant!"
When we were ready to start for church this morning, I was surprised to see Nucky halt before me, and eye me frowningly from head to foot. "What makes you allus wear ole ugly clothes?" he inquired. "Haint you got no pretty ones, like t'other women?"
I looked down at my blackcrêpede chine,—of course I have worn deep mourning since I lost Mother, and for six years before I had not had on a color. "You don't like it?" I asked.
"I'd as soon look at a coal-bank, or a buzzard," he replied.
It suddenly struck me that the dear ones I have loved and lost would be of much the same opinion. "Wait a minute, boys," I said. I flew back and pulled from my trunk a white dress and some black ribbons laid away a year ago. When I emerged, there was a chorus of pleased "gee-ohs" and a decided accession of friendliness, the boys trying who could be first in helping me over the frightful mudholes between the school and the village. I see my duty clear now,—white dresses instead of black.
Considering the antecedents of Nucky and Killis, I was not surprised when they informed me this morning they would make beds no longer, but would leave unless given men's work all the time. My reply, "But making bedsismen's work," was met by incredulous whistles.
"Now, boys," I said, "how about soldiers,—do you call them men?"
"By grab, them's the only menismen,—I'd ruther be dead as not to be one," said Nucky.
"Gee, fighting's the best job there is," agreed Killis.
"Well, soldiers make their beds every single day," I said; "I have a cousin right now at West Point, learning to be a soldier, and when he gets out he will command a whole company, and he makes his bed every morning, and couldn't be a soldier if he didn't."
The two stood, dazed and pondering, for some minutes; then Nucky quietly flung an end of the sheet across to Killis, with the words, "There, son, take-a-holt of that kiver, and le's lay it straight!"
To my great relief, I heard Keats singing a more cheerful song at his work to-day:
Wisht I was a little turkle-dove,Setting on a limb so high.I'd take my darling on my kneeAnd bid this world goodbye!
Wisht I was a little turkle-dove,Setting on a limb so high.I'd take my darling on my kneeAnd bid this world goodbye!
and at dinner, by actual count, he ate nine corn-dodgers, three helpings of string-beans, four sweet-potatoes and I know not how much sorghum.
He still sits with me in the evenings, and I feel now that I have always known Nervesty and the four small children at home, especially Sammy the baby, not to mention Charlie, the "flea-bit" nag, Ole Suke, the "pied" cow, with her twin sons the steers Buck and Brandy, and her daughter Reddy the heifer (now the proud possessor of a little "pied" calf and a "blind" teat), also the big black sow, Julia, who, true to mountain traditions, never has less than nine in her family, and above all the wonderful dog, Ponto, who appears to be all that a dog can, and more. And not infrequently during these talks Keats is called out to help fight some antagonist of Hen's (though there is often civil war between the brothers, they always combine against outside aggression); and at other times Hen will pause breathless on his swift way through house or yard to corroborate some statement of Keats's with, "Gee, woman, that 'ere's a dandy of a dog! He can do anything but climb a tree, and he gits half-way up them. He rounds up the shoats and drives up Ole Suke and the steers gooder than I can; and possums! groundhogs! polecats! dad burn my looks if he haint the beatenest ever you seed!"
I have tried all along to respect Jason's feelings, and give him jobs which would injure neither his pride nor his person. But yesterday while we were spading up a patch for turnip-and-mustard-greens, I forgot and sent him off to the school-yard to pick up trash. An hour later, I heard from a passer-by that he had been seen a mile up Perilous. "Don't you recollect him a-saying he would leave if you give him little-boy jobs?" Geordie reminded me.
"Saddle the nag and hurry after him," I implored Taulbee. Sometime later, he overtook the proud child on his way to Spraddle Creek, and brought him back under protest.
The boys say they see no good reason why they should say "yes ma'am" and "no ma'am." When I told them it was for the sake of politeness, Philip replied, "Polite's a lick-spittle,—I don't aim to be polite,—I don'thaveto,—I'm able to get what I want without it!"
This last is only too true. "For they shall take who have the power, and they shall keep who can," is the creed of all, but more especially of Philip. This noon, when Iry's father had sent him from Rakeshin a fine, yellow, mellow apple, and the "pure scholar" was eating it as frugally and lingeringly as possible, Philip, came along, snatched it, bit off three-fourths, and coolly handed back the fragment to Iry, who, howling dismally, still had no redress.
"To think you could do such a base thing!" I exclaimed,—"Rob a little boy who cannot defend himself. You ought to be everlastingly ashamed!"
"I was behind the door when shame passed by," replied the robber, flippantly.
"You were indeed," I agreed; "I would not believe that a boy named Philip Sidney could be guilty of such a thing." Then I told him the story of the great Sir Philip, mortally wounded, fevered and athirst, handing the cup of water to the dying soldier beside him, with the words, "Your need is greater than mine."
He pondered a moment, then remarked, "No man'd be such a fool,—I bet it's just a slander they made up on him!"
I told him he should lose three days' playtime for his rapacity.
Last night the Trojan War reached a climax in the death of Horse-Taming Hector, amid shouts of joy from Killis, and howls of fury from Nucky. I have seen for two weeks that considerable feeling has developed between the two on the subject, intensifying the natural jealousy each has of the prowess and reputation of the other.
This morning I had left the boys at the big house to help with the breakfast dishes—the regular Sunday proceeding—and was standing in the back cottage door drinking in the beauty of the morning and the Sabbath peace of the hills, when savage yells smote my ears. Following the sound, I ran to the school-yard. When I arrived, Nucky had just buried his teeth in Killis's arm, from which the blood was spurting, while Killis was striking out fiercely with his knife. Around the combatants the other boys formed a delighted, cheering circle, within which Philip danced madly about, shouting,
Fight, dogs, you haint no kin,'F you kill one another, taint no sin!
Fight, dogs, you haint no kin,'F you kill one another, taint no sin!
In another second, Nucky had abandoned the hold with his teeth, and was flashing his own knife around Killis's throat. With a shinny-stick, I knocked up one knife after the other, and kept death at bay until four of the grown-up boys arrived and with difficulty separated the heroes and escorted them to the hospital to have their wounds staunched and dressed. Later, I heard that Nucky had begun it by leaping upon Killis with the words, "I'll show you Hector haint dead yet!"
Nucky and Killis fighting, the latter armed with a knife. Ten boys around them are cheering them on, with one of the boys sitting on a tree branch. In the foreground lie some clothes apparently abandoned by Nucky and Killis.“'Fight, dogs, you haint no kin,'F you kill one another, taint no sin!'”
To-night when I had the two in durance vile, and talked to them more severely than I had yet done on the evils of fighting, Nucky, the aggressor, gave as his excuse that his great-great-great-grandpaw had fit the British, his great-great-grandpaw the Indians, his great-grandpaw the Mexicans, his grandpaw the Rebels, and his paw and Blant the Cheevers ever since he could recollect, and that he himself was just bound to fight.
This was sound reasoning; and it brought before me with hitherto unrealized force the fact that these boys are in very truth the sons of heroes,—of forefathers who fought gloriously for freedom in the Revolution, afterward subdued the wilderness and the savages, and have since poured forth as one man from their fastnesses to safeguard the Union in every emergency; and that here, forgotten and neglected by an ungrateful state and nation, is the precious stuff of which great patriots and heroes are made.
Therefore I did not upbraid Nucky and Killis further; I merely explained to them the difference between fighting just to be fighting, and fighting to save one's country, and, since they had no idea who the "British," the "Mexicans" and the "Rebels" were, told them something of the history and causes of those wars, and how I hoped that they, too, when necessary, would fight for their nation. And though to them at first their country meant their mountains only, and they were surprised to hear that the great "level land" beyond was also theirs to love and fight for, their affections were hospitable, and with one voice they demanded that an enemy of the nation be produced at once.
Here endeth the Trojan War,—I see that it has fanned a flame already too intense. Even little Jason slipped out under the benches at church this morning, while I played the organ, and was found an hour later out in the road in front of the court-house, covered with mud, but glowing with the white-hot joy of having "whupped-out four-at-a-time" of the little village boys. Hereafter I shall tell and read stories of heroes who won glory by fighting, not one another, but dragons, giants, gorgons, and like destroyers of their countries.
Nucky inquired of me at supper to-night when he might make a visit home to Trigger; whereupon there was an instant and unanimous offer on the part of the boys to accompany him, when he goes, and see the hero Blant. He shook his head. "I haint aiming to take none of you," he said, "not if she'll go 'long with me," looking at me.
"I?" I said, much complimented. "Why, surely I will if I can. But it is three weeks yet before your time comes:"—the children are permitted to go home over week-ends every seven or eight weeks, in rotation. I am glad he wants me, and feel a considerable desire to visit Trigger.
Four weeks to-day since I acquired my family of sons, and now it seems as if I had had them always. So far from being ready to leave now my month is out, wild horses could not drag me away. The hours, once so leaden, pass with lightning swiftness; there is never any time for depression, or for looking into a desolate and dreaded future; my days are crammed with human interest, exciting as a dime novel. Besides, although I see no evidence that the boys care much for me, I care a great deal for them, and would not willingly leave them.
Geordie brought back with him from our walk yesterday a large bundle of elder-poles. This morning, mumble-peg went out, and pop-guns came in, like a clap of thunder, and I heard that Geordie was selling lengths of elder to the boys for two cents, or a satisfactory equivalent. It was impossible this afternoon to get manure hauled to the new flower-borders,—every time a barrow would get out of sight, the wheeler would sit down on it and go to whittling a pop-gun. After being scolded a third time, Philip complained bitterly to me,
"If you never wanted us to have pop-guns, whyn't you take them poles away from Geordie yesterday? Dad burn my looks, we git all the blame, and he gits all the gain,—he's a making it hand over fist."
"He was the only one who thought of putting the elder to use," I said. "I suppose he has a right to his gains."
Philip sadly admitted the justice of this view. "Dag goneme," he sighed, "I wisht I was a born trader and forelooker like him! Good thing I haint aiming to be no preacher, I'd starve to death the first week. But Geordie he's cut out for it."
"I'm afraid I don't see the connection between trading and preaching," I said.
"Well, preachers can't take no money for preaching—it would be a sin—and they haint got much time for tending craps and such, and less'n they good traders they mighty apt to starve. Geordie he haint never going to run out of wheat-flour, let alone corn meal. Gee! if you could see the things he's got in that locked box of his!"
"What has he?" I asked.
"Oh,Ihaint never seed 'em,—nobody haint; but any minute in the day he can run his hand in and pull out something a boy'll think he's pine-blank bound to have or die!"
When I heard to-night that Keats's tooth-brush, Jason's blue necktie I gave him, Hen's fine-comb and pencil, Iry's "gallusses," and Nucky's only handkerchief, were among the articles traded for pop-gun material, I was moved to wrath with Geordie; but when he displayed to me the small and apparently worthless things he had accepted from other boys,—a torn woolen comforter from Taulbee, Killis's holey mittens, Joab's worn-out yarn socks, and a handful of rusty horse-shoe nails from Hosea, it seemed to me that, on the whole, there had not been such exorbitant exchanges for the joy of a pop-gun, and I softened my reprimand.
Mrs. Salyer rode in to-day to see her boys, a watermelon in one saddle-pocket, a lot of fine pawpaws in the other. Oh the joy of the "two homesicks"! Before leaving, she said that her cousin Emmeline's funeral occasion was set for the fourth Saturday and Sunday in October, and she hoped her boys might be permitted to come home at that time and pay their respects to Emmeline, adding that she would be pleased to have me come with them. In answer to my puzzled inquiries—for I failed to see how Emmeline's death could be so nicely calculated in advance—she explained that funerals are never held in this country at the time of burial, when it is usually impossible to get a preacher, but that they are conducted in deliberate and appropriate style a year or two after the death.
This is to be the little Salyers' first visit home—we think it best they shall not go until then—and never, I suppose, was a funeral-occasion the subject of such desire and rejoicing.
For two weeks we have been reading Hawthorne's Wonder Tales; and this afternoon on our walk the boys, led by Nucky, searched hopefully in caves, coal-banks and rock-dens for gorgons, minotaurs and dragons, finding nothing worse, however, than a few rattlesnakes and copperheads,—a tame substitute and an old story. But the value of drawing their minds to foes in the abstract is already apparent,—they fight less, and traits other than martial are coming to the front. Nucky has been giving his energies to learning, with results that astonish. His teacher says she has never seen such mental alertness. She has already put him up two grades, and says if he keeps on he may go up another this half-term. Iry, too, is proving his right to his title of "pure scholar."
To-night when we began again on the Wonder Book, Nucky said, "I can tell you a story that beats them,—all about a man by the name of Christian, that fit with devils, and come near being et up by a giant ten times as big as him."
There were loud cries of, "Tell it, Trojan!"; and he launched forth into a most graphic version of Pilgrim's Progress, the other boys listening absorbed throughout the evening. When all started off to bed, I called Nucky back. "Where did you learn that story?" I asked him.
"I have knowed it sence allus-ago," he said; "Maw she used to read it to me out of a book with pictures."
It is the first time he has spoken of his mother,—I hear from the other boys that he lost her quite recently.
"Then your mother had learning?" I inquired.
"She never got any inside a school-house," he replied; "but her great-grandpaw he had a sight of learning, and when he was a' old man, too feeble to do anything but set by the fire, he teached her how to read and write and figger, and was so proud of her being a scholar that when he come to die he left her what books he had,—there is several, all yallow and crumbly. One is a Bible; but the one I like is this-here about Christian and the devils. I used to lay and look at it by the hour, and learnt to read a-trying on it."
This is most interesting as being another proof that the early settlers of this country were men of an education impossible to their descendants. It also helps to account for Nucky's remarkable mentality. He grasps a thing almost before it is spoken, has only to read over his lessons once, and remembers the stories I tell and read with surprising minuteness.
I suppose I might have expected some ill effects from the hero-tales. When I went down to inspect the stable-lot this morning, I found three barn cats writhing in their death agonies, and Jason galloping off on a stick-horse, brandishing a shinny-bat. His explanation that he was Bellerophon, the stick Pegasus, and the cats the three heads of the Chimæra failed to mollify me. I gave him his first taste of "the rod," and did not "spar'" it. Evidently the child has a poetic imagination, which must not be permitted to run riot.
The little Salyers, while really fond of one another, have queer ways sometimes of showing it. This afternoon Keats called up wearily from the back yard, where for eight hours he had been carrying water and keeping up fires for the wash-girls, to Hen in the doorway, "What time is it, son?" to receive the affectionate reply, "Time all dogs was dead,—haint you sick?"
To-night, sitting around our lamp, eating peppermint candy, the boys got to talking about their mothers, living or dead,—Keats and Hen of course about Nervesty, Taulbee, Killis and Hosea about their good mothers at home, Geordie and Absalom about theirs who is married again and lives in Virginia, and Philip, Joab, Iry and Jason about theirs who are dead. Nucky alone did not talk,—it seems impossible for him to speak of his mother.
Iry told many little incidents his remarkable memory enables him to recall, though his mother died when he was only three. One is, standing beside her while she fed him beans and sorghum from a spoon; another, having a small paddle and helping her "battle" the clothes as she washed them beside the branch; still another, being left by her in a pen made of rails and a log high up on the mountainside where she was hoeing corn, seeing a beautiful, shining, spotted thing come out on the log to sun itself, and amusing himself poking his finger at the pretty creature to make it lick out its tongue, rattle its tail, and "quile" itself up, till suddenly something fell on the bright head, and his mother, with a terrible scream, threw down her hoe and caught him to her bosom. These and other scraps of recollection the "pure scholar" treasures so tenderly it seems hard indeed that his mother should have taken the "breast-complaint,—some calls it the galloping consumpt'," and died so young, missing his love.
"You know," I said to him, "that being dead isn't really being dead, but just gone out of sight. Your dear mother still lives and loves and watches over you constantly, though you cannot see her."
"I allus heared dead folks was just h'ants, trying to layway and scare folks," said Iry.
"Nothing of the kind," I assured him; "they can never be seen by these eyes of ours, but they are near, quite near us always, to love and protect us, especially mothers their orphan children."
There was a long silence. Then, with a sigh, little Iry exclaimed, slowly, "Dag gone, I wisht somebody'd a-told me that before,—I wouldn't a-been so lonesome!"
Nucky, who had not spoken a word during the conversation, got up and hurried from the room. At bed-time, Hen slipped into my door to report, "I tracked Trojan to the hayloft, and heared him a-laying up there crying fit to kill for his maw."
Poor child,—the still waters run deep!
Nucky asked for extra work during his playtime yesterday in order to make some money, and for three hours spaded flower-beds, receiving a dime in pay, and making a mysterious visit to the village after supper. This morning when I was ready for church, he came into my room with a yard of bright pink ribbon dangling from his hand. This he held out to me, saying,
"You allus go about with them old black strings on, and haint got no pretty fixings like t'other women,—I allow you're too poor to buy 'em. I want you to have something pretty."
For seven years I have not had on a color,—I never supposed I could wear one again. But I slowly unfastened the black ribbon from my collar, and replaced it with the pink. Then I put my arms around Nucky, and kissed him.
"Iwaspoor,—horribly poor, Nucky," I said, "before I got you and the other boys. But I shall never feel poor again, after receiving such a precious gift as this!"
Precious indeed it is, not only as representing untold sacrifice on his part, but as showing that he really cares for me,—he is so reserved and self-contained I did not dream he did.
One thing is certain,—I will try to deserve his sacrifice and love,—to-morrow I will send away not only for bright ribbons, but for cheerful dresses which shall please his eyes and those of the others. No longer shall they see me in garments of heaviness.
This noon, Iry, who since our first talk about swearing, has been trying without much success to stop it—sometimes he bites off the tail of a swear-word, but generally the head and trunk escape him—ran into my room with big eyes. "Geordie and me was a-quarling over a shinny-bat he traded me out of, and I started to say a' awful cuss-word at him, and then I ricollected what you said about my maw a-watching me all the time, and I never said a thing to him but 'Dad burn your ole soul!'"
I congratulated the "pure scholar" on his great victory, and encouraged him to press on.
To-day was Mother's birthday. While I was placing a bowl of asters before her picture over my fireboard, Nucky came in, and I spoke to him about her, telling him how her love and courage had sustained me through deepest sorrow, and how terribly I miss her now. After a while he said, in a low voice, "I miss my maw, too."
"Tell me about her," I said.
Then, little by little, and often with great difficulty, and with long silences, he told me the story of his mother; how devoted she had been to her children, and how eager that they, and especially he, should get learning, teaching him what she could, getting a little district school established on Trigger three years ago, and coming over herself to this school last April to try and get him in here, being nag-flung on her way home, and sustaining injuries which caused her to die a month later when her last baby was born; how on her deathbed she had called her family around her, and given them her love and blessing and advice, asking her husband never to put a "step-maw" over her children, and leaving them all in Blant's charge, confiding to his special care the day-old baby, "your paw being too puny to set up with it of nights," and passing away at last clinging to them and weeping bitter tears that she must leave them. He also told how Blant had accepted his sacred trust; tenderly and tirelessly minding the younger children, cooking and cleaning; when not out tending the crop, clearing new-ground, logging and the like, and how, above all, he has devoted himself to "the babe," patiently walking the floor with it at night, warming its bottle, jolting it on his knee, toasting its little feet before the fire, sleeping with it on his arm, and "making it sugar-teats and soot-tea as good as a woman." This being the same Blant who "never goes out without a gun," and has done such notable slaughter in the hereditary "war" with the Cheevers!
I own to a large curiosity to behold this hero—more than ever since I heard what Nucky told me to-day. I am glad that the visit to Trigger comes the end of this week.
Soon after breakfast on Saturday we set out on our sixteen-mile ride to Trigger Branch, I on Mandy, Nucky walking,—he refused to ride behind, remarking, "I'm allus used to seeing the women ride there." The day was glorious, the way more and more beautiful as we proceeded. We crossed three mountains, stopping on the top of one, where the sunlight sifted down through translucent beech leaves, to eat our lunch, and then "followed" Powderhorn, a large creek, two or three miles, finally turning up Trigger Branch. At its mouth, Nucky pointed out the little log school-house in which he has received his education up to this term, and farther on he showed me various rocks and trees where he has delighted to "layway" and "ambush" infant Cheevers. Trigger Branch is the most picturesque creek I have yet seen; along its sides cliffs and "rock-houses" alternate with rich hollows, small strips of bottom, and steep but flourishing cornfields. All the houses we passed on the lower reaches belonged to Cheevers, sons of Israel, and last of all was Israel's home. Three "sights," or about a half-mile above this, is the disputed boundary-line, which runs down from a mountain spur on the right hand side, and then across a piece of bottom to the branch. The bone of contention is a triangular slice of bottom, with its apex at the foot of the spur, not an acre in extent, all told. As Nucky pointed it out to me, I looked with mingled curiosity and horror. The fence of course now stands on the ancient line claimed by the Marrses, where it has stood for nearly a century and a quarter.
"It is impossible to believe that more than a dozen lives have been sacrificed for this little piece of land," I said to Nucky, "why, I doubt if you could raise forty bushels of corn a year on it."
His face flushed. "It haint the money's worth," he said, proudly; "we don't care nothing about that. But it was granted to my great-great-great-grandpaw for fighting the British, and me'n' Blant would ruther die than part with a' inch of it."
He pointed to a thick, dark clump of hemlock near the foot of the spur, on the Marrs land. "That's where I keep lookout of moonlight nights when war is on," he said.