WYNADOTTÉ (Unabridged). Джеймс Фенимор Купер
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was rich, in a small way; in other words, he possessed a few thousand pounds besides his land, and had yet to receive the price of his commission. A portion of these means were employed judiciously to advance his establishment; and, satisfied that there would be no scarcity of fodder for the ensuing winter, a man had been sent into the settlements for another yoke of cattle, and a couple of cows. Farming utensils were manufactured on the spot, and sleds began to take the place of carts; the latter exceeding the skill of any of the workmen present.
October offered its products as a reward for all this toil. The yield was enormous, and of excellent quality. Of Indian corn, the captain gathered several hundred bushels, besides stacks of stalks and tops. His turnips, too, were superabundant in quantity, and of a delicacy and flavour entirely unknown to the precincts of old lands. The potatoes had not done so well; to own the truth, they were a little watery, though there were enough of them to winter every hoof he had, of themselves. Then the peas and garden truck were both good and plenty; and a few pigs having been procured, there was the certainty of enjoying a plenty of that important article, pork, during the coming winter.
Late in the autumn, the captain rejoined his family in Albany, quitting the field for winter quarters. He left sergeant Joyce, in garrison, supported by Nick, a miller, the mason, carpenter, and three of the axe-men. Their duty was to prepare materials for the approaching season, to take care of the stock, to put in winter crops, to make a few bridges, clear out a road or two, haul wood to keep themselves from freezing, to build a log barn and some sheds, and otherwise to advance the interests of the settlement. They were also to commence a house for the patentee.
As his children were at school, captain Willoughby determined not to take his family immediately to the Hutted Knoll, as the place soon came to be called, from the circumstance of the original bivouack. This name was conferred by sergeant Joyce, who had a taste in that way, and as it got to be confirmed by the condescension of the proprietor and his family, we have chosen it to designate our present labours. From time to time, a messenger arrived with news from the place; and twice, in the course of the winter, the same individual went back with supplies, and encouraging messages to the different persons left in the clearing. As spring approached, however, the captain began to make his preparations for the coming campaign, in which he was to be accompanied by his wife; Mrs. Willoughby, a mild, affectionate, true-hearted New York woman, having decided not to let her husband pass another summer in that solitude without feeling the cheering influence of her presence.
In March, before the snow began to melt, several sleigh-loads of different necessaries were sent up the valley of the Mohawk, to a point opposite the head of the Otsego, where a thriving village called Fortplain now stands. Thence men were employed in transporting the articles, partly by means of “jumpers” improvised for the occasion, and partly on pack-horses, to the lake, which was found this time, instead of its neighbour the Canaderaiga. This necessary and laborious service occupied six weeks, the captain having been up as far as the lake once himself; returning to Albany, however, ere the snow was gone.
Chapter II
All things are new—the buds, the leaves,
That gild the elm-tree’s nodding crest,
And even the nest beneath the eaves—
There are no birds in last year’s nest.
—Longfellow
“I have good news for you, Wilhelmina,” cried the captain, coming into the parlour where his wife used to sit and knit or sew quite half the day, and speaking with a bright face, and in a cheerful voice—“Here is a letter from my excellent old colonel; and Bob’s affair is all settled and agreed on. He is to leave school next week, and to put on His Majesty’s livery the week after.”
Mrs. Willoughby smiled, and yet two or three tears followed each other down her cheeks, even while she smiled. The first was produced by pleasure at hearing that her son had got an ensigncy in the 60th, or Royal Americans; and the last was a tribute paid to nature; a mother’s fears at consigning an only boy to the profession of arms.
“I am rejoiced, Willoughby,” she said, “because you rejoice, and I know that Robert will be delighted at possessing the king’s commission; but, he is very young to be sent into the dangers of battle and the camp!”
“I was younger, when I actually went into battle, for then it was war; now, we have a peace that promises to be endless, and Bob will have abundance of time to cultivate a beard before he smells gunpowder. As for myself”—he added in a half-regretful manner, for old habits and opinions would occasionally cross his mind—“as for myself, the cultivation of turnips must be my future occupation. Well, the bit of parchment is sold, Bob has got his in its place, while the difference in price is in my pocket, and no more need be said—and here come our dear girls, Wilhelmina, to prevent any regrets. The father of two such daughters ought, at least, to be happy.”
At this instant, Beulah and Maud Willoughby, (for so the adopted child was called as well as the real), entered the room, having taken the lodgings of their parents, in a morning walk, on which they were regularly sent by the mistress of the boarding-school, in which they were receiving what was then thought to be a first-rate American female education. And much reason had their fond parents to be proud of them! Beulah, the eldest, was just eleven, while her sister was eighteen months younger. The first had a staid, and yet a cheerful look; but her cheeks were blooming, her eyes bright, and her smile sweet. Maud, the adopted one, however, had already the sunny countenance of an angel, with quite as much of the appearance of health as her sister; her face had more finesse, her looks more intelligence, her playfulness more feeling, her smile more tenderness, at times; at others, more meaning. It is scarcely necessary to say that both had that delicacy of outline which seems almost inseparable from the female form in this country. What was, perhaps, more usual in that day among persons of their class than it is in our own, each spoke her own language with an even graceful utterance, and a faultless accuracy of pronunciation, equally removed from effort and provincialisms. As the Dutch was in very common use then, at Albany, and most females of Dutch origin had a slight touch of their mother tongue in their enunciation of English, this purity of dialect in the two girls was to be ascribed to the fact that their father was an Englishman by birth; their mother an American of purely English origin, though named after a Dutch god-mother; and the head of the school in which they had now been three years, was a native of London, and a lady by habits and education.
“Now, Maud,” cried the captain, after he had kissed the forehead, eyes and cheeks of his smiling little favourite—“Now, Maud, I will set you to guess what good news I have for you and Beulah.”
“You and mother don’t mean to go to that bad Beave Manor this summer, as some call the ugly pond?” answered the child, quick as lightning.
“That is kind of you, my darling; more kind than prudent; but you are not right.”
“Try Beulah, now,” interrupted the mother, who, while she too doted on her youngest child, had an increasing respect for the greater solidity and better judgment of her sister: “let us hear Beulah’s guess.”
“It is something about my brother, I know by mother’s eyes,” answered the eldest girl, looking inquiringly into Mrs. Willoughby’s face.
“Oh! yes,” cried Maud, beginning to jump about the room, until she ended her saltations in her father’s arms—“Bob has got his commission!—I know it all well enough, now—I would not thank you to tell me—I know it all now—dear Bob, how he will laugh! and how happy I am!”
“Is it so, mother?” asked Beulah, anxiously, and without even a smile.
“Maud is right; Bob is an ensign—or, will be one, in a day or two. You do not seem pleased, my child?”
“I wish Robert were not a soldier, mother. Now he will be always away, and we shall never see him; then he may be obliged to fight, and