Title: The Kentuckian in New-York, Volume I (of 2) - or, The Adventures of Three Southerns
Author: Caruthers, William Alexander
Language: English
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THE KENTUCKIAN IN NEW-YORK.

Or, The Adventures of Three Southerns.

BY A VIRGINIAN.


"Perhaps it may turn out a sang,
Perhaps turn out a sermon."--_Burns._


In Two Volumes.

VOL. I.



New-York:
Published by Harper & Brothers,
No. 82 Cliff-Street.
1834.

Entered, according to Act of Congress, in the year 1834,
By Harper & Brothers,
In the Clerk's Office of the Southern District of New-York.

       *       *       *       *       *

NEARLY READY.


     HELEN. A new Tale. By MARIA EDGEWORTH--forming the _tenth_ volume
     of Harper's Uniform Edition of her Works. Containing two
     beautiful Engravings on steel.

     TALES AND SKETCHES,--such as they are. By W. L. STONE, Esq. In 2
     vols. 12mo.

     THE FROLICS OF PUCK. In 2 vols. 12mo.

     THE KENTUCKIAN IN NEW-YORK. By A VIRGINIAN. In 2 vols. 12mo.

     GUY RIVERS. A Novel. By the Author of "Martin Faber." In 2 vols.
     12mo.

     MRS. SHERWOOD'S WORKS. Uniform Edition. With Engravings on steel.
     12mo.

     PAULDING'S WORKS. Uniform Edition. Revised and corrected by the
     Author. 12mo.

       *       *       *       *       *


THE

KENTUCKIAN IN NEW-YORK.



CHAPTER I.


Towards the latter part of the summer of 18--, on one of those cool,
delightful, and invigorating mornings which are frequent in the southern
regions of the United States, there issued from the principal hotel on
the valley-side of Harper's Ferry two travellers, attended by a
venerable and stately southern slave. The experienced eye of the old
ferryman, as he stood in his flat-bottomed boat awaiting the arrival of
this party, discovered at once that our travellers were from the far
South.

The first of these, Victor Chevillere, entered the "flat," leading by
the bridle a mettlesome southern horse; when he had stationed this fine
animal to his satisfaction, he stood directly fronting the prescriptive
Charon of the region. This young gentleman, who appeared to be the
principal character of the party just entering the boat, was handsomely
formed, moderately tall, and fashionably dressed. His face was bold,
dignified, and resolute, and not remarkable for any very peculiar
fashion of the hair or beard which shaded it. He appeared to be about
twenty-three years of age, and though so young, much and early
experience of the world had already o'ershadowed his face with a
becoming serenity, if not sadness. Not that silly, affected melancholy,
however, which is so often worn in these days by young and romantic idle
gentlemen, to catch the errant sympathies of some untravelled country
beauty.

The next personage of the party (who likewise entered the boat leading a
fine southern animal), was a fashionable young gentleman, about the
middle size; his face was pale and wan, as if he had but just recovered
from an attack of illness. Nevertheless there was a brilliant fire in
his eye, and a lurking, but too evident, disposition to fun and humour,
which illness had not been entirely able to subdue. Augustus Lamar, for
such was his name, was the confidential and long-tried friend of the
first-named gentleman: their mutual regard had existed undiminished from
the time of their early school days in South Carolina, through their
whole college career in Virginia up to the moment of which we speak.

The third and more humble personage of the party bore the time-honoured
appellation of Cato. He was a tall old negro, with a face so black as to
form a perfect contrast to his white hair and brilliant teeth. He was
well dressed and cleanly in his person, and rather solemn and pompous
in his manners. Cato had served the father of his present highly
honoured young master, and was deeply imbued with that strong feudal
attachment to the family, which is a distinguishing characteristic of
the southern negroes who serve immediately near the persons of the great
landholders.

Our travellers were now smoothly gliding over that most magnificent
"meeting of the waters" of the Shenandoah and Potomack, which is usually
known by the unpretending name of "Harper's Ferry." It was early
morning; the moon was still visible above the horizon, and the sun had
not yet risen above those stupendous fragments whose chaotic and
irregular position gives token of the violence with which the mass of
waters rent for themselves a passage through the mountains, when rushing
on to meet that other congregation of rivers, with whose waters they
unite to form the Bay of the Chesapeake. The black bituminous smoke from
the hundred smithies of the United States' armory, had just begun to
rise above the towering crags that seemed, at this early period, to
battle with the vapours which are here sent up in thick volumes from the
contest of rocks and rivers beneath.

Old Cato had by this time assumed his post at the heads of the three
horses, while our southerns stood with folded arms, each impressed with
the scene according to his individual impulses. As they approached
nearer to the northern shore, Chevillere, addressing Lamar, observed:
"An unhappy young lady she must be who arrived at our hotel last
evening. I could hear her weeping bitterly as she paced the floor, until
a late hour of the night, when finally she seemed to throw herself upon
the bed, and fall asleep from mere exhaustion;" and then, turning to the
weather-beaten steersman, continued: "I suppose we are the first
passengers in the 'flat' this morning?"

"No, sir, you are not; a carriage from the same tavern went over half an
hour ago. There was an old gray-headed man, and two young women in it,
besides the driver, and the driver told me that they were all the way
from York State,--the mail stage, too, went over."

"The same party," said Chevillere, abstractedly; "Did you learn where
they were to breakfast, boatman?"

"About ten miles from this, I think I heard say."

They were soon landed and mounted, and cantering away through the fog
and vapours of the early morning. Nor were they long in overtaking a
handsome travelling-carriage, which was moving at a brisk rate, in
accordance with the exertions of two fine, evidently northern, horses.
The carriage contained an elderly, grave, formal, and magisterial
gentleman; his locks quite gray, and hanging loose upon the collar of
his coat; his countenance harsh, austere, and forbidding in the extreme.
By his side sat a youthful lady, so enveloped in a large black mantle,
and travelling hat and veil, that but little of her form or features
could be seen, except a pair of brilliant blue eyes.

It is not to be denied, that these sudden apparitions of young and
beautiful females, almost completely shrouded in mantles, drapery, or
veils, are the very circumstances fully to arouse the slumbering
energies of a lately emancipated college Quixotte. A lovely pair of
eyes, brimful of tears,--a "Cinderella" foot and ankle,--a white and
beautifully turned hand and tapered fingers, with perhaps a mourning
ring or two,--or a bonnet suddenly blown off, so as to dishevel a
magnificent head of hair, its pretty mistress meanwhile all confusion,
and her snowy neck and temples suffused with blushes,--these are the
little incidents on which the real romances of human life are founded.
How many persons can look back to such a commencement of their youthful
loves! nay, perhaps, refer to it all the little enjoyment with which
they have been blessed through life! We venture to say, that those who
were so unfortunate as never to bring their first youthful romance to a
fortunate denouement, can likewise look back upon such occurrences with
many pleasing emotions. A bachelor or a widower, indeed, may not always
recur with pleasure to these first passages in the book of life,--but
the feelings even of these are not altogether of the melancholy kind.
The fairy queens of their spring-tide will sometimes arise in the
present tense, until they almost imagine themselves in the possession
again of youth and all its raptures,--its brilliant dreams, airy
castles, "hair-breadth 'scapes," and miraculous deliverances,--cruel
fathers, and perverse guardians, and stolen interviews, and lovers' vows
and tokens,--winding up finally with a runaway match--all of the
imagination.

After the equipage before alluded to had been for some time left behind,
our travellers began to descry, at the distance of several miles, the
long white portico of the country inn at which they proposed to
breakfast. The United States mail-coach for Baltimore was standing at
the door, evidently waiting till the passengers should have performed
the same needful operation. Servants were running hither and thither,
some to the roost, others to the stable, as if a large number of the
most distinguished dignitaries of the land had just arrived.

But, behold, when our travellers drew up, they found that all this stir
among the servants of the inn was called into being by the real or
affected wants of a number of very young gentlemen. We say affected,
because we are sorry to acknowledge that it is not uncommon to see very
young and inexperienced gentlemen, on such occasions, assume airs and
graces which are merely put on as a travelling dress, and which would be
thrown aside at the first appearance of an old acquaintance. At such
times it is by no means rare to see all the servants of the inn,
together with the host and hostess, entirely engrossed by one of these
overgrown boys or ill-bred men, while their elders and superiors are
compelled either to want or wait upon themselves. At the time we notice,
some young bloods of the cities were exercising themselves in their new
suit of stage-coach manners.

"Here waiter! waiter!" with an affectedly delicate and foreign voice,
cried one of these youths, enveloped in a brown "Petersham box" coat,
and with his hands stuck into his pockets over his hips. Under the arm
of this person was a black riding-switch, with a golden head, and a
small chain of the same precious metal, fastened about six inches
therefrom, after the fashion of some old rapier guards. He wore a
rakish-looking fur cap, round and tight on the top of his head as a
bladder of snuff; this was cocked on one side after a most piratical
fashion, so as to show off, in the best possible manner, a great
profusion of coarse, shining black hair, which was evidently indebted to
art rather than nature for the curls that frizzled out over his ears,
while the back part of his head was left as bare and defenceless as if
he had already been under the hands of a deputy turnkey. He practised
what may be called American puppyism, as technically distinguished from
the London species of the same genus. "Here waiter! waiter!" said he,
"bring me a gin sling,--and half-a-dozen Bagdad segars,--and a lighted
taper,--and a fresh egg,--and a bowl of water, and a clean towel,--and
polish my boots,--and dust my coat,--and then send me the barber, do you
hear?"

"O, sir! we has no barber, nor Bagdab segars neither; but we has plenty
of the real Baltimores,--real good ones, too,--as I knows very well, for
I smokes the old sodgers what the gentlemen throws on the bar-room
floor."

"It is one of the most amusing scenes imaginable," said Victor
Chevillere to Augustus Lamar, as they sat witnessing this scene, "when
the waiter and the master pro tempore are both fools. The fawning,
bowing, cringing waiter, with his big lips upon the _qui vive_, his head
and shoulders constantly in motion, and rubbing his hands one over the
other after the most approved fashion of the men of business. In such a
case as that which we have just witnessed, where puppyism comes in
contact with the kindred monkey-tricks of the waiter, I can enjoy it.
But when it happens, as I have more than once seen, that the waiter is a
manly, sensible, and dignified old negro of the loftier sort, such as
old Cato,--then you can soon detect the curl of contempt upon his
lip,--and he is not long thereafter in selecting the real gentlemen of
the party,--always choosing to wait most upon those who least demand
it."

"I would bet my horse Talleyrand against an old field scrub, that that
fellow is a Yankee," answered Lamar.

"He may be a Yankee," continued Victor Chevillere, "but you have
travelled too much and reflected too long upon the nature of man, to
ascribe every thing disgusting to a Yankee origin. For my part, I make
the character of every man I meet in some measure my study during my
travels, and as we have agreed to exchange opinions upon men and things,
I will tell you freely what I think of that fellow who has just
retreated from our laughter. I have found it not at all uncommon, to see
the most undisguised hatred arise between two such persons as he of the
stage-coach,--the one from the north, and the other from the
south,--when in truth, the actuating impulse was precisely the same in
both, but had taken a different direction, and was differently developed
by different exciting causes.

"The puppyism of Charleston and that of Boston are only different shades
of the same character, yet these kindred spirits can in nowise tolerate
each other. As is universally the case, those are most intolerant to
others who have most need of forgiveness themselves. The mutual jealousy
of the north and south is a decided evidence of littleness in both
regions, and ample cause for shame to the educated gentlemen of all
parties of this happy country. If pecuniary interest had not been mixed
up with this provincial rivalry, the feeling could easily have been so
held up to the broad light of intelligence, as to be a fertile source of
amusement, and furnish many a subject for comedy and farce in
after-times."

This specimen was by no means the only one among the arrivals by the
stage-coach. Every waiter in the house was pressed into the service of
these coxcombs,--some smoked,--some swaggered through the private
rooms,--others adjusted their frizzled locks at the mirrors with brushes
carried for the purpose,--and all together created a vast commotion in
the quiet country inn.

As our two young southerns sat in the long piazza, eying these
stage-coach travellers and waiting for breakfast, the same equipage
which they had passed on the road, and containing our northern party,
drew up to the door.

Not many minutes had elapsed before a black servant stood in the entry
between the double suite of apartments, and briskly swung a small bell
to and fro, which seemed to announce breakfast, from the precipitate
haste with which the gentlemen of the stage-coach found their way into
the long breakfasting-hall of the establishment. Our southerns followed
their example, but more quietly, and by the invitation of the host. At
the upper end of the table stood the hostess, who, like most of her kind
in America, was the wife of a wealthy landholder and farmer, as well as
tavern-keeper. She was a genteel and modest-looking woman, and did the
honours of the table like a lady at her own hospitable board, and among
selected guests. It is owing to a mistake in the character of the host
and hostess, that so many foreigners give and take offence at these
establishments. They often contumaciously demand as a right, what would
have been offered to them in all courtesy after the established usages
of the country.

On the right of the hostess sat the youthful lady who had spent such an
unhappy night at the ferry,--in the hearing of Victor Chevillere,--and
whom they had passed on the road. She was still so enveloped in her
travelling dress and veil as to be but partially seen. On the same side,
unfortunately, as he no doubt thought, sat Chevillere with Lamar. The
grave-looking old gentleman, the companion of the youthful lady
mentioned, sat immediately opposite to her. The gentlemen of extreme ton
(as they wished to be thought), were ranged along the table, already
mangling the dishes, cracking and replacing the eggs, and apparently
much dissatisfied with the number of seconds they had remained in heated
water. Nor were they long in striking up a conversation, as loud and
full of slang as their previous displays had been. During this unseemly
and boisterous conduct, some more tender chord seemed to be touched
within the bosom of the lovely young female, than would have been
supposed from the character of the assailants. Victor Chevillere turned
his head in that direction, and saw that her face had become more deadly
pale; at the same moment he heard her say, in an under-tone, to the old
gentleman her companion, "My dear sir, assist me from this room,--my
head grows dizzy, and I feel a deathlike sickness."

Chevillere was upon his feet in an instant, and assisted the lady to
rise; by this time, the old gentleman having taken her other arm, they
carried rather than led her into one of the adjoining apartments,
where, after depositing their beautiful burden upon a sofa, Chevillere
left her to the care of the hostess, who had followed, and returned to
the breakfast-table.

Let us describe a country breakfast for the uninitiated. At the head of
the table was a large salver, or japanned waiter, upon which was spread
out various utensils of China-ware,--the only articles of plate being a
sugar-dish and cream-pot. On the right of this salver stood a coffee and
tea-urn, of some composition metal, resembling silver in appearance. At
the other end of the table, under the skilful hands of the host, was a
large steak, cut and sawed entirely through the sirloin of the beef.
Half-way up the table, on either side, were dishes of broiled game, the
intermediate spaces being filled up with various kinds of hot bread,
biscuit and pancakes (as they are called in some parts of the north).
This custom of eating hot bread at the morning and evening meal, is
almost universal at the south. Immediately in the centre stood a pyramid
of fresh-churned butter, with a silver butter-knife sticking into the
various ornaments of vine-leaves and grapes with which it was stamped.

To this fare Chevillere found his friend Lamar doing the most ample
justice, nor was his own keen appetite entirely destroyed by the
temporary indisposition of the lady who had so much excited his
curiosity and his sympathy. He could have congratulated himself on the
little occurrence which had given him some claims to a farther
acquaintance, and doubtless could have indulged in delightful reveries
as to the fair and youthful stranger,--had not all his gay dreams been
put to flight by the boisterous laughter and meager attempts at wit of
the other travellers. As he returned towards the table, the one whom we
have more particularly described elevated a glass, with a golden handle,
to his large, full, and impudent eye. Chevillere returned the gaze until
his look almost amounted to a deliberate stare. The "bloods" looked
fierce, and exchanged pugnacious looks, but all chance of a collision
was prevented by the return of the hostess. Notwithstanding the
disagreeable qualities of most of the guests at the table, Chevillere
found time to turn the little incident of the sudden indisposition and
its probable cause several times in his own mind; and, as may be well
imagined, his mental soliloquy resulted in no injurious imputation upon
the youthful lady,--there was evidently no trait of affectation.

At length the meal was brought to a close,--not however, before the
driver of the mail-coach had wound sundry impatient blasts upon his
bugle,--general joy seemed to pervade every remaining countenance after
the departure of the coxcombs. Both the northern and southern
travellers, who were journeying northward, and who had breakfasted at
the inn, were soon likewise plodding along at the usual rate of weary
travellers by a private conveyance.



CHAPTER II.


The misery of the young and the beautiful is at all times infectious.
Few young persons can withhold sympathy in such a case,--especially if
the person thus afflicted be unmarried--of the other sex--and near one's
own age.

Victor Chevillere could not expel from his imagination the image of the
fair stranger. Again and again did he essay to join Lamar in his light
and sprightly conversation, as they, on the day after the one recorded
in the last chapter, pursued their journey along the noble turnpike
between Fredericktown and Baltimore. The same profound revery would
steal upon him, and abide until broken by the merry peals of Lamar's
peculiarly loud and joyous laughter, at the new mood which seemed to
have visited the former. When a young person first begins to experience
these abstracted moods, there is nothing, perhaps, that sounds more
harsh and startling to his senses, than the mirthful voice of his best
friend. He looks up as one would naturally look at any unseemly or
boisterous conduct at a funeral. He seems to gaze and wonder, for the
first time, that all things and all men are jogging on at their usual
gait. Thus were things moving upon the Fredericktown turnpike: Lamar
riding forty or fifty paces in front, singing away the blue devils;
Chevillere in the centre, moody and silent; and old Cato, stately as a
statue on horseback, bringing up the rear.

From hearing sundry merry peals of laughter from Lamar's quarter,
Chevillere was induced at length to forego his own society for a moment,
to see what new subject his Quixotic friend had found for such unusual
merriment; and a subject he had indeed found in the shape of a tall
Kentuckian. The name of the stranger, it seems, was Montgomery Damon. He
was six feet high, with broad shoulders, full, projecting chest, light
hair and complexion, and a countenance that was upon the first blush an
index to a mind full of quaint, rude, and wild humour. His dress was any
thing but fashionable; he wore a large, two-story hat, with a bandana
handkerchief hanging out in front, partly over his forehead, as if to
protect it from the great weight of his castor. His coat and pantaloons
were of home-made cotton and woollen jeans, and he carried in his hand a
warlike riding-whip, loaded with lead, and mounted with silver, with
which, now and then, he gave emphasis to his words, by an unexpected and
sonorous crack.

Our Kentuckian was no quiet man; but, like most of his race, bold,
talkative, and exceedingly democratic in all his notions; feeling as
much pride in his occupation of drover, as if he had been a senator in
Congress from his own "Kentuck," as he emphatically called it. He was a
politician, too, inasmuch as he despised _tories_, as he called the
federalists, approved of the late war, and had a most venomous hatred
against Indians, of whatever tribe or nation. We shall break into their
dialogue at the point at which Victor became a listener.

"How did it happen," said Lamar, "that you did not join the army either
of the north or south, when your heart seems to have been so entirely
with them?"

"O! as to _jine_en the army to the north," said Damon, "I was afraid the
blasted tories would sell me to the British, me and my messmates, like
old Hull, the infernal old traitor, sold his men for so much a head,
_jist_ as I sell my hogs. As to t'other business, down yonder, under Old
Hickory, I reckon I _did_ take a hand or so aginst the bloody Injins."

"You prefer a fight with Indians, then, to one with white men."

"To be sure I do; I think no more of taking my jack-knife, and
unbuttonin the collar of a Creek Injin, than I would of takin the jacket
off a good fat bell-wether, or mout-be a yerlin calf. Old Hickory's the
boy to _sculp_ the bloody creters; he's the boy to walk into their
bread-baskets; and Dick Johnston ain't far behind him, I can tell you,
stranger; he's the chap what plumped a bullet right into old Tecumseh's
bagpipes. Let him alone for stoppin their war-whoops."

"You were a rifleman, I suppose," said Lamar.

"Right agin, stranger. Give me a rifle for ever; they never spiles meat,
though, as one may say, Injin's meat ain't as good as blue-lick buck's;
but for all that, it's a pity to make bunglin work of a neat job;
besides, your smooth bores waste a deal of powder and lead upon the
outlandish creters."

"Were you ever wounded?" asked Lamar.

"Yes! don't you see this here hare-lip to my right eye? Well! that was
jist the corner of an Injin's hatchet. Bob Wiley jist knocked up his arm
in time to save me for another whet at the varmints; if so mout be that
we ever has another brush with 'em, and Bob goes out agin, maybe I may
do him a good turn yet; he's what I call a tear down sneezer (crack went
the whip). He's got no more fear among the Injins than a wild cat in a
weasel's nest; O! it would have done your heart good to see him jist lie
down behind an old log, and watch for one of the varmint's heads bobbin
up and down like a muskovy drake in a barn yard, and as sure as you saw
the fire at the muzzle of his gun, so sure he knocked the creter's hind
sights out. You see he always took 'em on the bob, jist as you would
shoot a divin bird, and that's what I always called taking the bread out
of the creter's mouth, for he was watchin for the same chance."

"Did you scalp the slain?" said Lamar.

"No!" replied Damon, "we had plenty of friendly Injins to do that, and
it used to make me laugh to see the yallow raskals sculpin their kin;
that's what I call dog eat dog."

"Do you think an Indian has a soul?" said Lamar.

"Ha! ha! ha!" roared the Kentuckian, giving a crack of unusual emphasis,
"that's what I call a stumper; but as you're no missionary, I 'spose
I'll tell you. I knows some dumb brutes--here's this Pete Ironsides that
I'm ridin on, has more of a Christian soul in him than any leather-skin
between Missouri and Red River. Why! stranger! what's an Injin good for,
more nor a wild cat? You can't tame ne'er a one of 'em."

"But those missionaries you spoke of, don't you think they will
civilize, if not Christianize them?"

"Ha! ha! ha!" shouted Damon, with another loud crack, and rolling a huge
quid of tobacco to the opposite side of his mouth, "they might as well
mount the trees and preach to the 'coons and tree-frogs; one of your
real psalm-singers mout tree a coon at it, but hang me if he can ever
put the pluck of a white man under a yellow jacket. Catch a weasel
asleep or a fox at a foot race. I rather suspicion, stranger, that I've
seen more Injins than your missionaries, and I'll tell you the way to
tame 'em;--slit their windpipes and hamstring 'em."

"Perhaps you are an enemy to religion, or prejudiced against the
missionaries?"

"No! no! stranger, no! I likes religion well enough of a Sunday; but
hang me if I should not die of laughin to see 'em layin it down to the
redskins. I'd as soon think of going into my horse stable and preachin
to the dumb brutes. Old Pete here knows more now than many an Injin, and
he's got more soul than some Yankees that mout be named; but come,
stranger, here's a public house, let's go in and cut the phlegm."

"Agreed," said Lamar, "but it must be at my expense."

"Well," said Damon, "we'll not quarrel about that;" and turning to
Victor, "Stranger, won't you join us in a glass of tight?"

"No! I thank you," said Chevillere, "but I will look on while you and my
friend drink to the better acquaintance of us all."

After the parties had refreshed themselves and their horses, and
remounted, the conversation was resumed. "Well now," said the
Kentuckian, addressing Victor, "I wish I may be contwisted if you ain't
one of the queerest men, to come from the Carolinas, I have clapped eyes
on this many a day. You don't chaw tobacco, and you don't drink nothin;
smash my apple-cart if I can see into it."

"I am one of those that don't believe in the happy effects of either
brandy or tobacco," replied Chevillere.

"Then you are off the trail for once in your life, stranger, for I take
tobacco to be one of God's mercies to the poor. Whether it came by a
rigular dispensation of providence (as our parson used to say), or in a
natural way, I can't tell; but hang me, if when I gets a quid of the
real Kentuck twist or Maryland kite-foot into my mouth, if I ain't as
proud a man as the grand Turk himself. It drives away the solemncholies,
and makes a fellow feel so good-natured, and so comfortable; it turns
the shillings in his pocket into dollars, and his wrath into fun and
deviltry. Let them talk about tobacco as they choose among the fine
gals, and at their theatres, and balls, and cotillions, and all them
sort of things; but let one of 'em git twenty miles deep into a Kentuck
forest, and then see if a chew of the stuff ain't good for company and
comfort."

"But you did not tell me," resumed Lamar, "whether you had ever shot at
a white man?"

"No! no! I never did; and I don't know that I ever will. I think I
should feel a leetle particlar, at standin up and shooting at a real
Christian man, with flesh and blood like you and me. You see, when we
boys of the long guns shoot, we don't turn our heads away and pull
trigger in a world of smoke, so that nobody can tell where the lead
goes; we look right into the white of a fellow's eye, and can most
always tell which side of his nose the ball went, and you see that would
be but a slayin and skinnen business among white people; but as to
shootin and sculpin Injins, that's a thing there is no bones made about,
because out on the frontiers at the west, if a man should stand addlin
his brains about the right and the wrong of the thing, the red devils
would just knock them out to settle the matter, and sculp him for his
pains into the bargain. Shooting real Christian men's quite another
thing. It's what I ha'nt tried yet; but when we Kentuck boys gits at it,
it won't all end like a log-rollin, with one or two broken shins and a
black eye. But I'm told the Yankees always sings a psalm before they go
to battle. Now, according to my notion, a chap would make a blue fist of
takin a dead aim through double sights, with the butt end of a psalm in
his guzzle."

"Some person must have told you that as a joke," said Lamar.

"No, no, I believe it, because we had just such a fellow once in our
neighbourhood--a Yankee schoolmaster--and we took him out a deer-driving
two or three times, and he was always singing a psalm at his stand. He
spoilt the fun, confound him! Hang me if I didn't always think the
fellow was afraid to stand in the woods by himself without it. I went to
his singin school of Saturday nights, too; but I never had a turn that
way. All the master could do, he could'nt keep me on the trail,--I was
for ever slipping into Yankee Doodle; you see, every once in a while,
the tune would take a quick turn, like one I knowed afore, so I used to
blaze away at it with the best of 'em, but the same old Yankee Doodle
always turned up at the end. But the worst of it was, the infernal
Yankee spoiled all the music I ever had in me; when I come out of the
school, I thought the gals at home would have killed themselves laughin'
at me. They said I ground up Yankee Doodle and Old Hundred together,
all in a hodge-podge, so I never sings to no one now but the dumb brutes
in the stable, when they gits melancholy of a rainy day. Old Pete here
raises his ears, and begins to snort the minute I raises a tune."

"Your singing-master was, like his scholar, an original."

"An original! When he come to them parts, he drove what we call a Yankee
cart, half wagon and half carriage, full of all sorts of odds and ends;
when he had sold them out, he sold his horse and cart too, and then
turned in to keepin a little old-field school; and over and above this,
he opened a Saturday night singin-school,--and I reckon we had rare
times with the gals there. At last, when the feller had got considerable
ahead, the word came out that he was studyin to be a doctor; and sure
enough, in a few months, he sold out the school for so much a head, just
like we sell our hogs; then off the Yankee starts to git made a doctor
of; and hang me if ever I could see into that business. How they can
turn a pedlar into a doctor in four months, is a leetle jist over my
head. It's true enough they works a mighty change in the chaps in that
time. Our Yankee went off, as well-behaved and as down-faced a chap as
you would wish to see in a hundred, and wore home-made clothes like
mine; but when he had staid his four months out, and 'most everybody had
forgot him, one day as I was leanen up against one of the poplar trees
in the little town, I saw a sign goin up on the side of a house, with
DOCTOR GUN in large letters. I'll take my Bible oath, when I saw the
thing, I thought I should have broke a blood-vessel. Howsomever, I
strained 'em down, till an old woman would have sworn I had the
high-strikes, with a knot o' wind in my guzzle. But I quieted the devil
in me, and then I slipped slyly over the street, behind where the doctor
was standing with his new suit of black; one hand stuck in his side, and
the other holding an ivory-headed stick up to his mouth in the most
knowing fashion, I tell you. I stole up behind him, and bawled out in
his ear, as loud as I could yell, '_faw--sol--law--me_.' Oh! my
grandmother! what a smashin rage he flew into; he shook his cane--he
walked backwards and forwards--and didn't he make the tobacco juice fly?
I rather reckon, if I hadn't had so many inches, he'd have been into my
meat; but the fun of it all was, the feller had foreswore his mother
tongue; dash me if he could talk a word of common lingo, much less sing
psalms and hymns by note; he rattled off words as long as my arm, and as
fast as a windmill. Some of the old knowing ones says they've got some
kind of a mill, like these little hand-organs, and that chops it out to
the chaps eny night and morning, pretty much as I chop straw to my
horses; but I'm going in to see that doctor-factory, when I git to
Philadelphia, if they don't charge a feller more nor half a dollar a
head."

"I hope we shall travel together to Philadelphia," said Lamar; "and if
so, I will introduce you into the establishment, free of expense."

"Thank you, sir, thank you," said the Kentuckian; "but I'm rather
inclined to think that we will hardly meet again after to-day; 'cause,
you see, I'm 'bliged to do a might of business in Baltimore afore I can
go on. After that, then I can go on as I please; as I'm only goin to see
the world abit, afore I settle down for life."

"But," said Lamar, "if you will call at Barnum's, and leave word what
day you will set out, I will see that we travel together, for I will
suit my time to yours; and I would advise you to send your horse a short
distance into the country, both for the sake of convenience and
economy."

"What! part with old Pete here! Bless my soul, stranger! he would go
into a gallopin consumption! or die of the solemncholies, if a rainy
spell should come on, and he and I couldn't have a dish of chat
together; and then I shouldn't know no more what to do in one of your
coaches nor a cow with a side-pocket."

"My word for it," replied Victor, "you would soon enjoy yourself inside
of a stage-coach. Come, let us make a bargain. I will engage to have
your horse well taken care of in the country, and provide him with a
groom that will soon learn his ways, and be able to cheer him up when he
gets low-spirited."

"Yes, do!" said Lamar, jocosely; "we are anxious to have your company
during our visit to the cities. We are from Carolina, and you are from
Kentuck; and after you get through with your business, we shall all be
on the same errand--pleasure and improvement."

"And a wild-goose chase it's like to be, I'm afraid; especially if I'm
to be of your mess. But suppose you should meet with some fine lady
acquaintances, what, in the name of old Sam, would you do with me? I
should be like a fifth wheel to a wagon."

"Were you never in the company of fine ladies?" asked Chevillere.

"Yes! and flummuck me if ever I want to be so fixed again; for there I
sat with my feet drawn straight under my knees, heads up, and hands laid
close along my legs, like a new recruit on drill, or a horse in the
stocks; and, twist me, if I didn't feel as if I was about to be nicked.
The whole company stared at me as if I had come without an invite; and I
swear I thought my arms had grown a foot longer, for I couldn't get my
hands in no sort of a comfortable fix--first I tried them on my lap;
there they looked like goin to prayers, or as if I was tied in that way;
then I slung 'em down by my side, and they looked like two weights to a
clock; and then I wanted to cross my legs, and I tried that, but my leg
stuck out like a pump handle; then my head stuck up through a glazed
shirt-collar, like a pig in a yoke; then I wanted to spit, but the floor
looked so fine, that I would as soon have thought of spittin on the
window; and then to fix me out and out, they asked us all to sit down
to dinner! Well, things went on smooth enough for a while, till we had
got through one whet at it. Then a blasted imp of a nigger come to me
first with a waiter of little bowls full of something, and a parcel of
towels slung over his arm; so I clapped one of the bowls to my head, and
drank it down at a swallow. Now, stranger, what do you think was in it?"

"Punch, I suppose," said Lamar, laughing; "or perhaps apple toddy."

"So I thought, and so would anybody, as dry as I was, and that wanted
something to wash down the fainty stuffs I had been layin in; but no! it
was warm water! Yes! you may laugh! but it was clean warm water. The
others dipped their fingers into the bowls, and wiped them on the towels
as well as they could for gigglin; but it was all the fault of that
pampered nigger, in bringin it to me first. As soon as I catched his
eye, I gin him a wink, as much as to let him know that if ever I caught
him on my trail, I would wipe him down with a hickory towel."

"But I suppose you enjoyed yourself highly before it was all over?" said
Chevillere.

"When it was all over, I was glad enough; I jumped and capered like a
school-boy at the first of the holydays."

"Have you never been invited out since?" asked Lamar.

"O yes, often," said Damon; "but you don't catch a weasel asleep again.
I like to give a joke, and take a joke; but then the joke was all on one
side. If I can take a hand in the laugh, I don't care whether a person
laughs _at_ me, or _with_ me."

"But what say you?" said Chevillere; "shall we send your horse to the
country with ours?"

"Why! as you gentlemen seem to speak me so fair, and to know the world
so well, I don't care if I do send old Pete out to board awhile. I
shouldn't be surprised though if he should give me up for lost, and fret
himself to death. But I must see the man that goes to the country with
them; 'cause Pete couldn't bear shabby talk; he's what I call a leetle
particular in his company for a dumb brute."

"The man rides behind us," said Chevillere, "who will perform that duty.
Cato! this gentleman wishes to speak to you."

"Did you call, your honour?"

"Yes. Cato! Mr. Damon wishes to give you some charges about his horse,
which you are to take into the country with ours."

"Cato," said Damon, "tell the farmer who takes the horses, that old Pete
Ironsides here has been used to good company, and that he has been
treated more like a Christian nor a horse, and that I wish him indulged
in his old ways."

During this harangue, Cato cast sundry glances from his master to the
speaker, as if to ascertain whether he was in earnest, or only playing
off one of those freaks in which the young men had so often indulged in
his presence. Being accustomed, however, to treat with respect those
whom his master respected, and seeing his eye calm and serious, he bowed
with grave deference, saying, "It shall be done as you direct, your
honour;" and then fell back.

"Now," said Damon, "that's what I call a well-bred nigger. I would
venture that old Scip would'nt have puzzled me with the warm water;
'cause he knows that I'm not one of them there sort of chaps what knows
all their new-fangled kick-shaws. He knows in a case of real
needcessity, or life and death, as I may say, either to man, woman, or
horse, I'm more to be depended on than a dozen such chaps as went along
here in the stage this morning."

"You saw the dandies in the stage, then?" asked Victor.

"Yes, and one of 'em popped his head out of the window, and says to me
as they went by, 'Country,' says he, 'there's something on your horse's
tail.'--'Yes,' says I, 'and there's something in his head that you
hav'nt got, if his ears ain't so long.'"

Thus were our acquaintances and their new companion jogging along when
the distant rumbling of wheels upon the pavements and the dense clouds
of black smoke which seemed to be hanging in the heavens but a short
distance ahead, announced that they were soon to enter the monumental
city.

There is not, perhaps, a feeling of more truly unmixed melancholy,
incident to the heart of an inexperienced and modest student, than that
which steals over him upon his first entrance into a strange city; a
feeling of incomparable loneliness, even deeper than if the same
individual were standing alone upon the highest blue peak of the far
stretching Alleghany. The vanishing rays of twilight were extending
their lengthening shadows; the husbandman and his cattle were seen
wending their way to their accustomed abodes for the night; and the
feathered tribes had already sought the resting-places which nature so
plentifully provides for them in our well-wooded land. The sad, and it
may be pleasing reflections which such sights produced, were
occasionally interrupted by the clattering of a horse's hoofs upon the
turnpike, as some belated countryman sought to redeem the time he had
spent at the alehouse; or as the solitary marketman, with more staid and
quiet demeanour, sped upon a like errand. Occasionally the scene was
marred by some besotted and staggering wretch, seeking his lowly and
miserable hut in the suburbs. At intervals too, the barking of dogs and
the lowing of cattle contributed their share to remind our friends that
they were about to take leave of these quiet and pastoral scenes, for an
indefinite period, and to mix in the bustle and gay assemblage of city
life. Often, at such junctures, there is a presentiment of the evil
which awaits the unhappy exchange. Warning clouds of the mind are
believed to exist by many of the clearest heads and soundest hearts: we
do not say that our heroes were thus sadly affected, nor that the
Kentuckian had a fore-taste of evil; but certain it is, that all were
silent until they arrived at the place of separation. All things having
been previously settled, they exchanged salutations, and departed upon
their separate routes. They passed a variety of streets in that most
gloomy period of the day when lamp-lighters are to be seen, with their
torches and ladders, starting their glimmering lights first in one
direction and then in another, as they hurry from post to post. Draymen
were driving home with reckless and Jehu-like speed; and the brilliant
lights which began to appear at long intervals, gave evidence that the
trading community carried their operations also into that portion of
time which nature has allotted for rest and repose to nearly all living
things. Our travellers now alighted at Barnum's; but as their adventures
were of an interesting character, we shall defer them till a new
chapter.



CHAPTER III.


After a substantial meal had been despatched, our travellers repaired to
the livery-stable, to inspect in person the condition of their horses.
The establishment was lighted with a single lamp, swung in the centre of
the building. The approach of the two young gentlemen was not therefore
immediately noticed by old Cato and another groom (who proved to be the
coachman of the equipage they had left on the road), as they were busily
engaged in rubbing down their horses, the dialogue between them was not
brought to a close at once.

"Who did you say the gentleman was?" said old Cato.

"His name is Brumley," replied coachee.

"And the young lady is his daughter, I suppose?" continued Cato.

"Oh! as to that, I cannot say," continued coachee, "but I believe she is
only his step-daughter; they calls her Miss Fanny St. Clair, and
sometimes of late the old gentleman calls her Mrs. Frances; but between
you and me and the horse-stall, there is some strange things about this
family; I rather guess that Sukey, the maid up yonder, could tell us
something that would make us open our eyes, if she was not so confounded
close; all that I know about it is, that the harsh old gentleman
sometimes gives her a talk in the carriage that throws her a'most into a
faintin' spell. But I could never see into it, not I; I don't somehow
believe in all these little hurrahs the women kicks up just for
pastime."

Our travellers did not think proper to listen further to the gossip of
the grooms, and having executed their business at the livery, they
retraced their steps to the splendid establishment at which they had put
up. Notwithstanding the doubtful source from which Chevillere had gained
his latest information concerning the singularly interesting young lady
whom they had seen at the inn, it made its impression. Corrupt indeed
must be that channel of information relative to a beautiful and
attractive female, apparently in distress, which will not find an
auditor in the person of a sensitive young man just emancipated from
college. On such occasions, and with such persons, the credibility of
all witnesses is the same, and the most improbable tale is taken at
once, and made the foundation of a whole train of reveries, dreams, and
plans.

It is not to be denied that Victor Chevillere had worked his imagination
up to a very romantic height, and had allowed his curiosity concerning
the youthful lady to reach such a pitch that little else gave occupation
to his fancies.

He was in this state of mind, leisurely marking time with lazy steps,
and in an abstracted mood, as he ascended the grand staircase of the
establishment, when his attention was again riveted by the sound of the
lady's voice in earnest entreaty with the old gentleman.

"Consider, my dear Frances," said the latter, "that your health is now
nearly re-established, and that these are subjects that you must dwell
upon; why not, therefore, become accustomed to it at once?"

"For heaven's sake! for my dear mother's! never, sir, mention that
fearful marriage, and more fearful death to me again! Why should I
recall hideous and frightful dreams!"

Chevillere was compelled to move on, but it must be confessed that
his steps were slower than before; and it may be readily imagined,
that his fancy and his curiosity were not much allayed by the shreds
of conversation which he had involuntarily overheard. When he had
ascended to his own apartment, and could indulge freely in that
bachelor recreation of pacing to and fro, the two words still
involuntarily quickened his movements whenever they flashed through his
mind---"marriage" and "death" were words of opposite import certainly,
viewed in the abstract, and we doubt whether he had ever connected them
together before;---"Fearful marriage! and more fearful death!" what
could it mean? to whom could they refer? Only one of them could refer to
her, that was certain; who then was married and died so fearfully? Ah!
thought he, I have it! her mother has married this old man, and died
suddenly; and he has got the fortune of both in his hands! Suspicious
circumstance! If fortune puts it in my power, I will watch him narrowly!
I disliked his countenance from the first!--must be cool, however, and
deliberate--must watch--and wait! pshaw, what am I at! Thus ended Victor
Chevillere's solution of the enigma, when Lamar stepped into the room
and disturbed his revery.

"What! still musing, Chevillere. By my troth, she must be a witch; but
it will be glorious news to write to our friend Beverly Randolph, of old
Virginia. What say you? Shall I sit down and indite an epistle? Let me
see--how do such narratives generally begin? Cupid, and darts, and
arrows--blind of an eye--shot right through the vitals of a poor
innocent youth that never did him any harm--never was struck
before--covered with a panoply, and shield, and armour, and all that;
and then worship prostrate before the shrine; and vows, and tears, and
tokens; and then the dart is taken out--and the wound heals up--and
then--'Richard's himself again!' What say you to that, or rather what
would Randolph say to that, think you?"

"He would say that Augustus Lamar was still the same mirth-loving
fellow, without regard to time or place."

"Then it is a serious affair, and too true to make a joke of! Well, then
I have done! She's a beautiful young creature, it is true; but then from
what I had seen of your cold philosophy, I did not think you were the
man to be slain at first sight, and surrender at discretion before a
single charge."

"I will acknowledge to you, Lamar, that my curiosity is most painfully
excited with regard to that unhappy young lady, but nothing more, I
assure you. Some facts have, without my seeking, come to my knowledge,
with which you are entirely unacquainted, and which have tended greatly
to increase that curiosity. I cannot at this time explain; as soon as my
own mind is satisfied on the subject, my confidence shall not be
withheld from you."

"Lovers are truly a singular set of mortals---here is a young lady (and
a Yankee too, perhaps) of some dozen hours' acquaintance, and with whom
you have never exchanged a dozen words; and yet you are already
entrusted with profound secrets, which excite you in the most painful
manner!"

"Come, come, Lamar, I see you are determined to misunderstand me. Let us
drop the subject. What do you think of the Kentuckian?"

"I think he is an admirable fellow; and I intend to patronise him; and
induct him into fashionable life; but do you think his singularities are
the natural products of the life, manners, and climate of Kentucky?"

"I cannot decide whether there is much in him that is peculiar to
Kentucky. Some of the most elegant and accomplished gentleman I have
seen were natives of that state."

"He takes a laugh at his expense admirably."

"He does, but you must be careful not to exceed the limits he has laid
down for himself and us, in that respect. For my own part, I entertain a
serious respect for Damon and his unsophisticated honesty, degenerating,
as it sometimes does, into prejudices and ludicrous fancies."

"Good night, and pleasant dreams to you. I will call early to interpret
them for you."

As Lamar closed the door, Chevillere drew from his pocket a little
basket segar-case, from which he extracted a genuine Havana, and
lighting a taper at the candle, and throwing himself into one of those
easy attitudes familiar to smokers, with his head back, and his eyes
closed, gave himself up to those absorbing reveries, generally
delightful in proportion to the goodness of the segar, which a southern
knows so well how to enjoy. To be fully relished, segars should be
resorted to only in the evening, and then in moderation. The sensibility
is blunted by excess, and in that case, tobacco, like the intoxicating
drinks, will sometimes conjure up frightful images upon the wall of a
dimly-lighted chamber, or among the embers of a dying fire. Victor,
however, had not converted his capacity for enjoyment into fruitful
sources of mental and physical suffering---he sat for a long time gently
throwing the fragrant results of his efforts into various columns,
wreaths, and pyramids. Not that his mind dwelt upon these things for a
moment; he was far distant in spirit; his imagination was calling up
delightful dreams of love and friendship, with thoughts of a beloved
cousin, of his friend and room-mate Beverley Randolph--his mother, his
home, and the scenes of his childhood, and finally, of the lady of the
black mantle. He beheld airy castles,--romantic adventures,--bridal
scenes--and flowers,--assemblies,--parties,--and the high hills of the
Santee.

Aladdin's lamp never wrought more rich and highly-coloured scenes of
enchantment than did this same Havana; but the most pleasant dream must
come to an end, as well as the richest flavoured segar--and so did
Chevillere's. Tossing the little hot remnant from him with a passionate
jerk, as if in anger at the insensible cause of his interruption, he
bounced into the centre of the floor and began to pace to and fro, in
his accustomed mood, clenching his fists now and then, and by his whole
appearance showing a perfect contrast to the calm and delightful revery
attendant upon the first stage of tobacco intoxication.

In this mood we shall leave him to seek his rest, while we recount in
the next chapter what farther befel our late collegians on the following
morning.



CHAPTER IV.


A brilliant morning found our collegians refreshed in health and elastic
in spirits. The more gloomy fancies of the previous night, which had
beset Chevillere both in his waking and sleeping hours--like the mists
of the morning, had been dispelled by the bright sunshine, and the
refreshing breezes of the bay. After the usual meal had been some time
despatched; and while Chevillere was leisurely turning over the papers
of the day (Lamar having departed in pursuit of the Kentuckian) he was
surprised by the entrance of Mr. Brumley (the austere gentleman), who
saluted him with the most friendly greetings of the hour and season, and
concluded by inviting him into their private parlour. It may be readily
imagined that this invitation was not tardily complied with, for he now
imagined that the whole history of the lady would be unravelled by a
single word--so sanguine is youthful hope, and so apt are we, at that
interesting period, to jump to those conclusions which are desirable,
without ever considering the previous steps, and painful delays, and
necessary forms, and conventional usages which inevitably intervene
between our highest hopes and their fruition. How often would the ardent
wishes and the bold hands of youth seize upon futurity, despoiling it
of the thin veil which separates us from what we wish to know,
especially when this could be learned by dispensing with the accustomed
formalities and wholesome restraints of refined society. A train of
kindred thoughts was passing through the mind of Chevillere as he was
ushered into a small but elegant saloon, connected with the back
chambers by folding-doors, which were now closed. On the left of the
door, and between the windows opening upon a great thoroughfare, sat the
lady who occupied his thoughts. She was sitting, or rather reclining
upon one end of a sofa, her head resting upon her hand in a thoughtful
mood. As is true of most daughters of this favoured land, nature had
evidently in nowise been thwarted, either in her mental or physical
education. She appeared to possess that naiveté which is so apt to be
the result of a mixed town, and country education; with just enough of
self-possession to show that native modesty had been properly regulated
by much good society, but not too much to forbid an occasional
crimsoning of the neck and face. Her eyes were blue, shaded by long dark
lashes, and so sparkling and joyous in their expression, that the
evident present sorrow which hung over her spirits, could not efface the
impression to a beholder, that they were naturally much more inclined to
beam with mirth and gayety, than to weeping; her features were
regular--arch in their expression, and finely formed--her complexion of
the finest shade--with a rich profusion of light brown hair, braided
and parted on the forehead without a single curl; her figure was just
tall enough to be elegant and graceful, and exhibited the graces of that
interesting period, when the school-girl is merging into the reserved
woman.

As Chevillere was ushered into the presence of this youthful lady, the
old gentleman presented him as Mr. Chevillere, of South Carolina, and
the lady by the name of (his step-daughter) Frances St. Clair; she
assumed the erect position barely long enough to return the salutation
of the gentleman, then reclined again and lapsed apparently into her sad
mood; for a moment she pressed her handkerchief to her face as if she
would drive away some horrible image, and then waited a moment as if she
expected her father to speak upon some previously settled subject.
Perceiving, however, that she waited in vain, she with some difficulty
forced herself to say, "Mr. Chevillere, I requested my father to invite
you to our apartments to"--here she seemed overpowered and stopped.
Chevillere seeing her distress, replied, "Madam, you do me too much
honour; but I see you are distressed--let me say then, without any
farther formality, that if there is any way in the world by which I can
lighten that distress, command me."

"It is about these very emotions that I would speak," she answered; "I
was afraid you might think the scene at the breakfast-table two days
since was got up in some silly girlish affectation, in pretended disgust
at the rudeness of the young men present; but believe me when I say,
their conduct would at many times in my life have furnished me with an
ample fund for laughter; it was not in their manners, it was in the
subject of one of their discourses that I felt so much affected--I tried
to subdue my feelings, but the more I tried the more they overcame me;
the truth is, some painful recollections were awakened"--Here again she
covered her face with her handkerchief, and seemed to be for a moment
almost suffocated. The lady resumed; "Nor should I have thought it
proper to offer this explanation to one who is apparently a perfect
stranger; but, sir, I have known you for some time by reputation."

"Indeed, madam, I must be indebted to some most flattering mistake for
my present good fortune; I am but just emancipated from college walls
and rules, and have, of course, even a reputation to make for myself."

"No! no!" said the youthful lady (a beautiful smile passing swiftly over
her sad countenance), "there can be no mistake about it," and drawing
from her work-bag a small bit of paper, rolled up in the shape of a
letter, she presented it to him; adding, "Do you know that
hand-writing?"

He gazed upon the signature for an instant, and then exclaimed, "My
honoured mother's! by all that's fortunate! then indeed we are old
acquaintances--with your permission; and I am perfectly content with the
reputation which you spoke of, when I know that it originated in such a
source."

"Your mother was indeed a prudent and a modest, but still a devoted
herald of your good qualities."

"Believe me, dear lady, that I shall be more proud than ever to appear
in your eyes to deserve some small share of her maternal praise; it was
always inexpressibly dear to me for its own sake, but now I shall
endeavour doubly to deserve it. You saw her, I suppose, at the White
Sulphur Springs?"

"We did, sir; and a most fortunate circumstance it was for me; for being
an invalid, she did every thing for me that my own mother could have
done. Oh! how I regretted that my mother did not come, merely to have
made her acquaintance."

"Your mother! is your mother alive, madam?"

"I hope and trust she is--and well; she was both when we last heard from
her, and that was but a few days since; but your agitation alarms me!
you know no bad news of my mother?" laying her hand upon his arm.

"None, madam! none. I don't know what put the foolish idea into my head,
but I thought that both your own parents were dead."

"You alarmed me," said she. "I conjured up every dreadful image--I
imagined that you had been commissioned by some of our friends here, to
break the painful intelligence to me--but you are sure she is well?"

Chevillere smiled, as he answered "You forget that I am a total stranger
to her, and she to me."

"True! true! But tell me how you left your charming young cousin
Virginia Bell, of whom I heard your mother speak so often. She told me,
I think, that she was at some celebrated school in North Carolina?"

"At Salem. She is well, I thank you, or was well when I came through the
town: my mother intends to take her home with her on her return."

"So she told me," said the lady.

"She did not tell you, I suppose, for I believe she does not know, that
I have promised the hand of the dear girl in marriage, though she is
scarcely sixteen yet. You must know that I had in college two dear and
beloved friends--the one, Mr. Lamar, you have seen; the other is Mr.
Beverley Randolph, of Virginia--we were both class and room-mates.
Randolph has gone on a journey through the Southern States, as he
pretends; but, I believe, in truth, to take a sly peep at his affianced
bride. If he likes her looks, it is a bargain; and if not, he will pass
it all off for a college joke." Here he was interrupted by the lady
gasping; and on looking in her face, he found she was as pale as marble,
and terribly agitated. She asked her father for water, which he handed
to her instantly, while Chevillere rang violently at the bell.

"It will all be over in a minute," said she; "it is only a return of the
suffering to which I am subject."

Many strange ideas flitted through Chevillere's mind during this
interruption of the conversation. He now recollected that one of the
subjects of discourse between the vulgar fops, at the breakfast-table
the previous morning, had been some runaway marriage--and "the fearful
marriage and more fearful death" still sounded in his ears, and now the
same subject again introduced by himself produced like consequences,--he
thought it strange and incomprehensible; he cheered himself, however,
with the reflection, that his mother was not likely to form an intimacy
with persons against whom there was any charge of crime; nay, more, he
felt assured that they must have been well sustained by public opinion,
or introduced to her acquaintance by some judicious friend.

"If I have unaptly said any thing offensive, I hope Miss St. Clair will
believe me, when I say that such a design was the farthest from my
thoughts."

"Rest easy on that score," said she; "I am now well again: you said
nothing that it was not proper for you to say, and me to hear, had I not
been a poor silly-headed girl."

"Well, Miss Frances, I am anxious to hear your opinion of Western
Virginia."

"My opinion is not worth having; but such as it is, you are welcome to
it, or rather to such observations as a lady might make. First, then, I
was delighted with the wild mountain scenery, and the beautiful valleys
between the mountains; such are those, you will recollect, perhaps, in
which all of those springs are situated. I doubt very much, whether
Switzerland, or Spain, could present as many rich and beautiful
mountain-scenes, as we have passed between Lexington and the White
Sulphur and Salt Sulphur springs. We have similar scenes along and among
the highlands of the Hudson, it is true; perhaps they are more grand and
majestic than these; but then, there is such a stir of busy life, such
an atmosphere of steam, and clouds of canvass, that one is perpetually
called back in spirit to the stir and bustle of a city life. But here,
among the rugged blue mountains of 'old Virginia,' as these people love
to call it, there are the silence and the solitude of nature, which more
befit such contemplations as the scenes induce. We can seat ourselves in
one of the green forests of the mountains we have just left, and imagine
ours to be the first human footsteps, which have ever been imprinted
upon the soil; and we can repose amid the shades and the profound and
solemn silence of those scenes, with a calmness and a serenity, and a
soothing, delightful, melancholy feeling, which no other objects can
produce. The very atmosphere seems teeming with these delightful
impressions; primitive nature seems to have returned upon us with all
its balmy delights,--quiet and peacefulness. The profound solitude would
become tiresome, perhaps, to those who have no resources in unison with
such scenes, or to those who admire and feign to revel in them, because
it is fashionable just now to do so. But to an educated mind, a natural
and feeling, and I may say devout heart, they furnish inexhaustible
food for contemplation, and ever-renewing sources of delight and
improvement."

"They are such scenes," replied Chevillere, "as I love to dwell upon,
even in imagination. But come, Miss Frances, I see by the hat and mantle
upon the table, that I have interrupted some intended promenade; shall I
have the honour to be of your party?"

"Unquestionably, young gentleman--you may take the whole journey off my
hands; Frances was only going out among the shops," said Mr. Brumley.

The plain, but tasteful apparel was soon adjusted, and the youthful pair
sallied forth upon the promised expedition.

The tide of human life seems to be ever rolling and tossing, and ever
renewing, and then rolling on again. Pestilence, and death, and famine
may do their worst, but the tide is still renewed, and still moves on to
the great sea of eternity.

Who that walks through the busy and thronged streets of a populous city,
and sees the gay plumage, the fantastic finery, the smiling faces, and
the splendid equipages, could ever form an adequate idea of the real
suffering and wo, which constitute the sum of one day's pains in a city
life? If all the miserable--the lame, the blind, the poor, the dumb, the
aged, and the diseased, could be poured out along one side of the gay
promenades, while fashionables were parading along the other, a much
truer picture of life in a city would be seen. Such were the ideas of
Victor Chevillere, as he escorted his timid and youthful companion
through the gay throng from shop to shop.

As they emerged into a part of the city less thronged, interchange of
opinions became more practicable.

"I am impatient to hear your opinion of the Southerns," said Chevillere;
"you had the finest opportunity imaginable to see our southern
aristocrats at the springs."

"Oh! I was delighted with the little society in which I moved there,"
replied she; "and, but for one unhappy, and most untoward circumstance
for me, my enjoyments would have far surpassed any thing which I had
ever laid out for myself again in this world."

"You excite my curiosity most strangely," said he; "and, if it would not
appear impertinent or intrusive, I should like to know two things:
first, what untoward circumstance you speak of? and next, what great bar
has been placed between you and happiness, that you should have laid off
so small a share for yourself in all time to come?"

"Oh! sir, your questions are painful to me, even to think of; how much
worse then must have been the reality of those circumstances, which
could poison the small share of happiness which is allotted to us under
the most favourable circumstances. I would gratify your curiosity if I
could, but indeed, indeed, sir, I cannot now relate to you the whole
history of my life; and nothing less could explain to you the cruel
train of circumstances by which I am surrounded, and from which there is
no escape."

"One question you can, and I am sure you will, answer me.

"Could a devoted friend, with a cool head and a resolute hand, effect
nothing in freeing you from this persecution?"

"I will answer you, sir, most plainly. You misunderstand my allusions,
in the first place; for I am not persecuted now, nor can I say that I
have been. It may seem enigmatical to you, but it is all that I can in
prudence say. There is no person on this side of the grave who can
relieve me from the cause of those emotions which you have unhappily
witnessed; nay, more! if those persons were to rise from the dead, who
were, unfortunately for themselves and for me, the cause of my painful
situation, my condition would be incomparably worse than it is now."

"Painful, indeed, must those circumstances be, and incomprehensible to
me, which seem to have been produced by the death of some one; and yet,
if that person should rise from the dead, you would be more miserable
than ever," said Chevillere.

During the latter part of this speech, the lady, as was often her
custom, pressed her handkerchief to her face, as if she would by
mechanical pressure drive off disagreeable images from the mind; and
then said, "Now, sir, let us drop this subject."

"One more question, and then I have done; and believe me, it is not idly
asked. Were the circumstances you spoke of developed so recently as your
visit to the Virginia springs?"

"Oh! by no means, sir; the untoward circumstance there that I spoke of,
was the frequent and unexpected presence of one who forcibly reminded me
of all the painful particulars; and what made it so much worse was, that
wherever I moved, he moved; he followed the same route round the
watering-places, and seemed purposely to throw himself in my way; and
even now I dread every moment to encounter him; and the more so, as I
have heard lately that his mind is unsettled. Poor gentleman, I pity
him."

By this time they had arrived in a part of the city from which
Washington's monument could be seen, elevating its majestic column above
a magnificent grove of trees.

"Suppose we extend our walk," said the gentleman, "to yonder beautiful
grove."

To this the lady readily assented. They found rude seats, constructed
perhaps by some romantic swain; or by some country-bred youths, who came
there, after the toils of the day, to refresh themselves with the pure
and invigorating breezes which sweep the green, fresh from their dear
and longed-for homes. Here they seated themselves, to enjoy this
delightful mixture of town and country.

"This is a noble monument to the great and good father of our Republic;
and worthy of the high-minded and public-spirited people of Baltimore,"
said Chevillere. "Give me such evidence as this of their veneration for
his memory, and none of your new-fangled nonsense about enshrining him
in the hearts of his countrymen. Let him be enshrined in the hearts of
his countrymen as individuals; but let cities, communities, and states
enshrine him in marble. These speak to the eyes; and hundreds, and
thousands will stand here, amid these beautiful shades, and think of him
with profound veneration, who would never otherwise look into any other
kind of history. The effect of such works as these is admirable; not
only in showing veneration for the great dead, but also upon the living,
in purifying the heart and ennobling its impulses."

"Baltimore, indeed, has set a noble example," said the lady.

"And richly will she be rewarded. A few years hence, the far West will
be brought to her doors; and she will grow up to be a mighty city.
Standing on the middle ground, between the angry sectionists of the
North and the South, she will present a haven in which the rivals may
meet, and learn to estimate each other's good qualities, and bury or
forget those errors which are inseparable from humanity. But see! Miss
St. Clair," said he, "what a singular looking man is just emerging from
within the column!"

"Heavens!" said the lady, in extreme terror, "that is the person! Do
take me from this place! I would not encounter him for the world!"

She was too late; for already had the object of her apprehension caught
a glimpse of her person; and no sooner had he done so, than with rapid
strides he advanced directly towards them. The lady shook with terror
and agitation. When he had approached almost in a direct line to within
some forty or fifty feet, he riveted a long and steady gaze upon the
lady, and another of shorter duration upon her companion, still walking
onward. Victor stood and gazed after him until he was entirely without
the enclosure.

He was a well-dressed man, apparently about fifty-five years of age,
tall, and straight in his carriage as an Indian; his hair was slightly
silvered; his countenance expressed wildness, but was steady and
consistent in the expression of present purpose; his eye was dark and
deep, and, when you looked upon it steadily for a short time, appeared
as if you were gazing at two black holes in his head; his complexion was
sallow; its characteristics--energy and deep determination.

"And that is the maniac?" said Chevillere, in a half-abstracted mood.

"I said not so," replied the lady; "but he is, indeed, that most
unfortunate man, whose whole business seems to be to haunt me in my
travels; otherwise our meeting has been most strangely accidental and
untoward."

"If he is in ill health," said Victor, "he may have gone to the Springs
without intending to meet you; and now, when the season is nearly over,
and he is likewise on his return, there is nothing more natural than his
visiting this monument--every stranger does so,--do not, therefore,
aggravate your distress by supposing these meetings to have been sought
on his part. I will endeavour to find him, and demand of him whether he
seeks to annoy an unhappy invalid by pursuing her from place to place,
and what are his motives."

"Oh! sir, for Heaven's sake, do not think of such a thing. He is a
powerful and a fearful man, when in his right mind; and even in his
derangement, might do you some harm, especially if you went as
commissioned by me. Besides, sir, if he was undoubtedly sane and
respectful, he might demand, as a right, to see me, and converse with me
too. Nay, he might possibly have some claim to control my actions; but
you see he does not. Let him alone, therefore, and do not involve
yourself in any of my troubles. I am inextricably entangled, and
pinioned down to a certain routine of suffering, perhaps unexampled, and
that too by no crime of my own."

"Dear lady," said Chevillere, taking her hand, as he saw her blue eye
filling with tears, and just ready to run over; "you cannot imagine how
much I feel interested for you; and what I am about to say, as it will
risk your displeasure, is the very best evidence that I can give of my
deep interest in your future peace and contentment. Believe me, dear
lady, that though I am young, and may be inexperienced,--I am not an
indifferent observer of the secret machinery of men's actions. I have
been a steady observer and a thinker for myself, without regard to the
opinion of individuals or the world, when I was conscious that I was
right, and that they were wrong. Listen to me, then, with patience,
while I give you my opinion, with regard to the difficulties which seem
to be accumulating around you. Of course, this opinion must be a general
one; as the circumstances upon which it is founded are only such as are
of a general character. Nor do I seek for more confidence on your part
towards me; I cannot expect that you should unfold the intimate
relations of your family and your friends to a comparative stranger.
This, then, is my (of course vague) opinion--I have generally observed,
in my intercourse with mankind, that the most trying situations and the
deepset distress are often brought about by a small mistake--
misfortune--or crime in the beginning. The latter of these I would defy
the most malignant misanthrope to look upon your countenance and charge
you with; one of the two former, then, is the point upon which all your
distress, and ill health, and melancholy hangs. My advice then is, upon
this general view of the case, that you go back to that point, and
rectify it as speedily as possible; and do it boldly and fearlessly, as
I am sure you can. Burst asunder these chains that fetter you, whatever
they may be."

"I see," said the lady (tears fast stealing down her cheeks), "that I am
always destined to make the same unhappy impression on every
acquaintance, male or female, valued or unvalued. Before I have grown
many degrees in their good opinion, some of these unlucky things are
seen to develop themselves, and then I am subject to the greatest
misfortune to which an honourable and a sensitive mind can be exposed;
that is, to be supposed weak or wicked, though at the same time
conscious of pure and upright motives. To be plain with you, sir, I must
tell you again, that in order for me to be relieved of that which
trammels me in some shape or other at every step, _the grave must give
up its own; and the law must give up its own; and the avaricious must
annul their decrees; and the dead of half a century must undo their
work; and the wisdom of the sage must be instilled into the mind of a
child; and the slanders, and the wild and wicked fancies of the lunatic
must be convinced by reason or actual demonstration of the foregoing
things_--before the point you speak of can be seized upon, and turned to
my advantage."

"Then, indeed, is it a hard case, and I will not distress you further on
the subject; I will not add my persecution to that of others--I will not
say enemies; for one so young and so artless, so innocent and so
unfortunate, can have no enemies."

"And therein consists part of my distress," replied she. "Is it not
strange that I have not an enemy living, to my knowledge, who has ever
wilfully injured me in word or deed? unless, indeed, it be yon wretched
old man, whose mind is now, and whose heart, I fear, has always been
wrong. Now, sir, let me beg of you, in future, whenever any of these
little occurrences embarrass me during my stay here, to take no notice
of them whatever; let me move along as quietly and as unobtrusively as
possible. I love the retirement of the country, and to the country and
retirement I will go. My mother loves me, and knows all my actions, and
their motives too; and even my father loves me in his own way. They will
be my companions for the remainder of a short and weary life."

The colloquy was cut short by their return to the hotel.

Lamar, as has been already announced, was a humorous gentleman, and
would not lose an opportunity of enjoying the remarks of one so new to
the busy world and its ways as Damon. He was not long in finding out the
retired quarters of the gentleman of the west. At the bar-room he
inquired if there was such a lodger in the house.

"No," said the barkeeper (so are these functionaries called), "but he is
expected every minute."

Lamar seated himself near the files of morning papers which lay strewed
along a reading-desk, and awaited the arrival of his singular new
acquaintance. In a few minutes Damon stalked in. A new black hat and
blue frock-coat had so much altered his appearance, that Lamar did not
recognise him until he took off his hat, wiped his dripping brows with
the handkerchief which he still carried in it, and then, seeing Lamar
for the first time, waved it over his head.

"Hurrah! for old Kentuck!" was his characteristic exclamation.

"Why, Damon, you have been under the tailor's hands," said Lamar.

"I believe I was in Old Sam's hands last night; but come up-stairs, and
I will tell you all about it."

They proceeded to the third story into a small apartment, dimly lighted
through a single window. Damon, after seating Lamar, threw aside his
coat, and drawing from under the head of his bed the one in which Lamar
had first seen him, he quickly inserted his arms through what remained
of the garment,--the lappels were torn off on each side down to the
waist, so that all the front of the coat was gone, leaving nothing but
the long straight back, collar, and sleeves. What remained was smeared
with mud, and torn in many places. He next proceeded to pull out of his
pocket a collar, and parts of two sleeves of a shirt, spreading them on
the bed, as a milliner would do her finery; and holding out both his
hands with the palms upward in the manner of an orator,----

"There!" said he, "that's what I call a pretty tolerable neat job, to
shirt a stranger the first night he comes to town."

Lamar, who by this time began to see a little into the affair, asked,
"But, Damon, how did all this happen? you seem to have been
discomfited."

"Now I'll be smashed if you ain't off the trail, stranger, for you see
I've only showed you half yet."

Upon which he drew from his other pocket a pair of spectacles, bent,
bloody, and broken,--then a wig,--and, lastly, the remains of a little
black rattan with a gold head and chain broken into inches. He displayed
these on the bed as he had done the others; only drawing his
handkerchief as a line between them. Upon this he fell, rather than sat,
back into a chair just behind him, and burst out into a loud, long, and
hearty laugh, seemingly excited afresh at the sight of his spoils.

"Well, now," said he, "I wish I may be horn swoggled, if ever I thought
to live to see the day when I should '_sculp_' a Christian man; but
there it is, you see; I left his head as clean as a peeled onion."

"But how? and when? and who was your antagonist in this frolic?"

"Frolic!" exclaimed Damon; "well, now, it's what I would call a regular
row; I never saw a prettier knock down and drag out in all the days of
my life, even in old Kentuck."

"But do tell me," said Lamar, "was anybody seriously hurt?"

"There was several chaps in the circus last night with their heels
uppermost, besides them suple chaps on the horses; I can tell you that."

"Oh! you were in the circus, were you?"

"Yes; and there was a rip-roaring sight of slight o'hand and tumblin
work there, besides their ground and lofty tumblin they had in the
handbills."

"You did some of the ground tumbling yourself then?" asked Lamar.

"No, I did the slight o'hand work, as you may see by the skin that's
gone off these four marrow-bones."

"And who did the ground tumbling?" asked Lamar.

"There was a good deal done there last night; the chaps in the ring and
the chaps in the pit all did a little at it; flummuck me if I didn't
think the heels of the whole house would be uppermost before they were
done; what an everlastin pity 'tis, these critters elbows ain't as suple
as their heels."

"Then you think all the people of Baltimore a little limber in the
heels."

"I can't say as to that; but I wish I may be hackled, if there was not
so much flyin up of the heels there last night, that I was fidlin and
tumblin all night in my sleep, jumpin through hoops, and tanglin my legs
in their long red garters, which the circus riders jumped over; and then
I thought they had my poor old horse, Pete Ironsides, jumpin over bars,
and leapin through fiery balloons, until at last they smashed his head
right into a tar barrel, and then maybe I didn't fly into a tear down
snortin rage! I was crammed full of fight then, and so I got to slingin
my arms about in my sleep, till I knocked out that head-board
there,--then I woke up, and I wish I may be hanged if I didn't think it
was all a dream; till I found that the forepart of my coat had run away
from the tail, and that I had got an odd collar among my linen. And then
on t'other hand I began to think it was all true, and rung the bell, and
sent the nigger down to the stable to see if Pete had his head in a tar
barrel sure enough; presently the nigger came back, grinen and giglin,
and said Pete had gone to the country two hours ago; so I run the little
nigger down stairs, and sent my old boots after him to get blacked; and
as I was dodgin through that long entry there, I saw the bottles, and
tumblers, and lemon-skins; so ho! said I, there's the mad dog that bit
me last night."

"Then you _began_ in a frolic at least," said Lamar.

"Only a small breeze or so; a few tumblers of punch, made of that
doubled and twisted Irish whiskey; it was none of your Kentuck low
wines, run off at a singlin, for I have made many a barrel. It was as
strong as _pison_, and it raised the Irish in me pretty quick, or rather
old Kentuck, for I jumped up and kicked the table over, and broke
things, afore I would have been cleverly primed with the low wines."

"Were you drinking all alone?"

"No; there was half-a-dozen milksops set down; I believe they board
here; but no sooner had I kicked the table over, and begun to smash
things a little, than they all sneaked out one by one, until they were
all gone but one, and I rather suspicion that he's a blackleg, for he
stuck pretty close to me till the row at the circus was over, and then
when I had got clear, he come up here with me, and sent for the chap who
furnished me with my new hat and coat; but it wasn't all for nothin, as
he thought, for he presently proposed that we should go down street a
piece, and see some fine fellers, he said, who were friends of his, and
who were going to have a night of it. Well, said I, 'a little hair of
the dog is good for the bite,' and down we went to a large room up four
pair of stairs in a dark alley. And there, sure enough, there was a
merry-looking set of fellers; but you see they overdid the job, for I
soon smelt a rat; they most all of 'em pretended to be too etarnal
drunk. I said nothin though, but 'possumed too a little; only sipped a
little wine, and that made me straight instead of crooked. But at last
they proposed a game of cards. Well, said I, I'm not much of a dabster
at it, but if the stake ain't high, I don't care if I do take a fling or
two; so down we set to it, and they pulled out their cards for loo.
Stop! stop! said I, we must have _new cards_; I never play with other
men's cards. They began to suspicion, maybe, that they had got the wrong
sow by the ear, but they sent and got some new packs, and then we took
a smash or two at the game, and I'm a Cherokee if I didn't give 'em a
touch or two of old Kentuck. I won all the money they had, but it wasn't
much, and they made me pay most of that for the refreshments, as they
said the winners always paid for them things."

"But you have not yet told me how you got into the row," said Lamar; "I
wish to know the whole story--come, let us have it?"

"Well, it's soon told. As I was telling you, the black-leg chap and I
went to the circus, and we had'nt set long in the pit before there was a
young gal come in, and set on one end of the same bench. She was'nt so
ugly neither, but I took pity on her because she looked like a country
gal, and there was no women settin near her. After a while, three chaps
come down from the boxes above, and set right down by the gal, and began
to push one another over against her; at last the one next her, and he
was the same chap you saw in the stage yesterday morning, only he had on
them green specks--well, he put his arm round her, and called her his
dear, and all that; well, you see, I had heard tell of these city gals,
and I thought if she was pleased it was none of my business; but
presently I heard her sobbing and crying, with her apron up to her eyes,
and she told them they were no gentlemen, or they would not treat a poor
girl so away from home. So the Irish whiskey, or old Kentuck, I don't
know which, began to rise in my throat. I jumped up and raised the
war-whoop. 'Old Kentuck for ever!' said I; and with that, I took the
back of my hand and knocked the chap's hat off, and his 'sculp' went
with it. Call your soul your own, said I; he jumped up and gin me a wipe
with that little black switch across the nose; it had hardly cleverly
touched me, afore I took him a sneezer, between the two eyes, glasses
and all; he dropped over like a rabbit when you knock 'em behind the
head; I rather suspicion he thought a two year old colt's heels had got
a taste of his cocoanut.

"Then the other two took it up, and both on 'em seized me, and swore
they would carry me to the police office; but I took 'em at cross
purposes, for while one of them held the collar of the old home-made, I
fetched the other a kick that sent him over the benches a rip roaring, I
tell you. The other little chap was hangin on to me like a leech to a
horse's leg; I jist picked him up and throwed him into the ring upon the
sand, for I did'nt want to hurt him: but then the real officers come up
and clamped me. I wished myself back in old Kentuck bad enough then; but
while they held me there, like a dog that had been killen sheep, the
little gal came up to me, and said she would go and bring her father, to
try and get me off; and then she asked me where I lived,--I told her in
old Kentuck; then she asked me where I put up, and I put my mouth to her
ear and told her; and I could hardly get it away again without givin her
a smack, for she would pass for a pretty gal even in old Kentuck; well,
this morning, her and her father were here by times to thank me, and the
old man invited me to stop at his house as I go home; it's on the same
road we came down yesterday."

"Did the girl go to the circus by herself?" asked Lamar.

"No; the old man stopped at the door to buy a ticket, and she went on,
and lost him."

"But you have not told me how you came by this scalp," said Lamar,
taking up the large black scratch with curled locks.

"Oh! you see, I grabbled that in the scuffle, and slipped it into my
pocket."

"How did you get away from the officers?"

"Oh! that's the way I lost the old 'home-made;' you see they began to
pull me over the benches, and I told 'em I would walk myself if they
would let me, and so they did, but they held on to my coat. I kept
pretty cool until they got outside of the house, and then a crowd
gathered round, and they began cologueing together, until I saw my way
out a little, and then I jist slipped my foot behind one of 'em and
pushed him down, and tumbled the other feller over him, and then I
showed them a clean pair of heels. They raised the whoop--and I raised
my tail like a blue-lick buck, for you see I had'nt much coat to keep it
down;--dash me if it was'nt tail all the way to the collar, and stood
out straight behind like it was afraid of my pantaloons. I made a few
turns to throw 'em off the trail, and then with a curly whoop, and a
hurrah! for old Kentuck, I got to my own door, where I found the
black-leg chap. Now you know the whole business, and I suppose you can
tell me whether there is any danger of their finding me out in that
little excuse for a coat that blasted tailor, who was so stingy with his
cloth, made me."

"I should suppose there was none in the world. Have no fear on that
head; there is not a magistrate in town who would not honour you in his
heart for what you did."

"I should think so too, if they had any gals of their own. The fact is,
if there was a little knockin down and draggin out once in a while among
them dandy chaps, they would take better care how they sleeved decent
men's daughters."

"Well, good day, Damon," said Lamar; "send for me or Chevillere if you
get into trouble."



CHAPTER V.


It will readily be perceived, by the reader, that Beverley Randolph, the
person to whom the following letter was written, is one of the three
southerns.


    VICTOR CHEVILLERE TO B. RANDOLPH.

                                                     Baltimore, 18--.

    "DEAR RANDOLPH,

    "Five long years have we lived under the same roof, pursued the
    same studies, or rather the same studies pursued us;--engaged in
    the same dissipation, drank of the same sour wine, shed the same
    vinous tears, discussed the same dinners and suppers, enjoyed the
    same dances,--stag dances, I mean,--played the same music,
    belonged to the same society, and, I was going to say, fallen in
    love with the same nymphs; but that brings me to the subject of
    this letter. I am in for it! Yes, you may well look surprised! It
    is a fact! Who is the lady? you ask. I will tell you,--that is,
    if I can; her name is St. Clair. O! she is the most lovely,
    modest, weeping, melancholy, blue-eyed, fair-haired, and
    mysterious little creature you ever beheld. If you could only see
    her bend that white neck, and rest her head upon that small hand,
    her eye lost in profound thought, until the lower lid just
    overflows, and a tear steals gently down that most lovely cheek;
    and then see her start up stealthily to join again in the
    conversation, with the most innocent consciousness of guilt
    imaginable;--but what is it that brings these tears to sadden the
    heart of one so youthful and so innocent? 'There's the rub,' as
    Hamlet says. Yourself, Lamar, and I were unanimous, as you
    perhaps remember, that men generally suffer in proportion to
    their crimes, even in this world. I here renounce that opinion,
    with all others founded upon college logic. A half-taught college
    boy, in the pride of his little learning and stubborn opinions,
    is little better than an innocent. But, you ought to see this
    fair sufferer in order fully to appreciate the foregoing opinion.
    You would see child-like innocence--intelligence--benevolence; in
    short, all that is good, in her sad but lovely countenance.

    "But to return to college logic; what is it? Conclusions without
    premises, ends without means; and opinions adopted without any of
    the previous and inevitable pains and penalties attendant upon
    the acquirement of human knowledge, or, in other words, without
    _experience_! I would take one of our old break-of-day club to
    tell the flavour of a ham, or the difference between a bottle of
    Bordeaux and Seignette brandy, as soon as any one; but what else
    did they know? or rather what else did we know? Nothing! not
    literally nothing, but truly nothing. If I now wanted a judicious
    opinion upon any subject, I would go to an experienced man! one
    that had suffered in order to learn; an original thinker for
    practical ends.

    "You ask me concerning my cousin, Virginia Bell; her with whose
    miniature, infantile as it was, you fell so desperately in love,
    and whom, yet unseen, I promised to yourself. She flourishes,
    Randolph, and is as beautiful as you could desire; she is yet
    unengaged in heart or hand, so far as I know; but _you_ know,
    that the little sly, dear, delightful creatures will complete a
    whole life-time of love affairs, while fathers, and brothers, and
    guardians, and affianced lords _unloved_, may be looking on none
    the wiser. And they will look as innocent, and as demure, and as
    child-like, as my dear beautiful little enigma of the Black
    Mantle.

    "You say you 'hate Yankees;'--my dear fellow, you forget that you
    and I would be considered Yankees in London or Paris. The
    national denomination we have abroad, is 'the nation of Yankees,'
    or the 'universal Yankee nation.' 'Tis galling to our southern
    pride, I grant you, that we should be a mere appendage, in the
    eyes of a foreigner, to a people who are totally dissimilar to
    us. We must brook it until we can outdo them, in literature at
    least. They are (say many) retailers of wooden nutmegs--unfair
    dealers, and a canting, snivelling, hypocritical set; tell me
    where the country is, where the population is growing
    dense--where means of living are scarce--land high--trades
    overstocked--professions run down--and manufactures injured by
    foreign competition, in which the little arts of trade, and
    'tricks upon travellers' do not also flourish. Let the population
    of your 'old dominion' be once multiplied by wholesome
    legislation, or rather let the yearly emigrants be induced to
    stay in the land of their sires, and the same cunning usages will
    prevail. As to the 'canting and snivelling,' you must allow
    something for the descendants of the Pilgrims. Besides, tell me,
    liberal sir, if you have not, in the very bosom of your great
    valley, as genuine Presbyterians and Roundheads as ever graced
    the Rump Parliament, or sung a psalm on horseback. And to give
    the devil his due, these same Presbyterians are no bad citizens
    of a popular government. But there is the lady of the Black
    Mantle. Observe that she was born north of the Potomac, yet I
    would wager any thing that you could not look steadily upon her
    face for one minute, and curse the Yankees as I have heard you
    do. I know you will say, therein lies the cause of my sudden
    conversion to Yankeeism. By no means! I had begun to find out
    that the Yankees had souls like other people, before I had ever
    seen her.

    "I approve of your determination to travel, and that even to the
    south, rather than not to travel at all; but is there not some
    danger lest a Virginian should become more bigoted, by travelling
    among a people still more bigoted than himself. I know your
    disposition; it is to hug up your dear southern prejudices within
    your own bosom. Lamar and I are becoming liberal, and then we
    will cast out devils for you. Do not forget that I shall have a
    mother and cousin there by the time you arrive at the high hills
    of the Santee. Lamar has taken desperately to a six foot
    Kentuckian, as fine a specimen as you could wish to see; he is
    what may be called an American yeoman of the west.

                                   "Yours truly,

                                                  "VICTOR CHEVILLERE."

       *       *       *       *       *


    B. RANDOLPH TO V. CHEVILLERE.

                                         "Salem, North Carolina, 18--.

    "DEAR CHEVILLERE,

    "Thus far I have flown before the wind--sand, I should have said.
    At any rate, here I am, in this town of German religionists. Here
    dwells the first unanimous people I have ever seen. They are
    Moravians; and every thing is managed by this little community
    for the common benefit. They have one tavern, one store, one
    doctor, one tanner, one potter, and so on in every trade or
    occupation. Besides these, they have a church and a flourishing
    female seminary. The latter is conducted upon the utilitarian
    plan--each lady, in turn, has to perform the offices of cook,
    laundress, and gardener; and, I need hardly say, that it is
    admirably conducted. After I had visited all these
    establishments--for every respectable looking stranger is waited
    upon by some one appointed for that purpose to conduct him
    thither,--I returned to the large, cool, and comfortable inn, and
    had scarcely seated myself to enjoy the comforts of nicotiana,
    when a small billet was handed to me by a handsomely dressed and
    polite black servant with a glazed hat, which not a little
    astonished me, you may be sure. I had not a living acquaintance
    in the whole state that I knew of; except, indeed, old Father
    Bagby, the master of ceremonies to the little community. It could
    not be a challenge from some Hans Von Puffenburg of these quiet
    burghers: so I concluded it must be a billet-doux from some of
    the beautiful creatures at the seminary on the hill. You can
    easily imagine, therefore, that I was no long time in tearing it
    open; when, behold! it was, in good truth, from a lady. Can you
    guess who? No. Then take the note itself entire.

        "'DEAR SIR,

        "'If, as I believe, you are the same Mr. Randolph who was a
        room and class-mate of my son Victor Chevillere, in college,
        I will be very glad to see you. The servant will show you to
        our little parlour.

                                                "'M. J. CHEVILLERE.'

    "'I am the luckiest dog alive,' said I, jumping nearly over the
    negro's head, 'Is your young mistress here also.'

    "'Yes, masta, she is just leaving school for home, so please you.'

    "'Please me!' said I; 'to be sure it does please me; I never was
    more pleased in all my life. For I was just about to forswear
    these eternal pine-barrens and sand-hills, and face to the
    right-about. So lead the way to your two mistresses.' Whereupon he
    led the way, hat in hand, to a room in the inn; and there,
    Chevillere, sat your honoured mother. Commend me to our southern
    matrons in high-life. Not that I know any thing against your
    northern ladies, old or young; but there is in our mothers a mild
    dignity, hospitality, and politeness, which makes every one at
    home. But I need not describe to you your own. But I will not
    promise you as much of the little blushing southern brunette, who
    gracefully arose on your mother's saying, 'Mr. Randolph, my
    adopted daughter Virginia Bell Chevillere.' I saw in an instant
    that you had told her of our college bargain, and my falling in
    love with her miniature. By-the-by, you ought to break that
    slanderous miniature, or the head of the dauber who perpetrated
    it. Her beauty never could be delineated on ivory or canvass. Can
    any one paint the living, breathing soul of a very young and
    beautiful female? No! and I'll tell you why. If a man had the
    genius to do so, the very enthusiasm which always attends it would
    throw him into very unpainter-like raptures at the sight of such a
    one; and that's the true reason why artists so seldom succeed in
    delineating young females. A precious piece of logic for you. But
    to return to the original of the picture; there was a blushing
    consciousness about the little Bell, as everybody calls her, which
    was truly charming. Her jet black hair and eyes shone like ebony;
    her brilliant white teeth and brunette complexion were radiant
    with blushing smiles at this first reception of her long-promised
    husband. There was no girlish pouting, or childish affectation, as
    is too often the case when the parties have been laid off for each
    other; she was at the same time modest and self-possessed; her
    fairy figure glided about, as if her little fairy foot scarcely
    touched the carpet. I tell you these things, because you asked me
    to do so in all plainness of speech. Your cousin is all that a
    cousin of my dearest friend should be--lovely, intelligent, and
    interesting.

    "Your mother intended to wait here for some male friend, who has
    diverged a day's ride from their route home from the Springs; but
    she has now determined to leave this place to-morrow. I shall
    escort them as far as the Chevilleres' proud family seat,
    Belville. You will, therefore, hear no more complaints of the
    dreariness of the eternal pine-barrens, or the fever-and-ague
    appearance of the poor; except, that I will say now, once for all,
    that the poor of a slave-country are the most miserable and the
    most wretched of all the human family. The grades of society in
    this state are even farther apart than in Virginia. Here, there is
    one immense chasm from the rich to the abject poor. In the valley
    of Virginia, or in the country where you are, there are regular
    gradations. The very happiest, most useful, and most industrious
    class of a well-regulated community, is here wanting. Their place
    is filled up by negroes; in consequence of which, your
    aristocrats are more aristocratic, and your poor still poorer. The
    slaves create an immeasurable distance between these two classes,
    which can never be brought together until this separating cause be
    removed. You know I am no _abolitionist_, in the incendiary
    meaning of the term; yet I cannot deny from you and myself, that
    they are an incubus upon our prosperity. This we would boldly
    deny, if a Yankee uttered it in our hearing; but to ourselves, we
    must e'en confess it. If I am, therefore, an abolitionist, it is
    not for conscience-sake, but from policy and patriotism.

    "We can never rival those northern people, until we assume the
    modern tactics in this provincial warfare; that is, throw aside
    all useless baggage, and concentrate our energies upon a single
    point at a time. I have done with this theme for the present, and
    will repair to your friends.

    "Your mother knows nothing of our college-treaty, therefore she
    little thinks what a masked enemy she has let into the camp.
    Little Bell smiles, and enjoys our mutual understanding highly.
    But there lies the mischief; she smiles too innocently, and too
    calmly, and too openly, and has lost too much of that blushing
    mood in which she first received me; and I have thought several
    times that the little arch gipsy was laughing at me. If she had
    not been your cousin, and my affianced bride for the last five
    years, I should have taken leave. _You_ know I never could stand
    to be exhibited; and would prefer being shot, at any time, to
    being laughed at. I shall watch the little fairy, and see if she
    is making me her butt; if so, I will see them safe to Belville,
    and then--you shall hear from me again.

    "You requested me to point out to you any thing in which I should
    observe that the Carolinas differed from Virginia. I must say
    then, with the judges, when they are pronouncing sentence,
    'however painful may be the duty imposed upon me,' that your
    country appears more miserable the more deeply I penetrate it. Not
    that you lack splendid mansions, and magnificent cotton-fields
    varied with flowers, rich and tropical gardens, the orange and the
    'pride of India,' your wild and fragrant swamp-flowers, princely
    hospitality, accomplished men and women,--not that you lack any of
    these. But the seeds of decay are sown at the very point where
    energy--enterprise--national
    pride--industry--economy--amusements--gayety--and above all,
    intelligence, should grow, namely, with your yeomanry!

    "I would not, if I could, have your young men and women
    transformed to spinning-jennies. Heaven forefend! I would have
    your lowest class of whites elevated to the dignity of intelligent
    and independent yeomen. How would I effect it? you ask. Apply the
    grand lever by which all human movement is brought about--hope!
    Has a poor North Carolinian hope? See him, on some cloudless
    morning, when the glorious rays of the sun are gladdening the
    hearts even of the unintelligent creation, standing within the
    door of his pine-log cabin, his hands in his pockets, his head
    leaning against the door in melancholy mood. Some half-dozen pale
    and swollen-faced children are sitting on a bench against the side
    of the hut, endeavouring to warm away the ague in the sunbeams.
    The wife lies sick in bed. The little fields are barely marked out
    with a rotten and broken-down pole-fence, and overgrown with
    broom, or Bermuda-grass, and blackberry-bushes. A miserable horse
    stands beyond the fence, doubtful whether there is better grazing
    within or without. A little short-cotton and sweet-potato patch,
    flanked by an acre of scrubby Indian corn; and, added to these,
    five poor sheep, two goats, and a lean cow, complete the inventory
    of his goods and chattels. You have all his cause for _hope_! You
    have, too, his causes for fear. He has in his pocket a summons for
    debt, contracted for sugar and tea, and other needful comforts,
    for his sick wife and children.

    "Had he any cause for hope? God knows he had none in this world.
    But you will say the picture is exaggerated. As I am a true man
    and a southern, it is not.

    "I was benighted, and sought lodgings in the very house I have
    described. 'Who lives here,' said I, on riding to the door. 'One
    Fifer,' said a white-headed, half-grown girl, so weak that she
    could scarcely stand. I sat up nearly all night with the sick
    woman and children. On relieving the poor man's embarrassments in
    the morning, I received the heart-felt thanks of the wretched
    family; and almost rode my horse to exhaustion, to get away from
    the wretched image imprinted on my memory.

    "Is this man a sample of the yeomanry of your country? I say, in
    deep and profound sorrow, I believe that he is. Where, then, does
    the evil lie? This is a question which every southern must soon
    ask himself, and one which Nullification cannot answer.

    "_Here_, then, is a triumphant answer--an answer in deeds, instead
    of words--in the happiness, the prosperity, and the substantial
    wealth of these simple and primitive Moravians. Here, where I am
    writing, is an industrious, intelligent, and healthy community, in
    the very heart of all the misery I before described. Let us then
    improve by the lesson, seek out the sources of their prosperity,
    find the point where their plans diverge from ours, and, my word
    for it (if there be no reason in the case), we become a great, a
    flourishing, and a happy people.

    "But I must take one small exception to the Moravian political
    economy. They require all the young gentlemen to be enrolled on
    one list, and all the willing young ladies on another; and the
    first gentleman on the list must marry the first lady; so that
    they are drafted for marriage, as our Virginia militia are drafted
    for duty. I do not know that this is certainly true; but if it be
    true, that a youth must marry the first that comes up, _nolens
    volens_, I would put in a plump negative. This excepted, they are
    worthy of all imitation, even to the drinking of home-brewed in
    their pewter mugs, and smoking long pipes around their
    council-table, when their little legislature meets.

    "There are no slaves in this little nation, and labour is no
    disgrace. In the extensive grounds, belonging to the female
    seminary, I saw many pretty little arms bared to work; not
    Moravian young ladies only, but elegant and aristocratic young
    ladies from all parts of the southern states, without distinction,
    and of every sect and denomination; and I never saw more beautiful
    complexions. The little gipsies would come in from their work in
    the morning, blooming as roses. Here is a complete refutation of
    the assertion, that the whites cannot work in a southern climate;
    here are as fine lands, and as fine husbandry and horticulture, as
    can be found in any country; here are the first paved streets
    south of Petersburg; here the first town, in which water is
    conveyed by pipes, as in Philadelphia; here the first stone-fences
    and grass-plots.

    "Your mother and little Bell are cheerful and happy. Indeed, the
    latter looks as if she had never suffered for a moment. How happy
    a life is that of a girl at a boarding-school, exempt from all the
    pains and penalties of collegians--the 'hair-breadth 'scapes'--the
    formal trials for riding other people's horses,--ringing church
    bells,--building fences across the road,--hanging cake and beer
    signs at magistrates' and elders' doors,--burnings in effigy,
    fights at country weddings and dances,--exploring expeditions in
    the mountains and caverns, professedly for geological, but really
    for depredating purposes,--shooting house-dogs,--expeditions upon
    the water, and skating upon the ice,--swimming, duelling,
    fighting, biting, scratching,--firing crackers and cannons in
    college entries,--heavy meat suppers, with oceans of strong
    waters,--and then headache, thirst, soda and congress-water in the
    morning, and perhaps a visit from the doctor or the
    president,--presentments by the grand jury for playing at cards
    and overturning apple-carts,--personating ghosts with
    winding-sheets, and getting knocked on the head for their
    pains,--serenading sweethearts, and taking linchpins out of
    wagons,--making sober people drunk and drunken people
    sober,--battling with watchmen, constables, and sheriffs,--running
    away from the tailors and tavern-keepers,--kissing country girls,
    and battling with their beaux,--tricks upon the tutors, and
    shaving the tails of the president's horses,--stealing away the
    lion or the elephant at an animal show, and pelting strolling
    players,--putting hencoops upon churches, painting out signs, and
    carrying off platforms,--throwing hot rolls under the table, and
    biscuit at the steward's head,--playing musical seals at prayers,
    and saying prayers at rows,--gambling in study hours, and filching
    at recitation,--having one face for the president and another for
    the fellows,--and, finally, being sent home with a letter to your
    father, informing him that you are corrupting the morals of your
    _teachers_ in these pranks. These are a few of the classical
    studies into which the dear little innocents are never initiated,
    while they form no small part of collegiate education in America,
    as we can testify from experience.

    "Many a fine fellow makes the first trial of a stump speech, with
    an extract from an Irish sermon at a drunken row; his head perhaps
    stuck three feet through the window of the little bar in a tavern,
    and his audience sitting round on the beer-tables, armed with
    sticks, stones, and staves. One, who with drunken gravity keeps
    his head and stick moving all the while, says, that he concurs
    fully in opinion with the speaker; though, if asked what the
    subject is, he swears it is the Greek question. The question and
    the laugh go round. One avers stoutly that it is Catholic
    emancipation; a third vociferates that it is a complete
    justification of Brutus for killing Cæsar; a fourth thinks it a
    part of the recitation of the day, while the most drunken man of
    the company jumps down from his seat on the table, and swears that
    he can see through the fellow clearly, 'it's nothing but sleight
    of hand;' with which he exclaims, as he rubs his eyes and looks
    round, 'Bless my soul, boys, how drunk you all are; come, I'll
    help you to your room before matters get worse,' leading off the
    soberest man in the room. The party then breaks up in a regular
    row; I think I see the _old_ fellows now, marching off two and two
    with the true would-be sober and drunken gravity, every man
    thinking that he is completely cheating his neighbour, by his
    picked steps and exactly poised head and shoulders, like a drunken
    soldier on drill. One gets into a carriage rut; another climbs
    into a pig-sty, and thinks he is getting over the college fence. A
    third falls over a cow, while a fourth takes off his hat to a
    blind horse, mistaking him in the dark for the president. At
    length they are lodged in bed, with boots, hats, and clubs, like
    soldiers expecting a surprise. Some murder a song or two in a
    drunken twang, while the rest snore in chorus.

    "But next comes the awful reward of transgression in the morning;
    dry throats, aching limbs, torn coats, sick stomachs, haggard
    countenances, swelled heads. The trembling and moody toilet is
    made; the bell rings for prayers; and a more repentant set of
    sinners never assembled under its sound. All wonder what has
    become of the joyous feelings of the previous night, and think
    with shame of such actions and speeches as they can recollect.
    Hereupon follows a gloomy and melancholy day. They are home-sick.
    Relations, friends, and the scenes of childhood, with all their
    quiet, innocent, and heartfelt pleasures, glide before the
    imagination. The head becomes dizzy; the heart palpitates; the
    hands tremble, and the sight grows double. Then comes the fear of
    illness, and death in a strange land. Associates of the 'row' are
    avoided; several chapters in the Bible are read; repentance is
    promised; sleep settles the nervous system; and next morning they
    arise gay and happy. This continues until the scene is repeated,
    and so on, until one half forswear brandy and the other half
    become confirmed sots.

    "Here is a coherent epistle for you. But if you dislike it, send
    it back, and I will divide it into--first--secondly--thirdly, et
    cetera, as the old president did his sermons.

                                                        "B. RANDOLPH."



CHAPTER VI.


After the visit to the monument, Chevillere daily inquired concerning
the health of the interesting invalid; and as regularly was
indisposition pleaded for her non-appearance. Late in the evening of the
third day, he was slowly pacing the pavement in front of the hotel; now
and then throwing a wistful glance at the lighted window of the lady,
when all at once he suddenly wheeled round, and grasping in the dark,
was surprised to find that a person whom he had supposed to be
impertinently dogging his steps, had eluded his grasp. He grimly smiled
at his own exasperation for an imaginary cause, hastily adjusted his
cloak, and turned down the street leading most directly to the bay.

When he arrived at the quiet and deserted wharf, and the rapid flow of
his impetuous blood was retarded by the cool invigorating breeze which
swept over the face of the water, he saw an old yawl lying on the dock,
with its broad bottom turned to the bay. Negligently leaning his person
at full length against its weather-beaten bottom, and drawing down his
hat close over his brows, he surrendered himself to one of those
habitual reveries which the southern well knows how to enjoy. Had his
mind and feelings been attuned to such things at the time, the scene
itself would have furnished no uninteresting subject, with its hundred
little lights, gleaming in the intense fog and darkness, and the
numberless vessels that lay upon the bosom of the waters, with their
dark outlines dimly visible, like slumbering monsters of their own
element. He heeded them not; yet were his feelings insensibly impressed
with the surrounding objects, and deeply tinctured with the profound
gloom of the time and scene. The direct current of his thoughts pointed,
however, in the direction of the invalid. Her extreme youth, beauty, and
apparent innocence,--her deep distress and profound melancholy,
naturally produced a corresponding depression in his own otherwise
elastic spirits. He was perfectly unconscious of the time he had spent
in this way, when accidentally turning his head to one side, he was
struck with the appearance of something intercepting the line of vision
in that direction. He was just about to approach the cause of his
surprise, when a deep voice, issuing from the very spot, added not a
little to his superstitious mood, by the exact manner in which it chimed
in with the present subject of his meditations.

"A beautiful young woman in affliction is a very dangerous subject of
meditation, under some circumstances."

"An honest heart fears no danger from any earthly source," was the
reply.

"Honesty is no guard against external danger in this world, whether
moral or physical," said the figure.

"Discernment may lend a hand to honesty in such a case."

"Ha! ha! ha!" hideously retorted the intruder; "Discernment, said you?
Man's discernment is a mighty thing; by it he reads the past, the
present, and the future; what can withstand his mighty vision? He can
descry danger at a distance, and bring happiness within his grasp; he
can tell the objects of his own creation, and his Creator's first
beginning; he can read the starry alphabet in yonder heavens, and fathom
the great deep; he can laugh at the instinct of grovelling creation, and
thunder the dogmas of reason in the teeth of revelation itself!
Discernment, indeed! ha! ha! ha! why, man is not half so well off as the
brutes. What is their instinct but God's ever present and supporting
hand; but man--he has neither perfect reason nor instinct! He has the
conscience of an angel, and the impulses of a devil; and reason sits
between them, for an umpire, with a fool's cap upon her head! Impulse
bribes reason, and reason laughs at conscience. Impulse leads downward,
like the power of gravity; and conscience struggles upward like the
nightmare: but reason and discernment will traffic and bargain with
impulse for one moment, and blind or cheat conscience the next! Turn
mankind loose with all their reason without providence, and they will
butt each other's foolish brains out! Bribed conscience makes
hypocrites,--frightened conscience makes fanatics,--but reason-drilled
conscience makes incarnate devils!"

"But," said Chevillere, involuntarily interested by this wild rhapsody,
"a tender, conscience-instructed reason, and christianized impulses,
make an honest and a discerning man, too."

"Instructed reason! who teaches man's reason, but the inward devils of
his impulses? A few good parents may point upward, periodically, but the
impulses pull down! down! down! for ever! no intermission. If they would
let go, I myself could plunge into the sea; but the deeper we plunge,
the harder they pull! The farther we sink, the heavier they become. Oh!
man! of what a cursed race art thou! Think you the inhabitants of the
moon are likewise under the ban of God's displeasure?"

"I indulge in no such impracticable dreams," said Chevillere.

"No! no! _you_ dream of paradise; but remember what I now tell you, your
paradise will not be without its Eve, and its serpent too!"

"To whom do you allude?"

"To the lady of whom you were thinking but now."

"You know not what you say," said Chevillere.

"Do I not? Perhaps you would have me speak more plainly! Perhaps you
could screw up your resolution to the point, that I might amputate your
hopes one by one, as a poor fellow sees the surgeon carrying off his
bloody limbs; nay, I could do it!"

"Why, sir, you never saw me till within the hour."

"Have I not? perhaps not; I would to heaven I could say as much about
the lady."

"To what lady do you so often allude?"

"To the lady with the _black mantle_."

"Hold, she is all innocence and purity."

"Innocence and purity! Eve was innocent and pure too! yea, and
surpassingly beautiful! but she fell! Alas! her daughters are like her."

"Come, sir," said Chevillere, with some exasperation, "let us put a stop
to this discourse; it is not pleasing to me, and I feel sure it is not
useful to you."

"Be it so," said the intruder, drawing up his long goat's-hair cloak,
and pulling a flat cloth cap closely over his gray locks, as they for a
moment became visible by the reflection of the long horizontal rays of a
lamp from the deck of a neighbouring vessel; "be it so, sir; there is no
convincing a child that a _beautiful_ candle will burn until it scorches
its fingers."

"In God's name, then, out with it, sir! what is it that seems to burn so
upon your tongue? come, out with it!" said Chevillere, sharply.

"For what do you take me, young man? a gossip or a stripling! I am
neither one nor the other; I am old enough to be your father; as well
born and as well educated as he ever was; and (notwithstanding your
southern blood and aristocratic notions) it may be as proud; farewell,
sir, and the next time I offer to pull you from the edge of a precipice,
perhaps you will listen with more respect to one of double your age, who
can have no interest in deceiving you. Farewell, sir!"

"Stay! stay! a moment,--one word more. Did you not visit Washington's
monument three days ago, and see me there for the first time?"

"I could answer either yes or no to that question. How do you know, sir,
that we have not met before, centuries ago? Do you not sometimes foresee
a whole scene, just as it afterward takes place? Do you not sometimes
look upon a strange face with a shudder? Does not a feature--a smile--or
an expression of them combined--sometimes awake the slumbering memory of
ages? Is it not so? have you never communed with the dead?"

"Never, sir."

"I have, often! often!--and many times have I been warned of approaching
evils, by these dreamy conversations; I never dream of seeing my father
smile upon me, that something good does not speedily follow; nor of
snakes and serpents, unattended by bad news or bad fortune. Of these
things I usually dream the night before meeting the lady yonder, after a
long absence."

"I supposed as much," said Chevillere.

"How, sir."

"I supposed that you had _dreamed_ something against that pure and
unfortunate young lady."

"Would to Heaven it were all a dream! Sunshine would again break into
the dark regions of my thoughts."

"Suppose I should undertake and pledge my life to convince you that it
is so."

"You might convince me of your sincerity, but not of your power. Can you
raise the dead?"

"No, but what has raising the dead to do with the lady?"

"More than you imagine, perhaps."

"Ah, I see it is useless to attempt what I proposed and hoped to effect
for the sake of the lady's peace. Have you no friends with you in this
city?"

"Yes, I have a dog! there sits the best friend I ever had, save one!"

"My dear sir! permit me to say I think you far from being well."

"I never felt better in health than I do at this moment."

"But we are not judges of our own ailments: Physicians do not often
prescribe for themselves."

"I tell you, sir, I am well!"

"Have it so, sir! but if you are the person whom I met a few days since
at the monument, I would mildly and respectfully recommend to you to
think no more of the lady you saw there with me. You certainly labour
under some grievous error, with regard to her, at least."

"You will find, when it is too late, perhaps, that others instead of me
are labouring under _fatal_ errors concerning that young lady!
Farewell, sir, farewell. When next we meet, you will listen with a more
attentive ear to what I have to say; you will have observed many strange
things yourself, and you will naturally seek, rather than repel a
solution of the mystery." Then with a signal to his dog, he hastily went
from the wharf, leaving Chevillere in no enviable state of mind.

Youthful thoughts will not long voluntarily dwell upon the gloomy aspect
even of the circumstances surrounding themselves; it was very natural,
therefore, that Chevillere should reflect with much complacency upon the
tendency of his friend Lamar's laughing philosophy; nor was he long in
threading his way to the lodgings of the Kentuckian. He had calculated
with great certainty upon finding his friend there, and on ascending the
three flights of stairs, he heard the voices of both in full chorus of
laughter, that of Lamar indicating his most joyful mood. He rapped at
the door once or twice before he was heard. "Come in!" shouted the
backwoodsman, "what the devil's the use of knocking with every mug of
punch." Lamar sprang to his feet at the sight of his friend, with
volumes of smoke rolling over his head, and laying one hand on
Chevillere's back and another on his breast, cried in the true mock
heroic;--"'Be thy intents wicked or charitable, thou com'st in such a
questionable shape, that I will speak to thee.' 'Revisit'st thou thus
the glimpses of the moon, making night hideous, and us fools of'
liquor--'so horribly to shake our dispositions, with thoughts beyond the
reaches of our souls; say, why is this?' But, by old Shakspeare's beard,
you look like a ghost indeed! why, whence com'st thou, man? see his
cloak, too! it is covered with sawdust!"

"Hurrah for old Kentuck!" said Damon, "he's been to the circus! I say,
stranger, was there any knockin down and draggin out there. O! black
eyes and bruises! what a rascally appetite I've got now for a knock
down; I swear I think my hands will git as tender as a woman's, if I
don't git a little now and then jist to keep 'em in."

"I may be soiled from leaning against a boat at the dock," said
Chevillere.

"You certainly have the air of one who had tried a few perils by land
and sea," said Lamar.

"The fact is, I do not feel well, nor in high spirits, and I came here
on purpose to see if Damon could not brighten me up a little."

"To be sure I can," said he; "but why didn't you come sooner, and then
we could all have gone to the circus together; that's the place for my
money; you see you want something to make your blood circulate: a small
taste or two would soon bring you round."

"A taste of what?" asked Chevillere.

"A small bit of a regular row, to be sure; all in good-nature, you know;
a man needn't git in a passion, in takin a little exercise after bein
cooped up here all day, in one of these cocklofts--why, if I sit here an
hour, and go down in the street, by hokies, but I want to snort
directly; I feel like old Pete when he's been stabled up for a week or
two, and jist turned loose to graze a little; and I'll tell you what it
is, stranger, I'm for making a straight coat-tail out of this place, and
that in a hurry, for I've got through all my business now, and I'm keen
to be among the Yorkers; for I've heard tell there's smashin work there
every night."

"Have you any acquaintances there?" asked Lamar.

"No; but I expect to find some of our Kentuck boys there, who come round
by the lakes; and if I do, I rather reckon we'll weed a wide row."

"Take care you do not run against old Hays in your mad pranks," said
Chevillere.

"They say he's a little touched with the snappin-turtle, but I'm thinkin
he'd hardly try old Kentuck at a fight or a foot-race."

"He has had a good many fights and foot-races in his day," said
Chevillere.

"Yes," said Damon, "but always with rogues; he'd find it rather a
different business at an honest ground-scuffle, where every man had to
take care of his own ears."

"You think, then, he could not be so successful in Kentucky as he is in
New-York, at his occupation," said Lamar.

"He'd be off the scent there, and I rather think he'd soon look like the
babes in the woods; you see he has the rogues in the city like a coon
when he's treed; an old dog's better than a young one in such a fix."

"But come, Damon, go on with your adventures of the day which
Chevillere's entrance interrupted."

"Not till we have wet our whistles; come, stranger (to Chevillere), you
have'nt drank nothin since you came into the room, nor into the city
either, for what I know."

"You know," said Chevillere, "that I am a cold water man, upon taste and
principle both."

"And that's what I call ra'al hard drink; well, here's to the little gal
of the circus, and the little gal down yonder at the hotel; cold water's
but a sorry drink to pledge such warm-hearted creters--but I see talking
of them makes you look solemncholy again, and so here goes for my day's
work; let me see--where did I leave off?"

"At the commission house where you carried the letter," said Lamar.

"Ah, by the hokies! so it was. Well, you see, I marched into the great
store, as they had told me it was, with my nose uppermost, like a pig in
the wind, I had an order on them for some of the eel-skins--but I soon
brought my snout down agin; ho! ho! thought I, here's a pretty spot of
work! I'm a Turk if I aint tetotally dished."

"What was the matter?" said Chevillere.

"Why, instead of all the fine things loomin out in the wind as I
expected for such great marchants, I found nothing but a long empty
store, and no shelves even, and there sat two or three starched lookin
dogs, on so many old rum bar'ls; I swear I thought in a minute about our
old still-house, and the school-master, and the miller, and the
blacksmith, and the stiller, talkin politics over the bar'ls, and takin
a swig every now and then out of the old proof-vial."

"Well! you presented your draft," said Lamar, "and what then?"

"No I did'nt--I got a straddle of a bar'l too; I thought I would take a
dish of chat, for that was about the most I expected to get. Rat me! but
I began to feel a little particular about the gizzard in thoughts of
sellin old Pete to get home on; I put on a long face. It's everlastin
dull times for business, said I. 'O sir, you are quite mistaken,
business is taking a look up--it's getting very brisk indeed.' And he
rubbed his hands, and looked as glad as if he had had a drink of that
hot punch. So, thought I, I'm off the trail; but I thought I would tree
him next time. 'The best horses, said I, will stumble sometimes.' 'Sir?'
said he, I said 'the honestest men sometimes make bad speculations.'
'Oh!' said he, 'I understand you! but I hope business is brisk and money
plenty this season in the west.' Now, thought I, he's got the boot on
the wrong leg this time; 'yes, said I, we can't complain, but I must say
I thought it looked a little dull hereabouts.' 'O, you western men are
such driving fellows, that you can't put up with our slow way of makin
money.' He's feedin me on soft corn, thought I. 'We do a little now and
then, but getting the money afterward is all our trouble,' said I. 'Why,
sir, you have hit the nail upon the head; that's the difficulty
everywhere,' said he. I thought I would run him into a stand 'fore long;
but he hoisted his tail and flung me clean off the trail agin. 'Can't I
sell you half a dozen bar'ls of cognac brandy to-day,' said he. I
snapped my fingers and jumped up, and by the long Harry I was near
raisin the whoop; for I thought old Pete and the money was all safe, and
so it was. 'O! the hunters of Kentucky! old Kentucky;' and he began to
sing and caper round the table.

"Did he pay the money?" asked Chevillere.

"Not exactly; these city chaps keep their money buried, I believe, for
you never see none of it; I reckon they're 'fraid it'll spile;
howsomever, he gave me an order on the bank for the eel-skins."

"Then you took your leave," said Lamar.

"No; he asked me if I had ever seen an auction of a ship's cargo; I said
no, I had never seen more nor a Kentuck vendue: he asked me to go along;
I'm your man, said I, for I expected there would be smashin work if a
whole ship-load was to be sold, for I have seen some very clever little
skrimmages at a vendue; well, when we got there, there was boxes and
bags all laying in rows, and little troughs laying under them, like them
we catch sugar-water in. Some had little long spoons made on purpose to
suck sugar with, and some had little augers for boring holes; presently
the crier began. '_Seven, seven, seven--eight, eight, eight cents a
pound, going, going_,' and smash went the little mallet; 'how many do
you take, sir? twenty, or the hundred boxes?' said he. 'Take the
hundred,' said a man, that looked like he wasn't worth the powder that
would blow him up."

"Could you always tell who bid?"

"No; they mostly did it by winkin, I believe; sometimes one fellow would
grunt this side and another that side; I kept my head bobbin after them
first one side and then the other; but whenever I looked in their faces
their eyes looked as sleepy as a dog in fly-time, just waitin to snap a
fellow that was buzzin about his ears."

"Did you find out at last who were the bidders?"

"No; they shut up their faces like steel-traps. Once or twice, maybe, I
saw a dyin-away wrinkle round a feller's mouth, like the rings in the
water when you throw a stone in; but they soon faded away, and they
looked as smooth and deceitful as a pool of deep water itself agin."

"They tasted and tried the articles, of course, before they bought?"

"Yes; some of them had their mouths daubed, like children suckin 'lasses
candy; and some of their big noses was stuck full of Bohea tea, outside
and in, like old Pete when he's had a good feed of chopped rye and cut
straw."

"And what sort of a man was the auctioneer?"

"Why, his mouth went so fast when he got to '_going, going, going_,'
that you couldn't say _stop_, if you had had your mouth fixed; but his
face I didn't like at all."

"What was there in his face objectionable?"

"O! I can't tell exactly, it looked out of all sort of nature; a good
deal I don't know howish. One thing I'll be sworn to, you would never
see such a one in old Kentuck; there every man wears his Sunday face on
week days."

"I suppose you mean that the man was disfigured with affectation," said
Chevillere.

"You've hit it, stranger, you've hit it; that's the very word I wanted
to be at, but I couldn't get it out. Well, from the vendue I took a
stroll round town, to see the lads and lasses; how they carried their
heads in these parts, and maybe to see how they carried on their
_sparkin_ in a big town like this; for, to tell you the truth, that's
one of the things I never could see how they carried on here."

"How did you manage such things in the west? Is there any thing peculiar
in your method?"

"I can't say we're different from other folks in the country, but you
see we have abundance of chances to court the gals a little; for there's
our weddings."

"There are weddings here, too, I hope," said Lamar.

"Yes, and a pretty business they make of 'em; I blundered into a church
the other day, and what should be goin on there but a weddin; and smash
my apple-cart, if there wasn't more cryin and snifflin than I've seen at
many an honest man's funeral, and all in broad daylight, too; and when
the parson had got through his flummery, with his long white mornin
gown, they all jumped into carriages, and off they went away into the
country somewhere, to hide themselves. I rather suspect they had stole a
march on the old folks, else they wouldn't have run so as if the devil
was at their heels."

"How do you conduct such things in the west?" asked Lamar.

"Oh! there we have quiltings, skutchings, and sewin frolics, and makin
apple butter, and all such like; and they always wind up at the little
end with a rip-sneezin dance, and that's where we do the sparkin; well,
presently a weddin grows out of it, and maybe then there isn't a little
fun agoing, dance all night, and play all sort of games, at least all
them sort that wind up in kissin the gals, and that they manage to bring
about by sellin pawns, and one thing or other. For my part, I never
could see into any but the kissin part, and that you know was the cream
of the joke."

"They do not often go to church to get married then," said Chevillere.

"No; I never saw anybody married at church before t'other day, and I
hope it'll be a long time before their new-fangled ways travels out to
old Kentuck; there our gals and boys stands up before the parson a few
minutes, and he rolls his tobacco two or three times over his teeth,
and _chaws_ a few words, and it's all over before you could say 'God
save the commonwealth' three times; and what's the use in makin three
bites of a cherry?"

"But you have wandered from your point," said Lamar; "you started out on
an expedition to see how the lads and lasses carried themselves here."

"O! ay, sure enough; well, one of the first things I come across was a
parcel of gals and boys on horseback, and I'm flummucked if it wouldn't
have been a pretty tolerable show in the land of hogs and homminy. The
gals rode well enough, considering how they were hampered with clothes
and trumpery; but the men! O smashy! how they rode! bobbin up and down
on the saddle, with three motions to the horse's one. I'm an Injin if
old Pete Ironsides wouldn't have kicked up his heels and squealed at the
very first motion of the rider goin ahead of him; and then the saddles
were stuck on the shoulders of the animals, like a hump on a man's back,
or a pair of _haims_ to hitch traces to. One of them chaps would ride a
saddle about twice as hard as a horse. I was lookin evry minute for one
of 'em to light behind his saddle."

"Did all the gentlemen and ladies you met carry themselves so
unnaturally?" said Lamar.

"No; I met one young lady dressed in black that I thought I had seen
before somewhere, and her spark too; but they were too busy to see me.
_She_ looked more coy and shamefaced, like our country gals, than any of
them."

"How did the gentleman bear himself? was he polite and respectful in his
carriage?" said Lamar, smiling, and looking at Chevillere.

"Oh, yes! he bowed his head close down to the bonnet of the pretty
little lady, and walked that way all through the street, as if he was
afraid to lose so much as a word; sometimes she seemed to be just ready
to cry, and looked pale and frightened. I rather suppose her old dad's a
little sour or cross, maybe; but for all I couldn't help thinkin what a
clever nice young couple they would make to stand up before the parson."

Chevillere attempted reserve of manner, but blushed and smiled in spite
of himself, as he asked Damon, "Not your chaw-tobacco parson, I hope?"

"And why not? what if he _would_ roll his chaw-tobacco into one cheek at
you, while he coupled you up with the other? I'll be bound you'd look at
somebody else's pretty cheeks more nor you would at the parson's
chaw-tobacco; besides, what harm is there in a parson's chawin? I know
an old one who would no more git up into his pulpit of a Sunday without
a good smart plug in his mouth, than I would strike my own brother when
he's down. I've seen him afore now, when his wind held out longer than
his tobacco, run his finger first into one jacket-pocket, and then into
the other, and at last he'd draw a little piece of pigtail, just up to
the top of the water (as you may say), and then he'd let it go again."

"Some virtuous shame, in view of the congregation, I suppose," said
Chevillere.

"Yes, that was it; but I never heard any of the sarmont after the old
boy's ammunition run out."

"Why, what had his tobacco to do with your listening?"

"A great deal; no sooner would the old feller begin to fumble in his
pockets, than my hand always run into mine, of its own accord, and
lugged out a chunk of a twist just ready to hand to the old man, and
then when I'd find it couldn't be, I naturally took a plug myself, and
chawed for the old boss till his wind _flagg'd_."

"Or, in other words, his desire for the weed made you desire it, to cure
which you chewed for yourself, and flattered your conscience all the
while that you were rendering him a service," said Chevillere.

"Very like! very like! for I know it makes a feller husky dry to see
another famishin for a little of the cretur."

"Not so much so, perhaps, as if a dry person, as you call him, should
see another drinking, and could get none himself."

"Oh! but that's a case out of all nature, as one may say, in these
parts, anyhow, where liquor runs down the streets, after a manner."

Chevillere and Lamar, both rising, exchanged the usual salutations, and
the _good night! good night!_ went the rounds of all present.



CHAPTER VII.


"Were you not delighted with the wild and mountainous scenery of the
country around the Virginia Springs?" said Victor Chevillere to Miss St.
Clair, on the morning after the scene related in the last chapter, as
the lady reclined, in a pensive mood, in the room before described.

"Oh, sir, you forget that I was too feeble in mind and body to enjoy the
scenery around me then, or to partake of the enthusiasm of my friends on
the subject. The rich and romantic scenery of the White Sulphur was
highly attractive to me, when I became somewhat convalescent; yet I
shall carry with me through life a sad remembrance of scenes, which to
many others of my age and sex will ever be associated with the gay
dance, the enlivening gallopade, the stirring music, and with
adventurous equestrian excursions among the mountains."

"I believe," said Chevillere, "that the most melancholy reflections may
be and are much softened and mellowed in after-life, by being associated
in the mind with the profoundly poetical feelings excited by the
constant view of quiet mountain scenery; such as the well-remembered,
long, long line of blue peaks, stretching far away until they reach the
clouds and the horizon."

"It is indeed true," said she, "that kind and beautiful nature, in the
season of green leaves and flowers, will sometimes almost tempt us to
believe that misery is not the inevitable lot of the human family; but
when the consciousness of the one and the beauty of the other are
together present to us, it depends entirely upon the degree, whether the
beauty softens the suffering or not."

"In other words," said he, "whether the evil be so irremediable that
_hope_ cannot enter the heart; that the ravishing beauty of nature
cannot excite benevolence, devotion, and love."

"That was not entirely my case," said she, "for I am grateful for having
felt some pleasing excitement at the time, and for being able now to
call up many pleasurable remembrances, clouded as they are for the most
part with sadness."

"If I have been rightly informed, you did not visit all the other
springs around the White Sulphur."

"My health would not permit of our making the entire fashionable round."

"Oh, then you have missed much pleasure," said he. "There are the Sweet
Springs, rising out of the earth like a boiling caldron, with brilliant
little balloons of gas ever ascending to the top of the water, and
bursting in the sunbeams. There is not perhaps in the world such another
natural fountain of soda-water. And there is the Salt Sulphur, with its
high romantic hills covered with herds, and its beautiful meadows, and
its long village of neat white cottages, and its splendid
assembly-rooms, and its sumptuous banquets of wild game and artificial
luxuries. But, above all, there is the Warm Spring, with its clear blue
crystal baths, large enough for a troop of horse to swim in; there,
likewise, is an extensive green lawn, flanked on the one side by the
same kind of neat white cottages, and on the other by the line of blue
mountains, rising abruptly from the plain within gun-shot of the baths.
On a clear moonlight night, one may see the invalids sitting out on the
green in front of their doors, enjoying the placid scenery of the
valley, and the profound and solemn monotony of the overhanging
mountains,--sometimes, indeed, interrupted by the bustle of a new
arrival, the neighing of horses, the crash of the wheels, the hoarse
voices of the coachmen as they exchange advice upon the descent into the
valley, or by the meeting of old friends and fellow-invalids, perhaps
acquaintances of a former season, and fellow-sufferers with the gout,
bantering each other upon their speed."

"From what little I saw of them, I think they perfectly justify the
southern enthusiasm which we found everywhere on the subject; and I
should think that there is no finer opportunity of seeing southern
fashionable society."

"True; our wealthiest and most fashionable people resort thither every
season. Yet I cannot say in truth, from what I have observed myself,
that our aristocracy are seen there to the best advantage. They are too
much in their holyday suit of manners,--too artificial,--too unnatural.
I have seen people who were agreeable at home, become affected and
disagreeable at watering-places. I have also seen some who were reserved
at home, become quite affable there. The latter effect, however, was by
no means so common as the former."

"I did not see much affectation, or many unnatural people at the White
Sulphur," said the lady.

"I cannot say that it is one of the besetting sins of the southern
fashionables; all I meant to say was, that they show more of it there
than at home."

"For my own part, I was delighted with the generous, free, and
open-hearted manner in which I was treated by the few female
acquaintances I made; and I am almost ashamed to acknowledge that they
were far more intelligent and accomplished than my prejudices had taught
me to expect."

"You acknowledge, then, that you had some provincial prejudices. Let me
see! _then_ I must take you regularly to account, and catechise you."

"Well," said the lady, as lightly as her habitual sadness ever
permitted, "I will answer truly."

"I know you will speak truly whatever you do answer; but will you speak
the whole truth in answer to whatever I shall ask?"

A sad and afflicted expression appeared upon her countenance as she
replied, "I need hardly say to Mr. Chevillere, that those questions
which are proper for him to ask and for me to hear shall be fully
answered."

"You do me but justice in supposing that I would not discredit my new
dignity, by propounding questions which would lessen me in the eyes of a
fair witness; but, to tell you the truth, I seriously meditated putting
a few in addition to such as were local, and perhaps in a more serious
mood than these might demand."

"Proceed, sir, proceed," said the lady, somewhat perturbed; "I must
reserve the right to answer or not. No trifling impediment, however,
shall prevent me from gratifying your curiosity."

"Would you consider it a great misfortune to reside in the southern
states?"

"Places and countries are to me nearly alike."

"How so? You surely prefer your native land to all others?"

"Unhappiness soon makes us indifferent to mere locality; situated as I
am, many would prefer new scenes."

"Does not affliction enlarge the heart, and extend the affections?"

"I believe that slight sufferings make us captious--great ones, humane
and benevolent."

"Is it a natural consequence, that, when benevolence becomes universal,
personal affections and partialities wither in proportion?"

"Certainly not, as a consequence; but it is questionable whether
blighted hopes do not generally precede the enlarged philanthropy spoken
of."

"May not much travelling and experience of the world produce the same
effect?"

"I cannot speak experimentally on that point; but I think it is very
probable they do upon a masculine mind."

As Chevillere was about to continue his half-serious, half-jesting
questions, Mr. Brumley abruptly entered, and announced to his
daughter-in-law his determination to proceed northward early on the
following morning; and almost at the same moment, old Cato, with his
stately step, profound bow, and cap in hand, presented a letter to his
master, which he instantly knew by the superscription to be from
Randolph. Presenting his regards to them both, he retired to peruse the
epistle, which will be found in the next chapter.



CHAPTER VIII.


    B. RANDOLPH TO V. CHEVILLERE.

                    "Belville, High Hills of the Santee, S. Carolina.

    "DEAR CHUM,

    "The deserts of Africa are not to be compared, for loneliness, to
    a South Carolinian swamp. Oh! the comforts and blessings of a
    corduroy turnpike! These, you know, are made of poles laid down
    in the bottom of the swamps for a road, in humble imitation of
    that same most durable web. But the swamps gone through, and
    myself safely landed here--this Belville of yours is a most
    desirable place. Your father must have been a man of taste,
    friend Victor. The grove of Pride of India trees, in front of the
    villa, stands exactly as you left it; the vines run up and around
    Bell's window as beautiful as ever; the pigeons wheel over the
    garden and cotton-fields as gayly as of old. The flowers which
    perfume this delightful and balmy air, send up their sweets from
    the garden and the lawn as they have done these forty years; at
    least so testifies old Tombo the gardener. Your favourite horse
    thrives, and is none the worse for a trial of his speed and
    bottom which I made the other day in a race with my own impetuous
    thoughts. Your mother seems happier than I have ever seen her;
    and little Virginia Bell is the fairest flower on the Chevillere
    estate. Will you believe it! she introduced me to the housekeeper
    on my arrival as having been her affianced bridegroom ever since
    she was three months old, and then enjoyed a school-girl laugh.
    By St. Benedict, that laugh cut nearer to my heart than a funeral
    sermon.

    "Why have you not written to her and extolled some of my good
    qualities? She will never find them out! and as to my becoming a
    serious, sighing suitor, I am ten times farther from it than I
    was the first day I blundered into such dangerous company. If I
    were to elongate my phiz by way of preparative for a sigh, she
    would split her little sides with laughing at me. The fact is, I
    begin to think myself pretty considerably of an ass among the
    ladies, as your Yankees would express it. What shall I do? shall
    I run for it? or shall I stand here and die of the cold plague?
    If I laugh, she laughs with me; if I look serious, she laughs at
    me; if we visit, I am laughed at; if we are visited, I am stared
    at; and thus it is, day after day, and week after week. To your
    mother, I no doubt appear like a more rational creature, but
    before Miss Bell I am utterly at a loss and dumbfoundered.

    "How can I show your charming cousin that I am not the fool she
    takes me for? must I shoot somebody? That would be too
    bloody-minded. Must I write a book? Sicken and become
    interesting? Ah! I have it! I'll get the fever and ague (no hard
    matter you know here); but then a man looks so unromantic with
    his teeth, and his hands, and his feet all in motion like a negro
    dancing 'Juba.' A lady would as soon think of falling in love
    with a culprit on the gibbet. I shall certainly try what absence
    will do; but then suppose that I am a bore, and no one entreats
    me to stay! Your mother might deem it indelicate, under the
    circumstances, for she certainly sees that I am a lost sinner;
    then I should be blown, indeed, with all my sins upon my head!
    without one redeeming quality for the little Bell to dwell upon
    in my absence. If I had rescued somebody from a watery
    grave--stopped a pair of runaway horses--saved somebody's
    life--shot a robber--been wounded myself--should turn out to be
    some lord's heir in England--had jumped down the Passaic or the
    Niagara--distinguished myself against the Indians or the
    Algerines--or even killed a mad dog--it would not be so desperate
    a case for the hero of a love affair.

    "But here I am--a poor forlorn somebody, without a single trait
    of heroism in my composition, or a solitary past deed of the kind
    to boast of; unless it may be bursting little brass bombs under
    the tutor's windows in College, or shaving a horse's tail, or one
    side of a drunken man's whiskers, or laying two drunken fellows
    at each other's door. Suppose I should get old Tombo, the
    gardener, into the river by stratagem, merely that I might pull
    him out again; as he seems to be a universal favourite here. But
    then suppose I should drown him in these mock heroics? Ah, I see
    I shall have to remain plain Beverly Randolph all my days! Alas!
    the days of chivalry are gone! If I could splinter a lance with
    some of these Sir Hotheads, or Sir Blunderbys, the case might not
    be so desperate.

    "Thank Heaven, however, that the age of poetry is not gone too;
    for poetry, you know, is but the shadow or reflection of
    chivalry--heroism--and action! First an age of deeds, and then an
    age of song--so here goes for the doggerel. But let me see; are
    there not more than two ages? what succeeds to an age of poetry?
    One of philosophy! What succeeds philosophy? Cynicism or
    infidelity--next a utilitarian age, and lastly we have a mongrel
    compound of all--then we have revolutions, bloodshed, sentiment,
    religion, and spinning-jennies. Now you see I have hit it! we
    live in the mongrel age; a hero of this era should
    fight--write--pray--and spin cotton! Let's see how all these
    could be united into a picture suitable for a frontispiece to a
    work of the current age. First there must be a spinning-jenny to
    go by steam, to the wheel of which there must be a hand-organ.
    The steam must be scattered against an enemy; a long nosed fellow
    with the real nasal twang must be seen upon his knees attending
    the jenny, and singing doggerel to the music of the
    hand-organ--there's a pretty coat of arms for you, and suitable
    for the present age.

    "But seriously, my dear Chevillere, what am I to do? I cannot get
    on without your assistance, and yet I am ashamed to ask it;
    however, I shall leave all these things to time--fate--and a
    better acquaintance between the charming Miss Bell and your
    humble servant.

    "I find you have more negroes here than we have in Virginia, in
    proportion to the whites; and existing under totally different
    circumstances, so far as regards the distance between them and
    their masters.

    "With us slavery is tolerable, and has something soothing about
    it to the heart of the philanthropist; the slaves are more in the
    condition of tenants to their landlords--they are viewed more as
    rational creatures, and with more kindly feelings; each planter
    owning a smaller number than the planters generally do here, of
    course the direct knowledge of, and intercourse between each
    other is greater. Every slave in Virginia knows, even if he does
    not love, his master; and his master knows him, and generally
    respects him according to his deserts. _Here_ slavery is
    intolerable; a single individual owning a hundred or more, and
    often not knowing them when he sees them. If they sicken and die,
    he knows it not except through the report of those wretched
    mercenaries, the overseers. The slaves here are plantation
    live-stock; not domestic and attached family servants, who have
    served around the person of the master from the childhood of
    both.

    "I have known masters in Virginia to exhibit the most intense
    sorrow and affliction at the death of an old venerable household
    servant, who was quite valueless in a pecuniary point of view.

    "Here, besides your white overseers, you have your black
    _drivers_;--an odious animal, almost peculiar to the far south.
    It is horrible to see one slave following another at his work,
    with a cow-skin dangling at his arm, and occasionally tying him
    up and flogging him when he does not get through his two tasks a
    day. These tasks I believe are two acres of land, which they are
    required to hoe without much discrimination, or regard to age,
    sex, health, or condition; now I have seen stout active fellows
    get through their two tasks by one o'clock, while another poor,
    stunted, bilious creature toiled the whole day at the same
    portion of labour. Another abomination here, and even known in
    some parts of Virginia, is that the females are required to work
    in the field, and generally to do as much as the males. This
    system is unworthy even of refined slave-holders. But the hardest
    part is to tell yet; they receive their provisions but once a
    week, and then, each has for seven days, either one peck of
    Indian corn, or three pecks of sweet potatoes, without meat, or
    any thing else to season this dry fare.

    "I will confess to you that, at first, I thought this allowance
    much more niggardly than I now consider it. In order to see how
    they lived, I went into the thickest of the quarter, on purpose
    to share a part of their food myself, and observe a little of
    their economy; I found two or three stout fellows standing at a
    large table, or frame, into which were fixed two grindstones, or
    rather one was fixed and the other revolved upon it, like two
    little mill-stones; the upper stone was turned by a crank, at
    which the two slaves seemed to work by turns. The arrangements
    for this labour they made among themselves. I then went into the
    best looking hut of the quarter, just as they had all drawn round
    a large kettle of small homminy, in the centre of which I was
    pleased to see a piece of salt fat pork about the size of a large
    apple. The family consisted of six persons. They had all clubbed
    their portions of food into a common stock.

    "'How often do you draw meat?' said I; they informed me that they
    had none except at Christmas, and that none were able to buy meat
    except those who finished their two tasks early in the day, and
    then cultivated their own little 'patches,' as they are called. I
    then went round the huts to see how many had meat, and was much
    rejoiced to find that more than three-fourths lived substantially
    well.

    "I was exceedingly amused at one thing in these singular little
    communities, which was, that matches of convenience are almost as
    common among them as among their more fashionable masters. I
    suspect it would puzzle some of your fashionable belles to guess
    how these have their origin, and what is the fortune upon which
    they are founded. I will tell you, if you have never observed it
    yourself. The most active and sober hands, who are able to finish
    their tasks early, and of course live well, are always in great
    demand for husbands; and a well-favoured girl is almost sure to
    select one of these for her _helpmate_ in the true sense of the
    word. Nor is this excellence confined to the males; many of the
    women are in as much demand among the lazy fellows for their
    prowess in the field, as the active men are among the women.

    "While the mothers are at work in the field, their helpless
    offspring are all left under the care of the superannuated women,
    in a large hut, or several large huts provided for that purpose;
    and a more unearthly set of wrinkled and arid witches you never
    saw, unless you have more curiosity than most of your
    Carolinians. These scenes, especially if visited by moonlight,
    transport a man into the centre of Africa at once; there is the
    dark, sluggish stream, the dismal-looking pine-barrens, and the
    palmetto, the oriental-looking cabbage-tree, aided by the foreign
    gibberish, and the unsteady light of the pine logs before the
    door, now and then casting a fitful gleam of light upon some of
    these natives of the shores of the Niger, with their tattooed
    visages, ivory teeth, flat noses, and yellow and blood-shot
    eyeballs.

    "I do not observe much difference between the North and South
    Carolinians, except in the case of those who inhabit the most
    southern portions of the latter state. There your rich are more
    princely and aristocratic, and your poor more wretched and
    degraded; but to tell you the plain truth, many of your little
    slaveholders are miserably poor and ignorant; and what must be
    the condition of that negro who is a slave to one of these
    miserable wretches? They are uniformly hard and cruel masters,
    and the more fortune or fate frowns upon them, the more cruel
    they become to their slaves. This is a singular development of
    human character, and not easily accounted for, unless we suppose
    them to be revenging themselves of fate.

    "Most of the accomplished ladies whom I have seen, were educated
    either at Salem or at the north, and sometimes at both,--the
    preference being given to New-York and Philadelphia. Therein
    Virginia has the advantage; for scarcely a town of two thousand
    inhabitants is without its seminary for girls. I have myself
    visited those at Richmond, Petersburg, Fredericksburg,
    Charlottesville, Staunton, Lexington, Fincastle, &c. &c. This,
    you will acknowledge, shows deep-seated wisdom and foresight in
    the people; for if our wives and mothers are intelligent, their
    offspring will be so too.

    "Virginia Bell has just stolen into the parlour in the south
    wing, where I am now writing, so there is an end of slavery, and
    education, and all that sort of thing; unless, indeed, your
    humble servant may be said to have surrendered his freedom, and
    to be now undergoing a new sort of schooling. Her look is arch
    and knowing, as if she had read every word I have written; I
    will finish my letter when she goes out.

    "There now, I breathe more easily,--she is gone! 'Mr. Randolph,'
    said she, 'I have a very great curiosity to see the letter of a
    young gentleman; I never saw one in my life.' 'Indeed!' said I,
    'then I will write you one before I leave my seat.'

    "'No, no, no!' said she, blushing just perceptibly, 'you
    understand me very well; I mean such letters as you write to my
    cousin; there would be something worth reading in them; as for
    your letters to young ladies, I have seen some of them. O!
    deliver me from the side-ache, and weeping till my eyes are red
    with irrepressible laughter; if they would write naturally and
    simply, it would not be so bad. There would then be only the
    natural awkwardness of the subject; but to get upon stilts,
    merely because the letter is to a lady, is too bad. But you have
    not answered my question; do you intend to show me that letter?'

    "'I will show you a better one.'

    "'No, no! I want to see none of your set speeches upon paper, all
    so prim and formal; if you care any thing for my good opinion,
    you will show me one of your careless ones,' said she.

    "'Care any thing for your good opinion!' said I, rising, and
    trying to seize her hand, which she held behind her; 'I value
    your opinion more than that of the whole sex besides.' She raised
    her eyes in mock astonishment, and puckering up her beautiful
    little lips, whistled as if in amazement, and then deliberately
    marched out of the room, saying, as she stood at the entrance,
    'Finish your copy like a good boy, and be sure not to blot it,
    and you shall have some nuts and a sweet cake;' and I crushed the
    unfortunate epistle with chagrin. She certainly takes me for a
    fool, and truly I begin to think she is not very far wrong.

                                                        "B. RANDOLPH."



CHAPTER IX.


    V. CHEVILLERE TO B. RANDOLPH.

                                                     "Baltimore, 18--.

    "You will have learned by the previous letters[A] of Lamar and
    myself, every interesting circumstance which has occurred to us,
    together with our _sage_ observations upon men and things as they
    were presented.

      [A] These letters are omitted, of course, as the same
            information has been already given to the reader.

    "Lamar spends more than half his time with the Kentuckian,--he
    declares that he will never rest satisfied until he persuades him
    to remove to the high hills of the Santee, where he can have him
    for a neighbour. He has found a new source of amusement to-day, in
    the supposed discovery that Damon is in love with the pretty
    country girl, on whose account, you will recollect, he got into
    the affray at the circus. Her father invited him to pay them a
    visit, and Lamar has been trying to persuade him to take advantage
    of it immediately, and has even offered to accompany him. I have
    no doubt he would succeed, had not the Kentuckian's idol, Pete
    Ironsides, been sent into the country 'to board,' as he calls it.
    As it is, he has determined upon accepting the invitation as he
    returns.

    "My own affairs are assuming too sombre a hue for me to enjoy
    Lamar's foolery as I used to do, when we three lived together, and
    when you and I were made joint partakers of his animal spirits;
    _I_ in fact lived upon his stock in trade in that respect, while
    you added no little to the joint concern; I was always, I fear,
    but a sullen companion for such merry fellows. But have you never
    observed that the most lasting and ardent friendships are formed
    of such materials? Even in married life, you will, in nine cases
    out of ten, see the most opposite qualities form the most durable
    and happy connexions. This is running, I know, right in the teeth
    of the romantic twaddle of the day, about congenial sentiments,
    and the like; but is it not true? Look around you, and see in
    every instance if the lively woman has not chosen a serious
    husband; the man of genius, a dull drone; the bigot and fanatic, a
    romp; the pious lady, a libertine. These observations, however,
    like most others of the college stamp, may be destined to give
    place to others of a very different character. When I look back
    upon all the various revolutions of opinion which the mind
    undergoes, before it arrives even at our present state of
    maturity, I am dismayed, and almost afraid to look forward.

    "Nor is it in matters of abstract opinion alone, I fear, that we
    are destined to undergo changes. Our hopes _must_ be in some
    measure paralyzed, our hearts made colder, and our youthful
    friendships broken asunder! Look what sad havoc a single year has
    already made in our own catalogue. Where now is that noble band of
    young and generous spirits, who but a single twelvemonth ago were
    all the world to each other? Two of them have surrendered the
    bright hopes of young life upon its very threshold, and the others
    are scattered abroad over land and sea. But I have wandered from
    the subject of our adventures, which we have promised faithfully
    to record.

    "Is it not strange how fate seems to play with us, when once we
    are fairly embarked upon life's great current? I am now completely
    wound up in perplexities and embarrassments, which, a week ago, I
    never once thought of. The actors in this new drama in which I am
    confessedly entangled, were then perfect strangers to me; and how
    handsomely has providence, or fate, or whatever you may choose to
    call it, paved the way for my more complete introduction into
    these new mysteries? The lady becomes intimate with my mother,
    though coming from opposite ends of the Union. She travels home
    again and is taken ill on the road, at the very time when Lamar
    and I strike into the same road. It seemed, too, as if I was
    placed at the table where our acquaintance commenced, in the very
    position where I could not avoid making a tender of my services;
    and now that I have become almost a part of their little family
    here, I find that they have been afflicted in some way beyond
    measure. They seem to be surrounded with mysteries and strange
    connexions; more than once have I gone specially to break the
    spell, and clear away the trammels which render this most strange
    and interesting young lady miserable. Various methods have I
    devised to acquire the secret, but they have always ended in
    awkwardness and embarrassment. It is no easy matter to initiate
    one's self into the midst of family secrets, when one is
    comparatively a stranger; yet it must be done, and that shortly. I
    feel that it is necessary to my own peace; indeed it is necessary
    in order that I may see my own way clearly, to have these cruel
    doubts solved. Every hour but adds to my entanglement, and if
    there is a shadow of foundation for the phantasies of the lunatic,
    the sooner I make the plunge the better. Yet how simple I become;
    if I had now the decision of character for which I once had credit
    in college, I should not long suffer the dreams of a maniac to
    disturb my good opinion of this most lovely and interesting girl.
    You may talk of your embarrassments and difficulties with Bell's
    untamable humour; they are all child's play,--mere romping,--but
    the case is not so easy of adjustment here; the old gentleman has
    just announced, that he shall resume his journey early to-morrow
    morning; so that something must be effected this afternoon or
    evening. If there is no other way, I will formally seek an
    interview with the lady, and, however painful it may be to her, I
    will ask her to explain her strange fear of the lunatic; of
    course I must avow the reason; you shall hear the result.

    "P.S. _12 o'clock at night_--I have broken the ice, my dear
    fellow, and no doubt you will think I have got a cold bath for my
    pains.

    "Soon after dark I knocked at the door, and waited some little
    time with throbbing pulses, to hear that gentle and silvery voice
    bid me '_come in!_' for I had seen the old gentleman go off in a
    carriage, to the theatre, as I hoped. No summons came--I repeated
    my knock with the same result. I do not know what prompted me to
    an act so rude, but I mechanically pushed open the door before I
    had reflected a moment. I was in the presence of the little fairy.
    She held in her hand an open letter, which was wet with tears; her
    head was leaning far back against the wall; her comb, carrying
    with it the large rolls of her fair brown hair, was partly lying
    on the window, and partly stuck into its place; the pearl of her
    cheeks was still wet with recent tears. I did not know which was
    now worst, to retreat or go forward. At first I thought she had
    fainted, and would have sprung to the bell; but I soon saw that
    she slumbered gently and peacefully. Randolph, there is something
    heavenly in the slumbers of a young, innocent, and beautiful
    female; but I will leave my reflections for another time. I was
    about to retreat, and had so far closed the door as to hide my
    person, when she suddenly awoke and said, 'Come in, dear father,
    come in!' the lights had not yet been brought, but I could see the
    crimson mantling her neck and cheeks as she discovered who the
    visiter was, and replaced her hair at the same time.

    "I felt confused and ashamed, and stammered some vague attempt at
    an apology. She made light of my intrusion; but one thing
    attracted my attention particularly. Just as the maid set the
    lights upon the table in the centre of the room, I thought that I
    recognised my mother's handwriting in the letter which she now
    hastily folded up and thrust into her reticule. As I mentioned,
    she had been weeping over it. This set my imagination to work; I
    could not divine on what theme my mother could write to her; still
    less what subject for grief they could have between them. I
    inquired if she was well; she said 'yes, as well as usual, but
    exhausted for want of sleep the previous night.' I instantly
    connected her want of sleep and restlessness with my mother's
    letter; and before I had sufficiently reflected upon the import of
    the question, I asked her whether her first acquaintance with my
    mother had not been formed during her late visit to the springs.
    She answered in the affirmative. 'But why do you ask?' said she,
    searchingly. 'For no particular reason, but the question occurred
    to me, from seeing the handwriting of the letter you have just
    folded up. I thought it strange that you should receive a letter
    from my mother, when I have received none,' 'This letter,' said
    she, 'was not received at this place; I was merely refreshing my
    memory with its contents.' 'It is not often,' said I, 'that my
    mother writes so as to bring tears into the eyes of her friends,
    and if you would not consider the expression of the wish too
    impertinent, and that too when I have little expectation of its
    being granted, I would say that I never before had so much
    curiosity to see one of her letters.'

    "'Your curiosity,' said she, 'should be gratified immediately, but
    this letter alludes to circumstances which would perhaps be
    uninteresting to you; but even were they otherwise, it would
    excite your curiosity still more to read the letter, when I am
    unable to give such explanations _now_ as it requires.'

    "'You labour under a most grievous error,' said I, 'if you suppose
    there are any circumstances connected in any way with the present
    distress of Miss Frances St. Clair, which would be uninteresting
    to me. The express object of my visit to-night was to ask that
    very explanation. It may seem strange and impertinent that I
    should seek that which you evidently avoid; but my excuse is, and
    it is the only one that I can plead, that this is your last
    evening in the city; will Miss St. Clair be offended, if I
    acknowledge that upon this explanation turns my happiness? I am
    fearful of giving offence by acknowledging that any previous
    history is necessary of one who carries in her countenance a
    refutation of all calumnies.'

    "I had ventured to seize her unresisting hand, but as I concluded
    the sentence, she withdrew it, and covered her face with her
    handkerchief, pressing it hard, and breathing short. At the same
    time I noticed some confusion with her distress, though without
    anger. This imboldened me to proceed.

    "'It may appear like double presumption in me to ask an
    explanation before I can proffer a suit, which may be instantly
    and indignantly rejected, either with or without your history.'

    "'I will not prudishly affect to misunderstand you, in either of
    the prominent points of your remarks,' said she, her head sinking
    in modest guise, 'but before I reply to them, will you tell me
    whence you have ever heard any thing against me.'

    "The question went straight to my suspicious heart, and rankled
    there; insomuch that I coughed and hemmed at it several times
    ineffectually; her eyes being riveted on me all the while, like a
    judge's upon a detected thief--I felt that her pure and searching
    gaze was far more honest than my own, and I should speedily have
    begun an explanation if her father had not at that instant entered
    the room. I thought he saw and disrelished the matter in hand, for
    he seated himself in a chair, in a certain manner, by which one
    understands a person to say, 'I'll stay all night, if you have no
    objections.' I will be up by daylight in the morning, lest the old
    gentleman steal a march upon me.

                                   "Yours truly,

                                                      "V. CHEVILLERE."



CHAPTER X.


    B. RANDOLPH TO V. CHEVILLERE.

                                                      "Savannah, 18--.

    "DEAR FRIEND,

    "After despatching my last letter, not knowing exactly what else
    to do with myself in the present state of affairs, I set out on
    horseback, telling the family that I wished to see a little more
    of Carolina, but inwardly resolved to follow the horse's nose
    wherever he might lead, and continue thus to ride and thus to be
    led until I might gather up my scattered thoughts and determine
    what course to pursue.

    "I will not deny, that on the second day in the afternoon, about
    three o'clock (truth is always precise, you know), I discovered in
    one corner of the storehouse of my thoughts a secret design to try
    'Bell' by a leave-taking, absence, and reappearance. If you had
    been upon the ground to charge me with the intention, I should no
    doubt have sworn upon a stack of Testaments that it was not so;
    and I could have done so honestly. You have looked inwards too
    often not to know, that in wandering through the dreary passages
    of one's own mind, we blunder by accident upon many obscure
    motives, which, if boldly charged with them before we set out on
    such a pilgrimage, we should stoutly deny.

    "When the horses were brought up on the gravelled road, and all
    things in readiness for my departure, I cast a furtive glance at
    that too-knowing and too-beautiful little brunette, who calls you
    cousin, to see how she was about to feel on the solemn occasion.
    Her looks were perfectly inexplicable. I have thought of them ever
    since, but for my life I cannot say in what feelings they had
    their origin. There was neither sorrow, joy, love, hatred,
    revenge, hope, despair, nor any other definable emotion. There was
    a scarcely perceptible smile, a slight shutting of the corner of
    one eye, and a mock solemnity of the other unruly features, as if
    one was winking to the other rebels as much as to say, 'wait till
    he's out of hearing, and we will have a rare laugh at his
    expense.' It was just such a look as would make a man say, 'Zounds
    and fury, madam, you'll never see me again; farewell, for ever;'
    and then be laughed at for his pains.

    "But what sort of a look was it? It was a very knowing look, I am
    sure of that. She looked as if she read all the inward workings of
    my moral machinery. It was a serio-comic look; produced, no doubt,
    by the idea that she was scanning me thoroughly, while I imagined
    that I could see just as clearly through her. In other words, as I
    have somewhere else beautifully expressed it, she thought me
    'pretty considerable much of an ass,' and I am pretty considerable
    much of her opinion, at least before ladies. It is somewhat
    singular that this tendency to display my weak side should have
    developed itself at the very time when I most desired to appear to
    advantage.

    "At last the parting moment came. I had bidden your mother
    farewell in the breakfast-room, and then proceeded to the front
    door, where stood Virginia Bell.

    "'I think it very doubtful,' said I, 'whether I shall be enabled
    to take your aunt's house in my route home.'

    "'You are not going to run away with cousin's favourite horse, are
    you?' said she.

    "By the Great Mogul! in my earnestness to invent a pathetic lie, I
    forgot to arrange the consistency of the plot.

    "'True, true!' said I, stammering; 'then I must indeed run my head
    into danger again!' saying which I sprang upon your horse, and
    rode like a country doctor who has no practice. By-the-by, that
    was nearer to an avowal than I have ever come yet; your joyous,
    fun-loving creatures are the most difficult to address in the
    world.

    "Oh! if I only had such a one in love with me, what a race I would
    lead her! I would punish the whole class of unapproachable little
    mischievous misses! I would make her ogle me at church; hang on my
    arm to the theatre; sigh by the fire-side, and weep when she went
    to bed; I would almost break her heart before I would take the
    least pity upon her.

    "I am curious to know what sort of wives these same little romps
    make. Do they romp it through life, or do they settle down into
    your miserable, sad, melancholy drones, who greet their husbands
    when they come home with a sigh, or inexpressible look, that
    drives more men to the bottle than all the good wine and good
    company in the world?

    "You ask me, at least I know you would ask me, what I saw, or what
    occurred on the road to the place from which this letter is dated.
    I will tell you what I have not seen since I entered this land of
    nullification. I have not seen a clear limpid river that could be
    forded on horseback. Your water-courses are dark, deep, still, and
    gloomy. The foliage on their banks is superlatively rich and
    abundant, but it is occasionally interspersed with a species of
    natural beauties which I don't admire, namely, little alligators;
    by-the-by, I never see alligators, lizards, or tadpoles, that I do
    not think of those weary days when we read together Ovid's
    Metamorphoses.

    "Of a southern swamp I had no proper conception. I thought they
    were black, dismal holes, covered with old black logs, and black
    snakes, and frogs, and vapours; instead of which, they bear a
    nearer resemblance, in the summer, to a princely (or _Prince's_)
    botanical garden. The very perfume upon the olfactories is far
    more delightful than the greatest assemblage of artificial
    odours. Then there are the rich and variegated flowers of all
    hues, sizes, and colours, set amid the deep green of the rich
    shrubbery. The soil of which these swamps are composed is as black
    as tar, and pretty much of the same consistence.

    "I observe, as I travel farther south, that bread is seldom seen
    upon the table. What is called here _small homminy_ is used in its
    place, at breakfast, dinner, and supper.

    "I saw no ploughs in your fields. Horses seemed to be used only
    for carriages, racing, and for the private use of gentlemen and
    ladies. I saw no brick houses; your mother's and that of Col. S.
    being the only two I saw in the whole state. I saw many private
    mansions very tastefully built and ornamented; some of them were
    splendid, but mostly built of wood and painted white.

    "After three days pretty constant riding after my horse's nose, he
    brought me to the banks of the Savannah, at a little
    miserable-looking town, or village, called Purysburg. Here I found
    a steamboat just about to depart for Savannah. I immediately
    engaged passage for myself, servant, and two horses (one of which
    is yours; confound him, I say, for betraying me). I amused myself
    by shooting at the alligators, as we glided along the water, and
    had kept up the sport some time, when a mellow distant sound came
    along the surface of the water, like an exquisitely played Kent
    bugle. It was decidedly the most enchanting music I ever heard,
    and seemed nearer and nearer until it appeared to rise from under
    the very bow of the boat. You will be surprised when I tell you
    that it was made through a straight wooden tube, about five feet
    long. The musician was a tall, ebony-coloured old African, who
    stood up in one of your singular-looking batteaux, amid
    half-a-dozen other negroes, who seemed to be at their luncheon. It
    looked much like a boat on the Niger; indeed, I found my
    imagination carrying me into such distant regions, that I
    instinctively bit my lip to see whether I was awake or dreaming.

    "The city of Savannah became distinctly visible at a distance of
    about seven miles. A brilliant city indeed it is. You cannot
    imagine any thing finer than the view from the river. It is
    situated on a high bluff, and commands an extensive view up and
    down the stream. In the latter direction, on a clear day, you can
    see, without glasses, the lighthouse on the island of Tybee.

    "By-the-by, I have been down among those islands; they are all
    inhabited, and by a class of men as much like our real
    old-fashioned Virginia gentlemen as can well be imagined. This
    city is nobly built, and is laid out on a magnificent scale,
    having a public square, containing a grove of pride of India
    trees, in the centre of every four squares, and a row of the same
    along each side of every street.

    "Talk of Philadelphia, and New-York, and Boston, and Richmond, and
    New-Haven--Savannah outstrips them all, both in artificial and
    natural beauty. It seems the residence of the prince of the world
    and his nobility.

                                   "Yours, most truly,

                                                        "B. RANDOLPH."



CHAPTER XI.


    V. CHEVILLERE TO B. RANDOLPH.

                                                     "Baltimore, 18--.

    "DEAR FRIEND,

    "Though I had but two hours' sleep, I was up betimes to catch a
    parting glimpse of an interesting person who need not be named.
    When I descended into the great vestibule of this extensive
    establishment, I found the door of their parlour open, and the
    entry nearly blocked up by bandboxes, trunks, and all the little
    paraphernalia of which you and I are as yet quite ignorant. A
    carriage stood at the door; the lady and the old gentleman sat
    side by side upon the sofa, the former in her travelling habit,
    while the latter held in his hand a cup of coffee, which he
    sipped, giving directions from time to time to the servants. I
    paid them the compliments of the morning, not in the most bland
    and courtly style, for to tell you the truth I felt a little
    inclined to poaching, and the old gentleman looked _to me_ not
    unlike a vigilant and surly gamekeeper; however, he received me
    with a welcome, perhaps it was a northern one; but of that I will
    tell you more when we get fully into the enemy's country, as your
    namesake of Roanoke would say. My presence seemed to hurry the
    old gentleman's coffee down his throat, hot as it was, and in ten
    minutes, before I had exchanged ten words with the lady, all was
    pronounced in readiness.

    "The old gentleman did not leave her for a moment. I of course
    handed her to the carriage, and took, as I supposed, a last look.
    I suppose I must have appeared dolorous enough. The parting moment
    came, the last pressure of the hand was given, the door closed,
    whip cracked, and the carriage had gone some time, before I found
    myself standing in the middle of the street, my head turned to one
    side just far enough to catch a glimpse of Lamar in his nightgown,
    half-way out of a three-story window, laughing with that
    complacent self-satisfaction which is peculiar to him. 'Half-past
    four and a dark stormy morning,' cried he, in true watchman style.
    I pulled my hat down over my face, and walked away from the hotel
    as fast as my impetuous blood would drive me; indeed, I felt
    provoked at the time. I had not walked far, before I recollected
    having felt something in my hand, as if it had found its way there
    by accident, while I was exchanging adieus with my enslaver. I had
    mechanically, while abstracted in the street, thrust it into my
    waistcoat pocket. I now drew it forth,--it was a small roll of
    paper, which you might have put into a thimble,--I opened it very
    carefully, in hope that there might be some even
    carelessly-scribbled line, which I could preserve as a memento.
    By heavens, Randolph, there was a memento upon it! and evidently
    intended for my eye alone.

    "The writing was in pencil, and scarcely legible; with some
    difficulty I could make out these words.

    "'The explanation sought by Mr. Chevillere has not been
    surreptitiously avoided by me, nor will it ever be; but if he is
    wise, he will forget one who has already extended the influence of
    her unhappiness too far.'

    "I read these lines over again and again. I walked round Baltimore
    as if it had been a hamlet. It seemed to me that every person whom
    I met could read in my countenance something strange and hurried.
    At length, however, I found my way to the breakfast table. Lamar,
    as my bad luck would have it, sat almost opposite to me. I do not
    think I ever saw him perfectly disagreeable before; all his
    remarks seemed to me _mal-apropos_, and he is not usually so
    unfortunate, you know. I made a hasty breakfast, and hurried out
    on purpose to avoid him, but in vain! he was with me in an
    instant. 'All settled, I suppose, Chevillere,' said he. 'Yes, all
    is settled for our journey to New-York,' said I, 'except our
    bills, and that you may attend to as soon as you please.' I
    ordered old Cato to see the luggage on board the steamboat for
    Philadelphia: Lamar did the same. 'But, Chevillere,' said he, 'you
    are not going to leave the Kentuckian,' upon which he set off to
    summon our new companion.

    "Our next epistle will in all probability be from Philadelphia or
    New-York; we shall only stay a short time in the former place, as
    we conceive the other to be the true point from which to make
    observations.

                                   "Yours truly,

                                                      "V. CHEVILLERE."



CHAPTER XII.


    B. RANDOLPH TO V. CHEVILLERE.

                                      "High Hills of the Santee, 18--.

    "DEAR FRIEND,

    "From the city of Savannah, I paid my first visit to our old
    heathen dad, Neptune, and if first impressions of the sea were not
    as common and as numerous as doggerel verses in a modern lady's
    album, I might be tempted to become sublime for your edification.
    I was rowed down from the city, in a beautiful boat made of a
    single cypress, by the hands of the gentleman who was so polite as
    to give me this gentle passage. By this you may know that they
    take as much pride in their boats as the Venetians themselves. It
    was beautifully painted, and rowed by eight well-formed negroes.
    Inside of the seat at one end was a marooning chest, as they
    called it, full of all kinds of liquors and cold meat, with the
    necessary utensils for their use. The gentleman was an islander;
    and during the few hours in which we were gliding over the
    seventeen miles between the city and the ocean, he entertained me
    with an account of his marooning expeditions. These are their
    excursions upon the Sea Islands, for purposes of fishing and
    hunting. These islanders are a peculiar, but delightful people;
    however, I must not keep you too long in the sea-breeze; at some
    other time, perhaps, I may indite you a history of these
    hospitable and isolated gentlemen.

    "When I left Savannah, I determined to pursue a different route
    from the one by which I came. I therefore crossed the Savannah
    river fifteen or sixteen miles above the city; I then crossed the
    country in as straight a line as I could draw upon the map,
    between the ferry and the high hills of Santee; and in a short
    time found myself in as complete solitude as ever Crusoe
    experienced upon his desolate island. Nothing was to be seen but
    the tall and gloomy-looking pines, stretching away into the bosom
    of the atmosphere, and the interminable sands which lay before me
    as far as the eye could reach. Twilight presently came on, and
    those horrible musicians, the tree-frogs, began to chirp and sing.
    The dolorous note of the whippoorwill was heard, with a horn
    accompaniment from the throat of a screech-owl. Here was a pretty
    serenade for a man with his heart attuned for melody, and his
    stomach attuned for a slash at a cold ham, for I had had no
    dinner. I struck up an accompaniment from my own pipes, but I soon
    found that the vacuum was too profound for a due modulation in
    concert pitch with this sylvan band. I wished them all at the
    d----l, with their shrill pipes and full crops, and set my horse,
    or rather _your_ horse, at full gallop, in a vain effort to escape
    from the intended honour; but the harder I rode, the more
    enthusiastic they became. I soon made another comfortable
    discovery; I found that I had been riding for the last two hours
    in a perfect wilderness, in utter contempt of what two pioneer
    wheels had made for a highway; nor could I tell the north from the
    south, nor the east from the west, having foolishly enough turned
    the horse round and round in order to gaze at the stars. 'Like
    master like man,' my servant did the same, as if he could read in
    the pine tops more than I could in the heavens. All my astronomy
    had gone with my dinner; I could see nothing in the starry regions
    but what is sometimes called the _Frying-pan_. Oh! the shades of
    Thales of Miletus, who first imported astronomy into Greece! to
    think that a bachelor of such heavenly arts could not look into
    the face of the Frying-pan without thinking of grilled chickens
    and rashers of bacon, and the crackling of fire, and the
    sputtering of fat. I dismounted, and ordered Sam to do likewise,
    and try to find me a piece of flint by which to strike a light; he
    declared that he had not seen a stone or a rock since he came into
    the Carolinas. 'So much for geology and astronomy,' said I. 'I
    rader tink they all bad fur empty stumuck, masta,' said Sam,
    considering himself privileged by the exigencies of the case.
    'True enough, Sam,' said I, 'it would be an apt scholar that could
    produce bread or a stone either by his learning, in our
    circumstances.'

    "As I mounted, Sam mounted, not a word more having been uttered;
    he seemed to be aware of the fact, that language generally fails
    with the food; a man's ideas in such a case run fast enough, but
    they are all in humble life; below stairs, diving among pots, and
    pans, and pantries, and receptacles for cold victuals. As the
    ideas ran, so ran the horses, until the water began to splash our
    legs from a thick bushy swamp, into which we found that we had
    initiated ourselves. 'Now Sam,' said I, 'we are swamped.' Sam said
    nothing aloud, but was evidently muttering something to himself,
    being engaged, as I supposed, at his secret devotions, for you
    must know that he would be a Puritan. Like most of his race,
    however, he has more faith in the effect of singing hymns, than
    devotions of any other kind. I saw that he was itching for a trial
    at his usual relief in all his troubles. I therefore told him not
    to suppress it on my account, but to give it free utterance; the
    idea of it naturally excited ludicrous recollections of old Noll
    and the veteran Rumpers, but Sam saw the new vein I had so
    inappropriately fallen into, and therefore resisted his inward
    strivings. I must say, _en passant_, that I think him honest and
    sincere in his faith, I therefore do not ridicule him.

    "We waded through the black regions of this little pandemonium for
    some three-quarters of a mile, before the dry sand again greeted
    our hearing. The Frying-pan still stared me in the face, and the
    sylvan band still plied their pipes. We had not proceeded far by
    land before we came directly against a fence. I was truly glad to
    see it, for I was sure it must lead to some inhabited place, and
    accordingly ordered Sam to let us into the field, which we found
    to be an immense plain covered with cotton,--the most beautiful of
    all crops. We rode between the rows, for many a weary foot, until
    at length the glimmering of many lights greeted our longing eyes.
    We made directly for them, and soon stood in the midst of an
    immense negro quarter. On inquiring whether their master's house
    was near at hand, we found that it was many miles distant. The
    overseer's house, they told us, was not more than half a mile off;
    but to these animals I have always had an utter aversion. I
    therefore bought some fodder for the horses, and two fowls for
    ourselves, from the _driver_, who had the privilege of raising
    them, and employed his wife to pick and grill them upon the coals,
    and a delightful and savoury prelude they soon sent up to my
    famished senses; a heartier or a sweeter meal was never made than
    I thus took; a fowl seasoned with salt, and a large pot of small
    homminy, served direct to my mouth from a large wooden spoon,
    without the cumbrous intervention of plates, knives, and forks.
    Our meal being finished,--for you must know Sam and I dined at the
    same time and from the same table, which was none other than the
    ground floor, covered with the head of a barrel,--hunger is a
    wonderful leveller of distinctions,--as I was saying, our meal
    being finished, a goodly number of the more aged, respectable,
    and intelligent blacks of the quarter assembled to entertain us,
    or be entertained themselves, I scarcely know which. Many of these
    negroes, I found, were born in Africa, and one poor tattooed
    fellow claimed to be of royal blood. He told me that his father,
    the king, had a hundred children. I asked if any of those present
    could write; they replied that there was one man in the quarter
    who could write in his own language, and several of them went out
    and brought in a tall, bald-headed old fellow, who seemed to come
    with great reluctance. After being told what was desired, he
    acknowledged to me that he could write when he last tried, which
    was many years previous. I took out my pocket-book, tore out a
    blank leaf, and handing him a pen from my pocket inkstand,
    requested him to give me a specimen. He took the head of the
    barrel on his lap, and began, if I recollect right, on the right
    side of the page; the following is a fac simile of his
    performance:

    [Illustration]

    "The following is a liberal translation into English:--

      "'In the name of God the merciful! the compassionate! God bless
      our Lord Mohammed his prophet, and his descendants, and his
      followers, and prosper them exceedingly. Praise be to God the
      Lord of all creatures! the merciful, the compassionate king of
      the day of judgment! Thee we adore, and of thee we implore
      assistance! Guide us in the right way, the way of those with whom
      thou art well pleased, and not of those with whom thou art angry,
      nor of those who are in error. Amen!'

    "The original is written in Arabic. The old fellow's name is
    Charno, which it seems he has retained, after being enslaved,
    contrary to their general custom in that respect. I became quite
    affected and melancholy in talking to this venerable old man, and
    you may judge from that rare circumstance that he is no common
    character.

    "I now fixed my saddle under my head in a cotton shed to rest for
    the night; but, weary as I was, I could not directly get to sleep
    for thinking of sandy deserts, old Charno, chicken suppers, negro
    quarters, and Virginia Bell! You see she is still the heroine, let
    my wanderings lay the scenes where they will.

    "I have no doubt but you will say, on the reception of this
    letter, 'Well! I thought Randolph would run his nose into all the
    out-of-the-way places in Carolina,' I plead guilty! I have a sort
    of natural instinct for unbeaten paths, and the one by which I
    arrived at Belville shall be given in my next; until then, fare
    thee well.

                                                        "B. RANDOLPH."



CHAPTER XIII.


    VICTOR CHEVILLERE TO B. RANDOLPH.

                                                      "New-York, 18--.

    "DEAR FRIEND,

    "At length we have arrived in this flourishing city, not, however,
    without having experienced many vicissitudes of weather, humour,
    and adventure, the two latter especially; how could we help it,
    when the Kentuckian formed so large a part of our little crew, by
    steamboat and stage? His animal spirits are worth a million.

    "You cannot conceive any thing more agreeable to an emancipated
    and sombre student, than to get a comfortable high backed leather
    seat in one of these fine northern coaches, his cloak collar put
    up like a mask, and the rim of his cap drawn down to meet it, just
    leaving a peeping-hole sufficient to see and enjoy every thing
    worth enjoying, at the same time defying the gaze of intruding
    eyes.

    "If there should fortunately happen to be such a reckless, yet
    generous spirit as Damon among the company, the student's
    happiness is complete, for you cannot imagine what a protector he
    is against intruders. In our American stage-coaches (and perhaps
    in all others) there are sometimes men, full of brandy eloquence,
    which is kept so constantly on the stretch by repeated libations;
    or boisterous politicians, with their mouths so full of the last
    importation of news from Washington, or of the contents of the
    morning papers, that a complaisant young man is almost compelled
    to make himself ridiculous, by getting into a political
    controversy.

    "Damon took all that sort of work off our hands, in the most
    generous and chivalrous spirit imaginable. His eye was ever bright
    and ready; there was no sinking into dull student-like lethargy
    one moment, and flashing out into erratic folly the next; he was
    ready with lance in rest, to take a tilt against anybody's
    windmill; at home upon all subjects, being exactly in such a state
    of refinement as not to be ashamed to show his ignorance, and
    always eager to acquire information. Nor is his mind dull or
    unapt; he will rebut or ridicule an adversary with astonishing
    shrewdness. One of his peculiarities amused me much; he was
    evidently more excited in the stage-coaches than in the boats. He
    was never satisfied until he had let down the front glasses, so
    that he could see the horses; then he would talk fluently to his
    near neighbour, and keep his neck stretched all the while, so as
    to have all the horses in view, throwing out occasional digressive
    remarks as to their various powers, as thus, 'that's my little
    hearty, make a straight back to it;' and then turning to his
    antagonist he would continue his remarks, as if nothing had drawn
    off his attention.

    "But I must not take up all your time with our comic adventures.
    When I get into that vein more completely, you shall have his
    exploits in the city. By-the-by, I suggested to Lamar that he
    should take that part of the correspondence off my hands, but he
    said, 'Randolph knows I'm not one of the writing sort, therefore
    you must write for us both; action,' said he, with a mock heroic
    flourish, 'is my forte.'

    "We are comfortably situated at the City Hotel in Broadway. After
    we had selected our rooms, I sallied out into that gay and
    brilliant promenade, which intersects the city from north-east to
    south-west. You may there see, on a fine sunshiny afternoon, all
    the fashion and beauty of this great city; the neat, tasteful,
    Parisian costume, in close contrast with the more sober guise of
    London. There you may hear intermingled the language of the Gaul,
    the German, and the modern Roman. To the right and left you see
    the spires of various Christian temples; and smiling faces, and
    happy hearts, will greet you at every step.

    "To a secluded college novice like myself, there is something new
    and moving in all this life and bustle; it irresistibly brings to
    my mind ideas of gay feats, tilts, tournaments, and brilliant
    fairs. Within the finished bow-windows are wealth and splendour,
    and brilliancy, which we poor southerns have not seen in our own
    native land; marble buildings, stores with granite columns, and
    the streets crowded with immense omnibuses (these are stages to
    transport persons from one part of the city to another); splendid
    private equipages, _republican_ liveries, and carts loaded with
    merchandise.

    "Seeing some trees and a comfortable green plat a little farther
    up the street, I worked through the crowd of persons, and carts,
    and stages, and found myself in the midst of the far famed Park,
    and immediately in front of that proud edifice the City Hall. I
    ascended the marble platform, and surveyed the gay throng, as they
    moved on in one continued and dense current, with merry faces,
    miserable hearts, and empty heads and pockets; but to talk of
    these stale things, you know, in the present age, is all stuff and
    sheer nonsense. I therefore put my reflections in my portfolio to
    carry home with me, and proceeded to the house-keeper's room, as I
    had been directed, to obtain the good lady's pilotage, or that of
    some deputy, to the governor's room, which I readily found. There
    is nothing remarkable in the two rooms which contain the
    paintings, except that they command from the windows a fine view
    of the park and the surrounding streets. Yes, there are two
    venerable old stuffed chairs. The one in the north wing was used
    by Washington at his inauguration as first President of the United
    States, and the one in the east room by the elder Adams. There are
    portraits of George Washington, George Clinton, Alexander
    Hamilton, Commodore Bainbridge, Monroe, Jackson, Duane, Varick,
    Livingston, Clinton, Willet, Radcliff, Captain Hull, Governor
    Lewis, Macomb, Yates, Van Buren, Brown, Perry, La Fayette,
    Decatur, Tompkins, Colden, Allen, Paulding, Hone, Stuyvesant,
    Bolivar, Columbus, Monkton, Williams: some of these last are only
    half-length. Over the portrait of Washington is a blue flag rolled
    up, with the following inscription in golden letters:--'This
    standard was displayed at the inauguration of George Washington,
    first President of the United States, on the 30th day of April,
    1789. And was presented to the Corporation of New-York by the
    Second Regt. of N. Y. State Artillery, Nov. 25th, 1821.'

    "While I was standing at one of the front windows again looking
    over the moving masses of Broadway, I saw a lady approach on the
    eastern footway of the Park, with a hurried step, until she came
    nearly opposite to the Hall. Crossing Chatham, she turned abruptly
    down one of the narrow streets running at right angles to the
    eastern line of the Park. There was something in the figure and
    carriage of this lady which, unknown at first to my consciousness,
    quickened my pulsations; but when she approached to the nearest
    point in her course, I felt morally certain that it was none other
    than that mysterious charmer, who by her father's connivance, or
    rather management, slipped through my fingers at Baltimore, and
    that, too, without my even having asked her address in this city.
    The recollection of this latter circumstance prompted me instantly
    to seize my hat and hurry after her. Throwing the accustomed fee
    to my obliging pilotess, I walked with all possible haste to the
    corner of the street which I supposed she had taken. I found that
    a little crowd of ragged urchins had collected upon some occasion
    of their own, and asked the most intelligent-looking among them if
    he had seen a lady in black go down that street,--pointing down
    the hill from Tammany Hall; and, by way of reply, one of the most
    disgusting, discordant, and ill-timed peals of laughter that I
    ever heard burst upon my senses.

    "'Lady in black!' said the most forward fellow, 'you will find
    plenty of black ladies down that street, with black eyes to boot.'
    I retreated in perfect disgust with these precocious vagabonds,
    not, however, before I was saluted with another peal of laughter,
    accompanied by the epithets--'greenhorn,' 'young 'un,' 'bumpkin,'
    &c. &c.

    "You cannot conceive of any more thoroughly disgusting feeling
    than that produced upon the mind of a young man bred up in the
    country, upon this first exhibition of the detestable forms which
    vice and dissipation assume in every large city,--young females
    with bloated countenances,--boys with _black_ eyes and bruised
    faces, with their disgusting slang and familiar nicknames, of Sal,
    Bet, Kate, Tom, Josh, Jack, or Jim, and their unmeaning oaths,
    Billingsgate wit, and filthy and ragged garments. There are
    certain districts of the city in which these are always to be
    seen, I am informed,--but of these more anon. I turned down the
    street, and pursued the course which I supposed the lady had
    taken, until I got to the bottom of what had once been a deep glen
    in its rural days. I could see nothing but entrances to tanyards,
    and warehouses full of leather and morocco. The houses, too,
    looked at least a century and a half behind those on the hill, in
    architectural taste. Turning to a woman who was sweeping the
    little narrow pavement in front of one of the houses, I asked her
    what part of the city I was in.

    "'This is called the _swamp_, sir,' was the reply.

    "'This,' thought I to myself, 'is a very different affair from our
    swamps.' Just at that moment, casting my eye along one of the
    narrow streets, I caught a glimpse of the same figure, attended
    only by her maid, entering a low, Dutch, dingy-looking house, with
    the gable end to the street. I walked as rapidly as I could in the
    same direction, and was within some twenty yards of the house,
    when two young men issued from the door, with the air and dress of
    gentlemen. I did not immediately observe their faces, because my
    mind was intently occupied with the lady, and the probable cause
    of her visit to such a strange part of the city. These reflections
    were suddenly interrupted by some one slapping me on the back, and
    exclaiming in my ear, 'Ha! my Chevillere! you here! how do you do?
    what brought you here?' but I am resolved to put your curiosity to
    a serious test; names in my next. Yours, truly,

                                                      "V. CHEVILLERE."



CHAPTER XIV.


    V. CHEVILLERE TO B. RANDOLPH.

    (In continuation.)

                                                      "New-York, 18--.

    "Who do you think it was who met me at such an unlucky moment,
    just, perhaps, as I was about to stumble upon some clew to unravel
    the mysteries of this fair little breathing ignis fatuus? It was
    no other than young Arthur, our old schoolfellow, from Kentucky.
    He has come hither to attend a course of medical lectures, though
    they have medical lectures in his own State. Arthur was not of our
    class, nor yet one of the glorious three, but he was an old and
    respected friend and schoolmate, and therefore his acquaintance
    could not be cut quite so unceremoniously at the very moment of
    its renewal; and even if I had made some silly excuse to avoid him
    for the moment, he would undoubtedly have seen me kicking my heels
    in the street, 'like a strange dog in a crowd,' as Damon has it;
    so I reluctantly wheeled about with him. His companion was also a
    student of medicine, and a native of this city; he was introduced
    to me by the name of Hazlehurst. I am aware you are anxious to
    know what they could be seeking in the identical house in which I
    had just blockaded my fair fugitive. I wish, as heartily as you
    can do, that I could explain that matter to our mutual
    satisfaction. I pumped our inchoate doctors in vain; they
    explained their own visit to the house very satisfactorily, upon
    the grounds of professional business, in the name and on behalf of
    their preceptor, for it seems Arthur has been here all the summer;
    but they neither saw nor heard of any lady in the premises, and
    all further inquiries were of course ended by the interpretation
    which Arthur chose to put upon my inquiries concerning a fair
    fugitive, so soon after my arrival. He was not a little pleased to
    hear that Lamar was in the city, in close league with a countryman
    of his own.

    "By-the-way, Arthur is a noble fellow and an accomplished
    gentleman. He has all the prerequisites of natural capacity and
    elementary acquirements, for the study of his arduous profession.
    I know no young gentleman who has chosen a profession in every way
    better suited to his peculiarities of mind and temperament. You
    will doubtless recollect that he always had a fondness for the
    natural sciences, and this, after all, is the true 'condition
    precedent' for making a profound and philosophic physician. How
    lamentable it is that such minds are always thrown in the
    background in our colleges! This results from that everlasting
    _dingdong_ hammering at languages, before the pupil has discovered
    their uses, and without any regard to his peculiarities of mind.
    Those students who, like Arthur, exhibit an apt capacity for the
    study of things, and their properties and relations, are almost
    always dull at the study of their representatives, or, in other
    words, languages; why, then, do the instructers in these
    institutions destroy the energies and the vigour of such a mind,
    by making him fail at those things for which nature has
    disqualified him, or, rather, for which nature has too nobly
    endowed him? I am no enemy to the study of the vehicles by which
    we communicate with our fellow-men, but I am an enemy to the
    uniform, monotonous drilling, which all collegians in this country
    receive alike, because I have observed in this process, that
    third-rate minds invariably rank first. There are, in every
    college, numbers of young gentlemen who have parrot-like
    capacities, and memories that retain little words; but who, if
    required to originate ideas of their own, would soon show the
    native barrenness of their understandings.

    "Look around you now in the world, and see what has become of
    these _distinguished_ linguists! One out of a hundred, perhaps,
    has received a professorship in some new institution, and the
    others are all falsifying the promises of their precocious youth;
    while of the thoughtful and abstract dunces, as they were
    considered in college, many are building up lasting reputations,
    upon the deep and solid foundations which our hackneyed systems of
    education could not develop. Necessity and the world develop them;
    and these, we soon find, are very different from college life.
    Now, college discipline should imitate the world in this respect;
    it should develope every man's peculiar genius. Neglect of this is
    the true reason why so many men distinguish themselves in the
    world, who were considered asses in college, and why so many who
    were considered amazingly clever in college, are found to be
    little better than asses in the world.

    "Now that I have somewhat recovered from the chagrin of Arthur's
    mal-apropos appearance, I am really glad that he is here. I must
    surely see the lady again. Indeed, I am resolved to do so, if I
    have to stay here twelve months; and then Arthur's presence will
    much facilitate our design of surveying the under-currents of the
    busy world. You know that I am not prone to trust the surface of
    things. I shall therefore follow him into many places besides his
    fashionable resorts. He tells me that a malignant epidemic is said
    to be prevailing here, and that their visit to the sick person
    before mentioned was with a view to ascertain whether the patient
    really had malignant symptoms. They think she had not. I was not
    so much interested in the affairs of their patient during the
    discussion on the subject, as I was in their possible consequences
    upon others,--but of that more in my next. Young Doctor Hazlehurst
    seems to be a very fashionable personage, but gentlemanly in his
    manners, and unaffected in his deportment.

    "They walked with me to our hotel, in order to see Lamar, but
    unfortunately he was out. However, Arthur left college greetings
    for him, and young Hazlehurst left his address, and invitations
    for us both to call at his father's house, who, it seems, lives in
    the city; so you see we have made the first step towards seeing
    both the upper and under-currents during our sojourn. Whatever
    they bring forth shall be as faithfully chronicled as your own
    adventures. Truly,

                                                      "V. CHEVILLERE."



CHAPTER XV.


    V. CHEVILLERE TO B. RANDOLPH.

    (In continuation.)

                                                      "New-York, 18--.

    "The little coincidences of real life are of much more frequent
    occurrence than is generally allowed by our prim historians.
    Arthur and his companion had not long departed, when Lamar and
    Damon came in. I mentioned their visit to the former, when,
    picking up the card and examining it with evident surprise, he
    placed his finger upon the number of the street, and held it
    across the table for Damon to see it, who immediately exclaimed,
    'Well! I'm flambergasted now! if that ain't what I call a _leetle_
    particular.'

    "'Why, what is the matter?' said I, astonished in my turn at their
    astonishment.

    "'Oh, nothing more,' said Lamar, 'than that Damon and myself have
    but just come from the very door upon which that name and number
    are placed.'

    "'Are you acquainted with the family?' said I.

    "'No,' replied he; 'I was standing opposite to the door in
    question, when a young lady alighted from her carriage and entered
    the house; not, however, before she suddenly stopped and took a
    searching look at your humble servant.'

    "'Had you ever seen her before?'

    "'If I am not mistaken she is the same young lady whom I saw two
    years ago at the Virginia springs, when I obtained leave from
    college to go there on account of my health; she was then quite
    young; just entering her teens, I should suppose.'

    "'Ah! ha! have I caught you at last?' said I, as Lamar began to
    redden under a searching glance; 'then there was some foundation
    for the stories which followed you upon that occasion.'

    "'Bah!' said he, 'they were all nonsense; but come, Damon, tell
    Chevillere what fine stump speeches you heard this morning at a
    New-York election.'

    "I saw his drift in amusing me with Damon, and I was indeed quite
    willing to be so amused.

    "'Smash me if I heard any speeches,' said Damon, 'nor saw any
    candidates either; they manage them things here quite after a
    different fashion.'

    "'Why, how do they manage them, if they have no candidates and no
    speeches?' said I.

    "'By the art of hocus pocus, I believe,' continued Damon; 'I had
    whetted my appetite for a New-York speech till I was completely on
    a wire edge, by the time we got to the polls; then they had a
    parcel of chaps standing behind a little counter, with gold headed
    poles, like freemasons in a cake-shop, playing at long-pole with
    the boys. Why! where's the election,' said I, to a chap outside
    the counter, with one black eye too many. 'Right under your nose,'
    said he; 'clap down your tickets and kiss the calf-skin, as I did
    just now;' and then he cramm'd my hands full of little bits of
    paper, 'H----l in the West,' said I, 'are we going to have no
    speeches, no drink, no fighten?' 'O!' said he, 'there's plenty of
    drink in the bar-room next door, and you can get your stomach full
    of fight, if you will walk down to the _Five Points_.'

    "'And how do the people know whom they vote for?' said I to Lamar.

    "His answer satisfied me that Damon's account of the business was
    nearly correct as to matters of fact; and that the New-Yorkers
    never have what we call 'stump speeches,' and never personally
    know, or even see their representatives. These city mobocracies,
    composed as they are, principally of wild Irish, are terrible
    things; but I must adhere to our bargain, to have nothing to do
    with politics.

    "Lamar has evidently ripped up an old wound this morning, and I am
    truly rejoiced thereat; we shall take an early day to pay the
    visit spoken of, at which time I shall observe the gentleman's
    movements, and see if I cannot treasure up a little ammunition for
    future use, wherewithal to pay off old scores against him.

    "You recollect, perhaps, the old woman's comfort in a time of
    great famine; 'she thanked God her neighbours were as bad off as
    herself.' I find very little comfort in this truly philanthropic
    doctrine, save from occasionally amusing myself with anticipations
    of Lamar's more fashionable dilemma.

    "The Kentuckian's pulsations seem to be regulated by a gigantic
    and equipoised animal impulse. There is very little sinking of the
    heart in gloomy anticipation, with him; he enjoys the present,
    uninterrupted by the past or future. After all, are not these
    hardy and free sons of the west the happiest of all created
    beings? They enjoy nearly every thing that we do, perhaps not
    exactly in the same degree, but certainly with as much of the
    heart, if not so much of the head; I really envy Damon his hearty
    and joyous laughs, such as I could once indulge in myself, and I
    have often asked what is it that has made the change? Can you
    answer the question, Randolph?

    "I once thought that you and Lamar would laugh it on through life,
    but it seems that you have scarcely started, each in his distinct
    career, before you begin sowing the seeds of your future sorrows,
    don't be frightened; it is the appointed race we must all run,
    sooner or later; we cannot be joyous and jovial college-lads all
    our days; but we may, and I hope will, be calm and tranquil old
    _country gentlemen_.

    "But pshaw! I grow old before my time; 'sufficient for the day is
    the evil thereof;' lay that flattering unction to your soul, and
    all will soon be well, that is now ill with you.

    "The more I see of these northern states, the more I am convinced
    that some great revolution awaits our own cherished communities.
    Revolutions, whether sudden or gradual, are fearful things; we
    learn to feel attachments to those things which they tear up, as a
    poor cripple feels attached to the mortified limb, that must be
    amputated to save his life. A line of demarkation in such a case
    is distinctly drawn between the diseased and the healthy flesh.
    Such a line is now drawing between the slave and free states, I
    fear. God send that the disease may be cured without amputation,
    and before mortification takes place. I know that this latter is
    your own belief. What think you now, since you have seen the
    greater extent of the disease? Truly,

                                                      "V. CHEVILLERE."



CHAPTER XVI.


    B. RANDOLPH TO V. CHEVILLERE.

                                  "Belville, High Hills of the Santee.

    "DEAR FRIEND,

    "I have heard of weeping willows, but I never saw weeping pines
    and black Jacks (scrub oaks) before I came into South Carolina;
    these are made so by the moss which here grows from the trees in
    long pendulous masses, which makes them look like gigantic weeping
    willows.

    "On the day of my arrival here, I was again benighted within a few
    miles of Belville, and again found my way into Christendom by a
    delightful custom which prevails among your city refugees. You
    know that they have a little village erected here among your
    sandhills, which is entirely owned by wealthy residents of
    Charleston; to these they retire during the sickly season, and of
    course they are now full of fashionables. Before each door is a
    large wooden pillar, with a hearth on the top of it, a kind of
    rude imitation of our urn. On these they kindle pine-knot fires to
    keep the mosquitoes away from the premises, and the effect is
    doubtless at all times brilliant; but it is doubly so when they
    are the means of restoring a poor benighted traveller to the
    region of hope and comfort; such was the case with your humble
    servant. I had but just begun to look out for the usual concert,
    and the Frying-pan, and the swamp, when I discovered these fires
    away to my right; I was not more than a mile out of my road.

    "This little mushroom village was entirely deserted when I passed
    through it before; I was therefore surprised to find carriages
    standing by each cabin, and fine ladies promenading along the
    sandy roads with their attendant beaux.

    "Sounds of infantile laughter, sweet music, and the still sweeter
    notes of frying-pans (very different affairs from my assortment),
    saluted my delighted ears as I cantered through the encamped
    throng. I did not stop, because the distance was but short to your
    own house, at which I soon arrived, and, for once in my life, not
    before I was wanted.

    "As I briskly rode up the long sandy avenue, I heard a strange
    confusion of noises and sounds from the direction of the quarter,
    which you have here dangerously near, but from benevolent views I
    suppose; I next discovered Bell walking to and fro along the
    little esplanade which surmounts the front portico, wringing her
    hands, weeping, and calling upon your mother's name most
    piteously. I dismounted, and ran towards the nearest entrance with
    all my speed, and there I met the dear girl, just in time to catch
    her in my arms for fear of a worse resting-place. As soon as she
    had recovered a little from her exhaustion, the effect of her
    previous excitement, she exclaimed, 'Oh! Mr. Randolph, how glad I
    am to see you!'

    "'Not more so than I am to see you, my dear Bell; but tell me the
    cause of all this noise at the quarter, and of your alarm.'

    "She told me, as well as she could for her short and convulsive
    breathing, that the driver had undertaken, in the absence of the
    overseer, to whip a young negro who is a great favourite among his
    fellows; and it seems that he had beaten him unmercifully. Some
    time after, a party had assailed his house where he had shut
    himself in; as I came up, they had just succeeded in breaking down
    the door; but the bird had been some time flown, out of a back
    window. Your mother had gone to drink tea with one of the
    refugees, a city acquaintance of hers, at the little encampment
    before mentioned. Under these circumstances, I seized a cudgel and
    departed to the scene of action, not, however, with Bell's
    consent. She declared that they would murder me, and clung to my
    garments until I gently disengaged myself and committed her to her
    maid. It is not to be denied that I almost blessed the rebellion,
    for its showing me that I was a person to be preserved in the eyes
    of your cousin.

    "When I arrived upon the ground, it was some minutes before I
    could make the principal actors conscious of the presence of any
    one not in the number of their confederates; however, by dint of
    lungs and violent gesticulations, I at length gained an audience,
    and no sooner had I done so, than the victory was gained. I merely
    promised to have the matter investigated, and the offender
    punished himself, if he should prove, upon investigation, to have
    whipped the favourite either without cause, or unmercifully, with
    cause. This desirable conclusion to the affair could not have been
    brought about in every quarter in this neighbourhood, or at any
    one where they had been less accustomed to have their mutual
    wrongs redressed.

    "When I returned to the house, the news of the result had preceded
    me, and Bell had retired to her room; she soon, however, again
    made her appearance, more beautiful, if possible, than when I left
    her; she found it exceedingly difficult to amalgamate her present
    evident gratitude with her former comico-quizzico treatment of
    me,--and though the latter decidedly had the advantage, the
    struggles between the little devil of mischief within, and a
    proper behaviour to me on the present occasion, kept me quite
    amused, considering our late excitement, until your mother, who
    had been sent for, arrived with a number of gentlemen from the
    sandhills. With these we formed quite a party; your mother was
    less moved than I expected, owing, I suppose, to her having so
    long been in the habit of putting her energies to the test. She
    was undisguisedly pleased to see me.

    "Among the gentlemen who returned with her, my green eyes soon
    discovered a suitor of Bell's; whether one formerly discarded, or
    at present encouraged, I could not tell; but I rather suspect the
    latter, as your mother's visit was to his sister, and Bell had
    excused herself from going upon some grounds, for which he was now
    taking her to task.

    "I was not so much surprised as I have been, at her easy control
    of _my_ poor generalship, when I saw with what admirable
    discipline she managed her troops, both raw militia and regulars;
    of course I class myself with the latter.

    "I was not too much delighted to hear many parties and excursions
    talked of and arranged; what a selfish animal I must have become
    since I have undertaken this southern tour! I wonder if the
    northern air and manners have had the same effect upon you and
    Lamar?

    "After our visiters had departed (you see I am domiciliated), Bell
    said to me, starting up suddenly, 'Mr. Randolph, if my memory
    serves me, you told me at the door, on the morning of your
    departure, that indispensable business would put it entirely out
    of your power to take our house in your way home; I hope you have
    heard favourable accounts from that urgent business?'

    "The little _devil_ within was now completely triumphant; and
    then, to make my intended pathos still more ridiculous, by
    inventing more than half of my speech! I had a great mind to say,
    'Oh, Mr. Randolph, how glad I am to see you!' and almost run into
    her arms; but your mother's dignity, Chevillere, though it is mild
    and benevolent, keeps me always on my good behaviour in her
    presence; so I only answered, 'The horse! the horse! you forget
    the horse!' and then she enjoyed a peculiarly sincere and
    triumphant laugh; and the first, too, with which she has greeted
    my return. I love them so much that I can almost bear to hear her
    laugh at myself, provided it is at my knavery and not at my folly.

                                                        "B. RANDOLPH."



CHAPTER XVII.


    V. CHEVILLERE TO B. RANDOLPH.

                                                      "New-York, 18--.

    "I told you in my last of our surprise at the little coincidence
    of the number on the card, and that on the house where the lady
    alighted, with whom Lamar had exchanged some intelligent glances
    in her more girlish days; but I did not complete the relation,
    which I will do presently.

    "In the mean time, was there ever a man of any travel or
    adventure, who has not been alarmed at these seeming accidents,
    or, what is more probable, made superstitious by their frequent
    recurrence? I think that I hazard nothing in saying, that more of
    such strange coincidences have occurred to me than I have ever
    seen in any work of fiction; not the clap-traps, and other little
    contrivances, which are intended to electrify the blunted nerves
    of veteran readers; but the coincidences of ordinary life in
    society, which reveal to us occasionally the finger of Providence
    in the course we vainly suppose we are chalking out for ourselves.
    What is it to a man to possess the will, when all the
    circumstances upon which that will is to operate, are ready
    arranged to his hand? I do not repine at this, if it be a fact.
    On the contrary, it is often a matter of consolation to me to
    think, how narrow is the choice which the Creator has given us;
    thereby, of course, decreasing our means of doing wrong; nor is
    this all his beneficence to us,--he has made it easier for us to
    do right than wrong; often leaving us but two plain roads to
    follow, the right one being the easier, plainer, more attractive
    to a cultivated head and heart, and more profitable in this world.
    There! you see I never preach beyond this world; and hard enough
    it is to see clearly all around us in that.

    "This brings me, by a very circuitous route you will no doubt
    think, to the further coincidence spoken of.

    "As Damon does not take up his abode with us, besides other
    reasons, he was not of our party when we went to pay our respects
    to the Hazlehurst family. On entering the parlour, we found the
    young gentleman who had invited us, with Arthur and the lady, who
    were sitting, at the time of our entrance, engaged in an
    apparently interesting conversation, in the recess of one of the
    windows. Arthur and Lamar seemed pleased to meet again. The lady
    smiled upon Lamar, and acknowledged her recollection of his
    countenance. She is elegant and lofty; not in height, indeed, for
    she is not remarkably tall, but lofty in her demeanour and
    bearing. There are none of the gentle whisperings which come
    directly from the heart of a certain little unhappy runaway. The
    one would captivate an assembly; the other has made terrible
    inroads upon the heart of a single gentleman; and this brings me
    to the matter with which I began this epistle.

    "Lamar, having mentioned to Arthur something about the young lady
    we had met on our travels, and having thrown many gratuitous
    remarks and glances towards me, the lady seemed at length to take
    some interest in the subject, and in Lamar's description. She then
    appealed to me for the name.

    "'Miss St. Clair!' exclaimed she, when I had succeeded in uttering
    it, 'and have you really fallen into her toils? Alas, I pity you!'

    "Why the plague should she pity me, Randolph? It was evident
    enough that she did not mean the mock pity, which is only another
    way for saying, 'how I am rejoiced!'

    "'But,' continued she, 'the lady is a dear and valued friend of
    mine, and you shall see her.'

    "'But when?' said I, eagerly, awakening out of a brown study.

    "All laughed; and I cannot say from my own experience, that I like
    the sport any better than yourself.

    "You could have amused yourself (it was no amusement to me) with
    the odd looks of Lamar, in presence of the object of a first and
    youthful attachment. There is something pure and primitive in
    these boyish loves, and they are too much out of fashion in the
    present age, even in this country. It is not certainly because
    matches of mere convenience have supplanted them, so much as
    because it has become too much the custom to treat very young
    affairs of the heart with ridicule and contempt. People are apt to
    say 'Oh! it is nothing more than puppy love!' (a refined
    expression truly) and to throw derision upon all such
    demonstrations, at the very time, too, when we are most sensitive
    upon such subjects, and when our impressions of the fair one are
    but too easily modified by the pretended opinions of our seniors
    and superiors. Opposition, direct and serious, will indeed
    sometimes make the youth steady in his course, but ridicule of the
    object, never!

    "From the little I know of the science of political economy and
    human happiness, I am inclined to run right into the teeth of the
    prevailing doctrines on this subject. I have never known a couple
    who married, whether young or old, upon the strength of a first
    and mutual passion, who were not contented, prosperous, and happy.
    There are doubtless exceptions to this sweeping rule, but I have
    not seen them.

    "Its enemies urge that the youthful pair are not capable of
    estimating each other's qualifications. But do age and experience
    qualify them? Or is the judgment of so much avail in these matters
    as is pretended? Look at the men most remarkable for discretion
    and judgment; I will venture to say you will find that most of
    them have trusted too much to their judgments, and too little to
    their hearts, to be happy. The truth is, that nature has made the
    heart the magnetic point of mutual attraction in these affairs,
    and the head of the wisest man is here out of its sphere.

    "It is too true, that many of your slow, cautious, miserly
    characters, attempt to reduce the whole business to a question in
    the single rule of three; as thus: if Caroline B. with a sweet
    face and a prudent turn makes a thrifty wife, what will Adeline B.
    make, with a sweet face, thrifty ways, and a heavy purse?

    "Thanks be to an overruling providence, they are often carried a
    rule or two farther in their mathematics than they intended; the
    honey-moon winds up with doleful calculations, in the ashes of the
    chimney-corner, with the end of their rattans; such as Vulgar
    Fractions, Profit and Loss, Tare and Trett, et cetera.

    "You must not imagine, from what I have here said, that I am one
    of those dreamers who contend that the world might again become a
    paradise; if, in these things, men would always consult the
    dictates of the heart.

    "If we look forward at the marriages which are to come, we can
    discern nothing. This you may think is too true to make a joke of,
    and too serious to discuss. But look back over all the world that
    you have seen, and I think you will own that Providence or destiny
    has had a great design constantly in view in their fulfilment. The
    human character has been equipoised, extremes have been avoided,
    the humble elevated, the exalted humbled; all the genius, and the
    wit, and the judgment, and the virtues, have not been suffered to
    be concentrated in the descendants of a single pair, but have been
    as nearly as possible divided among us, the descendants of the
    multitude. Opposite, or rather diverging characters, are
    frequently enamoured of each other--the brave man loves the gentle
    woman; the gentle man, the gay woman; and thus in their
    descendants we have the grand compromise of nature.

    "There is a sermon, now for the text--'neither is the battle to
    the strong nor the race to the swift.'

                                                      "V. CHEVILLERE."

       *       *       *       *       *


    V. CHEVILLERE TO B. RANDOLPH.

    (In continuation.)

                                                      "New-York, 18--.

    "The day being Sunday, I sent old Cato this morning to arouse
    Lamar quite early, in order to ascertain if he was disposed to
    walk before breakfast, and view some of the boasted parks, groves,
    and gardens of these hospitable Gothamites. Old Cato soon
    returned, saying that Lamar had but that moment fallen asleep, but
    that he would be with me as soon as he could make a hasty toilet;
    hasty it indeed was, for he was not many minutes behind Cato, in
    his morning-gown and slippers, yawning and stretching his clenched
    fists through the room as if he had sat in his chair all night.

    "'Beshrew me, Chevillere,' said he, 'but you are an uneasy and
    restless spirit, to be waking a man up at all hours of the night
    in this style. I thought, at least, when I saw old Cato's grisly
    head, that you had had a surfeit, or a fit of indigestion.'

    "I suppose then you are disappointed to find me well; but tell me,
    Lamar, how you intend to spend the day?

    "'Why, I have not laid it down in a regular campaign, but I
    suppose, as you are too much of a Roundhead to kill the day with
    me at cards, that I shall have to submit myself to be whined to
    death with nasal psalmody, at some conventicle or other. Be that
    as it may, Damon shall sit on the stool of repentance as well as
    myself.'

    "'In the mean time, suppose we walk to the Battery and Castle
    Garden?'

    "'Agreed!' said he, 'provided you wait till I jump into a more
    seemly garb.'

    "We were soon arm in arm, sauntering down the southern extremity
    of Broadway, which terminates in a beautiful oval grass-plot,
    called the Bowling Green; surrounded by a handsome iron railing,
    and containing a young and an old grove of trees; in imitation,
    doubtless, of human life, the young to supplant the aged. During
    the colonial government, there stood in the centre of this
    beautiful spot a painted leaden equestrian statue of George the
    Third, but as soon as the revolutionary war broke out, it was
    melted into bullets, and shot at his own ships and soldiers. On
    the opposite side of the right branch of Broadway, in a
    southwesterly direction, is the Battery--a noble lawn, covering
    some acres of the southern extremity of Manhattan Island, and of
    course looking into the Bay of New-York. What is by a misnomer
    called Castle Garden, stands out in the waters of the bay on the
    south-west side, and is connected with the lawn by a wooden bridge
    of some thirty or forty yards length, and not too strong to give
    way under some future pressure. Castle Garden is a castellated
    structure, without turrets and battlements, built of hewn stone,
    and pierced with a row of port-holes. It seems to have been built
    for warlike purposes, but is now used as a public promenade, and
    exhibition garden, having tiers of seats inside, and around an
    extensive area, in the manner of an amphitheatre. In the centre of
    the area is a little temple or dome, supported on columns.
    Surmounting the whole body of the castle is an esplanade,
    protected by plain railings; from the top of this extends high
    into the air a flag-staff, from which, on national festivals, the
    'star spangled banner' proudly floats over the blue waves which
    beat against its base.

    "It was here that the corporation entertained Lafayette, a
    platform having been thrown over the area, and a canvass marquee
    over the top; this ball-room is said to have been capable of
    containing from six to ten thousand persons.

    "Lamar and I mounted the esplanade, and seated ourselves upon the
    benches, just within the railing.

    "We could see the ships of every nation, as they rode triumphantly
    over the waters of this magnificent bay, gliding about like
    'things of life;' marine birds screaming and diving among them,
    and sometimes the porpoises in their clumsy gambols, shooting
    their black masses above the water and down again; steamers with
    their gay pennants, thundering noises, and deafening bells; the
    rude music and songs of the sailors, the hoarse voice of the
    pilot, as he stepped on board some outward-bound vessel, and the
    'ay! ay!' of the sailor, as the order reached his ears, through
    the rattling of the shrouds, and the whistling of the breeze.

    "Farther out in the bay, between us and the ocean, is a beautiful
    chain of islands; first Ellis's, then Bedloe's, and lastly, next
    the ocean, Staten Island.

    "Gay throngs of well-dressed people began now to crowd the
    gravelled walks of the Battery; maids attending on children were
    seen with their little charges, gambolling over the green in their
    Sunday suits; the emancipated mechanics, with their snow-white
    jackets and collars; and the happy negro, with his tawdry and
    cast-off finery, as free (personally, not politically, free) as
    any of the loungers. There was something in this Sunday scene
    inexpressibly soothing and delightful to my feelings.

    "Every southern should visit New-York. It would allay provincial
    prejudices, and calm his excitement against his northern
    countrymen. The people here are warm-hearted, generous, and
    enthusiastic, in a degree scarcely inferior to our own southerns.
    The multitude move as one man, in all public-spirited, benevolent,
    or charitable measures. Many of these Yorkers are above local
    prejudices, and truly consider this as the commercial metropolis
    of the Union, and all the people of the land as their customers,
    friends, patrons, and countrymen.

    "Nor is trade the only thing that flourishes. The arts of polished
    and refined life, refined literature, and the profounder studies
    of the schoolmen, all have their distinguished votaries,--I say
    distinguished, with reference to the standard of science in our
    country.

    "This much I have written before going to church. The further
    adventures of the day, in the evening.

                                                      "V. CHEVILLERE."

       *       *       *       *       *


    V. CHEVILLERE TO B. RANDOLPH.

    (In continuation.)

                                                     "10 o'clock P. M.

    "About ten o'clock this morning the bells began to ring, from
    Trinity to St. John's. A forest of steeples seemed to have let
    loose their artillery at once upon us tardy Christians. These
    gongs seemed to take effect in about fifteen minutes, for
    simultaneously the houses poured out their thronging occupants,
    until the streets literally swarmed with these church-going
    people.

    "'Whither shall we bend our steps?' said I; 'here are various
    routes to heaven; which do you choose, Episcopal, Methodist, or
    Presbyterian?'

    "'Not any one of the three,' said he.

    "'Indeed! Perhaps Jewishly inclined?'

    "'No; I thought that you were aware of my partiality for the
    close-communion Baptists,' said he, with mock gravity.

    "'But seriously, Lamar, you accused me of wishing to drag you to
    some conventicle or other; choose for us both; indeed for _three_,
    for here comes Damon.'

    "'Then,' said he, 'I choose the most celebrated preacher! you will
    thus be most likely to see a certain demure little runaway.'

    "'And there,' said I, 'you will be most likely to see her friend,
    with Arthur by her side.'

    "Damon now coming up, was asked by me where he would choose to
    spend the forenoon of the day.

    "'I can't tell exactly,' replied he, 'for the truth is, I feel
    pretty much like a fish out of water even of week days; but Sunday
    I'm completely dished; I was thinking of walking out into the
    country, and bantering somebody for a foot-race.'

    "I proposed that we should all go and hear Dr. ----, and
    forthwith led the way, my two companions following on, much like
    truant boys on their return march to school. We entered a low
    white church, I don't recollect where exactly, but on the western
    side of Broadway. The preacher was already in the pulpit, and the
    aisles and pews on the lower floor were crammed with hearers,
    insomuch that we were compelled to seek seats in the small
    gallery, where with great difficulty we found them.

    "The preacher, who had already begun, was a commanding-looking
    gentleman, clothed in black, and, like most of our dissenting
    clergymen, without gown or surplice; his features were large and
    well-formed; his forehead lofty beyond any thing I have ever seen,
    but falling back at the top until it was lost in little short
    bristly curls; his attitudes were lofty and dignified. He had, as
    I said before, announced the portion of Scripture which he was
    attempting to elucidate, before we entered the church. The subject
    seemed to be, the practicability and means of a direct revelation
    from God! When he spoke of the Great Spirit who rules our
    destinies revealing himself, and his manner of doing it, he was
    almost sublime. I must try to recollect a few passages for your
    edification, but you must remember that they are transposed into
    my own language.

    "He painted in vivid and striking colours, the utter incapacity of
    man to conceive identically of such a being as God. 'The little
    puny brain of man,' said he, 'which you may hold in the hollow of
    your hand, cannot contain a true conception of God in all his
    majesty! the little arteries and fibres of our poor heads would
    rend and burst asunder with such an idea.

    "'To form one single correct thought of so great a Spirit, you
    must first conceive of those things which surround him; as, when
    we view a painting of some earthly object, there must first be a
    background to relieve the eye. So when you would conceive of that
    great Being truly and fully, you must be able to realize the
    duration of eternity, obliterate the little periods of time and
    chronology, which require a starting and a resting-place in our
    human minds,--soar out of the reach of the sickly atmospheres
    which surround these little planets, and stand erect in the broad
    and fathomless light of God's own atmosphere! Could the human eye
    see with such rays, and stretch its glances over the great waves
    and boundless oceans of light in which he dwells, one single ray
    of it would blast your optic nerves.

    "'Even here upon earth, if we are suddenly brought from a dark
    dungeon into the bright rays of his reflected glory, our little
    optical machinery quails and dances with the shock; but take that
    same creature from his gloomy dungeon, and place him in the glassy
    sea of light in which God dwells! The utter horrors of such a
    moment, if they did not instantly explode the soul into its
    elements, would be worse than the terrors of convulsions, and
    earthquakes, and the black and fathomless chasms of the sea. And
    yet! some of us desire in our hearts a direct revelation to
    ourselves from this sublime Being! Know you what you desire? You
    desire that God should stretch out his mighty power, and draw away
    the friendly veil of the heavens, and burst upon an astounded
    world in all his fearful attributes! Before such an immediate
    presence, the sun and moon would become dark in contrast. The
    natural laws which he has given us for our protection, of
    gravitation, electricity, and magnetism, would burst loose from
    their reflected positions, and all animate and inanimate nature
    would fall before their First Great Cause! We cannot have direct
    physical intercourse with God. We are physically incompetent to
    encounter him, either in his goodness or in his wrath.

    "You say in your hearts, that there is mystery in this revelation
    of the Bible! Can mystery be separable from sublime or profound
    greatness, when viewed through human powers? Are not height, and
    depth, and space, and air, all mysterious to your minds, when
    beyond the reach of the eye? Is not darkness alone profoundly
    mysterious? mysterious in its effects and in its properties! Can
    any mind analyze darkness? Is it positive or negative? Does it
    extend through eternal and measureless space? or is it only a
    creative property dependent upon the functions of the eye? Our
    darkness is to one part of creation light, and our light their
    darkness.

    "Is measureless space a positive creation, or a negative
    nonentity! No human intellect can fathom these subjects; not from
    any of their delusive properties, but from our limited capacities!
    These then are but the beginning of those things which interpose
    between us and our great and sublime Creator!

    "You can now, perhaps, form some idea of the difficulties of
    revealing God to man!

    "What would you have with a more powerful and sublime revelation
    than this? Would you disorganize the minds of the whole human
    family, by opening to them frightful volumes which would craze and
    bewilder, rather than direct them? Do you complain of mystery, and
    yet call upon God for more?

    "But the greatest difficulty between us and a direct revelation
    from our Creator, has yet to be considered.

    "This revelation of the Bible was necessarily conveyed to us
    through the medium of human language. Now let us examine what this
    human language is. It is a system of words or signs, which convey
    to our minds the ideas of things. These words only represent such
    ideas as we ourselves have formed from the things we have seen,
    and their various combinations. How then can these signs and
    symbols convey identical ideas of God and his attributes? All the
    imperfections of this revelation then are confessedly owing to our
    imperfections, both as it regards mind and language.

    "I have given you but a faint outline of this powerful and
    vehement speaker's discourse. During its delivery I once or twice
    turned to Lamar and the Kentuckian, to see how they were affected.
    The former had insensibly risen during the fervency of the
    preacher's eloquence, and stood leaning over the balustrade,
    drinking in the sounds of a voice which are truly powerful though
    not musical, until he came to a pause; he then sank into his seat,
    a grim smile passing over his pale sickly features, clearly
    showing to those who knew him, how intently he had listened. Damon
    chewed tobacco at a prodigious rate, and the more eloquent the
    speaker became, the more energetic was the action of his jaws. His
    eye was wild and savage, like that of a forest animal when it
    suddenly finds itself in the midst of a settlement. He sometimes
    cracked his fingers together, for the same purpose, I suppose,
    that he used to crack his whip when travelling on horseback, to
    give emphasis and round his periods.

    "But I had not long to consider these effects upon different
    characters, for at this moment Lamar pointed over the balustrade
    at two moving figures on the lower floor. You already guess, if
    you are any thing of a Yankee, what these were. Lamar and I
    simultaneously arose to our feet and gazed at the heads which
    filled up every crevice, as a veteran soldier would have gazed at
    so many bristling bayonets upon an impregnable bastion. We soon
    heard the steps of a carriage let down, and then the rolling of
    the wheels. Lamar bit his lip till the blood almost started from
    it. Whether the pressure was increased by his having seen that
    Arthur joined the ladies near the door, I shall not undertake to
    say.

    "The sermon now being over we had merely to throw ourselves into
    the tide of human figures which moved down stairs, to be carried
    safely to the bottom.

    "When there, Damon drew one long and whistling breath, and an
    inarticulate sound not unlike the snort of a whale.

    "'I'm flambergasted! if that ain't what I call goin the whole
    cretur, he'd go to Congress from old Kentuck as easy as I could
    put a gin sling under my jacket. O Christopher! what a stump
    speech he could make, if he would only turn his hand to it,
    instead of wasting his wind here among the old wives!'

    "'Well, Lamar, what did you think of him?'

    "'Think of him! (rousing himself from a brown study), I never
    knew before that I had nerves in the hairs of my head.'

    "'And where did you now obtain that precious piece of anatomical
    news?'

    "'In the church, to be sure! Were not my locks dancing all the
    while to the music of that eccentric man's voice? The cold chills
    ran over me, as if I had been under the influence of miasma.'

    "I watched Damon through an unusually long silence, while he
    several times snapped his fingers and took a fresh chew of
    tobacco.

    "'I'll tell you what it is, that's what I call a real tear-down
    sneezer,' ejaculated he; 'he's a bark-well and hold-fast too; he
    doesn't honey it up to 'em, and mince his words--he lets it down
    upon 'em hot and heavy; he knocks down and drags out; first he
    gives it to 'em in one eye and then in 'tother, then in the
    gizzard, and at last he gits your head under his arm, and then I
    reckon he feathers it in, between the lug and the horn; he gives a
    feller no more chance nor a 'coon has in a black jack.'

    "'Then you give him more credit for sincerity than you usually do
    men of his cloth,' said I.

    "'Yes, yes! there's no whippin the devil round the stump with him;
    he jumps right at him, tooth and toe-nail, and I'm flambergasted
    if I don't think he rather worsted the _Old Boy_ this morning; and
    he's the best match I ever saw him have, he looks so stout and
    soldier-like; and then his eye! Did you see his eye, stranger? I'm
    shot if he didn't look as if he could'a jumped right a-straddle
    of the devil's neck, and just run his thumbs in, and scooped out
    his two eyes, as easy as I would scoop an oyster out of his
    shell.'

    "'You don't go to church often when you are at home?'

    "'No; but I _would_ go, if we had such a Samson as this; he raises
    old Kentuck in me in a minute. I feel full of fight, and ready for
    any thing now! But our old parson! he's an entirely different cut
    in the jib. He whines it out to us like an old woman in the last
    of pea-time; he doesn't thunder it down to 'em like this chap, and
    like old Hickory did the grape-shot at New-Orleans.'

    "We had now arrived at that point of the street where we were to
    separate. Damon abruptly informed us of his intention to return
    soon to Baltimore. I asked him if he was not pleased with
    New-York.

    "'O, yes;' said he, 'it's a real Kentuck of a place, a man can do
    here what he likes; they don't look at the cut of a feller's coat,
    but at the cut of his jib. I could wear my coat upside down here,
    and my hat smashed all into a gin-shop, and nobody has time to
    turn round and look at me. Yes, yes, stranger, they are a
    whole-souled people, and I like 'em, but I have staid long
    enough.'

    "Here we separated for the day. Lamar intends to try and prevail
    upon him to accompany us to the theatre, and the Italian opera. I
    have great curiosity to see him at the latter place. Pedrotti,
    they say, can tame a tiger with her melodious and touching voice.
    As you may suppose, I am anxious to hear it myself, and to see its
    effects upon one so unschooled in the music of luxurious and
    effeminate Italy.

    "I have written you more at length than I intended, but I could
    not do otherwise in return for your amusing, friendly, and
    satisfactory epistle. We shall meet again, as in days of yore, and
    then we will gather up all these scribblings, and enjoy these
    scenes again. In the mean time, believe that I wish you success in
    your present suit, for the sake of three of us,--but more
    particularly and selfishly that of

                                                      "V. CHEVILLERE."



CHAPTER XVIII.


    V. CHEVILLERE TO B. RANDOLPH.

                                                      "New-York, 18--.

    "DEAR CHUM,

    "Events which seem to me worth recording, crowd upon us so fast
    now, that it is almost impossible to give you, according to
    promise, even a profile view of our movements.

    "This morning, about the same hour at which we went to church
    yesterday, we strolled down Wall-street (and we seemed the only
    strollers there) to see the Shylocks in their dens, if any such
    could be found. I was instantly struck with the concentrated
    looks, and absorbed countenances of all the persons we met. Most
    of them were running in and out of the banks, with their little
    bank books in their hands, making mental calculations of notes to
    be taken up, deposites where made, and how much. Brokers were
    standing behind their counters, ready to commence their brisk, and
    (in this country) almost unhazardous game. Many of them amass
    immense fortunes; it is not at all uncommon for one of these
    houses to loan to a state several millions at once.

    "We went upon 'change at the hour of twelve. There, in the large
    room of the rotunda, or circular part of the exchange, merchants,
    and brokers, and bankers, and moneyed men meet, pretty much after
    the same fashion as our jockeys and racers upon the turf. The
    light falls from the dome upon these faces, and reveals the best
    study for a picture I have ever seen. The seller and the sellee,
    the shaver and the shavee, or diamond cut diamond, as Damon
    expresses it:--bear with me but a moment while I go over these
    dull details, and in return I will tell you something more of the
    lady with the black mantle.

    "The most predominant expression that I saw upon 'change was
    _affectation_; the affectation of business; not the silly
    school-boy affectation which wears off with the improving mind,
    but that which is first put on by business men, to disguise the
    real operations of the mind, and which afterward grows into a
    confirmed habit, and is seen deeply set in wrinkles, long after
    the first exciting cause has disappeared.

    "This symptom, among the moneyed men, varies according to
    character and strength of mind in the individual. One man I saw
    standing with his back against a window, his thumbs stuck into the
    armholes of his waistcoat, his quill toothpick tight between his
    teeth,--his features large and fleshy, his complexion between a
    copper and an apoplectic dapple of blue and red,--his teeth large,
    white, and flat, his eye small and gray, and his head grizzled; he
    had evidently been a free, but what is _called_ a _temperate_
    liver. I tried to trace back through the wrinkles in this man's
    face, what the emotions were which in his younger days he had
    attempted to engrave upon it, and which long habit had now made
    part of his nature; but I should first attempt to describe _the_
    expression itself. His upper lip was turned into a curl of
    contempt; his eye was thrown a little down, and the eyelid raised
    high, so as to show much of the white of the eye, as when a person
    is in the attitude of profound thought upon some far distant
    subject. This man had, I thought, the best chosen affectation; it
    expressed profound abstraction in _one_ direction, when he was no
    doubt really abstracted in another.

    "His right-hand neighbour had not been so fortunate in his
    selection of a vizor for the moneyed masquerade. He had chosen
    comedy; and attempted to hide pounds, shillings, and pence under a
    comic visage. It was not well chosen. His business-laugh was too
    horrid. It displayed teeth, gums, and throat, and was too
    affectedly sincere. He too frequently passed his glances quickly
    round from one face to the other, to see if they enjoyed the
    sport. This species of affectation had its origin in a settled
    contempt for the sense of his associates, and an exalted
    conception of his own, and especially of his powers to amuse. He
    frequently drew the corners of his mouth towards his ears, by a
    voluntary motion, without exercising the corresponding risible
    muscles; elevating his eyebrows at the same time in a knowing
    way. Do this yourself, and you will have the expression instantly.
    His only additional comic resource consisted in sticking one thumb
    directly under his chin, like a pillar. This man is celebrated on
    'change for telling what _he_ considers a good story.

    "Another description of affectation here seen, and by far the most
    common, is the affectation of decision, firmness, stability, and
    concentrated purpose.

    "Various methods, I saw, had been practised through long lives to
    attain this safe look. Some, to whom it was not natural to do so,
    pushed out the under jaw, like a person who (to use a Southern
    term) is _jimber_-jawed. Others carried the head on one side, drew
    up the muscles at the outer angle of one eye, and kept the
    nostrils distended. Others clenched the teeth, looked fierce and
    steady, and habitually patted one foot upon the floor, as if in
    high-spirited impatience. Some looked pensive and sad, and
    occasionally drew long sighs. Beware of these, if you ever trade
    in the money-market.

    "The most ludicrous of all moneyed whims is a desire to make
    others suppose that you think yourself poor. A heartless man
    begging for sympathy is, of all kinds of affectation, the most
    contemptible. But the most dangerous of all others, and the most
    apt to deceive a candid and upright mind, is the affectation of
    being unaffected. Such is the sin of those who affect bold,
    independent, and reckless looks. If good fortune had not made
    them brokers, bad fortune (they seem to say) might have made them
    robbers.

    "There is yet another class to describe--the sincere and the
    honest. These are easily descried. Something like an electric
    intelligence passes from the eye of one honest man to that of
    another. These are usually modest, retiring, and humble. I speak
    of real humility, which is best displayed in a respect for the
    understanding of other men; a desire to place one's companions at
    their ease; and a tenderness and sympathy towards the failings of
    the bankrupt, the vicious, and the unfortunate generally.

    "Not that these indications occur only on 'change; they may be
    seen in the pulpit, at the bar, at the bedside, and behind the
    counter. As you read my descriptions, try to produce the
    expression upon your face; then call up some individual of your
    acquaintance, who may have sat for such a picture--poor, indeed,
    in its finish, but if it convey to you the idea, my ambition is
    satisfied. This is a severe test, but I think you may muster up
    _dramatis personæ_ for all the characters.

    "As I am now upon this subject, permit me to make one or two
    general remarks.

    "I have learned to hold no intimacy with those men who are harsh
    and uncompromising towards unfortunates and criminals. These
    feelings often arise from the identical weaknesses, or faults,
    which drove their victims to ruin. You have, doubtless, seen two
    slaves quarrel because one belonged to a rich and the other to a
    poor man.

    "As one well-fed dog is sure to be snarlish to a poorer
    brother--poor human nature--this currish principle is but too true
    when applied to us.

    "There is none who appears so virtuously indignant at crime as the
    man who is a rogue in his heart. A horse-stealer who has blundered
    into better fortune is scandalized at his former craft; and a
    sheep-stealer can weep in the very face of the lamb which another
    has stolen.

    "Those ladies, the purity of whose characters is most
    questionable, are uniformly the first to cease visiting an openly
    suspected sister.

    "But I see plainly that if I go on, the subject must become too
    revolting; at all events I must give it to you in broken doses;
    and by the time Arthur introduces me into the human catacombs,
    where the living are _soul_-dead, you will be ready to take
    another view of those dark and dismal abodes, and attempt further
    observations of humanity in its darker developments.

    "A malignant disease, as Arthur thinks, has broken out in the
    portions of the city alluded to; if so, I will remain with him.
    This is the time to see fearful sights; and we Southerns, you
    know, have looked the grim monster too often in the face in this
    shape to be easily frightened from a cherished purpose.

    "Damon begins to be very uneasy under these reports of sudden
    deaths, and black infections sweeping through the air."

       *       *       *       *       *


    V. CHEVILLERE TO B. RANDOLPH.

    (In continuation.)

                                                      "New-York, 18--.

    "I have seen her, Randolph, and seen her far more captivating and
    beautiful than ever!

    "Yesterday, after I had finished the former part of this letter, I
    met, on my way down to dinner, Arthur and young Hazlehurst. The
    latter had come expressly to invite Lamar and myself to spend the
    evening at their house. As you may suppose, it was not refused; we
    pressed them to go in with us, as they had not yet dined, to which
    they finally consented.

    "I find Hazlehurst an intelligent young man, but with many
    erroneous opinions concerning the south, of which he must be
    disabused. He imagines us to be a generous and hospitable people,
    but in a rather semi-barbarous state.

    "As this very subject occupied our attention in presence of the
    ladies, I prefer giving you an imperfect sketch of the discourse.
    I must not omit a table lecture of Lamar's on nicotiana, however
    impatient you may be to hear more of a certain fair one.

    "The subject of tobacco was introduced simultaneously with the
    segars, after most of the company had retired. One having been
    offered to young Hazlehurst, he declined it, saying that he did
    not use tobacco in any shape.

    "'Not use tobacco! not smoke!' said Lamar; 'why, sir, you have yet
    to experience one of the most calm, delightful, and soothing
    pleasures of which human nerves are sensible.'

    "'I have always understood,' said the other, 'that the stimulus
    leaves one far more miserable than if he had not applied it.'

    "'Then you labour under some mistake,' said Lamar; 'and if you
    will permit, and your doctorships will forbear laughter, I will
    explain to you the effects of a fine segar upon my system, and
    "suit the action to the word."

    "'When a man takes a genuine, dappled Havana segar in his mouth,
    places his legs upon a hair cushioned chair, his head thrown back
    on that upon which he sits, or against the wall; his arms folded
    upon his chest,--the following phenomena occur:

    "'_First stage._ He becomes heroic and chivalrous, or perhaps
    eloquent; if the last, and thinks himself alone, you will see him
    wave his hand in the most graceful and captivating style of
    oratory. His eye is the soul of imaginary eloquence, his features
    are all swelled out until they seem grand--gloomy--and profound;
    his nostrils pant and show their red lining, like a fiery and
    blooded steed. He rolls out thick volumes of smoke, and puffs it
    from him like a forty-two-pounder. He draws down his feet, and
    raises his head and looks after it, as if victory or conviction
    had been hurled upon its clouds. Perhaps some one laughs at him,
    as you laugh now at me.

    "'He replaces his legs, leans back his head again; the _second
    stage_ is come; he smiles, perhaps, at the laurels just won; he
    closes his eyes, delightful visions of green meadows and lawns,
    fragrant flowers, meandering streams, limpid brooks, beautiful
    nymphs, twilight amid tall and venerable trees, and lengthening
    shadows, flit before his imagination. His face now is towards the
    heavens; his features are calm and serene; he wafts the smoke
    gently upward in long continued columns, and wreaths, and
    garlands; his hands fall by his side--the diminished stump falls
    from his hand.

    "'And now, in the _third stage_, he is in a revery. A servant
    touches him three times, and tells him a gentleman wants to see
    him; he kicks his shins; servant retreats. Eyes being still
    closed, he draws a long sigh or two, but full, pleasant, and
    satisfactory. Servant returns; shakes him by the shoulder; he
    jumps up and throws an empty bottle at his head, as I do this one,
    at that grinning fellow there (making a mock effort), and then the
    trance is over.

    "'Now where are the bad effects, except upon Cato's shins, if he
    should happen to be the man?'

    "We all applauded Lamar for his treat, with three hearty cheers,
    in a small way.

    "I am sorry to see a little sly, stealthy, unmentionable coldness
    arising between Lamar and Arthur. I first discovered it in little
    acts of what the world calls politeness, but which I call
    formality, towards each other. They are unconscious of it, as yet,
    for it seems to have sprung up by irresistible mutual repulsion
    between them: deep seated self appears to have warned each of a
    dangerous rival in the other. These are little secret
    selfishnesses of the soul, which lie deep, dark, and still,
    running in an unseen current, far below the soundings of the
    self-searching consciousness. How mysterious is the mind of man!
    We may draw up the flood-gates, and let loose the dammed-up waters
    in order to find some secret at the bottom; but the flood rolls
    by, and the secret still lies buried as profoundly as before. At
    some future day, when the thunder and the storms shall come, these
    secrets may, perhaps, be washed up to the surface, like wonders of
    the deep, when least expected!

    "At about eight o'clock, Lamar and I sallied out to find Mrs.
    Hazlehurst's house in Broadway; amid music from clarionet, violin,
    and kent bugle. These were stationed in the balconies of the
    different museums. Carriages were just setting down their company
    at the old Park Theatre. Little blind and lame boys sat about the
    iron railing at St. Paul's church, grinding hand-organs, and
    making music little better than so many grindstones--all for a
    miserable pittance which they collect in the shape of pennies,
    perhaps to the amount of a dozen a day.

    "Negroes were screaming 'ice-cream' at the top of their lungs,
    though it is now becoming cold in the evenings and mornings. At
    every corner some old huckster sang out 'Hot corn! hot corn!'
    though the regular season of 'roasting-ears,' has long since
    passed by. Little tables of fruit, cakes, and spruce-beer were
    strewed along the walks and under the awnings, which often remain
    extended during the night.

    "We at length found the house, and entered with palpitating
    hearts. I had a sort of presentiment that I was to meet Miss St.
    Clair, from what the lively Isabel had said.

    "When we entered the saloon she was nowhere to be seen! my
    disappointment was no doubt visible, for I saw an arch smile upon
    Isabel's countenance, and, I must say, a very singular one upon
    that of her brother. The idea first struck me that he is either
    now, or has been, a suitor of the absent lady! Was there a lurking
    jealousy at the bottom of my own heart, at the very time that I
    was fishing up green monsters from Lamar's mental pandemonium?
    Randolph, Oh! the human heart is deceitful above all things; and
    it oftener deceives ourselves than others. We have radiated rays
    of light for our mental vision outwards which we may extend _ad
    infinitum_, but once turn our observations inwards, and it is like
    inverting the telescope.

    "We were presented to the lady of the mansion immediately upon our
    entrance. She is benignant and bland, yet aristocratic withal. She
    discovers a warm heart towards the South, probably from an idea of
    a kindred aristocratic feeling in us. The two are, however, very
    different in their developments. It is necessary here to have many
    more bulwarks between this class and those below them than is
    needful with us; as there is here a regular gradation in the
    divisions of society. The end of one and the beginning of the next
    are so merged, that it would be impossible to separate them
    without these barriers. What are they? you would ask. They consist
    in little formalities,--rigid adherence to fashion in its higher
    flights,--exhibition of European and Oriental luxuries, et cetera,
    et cetera.

    "We were presented to the company in general; most of the
    fashionable ladies were sitting or standing around a fine-toned
    upright piano-forte, at which two of the party were executing, in
    a very finished style of fashionable elegance, some of Rossini's
    compositions, accompanied by a gentleman on the flute. And in good
    truth, they produced scientific and fashionable music; but,
    Randolph, it was not to my taste. You know that I have cultivated
    music as a science, from my earliest youth; that I am an
    enthusiast here, and not altogether a bungler in my own execution.
    I have now discovered either that I lack taste, or that the
    fashionable world is therein deficient. You shall decide between
    us at another time.

    "Lamar very soon contrived (how, heaven only knows) to throw me
    completely in the shade; but the first evidence I had of it was
    his sitting bolt upright between the gay Isabel and her mother. He
    had already betrayed them into laughter,--not fashionable
    laughter, for I saw the old lady wiping the tears from her eyes.
    It is almost impossible for any one to adhere long to conventional
    forms, when he is of the party,--so manly, generous, and sincere
    is he. My chagrin at not finding myself situated equally to my
    heart's content did not escape him, and he perhaps discovered my
    awkwardness, for he attempted to draw me into a discussion
    concerning the provincial rivalry of the North and South. I evaded
    his friendly hand, but soon the younger lady renewed the attack.

    "'Come, Mr. Chevillere, you will tell us what peculiarities you
    have observed, as existing between the northern and southern
    ladies as to polish,--fashion,--education,--any thing! This
    gentleman is so wonderfully free from prejudices and rivalry, that
    he declares the instant he beholds a beautiful woman, he forgets
    that she has a local habitation upon earth. You, sir, I hope, are
    not so catholic an admirer of beauty?'

    "'I too, madam, am always disarmed of local prejudices when I see
    a beautiful northern lady; but that is not what you wish me to
    answer. If I understood you right, I suppose you wish to know
    whether any peculiarity in fashion, habits, or manners strikes us
    at first sight disagreeably.'

    "'Precisely. Your general opinion of us.'

    "'I am glad to be able to say, then, that with regard to this city
    I am a perfect enthusiast. Every thing is arranged as I would have
    it. Nature appears to be the criterion here in matters of taste;
    utility and improvement seem to prompt the efforts of your men of
    talents, and that delightful politeness to prevail, which consists
    in placing all well-meaning persons at their ease, without useless
    conventional forms.'

    "I hate this formal speech-making, Randolph, across a room _at_
    people, so I thought I would be myself at once. I therefore
    continued my remarks for the remainder of the evening rather more
    in a nonchalant way, and as an introduction to a more free and
    easy tone to the company. I asked Lamar to repeat his lecture of
    the day, on smoking. Hazlehurst, as soon as he heard the subject
    mentioned, began to describe it to a party of young ladies who
    stood round the piano. Their curiosity was excited immediately;
    and though Lamar frowned at me, the ladies entreated until he was
    forced to comply.

    "He set the room in a perfect roar of laughter, and then a
    delightful confusion prevailed. Lamar did not repeat exactly the
    same things which he had treated us with at the dinner-table, but
    he preserved the stages, dwelling a much shorter time on the
    heroic, and much longer on the two latter.

    "He introduced a heroine into his shades and bowers, and painted
    Isabel as he saw her at the Springs; so, at least, I suspect from
    a certain mantling of the colour into her cheeks.

    "'Then,' said he, speaking of the third stage, 'his hands fall by
    his side, his eyes are closed, he sighs profoundly, but
    comfortably and _somnolently_; perhaps he is married; his wife
    steals gently up and kisses him. 'My dear, the milliner's bill has
    come.'--'O _dam_ the miller!' In a short time she returns--'My
    dear, my pin money is out: come now, you are not asleep, I know:
    and that is not all--the carriage wants painting; the house wants
    repairs; the children want toys; servants want wages.' He rolls
    his head over on one shoulder, opens his eyes, and fixes them in a
    deliberate stare, as I do now, upon Miss Isabel.' This last idea
    became either too sentimental or too ludicrous for Lamar; and he
    jumped up in an unsuppressed fit of laughter. You know Lamar,
    therefore I need not tell you that this is a very imperfect sketch
    of the manner in which he acted the ludicrous and careless, but
    _hen-pecked_, husband. I do not wonder that he laughed, when he
    looked at Isabel, for her face was indescribably arch and
    sanctimonious.

    "Hilarity and glee seemed now to be the order of the evening with
    all except poor Arthur. I thought that Lamar would actually sow
    the seeds of a future quarrel, while discussing something
    relating to the West. How introduced I do not know, unless Lamar
    was talking of Damon. However, Arthur stated one fact which
    surprised us all, and of which we had been all equally ignorant.
    He stated that Kentucky had one more college than any other State
    in the Union; half as many as all New-England; and more than North
    Carolina, South Carolina, Georgia, and Alabama, united.

    "While these things were going on, I heard a gentle and scarcely
    perceptible step behind me, on the carpet; and seeing the other
    gentlemen rise, I mechanically rose also--to be electrified by the
    vision of Miss St. Clair. She was pale and trembling, but far more
    beautiful than I had ever seen her. It was not the beauty of the
    waxen figure, or the picture; it was the beauty of feeling,
    sensibility, and tenderness. You have seen that little plant which
    shrinks at the rude touch of man, Randolph; that should be her
    emblem.

    "She glided into a rather darkened recess of the room, near where
    I stood, and seated herself alone, as if to be out of the reach of
    observation; yet by some means I was seated by her side, almost as
    dumb as a statue. I even longed for more of Lamar's delineations,
    if for nothing else but to see her smile again, and light up those
    features which nature evidently made to smile. Her hair was still
    parted over the forehead in the Grecian manner; a single ringlet
    stole down behind her ear. Her dress was simplicity itself,
    exceedingly plain and tasteful.

    "I need not tell Miss St. Clair how much gratified I am at again
    meeting her in a circle composed almost entirely of my friends and
    my friends' friends; but, if I have been rightly informed, we are
    more indebted to accident than to any benevolent designs on her
    part for this meeting.

    "'A strange accident indeed, my being here. Not less so than your
    own. But _you_ are not a believer in accidents.'

    "How beautiful a little act sometimes appears, Randolph, when it
    sits upon the countenance of one so artless by nature that you can
    see all the machinery which she imagines is so completely hidden,
    as a child often hides its eyes and vainly supposes itself unseen.
    This _ruse_, intended to draw me into some argument about
    accidents, and to avoid the real case at issue, really amused me;
    I was willing, however, to follow her lead for a time.
    'Accidents,' said I, 'seem to us, at first sight, to be without
    the usual train of cause and effect; but, if they were all placed
    in my hands, I think I could govern the destinies of the world, so
    long as I could control my own destiny.'

    "'I do not understand you, sir,' said she, with the simplest
    cunning imaginable; feigning deep interest, though her countenance
    would not join in the plot.

    "'The condition,' I continued, 'and the present circumstances of
    every individual now in this room might be traced back to some
    accident which has happened--to the person, his father, or his
    grandfather; the death of one friend, the marriage of another, may
    affect the destinies of the persons themselves and all connected
    with them.'

    "Ah, Randolph! there was a tender chord touched. Did you ever see
    a person shot through and through? The countenance expresses a
    whole age of misery in an instant. The soul is conscious of it
    before the body. One will even ask whether he is shot--while his
    countenance proclaims death more forcibly than a hundred tongues
    could utter it. There is a writhing, convulsive, retreating
    misery; part of which I saw I had inflicted upon this gentle
    being. This mystery must be solved. The system on which she is
    treated by those around her is false.

    "You have, perhaps, seen a whole family after the death of one of
    its members, religiously observe profound silence on the subject.
    Should any one rudely or even gently mention the deceased, all are
    instantly horrified. Each fears that the feelings of all the rest
    have been shocked. At this moment, a calm and judicious friend,
    when the ice is once broken, may cure all this amiable weakness by
    steadily and tenderly persevering. I was determined to try the
    experiment in this case. A bold measure, when you consider the
    person and the circumstances.

    "'Miss St. Clair,' said I, after she had recovered her composure;
    'allow me to ask whether your family is related to that of General
    St. Clair?'

    "'I believe not,' she composedly answered.

    "'Has your father been long dead?'

    "'Not a very long time: and the loss is the greater, as I have
    never known the value of a brother or a sister.'

    "'You do not seem to labour under the usual disadvantages of
    step-daughters.'

    "'Never was step-father more devoted and affectionate than mine,
    in his own peculiar way; and with that I am quite contented.'

    "Now, Randolph, you know that impertinence had no share in
    dictating these questions, but could impertinence have gone
    farther? what ramification could I next attempt? Here was nearly
    the whole genealogical tree, but farther down there was no hope of
    touching the true branch.

    "Her own gentle heart alone remained to be suspected. How could I
    suspect it, Randolph? so young, so pure, so gentle, so beautiful!
    Alas! that is but a poor protection against suitors. Besides, she
    is said to be rich. Must the question be asked? I resolved upon
    it! Was I not justifiable in doing so? Am I not an avowed suitor?
    at least have I not shown myself ready to become so? The
    opportunity was good; the company were all engaged in little
    coteries around the saloon. My previous questions seemed rather to
    have tranquillized her than otherwise; it was a trying moment!
    but no other step could be gained until this obstacle was
    surmounted. I therefore proceeded to make one or two anxious
    inquiries, critical as it regards my happiness, but which a lover
    cannot confide even to the ear of Randolph.

    "My object was to know whether I had aught to fear from rivalry.
    Her lips moved, but no sound issued from them. I resumed; 'Believe
    me, that this pain would not have been inflicted, if my supposed
    relation to yourself had not imboldened me to ask whether any
    other man were so happy as to render me miserable.'

    "'I see no impropriety in answering your question, though it can
    avail nothing; my _affections_ are now as they have always
    been--disengaged.'

    "These words were wafted along the vestibule of my ear, like some
    gentle breathings of magic; you have heard the soft vibrations of
    the Æolian harp, as a gentle summer breeze bore them along the
    air, redolent of the rich perfumes of summer flowers, and attuned
    to the wild music of songsters without.

    "Sweeter, far sweeter, was her voice; a silvery voice is at all
    times the organ of the heart, but when it dies away in a thrilling
    whisper from the profoundness of the internal struggle, the ardent
    sympathy of the hearer is involuntary. Tragedians understand this
    language of the heart, insomuch that custom has now established
    the imitation, in deep-toned pathos.

    "She placed emphasis on the word _affections_; why was this,
    unless her hand is engaged without them? This idea flashed upon me
    with electric force; you can well imagine how suddenly it broke
    asunder the links of the delicious revery of which I have
    attempted to give you a glimpse. Another more painful question
    than any of the former now became absolutely necessary;
    consequently I resumed: 'I think that I know Miss St. Clair
    sufficiently well to presume with a good deal of certainty that
    her hand is not pledged where her heart cannot accompany it?'

    "'My hand, sir, is like my affections.'

    "Her head now hung down a little, and her eye sought the carpet;
    my own expressive glances, sanguine as they perhaps had
    occasionally been, were themselves much softened and humbled; but
    again I summoned my scattered thoughts to the charge.

    "'Will Miss St. Clair grant me an interview on the morrow, or some
    other day more convenient to herself?'

    "The words had hardly escaped my mouth, when Isabel stood before
    us. Lamar was soon by her side. I also arose.

    "'My dear Frances,' said she, taking my seat, and locking her hand
    where I would have given kingdoms to have had mine; 'we are
    talking of making up a little equestrian party to the Passaic
    Falls. Will you be of the company? Pray join us, like a dear girl;
    it is only fifteen miles.'

    "The lady addressed shook her head gravely. Isabel arose, and
    turning to me, 'I leave the case in your hands, sir, and you are a
    poor diplomatist for a southern, if you do not succeed in
    persuading her to go.'

    "I was much alarmed to hear many ladies calling for shawls and
    bonnets. I was not long, therefore, in urging the case, for it was
    emphatically _my_ case.

    "'I cannot go,' said she; 'in the first place, I have not been on
    horseback since my boarding-school days; and in the next place, I
    could not undergo the fatigue.'

    "'But if all these objections could be obviated?' I eagerly
    inquired.

    "'Then I should certainly be pleased to go, and still more pleased
    to gratify others by going.'

    "To make the story a short one, as my letter has already become
    too long, she finally consented that I should drive her in a
    cabriolet, provided her father, who was not present, thought it
    proper for her to go.

    "I reported progress to Isabel, who looked sly and arch; her
    brother was as solemn as a tombstone. I do not say this in
    triumph, Randolph, for God knows I have little cause as yet. I
    merely state the fact in all plainness and honesty, that you may
    have the whole case before you.

    "'This augurs well for you, Mr. Chevillere,' whispered the lively
    girl.

    "'I am not so certain of that,' said I.

    "Finally, we agreed to go, 'weather permitting,' as they say at
    country sales, on the day after to-morrow.

    "I did not urge this interview any farther, for a reason which you
    will easily perceive. What has become of you? I write two pages to
    your one now. Is the North more prolific than the South in
    incidents?

                                       "Your Friend and Chum,

                                                      "V. CHEVILLERE."



CHAPTER XIX.


    V. CHEVILLERE TO B. RANDOLPH.

                                                      "New-York, 18--.

    "DEAR FRIEND,

    "Certainly I must be one of the most unfortunate fellows that ever
    lived. And none the less so because the bitter strokes come upon
    me in the midst of apparent prosperity; but before I tell you of
    one disappointment, I must tell you of the things which preceded
    it, in the order of their occurrence.

    "On the evening after the assemblage of our little party at
    Hazlehurst's, Lamar, Damon, and myself went to the Italian Opera;
    and to please Lamar no less than Damon, we took seats in the pit.

    "The assemblage was brilliant beyond any thing I have seen, in the
    two lower tiers of boxes. All the fashion, and wealth, and beauty
    of this fair city seemed to be assembled around us, with their gay
    plumage and foreign head-attire, and opera-glasses. As a shading
    to this gay picture, there were the gentlemen, with enormous
    whiskers and mustaches curling sentimentally and greasily over
    the upper lip; their teeth glistening through the bristles,
    ghastly as Peale's mummy itself.

    "The passion for hairy visages is a singular characteristic of
    this phrenological age. Large and frizzled locks puffed out on
    each side of the head to hide the absence of development are
    easily enough accounted for; but this supererogatory disfiguration
    of ugly faces is altogether unaccountable on the same principles.

    "'I'll be dad shamed if it ain't all cowardice, and I hate to see
    it practised,' said Damon.

    "There is, perhaps, more truth in this remark than you would at
    first suppose. No man is so desirous to appear fierce, courageous,
    and even piratical as he that is a dastard in his heart. Indeed
    most men are fond of making a parade of those qualifications with
    which they are least endowed by nature.

    "There is one bewhiskered class, however, from whom we ought to
    expect better things; I mean young and thoughtless men, who are
    led away by fashion; many of whom have rubbed through the walls,
    if not through the studies, of college; and whose taste ought to
    have been more refined by associating with gentlemen, however
    great their stolidity or idleness.

    "Finally, as to whiskers, I have seen most of the American naval
    and military heroes; and I cannot now recall a single one of them
    who ever wore remarkable whiskers, or bristles on the upper lip.
    Nor have I ever seen a polished southern gentleman remarkable for
    either. There is one fact which, if generally known, would root
    out the evil at its source; and that is, that men who flourish
    large whiskers are very apt to become _bald_!

    "'O! corn-stalks and jews-harps!' said Damon, after worrying on
    his seat during the performance of the overture by the orchestra;
    'will they tune their banjoes all night, and never get to playin?'

    "'That is called fine Italian music,' said Lamar.

    "'Yes! yes!' replied he, 'there's 'four-and-twenty fiddlers' sure
    enough! but I rather suspicion that it would puzzle some of our
    Kentuck gals to dance a reel to that music. O my grandmother! what
    jaunty heels they would have to sling after such elbow-greese as
    that. But you are stuffing me with soft corn--I see you are by
    your laughing. They know better than to pass that for music; no,
    no, catch a weasel asleep!'

    "The opera now commenced, and I must own that I saw more of Damon
    than I did of the play. He was struck dumb with astonishment;
    seemed scarcely to believe his own senses, but looking round the
    house after an unusual silence, and seeing the audience serious
    and apparently attentive, he burst into a cachinnation.

    "'Well,' said he, with a long breath, 'I wish I may be tetotally
    smashed in a cider-mill, if that don't out-Cherokee old Kentuck;
    why that ain't a chaw-tobacco better nor Cherokee! Just wait a
    minute, and they'll raise the whoop, it's likely; and if they do,
    if I don't give them a touch of Kentuck pipes that'll make them
    think somebody's busted their biler. Look! some of the men have
    got rings in their ears too; and leather skinned. Now I'm snagged
    if I was to meet that feller in a Mississip cane-brake, and my
    rifle on my arm, if I wouldn't be apt to let the wind through his
    whistle cross-ways.'

    "'Not if he was to speak to you, and tell you he was a Christian
    like yourself?'

    "'Speak to me! he would do a devilish sight better to play dummy:
    for sure as he spoke, I should let fly at him, because I wouldn't
    know but he belonged to some of those far away tribes of
    Black-feet, or the likes of that.'

    "'But you do not really think that they look and speak any thing
    like the western savages, Damon?' said I.

    "'I'm smashed if I don't bet that I can put blankets and leggins
    on the whole tribe, and pass them through the Cherokee nation for
    friendly Black-feet.'

    "The incomparable Prima Donna (as she is called here) now made her
    first appearance; her voice is exquisite, Randolph, and her
    execution beyond the conception of an unsophisticated student.

    "The music is pleasing to the ear, and may touch an Italian heart,
    but it found no response from mine. I tell this to you in all
    sincerity and confidence, but it would lower a man, I fear, to
    say so in the fashionable circles.

    "'Well, Damon, would the Italian ladies pass for squaws?'

    "'No, no; they are better than the men, and they are right pretty
    too, if they didn't talk such outlandish gibberish; but that dark
    skinn'd man there, I swear Pete Ironsides would kick him if he was
    to go in my stable; for he hates an Injin, as I do an allegator;
    poor Pete! I reckon he thinks I'm skulped.'

    "'Pete is well cared for, I will guaranty,' said Lamar, very
    pathetically.

    "'Look! look!' exclaimed Damon; 'what's that under the green
    umbrella there, at the front of the stage among the lights?'

    "'That is the prompter, to put them right when they go wrong.'

    "'Yes, yes! I see, I see!' continued he; 'he gives them a wink
    every now and then.'

    "In the operas it is very frequently the case that one of the
    subordinate characters comes to the front of the stage after the
    principals have made their exit, and explains what rare sport is
    coming.

    "'What does that fellow slip out here every now and then like a
    dropped stitch for?'

    "We explained to him the meaning of it, as well as we understood
    it ourselves.

    "'Ay, ay! I see it now; he is the Nota Bene!'

    "We found great difficulty in getting Damon to understand, with
    his shrewd natural view of things, that an opera was nothing more
    than a common play; the parts being sung, instead of spoken.

    "'Now I wish my head may be knocked into a cocked-hat, if a man
    had told this to me of the Yorkers in old Kentuck, if I wouldn't
    have thought he was spinnin long yarns; there is no sense in it,
    nor there's no fun in it, as they all take it up there in the
    pews; if so moutbe now that they were all of my way of thinking,
    and would only join in a _leetle_ touch of the warwhoop, why we
    might show them fellers a little of the real Cherokee, that I
    rather suspicion they haven't seen.'

    "'Why, what would you do, Damon?'

    "'_Jist_ set them four-and-twenty fiddlers to playin of something
    like Christian reels; hand the gals down on the floor; then I
    reckon there would be a little sort of a regular hand-round!
    Confound their jimmy simequivers, and their supple elbows! Smash
    me, if they don't think the whole cream of the ball lies in
    rattlin the bones of their elbows. Give me your long sweeping bow
    hands, that saws the music right in under your ribs, and sets your
    legs to dancin, whether they will or not. Do you think them
    fellers ever made anybody feel in the humour for a hand-round?'

    "'I can't say that I think they ever did.'

    "'No, nor they never will! they may set people's teeth on a wire
    edge, or make their flesh crawl, or set them into an ague fit with
    their shakin, and grindin, and squawkin. And now I think of it,
    the whole business sounds more like grinding ramrods in an
    armory, than any thing I ever come across; there's the squeakin of
    the wheels, that would go for them goose guzzles them fellers are
    pipin on. The ramrods on the grindstones will go for the
    fiddles,--only I don't see any fire flyin out of the catgut, but
    I've been watchin sharp for it some time. Then there's the old
    leather bellows groanin and gruntin away, jist like those two
    fellers seesawin there, on them two big-bellied fiddles, and the
    leather bands flappin every time they come round, keeps the time
    for the whole concern.'

    "'Well, have you seen any fire yet?' after a long pause.

    "'Yes, plenty of it! they make it fly out of my eyes, if they
    don't out of the catguts; confound them, I say, they keep me all
    the time drawin down first one eye and then another, first one
    corner of my mouth and then another, jist as if a horse was on a
    dead strain, and you were bowing your neck and stickin your leg
    straight in the ground, and then strainin with all your might as
    if you could help him; but this is worse! a confounded sight
    worse! for every now and then all the fiddlers and trumpeters
    comes rattlin down their tinklin quivers, like a four-horse load
    of china, goin to the devil down a steep hill at the rate of ten
    knots an hour; and then it all dies away agin, as if horses,
    wagon, and chinaware had all gone over a bank as high as a church
    steeple. Then! I begin to draw a long breath agin, and feel a
    little comfortable. But here's a dyin away sound! hop and come
    agin, rising and whooping, until the whole team's going full tilt,
    pull dick, pull devil, here they go again! old Nick take the
    hindmost. See their elbows now, how they move out and in, out and
    in, like spinning jinnies. And see that feller that sets at the
    top of the mob, on the high chair in the middle, how his head
    goes. See how he looks at that book before him, as if that stuff
    could be put down there in black and white.'

    "'It _is_ all down there, Damon.'

    "'Come, come, now, strangers, you have stuffed me enough! I can't
    swallow that exactly neither! All the lawyers in Philadelphia
    couldn't write down half the wriggle-ma-rees one of them chaps has
    made since I set here! Smash my apple-cart, if I wouldn't like
    jist to see a goosequill goin at the rate of one of them elbows.
    Ink would fly like mud at a scrub-race, and when it was done it
    would look like my copy-book used to do at school; more stops than
    words.'

    "'But you keep your eye on the orchestra all the while; why not
    look on the stage?'

    "'I do, I do; and that puzzles me the blamedest,--how they all
    come out square at the stops, fiddlers and all. Every now and then
    they seem to git into a fair race, and one feller's eye is poppin
    out of his head, and the veins on the woman's neck is ready to
    burst, and the fiddlers and the pipers and the trumpeters are all
    puffin and blowin, like our Kentuck jockeys at a pony
    sweepstakes; and then all at once, jist as there begins to be a
    little sport, to see who has the wind and the bottom, their heads
    begin to move first one side and then the other all so kind, and
    ready to make a draw game of it, blabbering all the time; till the
    trumpeter sees they're pretty well blown, then he begins to come
    down a little with his toot! toot! toot! That's to call all hands
    off, you see, and they slip down as easy and as quiet as if it had
    all been in fun. Then they all clear out but one, and he watches
    his chance till they're all gone. Then he comes here to the front,
    and flaps his wings and crows over them, as if he had done some
    great things, if we hadn't been here to show fair play.'

    "I am sure, Randolph, that I give you but a poor idea of the
    reality, but you must supply the deficiencies by your imagination.
    Damon talked incessantly, and I enjoyed it far more than I could
    have done the opera, even if I had been a perfect Italian scholar.
    I find that I must defer the account of our disappointment till
    another time, when I will tell you some matters of interest.

                                       "Truly yours,

                                                      "V. CHEVILLERE."


END OF VOL. I.



       *       *       *       *       *



Transcriber's note:

    Alternate, archaic, and inconsistent spelling of some words have
    been retained.

    Punctuation has been made consistent including the use of
    quotation marks.

    page 36: "faintin" changed to "faintin'" (a faintin' spell).

    page 57: "ear" changed to "dear" (Believe me, dear lady,).

    page 114: "doggrel" changed to "doggerel" so as to be consistent
    with other places this word is used (and singing doggerel to the
    music).





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