Читать книгу The Cavaliers of Virginia. Volume 2 of 2 - Caruthers William Alexander - Страница 2

"The several causes of discontent in the colony of Virginia long nourished in secret, or manifesting themselves in partial riots and insurrections, were now rapidly maturing, and only the slightest incident was wanting to precipitate them into open rebellion.

"Since the death of Opechancanough, the Indians, deprived of the benefits of federative concert, had made but few attempts to disturb the tranquillity of the colony. Several of the tribes had retired westward, and those which remained, reduced in their numbers and still more in strength by the want of a common leader, lingered on the frontiers, exchanging their superfluous productions at stated marts with their former enemies. A long peace, added to a deportment almost invariably pacific, had in a great measure relaxed the vigilance of the colonists, and the Indians were admitted to a free intercourse with the people of all the counties. It was scarcely to be expected that during an intercourse so irregular and extensive no grounds of uneasiness should arise. Several thefts had been committed upon the tobacco, corn, and other property of the colonists."

These depredations were becoming daily more numerous and alarming, and repeated petitions had been sent in from all parts of the colony calling upon Sir William Berkley in the most urgent terms to afford them protection. The Governor remained singularly deaf to these reasonable demands, and took no steps to afford that protection to the citizens for which government was in a great measure established. Some excuse was offered by his friends and supporters by pleading his great age and long services. Sir H. Chicerly, who had some time before arrived in the colony, clothed with the authority of Lieutenant Governor, and who had till now remained an inactive participator of the gubernatorial honours, began to collect the militia of the state; but Sir William was no sooner informed of these proceedings, so well calculated to allay the rising popular ferment, than he at once construed it into an attempt to supersede his authority, and forthwith disbanded the troops already collected, and countermanded the orders for raising more, which had been sent by his subordinate through the several counties. These high-handed measures of an obstinate and superannuated man, inflamed the public mind. Meetings were called without any previous concert in almost every county in the province, and the most indignant remonstrances were sent in to the Governor. These, however, only served to stimulate his obstinacy, while the continued depredations of the Indians wrought up the general feeling of dissatisfaction into a blaze of discontent. While these things were in progress, a circumstance happened, which, while it brought the contest to an immediate issue, had at the same time an important bearing upon all the principal personages of our narrative. On the night succeeding the melancholy catastrophe at the chapel, related in the last chapter, the tribes of Indians which had formerly been leagued together in the Powhatan confederacy, simultaneously rose at dead of night and perpetrated the most horrid butcheries upon men, women, and children, in every part of the colony. The council had scarcely convened on the next morning before couriers from every direction arrived with the dreadful tidings. Among others, there came one who announced to the Governor that his own country seat had been consumed by the fires of the savage incendiaries, and that Mrs. Fairfax, who had been removed thither for change of scene by the advice of her physician, was either buried in its ruins or carried away captive by the Indians. Public indignation was roused to its highest pitch, but it was confidently expected, now that his excellency himself was a sufferer both in property and feelings, that he would recede from his obstinate refusal to afford relief. But strange to say, in defiance of enemies, and regardless of the remonstrances of his friends, he still persisted. The result ensued which might have been expected; meetings of the people, which had before been called from the impulse of the moment, and without concert, were now regularly organized, and immediate steps taken to produce uniformity of action throughout the different counties.

While these elements of civil discord are fermenting, we will pursue the adventures of our hero, whom we left just rescued from the hands of the relentless savages. The new queen of the Chickahominies, after having conducted Bacon to her own rude palace, retired for a short period in order to allow him just time to prepare himself for her reception. An Indian doctor was immediately summoned and directed to extract the splinters and dress the wounds. The departure of this wild and fantastical practitioner of the healing art was the signal for her own entrance. Slowly and doubtfully she approached her visiter, who was reclining almost exhausted upon a mat. Upon her entrance he attempted to rise and profess his gratitude, but overcome with pain, sorrow, and weakness, he fell back upon his rude couch, a grim smile and wild expression crossing his features. She gracefully and benignantly motioned him to desist, and at once waived all ceremony by seating herself on a mat beside him. Both remained in a profound and painful silence for some moments. Bacon's mind could dwell upon nothing but the horrid images of the preceding hours of the night. Regardless of her presence and her ignorance of those circumstances which dwelt so painfully upon his memory, he remained in a wild abstraction, now and then casting a glance of startled recognition and surprise at his royal hostess.

She examined him far more intently and with not less surprise, after the subsidence of her first embarrassment. Her sparkling eyes ran over his strange dress and condition, with the rapidity of thought, but evidently with no satisfactory result. She was completely at a loss to understand the cause of his visit, and the singular time and appearance in which he had chosen to make it. It is not improbable that female vanity, or the whisperings of a more tender passion, connected it in some way with her own recent flight. These scarcely recognised impressions produced however an evident embarrassment in her manner of proceeding. She longed to ask if Virginia was his bride, yet dreaded to do so both on her own account and his. She had lived long enough in civilized society to understand the signification of his bridal dress, but she was utterly at a loss to divine why he should appear in such a garb covered with mud, as if he had ridden in haste, in the midst of a warlike nation, and on the very night appointed for the celebration of his nuptials, unless indeed she might solve the mystery in the agreeable way before suggested. Catching one of the originally white bridal flowers of his attire between her slender fingers, she said with a searching glance; "Faded so soon?" He covered his face with his hands, and threw himself prostrate upon the mat, writhing like one in the throes of expiring agony.

His benevolent hostess immediately called a little Indian attendant, in order to despatch him for the doctor; but her guest shook his head and motioned with his uplifted hand for her to desist. She reseated herself, more at a loss than ever to account for his present appearance and conduct. She had supposed that he was suffering from the pain of his wounds, but she now saw that of these he was entirely regardless. She became aware that a more deeply seated pain afflicted him. Again he turned his face toward the roof of the hut, his hands crossed upon his breast, and his bosom racked with unutterable misery.

"Is the pretty Virginia dead?"

The blackness of hell and horror was in his face as he turned a scowl upon his interrogator, and replied, "Is this a new method of savage torture? If so, call in the first set, they are kind and benignant compared to you." But seeming suddenly to recollect that she was ignorant of the pain she inflicted, he took her hand kindly and respectfully, and continued, "Yes, Wyanokee, she is indeed dead to me. If you regard the peace of my soul, or the preservation of my senses, never whisper her name to the winds where it will be wafted to my ears. Never breathe what she has taught you. Be an Indian princess, but for God's sake look, speak, or act not in such a way as to remind me of passed days. Tear open these wounds, inflict fresh tortures – yea, torture others if you will, so I but horrify my mind with any other picture than hers. O God, did ever sister rise before man's imagination in such a damning form of loveliness? With most men, that little word would suffice to dispel the horrid illusion! but with me, cursed as I have been from my birth, and as I still am deeper cursed, the further I pursue this wretched shadow called happiness, I would wed her to-morrow, yea were the curse of the unpardonable sin denounced upon me from the altar instead of the benediction. For her I would go forth to the world, branded with a deeper damnation than ever encircled the brows of the first great murderer. I would be the scorn, the jest, the by-word of present generations, and a never dying beacon to warn those who come after me."

As he proceeded, Wyanokee fixed her dark penetrating eyes upon his face, until her own countenance settled into the expression of reverential awe, with which the Indian invariably listens to the ravings of the maniac. At every period she moved herself backward on the mat, until at the conclusion, she had arrived at a respectful distance, and crossed her hands in superstitious dread. A single glance conveyed her impressions to his mind, and he resumed, "No, no, my gentle preserver, reason is not dethroned, she still presides here, (striking his forehead,) a stern spectator of the unholy strife which is kept up between her sister faculties." Leaning toward her upon his elbow, he continued in a thrilling whisper, "You have heard me read from the sacred volume of the tortures prepared for the damned! of a future existence, in which the torments of ten thousand deaths shall be inflicted, and yet the immortal sufferer find no death! His soul will be prepared for the endurance! I have already a foretaste of that horrible eternity! And yet you see I preserve the power to know and to endure! Is it not a dread mystery in this frail compound of ours – and portentous of evil to come, that this faculty of supporting misery so long outlives the good? The wise men of our race teach us that every pain endured is a preparation of the opposite faculty to enjoy pleasure! that our torpid fluids would stagnate without these contrasted stimulants; 'tis all a delusion, a miserable invention of the enemy. Man can suffer in this life a compound of horrors, for which its pleasures and allurements have no equivalent; yea, and he suffers them after all chance for happiness has vanished for ever. The pleasures of the world are like the morning glories of a sea of ice. The sun rises and sparkles in glittering rainbows for an hour, and then sinks behind the dark blue horizon, and leaves the late enraptured beholder, to feel the chill of death creeping along his veins, until his heart is as cold and dead as the icebergs around 'an atom of pleasure, and a universe of pain.'"

His hearer sat in the most profound bewilderment; much of his discourse was to her unintelligible, and notwithstanding his protestations to the contrary, she still retained her first impressions as to the state of his mind. She knew something of the various relations existing between the most important personages of our story, and in her own mind, had already begun to account for his present state. She supposed him to have been rudely torn from his bride. Her object therefore in the following words, was to learn something more of these particulars, and at the same time to soothe the excited feelings of her guest.

"The great Father of the white man at Jamestown will restore your bride. Does not your good book say, 'whom the' Great Spirit 'has joined together let no man put asunder?'"

"Ay!" replied Bacon, "but what does it say when they are first joined together by the ties of blood? Besides, he never did join us together in the holy covenant. He stamped it with his curse? He denounced his veto against it at the very foot of the altar. The same voice which thundered upon mount Sinai spoke there. His servant stood up before him and asked, 'If any man can show just cause why they may not lawfully be joined together let him now speak, or else hereafter forever hold his peace.' And lo, both heaven and earth interposed at the same moment. The thunders of heaven rent the air, and that most fearful man appeared as if by miracle." Again lowering his voice to a whisper, he continued, "As I rode upon the storm last night, and communed with the spirits of the air, some one whispered in my ear, that the heavens were rent asunder and he came upon a thunderbolt. And then again as I walked upon the waves, and the black curtains gathered around, a bright light darted into my brain and I saw the old Roundheads who were executed the other day, sitting upon a glorious cloud, mocking at my misery! yea, they mouthed at me. Ha, ha, ha!" The sound of his own unnatural laughter startled him like an electric shock – and instantly he seemed to recollect himself.

He covered his face with his hands, and rested them upon his knees in silence. Some one entered and spoke to the queen in a low voice, and she immediately informed her guest that his horse was dead. "Dead!" said he, as he sprang upon his feet. "His last – best – most highly prized gift dead! All on the same night – am I indeed cursed – in going out and in coming in? Are even the poor brutes that cling to me with affection, thus cut down? but I would see him ere he is cold."

A torch-bearer soon appeared at the summons of his mistress, and the royal hostess and her guest proceeded to the spot. There lay the noble animal, his once proud neck straightened in the gaunt deformity of death. His master threw himself upon his body and wept like an infant. The tears, the first he had shed, humanized and soothed his harrowed feelings. Slowly he arose, and gazing upon the lifeless beast, exclaimed with a piteous voice, "Alas poor Bardolph, thy lot is happier than thy master's!"

The day was now dawning, and the morning air came fresh and invigorating to the senses, redolent of the wild perfumes blown upon the moor and forest, from the influence of a humid night. These reviving influences however fell dead upon the benumbed faculties of our hero. In accordance with the urgent solicitations of his hostess, he agreed to swallow an Indian soporific, and try to lose his sorrows and his memory in that nearest semblance of death. He did not fail, as he re-entered the wigwam, to observe that the whole village (called Orapacs) was busily preparing for some imposing ceremony, and that great accessions had been made to the numbers of the previous night.

Long and soundly he slept; when he awoke the sun was coursing high in the heavens. The air was balmy and serene, and his own monomaniacal hallucinations were dissipated, partly worn out by their own violence and partly dispelled by many hours of uninterrupted repose. Dreadful is that affliction which sleep will not alleviate. It is true that one suffering under a weight of misery which no hope lightens, no reasoning assuages, wakes to a present sense of his condition with a startling and miserable consciousness, yet upon the whole, the violence of grief has been soothed and moderated. So it was with our hero, and he walked forth a new and revived creature.

But as he stepped from the wigwam, a spectacle greeted his eye more akin to the fantasies of the previous night than to stern reality. The village was situated on a plain near the banks of the river. The forest remained much as it first grew, save that the undergrowth had been burned away and the ground afterwards overgrown with a luxuriant coat of grass. This summary method of trimming the primitive forest gives it much the resemblance of a noble park, cleared of its shrubs, undergrowth, and limbs, by the careful hands of the woodman. The scene, as Bacon looked along the woodland vista, had a wild novelty, and its aspect would doubtless have been sedative in its effect had it not been for the spectacle already alluded to, which we shall now endeavour to describe. An immense concourse of Indians was collected just without the external range of wigwams. They were seated in groups, in each of which he recognised the distinguishing marks of separate tribes, the representatives of each distinct nation of the peninsula having a distinct and separate place. At the head of this warlike assemblage, on a rude throne sat the youthful Queen of the Chickahominies. Immediately around the foot of this elevation were seated the few grim warriors yet remaining of that once powerful nation, and on her right hand the Powhatans. A fantastically dressed prophet of the latter tribe, with a curiously coloured heron's feather run through the cartilage of his nose stood in the centre of the assembled nations, and harangued the deputies with the most violent gesticulations, every now and then pointing in the direction first of Jamestown, and then of Middle Plantations, (now Williamsburg,) and in succession after these, to the other most thickly peopled settlements of the whites. His rude eloquence seemed to have a powerful effect upon his warlike audience, from the repeated yells of savage cheering by which each appeal was followed. He concluded his harangue by brandishing a bloody tomahawk over his head, and then striking it with great dexterity into a pole erected in the centre of the area. Numerous warriors and prophets from other tribes followed with similar effect and like purpose, to all of whom the stern savages listened with an eager yet respectful attention. When they had concluded, the youthful queen of the Chickahominies descended one step from her throne, and addressed the assembled nations; but her discourse was received in a far different spirit from that which had attended the eloquence of her predecessors. She was evidently maintaining the opposite side of the question which occupied the grave assembly, and it was apparent that the feelings of her auditors were hostile to her wishes and opinions. No evidences of delight greeted her benevolent counsels, and she resumed her seat almost overpowered by the loud and general murmurs of discontent which arose at the conclusion of her "talk." She felt herself a solitary advocate of the plainest dictates of justice and humanity – she felt the difficulty and embarrassment of addressing enlightened arguments to savage ears and uncultivated understandings, and a painful sense of her own responsibility, and of regret for having assumed her present station, pressed heavily upon heart.

Bacon saw only the eloquent language of their signs and gestures; but some knowledge of the outrages already perpetrated easily enabled him to interpret their intentions. He knew that bloodshed and murder were the objects of their meeting, and he resolved to seize the earliest opportunity to escape, in order to take part in the defence of his country. His mind turned eagerly to this wholesome excitement, as the best outlet which was now left for the warring impulses within his breast.