Thou barraine ground, whom winter's wrath hath wasted,
Art made a mirror to behold my plight:
Whilome thy fresh spring flower'd: and after hasted
Thy summer prowde, with daffodillies dight;
And now is come thy winter's stormy state,
Thy mantle mar'd wherein thou maskedst late.
SPENSER.
Although the soldier may regard danger and even death with
indifference in the tumult of battle, when the passage of the soul
is delayed to moments of tranquillity and reflection the change
commonly brings with it the usual train of solemn reflections;
of regrets for the past, and of doubts and anticipations for the
future. Many a man has died with a heroic expression on his lips,
but with heaviness and distrust at his heart; for, whatever may be
the varieties of our religious creeds, let us depend on the mediation
of Christ, the dogmas of Mahomet, or the elaborated allegories of
the East, there is a conviction, common to all men, that death is
but the stepping-stone between this and a more elevated state of
being. Sergeant Dunham was a brave man; but he was departing for
a country in which resolution could avail him nothing; and as he
felt himself gradually loosened from the grasp of the world, his
thoughts and feelings took the natural direction; for if it be true
that death is the great leveller, in nothing is it more true than
that it reduces all to the same views of the vanity of life.
Pathfinder, though a man of peculiar habits and opinions, was always
thoughtful, and disposed to view the things around him with a shade
of philosophy, as well as with seriousness. In him, therefore,
the scene in the blockhouse awakened no very novel feelings. But
the case was different with Cap: rude, opinionated, dogmatical,
and boisterous, the old sailor was little accustomed to view even
death with any approach to the gravity which its importance demands;
and notwithstanding all that had passed, and his real regard for
his brother-in-law, he now entered the room of the dying man with
much of that callous unconcern which was the fruit of long training
in a school that, while it gives so many lessons in the sublimest
truths, generally wastes its admonitions on scholars who are little
disposed to profit by them.
The first proof that Cap gave of his not entering so fully as those
around him into the solemnity of the moment, was by commencing a
narration of the events which had just led to the deaths of Muir
and Arrowhead. "Both tripped their anchors in a hurry, brother
Dunham," he concluded; "and you have the consolation of knowing
that others have gone before you in the great journey, and they,
too, men whom you've no particular reason to love; which to me,
were I placed in your situation, would be a source of very great
satisfaction. My mother always said, Master Pathfinder, that dying
people's spirits should not be damped, but that they ought to be
encouraged by all proper and prudent means; and this news will give
the poor fellow a great lift, if he feels towards them savages any
way as I feel myself."
June arose at this intelligence, and stole from the blockhouse with
a noiseless step. Dunham listened with a vacant stare, for life
had already lost so many of its ties that he had really forgotten
Arrowhead, and cared nothing for Muir; but he inquired, in a feeble
voice, for Eau-douce. The young man was immediately summoned, and
soon made his appearance. The Sergeant gazed at him kindly, and
the expression of his eyes was that of regret for the injury he
had done him in thought. The party in the blockhouse now consisted
of Pathfinder, Cap, Mabel, Jasper, and the dying man. With the
exception of the daughter, all stood around the Sergeant's pallet,
in attendance in his last moments. Mabel kneeled at his side, now
pressing a clammy hand to her head, now applying moisture to the
parched lips of her father.
"Your case will shortly be ourn, Sergeant," said Pathfinder, who
could hardly be said to be awestruck by the scene, for he had
witnessed the approach and victories of death too often for that;
but who felt the full difference between his triumphs in the
excitement of battle and in the quiet of the domestic circle; "and
I make no question we shall meet ag'in hereafter. Arrowhead has
gone his way, 'tis true; but it can never be the way of a just
Indian. You've seen the last of him, for his path cannot be the
path of the just. Reason is ag'in the thought in his case, as it
is also, in my judgment, ag'in it too in the case of Lieutenant
Muir. You have done your duty in life; and when a man does that,
he may start on the longest journey with a light heart and an actyve
foot."
"I hope so, my friend: I've tried to do my duty."
"Ay, ay," put in Cap; "intention is half the battle; and though
you would have done better had you hove-to in the offing and sent
a craft in to feel how the land lay, things might have turned out
differently: no one here doubts that you meant all for the best,
and no one anywhere else, I should think, from what I've seen of
this world and read of t'other."
"I did; yes. I meant all for the best."
"Father! Oh, my beloved father!"
"Magnet is taken aback by this blow, Master Pathfinder, and can say
or do but little to carry her father over the shoals; so we must
try all the harder to serve him a friendly turn ourselves."
"Did you speak, Mabel?" Dunham asked, turning his eyes in the
direction of his daughter, for he was already too feeble to turn
his body.
"Yes, father; rely on nothing you have done yourself for mercy and
salvation; trust altogether in the blessed mediation of the Son of
God!"
"The chaplain has told us something like this, brother. The dear
child may be right."
"Ay, ay, that's doctrine, out of question. He will be our Judge,
and keeps the log-book of our acts, and will foot them all up at
the last day, and then say who has done well and who has done ill.
I do believe Mabel is right; but then you need not be concerned,
as no doubt the account has been fairly kept."
"Uncle! -- Dearest father! this is a vain illusion! Oh, place all
your trust in the mediation of our Holy Redeemer! Have you not
often felt your own insufficiency to effect your own wishes in the
commonest things? And how can you imagine yourself, by your own
acts, equal to raise up a frail and sinful nature sufficiently to
be received into the presence of perfect purity? There is no hope
for any but in the mediation of Christ!"
"This is what the Moravians used to tell us," said Pathfinder to
Cap in a low voice; "rely on it, Mabel is right."
"Right enough, friend Pathfinder, in the distances, but wrong in
the course. I'm afraid the child will get the Sergeant adrift,
at the very moment when we had him in the best of the water and in
the plainest part of the channel."
"Leave it to Mabel, leave it to Mabel; she knows better than any
of us, and can do no harm."
"I have heard this before," Dunham at length replied. "Ah, Mabel!
it is strange for the parent to lean on the child at a moment like
this!"
"Put your trust in God, father; lean on His holy and compassionate
Son. Pray, dearest, dearest father; pray for His omnipotent
support."
"I am not used to prayer. Brother, Pathfinder -- Jasper, can you
help me to words?"
Cap scarcely knew what prayer meant, and he had no answer to give.
Pathfinder prayed often, daily, if not hourly; but it was mentally,
in his own simple modes of thinking, and without the aid of words
at all. In this strait, therefore, he was as useless as the mariner,
and had no reply to make. As for Jasper Eau-douce, though he would
gladly have endeavored to move a mountain to relieve Mabel, this
was asking assistance it exceeded his power to give; and he shrank
back with the shame that is only too apt to overcome the young and
vigorous, when called on to perform an act that tacitly confesses
their real weakness and dependence on a superior power.
"Father," said Mabel, wiping her eyes, and endeavoring to compose
features that were pallid, and actually quivering with emotion,
"I will pray with you, for you, for _myself_; for us _all_. The
petition of the feeblest and humblest is never unheeded."
There was something sublime, as well as much that was supremely
touching, in this act of filial piety. The quiet but earnest manner
in which this young creature prepared herself to perform the duty;
the self-abandonment with which she forgot her sex's timidity and
sex's shame, in order to sustain her parent at that trying moment;
the loftiness of purpose with which she directed all her powers
to the immense object before her, with a woman's devotion and a
woman's superiority to trifles, when her affections make the appeal;
and the holy calm into which her grief was compressed, rendered her,
for the moment, an object of something very like awe and veneration
to her companions.
Mabel had been religiously educated; equally without exaggeration
and without self-sufficiency. Her reliance on God was cheerful
and full of hope, while it was of the humblest and most dependent
nature. She had been accustomed from childhood to address herself
to the Deity in prayer; taking example from the Divine mandate
of Christ Himself, who commanded His followers to abstain from
vain repetitions, and who has left behind Him a petition which is
unequalled for sublimity, as if expressly to rebuke the disposition
of man to set up his own loose and random thoughts as the most
acceptable sacrifice. The sect in which she had been reared has
furnished to its followers some of the most beautiful compositions
in the language, as a suitable vehicle for its devotion and
solicitations. Accustomed to this mode of public and even private
prayer, the mind of our heroine had naturally fallen into its train
of lofty thought; her task had become improved by its study, and
her language elevated and enriched by its phrases. When she kneeled
at the bedside of her father, the very reverence of her attitude
and manner prepared the spectators for what was to come; and as her
affectionate heart prompted her tongue, and memory came in aid of
both, the petition and praises that she offered up were of a character
which might have worthily led the spirits of angels. Although the
words were not slavishly borrowed, the expressions partook of the
simple dignity of the liturgy to which she had been accustomed,
and was probably as worthy of the Being to whom they were addressed
as they could well be made by human powers. They produced their
full impression on the hearers; for it is worthy of remark, that,
notwithstanding the pernicious effects of a false taste when long
submitted to, real sublimity and beauty are so closely allied to
nature that they generally find an echo in every heart.
But when our heroine came to touch upon the situation of the dying
man, she became the most truly persuasive; for then she was the
most truly zealous and natural. The beauty of the language was
preserved, but it was sustained by the simple power of love; and her
words were warmed by a holy zeal, that approached to the grandeur
of true eloquence. We might record some of her expressions,
but doubt the propriety of subjecting such sacred themes to a too
familiar analysis, and refrain.
The effect of this singular but solemn scene was different on
the different individuals present. Dunham himself was soon lost
in the subject of the prayer; and he felt some such relief as one
who finds himself staggering on the edge of a precipice, under a
burthen difficult to be borne, might be supposed to experience when
he unexpectedly feels the weight removed, in order to be placed
on the shoulders of another better able to sustain it. Cap was
surprised, as well as awed; though the effects on his mind were
not very deep or very lasting. He wondered a little at his own
sensations, and had his doubts whether they were so manly and heroic
as they ought to be; but he was far too sensible of the influence
of truth, humility, religious submission, and human dependency,
to think of interposing with any of his crude objections. Jasper
knelt opposite to Mabel, covered his face, and followed her words,
with an earnest wish to aid her prayers with his own; though it
may be questioned if his thoughts did not dwell quite as much on
the soft, gentle accents of the petitioner as on the subject of
her petition.
The effect on Pathfinder was striking and visible: visible, because
he stood erect, also opposite to Mabel; and the workings of his
countenance, as usual, betrayed the workings of the spirit within.
He leaned on his rifle, and at moments the sinewy fingers grasped
the barrel with a force that seemed to compress the weapon; while,
once or twice, as Mabel's language rose in intimate association
with her thoughts, he lifted his eyes to the floor above him, as
if he expected to find some visible evidence of the presence of
the dread Being to whom the words were addressed. Then again his
feelings reverted to the fair creature who was thus pouring out
her spirit, in fervent but calm petitions, in behalf of a dying
parent; for Mabel's cheek was no longer pallid, but was flushed
with a holy enthusiasm, while her blue eyes were upturned in the
light, in a way to resemble a picture by Guido. At these moments
all the honest and manly attachment of Pathfinder glowed in his
ingenuous features, and his gaze at our heroine was such as the
fondest parent might fasten on the child of his love.
Sergeant Dunham laid his hand feebly on the head of Mabel as she
ceased praying, and buried her face in his blanket.
"Bless you, my beloved child! bless you!" he rather whispered than
uttered aloud; "this is truly consolation: would that I too could
pray!"
"Father, you know the Lord's Prayer; you taught it to me yourself
while I was yet an infant."
The Sergeant's face gleamed with a smile, for he _did_ remember
to have discharged that portion at least of the paternal duty, and
the consciousness of it gave him inconceivable gratification at
that solemn moment. He was then silent for several minutes, and
all present believed that he was communing with God.
"Mabel, my child!" he at length uttered, in a voice which seemed
to be reviving, -- "Mabel, I'm quitting you." The spirit at its
great and final passage appears ever to consider the body as nothing.
"I'm quitting you, my child; where is your hand?"
"Here, dearest father -- here are both -- oh, take both!"
"Pathfinder," added the Sergeant, feeling on the opposite side of
the bed, where Jasper still knelt, and getting one of the hands
of the young man by mistake, "take it - I leave you as her father
-- as you and she may please --bless you -- bless you both!"
At that awful instant, no one would rudely apprise the Sergeant of
his mistake; and he died a minute or two later, holding Jasper's and
Mabel's hands covered by both his own. Our heroine was ignorant of
the fact until an exclamation of Cap's announced the death of her
father; when, raising her face, she saw the eyes of Jasper riveted
on her own, and felt the warm pressure of his hand. But a single
feeling was predominant at that instant, and Mabel withdrew to weep,
scarcely conscious of what had occurred. The Pathfinder took the
arm of Eau-douce, and he left the block.
The two friends walked in silence past the fire, along the glade,
and nearly reached the opposite shore of the island in profound
silence. Here they stopped, and Pathfinder spoke.
"'Tis all over, Jasper," said he, -- "'tis all over. Ah's me!
Poor Sergeant Dunham has finished his march, and that, too, by the
hand of a venomous Mingo. Well, we never know what is to happen,
and his luck may be yourn or mine to-morrow or next day!"
"And Mabel? What is to become of Mabel, Pathfinder?"
"You heard the Sergeant's dying words; he has left his child in my
care, Jasper; and it is a most solemn trust, it is; yes, -- it is
a most solemn trust."
"It's a trust, Pathfinder, of which any man would be glad to relieve
you," returned the youth, with a bitter smile.
"I've often thought it has fallen into wrong hands. I'm not consaited,
Jasper; I'm not consaited, I do think I'm not; but if Mabel Dunham
is willing to overlook all my imperfections and ignorances like,
I should be wrong to gainsay it, on account of any sartainty I may
have myself about my own want of merit."
"No one will blame you, Pathfinder, for marrying Mabel Dunham, any
more than they will blame you for wearing a precious jewel in your
bosom that a friend had freely given you."
"Do you think they'll blame Mabel, lad? I've had my misgivings
about that, too; for all persons may not be so disposed to look at
me with the same eyes as you and the Sergeant's daughter."
Jasper Eau-douce started as a man flinches at sudden bodily pain;
but he otherwise maintained his self-command. "And mankind is envious
and ill-natured, more particularly in and about the garrisons.
I sometimes wish, Jasper, that Mabel could have taken a fancy to
you, -- I do; and that you had taken a fancy to her; for it often
seems to me that one like you, after all, might make her happier
than I ever can."
"We will not talk about this, Pathfinder," interrupted Jasper
hoarsely and impatiently; "you will be Mabel's husband, and it is
not right to speak of any one else in that character. As for me,
I shall take Master Cap's advice, and try and make a man of myself
by seeing what is to be done on the salt water."
"You, Jasper Western! -- you quit the lakes, the forests, and the
lines; and this, too, for the towns and wasty ways of the settlements,
and a little difference in the taste of the water. Haven't we the
salt-licks, if salt is necessary to you? and oughtn't man to be
satisfied with what contents the other creatur's of God? I counted
on you, Jasper, I counted on you, I did; and thought, now that
Mabel and I intend to dwell in a cabin of our own, that some day
you might be tempted to choose a companion too, and come and settle
in our neighborhood. There is a beautiful spot, about fifty miles
west of the garrison, that I had chosen in my mind for my own place
of abode; and there is an excellent harbor about ten leagues this
side of it where you could run in and out with the cutter at any
leisure minute; and I'd even fancied you and your wife in possession
of the one place, and Mabel and I in possession of t'other. We
should be just a healthy hunt apart; and if the Lord ever intends
any of His creaturs to be happy on 'arth, none could be happier
than we four."
"You forget, my friend," answered Jasper, taking the guide's hand
and forcing a friendly smile, "that I have no fourth person to love
and cherish; and I much doubt if I ever shall love any other as I
love you and Mabel."
"Thank'e, boy; I thank you with all my heart; but what you call
love for Mabel is only friendship like, and a very different thing
from what I feel. Now, instead of sleeping as sound as natur' at
midnight, as I used to could, I dream nightly of Mabel Dunham. The
young does sport before me; and when I raise Killdeer, in order to
take a little venison, the animals look back, and it seems as if
they all had Mabel's sweet countenance, laughing in my face, and
looking as if they said, 'Shoot me if you dare!' Then I hear her
soft voice calling out among the birds as they sing; and no later
than the last nap I took, I bethought me, in fancy, of going over
the Niagara, holding Mabel in my arms, rather than part from her.
The bitterest moments I've ever known were them in which the
devil, or some Mingo conjuror, perhaps, has just put into my head
to fancy in dreams that Mabel is lost to me by some unaccountable
calamity -- either by changefulness or by violence."
"Oh, Pathfinder! If you think this so bitter in a dream, what must
it be to one who feels its reality, and knows it all to be true,
true, true? So true as to leave no hope; to leave nothing but
despair!"
These words burst from Jasper as a fluid pours from the vessel that
has been suddenly broken. They were uttered involuntarily, almost
unconsciously, but with a truth and feeling that carried with them
the instant conviction of their deep sincerity. Pathfinder started,
gazed at his friend for full a minute like one bewildered, and then
it was that, in despite of all his simplicity, the truth gleamed
upon him. All know how corroborating proofs crowd upon the mind
as soon as it catches a direct clue to any hitherto unsuspected
fact; how rapidly the thoughts flow and premises tend to their just
conclusions under such circumstances. Our hero was so confiding
by nature, so just, and so much disposed to imagine that all his
friends wished him the same happiness as he wished them, that,
until this unfortunate moment, a suspicion of Jasper's attachment
for Mabel had never been awakened in his bosom. He was, however,
now too experienced in the emotions which characterize the passion;
and the burst of feeling in his companion was too violent and too
natural to leave any further doubt on the subject. The feeling
that first followed this change of opinion was one of deep humility
and exquisite pain. He bethought him of Jasper's youth, his higher
claims to personal appearance, and all the general probabilities
that such a suitor would be more agreeable to Mabel than he could
possibly be himself. Then the noble rectitude of mind, for which
the man was so distinguished, asserted its power; it was sustained
by his rebuked manner of thinking of himself, and all that habitual
deference for the rights and feelings of others which appeared to
be inbred in his very nature. Taking the arm of Jasper, he led
him to a log, where he compelled the young man to seat himself by
a sort of irresistible exercise of his iron muscles, and where he
placed himself at his side.
The instant his feelings had found vent, Eau-douce was both alarmed
at, and ashamed of, their violence. He would have given all he
possessed on earth could the last three minutes be recalled; but
he was too frank by disposition and too much accustomed to deal
ingenuously by his friend to think a moment of attempting further
concealment, or of any evasion of the explanation that he knew was
about to be demanded. Even while he trembled in anticipation of
what was about to follow, he never contemplated equivocation.
"Jasper," Pathfinder commenced, in a tone so solemn as to thrill
on every nerve in his listener's body, "this _has_ surprised me!
You have kinder feelings towards Mabel than I had thought; and,
unless my own mistaken vanity and consait have cruelly deceived
me, I pity you, boy, from my soul I do! Yes, I think I know how
to pity any one who has set his heart on a creature like Mabel,
unless he sees a prospect of her regarding him as he regards her.
This matter must be cleared up, Eau-douce, as the Delawares say,
until there shall not be a cloud 'atween us."
"What clearing up can it want, Pathfinder? I love Mabel Dunham,
and Mabel Dunham does not love me; she prefers you for a husband;
and the wisest thing I can do is to go off at once to the salt
water, and try to forget you both."
"Forget me, Jasper! That would be a punishment I don't desarve.
But how do you know that Mabel prefars _me_? How do you know it,
lad? To me it seems impossible like!"
"Is she not to marry you, and would Mabel marry a man she does not
love?"
"She has been hard urged by the Sergeant, she has; and a dutiful
child may have found it difficult to withstand the wishes of a dying
parent. Have you ever told Mabel that you prefarred her, Jasper
-- that you bore her these feelings?"
"Never, Pathfinder. I would not do you that wrong."
"I believe you, lad, I do believe you; and I think you would now
go off to the salt water, and let the scent die with you. But this
must not be. Mabel shall hear all, and she shall have her own way,
if my heart breaks in the trial, she shall. No words have ever
passed 'atween you, then, Jasper?"
"Nothing of account, nothing direct. Still, I will own all my
foolishness, Pathfinder; for I ought to own it to a generous friend
like you, and there will be an end of it. You know how young
people understand each other, or think they understand each other,
without always speaking out in plain speech, and get to know each
other's thoughts, or to think they know them, by means of a hundred
little ways."
"Not I, Jasper, not I," truly answered the guide; for, sooth to
say, his advances had never been met with any of that sweet and
precious encouragement which silently marks the course of sympathy
united to passion. "Not I, Jasper; I know nothing of all this.
Mabel has always treated me fairly, and said what she has had to
say in speech as plain as tongue could tell it."
"You have had the pleasure of hearing her say that she loved you,
Pathfinder?"
"Why, no, Jasper, not just that in words. She has told me that we
never could, never ought to be married; that _she_ was not good
enough for _me_, though she _did_ say that she honored me and
respected me. But then the Sergeant said it was always so with the
youthful and timid; that her mother did so and said so afore her;
and that I ought to be satisfied if she would consent on any terms
to marry me, and therefore I have concluded that all was right, I
have."
In spite of all his friendship for the successful wooer, in spite
of all his honest, sincere wished for his happiness, we should be
unfaithful chroniclers did we not own that Jasper felt his heart
bound with an uncontrollable feeling of delight at this admission.
It was not that he saw or felt any hope connected with the circumstance;
but it was grateful to the jealous covetousness of unlimited love
thus to learn that no other ears had heard the sweet confessions
that were denied its own.
"Tell me more of this manner of talking without the use of
the tongue," continued Pathfinder, whose countenance was becoming
grave, and who now questioned his companion like one who seemed
to anticipate evil in the reply. "I can and have conversed with
Chingachgook, and with his son Uncas too, in that mode, afore the
latter fell; but I didn't know that young girls practysed this art,
and, least of all, Mabel Dunham."
"'Tis nothing, Pathfinder. I mean only a look, or a smile, or a
glance of the eye, or the trembling of an arm or a hand when the
young woman has had occasion to touch me; and because I have been
weak enough to tremble even at Mabel's breath, or her brushing me
with her clothes, my vain thoughts have misled me. I never spoke
plainly to Mabel myself, and now there is no use for it, since
there is clearly no hope."
"Jasper," returned Pathfinder simply, but with a dignity that
precluded further remarks at the moment, "we will talk of the
Sergeant's funeral and of our own departure from this island. After
these things are disposed of, it will be time enough to say more
of the Sergeant's daughter. This matter must be looked into, for
the father left me the care of his child."
Jasper was glad enough to change the subject, and the friends
separated, each charged with the duty most peculiar to his own
station and habits.
That afternoon all the dead were interred, the grave of Sergeant
Dunham being dug in the centre of the glade, beneath the shade of
a huge elm. Mabel wept bitterly at the ceremony, and she found relief
in thus disburthening her sorrow. The night passed tranquilly, as
did the whole of the following day, Jasper declaring that the gale
was too severe to venture on the lake. This circumstance detained
Captain Sanglier also, who did not quit the island until the
morning of the third day after the death of Dunham, when the weather
had moderated, and the wind had become fair. Then, indeed, he
departed, after taking leave of the Pathfinder, in the manner of
one who believed he was in company of a distinguished character
for the last time. The two separated like those who respect one
another, while each felt that the other was all enigma to himself.