All things are new--the buds, the leaves,
That gild the elm-tree's nodding crest,
And even the nest beneath the eaves--
There are no birds in last year's nest.Longfellow.
"I have good news for you, Wilhelmina," cried the captain, coming into
the parlour where his wife used to sit and knit or sew quite half the
day, and speaking with a bright face, and in a cheerful voice--"Here is
a letter from my excellent old colonel; and Bob's affair is all settled
and agreed on. He is to leave school next week, and to put on His
Majesty's livery the week after."
Mrs. Willoughby smiled, and yet two or three tears followed each other
down her cheeks, even while she smiled. The first was produced by
pleasure at hearing that her son had got an ensigncy in the 60th, or
Royal Americans; and the last was a tribute paid to nature; a mother's
fears at consigning an only boy to the profession of arms.
"I am rejoiced, Willoughby," she said, "because _you_ rejoice,
and I know that Robert will be delighted at possessing the king's
commission; but, he is _very_ young to be sent into the dangers of
battle and the camp!"
"I was younger, when I actually went into battle, for _then_ it
was war; now, we have a peace that promises to be endless, and Bob will
have abundance of time to cultivate a beard before he smells gunpowder.
As for myself"--he added in a half-regretful manner, for old habits and
opinions would occasionally cross his mind--"as for myself, the
cultivation of _turnips_ must be my future occupation. Well, the
bit of parchment is sold, Bob has got _his_ in its place, while
the difference in price is in my pocket, and no more need be said--and
here come our dear girls, Wilhelmina, to prevent any regrets. The
father of two such daughters _ought_, at least, to be happy."
At this instant, Beulah and Maud Willoughby, (for so the adopted child
was called as well as the real), entered the room, having taken the
lodgings of their parents, in a morning walk, on which they were
regularly sent by the mistress of the boarding-school, in which they
were receiving what was _then_ thought to be a first-rate American
female education. And much reason had their fond parents to be proud of
them! Beulah, the eldest, was just eleven, while her sister was
eighteen months younger. The first had a staid, and yet a cheerful
look; but her cheeks were blooming, her eyes bright, and her smile
sweet. Maud, the adopted one, however, had already the sunny
countenance of an angel, with quite as much of the appearance of health
as her sister; her face had more finesse, her looks more intelligence,
her playfulness more feeling, her smile more tenderness, at times; at
others, more meaning. It is scarcely necessary to say that both had
that delicacy of outline which seems almost inseparable from the female
form in this country. What was, perhaps, more usual in that day among
persons of their class than it is in our own, each spoke her own
language with an even graceful utterance, and a faultless accuracy of
pronunciation, equally removed from effort and provincialisms. As the
Dutch was in very common use then, at Albany, and most females of Dutch
origin had a slight touch of their mother tongue in their enunciation
of English, this purity of dialect in the two girls was to be ascribed
to the fact that their father was an Englishman by birth; their mother
an American of purely English origin, though named after a Dutch god-
mother; and the head of the school in which they had now been three
years, was a native of London, and a lady by habits and education.
"Now, Maud," cried the captain, after he had kissed the forehead, eyes
and cheeks of his smiling little favourite--"Now, Maud, I will set you
to guess what good news I have for you and Beulah."
"You and mother don't mean to go to that bad Beave Manor this summer,
as some call the ugly pond?" answered the child, quick as lightning.
"That is kind of you, my darling; more kind than prudent; but you are
not right."
"Try Beulah, now," interrupted the mother, who, while she too doted on
her youngest child, had an increasing respect for the greater solidity
and better judgment of her sister: "let us hear Beulah's guess."
"It is something about my brother, I know by mother's eyes," answered
the eldest girl, looking inquiringly into Mrs. Willoughby's face.
"Oh! yes," cried Maud, beginning to jump about the room, until she
ended her saltations in her father's arms--"Bob has got his
commission!--I know it all well enough, now--I would not thank you to
tell me--I know it all now--_dear_ Bob, how he _will_ laugh!
and how happy I am!"
"Is it so, mother?" asked Beulah, anxiously, and without even a smile.
"Maud is right; Bob is an ensign--or, will be one, in a day or two. You
do not seem pleased, my child?"
"I wish Robert were not a soldier, mother. Now he will be always away,
and we shall never see him; then he may be obliged to fight, and who
knows how unhappy it may make _him_?"
Beulah thought more of her brother than she did of herself; and, sooth
to say, her mother had many of the child's misgivings. With Maud it was
altogether different: she saw only the bright side of the picture; Bob
gay and brilliant, his face covered with smiles, his appearance admired
himself, and of course his sisters, happy. Captain Willoughby
sympathized altogether with his pet. Accustomed to arms, he rejoiced
that a career in which he had partially failed--this he did not conceal
from himself or his wife--that this same career had opened, as he
trusted, with better auspices on his only son. He covered Maud with
kisses, and then rushed from the house, finding his heart too full to
run the risk of being unmanned in the presence of females.
A week later, availing themselves of one of the last falls of snow of
the season, captain Willoughby and his wife left Albany for the Knoll.
The leave-taking was tender, and to the parents bitter; though after
all, it was known that little more than a hundred miles would separate
them from their beloved daughters. Fifty of these miles, however, were
absolutely wilderness; and to achieve them, quite a hundred of tangled
forest, or of difficult navigation, were to be passed. The
communications would be at considerable intervals, and difficult. Still
they might be held, and the anxious mother left many injunctions with
Mrs. Waring, the head of the school, in relation to the health of her
daughters, and the manner in which she was to be sent for, in the event
of any serious illness.
Mrs. Willoughby had often overcome, as she fancied, the difficulties of
a wilderness, in the company of her husband. It is the fashion highly
to extol Napoleon's passage of the Alps, simply in reference to its
physical obstacles. There never was a brigade moved twenty-four hours
into the American wilds, that had not greater embarrassments of this
nature to overcome, unless in those cases in which favourable river
navigation has offered its facilities. Still, time and necessity had
made a sort of military ways to all the more important frontier points
occupied by the British garrisons, and the experience of Mrs.
Willoughby had not hitherto been of the severe character of that she
was now compelled to undergo.
The first fifty miles were passed over in a sleigh, in a few hours, and
with little or no personal fatigue. This brought the travellers to a
Dutch inn on the Mohawk, where the captain had often made his halts,
and whither he had from time to time, sent his advanced parties in the
course of the winter and spring. Here a jumper was found prepared to
receive Mrs. Willoughby; and the horse being led by the captain
himself, a passage through the forest was effected as far as the head
of the Otsego. The distance being about twelve miles, it required two
days for its performance. As the settlements extended south from the
Mohawk a few miles, the first night was passed in a log cabin, on the
extreme verge of civilization, if civilization it could be called, and
the remaining eight miles were got over in the course of the succeeding
day. This was more than would probably have been achieved in the virgin
forest, and under the circumstances, had not so many of the captain's
people passed over the same ground, going and returning, thereby
learning how to avoid the greatest difficulties of the route, and here
and there constructing a rude bridge. They had also blazed the trees,
shortening the road by pointing out its true direction.
At the head of the Otsego, our adventurers were fairly in the
wilderness. Huts had been built to receive the travellers, and here the
whole party assembled, in readiness to make a fresh start in company.
It consisted of more than a dozen persons, in all; the black domestics
of the family being present, as well as several mechanics whom Captain
Willoughby had employed to carry on his improvements. The men sent in
advance had not been idle, any more than those left at the Hutted
Knoll. They had built three or four skiffs, one small batteau, and a
couple of canoes. These were all in the water, in waiting for the
disappearance of the ice; which was now reduced to a mass of
stalactites in form, greenish and sombre in hue, as they floated in a
body, but clear and bright when separated and exposed to the sun. The
south winds began to prevail, and the shore was glittering with the
fast-melting piles of the frozen fluid, though it would have been vain
yet to attempt a passage through it.
The Otsego is a sheet that we have taken more than one occasion to
describe, and the picture it then presented, amidst its frame of
mountains, will readily be imagined by most of our readers. In 1765, no
sign of a settlement was visible on its shores; few of the grants of
land in that vicinity extending back so far. Still the spot began to be
known, and hunters had been in the habit of frequenting its bosom and
its shores, for the last twenty years or more Not a vestige of their
presence, however, was to be seen from the huts of the captain; but
Mrs. Willoughby assured her husband, as she stood leaning on his arm,
the morning after her arrival, that never before had she gazed on so
eloquent, and yet so pleasing a picture of solitude as that which lay
spread before her eyes.
"There is something encouraging and soothing in this bland south wind,
too," she added, "which seems to promise that we shall meet with a
beneficent nature, in the spot to which we are going. The south airs of
spring, to me are always filled with promise."
"And justly, love; for they are the harbingers of a renewed vegetation.
If the wind increase, as I think it may, we shall see this chilling
sheet of ice succeeded by the more cheerful view of water. It is in
this way, that all these lakes open their bosoms in April."
Captain Willoughby did not know it, while speaking, but, at that
moment, quite two miles of the lower, or southern end of the lake, was
clear, and the opening giving a sweep to the breeze, the latter was
already driving the sheets of ice before it, towards the head, at a
rate of quite a mile in the hour. Just then, an Irishman, named Michael
O'Hearn, who had recently arrived in America, and whom the captain had
hired as a servant of all work, came rushing up to his master, and
opened his teeming thoughts, with an earnestness of manner, and a
confusion of rhetoric, that were equally characteristic of the man and
of a portion of his nation.
"Is it journeying south, or to the other end of this bit of wather, or
ice, that yer honour is thinking of?" he cried "Well, and there'll be
room for us all, and to spare; for divil a bir-r-d will be left in that
quarter by night, or forenent twelve o'clock either, calculating by the
clock, if one had such a thing; as a body might say."
As this was said not only vehemently, but with an accent that defies
imitation with the pen, Mrs. Willoughby was quite at a loss to get a
clue to the idea; but, her husband, more accustomed to men of Mike's
class, was sufficiently lucky to comprehend what he was at.
"You mean the pigeons, Mike, I suppose," the captain answered, good-
humouredly. "There are certainly a goodly number of them; and I dare
say our hunters will bring us in some, for dinner. It is a certain sign
that the winter is gone, when birds and beasts follow their instincts,
in this manner. Where are you from, Mike?"
"County Leitrim, yer honour," answered the other, touching his cap.
"Ay, that one may guess," said the captain, smiling, 'but where last?"
"From looking at the bir-r-ds, sir!--Och! It's a sight that will do
madam good, and contains a sartainty there'll be room enough made for
us, where all these cr'atures came from. I'm thinking, yer honour, if
we don't ate _them_, they'll be wanting to ate _us_. What a
power of them, counting big and little; though they 're all of a size,
just as much as if they had flown through a hole made on purpose to
kape them down to a convanient bigness, in body and feathers."
"Such a flight of pigeons in Ireland, would make a sensation, Mike,"
observed the captain, willing to amuse his wife, by drawing out the
County Leitrim-man, a little.
"It would make a dinner, yer honour, for every mother's son of 'em,
counting the gur-r-rls, in the bargain! Such a power of bir-r-ds, would
knock down 'praties, in a wonderful degree, and make even butthermilk
chape and plenthiful. Will it be always such abundance with us, down at
the Huts, yer honour? or is this sight only a delusion to fill us with
hopes that's never to be satisfied?"
"Pigeons are seldom wanting in this country, Mike, in the spring and
autumn; though we have both birds and beasts, in plenty, that are
preferable for food."
"Will it be plentthier than this?--Well, it's enough to destroy human
appetite, the sight of 'em! I'd give the half joe I lost among them
blackguards in Albany, at their Pauss, as they calls it, jist to let my
sisther's childer have their supper out of one of these flocks, such as
they are, betther or no betther. Och! its pleasant to think of them
childer having their will, for once, on such a power of wild, savage
bir-r-ds!"
Captain Willoughby smiled at this proof of _naiveté_ in his new
domestic, and then led his wife back to the hut; if being time to make
some fresh dispositions for the approaching movement. By noon, it
became apparent to those who were waiting such an event, that the lake
was opening; and, about the same time, one of the hunters came in from
a neighbouring mountain, and reported that he had seen clear water, as
near their position as three or four miles. By this time it was blowing
fresh, and the wind, having a clear rake, drove up the honeycomb-
looking sheet before it, as the scraper accumulates snow. When the sun
set, the whole north shore was white with piles of glittering icicles;
while the bosom of the Otsego, no longer disturbed by the wind,
resembled a placid mirror.
Early on the following morning, the whole party embarked. There was no
wind, and men were placed at the paddles and the oars. Care was taken,
on quitting the huts, to close their doors and shutters; for they were
to be taverns to cover the heads of many a traveller, in the frequent
journeys that were likely to be made, between the Knoll and the
settlements. These stations, then, were of the last importance, and a
frontier-man always had the same regard for them, that the mountaineer
of the Alps has for his "refuge."
The passage down the Otsego was the easiest and most agreeable portion
of the whole journey. The day was pleasant, and the oarsmen vigorous,
if not very skilful, rendering the movement rapid, and sufficiently
direct. But one drawback occurred to the prosperity of the voyage.
Among the labourers hired by the captain, was a Connecticut man, of the
name of Joel Strides, between whom and the County Leitrim-man, there
had early commenced a warfare of tricks and petty annoyances; a warfare
that was perfectly defensive on the part of O'Hearn, who did little
more, in the way of retort, than comment on the long, lank, shapeless
figure, and meagre countenance of his enemy. Joel had not been seen to
smile, since he engaged with the captain; though three times had he
laughed outright, and each time at the occurrence of some mishap to
Michael O'Hearn the fruit of one of his own schemes of annoyance.
On the present occasion, Joel, who had the distribution of such duty,
placed Mike in a skiff, by himself, flattering the poor fellow with the
credit he would achieve, by rowing a boat to the foot of the lake,
without assistance. He might as well have asked Mike to walk to the
outlet on the surface of the water! This arrangement proceeded from an
innate love of mischief in Joel, who had much of the quiet waggery,
blended with many of the bad qualities of the men of his peculiar
class. A narrow and conceited selfishness lay at the root of the larger
portion of this man's faults. As a physical being, he was a perfect
labour-saving machine, himself; bringing all the resources of a
naturally quick and acute mind to bear on this one end, never doing
anything that required a particle more than the exertion and strength
that were absolutely necessary to effect his object. He rowed the skiff
in which the captain and his wife had embarked, with his own hands;
and, previously to starting, he had selected the best sculls from the
other boats, had fitted his twhart with the closest attention to his
own ease, and had placed a stretcher for his feet, with an intelligence
and knowledge of mechanics, that would have done credit to a Whitehall
waterman. This much proceeded from the predominating principle of his
nature, which was, always to have an eye on the interests of Joel
Strides; though the effect happened, in this instance, to be beneficial
to those he served.
Michael O'Hearn, on the contrary, thought only of the end; and this so
intensely, not to so say vehemently, as generally to overlook the
means. Frank, generous, self-devoted, and withal accustomed to get most
things wrong-end-foremost, he usually threw away twice the same labour,
in effecting a given purpose, that was expended by the Yankee; doing
the thing worse, too, besides losing twice the time. He never paused to
think of this, however. The _masther's_ boat was to be rowed to
the other end of the lake, and, though he had never rowed a boat an
inch in his life, he was ready and willing to undertake the job. "If a
certain quantity of work will not do it," thought Mike, "I'll try as
much ag'in; and the divil is in it, if _that_ won't sarve the
purpose of that little bit of a job."
Under such circumstances the party started. Most of the skiffs and
canoes went off half an hour before Mrs. Willoughby was ready, and Joel
managed to keep Mike for he last, under the pretence of wishing his aid
in loading his own boat, with the bed and bedding from the hut. All was
ready, at length, and taking his seat, with a sort of quiet
deliberation, Joel said, in his drawling way, "You'll follow _us_,
Mike, and you can't be a thousand miles out of the way." Then he pulled
from the shore with a quiet, steady stroke of the sculls, that sent the
skiff ahead with great rapidity, though with much ease to himself.
Michael O'Hearn stood looking at the retiring skiff, in silent
admiration, for two or three minutes. He was quite alone; for all the
other boats were already two or three miles on their way, and distance
already prevented him from seeing the mischief that was lurking in
Joel's hypocritical eyes.
"Follow _yees_!" soliloquized Mike--"The divil burn ye, for a
guessing yankee as ye ar'--how am I to follow with such legs as the
likes of these? If it wasn't for the masther and the missus, ra'al
jontlemen and ladies they be, I'd turn my back on ye, in the desert,
and let ye find that Beaver estate, in yer own disagreeable company.
Ha!--well, I must thry, and if the boat won't go, it'll be no fault of
the man that has a good disposition to make it."
Mike now took his seat on a board that lay across the gunwale of the
skiff at a most inconvenient height, placed two sculls in the water,
one of which was six inches longer than the other, made a desperate
effort, and got his craft fairly afloat. Now, Michael O'Hearn was not
left-handed, and, as usually happens with such men, the inequality
between the two limbs was quite marked. By a sinister accident, too, it
happened that the longest oar got into the strongest hand, and there it
would have staid to the end of time; before Mike would think of
changing it, on that account. Joel, alone, sat with his face towards
the head of the lake, and he alone could see the dilemma in which the
county Leitrim-man was placed. Neither the captain nor his wife thought
of looking behind, and the yankee had all the fun to himself. As for
Mike, he succeeded in getting a few rods from the land, when the strong
arm and the longer lever asserting their superiority, the skiff began
to incline to the westward. So intense, however, was the poor fellow's
zeal, that he did not discover the change in his course until he had so
far turned as to give him a glimpse of his retiring master; then he
inferred that all was right, and pulled more leisurely. The result was,
that in about ten minutes, Mike was stopped by the land, the boat
touching the north shore again, two or three rods from the very point
whence it had started. The honest fellow got up, looked around him,
scratched his head, gazed wistfully after the fast-receding boat of his
master, and broke out in another soliloquy.
"Bad luck to them that made ye, ye one-sided thing!" he said, shaking
his head reproachfully at the skiff: "there's liberty for ye to do as
ye ought, and ye'll not be doing it, just out of contrairiness. Why the
divil can't ye do like the other skiffs, and go where ye're wanted, on
the road towards thim beavers? Och, ye'll be sorry for this, when ye're
left behind, out of sight!"
Then it flashed on Mike's mind that possibly some article had been left
in the hut, and the skiff had come back to look after it; so, up he ran
to the captain's deserted lodge, entered it, was lost to view for a
minute, then came in sight again, scratching his head, and renewing his
muttering--"No," he said, "divil a thing can I see, and it must be pure
con_trair_iness! Perhaps the baste will behave betther next time,
so I'll thry it ag'in, and give it an occasion. Barring obstinacy, 't
is as good-lookin' a skiff as the best of them."
Mike was as good as his word, and gave the skiff as fair an opportunity
of behaving itself as was ever offered to a boat. Seven times did he
quit the shore, and as often return to it, gradually working his way
towards the western shore, and slightly down the lake. In this manner,
Mike at length got himself so far on the side of the lake, as to
present a barrier of land to the evil disposition of his skiff to
incline to the westward. It could go no longer in that direction, at
least.
"Divil burn ye," the honest fellow cried, the perspiration rolling down
his face; "I think ye'll be satisfied without walking out into the
forest, where I wish ye war' with all my heart, amang the threes that
made ye! Now, I'll see if yer con_trair_y enough to run up a
hill."
Mike next essayed to pull along the shore, in the hope that the sight
of the land, and of the overhanging pines and hemlocks, would cure the
boat's propensity to turn in that direction. It is not necessary to say
that his expectations were disappointed, and he finally was reduced to
getting out into the water, cool as was the weather, and of wading
along the shore, dragging the boat after him. All this Joel saw before
he passed out of sight, but no movement of his muscles let the captain
into the secret of the poor Irishman's strait.
In the meanwhile, the rest of the flotilla, or _brigade_ of boats,
as the captain termed them, went prosperously on their way, going from
one end of the lake to the other, in the course of three hours. As one
of the party had been over the route several times already, there was
no hesitation on the subject of the point to which the boats were to
proceed. They all touched the shore near the stone that is now called
the "Otsego Rock," beneath a steep wooded bank, and quite near to the
place where the Susquehannah glanced out of the lake, in a swift
current, beneath a high-arched tracery of branches that were not yet
clothed with leaves.
Here the question was put as to what had become of Mike. His skiff was
nowhere visible, and the captain felt the necessity of having him
looked for, before he proceeded any further. After a short
consultation, a boat manned by two negroes, father and son, named Pliny
the elder, and Pliny the younger, or, in common parlance, "old Plin"
and "young Plin," was sent back along the west-shore to hunt him up. Of
course, a hut was immediately prepared for the reception of Mrs.
Willoughby, upon the plain that stretches across the valley, at this
point. This was on the site of the present village of Cooperstown, but
just twenty years anterior to the commencement of the pretty little
shire town that now exists on the spot.
It was night ere the two Plinies appeared towing Mike, as their great
namesakes of antiquity might have brought in a Carthaginian galley, in
triumph. The county Leitrim-man had made his way with excessive toil
about a league ere he was met, and glad enough was he to see his
succour approach. In that day, the strong antipathy which now exists
between the black and the emigrant Irishman was unknown, the
competition for household service commencing more than half a century
later. Still, as the negro loved fun constitutionally, and Pliny the
younger was somewhat of a wag, Mike did not entirely escape, scot-free.
"Why you drag 'im like ox, Irish Mike?" cried the younger negro--"why
you no row 'im like other folk?"
"Ah--you're as bad as the rest of 'em," growled Mike. "They tould me
Ameriky was a mighty warm country, and war-r-m I find it, sure enough,
though the wather isn't as warm as good whiskey. Come, ye black divils,
and see if ye can coax this _contrairy_ crathure to do as a person
wants."
The negroes soon had Mike in tow, and then they went down the lake
merrily, laughing and cracking their jokes, at the Irishman's expense,
after the fashion of their race. It was fortunate for the Leitrim-man
that he was accustomed to ditching, though it may be questioned if the
pores of his body closed again that day, so very effectually had they
been opened. When he rejoined his master, not a syllable was said of
the mishap, Joel having the prudence to keep his own secret, and even
joining Mike in denouncing the bad qualities of the boat. We will only
add here, that a little calculation entered into this trick, Joel
perceiving that Mike was a favourite, and wishing to bring him into
discredit.
Early the next morning, the captain sent the negroes and Mike down the
Susquehannah a mile, to clear away some flood-wood, of which one of the
hunters had brought in a report the preceding day. Two hours later, the
boats left the shore, and began to float downward with the current,
following the direction of a stream that has obtained its name from its
sinuosities.
In a few minutes the boats reached the flood-wood, where, to Joel's
great amusement, Mike and the negroes, the latter having little more
calculation than the former, had commenced their operations on the
upper side of the raft, piling the logs on one another, with a view to
make a passage through the centre. Of course, there was a halt, the
females landing. Captain Willoughby now cast an eye round him in
hesitation, when a knowing look from Joel caught his attention.
"This does not seem to be right," he said--"cannot we better if a
little?"
"It's right wrong, captain," answered Joel, laughing like one who
enjoyed other people's ignorance. "A sensible crittur' would begin the
work on such a job, at the lower side of the raft."
"Take the direction, and order things to suit yourself."
This was just what Joel liked. _Head-work_ before all other work
for him, and he set about the duty authoritatively and with
promptitude. After rating the negroes roundly for their stupidity, and
laying it on Mike without much delicacy of thought or diction, over the
shoulders of the two blacks, he mustered his forces, and began to clear
the channel with intelligence and readiness.
Going to the lower side of the jammed flood-wood, he soon succeeded in
loosening one or two trees, which floated away, making room for others
to follow. By these means a passage was effected in half an hour, Joel
having the prudence to set no more timber in motion than was necessary
to his purpose, lest it might choke the stream below. In this manner
the party got through, and, the river being high at that season, by
night the travellers were half-way to the mouth of the Unadilla. The
next evening they encamped at the junction of the two streams, making
their preparations to ascend the latter the following morning.
The toil of the ascent, however, did not commence, until the boats
entered what was called the creek, or the small tributary of the
Unadilla, on which the beavers had erected their works, and which ran
through the "Manor." Here, indeed, the progress was slow and laborious,
the rapidity of the current and the shallowness of the water rendering
every foot gained a work of exertion and pain. Perseverance and skill,
notwithstanding, prevailed; all the boats reaching the foot of the
rapids, or straggling falls, on which the captain had built his mills,
about an hour before the sun disappeared. Here, of course, the boats
were left, a rude road having been cut, by means of which the freights
were transported on a sledge the remainder of the distance. Throughout
the whole of this trying day, Joel had not only worked head-work, but
he had actually exerted himself with his body. As for Mike, never
before had he made such desperate efforts. He felt all the disgrace of
his adventure on the lake, and was disposed to wipe it out by his
exploits on the rivers. Thus Mike was ever loyal to his employer. He
had sold his flesh and blood for money, and a man of his conscience was
inclined to give a fair penny's-worth. The tractable manner in which
the boat had floated down the river, it is true, caused him some
surprise, as was shown in his remark to the younger Pliny, on landing.
"This is a curious boat, afther all," said Pat. "One time it's all
con_trar_iness, and then ag'in it's as obliging as one's own
mother. It _followed_ the day all's one like a puppy dog, while
yon on the big wather there was no more _dhriving_ it than a hog.
Och! it's a faimale boat, by its whims!"