CHAPTER XIII.
“And I’ll drink out of the quart pot— Here’s a health to the barley
mow. “—Drinking Song.
On one of the corners, where the two principal streets of Templeton
intersected each other, stood, as we have already mentioned, the inn
called the “Bold Dragoon”. In the original plan it was ordained that
the village should stretch along the little stream that rushed down
the valley; and the street which led from the lake to the academy was
intended to be its western boundary. But convenience frequently
frustrates the best-regulated plans. The house of Mr., or as, in
consequence of commanding the militia of that vicinity, he was called,
Captain Hollister, had, at an early day, been erected directly facing
the main street, and ostensibly interposed a barrier to its further
progress. Horsemen, and subsequently teamsters, however, availed
themselves of an opening, at the end of the building, to shorten their
passage westward, until in time the regular highway was laid out along
this course, and houses were gradually built on either side, so as
effectually to prevent any subsequent correction of the evil.
Two material consequences followed this change in the regular plans of
Marmaduke. The main street, after running about half its length, was
suddenly reduced for precisely that difference in its width; and “Bold
Dragoon” became, next to the mansion-house, by far the most
conspicuous edifice in the place.
This conspicuousness, aided by the characters of the host and hostess,
gave the tavern an advantage over all its future competitors that no
circumstances could conquer. An effort was, however, made to do so;
and at the corner diagonally opposite, stood a new building that was
in tended, by its occupants, to look down all opposition. It was a
house of wood, ornamented in the prevailing style of architecture, and
about the roof and balustrades was one of the three imitators of the
mansion-house. The upper windows were filled with rough boards
secured by nails, to keep out the cold air—for the edifice was far
from finished, although glass was to be seen in the lower apartments,
and the light of the powerful fires within de noted that it was
already inhabited. The exterior was painted white on the front and on
the end which was exposed to the street; but in the rear, and on the
side which was intended to join the neighboring house, it was coarsely
smeared with Spanish brown. Before the door stood two lofty posts,
connected at the top by a beam, from which was suspended an enormous
sign, ornamented around its edges with certain curious carvings in
pine boards, and on its faces loaded with Masonic emblems. Over these
mysterious figures was written, in large letters, “The Templeton
Coffee-house, and Traveller’s Hotel,” and beneath them, “By Habakkuk
Foote and Joshua Knapp.” This was a fearful rival to the” Bold
Dragoon,” as our readers will the more readily perceive when we add
that the same sonorous names were to be seen over a newly erected
store in the village, a hatter’s shop, and the gates of a tan-yard.
But, either because too much was attempted to be executed well, or
that the “Bold Dragoon” had established a reputation which could not
be easily shaken, not only Judge Temple and his friends, but most of
the villagers also, who were not in debt to the powerful firm we have
named, frequented the inn of Captain Hollister on all occasions where
such a house was necessary
On the present evening the limping veteran and his consort were hardly
housed after their return from the academy, when the sounds of
stamping feet at their threshold announced the approach of visitors,
who were probably assembling with a view to compare opinions on the
subject of the ceremonies they had witnessed.
The public, or as it was called, the “bar-room,” of the Bold Dragoon,”
was a spacious apartment, lined on three sides with benches and on the
fourth by fireplaces. Of the latter there were two of such size as to
occupy, with their enormous jambs, the whole of that side of the
apartment where they were placed, excepting room enough for a door or
two, and a little apartment in one corner, which was protected by
miniature palisades, and profusely garnished with bottles and glasses.
In the entrance to this sanctuary Mrs. Hollister was seated, with
great gravity in her air, while her husband occupied himself with
stirring the fires, moving the logs with a large stake burnt to a
point at one end.
“There, sargeant, dear,” said the landlady, after she thought the
veteran had got the logs arranged in the most judicious manner, “give
over poking, for it’s no good ye’ll be doing, now that they burn so
convaniently. There’s the glasses on the table there, and the mug
that the doctor was taking his cider and ginger in, before the fire
here— just put them in the bar, will ye? for we’ll be having the
jooge, and the Major, and Mr. Jones down the night, without reckoning
Benjamin Poomp, and the lawyers; so yell be fixing the room tidy; and
put both flip irons in the coals; and tell Jude, the lazy black baste,
that if she’s no be cleaning up the kitchen I’ll turn her out of the
house, and she may live wid the jontlemen that kape the ‘Coffee
house,’ good luck to ‘em. Och! sargeant, sure it’s a great privilege
to go to a mateing where a body can sit asy, without joomping up and
down so often, as this Mr. Grant is doing that same.”
“It’s a privilege at all times, Mrs. Hollister, whether we stand or be
seated; or, as good Mr. Whitefleld used to do after he had made a
wearisome day’s march, get on our knees and pray, like Moses of old,
with a flanker to the right and left to lift his hands to heaven,”
returned her husband, who composedly performed what she had directed
to be done. “It was a very pretty fight, Betty, that the Israelites
had on that day with the Amalekites, It seams that they fout on a
plain, for Moses is mentioned as having gone on the heights to
overlook the battle, and wrestle in prayer; and if I should judge,
with my little larning, the Israelites depended mainly on their horse,
for it was written ‘that Joshua cut up the enemy with the edge of the
sword; from which I infer, not only that they were horse, but well
diseiplyned troops. Indeed, it says as much as that they were chosen
men; quite likely volunteers; for raw dragoons seldom strike with the
edge of their swords, particularly if the weapon be any way crooked.”
“Pshaw! why do ye bother yourself wid texts, man, about so small a
matter?” interrupted the landlady; “sure, it was the Lord who was with
‘em; for he always sided with the Jews, before they fell away; and
it’s but little matter what kind of men Joshua commanded, so that he
was doing the right bidding. Aven them cursed millaishy, the Lord
forgive me for swearing, that was the death of him, wid their
cowardice, would have carried the day in old times. There’s no rason
to be thinking that the soldiers were used to the drill.”
“I must say, Mrs. Hollister, that I have not often seen raw troops
fight better than the left flank of the militia, at the time you
mention. They rallied handsomely, and that without beat of drum,
which is no easy thing to do under fire, and were very steady till he
fell. But the Scriptures contain no unnecessary words; and I will
maintain that horse, who know how to strike with the edge of the
sword, must be well disoiplyned. Many a good sarmon has been preached
about smaller matters than that one word! If the text was not meant to
be particular, why wasn’t it written with the sword, and not with the
edge? Now, a back-handed stroke, on the edge, takes long practice.
Goodness! what an argument would Mr. Whitefield make of that word
edge! As to the captain, if he had only called up the guard of
dragoons when he rallied the foot, they would have shown the inimy
what the edge of a sword was; for, although there was no commissioned
officer with them, yet I think I must say,” the veteran continued,
stiffening his cravat about his throat, and raising himself up with
tile air of a drill-sergeant, “they were led by a man who knowed how
to bring them on. in spite of the ravine.”
“Is it lade on ye would,” cried the landlady, “when ye know yourself,
Mr. Hollister, that the baste he rode was but little able to joomp
from one rock to another, and the animal was as spry as a squirrel?
Och! but it’s useless to talk, for he’s gone this many a year. I
would that he had lived to see the true light; but there’s mercy for a
brave sowl, that died in the saddle, fighting for the liberty. It is
a poor tombstone they have given him, anyway, and many a good one that
died like himself; but the sign is very like, and I will be kapeing it
up, while the blacksmith can make a hook for it to swing on, for all
the ‘coffee-houses’ betwane this and Albany.”
There is no saying where this desultory conversation would have led
the worthy couple, had not the men, who were stamping the snow off
their feet on the little plat form before the door, suddenly ceased
their occupation, and entered the bar-room.
For ten or fifteen minutes the different individuals, who intended
either to bestow or receive edification before the fires of the “Bold
Dragoon” on that evening, were collecting, until the benches were
nearly filled with men of different occupations. Dr. Todd and a
slovenly-looking, shabby-genteel young man, who took tobacco
profusely, wore a coat of imported cloth cut with something like a
fashionable air, frequently exhibited a large French silver watch,
with a chain of woven hair and a silver key, and who, altogether,
seemed as much above the artisans around him as he was himself
inferior to the real gentle man, occupied a high-back wooden settee,
in the most comfortable corner in the apartment.
Sundry brown mugs, containing cider or beer, were placed between the
heavy andirons, and little groups were found among the guests as
subjects arose or the liquor was passed from one to the other. No man
was seen to drink by himself, nor in any instance was more than one
vessel considered necessary for the same beverage; but the glass or
the mug was passed from hand to hand until a chasm in the line or a
regard to the rights of ownership would regularly restore the dregs of
the potation to him who de frayed the cost.
Toasts were uniformly drunk; and occasionally some one who conceived
himself peculiarly endowed by Nature to shine in the way of wit would
attempt some such sentiment as “ hoping that he” who treated “might
make a better man than his father;” or “live till all his friends
wished him dead;” while the more humble pot-companion contented
himself by saying, with a most composing gravity in his air, “Come,
here’s luck,” or by expressing some other equally comprehensive
desire. In every instance the veteran landlord was requested to
imitate the custom of the cupbearers to kings, and taste the liquor he
presented, by the invitation of “After you is manners,” with which
request he ordinarily complied by wetting his lips, first expressing
the wish of “Here’s hoping,” leaving it to the imagination of the
hearers to fill the vacuum by whatever good each thought most
desirable. During these movements the landlady was busily occupied
with mixing the various compounds required by her customers, with her
own hands, and occasionally exchanging greetings and inquiries
concerning the conditions of their respective families, with such of
the villagers as approached the bar.
At length the common thirst being in some measure assuaged,
conversation of a more general nature became the order of the hour.
The physician and his companion, who was one of the two lawyers of the
village, being considered the best qualified to maintain a public
discourse with credit, were the principal speakers, though a remark
was hazarded, now and then, by Mr. Doolittle, who was thought to be
their inferior only in the enviable point of education. A general
silence was produced on all but the two speakers, by the following
observation from the practitioner of the law:
“So, Dr. Todd, I understand that you have been per forming an
important operation this evening by cutting a charge of buckshot from
the shoulder of the son of Leather-Stocking?”
“Yes, sir,” returned other, elevating his little head with an air of
importance. “I had a small job up at the Judge’s in that way; it was,
however, but a trifle to what it might have been, had it gone through
the body. The shoulder is not a very vital part; and I think the
young man will soon be well. But I did not know that the patient was
a son of Leather-Stocking; it is news to me to hear that Natty had a
wife.”
“It is by no means a necessary consequence, returned the other,
winking, with a shrewd look around the bar room; “there is such a
thing, I suppose you know, in law as a filius nullius.”
“Spake it out, man,” exclaimed the landlady; “spake it out in king’s
English; what for should ye be talking Indian in a room full of
Christian folks, though it is about a poor hunter, who is but little
better in his ways than the wild savages themselves? Och! it’s to be
hoped that the missionaries will, in his own time, make a conversion
of the poor devils; and then it will matter little of what color is
the skin, or wedder there be wool or hair on the head.”
“Oh! it is Latin, not Indian, Miss Hollister!” returned the lawyer,
repeating his winks and shrewd looks; “and Dr. Todd understands Latin,
or how would he read the labels on his gailipots and drawers? No, no,
Miss Hollis ter, the doctor understands me; don’t you, doctor?”
“Hem—why, I guess I am not far out of the way,” returned Elnathan,
endeavoring to imitate the expression of the other’s countenance, by
looking jocular. “Latin is a queer language, gentlemen; now I rather
guess there is no one in the room, except Squire Lippet, who can
believe that ‘Far. Av.’ means oatmeal, in English.”
The lawyer in his turn was a good deal embarrassed by this display of
learning; for, although he actually had taken his first degree at one
of the eastern universities, he was somewhat puzzled with the terms
used by his companion. It was dangerous, however, to appear to he out
done in learning in a public bar-room, and before so many of his
clients; he therefore put the best face on the matter, and laughed
knowingly as if there were a good joke concealed under it, that was
understood only by the physician and himself. All this was attentively
observed by the listeners, who exchanged looks of approbation; and the
expressions of “ tonguey mati,” and “I guess Squire Lippet knows if
anybody does,” were heard in different parts of the room, as vouchers
for the admiration of his auditors. Thus encouraged, the lawyer rose
from his chair, and turning his back to the fire, and facing the
company, he continued:
“The son of Natty, or the son of nobody, I hope the young man is not
going to let the matter drop. This is a country of law; and I should
like to see it fairly tried, whether a man who owns, or says he owns,
a hundred thousand acres of land, has any more right to shoot a body
than another. What do you think of it, Dr. Todd?”
Oh, sir, I am of opinion that the gentleman will soon be well, as I
said before; the wound isn’t in a vital part; and as the ball was
extracted so soon, and the shoulder was what I call well attended to,
I do not think there is as much danger as there might have been.”
“I say, Squire Doolittle,” continued the attorney, raising his voice,
“you are a magistrate, and know what is law and what is not law. I
ask you, sir, if shooting a man is a thing that is to be settled so
very easily? Suppose, sir, that the young man had a wife and family;
and suppose that he was a mechanic like yourself, sir; and sup pose
that his family depended on him for bread; and suppose that the ball,
instead of merely going through the flesh, had broken the shoulder-
blade, and crippled him forever; I ask you all, gentlemen, supposing
this to be the case, whether a jury wouldn’t give what I call handsome
damages?”
As the close of this supposititious case was addressed to the company
generally, Hiram did not at first consider himself called on for a
reply; but finding the eyes of the listeners bent on him in
expectation, he remembered his character for judicial discrimination,
and spoke, observing a due degree of deliberation and dignity.
“Why, if a man should shoot another,” he said, “ and if he should do
it on purpose and if the law took notice on’t, and if a jury should
find him guilty, it would be likely to turn out a state-prison
matter.”
“It would so, sir,” returned the attorney. “The law, gentlemen, is no
respecter of persons in a free country. It is one of the great
blessings that has been handed down to us from our ancestors, that all
men are equal in the eye of the laws, as they are by nater. Though
some may get property, no one knows how, yet they are not privileged
to transgress the laws any more than the poorest citizen in the State.
This is my notion, gentlemen: and I think that it a man had a mind to
bring this matter up, something might be made out of it that would
help pay for the salve—ha! doctor!”
“Why, sir,” returned the physician, who appeared a little uneasy at
the turn the conversation was taking, “I have the promise of Judge
Temple before men—not but what I would take his word as soon as his
note of hand— but it was before men. Let me see—there was Mounshier
Ler Quow, and Squire Jones, and Major Hartmann, and Miss Pettibone,
and one or two of the blacks by, when he said that his pocket would
amply reward me for what I did.”
“Was the promise made before or after the service was performed?”
asked the attorney.
“It might have been both,” returned the discreet physician; “though
I’m certain he said so before I undertook the dressing.”
“But it seems that he said his pocket should reward you, doctor,”
observed Hiram. “Now I don’t know that the law will hold a man to
such a promise; he might give you his pocket with sixpence in’t, and
tell you to take your pay out on’t,”
“That would not be a reward in the eye of the law, interrupted the
attorney—” not what is called a ‘quid pro quo;’ nor is the pocket to
be considered as an agent, but as part of a man’s own person, that is,
in this particular. I am of opinion that an action would lie on that
promise, and I will undertake to bear him out, free of costs, if he
don’t recover.”
To this proposition the physician made no reply; but he was observed
to cast his eyes around him, as if to enumerate the witnesses, in
order to substantiate this promise also, at a future day, should it
prove necessary. A subject so momentous as that of suing Judge Temple
was not very palatable to the present company in so public a place;
and a short silence ensued, that was only interrupted by the opening
of the door, and the entrance of Natty himself.
The old hunter carried in his hand his never-failing companion, the
rifle; and although all of the company were uncovered excepting the
lawyer, who wore his hat on one side, with a certain dam’me air, Natty
moved to the front of one of the fires without in the least altering
any part of his dress or appearance. Several questions were addressed
to him, on the subject of the game he had killed, which he answered
readily, and with some little interest; and the landlord, between whom
and Natty there existed much cordiality, on account of their both
having been soldiers in youth, offered him a glass of a liquid which,
if we might judge from its reception, was no unwelcome guest. When
the forester had got his potation also, he quietly took his seat on
the end of one of the logs that lay nigh the fires, and the slight
interruption produced by his entrance seemed to he forgotten.
“The testimony of the blacks could not be taken, sir,” continued the
lawyer, “for they are all the property of Mr. Jones, who owns their
time. But there is a way by which Judge Temple, or any other man,
might be made to pay for shooting another, and for the cure in the
bargain. There is a way, I say, and that without going into the
‘court of errors,’ too,”
“And a mighty big error ye would make of it, Mister Todd,” cried the
landlady, “should ye be putting the mat ter into the law at all, with
Joodge Temple, who has a purse as long as one of them pines on the
hill, and who is an asy man to dale wid, if yees but mind the humor of
him. He’s a good man is Joodge Temple, and a kind one, and one who
will be no the likelier to do the pratty thing, becase ye would wish
to tarrify him wid the law. I know of but one objaction to the same,
which is an over-careless ness about his sowl. It’s neither a
Methodie, nor a Papish, nor Parsbetyrian, that he is, but just nothing
at all; and it’s hard to think that he, ‘who will not fight the good
fight, under the banners of a rig’lar church, in this world, will be
mustered among the chosen in heaven,’ as my husband, the captain
there, as ye call him, says—though there is but one captain that I
know, who desarves the name. I hopes, Lather-Stocking, ye’ll no be
foolish, and putting the boy up to try the law in the matter; for
‘twill be an evil day to ye both, when ye first turn the skin of so
paceable an animal as a sheep into a bone of contention, The lad is
wilcome to his drink for nothing, until his shoulther will bear the
rifle agin.”
“Well, that’s gin’rous,” was heard from several mouths at once, for
this was a company in which a liberal offer was not thrown away; while
the hunter, instead ‘of expressing any of that indignation which he
might be sup posed to feel, at hearing the hurt of his young companion
alluded to, opened his mouth, with the silent laugh for which he was
so remarkable; and after he had indulged his humor, made this reply:
“I knowed the Judge would do nothing with his smooth bore when he got
out of his sleigh. I never saw but one smooth-bore that would carry
at all, and that was a French ducking-piece, upon the big lakes; it
had a barrel half as long agin as my rifle, and would throw fine shot
into a goose at one hundred yards; but it made dreadful work with the
game, and you wanted a boat to carry it about in. When I went with
Sir William agin’ the French, at Fort Niagara, all the rangers used
the rifle; and a dreadful weapon it is, in the hands of one who knows
how to charge it, and keep a steady aim. The captain knows, for he
says he was a soldier in Shirley’s; and, though they were nothing but
baggonet-men, he must know how we cut up the French and Iroquois in
the skrimmages in that war. Chingachgook, which means ‘Big Sarpent’
in English, old John Mohegan, who lives up at the hut with me, was a
great warrior then, and was out with us; he can tell all about it,
too; though he was overhand for the tomahawk, never firing more than
once or twice, before he was running in for the scalps. Ah! times is
dreadfully altered since then. Why, doctor, there was nothing but a
foot path, or at the most a track for pack-horses, along the Mohawk,
from the Jarman Flats up to the forts. Now, they say, they talk of
running one of them wide roads with gates on it along the river; first
making a road, and then fencing it up! I hunted one season back of the
Kaatskills, nigh-hand to the settlements, and the dogs often lost the
scent, when they came to them highways, there was so much travel on
them; though I can’t say that the brutes was of a very good breed.
Old Hector will wind a deer, in the fall of the year, across the
broadest place in the Otsego, and that is a mile and a half, for I
paced it my self on the ice, when the tract was first surveyed, under
the Indian grant.”
“It sames to me, Natty, but a sorry compliment to call your comrad
after the evil one,” said the landlady; “and it’s no much like a snake
that old John is looking now, Nimrod would be a more becomeing name
for the lad, and a more Christian, too, seeing that it conies from the
Bible. The sargeant read me the chapter about him, the night before
my christening, and a mighty asement it was to listen to anything from
the book.”
“Old John and Chingachgook were very different men to look on,”
returned the hunter, shaking his head at his melancholy recollections.
“In the ‘fifty-eighth war’ he was in the middle of manhood, and taller
than now by three inches. If you had seen him, as I did, the morning
we beat Dieskau, from behind our log walls, you would have called him
as comely a redskin as ye ever set eyes on. He was naked all to his
breech-cloth and leggins; and you never seed a creatur’ so handsomely
painted. One side of his face was red and the other black. His head
was shaved clean, all to a few hairs on the crown, where he wore a
tuft of eagle’s feathers, as bright as if they had come from a
peacock’s tail. He had colored his sides so that they looked like
anatomy, ribs and all, for Chingachgook had a great taste in such
things, so that, what with his bold, fiery countenance, his knife, and
his tomahawk, I have never seen a fiercer warrior on the ground. He
played his part, too, like a man, for I saw him next day with thirteen
scalps on his pole. And I will say this for the ‘Big Snake,’ that he
always dealt fair, and never scalped any that he didn’t kill with his
own hands.”
“Well, well!” cried the landlady, “fighting is fighting
anyway, and there is different fashions in the thing; though
I can’t say that I relish mangling a body after the breath
is out of it; neither do I think it can be uphild by doctrine.
I hope, sargeant, ye niver was helping in sich evil worrek.”
“It was my duty to keep my ranks, and to stand or fall by the baggonet
or lead,” returned the veteran. “I was then in the fort, and seldom
leaving my place, saw but little of the savages, who kept on the
flanks or in front, skrimmaging. I remember, howsomever, to have
heard mention made of the ‘Great Snake,’ as he was called, for he was
a chief of renown; but little did I ever expect to see him enlisted in
the cause of Christianity, and civilized like old John.”
“Oh! he was Christianized by the Moravians, who were always over-
intimate with the Delawares,” said Leather-Stocking. “It’s my opinion
that, had they been left to themselves, there would he no such doings
now about the head-waters of the two rivers, and that these hills
mought have been kept as good hunting-ground by their right owner, who
is not too old to carry a rifle, and whose sight is as true as a fish-
hawk hovering—”
He was interrupted by more stamping at the door, and presently the
party from the mansion-house entered, followed by the Indian himself.
