The Pioneers (Cooper)/Chapter 15
Previously to the occurrence of the scene at the "Bold Dragoon," Elizabeth had been safely reconducted to the Mansion-house, where she was left, as its mistress, either to amuse or employ herself during the evening, as best suited her own inclination. Most of the lights were extinguished; but as Benjamin adjusted, with great care and regularity, four large candles, in as many massive candlesticks of brass, in a row on the sideboard, the hall possessed a peculiar air of comfort and warmth, contrasted with the cheerless aspect of the room she had left, in the academy.
Remarkable had been one of the listeners to Mr. Grant, and returned with her resentment, which had been not a little excited by the language of the Judge, somewhat softened by reflection and the worship. She recollected the youth of Elizabeth, and thought it no difficult task, under present appearances, to exercise that power indirectly, which hitherto she had enjoyed undisputed The idea of being governed, or of being compelled to pay the deference of servitude, was absolutely intolerable; and she had already determined within herself, some half-dozen times, to make an effort, that should at once bring to an issue the delicate point of her domestic condition. But as often as she met the dark, proud eye of Elizabeth, who was walking up and down the apartment, musing on the scenes of her youth, and the change in her condition, and perhaps the events of the day, the housekeeper experienced an awe, that she would not own to herself could be excited by any thing mortal. It, however, checked her advances, and for some time held her tongue-tied. At length she determined to commence the discourse, by entering on a subject that was apt to level all human distinctions, and in which she might display her own abilities.
"It was quite a wordy sarmont that Parson Grant give us to-night," said Remarkable.—"Them church ministers be commonly smart sarmonizers; but they write down their idees, which is a great privilege. I don't think that by nater they are sitch tonguey speakers for an offhand discourse, as the standing-order ministers be."
"And what denomination do you distinguish as the standing-order?" inquired Miss Temple, with some surprise.
"Why, the Presbyter'ans, and Congregationals, and Baptists too, for-ti-now; and all sitch as don't go on their knees to prayer."
"By that rule, then, you would call those who belong to the persuasion of my father, the sitting-order," observed Elizabeth.
"I'm sure I've never heer'n 'em spoken of by any other name than Quakers, so called," returned Remarkable, betraying a slight uneasiness: "I should be the last one to call them otherwise, for I never in my life used a disparaging tarm of the Judge, or any of his family. I've always set store by the Quakers, they are sitch pretty-spoken, clever people; and it's a wonderment to me, how your daddy come to marry into a church family, for they are as contrary in religion as can be. One sits still, and for the most part, says nothing, while the church folks practyse all kinds of ways, so that I sometimes think it quite moosical to see them; for I went to a church-meeting once before, down country."
"You have found an excellence in the church liturgy, that has hitherto escaped me," said Miss Temple. "I will thank you to inquire whether the fire in my room burns: I feel fatigued with my day's journey, and will retire."
Remarkable felt a wonderful inclination to tell the young mistress of the mansion, that by opening a door she might see for herself; but prudence got the better of her resentment, and after pausing some little time, as a salvo to her dignity, she did as desired. The report was favourable, and the young lady, wishing Benjamin, who was filling the stove with wood, and the housekeeper, each a good night, withdrew.
The instant that the door closed on Miss Temple, Remarkable commenced a sort of mysterious, ambiguous discourse, that was neither abusive nor commendatory of the qualities of the absent personage; but which seemed to be drawing nigh, by regular degrees, to a most dissatisfied description. The Major-domo made no reply, but continued his occupation with great industry, which being happily completed, he took a look at the thermometer, and then, opening a drawer of the sideboard, he produced a supply of stimulants, that would have served to keep the warmth in his system, without the aid of the enormous fire he had been building. A small stand was drawn up near the stove, and the bottles and the glasses necessary for convenience, were quietly arranged. Two chairs were placed by the side of this comfortable situation, when Benjamin, for the first time, appeared to observe his companion.
"Come," he cried, "come, Mistress Remarkable, bring yourself to an anchor in this here chair. It's a peeler without, I can tell you, good woman; but what cares I, blow high or blow low, d'ye see, it's all the same thing to Ben. The niggers are snug stowed below, before a fire that would roast an ox whole. The thermometer stands now at fifty-five, but if there's any vartue in good maple wood, I'll weather upon it, before one glass, as much as ten points more, so that the Squire, when he comes home from Betty Hollister's warm room, will feel as hot as a hand that has given the rigging a lick with bad tar. Come, Mistress, bring up in this here chair, and tell me how it is you like our new heiress."
"Why to my notion, Mr. Penguillum———"
"Pump—Pump," interrupted Benjamin; "it's Christmas-eve, Mistress Remarkable, and so d'ye see, you had better call me Pump. It's a shorter name, and as I mean to pump this here decanter till it sucks, why you may as well call me Pump."
"Did you ever!" cried Remarkable, with a laugh that seemed to unhinge every joint in her body: "You're a moosical creater, Benjamin, when the notion takes you. But as I was saying, I rather guess that times will be altered now in this house."
"Altered!" exclaimed the Major-domo, eyeing the bottle, that was assuming the clear aspect of cut glass with astonishing rapidity; "it don't matter much, Mistress Remarkable, so long as I keep the keys of the lockers in my pocket."
"I can't say," continued the housekeeper, "but there's good eatables and drinkables enough in the house for a body's content—a little more sugar, Benjamin, in the glass—for Squire Jones is an excellent provider. But new lords, new laws; and I shouldn't wonder if you and I had an unsartain time on't in footer."
"Life is as unsartain as the wind that blows," said Benjamin, with a most imposingly moralizing air; "and nothing is more vari'ble than the wind, Mistress Remarkable, unless you happen to fall in with the trades, d'ye see, and then you may run for the matter of a month at a time, with studding-sails on both sides alow and aloft, and with the cabin-boy at the wheel."
"I know hat life is disp'ut unsartain," said Remarkable, compressing her features to the humour of her companion; "but I expect there will be great changes made in the house to rights; and that you will find a young man put over your head, as well as there is one that wants to be over mine; and after having been settled as long as you have, Benjamin, I should judge that to be hard."
"Promotion should go according to length of sarvice," said the Major-domo; "and if-so-be that they ship a hand for my birth, or place a new steward aft, I shall throw up my commission in less time than you can put a pilot-boat in stays. Thof Squire Dickens," this was a common misnomer with Benjamin, "is a nice gentleman, and as good a man to sail with as heart could wish, yet I shall tell the Squire, d'ye see, in plain English, and that's my native tongue, that if-so-be he is thinking of putting any Johnny-raw over my head, why I shall resign, I began forrard, Mistress Pretty-bones, and worked my way aft, like a man. I was six months aboard a Garnsey lugger, hauling in the slack of the lee-sheet, and coiling up rigging. From that I went a few trips in a fore-and-after, in the same trade, which after all, was but a blind kind of sailing in the dark, where a man larns but little, excepting how to steer by the stars. Well! then, d'ye see, I larnt how a topmast should be slushed, and how a top gallant-sail was to be becketted; and then I did small jobs in the cabin, such as mixing the skipper's grog. 'Twas there I got my taste, which you must have often seen, is excellent. Well, here's better acquaintance to us."
Remarkable nodded a return to the compliment, and took a sip of the beverage before her; for, provided it was well sweetened, she had no objection to a small potation now and then. After this observance of courtesy between the worthy couple, the dialogue proceeded as follows:
"You have had great experunces in your life, Benjamin; for, as the scripter says, 'they that go down to the sea in ships see the works of the Lord.'"
"Ay! for that matter, they in brigs and schooners too; and it mought say the works of the devil. The sea. Mistress Remarkable, is a great advantage to a man, in the way of knowledge, for he sees the fashions of nations, and the shape of a country. Now, I suppose, for myself here, who is but an unlarned man to some that follows the seas, I suppose that, taking the coast from Cape Ler-Hogue as low down as Cape Finish-there, there isn't so much as a head land, or an island, that I don't know either the name of it, or some thing more or less about it. Take enough, woman, to colour the water. Here's sugar. It's a sweet tooth, that fellow that you hold on upon yet, Mistress Pretty-bones. But as I was saying, take the whole coast along, I know it as well as the way from here to the Bold Dragoon; and a devil of an acquaintance is that Bay of Biscay. Whew! I wish you could but hear the wind blow there. It sometimes takes two to hold one man's hair on his head. Scudding through the Bay is pretty much the same thing as travelling the roads in this country, up one side of a mountain, and down the other."
"Do tell!" exclaimed Remarkable; "and does the sea run as high as mountains, Benjamin?"
"Well, I will tell; but first let's taste the grog. Hem! its the right kind of stuff, I must say, that you keeps in this country; but then you're so close aboard the West-Indees, you make but a small run of it. By the lord Harry, woman, if Garnsey only lay some where between Cape Hatteras and the Bite of Logann, but you'd see rum cheap! As to the seas, they runs more in lippers in the Bay of Biscay, unless it may be in a sow-wester, when they tumble about quite handsomely; thof its not in the narrow seas that you are to look for a swell; just go off the Western-Islands, in a westerly blow, keeping the land on your larboard hand, with the ship's head to the southward, and bring to, under a close-reef'd topsail; or mayhap a reef'd foresail, with a fore-topmast-staysail; arid mizzen-staysail, to keep her up to the sea, if she will bear it; and lay there for the matter of two watches, if you want to see, mountains. Why, good woman, I've been off there in the Boadishey frigate, when you could see nothing but some such matter as a piece of sky, mayhap, as big as the mainsail; and then again, there was a hole under your lee-quarter, big enough to hold the whole British navy."
"Oh! for massy's sake! and wan't you afeard, Benjamin? and how did you get off?"
"Afeard! who the devil do you think was to be frightened at a little salt water tumbling about his head? As for getting off, when we had enough of it, and had washed our decks down pretty well, we called all hands, for d'ye see, the watch below was in their hammocks, all the same as if they were in one of your best bed-rooms; and so we watched for a smooth time; clapt her helm hard a-weather, let fall the foresail, and got the tack aboard; and so, when we got her afore it, I ask you, Mistress Pretty-bones, if she did'nt walk? didn't she! I'm no liar, good woman, when I say that I saw that ship jump from the top of one sea to another, just like one of these squirrels, that can fly, jumps from tree to tree?"
"What, clean out of the water!" exclaimed Remarkable, lifting her two lank arms, with their bony hands spread in astonishment.
"It was no such easy matter to get out of the water, good woman, for the spray flew so that you could'nt tell which was sea and which was cloud. So there we kept her afore it, for the matter of two glasses. The First Lieutenant he cun'd the ship himself, and there was four quarter-masters at the wheel, besides the master, with six forecastle men in the gun-room, at the relieving tackles. But then she behaved herself so well! Oh! she was a sweet ship, mistress! That one frigate was well worth more, to live in, than the best house in the island. If I was King of England, I'd have her hauled up above Lon'on bridge, and fit her up for a palace; because why? If any body can afford to live comfortably, his majesty can."
"Well! but Benjamin," cried his listener, who was in an ecstasy of astonishment, at this relation of the steward's dangers, "what did you do?"
"Do! why we did our duty, like good hearty fellows. Now, if the countrymen of Mounsheer Ler Quaw had been aboard of her, they would have just struck her ashore on some of them small islands; but we run along the land until we found her dead to leeward off the mountains of Pico, and dam'me, if I know to this day how we got there, whether we jumped over the island, or hauled round it: but there we was, and there we lay, under easy sail, fore-reaching, first upon one tack and then upon t'other, so as to poke her nose out now and then, and take a look to wind'ard, till the gale blow'd its pipe out."
"I wonder now!" exclaimed Remarkable, to whom most of the terms used by Benjamin were perfectly unintelligible, but who had got a confused idea of a raging tempest; "it must be an awful life, that going to sea! and I don't feel astonishment that you're so affronted with the thoughts of being forced to quit a comfortable home like this. Not that a body cares much for't, as there's more housen than one to live in. Why, when the Judge agreed with me to come and live with him, I'd no more notion of stopping any time, than any thing. I happened in, just to see how the family did, about a week after Miss Temple died, thinking to be back home agin night; but the family was in sitch a distressed way, that I could'nt but stop awhile and help 'em on. I thought the sitooation a good one, seeing that I was an unmarried body, and they were so much in want of help; so I tarried."
"And a long time have you left your anchors down in the same place, mistress; I think you must find that the ship rides easy?"
"How you talk, Benjamin! there's no believing a word you say. I must say that the Judge and Squire Jones have both acted quite clever, so long; but I see that now we shall have a specimen to the contrary. I heer'n say that the Judge was gone a great 'broad, and that he meant to bring his darter hum, but I did'nt calcoolate on sitch carrins on. To my notion, Benjamin, she's likely to turn out a desput ugly gall."
"Ugly!" echoed the Major-domo, opening his eyes, that were beginning to close in a very suspicious sleepiness, in wide amazement; "by the Lord Harry, woman, I should as soon think of calling the Boadishey a clumsy frigate. What the devil would you have? arn't her eyes as bright as the morning and evening stars! and isn't her hair as black and glistening as rigging that has just had a lick of tar! does'nt she move as stately as a first-rate in smooth water, on a bow-line! Why, woman, the figure-head of the Boadishey was a fool to her, and that, as I've often heard the captain say, was an image of a great Queen; and arn't Queens always comely, woman? for who do you think would be a King, and not choose a handsome bedfellow?"
"Talk decent, Benjamin," said the housekeeper, "or I won't keep your company. I don't gainsay her being comely to look on, but I will maintain that she's likely to show but poor conduct. She seems to think herself too good to talk to a poor body. From what Squire Jones had tell'd me, I some expected to be quite captivated by her company. Now, to my reckoning, Lowizy Grant is much more pritty behaved than Betsy Temple. She wouldn't so much as hold discourse with me, when I wanted to ask her how she felt, on coming home and missing her mammy."
"Perhaps she didn't understand you, woman; you are none of the best linguister; and then Miss Lizzy has been exercising the King's English under a great Lon'on lady, and, for that matter, can talk the language almost as well as myself, or any native born British subject. You've forgot your schooling, and the young mistress is a great scollard."
"Mistress!" cried Remarkable; "don't make one out to be a nigger, Benjamin. She's no mistress of mine, and never will be. And as to speech, I hold myself as second to nobody out of New-England. I was born and raised in Essex county; and I've always heer'n say, that the Bay State was provarbal for pronounsation!"
"I've often heard of that Bay of State," said Benjamin; "but can't say that I've ever been in it, nor do I know exactly where away it is that it lays; but I suppose that there's good anchorage in it, and that it's no bad place for the taking of ling; but for size, it can't be so much as a yawl to a sloop of war, compared with the bay of Biscay, or mayhap, Tor-bay. And as for language, if you want to hear dictionary overhauled, like a log-line in a blow, you must go to Wapping, and listen to the Lon'oners, as they deal out their lingo. Howsomever, I see no such mighty matter that Miss Lizzy has been doing to you, good woman, so take another drop of your brew, and forgive and forget, like an honest soul."
"No, indeed! and I shan't do sitch a thing, Benjamin. This treatment is a newity to me, and what I won't put up with. I have a hundred and fifty dollars at use, besides a bed and twenty sheep, to good; and I don't crave to live in a house where a body mus'nt call a young woman by her given name to her face. I will call her Betsy as much as I please; its a free country, and nobody can stop me. I did intend to stop while summer, but I shall quit to-morrow morning; and I will talk just as I please."
"For that matter, Mistress Remarkable," said Benjamin, "there's none here who will contradict you, for I'm of opinion that it would be as easy to stop a hurricane with a Barcelony hankerchy, as to bring up your tongue, when the stopper is off. I say, good woman, do they grow many monkeys along the shores of that Bay of State?"
"You're a monkey yourself, Mr. Penguillum," cried the enraged housekeeper, "or a bear! a black, beast'y bear! and an't fit for a decent woman to stay with. I'll never keep your company agin, sir, if I should live thirty years with the Judge. Sitch talk is more befitting the kitchen than the keeping-room of a house of one who is well to do in the world."
"Look you, Mistress Pitty—Patty—Pretty-bones, mayhap I'm some such matter as a bear, d'ye see, as they will find who come to grapple with me; but darn'me if I'm a monkey—a thing that chatters without knowing a word of what it says—a parrot, that will hold dialogue, for what an honest man knows, in a dozen languages; mayhap in the Bay of State lingo; mayhap in Greek or High Dutch. But dost it know what it means itself? canst answer me that, good woman? Your Midshipman can sing out, and pass the word, when the Captain gives the order, but just set him adrift by himself, and let him work (Le ship of his own head, and, slop my grog, if you don't find all the Johnny-raws laughing at him."
"Stop your grog indeed!" said Remarkable, rising with great indignation, and seizing a candle; "you're groggy now, Benjamin, and I'll quit the room before I hear any of your misbecoming words from you."
The housekeeper retired, with a manner but little less dignified, as she thought, than the air of the stately heiress, muttering, as she drew the floor after her, with a noise like the report of a musket, the opprobrious terms of "drunkard," "sot," and "beast."
"Who's that you say is drunk?" cried Benjamin, fiercely, rising and making a movement towards Remarkable. "You talk of mustering yourself with a lady! you're just fit to grumble and find fault. Where the devil should you larn behaviour and dictionary? in your damned Bay of State, ha!"
Benjamin here fell back in his chair, and soon gave vent to certain ominous sounds, which resembled, not a little, the growling of his favourite animal, the bear itself. Before, however, he was quite locked, to use the language that would suit the Della-cruscan humour of certain refined critics of the present day, "in the arms of Morpheus," he spoke aloud, observing due pauses between his epithets, the impressive terms of "monkey," "parrot," "pic-nic," "tar pot," and "linguisters."
We will not attempt to explain his meaning, nor connect his sentences, and our readers must be satisfied with our informing them, that they were expressed with all that coolness of contempt that a man might well be supposed to feel for a monkey.
Nearly two hours passed in this sleep, before the Major-domo was awakened by the noisy entrance of Richard, Major Hartmann, and the master of the mansion. Benjamin so far rallied his confused faculties, as to shape the course of the two former to their respective apartments, when he disappeared himself, leaving the task of securing the house to him who was most interested in its safety. Locks and bars were but little attended to in the early day of that settlement; and so soon as Marmaduke had given an eye to the enormous fires of his dwelling, he retired. And with this act of prudence closes the first night of our tale.
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James Fenimore Cooper, The Pioneers, Preface, Ch.1, Ch.2, Ch.3, Ch.4, Ch.5, Ch.6, Ch.7, Ch.8, Ch.9, Ch.10, Ch.11, Ch.12, Ch.13, Ch.14, Ch.15, Ch.16, Ch.17, Ch.18, Ch.19, Ch.20, Ch.21, Ch.22, Ch.23, Ch.24, Ch.25, Ch.26, Ch.27, Ch.28, Ch.29, Ch.30, Ch.31, Ch.32, Ch.33, Ch.34, Ch.35, Ch.36, Ch.37, Ch.38, Ch.39, Ch.40, Ch.41, Characters. |