[figure description] Page 154.[end figure description]

The succeeding fortnight, or three weeks, brought no
material changes, beyond those connected with the progress
of the season. Vegetation was out in its richest luxuriance,
the rows of corn and potatoes, freshly hoed, were ornamenting
the flats, the wheat and other grains were throwing up
their heads, and the meadows were beginning to exchange
their flowers for the seed. As for the forest, it had now
veiled its mysteries beneath broad curtains of a green so
bright and lively, that one can only meet it, beneath a generous
sun, tempered by genial rains, and a mountain air.
The chain-bearers, and other companions of Beekman,
quitted the valley the day after the wedding, leaving no one
of their party behind but its principal.

The absence of the major was not noted by Joel and
his set, in the excitement of receiving so many guests, and
in the movement of the wedding. But, as soon as the fact
was ascertained, the overseer and miller made the pretence
of a `slack-time' in their work, and obtained permission to
go to the Mohawk, on private concerns of their own. Such
journeys were sufficiently common to obviate suspicion;
and, the leave had, the two conspirators started off, in company,
the morning of the second day, or forty-eight hours
after the major and Nick had disappeared. As the latter
was known to have come in by the Fort Stanwix route, it
was naturally enough supposed that he had returned by the
same; and Joel determined to head him on the Mohawk, at
some point near Schenectady, where he might make a merit
of his own patriotism, by betraying the son of his master.

[figure description] Page 155.[end figure description]

The reader is not to suppose Joel intended to do all this
openly; so far from it, his plan was to keep himself in the
back-ground, while he attracted attention to the supposed
toryism of the captain, and illustrated his own attachment
to the colonies.

It is scarcely necessary to say that this plan failed, in
consequence of the new path taken by Nick. At the very
moment when Joel and the miller were lounging about a
Dutch inn, some fifteen or twenty miles above Schenectady,
in waiting for the travellers to descent the valley of the
Mohawk, Robert Willoughby and his guide were actually
crossing the Hudson, in momentary security at least. After
remaining at his post until satisfied his intended prey had
escaped him, Joel, with his friend, returned to the settlement.
Still, the opportunity had been improved, to make
himself better acquainted with the real state of the country;
to open communications with certain patriots of a moral
calibre about equal to his own, but of greater influence; to
throw out divers injurious hints, and secret insinuations concerning
the captain; and to speculate on the propriety of
leaving so important a person to work his will, at a time so
critical. But the pear was not yet ripe, and all that could
now be done was to clear the way a little for something important
in future.

In the meantime, Evert Beekman having secured his
gentle and true-hearted wife, began, though with a heavy
heart, to bethink him of his great political duties. It was
well understood that he was to have a regiment of the new
levies, and Beulah had schooled her affectionate heart to a
degree that permitted her to part with him, in such a cause,
with seeming resignation. It was, sooth to say, a curious
spectacle, to see how these two sisters bent all their thoughts
and wishes, in matters of a public nature, to favour the engrossing
sentiments of their sex and natures; Maud being
strongly disposed to sustain the royal cause, and the bride
to support that in which her husband had enlisted, heart
and hand.

As for captain Willoughby, he said little on the subject
of politics; but the marriage of Beulah had a powerful influence
in confirming his mind in the direction it had taken
after the memorable argument with the chaplain. Colonel

[figure description] Page 156.[end figure description]

Beekman was a man of strong good sense, though without
the least brilliancy; and his arguments were all so clear
and practical, as to carry with them far more weight than
was usual in the violent partisan discussions of the period.
Beulah fancied him a Solon in sagacity, and a Bacon in
wisdom. Her father, without proceeding quite as far as this,
was well pleased with his cool discriminating judgment, and
much disposed to defer to his opinions. The chaplain was
left out of the discussions as incorrigible.

The middle of June was passed, at the time colonel Beekman
began to think of tearing himself from his wife, in
order to return into the active scenes of preparation he had
quitted, to make this visit. As usual, the family frequented
the lawn, at the close of the day, the circumstance of most
of the windows of the Hut looking on the court, rendering
this resort to the open air more agreeable than might otherwise
have been the case. Evert was undecided whether to
go the following morning, or to remain a day longer, when
the lawn was thus occupied, on the evening of the 25th of
the month, Mrs. Willoughby making the tea, as usual, her
daughters sitting near her, sewing, and the gentlemen at
hand, discussing the virtues of different sorts of seed-corn.

“There is a stranger!” suddenly exclaimed the chaplain,
looking towards the rocks near the mill, the point at which
all arrivals in the valley were first seen from the Hut. “He
comes, too, like a man in haste, whatever may be his errand.”

“God be praised,” returned the captain rising; “it is
Nick, on his usual trot, and this is about the time he should
be back, the bearer of good news. A week earlier might
have augured better; but this will do. The fellow moves
over the ground as if he really had something to communicate!”

Mrs. Willoughby and her daughters suspended their avocations,
and the gentlemen stood, in silent expectation,
watching the long, loping strides of the Tuscarora, as he
came rapidly across the plain. In a few minutes the Indian
came upon the lawn, perfectly in wind, moving with deliberation
and gravity, as he drew nearer to the party. Captain
Willoughby, knowing his man, waited quite another

[figure description] Page 157.[end figure description]

minute, after the red-man was leaning against an apple-tree,
before he questioned him.

“Welcome back, Nick,” he then said. “Where did you
leave my son?”

“He tell dere,” answered the Indian, presenting a note,
which the captain read.

“This is all right, Nick; and it shows you have been a
true man. Your wages shall be paid to-night. But, this
letter has been written on the eastern bank of the Hudson,
and is quite three weeks old—why have we not seen you,
sooner?”

“Can't see, when he don't come.”

“That is plain enough; but why have you not come back
sooner? That is my question.”

“Want to look at country—went to shore of Great Salt
Lake.”

“Oh!—Curiosity, then, has been at the bottom of your
absence?”

“Nick warrior—no squaw—got no cur'osity.”

“No, no—I beg your pardon, Nick; I did not mean to
accuse you of so womanish a feeling. Far from it; I know
you are a man. Tell us, however, how far, and whither
you went?”

“Bos'on,” answered Nick, sententiously.

“Boston! That has been a journey, indeed. Surely my
son did not allow you to travel in his company through
Massachusetts?”

“Nick go alone. Two path; one for major; one for
Tuscarora. Nick got dere first.”

“That I can believe, if you were in earnest. Were you
not questioned by the way?”

“Yes. Tell 'em I'm Stockbridge—pale-face know no
better. T'ink he fox; more like wood-chuck.”

“Thank you, Nick, for the compliment. Had my son
reached Boston before you came away?”

“Here he be”—answered the Indian, producing another
missive, from the folds of his calico shirt.

The captain received the note which he read with extreme
gravity, and some surprise.

“This is in Bob's hand-writing,” he said, “and is dated

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`Boston, June 18th, 1775;' but it is without signature, and
is not only Bob, but Bob Short.”

“Read, dear Willoughby,” exclaimed the anxious mother.
“News from him, concerns us all.”

“News, Wilhelmina!—They may call this news in Boston,
but one is very little the better for it at the Hutted Knoll.
However, such as it is, there is no reason for keeping it a
secret, while there is one reason, at least, why it should be
known. This is all. `My dearest sir—Thank God I am
unharmed; but we have had much to make us reflect; you
know what duty requires—my best and endless love to my
mother, and Beulah—and dear, laughing, capricious, pretty
Maud. Nick was present, and can tell you all. I do not
think he will “extenuate, or aught set down in malice.”'
And this without direction, or signature; with nothing, in
fact, but place and date. What say you to all this, Nick?”

“He very good—major dere; he know. Nick dere—hot
time—a t'ousand scalp—coat red as blood.”

“There has been another battle!” exclaimed the captain;
“that is too plain to admit of dispute. Speak out at once,
Nick—which gained the day; the British or the Americans?”

“Hard to tell—one fight, t'other fight. Red-coat take de
ground; Yankee kill. If Yankee could take scalp of all he
kill, he whip. But, poor warriors at takin' scalp. No know
how.”

“Upon my word, Woods, there does seem to be something
in all this! It can hardly be possible that the Americans
would dare to attack Boston, defended as it is, by a
strong army of British regulars.”

“That would they not,” cried the chaplain, with emphasis.
“This has been only another skirmish.”

“What you call skirmge?” asked Nick, pointedly. “It
skirmge to take t'ousand scalp, ha?”

“Tell us what has happened, Tuscarora?” said the captain,
motioning his friend to be silent.

“Soon tell—soon done. Yankee on hill; reg'lar in canoe.
Hundred, t'ousand, fifty canoe—full of red-coat. Great
chief, dere!—ten—six—two—all go togeder. Come ashore—
parade, pale-face manner — march — booh — booh -- dem
cannon; pop, pop—dem gun. Wah! how he run”

[figure description] Page 159.[end figure description]

“Run! — who ran, Nick? — Though I suppose it must
have been the poor Americans, of course.”

“Red-coat run,” answered the Indian, quietly.

This reply produced a general sensation, even the ladies
starting, and gazing at each other.

“Red-coat run”—repeated the captain, slowly. “Go on
with your history, Nick—where was this battle fought?”

“T'other Bos'on—over river—go in canoe to fight, like
Injin from Canada.”

“That must have been in Charlestown, Woods—you may
remember Boston is on one peninsula, and Charlestown on
another. Still, I do not recollect that the Americans were
in the latter, Beekman—you told me nothing of that?”

“They were not so near the royal forces, certainly, when
I left Albany, sir,” returned the colonel. “A few direct
questions to the Indian, however, would bring out the whole
truth.”

“We must proceed more methodically. How many
Yankees were in this fight, Nick?—Calculate as we used
to, in the French war.”

“Reach from here to mill—t'ree, two deep, cap'in. All
farmer; no sodger. Carry gun, but no carry baggonet;
no carry knapsack. No wear red-coat. Look like town-meetin';
fight like devils.”

“A line as long as from this to the mill, three deep, would
contain about two thousand men, Beekman. Is that what
you wish to say, Nick?”

“That about him—pretty near—just so.”

“Well, then, there were about two thousand Yankees on
this hill—how many king's troops crossed in the canoes, to
go against them?”

“Two time — one time, so many; t'other time, half so
many. Nick close by; count him.”

“That would make three thousand in all! By George,
this does look like work. Did they all go together, Nick?”

“No; one time go first; fight, run away. Den two time
go, fight good deal—run away, too. Den try harder—set
fire to wigwam—go up hill; Yankee run away.”

“This is plain enough, and quite graphical. Wigwam on
fire? Charlestown is not burnt, Nick?”

“Dat he — Look like old Council Fire, gone out. Big

[figure description] Page 160.[end figure description]

canoe fire—booh—booh—Nick nebber see such war before—
wah! Dead man plenty as leaves on tree; blood run
like creek!”

“Were you in this battle, Nick? How came you to learn
so much about it?”

“Don't want to be in it — better out — no scalp taken.
Red-man not'in' to do, dere. How know about him?—See
him — dat all. Got eye; why no see him, behind stone
wall. Good see, behind stone wall.”

“Were you across the water yourself, or did you remain
in Boston, and see from a distance?”

“Across in canoe — tell red-coat, general send letter by
Nick—major say, he my friend—let Nick go.”

“My son was in this bloody battle, then!” said Mrs.
Willoughby. “He writes, Hugh, that he is safe?”

“He does, dearest Wilhelmina; and Bob knows us too
well, to attempt deception, in such a matter.”

“Did you see the major in the field, Nick — after you
crossed the water, I mean?”

“See him, all. Six—two—seven t'ousand. Close by;
why not see major stand up like pine—no dodge he head,
dere. Kill all round him—no hurt him! Fool to stay dere—
tell him so; but he no come away. Save he scalp, too.”

“And how many slain do you suppose there might have
been left on the ground—or, did you not remain to see?”

“Did see—stay to get gun—knapsack—oder good t'ing—
plenty about; pick him up, fast as want him.” Here Nick
coolly opened a small bundle, and exhibited an epaulette,
several rings, a watch, five or six pairs of silver buckles,
and divers other articles of plunder, of which he had managed
to strip the dead. “All good t'ing—plenty as stone—
have him widout askin'.”

“So I see, Master Nick—and is this the plunder of Englishmen,
or of Americans?”

“Red-coat nearest—got most t'ing, too. Go farder, fare
worse; as pale-face say.”

“Quite satisfactory. Were there more red-coats left on
the ground, or more Americans?”

“Red-coat so,” said Nick, holding up four fingers —
“Yankee, so;” holding up one. Take big grave to hold
red-coat. Small grave won't hold Yankee. Hear what he

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count; most red-coat. More than t'ousand warrior! British
groan, like squaw dat lose her hunter.”

Such was Saucy Nick's description of the celebrated,
and, in some particulars, unrivalled combat of Bunker Hill,
of which he had actually been an eye-witness, on the ground,
though using the precaution to keep his body well covered.
He did not think it necessary to state the fact that he had
given the coup-de-grace, himself, to the owner of the epaulette,
nor did he deem it essential to furnish all the particulars
of his mode of obtaining so many buckles. In other
respects, his account was fair enough, “nothing extenuating,
or setting down aught in malice.” The auditors had listened
with intense feeling; and Maud, when the allusion was made
to Robert Willoughby, buried her pallid face in her hands,
and wept. As for Beulah, time and again, she glanced
anxiously at her husband, and bethought her of the danger
to which he might so soon be exposed.

The receipt of this important intelligence confirmed Beekman
in the intention to depart. The very next morning he
tore himself away from Beulah, and proceeded to Albany.
The appointment of Washington, and a long list of other
officers, soon succeeded, including his own as a colonel;
and the war may be said to have commenced systematically.
Its distant din occasionally reached the Hutted Knoll; but
the summer passed away, bringing with it no event to affect
the tranquillity of that settlement. Even Joel's schemes were
thwarted for a time, and he was fain to continue to wear the
mask, and to gather that harvest for another, which he had
hoped to reap for his own benefit.

Beulah had all a young wife's fears for her husband; but,
as month succeeded month, and one affair followed another,
without bringing him harm, she began to submit to the
anxieties inseparable from her situation, with less of self-torment,
and more of reason. Her mother and Maud were
invaluable friends to her, in this novel and trying situation,
though each had her own engrossing cares on account of
Robert Willoughby. As no other great battle, however
occurred in the course of the year '75, Beekman remained
in safety with the troops that invested Boston, and the major
with the army within it. Neither was much exposed, and

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glad enough were these gentle affectionate hearts, when they
learned that the sea separated the combatants.

This did not occur, however, until another winter was
passed. In November, the family left the Hut, as had been
its practice of late years, and went out into the more inhabited
districts to pass the winter. This time it came only to
Albany, where colonel Beekman joined it, passing a few
happy weeks with his well-beloved Beulah. The ancient
town mentioned was not gay at a moment like that; but it
had many young officers in it, on the American side of the
question, who were willing enough to make themselves acceptable
to Maud. The captain was not sorry to see several
of these youths manifesting assiduity about her he had so
long been accustomed to consider as his youngest daughter;
for, by this time, his opinions had taken so strong a bias in
favour of the rights of the colonies, that Beekman himself
scarce rejoiced more whenever he heard of any little success
alighting on the American arms.

“It will all come right in the end,” the worthy captain
used to assure his friend the chaplain. “They will open
their eyes at home, ere long, and the injustice of taxing the
colonies will be admitted. Then all will come round again;
the king will be as much beloved as ever, and England and
America will be all the better friends for having a mutual
respect. I know my countrymen well; they mean right,
and will do right, as soon as their stomachs are a little
lowered, and they come to look at the truth, coolly. I'll
answer for it, the Battle of Bunker's Hill made us”—the
captain had spoken in this way, now, for some months—
“made us a thousand advocates, where we had one before.
This is the nature of John Bull; give him reason to respect
you, and he will soon do you justice; but give him reason
to feel otherwise, and he becomes a careless, if not a hard
master.”

Such were the opinions captain Willoughby entertained
of his native land; a land he had not seen in thirty years,
and one in which he had so recently inherited unexpected
honours, without awakening a desire to return and enjoy
them. His opinions were right in part, certainly; for they
depended on a law of nature, while it is not improbable they
were wrong in all that was connected with the notions of

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any peculiarly manly quality, in any particular part of
christendom. No maxim is truer than that which teaches
us “like causes produce like effects;” and as human beings
are governed by very similar laws all over the face of this
round world of ours, nothing is more certain than the similarity
of their propensities.

Maud had no smiles, beyond those extracted by her naturally
sweet disposition, and a very prevalent desire to oblige,
for any of the young soldiers, or young civilians, who
crowded about her chair, during the Albany winter mentioned.
Two or three of colonel Beekman's military friends,
in particular, would very gladly have become connected
with an officer so much respected, through means so exceedingly
agreeable; but no encouragement emboldened
either to go beyond the attention and assiduities of a marked
politeness.

“I know not how it is,” observed Mrs. Willoughby, one
day, in a tête-à-tête with her husband; “Maud seems to
take less pleasure than is usual with girls of her years, in the
attentions of your sex. That her heart is affectionate —
warm—even tender, I am very certain; and yet no sign of
preference, partiality, or weakness, in favour of any of these
fine young men, of whom we see so many, can I discover
in the child. They all seem alike to her!”

“Her time will come, as it happened to her mother before
her,” answered the captain. “Whooping-cough and measles
are not more certain to befall children, than love to befall a
young woman. You were all made for it, my dear Willy,
and no fear but the girl will catch the disease, one of these
days; and that, too, without any inoculation.”

“I am sure, I have no wish to separate from my child”—
so Mrs. Willoughby always spoke of, and so she always
felt towards Maud—“I am sure, I have no wish to separate
from my child; but as we cannot always remain, it is perhaps
better this one should marry, like the other. There is
young Verplanck much devoted to her; he is everyway a
suitable match; and then he is in Evert's own regiment.”

“Ay, he would do; though to my fancy Luke Herring is
the far better match.”

“That is because he is richer and more powerful, Hugh—
you men cannot think of a daughter's establishment,

[figure description] Page 164.[end figure description]

without immediately dragging in houses and lands, as part of
the ceremony.”

“By George, wife of mine, houses and lands in moderation,
are very good sweeteners of matrimony!”

“And yet, Hugh, I have been very happy as a wife, nor
have you been very miserable as a husband, without any
excess of riches to sweeten the state!” answered Mrs. Willoughby,
reproachfully. “Had you been a full general, I
could not have loved you more than I have done as a mere
captain.”

“All very true, Wilhelmina, dearest,” returned the husband,
kissing the faithful partner of his bosom with strong
affection—“very true, my dear girl; for girl you are and
ever will be in my eyes; but you are one in a million, and
I humbly trust there are not ten hundred and one, in every
thousand, just like myself. For my part, I wish dear, saucy,
capricious little Maud, no worse luck in a husband, than
Luke Herring.”

“She will never be his wife; I know her, and my own
sex, too well to think it. You are wrong, however, Willoughby,
in applying such terms to the child. Maud is not
in the least capricious, especially in her affections. See with
what truth and faithfulness of sisterly attachment she clings
to Bob. I do declare I am often ashamed to feel that even
his own mother has less solicitude about him than this dear
girl.”

“Pooh, Willy; don't be afflicted with the idea that you
don't make yourself sufficiently miserable about the boy.
Bob will do well enough, and will very likely come out of
this affair a lieutenant-colonel. I may live yet to see him a
general officer; certainly, if I live to be as old as my grandfather,
Sir Thomas. As for Maud, she finds Beulah uneasy
about Beekman; and having no husband herself, or any
lover that she cares a straw about, why she just falls upon
Bob as a pis aller. I'll warrant you she cares no more for
him than any of the rest of us—than myself, for instance;
though as an old soldier, I don't scream every time I fancy
a gun fired over yonder at Boston.”

“I wish it were well over. It is so unnatural for Evert
and Robert to be on opposite sides.”

“Yes, it is out of the common way, I admit; and yet

[figure description] Page 165.[end figure description]

'twill all come round, in the long run. This Mr. Washington
is a clever fellow, and seems to play his cards with spirit
and judgment. He was with us, in that awkward affair of
Braddock's; and between you and me, Willhelmina, he covered
the regulars, or we should all have laid our bones on
that accursed field. I wrote you at the time, what I thought
of him, and now you see it is all coming to pass.”

It was one of the captain's foibles to believe himself a
political prophet; and, as he had really both written and
spoken highly of Washington, at the time mentioned, it had
no small influence on his opinions to find himself acting on
the same side with this admired favourite. Prophecies often
produce their own fulfilment, in cases of much greater gravity
than this; and it is not surprising that our captain
found himself strengthened in his notions by the circumstance.

The winter passed away without any of Maud's suitors
making a visible impression on her heart. In March,
the English evacuated Boston, Robert Willoughby sailing
with his regiment for Halifax, and thence with the expedition
against Charleston, under Sir Henry Clinton. The
next month, the family returned to the Knoll, where it was
thought wiser, and even safer to be, at a moment so critical,
than even in a more frequented place. The war proceeded,
and, to the captain's great regret, without any very visible
approaches towards the reconciliation he had so confidently
anticipated. This rather checked his warmth in favour of
the colonial cause; for, an Englishman by birth, he was
much opposed at bottom to anything like a dissolution of
the tie that connected America with the mother country; a
political event that now began seriously to be talked of
among the initiated.

Desirous of thinking as little as possible of disagreeable
things, the worthy owner of the valley busied himself with
his crops, his mills, and his improvements. He had intended
to commence leasing his wild lands about this time, and to
begin a more extended settlement, with an eye to futurity;
but the state of the country forbade the execution of the
project, and he was fain to limit his efforts by their former
boundaries. The geographical position of the valley put it
beyond any of the ordinary exactions of military service;

[figure description] Page 166.[end figure description]

and, as there was a little doubt thrown around its owner's
opinions, partly in consequence of his son's present and his
own previous connection with the royal army, and partly
on account of Joel's secret machinations, the authorities
were well content to let the settlement alone, provided it
would take care of itself. Notwithstanding the prominent
patriotism of Joel Strides and the miller, they were well
satisfied, themselves, with this state of things; preferring
peace and quietness to the more stirring scenes of war.
Their schemes, moreover, had met with somewhat of a
check, in the feeling of the population of the valley, which,
on an occasion calculated to put their attachment to its
owner to the proof, had rather shown that they remembered
his justice, liberality, and upright conduct, more than exactly
comported with their longings. This manifestation of respect
was shown at an election for a representative in a
local convention, in which every individual at the Hutted
Knoll, who had a voice at all, the two conspirators excepted,
had given it in favour of the captain. So decided was this
expression of feeling, indeed, that it compelled Joel and the
miller to chime in with the cry of the hour, and to vote
contrary to their own wishes.

One, dwelling at the Hutted Knoll, in the summer of 1776,
could never have imagined that he was a resident of a country
convulsed by a revolution, and disfigured by war. There,
everything seemed peaceful and calm, the woods sighing
with the airs of their sublime solitude, the genial sun shedding
its heats on a grateful and generous soil, vegetation
ripening and yielding with all the abundance of a bountiful
nature, as in the more tranquil days of peace and hope.

“There is something frightful in the calm of this valley,
Beulah!” exclaimed Maud one Sunday, as she and her sister
looked out of the library window amid the breathing stillness
of the forest, listening to the melancholy sound of the bell
that summoned them to prayers. “There is a frightful
calm over this place, at an hour when we know that strife
and bloodshed are so active in the country. Oh! that the
hateful congress had never thought of making this war!”

“Evert writes me all is well, Maud; that the times will
lead to good; the people are right; and America will now

[figure description] Page 167.[end figure description]

be a nation—in time, he thinks, a great, and a very great
nation.”

“Ah! It is this ambition of greatness that hurries them
all on! Why can they not be satisfied with being respectable
subjects of so great a country as England, that they
must destroy each other for this phantom of liberty? Will
it make them wiser, or happier, or better than they are?”

Thus reasoned Maud, under the influence of one engrossing
sentiment. As our tale proceeds, we shall have occasion
to show, perhaps, how far was that submission to events
which she inculcated, from the impulses of her true character.
Beulah answered midly, but it was more as a young American
wife:

“I know Evert thinks it all right, Maud; and you will
own he is neither fiery nor impetuous. If his cool judgment
approve of what has been done, we may well suppose that
it has not been done in too much haste, or needlessly.”

“Think, Beulah,” rejoined Maud, with an ashen cheek,
and in trembling tones, “that Evert and Robert may, at
this very moment, be engaged in strife against each other.
The last messenger who came in, brought us the miserable
tidings that Sir William Howe was landing a large army
near New York, and that the Americans were preparing to
meet it. We are certain that Bob is with his regiment; and
his regiment we know is in the army. How can we think
of this liberty, at a moment so critical?”

Beulah did not reply; for in spite of her quiet nature, and
implicit confidence in her husband, she could not escape a
woman's solicitude. The colonel had promised to write at
every good occasion, and that which he promised was usually
performed. She thought, and thought rightly, that a very
few days would bring them intelligence of importance;
though it came in a shape she had little anticipated, and by
a messenger she had then no desire to see.

In the meantime, the season and its labours advanced.
August was over, and September with its fruits had succeeded,
promising to bring the year round without any new
or extraordinary incidents to change the fortunes of the inmates
of the Hutted Knoll. Beulah had now been married
more than a twelvemonth, and was already a mother; and
of course all that time had elapsed since the son quitted his

[figure description] Page 168.[end figure description]

father's house. Nick, too, had disappeared shortly after
his return from Boston; and throughout this eventful summer,
his dark, red countenance had not been seen in the
valley.