[figure description] Page 085.[end figure description]

As the bell in a neighbouring spire tolled the hour
of two on the afternoon of the day on which the
events related in the last chapter transpired, a small
troop, consisting of six dragoons, trotted across the
lawn in front of the quarters of General Putnam,
and, drawing up at the corner of the street, sat immoveable
in their saddles, as if awaiting the orders
of some one within the mansion. A little way before
them a footman held two horses, one caparisoned
for a lady, the other a noble warhorse in
military harness. In a few moments afterward,
mounted on a nag with a shaggy and uncombed
mane, long whisking tail, short legs, and round
plump body, did Zacharie, arrayed in a sort of uniform,
also gallop round from the stables, and by
dint of beating with his fists and thumping with
his unarmed heels, compel his fierce little horse to
range up along the flank of the dragoons.

“Lo, are ye here, my masters?” he cried, in a
shrill voice and confident tone, when at length
he had brought his horse to stand at an oblique
angle with the grave studs of the troopers, it being
the only mode of proximity he could compel him
to assume; “I thought you'd be so busy stowing
provender 'neath your belt, Simon,” he continued,
addressing one of the troopers, in good corporeal
condition for a soldier in garrison, who seemed to
command the party, “that you'd give your knaves
a plea for loitering when work's to do.”

[figure description] Page 086.[end figure description]

“So, then! work's to do, ha! younker?” said the
stout soldier, with some alertness; “'twere time the
rust were taken off our blades. They've been idle
full long.”

“Marry have they, stout Simon. You've been
feeding and fatting here till you are now like so
much live pork, fit only to be killed.”

“Art at your jokes, younker,” said the trooper,
laughing with good-humour. “If't come to that,
I'll use the flat o' my broadsword on your back;
its what'll only match that sharp tongue o' thine.”

“The saints a mercy, Simon,” replied the lad, in
affected terror; “if thou makest such arguments
to thy rib's ribs when her tongue plays nimbly in
thine ears, thou hast no need of other work to keep
they blade from rusting. Marry! if all our troopers
had wives like thine, 'twould keep them in practice.
Six so experienced would put a score of the enemy
to flight.”

“Out upon thee, jackanapes! didst ever know a
woman without a tongue?”

“By the pope! have I not. 'Tis as useful to
her as the broadsword to a bold trooper. My
grandam hath a tongue will start fair with a guineakeet
and win the field. 'Twas the song used to
wake me o' mornings, season my porridge, and
sing me to sleep o' nights.”

“Then hast thou come honestly by thy tongue,
boy; but hist! here comes thy master,” he added,
as Burton came to the door, and, after glancing at
the escort, returned into the hall.

“Thou liest, Simon! he is no master of mine.
We are sworn friends. We did each other a good
turn in the northern wars, and so we stick to each
other from sympathy.”

“Thou wearest his livery, and art ever at his
heels.”

[figure description] Page 087.[end figure description]

“There again thou liest! Look ye! Dost not
know the Congress livery from a master's? Wear
I not the same blue jacket with the yellow braid—
the same lawloop on my shoulders, and the same
spurred boot; ay, am I not mounted all the same
as thou art? Thou art an ignorant ass not to
know thine own comrade! and, look ye,” he added,
unsheathing his hanger, “carry I not arms as well
as thou? Thy wife's finger-nails have blinded thee,
stout Simon.”

“Thou art bravely apparelled, comrade,” said the
trooper, laughing, and glancing down upon the boy,
“and gallantly mounted withal. I ask thy pardon
that I did not observe thee minutely. When next
I come in thy company,” he added, looking at him
through the focus formed by his closed hand, “I'll
bring a microscope lest thou shouldst escape my
vision. But I could swear thou wast not thus
decked out when thou camest to the barracks an
hour ago to call us out.”

“And for once in thy day thou wouldst make oath
to the truth. Dost think a man can be but one
thing, because thou thyself art fit only to straddle
a horse's back, deal blows with thy broadsword,
and move at the word of command, for all the
world like a huge wooden chessman? My wit is
put to better use. I can be private secretary at
home, soldier in the field, companion in the walk,
and in a thousand ways make myself of use, and
turn a shilling into my pocket.”

“A sort of chameleon of the times,” said one of
the other troopers, dryly, with a shrewd physiognomy,
a tall, gaunt frame, and the nose of Bardolph.

“Thou art an overgrown camel, carrying more
liquor in thy belly than brains in thy scull,” retorted
Zacharie to him.

[figure description] Page 088.[end figure description]

“There thou hast it, Mack, close home,” cried another,
laughing; and then turning, he said, “Zacharie,
thou dost mean that thou art now a robber,
now a saint; serving God or the devil, as suits thy
present convenience.”

“It hath never yet suited thy convenience, Joe
Carbine, to be but the one, and that a devil-server.
When thou art a saint, Mack's nose will turn pale
with wonder. But hush up thy garrulous jaws;
here comes thy master, if not mine,” he quickly
added, as General Putnam came to the door, lightly
sustaining on his arm the elegant figure of Isabel
Ney. Burton soon followed them, and, ordering
the troop to ride forward, mounted his horse while
General Putnam assisted Isabel into her saddle.

“I have, then, your full pardon for my inhospitality,
my dear Miss Ney?” he said, taking leave of her.

“You have, sir,” she answered, with a smile;
and then added, glancing archly at her glove, which
still adorned the breast of the gallant officer, “in
token of which I recall my gage.”

“Not so, Miss Ney,” he replied, courteously;
“that smile shall be sufficient token. This graceful
gauntlet I beg leave to retain as a memento of the
fair combatant who so bravely flung it into the lists.”

“You had best present it to your chief,” she
said, in a laughing tone, in which a slight vein of
sarcasm was just perceptible, “in memorial of his
arrest of the challenger.”

She then extended her hand to her late host, who
with formal courtesy pressed his lips to the taper
fingers, and cantered away. Burton, after giving
some orders to Zacharie, waved an adieu to the
general in reply to some half-heard pleasantry in
relation to black eyes and toryism; and, galloping
after Isabel, the party was soon out of sight.

Zacharie, who had been left behind, followed

[figure description] Page 089.[end figure description]

them for a moment with his eyes; then, putting
spurs to his nag, he dashed down a narrow alley
which led in the direction of Queen-street. After
a break-neck ride up hill and down hill, for this section
of the city was at that time uneven, he arrived
at the entrance of the square, on the northern side of
which stood the quarters of General Washington,
and turned abruptly into the lane where he had
formerly held a brief interview with Burton. Dismounting,
he fastened his horse to a tree that
stood at the corner of the lane, and placing himself
behind it so that he could, without observation, command
the whole front of the mansion, he continued
to gaze steadily towards the edifice, occasionally
uttering an exclamation of impatience. He had
waited, however, but a quarter of an hour, when a
heavily-built coach, drawn by a pair of large bay
horses and driven by a black coachman, rumbled
through the gate which led to the stables, and, passing
round the house, drew up before it. A black
footman descended from behind and opened the carriage
door as General Washington and his lady, accompanied
by two ladies and a young officer, came
forth from the house. Zacharie beheld the last
three get into the coach, the general and his lady
take leave of them and re-enter the house, and the
carriage turn down a road to the east leading to
Crown Point, now called Coenties-slip.

When the top of the carriage had disappeared
behind the intervening hill, Zacharie remounted
his pony, and, making a detour so as to elude the
observation of the inmates at headquarters, came
into the road behind the coach about half a mile
beyond. He followed slowly at a distance, along
a dusty road running within a few rods of the East
River, and bordered by magnificent elms and oaks

[figure description] Page 090.[end figure description]

of enormous size. The coach turned at length
into a grassy lane a few yards in extent, which
terminated at the water's edge, where the youthful
spy saw the arms and waving feathers of a party
of American soldiers. Leaving his horse by a
fence, he crossed a narrow enclosure, and, undiscovered,
gained a clump of bushes in an angle of the
hedge close to the party. Insinuating his flexible
form among the limbs and foliage, he at length
stood within a few feet of them, and within the
hearing of their voices.

Four soldiers, with muskets and fixed bayonets,
were seated in a boat with an awning over the
stern, and, their arms lying beside them, had taken
oars in their hands. The coachman sat upon his
box, his glistening eyes rolling about in wonder,
which was the more lively as he dared not express
it by any other organ; and the footman stood with
his hand upon the door of the coach from which the
ladies and young officer had just descended. One
of the ladies, who possessed a tall and fine person,
and whom Zacharie recognised as a Mrs. Stuyvesant,
who had been two or three days on a visit at
General Washington's, was supporting to the boat
the other female, who was of a slighter figure and
closely veiled, and appeared to be deeply agitated.

“Are you all ready, Holton?” asked the officer.

“Ay, ay, sir, for the last hour; 'tis now full late
to go and return by dark.”

“'Tis only to Kip's Bay. We can run down
in half an hour.”

When the party was seated the young officer
removed his cloak, exposing by the act a sword
and brace of pistols, and placed it upon the seat for
the comfort of his fair passengers, particularly the
youngest, who received the largest share, and around
whom he folded it with tender assiduity, as if the

[figure description] Page 091.[end figure description]

cool August breeze from the sea would chill her
limbs. He then commanded the amphibious guard
to give way to their oars.

Handling them something as they would grasp
a musket to charge bayonet, and dropping them
into the water in such a fashion as to besprinkle
the party with a shower of salt water, and feathering
them, or, as sailors term it, “catching crabs” at
every alternate stroke, as if they sought to inflict
further ablution, the soldiers pulled out from the
land, and rowed along parallel with it until they
turned the first point. Then hoisting a sail, they
held their course northwardly, still hugging the
shore, until they disappeared from the eyes of
Zacharie behind a projecting ledge.

“Now, by my two patrons, Love and War,” he
said, making his way out of the bushes, not without
divers scratches and punctures from the thorns and
branches, “if our six troopers, with myself to match
that younker, leaving the Frère Edward to take care
o' the petticoats, do not make these longlegged soldiers
yield their charge, and on their marrow-bones
cry peccavi, as Father Duc says, before we've done
with them, then will I forfeit my manhood. Come,
thou shaggy imp,” he added, as he regained his steed,
“put thy four legs in motion if thou lovest mischief
like thy master. Dost thou not know thou wast
given me by the frère, because thou art so near akin
to me? Now paddle thy ducklegs, and make the
road smoke behind us.”

Thus speaking, Zacharie stuck his spurs into the
flanks of his nag, who, after flinging his heels into
the air and making a demivolte across the road by
way of reply, scrambled forward, snorting and tossing
his head: in a little while he left the main road,
and, entering a bridle-path, pursued his way rapidly
across wide fields to the northwest. A short time

[figure description] Page 092.[end figure description]

afterward he entered the Boston road, about two
miles from its southern junction with Broadway,
and, following the wellbeaten road, rode forward
without slackening his pace, occasionally catching
glimpses of the distant sailboat, which slowly kept
its way along close to the land.

He had ridden about half an hour, when, descrying
from a hill the approach of a company of infantry,
he cautiously turned to the right into a
wood to conceal himself until they passed by. On
gaining this shelter, and canterning round an abrupt
ridge covered with trees, he came suddenly
upon a small detachment of soldiers, seated around
their open knapsacks eating their evening meal.
Before he could retreat his bridle was seized by
the one nearest, and his business demanded in no
hospitable tone.

“I'm a trooper in the York dragoons, and despatched
to meet my detachment, who are now on
their way back from Kingsbridge.”

“A pretty cock and bull story,” cried the soldier
who had arrested him; “you a trooper!” added he,
with a laugh of derision; “I could put you and
your horse in my knapsack, with ten day's provender,
and not feel you.”

“Ay,” said another, holding up the breastbone
of a chicken which he had just denuded, “I could
make a better dragoon of this, set it astride my
finger.”

“A fine route you've taken to Kingsbridge, my
hop-o'-my-thumb,” growled a third, taking a canteen
from his mouth, and drying his lips with his sleeve;
“does Kingsbridge lie across East River that you
take this course, coming down upon us peaceable
soldiers as if the devil kicked you on end?”

“He's a foreigner! hear his base accent!” continued
a fourth.

[figure description] Page 093.[end figure description]

“He's a Hessian,” roared a fifth; “twig his
Dutch build.”

“If he dodges,” cried a sixth, aiming a well-picked
bone at Zacharie's head, “he's a tory, and
shall be hung up on the highest tree.”

Zacharie dodged as the missile hummed past his
left ear, which it narrowly missed. A shout of laughter,
and the cries of a “tory, a tory—hang him—
noose him up,” resounded from the whole party.

Zacharie had turned from one to the other of
his antagonists as they severally spoke, with a fierce
look that only increased the merriment which a
good subject, as they thought, and a full stomach
gave rise to. But at this last insult he drew a
pistol from his belt, where he carried a brace, his
saddle not being furnished with holsters, and, suddenly
striking his foot into the face of the soldier
who held his rein, at the same time crying out,
“There is a bone for you,” he aimed and fired at
the man who had tested his politics by flinging
the bone at his head; then, quicker than thought,
turning his horse, he galloped round the ridge by
the way he had approached. Before, however, he
could get out of the reach of their muskets, two
or three shots, fired by some of the soldiers who
had seized their arms, whizzed by him, one of the
balls passing through his cap. Instead of entering
the road, lest he should encounter the infantry which
were yet some distance off, he rode along the skirts
of the wood, and, being mounted, soon distanced
all his pursuers, who were on foot, and who, after
firing a few more ineffectual shots, gave up the
pursuit. One of their number, however, had got
possession of a horse, probably the fruit of a forage;
for the continental troops were often as dangerous
enemies to private property, either of whig
or tory, in the neighbourhood of their encampment,

[figure description] Page 094.[end figure description]

as even the British soldiers themselves. This man,
with a sword in his hand, with which he would one
moment point energetically towards the object of
pursuit, and the next belabour his steed, came on,
shouting and extravagantly gesticulating, swearing
huge oaths, and loudly calling on the fugitive to
stop. Zacharie only laughed, mocked his mode of
riding, and, turning round, fired his remaining pistol
at him in defiance.

The chase continued for half a mile, when
Zacharie, finding that he was the best mounted,
and seeing that his pursuer bore no firearms,
slackened his pace; then, throwing the reins on
his horse's neck, he proceeded, with great coolness,
to reload his pistol. Having accomplished
this, he looked back upon his antagonist, and, after
measuring him steadily for a moment, turned short
to the right, leaped a narrow brook, and, favoured
by the impetus of his pursuer, was the next moment
in his rear.

“Now yield thee, base villain!” he cried, stopping
his horse, and levelling his pistol at the soldier
as he reined up, on finding himself, by this skilful
manœuvre, the pursued instead of the pursuer.

“That will I, and gladly, Zacharie; for such
thou art, or else it be thy ghost. By my beard!
thou hast given me a sweat for't, lad.”

“And who art thou, that swearest by thy beard,
and callest me Zacharie, as if thou wert my pot
companion? By the pope! I should know that
face o' thine, though the varlet that I think it belongs
to were better at the tail of a plough than
where men use sharp steel and burn gunpowder.”

“Who, then, dost take me for, good Zacharie?”

“If I saw that foxy face 'neath a bonnet blue,
and a capote over thy short carcass, and that carcass
in the Vale of Chaudiere, I should call thee

[figure description] Page 095.[end figure description]

Jacques; but Jacques had so much of that better
part of valour called discretion, that thou, in thy
soldier's casque and with steel in thy hand, canst
not be him I mean.” As he spoke a sly expression
of humour, as if he now recognised the soldier,
twinkled in his gray eyes.

“By my beard! I wish I were 'neath hood and
capote, and once more safe in my cot; I am that
same Jacques, good Zacharie, whom thou knowest.
Turn away that pistolet from my body, and let me
grasp the hand o' thee. 'Tis a long time since
I've grasped a countryman's hand.”

“Then here's a welcome to thee, Jacques,” said
the lad, replacing his pistol in his holsters, and riding
to the side of his old acquaintance, who grasped
both of his hands and shook them with good-will.

“Gad's me,” he said, his voice thick with delight,
“but 'tis a lucky hour this! I doan't know whether
to cry or laugh;” and, making a noise something
between both, he again heartily shook his countryman's
hand. “Lawk! who'd ha' thought of seeing
you here! though they did tell me you were
gone to the wars.”

“Who, in the name of Beelzebub, rather, would
have thought of finding the ploughman Jacques,
who had not the heart to kill a mouse, armed to the
teeth, mounted on a fierce charger, pursuing an
armed trooper, and ready to do battle to the death?”

“Noa, Zacharie, I know'd thee when thou didst
ride so scamprageously in among us, and would
ha' spoke to thee, but could not get time to put in
my word with all the speaking; and so, when you
kicked up the scrimmage, and was off as quick as
you came, I jumps on this horse, which belonged to
nobody in particular, but is a sort of a camp follower,
and gave chase. Noa, not I! I didn't think
o' making battle.”

[figure description] Page 096.[end figure description]

“I'll be sworn you didn't, Jacques,” said the boy,
laughing; “thou hast too much discretion left, I
will answer for't, to risk thy life on the chances of
a humming bullet or the prick of a sword.”

“Thanks to the holy saints, that have I, valiant
Zacharie! an' if I were once well out o' this fighting
work, and home again, if I'm caught ayont the
sound o' the old convent bell again, may the old
one flay me.”

“Then 'tis not thine own valiancy that hath impelled
thee to the wars, Jacques?”

“By my beard, no! It got abroad, after the
army went through the valley, that I guided a
monk, who proved to be no monk, but a spy, Zacharie,”
Jacques added, in a low tone, as if revealing
an important item of intelligence; “and they told
me I would be hung for't. Think of that, Zacharie!
for a man to have his weasand twisted round
like a barndoor fowl's;” he here mechanically
sought the threatened precincts. “Hugh! 'tis
awful to think on. Well, I began to tremble in my
shoes; but there was nobody I feared so much as
Luc Giles. Two nights after Arnold went past, I
was in neighbour Bourné's cowpen—canst guess
what I was there for, Zach?” he asked, with a
grave look, that was intended for a sly one.

“How in the devil should I tell? Go on, and
be less familiar with your nicknames.”

“Well, Master Zacharie, an it please you, I was
helping Netty Bourné milk the kine—coz, see thou,
Netty and I have a—thou knowst—a little sort of
a secret together—a—the priest—thou knowst—”

“Keep the priest to his cell, and you to your
tale,” said Zacharie, impatiently.

“Well, I heard Luc Giles going by with a score
more, and I heard him say he was for the wars,
but that he would hang me up first; and I found

[figure description] Page 097.[end figure description]

they were going to my cot, so I trembled all over,
and Netty let me hide in the stall, and covered me
over with hay, and there I laid all night.”

“By the pope! then wert thou, like an ass as
thou art, in thy proper place. If it had been the
spy-monk in thy case, he would not have let a maiden
tuck him up in the hay, and leave him there to
go to her lone pillow. But what can we expect of
an ass but that he will bray? Go on, for time presses.
What became of thee the next morning?”

“Netty came and pulled the hay from off o' me
in the morning, and, with a sweet voice, bid me get
up, for my enemy had fled; and when I crawled
out and shook myself, who dost think I saw standing
there beside her?”

“'Tis more than I can tell, unless one of the cows
waiting for thee to milk her.”

“By my beard! the first thing I put eyes on
was big Luc Giles, looking fiercely at me from over
her shoulder with his great black eyes; and, giving
one yell, I fell down on my face as if I were a dead
man.”

“Ha! ha! then Netty had really no better lodging
for thee than a stall!”

“By my beard! it may be so. She looked very
pleasant, methought, when she awoke me. Well,
Luc Giles told me, in a terrible voice, while Netty
laughed, no doubt, to give me courage, that I had
done treason, and deserved to be hung; but that,
if I would follow him to the wars, my life should
be spared.”

“So thou hadst choice of dying by ball or rope?”

“By my beard! did I, and, like a brave soldier,
I chose the ball. So I joined the troop and marched
to Quebec.”

“Wert there when the assault was made, most
brave Jacques?”

[figure description] Page 098.[end figure description]

“That was I, and did the enemy much damage.”

“By thy beard! an I believed thee, if I would
not damage thy brainpan for thee! Tell me truly,
where wast thou during the siege?”

“I hid myself in a stout house to 'scape the
balls that flew somewhat thickly.”

“I will answer for that. Where is Luc Giles?”

“That was the blessing of that day, good Master
Zacharie. He was killed.”

“Dost know how?”

“'Twas said a young, ill-famed devil, with a
forked tail and cloven hoof, rose out of the ground
and whisked him up into the air, and then pitched
him down head foremost among the rocks in the
thick o' the fight.”

“Thou liest there,” said the lad, striking him in
the face. “'Twas I myself who tumbled him
down the ramparts to save my officer's life.”

“If I were not afeard o' them pistolets o' thine,”
said Jacques, hastily, “I would strike thee back
this blow; but one o' them might kill me, whereas
thy fist only hurts a little, it being small.”

“Thou art a philosopher, Jacques, and I am
sorry for the blow. But how camest thou here.”

“When I knew big Luc Giles was dead—oh,
'twas an awful sight to see 'um piled up so thick!—
I went, after a while, with great General Carleton
to Ticonderoga, and then, to 'scape a fight the next
day, went with another comrade over to the colony
troop. We then marched down to York, where
we've been most two weeks.”

“Your company is stationed near by, no doubt.
What is the detachment I came upon doing?”

“We belong to the troops quartered at Harlem,
and are on our way down to town to escort up some
ammunition; but, oh Marie! I wish I could get
rid o' these wars!”

[figure description] Page 099.[end figure description]

“Desert, desert!”

“Then I should be hanged if caught.”

“But thou'lt be shot if thou stayest.”

“I know it. But, if I must die, why, then, I'll die
like a valiant soldier,” answered Jacques, stoutly.

“Bravely said, Jacques. So thou dost fight
from cowardice, like a thousand others. By the
pope! if every soldier's valiancy were sifted,
'twould be found to be four parts out o' five of
sheer cowardice. The better coward the better
soldier, so you give him no chance to run away.
Believe me, Jacques, thou art in a fair way of promotion.”

“The saints grant it may be in the ranks, and
not by the neck. But how camest thou here, and
whither ride you so bravely?”

“How I came hither is none of thy business;
but, if thou wilt have tale for tale, wait my leisure.
I am going on brave matters; if thou choosest,
come with me, and I will show thee the man who
caused thee to turn soldier against thy nature.”

“Art thou on the right side, Zacharie?”

“That am I.”

“'Twill be no deserting, then, to go with thee,
Master Zacharie?”

“By the pope! no. But forward, and we'll discuss
that point.”

The two Canadians rode forward at good speed—
Jacques, delighted to fall in with a fellow-countryman,
and one whom he had before seen, giving way
to an emotion which all men who have visited distant
countries have at times experienced; Zacharie,
pleased at finding one over whom he could exercise
an influence congenial with his domineering spirit,
secretly determining to seduce him from his corps,
and attach him in some sort to his person.

p157-375

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