CHAPTER II. THE ALARM.
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We are apt when dwelling in the sunshine of peace to
look upon the season of war as one of unmitigated horror.
We forget that man is powerless effectually to mar the fair
face of nature, or intercept the smiles of Heaven. We forget
that the fields still are verdant, the streams still sparkling,
the sunlit canopy by day and the starry firmament at
night, still beautiful and sublime, amidst all the puny tempests
of human strife. The mind, too, buoyant and elastic
with hope, and containing within itself the secret springs
of joy, bids defiance at times to every peril, and often
seems least desponding when dangers and trials are the
most numerous and severe. The twilight had gradually
disappeared, and the moon, riding high in the heavens,
was illuming the landscape as Dudley pursued his homeward
way. Hill, dale and stream, bathed in a flood of silvery
light, lay spread around him far as the eye could
reach, and for a while engrossed his undivided attention.
But sadder themes soon pressed upon his mind. The massacre
at Shell's Bush, of which Waldon had so unfeelingly
spoken, was one of many similar deeds which had already
been perpetrated in the valley of the Mohawk. They were
the work of savages, aided and instigated by some of the
lowest and vilest of the white inhabitants, who, having declared
in favor of the royal cause, made it a cover for the
perpetration of every enormity which either private revenge
or the most sordid cupidity could dictate. Although these
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atrocities usually occurred and were most to be dreaded in
the darker nights, they were by no means confined to such
seasons; the full light of the moon, and the broad glare of
day, affording no protection to the peaceable inhabitants
when the war spirit of their savage foes was fully aroused.
On again viewing the sky, Dudley beheld a belt of dense
clouds skirting the western horizon, from which detached
fragments were occasionally ascending zenithward, threatening
ere long to obscure the whole firmament; and he
shuddered as he thought that perhaps some fearful tragedy
might be enacted upon that very night.
Nor were these apprehensions his only source of disquiet.
Other griefs of a private and more selfish nature also engaged
his attention. The claim made by Waldon to the
affections of Miss Welles, although little worthy of credit,
was not without its effect upon his mind. It had revealed
to him the state of his own feelings, of which he had before
scarcely been conscious, and at the same time had conjured
up phantoms of obstacles to his hopes, which, with all a
lover's variableness of feeling, at one moment seemed shadowy
and at the next insuperable. Ellen Welles was a
lady well calculated to inspire affection in such a heart as
Dudley's. The ordinary charms of youth and beauty were
enhanced in her person by a natural grace of manner and
an unalloyed sweetness of temper. If a judgment, just and
discriminating, was necessary to prevent such a character
from degenerating into insipidity, that gift also was Ellen's.
Her father was a military man, and had held a captain's
commission under Sir William Johnson, in the war of 1756.
He had purchased at the close of that contest a large estate
in Tryon county, which the advancing settlement of
the country had rendered highly valuable, and at the period
now spoken of was what, in more modern parlance,
would be termed a large landed proprietor.
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It was no matter of surprise to Dudley that Captain
Welles should have again offered his services to the crown;
but he wondered much what provision he had made for the
security of Ellen, who was an only child, and who had long
before been deprived of her other parent. But had he
been so disposed, he might have solved his curiosity by a
direct appeal to the object of it; for Ellen Welles at that
moment stood before him. She was accompanied by a single
domestic, who bore a few articles of value in his hands;
and her deportment gave token of alarm and agitation.
Her answers to his hasty inquiries were exactly what he
had expected to hear. Her father was absent from home;
there were rumors of expected attacks from the Indians,
and she was hastening to place herself under the protection
of a neighboring family; for although Captain Welles was
well known to be loyal in his sentiments, his house was too
secluded and presented too many temptations to the plunderers
to be a safe abode for an unprotected female. That
Dudley at once became her escort, that he strove in every
way to soothe her alarm, although far from considering it
unfounded, and that he promised such protection as he
could give, were quite matters of course. On arriving at
the house which Ellen had selected for refuge, its inmates
were found to be in a state of alarm nearly equal to her
own. The intelligence of the expected attack had spread
like wildfire through the little community, where the merciless
character of these onslaughts was well understood.
The owner of the house, Mr. Lee, who was a well known
patriot, was, together with his sons, busily engaged in
making such hasty preparations for defence as the time allowed.
Doors and windows were barricaded, ammunition
prepared, and weapons put in order with all that bustling
activity which such an emergency might well be supposed
to create. The panic in the vicinity had become general,
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and several other of the immediate neighbors, whose houses
were considered less defensible than Lee's, were soon seen
flocking to his little fort, with their arms and ammunition
and such of their more valuable effects as they could conveniently
transport. Lee's reputation as a bold and resolute
man contributed not a little to produce this result, although
it might be considered a very questionable prudence which
sought shelter under a roof rendered, by the very reputation
of its owner, so prominent an object of hostility. The
work of defence now went more rapidly forward. A breastwork
of logs was soon thrown up in front of the house, and
another opposite the postern door; and upon the roof of
the building, blankets, saturated with water, were spread
as a protection from that most formidable engine of Indian
warfare, the firebrand. Dudley having become convinced
of the reality of the danger, hastened to summon to Lee's
such other of the neighbors as did not choose rather to seek
the shelter of the forest, being conscious that their chief
hope of safety must consist in thus consolidating their
strength. He had no immediate relatives in the vicinity
to awaken his solicitude, and was able to act the more efficiently
for the whole. With many injunctions to regard
his personal safety, and one from a voice which he fondly
fancied to be Ellen's, he departed on his mission. He
found the neighborhood everywhere alarmed. Some were
secreting their effects, preparatory to flight; some were barricading
their premises, determined to die, if necessary, on
their own hearthstones; and others, in small bands, were
fleeing to the forests, bearing their children in their arms,
and upholding the tottering steps of the sick and the aged.
The scene was one to draw tears from the stoutest heart,
but the necessity for speedy action left little room for contemplation.
Dudley had a word of encouragement and
hope for all, and, although numbers gladly accepted his
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proposal and hastened to accompany him, the majority preferred
to trust to the hiding places of the wilderness. He
was more successful, however, in gaining refugees than recruits.
Women and children would add but little to the
effective force of the garrison, and he was, therefore, not a
little delighted at the accession to his numbers of four or
five members of the half-organized band, bearing the imposing
title of the Life Guard. These were all young men,
well armed, and, by the presence and peril of those most
near and dear to them, furnished with the loftiest incentives
to action.
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Myers, P. Hamilton (Peter Hamilton), 1812-1878 [1854], The miser's heir, or, The young millionaire; and, Ellen Welles, or, The siege of Fort Stanwix. (T. B. Peterson, Philadelphia) [word count] [eaf657T].
