Many people warmly congratulated
themselves that he never had; for drier sermons than those he
selected were surely never heard, and a shuddering imagination
shrinks appalled from the problematic mental drought of his
ideal original discourse.
themselves that he never had; for drier sermons than those he
selected were surely never heard, and a shuddering imagination
shrinks appalled from the problematic mental drought of his
ideal original discourse.
Warner - World's Best Literature - v18 - Mom to Old
The normal mind
is more active in the details of human life than in the details of
landscape; but Miss Murfree, although she has not always accepted
this as a fact, has painted scenes where she has perfectly adjusted
her characters and their surroundings. In 'Old Sledge at the Settle-
mint,' the picture of the group of card-players throwing their cards
on the inverted splint basket by the light of the tallow dip and a
pitch-pine fire, while the moon shines without, and the uncanny
echoes ring through the rocks and woods, is as graphic as one of
Spagnoletto's paintings. And she has done a gentler and even more
sympathetic service in depicting the lonely, self-reliant, half mournful
life of the mountain women whom she loves; particularly the young
## p. 10455 (#323) ##########################################
MARY NOAILLES MURFREE
10455
women, pure, sweet, naïve, and innocent of all evil. The older women
"hold out wasted hands to the years as they pass,-holding them out
always, and always empty"; but in drawing her old women, Miss
Murfree lightens her somewhat sombre pictures by their shrewd fun
and keen knowledge of human nature. Mrs. Purvine is a stroke of
genius.
Nor could Miss Murfree's stories have won their wide popularity
with an American audience without a sense of huinor, which is to her
landscape as the sun to the mist. Her mountaineer who has been
restrained from killing the suspected horse-thief is rather relieved
than otherwise, having still a sense of justice: "The bay filly ain't
such a killin' matter nohow; ef it was the roan three-year-old
'twould be different. "
The novels which have most added to Miss Murfree's reputation,
perhaps, are 'In the Tennessee Mountains,' 'The Prophet of the Great
Smoky Mountain,' and 'In the Clouds,'-all stories of the Tennessee
mountains, told in her vigorous, dramatic manner.
THE DANCIN' PARTY AT HARRISON'S COVE
From In the Tennessee Mountains. Copyright 1884, by Houghton, Mifflin & Co.
UR ye see, Mis' Darley, them Harrison folks over yander ter
the Cove hev determinated on a dancin' party. "
"F"
The drawling tones fell unheeded on old Mr. Kenyon's
ear, as he sat on the broad hotel piazza of the New Helvetia
Springs, and gazed with meditative eyes at the fair August sky.
An early moon was riding, clear and full, over this wild spur of
the Alleghanies; the stars were few and very faint; even the
great Scorpio lurked vaguely outlined above the wooded ranges;
and the white mist that filled the long, deep, narrow valley be-
tween the parallel lines of mountains, shimmered with opalescent
gleams.
All the world of the watering-place had converged to that
focus the ball-room; and the cool, moonlit piazzas were nearly
deserted. The fell determination of the "Harrison folks to
give a dancing party made no impression on the preoccupied old
gentleman. Another voice broke his revery, -a soft, clear, well-
modulated voice; and he started and turned his head as his
own name was called, and his niece, Mrs. Darley, came to the
window.
"Uncle Ambrose, are you there? So glad! I was afraid
you were down at the summer-house, where I hear the children
―――――
## p. 10456 (#324) ##########################################
10456
MARY NOAILLES MURFREE
singing. Do come here a moment, please. This is Mrs. Johns,
who brings the Indian peaches to sell-you know the Indian
peaches? »
Mr. Kenyon knew the Indian peaches; the dark-crimson fruit
streaked with still darker lines, and full of blood-red juice, which
he had meditatively munched that very afternoon. Mr. Kenyon
knew the Indian peaches right well. He wondered, however,
what had brought Mrs. Johns back in so short a time; for
although the principal industry of the mountain people about the
New Helvetia Springs is selling fruit to the summer sojourners,
it is not customary to come twice on the same day, nor to
appear at all after nightfall.
Mrs. Darley proceeded to explain.
"Mrs. Johns's husband is ill, and wants us to send him some
medicine. "
Mr. Kenyon rose, threw away the stump of his cigar, and
entered the room. "How long has he been ill, Mrs. Johns? »
he asked dismally.
Mr. Kenyon always spoke lugubriously, and he was a dismal-
looking old man. Not more cheerful was Mrs. Johns: she was
tall and lank, and with such a face as one never sees except in
these mountains,- elongated, sallow, thin, with pathetic, deeply
sunken eyes, and high cheek-bones, and so settled an expression
of hopeless melancholy that it must be that naught but care
and suffering had been her lot; holding out wasted hands to the
years as they pass,- holding them out always, and always empty.
She wore a shabby, faded calico, and spoke with the peculiar
expressionless drawl of the mountaineer. She was a wonderful
contrast to Mrs. Darley, all furbelows and flounces, with her
fresh, smooth face and soft hair, and plump, round arms half
revealed by the flowing sleeves of her thin black dress. Mrs.
Darley was in mourning, and therefore did not affect the ball-
room. At this moment, on benevolent thoughts intent, she was
engaged in uncorking sundry small phials, gazing inquiringly at
their labels, and shaking their contents.
In reply to Mr. Kenyon's question, Mrs. Johns, sitting on the
extreme edge of a chair, and fanning herself with a pink calico
sun-bonnet, talked about her husband, and a misery in his side.
and in his back, and how he felt it "a-comin' on nigh on ter a
week ago. " Mr. Kenyon expressed sympathy, and was surprised
by the announcement that Mrs. Johns considered her husband's
## p. 10457 (#325) ##########################################
•
10457
MARY NOAILLES MURFREE
illness "a blessin', 'kase ef he war able ter git out'n his bed,
he 'lowed ter go down ter Harrison's Cove ter the dancin' party,
'kase Rick Pearson war a-goin' ter be thar, an' hed said ez how
none o' the Johnses should come. "
"What, Rick Pearson, that terrible outlaw! " exclaimed Mrs.
Darley, with wide-open blue eyes. She had read in the news-
papers sundry thrilling accounts of a noted horse-thief and out-
law, who with a gang of kindred spirits defied justice and roamed
certain sparsely populated mountainous counties at his own wild
will; and she was not altogether without a feeling of fear as she
heard of his proximity to the New Helvetia Springs,-not fear
for life or limb, because she was practical-minded enough to re-
flect that the sojourners and employés of the watering-place would
far outnumber the outlaw's troop, but fear that a pair of shiny.
bay ponies, Castor and Pollux, would fall victims to the crafty
wiles of the expert horse thief.
"I think I have heard something of a difficulty between your
people and Rick Pearson," said old Mr. Kenyon. "Has a peace
never been patched up between them? »
«<
"N-o," drawled Mrs. Johns, same as it always war. My
old man'll never believe but what Rick Pearson stole that thar
bay filly we lost 'bout five year ago. But I don't believe he done
it: plenty other folks around is ez mean ez Rick, leastways mos'
ez mean; plenty mean enough ter steal a horse, anyhow. Rick
say he never tuk the filly; say he war a-goin' ter shoot off the
nex' man's head ez say so. Rick say he'd ruther give two bay
fillies than hev a man say he tuk a horse ez he never tuk. Rick
say ez how he kin stand up ter what he does do, but it's these
hyar lies on him what kills him out. But ye know, Mis' Darley,
ye know yerself, he never give nobody two bay fillies in this
world, an' what's more he's never goin' ter. My old man an' my
boy Kossute talks on 'bout that thar bay filly like she war stole
yestiddy, an' 'twar five year ago an' better; an' when they hearn
ez how Rick Pearson hed showed that red head o' his'n on this
hyar mounting las' week, they war fightin' mad, an' would hev
lit out fur the gang sure, 'ceptin' they hed been gone down the
mounting fur two days. An' my son Kossute, he sent Rick word
that he had better keep out'n gunshot o' these hyar woods; that
he didn't want no better mark than that red head o' his'n, an'
he could hit it two mile off. An' Rick Pearson, he sent Kossute
word that he would kill him fur his sass the very nex' time he
## p. 10458 (#326) ##########################################
10458
MARY NOAILLES MURFREE
see him, an' ef he don't want a bullet in that pumpkin head o'
his'n he hed better keep away from that dancin' party what the
Harrisons hev laid off ter give, 'kase Rick say he's a-goin' ter it
hisself, an' is a-goin' ter dance too; he ain't been invited, Mis'
Darley, but Rick don't keer fur that. He is a-goin' anyhow; an'
he say ez how he ain't a-goin' ter let Kossute come, 'count o'
Kossute's sass, an' the fuss they've all made 'bout that bay filly
that war stole five year ago-'twar five year an' better. But
Rick say ez how he is goin', fur all he ain't got no invite, an'
is a-goin' ter dance too: 'kase you know, Mis' Darley, it's a-goin'
ter be a dancin' party; the Harrisons hev determinated on that.
Them gals of theirn air mos' crazed 'bout a dancin' party. They
ain't been a bit of account sence they went ter Cheatham's Cross-
Roads ter see thar gran'mother, an' picked up all them queer
new notions. So the Harrisons hev determinated on a dancin'
party; an' Rick say ez how he is goin' ter dance too: but Jule,
she say ez how she know thar ain't a gal on the mounting ez
would dance with him; but I ain't so sure 'bout that, Mis' Dar-
ley: gals air cur'ous critters, ye know yerself; thar's no sort o'
countin' on 'em; they'll do one thing one time, an' another thing
nex' time; ye can't put no dependence in 'em. But Jule say ef
he kin git Mandy Tyler ter dance with him, it's the mos' he
kin do, an' the gang'll be nowhar. Mebbe he kin git Mandy ter
dance with him, 'kase the other boys say ez how none o' them is
a-goin' ter ax her ter dance, 'count of the trick she played on
'em down ter the Wilkins settlemint-las' month, war it? no,
'twar two month ago, an' better; but the boys ain't forgot how
scandalous she done 'em, an' none of 'em is a-goin' ter ax her ter
dance. "
'Why, what did she do? " exclaimed Mrs. Darley, surprised.
"She came here to sell peaches one day, and I thought her such
a nice, pretty, well-behaved girl. "
"Waal, she hev got mighty quiet say-nuthin' sort'n ways, Mis'
Darley, but that thar gal do behave rediculous. Down thar ter
the Wilkins settlemint,- ye know it's 'bout two mile or two
mile'n a half from hyar,-waal, all the gals walked down thar
ter the party an hour by sun; but when the boys went down
they tuk thar horses, ter give the gals a ride home behind 'em.
Waal, every boy axed his gal ter ride while the party war goin'
on, an' when 'twar all over they all set out fur ter come home.
Waal, this hyar Mandy Tyler is a mighty favorite 'mongst the
## p. 10459 (#327) ##########################################
MARY NOAILLES MURFREE
10459
boys, they ain't got no sense, ye know, Mis' Darley, -an' stid-
dier one of 'em axin' her ter ride home, thar war five of 'em
axed her ter ride, ef ye'll believe me; an' what do ye think she
done, Mis' Darley? She tole all five of 'em yes; an' when the
party war over, she war the last ter go, an' when she started
out'n the door, thar war all five of them boys a-standin' thar
waitin' fur her, an' every one a-holdin' his horse by the bridle,
an' none of 'em knowed who the others war a-waitin' fur. An'
this hyar Mandy Tyler, when she got ter the door an' seen 'em
all a-standin' thar, never said one word, jest walked right through
'mongst 'em, an' set out fur the mounting on foot, with all them
five boys a-followin' an' a-leadin' thar horses, an' a-quarrelin'
enough ter take off each other's heads 'bout which one war
a-goin' ter ride with her; which none of 'em did, Mis' Darley,
fur I hearn ez how the whole layout footed it all the way ter
New Helveshy. An' thar would hev been a fight 'mongst 'em,
'ceptin' her brother, Jacob Tyler, went along with 'em, an' tried
ter keep the peace atwixt 'em. An' Mis' Darley, all them mar-
ried folks down thar at the party-them folks in the Wilkins
settlemint is the biggest fools, sure when all them married
folks come out ter the door, an' see the way Mandy Tyler hed
treated them boys, they jest hollered and laffed an' thought it
war mighty smart an' funny in Mandy; but she never say a
word till she kem up the mounting, an' I never hearn ez how
she say anything then. An' now the boys all say none of 'em
is a-goin' ter ax her ter dance, ter pay her back fur them fool
airs of hern. But Kossute say he'll dance with her ef none the
rest will. Kossute, he thought 'twar all mighty funny too,-he's
sech a fool 'bout gals, Kossute is,- but Jule, she thought ez how
'twar scandalous. "
--
-
Mrs. Darley listened in amused surprise: that these mount-
ain wilds could sustain a first-class coquette was an idea that
had not hitherto entered her mind; however, "that thar Mandy»
seemed, in Mrs. Johns's opinion at least, to merit the unenviable
distinction, and the party at the Wilkins settlement and the pro-
spective gayety of Harrison's Cove awakened the same sentiments
in her heart and mind as do the more ambitious germans and
kettle-drums of the lowland cities in the heart and mind of
Mrs. Grundy. Human nature is the same everywhere, and the
Wilkins settlement is a microcosm. The metropolitan centres,
stripped of the civilization of wealth, fashion, and culture, would
## p. 10460 (#328) ##########################################
10460
MARY NOAILLES MURFREE
present only the bare skeleton of humanity outlined in Mrs.
Johns's talk of Harrison's Cove, the Wilkins settlement, the en-
mities and scandals and sorrows and misfortunes of the mountain
ridge. As the absurd resemblance developed, Mrs. Darley could
not forbear a smile. Mrs. Johns looked up with a momentary
expression of surprise; the story presented no humorous phase
to her perceptions, but she too smiled a little as she repeated,
"Scandalous, ain't it? " and proceeded in the same lack-lustre
tone as before.
"Yes,- Kossute say ez how he'll dance with her ef none the
rest will, fur Kossute say ez how he hev laid off ter dance, Mis'
Darley; an' when I ax him what he thinks will become of his
soul ef he dances, he say the Devil may crack away at it, an' ef
he kin hit it he's welcome; fur soul or no soul he's a-goin' ter
dance. Kossute is a-fixin' of hisself this very minute ter go; but
I am verily afeard the boy'll be slaughtered, Mis' Darley, 'kase
thar is goin' ter be a fight, an' ye never in all yer life hearn
sech sass ez Kossute and Rick Pearson done sent word ter each
other. "
Mr. Kenyon expressed some surprise that she should fear for
so young a fellow as Kossuth. Surely," he said, "the man is
not brute enough to injure a mere boy: your son is a mere boy. "
"That's so," Mrs. Johns drawled. "Kossute ain't more'n
twenty year old, an' Rick Pearson is double that ef he is a day;
but ye see it's the firearms ez makes Kossute more'n a match
fur him, 'kase Kossute is the best shot on the mounting, an' Rick
knows that in a shootin' fight Kossute's better able ter take keer
of hisself an' hurt somebody else nor anybody. Kossute's more
likely ter hurt Rick nor Rick is ter hurt him in a shootin' fight;
but ef Rick didn't hurt him, an' he war ter shoot Rick, the
gang would tear him ter pieces in a minute; and 'mongst 'em I'm
actially afeard they'll slaughter the boy. "
Mr. Kenyon looked even graver than was his wont upon re-
ceiving this information, but said no more; and after giving Mrs.
Johns the febrifuge she wished for her husband, he returned to
his seat on the piazza.
«<
Mrs. Darley watched him with some little indignation as he
proceeded to light a fresh cigar. "How cold and unsympathetic
Uncle Ambrose is," she said to herself. And after condoling
effusively with Mrs. Johns on her apprehensions for her son's
safety, she returned to the gossips in the hotel parlor; and Mrs.
## p. 10461 (#329) ##########################################
MARY NOAILLES MURFREE
10461
Johns, with her pink calico sun-bonnet on her head, went her way
in the brilliant summer moonlight.
The clear lustre shone white upon all the dark woods and
chasms and flashing waters that lay between the New Helvetia
Springs and the wide, deep ravine called Harrison's Cove; where
from a rude log hut the vibrations of a violin, and the quick
throb of dancing feet, already mingled with the impetuous rush
of a mountain stream close by, and the weird night sounds of
the hills, the cry of birds among the tall trees, the stir of the
wind, the monotonous chanting of frogs at the water-side, the
long, drowsy drone of the nocturnal insects, the sudden faint
blast of a distant hunter's horn, and the far baying of hounds.
--
Mr. Harrison had four marriageable daughters, and had arrived
at the conclusion that something must be done for the girls; for
strange as it may seem, the prudent father exists even among
the "mounting folks. " Men there realize the importance of pro-
viding suitable homes for their daughters as men do elsewhere,
and the eligible youth is as highly esteemed in those wilds as is
the much scarcer animal at a fashionable watering-place. Thus
it was that Mr. Harrison had "determinated on a dancin' party. "
True, he stood in bodily fear of the Judgment Day and the cir-
cuit-rider: but the dancing party was a rarity eminently calcu-
lated to please the young hunters of the settlements round about;
so he swallowed his qualms, to be indulged at a more convenient
season, and threw himself into the vortex of preparation with an
ardor very gratifying to the four young ladies, who had become.
imbued with sophistication at Cheatham's Cross-Roads.
Not so Mrs. Harrison: she almost expected the house to fall
and crush them, as a judgment on the wickedness of a dancing
party; for so heinous a sin, in the estimation of the greater part
of the mountain people, had not been committed among them for
many a day. Such trifles as killing a man in a quarrel, or on
suspicion of stealing a horse or wash-tub or anything that came
handy, of course do not count; but a dancing party! Mrs. Har-
rison could only fold her idle hands, and dread the heavy penalty
that must surely follow so terrible a crime.
It certainly had not the gay and lightsome aspect supposed
to be characteristic of such a scene of sin: the awkward young
mountaineers clogged heavily about in their uncouth clothes and
rough shoes, with the stolid-looking, lack-lustre maids of the
hill, to the violin's monotonous iteration of The Chicken in the
## p. 10462 (#330) ##########################################
10462
MARY NOAILLES MURFREE
Bread-Trough,' or 'The Rabbit in the Pea-Patch,'-all their
grave faces as grave as ever. The music now and then changed
suddenly to one of those wild, melancholy strains sometimes heard
in old-fashioned dancing tunes, and the strange pathetic cadences.
seemed more attuned to the rhythmical dash of the waters rush-
ing over their stone barricades out in the moonlight yonder, or
to the plaintive sighs of the winds among the great dark arches
of the primeval forests, than to the movement of the heavy,
coarse feet dancing a solemn measure in the little log cabin in
Harrison's Cove. The elders, sitting in rush-bottomed chairs close
to the walls, and looking on at the merriment, well pleased despite
their religious doubts, were somewhat more lively; every now
and then a guffaw mingled with the violin's resonant strains and
the dancers' well-marked pace; the women talked to each other
with somewhat more animation than was their wont, under the
stress of the unusual excitement of a dancing party; and from
out the shed-room adjoining came an anticipative odor of more
substantial sin than the fiddle or the grave jiggling up and down
the rough floor. A little more cider too, and a very bad article
of illegally distilled whisky, were ever and anon circulated among
the pious abstainers from the dance; but the sinful votaries of
Terpsichore could brook no pause nor delay, and jogged up and
down quite intoxicated with the mirthfulness of the plaintive old
airs, and the pleasure of other motion than following the plow or
hoeing the corn.
And the moon smiled right royally on her dominion: on the
long dark ranges of mountains, and mist-filled valleys between;
on the woods and streams, and on all the half-dormant creatures
either amongst the shadow-flecked foliage or under the crystal
waters; on the long white sandy road winding in and out
through the forest; on the frowning crags of the wild ravine;
on the little bridge at the entrance of the gorge, across which a
party of eight men, heavily armed and gallantly mounted, rode
swiftly and disappeared amid the gloom of the shadows.
The sound of the galloping of horses broke suddenly on the
music and the noise of the dancing; a moment's interval, and
the door gently opened, and the gigantic form of Rick Pearson
appeared in the aperture. He was dressed, like the other mount-
aineers, in a coarse suit of brown jeans somewhat the worse for
wear, the trousers stuffed in the legs of his heavy boots; he
wore an old soft felt hat, which he did not remove immediately
## p. 10463 (#331) ##########################################
MARY NOAILLES MURFREE
10463
on entering, and a pair of formidable pistols at his belt conspicu-
ously challenged attention. He had auburn hair, and a long full
beard of a lighter tint reaching almost to his waist; his com-
plexion was much tanned by the sun, and roughened by exposure
to the inclement mountain weather; his eyes were brown, deep-
set, and from under his heavy brows they looked out with quick,
sharp glances, and occasionally with a roguish twinkle; the ex-
pression of his countenance was rather good-humored: a sort of
imperious good-humor, however, the expression of a man accus-
tomed to have his own way and not to be trifled with, but able
to afford some amiability since his power is undisputed.
He stepped slowly into the apartment, placed his gun against
the wall, turned, and solemnly gazed at the dancing, while his
followers trooped in and obeyed his example. As the eight
guns, one by one, rattled against the wall, there was a startled
silence among the pious elders of the assemblage, and a sudden
disappearance of the animation that had characterized their inter-
course during the evening. Mrs. Harrison, who by reason of
flurry, and a housewifely pride in the still unrevealed treasures
of the shed-room, had well-nigh forgotten her fears, felt that the
anticipated judgment had even now descended; and in what
terrible and unexpected guise! The men turned the quids of
tobacco in their cheeks, and looked at each other in uncertainty:
but the dancers bestowed not a glance upon the new-comers; and
the musician in the corner, with his eyes half closed, his head
bent low upon the instrument, his hard, horny hand moving the
bow back and forth over the strings of the crazy old fiddle, was
utterly rapt by his own melody. At the supreme moment when
the great red beard had appeared portentously in the doorway,
and fear had frozen the heart of Mrs. Harrison within her at
the ill-omened apparition, the host was in the shed-room, filling
a broken-nosed pitcher from the cider barrel. When he re-
entered, and caught sight of the grave sunburned face with its
long red beard and sharp brown eyes, he too was dismayed for
an instant, and stood silent at the opposite door with the pitcher
in his hand. The pleasure and the possible profit of the dancing.
party, for which he had expended so much of his scanty store
of this world's goods and risked the eternal treasures laid up in
heaven, were a mere phantasm; for with Rick Pearson among
them, in an ill frame of mind and at odds with half the men in
the room, there would certainly be a fight, and in all probability
-
## p. 10464 (#332) ##########################################
10464
MARY NOAILLES MURFREE
one would be killed, and the dancing party at Harrison's Cove
would be a text for the bloody-minded sermons of the circuit-
rider for all time to come. However, the father of four mar-
riageable daughters is apt to become crafty and worldly-wise:
only for a moment did he stand in indecision; then catching
suddenly the small brown eyes, he held up the pitcher with a
grin of invitation. "Rick! " he called out above the scraping of
the violin and the clatter of the dancing feet, "slip round hyar
ef ye kin,—I've got somethin' for ye;" and he shook the pitcher
significantly.
Not that Mr. Harrison would for a moment have thought of
Rick Pearson in a matrimonial point of view, for even the sophis-
tication of the Cross-Roads had not yet brought him to the state
of mind to consider such a half-loaf as this better than no bread;
but he felt it imperative from every point of view to keep that
set of young mountaineers dancing in peace and quiet, and their
guns idle and out of mischief against the wall. The great red
beard disappeared and reappeared at intervals, as Rick Pearson
slipped along the gun-lined wall to join his host and the cider
pitcher; and after he had disposed of the refreshment, in which
the gang shared, he relapsed into silently watching the dancing,
and meditating a participation in that festivity.
Now it so happened that the only young girl unprovided with
a partner was "that thar Mandy Tyler," of Wilkins settlement
renown: the young men had rigidly adhered to their resolution
to ignore her in their invitations to dance, and she had been sit-
ting since the beginning of the festivities, quite neglected, among
the married people, looking on at the amusement which she had
been debarred sharing by that unpopular bit of coquetry at Wil-
kins settlement. Nothing of disappointment or mortification was
expressed in her countenance. She felt the slight, of course,—
even a "mounting" woman is susceptible of the sting of wounded.
pride; all her long-anticipated enjoyment had come to naught by
this infliction of penance for her ill-timed jest at the expense of
those five young fellows dancing with their triumphant partners,
and bestowing upon her not even a glance: but she looked the
express image of immobility as she sat in her clean pink cal-
ico, so carefully gotten up for the occasion, her short black hair
curling about her ears, and watched the unending reel with slow
dark eyes.
Rick's glance fell upon her, and without further hesi-
tation he strode over to where she was sitting, and proffered
30
4
k
## p. 10465 (#333) ##########################################
MARY NOAILLES MURFREE
10465
his hand for the dance. She did not reply immediately, but
looked timidly about her at the shocked pious ones on either side,
who were ready but for mortal fear to aver that "dancin' any-
how air bad enough, the Lord knows, but dancin' with a horse
thief air jest scandalous! " Then for there is something of
defiance to established law and prejudice in the born flirt every-
where with a sudden daring spirit shining in her brightening
eyes, she responded, "Don't keer ef I do," with a dimpling half-
laugh; and the next minute the two outlaws were flying down
the middle together.
――――――
XVIII-655
―――――
While Rick was according grave attention to the intricacies
of the mazy dance, and keeping punctilious time to the scrap-
ing of the old fiddle-finding it all a much more difficult feat
than galloping from the Cross-Roads to the "Snake's Mouth" on
some other man's horse with the sheriff hard at his heels,-the
solitary figure of a tall gaunt man had followed the long wind-
ing path leading deep into the woods, and now began the steep
descent to Harrison's Cove. Of what was old Mr. Kenyon think-
ing, as he walked on in the mingled shadow and sheen? Of St.
Augustine and his Forty Monks, probably, and what they found
in Britain. The young men of his acquaintance would gladly
have laid you any odds that he could think of nothing but his
antique hobby, the ancient Church. Mr. Kenyon was the most
prominent man in St. Martin's Church in the city of B, not
excepting the rector. He was a lay-reader, and officiated upon
occasions of "clerical sore-throat," as the profane denominate the
ministerial summer exodus from heated cities.
This summer,
however, Mr. Kenyon's own health had succumbed, and he was
having a little "sore-throat" in the mountains on his own account.
Very devout was Mr. Kenyon. Many people wondered that
he had never taken orders.
Many people warmly congratulated
themselves that he never had; for drier sermons than those he
selected were surely never heard, and a shuddering imagination
shrinks appalled from the problematic mental drought of his
ideal original discourse. But he was an integrant part of St.
Martin's; much of his piety, materialized into contributions, was
built up in its walls, and shone before men in the costliness of
its decorations. Indeed, the ancient name had been conferred
upon the building as a sort of tribute to Mr. Kenyon's well-
known enthusiasm concerning apostolic succession and kindred
doctrines.
## p. 10466 (#334) ##########################################
10466
MARY NOAILLES MURFREE
Dull and dismal was Mr. Kenyon, and therefore it may be
considered a little strange that he should be a notable favorite
with men. They were of many different types, but with one
invariable bond of union: they had all at one time served as
soldiers; for the war, now ten years passed by, its bitterness
almost forgotten, had left some traces that time can never oblit-
erate. What a friend was the droning old churchman in those
days of battle and bloodshed and suffering and death!
Not a
man sat within the walls of St. Martin's who had not received
some signal benefit from the hand stretched forth to impress
the claims of certain ante-Augustine British clergy to considera-
tion and credibility; not a man who did not remember stricken
fields where a good Samaritan went about under shot and shell,
succoring the wounded and comforting the dying; not a man
who did not applaud the indomitable spirit and courage that
cut his way from surrender and safety, through solid barriers of
enemies, to deliver the orders on which the fate of an army
depended; not a man whose memory did not harbor fatiguing
recollections of long, dull sermons read for the souls' health of
the soldiery. And through it all-by the camp-fires at night,
on the long white country roads in the sunshiny mornings; in
the mountains and the morasses; in hilarious advance and in
cheerless retreat; in the heats of summer and by the side of
frozen rivers- the ancient British clergy went through it all.
And whether the old churchman's premises and reasoning were
false, whether his tracings of the succession were faulty, whether
he dropped a link here or took in one there, he had caught the
spirit of those stanch old martyrs, if not their falling churchly
mantle.
The mountaineers about the New Helvetia Springs supposed
that Mr. Kenyon was a regularly ordained preacher, and that the
sermons which they had heard him read were, to use the ver-
nacular, out of his own head. For many of them were accus-
tomed on Sunday mornings to occupy humble back benches in
the ball-room, where on week-day evenings the butterflies sojourn-
ing at New Helvetia danced, and on the Sabbath metaphorically
beat their breasts, and literally avowed that they were "miser-
able sinners," following Mr. Kenyon's lugubrious lead.
The conclusion of the mountaineers was not unnatural, there-
fore; and when the door of Mr. Harrison's house opened and
another uninvited guest entered, the music suddenly ceased.
The
## p. 10467 (#335) ##########################################
MARY NOAILLES MURFREE
10467
half-closed eyes of the fiddler had fallen upon Mr. Kenyon at
the threshold; and supposing him a clergyman, he immediately
imagined that the man of God had come all the way from New
Helvetia Springs to stop the dancing and snatch the revelers.
from the jaws of hell. The rapturous bow paused shuddering
on the string, the dancing feet were palsied, the pious about the
walls were racking their slow brains to excuse their apparent
conniving at sin and bargaining with Satan; and Mr. Harrison
felt that this was indeed an unlucky party, and it would un-
doubtedly be dispersed by the direct interposition of Providence
before the shed-room was opened and the supper eaten. As to
his soul-poor man! these constantly recurring social anxieties.
were making him callous to immortality: this life was about to
prove too much for him, for the fortitude and tact even of a
father of four marriageable young ladies has a limit. Mr. Ken-
yon too seemed dumb as he hesitated in the doorway; but when
the host, partially recovering himself, came forward and offered.
a chair, he said with one of his dismal smiles, that he hoped
Mr. Harrison had no objection to his coming in and looking at
the dancing for a while. "Don't let me interrupt the young
people, I beg," he added as he seated himself.
The astounded silence was unbroken for a few moments. To
be sure he was not a circuit-rider, but even the sophistication of
Cheatham's Cross-Roads had never heard of a preacher who did
not object to dancing. Mr. Harrison could not believe his ears,
and asked for a more explicit expression of opinion.
"Ye say ye don't keer ef the boys an' gals dance? " he
inquired. "Ye don't think it's sinful? »
And after Mr. Kenyon's reply, in which the astonished
"mounting folks" caught only the surprising statement that
dancing if properly conducted was an innocent, cheerful, and
healthful amusement, supplemented by something about dancing
in the fear of the Lord, and that in all charity he was disposed
to consider objections to such harmless recreations a tithing of
mint and anise and cummin, whereby might ensue a neglect of
weightier matters of the law; that clean hands and clean hearts,
-hands clean of blood and ill-gotten goods, and hearts free
from falsehood and cruel intention,-these were the things well
pleasing to God: after his somewhat prolix reply, the gayety
recommenced. The fiddle quavered tremulously at first, but
soon resounded with its former vigorous tones, and the joy of
## p. 10468 (#336) ##########################################
10468
MARY NOAILLES MURFREE
the dance was again exemplified in the grave joggling back and
forth.
Meanwhile Mr. Harrison sat beside this strange new guest,
and asked him questions concerning his church; being instantly,
it is needless to say, informed of its great antiquity, of the
journeying of St. Augustine and his Forty Monks to Britain, of
the church they found already planted there, of its retreat to the
hills of Wales under its oppressors' tyranny; of many cognate
themes, side issues of the main branch of the subject, into which
the talk naturally drifted, -the like of which Mr. Harrison had
never heard in all his days. And as he watched the figures dan-
cing to the violin's strains, and beheld as in a mental vision the
solemn gyrations of those renowned Forty Monks to the monotone
of old Mr. Kenyon's voice, he abstractedly hoped that the double
dance would continue without interference till a peaceable dawn.
His hopes were vain. It so chanced that Kossuth Johns, who
had by no means relinquished all idea of dancing at Harrison's
Cove and defying Rick Pearson, had hitherto been detained by
his mother's persistent entreaties, some necessary attentions to his
father, and the many trials which beset a man dressing for a
party who has very few clothes, and those very old and worn.
Jule, his sister-in-law, had been most kind and complaisant, put-
ting on a button here, sewing up a slit there, darning a refrac-
tory elbow, and lending him the one bright ribbon she possessed
as a neck-tie. But all these things take time; and the moon did
not light Kossuth down the gorge until she was shining almost
vertically from the sky, and the Harrison's Cove people and the
Forty Monks were dancing together in high feather. The eccle-
siastic dance halted suddenly, and a watchful light gleamed in
old Mr. Kenyon's eyes, as he became silent, and the boy stepped
into the room. The moonlight and the lamplight fell mingled
on the calm, inexpressive features and tall, slender form of the
young mountaineer. "Hy're, Kossute! " a cheerful greeting from
many voices met him. The next moment the music ceased once
again, and the dancing came to a standstill; for as the name fell
on Pearson's ear he turned, glanced sharply toward the door,
and drawing one of his pistols from his belt, advanced to the
middle of the room. The men fell back; so did the frightened
women, without screaming, however, for that indication of femi-
nine sensibility had not yet penetrated to Cheatham's Cross-Roads,
to say nothing of the mountains.
-
## p. 10469 (#337) ##########################################
MARY NOAILLES MURFREE
10469
"I told ye that ye warn't ter come hyar," said Rick Pearson
imperiously; "and ye've got ter go home ter yer mammy, right
off, or ye'll never git thar no more, youngster. "
"I've come hyar ter put you out, ye cussed red-headed horse
thief! " retorted Kossuth angrily: "ye hed better tell me whar
that thar bay filly is, or light out, one. "
It is not the habit in the mountains to parley long on these
occasions. Kossuth had raised his gun to his shoulder as Rick,
with his pistol cocked, advanced a step nearer. The outlaw's
weapon was struck upward by a quick, strong hand; the little log
cabin was filled with flash, roar, and smoke; and the stars looked
in through a hole in the roof from which Rick's bullet had sent
the shingles flying. He turned in mortal terror and caught the
hand that had struck his pistol; in mortal terror, for Kossuth
was the crack shot of the mountains, and he felt he was a dead
man. The room was somewhat obscured by smoke; but as he
turned upon the man who had disarmed him,- for the force of
the blow had thrown the pistol to the floor, he saw that the
other hand was over the muzzle of young Johns's gun, and Kos-
suth was swearing loudly that by the Lord Almighty if he didn't
take it off he would shoot it off.
-
"My young friend," Mr. Kenyon began, with the calmness
appropriate to a devout member of the one catholic and apostolic
church; but then, the old Adam suddenly getting the upper
hand, he shouted out in irate tones, "If you don't stop that noise
I'll break your head! -Well, Mr. Pearson," he continued, as he
stood between the combatants, one hand still over the muzzle of
young Johns's gun, the other, lean and sinewy, holding Pearson's
powerful right arm with a vise-like grip,-"Well, Mr. Pearson,
you are not so good a soldier as you used to be: you didn't fight
boys in the old times. "
Rick Pearson's enraged expression suddenly gave way to a
surprised recognition. "Ye may drag me through hell an' beat
me with a soot-bag ef hyar ain't the old fightin' preacher agin! "
he cried.
"I have only one thing to say to you," said Mr. Kenyon.
"You must go: I will not have you here shooting boys and break-
ing up a party. "
Rick demurred. "See hyar, now," he said, "ye've got no
business meddlin'. "
"You must go," Mr. Kenyon reiterated,
## p. 10470 (#338) ##########################################
MARY NOAILLES MURFREE
10470
"Preachin's yer business," Rick continued: "'pears like ye
don't 'tend to it, though. "
You must go. "
"S'pose I say I won't," said Rick good-humoredly: "I s'pose
ye'd say ye'd make me. ”
"You must go," repeated Mr. Kenyon. "I am going to take
the boy home with me, but I intend to see you off first. "
Mr. Kenyon had prevented the hot-headed Kossuth from firing
by keeping his hand persistently over the muzzle of the gun; and
young Johns had feared to try to wrench it away lest it should
discharge in the effort. Had it done so, Mr. Kenyon would have
been in sweet converse with the Forty Monks in about a min-
ute and a quarter. Kossuth had finally let go the gun, and made
frantic efforts to borrow a weapon from some of his friends, but
the stern authoritative mandate of the belligerent peace-maker had
prevented them from gratifying him; and he now stood empty-
handed beside Mr. Kenyon, who had shouldered the old rifle in
an absent-minded manner, although still retaining his powerful
grasp on the arm of the outlaw.
"Waal, parson," said Rick at length, "I'll go, jest ter pleas-
ure you-uns. Ye see, I ain't forgot Shiloh. "
"I am not talking about Shiloh now," said the old man. You
must get off at once-all of you," indicating the gang, who
had been so whelmed in astonishment that they had not lifted
a finger to aid their chief.
"Ye say ye'll take that-that- Rick looked hard at Kos-
suth while he racked his brains for an injurious epithet - "that
sassy child home ter his mammy? "
«< Come, I am tired of this talk," said Mr. Kenyon: "you
must go. "
>>
-
«<
Rick walked heavily to the door and out into the moonlight.
"Them was good old times," he said to Mr. Kenyon, with a
regretful cadence in his peculiar drawl; "good old times, them
War days.
I wish they was back agin,—I wish they was back
agin. I ain't forgot Shiloh yit, though, and I ain't a-goin' ter.
But I'll tell ye one thing, parson," he added, his mind reverting
from ten years ago to the scene just past, as he unhitched his
horse and carefully examined the saddle-girth and stirrups, "ye're
a mighty queer preacher, ye air, a-sittin' up an' lookin' at sin-
ners dance, an' then gittin' in a fight that don't consarn ye.
ye're a mighty queer preacher! Ye ought ter be in my gang,
---
## p. 10471 (#339) ##########################################
MARY NOAILLES MURFREE
10471
that's whar ye ought ter be," he exclaimed with a guffaw, as he
put his foot in the stirrup; "ye've got a damned deal too much
grit fur a preacher. But I ain't forgot Shiloh yit, an' I don't
mean ter, nuther. "
A shout of laughter from the gang, an oath or two, the quick
tread of horses' hoofs pressing into a gallop, and the outlaw's
troop were speeding along the narrow paths that led deep into
the vistas of the moonlit summer woods.
As the old churchman, with the boy at his side and the gun
still on his shoulder, ascended the rocky, precipitous slope on the
opposite side of the ravine above the foaming waters of the wild
mountain stream, he said but little of admonition to his com-
panion: with the disappearance of the flame and smoke and the
dangerous ruffian, his martial spirit had cooled; the last words of
the outlaw, the highest praise Rick Pearson could accord to the
highest qualities Rick Pearson could imagine,- he had grit enough
to belong to the gang,- had smitten a tender conscience. He, at
his age, using none of the means rightfully at his command,—
the gentle suasion of religion,- must needs rush between armed
men, wrench their weapons from their hands, threatening with
such violence that an outlaw and desperado, recognizing a paral-
lel of his own belligerent and lawless spirit, should say that he
ought to belong to the gang! And the heaviest scourge of the
sin-laden conscience was the perception that so far as the unsub-
dued old Adam went, he ought indeed.
He was not so tortured, though, that he did not think of
others. He paused on reaching the summit of the ascent, and
looked back at the little house nestling in the ravine, the lamp-
light streaming through its open doors and windows across the
path among the laurel bushes, where Rick's gang had hitched
their horses.
"I wonder," said the old man, "if they are quiet and peace-
able again: can you hear the music and dancing? "
"Not now," said Kossuth. Then, after a moment, "Now I
kin," he added, as the wind brought to their ears the oft-told
tale of the rabbit's gallopade in the pea-patch. "They're a-dan-
cin' now, and all right agin. "
As they walked along, Mr. Kenyon's racked conscience might
have been in a slight degree comforted had he known that he
was in some sort a revelation to the impressible lad at his side;
that Kossuth had begun dimly to comprehend that a Christian
## p. 10472 (#340) ##########################################
10472
MARY NOAILLES MURFREE
may be a man of spirit also, and that bravado does not constitute
bravery. Now that the heat of anger was over, the young fellow
was glad that the fearless interposition of the warlike peace-
maker had prevented any killing, "'kase ef the old man hedn't
hung on ter my gun like he done, I'd have been a murderer like
he said, an' Rick would hev been dead. An' the bay filly ain't
sech a killin' matter nohow: ef it war the roan three-year-old
now, 'twould be different »
## p. 10473 (#341) ##########################################
10473
ZOO. G
HENRI MURGER
(1822-1861)
AKING into account a strange and persistent conception which
has been afloat for many generations, the genius of artistic
passion might well be represented as a haloed vagabond,
with immortal longings in his eyes, and out at the elbows.
In his 'Bohemians of the Latin Quarter,' Henri Murger, seizing
upon this conception, has prefaced his story of the gay, sad, wild, half-
starved, half-surfeited life led by four followers of art in Paris, with a
history of the world's Bohemians. He christens the picturesque clan by
this name, now in general use; but he does
not attempt to explain why the pursuit of
art in painting or literature has been so
often identified, in the past at least, with
worthlessness as a citizen. He merely calls
the long roll of those who have lived by
poetry rather than bread. He does not hesi-
tate to include the wanderer Homer, nor
Shakespeare, nor Molière, in this fellowship.
The inspired rascal Villon he claims as his
soul's own brother; Gringoire,-"friend to
vagrants and foe to fasting, "- Marot, Rous-
seau, Chatterton, are of his kin. For Mur-
ger himself was a prince of Bohemians.
Born in Paris in 1822, his father, a tailor,
arranged that he should study law; but Murger chose literature and
starvation. His 'Bohemians,' which was published in 1848, and which
made his fame, is the record of his own life and of the lives of some
boon friends in the Latin Quarter. It is the story of those spirits in
the untamed twenties, who like Omar desire only —
HENRI MURGER
"A book of verses underneath the bough,
A jug of wine, a loaf of bread, and thou
Beside me singing in the wilderness. "
What does it matter that the wilderness is that of the Paris roofs,
and the bread at least wanting, perhaps, and the beloved a little
working-girl in chintz, happy with a few sous' worth of violets or an
## p. 10474 (#342) ##########################################
10474
HENRI MURGER
afternoon at Versailles? The Bohemians of Paris are linked by the
chains of vagabondage, and of possible genius, to all those in every
age and clime who have found stimulus for their powers in love and
wine and song; and who in serving this trinity have forgotten the
obligation to earn more than they spend.
-
Murger himself did not long survive his translation, from that
quarter of Paris where he lived in the fifth story of a cheap lodging-
house because there was no sixth, to the realm of respectability. He
was, however, still enough of a Bohemian to prefer a cottage in the
Forest of Fontainebleau to the smug quarters of Paris, whose inhabit-
ants know nothing of the excitement of chasing "that wild beast
called a five-franc piece. " Murger died in 1861; and there were
those who questioned, in reviewing his life, whether he had been
really at heart a Bohemian. His book, at least, shows the subtlest
penetration into that irregular form of human nature known as the
artistic temperament. The reader regrets that the possessor of such
insight — a man who could discern a brother Bohemian across many
centuries and under the strangest disguises of mediæval rags — should
not have explained why the world instinctively feels that the poet
or the artist is not likely to be normal in his habits of living. Had
he attempted to answer this question, he might have said that the
man who sees visions and dreams dreams, knows the true value of
bread and meat and gold pieces better than the Philistine; and can
therefore accept their services irregularly, and with the nonchalance
of the inspired. The world, before whom the bread and meat and
gold pieces loom large as fate itself, translates this nonchalance into
shiftless ignorance of the duties and obligations of life. As poets and
artists are as a rule visionaries, this reputation is therefore fastened
upon them.
--
The world is not without its justification. Even Murger himself
says, "Bohemia is a stage in the artistic life: it is the preface to the
Academy, the Hôtel Dieu-or the Morgue. "
## p. 10475 (#343) ##########################################
HENRI MURGER
10475
M.
A BOHEMIAN EVENING PARTY
From The Humor of France,' in International Humor Series >
TOWA
NOWARDS the end of December the messengers of Bidault's
agency were commissioned to distribute about a hundred
copies of an invitation, of which the following is a faithful
reproduction:-
―――
MM. Rodolphe and Marcel request the honor of your company on
Saturday evening next, Christmas Eve.
There will be fine fun.
PROGRAMME OF THE ENTERTAINMENT
At 7 P. M. , opening of the reception rooms; lively and animated
conversation.
At 8 P. M. , entrance and walk through the rooms of the talented
authors of the Mountain in Labor,' comedy refused at the Odéon
Théâtre.
At 8:30 P. M. , M. Alexandre Schaunard, the celebrated virtuoso, will
perform on the piano 'The Influence of Blue in the Arts,' descript-
ive symphony.
At 9 P. M. , first reading of the paper on The Abolition of the Pen-
alty in Tragedy. '
At 9:30 P. M. , M. Gustave Colline, hyperphysical philosopher, and
Monsieur Schaunard, will hold a debate comparing dephilosophy and
metapolitics. In order to avoid any collision between the antagonists,
they will each be securely fastened.
At 10
P. M. , M. Tristan, man of letters, will relate his early
amours. M. Alexandre Schaunard will accompany him on the piano.
At 10:30 P. M. , second reading of the paper on The Abolition of
the Penalty in Tragedy. '
At 11 P. M. , a foreign Prince will describe a Cassowary hunt.
PART II
AT MIDNIGHT, Monsieur Marcel, historical painter, blindfolded, will
improvise in chalk the meeting of Napoleon and Voltaire in the Elys-
ian Fields. Monsieur Rodolphe will improvise a comparison between
the author of 'Zaïre' and the author of Austerlitz.
At 12:30 P. M. , M. Gustave, in a decent undress, will imitate the
athletic games of the fourth Olympiad.
At I
A. M. , third reading of the paper on The Abolition of the
Penalty in Tragedy,' and collection for the tragic authors who will
one day be out of work.
## p. 10476 (#344) ##########################################
10476
HENRI MURGER
At 2 A. M.
is more active in the details of human life than in the details of
landscape; but Miss Murfree, although she has not always accepted
this as a fact, has painted scenes where she has perfectly adjusted
her characters and their surroundings. In 'Old Sledge at the Settle-
mint,' the picture of the group of card-players throwing their cards
on the inverted splint basket by the light of the tallow dip and a
pitch-pine fire, while the moon shines without, and the uncanny
echoes ring through the rocks and woods, is as graphic as one of
Spagnoletto's paintings. And she has done a gentler and even more
sympathetic service in depicting the lonely, self-reliant, half mournful
life of the mountain women whom she loves; particularly the young
## p. 10455 (#323) ##########################################
MARY NOAILLES MURFREE
10455
women, pure, sweet, naïve, and innocent of all evil. The older women
"hold out wasted hands to the years as they pass,-holding them out
always, and always empty"; but in drawing her old women, Miss
Murfree lightens her somewhat sombre pictures by their shrewd fun
and keen knowledge of human nature. Mrs. Purvine is a stroke of
genius.
Nor could Miss Murfree's stories have won their wide popularity
with an American audience without a sense of huinor, which is to her
landscape as the sun to the mist. Her mountaineer who has been
restrained from killing the suspected horse-thief is rather relieved
than otherwise, having still a sense of justice: "The bay filly ain't
such a killin' matter nohow; ef it was the roan three-year-old
'twould be different. "
The novels which have most added to Miss Murfree's reputation,
perhaps, are 'In the Tennessee Mountains,' 'The Prophet of the Great
Smoky Mountain,' and 'In the Clouds,'-all stories of the Tennessee
mountains, told in her vigorous, dramatic manner.
THE DANCIN' PARTY AT HARRISON'S COVE
From In the Tennessee Mountains. Copyright 1884, by Houghton, Mifflin & Co.
UR ye see, Mis' Darley, them Harrison folks over yander ter
the Cove hev determinated on a dancin' party. "
"F"
The drawling tones fell unheeded on old Mr. Kenyon's
ear, as he sat on the broad hotel piazza of the New Helvetia
Springs, and gazed with meditative eyes at the fair August sky.
An early moon was riding, clear and full, over this wild spur of
the Alleghanies; the stars were few and very faint; even the
great Scorpio lurked vaguely outlined above the wooded ranges;
and the white mist that filled the long, deep, narrow valley be-
tween the parallel lines of mountains, shimmered with opalescent
gleams.
All the world of the watering-place had converged to that
focus the ball-room; and the cool, moonlit piazzas were nearly
deserted. The fell determination of the "Harrison folks to
give a dancing party made no impression on the preoccupied old
gentleman. Another voice broke his revery, -a soft, clear, well-
modulated voice; and he started and turned his head as his
own name was called, and his niece, Mrs. Darley, came to the
window.
"Uncle Ambrose, are you there? So glad! I was afraid
you were down at the summer-house, where I hear the children
―――――
## p. 10456 (#324) ##########################################
10456
MARY NOAILLES MURFREE
singing. Do come here a moment, please. This is Mrs. Johns,
who brings the Indian peaches to sell-you know the Indian
peaches? »
Mr. Kenyon knew the Indian peaches; the dark-crimson fruit
streaked with still darker lines, and full of blood-red juice, which
he had meditatively munched that very afternoon. Mr. Kenyon
knew the Indian peaches right well. He wondered, however,
what had brought Mrs. Johns back in so short a time; for
although the principal industry of the mountain people about the
New Helvetia Springs is selling fruit to the summer sojourners,
it is not customary to come twice on the same day, nor to
appear at all after nightfall.
Mrs. Darley proceeded to explain.
"Mrs. Johns's husband is ill, and wants us to send him some
medicine. "
Mr. Kenyon rose, threw away the stump of his cigar, and
entered the room. "How long has he been ill, Mrs. Johns? »
he asked dismally.
Mr. Kenyon always spoke lugubriously, and he was a dismal-
looking old man. Not more cheerful was Mrs. Johns: she was
tall and lank, and with such a face as one never sees except in
these mountains,- elongated, sallow, thin, with pathetic, deeply
sunken eyes, and high cheek-bones, and so settled an expression
of hopeless melancholy that it must be that naught but care
and suffering had been her lot; holding out wasted hands to the
years as they pass,- holding them out always, and always empty.
She wore a shabby, faded calico, and spoke with the peculiar
expressionless drawl of the mountaineer. She was a wonderful
contrast to Mrs. Darley, all furbelows and flounces, with her
fresh, smooth face and soft hair, and plump, round arms half
revealed by the flowing sleeves of her thin black dress. Mrs.
Darley was in mourning, and therefore did not affect the ball-
room. At this moment, on benevolent thoughts intent, she was
engaged in uncorking sundry small phials, gazing inquiringly at
their labels, and shaking their contents.
In reply to Mr. Kenyon's question, Mrs. Johns, sitting on the
extreme edge of a chair, and fanning herself with a pink calico
sun-bonnet, talked about her husband, and a misery in his side.
and in his back, and how he felt it "a-comin' on nigh on ter a
week ago. " Mr. Kenyon expressed sympathy, and was surprised
by the announcement that Mrs. Johns considered her husband's
## p. 10457 (#325) ##########################################
•
10457
MARY NOAILLES MURFREE
illness "a blessin', 'kase ef he war able ter git out'n his bed,
he 'lowed ter go down ter Harrison's Cove ter the dancin' party,
'kase Rick Pearson war a-goin' ter be thar, an' hed said ez how
none o' the Johnses should come. "
"What, Rick Pearson, that terrible outlaw! " exclaimed Mrs.
Darley, with wide-open blue eyes. She had read in the news-
papers sundry thrilling accounts of a noted horse-thief and out-
law, who with a gang of kindred spirits defied justice and roamed
certain sparsely populated mountainous counties at his own wild
will; and she was not altogether without a feeling of fear as she
heard of his proximity to the New Helvetia Springs,-not fear
for life or limb, because she was practical-minded enough to re-
flect that the sojourners and employés of the watering-place would
far outnumber the outlaw's troop, but fear that a pair of shiny.
bay ponies, Castor and Pollux, would fall victims to the crafty
wiles of the expert horse thief.
"I think I have heard something of a difficulty between your
people and Rick Pearson," said old Mr. Kenyon. "Has a peace
never been patched up between them? »
«<
"N-o," drawled Mrs. Johns, same as it always war. My
old man'll never believe but what Rick Pearson stole that thar
bay filly we lost 'bout five year ago. But I don't believe he done
it: plenty other folks around is ez mean ez Rick, leastways mos'
ez mean; plenty mean enough ter steal a horse, anyhow. Rick
say he never tuk the filly; say he war a-goin' ter shoot off the
nex' man's head ez say so. Rick say he'd ruther give two bay
fillies than hev a man say he tuk a horse ez he never tuk. Rick
say ez how he kin stand up ter what he does do, but it's these
hyar lies on him what kills him out. But ye know, Mis' Darley,
ye know yerself, he never give nobody two bay fillies in this
world, an' what's more he's never goin' ter. My old man an' my
boy Kossute talks on 'bout that thar bay filly like she war stole
yestiddy, an' 'twar five year ago an' better; an' when they hearn
ez how Rick Pearson hed showed that red head o' his'n on this
hyar mounting las' week, they war fightin' mad, an' would hev
lit out fur the gang sure, 'ceptin' they hed been gone down the
mounting fur two days. An' my son Kossute, he sent Rick word
that he had better keep out'n gunshot o' these hyar woods; that
he didn't want no better mark than that red head o' his'n, an'
he could hit it two mile off. An' Rick Pearson, he sent Kossute
word that he would kill him fur his sass the very nex' time he
## p. 10458 (#326) ##########################################
10458
MARY NOAILLES MURFREE
see him, an' ef he don't want a bullet in that pumpkin head o'
his'n he hed better keep away from that dancin' party what the
Harrisons hev laid off ter give, 'kase Rick say he's a-goin' ter it
hisself, an' is a-goin' ter dance too; he ain't been invited, Mis'
Darley, but Rick don't keer fur that. He is a-goin' anyhow; an'
he say ez how he ain't a-goin' ter let Kossute come, 'count o'
Kossute's sass, an' the fuss they've all made 'bout that bay filly
that war stole five year ago-'twar five year an' better. But
Rick say ez how he is goin', fur all he ain't got no invite, an'
is a-goin' ter dance too: 'kase you know, Mis' Darley, it's a-goin'
ter be a dancin' party; the Harrisons hev determinated on that.
Them gals of theirn air mos' crazed 'bout a dancin' party. They
ain't been a bit of account sence they went ter Cheatham's Cross-
Roads ter see thar gran'mother, an' picked up all them queer
new notions. So the Harrisons hev determinated on a dancin'
party; an' Rick say ez how he is goin' ter dance too: but Jule,
she say ez how she know thar ain't a gal on the mounting ez
would dance with him; but I ain't so sure 'bout that, Mis' Dar-
ley: gals air cur'ous critters, ye know yerself; thar's no sort o'
countin' on 'em; they'll do one thing one time, an' another thing
nex' time; ye can't put no dependence in 'em. But Jule say ef
he kin git Mandy Tyler ter dance with him, it's the mos' he
kin do, an' the gang'll be nowhar. Mebbe he kin git Mandy ter
dance with him, 'kase the other boys say ez how none o' them is
a-goin' ter ax her ter dance, 'count of the trick she played on
'em down ter the Wilkins settlemint-las' month, war it? no,
'twar two month ago, an' better; but the boys ain't forgot how
scandalous she done 'em, an' none of 'em is a-goin' ter ax her ter
dance. "
'Why, what did she do? " exclaimed Mrs. Darley, surprised.
"She came here to sell peaches one day, and I thought her such
a nice, pretty, well-behaved girl. "
"Waal, she hev got mighty quiet say-nuthin' sort'n ways, Mis'
Darley, but that thar gal do behave rediculous. Down thar ter
the Wilkins settlemint,- ye know it's 'bout two mile or two
mile'n a half from hyar,-waal, all the gals walked down thar
ter the party an hour by sun; but when the boys went down
they tuk thar horses, ter give the gals a ride home behind 'em.
Waal, every boy axed his gal ter ride while the party war goin'
on, an' when 'twar all over they all set out fur ter come home.
Waal, this hyar Mandy Tyler is a mighty favorite 'mongst the
## p. 10459 (#327) ##########################################
MARY NOAILLES MURFREE
10459
boys, they ain't got no sense, ye know, Mis' Darley, -an' stid-
dier one of 'em axin' her ter ride home, thar war five of 'em
axed her ter ride, ef ye'll believe me; an' what do ye think she
done, Mis' Darley? She tole all five of 'em yes; an' when the
party war over, she war the last ter go, an' when she started
out'n the door, thar war all five of them boys a-standin' thar
waitin' fur her, an' every one a-holdin' his horse by the bridle,
an' none of 'em knowed who the others war a-waitin' fur. An'
this hyar Mandy Tyler, when she got ter the door an' seen 'em
all a-standin' thar, never said one word, jest walked right through
'mongst 'em, an' set out fur the mounting on foot, with all them
five boys a-followin' an' a-leadin' thar horses, an' a-quarrelin'
enough ter take off each other's heads 'bout which one war
a-goin' ter ride with her; which none of 'em did, Mis' Darley,
fur I hearn ez how the whole layout footed it all the way ter
New Helveshy. An' thar would hev been a fight 'mongst 'em,
'ceptin' her brother, Jacob Tyler, went along with 'em, an' tried
ter keep the peace atwixt 'em. An' Mis' Darley, all them mar-
ried folks down thar at the party-them folks in the Wilkins
settlemint is the biggest fools, sure when all them married
folks come out ter the door, an' see the way Mandy Tyler hed
treated them boys, they jest hollered and laffed an' thought it
war mighty smart an' funny in Mandy; but she never say a
word till she kem up the mounting, an' I never hearn ez how
she say anything then. An' now the boys all say none of 'em
is a-goin' ter ax her ter dance, ter pay her back fur them fool
airs of hern. But Kossute say he'll dance with her ef none the
rest will. Kossute, he thought 'twar all mighty funny too,-he's
sech a fool 'bout gals, Kossute is,- but Jule, she thought ez how
'twar scandalous. "
--
-
Mrs. Darley listened in amused surprise: that these mount-
ain wilds could sustain a first-class coquette was an idea that
had not hitherto entered her mind; however, "that thar Mandy»
seemed, in Mrs. Johns's opinion at least, to merit the unenviable
distinction, and the party at the Wilkins settlement and the pro-
spective gayety of Harrison's Cove awakened the same sentiments
in her heart and mind as do the more ambitious germans and
kettle-drums of the lowland cities in the heart and mind of
Mrs. Grundy. Human nature is the same everywhere, and the
Wilkins settlement is a microcosm. The metropolitan centres,
stripped of the civilization of wealth, fashion, and culture, would
## p. 10460 (#328) ##########################################
10460
MARY NOAILLES MURFREE
present only the bare skeleton of humanity outlined in Mrs.
Johns's talk of Harrison's Cove, the Wilkins settlement, the en-
mities and scandals and sorrows and misfortunes of the mountain
ridge. As the absurd resemblance developed, Mrs. Darley could
not forbear a smile. Mrs. Johns looked up with a momentary
expression of surprise; the story presented no humorous phase
to her perceptions, but she too smiled a little as she repeated,
"Scandalous, ain't it? " and proceeded in the same lack-lustre
tone as before.
"Yes,- Kossute say ez how he'll dance with her ef none the
rest will, fur Kossute say ez how he hev laid off ter dance, Mis'
Darley; an' when I ax him what he thinks will become of his
soul ef he dances, he say the Devil may crack away at it, an' ef
he kin hit it he's welcome; fur soul or no soul he's a-goin' ter
dance. Kossute is a-fixin' of hisself this very minute ter go; but
I am verily afeard the boy'll be slaughtered, Mis' Darley, 'kase
thar is goin' ter be a fight, an' ye never in all yer life hearn
sech sass ez Kossute and Rick Pearson done sent word ter each
other. "
Mr. Kenyon expressed some surprise that she should fear for
so young a fellow as Kossuth. Surely," he said, "the man is
not brute enough to injure a mere boy: your son is a mere boy. "
"That's so," Mrs. Johns drawled. "Kossute ain't more'n
twenty year old, an' Rick Pearson is double that ef he is a day;
but ye see it's the firearms ez makes Kossute more'n a match
fur him, 'kase Kossute is the best shot on the mounting, an' Rick
knows that in a shootin' fight Kossute's better able ter take keer
of hisself an' hurt somebody else nor anybody. Kossute's more
likely ter hurt Rick nor Rick is ter hurt him in a shootin' fight;
but ef Rick didn't hurt him, an' he war ter shoot Rick, the
gang would tear him ter pieces in a minute; and 'mongst 'em I'm
actially afeard they'll slaughter the boy. "
Mr. Kenyon looked even graver than was his wont upon re-
ceiving this information, but said no more; and after giving Mrs.
Johns the febrifuge she wished for her husband, he returned to
his seat on the piazza.
«<
Mrs. Darley watched him with some little indignation as he
proceeded to light a fresh cigar. "How cold and unsympathetic
Uncle Ambrose is," she said to herself. And after condoling
effusively with Mrs. Johns on her apprehensions for her son's
safety, she returned to the gossips in the hotel parlor; and Mrs.
## p. 10461 (#329) ##########################################
MARY NOAILLES MURFREE
10461
Johns, with her pink calico sun-bonnet on her head, went her way
in the brilliant summer moonlight.
The clear lustre shone white upon all the dark woods and
chasms and flashing waters that lay between the New Helvetia
Springs and the wide, deep ravine called Harrison's Cove; where
from a rude log hut the vibrations of a violin, and the quick
throb of dancing feet, already mingled with the impetuous rush
of a mountain stream close by, and the weird night sounds of
the hills, the cry of birds among the tall trees, the stir of the
wind, the monotonous chanting of frogs at the water-side, the
long, drowsy drone of the nocturnal insects, the sudden faint
blast of a distant hunter's horn, and the far baying of hounds.
--
Mr. Harrison had four marriageable daughters, and had arrived
at the conclusion that something must be done for the girls; for
strange as it may seem, the prudent father exists even among
the "mounting folks. " Men there realize the importance of pro-
viding suitable homes for their daughters as men do elsewhere,
and the eligible youth is as highly esteemed in those wilds as is
the much scarcer animal at a fashionable watering-place. Thus
it was that Mr. Harrison had "determinated on a dancin' party. "
True, he stood in bodily fear of the Judgment Day and the cir-
cuit-rider: but the dancing party was a rarity eminently calcu-
lated to please the young hunters of the settlements round about;
so he swallowed his qualms, to be indulged at a more convenient
season, and threw himself into the vortex of preparation with an
ardor very gratifying to the four young ladies, who had become.
imbued with sophistication at Cheatham's Cross-Roads.
Not so Mrs. Harrison: she almost expected the house to fall
and crush them, as a judgment on the wickedness of a dancing
party; for so heinous a sin, in the estimation of the greater part
of the mountain people, had not been committed among them for
many a day. Such trifles as killing a man in a quarrel, or on
suspicion of stealing a horse or wash-tub or anything that came
handy, of course do not count; but a dancing party! Mrs. Har-
rison could only fold her idle hands, and dread the heavy penalty
that must surely follow so terrible a crime.
It certainly had not the gay and lightsome aspect supposed
to be characteristic of such a scene of sin: the awkward young
mountaineers clogged heavily about in their uncouth clothes and
rough shoes, with the stolid-looking, lack-lustre maids of the
hill, to the violin's monotonous iteration of The Chicken in the
## p. 10462 (#330) ##########################################
10462
MARY NOAILLES MURFREE
Bread-Trough,' or 'The Rabbit in the Pea-Patch,'-all their
grave faces as grave as ever. The music now and then changed
suddenly to one of those wild, melancholy strains sometimes heard
in old-fashioned dancing tunes, and the strange pathetic cadences.
seemed more attuned to the rhythmical dash of the waters rush-
ing over their stone barricades out in the moonlight yonder, or
to the plaintive sighs of the winds among the great dark arches
of the primeval forests, than to the movement of the heavy,
coarse feet dancing a solemn measure in the little log cabin in
Harrison's Cove. The elders, sitting in rush-bottomed chairs close
to the walls, and looking on at the merriment, well pleased despite
their religious doubts, were somewhat more lively; every now
and then a guffaw mingled with the violin's resonant strains and
the dancers' well-marked pace; the women talked to each other
with somewhat more animation than was their wont, under the
stress of the unusual excitement of a dancing party; and from
out the shed-room adjoining came an anticipative odor of more
substantial sin than the fiddle or the grave jiggling up and down
the rough floor. A little more cider too, and a very bad article
of illegally distilled whisky, were ever and anon circulated among
the pious abstainers from the dance; but the sinful votaries of
Terpsichore could brook no pause nor delay, and jogged up and
down quite intoxicated with the mirthfulness of the plaintive old
airs, and the pleasure of other motion than following the plow or
hoeing the corn.
And the moon smiled right royally on her dominion: on the
long dark ranges of mountains, and mist-filled valleys between;
on the woods and streams, and on all the half-dormant creatures
either amongst the shadow-flecked foliage or under the crystal
waters; on the long white sandy road winding in and out
through the forest; on the frowning crags of the wild ravine;
on the little bridge at the entrance of the gorge, across which a
party of eight men, heavily armed and gallantly mounted, rode
swiftly and disappeared amid the gloom of the shadows.
The sound of the galloping of horses broke suddenly on the
music and the noise of the dancing; a moment's interval, and
the door gently opened, and the gigantic form of Rick Pearson
appeared in the aperture. He was dressed, like the other mount-
aineers, in a coarse suit of brown jeans somewhat the worse for
wear, the trousers stuffed in the legs of his heavy boots; he
wore an old soft felt hat, which he did not remove immediately
## p. 10463 (#331) ##########################################
MARY NOAILLES MURFREE
10463
on entering, and a pair of formidable pistols at his belt conspicu-
ously challenged attention. He had auburn hair, and a long full
beard of a lighter tint reaching almost to his waist; his com-
plexion was much tanned by the sun, and roughened by exposure
to the inclement mountain weather; his eyes were brown, deep-
set, and from under his heavy brows they looked out with quick,
sharp glances, and occasionally with a roguish twinkle; the ex-
pression of his countenance was rather good-humored: a sort of
imperious good-humor, however, the expression of a man accus-
tomed to have his own way and not to be trifled with, but able
to afford some amiability since his power is undisputed.
He stepped slowly into the apartment, placed his gun against
the wall, turned, and solemnly gazed at the dancing, while his
followers trooped in and obeyed his example. As the eight
guns, one by one, rattled against the wall, there was a startled
silence among the pious elders of the assemblage, and a sudden
disappearance of the animation that had characterized their inter-
course during the evening. Mrs. Harrison, who by reason of
flurry, and a housewifely pride in the still unrevealed treasures
of the shed-room, had well-nigh forgotten her fears, felt that the
anticipated judgment had even now descended; and in what
terrible and unexpected guise! The men turned the quids of
tobacco in their cheeks, and looked at each other in uncertainty:
but the dancers bestowed not a glance upon the new-comers; and
the musician in the corner, with his eyes half closed, his head
bent low upon the instrument, his hard, horny hand moving the
bow back and forth over the strings of the crazy old fiddle, was
utterly rapt by his own melody. At the supreme moment when
the great red beard had appeared portentously in the doorway,
and fear had frozen the heart of Mrs. Harrison within her at
the ill-omened apparition, the host was in the shed-room, filling
a broken-nosed pitcher from the cider barrel. When he re-
entered, and caught sight of the grave sunburned face with its
long red beard and sharp brown eyes, he too was dismayed for
an instant, and stood silent at the opposite door with the pitcher
in his hand. The pleasure and the possible profit of the dancing.
party, for which he had expended so much of his scanty store
of this world's goods and risked the eternal treasures laid up in
heaven, were a mere phantasm; for with Rick Pearson among
them, in an ill frame of mind and at odds with half the men in
the room, there would certainly be a fight, and in all probability
-
## p. 10464 (#332) ##########################################
10464
MARY NOAILLES MURFREE
one would be killed, and the dancing party at Harrison's Cove
would be a text for the bloody-minded sermons of the circuit-
rider for all time to come. However, the father of four mar-
riageable daughters is apt to become crafty and worldly-wise:
only for a moment did he stand in indecision; then catching
suddenly the small brown eyes, he held up the pitcher with a
grin of invitation. "Rick! " he called out above the scraping of
the violin and the clatter of the dancing feet, "slip round hyar
ef ye kin,—I've got somethin' for ye;" and he shook the pitcher
significantly.
Not that Mr. Harrison would for a moment have thought of
Rick Pearson in a matrimonial point of view, for even the sophis-
tication of the Cross-Roads had not yet brought him to the state
of mind to consider such a half-loaf as this better than no bread;
but he felt it imperative from every point of view to keep that
set of young mountaineers dancing in peace and quiet, and their
guns idle and out of mischief against the wall. The great red
beard disappeared and reappeared at intervals, as Rick Pearson
slipped along the gun-lined wall to join his host and the cider
pitcher; and after he had disposed of the refreshment, in which
the gang shared, he relapsed into silently watching the dancing,
and meditating a participation in that festivity.
Now it so happened that the only young girl unprovided with
a partner was "that thar Mandy Tyler," of Wilkins settlement
renown: the young men had rigidly adhered to their resolution
to ignore her in their invitations to dance, and she had been sit-
ting since the beginning of the festivities, quite neglected, among
the married people, looking on at the amusement which she had
been debarred sharing by that unpopular bit of coquetry at Wil-
kins settlement. Nothing of disappointment or mortification was
expressed in her countenance. She felt the slight, of course,—
even a "mounting" woman is susceptible of the sting of wounded.
pride; all her long-anticipated enjoyment had come to naught by
this infliction of penance for her ill-timed jest at the expense of
those five young fellows dancing with their triumphant partners,
and bestowing upon her not even a glance: but she looked the
express image of immobility as she sat in her clean pink cal-
ico, so carefully gotten up for the occasion, her short black hair
curling about her ears, and watched the unending reel with slow
dark eyes.
Rick's glance fell upon her, and without further hesi-
tation he strode over to where she was sitting, and proffered
30
4
k
## p. 10465 (#333) ##########################################
MARY NOAILLES MURFREE
10465
his hand for the dance. She did not reply immediately, but
looked timidly about her at the shocked pious ones on either side,
who were ready but for mortal fear to aver that "dancin' any-
how air bad enough, the Lord knows, but dancin' with a horse
thief air jest scandalous! " Then for there is something of
defiance to established law and prejudice in the born flirt every-
where with a sudden daring spirit shining in her brightening
eyes, she responded, "Don't keer ef I do," with a dimpling half-
laugh; and the next minute the two outlaws were flying down
the middle together.
――――――
XVIII-655
―――――
While Rick was according grave attention to the intricacies
of the mazy dance, and keeping punctilious time to the scrap-
ing of the old fiddle-finding it all a much more difficult feat
than galloping from the Cross-Roads to the "Snake's Mouth" on
some other man's horse with the sheriff hard at his heels,-the
solitary figure of a tall gaunt man had followed the long wind-
ing path leading deep into the woods, and now began the steep
descent to Harrison's Cove. Of what was old Mr. Kenyon think-
ing, as he walked on in the mingled shadow and sheen? Of St.
Augustine and his Forty Monks, probably, and what they found
in Britain. The young men of his acquaintance would gladly
have laid you any odds that he could think of nothing but his
antique hobby, the ancient Church. Mr. Kenyon was the most
prominent man in St. Martin's Church in the city of B, not
excepting the rector. He was a lay-reader, and officiated upon
occasions of "clerical sore-throat," as the profane denominate the
ministerial summer exodus from heated cities.
This summer,
however, Mr. Kenyon's own health had succumbed, and he was
having a little "sore-throat" in the mountains on his own account.
Very devout was Mr. Kenyon. Many people wondered that
he had never taken orders.
Many people warmly congratulated
themselves that he never had; for drier sermons than those he
selected were surely never heard, and a shuddering imagination
shrinks appalled from the problematic mental drought of his
ideal original discourse. But he was an integrant part of St.
Martin's; much of his piety, materialized into contributions, was
built up in its walls, and shone before men in the costliness of
its decorations. Indeed, the ancient name had been conferred
upon the building as a sort of tribute to Mr. Kenyon's well-
known enthusiasm concerning apostolic succession and kindred
doctrines.
## p. 10466 (#334) ##########################################
10466
MARY NOAILLES MURFREE
Dull and dismal was Mr. Kenyon, and therefore it may be
considered a little strange that he should be a notable favorite
with men. They were of many different types, but with one
invariable bond of union: they had all at one time served as
soldiers; for the war, now ten years passed by, its bitterness
almost forgotten, had left some traces that time can never oblit-
erate. What a friend was the droning old churchman in those
days of battle and bloodshed and suffering and death!
Not a
man sat within the walls of St. Martin's who had not received
some signal benefit from the hand stretched forth to impress
the claims of certain ante-Augustine British clergy to considera-
tion and credibility; not a man who did not remember stricken
fields where a good Samaritan went about under shot and shell,
succoring the wounded and comforting the dying; not a man
who did not applaud the indomitable spirit and courage that
cut his way from surrender and safety, through solid barriers of
enemies, to deliver the orders on which the fate of an army
depended; not a man whose memory did not harbor fatiguing
recollections of long, dull sermons read for the souls' health of
the soldiery. And through it all-by the camp-fires at night,
on the long white country roads in the sunshiny mornings; in
the mountains and the morasses; in hilarious advance and in
cheerless retreat; in the heats of summer and by the side of
frozen rivers- the ancient British clergy went through it all.
And whether the old churchman's premises and reasoning were
false, whether his tracings of the succession were faulty, whether
he dropped a link here or took in one there, he had caught the
spirit of those stanch old martyrs, if not their falling churchly
mantle.
The mountaineers about the New Helvetia Springs supposed
that Mr. Kenyon was a regularly ordained preacher, and that the
sermons which they had heard him read were, to use the ver-
nacular, out of his own head. For many of them were accus-
tomed on Sunday mornings to occupy humble back benches in
the ball-room, where on week-day evenings the butterflies sojourn-
ing at New Helvetia danced, and on the Sabbath metaphorically
beat their breasts, and literally avowed that they were "miser-
able sinners," following Mr. Kenyon's lugubrious lead.
The conclusion of the mountaineers was not unnatural, there-
fore; and when the door of Mr. Harrison's house opened and
another uninvited guest entered, the music suddenly ceased.
The
## p. 10467 (#335) ##########################################
MARY NOAILLES MURFREE
10467
half-closed eyes of the fiddler had fallen upon Mr. Kenyon at
the threshold; and supposing him a clergyman, he immediately
imagined that the man of God had come all the way from New
Helvetia Springs to stop the dancing and snatch the revelers.
from the jaws of hell. The rapturous bow paused shuddering
on the string, the dancing feet were palsied, the pious about the
walls were racking their slow brains to excuse their apparent
conniving at sin and bargaining with Satan; and Mr. Harrison
felt that this was indeed an unlucky party, and it would un-
doubtedly be dispersed by the direct interposition of Providence
before the shed-room was opened and the supper eaten. As to
his soul-poor man! these constantly recurring social anxieties.
were making him callous to immortality: this life was about to
prove too much for him, for the fortitude and tact even of a
father of four marriageable young ladies has a limit. Mr. Ken-
yon too seemed dumb as he hesitated in the doorway; but when
the host, partially recovering himself, came forward and offered.
a chair, he said with one of his dismal smiles, that he hoped
Mr. Harrison had no objection to his coming in and looking at
the dancing for a while. "Don't let me interrupt the young
people, I beg," he added as he seated himself.
The astounded silence was unbroken for a few moments. To
be sure he was not a circuit-rider, but even the sophistication of
Cheatham's Cross-Roads had never heard of a preacher who did
not object to dancing. Mr. Harrison could not believe his ears,
and asked for a more explicit expression of opinion.
"Ye say ye don't keer ef the boys an' gals dance? " he
inquired. "Ye don't think it's sinful? »
And after Mr. Kenyon's reply, in which the astonished
"mounting folks" caught only the surprising statement that
dancing if properly conducted was an innocent, cheerful, and
healthful amusement, supplemented by something about dancing
in the fear of the Lord, and that in all charity he was disposed
to consider objections to such harmless recreations a tithing of
mint and anise and cummin, whereby might ensue a neglect of
weightier matters of the law; that clean hands and clean hearts,
-hands clean of blood and ill-gotten goods, and hearts free
from falsehood and cruel intention,-these were the things well
pleasing to God: after his somewhat prolix reply, the gayety
recommenced. The fiddle quavered tremulously at first, but
soon resounded with its former vigorous tones, and the joy of
## p. 10468 (#336) ##########################################
10468
MARY NOAILLES MURFREE
the dance was again exemplified in the grave joggling back and
forth.
Meanwhile Mr. Harrison sat beside this strange new guest,
and asked him questions concerning his church; being instantly,
it is needless to say, informed of its great antiquity, of the
journeying of St. Augustine and his Forty Monks to Britain, of
the church they found already planted there, of its retreat to the
hills of Wales under its oppressors' tyranny; of many cognate
themes, side issues of the main branch of the subject, into which
the talk naturally drifted, -the like of which Mr. Harrison had
never heard in all his days. And as he watched the figures dan-
cing to the violin's strains, and beheld as in a mental vision the
solemn gyrations of those renowned Forty Monks to the monotone
of old Mr. Kenyon's voice, he abstractedly hoped that the double
dance would continue without interference till a peaceable dawn.
His hopes were vain. It so chanced that Kossuth Johns, who
had by no means relinquished all idea of dancing at Harrison's
Cove and defying Rick Pearson, had hitherto been detained by
his mother's persistent entreaties, some necessary attentions to his
father, and the many trials which beset a man dressing for a
party who has very few clothes, and those very old and worn.
Jule, his sister-in-law, had been most kind and complaisant, put-
ting on a button here, sewing up a slit there, darning a refrac-
tory elbow, and lending him the one bright ribbon she possessed
as a neck-tie. But all these things take time; and the moon did
not light Kossuth down the gorge until she was shining almost
vertically from the sky, and the Harrison's Cove people and the
Forty Monks were dancing together in high feather. The eccle-
siastic dance halted suddenly, and a watchful light gleamed in
old Mr. Kenyon's eyes, as he became silent, and the boy stepped
into the room. The moonlight and the lamplight fell mingled
on the calm, inexpressive features and tall, slender form of the
young mountaineer. "Hy're, Kossute! " a cheerful greeting from
many voices met him. The next moment the music ceased once
again, and the dancing came to a standstill; for as the name fell
on Pearson's ear he turned, glanced sharply toward the door,
and drawing one of his pistols from his belt, advanced to the
middle of the room. The men fell back; so did the frightened
women, without screaming, however, for that indication of femi-
nine sensibility had not yet penetrated to Cheatham's Cross-Roads,
to say nothing of the mountains.
-
## p. 10469 (#337) ##########################################
MARY NOAILLES MURFREE
10469
"I told ye that ye warn't ter come hyar," said Rick Pearson
imperiously; "and ye've got ter go home ter yer mammy, right
off, or ye'll never git thar no more, youngster. "
"I've come hyar ter put you out, ye cussed red-headed horse
thief! " retorted Kossuth angrily: "ye hed better tell me whar
that thar bay filly is, or light out, one. "
It is not the habit in the mountains to parley long on these
occasions. Kossuth had raised his gun to his shoulder as Rick,
with his pistol cocked, advanced a step nearer. The outlaw's
weapon was struck upward by a quick, strong hand; the little log
cabin was filled with flash, roar, and smoke; and the stars looked
in through a hole in the roof from which Rick's bullet had sent
the shingles flying. He turned in mortal terror and caught the
hand that had struck his pistol; in mortal terror, for Kossuth
was the crack shot of the mountains, and he felt he was a dead
man. The room was somewhat obscured by smoke; but as he
turned upon the man who had disarmed him,- for the force of
the blow had thrown the pistol to the floor, he saw that the
other hand was over the muzzle of young Johns's gun, and Kos-
suth was swearing loudly that by the Lord Almighty if he didn't
take it off he would shoot it off.
-
"My young friend," Mr. Kenyon began, with the calmness
appropriate to a devout member of the one catholic and apostolic
church; but then, the old Adam suddenly getting the upper
hand, he shouted out in irate tones, "If you don't stop that noise
I'll break your head! -Well, Mr. Pearson," he continued, as he
stood between the combatants, one hand still over the muzzle of
young Johns's gun, the other, lean and sinewy, holding Pearson's
powerful right arm with a vise-like grip,-"Well, Mr. Pearson,
you are not so good a soldier as you used to be: you didn't fight
boys in the old times. "
Rick Pearson's enraged expression suddenly gave way to a
surprised recognition. "Ye may drag me through hell an' beat
me with a soot-bag ef hyar ain't the old fightin' preacher agin! "
he cried.
"I have only one thing to say to you," said Mr. Kenyon.
"You must go: I will not have you here shooting boys and break-
ing up a party. "
Rick demurred. "See hyar, now," he said, "ye've got no
business meddlin'. "
"You must go," Mr. Kenyon reiterated,
## p. 10470 (#338) ##########################################
MARY NOAILLES MURFREE
10470
"Preachin's yer business," Rick continued: "'pears like ye
don't 'tend to it, though. "
You must go. "
"S'pose I say I won't," said Rick good-humoredly: "I s'pose
ye'd say ye'd make me. ”
"You must go," repeated Mr. Kenyon. "I am going to take
the boy home with me, but I intend to see you off first. "
Mr. Kenyon had prevented the hot-headed Kossuth from firing
by keeping his hand persistently over the muzzle of the gun; and
young Johns had feared to try to wrench it away lest it should
discharge in the effort. Had it done so, Mr. Kenyon would have
been in sweet converse with the Forty Monks in about a min-
ute and a quarter. Kossuth had finally let go the gun, and made
frantic efforts to borrow a weapon from some of his friends, but
the stern authoritative mandate of the belligerent peace-maker had
prevented them from gratifying him; and he now stood empty-
handed beside Mr. Kenyon, who had shouldered the old rifle in
an absent-minded manner, although still retaining his powerful
grasp on the arm of the outlaw.
"Waal, parson," said Rick at length, "I'll go, jest ter pleas-
ure you-uns. Ye see, I ain't forgot Shiloh. "
"I am not talking about Shiloh now," said the old man. You
must get off at once-all of you," indicating the gang, who
had been so whelmed in astonishment that they had not lifted
a finger to aid their chief.
"Ye say ye'll take that-that- Rick looked hard at Kos-
suth while he racked his brains for an injurious epithet - "that
sassy child home ter his mammy? "
«< Come, I am tired of this talk," said Mr. Kenyon: "you
must go. "
>>
-
«<
Rick walked heavily to the door and out into the moonlight.
"Them was good old times," he said to Mr. Kenyon, with a
regretful cadence in his peculiar drawl; "good old times, them
War days.
I wish they was back agin,—I wish they was back
agin. I ain't forgot Shiloh yit, though, and I ain't a-goin' ter.
But I'll tell ye one thing, parson," he added, his mind reverting
from ten years ago to the scene just past, as he unhitched his
horse and carefully examined the saddle-girth and stirrups, "ye're
a mighty queer preacher, ye air, a-sittin' up an' lookin' at sin-
ners dance, an' then gittin' in a fight that don't consarn ye.
ye're a mighty queer preacher! Ye ought ter be in my gang,
---
## p. 10471 (#339) ##########################################
MARY NOAILLES MURFREE
10471
that's whar ye ought ter be," he exclaimed with a guffaw, as he
put his foot in the stirrup; "ye've got a damned deal too much
grit fur a preacher. But I ain't forgot Shiloh yit, an' I don't
mean ter, nuther. "
A shout of laughter from the gang, an oath or two, the quick
tread of horses' hoofs pressing into a gallop, and the outlaw's
troop were speeding along the narrow paths that led deep into
the vistas of the moonlit summer woods.
As the old churchman, with the boy at his side and the gun
still on his shoulder, ascended the rocky, precipitous slope on the
opposite side of the ravine above the foaming waters of the wild
mountain stream, he said but little of admonition to his com-
panion: with the disappearance of the flame and smoke and the
dangerous ruffian, his martial spirit had cooled; the last words of
the outlaw, the highest praise Rick Pearson could accord to the
highest qualities Rick Pearson could imagine,- he had grit enough
to belong to the gang,- had smitten a tender conscience. He, at
his age, using none of the means rightfully at his command,—
the gentle suasion of religion,- must needs rush between armed
men, wrench their weapons from their hands, threatening with
such violence that an outlaw and desperado, recognizing a paral-
lel of his own belligerent and lawless spirit, should say that he
ought to belong to the gang! And the heaviest scourge of the
sin-laden conscience was the perception that so far as the unsub-
dued old Adam went, he ought indeed.
He was not so tortured, though, that he did not think of
others. He paused on reaching the summit of the ascent, and
looked back at the little house nestling in the ravine, the lamp-
light streaming through its open doors and windows across the
path among the laurel bushes, where Rick's gang had hitched
their horses.
"I wonder," said the old man, "if they are quiet and peace-
able again: can you hear the music and dancing? "
"Not now," said Kossuth. Then, after a moment, "Now I
kin," he added, as the wind brought to their ears the oft-told
tale of the rabbit's gallopade in the pea-patch. "They're a-dan-
cin' now, and all right agin. "
As they walked along, Mr. Kenyon's racked conscience might
have been in a slight degree comforted had he known that he
was in some sort a revelation to the impressible lad at his side;
that Kossuth had begun dimly to comprehend that a Christian
## p. 10472 (#340) ##########################################
10472
MARY NOAILLES MURFREE
may be a man of spirit also, and that bravado does not constitute
bravery. Now that the heat of anger was over, the young fellow
was glad that the fearless interposition of the warlike peace-
maker had prevented any killing, "'kase ef the old man hedn't
hung on ter my gun like he done, I'd have been a murderer like
he said, an' Rick would hev been dead. An' the bay filly ain't
sech a killin' matter nohow: ef it war the roan three-year-old
now, 'twould be different »
## p. 10473 (#341) ##########################################
10473
ZOO. G
HENRI MURGER
(1822-1861)
AKING into account a strange and persistent conception which
has been afloat for many generations, the genius of artistic
passion might well be represented as a haloed vagabond,
with immortal longings in his eyes, and out at the elbows.
In his 'Bohemians of the Latin Quarter,' Henri Murger, seizing
upon this conception, has prefaced his story of the gay, sad, wild, half-
starved, half-surfeited life led by four followers of art in Paris, with a
history of the world's Bohemians. He christens the picturesque clan by
this name, now in general use; but he does
not attempt to explain why the pursuit of
art in painting or literature has been so
often identified, in the past at least, with
worthlessness as a citizen. He merely calls
the long roll of those who have lived by
poetry rather than bread. He does not hesi-
tate to include the wanderer Homer, nor
Shakespeare, nor Molière, in this fellowship.
The inspired rascal Villon he claims as his
soul's own brother; Gringoire,-"friend to
vagrants and foe to fasting, "- Marot, Rous-
seau, Chatterton, are of his kin. For Mur-
ger himself was a prince of Bohemians.
Born in Paris in 1822, his father, a tailor,
arranged that he should study law; but Murger chose literature and
starvation. His 'Bohemians,' which was published in 1848, and which
made his fame, is the record of his own life and of the lives of some
boon friends in the Latin Quarter. It is the story of those spirits in
the untamed twenties, who like Omar desire only —
HENRI MURGER
"A book of verses underneath the bough,
A jug of wine, a loaf of bread, and thou
Beside me singing in the wilderness. "
What does it matter that the wilderness is that of the Paris roofs,
and the bread at least wanting, perhaps, and the beloved a little
working-girl in chintz, happy with a few sous' worth of violets or an
## p. 10474 (#342) ##########################################
10474
HENRI MURGER
afternoon at Versailles? The Bohemians of Paris are linked by the
chains of vagabondage, and of possible genius, to all those in every
age and clime who have found stimulus for their powers in love and
wine and song; and who in serving this trinity have forgotten the
obligation to earn more than they spend.
-
Murger himself did not long survive his translation, from that
quarter of Paris where he lived in the fifth story of a cheap lodging-
house because there was no sixth, to the realm of respectability. He
was, however, still enough of a Bohemian to prefer a cottage in the
Forest of Fontainebleau to the smug quarters of Paris, whose inhabit-
ants know nothing of the excitement of chasing "that wild beast
called a five-franc piece. " Murger died in 1861; and there were
those who questioned, in reviewing his life, whether he had been
really at heart a Bohemian. His book, at least, shows the subtlest
penetration into that irregular form of human nature known as the
artistic temperament. The reader regrets that the possessor of such
insight — a man who could discern a brother Bohemian across many
centuries and under the strangest disguises of mediæval rags — should
not have explained why the world instinctively feels that the poet
or the artist is not likely to be normal in his habits of living. Had
he attempted to answer this question, he might have said that the
man who sees visions and dreams dreams, knows the true value of
bread and meat and gold pieces better than the Philistine; and can
therefore accept their services irregularly, and with the nonchalance
of the inspired. The world, before whom the bread and meat and
gold pieces loom large as fate itself, translates this nonchalance into
shiftless ignorance of the duties and obligations of life. As poets and
artists are as a rule visionaries, this reputation is therefore fastened
upon them.
--
The world is not without its justification. Even Murger himself
says, "Bohemia is a stage in the artistic life: it is the preface to the
Academy, the Hôtel Dieu-or the Morgue. "
## p. 10475 (#343) ##########################################
HENRI MURGER
10475
M.
A BOHEMIAN EVENING PARTY
From The Humor of France,' in International Humor Series >
TOWA
NOWARDS the end of December the messengers of Bidault's
agency were commissioned to distribute about a hundred
copies of an invitation, of which the following is a faithful
reproduction:-
―――
MM. Rodolphe and Marcel request the honor of your company on
Saturday evening next, Christmas Eve.
There will be fine fun.
PROGRAMME OF THE ENTERTAINMENT
At 7 P. M. , opening of the reception rooms; lively and animated
conversation.
At 8 P. M. , entrance and walk through the rooms of the talented
authors of the Mountain in Labor,' comedy refused at the Odéon
Théâtre.
At 8:30 P. M. , M. Alexandre Schaunard, the celebrated virtuoso, will
perform on the piano 'The Influence of Blue in the Arts,' descript-
ive symphony.
At 9 P. M. , first reading of the paper on The Abolition of the Pen-
alty in Tragedy. '
At 9:30 P. M. , M. Gustave Colline, hyperphysical philosopher, and
Monsieur Schaunard, will hold a debate comparing dephilosophy and
metapolitics. In order to avoid any collision between the antagonists,
they will each be securely fastened.
At 10
P. M. , M. Tristan, man of letters, will relate his early
amours. M. Alexandre Schaunard will accompany him on the piano.
At 10:30 P. M. , second reading of the paper on The Abolition of
the Penalty in Tragedy. '
At 11 P. M. , a foreign Prince will describe a Cassowary hunt.
PART II
AT MIDNIGHT, Monsieur Marcel, historical painter, blindfolded, will
improvise in chalk the meeting of Napoleon and Voltaire in the Elys-
ian Fields. Monsieur Rodolphe will improvise a comparison between
the author of 'Zaïre' and the author of Austerlitz.
At 12:30 P. M. , M. Gustave, in a decent undress, will imitate the
athletic games of the fourth Olympiad.
At I
A. M. , third reading of the paper on The Abolition of the
Penalty in Tragedy,' and collection for the tragic authors who will
one day be out of work.
## p. 10476 (#344) ##########################################
10476
HENRI MURGER
At 2 A. M.
