THE CAVALIERS OF VIRGINIA,

OR, THE RECLUSE OF JAMESTOWN.

AN HISTORICAL ROMANCE OF THE OLD DOMINION.

BY WILLIAM A. CARUTHERS

THE AUTHOR OF "THE KENTUCKIAN IN NEW-YORK."

IN TWO VOLUMES.
VOL. I.

NEW-YORK:
PUBLISHED BY HARPER & BROTHERS,
NO. 82 CLIFF-STREET,
AND SOLD BY THE PRINCIPAL BOOKSELLERS THROUGHOUT
THE UNITED STATES.
1834.

Entered according to the Act of Congress, in the year 1834, by Harper & Brothers, in the Clerk's Office of the District Court of the Southern District of New-York.

CONTENTS

[CHAPTER I.]
[CHAPTER II.]
[CHAPTER III.]
[CHAPTER IV.]
[CHAPTER V.]
[CHAPTER VI.]
[CHAPTER VII.]
[CHAPTER VIII.]
[CHAPTER IX.]
[CHAPTER X.]
[CHAPTER XI.]
[CHAPTER XII.]
[CHAPTER XIII.]
[CHAPTER XIV.]
[CHAPTER XV.]
[CHAPTER XVI.]

THE CAVALIERS OF VIRGINIA.

CHAPTER I.

The romance of history pertains to no human annals more strikingly than to the early settlement of Virginia. The mind of the reader at once reverts to the names of Raleigh, Smith, and Pocahontas. The traveller's memory pictures in a moment the ivy-mantled ruin of old Jamestown.

About the year 16—, the city of Jamestown, then the capital of Virginia, was by no means an unapt representation of the British metropolis; both being torn by contending factions, and alternately subjected to the sway of the Roundheads and Royalists.

First came the Cavaliers who fled hither after the decapitation of their royal master and the dispersion of his army, many of whom became permanent settlers in the town or colony, and ever afterwards influenced the character of the state.

These were the first founders of the aristocracy which prevails in Virginia to this day; these were the immediate ancestors of that generous, fox-hunting, wine-drinking, duelling and reckless race of men, which gives so distinct a character to Virginians wherever they may be found.

A whole generation of these Cavaliers had grown up in the colony during the interregnum, and, throughout that long period, were tolerated by those in authority as a class of probationers. The Restoration was no sooner announced, however, than they changed places with their late superiors in authority. That stout old Cavalier and former governor, Sir William Berkley (who had retired to the shades of Accomack,) was now called by the unanimous voice of the people, to reascend the vice-regal chair.

Soon after his second installation came another class of refugees, in the persons of Cromwell's veteran soldiers themselves, a few of whom fled hither on account of the distance from the court and the magnitude of their offences against the reigning powers. It will readily be perceived even by those not conversant with the primitive history of the Ancient Dominion, that these heterogeneous materials of Roundheads and Cavaliers were not the best calculated in the world to amalgamate in the social circles.

Our story commences a short time after the death of Cromwell and his son, and the restoration of Charles the Second to the throne of his fathers.

The city of Jamestown was situated upon an island in the Powhatan, about twenty leagues from where that noble river empties its waters into those of the Chesapeake Bay.

This island is long, flat on its surface, and presents a semicircular margin to the view of one approaching from the southeast; indeed it can scarcely be seen that it is an island from the side facing the river—the little branch which separates it from the main land having doubtless worn its way around by a long and gradual process.

At the period of which we write, the city presented a very imposing and romantic appearance, the landscape on that side of the river being shaded in the back ground by the deep green foliage of impenetrable forests standing in bold relief for many a mile against the sky. Near the centre of the stream, and nearly opposite the one just mentioned, stands another piece of land surrounded by water, known to this day by the very unromantic name of Hog Island, and looking for all the world like a nest for pirates, so impenetrable are the trees, undergrowth, and shrubbery with which it is thickly covered.

To prevent the sudden incursions of the treacherous savage, the city was surrounded with a wall or palisade, from the outside of which, at the northwestern end, was thrown a wooden bridge, so as to connect the first mentioned island with the main land. A single street ran nearly parallel with the river, extending over the upper half of the island and divided in the centre by the public square. On this were situated the Governor's mansion, state house, church, and other public buildings. Near where the line was broken by the space just mentioned, stood two spacious tenements, facing each other from opposite sides of the street. These were the rival hotels of the ancient city; and, after the fashion of that day, both had towering signposts erected before their respective doors, shaped something like a gibbet, upon which swung monotonously in the wind two huge painted sign-boards. These stood confronting each other like two angry rivals—one bearing the insignia of the Berkley arms, by which name it was designated,—and the other the Cross Keys, from which it also received its cognomen. The Berkley Arms was the rendezvous of all the Cavaliers of the colony, both old and young, and but a short time preceding the date of our story, was honoured as the place of assembly for the House of Burgesses.

The opposite and rival establishment received its patronage from the independent or republican faction.

It was late in the month of May, and towards the hour of twilight; the sun was just sinking behind the long line of blue hills which form the southwestern bank of the Powhatan, and the red horizontal rays fell along the rich volume of swelling waters dividing the city of Jamestown from the hills beyond with a line of dazzling yet not oppressive brilliance.

As the rich tints upon the water gradually faded away, their place was supplied in some small degree from large lanterns which now might be seen running half way up the signposts of the two hotels before mentioned, together with many lights of less magnitude visible in the windows of the same establishments and the various other houses within reflecting distance of the scene. The melancholy monotony of the rippling and murmuring waters against the long graduated beach now also began to give place to louder and more turbulent sounds, as the negroes collected from their work to gossip in the streets—Indians put off from the shore in their canoes, or the young Cavaliers collected in the Berkley Arms to discuss the news of the day or perhaps a few bottles of the landlord's best. On this occasion the long, well-scrubbed oaken table in the centre of the "News Room" was graced by the presence of some half dozen of the principal youths of the city. In the centre of the table stood the half-emptied bottle, and by each guest a full bumper of wine, and all were eager to be heard as the wine brightened their ideas and the company received fresh accessions from without.

"Oh, here comes one who can give us some news from the Governor's," said the speaker pro tempore, as a handsome and high-born youth of twenty-one entered the room with a proud step and haughty mien, and seated himself at the table as a matter of course, calling for and filling up a wine glass, and leisurely and carelessly throwing his cap upon the seat and his arm over the back of the next vacant chair, as he replied—"No, I bring no news from the Governor's, but I mistake the signs of the times if we do not soon hear news in this quarter."

All eyes were now turned upon the youth as he tossed off his wine. He was generally known among his companions by the familiar name of Frank Beverly, and was a distant kinsman and adopted son of the Governor, Sir William Berkley. News was no sooner mentioned than our host, turning a chair upon its balance, and resting his chin upon his hand, was all attention.

"What is it, Frank?" inquired Philip Ludwell, his most intimate friend and companion.

"Some mischief is brewing at the Cross Keys to-night," replied Frank, as the landlord moved up his chair nearer to the table, more than ever on the qui vive, when the Cross Keys became the subject of discussion.

"There is no one in the Tap of the Keys, as I can see from here," said another of the party, "and there is no light in any other portion of the house except the apartments of the family."

"They hide their lights under a bushel," continued Frank, with an affected nasal twang and a smile of contempt. Taking his nearest companion by the lappel of his doublet, and drawing him gently to where the rival establishment was visible through the door—"Do you not see a line of light just perceptible along the margin of the upper window? and if you will observe steadily for a moment, you will see numerous dim shadows of moving figures upon the almost impenetrable curtain which is drawn over it."

"Master Beverly is right, by old Noll's nose," said the landlord, as they all grouped together to catch a glimpse of the objects mentioned.

"You may well swear by Noll's nose in this case," returned Frank, "for unless I am much mistaken, those motions and gestures proceed from some of his late followers; indeed I know it. I was accidentally coming up the alley-way between the Keys and the next house, when I saw four or five of them cross the fence into the yard, and from thence enter the house by the back door."

"That's true, I'll swear," said the host, "for there they are, some dozen of them at least, and I'm a Rumper if a soul has darkened his front door this night. But couldn't you, Master Beverly, or one of the other young gentry, just step to the stout Sir William's, and make an affidavy to the facts? My word for it, he'd soon be down upon 'em with a fiery facias or a capias, or some such or another invention of the law."

The youths all burst into a loud cachinnation at the zeal of the landlord to unmask his rival, and reseating themselves, called for another bottle, which our friend of the Arms was not slow to produce, by way of covering his retreat and hiding his disinterested zeal. As they all refilled their glasses, Frank waved his hand for silence. "Has any gentleman here seen Mr. Nathaniel Bacon very lately?"

"I have not—I have not," replied each of the party, and the interrogator then continued, "I would give the best pair of spurs that ever graced a Cavalier's heels to know whether his long absence has had any thing to do with the getting up of yonder dark conclave?"

Whether any of the party were Bacon's immediate friends, or whether they suspected Frank's motives in the case, we shall not undertake to determine at present; but certain it is they were all silent on the point except his intimate friend Ludwell, who replied—"By St. George, Beverly, I believe you are jealous of Bacon on account of the favourable light in which he is said to stand in the eyes of your fair little mistress."

"If I thought that Virginia Fairfax would entertain a moment's consideration for a person of such doubtful parentage and more doubtful principles as Mr. Nathaniel Bacon, the ill-advised protegé of her father, I would forswear her for ever, and dash this glass against the floor, with which I now invite you all to join me in pledging her,—What say you? Will you join me, one and all?" All rose at the invitation, and while standing with glasses suspended midway to their lips, Ludwell added the name of "the pretty Harriet Harrison." It was drunk with three times three, and then the landlord was brought up by the collar of his jerken between two of the liveliest of the party, and made to tell the reckoning upon the table with his well-worn chalk. Having settled the score, they proceeded to decant full half the remaining bottle into one of his own pint flagons, seized from his shelves for that purpose. "Mine host" made sundry equivocal contortions of the countenance, and practised by anticipation several downward motions of the muscles of deglutition, and then swallowed the enormous potation without a groan.

"There now," said Ludwell, "bear it always in your remembrance that a like fate awaits you, whenever your wine bears evidence of having passed rather far into the state of acetous fermentation." As the party were now leaving the room in pairs, linked arm in arm, "Stop! stop!" cried Beverly; "I have one proposition to make before we separate. It is this. You know that there is to be a grand celebration the day after to-morrow, which is the anniversary of the restoration. The whole to conclude with a ball at the Governor's, to which I feel myself authorized to say that you will all be invited. Now I propose that we all go at different hours to-morrow and engage the hand of the fair Virginia for the first, second, third, fourth, fifth, and sixth sets. So that when Mr. Nathaniel Bacon returns, as he assuredly will, to claim her hand, to which he seems to think he has a prescriptive right, he will find no less than six different successful competitors. What say you, gentlemen?"

The proposition was instantly acceded to by all the party, and then the landlord of the Arms was left to digest the pint of his own sour wine in solitude, as he leaned his overgrown person against the casings of the door and watched the youths as they departed one by one in different directions to their respective places of abode.

"Natty Bacon is a goodly youth, however," he muttered in soliloquy; "ha, ha, ha; but he shall know of the plot if I can only clap eyes on him before they see the young lady. Let me see; can it be possible that Natty can have any thing to do with yonder dark meeting of Noll's men? I'll not believe it; he is too good a youth to meddle with such a canting, snivelling set as are congregated there. He always pays his reckoning like any gentleman's son of them all; and a gentleman's son I'll warrant he is, for all that no one knows his father but Mr. Gideon Fairfax."

The Cromwellians alluded to, who were supposed by the youths to be assembled at the Cross Keys, were a few of the late Protector's veteran soldiers, and were the most desperate, reckless and restless of the republicans who, as has been already mentioned, had fled to Jamestown after the restoration. These soldiers were unfitted for any kind of business, and generally lived upon the precarious hospitality of those of their own party who had settled themselves as industrious citizens of the new community.

The names of the leaders of these veteran soldiers and furious bigots were Berkinhead, Worley, Goodenough and Proudfit; and of these the reader will hear more anon.

CHAPTER II.

Late in the afternoon of the day succeeding the one designated in the last chapter, towards the southwestern extremity of the beach and outside of the palisade, a young and gentle creature, of most surpassing loveliness, moved thoughtfully along the sandy shore, every now and then casting a wistful glance over the water, and as often heaving a gentle sigh, as a shade of girlish disappointment settled upon her blooming face. Her dress was simple, tasteful, and exquisitely appropriate to her style of beauty. She had apparently scarce passed her sixteenth birthday; and of course her figure was not yet rounded out to its full perfection of female loveliness. So much of her neck as was visible above a rather high and close cut dress, was of that pure, chaste and lovely white which gives such an air of heavenly innocence to the budding girl of that delightful age. The face although exceeding the neck in the height, variety and richness of its colouring, was not disfigured by a single freckle, scar or blemish. The features were generally well proportioned and suited to each other, the lips full and gently pouting, with a margin of as luxurious tinting as that with which nature ever adorned the first budding rose of spring, and when parted, as they often were, by the most gentle and naïve laughter, displayed a set of teeth beautifully white and regular. Yet one could scarcely fasten the eye upon them for the admiration excited by the exquisite expression of the dimpled mouth, ever varying, and as it seemed, more lovely with each succeeding change. The motion of her eyes was so rapid that it was difficult to ascertain their colour; but certain it is they were soft and brilliant, the latter effect produced in no small degree by long fair dewy lashes which rose and fell over the picture, as lights and shadows fall from the pencil of an inspired painter.

The fair flaxen ringlets fell beneath the small gipsey hat in short thick curls, and were clustered around her brow, so as to form the most natural and appropriate shade imaginable to a forehead of polished ivory. She was about the medium height, symmetrically proportioned, with an exquisitely turned ankle and little foot, which now bounded over the beach with an impatience only surpassed by her own impetuous thoughts, as her eyes became intently riveted upon a moving speck upon the distant waters. The wild and startled expression, excited in the first moment of surprise, might now be seen merging into one of perfect satisfaction, as the distant object began to grow into distinct outlines at every plunge of the buoyant waves; her heart heaving its own little current to her face in perfect unison with their boisterous movements.

A beautifully painted canoe soon ran its curled and fantastic head right under the bank upon which she stood, and in the next moment a gallant and manly youth leaped upon the shore by her side, and taking her unresisting hand, gently removed the gipsey hat so as to bring into view a certain crimsoning of the neck and half averted face. Nathaniel Bacon, the youth just landed, was about twenty-one, and altogether presented an appearance of the most attractive and commanding character. He wore a green hunting jerken, buttoned close up to his throat so as to show off to the best advantage a broad and manly chest. Upon his head was a broad brimmed unstiffened castor, falling over his shoulders behind, and looped up in front by a curiously wrought broach.

A small brass hunting horn swung beneath one shoulder, while to the other was suspended a short cut and thrust sword. In his hand he bore a fishing rod and tackle.

Few as evidently were his years, much painful thought had already shadowed his handsome and commanding features with a somewhat precocious maturity. It was obviously, however, not the natural temperament of the man which now shone out in his features, after the subsiding of the first glow of delighted feeling visible for an instant as he watched the heightened bloom on the countenance of the maiden.

"You were not irreconcilably offended then at my rash and disrespectful behaviour to your father at our last meeting?"

"Certainly not irreconcilably so, Nathaniel, if offended at all; but I will confess to you candidly, that I was hurt and mortified, as much on your own, as on my father's account."

"You are always kind, considerate and forgiving, Virginia, and it behooves me in presence of so much gentleness, to ease my conscience in some measure by a confession. You have sometimes, but I have never, forgotten that I was thrown upon your father's hospitality an orphan and an outcast. This fact constantly dwells upon my mind, and sometimes harrows up my feelings to such a degree that I am scarcely conscious of my words or actions. It was so on the occasion alluded to. I forgot your presence, the respect due to your father and my benefactor, as well as what was due to myself. I had been endeavouring to revive some of the drunken reminiscences of that eccentric fellow who sits in the canoe there, but they tended only to inflame my ardent desire to know something more of myself. Certainly some allowances must be made for me, Virginia, under the mortifying circumstances in which I am placed. I thought your father could and ought to relieve this cruel suspense!"

"He will if he can, Nathaniel; and that he does not do so immediately, is the best evidence to my mind either that he knows nothing on the subject, or that some powerful reason exists why he should not disclose his knowledge at present. Come, then, return with me to our house; my father will take no notice of your absence or its cause, unless to jest with you upon your want of success in your fishing expedition, which it seems was the ostensible motive of your absence."

"It was my purpose to return, but I had not so amiably settled the how and the when; indeed the objects I had in view were so urgent that I determined to brave even your father's continued anger in order to obtain an interview with you."

"With me, Nathaniel!"

"Ay, with you, Virginia! You know that there are on the island some restless and turbulent spirits—late soldiers of the Protector. They have some dangerous project brewing I am well satisfied, from circumstances which accidentally fell under my own observation. You know too that the Recluse is said to have unbounded influence with these desperate men, and to be familiar with all their designs and movements. And notwithstanding your childish dread of him, you know that he loves you more than any living creature."

"I know all the things you speak of, except the last, and for that I suspect I am indebted to your imagination; but to what does all this lead?"

"I have just returned from a visit to that strange and mysterious old man, and as I have already hinted, hastened hither for the purpose of seeking an interview with you, which fortune has so opportunely thrown in my way."

"But I am yet in the dark. Why did you hasten from the Recluse to me, after discovering the things you speak of?"

"I will tell you; but you must be cool, calm and considerate while I do so, because I have that to tell and that to propose which will astound you!"

"Oh do tell it at once then, and not play upon my feelings thus."

"Your father's and your uncle's life is in danger, Virginia! Heaven, what have I done?" he continued, as he saw his companion turn deadly pale and lean against the palisade for support. But instantly recovering herself she asked—

"Whence does this danger come?"

"That I do not know exactly; but the Recluse knows, and I have been vainly endeavouring to learn it from him; and this brings me to the proposition which I have to make. You must visit him this night! 'Ay, Virginia! start not, you must do it for your father's and your uncle's sake!"

"Visit the Recluse, and at night! What will my parents say to it, think you?"

"They must not know one word of it."

"Then it is absolutely out of the question."

"Do not say so, Virginia, till you hear me out. As I have already said, the Recluse loves you better than he does any creature in the colony. He knows all the plots and counterplots that are going on, and if you will surprise him with a visit to-night, he will divulge the whole affair to you."

"Why must it be to-night?"

"Because there is no time to be lost. To-morrow is the anniversary of the Restoration. There is to be a grand celebration during the day, and a ball at night; this opportunity is to be taken advantage of in some way or other by the desperate men alluded to. If we wait till to-morrow, and make our visit publicly, these men will all know of it, and its very object be counteracted by that circumstance."

"Your reasons are plausible I confess, Nathaniel, and secret enemies are at all times dreadful, but your alternative is scarcely less so."

"I will pledge my life for your safety. You have the keys of your father's house at command, you can go and return through the servants' hall when they are all asleep. No sentinels are placed on the walls since the general peace with the confederated tribes of Indians. My canoe lies under the first abutment of the bridge. I will watch you from your father's door till you arrive there. We can then cross the creek in the canoe, so that no one will see us at the bridge. Brian O'Reily shall wait on the opposite shore with my horse and pillion for you, and another for himself. What then is there so much to be dreaded in this simple nocturnal excursion to a retired old man, who, to say the worst of him, is nothing more than fanatical on religious subjects, and certainly he is very wise and learned upon all others."

"It is the clandestine nature of the expedition that I object to, Nathaniel; it is so hurried—at such a strange hour too. At all events I must have a little time to consider of the propriety of the step."

"Certainly, you shall have as much time as the nature of the case will admit of. But see, the long shadows of the trees are already extending across the river and the birds are seeking their resting places for the night."

"Oh, happy little songsters! would to Heaven that my rest could be as sweet and tranquil as theirs this night? But Nathaniel, at what hour shall I meet you at the bridge, provided I determine upon the step you propose?"

"As the clock from the tower of the church strikes eleven I will be at my post." And as he stepped into his canoe, he continued, "Remember, Virginia, that it is your own peace and your father's safety that I am endeavouring to secure in the course I urge you to adopt."

As the little vessel rose and sunk over the swelling waves in its passage round the town, Virginia stood on the brink of the river and gazed upon the scene in a deeply meditative mood, very new to her young and hitherto careless heart. At length when her late companion had long disappeared from her sight, and the sombre shadows of evening were fast closing around the ancient city, she slowly passed into the gates of the palisade and sought her father's dwelling.

CHAPTER III.

Violent was the struggle of contending emotions within the bosom of Virginia Fairfax, when she had gained her own apartment, and strove to form her determination in the matter proposed by Nathaniel Bacon. On such occasions feeling usurps the place of reason, and the longer we deliberate, the more perplexing seem to grow our doubts and difficulties. If, however, there were powerful feelings contending against the enterprise, there were equally if not more powerful ones operating in its favour. Not the least among these was the estimation in which she held both him who proposed the nocturnal expedition and him whose advice and aid were expected to be gained. Bacon himself, it was generally believed, had acquired most of his knowledge of books from the mysterious personage alluded to, and he in his turn had been the instructer of his fair young associate and playmate. It is true that these relations of the several parties had somewhat changed of late years, as the two younger ones approached the age at which their continuance might be deemed improper, to say nothing of any little misgivings of which, they might themselves be conscious, as to the nature of many strange and novel impressions, the growth of years and intimacy, perhaps, but not suspected until with advancing years came change of relative situation and prospect for the future.

All the various relations of our heroine to the other parties presented themselves in successive aspects to her view, as she endeavoured honestly to decide the matter according to the dictates of duty. While she was thus deliberating, the usual evening meal was announced. As she entered the apartment, and beheld her father and mother waiting for her to assume the head of the table, which on account of the latter's delicate health had been her custom of late, all the contending emotions which had so lately occupied her mind were renewed with increasing force by the sight of the beloved objects in whose behalf she was solicited to undertake the strange adventure.

Gideon Fairfax, the father of Virginia, was one of the Cavaliers, before alluded to, who fled to Jamestown during the interregnum. He was brother-in-law to the Governor of the colony, and was, at the time of which we write, a member of the council. He was one of that remarkable race of men which has so powerfully influenced the destinies of the Ancient Dominion from that day to the present. He was rather above the medium height, with light hair and eyes, and although he had considerably passed the prime of life, there was a sparkling of boyish vivacity in his eyes, and a cheerful expression always hovering about his mouth, which instantly dispelled any thing like formality in his intercourse with others. Yet withal there was a bold, reckless daring in his look, together with an open-hearted sincerity which served to give a manly dignity to the lighter expressions already mentioned. To his only daughter he was most devotedly attached.

Mrs. Emily Fairfax seemed about the same age as her husband, and though she still preserved some evidence of former beauty, her countenance was now mostly indebted for any charm that it possessed to a mild, lady-like and placid serenity, which was occasionally shadowed by an air of melancholy so profound, that more than once her friends were alarmed for her reason. As Virginia assumed her place at the board, the conflict in her mind was in nowise subdued by observing that one of these melancholy visitations was just settling upon her mother's countenance; indeed there seemed to be a mutual discovery on the part of mother and daughter, that each had some secret cause of uneasiness; but the effect was by far the most painful to the mother's heart, as it was the first time that she had ever seen her daughter's gay and happy temperament seriously disturbed. The parting hour for the night arrived, without making either of them wiser as to the cause of the other's pre-occupation and evident anxiety; the mother having sought an explanation in vain, and the daughter being too much accustomed to her present state of mind to intrude farther upon her sorrows, whatever might be their cause or nature. Bacon's arguments prevailed, and long before the hour appointed, Virginia was sitting at the window, her light extinguished, mantle drawn close around her to exclude the damp air from the river, and her hat tied on in readiness for the expedition.

At length the town clock began to send its slow and solemn sounds across the water. The house was still and dark, and the inmates apparently wrapped in profound slumber. Her own clandestine movements, so new to her, seemed like the trampling of armed heels rather than the footfalls of her own slight figure. More than once she was on the point of retracing her steps, so tumultuous and painful were her emotions in prosecuting an adventure which still appeared to her of such questionable propriety. The servants' hall, garden, and postern gate were all passed without the slightest interruption, save an occasional start at her own shadow, or the impetuous beating of her agitated heart. The moon was at her zenith, and the clouds coursing high in the heavens, so as every now and then to obscure her reflected beams, and present alternate and fantastic contrasts of light and shade upon the surrounding objects. The river for one moment looked like a dark abyss, and the next a mirror of light as the silver rays fell sparkling upon the rippling waters beneath the bridge. The interminable forest beyond was at one moment dark as Erebus, and the next as light as fairy land. There is no appearance of the heavens, perhaps, which produces a greater tendency in the mind to undefined and superstitious terror than that which we have attempted to describe. Our own shadow, visible as it is only for an instant, will startle us; and the ill-omened birds of night acquire huge and unnatural proportions as they flit swiftly by on noiseless wings in this rapid alternation of light and gloom. The wolves and other beasts of prey might be heard at long intervals, as their wild and savage howls broke upon the ear, reverberating from cliff to cliff as they fell upon and were borne across the water. Under these circumstances it may be readily imagined that our heroine was not a little relieved at the sight of Bacon leaning against the nearest abutment of the bridge, anxiously watching for her approach. In a few moments he had seated his companion in the boat, upon a cushion formed of his cloak, and was rapidly approaching the opposite shore. When they arrived at the appointed rendezvous, a very unexpected source of uneasiness was speedily discovered. As has been already intimated, Bacon had early in the evening despatched his usual attendant, Brian O'Reily, across the bridge to wait their arrival. The horses were indeed there—and O'Reily was there, but so intoxicated as to be apparently in no condition to guide the motions of a horse, even should he be able to keep the saddle. Bacon lost all patience at this discovery, and would perhaps have taken summary and not very agreeable means to sober his attendant, had he not been reminded by his gentle companion of the peculiar and privileged position which Brian had from time immemorial enjoyed in his service, as well as that of their own family. "How comes it, sir," said the young man, "that I find you in this predicament when I gave you such strict injunctions to keep yourself sober? Now of all other times!—when I had taken so much trouble to instruct you whom you were to guard, and upon what expedition?"

"By the five crasses, but you've hit the very nail upon the head. By the contints of the book but that's the very rason I took a dhrop of the crathur!"

"What is the reason, you drunken old fool?"

"The business were an to be sure! you wouldn't be after axing a sinner like Brian O'Reily to ixpose himself to sich a temptation widout taking a dhrop, and may be your haner would do that same for all your spaking aginst it so intirely."

"And what may the nature of the temptation be of which you speak?"

"And is it Brian you're after axin? O begorra, but that's runnin away wid the story intirely, so it is; sure it's me should be axin your haner after that same!"

"None of your subterfuges, sir! I am determined to know your ideas of this dreadful temptation."

"By my purty an is it Brian's idaas you're axin after, divil a miny o' them he's got any way, barrin a small bit of a smotherin about the heart whenever I think of the business we're on, and the gintleman we're goin to see, savin your prisence and the beauty o' the world by your side."

"What gentleman—speak out and I will forgive your drunkenness, provided you give me up that bottle I see peeping from the pouch of your jerkin."

"An is'nt it the man widout the shadow you're after making a tay party wid?"

"And who is the man without a shadow, Brian?" inquired Virginia, willing to forget her own misgivings in the more ludicrous superstition of the son of the Emerald Isle, whose countrymen, it may be remarked, formed no inconsiderable part of the inferior population of the city at that day.

"Oh bad cess to me, but I'm as glad to see you as two tin pinnies, you beauty o' the world; but it bates all the love I had for you and ever had these ten years past to see where you'r going."

"Well, where is it, Brian?"

"Hav'nt I tould your ladyship it was to a tay party wid the inimy himself."

"Come, see if you can assist Virginia to the pillion," said Bacon, as he sprang into the saddle.

"By my purty and I'll do that same;" kneeling upon one knee and taking one foot in his hand, and then seating her as easily and gracefully as if he had been a stranger to the bottle for a month.

"I had no idea that you were such a coward, Brian," continued his master.

"Sorra a dhrop o' coward's blood runs in Brian O'Reily's heart, iny way. It's one thing to trate the grate inimy with dacent respect, and its another to fight the yellow nagres that go dodgin from tree to tree like so many frogs; the devil fly away wid the one and the t'other o' them for me, I say."

"And who is the great enemy?"

"Sure hav'nt I tould your haner and the beauty o' the world by your side, it was the man widout a shadow what lives in the stone house widout windows, as well he may, seein the light o' his own counthenance may be seen across the river the darkest night any day."

"Sit your horse straight, you drunken piece of stupidity, or you will break your neck."

"Oh! an if Brian never breaks his neck till he falls from a horse, sure he'll live to take many a dhrop of the crathur yet before he dies. Sure I was only crassin myself, divil a word o' lie's in that, iny way."

"There, I have broken one of your necks at least," said Bacon, as with the butt of his riding whip he struck the neck from a bottle which every now and then peeped from Brian's pocket as the motions of the horse raised him in the saddle.

"Oh! murther all out, but you'll come to want yet before you die. Oh sure, but the crathur's safe after all. Wo, ye divil of a baste, don't you hear the crathur all runnin down the wrang side o' me. Wo, I say! Oh but the bottle sticks as tight to the pouch as if it growed there. Oh murther all out, I'm ruined, I'm ruined intirely."

"Draw your arm from your jerken, Brian, and then you can drink out of your pocket," said Virginia, suppressing a laugh.

"Oh you beauty o' the world, see what it is to have the larnin," replied the Irishman, immediately adopting the expedient; but here a new difficulty presented itself. "Oh murther, but the gable end's all knocked off and fax the chimney went along with it. Oh, but the crokery sticks up all round like pike staffs. Wo you murthur'n baste; Now I've got it, now I've got it, you beauty; sorra one of the lane cows at Jamestown gives sich milk as that, fax if they did, I'd be head dairyman to the Governor any way."

Thus our adventurers beguiled the way through a dreary and trackless forest of some miles, until they approached a spot where Bacon signified to the party that they had accomplished so much of their journey as was to be performed on horseback. What farther befell them will be described in the ensuing chapter.

CHAPTER IV.

Bacon and his companion having left O'Reily with the horses, now commenced descending an immense hill which formed one side of a dark and dismal looking glen. The tall pine trees with which the higher grounds were covered seemed to reach half way to the clouds. A cold midnight breeze swept through the damp and dewy foliage of the trees and shrubbery. The birds of night chimed mournfully and dismally in unison with the monotonous rustling of the leaves, and the rippling of a little brook just before them. When they had stepped across the stream, and cast their eyes up the face of the opposite hill, the rays of the moon suddenly broke through a fissure of the clouds, revealing to them rather the darkness around than any distinct traces of the path which they were to pursue. Bacon stood for an instant, and gazed intently upon a little spot of partially cleared ground half way to the summit, then gently drawing his companion to the same place where he stood, and pointing upwards, he said "Do you not perceive something moving yonder? It is he! you must now proceed alone!"

"Alone, Nathaniel? Impossible!"

"You must, Virginia; he will not admit more than one person at a time within his cell. Fear not there is no earthly danger; I will be within call. Rouse your drooping courage! the worst half of your undertaking is now accomplished."

"By far the worst half is yet to come, Nathaniel; you can form no conception of the awe with which I look upon that being! You forget that I have never seen more of him than I see now, notwithstanding you say that he is so much attached to me."

"It is strange, I confess Virginia, but it is nevertheless true."

"His affection, if it exists, must be the fruit of your representations as to some imaginary proficiency in my studies."

"Not at all; he seems to know every one in Jamestown, and all the circumstances connected with their history: but come, Virginia, we are losing precious time. Move on and fear nothing."

Clasping her hands, and internally summoning up all her resolution, she advanced with a sort of desperate determination. Having arrived within some forty yards of the spot before alluded to, the outlines of a gigantic figure could easily be discerned as his footfalls were distinctly heard moving restlessly to and fro on a sort of platform or level space, left by nature or formed by art, in the side of the hill. His head towered far above the stunted undergrowth, interspersed among the rugged outlines of the scene. And as he impatiently measured the narrow limits of this outer court to his castle, he seemed not unlike a chafed and hungry monarch of the forest when making the narrow rounds of his iron bound limits. Having gone thus far, she was sensible that it was nearly as bad to recede as go forward, and that if she retreated now upon the very eve of the fulfilment of all that Bacon had promised, her past anxieties would have been endured for nothing: she braced her nerves therefore, and endeavoured to subdue the overpowering terror which the distant view of this strange and mysterious man had excited. Summoning all her resolution for one desperate effort, she threw herself forward and fell at the feet of the huge mortal, who stood apparently astounded at the abrupt appearance of his unwonted and untimely visiter. When Virginia found courage enough to raise her lately closed eyes, she was not a little astonished to see him leaning against the stone walls of his cell, no less agitated than herself. He was apparently about sixty years of age, his hair slightly silvered, and his features worn and weatherbeaten, yet eminently handsome. His person was very remarkable, being about six feet and a half in height and perfectly proportioned. His dress conformed in some degree to the military fashions of the day, having however rather the appearance of undress than full uniform. The expression of his countenance was decidedly intellectual; and about the lower part of his face there were some indications of a disposition to sensuality, but tempered and controlled in no ordinary degree by some other fierce and controlling passion. His eye was wild and unsettled at times, and again assumed the mild serenity of the profound student. Altogether, his presence was intellectual and commanding in the highest degree.

As he stood against the wall of his cell quaking like an aspen, an indifferent observer would have been at a loss to determine which was the most agitated, he or his gentle visiter. Virginia noted with more than one furtive glance his strange and unexpected embarrassment, still however, preserving her humble and supplicating posture. At length, struggling with the emotions which unmanned him, muttering all the while broken sentences which fell strangely upon her ear, and among which she could distinguish repeated allusions to herself, and to events of long passed years, recalled as it appeared by some fancied resemblance traced by his excited imagination in her form and features. He approached the kneeling maiden, and taking her hand, he raised her from the ground, and said in a tone of kindness, "My wayward fancies frighten thee, my child; be not alarmed, however—there is nothing here to harm thee. My house is poor and cheerless, but such as it is, thou art welcome to its shelter, and to any services which I can render to thee. Come, my daughter, let us in from the damps of the night."

The cell of the Recluse was formed on three sides by stone walls without windows, as O'Reily had described them, the fourth being furnished by the side of the hill, and the roof an arch of masonry overgrown with moss, grass and weeds.[1]

Pressing open the rude door, he entered, followed by Virginia. Near one corner of the room stood a common deal table, on which was placed a small iron lamp, and near to it a three legged stool of the rudest construction. These were the only articles of furniture of which the apartment could boast. The floor, which consisted of the earth, as nature had made it, was overgrown with weeds and bushes. "This," said he, with a bitter smile upon his countenance, "is my hall of audience! Here I receive my guests, with one solitary exception; thou shalt be another." Having thus spoken, he took the lamp from the table, and drawing aside some dried bushes which were piled against the side formed by the hill in apparent carelessness, he exhibited to her view the mouth of a cavern, not sufficient in height by several feet to admit his person in the erect position. "This," said he as he stooped to enter, "is not a house made with hands, and it is built upon a rock of ages. The rains may descend, floods may come, winds blow and beat upon it, but it falleth not. It is proper that thou shouldst see it, and such has long been my intention. I have much to say to thee, and doubtless thou hast something to communicate to me, or thou wouldst not have made this visit. But not a whisper of what thou mayst see or hear must ever pass thy lips, save to those I shall authorize thee to make partakers of thy knowledge. This is a condition which thou must impress upon thy mind." Stepping in a bent position within the mouth of the cavern, he moved forward and downward, motioning her to follow. They descended many rude and natural steps, which were imperfectly seen by the light of the lamp borne by her singular guide, the rays being often obscured by the bulk and great height of his person in the narrow passages of the cave, so that she was more than once compelled to grope her way by sliding her hand along the cold damp and dripping walls, and by slipping her feet over the uneven ground, without raising them in the act of stepping. Having completed the descent, she found herself in a long natural vestibule to the inner apartments. Her guide had gained rapidly upon her, so that when once more upon level ground, some thirty feet below the outer surface of the earth, he was almost out of sight. She would have cried out, had she not been restrained by a counteracting feeling, which placed her in a grievous dilemma between horror at the dismal place, and fear of the singular being who had undertaken to guide her through its recesses. Commending herself however to her Maker in mental prayer, and trusting in his protection the more confidently on account of the motive for her undertaking, she hastened forward so as with great exertions to keep within sight of the rising and sinking light of the lamp, and the devious windings of the cavern. The footfalls of her Herculean guide reëchoed along the damp and gloomy tunnels with an awful and dismal effect, amidst the grave-like stillness of the place. Occasionally flickering shadows were reflected against the walls, when the light turned suddenly round a projecting rock, affording to her imagination the most startling and frightful images. While her mind was combatting these unreal terrors, she was surprised by the tone of a deep hoarse voice abruptly rumbling through the high dark arches far above her head, with that reverberating sound peculiar to these secret places of the earth. But her amazement was still greater, when lifting her eyes in the direction of the lamp she beheld the Recluse standing upon a lofty but narrow ledge of rock, the lamp flickering and sinking every now and then so as to threaten total darkness. He was pointing with his finger, and directing her to a projecting and winding pathway by which she must ascend to the platform upon which he stood. This once gained, she had a complete view of the resting place of her mysterious guide.

Immediately fronting the platform was a natural doorway, about as high as her own head, leading into the inner chamber. From the high and vaulted arches hung thousands of the fantastic creations of hoary time, and from the centre of these a cord swung into the middle of the area, to which was suspended a burning lamp, the rays of which were brilliantly reflected from a thousand shining mirrors of nature's forming. In one corner she discovered, as they entered, several pieces of firearms, and against the wall on one side hung huge swords, long enough for two-handed weapons to ordinary mortals, together with Indian war clubs, moccasins, wampum, pipes, tomahawks, spears, arrows, and other implements of savage warfare. In another corner stood a rude bedstead, evidently constructed by the hands of its nightly occupant, a small table, two or three chairs, and a few culinary articles,—some the manufacture of the savages, and others the product of civilized ingenuity. By far the largest part of one side of the room was occupied by coarsely constructed shelves, bearing many volumes of the most venerable appearance. One of these was lying open upon the table, a pair of horn spectacles upon the page to mark the place where the owner had last been engaged. The very letters in which it was printed were entire strangers to the eyes of our heroine. Some thirty yards distant, in the remotest part of the room, a little furnace diffused a narrow circle of glowing light through its otherwise gloomy precincts. These completed the establishment, so far as the eye could discover its arrangement.

When he had led Virginia into the habitable part of this area, he placed a chair, and motioned for her to be seated, drawing a stool near the table at the same time for himself, and resting his head upon the palm of his hand. "I will not affect ignorance of thy name and person, my daughter, nor yet of thy errand here. The first I should most certainly have known, if I had not surmised the last. Alas! my child, thou wilt think no doubt that I speak in riddles when I tell thee that those features have been engraven upon the heart of one who has forsworn the world for many a long and irksome year. Thou mayest well look amazed, my poor bewildered child, but it is true! I cannot explain it to thee now, however; some day perhaps thou mayest know all. Oh, if thou couldst imagine what events must take place in this little isolated world around Jamestown, before the mysteries of which I speak can rightfully be made clear to thee, thou wouldst fall upon thy knees and pray that such disastrous knowledge might never come to thy understanding!"

As his eye rested from time to time, while he spoke, upon the features of the beautiful girl, he covered his face with his hands, and seemed for an instant to give way to an agitation similar to that which unnerved him at her first appearance on the platform. Occasionally too, when not speaking himself, he became profoundly abstracted for a moment, and his eye was wild and restless, and not a little alarming to his gentle visiter, as it ever and anon fell upon herself, and seemed to gather in her face the solution of some subtle doubt of his troubled mind. But observing that his glances, wild as they were, always became humanized and softened as they rested upon her face, she seized the first opportunity to complete the object of her journey, not well knowing how it might terminate, being herself ignorant of its especial object, and indeed of the very nature of the threatened danger.

"Father, I came here to seek your aid and protection for those who are near and dear to me; My honoured parents—my mother"—she would have proceeded, but at the mention of her mother's name he was seized with such a convulsive shudder that she paused in astonishment. It seemed as if the hand of death was already laying its cold grasp upon his vitals. His eye gleamed wildly—his lips trembled, and his hands shook as one stricken with the palsy, or overwhelmed by some sudden stroke of calamity. By a desperate effort of resolution, he speedily resumed his attention to the discourse, and she proceeded: "I have been advised and urged in my resort to this step by one not unknown to you, under the vain hope, I fear, that you were cognizant of some threatened danger to my dear parents and kindred, and that you would communicate the knowledge to me rather than to him."

"As I have already said, my daughter, I surmised that something of this nature was the object of thy visit, and I will now confess to thee that this appeal places me in an embarrassing position between some friends of former and better days and my desire to grant thy request." Pausing and apparently soliloquizing, he continued: "But have they not acted against my advice? Did I not tell them, that we had had enough of that already? Did I not warn them against this very result? I cannot betray them, however; no, no, my old comrades, I will give you another warning, and then your blood, if it must flow, be upon your own heads." He was about to resume his discourse to his visiter, but stopping suddenly and raising his finger in the attitude of one listening in the profoundest attention, he seized the small lamp, rushed past the little furnace in the direction of the cave through the hill opposite the entrance, at one time rising and anon descending, until Virginia (who had followed, fearing to be left alone) supposed they must be again near the surface of the earth. He paused once more to listen, motioning her at the same time to be silent. He had scarcely done so, when the distant sound of running water struck upon her ear,—sometimes distinct, and again as if buried in the bowels of the earth. Then came the noise as of a stone splashing in the water. The eye of the Recluse sparkled as he turned with a quick and expressive glance towards his companion. He hastily applied his ear to the rocky side of the cavern and listened for a second, then hurried back, taking Virginia by the hand in his return, and leading her to her former seat. He then busied himself for a few moments in exchanging the short cutlass by his side for one of the huge weapons hanging on the wall, and placed a pair of large and richly inlaid petronels in his belt, as if about to march on some secret and desperate expedition.

Whether these were really for such a purpose, or were his usual preparations for repose, Virginia was entirely at a loss to determine. Meantime she had an opportunity to survey the features and expression of his countenance, as he from time to time faced towards her, intently engaged with his occupation, and muttering all the while words to her altogether inexplicable at the time.

His large and light blue eye had an expression of forced resignation and calmness, drops of cold perspiration stood upon his brow, lip, and bald head, which was now uncovered. His features were large and striking, but well proportioned, the lips protuberant, the teeth large, white, and regular, and as a smile, indicative more of wretchedness than mirth, played upon his face, the impression was irresistible that the wrinkles which marked his features were the impress of suffering rather than of age. In his personal as well as mental attributes he was eminently gifted, though there seemed to be a settled design, as much to clothe the one in the garb of age, as to exhibit the other, if at all, in meekness and humility.

"It is not consistent with my duty to all parties in this business, my daughter, to enlighten thee as to the nature of the danger which threatens thy friends, or as to the means of preventing it. I owe it to myself, first to warn those from whom it comes, yet once more against their undertaking, as I have already done—but thus far in vain. If they are still deaf to my admonition and entreaties, rest assured that I will leave no power or influence within my control unexerted to thwart their purposes. Thou mayest therefore direct him who must have conducted thee hither, to see me early on the morrow, and I will inform him as to the result of my endeavours and the best means to pursue in case they are unsuccessful. Rest thou contented yet a little while; I see thou art impatient, but I have some things to say to thee concerning other matters than those which brought thee hither. I see thou art studying these evidences of years in my features as the forester examines the rings in the fallen tree to estimate its age, but these (pointing to the wrinkles) are records which years alone could not have wrought. Few of us, my daughter, can read these marks of time and destiny, and trace through them one by one, the disappointed hopes, the cruel mishaps, the hair-breadth adventures, their failure, sealed perhaps in the blood of those who had basked together with us in the sunshine of youth and hope, without a sinking of the heart within us, and a deep sense of the utter worthlessness of all those gay illusions which beam so brightly on thy own youthful features.

"I allude to this subject now, my daughter, because there seems to be some connexion between it and the one upon which I have been so anxious to commune with thee. Although we have never met before, it is not the first time I have seen thee, nor is this, which thou hast given me, the first information I have received concerning thee and thine. I have taken some pains to learn even the minutest circumstances connected with thy past history, present occupation and future prospects. I see thy surprise, but it was not done in idle gossip thou mayest be well assured. My motives will all be made plain enough to thee some day. In the mean time I must approach a subject which I fear will give thee pain, but my duty is imperative, I mean the state of thy mind and feelings."

"Alas, father, I fear you will find them but too deeply engrossed with the cares and pleasures of this world."

"Thy mistake is a natural one," said he, (one of those smiles of wretchedness passing over his pale countenance, as a flash of electricity darting along the horizon sometimes shows us the extent and depth of the darkness beyond) "my situation and past misfortunes would indeed seem to fit me for a teacher of holy things, but my present business is with thy worldly affections. Start not, my daughter; I have the most urgent reasons which a mortal can have for thus endeavouring to intrude myself into thy feminine secrets; believe me, no trifling cause could impel me thus to startle thy maidenly delicacy, nor indeed needest thou be startled on one account which I see agitates thee. Thou very naturally supposest me to have some charge to bring against thee for want of proper spirit and maidenly reserve; I see it by thy blushes; but there is no such thought within my breast; thou mayest have been even more guarded than is customary with females of thy age. My business is with facts, and facts of such a nature that however stubborn they may be, I fear that thou art unconscious of them, though they relate to thyself and one other person only. However, without bringing thee to confessional, I think I can sufficiently put thee upon thy guard without wounding thy delicacy. The only question in my own mind is, whether the time to speak has not already passed."

"I am at a loss to comprehend you, father."

"I will speak more plainly then. Thou hast been associating for some years with a youth of little more than thine own age. He is noble and gifted with every manly and generous attribute; well instructed too for his time and country. To thee I will give credit for corresponding qualities suitable to thy own sex, and I have no doubt that thou possessest them. Thinkest thou then that two such persons could grow up together constantly within the influence of each other's expanding personal attractions, besides the nobler ones of mind and heart, without feeling more towards each other than two ordinary mortals of the same sex? Oh, I see the crimson tell-tale mounting in thy cheeks; thou hangest thy head too in tacit acknowledgement, that I have surmised no more than the truth." His visiter for some time made a vain effort to speak, and at length overcoming her confusion and surprise, in broken sentences exclaimed, "Indeed" indeed, father, you wrong me! indeed you wrong us both! such a subject was never mentioned between us to this hour! Nay more, it never entered our"—as she looked up and perceived his searching glance riveted upon her countenance, her head again sunk in embarrassment, and the words died upon her lips.

"Cease, cease, my daughter, to punish thyself. I will give thee credit for all thou wouldst say. I am willing to believe that neither of you has ever mentioned this subject, and perhaps that neither has ever been conscious of more than a brotherly affection towards the other. Nevertheless, the last half hour has fully convinced me that self-examination, some sudden prospect of separation, or some untoward circumstance in the ordinary current of your intercourse was only necessary to awaken both to the perception of the truth. But my business now is of a far more painful nature than the mere finding of the facts. I am bound in duty to warn thee! solemnly warn thee that this passion must be subdued in its inception. I beg of thee not to suppose for one moment, that my warning has reference merely to obstacles which commonly obstruct the current of young and mutual affection! They are absolutely insurmountable,—far more so than any that could arise from difference of rank, or faith, or country! Nay, if death itself had put its seal upon one or both, the gulf could not have been more impassable!" His language began gradually to grow more impassioned, his eye shot forth a continued instead of occasional gleam of wildness—he rose upon his feet, and as he pronounced the barrier to be impassable, he took down a large and ancient manuscript volume, bound in leather, threw it open upon the table, and to her astonishment a bloody hand was all that was visible upon the page which seemed to have been accidentally turned up. He pointed to this singular sign-manual—his finger trembling with emotion—"See there," said he—"see what it is to neglect a solemn warning. There is the diary of my eventful life—the transactions of every day for more than twenty-seven years are there written, save one! There is the only record of that day! Its history is written in blood! The seal of Cain is stamped upon all the events of the succeeding pages. Since that bloody token was placed there, its author has been a wanderer and an outcast. I was born among the haughty and the proud of a proud land—there is my coat of arms," said he, with a horrid laugh which sent the blood coursing back to the heart of our heroine chilled and horrified. "These are not or should not be uninteresting records to thee!—had that crimson attestation never been imprinted there, thou wouldst never have been born! but this will suffice for the first lesson," (and he closed the book and replaced it upon the shelf;) "at some more convenient season I will reveal another page of the history of one with whom henceforth thou wilt be more connected than thou now imaginest. Now, my daughter, before thou takest leave, let me entreat thee to remember and ponder well upon what I have said to thee. Shouldst thou ever be in any sudden strait of danger or difficulty send to me a memento of the bloody seal and I will come to thee, if within the compass of mortal means; and remember likewise, should I ever send such an emblem to thee—pause well upon what thou art about to do. Now thou mayest depart in peace, but say nothing of what thou hast seen or heard farther than I have directed thee to do." And thus speaking he took the lamp and conducted her out by the same opening at which they had entered.

They stood upon the platform overlooking the shadowy mazes of moonlit foliage down the glen; all nature was as silent as when it first came from the hands of its Creator. Looking towards heaven, and placing his hand upon her flaxen ringlets, now wafted about in the richest reflections and deepest contrasts of light and shadow, as a cold breeze from the valley beneath sought an opening to the plains beyond, he said, "May God Almighty bless and preserve thee, my daughter!" And then led her some distance down the hill—bade her adieu, and left her to seek her more youthful guide, and to ponder upon some novel and not very pleasing passages in the diary of her own experience.

Her ideas were any thing but clear and definite. The whole scene of her late interview was so new—the subject so startling to her young and innate delicacy. Taking it for granted, however, that all the surmises of the Recluse were true with regard to herself, that person has studied human nature to little purpose, who supposes that she, after all that had been so solemnly announced, admitted the undefined obstacles mentioned to be as insuperable as the person who suggested them seemed to imagine. Nevertheless an injunction so grave and authoritative had its minor effects—the first of which were visited upon the head of our hero, who impatiently awaited her approach at the foot of the hill.

CHAPTER V.

When Virginia arrived at the foot of the hill, and looked back, she could see the Herculean figure of the Recluse, throwing its tall shadow far down the face of the cliff, as he paced his narrow court exactly as she had found him doing.

The surrounding scenery now looked doubly brilliant to her confused senses, after the gloomy contrasts of her late subterranean journey. The fleeting clouds were entirely dispersed, and the moonbeams shone clearly forth in undimmed splendour, tipping with silver light each tree and shrub, on the hill side and in the dale, and sparkling like gems along the rippling current of the purling brook on the banks of which Bacon waited her approach.

Although the language of the Recluse was somewhat dark and oracular, it was sufficiently explicit to produce a very sensible effect upon the mind of Virginia, which our hero was not long in discovering; for as he extended his hand to assist her across the brook, she tacitly declined the proffered aid, as if unobservant of his intention, and leaped the streamlet unassisted. He was the more astonished, that in the whole of their long intercourse he could not recollect such a whim or freak occurring towards himself. She seemed reserved and formal too, as they moved up the opposite hill; but without remarking on her altered mood, he sought to draw from her the result of her expedition. Barely communicating so much as she had been directed to do, however, she remained to him inexplicably silent.

While he was revolving these things in his mind his companion, silently and moodily walking at his side, without availing herself of his offered arm, they met Brian O'Reily somewhat farther down the hill than the spot where they had left him—the bridle of a horse slung upon each arm—a handkerchief tied round his waist, into which were stuck two pertronels from his own saddlebow; and in his hand his master's ready for use.

"In the name of all the saints in Ireland, what is the matter, Brian?" exclaimed Bacon.

"Oh! an be the Holy Father at Rome, is it there'ye are? Sure as death, but I'm the boy that thought ye were clane murthered iny'way."

"Murdered! why who was to murder us?"

"Faix, an there's enough iv them to do that same in this bloody place. Barrin the tay party wid the great inimy in the side iv the hill yonther, a'int there enough iv the bloody nagurs (the savages,) ranting about like so many wild bastes, ready to peale the tap iv your heads like a pair of onions or murpheys—divil a word a lie's in that iny way."

"Are there any of the savages abroad to-night?"

"Be the contints iv the book, but there is five yallow rascals gone over the hill towards the city half an hour since. Oh, by my purty, but I was as near putting a key note to one of their whistles, as two tin pinnies, only, that I was jalous iv your own safety, and the beauty by your side at that same reckning."

"I commend your discretion in not shooting—and I wonder at your sobriety, considering the condition in which we left you."

"Oh, is it Brian O'Reily's discretion your haner's after namin?—an is'nt it me that's a pathern o' sobriety? Oh, by the five crasses, but it all comes iv the dhrap o' the crathur I got by the larnin iv you, ye beauty; divil a word a lie's in that."

"Gone towards the town have they?" said Bacon, musing—and then examining the priming of his petronels, he took them—placed them in their holsters, and mounted his horse, motioning to his attendant at the same time, to assist Virginia to the pillion. She being mounted, he continued his discourse to her. "Keep up your courage my brave pupil; no danger shall molest you unencountered."

"Strange as it may appear," replied she, for the first time uttering something more than a monosyllable. "The real danger in which we seem placed, has few terrors, after my late subterranean visit." This last part of the sentence was said in an under tone, as they cantered over the hill.

"You have done bravely, Virginia, and now Brian it is our turn. Do you ride foremost—but on no account pull trigger, or draw your sword, without my orders. We are at peace with the confederated tribes of the peninsula:—should the party therefore prove to be any of these, bloodshed will be, unnecessary. Remember, and be watchful!"

"Oh! be the powers iv mud and darkness, but there's no more profit in watchin these skulking nagurs, than there is in spakin to the fish to make them take the bate; both the one and the tother o' them bites when you laste expect it. Oh! would'nt it be a fine thing to have a praste to walk along afore ye wid the contints of the book spread out before him?"

"Get along O'Reily with your nonsense; one would suppose, to hear you talk, that you were the greatest coward in Christendom."

The conversation of the Hibernian was at all times amusing to our adventurers, and was enjoyed with more zest, doubtless, on account of the many excellent qualities which they knew him to possess, being as they knew, brave, devotedly attached to them both, and of unvarying good humour. On the present occasion, Bacon encouraged his volubility in order to divert his companion's attention from dwelling upon the danger which he but too clearly saw might await them on their passage to the city; and thus was the time beguiled, until they arrived at the top of the hill commanding the town and river, without encountering a single foe, or meeting with any adventure worth recording. As they descended towards the river, and O'Reily was just felicitating himself "that there was a clane path intirely across the stream." A sudden exclamation of surprise from Bacon, induced him to rein up his steed, in order to ascertain the cause. This however was clearly seen before the retrograde movement was completed.

"Oh! the murtherin thaves iv the world," said O'Reily, "there they are in our boat too, as sure as my name's Brian O'Reily. Your haner's a good shot across that same little river, any way, and by these pair o' beauties that never lie nor chate" he continued, unslinging his arms, "but I'll be bound for a couple or three more iv them. By the vestments but we'll put some o' them to slape, wid a tune that'll ring in their ears to the day o' their deaths."

"Softly! softly, O'Reily" said Bacon, "you are as far on the one extreme now as I thought you on the other a while ago. Don't you see that two watch on this side, besides the three in the boat? And as I live, they are preparing to push off. Quick, Brian, dismount and follow me behind these bushes! we must despatch these two, at least, without the use of firearms. And you, my gentle pupil, must remain with the horses. If we fall, remain quiet until they have carried off whatever it is they are endeavouring to steal, and then leave the horses, and seek a passage by the bridge. I know your situation is a trying one, but it is the best we can do under the circumstances."

"Oh! no, no, Nathaniel!" said Virginia, suddenly recovering her feelings as well as her voice. "It is not the best we can do. Stay here yourself, and I can slip round, unperceived, to the gate of the bridge, and from thence alarm the city. Do, Nathaniel, suffer me to go."

"Not for worlds!" answered Bacon; "do you not perceive that it would be impossible for you to pass the two on this side unnoticed? Besides, were you even to gain the gate, they would tomahawk you before you could arouse one person in the town. No, no, you must remain. Seat yourself on the sward and hide your eyes, if you will, until we despatch these two, and then we can hold the others at bay."

"But what is the necessity of attacking them at all, Nathaniel?"

"Do you not see that they have been committing some depredation?—perhaps worse, and would be sure to make fight were we to show ourselves in so small force. But come, O'Reily, we are losing precious time; follow me, and for your life do not shoot."

This short and earnest dialogue was held in whispers, and in much less time than we have taken to record it.

The precaution against using firearms was doubtless given for fear of betraying to the inhabitants of the town the delicate and apparently equivocal position in which Virginia was placed. "We must be upon these two with our good swords, O'Reily," said Bacon, "before the others can join them, and if possible before they perceive us."

"Devil burn me but my hand itches to get acquainted wid the taste o' their skulls any way. Oh! if we can only smash these two but we'll keep the others to see their own funerals iny way."

In a few moments, Bacon and his trusty follower were silently gliding through the bushes on the banks of the river, and advanced to within a few rods of the savages, unperceived either by the party on the beach or those loading the boat on the opposite shore. But as they were just emerging from the last bush which protected their movements, a characteristic and startling exclamation "hugh!" from the watch stationed in the boat, at once precipitated their movements, and put the two on their guard whom they were about to attack.

There was at that day no male inhabitant of Jamestown or the surrounding Colony, arrived at the years and vigour of manhood, who was entirely unacquainted with the mode and usual end of Indian warfare. Of course, on such occasions as the present, the contest was for life or death.

Bacon, notwithstanding his youth, had already acquired some renown as a warrior in these desperate single-handed conflicts, which doubtless gave him and his companion more assurance of success on this occasion, notwithstanding the fearful odds which it was possible might be brought against them. Springing upon their adversaries, who, as has been seen, were on their guard, the conflict at once became desperate, while those in the boat made the utmost efforts to join their companions and overpower their unexpected enemies. No sooner were the two good swords of Bacon and O'Reily flashing in the moonbeams, than corresponding motions of the savage war clubs gave evidence that they also were ready for battle. Many and hard were the blows which were given on both sides in the struggle, a mere protraction of which Bacon perceived was destruction. Accordingly bracing up his own nerves, and cheering O'Reily, he made a vigorous and successful lunge at his immediate antagonist, but not before the reinforcement of the enemy was on the ground to take his place. A contest of this kind, when the parties were any thing like equal in number, was generally not long doubtful—victory in most instances being upon the side of superior skill and weapons. But O'Reily, although a veteran soldier, had met his match in this instance, his antagonist being a tall and brawny warrior of most fearful proportions. Yet he laid about him stoutly, while Bacon, merely having time to catch his breath, renewed the unequal contest with two of the new assailants, the third at the same time joining his already too powerful chief against the Irishman. The conflict was now desperate and bloody; our adventurers fought well and skilfully, every blow was followed by a crimson stream, and they too in their turn were more than once beaten to their knees by the terrific sweep of the war clubs. At one time Bacon was entirely prostrated, but instantly recovering and rising to his knees he continued to defend himself until he had once more regained his feet.

This warfare had now lasted for some minutes, which seemed an age to the trembling maiden who stood an unwilling yet enchained spectator on the side of the hill above them. But victory appeared at length about to crown the desperate efforts of her friends, whose assailants were now reduced to exactly their own number, and one; the tall old chief opposed to Brian, covered with his own blood and just ready to fall, when a sudden and terrific yell immediately behind them announced a reinforcement; and Virginia sank upon the earth in terror and despair.

"Plunge into the stream and swim for your life," shouted Brian—"Oh! but I'll keep their hands busy till ye go clear, even wid a stack of the yellow devils afore me!"

Six horrid and painted human monsters, (so they seemed to our adventurers) now leaped into the midst of the conflict, relieving their own brethren and thundering their blows upon the heads of their already exhausted adversaries. In vain they made furious lunges, forgetting the cunning of fence in the perfect desperation of the hopeless conflict. At length they both fell under the weapons of their new enemies and two of the savages, flashing their knives from their sheaths, prepared to complete the sacrifice; indeed a despairing yell from O'Reily announced that the butchery had already commenced; when in an instant the head of the old Chief stooping over him was severed from the trunk, and in the next a second blow from the same gigantic arm prostrated the one about to tear the bloody trophy from the fallen Cavalier.

Virginia had by this time ventured another despairing look upon the fate of him who was the cherished companion of her childhood. In that moment, doubtless, all the warnings and injunctions of the Recluse were forgotten, or if remembered, instantly set aside as the over prudential suggestions of pride in rank, or wealth, or power, governing the feelings of her friends, or of him who undertook to give her counsel in their stead.

But there were still enemies left besides the two who had flourished the scalping knife over our prostrate adventurers. With these the Recluse (for he it was who had come so opportunely to the rescue) at once renewed the conflict. Placing his back against a tree, and throwing away his castor and scabbard, he joined in the strife with a zest like that of an epicure who bares his arm to the exercise of the carving knive—whirling his enormous weapon amidst the falling clubs with the precision, ease and coolness of a professor exhibiting his skill with the harmless foils. His first exertions were, of course, on the defensive, among so many assailants, but if his blows were rare they were sure and fatal. He was evidently but putting in practice a sort of exercise in which he must have both delighted and excelled in days long past.

At every blow or thrust a savage went down to rise no more, Bacon, too, now rallied his scattered senses and exhausted strength, and resumed his part in the conflict, with enough of both to render him a valuable auxiliary in the way of defence, which the Recluse perceiving, sprang into the midst of the enemy and speedily put to flight, or the sword, the exhausted and disheartened remnant. When Virginia saw this devoutly-prayed-for termination to the battle, she sank upon the ground as powerless and exhausted as if she too had been actively engaged. The Recluse stooping over O'Reily and feeling his head and wrist, hastened to the boat, and seizing the wooden vessel with which the water was usually bailed out, returned and bathed his face and temples. Not so swift were his motions however as to prevent his stopping for a moment at the boat and gazing with astonishment at Something which it contained; but there was little time for wonder, and he hastened on his errand. When Brian's face was cleansed from blood it was found that the scalping knife of the old warrior had probably been struck from its intended destination so that the point had caught in one corner of his mouth and inflicted a wound of some magnitude across his face. While he was thus attended, Bacon hastened, with what speed he was able to exert, toward the spot where he had left his helpless companion. He found her just recovering from the listless stupor in which we left her. "Oh, Nathaniel!" was all that she was enabled to articulate as she fell into his arms, forgetting in the deep excitement of the moment every feeling save the strong and innocent affection which had so long existed between them.

Bacon placed her upon his horse, and taking the bridle in one hand, and holding her steady in her seat with the other, proceeded to the scene of the late mortal struggle. They found O'Reily sitting up, with his mouth already bandaged, and his late assistant and protector gone, having first, as Brian indistinctly muttered, pointed to the boat, as if there were something there which craved attention. Their own perceptions were now startled from the same quarter, by the sound of groans. Bacon ran to the spot, and found a female bound, and lying upon her face in the bottom of the boat. Having cut the cords and bathed her swollen face and temples, he speedily restored her to something like consciousness, and then bore her to the shore and laid her upon the ground. O'Reily now recognised her as Mrs. Jamieson, wife of Jamie Jamieson, principal fisherman to the town, whose hut, for convenient purposes in his avocation, was situated without the protection of the fort. This statement also accounted to Bacon for the presence of a quantity of fish netting in the boat, which doubtless excited the cupidity of the poor ignorant savages, who lay cold and lifeless at his feet.

New embarrassments seemed to stare our wanderers in the face at every step on this eventful night. Scarcely was O'Reily restored to his senses, and Mrs. Jamieson to such a state as to give hopes of recovery, when it occurred to our hero that something must be done with the dead bodies. But when he came to reflect upon the appearance which the battle ground itself would present, he determined to leave the rest to chance, and to say nothing himself or through his follower, and thus leave the gossips of the town to account for the slaughter of the Indians as they might. Mrs. Jamieson was now carefully replaced in the boat, and O'Reily assisted to his post at the tiller, while Bacon, having seated Virginia, occupied Brian's usual place at the oar, being the least injured of the two.

The former was for once in his life perfectly silent, perhaps owing to the awkward accident which had happened to his mouth, thereby rendering it difficult for him to enunciate with the true Hibernian pathos.

The females having been landed, Bacon desiring Virginia to sit by the still benumbed Mrs. Jamieson, returned for his horses, which were led by the side of the boat without any difficulty.

The whole party now proceeded to the fisherman's hut, Bacon supporting the feeble steps of its exhausted mistress. Here a new disaster awaited them. A few yards from the house towards the river, they discovered the body of the fisherman himself, cold, stiff, and lifeless. O'Reily was directed to remain with the woman of the house until she should completely recover her senses, but on no account to stay longer, or enter into any explanations.

Bacon and Virginia entered the gate of the fort unchallenged, and proceeded to the house of Mr. Fairfax, when the latter entered as quietly and as unperceived as she had sallied forth; while he officiated as ostler to his own steed, which service being finished to his satisfaction he sought his apartment; the morning being far advanced towards the dawn of day. His slumbers, it may be readily imagined, were not profound and undisturbed,—the restless nervousness of over exertion in mind and body, being very similar in its effects to that of too much repose.

CHAPTER VI.

On the morning of the Anniversary of the Restoration, the sun was just emerging above the eastern horizon, the sky was unclouded and serene, the air balmy and elastic, and the volumes of misty drapery from the river were fast rolling away over the hills, as the Recluse stood upon one of the highest points of the river cliffs, with folded arms, surveying the scene around him.

Far back as the eye could reach to the west, all was interminable forest—the foreground exhibiting occasional specks of cleared land, where some planter, more adventurous than his fellows, had boldly trusted his fortunes to the mercy of the savage.

He looked upon the little city beneath, as the weary mariner on a long voyage may be supposed to look upon a green island in the midst of a desert of waters. His chest heaved as the swelling emotions of pent up years burst from his over-loaded heart. Bacon, the manly and ingenuous youth, whom the reader will remember as having been appointed to visit him on this morning, had just sprung upon a mettled and pawing charger, which was now throwing the fire and pebbles from his heels in thick volleys, as his master with a fire and impetuosity scarcely inferior to his own, bent over his uncurbed neck as he descended into the plain. Several pieces of light artillery, together with volleys of musketry in quick succession, thundered over the smooth waters of the Powhatan, and reverberated in multiplied peals under the feet of the Recluse. There was something connected with this day, and its celebration, which seemed powerfully to have stirred up the still waters within him. Thick coming fancies connected with by-gone days were rolling over his soul in an uncontrolled torrent. But we must leave him for a time to his own reflections, amidst the solitary grandeur of the scene, while we pursue the road of the flying Cavalier towards the city.

The bells from the Church and State House were now also heard in the intervals of the cannonade, and as we approach nearer to the scene, a strange confusion of many sounds greet the ear. Drums and fifes, violins and banjoes, and even jews-harps, all lent their aid to swell the burst of joy and gratulation. Smiling and happy faces were grouped along the streets, while gay damsels, in their holyday finery, adorned the doors and windows of the busy citizens. A perfect Babel of commingled noises issued from the spacious area of a tobacco warehouse, which, after the usual fashion, consisted of an extensive roof, supported by colonnades to every front. Here was congregated the rising generation—boisterous and happy in the midst of their games and sports. No schoolmaster was abroad on that day, to rush in upon the unwary urchins, and wreak upon them the vengeance of Samson upon the Philistines.

Our forefathers suffered their children to follow very much their own humours in the selection of those amusements suited to their age and condition. We see not but the result was as happy as that of the systems of our day, when every thing is regulated by system, even to the games and amusements of our children. The time is certainly not far distant when Geography will be taught by a game at cards; Chemistry by set conversations upon the constituents of our edibles, and Natural Philosophy developed in nursery rhymes, that we may imbibe it with our lullabies.

On the morning in question, as merry a set of boisterous lads kicked up the dust in the old warehouse, as ever fought over a game of marbles, or laughed through one of leap-frog. And while the merry urchins, whom we have taken under our special protection, were thus enjoying a glorious holyday, their elders and superiors were moved by the same impulses. The mansion of the Governor itself was in visible commotion; servants swelling with importance, aped the grandeur of their masters' looks, while they ran from room to room on their various duties. A provincial band of music was stationed under the windows, uniting their sweet sounds to the Babel-like uproar, in the well known tune of "Over the waters to Charley."

There was one little green spot upon the common inviting the contemplative mind to pleasing reveries. Here a few of the humbler maidens of the city were adorning the overhanging bushes with gay garlands of flowers, preparatory to the evening dance, which they contemplated celebrating in imitation of their superiors, who were to move in more stately measures at the mansion of the Governor.

The household of Gideon Fairfax was likewise earlier than usual on the alert, and he being one of the council of the Colony, came in also for a share of the honours noised forth under the windows of the most distinguished Cavaliers.

Breakfast had been some time waiting at the table, and the fondly indulged daughter had been repeatedly summoned, but still she came not. This excited the more surprise in the minds of her parents, as they supposed, that on this eventful morning, of all others in the year, she would be up with the lark. The truth was, that after retiring at such an unusual hour of the night, or rather morning—her slumbers were disturbed between sleeping and waking, by shadowy dreams of yelling savages, chivalrous youths, and mighty giants.

At length, however, she appeared, but instead of bounding into the room with gay and elastic steps, and more buoyant spirits, in happy anticipation of the promised enjoyments of the day, her movements were slow and heavy—her eyes red and swollen, and her whole appearance indicative of languor and dejection. Her fond parents were instantly at her side—each taking a hand as she walked into the room, and striving to learn from the fancied invalid the nature of her sufferings. She assured them that she had nothing to complain of but want of rest, and with this they were the more readily satisfied, as towards morning there had indeed been much firing of guns, and other demonstrations of loyalty. Her parents being thus satisfied, that her account of the matter was the true one, Virginia was suffered to assume her place at the head of the table—a place she had for some time occupied on account of the delicate state of her mother's health. Meanwhile the anxious parents assumed their own places, and endeavoured to beguile their daughter's languor by allusions to the merry sounds, and gay group without, not forgetting the assembly at the Governor's; and it is more than probable that they would have succeeded, as few spirited and blooming beauties of sixteen can long listen unmoved to such details, had not Virginia, raising her half cheerful face at that moment to a large mirror which hung opposite, caught the reflection of a person in whose welfare she took a lively interest, standing in one corner of the room, and partly behind her chair, with a countenance and attitude which expressed the deepest misery. This was no other that Wyanokee, her own little Indian attendant, who officiated near the person of her mistress, in a medium capacity between friend and servant; the mistress only requiring the companion, and the maid spontaneously offering the services due both from affection and gratitude.

The figure of Wyanokee was diminutive, but like most of the aboriginal females, exquisitely proportioned, and graceful, after the fashion of nature's finest schooling. Her face was oval and between a brown and yellow colour, yet there was a vital tinge occasionally illuminating this predominant dark ground, which bespoke the refined female, in language intelligible to all, and far more eloquently than the tongue. Her hair was jet black, and folded upon her small round head after the fashion of the Europeans; and her brilliant teeth exhibited a striking contrast to the dark shades of her skin, and darker sparkling eyes. The delicately penciled brows, arched beautifully over a countenance strikingly feminine and lady-like; and the general expression was that calm sadness which has been remarked as characteristic of the domesticated aborigines from that day to the present. Her dress was essentially after the fashion of the whites of that day, just retaining sufficient of the Indian costume, however, to set off her slight but graceful figure to the best advantage. The exquisite proportions of her finely shaped foot and ankle were displayed in a closely fitting deer skin moccasin, studded around the eyelet holes, and wrought in curious, but not unpleasing figures, with party-coloured beads and porcupine quills. Around her neck, and falling upon her gently swelling bosom, were many ingeniously wrought ornaments of wampum and silver—and around her wrists, bracelets of the same materials. Wyanokee was of the Chickahominy tribe, and had been taken prisoner after the murder of her parents by one of the neighbouring tribes, who at the time were at war with the Chickahominies. Nathaniel Bacon saw her in one of his hunting excursions, and struck with her native beauty, and pleading countenance, redeemed her from captivity at the expense of a string of blue beads. From thence he brought her to Jamestown, to remain until some opportunity should occur of restoring her to her tribe. Her parents having been slain, however, as we have already said, and much time necessarily having elapsed before such opportunity occurred, Virginia took advantage of it, and by mild and affectionate treatment, endeavoured to win her to herself. A mutual and peculiar attachment was the consequence, so that when the opportunity actually occurred, Wyanokee refused to return to the almost extinct tribe of her fathers. Two years had now elapsed since her introduction into the Fairfax family, during which time Virginia, an assiduous pupil herself, became in her turn instructress to her little protegée. Already had she learned many of the little feminine arts and accomplishments of civilized life, and made considerable proficiency in the English language—which, however, she never employed except in private to her instructress, or on some urgent occasion. Half the young Cavaliers in Jamestown would have been willing devotees at the shrine of Wyanokee's beauty, after the corrupt fashions of the parent court and country. But such celebrity was not suited to the taste or ambition of the Indian maiden. Whenever the little errands of her patroness led her to the shops of the city, instead of encouraging the forward and impudent gallantries of the young profligates, she would trip along like a frightened partridge—always turning a deaf ear to their flatteries, and keeping her eyes fixed upon the earth, in the most modest, natural and simple guise. Notwithstanding her habitual indifference to the flatteries of her many admirers, there was one youth whose very step upon the door sill her practised ear could detect. Not that her deliverer had ever taken advantage of her gratitude to him—her ignorance of civilized refinements, or her dependent situation, to poison her mind with the deceitful flatteries too common with his comrades of that day. The passion was perhaps the growth of time and reflection and the effect of gratitude, as the little Indian maiden became capable of instituting comparisons between his conduct towards herself and that of the young Cavaliers, whose assiduities have been already mentioned. Certain it is, that if it had been from some sudden impulse in their earlier intercourse, the customs of her race would have fully borne her out in declaring her passion to its object at once. At the time of which we write, however, this feeling was a profound secret within her own bosom, as she hoped and believed; and the more Virginia impressed upon her mind the necessity of reserve and modesty in her intercourse with the other sex, the more jealous she became in concealing the passion that possessed her heart. Nevertheless, it influenced all her after life, and gave a touching interest to the progress of her moral and intellectual development.

Some few of her Indian peculiarities were still retained by Wyanokee; her gesticulation was far more powerful and expressive than her small compass of language, and the ordinary indifference of her race to passing and exciting themes, was yet preserved by her. Her gentle mistress could indeed work upon her sensibilities through the medium of her affection and gratitude, like a skilful musician upon a finely toned instrument, but the master key was still wanting even to her. There was one peculiarity of her race not quite so agreeable or inoffensive as those already mentioned—namely, the silence and celerity of her movements; sometimes she would appear to Virginia in the middle of the night with the imagined abruptness of an unearthly spirit. Often would the fair maiden awake from her slumbers and find her stooping over her couch—with the saddest and most intense interest expressed in her countenance—and again she would glide through the silent apartments of the spacious mansion with a movement so shadowy and noiseless, that it seemed almost impossible to be effected by a substantial being.

When Virginia raised her eyes from the breakfast-table, and beheld Wyanokee's mute despair, as exhibited in the opposite mirror, her former nervous alarm and agitation instantly returned.

She was entirely at a loss to account for the unusual feeling exhibited by her attendant, except by connecting it in some way with her late nocturnal adventures. And it was a fearful supposition which flashed through her mind, that Wyanokee was acquainted with her last night's undertaking; yet at the same time ignorant of her motives. Hurrying mechanically through the meal, she rose, and taking the hand of the young Indian, was about to retire; but at that moment Nathaniel Bacon rode up to the door, his charger covered with dust and foam; leaping from his back and throwing the rein to an attendant, he entered the room at the very moment when the two maidens were about to make their exit. Under the peculiar circumstances of the case perhaps no one could have entered more mal-appropos. Mr. Fairfax himself and Bacon had parted, at the termination of their last interview, with excited and unpleasant feelings, both having lost command of temper. Virginia had last seen him under circumstances also which in themselves were calculated to excite no very pleasing reminiscences; but considering the precise attitude in which she stood at that moment with regard to Wyanokee, the interview promised to be still more embarrassing. Nor was the promise falsified—the salutations of the gentlemen were cold, formal, and embarrassing to both parties, while the two maidens stood on the eve of departure, each labouring under her own peculiar difficulties. Virginia felt as if all the adventures of the preceding night stood revealed to her parents, without any of the justificatory motives which had satisfied her own mind for embarking in them—while her attendant looked to her as if she too was labouring under a weight of surreptitious knowledge. Mrs. Fairfax was the only one of the party who preserved self-possession enough to welcome their young friend, after so long an absence, in intelligible language.

With the peculiar tact of the cultivated female mind she judiciously led the conversation to such subjects of universal interest at the time, as to induce her husband and the young Cavalier to forget their late unpleasant difference, and Virginia to resume her seat at the table, where she busied herself in helping the visiter to his breakfast. It was singular enough too, as Virginia no doubt thought, that one of these subjects should have direct reference to some personages who had so lately and so intently occupied her own thoughts—namely the Roundheads and Independents. Frank Beverly it seems had already blown abroad the meeting of these persons in secret conclave, as mentioned in the first chapter. The meal being concluded, Bacon again sprang upon his horse and hurried forward to the portico of the Berkley Arms, in which were now displayed no very equivocal evidences of loyalty, from the master of the house and his numerous guests, who thronged its area upon his approach. All the elite of the Cavalier youth were there in a perfect throng.

No sooner had Bacon alighted and made his way into the throng, than the tumultuous discussion of the youths was hushed into silence. This was not so much owing to any sternness in the dignity of the youth as to the peculiar nature of the discussion which was going on between Dudley and Beverly, and their several partizans, at the very moment of his entrance. The tumblers of julip were held in suspense, while heavy bets were offered, and about to be taken, upon the disputed question whether the very person who so suddenly appeared among them would be present at the celebration. No sooner had he set foot on the premises, however, than the fat landlord came waddling up, grasping the hand of our hero in one of his own, while in the other he presented him with a goblet of the national beverage.

"A pledge! a pledge!" now resounded from several quarters of the well filled Tap. It may well be supposed that the suspected one had no very great relish for julip after breakfast, but knowing the importance of such trifles on an occasion like the present, and under all the peculiar circumstances in which he was placed he took the cup, and elevating it, said—"Here's to the merry king Charles, who shall be king but Charley."

"Bravely done," shouted the host—and "huzzah for Bacon," shouted his own immediate partisans, many of whom belonged to a volunteer military company of which he was the commander, and whom to see was the very object of his visit to the Arms. Taking Dudley therefore by the arm, and calling to others of the corps, he invited them to a private interview in another apartment. As Bacon passed Frank Beverly a mutual but cold salutation was exchanged—dignified and polite on the part of the former, and cold, haughty and sneering on that of the latter—the ungracious feeling not at all lessened, it is probable, by the pointed exclusion of Beverly and his partisans from the private meeting just alluded to.

Although this was Bacon's first appearance in public, since his abrupt departure from the house of his friend and patron, it was not the first visit he had paid to the hotel, where he and his partisans now held their meeting. He had privately visited the landlord on the preceding evening, previous to the adventures related in the last chapter, for some purposes connected with the present meeting of his friends, but which he was by no means willing should be generally known. At that visit he was informed by the landlord of the mischievous plot laid by his rival to deprive him of the pleasure of Virginia's hand during the approaching festivities at the Mansion of the Governor, and his first intention was to counteract their machinations. But so intensely had his mind been engaged with the adventures of the preceding evening, that all minor interests escaped his recollection. It was the object of his visit on this morning, to remedy that oversight; but so cold and formal was his reception by Mr. Fairfax, and so embarrassed was that of his daughter, that he gave up the scheme for the present, leaving the house with any thing but pleasant emotions. Indeed, from the various combinations of parties and factions, he saw his own position becoming hourly more embarrassing and difficult, and still more so from the neutral position in which he was thrown—partly from the mystery connected with his origin, and partly from his connexion with the Recluse. But let the Independents on the one hand, and the Cavaliers on the other, plot and counterplot as they might, his course was clearly taken in his own mind. None of the doubts as to what cause he should espouse, which had been hinted at by some of the personages of our narrative, really existed in his mind. His course was plain, manly, upright, and straight forward. Nevertheless, as has been seen, he had not thus far entirely escaped suspicion. But trusting to the uprightness of his intentions, he took his measures on this eventful morning with a single eye to the public peace and the cause of truth, justice and humanity. It was to promote these great ends, that he now assembled the members of the military company of which he was the commander. Upon what service they were to be engaged, will appear in the succeeding chapters.

CHAPTER VII.

While Bacon and his partisans were deliberating in one of the upper rooms of the Berkley Arms, and Beverly, Ludwell and their friends, still kept up their potations in the Tap below, all of a sudden the bells ceased to chime, and the cannons to roar, and the various other demonstrations of noisy mirth that pervaded the city, were hushed into silence. A corresponding stillness instantly prevailed throughout both the assembled parties, for a moment, in order to ascertain if possible the cause of this interruption to the public rejoicings. No one in either being able to explain the matter, both parties at the same moment rushed tumultuously into the street. They beheld men, women, and children, thronging in the direction of the public square, and naturally fell into the current, and were borne on its tide into the very centre of attraction. Here they found several oxcarts standing in the street, in the beds of which were stretched the dead bodies of eight Indians—fearfully mangled, and one with his head entirely severed from the body. Twenty voices at once were interrogating the gaping negroes who bestrode the cattle, but no other satisfaction could be gained from them than a mute reference to their master; a little busy important man, who resided on the main land, and was now holding forth with great energy and amplitude of expression, touching his various adventures of the morning, to a crowd of eager loungers gathered around him, as if to appropriate his wonderful disclosure entirely to themselves.

He stated that he had found the dead bodies upon the banks of the river, where there were still many evidences of a desperate conflict of both horse and foot. That the ground was covered with blood, and that one party must have been driven into the river, and drowned, as he had been enabled to trace them by their footmarks to the very edge of the water.

It will be readily imagined by the reader that Nathaniel Bacon was no unmoved spectator of this scene, or of the various conjectural explanations that were now given in his hearing, of a transaction in which he had been such a principal actor, and of which he could have given such an authentic history. He was rather rejoiced than otherwise, that the little planter of the main seemed so much disposed to indulge his imagination, as a discovery of his own part in the matter, and of Virginia's delicate position on the occasion, was thereby rendered less probable. But his self congratulations were too hasty; for scarcely had he revolved these things in his mind, before a sudden rush of the crowd towards some new object of surprise arrested his attention. This was no other than Brian O'Reily, bearing into the crowd upon his back the dead body of Jamie Jamieson, and followed by his wife, who to her bruises and misfortunes had applied the comfort of whiskey in great profusion. O'Reily, it seemed, had fully sympathised with the widowed lady, for his motions were anything but accordant with the solemnity of the occasion. Bacon could scarce suppress a smile as he caught a glimpse of this group through the crowd. His first object; however, was to catch O'Reily's eye, and make him understand, if possible by a look, that he was to volunteer no evidence in the case. He had no sooner succeeded in gaining the notice of his attendant, than the latter applied his finger slyly to his lip, looking another way at the same time, and thus indicating that he understood the policy to be pursued, and that he was not so much intoxicated as he thought proper to seem. With this doubtful assurance Bacon was compelled to rest satisfied, walking about the square all the while in visible agitation.

The corpse of the fisherman being laid out in the market-place, the officer, whose duty it was, proceeded to summon an inquest to inquire into the manner and cause of his death. The first witness summoned before this tribunal, was, of course, the wife of the deceased. She testified that a party of savages had on the preceding night entered their house, and after having cruelly murdered her husband, beaten herself, and bound her limbs with cords, had carried away all their fishing nets. That having placed these in a canoe, they laid her in it also, and paddled across the river—where they were met by another party of savages, about fifty in number, as she supposed, and while they were busily engaged in dividing the spoil, a gigantic man, with a face flaming like fire, and a sword as long as a fishing pole, had suddenly fallen upon the murderers, and quickly put them to flight, or the sword. That having thus conquered the whole horde, he had placed her in the boat again, and brought her to her own house, where he left her, and where she remained alone until morning, when she was found by Mr. Brian O'Reily, who happened to be coming that way.

Improbable as some parts of this story were, it met with a ready credence from nearly the whole of the multitude; no tale, having any relation to the Recluse, being so marvellous that they would not readily believe it. But in no one of the assembled listeners did it excite greater surprise than in Bacon himself. It is true, that he readily recognised in the whole invention the joint influence of whiskey, and O'Reily's ingenuity, but even to these he had not supposed that he should be indebted for such downright falsehoods in his behalf. Mrs. Jamieson, too, seemed firmly to believe all that she had testified. Under these circumstances he did not feel himself called upon to set the matter right at the expense of Virginia's feelings, and the inevitable defeat of the measures in which he was that very morning deeply engaged. How the Irishman was to manage his part of the narrative when called upon, as he certainly would be, and that so speedily that no time would be allowed to exchange a word with his master, Bacon could not divine. He knew right well that O'Reily was gifted with a strong tendency to the most outrageous and even ridiculous exaggeration, and that he would carry through whatever he should undertake to say, with wonderful shrewdness and imperturbable confidence; but how he was to make his story agree with that which he had put into the mouth of Mrs. Jamieson, and at the same time explain the wound upon his own face, and the contusion upon his head, without being guilty of some direct and palpable falsehood, was more than his master could imagine. At length Brian O'Reily was called to state what he knew touching the death of the fisherman. The first question propounded by the officer was, "Well, O'Reily, tell the jury how, and when you came to the house of the deceased."

"Oh! thin, and I'm bothered to know whether I got there by land or wather, and faix, I'm after b'leiven it was naither uv them."

"How then did you get there, if you went neither by land nor water?"

"An by the vestments, may be I wouldn't be far wrang, if I said it was the crathur that took me there, seein I can't deny it iny way, your haner."

"You saw no one strike or maltreat the deceased.".

"It would be but ill manners in me to be conthradictin your haner."

"You are sure you did not strike him yourself."

"As sure as two tin-pinnies—Divil burn the man that Brian O'Reily ever ill used when he was down—much less when he was dead, your haner." (crossing himself.)

"How then came that cut upon the corner of your mouth?"

"Oh! murther, and is it these your haner's axing after?" and he ingeniously placed his finger upon a smaller wound made by his bottle on the previous night. "Yes, O'Reily, we wish you to state how you came by those wounds."

"Oh! but I'm bowld to show your haner, seein its you that axed me—sure here's the wapon that kilt me all out!" and as he spoke, he pulled out his broken necked bottle and handed it to his catechist.

"I see it has blood upon it, O'Reily, and this may explain the cut on your mouth, but how came that contusion on your temple?"

"Be dad but I run aginst a good big shelaleigh, an it broke me head so it did—sorra much head I had left at that same recknin, for the crather."

"You ran against a club, O'Reily? Was it growing in the ground or was it in the hands of an enemy?"

"It might be growin, your haner, or it might be in the hands of the great inimy himself, for all that Brian O'Reily knows—sure your haner isn't very particular in examinin the tixture of the timber that knocks you down. It might be a door-post—or may be the gate of the foort—as the thimber grows as thick here as paraties, and this gate was always too small for me when I had a dhrap of the whiskey."

"You ran against the gate-post, or the facings of Jamieson's door, then?"

"By the five crasses, an I've done that same many's the time—barrin always that it would be ill manners in me to conthradict your haner if I hadn't."

"You saw nothing then of the treacherous and thieving savages on the night of Jamieson's murder?"

"Oh then but I'm puzzled now intirely. By the holy father, I saw a power of sights on that same night. The whiskey was clane too strong for me. I saw all sorts of yeller nagres and men widout shadows, and flamin counthenances, and the fire sparklin from the very eyes of me, by the same token. Divil a word of a lie's in that iny way."

"But you saw no person strike or maltreat this man who lies dead here?"

"Divil the one, your haner! Brian O'Reily's the boy that wouldn't see foul-play to man nor baste. I never saw Jamie, till I saw him stretched all out as you see him there."

"You do not know then but that you may have encountered the murderers in your own drunken travels?"

"Faix and you may say that, your haner, widout a word of a lie in it; it bothers me intirely to tell what I did see. And, by the five crasses, if it wasn't for the wapon you've got in your hand—and poor Jamie that I brought here on my back—and this thump upon my head, I should, say it was all a dhrame clane out."

"Well, you may go, O'Reily. I believe you know little of what happened to yourself or any one else last night."

"An that's thrue for you iny way; many thanks to your haner for your kindness and civility," said O'Reily, as he left the crowd, slily tipping a wink of triumph to his master.

Bacon certainly began to breathe more freely towards the conclusion, as having edged in with the crowd, he heard O'Reily's ingenious parries of the official's thrusts. But his trials were not yet over, for scarcely had he followed his attendant with his eye out of the crowd, before Mr. Fairfax stepped up to the officer and whispered something in his ear. In a few moments after a deputy was seen leading Wyanokee into the market-place—a look of the most profound dejection, still visible through her fright, at being brought into the presence of such a multitude.

She testified, that two of the Indians slain were her nearest kinsmen. That the one with his head severed from the body, was old King Fisher; and, upon examination, the blue feathers of his patronymic bird were found still sticking in the matted tuft of hair upon his crown. She farther stated that he was her father's only brother, and that another of the slain was his son—the only two remaining male relatives she had in the world. That all these savages were of the Chickahominy tribe; and that there were not more than two hundred warriors, left of all that, brave and powerful nation which had once thronged the banks of the Chickahominy river. And here the little Indian maiden seemed almost suffocated with overpowering emotions, as the memory of former days came gushing over her heart. No tear relieved her swelling emotions, but ever and anon she cast her eyes over the mangled bodies of her kinsmen, and once or twice turned with looks more rapid and of darker meaning towards Bacon. The general expression of her countenance; however, was one of profound and overwhelming sadness. Her soul seemed fully capable of realizing the melancholy destiny which awaited all the nations of the aborigines then inhabiting the country, from the sea board to the blue mountains,[2] and whose fiat was fast bearing her race from the loved places which had known them so long. It was doubtless in her mind a poor compensation for the destruction of her native tribe and their contemporaries, that she herself had been reclaimed from the happy ignorance of savage, to the more painful knowledge of civilized life.

She was asked if she knew of the visit of these unfortunate men on the preceding night. Her eye furtively ran over the eager faces gathered around, until it fell upon that of Bacon, when a momentary flash of some internal impulse illumined her countenance. It might be vengeance, or the hatred of unrequited passion—but let the cause be what it might, it glimmered with a demoniacal fire but for an instant, and then, like the expiring taper in the socket after its last flash, sunk for ever. The sadness of past and coming years seemed concentrated in the despair of are moment. She waived her hand and shook her head in silence, thus indicating, that she could say no more—that human endurance had been stretched to its utmost verge. Walking deliberately out of the crowd until she came to the trunkless head of the last of the Chickahominy chiefs, she bent over the mutilated remains for a moment in unutterable sorrow, and then throwing her eyes to heaven, dark in despair, she stooped to pluck one of the blue feathers from the scalp, and then with sad and lingering steps, proceeded to her home.

All were impressed with involuntary respect for the bereaved maiden, and even the hardened officer suffered her to depart without having finished his examination. Sufficient, however, had been gleaned for the jury to bring in a verdict of murder by the hands of some of the Chickahominy tribe of savages. This tribe of Indians inhabited a small town called Orapacks, on the banks of the river which gave its name to the nation. They formed a part of the grand confederation which had first been united under Powhatan, and afterwards his successor, Opechancanough; the latter of whom so unfortunately fell, while a prisoner at Jamestown, by the hands of a dastardly soldier, who took his life in revenge for some petty wrong, real or imaginary. The depredation related in the foregoing pages, and the unfortunate result to so many of its perpetrators, was the first interruption to the general peace which Sir William Berkley had been enabled to secure for the colony, after various sanguinary massacres and conflicts, with the numerous tribes composing the empire of Virginia, as it was sometimes called, and reaching from the Peninsula to the present seat of Richmond.

It may be well, perhaps, to state that a process had been despatched, for form's sake, to summon the Recluse, but it was returned as similar messages had always been before—he was non est inventus.

The dead bodies were now removed,—that of Jamieson to the more consecrated ground around the church, and those of the Indians to a sort of Potter's-field or general burying ground, such as every city has possessed from the time of Judas Iscariot to the present day.

The necessary and justifiable sacrifice of some half a dozen savages was, at that time, too common a circumstance in Jamestown, long to affect the gayeties-of-the day. Accordingly the afternoon found the daughters and wives of the hardy citizens gayly tripping it over the green common, to which we have already introduced the reader, inspired by the music of two sable musicians, who rattled and scraped defiance to all untoward interruptions whatsoever. The town was full of strangers from the neighbouring plantations, together with many members of the House of Burgesses from surrounding counties, who had arrived in preparation for the meeting of that body, summoned to be held on the third succeeding day. Many of these dignified personages had collected on the green, to witness the enjoyment of the humbler citizens and their wives and daughters.

A merry set of joyful lads and lasses were whirling through the giddy dance; when all at once a savage yell abruptly struck upon the ear; the music ceased, the youths stood still in the circle, while some of the maidens fled toward the public square, and others sought the protection of their fathers, husbands, or lovers. Consternation was visible in the boldest countenances. The transactions of the morning had unstrung the nerves of the females, and urged the sterner sex to thoughts of war, which had lain dormant since the general peace and the death of Opechancanough. But soon a jingle of little bells was heard, and the next moment the multitude burst into a loud laugh, and simultaneously cast their eyes up to a tall tree which overhung the green, and upon which was seen a painted savage, descending with great agility, he soon leaped into the middle of the area, where the dance had been in progress, and commenced shuffling away at a most indefatigable rate, the fiddlers striking at the same moment into the humour of this strange visiter, and he himself dexterously rattling a number of little bones which he held between his fingers—the bells all the while continuing to jingle, and producing the strangest effect upon the ear. His face was painted in the ordinary warrior guise, his head shaved close to the cranium, save a lock upon the crown, to which hung a tuft of scarlet feathers—his person was grotesquely ornamented with beads, bells and buttons in great profusion, interspersed with hundreds of red feathers, from which he took his name. He was called Red Feather Jack, and was remarkably fond of the music and all the ordinary diversions of the whites. In this respect he was the most remarkable Indian of his day—that race having been peculiar for the haughty and dignified contempt with which they looked upon the amusements of their civilized neighbours. He was known to be as desperate in battle as he was light hearted and merry at the sports of the white man, and had never been known guilty of any kind of treachery, and was a universal favourite at Jamestown among all the young people of both sexes. It may be readily imagined, therefore, that a shout of "Red Feather Jack," which was instantly raised by the assembled throng, brought no slight accession to their numbers. The amusement thus afforded was kept up, intermingled with dances of their own, to which Jack beat time with his loudest bells, until the hour had arrived for the commencement of the more imposing and aristocratic ceremonies and amusements at the gubernatorial mansion.

Red Feather Jack was believed by many to be an admirer of Wyanokee's, though of a different tribe. He had once, on an occasion nearly similar to the one just related, offered to lead her to the dance, but the more refined maiden looked upon him with ineffable scorn and contempt, produced as much, doubtless, by his undignified and unnational habits, as by what she considered his inferior rank and understanding. After the cessation of the various sports upon the green—in the warehouse, and throughout the town, Jack was taken to the Berkley Arms, where his merry performances were kept up until a late hour of the night, to the great amusement of the loungers and the disappointed youths who had vainly aspired to a participation in the celebration of the Cavaliers.

There was one peculiar circumstance attending this day's celebration which became generally the subject of after remark. Not a sign of festivity or rejoicing was visible at the Cross Keys. Its master sat a solitary spectator in his own door, apparently regarding the passing levities with sovereign contempt. This of course did not escape without many comments from the more jovial landlord of "the Arms." It was likewise remarkable that none of the Independents were visible on this general holyday, and this was the more singular as many of the humbler followers of the late Lord Protector had been sold into temporary bondage, and of course might be supposed eager to enjoy one day's cessation from labour, even if they did not care to join the humbler citizens in their demonstrations of loyalty.

CHAPTER VIII.

As the sun went down upon the boisterous revellers in the ancient city, and closed the festivities of the day among the plebeians, the aristocracy of the vice-regal court began to roll along the streets in their carriages, and surround the door of the stout old knight who represented the person of his royal master in the colony. The members of the Council and of the house of Burgesses, with their wives and daughters, and all other citizens and sojourners of distinction were among the number. Now came the crash of Carriages—swearing of footmen—cracking of whips rattling of wheels—clattering of steps, and the pompous announcement of the man in office, as each party was marshalled into the long suite of apartments brilliantly lighted for the occasion. At the head of the largest room stood Sir William and Lady Berkley. The old knight was dressed in a blue velvet doublet, which being sashed below the belt or waistband, protruded out all round so as to show the yellow silk linings of the aforesaid garment, fringing and ornamenting the waist. His breeches were of pink satin, and were cut in what was called at that day[3] "the petticoats;" they were tied to the large mouthed silk hose with gay ribands, and the lining of the breeches being longer than the garment itself, formed a sort of ornament for the overhanging hose; immediately over this row of knotted ribands ornamenting the knee, his breeches hung in ample folds. The sleeves of his doublet reached nearly to the elbow; and from the end of these the shirt was so fashioned as to bulge out in large flowing plaits to his ruffled wrists. His stockings were of white silk, and shoes ornamented with a profusion of ribands, knotted and bound into the shape of flowers. On one shoulder hung a short mantle, reaching to the haunches and falling in rich folds over one side of his person. Lady Berkley appeared For the first time without her farthingale, but still retained its contemporary, the French hood. In place of the starched ruff, she wore the graceful and flowing collar, falling in folds and terminated in rich pointed lace round the upper half of the bust; she wore a stomacher indeed, but greatly modified from the long strait jacket fashion of the preceding reign.

A slight degree of pomp and formality characterized the profound inclination of the knight's magisterial person, as some guest of distinction was from time to time announced, while his lady performed her part of the ceremony in exact accordance with the stately habits of her lord, but softened by a native blandness of manner and sweetness of disposition. She was a lady in the most refined and polished acceptation of the term. They were both just sufficiently advanced in years to add the dignity, of age to that resulting from their station, and command, respect from those who moved within their sphere. The ladies began now to re-appear, after the momentary retouch of the toilet, and arrange themselves round the apartment apparently appropriated to the dance, from a band of musicians stationed some six feet above the floor in a temporary orchestra. The first touch upon the string of the leader's kit was magical—the chords of every young female heart in the room vibrated in unison. No letting down of one string and raising of another was required to bring them to concert pitch; like the blooded charger in the field, in whose veins, the first clang of the trumpet sends the vital stream glistening to the very eye-balls, their gayly decorated persons were at once glowing with animation; their eyes sparkling and their bosoms heaving with impatience, joy, and anticipated triumph. But when the bow of an evident master was drawn over the strings of his rusty cremona in a long single sweep, every heart palpitated in eagerness. The eyes of the gentlemen wandered over the multitude of youthful and lovely faces beaming with a delighted expression, and all were keenly alive to the coming pleasures of the dance. But there was a precedence in the arrangement of the first set which, we must by no means neglect. Virginia Fairfax, by right of birth and consanguinity to the governor, invariably assumed her aunt's place at the head of the set. The blooming Hebe issued forth from the impenetrable ranks of her compeers with the blushing grace and beauty of a nymph—her hand was slightly extended as though its owner were conscious that scores of the opposite ranks would have perilled life and fortune for its possession. She was clad in simple white; not a colour marring the chaste and perfect purity of her attire, save the transparent shadow of a crimson tint which rose and fell in vivid flashes over her complexion with the rapidity of thought. Near her stood a youth, his finely formed person set off to the best advantage by the gay and tasteful fashion of his time, and his dark hazel eye, brilliant with the momentary fire of excitement. Instinctively he moved forward to receive the outstretched and now trembling little hand, but scarcely had he gained it before a competitor appeared upon the field, of not less personal and far more aristocratic pretension. "With your leave, sir," said Frank Beverly, with a profound inclination of his finely dressed person, as he took the hand which Bacon, in the abstraction of the moment, was about to usurp. The latter retired in the most undisguised mortification; his rival moving to the head of the set with all the grace and ease of self-possession, rank, and consciousness of right in the present instance.

Sir William himself bent his dignity to enjoy this scene, the most evident satisfaction beaming upon his countenance as he cast an intelligent glance toward his lady.

Our heroine had been too finely schooled in the etiquette and manners of the ball-room, to allow the most penetrating observer any means of ascertaining whether the incident just related was as pleasing to her as to her partner. Bacon's mortification was not long visible, for with a desperate sort of boldness, quite foreign to his general demeanour, he crossed the room and approached a young lady whose beauty shone conspicuous amid all the gay throng by which she was surrounded. Harriet Harrison was the daughter of one of the proudest and most wealthy families in the colony. They moved in the front ranks of those who radiated around the fashionable orbit of which the Governor and his family were the principal luminaries, and were esteemed by them as among their most honoured friends and supporters. Harriet was the intimate friend of Virginia Fairfax, and, after her mother, the most esteemed repository of her confidence. Though an idea of rivalry in any shape or form had never entered their young and guileless hearts, the youthful Cavaliers who floated upon the same fashionable tide, had frequently placed them in this attitude in their private discussions of the various personal and mental attractions of the maidens, each in her turn proving the reigning favourite, as their respective admirers happened to possess the supremacy over the minds of their companions. She was near the same age with Virginia, and undoubtedly possessed attractions of the most captivating quality, both in mind and person, yet they were finely contrasted with those of her friend. Harriet's complexion was brunette—her hair dark and shining as the raven's plumage—her eye black, keen and sparkling, her finely pencilled brows beautifully overshadowing the native archness of her countenance, and her mouth always expressive of amiable feelings, just sufficiently characterized perhaps by a dash of innocent humour and coquetry; or rather that coquetry which is the result of archness and humour as distinguished from premeditated design. Her figure was slight but finely proportioned. As Bacon approached this laughing little belle, his boldness visibly diminished beneath her sparkling eye, and his petition for her hand was uttered with the most courtly and deferential humility. The brunette cast a significant glance toward her friend at the head of the set, and then with promptitude accepted the offered partner, her intelligent and sparkling countenance turning towards Charles Dudley, who stood near, with a speaking archness, which conveyed as plainly as it could have been in words, her perfect understanding of the byplay which was going on at the expense of his friend. The set being completed, the music now struck up its enlivening notes, and the various contending passions and emotions of those engaged were soon lost for the time in the giddy whirl of excitement which succeeded. Every countenance was clad in joy and hilarity—Bacon himself seeming to forget, in the secret pleasure created by the occasional touch of Virginia's hand, that he himself was not the honoured partner. Nor was the exhilirating effect of the dance confined to those who partook in the exercise—the young enjoyed it present, the old by retrospection. The latter lived over again the gay and brilliant dreams of their own youth, and were what they beheld. The music perhaps touched upon some long forgotten associations of other days and other friends, when and with whom they had mingled in the merry dance under circumstances like the present. These hallowed and blessed associations were not unmixed with melancholy, but it was of the softest and most soothing kind; the tide of feeling flowed over the heart to the cadences of the music, rising and swelling like the waves of the subsiding storm, and irresistibly inviting to mental calm and repose. The elder matrons sat under its influence—their eyes half closed in a sort of pleasing abstraction—while a gentle and subdued smile of mixed emotions played upon their lips. They lived again in the persons of their gay and happy daughters, and with no more selfish wish than to see their offspring following quietly in their own footsteps.

The formality which had somewhat characterized the opening ceremonies was entirely banished—it could not live in the atmosphere of music and the dance. Sir William and his compeers in dignity seemed early to be sensible of this, for no sooner had the motion of "hands round" commenced, than he collected his forces, and retreated to the card room, where, from the excitement of the game and wine, they endeavoured to compensate themselves for their want of the more sentimental retrospects of their ladies.

Conversation, which till now had flagged under the withering influence of etiquette, burst forth in all the vivacity of unrestrained and unsophisticated nature. The eyes of Harriet Harrison sparkled like gems, as she and Virginia laughed and chatted together, when they occasionally met in the figures of the dance. But with all Virginia's hilarity, an acute observer might have perceived a shade more than once passing over the sunshine of her countenance; whether owing to some vague presentiment of coming evil—to better defined apprehensions from those events which had so lately passed under her eyes—to the mysterious injunctions of the Recluse, or to some not altogether satisfactory arrangements of the dance, we shall leave the sagacity of the reader to determine. Certain it is, however, that she underwent no little badinage from her lively friend and confidant.

A certain emphatic declination in the notes of the leader, which all the initiated will understand, warned those in possession of the floor, that there is an order of rotation in happiness on these joyful occasions, a cadence, any thing but musical to those happily and mutually suited in partners, while to those not so fortunately coupled, it was a joyful relief. Each gentleman led his partner to her seat, which she had scarcely taken, perhaps, if one of the favoured few, before new applications for the honour of her hand were laid at her feet. Bacon had no sooner escorted Harriet to her place, than turning to her friend he again put in his claim in more formal parlance than his former instinctive aspirations, but again he was doomed to disappointment; Philip Ludwell on this occasion, with a smirking smile upon his countenance, claiming a prior engagement. Bacon scowled upon him with mingled scorn and rage, as he turned upon his heel and besought the honour of the first hand within his reach. But if he was disappointed, his friend Dudley seemed more fortunate, for at the same moment that the former led out his partner, he encountered the latter escorting the pretty Harriet—and certainly no one in the room claimed a larger portion of his sympathy. But he was struck with the change in the countenance of the lively brunette in the very short time which had elapsed between the two sets. During the first, there was a free, untramelled, mischievous expression in her countenance, which was now merged in one of partial embarrassment. The guileless and confiding air with which she had looked into the face of her former partner, was now exchanged for one of consciousness, as if the lively little belle expected retributive justice from her friends for her own previous badinage. The unpractised Dudley interpreted these appearances any thing but favourably to his own ardent hopes.

Bacon was more deeply studied in the workings of the "human face divine," especially when feeling no personal interest in their meaning, and he therefore amused himself in his ungrateful situation, by watching the changes of his friend's arch little mistress. He doubtless considered it a beautiful and interesting development of character, to see this lively little romp—so lately overflowing with vivacity and animal spirits—all at once transformed into the sensitive, sedate, and downcast maiden. He was certainly not less amused to perceive that these two interesting young personages were unconsciously playing at cross purposes. First the gentleman became cold and moody at the reserve exhibited by his mistress, which did undoubtedly exist, but from which his jealous anxiety made him draw a most erroneous conclusion; while she, on the other hand, resented this apparently ungrateful return for a partiality which her own consciousness induced her to believe was perceptible to its object; indeed this very fear of his knowledge was perhaps the moving impulse of her own wayward conduct. The resentment occasioned by his apparent coldness, and assumed indifference, produced a corresponding feeling in her bosom, and thus they mutually acted and reacted upon each other, departing farther and farther from a mutual understanding at every renewed attempt, until at the close of the set, Dudley retired, as he imagined, irreconcilably offended, folding his arms upon his breast, and looking the very picture of love in despair. While in this mood Bacon approached him, and tapped him on the shoulder, saying, "Hah, Charles, would'st drown thyself? Thou dost not set thy life at a pin's fee I'll warrant me. Why, what would'st thou have, man? Thou would'st not have her forward and pert enough to run unbidden into thy arms?"

"Run into my arms, forsooth! I think she was nearer running into thine own."

"Tut man, does thy knowledge of the sex extend no farther? Dost not know thou art quarrelling with the light of thine own eyes? Art thou not yet acquainted with the windings and apparent inconsistencies of the female heart? I say apparent, because when the primum mobile is once understood, all these little perversities of lovers' quarrels are beautifully consistent, and always traceable to the one great original cause. Once gain an insight of this leading motive, and you will admire where you now condemn—you will attribute to maidenly modesty and proper reserve, what you now censure as perverse and whimsical."

"I understand you not, Sir Professor."

"No, because you are interested in the matter. You cannot truly place the small end of the telescope to your eye, and see yourself at the other. You cannot stand, for instance, as I stand, and see yourself as I see you. But study the subject a little before you give way to the identical petulant humours with which you would quarrel in your mistress."

"And how long is it, pray, Sir Sage, since you took the beam from your own eye. If mine deceived me not, I saw you but a little while since swelling with all the offended dignity of majesty itself—merely because some more fortunate swain had previously secured the hand of the Governor's fair niece."

"You are as far wrong in my affairs, Charles, as you were just now in your own. You seem peculiarly predisposed to-night, to see only the surface of things. Suppose that some half a dozen of those butterflies who are now congregating round Lady Berkley, were to form a plot by which you were to be deprived of the hand of that lady whom you most desired to lead to the dance? Nay, more, suppose that you considered it all important to your interests that you should possess the hand on this particular night, and that you should be thwarted by such a contrivance of sub vice-royalty! What would you do? Would you content yourself with spending your rage upon your own lips between your teeth?"

"No, by heavens, I would tweak the nose of a small sprig of royalty itself."

"What, under the circumstances and responsibilities that environ us to-night?"

"No! not to-night certainly; there is no hurry in the business—his nasal organ will be as tangible a week hence as now, I suppose; but who is it that has done this deed? I see you have many rivals."

"Frank Beverly, to be sure."

"I supposed as much."

"You see," continued Bacon, "that I have now removed the mote from my own eye, and that you did in my case exactly what you did in your own—you looked only at the surface. But really, Charles, between ourselves, I begin to entertain some fears that they will at last affect Virginia with their own aristocratic notions and pretensions, for the absence of which we have so often praised her. I have seen a strange unusual something stealing over her countenance whenever I have approached her of late, which I do not like. She evidently struggles with it herself, but it has obtained the mastery in every instance, so far. Think you they will succeed at last?"

"I know not, my friend! but step with me into the entry—a word in your ear." The parties stepped just behind the casings to the door of the room in which they had been dancing, so as to occupy a small entry-way between the two largest apartments of the mansion, and there Dudley continued in an under tone.—

"Do you think they will dare the deed to-night?"

"As sure as there is truth in that strange old man—and he has never yet deceived me!"

"Tis well! and are all things prepared for their reception?"

"They are! As for myself, never did such occasion come more opportunely. I will raise a bloody monument to perpetuate the events of this night upon more than one memory in yonder gay assembly! And since the thought strikes me, Dudley, tis pity I disturbed the savage moroseness which was just stealing over you; however I shall retain a quantum sufficit for us both!"

At that moment they were about to return to the party which they had left, when Dudley elevating his finger, said, "Hist!"—and Bacon heard his own name pronounced, just on the other side of the partition against which they were leaning. The voice was Ludwells. "Can you tell me Beverly," said he, "the reason why Bacon does not wear the love lock!"

"Yes, I can, nature stamped him for a Roundhead and Crop-ear at his birth. Have you not observed how obstinately his curling locks are matted to his head? I'll warrant me if the truth could be known, his father was as pestilent a Rumper as ever sung a psalm on horseback."

Bacon heard no more; he was seized with the most ungovernable rage, and the utmost endeavours and remonstrances of his friend could scarcely prevent him from bursting in upon the speakers. In his endeavours to effect this object he forced his person partly in front of the doorway, just sufficiently to perceive that Virginia sat near, for whom, he doubted not these observations were intended. Again he became nearly unmanageable, until Dudley said to him in a harsh tone. "Rash man, would you sacrifice the whole colony for the purpose of chastising a piece of unmannerly insolence upon the spur of the moment, when you can as well do it to-morrow? Nay, it is the more manly course of the two."

Bacon by a powerful effort seemed to master his feelings, and compressing his lips, and folding his arms so as entirely to deceive his companion, he marched deliberately into the room, as if he intended to cross to the opposite side. But when not more than three paces from the door, he wheeled suddenly round and addressed Beverly. "This is no place for a personal reencounter, Sir Slanderer, and I will no farther break through the rules of good breeding than to hurl defiance in your teeth, and even this much I would not do, only that the defiance may go abroad with the calumny;" and with these words he flung his glove in the face of him to whom they were addressed. Beverly was taken entirely by surprise; and for some moments did not seem to realize the extent of the insult, and the greater personal indignity which had been offered to him. He was not long, however, in comprehending the nature of the case, and deliberately stooping to pick up the glove he answered, "This, as you have better said than acted, is no place to quarrel, but I accept your gage, and dearly shall it be redeemed on your part."

During this short but pertinent dialogue, Virginia screamed and ran to the protection of her father and uncle, followed by the other ladies in that part of the room. A crowd instantly collected round each of the parties to hear their statements of the case. But Sir William, always prompt and energetic, ordered the orchestra to strike up and the dance to be resumed, which had ceased for the purpose of affording refreshment. "A mere boy's quarrel," said the old Knight with smiling visage, and the dance was resumed, as if nothing unusual had occurred.

General joy and hilarity were soon restored, for though the serenity and happiness of several important personages of our narrative might have been disturbed, there were still plenty of those left who were both light of heart and nimble of foot. The dance was again going round, wine circulating, wit sparkling, and merry faces and loud voices in all quarters, when a sudden explosion like the discharge of a broadside from a line of battle ship, seemed to shake the very foundations of the earth; windows rattled and fell—plastering came tumbling down—and ladies screamed and leaped from the casements, while others were borne off fainting to their friends. Bacon seized Virginia and Harriet, one under each arm, and bore them to a carriage, while Mr. Fairfax and Governor Berkley forced their ladies into the same vehicle, ordering the driver to speed for his life to the residence of the former. A bright red light in the midst of a dark column of smoke was now seen to ascend from behind the Governor's house. The powder magazine had been fired by the Cromwellians who were now in open revolt against the government. The schemes which they had been so long meditating, and which Bacon so truly anticipated, had now arrived at the crisis—the struggle was commenced which was to test whether a few scores of misguided but brave zealots were to triumph over the constituted authorities of the land, as they had before done in England.

CHAPTER IX.

The night was dark and lowering, and masses of heavy clouds enveloped the city, a bright red column of fire ever and anon shot fitfully up from the smouldering ruins of the magazine, tipping the clouds with a crimson tinge, and illuminating the city to the light of noonday, and again suddenly giving place to volumes of thick sulphureous smoke which involved the surrounding objects in tenfold darkness. Drums were heard beating to arms—trumpets sounding the charge—fifes piercing the air—bells ringing the alarm—muskets and petronels discharged in quick succession, swords clashing, women shrieking, and men were seen running hither and thither in all the tumult of popular commotion. Bacon had no sooner lifted his frightened protegées into the carriage, than rushing into the back court, he found Dudley at the head of their youthful corps already desperately engaged with the Roundheads. He immediately threw himself into the thickest of the fight. With all their desperate valour, however, the two young officers were quickly sensible that they had entirely miscalculated the number and appointments of their enemies. In vain they endeavoured to repulse the hardy veterans who forced their way to the doors and windows of the gubernatorial mansion. The assailants moved to their work in a solid phalanx, that veteran soldier Worley, conspicuous at their head, and literally hewing down all opposition. One line after another of the valiant and high born youths fell before the murderous weapons of the insurgents. In vain did Bacon and Dudley, and Beverly and Ludwell, all now united in a common cause, enact prodigies of valour; their impetuous lunges fell powerless upon the iron frames of their opponents. Crowds of citizens now rushed against the insurgents some armed with swords, others with scythe blades, others again with bludgeons, and the rest with such means of destruction as they could seize in the street as they hurried to the contest. The accession of strength to the cause of the government was as yet of little avail, Bacon and his followers being driven to the walls, while the insurgents were protected on each side by a high wooden fence or barricade. Tables, chairs and bedsteads were hurled upon the heads of the besiegers, and the lower windows were thronged with eager citizens throwing their hastily seized weapons upon the heads of the foe in a vain effort to come within reach. The Cromwellians were now likewise receiving momentary reinforcements of those who leapt the high fences, and filled up the vacancies in the rear, as the front ranks fell in the desperate encounter with the youths and citizens. To whom the victory would fall could not long prove doubtful, situated as they now were; this Sir William Berkley and his kinsman Fairfax had no doubt perceived early in the engagement, for a shout from a multitude without the enclosure, in the midst of which might be heard the voice of Brian O'Reily, now announced the presence of the Governor. The welcome sound was speedily and cheerily answered by the sinking youths within, who took courage at the approach of succour, and fought with renewed spirit. The wooden barricade, was now seen to heave and shake, with every motion and creak of which O'Reily shouted in chorus, until at length the whole yielded and fell with aloud crash. A rush of citizens quickly filled up the breach, and poured their blows into the flank of the Roundheads, who now changing their front charged upon their new assailants at the head of whom were the Governor and Gideon Fairfax. The two old Cavaliers laid about them in a style worthy of their best and most chivalrous days, and the citizens as stoutly supported them although but poorly armed and equipped for such a rencounter. By this change of front the gallant little corps which had so long maintained its ground, was now in some measure relieved, and no longer subject to the murderous strokes of the iron-handed Cromwellians. By the order of Bacon they now poured their fire into the flank of the enemy, and by this double annoyance to their phalanx, would doubtless have speedily terminated the conflict, but the friends of the Insurgents without, taking example by the manœuvre of the governor and his party, now broke down the barricade on the other side, and rushed in their turn to the scene of conflict. As this new reinforcement were pushing through the court to join their friends, in storming the first breach, a loud explosion from Sir William's quarter was heard, followed by the groans and shrieks of a whole phalanx of the old and new assailants, in whose ranks a perfect lane was cut by this discharge of grape shot through the very centre of their column. A rush was now instantly made for the possession of the cannon, and as the citizens poured through the governor's house and the Roundheads through the new breach in the party-wall, a deadly scuffle ensued, which became more and more ferocious and sanguinary as each party received fresh accessions from their friends without. And though the Cavaliers and their supporters outnumbered their enemies, the latter had decidedly the advantage in equipment, strength and discipline; more especially in the hand-to-hand mode of warfare which now became necessary from the numbers crowded into so small a space. But there was another advantage which they possessed—they had but one commander, the veteran Worley, while the Cavaliers and citizens of the town were at one time commanded by Bacon, and at another by Sir William Berkley.

Bacon perceiving the effect of this circumstance, singled out and attacked the opposite leader in person, determined, if he lost his life in the unequal conflict, to make the attempt at least to place the two parties on a more equal footing. But Worley quickly detected his aim, and being a not less expert swordsman than his antagonist, took advantage of an impetuous thrust, and quickly brought him to the grapple of close quarters. One excelled in strength, and the other in activity, but notwithstanding the latter, superior powers of endurance would soon have ended the duel unfavourably for our hero, had not a blow from behind brought his powerful enemy to the ground. Before Bacon discovered O'Reily, he was well convinced that the bludgeon which had interfered so opportunely in his behalf, was wielded by no tyro at the weapon. However, he lost but few seconds, either upon his assailant or deliverer, but quickly directed his attention to matters of more absorbing importance in the direction of cannon. Meantime O'Reily seized the opportunity afforded by the engrossing nature of the conflict, in the quarter just mentioned, and stooping down he took one of Worley's feet under each arm, using his legs as shafts, and dragged him off to a horse stall hard by, where having deposited the insensible veteran upon the straw, he turned the key and consigned it to his pouch.

The battle now consisted almost entirely of numerous desperate individual conflicts, each citizen as he arrived singling out some hated Roundhead neighbour, and he in his turn as anxious to vent the party and personal hatred which had been so long festering within his bosom. Sir William Berkley perceiving that their veteran foes had a decided advantage in the position now occupied by the parties respectively, quickly devised a scheme, in concert with Mr. Fairfax, by which, while the Governor kept the enemy engaged over the cannon, the latter should take a score of sturdy citizens, and rushing in, regardless of consequences, drag this sole apparent cause of contention into the public square, and thus change the scene of action to a more open position, where the superior bodily strength of the insurgents could no longer avail them. The measure was executed with great spirit and promptitude, and succeeded beyond their most sanguine expectations; for no sooner had the citizens commenced dragging the piece at a brisk trot, than both parties tumultuously pressed round its wheels, and thus unconsciously were brought into a fair field of action. Bacon, as soon as he saw the design of the movement, wheeled his hardy youths through the Governor's house, and formed a line at the critical moment when the confused combatants arrived fighting over the gun: thus affording a rallying point for the friends of order and the government. The governmental troops immediately formed upon the line already partly established by Bacon and his corps, and thus the gun was at length brought to bear for a time upon the opposing ranks. The light which had hitherto fitfully gleamed upon the strife, was now sinking after long intervals, and emitting that unsteady and wavering flame which announces rapidly approaching extinction. A few rounds of musketry and one or two discharges from the small fieldpiece, and the arena of conflict was shrouded in impenetrable darkness, save from the momentary glare which preceded the explosions. The Cromwellians, locking their column more compactly together, rushed in a solid body upon the newly formed line of the citizens. So sudden and so impetuous was this movement, and so skilfully executed, that the brave but ill disciplined combatants, against whom it was directed, gave way before the solid phalanx of the enemy, leaving the long disputed fieldpiece surrounded by the Insurgents. They immediately turned its muzzle upon its late owners, and were about charging it with the usual silence and promptitude of their movements, when a bright light from a burning torch was seen forcing its way almost undisputed through their ranks. The Cromwellians stood aside for its passage with an irresolute sort of tardiness, produced by a doubt whether the bearer were a friend or an enemy. But they were not left long in suspense, for he had no sooner arrived at this point, now forming the line between the contending parties, than he sprang upon the carriage of the gun, holding his torch aloft, so as to shed a glaring light upon the assembled multitude of both parties, who stood now for a moment of truce, in wonder at the strange and gigantic figure before them.

"Hold!" said he in a loud authoritative voice, and waving his hand with a commanding gesture over the ranks of the Roundheads who crowded round him. "Where is your commander, Worley?"

"He is slain," answered twenty voices.

"His blood be upon his own head. Where is he who commandeth in his stead?"

"Here am I," said a short black visaged thick-set man. "Here am I, Ananias Proudfit, whom the Lord hath commissioned this night to take away the wicked from the land, and to root out the Amalekite, and the Jebusite, and the Perizzite, and the Hittite, and the Girgashite and the Amorite. And are not this council and this wicked Governor justly comparable to the five Kings who took shelter in the cave of Makkeda, who were"—

"Peace, brawler, peace," thundered the gigantic umpire, "and cease to pervert the word of God to thy murderous and unholy purposes. Take warning by the fate of thy predecessor. Thou would'st not listen to a more safe and peaceable admonition, administered in humility and good faith. Now I tell thee that if thou art still deaf, this good sword shall cleave thy hardened skull," and he drew his formidable weapon and brandished it over the torch. "Hah! sayest thou so," said the enraged Proudfit, aiming a deadly blow at the gigantic figure towering above him, but which the stranger struck aside with the ease of a wary and practised swordsman, and in the next moment as he had promised, drove his ponderous weapon into the skull of his assailant. Then hurling his torch into the advancing throng of the Independents, he brandished the huge glittering blade in fearful circles around the besieged gun, and quickly cleared a space for its more dexterous and effectual employment.

The fight was now renewed in all quarters, but evidently to greater disadvantage on the part of the Insurgents, than they yet had to contend with. The loss of their commander a second time, even in the ordinary course of warfare, would doubtless have disheartened them, but the circumstances under which the last had fallen—the superstitious reverence in which they were accustomed to hold the Recluse—all contributed to damp their ardour, to say nothing of the bloody barricade he had already piled around his person. They were now, too, in a comparatively open field, where the greater numbers of their enemies could avail much, and where no opportunity was afforded for the fatal grapple which had so well served the rebels in the earlier stages of the conflict. They were assailed from all points of the square at the same moment, while the Recluse, in the very heart of their ranks, was literally hewing them down like weeds and cumberers of the ground. No quarter was asked or given—they had staked their all upon the success of their enterprise, and seemed determined, long after all hope of success in their first project must have failed, to leave a bloody monument to their foolhardy courage, if not to their wisdom and fore-thought. Nathaniel Bacon, exhausted by the loss of blood from wounds received in the desperate repulse of the insurgents during the early part of the engagement, and feeling his tremendous responsibility for his inadequate preparations, no longer so onerous or so urgent upon himself, fell upon the field, and was borne to the house of his early friend and patron.

With the powerful aid of the Recluse, and the accumulating reinforcements from the loyal citizens of the town, the remainder of the gallant but misguided zealots were soon either cut down, captured, or put to flight. The slain of the Cavalier party were laid out in the State House, while those of the opposite faction were deposited in the tobacco warehouse, so lately the scene of youthful revels.

The wounded were removed to the houses of their friends and relations throughout the city, and in a short time as profound silence reigned along its deserted streets as if no one had arisen to disturb its peace. Not an individual could be found who had seen the Recluse after the termination of the struggle. The slain were carefully examined, but no such huge proportions as his lay stretched in death, among the gory trophies of his prowess.

The veteran soldiers, so many of whom had fallen, while others were confined within the jail of the colony, were a remnant of Cromwell's soldiers who had been sent from the parent country, on account of their restless and dangerous propensities, some of them had been sold into temporary bondage, while others established themselves in business or planting on their own account. They had formed the desperate resolution of rising upon the governor and his guests while seated over their wine, supposing that, in the promiscuous massacre which they had intended to perpetrate, all the councillors, and leading men of the colony would be swept away, and themselves thereby enabled to revolutionize the government.

The Recluse had doubtless been vainly urged to join their desperate faction, and it would appear that they had either depended upon their threats of vengeance as a sufficient warrant for his fidelity, or trusted to his supposed predilection for their cause, and hatred against the authorities then at the head of colonial affairs. Nor does it appear that he did openly and boldly betray them. Bacon had by some means or other of his own, pryed so far into the secret of the incipient rebellion as to learn who were the prominent leaders—by the suggestion of the Recluse, obtained through the agency of Virginia, he had found access to the ear of one Berkenhead, an influential man among them, who, influenced by gold and liberal promises, betrayed so much of the conspirators' designs as enabled Bacon to adopt the preparations of which we have just seen the result. And though they were of themselves totally inadequate, yet they served the purpose of keeping the murderers at bay, until time was afforded for the intervention of the citizens, and thus had preserved the lives of the Governor and his Council, together with those of many members of the House of Burgesses. The Assembly, which convened three days afterward, unanimously voted three thousand weight of tobacco to the traitor Berkenhead, and passed sundry pious resolutions of thanks to the Almighty for their deliverance, besides setting the day apart as one of thanksgiving for ever after.

The ancient city presented a strange and desolate appearance on the succeeding morning, in the neighbourhood of the public square. Houses were deserted by their tenants, windows shattered, palings pulled down, the ground stained with blood; guns, petronels, swords, hats, and missiles of various descriptions lay scattered about in strange confusion.

At length the drowsy citizens were awakened to the importance of the day. A court of inquiry was assembled for the purpose of investigating the conspiracy which had so nearly proved fatal to the existing order of things on the previous night. The prisoners were brought from the jail to the Court House in irons, and all the witnesses supposed to know any thing of the matter, were in readiness. Nathaniel Bacon was the first called, but Mr. Fairfax came forward and stated that his wounds were so much more dangerous than had previously been supposed, that the surgeon strictly enjoined quiet and repose, and recommended if possible to postpone taking his deposition for the present. As the testimony was ample and satisfactory without his attendance, the examination of course proceeded. Berkenhead's deposition was essentially what we have already more succinctly stated in explanation of the insurrection, and most of the other witnesses testified only to what the reader has already seen or surmised. There was one witness, however, whose testimony was so novel and amusing, amidst the general scene of confusion and bloodshed, that we must by no means neglect it. Brian O'Reily was called in his turn to give evidence on behalf of the crown on a charge of treason against the prisoners at the bar.