“It’s like the breath of life to me to feel the heft of a gun and to smell the trees round me,” said Amos. “Why, it cannot be more than a hundred leagues from here to Albany or Schenectady, right through the forest.”
“Ay, lad, but how is the gal3 to walk a hundred leagues through a forest? No, no, let us keep water under our keel, and lean on the Lord.”
“Then there is only one way for it. We must make the Richelieu River, and keep right along to Lake Champlain and Lake St. Sacrament. There we should be close by the headwaters of the Hudson.”
“It is a dangerous road,” said De Catinat, who understood the conversation of his companions, even when he was unable to join in it. “We should need to skirt the country of the Mohawks.”
“It’s the only way, I guess. It’s that or nothing.”
“And I have a friend upon the Richelieu River who, I am sure, would help us on our way,” said De Catinat with a smile. “Adele, you have heard me talk of Charles de la Noue, seigneur de Sainte Marie?”
“He whom you used to call the Canadian duke, Amory?”
“Precisely. His seigneury lies on the Richelieu, a little south of Fort St. Louis, and I am sure that he would speed us upon our way.”
“Good!” cried Amos. “If we have a friend there we shall do well. That clenches4 it then, and we shall hold fast by the river. Let’s get to our paddles then, for that friar will make mischief5 for us if he can.”
And so for a long week the little party toiled6 up the great waterway, keeping ever to the southern bank, where there were fewer clearings. On both sides of the stream the woods were thick, but every here and there they would curve away, and a narrow strip of cultivated land would skirt the bank, with the yellow stubble to mark where the wheat had grown. Adele looked with interest at the wooden houses with their jutting7 stories and quaint8 gable-ends, at the solid, stone-built manor-houses of the seigneurs, and at the mills in every hamlet, which served the double purpose of grinding flour and of a loop-holed place of retreat in case of attack. Horrible experience had taught the Canadians what the English settlers had yet to learn, that in a land of savages10 it is a folly11 to place isolated12 farmhouses13 in the centre of their own fields. The clearings then radiated out from the villages, and every cottage was built with an eye to the military necessities of the whole, so that the defence might make a stand at all points, and might finally centre upon the stone manor-house and the mill. Now at every bluff14 and hill near the villages might be seen the gleam of the muskets15 of the watchers, for it was known that the scalping parties of the Five Nations were out, and none could tell where the blow would fall, save that it must come where they were least prepared to meet it.
Indeed, at every step in this country, whether the traveller were on the St. Lawrence, or west upon the lakes, or down upon the banks of the Mississippi, or south in the country of the Cherokees and of the Creeks16, he would still find the inhabitants in the same state of dreadful expectancy17, and from the same cause. The Iroquois, as they were named by the French, or the Five Nations as they called themselves, hung like a cloud over the whole great continent. Their confederation was a natural one, for they were of the same stock and spoke18 the same language, and all attempts to separate them had been in vain. Mohawks, Cayugas, Onondagas, Oneidas, and Senecas were each proud of their own totems and their own chiefs, but in war they were Iroquois, and the enemy of one was the enemy of all. Their numbers were small, for they were never able to put two thousand warriors19 in the field, and their country was limited, for their villages were scattered20 over the tract21 which lies between Lake Champlain and Lake Ontario. But they were united, they were cunning, they were desperately22 brave, and they were fiercely aggressive and energetic. Holding a central position, they struck out upon each side in turn, never content with simply defeating an adversary23, but absolutely annihilating24 and destroying him, while holding all the others in check by their diplomacy25. War was their business, and cruelty their amusement. One by one they had turned their arms against the various nations, until, for a space of over a thousand square miles, none existed save by sufferance. They had swept away Hurons and Huron missions in one fearful massacre26. They had destroyed the tribes of the north-west, until even the distant Sacs and Foxes trembled at their name. They had scoured27 the whole country to westward28 until their scalping parties had come into touch with their kinsmen29 the Sioux, who were lords of the great plains, even as they were of the great forests. The New England Indians in the east, and the Shawnees and Delawares farther south, paid tribute to them, and the terror of their arms had extended over the borders of Maryland and Virginia. Never, perhaps, in the world’s history has so small a body of men dominated so large a district and for so long a time.
For half a century these tribes had nursed a grudge30 wards31 the French since Champlain and some of his followers32 had taken part with their enemies against them. During all these years they had brooded in their forest villages, flashing out now and again in some border outrage33, but waiting for the most part until their chance should come. And now it seemed to them that it had come. They had destroyed all the tribes who might have allied34 themselves with the white men. They had isolated them. They had supplied themselves with good guns and plenty of ammunition from the Dutch and English of New York. The long thin line of French settlements lay naked before them. They were gathered in the woods, like hounds in leash35, waiting for the orders of their chiefs, which should precipitate36 them with torch and with tomahawk upon the belt of villages.
Such was the situation as the little party of refugees paddled along the bank of the river, seeking the only path which could lead them to peace and to freedom. Yet it was, as they well knew, a dangerous road to follow. All down the Richelieu River were the outposts and blockhouses of the French, for when the feudal37 system was grafted38 upon Canada the various seigneurs or native noblesse were assigned their estates in the positions which would be of most benefit to the settlement. Each seigneur with his tenants39 under him, trained as they were in the use of arms, formed a military force exactly as they had done in the middle ages, the farmer holding his fief upon condition that he mustered40 when called upon to do so. Hence the old officers of the regiment41 of Carignan, and the more hardy42 of the settlers, had been placed along the line of the Richelieu, which runs at right angles to the St. Lawrence towards the Mohawk country. The blockhouses themselves might hold their own, but to the little party who had to travel down from one to the other the situation was full of deadly peril43. It was true that the Iroquois were not at war with the English, but they would discriminate44 little when on the warpath, and the Americans, even had they wished to do so, could not separate their fate from that of their two French companions.
As they ascended45 the St. Lawrence they met many canoes coming down. Sometimes it was an officer or an official on his way to the capital from Three Rivers or Montreal, sometimes it was a load of skins, with Indians or coureurs-debois conveying them down to be shipped to Europe, and sometimes it was a small canoe which bore a sunburned grizzly-haired man, with rusty46 weather-stained black cassock, who zigzagged47 from bank to bank, stopping at every Indian hut upon his way. If aught were amiss with the Church in Canada the fault lay not with men like these village priests, who toiled and worked and spent their very lives in bearing comfort and hope, and a little touch of refinement48 too, through all those wilds. More than once these wayfarers49 wished to have speech with the fugitives50, but they pushed onwards, disregarding their signs and hails. From below nothing overtook them, for they paddled from early morning until late at night, drawing up the canoe when they halted, and building a fire of dry wood, for already the nip of the coming winter was in the air.
It was not only the people and their dwellings51 which were stretched out before the wondering eyes of the French girl as she sat day after day in the stern of the canoe. Her husband and Amos Green taught her also to take notice of the sights of the woodlands, and as they skirted the bank, they pointed52 out a thousand things which her own senses would never have discerned. Sometimes it was the furry53 face of a raccoon peeping out from some tree-cleft, or an otter54 swimming under the overhanging brushwood with the gleam of a white fish in its mouth. Or, perhaps, it was the wild cat crouching55 along a branch with its wicked yellow eyes fixed56 upon the squirrels which played at the farther end, or else with a scuttle57 and rush the Canadian porcupine58 would thrust its way among the yellow blossoms of the resin59 weed and the tangle60 of the whortleberry bushes. She learned, too, to recognise the pert sharp cry of the tiny chick-a-dee, the call of the blue-bird, and the flash of its wings amid the foliage61, the sweet chirpy note of the black and white bobolink, and the long-drawn mewing of the cat-bird. On the breast of the broad blue river, with Nature’s sweet concert ever sounding from the bank, and with every colour that artist could devise spread out before her eyes on the foliage of the dying woods, the smile came back to her lips, and her cheeks took a glow of health which France had never been able to give. De Catinat saw the change in her, but her presence weighed him down with fear, for he knew that while Nature had made these woods a heaven, man had changed it into a hell, and that a nameless horror lurked62 behind all the beauty of the fading leaves and of the woodland flowers. Often as he lay at night beside the smouldering fire upon his couch of spruce, and looked at the little figure muffled63 in the blanket and slumbering64 peacefully by his side, he felt that he had no right to expose her to such peril, and that in the morning they should turn the canoe eastward65 again and take what fate might bring them at Quebec. But ever with the daybreak there came the thought of the humiliation66, the dreary67 homeward voyage, the separation which would await them in galley68 and dungeon69, to turn him from his purpose.
On the seventh day they rested at a point but a few miles from the mouth of the Richelieu River, where a large blockhouse, Fort Richelieu, had been built by M. de Saurel. Once past this they had no great distance to go to reach the seigneury of De Catinat’s friend of the noblesse who would help them upon their way. They had spent the night upon a little island in midstream, and at early dawn they were about to thrust the canoe out again from the sand-lined cove70 in which she lay, when Ephraim Savage growled71 in his throat and pointed Out across the water.
A large canoe was coming up the river, flying along as quick as a dozen arms could drive it. In the stern sat a dark figure which bent72 forward with every swing of the paddles, as though consumed by eagerness to push onwards. Even at that distance there was no mistaking it. It was the fanatical monk73 whom they had left behind them.
Concealed74 among the brushwood, they watched their pursuers fly past and vanish round a curve in the stream. Then they looked at one another in perplexity.
“We’d have done better either to put him overboard or to take him as ballast,” said Ephraim. “He’s hull75 down in front of us now, and drawing full.”
“Well, we can’t take the back track anyhow,” remarked Amos.
“And yet how can we go on?” said De Catinat despondently76. “This vindictive77 devil will give word at the fort and at every other point along the river. He has been back to Quebec. It is one of the governor’s own canoes, and goes three paces to our two.”
“Let me cipher78 it out.” Amos Green sat on a fallen maple79 with his head sunk upon his hands. “Well,” said he presently, “if it’s no good going on, and no good going back, there’s only one way, and that is to go to one side. That’s so, Ephraim, is it not?”
“Ay, ay, lad, if you can’t run you must tack9, but it seems shoal water on either bow.”
“We can’t go to the north, so it follows that we must go to the south.”
“Leave the canoe?”
“It’s our only chance. We can cut through the woods and come out near this friendly house on the Richelieu. The friar will lose our trail then, and we’ll have no more trouble with him, if he stays on the St. Lawrence.”
“There’s nothing else for it,” said Captain Ephraim ruefully. “It’s not my way to go by land if I can get by water, and I have not been a fathom80 deep in a wood since King Philip came down on the province, so you must lay the course and keep her straight, Amos.”
“It is not far, and it will not take us long. Let us get over to the southern bank and we shall make a start. If madame tires, De Catinat, we shall take turns to carry her.”
“Ah, monsieur, you cannot think what a good walker I am. In this splendid air one might go on forever.”
“We will cross then.”
In a very few minutes they were at the other side and had landed at the edge of the forest. There the guns and ammunition were allotted81 to each man, and his share of the provisions and of the scanty82 baggage. Then having paid the Indians, and having instructed them to say nothing of their movements, they turned their backs upon the river and plunged83 into the silent woods.
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1
savage
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| adj.野蛮的；凶恶的，残暴的；n.未开化的人 | |
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ammunition
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| n.军火，弹药 | |
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gal
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| n.姑娘，少女 | |
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clenches
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| v.紧握，抓紧，咬紧( clench的第三人称单数 ) | |
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mischief
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| n.损害，伤害，危害；恶作剧，捣蛋，胡闹 | |
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6
toiled
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| 长时间或辛苦地工作( toil的过去式和过去分词 )； 艰难缓慢地移动，跋涉 | |
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jutting
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| v.（使）突出( jut的现在分词 )；伸出；（从…）突出；高出 | |
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quaint
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| adj.古雅的，离奇有趣的，奇怪的 | |
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tack
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| n.大头钉；假缝，粗缝 | |
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savages
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| 未开化的人，野蛮人( savage的名词复数 ) | |
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folly
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| n.愚笨，愚蠢，蠢事，蠢行，傻话 | |
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isolated
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| adj.与世隔绝的 | |
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farmhouses
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| n.农舍，农场的主要住房( farmhouse的名词复数 ) | |
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bluff
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| v.虚张声势，用假象骗人；n.虚张声势，欺骗 | |
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muskets
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| n.火枪，（尤指）滑膛枪( musket的名词复数 ) | |
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creeks
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| n.小湾( creek的名词复数 )；小港；小河；小溪 | |
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17
expectancy
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| n.期望，预期，（根据概率统计求得）预期数额 | |
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spoke
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| n.（车轮的）辐条；轮辐；破坏某人的计划；阻挠某人的行动 v.讲，谈（speak的过去式）；说；演说；从某种观点来说 | |
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warriors
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| 武士，勇士，战士( warrior的名词复数 ) | |
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scattered
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| adj.分散的，稀疏的；散步的；疏疏落落的 | |
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tract
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| n.传单，小册子，大片(土地或森林) | |
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desperately
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| adv.极度渴望地，绝望地，孤注一掷地 | |
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adversary
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| adj.敌手，对手 | |
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annihilating
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| v.（彻底）消灭( annihilate的现在分词 )；使无效；废止；彻底击溃 | |
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25
diplomacy
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| n.外交；外交手腕，交际手腕 | |
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26
massacre
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| n.残杀，大屠杀；v.残杀，集体屠杀 | |
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27
scoured
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| 走遍（某地）搜寻（人或物）( scour的过去式和过去分词 )； （用力）刷； 擦净； 擦亮 | |
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westward
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| n.西方，西部；adj.西方的，向西的；adv.向西 | |
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29
kinsmen
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| n.家属，亲属( kinsman的名词复数 ) | |
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grudge
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| n.不满，怨恨，妒嫉；vt.勉强给，不情愿做 | |
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31
wards
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| 区( ward的名词复数 )； 病房； 受监护的未成年者； 被人照顾或控制的状态 | |
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32
followers
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| 追随者( follower的名词复数 )； 用户； 契据的附面； 从动件 | |
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33
outrage
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| n.暴行，侮辱，愤怒；vt.凌辱，激怒 | |
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allied
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| adj.协约国的；同盟国的 | |
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leash
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| n.牵狗的皮带，束缚；v.用皮带系住 | |
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precipitate
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| adj.突如其来的；vt.使突然发生；n.沉淀物 | |
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feudal
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| adj.封建的，封地的，领地的 | |
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grafted
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| 移植( graft的过去式和过去分词 )； 嫁接； 使（思想、制度等）成为（…的一部份）； 植根 | |
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tenants
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| n.房客( tenant的名词复数 )；佃户；占用者；占有者 | |
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40
mustered
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| v.集合，召集，集结（尤指部队）( muster的过去式和过去分词 )；（自他人处）搜集某事物；聚集；激发 | |
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41
regiment
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| n.团，多数，管理；v.组织，编成团，统制 | |
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42
hardy
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| adj.勇敢的，果断的，吃苦的；耐寒的 | |
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43
peril
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| n.(严重的)危险；危险的事物 | |
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44
discriminate
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| v.区别，辨别，区分；有区别地对待 | |
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45
ascended
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| v.上升，攀登( ascend的过去式和过去分词 ) | |
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46
rusty
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| adj.生锈的；锈色的；荒废了的 | |
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47
zigzagged
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| adj.呈之字形移动的v.弯弯曲曲地走路，曲折地前进( zigzag的过去式和过去分词 ) | |
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48
refinement
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| n.文雅；高尚；精美；精制；精炼 | |
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49
wayfarers
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| n.旅人，（尤指）徒步旅行者( wayfarer的名词复数 ) | |
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50
fugitives
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| n.亡命者，逃命者( fugitive的名词复数 ) | |
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51
dwellings
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| n.住处，处所( dwelling的名词复数 ) | |
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52
pointed
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| adj.尖的，直截了当的 | |
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53
furry
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| adj.毛皮的；似毛皮的；毛皮制的 | |
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54
otter
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| n.水獭 | |
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55
crouching
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| v.屈膝，蹲伏( crouch的现在分词 ) | |
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56
fixed
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| adj.固定的，不变的，准备好的；(计算机)固定的 | |
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57
scuttle
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| v.急赶，疾走，逃避；n.天窗；舷窗 | |
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58
porcupine
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| n.豪猪， 箭猪 | |
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59
resin
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| n.树脂，松香，树脂制品；vt.涂树脂 | |
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60
tangle
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| n.纠缠；缠结；混乱；v.(使)缠绕；变乱 | |
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61
foliage
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| n.叶子，树叶，簇叶 | |
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62
lurked
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| vi.潜伏，埋伏（lurk的过去式与过去分词形式） | |
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muffled
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| adj.（声音）被隔的；听不太清的；（衣服）裹严的；蒙住的v.压抑，捂住( muffle的过去式和过去分词 )；用厚厚的衣帽包着（自己） | |
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64
slumbering
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| 微睡，睡眠（slumber的现在分词形式） | |
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eastward
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| adv.向东；adj.向东的；n.东方，东部 | |
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66
humiliation
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| n.羞辱 | |
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67
dreary
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| adj.令人沮丧的，沉闷的，单调乏味的 | |
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68
galley
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| n.（飞机或船上的）厨房单层甲板大帆船；军舰舰长用的大划艇； | |
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69
dungeon
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| n.地牢，土牢 | |
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70
cove
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| n.小海湾，小峡谷 | |
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71
growled
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| v.（动物）发狺狺声， （雷）作隆隆声( growl的过去式和过去分词 )；低声咆哮着说 | |
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72
bent
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| n.爱好，癖好；adj.弯的；决心的，一心的 | |
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73
monk
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| n.和尚，僧侣，修道士 | |
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74
concealed
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| a.隐藏的，隐蔽的 | |
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75
hull
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| n.船身；(果、实等的)外壳；vt.去(谷物等)壳 | |
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76
despondently
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| adv.沮丧地，意志消沉地 | |
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77
vindictive
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| adj.有报仇心的，怀恨的，惩罚的 | |
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78
cipher
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| n.零；无影响力的人；密码 | |
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79
maple
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| n.槭树，枫树，槭木 | |
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80
fathom
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| v.领悟，彻底了解 | |
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81
allotted
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| 分配，拨给，摊派( allot的过去式和过去分词 ) | |
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82
scanty
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| adj.缺乏的，仅有的，节省的，狭小的，不够的 | |
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83
plunged
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| v.颠簸( plunge的过去式和过去分词 )；暴跌；骤降；突降 | |
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