Matilda Montgomerie Or The Prophecy Fulfilled Part 19

Gerald pulled the trigger of his blunderbuss, aimed into the very centre of the boat. Shrieks, curses and plas.h.i.+ngs as of bodies falling in the water, succeeded; and in the confusion occasioned by the murderous fire, the first boat evidently fell off.

"Again, Sambo," whispered the officer. A second time the torch streamed suddenly in air, and the contents of the yet undischarged blunderbuss spread confusion, dismay and death, into the second boat.

"Old Sal herself couldn't have done better: pity he hadn't a hundred of them," growled Tom Fluke, who, although concealed behind the bulwarks, had availed himself of a crevice near him, to watch the effect produced by the formidable weapons.

There was a momentary indecision among the enemy, after the second destructive fire; it was but momentary. Again they advanced, and closing with the vessel, evinced a determination of purpose, that, left little doubt as to the result. A few sprang into the chains and rigging, while others sought to enter by her bows; but the main effort seemed to be made at her gangway, at which Gerald had stationed himself with ten of his best men, the rest being detached to make the best defence they could, against those who sought to enter in the manner above described.

Notwithstanding the great disparity of numbers, the little crew of the schooner had for some time a considerable advantage over their enemies.

At the first onset of these latter, their pistols had been discharged, but in so random a manner as to have done no injury--whereas the a.s.sailed, scrupulously obeying the order of their commander, fired not a shot until they found themselves face to face with an enemy; the consequence of which was that every pistol-ball killed an American, or otherwise placed him _hors du combat_. Still, in spite of their loss, the latter was more than adequate to the capture, unless a miracle should interpose to prevent it; and, exasperated as they were by the fall of their comrades, their efforts became at each moment more resolute and successful. A deadly contest had been maintained in the gangway, from which, however, Gerald was compelled to retire, although bravely supported by his handful of followers. His force now consisted merely of five men remaining of his own party, and three of those who had been detached, who, all that were left alive, had been compelled to fall back on their commander. How long he would have continued the hopeless and desperate struggle in this manner is doubtful, had not a fresh enemy appeared in his rear. These were the crews of two other boats, who, having boarded without difficulty, now came up to the a.s.sistance of their comrades. So completely taken by surprise was Gerald in this quarter, that the first intimation he had of his danger was, in the violent seizure of his sword arm from behind, and a general rush upon and disarming of the remainder of his followers. On turning to behold his enemy, he saw with concern the triumphant face of Desborough.

"Every dog has his day, I guess," huskily chuckled the settler, as by the glare of several torches which had been suddenly lighted, he was now seen casting looks of savage vengeance, and holding his formidable knife threateningly over the head of the officer whom he had grappled. "I reckon as how I told you it would be Jeremiah Desborough's turn next."

"Silence, fellow--loose your hold," shouted one, whose authoritative voice and manner announced him for an officer, apparently the leader of the boarding party.

"I regret much, sir," pursued the American commander, seriously, and turning to Gerald, "that your obstinate defence should have been carried to the length it has. We were given to understand that ours would not be an easy conquest, yet little deemed it would have been purchased with the lives of so many of our force. Still, even while we deplore our loss, have we hearts to estimate the valor of our foe. I cannot give you freedom, since the gift is not at my disposal; but at least I may spare you the pain of surrendering a blade you have so n.o.bly wielded. Retain your sword, sir."

Gerald's was not a nature to remain untouched by such an act of chivalrous courtesy, and he expressed, in brief but pointed terms, his sense of the compliment.

Five minutes afterwards Gerald, who had exchanged his trusty cutla.s.s for the sword he had been so flatteringly permitted to retain, found himself in the leading boat of the little return squadron, and seated at the side of his generous captor.

"I think you said," he observed, "that you had been informed the conquest of the schooner would not be an easy one. Would it be seeking too much to know who was your informant."

The American officer shook his head. "I fear I am not at liberty exactly to name--but thus much I may venture to state, that the person who has so rightly estimated your gallantry, is one not wholly unknown to you."

"This is ambiguous. One question more--were you prepared to expect the failure of the schooner's princ.i.p.al means of defence, her long gun?"

"If you recollect the cheer that burst from my fellows at the moment when the harmless flash was seen ascending, you will require no further elucidation on that head," replied the American evasively.

This was sufficient for Gerald. He folded his arms, sank his head upon his chest, and continued to muse deeply. Soon afterwards the boat touched the beach, where many of the citizens were a.s.sembled to hear tidings of the enterprize and congratulate the victors. Thence he was conducted to the neat little inn, which was the only accommodation the small town, or rather village of Buffalo, at that time afforded.

CHAPTER XVIII.

At the termination of the memorable war of the Revolution--that war, which, on the one hand, severed the ties that bound the Colonies in interest and affection with the parent land, and on the other, seemed, as by way of indemnification, to have riveted the Canadas in closer love to their adopted mother--hundreds of families who had remained staunch in their allegiance quitted the American soil, to which they had been unwillingly transferred, and hastened to close, on one side of the vast chain of waters that separated the descendants of France from the descendants of England, the evening of an existence, whose morning and noon had been pa.s.sed on the other. Among the number of these was Major Grantham, who, at the close of the Revolution, had espoused a daughter (the only remaining child) of Frederick and Madeline De Haldimar, whose many vicissitudes of suffering prior to their marriage, have been fully detailed in Wacousta. When, at that period, the different garrisons on the frontier were given up to the American troops, the several British regiments crossed over into Canada, and, after a short term of service in that country, were successively relieved by fresh corps from England.

One of the earliest recalled of these was the regiment of Colonel Frederick De Haldimar. Local interests, however, attaching his son-in-law to Upper Canada, the latter had, on the reduction of his corps, a provincial regiment, well known throughout the war of the Revolution, for its strength, activity, and good service finally fixed himself at Amherstburg.

In the domestic relations of life Major Grantham was exemplary, although perhaps his rigid notions of right had obtained for him more of the respect than of the love of those who came within their influence, and yet no mean portion of both. Tenderly attached to his wife, whom he had lost when Gerald was yet in his twelfth year, he had not ceased to deplore her loss; and this perhaps had contributed to nourish a reservedness of disposition, which, without at all aiming at, or purposing, such effect, insensibly tended to the production of a corresponding reserve on the part of his children, that increased with their years. Indeed, on their mother all the tenderness of their young hearts had been lavished, and, when they suddenly saw themselves deprived of her who loved and had been loved by them, with doting fondness, they felt as if a void had been left in their affections which the less tender evidences of paternal love were but insufficient wholly to supply. Still--although not to the same extent--did they love their father also; and what was wanted in intensity of feeling was more than made up by the deep, the exalted respect, they entertained for his principles and conduct. It was with pride they beheld him, not merely the deservedly idolized of the low, but the respected of the high--the example of one cla.s.s, and the revered of another; one whose high position in the social circle had been attained, less by his striking exterior advantages than the inward worth that governed every action of his life, and whose moral character, as completely _sans tache_ as his fulfilment of the social duties was proverbially _sans reproche_, could not fail, in a certain degree, to reflect the respect it commanded upon themselves.

As we have before observed, however, all the fervor of their affection had been centered in their mother, and that was indeed a melancholy night in which the youths had been summoned to watch the pa.s.sing away of her gentle spirit for ever from their love. Isabella De Haldimar had, from her earliest infancy, been remarkable for her quiet and contemplative character; and bred amid scenes that brought at every retrospect recollections of some acted horror, it is not surprising that the bias given by nature should have been developed and strengthened by the events that had surrounded her. Not dissimilar in disposition, as she was not unlike in form, to her mother, she was by that mother carefully endowed with those gentler attributes of goodness, which, taking root within a soil so eminently disposed to their reception, could not fail to render her in after life a model of excellence, both as a mother and a wife. Notwithstanding, however, this moulding of her pliant and well-directed mind, there was about her a melancholy, which, while it gave promise of the devoted affection of the mother, offered but little prospect of cheerfulness, in an union with one, who, reserved himself, could not be expected to temper that melancholy by the introduction of a gaiety that was not natural to him. And yet it was for this very melancholy, tender and fascinating in her, that Major Grantham had sought the hand of Isabella De Haldimar; and it was for the very austerity and reserve of his general manner, more than from the manly beauty of his tall dark person, that he too had become the object of her secret choice long before he had proposed for her.

The austerity which Major Grantham carried with him into public life was, if not wholly laid aside, at least considerably softened, in the presence of his wife, and when, later, the birth of two sons crowned their union, there was nothing left her to desire which it was in the power of circ.u.mstances to bestow. Mrs. De Haldimar had not taken into account the effect likely to be produced by a separation from herself--the final severing, as it were, of every tie of blood. Of the four children who had composed the family of Colonel Frederick De Haldimar, the two oldest (officers in his own corps) had perished in the war: the fourth, a daughter, had died young, of a decline: and the loss of the former especially, who had grown up with her from childhood to youth, was deeply felt by the sensitive Isabella. With the dreadful scenes perpetrated at Detroit--scenes in which their family had been the princ.i.p.al sufferers--the boys had been familiarized by the soldiers of their father's regiment, who often took them to the several points most worthy of remark from the incidents connected with them; and, pointing out the spots on which their uncle Charles and their aunt Clara had fallen victims to the terrible hatred of Wacousta for their grandfather, detailed the horrors of those days with a rude fidelity of coloring that brought dismay and indignation to the hearts of their wondering and youthful auditors. On these occasions Isabella became the depository of all they had gleaned. To her they confided, under the same pledge of secrecy that had been exacted from themselves, every circ.u.mstance of horror connected with those days; nor were they satisfied, until they had shown her those scenes with which so many dreadful recollections were a.s.sociated.

Thus was the melancholy of Isabella fed by the very silence in which she was compelled to indulge. Often was her pillow wetted with tears, as she pa.s.sed in review the several fearful incidents connected with the tale in which her brothers had so deeply interested her, and she would have given worlds at those moments, had they been hers to bestow, to recal to life and animation the beloved but unfortunate uncle and aunt, to whose fate, her brothers a.s.sured her, even their veteran friends never alluded without sorrow. Often, too, did she dwell on the share her own fond mother had borne in those transactions, and the anguish which must have pierced her heart when first apprized of the loss of her, whom she had even _then_ loved with all a mother's love. Nay, more than once, while gazing on the face of the former, her inmost soul given up to the recollection of all she had endured, first at Michillimackinac, and afterwards at Detroit, had she unconsciously suffered the tears to course down her cheeks without an effort to restrain them. Ignorant of the cause, Mrs. De Haldimar only ascribed this emotion to the natural melancholy of her daughter's character, and then she would gently chide her, and seek, by a variety of means, to divert her thoughts into some lively channel; but she had little success in the attempt to eradicate reflections already rooted in so congenial a soil.

Her sister died very young, and she scarcely felt her loss; but when, subsequently, the vicissitudes of a military life had deprived her for ever of her beloved brothers, her melancholy increased. It was however the silent, tearless melancholy, that knows not the paroxysm of outrageous grief. The quiet resignation of her character formed an obstacle to the inroads of all vivacious sorrow; yet was her health not the less effectually undermined by the slow action of her innate feeling, unfortunately too much fostered by outward influences. By her marriage and the birth of her sons, whom she loved with all a mother's fondness, her mental malady had been materially diminished, and indeed in a great degree superseded, but unhappily, previous to these events, it had seriously effected her const.i.tution, and produced a morbid susceptibility of mind and person, that exposed her to be overwhelmed by the occurrence of any of those afflictions which otherwise she might, with ordinary fort.i.tude, have endured. When therefore intelligence from England announced that her parents had both perished in a hurricane on their route to the West Indies, whither the regiment of Colonel De Haldimar had been ordered, the shock was too great for her, mentally and physically enfeebled as she had been, to sustain, and she sank gradually under this final infliction of Providence.

Major Grantham beheld with dismay the effect of this blow upon his beloved wife. Fell consumption had now marked her for her own, and so rapid was the progress of the disease acting on a temperament already too much predisposed to its influence, that, in despite of all human preventives, the sensitive Isabella, before six months had elapsed, was summoned to a better world.

We will pa.s.s over the deep grief which preyed upon the hearts of the unfortunate brothers for weeks after they had been compelled to acknowledge the stern truth that they were indeed motherless.

It was soon after this event, that the first seeds of disunion began to spring up between England and the United States, the inevitable results of which it was antic.i.p.ated, would be the involving of Canada in the struggle; and, notwithstanding the explosion did not take place for several years afterwards, preparations were made on either sh.o.r.e, to an extent that kept the spirit of enterprise on the alert.

Inheriting the martial spirit of their family, the inclinations of the young Granthams led them to the service; and, as their father could have no reasonable objection to oppose to a choice which promised not merely to secure his sons in an eligible profession, but to render them in some degree of benefit to their country, he consented to their views.

Gerald's preference leading him to the navy, he was placed on that establishment as a mids.h.i.+pman; while Henry, several years later, obtained, through the influence of their father's old friend General Brock, an ensigncy in the King's Regiment.

Meanwhile, Major Grantham, whose reserve appeared to have increased since the death of his wife, seemed to seek, in the active discharge of his magisterial duties, a relief from the recollection of the loss he had sustained; and it was about this period that, in consequence of many of the American settlers in Canada, having, in antic.i.p.ation of a rupture between the two countries, secretly withdrawn themselves to the opposite sh.o.r.e, his exaction of the duties of British subjects from those who remained, became more vigorous than ever.

We have already shown Desborough to have been the most unruly and disorderly of the worthless set; and as no opportunity was omitted of compelling him to renew his oath of allegiance, (while his general conduct was strictly watched), the hatred of the man for the stern magistrate was daily matured, until at length it grew into an inextinguishable desire for revenge.

The chief, and almost only recreation, in which Major Grantham indulged, was that of fowling. An excellent shot himself, he had been in some degree the instructor of his sons; and, although, owing to the wooded nature of the country, the facilities afforded to the enjoyment of his favorite pursuit in the orthodox manner of a true English sportsman, were few, still, as game was everywhere abundant, he had continued to turn to account the advantages that were actually offered. Both Gerald and Henry had been his earlier companions in the sport, but, of late years and especially since the death of their mother, he had been in the habit of going out alone.

It was one morning in that season of the year when the migratory pigeons pursue their course towards what are termed the "burnt woods," on which they feed, and in such numbers as to cover the surface of the heavens, as with a dense and darkening cloud, that Major Grantham sallied forth at early dawn, with his favorite dog and gun, and, as was his custom, towards Hartley's point. Disdaining, as unworthy of his skill, the myriads of pigeons that everywhere presented themselves, he pa.s.sed from the skirt of the forest towards an extensive swamp, in the rear of Hartley's, which, abounding in golden plover and snipe, usually afforded him a plentiful supply. On this occasion he was singularly successful, and, having bagged as many birds as he could conveniently carry, was in the act of ramming down his last charge, when the report of a shot came unexpectedly from the forest. In the next instant he was sensible he was wounded, and, placing his hand to his back, felt it wet with blood. As there was at the moment several large wild ducks within a few yards of the spot where he stood, and between himself and the person who had fired, he at once concluded that he had been the victim of an accident, and, feeling the necessity of a.s.sistance, he called loudly on the unseen sportsman to come forward to his aid; but, although his demand was several times repeated, no answer was returned, and no one appeared.

With some difficulty he contrived, after disembarra.s.sing himself of his game-bag, to reach the farm at Hartley's, where every a.s.sistance was afforded him, and, a waggon having been procured, he was conducted to his home, when, on examination the wound was p.r.o.nounced to be mortal.

On the third day from this event Major Grantham breathed his last, bequeathing the guardians.h.i.+p of his sons to Colonel D'Egville, who had married his sister. At this epoch, Gerald was absent with his vessel on a cruise, but Henry received his parting blessing upon both, accompanied by a solemn injunction, that they should never be guilty of any act which could sully the memory, either of their mother or himself. This Henry promised, in the name of both, most religiously to observe; and, when Gerald returned, and to his utter dismay beheld the lifeless form of the parent, whom he had quitted only a few days before in all the vigor of health, he not only renewed the pledge given by his brother, but with the vivacity of character habitual to him, called down the vengeance of Heaven upon his head, should he ever be found to swerve from those principles of honor, which had been so sedulously inculcated in him.

Meanwhile, there was nothing to throw even the faintest light on the actual cause of Major Grantham's death. On the first probing and dressing of the wound, the murderous lead had been extracted, and, as it was discovered to be a rifle ball it was taken for granted that some Indian, engaged in the chase, had, in the eagerness of pursuit, missed an intermediate object at which he had taken aim and lodged the ball accidentally in the body of the old gentleman; and that, terrified at discovery of the mischief he had done, and perhaps apprehending punishment, he had hastily fled from the spot, to avoid detection. This opinion, unanimously entertained by the townspeople, was shared by the brothers, who knowing the unbounded love and respect of all for their parent, dreamt not for one moment that his death could have been the result of premeditation. It was left for Desborough to avow, at a later period, that he had been the murderer; and with what startling effect on him, to whom the admission was exultingly made, we have already seen.

CHAPTER XIX.

Autumn had pa.s.sed away, and winter, the stern invigorating winter of beautiful America had already covered the earth with enduring snows, and the waters with bridges of seemingly eternal ice, and yet no effort had been made by the Americans to repossess themselves of the country they had so recently lost. The several garrisons of Detroit and Malden, reposing under the laurels they had so easily won, made holiday of their conquest; and, secure in the distance that separated them from the more populous districts of the Union, seemed to have taken it for granted that they had played their final part in the active operations of the war, and would be suffered to remain in undisturbed possession. But the storm was already brewing in the far distance which, advancing progressively like the waves of the coming tempest, was destined first to shake them in their security, and finally to overwhelm them in its vortex. With the natural enterprise of their character, the Americans had no sooner ascertained the fall of Detroit, than means slow but certain, were taken for the recovery of a post, with which, their national glory was in no slight decree identified. The country whence they drew their resources for the occasion, were the new states of Ohio and Kentucky, and one who had previously travelled through those immense tracts of forests, where the dwelling of the backwoodsman is met with at long intervals, would have marvelled at the zeal and prompt.i.tude with which these adventurous people, abandoning their homes, and disregarding their personal interests, flocked to the several rallying points. Armed and accoutred at their own expense, with the unerring rifle that provided them with game, and the faithful hatchet that had brought down the dark forest into ready subjection to their will, their claim upon the public was for the mere sustenance they required on service. It is true that this partial independence of the Government whom they served rather in the character of volunteers, than of conscripts, was in a great measure fatal to their discipline; but in the peculiar warfare of the country, absence of discipline was rather an advantage than a demerit, since when checked, or thrown into confusion, they looked not for a remedy in the resumption of order, but in the exercise each of his own individual exertions, facilitated as he was by his general knowledge of localities, and his confidence in his own personal resources.

But although new armies were speedily organized--if organized may be termed those who brought with them into the contest much courage and devotedness, yet little discipline--the Americans, in this instance, proceeded with a caution that proved their respect for the British garrison, strongly supported as it was by a numerous force of Indians.

Within two months after the capitulation of Detroit, a considerable army, Ohioans and Kentuckians, with some regular infantry, had been pushed forward as with a view to feel their way; but these having been checked by the sudden appearance of a detachment from Fort Malden, had limited their advance to the Miami River, on the banks of which, and on the ruins of one of the old English forts of Pontiac's days, they had constructed new fortifications, and otherwise strongly entrenched themselves. It was a mistake, however, to imagine that the enemy would be content with establis.h.i.+ng himself here. The new fort merely served as a nucleus for the concentration of such resources of men and warlike equipment, as were necessary to the subjection, firstly of Detroit, and afterwards of Fort Malden. Deprived of the means of transport, the shallow bed of the Miami aiding them but little, it was a matter of no mean difficulty with the Americans to convey, through several hundred miles of forest, the heavy guns they required for battering, and as it was only at intervals this could be effected--the most patient endurance and unrelaxing perseverance being necessary to the end. From the inactivity of this force, or rather the confinement of its operations to objects of defence, the English garrison had calculated on undisturbed security, at least throughout the winter, if not for a longer period; but, although it was not until this latter season was far advanced that the enemy broke up from his entrenchments on the Miami, and pushed himself forward for the attainment of his final view, the error of imputing inactivity to him was discovered at a moment when it was least expected.

It was during a public ball given at Amherstburg, on the 18th of January, 1813, that the first intelligence was brought of the advance of a strong American force, whose object it was supposed was to push rapidly on to Detroit, leaving Amherstburg behind to be disposed of later. The officer who brought this intelligence was the fat Lieutenant Raymond, who, commanding an outpost at the distance of some leagues, had been surprised, and after a resistance very creditable under the circ.u.mstances, driven in by the American advanced guard with a loss of nearly half his command.

Thus was the same consternation produced in the ball-room at Amherstburg, that at a later period occurred in a similar place of amus.e.m.e.nt at Brussels; and although not followed by the same momentous public results, producing the same host of fluttering fears and anxieties in the bosoms of the female votaries of Terpsich.o.r.e. We believe, however, that there existed some dissimilarity in the several modes of communication--the Duke of Wellington receiving his, with some appearance of regard on the part of the communicator for the nerves of the ladies, while to Colonel St. Julian, commanding at Amherstburg, and engaged at that moment at the whist-table, the news was imparted in stentorian tones, which were audible to every one in the adjoining ball-room.

But even if his voice had not been heard, the appearance of Lieutenant Raymond would have justified the apprehension of any reasonable person, for, in the importance of the moment, he had not deemed it necessary to make any change in the dress in which he had been surprised and driven back. Let the reader figure to himself a remarkably fat, ruddy faced man, of middling age, dressed in a pair of tightly fitting, dread-naught trowsers, and a sh.e.l.l jacket that had once been scarlet, but now, from use and exposure, rather resembled the color of brickdust; boots from which all polish had been taken by the grease employed to render them snow-proof; a brace of pistols thrust into the black waist belt that encircled his huge circ.u.mference, and from which depended a sword, whose steel scabbard showed the rust of the rudest bivouac. Let him, moreover, figure to himself that ruddy, carbuncled face, and nearly as ruddy brow, suffused with perspiration, although in a desperately cold winter's night, and the unwashed hands, and mouth, and lips black from the frequent biting of the ends of cartridges, while ever and anon the puffed cheeks, in the effort to procure air and relieve the panting chest, recal the idea of a Bacchus, after one of his most lengthened orgies--let him figure all this, and if he will add short, curling, wiry, damp hair, surmounting a head as round as a turnip, a snubby, red, _retrousse_ nose, and light grey eyes; he will have a tolerable idea of the startling figure that thus abruptly made its appearance in the person of Lieutenant Raymond, first among the dancers, and bustlingly thence into the adjoining card-room.

At the moment of his entrance, every eye had been turned upon this strange apparition, while an almost instinctive sense of the cause of his presence pervaded every breast. Indeed it was impossible to behold him arrayed in the bivouac garb in which we have described him, contrasted as it was with the elegant ball dresses of his brother officers and not attribute his presence to some extraordinary motive; and as almost every one in the room was aware of his having been absent on detachment, his mission had been half divined even before he had opened his lips to Colonel St. Julian, for whom, on entering, he had hurriedly inquired.

But when the latter officer was seen soon afterwards to rise from and leave the card-table, and, after communicating hurriedly with the several heads of departments, quit altogether the scene of festivity, there could be no longer a doubt; and, as in all cases of the sort, the danger was magnified, as it flew from lip to lip, even as the tiny snow-ball becomes a mountain by the accession it receives in its rolling course. Suddenly the dance was discontinued, and indeed in time, for the fingers of the non-combatant musicians, sharing in the general nervousness, had already given notice, by numerous falsettos, of their inability to proceed much longer. Bonnets, cloaks, m.u.f.fs, tippets, shawls, snow-shoes, and all the paraphernalia of a female winter equipment peculiar to the country, were brought unceremoniously in, and thrown _en ma.s.se_ upon the deserted benches of the ball-room. Then was there a scramble among the fair dancers, who, having secured their respective property, quitted the house; not, however, without a secret fear, on the part of many, that the first object they should encounter, on sallying forth, would be a corps of American sharpshooters. To the confusion within was added the clamor without, arising from swearing drivers, neighing horses, jingling bells, and jostling sledges. Finally, the only remaining ladies of the party were the D'Egvilles, whose sledge had not yet arrived: with these lingered Captain Molineux, Middlemore, and Henry Grantham, all of whom, having obtained leave of absence for the occasion, had accompanied them from Detroit. The two former, who had just terminated one of the old fas.h.i.+oned cotillions, then peculiar to the Canadas, stood leaning over the chairs of their partners, indulging in no very charitable comments on the unfortunate Raymond, to whose inopportune presence at that unseasonable hour they ascribed a host of most important momentary evils; as, for example, the early breaking up of the pleasantest ball of the season, the loss of an excellent antic.i.p.ated supper that had been prepared for a later hour, and, although last not least, the necessity it imposed upon them of an immediate return, that bitter cold night, to Detroit. Near the blazing wood fire, at their side, stood Henry Grantham, and Captain St. Clair of the Engineers. The former with his thoughts evidently far away from the pa.s.sing scene, the latter joining in the criticisms on Raymond.

A few moments afterwards Colonel D'Egville entered the room, now deserted save by the little coterie near the fire-place. Like Lieutenant Raymond's, his dress was more suited to the bivouac than the ball-room, and his countenance otherwise bore traces of fatigue.

His daughters flew to meet him. The officers also grouped around, desirous to hear what tidings he brought of the enemy, to corroborate the statement of Raymond. To the great mortification of the latter, it was now found that he and his little detachment had had all the running to themselves, and that, while they fancied the whole of the American army to be close at their heels, the latter had been so kept in check by the force of Indians, under Colonel D'Egville in person, as to be compelled to retire upon the point whence the original attack had been made. They had not followed the broken English outpost more than a mile, and yet, so convinced of close pursuit had been the latter, that for the s.p.a.ce of six leagues they had scarce relaxed in their retreat. The information now brought by Colonel D'Egville was, that the Americans had not advanced a single foot beyond the outpost in question, but, on the contrary, had commenced constructing a stockade and throwing up entrenchments. He added, moreover, that he had just dispatched an express to Sandwich, to General Proctor, communicating the intelligence, and suggesting the propriety of an attack before they could advance farther, and favor any movement on the part of the inhabitants of Detroit. As this counter-movement on our part would require every man that could be spared from the latter fortress, Colonel D'Egville seemed to think that before the officers could reach it, its garrison would be already on the way to join the expedition, which would doubtless be ordered to move from Amherstburg; and as the same impression appeared to exist in the mind of Colonel St. Julian, whom he had only just parted from to proceed in search of his daughters, the latter had taken it upon himself to determine that they should remain where they were until the answer, communicating the final decision of General Proctor, should arrive.

If the young officers were delighted at the idea of escaping the horror of an eighteen miles drive, on one of the bitterest nights of the season, supperless, and at the moment of issuing from a comfortable ball-room, their annoyance at (what they termed) the pusillanimity of Raymond, who had come thus unnecessarily in, to the utter annihilation of their evening's amus.e.m.e.nt--was in equal proportion. For this, on their way home, they revenged themselves by every sort of persiflage their humor could adapt to the occasion, until in the end they completely succeeded in destroying the good humor of Raymond, who eventually quitted them under feelings of mortified pride, which excited all the generous sympathy of the younger Grantham, while it created in his breast a sentiment of almost wrath against his inconsiderate companions. Even these latter were at length sensible that they had gone too far, and, as their better feelings returned, they sought to a.s.sure the offended object of their pleasantry that what they had uttered was merely in jest; but finding he received these disclaimers in moody silence, they renewed their attack, nor discontinued it until they separated for their mutual quarters for the night.

The following dawn broke in, decked with all the sad and sober grey peculiar to an American sky in the depth of winter, and, with the first rising of the almost rayless sun, commenced numerous warlike preparations, that gave promise to the inhabitants of some approaching crisis. The event justified their expectation; the suggestion of Colonel D'Egville had been adopted, and the same express which carried to General Proctor the information of the advance of the enemy, and the expulsion of Lieutenant Raymond from his post, was pushed on to Detroit, with an order for every man who could be spared from that fortress, to be marched without a moment's delay to Malden. At noon the detachment had arrived, and the General making his appearance soon after, the expedition, composed of the strength of the two garrisons, with a few light guns, and a considerable body of Indians, under the Chief Round-head, were pushed rapidly across the lake, and the same night occupied the only road by which the enemy could advance.