CHAPTER II
SOWING THE DRAGON'S TEETH
Solomon Binkus in his talk with Colonel Hare had signalized the arrivalof a new type of man born of new conditions. When Lord Howe andGeneral Abercrombie got to Albany with regiments of fine, high-bred,young fellows from London, Manchester and Liverpool, out for a holidayand magnificent in their uniforms of scarlet and gold, each with hisbeautiful and abundant hair done up in a queue, Mr. Binkus laughed andsaid they looked "terrible pert." He told the virile and profaneCaptain Lee of Howe's staff, that the first thing to do was to "make ahaystack o' their hair an' give 'em men's clothes."
"A cart-load o' hair was mowed off," to quote again from Solomon, andall their splendor shorn away for a reason apparent to them before theyhad gone far on their ill-fated expedition. Hair-dressing and finemillinery and drawing-room clothes were not for the bush.
An inherited sense of old wrongs was the mental background of this newtype of man. Life in the bush had strengthened his arm, his will andhis courage. His words fell as forcefully as his ax under provocation.He was deliberate as became one whose scalp was often in danger;trained to think of the common welfare of his neighborhood and rathercareless about the look of his coat and trousers.
John Irons and Solomon Binkus were differing examples of the new man.Of large stature, Irons had a reputation of being the strongest man inthe New Hampshire grants. No name was better known or respected in allthe western valleys. His father, a man of some means, had left him areasonable competence.
Certain old records of Cumberland County speak of his unusual gifts,the best of which was, perhaps, modesty. He had once entertained SirWilliam Johnson at his house and had moved west, when the French andIndian War began, on the invitation of the governor, bringing hishorses with him. For years he had been breeding and training saddlehorses for the markets in New England. On moving he had turned hisstock into Sir William's pasture and built a log house at the fort andserved as an aid and counselor of the great man. Meanwhile his wifeand children had lived in Albany. When the back country was thoughtsafe to live in, at the urgent solicitation of Sir Jeffrey Amherst, hehad gone to the northern valley with his herd, and prospered there.
Albany had one wide street which ran along the river-front. It endedat the gate of a big, common pasture some four hundred yards south ofthe landing which was near the center of the little city. In the northit ran into "the great road" beyond the ample grounds of ColonelSchuyler. The fort and hospital stood on the top of the big hill.Close to the shore was a fringe of elms, some of them tall and stately,their columns feathered with wild grape-vines. A wide space betweenthe trees and the street had been turned into well-kept gardens, andtheir verdure was a pleasant thing to see. The town lay along the footof a steep hill, and, midway, a huddle of buildings climbed a few rodsup the slope. At the top was the English Church and below it were theTown Hall, the market and the Dutch Meeting-House. Other thoroughfareswest of the main one were being laid out and settled.
John Irons was well known to Colonel Schuyler. The good man gave thenewcomers a hearty welcome and was able to sell them a house readyfurnished--the same having been lately vacated by an officer summonedto England. So it happened that John Irons and his family were quicklyand comfortably settled in their new home and the children at work inschool. He soon bought some land, partly cleared, a mile or so downthe river and began to improve it.
"You've had lonesome days enough, mother," he said to his wife. "We'lllive here in the village. I'll buy some good, young niggers if I can,and build a house for 'em, and go back and forth in the saddle."
The best families had negro slaves which were, in the main, likeAbraham's servants, each having been born in the house of his master.They were regarded with affection.
It was a peaceful, happy, mutually helpful, God-fearing community inwhich the affairs of each were the concern of all. Every summer day,emigrants were passing and stopping, on their way west, towing bateauxfor use in the upper waters of the Mohawk. These were mostly Irish andGerman people seeking cheap land, and seeing not the danger in wars tocome.
There is an old letter from John Irons to his sister in Braintree whichsays that Jack, of whom he had a great pride, was getting on famouslyin school. "But he shows no favor to any of the girls, having lost hisheart to a young English maid whom he helped to rescue from theIndians. We think it lucky that she should be far away so that he maybetter keep his resolution to be educated and his composure in thetask."
The arrival of the mail was an event in Albany those days. Letters hadcome to be regarded there as common property. They were passed fromhand to hand and read in neighborhood assemblies. Often they told ofgreat hardship and stirring adventures in the wilderness and of eventsbeyond the sea.
Every week the mail brought papers from the three big cities, whichwere read eagerly and loaned or exchanged until their contents hadtraveled through every street. Benjamin Franklin's _PennsylvaniaGazette_ came to John Irons, and having been read aloud by the firesidewas given to Simon Grover in exchange for Rivington's _New York Weekly_.
Jack was in a coasting party on Gallows Hill when his father broughthim a fat letter from England. He went home at once to read it. Theletter was from Margaret Hare--a love-letter which proposed a ratherdifficult problem. It is now a bit of paper so brittle with age it hasto be delicately handled. Its neatly drawn chirography is faded to alight yellow, but how alive it is with youthful ardor:
"I think of you and pray for you very often," it says. "I hope youhave not forgotten me or must I look for another to help me enjoy thathappy fortune of which you have heard? Please tell me truly. Myfather has met Doctor Franklin who told of the night he spent at yourhome and that he thought you were a noble and promising lad. What apleasure it was to hear him say that! We are much alarmed by events inAmerica. My mother and I stand up for Americans, but my father haschanged his views since we came down the Mohawk together. You mustremember that he is a friend of the King. I hope that you and yourfather will be patient and take no part in the riots and houseburnings. You have English blood in your veins and old England oughtto be dear to you. She really loves America very much, indeed, if notas much as I love you. Can you not endure the wrongs for her sake andmine in the hope that they will soon be righted? Whatever happens Ishall not cease to love you, but the fear comes to me that, if you turnagainst England, I shall love in vain. There are days when the futurelooks dark and I hope that your answer will break the clouds that hangover it."
So ran a part of the letter, colored somewhat by the diplomacy of ashrewd mother, one would say who read it carefully. The neighbors hadheard of its arrival and many of them dropped in that evening, but theywent home none the wiser. After the company had gone, Jack showed theletter to his father and mother.
"My boy, it is a time to stand firm," said his father.
"I think so, too," the boy answered.
"Are you still in love with her?" his mother asked.
The boy blushed as he looked down into the fire and did not answer.
"She is a pretty miss," the woman went on. "But if you have to choosebetween her and liberty, what will you say?"
"I can answer for Jack," said John Irons. "He will say that we inAmerica will give up father and mother and home and life and everythingwe hold dear for the love of liberty."
"Of course I could not be a Tory," Jack declared. The boy hadstudiously read the books which Doctor Franklin had sent tohim--_Pilgrim's Progress_, _Plutarch's Lives_, and a number of theworks of Daniel Defoe. He had discussed them with his father and atthe latter's suggestion had set down his impressions. His father hadassured him that it was well done, but had said to Mrs. Irons that itshowed "a remarkable rightness of mind and temper and unexpectedaptitude in the art of expression."
It is likely that the boy wrote many letters which Miss Margaret neversaw before his arguments were set down in the firm, gentle and winningtone which satisfied his spirit.
Having finished his letter, at last,he read it aloud to his father and mother one evening as they sattogether, by the fireside, after the rest of the family had gone tobed. Tears of pride came to the eyes of the man and woman when thelong letter was finished.
"I love old England," it said, "because it is your home and because itwas the home of my fathers. But I am sure it is not old England whichmade the laws we hate and sent soldiers to Boston. Is it not anotherEngland which the King and his ministers invented? I ask you to betrue to old England which, my father has told me, stood for justice andhuman rights.
"But after all, what has politics to do with you and me as a pair ofhuman beings? Our love is a thing above that. The acts of the King ormy fellow countrymen can not affect my love for you, and to know thatyou are of the same mind holds me above despair. I would think it agreat hardship if either King or colony had the power to put a tax onyou--a tax which demanded my principles. Can not your father differwith me in politics--although when you were here I made sure that heagreed with us--and keep his faith in me as a gentleman? I can notbelieve that he would like me if I had a character so small and soeasily shifted about that I would change it to please him. I am sure,too, that if there is anything in me you love, it is my character.Therefore, if I were to change it I should lose your love and hisrespect also. Is that not true?"
This was part of the letter which Jack had written.
"My boy, it is a good letter and they will have to like you the betterfor it," said John Irons.
Old Solomon Binkus was often at the Irons home those days. He had goneback in the bush, since the war ended, and, that winter, his traps wereon many streams and ponds between Albany and Lake Champlain. He camedown over the hills for a night with his friends when he reached thesouthern end of his beat. It was probably because the boy had lovedthe tales of the trapper and the trapper had found in the boy somethingwhich his life had missed, that an affection began to grow up betweenthem. Solomon was a childless widower.
"My wife! I tell ye, sir, she had the eyes an' feet o' the young doean' her cheeks were like the wild, red rose," the scout was wont to sayon occasion. "I orto have knowed better. Yes, sir, I orto. We livedway back in the bush an' the child come 'fore we 'spected it one night.I done what I could but suthin' went wrong. They tuk the high trail,both on 'em. I rigged up a sled an' drawed their poor remains into asettlement. That were a hard walk--you hear to me. No, sir, Icouldn't never marry no other womern--not if she was a queen coveredwith dimon's--never. I 'member her so. Some folks it's easy to fergitan' some it ain't. That's the way o' it."
Mr. and Mrs. Irons respected the scout, pitying his lonely plight andloving his cheerful company. He never spoke of his troubles unlesssome thoughtless person had put him to it.