A Soldier of Virginia Part 3

Now one of those who had been sold in Virginia was the Thomas Stewart whom I have already mentioned, and whom neither stinking jail nor crowded transport had much affected. Doubtless, no matter what the surroundings, he had only to close his eyes to see again before him the green hills and plashing brooks of Kincardine, with his own home in the midst, and the bonny wife waiting at the door, a boy on either side. Alas, it was only thus he was ever to see them this side heaven. He was bought by a man named Nicholas Spenser, who owned a plantation on the Potomac in Westmoreland County, and there he worked, first as laborer and then as overseer, for nigh upon ten years. His master treated him with great kindness, and at the Restoration, having made tenfold his purchase money by him, gave him back his freedom.

Despite the years and the hard work in the tobacco-fields, Stewart's thoughts had often been with the wife and children he had left behind in Scotland, and he prevailed upon Spenser to secure him pa.s.sage in one of his ships for London, where he arrived early in 1662. He made his way back to Kincardine, where he found his estate sequestered, his wife and one child dead in poverty, the other disappeared. From a neighbor he learned that the boy had run away to sea after his mother's death, but what his fate had been he never knew. Weary and disheartened, Stewart retraced his steps to London, and after overcoming obstacles innumerable, occasioned mostly by his want of money, laid his case before the king.

Charles listened to him kindly enough, for his office had not yet grown a burden to him, and finally granted him a patent for two thousand acres of land along the upper Potomac. It was a gift which cost the king nothing, and one of a hundred such he bestowed upon his favorites as another man would give a crust of bread for which he had no use. Stewart returned to Virginia with his patent in his pocket, and built himself a home in what was then a wilderness.

In five or six years he had cleared near three hundred acres of land, had it planted in sweet-scented tobacco, for which the Northern Neck was always famous, bought two-score negroes to tend it, and began to see light ahead. It was at this time that he met Marjorie Usner, while on a visit to Williamsburg, and he married her in 1670, having in the mean time erected a more s.p.a.cious residence than the rude log-hut which had previously been his home. He was at that time a man nigh fifty years of age, but handsome enough, I dare say, and well preserved by his life of outdoor toil. Certainly Mistress Marjorie, who must have been much younger, made him a good wife, and when he died, in 1685, he left a son and a daughter, besides an estate valued at several thousands of pounds, acc.u.mulated with true Scottish thrift. It was this daughter who named the estate Riverview, and though the house was afterwards remodeled, the name was never changed. The Stewarts continued to live there, marrying and giving in marriage, and growing ever wealthier, for the next half century, at the end of which time occurred the events that brought me into being.

In 1733, Thomas Stewart, great-grandson of the Scotsman, was master of Riverview. His portrait, which hangs to-day to the left of the fireplace in the great hall, shows him a white-haired, red-faced, choleric gentleman, with gray eyes and proudly smiling mouth. He had been chosen a member of the House of Burgesses, as had his father before him, and was one of the most considerable men in the county. His son, Tom, was just twenty-one, and had inherited from his father the hasty temper and invincible stubbornness which belong to all the Stewarts.

It was in the fall of 1733 that they made the trip to Williamsburg which was to have such momentous consequences. The House of Burgesses was in session, and Mr. Stewart, as the custom was, took his whole family with him to the capital. I fancy I can see them as they looked that day. The great coach, brought from London at a cost of so many thousand pounds of tobacco, is polished until it shines again. The four horses are harnessed to it, and Sambo, mouth stretched from ear to ear, drives it around to the front of the mansion, where a broad flight of stone steps leads downward from the wide veranda. The footmen and outriders spring to their places, their liveries agleam with buckles, the planter and his lady and their younger son enter the coach, while young Tom mounts his horse and prepares to ride by the window. The odorous cedar chests containing my lady's wardrobe are strapped behind or piled on top, the negroes form a grinning avenue, the whip cracks, and they are off, half a dozen servants following in an open cart. It is a four days' journey to Williamsburg, over roads whose roughness tests the coach's strength to the uttermost but it is the one event of all the year to this isolated family, and small wonder that they look forward to it with eager antic.i.p.ation.

Once arrived at Williamsburg, what craning of necks and waving of handkerchiefs and kissing of hands to acquaintances, as the coach rolls along the wide, white, sandy street, scorching in the sun, with the governor's house, called by courtesy a palace, at one end, and the College of William and Mary at the other, and perhaps two hundred straggling wooden houses in between. The coaches and chariots which line the street give earnest of the families already a.s.sembled from Princess Ann to Fairfax and the Northern Neck. My lady notes that the Burkes have at last got them a new chariot from London, and her husband looks with appreciative eyes at the handsome team of matched grays which draw it. As for young Tom, his eyes, I warrant, are on none of these, but on the bevy of blooming girls who promenade the side-path, arrayed in silks and satins and brocades, their eyes alight, their cheeks aglow with the joy of youth and health. Small blame to him, say I, for that is just where my own eyes would have been.

That very night Governor Gooch gave a ball at his palace, and be sure the Stewart family was there, my lady in her new London gown of flowered damask in the very latest mode, and Tom in his best suit of peach-blossom velvet, and in great hopes of attracting to himself some of the bright eyes he had seen that afternoon. Nor was he wholly unsuccessful, for one pair of black eyes rested on his for a moment,--they were those of Mistress Patricia Wyeth,--and he straightway fell a victim to their charms, as what young man with warm heart and proper spirit would not?

Young Tom must himself have possessed unusual attractions, or a boldness in wooing which his son does not inherit, for at the end of a week he disturbed his father at his morning dram to inform him that he and Mistress Patricia had decided to get married.

"Married!" cried the elder Stewart. "Why, damme, sir, do you know who the Wyeths are?"

"I know who Patricia is," answered young Tom very proudly, his head well up at this first sign of opposition. "I care naught about the rest of them."

"But I care, sir!" shouted his father. "Why, the girl won't have a shilling to bless herself with. Old Wyeth has gambled away every penny he possesses, and a good many more than he possesses, too, so they tell me, at his infernal horse-racing and c.o.c.k-fighting, and G.o.d knows what else.

A gentleman may play, sir,--I throw the dice occasionally, myself, and love to see a well-matched, race as well as any man,--but he ceases to be a gentleman the moment he plays beyond his means,--a fact which you will do well to remember. A pretty match for a Stewart 'pon my word!"

During this harangue young Tom would have interrupted more than once, but his father silenced him with a pa.s.sionate waving of his arm. At last he was compelled to pause for want of breath to say more, and the boy got in a word.

"All this is beside the point, father," he said hotly. "My word is given, and I intend to keep it. Even if it were not given, I should still do my best to win Patricia, because I love her."

"Love her, and welcome!" cried his father. "Marry her, if you want to. But you'll never bring a pauper like that inside my house while I am alive."

"Nor after you are dead, if you do not wish it," answered Tom, with his head higher in the air than ever.

"No, nor after I am dead!" thundered the old man, his anger no doubt carrying him farther than he intended going. "You are acting like a scoundrel, sir. You know well enough I can't cut you out of the estate, since you are the eldest, so you think to take advantage of me."

"Never fear, sir," cried Tom, his lips white with anger and his eyes ablaze. "You shall ask me back to Riverview yourself ere I return there; yes, and beg my wife's pardon for insulting her."

"Then, by G.o.d, you'll never return!" snorted his father, and without waiting to hear more, Tom stalked from the room and from the house. I think even then his father would have called him back, had the boy given him the chance, and his face was less red than usual when he heard the street door slam.

Of course there was a great to-do immediately. Tom's mother interceded for him, and I doubt not a single word on his part would have won full pardon from his father, but one was no less stubborn than the other, and the word was never spoken. When Mistress Patricia heard of the quarrel, she straightway informed her lover that she would never marry him and ruin his inheritance, and returned to her home above Charles City, taking her old reprobate of a father with her, where he died not long afterwards, perhaps finding life not worth living when there remained no one who would take his wagers.

At the close of the session, the Stewart coach rolled back to Riverview, but young Tom did not ride beside it. He remained at Williamsburg, and managed to pick up a scanty practice as an attorney, for he had read a little law in want of something better to do, and to fit himself for his coming honors as a member of the House of Burgesses. And at Riverview his father moped in his office and about his fields, growing ever more crabbed and more obstinate, and falling into a rage whenever any one dared mention Tom's name before him.

It was in the spring of 1734 that Tom Stewart mounted his horse and rode out of Williamsburg across the Chickahominy, to try his fortune once more with Patricia Wyeth. The winter had been a hard one for a man brought up as Tom had been, and that suit of peach-bloom velvet had long since been converted into bread. Yet still he made a gallant figure when, on the evening of an April day, he cantered up the road to Patricia's home, and I dare say the heart of the owner of those bright eyes which peeped out upon him from an upper window beat faster when they saw him coming. But it was a very demure little maiden who met him at the great door as he entered, and gave him her hand to kiss. She was all in white, with a sprig of blossoms in her hair, and she must have made a pretty picture standing there, and one to warm the heart of any man.

Of the week that followed, neither my father nor my mother ever told me much,--its memories were too sweet to trust to words, perhaps,--but the event was, that on the first day of May, 1734, Thomas Stewart, attorney, and Patricia Wyeth, spinster, were made man and wife in Westover church by the Reverend Peter Fontaine, of sainted memory. How well I recall his benign face, and what tears of affectionate remembrance brimmed my eyes when I heard, not long ago, that he was dead! The closing sentences of his will show how he ever thought of others and not of himself, for he wrote: "My will and desire is, that I may have no public funeral, but that my corpse may be accompanied by a few of my nearest neighbors; that no liquors be given to make any of the company drunk,--many instances of which I have seen, to the great scandal of the Christian religion and abuse of so solemn an ordinance. I desire none of my family to go in mourning for me." His sister sent me a copy of the will, and a very pretty letter, in which she told me how her brother often spoke of me, and wished me to have his Bible. It is there on the shelf at my bedside, and while G.o.d gives me life I will read in no other.

It was in the modest Wyeth homestead, on the bank of the James, that my father and mother entered upon their honeymoon. Of the depth of their love for each other I know best of all, and the summer slipped away on golden wings. My father thought no more of returning to Williamsburg, nor did he greatly regret Riverview. He wrote a formal letter to his mother announcing his marriage, but no answer came to it, and I doubt not that worthy woman sobbed herself to sleep more than once in grieving over the obstinacy of her husband and her son. Dear lady, it was this trouble which did much to shorten her days, and the end came soon afterwards. 'T is said that on her deathbed she tried to soften her husband's heart against their boy, but with such ill success that she fell sobbing into the sleep from which she was never to awaken. To such a degree can a fault persisted in change the natural humor of a man.

My father, perhaps, hoped for a reply to his letter, but he showed no sign of disappointment when none came, and never spoke upon the subject to my mother. He soon found enough in his affairs at home to occupy his mind, for old Samuel Wyeth had left the estate sadly inc.u.mbered with his debts, and more than half of it was sacrificed to save the rest. With care and frugality, there yet remained enough to live on, and for the first year, at least, there came no cloud to dim their happiness. Their cup of joy was full to overflowing, so my mother often told me, when, on the night of April 15,1735, a child was born to them. It was a boy, and a week later, before the altar of the little Westover church, its worthy rector christened the child "Thomas Stewart," the fifth of his line in the New World.

CHAPTER IV

THE ENDING OF THE HONEYMOON

Besides my father and my mother, the figure which stands out most clearly in my memory of my childhood is that of the man who christened me. I cannot remember the time when I did not know and love him. He was a tall, well-built man, with kindly face and clear blue eyes which darkened when any emotion stirred him, and rode--how well I remember it!--a big, bony, gray horse. It was on this horse's back that I took my first ride, when I was scarce out of petticoats, and often after that, held carefully before him on the saddle, or, as I grew older, b.u.mping joyously behind, my arms about his waist. My place was always on his knee when he was within our doors, and he held me there with unfailing good humor during his long talks with my mother, of which I, for the most part, comprehended nothing, except that oftentimes they spoke of me, and then he would smooth my hair with great tenderness. But I sat there quite content, and sometimes dozed off with my head against his flowered waistcoat,--it was his one vanity,--and wakened only when he set me gently down.

It was not until I grew older that I learned something of his history.

One day, he had seized time from his parish work to take me for a ramble along the river, and as we reached the limit of our walk and sat down for a moment's rest before starting homeward, and looked across the wide water, I asked him, with a childish disregard for his feelings, if it were true that his father was a Frenchman, adding that I hoped it were not true, because I did not like the French.

"Yes, it is true," he answered, and looked down at me, smiling sadly.

"Shall I tell you the story, Thomas?"

I nodded eagerly, for I loved to listen to stories, especially true ones.

"When Louis Fourteenth was King of France," he began, and I think he took a melancholy pleasure in telling it, "he issued a decree commanding all the Protestants, who in France are called Huguenots, to abjure their faith and become Catholics, or leave the kingdom. He had oftentimes before promised them protection, but he was growing old and weak, and thought that this might help to save his soul, which was in great need of saving, for he had been a wicked king. My father and my mother were Huguenots, and they chose to leave their home rather than give up their faith, as did many thousand others, and after suffering many hardships, escaped to England, with no worldly possession save the clothes upon their backs, but with a great treasure in heaven and an abiding trust in the Lord. They had six children, and after giving us a good education, especially as to our religion, committed us to the providence of a covenant G.o.d to seek our fortunes in the wide world. All of us came to America, although Moses and John have since returned to England. James is a farmer in King William County, Francis is minister of York-Hampton parish, and sister Ruth lives with me, as you know."

A great deal more he told me, which slipped from my memory, for I was thinking over what he had already said.

"And your mother and father," I asked, as we started back together, "fled from France rather than give up their faith?"

"Yes," he answered, and smiled down into my eyes, raised anxiously to his.

"And were persecuted just as the early martyrs were?"

"Yes, very much the same. All of their goods were taken from them, and they were long in prison."

"But they were never sorry?"

"No, they were never sorry. No one is ever sorry for doing a thing like that."

I trotted on in silence for a moment, holding tight to his kindly hand, and revolving this new idea in my mind. At last I looked up at him, big with purpose.

"I am going to do something like that some day," I said.

He gazed down at me, his eyes shining queerly.

"G.o.d grant that you may have the strength, my boy," he said. He bent and kissed me, and we returned to the house together without saying another word.

It was the custom of the Fontaine family to hold a meeting every year to give thanks for the deliverance from persecution of their parents in France, and I remember being present with my father and mother at one of these meetings when I was seven or eight years old. One pa.s.sage of the sermon he preached on that occasion remained fixed indelibly in my mind.

He took his text from Romans, "That ye may with one mind and one mouth glorify G.o.d, even the Father of our Lord Jesus Christ." He applied the duty thus enjoined to the Fontaine family, saying,--

"For many weary months was our father forced to shift among forests and deserts for his safety, because he had dared to preach the word of G.o.d to the innocent and sincere people among whom he lived, and who desired to be instructed in their duty and to be confirmed in their faith. The forest afforded him a shelter and the rocks a resting-place, but his enemies gave him no quiet, and pursued him even to these fastnesses, until finally, of his own accord, he delivered himself to them. They loaded his hands with chains, a dungeon was his abode, and his feet stuck fast in the mire. Murderers and thieves were his companions, yet even among them did he pursue his labors, until G.o.d, by means of a pious gentlewoman, who had seen and pitied his sufferings, relieved him."

To my childish imagination, the picture thus painted was a real and living one, and filled me with a singular exaltation. I think each of us at some time of his life has felt, as I did then, a desire to suffer for conscience' sake.

The preachers of Virginia were, as a whole, anything but admirable, a condition due no doubt to the worldly spirit which pervaded the church on both sides of the ocean. The average parson was then--and many of them still are--coa.r.s.e and rough, as contact with the forests and waste places of the world will often make men, even G.o.dly ones. But many of them were worse than that, gamblers and drunkards. They hunted the fox across country with great halloo, mounted on fast horses of their own. They attended horse-races and c.o.c.k-fights, almost always with some money on the outcome, and frequently with a horse or c.o.c.k entered in the races or the pittings. And when the sport was over, they would accompany the planters home to dinner, which ended in a drinking-bout, and it was seldom the parson who went under the table first. One fought a duel in the graveyard behind his church,--our own little Westover church, it was,--and succeeded in pinking his opponent through the breast, for which he had incontinently to return to England; another stopped the communion which he was celebrating, and bawled out to his warden, "Here, George, this bread's not fit for a dog," nor would he go on with the service until bread more to his liking had been brought; another married a wealthy widow, though he had already a wife living in England. His bishop was compelled to recall him, but I never heard that he was discharged from holy orders. Another on a certain Sat.u.r.day called a meeting of his vestry, and when they refused to take some action which he desired, thrashed them all soundly, and on the next day added insult to injury by preaching to them from the text, "And I contended with them, and cursed them, and smote certain of them, and plucked off their hair." I should like to have seen the faces of the vestrymen while the sermon was in progress! It was not an unusual sight to see the parson riding home from some great dinner tied fast in his chaise to keep him from falling out, as the result of over-indulgence in the planter's red wine. But our worthy pastor, during his forty years' ministry in Charles City parish, was concerned in no such escapades, and I count it one of the great happinesses of my life that I had the good fortune to fall under the influence of such a man. A pa.s.sage of a letter written by him to one of his brothers in England on the subject of preserving health gives an outline of the rules of his life. After commending active exercise in the open air on foot and on horseback, he says, "I drink no spirituous liquors at all; but when I am obliged to take more than ordinary fatigue, either in serving my churches or other branches of duty, I take one gla.s.s of good old Madeira wine, which revives me, and contributes to my going through without much fatigue."