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Benjamin of Ohio: A Story of the Settlement of Marietta cover

Benjamin of Ohio: A Story of the Settlement of Marietta

Chapter 17: MISTRESS DEVOLL'S OUTFIT
By James Otis
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AdventureAmerican Literature

About This Book

A young narrator recounts leaving New England with an organized land company to settle in the Ohio country, tracing the group's formation, surveying and purchase of territory, and the hardships of overland and river travel. The narrative details building a fortified riverside village, clearing land, erecting mills and community institutions, encounters and cautious diplomacy with Native peoples, and everyday trials of frontier life. Interwoven with practical descriptions are personal episodes of labor, friendship, moral lessons, and the boy's growing sense of responsibility as the settlement develops into a permanent town.

MISTRESS DEVOLL'S OUTFIT

We had but one wagon for all our party from the time we left Mattapoisett until coming to Providence. Mistress Devoll and Mistress Rouse are sisters and were much together at Mattapoisett after Captain Devoll set off for the Ohio country. It was while the captain's wife was in our village that she made me the offer to pay my passage to the Muskingum River by looking after her belongings.

Mistress Devoll expected to join Master Rouse's company at her home in Providence, where she was to have ready a wagon in which would be all her household goods that could be transported over the mountains. She was to have a team of four horses, and her brother, Isaac Barker, was to act as driver, while I played the part of helper.

Therefore on leaving Mattapoisett I ran ahead or behind Master Rouse's wagon, or clambered up by the side of Ben Cushing when the seat next to him was not occupied, for he was a good friend of mine and could be counted on to give me a hint now and then, if I overstepped my bounds.

The stay at the Long Plain overnight was what you might call a friendly visit for all the members of the company save Ben Cushing and me; but we two were not lonely, for we laid ourselves down to sleep in the wagon, after having had a bountiful meal at the home of Mistress Devoll's cousin, and it is safe to say that during the first night after starting for the Ohio country we slept more comfortably, if not more soundly, than on any other during the journey.

We were up at break of day, however, for the horses were to be groomed and fed, and Master Rouse had decided that we must travel as far as Providence before nightfall.

The young women who had come out from Mattapoisett with us, went back some time late in the evening after Cushing and I were asleep, and when breakfast had been eaten we set off once more, just as the sun was rising. It seemed as if this was really the beginning of the journey, for we were alone, plodding over the dusty road which, to look into the future, seemed as if it would have no end.