CHAPTER VII.

Enemies in War.

As this is not a history of the wars I shall not dwell upon the talk and preparations that went on during the weeks ensuing upon our eventful Sunday: which talk was common to both parties, but which preparations were mainly on the part of the rebels, we loyalists awaiting events and biding the return from England of Governor Tryon. There were looks of suspicion exchanged, and among the more violent and uncouth there were open boasts bandied, open taunts reciprocated, and open threats hurled back and forth. Most of the quality of the town were on the loyal side; but yet there were some excellent families—such as the Livingstones—who stood first and last among the so-called Whigs. This was the case in great part of the country, the wealth and culture, with distinguished exceptions, being for the king and parliament; though, I must own, a great quantity of the brains being on the other side: but in Virginia and her Southerly neighbours, strange to say, the aristocracy largely, though not entirely, leaned toward revolt; for what reason I never knew, unless it was that many of them, descended from younger sons of good English stock who had been exiled as black sheep or ne'er-do-wells, inherited feelings similar to Mr. Faringfield's. Or perhaps 'twas indeed a pride, which made them resentful of the superiority assumed by native Englishmen over them as colonists. Or they may have felt that they should actually become slaves in submitting to be taxed by a parliament in which they were not represented. In any case, they (like Philip Winwood and Mr. Faringfield, the Adamses of Boston, and thousands of others) had motives that outweighed in them the sentiment of loyalty, the passion of attachment to the land whence we had drawn our race and still drew our culture and all our refinements and graces. This sentiment, and this passion, made it impossible for Tom Faringfield and me to see any other course for us than undeviating fidelity to the king and the mother-country. There were of course some loyalists (or Tories, if you prefer that name) who took higher views than arose from their mere affections, and who saw harm for America in any revolt from English government; and there were others, doubtless, whose motives were entirely low and selfish, such as holders of office under the crown, and men who had powers and privileges of which any change of system, any disturbance of the royal authority, might deprive them. It was Philip who called my attention to this last class, and to the effect its existence must have on the common people in the crisis then present.

"The colonists of America are not like any other people," said he. "Their fathers came to this land when it was a savage wilderness, tearing themselves from their homes, from civil surroundings; that they might be far from tyranny, in small forms as well as great. Not merely tyranny of king or church, but the shapes of it that Hamlet speaks of—'the oppressor's wrong, the proud man's contumely, the insolence of office.' All for the sake of liberty, they battled with savages and with nature, fought and toiled, bled and starved. And Tyranny ignored them till they had transformed their land and themselves into something worth its attention. And then, backed and sustained by royal authority, those hated things stole in upon them—'the insolence of office, the proud man's contumely, the oppressor's wrong.' This, lookye, besides the particular matter of taxation without representation; of being bid to obey laws they have no hand in making; of having a set of masters, three thousand miles away, and not one of their own land or their own choosing, order them to do thus and so:—why, 'twere the very soul and essence of slavery to submit! Man, how can you wonder I am of their side?"

"And with your taste for the things to be found only in the monarchies of Europe; for the arts, and the monuments of past history, the places hallowed by great events and great men!" said I, quoting remembered expressions of his own.

"Why," says he, smiling a little regretfully, "we shall have our own arts and hallowed places some day; meanwhile one's taste must defer to one's heart and one's intelligence."

"Yes," said I, with malicious derision, "when 'tis so great a question as a paltry tax upon tea."

"'Tis no such thing," says he, warming up; "'tis a question of being taxed one iota, the thousandth part of a farthing, by a body of strangers, a body in which we are not represented."

"Neither were we represented in it when it sent armies to protect us from the French, and toward the cost of which 'tis right we should pay."

"We paid, in men and money both. And the armies were sent less for our protection than for the aggrandisement of England. She was fighting the French the world over; in America, as elsewhere, the only difference being that in America we helped her."

So 'twas disputed between many another pair of friends, between brothers, between fathers and sons, husbands and wives. I do not know of another civil war that made as many breaks in families. Meanwhile, the local authorities—those of local election, not of royal appointment—were yet outwardly noncommittal. When Colonel Washington, the general-in-chief appointed by the congress of the colonies at Philadelphia, was to pass through New York on his way to Cambridge, where the New England rebels were surrounding the king's troops in Boston, it was known that Governor Tryon would arrive from England about the same time. Our authorities, rather than seem to favour one side, sent a committee to New Jersey to meet the rebel commander and escort him through the town, and immediately thereafter paid a similar attention to the royal governor. One of those who had what they considered the honour of riding behind Mr. Washington a part of his way (he came accompanied by a troop of horse from Philadelphia, and made a fine, commanding figure, I grant) was Philip Winwood. When he returned from Kingsbridge, I, pretending I had not gone out of my way to see the rebel generalissimo pass, met him with a smile, as if to make a joke of all the rebel preparations:

"Well," says I, "what manner of hero is your illustrious chief? A very Julius Cæsar, I make no doubt."

"A grave and modest gentleman," says Phil, "and worthy of all the admiration you used to have for him when we would talk of the French War. I remember you would say he was equal to all the regular English officers together; and how you declared Governor Shirley was a fool for not giving him a king's commission."

"Well," said I, "'tis a thousand to one, that if Colonel Washington hadn't been disappointed of a king's commission, he wouldn't now be leader of the king's enemies." I knew I had no warrant the slightest for attributing Mr. Washington's patriotism to such a petty motive as a long-cherished resentment of royal neglect; and years afterward, in London, I was to chastise an equally reckless speaker for a similar slander; but I was young and partisan, and being nettled by the reminder of my inconsistency, spoke to irritate.

"That is a lie!" said Phil, quietly, looking me straight in the face.

Such a word from Philip made me stare in amazement; but it did not improve my temper, or incline me to acknowledge the injustice I had uttered. My face burned, my fingers clenched. But it was Philip that had spoken; and a thing or two flashed into my mind in the pause; and, controlling myself, I let out a long breath, opened my fists, and, with the best intentions in the world, and with the quietest voice, gave him a blow far more severe than a blow of the fist had been.

"I will take that from you, Phil," said I: "God knows, your stand in this rebellion has caused you enough unhappiness."

He winced, and sent me a startled look, stung at my alluding to the estrangement of his wife. I know not whether he took it as a taunt from so dear a friend, or whether the mere mention of so delicate a sorrow was too much for him; but his face twitched, and he gave a swallow, and was hard put to it to hold back the tears.

"Forgive me," I said, stricken to the heart at sight of this. "I am your friend always, Phil." I put a hand upon his shoulder, and his face turned to a kindly expression of pardon, a little short of the smile he dared not yet trust himself to attempt.

Margaret's demeanour to him, indeed, had not shown the smallest softening. But to the rest of the world, after the immediate effects of that Sunday scene had worn off, she seemed vastly more sparkling and fascinating than ever before: whether she was really so, and of intention, or whether the appearance was from contrast with her treatment of Philip, I dare not say. But the impression was Philip's, I think, as well as every one's else; and infinitely it multiplied the sorrow of which he would not speak, but which his countenance could not conceal. When the news of the affair at Bunker's Hill was discussed at the supper-table one evening in June, I being present, and Margaret heard how bravely the British charged the third and successful time up to the rebel works, after being hurled back twice by a very hell of musketry, she dropped her fork, and clapped her hands, crying:

"Bravo, bravo! 'Tis such men that grow in England. I could love every one of 'em!"

"Brave men, I allow," said Philip; "but as for their victory, 'twas but a technical one, if accounts be true. Their loss was greater than ours; and the fight proved that Americans can stand before British regulars."

Margaret paid no more notice than if Philip had not spoken—'twas her practice now to ignore his speeches not directed to herself alone—and when he had done, she said, blithely, to one of the young De Lanceys, who was a guest:

"And so they drove the Yankees out! And what then, cousin?"

"Why, that was all. But as for the men that grow in England, you'll find some of us grown in America quite as ready to fight for the king, if matters go on. Only wait till Governor Tryon sets about calling for loyal regiments. We shall be falling over one another in the scramble to volunteer. But I mean to be first."

"Good, cousin!" she cried. "You may kiss my hand for that—nay, my cheek, if I could reach it to you."

"Faith," said De Lancey, after gallantly touching her fingers with his lips, "if all the ladies in New York had such hands, and offered 'em to be kissed by each recruit for the king, there'd be no man left to fight on the rebel side."

"Why, his Majesty is welcome to my two hands for the purpose, and my face, too," she rattled on. "But some of our New York rebels were going to do great things: 'tis two months now, and yet we see nothing of their doings."

"Have a little patience, madam," said Philip, very quietly. "We rebels may be further advanced in our arrangements than is known in all quarters."

The truth of this was soon evident. In the open spaces of the town—the parade-ground (or Bowling Green) outside the fort; the common at the head of the town; before the very barracks in Chambers Street that had just been vacated by the last of the royal troops in New York, they having sailed for Boston rather for their own safety than to swell the army there—there was continual instructing and drilling of awkward Whigs. Organisation had proceeded throughout the province, whose entire rebel force was commanded by Mr. Philip Schuyler, of Albany; subordinate to whom was Mr. Richard Montgomery, an Irish gentleman who had first set foot in America at Louisbourg, as a king's officer, and who now resided beyond Kingsbridge.

It was under Montgomery that Philip Winwood took service, enlisting as a private soldier, but soon revealing such knowledge of military matters that he was speedily, in the off-hand manner characteristic of improvised armies, made a lieutenant. This was a little strange, seeing that there was a mighty scramble for commissions, nine out of every ten patriots, however raw, clamouring to be officers; and it shows that sometimes (though 'tis not often) modest merit will win as well as self-assertive incompetence. Philip had obtained his acquaintance with military forms from books; he was, in his ability to assimilate the matter of a book, an exception among men; and a still greater exception in his ability to apply that matter practically. Indeed, it sometimes seemed that he could get out of a book not only all that was in it, but more than was in it. Many will not believe what I have related of him, that he had actually learned the rudiments of fencing, the soldier's manual of arms, the routine of camp and march, and such things, from reading; but it is a fact: just as it is true that Greene, the best general of the rebels after Washington, learned military law, routine, tactics, and strategy, from books he read at the fire of the forge where he worked as blacksmith; and that the men whom he led to Cambridge, from Rhode Island, were the best disciplined, equipped, uniformed, and maintained, of the whole Yankee army at that time. As for Philip's gift of translating printed matter into actuality, I remember how, when we afterward came to visit strange cities together, he would find his way about without a question, like an old resident, through having merely read descriptions of the places.

But rank did not come unsought, or otherwise, to Philip's fellow volunteer from the Faringfield house, Mr. Cornelius. The pedagogue, with little to say on the subject, took the rebel side as a matter of course, Presbyterians being, it seems, republican in their nature. He went as a private in the same company with Philip.

It was planned that the rebel troops of New York province should invade Canada by way of Lake George, while the army under Washington continued the siege of Boston. Philip went through the form of arranging that his wife should remain at her father's house—the only suitable home for her, indeed—during his absence in the field; and so, in the Summer of 1775, upon a day much like that in which he had first come to us twelve years before, it was ours to wish him for a time farewell.

Mr. Faringfield and his lady, with Fanny and Tom, stood in the hall, and my mother and I had joined them there, when Philip came down-stairs in his new blue regimentals. He wore his sword, but it was not his wife that had buckled it on. There had been no change in her manner toward him: he was still to her but as a strange guest in the house, rather to be disdained than treated with the courtesy due even to a strange guest. We all asked ourselves what her farewell would be, but none mentioned the thought. As Phil came into view at the first landing, he sent a quick glance among us to see if she was there. For a moment his face was struck into a sadly forlorn expression; but, as if by chance, she came out of the larger parlour at that moment, and his countenance revived almost into hope. The rest of us had already said our good-byes to Mr. Cornelius, who now stood waiting for Philip. As the latter reached the foot of the stairs, Margaret suddenly turned to the pedagogue, to add her civility to ours, for she had always liked the bashful fellow, and his joining the rebels was to her a matter of indifference—it did not in any way affect her own pleasure. This movement on her part made it natural that Philip's first leave-taking should be of Mr. Faringfield, who, seeing Margaret occupied, went forward and grasped Phil's hand.

"God bless thee, lad," said he, showing the depth of his feelings as much by a tenderness very odd in so cold a man, as by reverting to the old pronoun now becoming obsolete except with Quakers, "and bring thee safe out of it all, and make thy cause victorious!"

"Good-bye, Philip," said Mrs. Faringfield, with some betrayal of affection, "and heaven bring you back to us!"

Fanny's farewell, though spoken with a voice more tremulous and eyes more humid, was in the same strain; and so was that of my mother, though she could not refrain from adding, "Tis such a pity!" and wishing that so handsome a soldier was on the right side.

"Good-bye and good luck, dear old Phil!" was all that Tom said.

"And so say I," I put in, taking his hand in my turn, and trying not to show my discomposure, "meaning to yourself, but not to your cause. Well—dear lad—heaven guard you, and give you a speedy return! For your sake and ours, may the whole thing be over before your campaign is begun. I should like to see a war, and be in one—but not a war like this, that makes enemies of you and me. Good-bye, Phil—and come back safe and sound."

'Twas Margaret's time now, for Ned was not present. There was a pause, as Phil turned questioningly—nay wistfully—toward her. She met his look calmly. Old Noah and some of the negroes, who had pressed forward to see Phil's departure from the house, were waiting for her to speak, that they might afterward call out their Godspeed.

"Good-bye!" she said, at last, holding out her hand indifferently.

He took the hand, bent over it, pressed it with his lips. Then he looked at her again. I think she must have shown just the slightest yielding, given just the least permission, in her eyes; for he went nearer, and putting his arm around her, gently drew her close to him, and looked down at her. Suddenly she turned her face up, and pursed her lips. With a look of gladness, he passionately kissed her.

"God bless you, my dear wife," he whispered; and then, as if by expecting more he might court a disappointment to mar the memory of that leave-taking, he released her, and said to us all: "Take care of her, I pray!" whereupon, abruptly turning, he hastened out of the open door, waving back his hat in response to our chorus of good-byes, and the loud "Go' bless you, Massa Philip!" of the negroes.

We followed quickly to the porch, to look after him. But he strode off so fast that Cornelius had to run to keep up with him. He did not once look back, even when he passed out of sight at the street corner. I believe he divined that his wife would not be among those looking after, and that he wished not to interpose any other last impression of his dear home than that of her kiss.

When we came back into the hall, she had flown. Later, as my mother and I went through the garden homeward, passing beneath Margaret's open windows, we heard her weeping—not violently, but steadily, monotonously, as if she had a long season of the past to regret, a long portion of the future to sorrow for. And here let me say that I think Margaret, from first to last, loved Philip with more tenderness than she was capable of bestowing upon any one else; with an affection so deep that sometimes it might be obscured by counter feelings playing over the surface of her heart, so deep that often she might not be conscious of its presence, but so deep that it might never be uprooted:—and 'twas that which made things the more pitiful.

Tom and I went out, with a large number of the town's people, to watch the rebel soldiers depart, and we saw Philip with his company, and exchanged with him a smile and a wave of the hat. How little we thought that one of us he was never to meet again, that the other he was not to see in many years, and that four of those years were to pass ere he should set foot again in Queen Street.

Many things, to be swiftly passed over in my history, occurred in those four years. One of these, the most important to me, happened a short time after Philip's departure for the North. It was a brief conversation with Fanny, and it took place upon the wayside walk at what they call the Battery, at the green Southern end of the town, where it is brought to a rounded point by the North and East Rivers approaching each other as they flow into the bay. To face the gentle breeze, I stopped and turned so we might look Southward over the bay, toward where, at the distant Narrows, Long Island and Staten Island seem to meet and close it in.

"I don't like to look out yonder," said Fanny. "It makes me imagine I'm away on the ocean, by myself. And it seems so lonely."

"Why, you poor child," replied I, "'tis a sin you should ever feel lonely; you do so much to prevent others being so." I turned my back upon the bay, and led her past the fort, toward the Broadway. "You see," said I, abruptly, glancing at her brown eyes, which dropped in a charming confusion, "how much you need a comrade." I remember I was not entirely unconfused myself at that moment, for inspiration had suddenly shown me my opportunity, and how to use it, and some inward trepidation was inseparable from a plunge into the matter I was now resolved upon going through.

"Why," says she, blushing, and seeming, as she walked, to take a great interest in her pretty feet, "I have several comrades as it is."

"Yes. But I mean one that should devote himself to you alone. Philip has Margaret; and besides, he is gone now, and so is Mr. Cornelius. And Tom will be finding a wife some day, and your parents cannot live for ever, and your friends will be married one after another."

"Poor me!" says she, with a sigh of comic wofulness. "How helpless and alone you make me feel!"

"Not so entirely alone, neither! There's one I didn't mention."

"And that one, too, I suppose, will be running off some day."

"No. He, like Tom, will be seeking a wife some day; perhaps sooner than Tom; perhaps very soon indeed; perhaps this very minute."

"Oh, Bert!—What nonsense! Don't look at me so, here in the street—people will take notice."

"What do I care for people? Let the fellows all see, and envy me, if you'll give me what I ask. What say you, dearest? Speak; tell me! Nay, if you won't, I'll make you blush all the more—I love you, I love you, I love you! Now will you speak?"

"Oh, Bert, dear, at least wait till we are home!"

"If you'll promise to say yes then."

"Very well—if 'twill please you."

"Nay, it must be to please yourself too. You do love me a little, don't you?"

"Why, of course I do; and you must have known it all the time!"

But, alas, her father's "yes" was not so easily to be won. I broached the matter to him that very evening (Fanny and I meanwhile having come to a fuller understanding in the seclusion of the garden); but he shook his head, and regarded me coldly.

"No, sir," said he. "For, however much you are to be esteemed as a young gentleman of honour and candour and fine promise, 'tis for me to consider you rather as an adherent of a government that has persecuted my country, and now makes war upon it. The day may come when you will find a more congenial home nearer the crown you have already expressed your desire to fight for. And then, if Fanny were your wife, you would carry her off to make an Englishwoman of her, as my first daughter would have been carried by her husband, upon different motives, but for this war. Perhaps 'twere better she could have gone," he added, with a sigh, for Margaret had been his favourite child; "my loss of her could scarce have been more complete than it is. But 'tis not so with Fanny."

"But, sir, I am not to take it that you refuse me, definitely, finally?—I beg—"

"Nay, sir, I only say that we must wait. Let us see what time shall bring to pass. I believe that you will not—and I am sure that Fanny will not—endeavour any act without my consent, or against my wish. Nay, I don't bid you despair, neither. Time shall determine."

I was not so confident that I would not endeavour any act without his consent; but I shared his certainty that Fanny would not. And so, in despondency, I took the news to her.

"Well," says she, with a sigh. "We must wait, that's all."

While we were waiting, and during the Fall and Winter, we heard now and then from Philip, for communication was still possible between New York and the rebel army proceeding toward Canada. He wrote Margaret letters of which the rest of us never saw the contents; but he wrote to Mr. Faringfield and me also. His history during this time was that of his army, of which we got occasional news from other sources. During part of September and all of October it was besieging St. John's, which capitulated early in November. Schuyler's ill-health had left the supreme active command to Montgomery. The army pushed on, and occupied Montreal, though it failed to capture Governor Carleton; who escaped to Quebec in a boat, by ingeniously disguising himself as a countryman. At Montreal the jealousies and quarrels of officers, so summarily created such, gave Montgomery much trouble, and when he set forward for Quebec, there to join the force sent under Arnold through the Maine wilderness from the rebel main army at Cambridge, he could take with him but three hundred men—so had the patriot warriors of New York fallen off in zeal and numbers! But you may be sure it was not from Philip's letters that we got these items disadvantageous to his cause.

Our last word from him was when he was in quarters before Quebec: Cornelius was with him; and they were having a cold and snowy time of it, waiting for Quebec to fall before them. He mentioned casually that he had been raised to a captaincy: we afterward learned that this was for brave conduct upon the occasion of a sally of Scotch troops from one of the gates of Quebec to cut off a mortar battery and a body of riflemen; Philip had not only saved the battery and the riflemen, but had made prisoners of the sallying party.

Late in the Winter—that is to say, early in 1776—we learned of the dire failure of the night attack made by the combined forces of Montgomery and Arnold upon Quebec at the end of December, 1775; that Arnold had been wounded, his best officers taken prisoners, and Montgomery killed. The first reports said nothing of Winwood. When Margaret heard the news, she turned white as a sheet; and at this triumph of British arms my joy was far outweighed, Mr. Faringfield's grief multiplied, by fears lest Philip, who we knew would shirk no danger, had met a fate similar to his commander's. But subsequent news told us that he was a prisoner, though severely wounded. We comforted ourselves with considering that he was like to receive good nursing from the French nuns of Quebec. And eventually we found the name of Captain Winwood in a list of rebel prisoners who were to be exchanged; from which, as a long time had passed, we inferred that he was now recovered of his injuries; whereupon Margaret, who had never spoken of him, or shown her solicitude other than by an occasional dispirited self-abstraction, regained all her gaiety and was soon her old, charming self again. In due course, we learned that the exchange of prisoners had been effected, and that a number of officers (among whom was Captain Winwood) had departed from Quebec, bound whither we were not informed; and after that we lost track of him for many and many a month.

Meanwhile, the war had made itself manifest in New York: at first distantly, as by the passage of a few rebel companies from Pennsylvania and Virginia through the town on their way to Cambridge; by continued enlistments for the rebel cause; by the presence of a small rebel force of occupation; and by quiet enrolments of us loyalists for service when our time should come. But in the beginning of the warm weather of 1776, the war became apparent in its own shape. The king's troops under Sir William Howe had at last evacuated Boston and sailed to Halifax, taking with them a host of loyalists, whose flight was held up to us New York Tories as prophetic of our own fate. Washington now supposed, rightly, that General Howe intended presently to occupy New York; and so down upon our town, and the island on which it was, and upon Long Island, came the rebel main army from Cambridge; and brought some very bad manners with it, for all that there never was a finer gentleman in the world than was at its head, and that I am bound to own some of his officers and men to have been worthy of him in good breeding. Here the army was reinforced by regiments from the middle and Southern provinces; and for awhile we loyalists kept close mouths. Margaret, indeed, for the time, ceased altogether to be a loyalist, in consequence of the gallantry of certain officers in blue and buff, and several Virginia dragoons in blue and red, with whom she was brought into acquaintance through her father's attachment to the rebel interest. She expanded and grew brilliant in the sunshine of admiration (she had even a smile and compliment from Washington himself, at a ball in honour of the rebel declaration of independence) in which she lived during the time when New York abounded with rebel troops.

But that was a short time; for the British disembarked upon Long Island, met Washington's army there and defeated it, so that it had to slip back to New York in boats by night; then landed above the town, almost in time to cut it off as it fled Northward; fought part of it on the heights of Harlem; kept upon its heels in Westchester County; encountered it again near White Plains; and came back triumphant to winter in and about New York. And now we loyalists and the rebel sympathisers exchanged tunes; and Margaret was as much for the king again as ever—she never cared two pins for either cause, I fancy, save as it might, for the time being, serve her desire to shine.

She was radiant and joyous, and made no attempt to disguise her feelings, when it was a settled fact that the British army should occupy New York indefinitely.

"'Tis glorious!" said she, dancing up and down the parlour before Tom and me. "This will be some relief from dulness, some consolation! The town will be full of gallant generals and colonels, handsome majors, dashing captains; there are lords and baronets among 'em; they'll be quartered in all the good houses; there will be fine uniforms, regimental bands, and balls and banquets! Why, I can quite endure this! War has its compensations. We'll have a merry winter of it, young gentlemen! Sure 'twill be like a glimpse of London."

"And there'll be much opportunity for vain ladies to have their heads turned!" quoth Tom, half in jest, half in disapproval.

"I know nothing of that," says she, "but I do know whose sister will be the toast of the British Army before a month is past!"

If the king's troops acquired a toast upon entering New York, the rebels had gained a volunteer upon leaving it. One day, just before Washington's army fled, Tom Faringfield came to me with a face all amusement.

"Who do you think is the latest patriot recruit?" cried he. It was our custom to give the rebels ironically their own denomination of patriots.

"Not you nor I, at any rate," said I.

"But one of the family, nevertheless."

"Why, surely—your father has not—"

"Oh, no; only my father's eldest."

"Ned?"

"Nobody else. Fancy Ned taking the losing side! Oh, 'fore God, it's true! He came home in a kind of uniform to-day, and told father what he had done; the two had a long talk together in private after that; and though father never shows his thoughts, I believe he really has some hopes of Ned now. The rebels made a lieutenant of him, on father's account. I wonder what his game is."

"I make no doubt, to curry favour with his father."

"Maybe. But perhaps to get an excuse for leaving town, and a way of doing so. I've heard some talk—they say poor Sally Roberts's condition is his work."

"Very like. Your brother is a terrible Adonis—with ladies of a certain kind."

"Not such an Adonis neither—at least the Adonis that Venus courted in Shakespeare's poem. Rather a Jove, I should say."

We did not then suspect the depth of Mr. Ned's contrivance or duplicity. He left New York with the rebels, and 'twas some time ere we saw, or heard of, him again.

And now at last several loyalist brigades were formed as auxiliaries to the royal army, and Tom and I were soon happy in the consciousness of serving our king, and in the possession of the green uniforms that distinguished the local from the regular force. We were of Colonel Cruger's battalion, of General Oliver De Lancey's brigade, and both were so fortunate as to obtain commissions, Tom receiving that of lieutenant, doubtless by reason of his mother's relationship to General De Lancey, and I being made an ensign, on account of the excellent memory in which my father was held by the loyal party. Mr. Faringfield, like many another father in similar circumstances, was outwardly passive upon his son's taking service against his own cause: as a prudent man, he had doubtless seen from the first the advantage of having a son actually under arms for the king, for it gave him and his property such safety under the British occupation as even his lady's loyalist affiliations might not have sufficed to do. Therefore Tom, as a loyalist officer, was no less at home than formerly, in the house of his rebel father. I know not how many such family situations were brought about by this strange war.

CHAPTER VIII.

I Meet an Old Friend in the Dark.

I shall not give an account of my military service, since it entered little into the history of Philip Winwood. 'Twas our duty to help man the outposts that guarded the island at whose Southern extremity New York lies, from rebel attack; especially from the harassments of the partisan troops, and irregular Whiggery, who would swoop down in raiding parties, cut off our foragers, drive back our wood-cutters, and annoy us in a thousand ways. We had such raiders of our own, too, notably Captain James De Lancey's Westchester Light Horse, Simcoe's Rangers, and the Hessian yagers, who repaid the visits of our enemies by swift forays across the neutral ground between the two armies.

But this warfare did not exist in its fulness till later, when the American army formed about us an immense segment of a circle, which began in New Jersey, ran across Westchester County in New York province, and passed through a corner of Connecticut to Long Island Sound. On our side, we occupied Staten Island, part of the New Jersey shore, our own island, lower Westchester County, and that portion of Long Island nearest New York. But meanwhile, the rebel main army was in New Jersey in the Winter of 1776-77, surprising some of our Hessians at Trenton, overcoming a British force at Princeton, and going into quarters at Morristown. And in the next year, Sir William Howe having sailed to take Philadelphia with most of the king's regulars (leaving General Clinton to hold New York with some royal troops and us loyalists), the fighting was around the rebel capital, which the British, after two victories, held during the Winter of 1777-78, while Washington camped at Valley Forge.

In the Fall of 1777, we thought we might have news of Winwood, for in the Northern rebel army to which General Burgoyne then capitulated, there were not only many New York troops, but moreover several of the officers taken at Quebec, who had been exchanged when Philip had. But of him we heard nothing, and from him it was not likely that we should hear. Margaret never mentioned him now, and seemed to have forgotten that she possessed a husband. Her interest was mainly in the British officers still left in New York, and her impatience was for the return of the larger number that had gone to Philadelphia. To this impatience an end was put in the Summer of 1778, when the main army marched back to us across New Jersey, followed part way by the rebels, and fighting with them at Monmouth Court House. 'Twas upon this that the lines I have mentioned, of British outposts protecting New York, and rebel forces surrounding us on all sides but that of the sea, were established in their most complete shape; and that the reciprocal forays became most frequent.

And now, too, the British occupation of New York assumed its greatest proportions. The kinds of festivity in which Margaret so brilliantly shone, lent to the town the continual gaiety in which she so keenly delighted. The loyalist families exerted themselves to protect the king's officers from dulness, and the king's officers, in their own endeavours to the same end, helped perforce to banish dulness from the lives of their entertainers. 'Twas a gay town, indeed, for some folk, despite the vast ugly blotches wrought upon its surface by two great fires since the war had come, and despite the scarcity of provisions and the other inconveniences of a virtual state of siege. Tom and I saw much of that gaiety, for indeed at that time our duties were not as active as we wished they might be, and they left us leisure enough to spend in the town. But we were pale candles to the European officers—the rattling, swearing, insolent English, the tall and haughty Scots, the courtly Hessians and Brunswickers.

"What, sister, have we grown invisible, Bert and I?" said Tom to Margaret, as we met her in the hall one night, after we had returned from a ball in the Assembly Rooms. "Three times we bowed to you this evening, and got never a glance in return."

"'Faith," says she, with a smile, "one can't see these green uniforms for the scarlet ones!"

"Ay," he retorted, with less good-humour than she had shown, "the scarlet coats blind some people's eyes, I think, to other things than green uniforms."

It was, I fancy, because Tom had from childhood adored her so much, that he now took her conduct so ill, and showed upon occasion a bitterness that he never manifested over any other subject.

"What do you mean, you saucy boy?" cried she, turning red, and looking mighty handsome. "You might take a lesson or two in manners from some of the scarlet coats!"

"Egad, they wouldn't find time to give me lessons, being so busy with you! But which of your teachers do you recommend—Captain Andre, Lord Rawdon, Colonel Campbell, or the two Germans whose names I can't pronounce? By George, you won't be happy till you have Sir Henry Clinton and General Knyphausen disputing for the front place at your feet!"

SHE WAS INDEED THE TOAST OF THE ARMY.

SHE WAS INDEED THE TOAST OF THE ARMY.

She softened from anger to a little laugh of conscious triumph, tapped him with her fan, and sped up the stairs. Her prediction had come true. She was indeed the toast of the army. Her mother apparently saw no scandal in this, being blinded by her own partiality to the royal side. Her father knew it not, for he rarely attended the British festivities, from which he could not in reason debar his wife and daughters. Fanny was too innocent to see harm in what her sister did. But Tom and I, though we never spoke of it to each other, were made sensitive, by our friendship for Philip, to the impropriety of the situation—that the wife of an absent American officer should reign as a beauty among his military enemies. I make no doubt but the circumstance was commented upon, with satirical smiles at the expense of both husband and wife, by the British officers themselves. Indeed I once heard her name mentioned, not as Mrs. Winwood, but as "Captain Winwood's wife," with an expression of voice that made me burn to plant my fist in the leering face of the fellow who spoke—some low-born dog, I'll warrant, who had paid high for his commission.

It was a custom of Tom's and mine to put ourselves, when off duty together, in the way of more active service than properly fell to us, by taking horse and riding to the eastern side of the Harlem River, where was quartered the troop of Tom's relation, James De Lancey. In more than one of the wild forays of these horsemen, did we take an unauthorised part, and find it a very exhilarating business.

One cold December afternoon in 1778, we got private word from Captain De Lancey that he was for a raid up the Albany road, that night, in retaliation for a recent severe onslaught made upon our Hessian post near Colonel Van Cortlandt's mansion, either ('twas thought) by Lee's Virginia Light Horse or by the partisan troop under the French nobleman known in the rebel service as Armand.

At nightfall we were on the gallop with De Lancey's men, striking the sparks from the stony road under a cloudy sky. But these troops, accustomed to darkness and familiar with the country, found the night not too black for their purpose, which was, first, the seizing of some cattle that two or three Whig farmers had contrived to retain possession of, and, second, the surprising of a small advanced post designed to protect rebel foragers. The first object was fairly well accomplished, and a detail of men assigned to conduct the prizes back to Kingsbridge forthwith, a difficult task for which those upon whom it fell cursed their luck, or their commander's orders, under their breath. One of the farmers, for stubbornly resisting, was left tied to a tree before his swiftly dismantled house, and only Captain De Lancey's fear of alarming the rebel outpost prevented the burning down of the poor fellow's barn.

The taking of these cattle had necessitated our leaving the highway. To this we now returned, and proceeded Northward to where the road crosses the Neperan River, near the Philipse manor-house. Instead of crossing this stream, we turned to the right, to follow its left bank some way upward, and then ascended the hill East of it, on which the rebel post was established. Our course, soon after leaving the road, lay through woods, the margin of the little river affording us only sufficient clear space for proceeding in single file. De Lancey rode at the head, then went two of his men, then Tom Faringfield and myself, the troop stringing out behind us, the lieutenant being at the rear.

'Twas slow and toilsome riding; and only the devil's own luck, or some marvellous instinct of our horses, spared us many a stumble over roots, stones, twigs, and underbrush. What faint light the night retained for well-accustomed eyes, had its source in the cloud-curtained moon, and that being South of us, we were hidden in the shadow of the woods. But 'tis a thousand wonders the noise of our passage was not sooner heard, though De Lancey's stern command for silence left no sound possible from us except that of our horses and equipments. I fancy 'twas the loud murmur of the stream that shielded us. But at last, as we approached the turning of the water, where we were to dismount, surround the rebels hutted upon the hill before us, creep silently upon them, and attack from all sides at a signal, there was a voice drawled out of the darkness ahead of us the challenge:

"Who goes thar?"

We heard the click of the sentinel's musket-lock; whereupon Captain De Lancey, in hope of gaining the time to seize him ere he could give the alarm, replied, "Friends," and kept riding on.

"You're a liar, Jim De Lancey!" cried back the sentinel, and fired his piece, and then (as our ears told us) fled through the woods, up the hill, toward his comrades.

There was now nothing for us but to abandon all thought of surrounding the enemy, or even, we told ourselves, of taking time to dismount and bestow our horses; unless we were willing to lose the advantage of a surprise at least partial, as we were not. We could but charge on horseback up the hill, after the fleeing sentinel, in hope of coming upon the rebels but half-prepared. Or rather, as we then felt, so we chose to think, foolish as the opinion was. Indeed what could have been more foolish, less military, more like a tale of fabulous knights in some enchanted forest? A cavalry charge, with no sort of regular formation, up a wooded hill, in a night dark enough in the open but sheer black under the thick boughs; to meet an encamped enemy at the top! But James De Lancey's men were noted rather for reckless dash than for military prudence; they felt best on horseback, and would accept a score of ill chances and fight in the saddle, rather than a dozen advantages and go afoot. I think they were not displeased at their discovery by the sentinel, which gave them an excuse for a harebrained onset ahorse, in place of the tedious manoeuvre afoot that had been planned. As for Tom and me, we were at the age when a man will dare the impossible.

So we went, trusting to the sense of our beasts, or to dumb luck, to carry us unimpeded through the black woods. As it was, a few of the animals ran headforemost against trees, and others stumbled over roots and logs, while some of the riders had their heads knocked nearly off by coming in contact with low branches. But a majority of us, to judge by the noise we made, arrived with our snorting, panting steeds at the hill-crest; where, in a cleared space, and fortified with felled trees, upheaved earth, forage carts, and what not, stood the improvised cabins of the rebels.

Three or four shots greeted us as we emerged from the thick wood. We, being armed with muskets and pistols as well as swords, returned the fire, and spurred our horses on toward the low breastwork, which, as it was not likely to have anything of a trench behind it, we thought to overleap either on horse or afoot. But the fire that we met, almost at the very barrier, felled so many of our horses and men, raised such a hellish chorus of wild neighing, cries of pain and wrath, ferocious curses and shouts of vengeance, that the men behind reined up uncertain. De Lancey turned upon his horse, waved his sword, and shouted for the laggards to come on. We had only the light of musketry to see by. Tom Faringfield was unhorsed and down; and fearing he might be wounded, I leaped to the ground, knelt, and partly raised him. He was unharmed, however; and we both got upon our feet, with our swords out, our discharged muskets slung round upon our backs, our intent being to mount over the rebel's rude rampart—for we had got an impression of De Lancey's sword pointed that way while he fiercely called upon his troops to disregard the fallen, and each man charge for himself in any manner possible, ahorse or afoot.

But more and more of the awakened rebels—we could make out only their dark figures—sprang forward from their huts (mere roofs, 'twere better to call these) to the breastwork, each waiting to take careful aim at our mixed-up mass of men and horses before he fired into it. As Tom and I were extricating ourselves from the mass by scrambling over a groaning man or two, and a shrieking, kicking horse that lay on its side, De Lancey rode back to enforce his commands upon the men at our rear, some of whom were firing over our heads. His turning was mistaken for a movement of retreat, not only by our men, of whom the unhurt promptly made to hasten down the hill, but also by the enemy, a few of whom now leaped from behind their defence to pursue.

Tom and I, not yet sensible of the action of our comrades, were striding forward to mount the rampart, when this sally of rebels occurred. Though it appalled us at the time, coming so unexpectedly, it was the saving of us; for it stopped the fire of the rebels remaining behind the barrier, lest they should hit their comrades. A ringing voice, more potent than a bugle, now called upon these latter to come back, in a tone showing their movement to have been without orders. They speedily obeyed; all save one, a tall, broad fellow—nothing but a great black figure in the night, to our sight—who had rushed with a clubbed musket straight upon Tom and me. A vague sense of it circling through the air, rather than distinct sight of it, told me that his musket-butt was aimed at Tom's head. Instinctively I flung up my sword to ward off the blow; and though of course I could not stop its descent, I so disturbed its direction that it struck only Tom's shoulder; none the less sending him to the ground with a groan. With a curse, I swung my sword—a cut-and-thrust blade-of-all-work, so to speak—with some wild idea of slicing off a part of the rebel's head; but my weapon was hacked where it met him, and so it merely made him reel and drop his musket. The darkness falling the blacker after the glare of the firing, must have cloaked these doings from the other rebels. Tom rose, and the two of us fell upon our enemy at once, I hissing out the words, "Call for quarter, you dog!"

"Very well," he said faintly, quite docile from having had his senses knocked out of him by my blow, and not knowing at all what was going on.

"Come then," said I, and grasped him by an arm, while Tom held him at the other side; and so the three of us ran after De Lancey and his men—for the captain had followed in vain attempt to rally them—into the woods and down the hill. Tom's horse was shot, and mine had fled.

Our prisoner accompanied us with the unquestioning obedience of one whose wits are for the time upon a vacation. Getting into the current of retreat, which consisted of mounted men, men on foot, riderless horses, and the wrathful captain whose enterprise was now quite hopeless through the enemy's being well warned against a second attempt, we at last reached the main road.

Here, out of a chaotic huddle, order was formed, and to the men left horseless, mounts were given behind other men. Captain De Lancey assigned a beast to myself and my prisoner. The big rebel clambered up behind me, with the absent-minded acquiescence he had displayed ever since my stroke had put his wits asleep. As we started dejectedly Southward, full of bruises, aches, and weariness, there was some question whether the rebels would pursue us.

"Not if their officer has an ounce of sense," said Captain De Lancey, "being without horses, as he is. He's scarce like to play the fool by coming down, as I did in charging up! Well, we've left some wounded to his care. Who is their commander? Ask your prisoner, Lieutenant Russell."

I turned on my saddle and put the query, but my man vouchsafed merely a stupid, "Hey?"

"Shake him back to his senses," said De Lancey, stopping his horse, as I did mine, and Tom his.

But shaking did not suffice.

"This infernal darkness helps to cloud his wits," suggested the captain. "Flash a light before his eyes. Here, Tippet, your lantern, please."

I continued shaking the prisoner, while the lantern was brought. Suddenly the man gave a start, looked around into the black night, and inquired in a husky, small voice:

"Who are you? Where are we?"

"We are your captors," said I, "and upon the Hudson River road, bound for Kingsbridge. And now, sir, who are you?"

But the rays of the lantern, falling that instant upon his face, answered my question for me.

"Cornelius!" I cried.

"What, sir? Why—'tis Mr. Russell!"

"Ay, and here is Tom Faringfield," said I.

"Well, bless my soul!" exclaimed the pedagogue, grasping the hand that Tom held to him out of the darkness.

"Mr. Cornelius, since that is your name," put in De Lancey, to whom time was precious. "Will you please tell us who commands yonder, where we got the reception our folly deserved, awhile ago?"

"Certainly, sir," said Cornelius. "'Tis no harm, I suppose—no violation of duty or custom?"

"Not in the least," said I.

"Why then, sir," says he, "since yesterday, when we relieved the infantry there—we are dragoons, sir, though dismounted for this particular service—a new independent troop, sir—Winwood's Horse—"

"Winwood's!" cried I.

"Ay, Captain Winwood's—Mr. Philip, you know—'tis he commands our post yonder."

"Oh, indeed!" said De Lancey, carelessly. "A relation of mine by marriage."

But for a time I had nothing to say, thinking how, after these years of separation, Philip and I had come so near meeting in the night, and known it not; and how, but for the turn of things, one of us might have given the other his death-blow unwittingly in the darkness.