Rolf In The Woods
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"Like a colt feeling the whip," indeed! Rolf reeled like a
stricken deer. To go back as a chore-boy drudge was possible,
but not alluring; to leave Quonab, just as the wood world was
opening to him, was devastating; but to exchange it all for
bondage in the pious household of Old Peck, whose cold cruelty
had driven off all his own children, was an accumulation of
disasters that aroused him.
"I won't go!" he blurted out, and gazed defiantly at the broad
and benevolent selectman.
"Come now, Rolf, such language is unbecoming. Let not a hasty
tongue betray you into sin. This is what your mother would have
wished. Be sensible; you will soon find it was all for the best.
I have ever liked you, and will ever be a friend you can count
on.
"Acting, not according to my instructions, but according to my
heart, I will say further that you need not come now, you need
not even give answer now, but think it over. Nevertheless,
remember that on or before Monday morning next, you will be
expected to appear at Elder Peck's, and I fear that, in case you
fail, the messenger next arriving will be one much less friendly
than myself. Come now, Rolf, be a good lad, and remember that in
your new home you will at least be living for the glory of God."
Then, with a friendly nod, but an expression of sorrow, the
large, black messenger turned and tramped away.
Rolf slowly, limply, sank down on a rock and stared at the fire.
After awhile Quonab got up and began to prepare the mid-day meal.
Usually Rolf helped him. Now he did nothing but sullenly glare
at the glowing coals. In half an hour the food was ready. He
ate little; then went away in the woods by himself. Quonab saw
him lying on a flat rock, looking at the pond, and throwing
pebbles into it. Later Quonab went to Myanos. On his return he
found that Rolf had cut up a great pile of wood, but not a word
passed between them. The look of sullen anger and rebellion on
Rolf's face was changing to one of stony despair. What was
passing in each mind the other could not divine.
The evening meal was eaten in silence; then Quonab smoked for an
hour, both staring into the fire. A barred owl hooted and
laughed over their heads, causing the dog to jump up and bark at
the sound that ordinarily he would have heeded not at all. Then
silence was restored, and the red man's hidden train of thought
was in a flash revealed.
"Rolf, let's go to the North Woods!"
It was another astounding idea. Rolf had realized more and more
how much this valley meant to Quonab, who worshipped the memory
of his people.
"And leave all this?" he replied, making a sweep with his hand
toward the rock, the Indian trail, the site of bygone Petuquapen,
and the graves of the tribe.
For reply their eyes met, and from the Indian's deep chest came
the single word, "Ugh." One syllable, deep and descending, but
what a tale it told of the slowly engendered and strong-grown
partiality, of a struggle that had continued since the morning
when the selectman came with words of doom, and of friendship's
victory won.
Rolf realized this, and it gave him a momentary choking in his
throat, and, "I'm ready if you really mean it."
"Ugh I go, but some day come back."
There was a long silence, then Rolf, "When shall we start?" and
the answer, "To-morrow night,"
Bound for the North Woods
When Quonab left camp in the morning he went heavy laden, and the
trail he took led to Myanos. There was nothing surprising in it
when he appeared at Silas Peck's counter and offered for sale a
pair of snowshoes, a bundle of traps, some dishes of birch bark
and basswood, and a tom-tom, receiving in exchange some tea,
tobacco, gunpowder, and two dollars in cash. He turned without
comment, and soon was back in camp. He now took the kettle into
the woods and brought it back filled with bark, fresh chipped
from a butternut tree. Water was added, and the whole boiled
till it made a deep brown liquid. When this was cooled he poured
it into a flat dish, then said to Rolf: "Come now, I make you a
Sinawa."
With a soft rag the colour was laid on. Face, head, neck, and
hands were all at first intended, but Rolf said, "May as well do
the whole thing." So he stripped off; the yellow brown juice on
his white skin turned it a rich copper colour, and he was changed
into an Indian lad that none would have taken for Rolf Kittering.
The stains soon dried, and Rolf, re-clothed, felt that already he
had burned a bridge.
Two portions of the wigwam cover were taken off; and two packs
were made of the bedding. The tomahawk, bows, arrows, and gun,
with the few precious food pounds in the copper pot, were divided
between them and arranged into packs with shoulder straps; then
all was ready. But there was one thing more for Quonab; he went
up alone to the rock. Rolf knew what he went for, and judged it
best not to follow.
The Indian lighted his pipe, blew the four smokes to the four
winds, beginning with the west, then he sat in silence for a
time. Presently the prayer for good hunting came from the rock:
"Father lead us!
Father, help us!
Father, guide us to the good hunting."
And when that ceased a barred owl hooted in the woods,
away to the north.
"Ugh! good," was all he said as he rejoined Rolf; and they set
out, as the sun went down, on their long journey due northward,
Quonab, Rolf, and Skookum. They had not gone a hundred yards
before the dog turned back, raced to a place where he had a bone
in cache and rejoining there trotted along with his bone.
The high road would have been the easier travelling, but it was
very necessary to be unobserved, so they took the trail up the
brook Asamuk, and after an hour's tramp came out by the Cat-Rock
road that runs westerly. Again they were tempted by the easy
path, but again Quonab decided on keeping to the woods. Half an
hour later they were halted by Skookum treeing a coon. After
they had secured the dog, they tramped on through the woods for
two hours more, and then, some eight miles from the Pipestave,
they halted, Rolf, at least, tired out. It was now midnight.
They made a hasty double bed of the canvas cover over a pole
above them, and slept till morning, cheered, as they closed their
drowsy eyes, by the "Hoo, Hoo, Hoo, Hoo, yah, hoo," of their
friend, the barred owl, still to the northward.
The sun was high, and Quonab had breakfast ready before Rolf
awoke. He was so stiff with the tramp and the heavy pack that it
was with secret joy he learned that they were to rest, concealed
in the woods, that day, and travel only by night, until in a
different region, where none knew or were likely to stop them.
They were now in York State, but that did not by any means imply
that they were beyond pursuit.
As the sun rose high, Rolf went forth with his bow and blunt
arrows, and then, thanks largely to Skookum, he succeeded in
knocking over a couple of squirrels, which, skinned and roasted,
made their dinner that day. At night they set out as before,
making about ten miles. The third night they did better, and the
next day being Sunday, they kept out of sight. But Monday
morning, bright and clear, although it was the first morning when
they were sure of being missed, they started to tramp openly
along the highway, with a sense of elation that they had not
hitherto known on the joumey. Two things impressed Rolf by their
novelty: the curious stare of the country folk whose houses and
teams they passed, and the violent antagonism of the dogs.
Usually the latter could be quelled by shaking a stick at them,
or by pretending to pick up a stone, but one huge and savage
brindled mastiff kept following and barking just out of stick
range, and managed to give Skookum a mauling, until Quonab drew
his bow and let fly a blunt arrow that took the brute on the end
of the nose, and sent him howl- ing homeward, while Skookum got a
few highly satisfactory nips at the enemy's rear. Twenty miles
they made that day and twenty-five the next, for now they were on
good roads, and their packs were lighter. More than once they
found kind farmer folk who gave them a meal. But many times
Skookum made trouble for them. The farmers did not like the way
he behaved among their hens. Skookum never could be made to
grasp the fine zoological distinction between partridges which
are large birds and fair game, and hens which are large birds,
but not fair game. Such hair splitting was obviously unworthy of
study, much less of acceptance.
Soon it was clearly better for Rolf, approaching a house, to go
alone, while Quonab held Skookum. The dogs seemed less excited
by Rolf's smell, and remembering his own attitude when tramps
came to one or another of his ancient homes, he always asked if
they would let him work for a meal, and soon remarked that his
success was better when he sought first the women of the house,
and then, smiling to show his very white teeth, spoke in clear
and un-Indian English, which had the more effect coming from an
evident Indian.
"Since I am to be an Indian, Quonab, you must give me an Indian
name," he said after one of these episodes.
"Ugh! Good! That's easy! You are 'Nibowaka,' the wise one." For
the Indian had not missed any of the points, and so he was named.
Twenty or thirty miles a day they went now, avoiding the
settlements along the river. Thus they saw nothing of Albany,
but on the tenth day they reached Fort Edward, and for the first
time viewed the great Hudson. Here they stayed as short a time
as might be, pushed on by Glen's Falls, and on the eleventh night
of the journey they passed the old, abandoned fort, and sighted
the long stretch of Lake George, with its wooded shore, and
glimpses of the mountains farther north.
Now a new thought possessed them -- "If only the had the canoe
that they had abandoned on the Pipestave." It came to them both
at the sight of the limit less water, and especially when Rolf
remembered that Lake George joined with Champlain, which again
was the highway to all the wilderness.
They camped now as they had fifty times before, and made their
meal. The bright blue water dancing near was alluring,
inspiring; as they sought the shore Quonab pointed to a track and
said, "Deer." He did not show much excitement, but Rolf did, and
they returned to the camp fire with a new feeling of elation -
they had reached the Promised Land. Now they must prepare for
the serious work of finding a hunting ground that was not already
claimed.
Quonab, remembering the ancient law of the woods, that parcels
off the valleys, each to the hunter first arriving, or succeeding
the one who had, was following his own line of thought. Rolf was
puzzling over means to get an outfit, canoe, traps, axes, and
provisions. The boy broke silence.
"Quonab, we must have money to get an outfit; this is the
beginning of harvest; we can easily get work for a month. That
will feed us and give us money enough to live on, and a chance to
learn something about the country."
The reply was simple, "You are Nibowaka."
The farms were few and scattered here, but there were one or two
along the lake. To the nearest one with standing grain Rolf led
the way. But their reception, from the first brush with the dog
to the final tilt with the farmer, was unpleasant -- "He didn't
want any darn red-skins around there. He had had two St. Regis
Indians last year, and they were a couple of drunken good-
for-nothings."
The next was the house of a fat Dutchman, who was just wondering
how he should meet the compounded accumulated emergencies of late
hay, early oats, weedy potatoes, lost cattle, and a prospective
increase of his family, when two angels of relief appeared at his
door, in copper-coloured skins.
"Cahn yo work putty goood?
"Yes, I have always lived on a farm," and Rolf showed his hands,
broad and heavy for his years.
"Cahn yo mebby find my lost cows, which I haf not find, already
yet?"
Could they! it would be fun to try.
"I giff yo two dollars you pring dem putty kvick."
So Quonab took the trail to the woods, and Rolf started into the
potatoes with a hoe, but he was stopped by a sudden outcry of
poultry. Alas! It was Skookum on an ill-judged partridge hunt.
A minute later he was ignominiously chained to a penitential
post, nor left it during the travellers' sojourn.
In the afternoon Quonab returned with the cattle, and as he told
Rolf he saw five deer, there was an unmisakable hunter gleam in
his eye.
Three cows in milk, and which had not been milked for two days,
was a serious matter, needing immediate attention. Rolf had
milked five cows twice a day for five years, and a glance showed
old Van Trumper that the boy was an expert.
"Good, good! I go now make feed swine."
He went into the outhouse, but a tow-topped, redcheeked girl ran
after him. "Father, father, mother says --" and the rest was
lost.
"Myn Hemel! Myn Hemel! I thought it not so soon," and the fat
Dutchman followed the child. A moment later he reappeared, his
jolly face clouded with a look of grave concern. "Hi yo big
Injun, yo cahn paddle canoe?" Quonab nodded. "Den coom.
Annette, pring Tomas und Hendrik." So the father carried
two-year-old Hendrik, while the Indian carried six-year-old
Tomas, and twelve-year-old Annette followed in vague,
uncomprehended alarm. Arrived at the shore the children were
placed in the canoe, and then the difficulties came fully to the
father's mind -- he could not leave his wife. He must send the
children with the messenger -- In a sort of desperation, "Cahn
you dem childen take to de house across de lake, and pring back
Mrs. Callan? Tell her Marta Van Trumper need her right now mooch
very kvick." The Indian nodded. Then the father hesitated, but
a glance at the Indian was enough. Something said, "He is safe,"
and in spite of sundry wails from the little ones left with a
dark stranger, he pushed off the canoe: "Yo take care for my
babies," and turned his brimming eyes away.
The farmhouse was only two miles off, and the evening calm; no
time was lost: what woman will not instantly drop all work and
all interests, to come to the help of another in the trial time
of motherhood?
Within an hour the neighbour's wife was holding hands with the
mother of the banished tow-heads. He who tempers the wind and
appoints the season of the wild deer hinds had not forgotten the
womanhood beyond the reach of skilful human help, and with the
hard and lonesome life had conjoined a sweet and blessed
compensation. What would not her sister of the city give for such
immunity; and long before that dark, dread hour of night that
brings the ebbing life force low, the wonderful miracle was
complete; there was another tow-top in the settler's home, and
all was well.
Life with the Dutch Settler
The Indians slept in the luxuriant barn of logs, with blankets,
plenty of hay, and a roof. They were more than content, for now,
on the edge of the wilderness, they were very close to wild life.
Not a day or a night passed without bringing proof of that.
One end of the barn was portioned off for poultry. In this the
working staff of a dozen hens were doing their duty, which, on
that first night of the "brown angels' visit," consisted of
silent slumber, when all at once the hens and the new hands were
aroused by a clamorous cackling, which speedily stopped. It
sounded like a hen falling in a bad dream, then regaining her
perch to go to sleep again. But next morning the body of one of
these highly esteemed branches of the egg-plant was found in the
corner, partly devoured. Quonab examined the headless hen, the
dust around, and uttered the word, "Mink."
Rolf said, "Why not skunk?"
"Skunk could not climb to the perch."
"Weasel then."
"Weasel would only suck the blood, and would kill three or four."
"Coon would carry him away, so would fox or wildcat, and a marten
would not come into the building by night."
There was no question, first, that it was a mink, and, second,
that he was hiding about the barn until the hunger pang should
send him again to the hen house. Quonab covered the hen's body
with two or three large stones so that there was only one
approach. In the way of this approach he buried a "number one"
trap.
That night they were aroused again; this time by a frightful
screeching, and a sympathetic, inquiring cackle from the fowls.
Arising, quickly they entered with a lantem. Rolf then saw a
sight that gave him a prickling in his hair. The mink, a large
male, was caught by one front paw. He was writhing and foaming,
tearing, sometimes at the trap, sometimes at the dead hen, and
sometimes at his own imprisoned foot, pausing now and then to
utter the most ear-piercing shrieks, then falling again in crazy
animal fury on the trap, splintering his sharp white teeth,
grinding the cruel metal with bruised and bloody jaws, frothing,
snarling, raving mad. As his foemen entered he turned on them a
hideous visage of inexpressible fear and hate, rage and horror.
His eyes glanced back green fire in the lantern light; he
strained in renewed efforts to escape; the air was rank with his
musky smell. The impotent fury of his struggle made a picture
that continued in Rolf's mind. Quonab took a stick and with a
single blow put an end to the scene, but never did Rolf forget
it, and never afterward was he a willing partner when the
trapping was done with those relentless jaws of steel.
A week later another hen was missing, and the door of the hen
house left open. After a careful examination of the dust, inside
and out of the building, Quonab said, "Coon." It is very unusual
for coons to raid a hen house. Usually it is some individual with
abnormal tastes, and once he begins, he is sure to come back.
The Indian judged that he might be back the next night, so
prepared a trap. A rope was passed from the door latch to a
tree; on this rope a weight was hung, so that the door was
selfshutting, and to make it self-locking he leaned a long pole
against it inside. Now he propped it open with a single
platform, so set that the coon must walk on it once he was
inside, and so release the door. The trappers thought they would
hear in the night when the door closed, but they were sleepy;
they knew nothing until next morning. Then they found that the
self-shutter had shut, and inside, crouched in one of the nesting
boxes, was a tough, old fighting coon. Strange to tell, he had
not touched a second hen. As soon as he found himself a prisoner
he had experienced a change of heart, and presently his skin was
nailed on the end of the barn and his meat was hanging in the
larder.
"Is this a marten," asked little Annette. And when told not, her
disappointment elicited the information that old Warren, the
storekeeper, had promised her a blue cotton dress for a marten
skin.
"You shall have the first one I catch," said Rolf.
Life in Van Trumper's was not unpleasant. The mother was going
about again in a week. Annette took charge of the baby, as well
as of the previous arrivals. Hendrik senior was gradually
overcoming his difficulties, thanks to the unexpected help, and a
kindly spirit made the hard work not so very hard. The shyness
that was at first felt toward the Indians wore off, especially in
the case of Rolf, he was found so companionable; and the
Dutchman, after puzzling over the combination of brown skin and
blue eyes, decided that Rolf was a half-breed.
August wore on not unpleasantly for the boy, but Quonab was
getting decidedly restless. He could work for a week as hard as
any white man, but his race had not risen to the dignity of
patient, unremitting, life-long toil.
"How much money have we now, Nibowaka?" was one of the mid-August
indications of restlessness. Rolf reckoned up; half a month for
Quonab, $15.00; for himself, $10.00; for finding the cows $2.00
-- $27.00 in all. Not enough.
Three days later Quonab reckoned up again. Next day he said: "We
need two months' open water to find a good country and build a
shanty." Then did Rolf do the wise thing; he went to fat Hendrik
and told him all about it. They wanted to get a canoe and an
outfit, and seek for a trapping or hunting ground that would not
encroach on those already possessed, for the trapping law is
rigid; even the death penalty is not considered too high in
certain cases of trespass, provided the injured party is ready to
be judge, jury, and executioner. Van Trumper was able to help
them not a little in the matter of location -- there was no use
trying on the Vermont side, nor anywhere near Lake Champlain, nor
near Lake George; neither was it worth while going to the far
North, as the Frenchmen came in there, and they were keen
hunters, so that Hamilton County was more promising than any
other, but it was almost inaccessible, remote from all the great
waterways, and of course without roads; its inaccessibility was
the reason why it was little known. So far so good; but happy
Hendrik was unpleasantly surprised to learn that the new help
were for leaving at once. Finally he made this offer: If they
would stay till September first, and so leave all in "good shape
fer der vinter," he would, besides the wages agreed, give them
the canoe, one axe, six mink traps, and a fox trap now hanging in
the barn, and carry them in his wagon as far as the Five- mile
portage from Lake George to Schroon River, down which they could
go to its junction with the upper Hudson, which, followed up
through forty miles of rapids and hard portages, would bring them
to a swampy river that enters from the southwest, and ten miles
up this would bring them to Jesup's Lake, which is two miles wide
and twelve miles long. This country abounded with game, but was
so hard to enter that after Jesup's death it was deserted.
There was only one possible answer to such an offer -- they stayed.
In spare moments Quonab brought the canoe up to the barn,
stripped off some weighty patches of bark and canvas and some
massive timber thwarts, repaired the ribs, and when dry and
gummed, its weight was below one hundred pounds; a saving of at
least forty pounds on the soggy thing he crossed the lake in that
first day on the farm.
September came. Early in the morning Quonab went alone to the
lakeside; there on a hill top he sat, looking toward the sunrise,
and sang a song of the new dawn, beating, not with a tom-tom --
he had none -- but with one stick on another. And when the
sunrise possessed the earth he sang again the hunter's song:
"Father, guide our feet, Lead us to the good hunting."
Then he danced to the sound, his face skyward, his eyes closed,
his feet barely raised, but rythmically moved. So went he three
times round to the chant in three sun circles, dancing a sacred
measure, as royal David might have done that day when he danced
around the Ark of the Covenant on its homeward joumey. His face
was illumined, and no man could have seen him then without
knowing that this was a true heart's worship of a true God, who
is in all things He has made.
Canoeing on the Upper Hudson
There is only one kind of a man I can't size up; that's the
faller that shets up and says nothing. -Sayings of Si Sylvanne.
A settler named Hulett had a scow that was borrowed by the
neighbours whenever needed to take a team across the lake. On
the morning of their journey, the Dutchman's team and wagon, the
canoe and the men, were aboard the scow, Skookum took his proper
place at the prow, and all was ready for "Goodbye." Rolf found it
a hard word to say. The good old Dutch mother had won his heart,
and the children were like his brothers and sisters.
"Coom again, lad; coom and see us kvick." She kissed him, he
kissed Annette and the three later issues. They boarded the scow
to ply the poles till the deep water was reached, then the oars.
An east wind springing up gave them a chance to profit by a
wagon-cover rigged as a sail, and two hours later the scow was
safely landed at West Side, where was a country store, and the
head of the wagon road to the Schroon River.
As they approached the door, they saw a rough-looking man
slouching against the building, his hands in his pockets, his
blear eyes taking in the new-comers with a look of contemptuous
hostility. As they passed, he spat tobacco juice on the dog and
across the feet of the men.
Old Warren who kept the store was not partial to Indians, but he
was a good friend of Hendrik and very keen to trade for fur, so
the new trappers were well received; and now came the settling of
accounts. Flour, oatmeal, pork, potatoes, tea, tobacco, sugar,
salt, powder, ball, shot, clothes, lines, an inch-auger, nails,
knives, awls, needles, files, another axe, some tin plates, and a
frying pan were selected and added to Hendrik's account.
"If I was you, I'd take a windy-sash; you'll find it mighty
convenient in cold weather." The store keeper led them into an
outhouse where was a pile of six-lighted window-frames all
complete. So the awkward thing was added to their load.
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