DAY THE FOURTH
When we had entered Tom's hospitable dwelling, and delivered over our guns to be duly cleaned, and the dogs to be suppered, by Tim Matlock, I passed through the parlor, on my way to my own crib, where I found Archer in close confabulation with a tall rawboned Dutchman, with a keen freckled face, small 'cute gray eyes, looking suspiciously about from under the shade of a pair of straggling sandy eyebrows, small reddish whiskers, and a head of carroty hair as rough and tangled as a fox's back.
His aspect was a wondrous mixture of sneakingness and smartness, and his expression did most villainously belie him, if he were not as sharp a customer as ever wagged an elbow, or betted on a horse-race.
"Frank," exclaimed Harry, as I entered, "I make you know Mr. McTaggart, better known hereabouts as the Flying Dutchman, though how he came by a Scotch name I can't pretend to say; he keeps the best quarter horses, and plays the best hand of whist in the country; and now, get yourself clean as quick as possible, for Tom never gives one five minutes wherein to dress himself; so bustle."
And off he went as he had finished speaking, and I shaking my new friend cordially by an exceeding bony unwashed paw, incontinently followed his example--and in good time I did so; for I had scarcely changed my shooting boots and wet worsteds for slippers and silk socks, before my door, as usual, was lounged open by Tom's massy foot, and I was thus exhorted.
"Come, come, your supper's gittin' cold; I never see such men as you and Archer is; you're wash, wash, wash--all day. It's little water enough that you use any other ways."
"Why, is there any other use for water, Tom?" I asked, simply enough.
"It's lucky if there aint, any how--leastwise, where you and Archer is-- else you'd leave none for the rest of us. It's a good thing you han't thought of washing your darned stinking hides in rum--you will be at it some of these odd days, I warrant me--why now, McTaggart, it's only yesterday I caught Archer up stairs, a fiddling away up there at his teeth with a little ivory brush; brushing them with cold water--cleaning them he calls it. Cuss all such trash, says I."
While I was listening in mute astonishment, wondering whether in truth the old savage never cleaned his teeth, Archer made his appearance, and to a better supper never did I sit down, than was spread at the old round table, in such profusion as might have well sufficed to feed a troop of horse.
"What have we got here, Tom?" cried Harry, as he took the head of the social board; "quail-pie, by George--are there any peppers in it, Tom?"
"Sartain there is," replied that worthy, "and a prime rump-steak in the bottom, and some first-best salt pork, chopped fine, and three small onions; like little Wax-skin used to fix them, when he was up here last fall."
"Take some of this pie, Frank;" said Archer, as he handed me a huge plate of leafy reeking pie-crust, with a slice of fat steak, and a plump hen quail, and gravy, and etceteras, that might have made an alderman's mouth water; "and if you don't say it's the very best thing you ever tasted, you are not half so good a judge as I used to hold you. It took little Johnny and myself three wet days to concoct it. Pie, Tom, or roast pig?" he continued; "or broiled woodcock? Here they are, all of them?"
"Why, I reckon I'll take cock; briled meat wants to be ate right stret away as soon as it comes off the griddle; and of all darned nice ways of cooking, to brile a thing, quick now, over hot hickory ashes, is the best for me!"
"I believe you're right about eating the cock first, for they will not be worth a farthing if they get cold. So you stick to the pig, do you-- hey, McTaggart? Well, there is no reckoning on taste--holloa, Tim, look sharp! the champagne all 'round--I'm choking!"
And for some time no sound was heard, but the continuous clatter of knives and forks, the occasional popping of a cork succeeded by the gurgling of the generous wine as it flowed into the tall rummers; and every now and then a loud and rattling eructation from Tom Draw, who, as he said, could never half enjoy a meal if he could not stop now and then to blow off steam.
At last, however--for supper, alas! like all other earthly pleasures, must come to an end--"The fairest still the fleetest"--our appetites waned gradually; and notwithstanding Harry's earnest exhortations, and the production of a broiled ham-bone, devilled to the very utmost pitch of English mustard, soy, oil of Aix, and cayenne pepper, by no hands, as may be guessed, but those of that universal genius, Timothy; one by one, we gave over our labors edacious, to betake us to potations of no small depth or frequency.
"It is directly contrary to my rule, Frank, to drink before a good day's shooting--and a good day I mean to have to-morrow!--but I am thirsty, and the least thought chilly; so here goes for a debauch! Tim, look in my box with the clothes, and you will find two flasks of Curacao; bring them down, and a dozen lemons, and some lump sugar--look alive! and you, Tom, out with your best brandy; I'll make a jorum that will open your eyes tight before you've done with it. That's right, Tim; now get the soup-tureen, the biggest one, and see that it's clean. The old villain has got a punch-bowl--bring half a dozen of champagne, a bucket full of ice, and then go down into the kitchen, and make two quarts of green tea, as strong as possible; and when it's made, set it to cool in the ice-house!"
In a few minutes all the ingredients were at hand; the rind, peeled carefully from all the lemons, was deposited with two tumblers full of finely powdered sugar in the bottom of the tureen; thereupon were poured instantly three pints of pale old Cognac; and these were left to steep, without admixture, until Tim Matlock made his entrance with the cold, strong, green tea; two quarts of this, strained clear, were added to the brandy, and then two flasks of curacoa!
Into this mixture a dozen lumps of clear ice were thrown, and the whole stirred up 'till the sugar was entirely suspended; then pop! pop! went the long necks, and their creaming nectar was discharged into the bowl; and by the body of Bacchus--as the Italians swear--and by his soul, too, which he never steeped in such delicious nectar, what a drink that was, when it was completed.
Even Tom Draw, who ever was much disposed to look upon strange potables as trash, and who had eyed the whole proceedings with ill-concealed suspicion and disdain, when he had quaffed off a pint-beaker full, which he did without once moving the vessel from his head, smacked his lips with a report which might have been heard half a mile off, and which resembled very nearly the crack of a first-rate huntsman's whip.
"That's not slow, now!" he said, half dubiously, "to tell the truth now, that's first rate; I reckon, though, it would be better if there wasn't that tea into it--it makes it weak and trashy-like!"
"You be hanged!" answered Harry, "that's mere affectation--that smack of your lips told the story; did you ever hear such an infernal sound? I never did, by George!"
"Begging your pardon, Measter Archer," interposed Timothy, pulling his forelock, with an expression of profound respect, mingled with a ludicrous air of regret, at being forced to differ in the least degree from his master; "begging your pardon, Measter Archer, that was a roommer noise, and by a vary gre-at de-al too, when Measter McTavish sneezed me clean oot o' t' wagon!"
"What's that?--what the devil's that?" cried I; "this McTavish must be a queer genius; one day I hear of his frightening a bull out of a meadow, and the next of his sneezing a man out of a phaeton."
"It's simply true! both are simply true! We were driving very slowly on an immensely hot day in the middle of August, between Lebanon Springs and Claverack; McTavish and I on the front seat, and Tim behind. Well! we were creeping at a foot's pace, upon a long, steep hill, just at the very hottest time of day; not a word had been spoken for above an hour, for we were all tired and languid--except once, when McTavish asked for his third tumbler, since breakfast, of Starke's Ferintosh, of which we had three two-quart bottles in the liquor case--when suddenly, without any sign or warning, McTavish gave a sneeze which, on my honor, was scarcely inferior in loudness to a pistol shot! The horses started almost off the road, I jumped about half a foot off my seat, and positively without exaggeration, Timothy tumbled slap out of the wagon into the road, and lay there sprawling in the dust, while Mac sat perfectly unmoved, without a smile upon his face, looking straight before him, exactly as if nothing had happened."
"Nonsense, Harry," exclaimed I; "that positively won't go down."
"That's an etarnal lie, now, Archer!" Tom chimed in; "leastwise I don't know why I should say so neither, for I never saw no deviltry goin' on yet, that didn't come as nat'ral to McTavish, as lying to a minister, or..."
"Rum to Tom Draw!" responded Harry. "But it's as true as the gospel, ask Timothy there!"
"Nay it's all true; only it's scarce so bad i' t' story, as it was i' right airnest! Ay cooped oot o' t' drag--loike ivry thing--my hinder eend was sair a moanth and better!"
"Now then," said I, "it's Tom's turn; let us hear about the bull."
"Oh, the bull!" answered Tom. "Well you see, Archer there, and little Waxskin--you know little Waxskin, I guess, Mister Forester--and old McTavish, had gone down to shoot to Hellhole--where we was yesterday, you see!--well now! it was hot--hot, worst kind; I tell you--and I was sort o' tired out--so Waxskin, in he goes into the thick, and Archer arter him, and up the old crick side--thinkin, you see, that we was goin up, where you and I walked yesterday--but not a bit of it; we never thought of no such thing, not we! We sot ourselves down underneath the haystacks, and made ourselves two good stiff horns of toddy; and cooled off there, all in the shade, as slick as silk.
"Well, arter we'd been there quite a piece, bang! we hears, in the very thick of the swamp--bang! bang!--and then I heerd Harry Archer roar out 'mark! mark!--Tom, mark!--you old fat rascal,'--and sure enough, right where I should have been, if I'd been a doin right, out came two woodcock--big ones--they looked like hens, and I kind o' thought it was a shame, so I got up to go to them, and called McTavish to go with me; but torights, jest as he was a gitting up, a heap of critters comes all chasin up, scart by a dog, I reckon, kickin their darned heels up, and bellowin like mad--and there was one young bull amongst them, quite a lump of a bull now I tell you; and the bull he came up pretty nigh to us, and stood, and stawmped, and sort o' snorted, as if he didn't know right what he would be arter, and McTavish, he gits up, and turns right round with his back to the critter; he got a bit of a round jacket on, and he stoops down till his head came right atween his legs, kind o' straddlin like, so that the bull could see nothing of him but his t'other eend, and his head right under it, chin uppermost, with his big black whiskers, lookin as fierce as all h-ll, and fiercer; well! the bull he stawmped agin, and pawed, and bellowed, and I was in hopes, I swon, that he would have hooked him; but just then McTavish, starts to run, going along as I have told you, hind eend foremost--bo-oo went the bull, a-boooo, and off he starts like a strick, with his tail stret on eend, and his eyes starin and all the critters arter him, and then they kind o' circled round--and all stood still and stared--and stawmped, 'till he got nigh to them, and then they all stricks off agin; and so they went on--runnin and then standin still,--and so they went on the hull of an hour, I'll be bound; and I lay there upon my back laughin 'till I was stiff and sore all over; and then came Waxskin and all Archer, wrathy as h-ll and swearin'--Lord how they did swear!
"They'd been a slavin there through the darned thorns and briers, and the old stinkin mud holes, and flushed a most almighty sight of cock, where the brush was too thick to shoot them, and every one they flushed, he came stret out into the open field, where Archer knew we should have been, and where we should have killed a thunderin mess, and no mistake; and they went on dam-min, and wonderin, and sweatin through the brush, till they got out to the far eend, and there they had to make tracks back to us through the bog meadow, under a brilin sun, and when they did get back, the bull was jest a goin through the bars--and every d--d drop o' the rum was drinked up; and the sun was settin, and the day's shootin--that was spoiled!--and then McTavish tantalized them the worst sort. But I did laugh to kill; it was the best I ever did see, was that spree--Ha! ha! ha!"
And, as he finished, he burst out into his first horse laugh, in which I chorused him most heartily, having in truth been in convulsions, between the queerness of his lingo, and the absurdly grotesque attitudes into which he threw himself, in imitating the persons concerning whom his story ran. After this, jest succeeded jest! and story, story! 'till, in good truth, the glass circling the while with most portentous speed, I began to feel bees in my head, and till in truth no one, I believe, of the party, was entirely collected in his thoughts, except Tom Draw, whom it is as impossible for liquor to affect, as it would be for brandy to make a hogshead drunk, and who stalked off to bed with an air of solemn gravity that would have well become a Spanish grandee of the olden time, telling us, as he left the room, that we were all as drunk as thunder, and that we should be stinkin in our beds till noon to-morrow.
A prediction, by the way, which he took right good care to defeat in his own person; for in less than five hours after we retired, which was about the first of the small hours, he rushed into my room, and finding that the awful noises which he made, had no effect in waking me, dragged me bodily out of bed, and clapping my wet sponge in my face, walked off, as he said, to fetch the bitters, which were to make me as fine as silk upon the instant.
This time, I must confess that I did not look with quite so much disgust on the old apple-jack; and in fact, after a moderate horn, I completed my ablutions, and found myself perfectly fresh and ready for the field. Breakfast was soon despatched, and on this occasion as soon as we had got through the broiled ham and eggs, the wagon made its appearance at the door.
"What's this, Harry?" I exclaimed; "where are we bound for, now?"
"Why, Master Frank," he answered, "to tell you the plain truth, while you were sleeping off the effects of the last night's regent's punch, I was on foot inquiring into the state of matters and things; and since we have pretty well exhausted our home beats, and I have heard that some ground, about ten miles distant, is in prime order, I have determined to take a try there; but we must look pretty lively, for it is seven now, and we have got a drive of ten stiff miles before us. Now, old Grampus, are you ready?"
"Aye, aye!" responded Tom, and mounted up, a work of no small toil for him, into the back seat of the wagon, where I soon took my seat beside him, with the two well-broke setters crouching at our feet, and the three guns strapped neatly to the side rails of the wagons. Harry next mounted the box. Tim touched his hat and jumped up to his side, and off we rattled at a merry trot, wheeling around the rival tavern which stood in close propinquity to Tom's; then turning short again to the left hand, along a broken stony road, with several high and long hills, and very awkward bridges in the valleys, to the north-westward of the village.
Five miles brought us into a pretty little village lying at the base of another ridge of what might almost be denominated mountains, save that they were cultivated to the very top. As we paused on the brow of this, another glorious valley spread out to our view, with the broad sluggish waters of the Wallkill winding away, with hardly any visible motion, toward the north-east, through a vast tract of meadow-land covered with high, rank grass, dotted with clumps of willows and alder brakes, and interspersed with large, deep swamps, thick-set with high grown timber; while far beyond these, to the west, lay the tall variegated chain of the Shawangunk mountains.
Rattling briskly down the hill, we passed another thriving village, built on the mountain side; made two or three sharp ugly turns, still going at a smashing pace, and coming on the level ground, entered an extensive cedar swamp, impenetrable above with the dark boughs of the evergreen colossi, and below with half a dozen varieties of rhododendron, calmia, and azalia. Through this dark, dreary track, the road ran straight as the bird flies, supported on the trunks of trees, constituting what is here called a corduroy road; an article which, praise be to all the gods, is disappearing now so rapidly, that this is the only bit to be found in the civilized regions of New York--and bordered to the right and left by ditches of black tenacious mire. Beyond this we scaled another sandy hillock, and pulled up at a little wayside tavern, at the door of which Harry set himself lustily to halloa.
"Why, John; hilloa, hillo; John Riker!"
Whereon, out came, stooping low to pass under the lintel of a very fair sized door, one of the tallest men I ever looked upon; his height, too, was exaggerated by the narrowness of his chest and shoulders, which would have been rather small for a man of five foot seven; but to make up for this, his legs were monstrous, his arms muscular, and his whole frame evidently powerful and athletic, though his gait was slouching, and his air singularly awkward and unhandy.
"Why, how do, Mr. Archer? I hadn't heerd you was in these pairts--arter woodcock, I reckon?"
"Yes, John, as usual; and you must go along with us, and show us the best ground."
"Well, you see, I carn't go to-day--for Squire Breawn, and Dan Faushea, and a whole grist of Goshen boys is comin' over to the island here to fish; but you carn't well go wrong."
"Why not; are birds plenty?"
"Well! I guess they be! Plentier than ever yet I see them here."
"By Jove! that's good news," Harry answered; "where shall we find the first?"
"Why, amost anywheres--but here, jist down by the first bridge, there's a hull heap--leastwise there was a Friday--and then you'd best go on to the second bridge, and keep the edge of the hill right up and down to Merrit's Island; and then beat down here home to the first bridge again. But won't you liquor?"
"No, not this morning, John; we did our liquoring last night. Tom, do you hear what John says?"
"I hear, I hear," growled out old Tom; "but the critter lies like nauthen. He always does lie, cuss him."
"Well, here goes, and we'll soon see!"
And away we went again, spinning down a little descent, to a flat space between the hill-foot and the river, having a thick tangled swamp on the right, and a small boggy meadow full of grass, breast-high, with a thin open alder grove beyond it on the left. Just as we reached the bridge Harry pulled up.
"Jump out, boys, jump out! Here's the spot."
"I tell you there aint none; darn you! There aint none never here, nor haint been these six years; you know that now, yourself, Archer."
"We'll try it, all the same," said Harry, who was coolly loading his gun. "The season has been wetter than common, and this ground is generally too dry. Drive on, Tim, over the bridge, into the hollow; you'll be out of shot there; and wait till we come. Holloa! mark, Tom."
For, as the wagon wheels rattled upon the bridge, up jumped a cock out of the ditch by the road side, from under a willow brush, and skimmed past all of us within five yards. Tom Draw and I, who had got out after Harry, were but in the act of ramming down our first barrels; but Harry, who had loaded one, and was at that moment putting down the wad upon the second, dropped his ramrod with the most perfect sang-froid I ever witnessed, took a cap out of his right-hand pocket, applied it to the cone, and pitching up his gun, knocked down the bird as it wheeled to cross the road behind us, by the cleverest shot possible.
"That's pretty well for no birds, anyhow, Tom," he exclaimed, dropping his butt to load. "Go and gather that bird, Frank, to save time; he lies in the wagon rut, there. How now? down charge, you Chase, sir! what are you about?"
The bird was quickly bagged, and Harry loaded. We stepped across a dry ditch, and both dogs made game at the same instant.
"Follow the red dog, Frank!" cried Archer, "and go very slow; there are birds here!"
And as he spoke, while the dogs were crawling along, cat-like, pointing at every step, and then again creeping onward, up skirred two birds under the very nose of the white setter, and crossed quite to the left of Harry. I saw him raise his gun, but that was all; for at the self-same moment one rose to me, and my ear caught the flap of yet another to my right; five barrels were discharged so quickly, that they made but three reports; I cut my bird well down, and looking quickly to the left, saw nothing but a stream of feathers drifting along the wind. At the same time, old Tom shouted on the right,
"I have killed two, by George! What have you done, boys?"
"Two, I!" said Archer. "Wait, Frank, don't you begin to load till one of us is ready; there'll be another cock up, like enough. Keep your barrel; I'll be ready in a jiffy!"
And well it was that I obeyed him, for at the squeak of the card, in its descent down his barrel, another bird did rise, and was making off for the open alders, when my whole charge riddled him; and instantly at the report three more flapped up, and of course went off unharmed; but we marked them, one by one, down in the grass at the wood edge. Harry loaded again. We set off to pick up our dead birds. Shot drew, as I thought, on my first, and pointed dead within a yard of where he fell. I walked up carelessly, with my gun under my arm, and was actually stooping to bag him, as I thought, when whiz! one rose almost in my face; and, bothered by seeing us all around him, towered straight up into the air. Taken completely by surprise, I blazed away in a hurry, and missed clean; but not five yards did he go, before Tom cut him down.
"Aha, boy! whose eye's wiped now?"
"Mine, Tom, very fairly; but can that be the same cock I knocked down, Archer?"
"Not a bit of it; I saw your's fall dead as a stone; he lies half a yard farther in that tussock."
"How the deuce did you see him? Why, you were shooting your own at the same moment."
"All knack, Frank; I marked both my own and yours, and one of Tom's besides. Are you ready? Hold up, Shot! There; he has got your dead bird. Was I not right? And look to! for, by Jove! he is standing on another, with the dead bird in his mouth! That's pretty, is it not?"
Again two rose, and both were killed; one by Tom, and one by Archer; my gun hanging fire.
"That's nine birds down before we have bagged one," said Archer; "I hope no more will rise, or we'll be losing these."
But this time his hopes were not destined to meet accomplishment, for seven more woodcock got up, five of which were scattered in the grass around us, wing-broken or dead, before we had even bagged the bird which Shot was gently mouthing.
"I never saw anything like this in my life, Tom. Did you?" cried Harry.
"I never did, by George!" responded Tom. "Now do you think there's any three men to be found in York, such darned etarnal fools as to be willing to shoot a match agin us?"
"To be sure I do, lots of them; and to beat us too, to boot, you stupid old porpoise. Why, there's Harry T--- and Nick L---, and a dozen more of them, that you and I would have no more chance with, than a gallon of brandy would have of escaping from you at a single sitting. But we have shot pretty well, to-day. Now do, for heaven's sake, let us try to bag them!"
And scattered though they were in all directions, among the most infernal tangled grass I ever stood on, those excellent dogs retrieved them one by one, till every bird was pocketed. We then beat on and swept the rest of the meadow, and the outer verge of the alders, picking up three more birds, making a total of seventeen brought to bag in less than half an hour. We then proceeded to the wagon, took a good pull of water from a beautiful clear spring by the road-side, properly qualified with whiskey, and rattled on about one mile farther to the second bridge. Here we again got out.
"Now, Tim," said Harry. "mark me well! Drive gently to the old barrack yonder under the west-end of that wood-side, unhitch the horses and tie them in the shade; you can give them a bite of meadow hay at the same time; and then get luncheon ready. We shall be with you by two o'clock at farthest."
"Ay, ay, sur!"
And off he drove at a steady pace, while we, striking into the meadow, to the left hand of the road, went along getting sport such as I never beheld, or even dreamed of before. For about five hundred yards in width from the stream, the ground was soft and miry to the depth of some four inches, with long sword-grass quite knee-deep, and at every fifty yards a bunch of willows or swamp alders. In every clump of bushes we found from three to five birds, and as the shooting was for the most part very open, we rendered on the whole a good account of them. The dogs throughout behaved superbly, and Tom was altogether frantic with the excitement of the sport. The time seemed short indeed, and I could not for a moment have imagined that it was even noon, when we reached the barrack.
This was a hut of rude, unplaned boards, which had been put up formerly with the intent of furnishing a permanent abode for some laboring men, but which, having been long deserted, was now used only as a temporary shelter by charcoal burners, haymakers, or like ourselves, stray sportsmen. It was, however, though rudely built, and fallen considerably into decay, perfectly beautiful from its romantic site; for it stood just at the end of a long tangled covert, with a huge pin oak-tree, leaning abruptly out from an almost precipitous bank of yellow sand, completely canopying it; while from a crevice in the sand-stone there welled out a little source of crystal water, which expanded into as sweet a basin as ever served a Dryad for her bath in Arcady, of old.
Before it stretched the wide sweep of meadow land, with the broad blue Wallkill gliding through it, fringed by a skirt of coppice, and the high mountains, veiled with a soft autumnal mist, sleeping beyond, robed in their many-colored garb of crimson, gold, and green. Besides the spring the indefatigable Tim had kindled a bright glancing fire, while in the basin were cooling two long-necked bottles of the Baron's best; a clean white cloth was spread in the shade before the barrack door, with plates and cups, and bread cut duly, and a traveling case of cruets, with all the other appurtenances needful.
On our appearance he commenced rooting in a heap of embers, and soon produced six nondescript looking articles enclosed--as they dress maintenon cutlets or red mullet--in double sheets of greasy letter paper--these he incontinently dished, and to my huge astonishment they turned out to be three couple of our woodcock, which that indefatigable varlet had picked, and baked under the ashes, according to some strange idea, whether original, or borrowed at second hand from his master, I never was enabled to ascertain.
The man, be he whom he may, who invented that plat, is second neither to Caramel nor to Ude--the exquisite juicy tenderness of the meat, the preservation of the gravy, the richness of the trail--by heaven! they were inimitable.
In that sweet spot we loitered a full hour--then counted our bag, which amounted already to fifty-nine cock, not including those with which Tim's gastronomic art had spread for us a table in the wilderness--then leaving him to pack up and meet us at the spot where we first started, we struck down the stream homeward, shooting our way along a strip of coppice about ten yards in breadth, bounded on one side by a dry bare bank of the river, and on the other by the open meadows. We of course kept the verges of this covert, our dogs working down the middle, and so well did we manage it, that when we reached the wagon, just as the sun was setting, we numbered a hundred and twenty-five birds bagged, besides two which were so cut by the shot as to be useless, six which we had devoured, and four or five which we lost in spite of the excellence of our retrievers. When we got home again, although the Dutchman was on the spot, promising us a quarter race upon the morrow, and pressing earnestly for a rubber to-night, we were too much used up to think of anything but a good supper and an early bed.