CHAPTER IV.
HIGH FESTIVAL AT PINEY COVE.
On the shores of Long Island, where the ocean heaves in its wildest and most crystalline surf, a small cove had broken itself into the slopes of an irregular hill, after generations of beating storms and crumbling earth, taking a crescent shape, and forming one of the most picturesque bits of landscape to be found along the coast. The two points or promontories that stretched their green arms to the ocean, were clothed with thickly growing white pines, scattered with chestnuts, and a few grand old oaks. The country sloped beautifully down to this bright sheet of water, and swept around it in rocky points and broken groves, giving glimpses of rich grass-land, more luxuriantly cultivated than is usual to that portion of the island. As you looked on the scene from the water, a house was visible on the hillside, and came in full view as the shore was approached. It was a noble stone mansion, old as the hills, people were used to say, and solid as their foundations. The house had been a stately residence before the Revolution, and, without an earthquake or a ton of powder, would remain such for a century to come.
Whatever the body of the house had been in the good old times, when ornament was little thought of, it was now rendered picturesque by lofty towers, and additional wings with oriel windows and carved balconies in one direction; while the other wing clasped in a conservatory, of which nothing could be seen from the distance but wave upon wave of rolling crystal emerald, tinted like the ocean by the wealth of green plants they covered.
This was the residence Grantley Mellen had inherited from a maternal uncle just after his first struggle in life commenced. It was backed by many a fruitful field and broad stretch of timber-land, which altogether went under the title of Piney Cove.
Grantley Mellen, since he became possessed of the estate, had completed the work his uncle commenced when he built the two grand towers, and a more picturesque building could not well be imagined, with its broad lawn, its clumps of forest trees, and that magnificent ocean view, which was broken only by the pine groves on the two points.
This was by no means the only house visible from the cove. As you turned the southern point, a village was seen down the coast; and about half way between that and the pines was a wooden house, brown and weather-beaten, standing unsheltered on the bleak shore. Back of this house, shutting out all prospect but that of the ocean, was a tall cliff, covered with ragged yellow pines and stunted cedars, from which on stormy nights many a quivering flame had shot upward, luring ships to their ruin. Still, with this grim protest against the name looming behind it, the lonely old house was called "The Sailor's Safe Anchor," and was known all along the coast as a fishing-lodge and small tavern.
But once within the cove, you saw no sign of habitation save the mansion house and its appurtenances.
Grantley Mellen had been some weeks at the cove, renovating and preparing the house for the reception of his bride; for it was understood that he intended henceforth to make it his permanent residence. But the wedding-day was near, and he had gone up to the city, leaving the last preparations to the care of a singular class of household servants, one of his uncle's philanthropic importations from the South, where he had owned a plantation, and emancipated all its slaves except a half dozen, that would only accept liberty on condition that they might follow the old man to his northern home.