Father told me of his uncle, Chauncey Avery, brother of Grandmother Burroughs, who, with his wife and seven children, was drowned near Shandaken, by a flood in the Esopus Creek, in April, 1814, or 1816. The creek rose rapidly in the night; retreat was cut off in the morning. They got on the roof and held family prayers. Uncle Chauncey tried to fell a tree and make a bridge, but the water drove him away. The house was finally carried away with most of the family in it. The father swam to a stump with one boy on his back and stood there till the water carried away the stump, then tried to swim with the boy for shore, but the driftwood soon engulfed him and all was over. Two of the bodies were never found. Their bones doubtless rest somewhere in the still waters of the lower Esopus.
(Here follow details concerning one paternal and one maternal aunt, which, though picturesque, would better be omitted. It is to be noted, however, that in this simple homely narrative of his ancestors (which, by the way, gives a vivid picture of the early pioneer days) and later in his own personal history, there is no attempt to conceal or gloss over weaknesses or shortcomings; all is set down with engaging candor.—C. B.)
Father's sister Abby married a maternal cousin, John Kelly. He was of a scholarly turn. He worked for Father the year I was born, and I was named after him. I visited him in Pennsylvania in 1873, and while there, when he was talking with me about the men of our family named John Burroughs, he said, "One was a minister in the West, one was Uncle Hiram's son, you are the third, and there is still another I have heard of,—a writer." And I was silly enough not to tell him that I was that one. After I reached home, some of my people sent him "Winter Sunshine," and when he found that I was its author, he wrote that he "set great store by it." I don't know why I should have been so reticent about my books—they were a foreign thing, I suppose; it was not natural to speak of them among my kinsfolk.
(In this connection let me quote from an early letter of Mr. Burroughs to me. It was written in 1901 after the death of his favorite sister: "She was very dear to me, and I had no better friend. More than the rest of my people she aspired to understand and appreciate me, and with a measure of success. My family are plain, unlettered farmer folk, and the world in which you and I live iss a sealed book to them. The have never read my books. What they value in me is what I have in common with them, which is, no doubt, the larger part of me. But I love them all just the same. They are a part of father and mother, of the old home, and of my youthful days."—C. B.)
Mother's father. Grandfather Kelly, was a soldier of 1776, of Irish descent, born in Connecticut, I think. His name was Edmund Kelly. He went into the war as a boy and saw Washington and La Fayette. He was at Valley Forge during that terrible winter the army spent there. One day Washington gave the order to the soldiers to dress-parade for inspection; some had good clothes, some scarcely any, and no shoes. He made all the well-dressed men go and cut wood for the rest, and excused the others.
Grandfather was a small man with a big head and quite pronounced Irish features. He was a dreamer. He was not a good provider; Grandmother did most of the providing. He wore a military coat with brass buttons, and red-top boots. He believed in spooks and witches, and used to tell us spook stories till our hair would stand on end.
He was an expert trout fisherman. Early in the morning I would dig worms for bait, and we would go fishing over in West Settlement, or in Montgomery Hollow. I went fishing with him when he was past eighty. He would steal along the streams and "snake" out the trout, walking as briskly as I do now. From him I get my dreamy, lazy, shirking ways.
In 1848 he and Grandmother came to live near us. He had a severe fit of illness that year. I remember we caught a fat coon for him. He was fond of game. I was there one morning when they entertained a colored minister overnight, probably a fugitive slave. He prayed—how lustily he prayed!
I have heard Grandfather tell how, when he was a boy in Connecticut, he once put his hand in a bluebird's nest and felt, as he said, "something comical"; he drew out his hand, which was followed by the head and neck of a black snake; he took to his heels, and the black snake after him. (I rather think that's a myth.) He said his uncle, who was ploughing, came after the black snake with a whip, and the snake slunk away. He thought he remembered that. It may be a black snake might pursue one, but I doubt it.
(Mr. Burroughs's ingrained tendency to question reports of improbable things in nature shows even in these reminiscences of his grandfather. His instinct for the truth is always on the qui vive.—C. B.)