“Nothing finer. I read some of the reports that young George Washington brought in—you know he surveyed the tract for Lord Fairfax. He noted down all about the soil and the timber, and the water power and all. I can tell you that young fellow is a smart one. I don’t wonder that they have made him a public surveyor. Lord Fairfax is sure a surveyor from England couldn’t have been more accurate.”
“I should like to see a surveyor at work,” said Dave. “It’s always been a good deal of a mystery to me how they measured land, especially from one hill or mountain to another.”
“Perhaps you’ll meet Washington on your way to Annapolis, lad; he’s out somewhere in the neighborhood of the Shenandoah, surveying a grant of land for a man named Burger. The north end of the grant lies at Heckwell’s Creek.”
“We intended to cross near Heckwell’s,” said Joseph Morris. “How is the river?”
“Very low now and you’ll have no trouble;” and after a few words more the friends parted, and the Morrises continued on their journey.
The route was now directly eastward, across the broad and fertile valley of the beautiful Shenandoah, the name of which, in the Indian tongue, means, “Daughter of the Stars.” Here the forests were still immense, but broken by wide patches of luxuriant grass and “islands” of wild flowers, some of which were still in bloom. The scene was truly entrancing, and often Joseph Morris would call a halt and point out one object or another of special interest.
“How people can box themselves up in a city when they might come forth to enjoy something like this is past my understanding,” he said once. “Was ever air purer or sweeter, or music more full of melody than that which yonder birds are giving us? And listen to the murmur of that brook as it trickles along through the brush and over the rocks; it is a psalm in itself.”
“It certainly is grand, Uncle Joe. If only a painter could set it all down on canvas and show it to the folks that live in such a city as London!”
“Aye, but he couldn’t, for the breath of the life that is here would be missing. To me every tree and bush, and patch of grass, can talk as well as can yonder brook and the birds. And what painter could put that talk in his picture, or that feeling that comes over one as he stands here under such a blue sky? No, it’s not possible, and painters must know it, unless they be truly conceited.”
At midday they came to a halt under the wide-spreading branches of a gigantic oak, a veritable monarch of the forest, standing like a sentinel on a grassy knoll overlooking a wide creek flowing into the Shenandoah several miles beyond. For the last hour the trail had been uncertain, with many wet and slippery spots to avoid, and they had moved forward slowly and with care.