Chapter Twenty Seven.
The Indian’s Visit.
“How cheerful and gay everything looks now,” observed Emma to Mary, a few mornings after the celebration of the marriage. “One could hardly credit that in a few months all this animated landscape will be nothing but one dreary white mass of snow and ice, and no sounds meeting the ear but the howling of the storm and the howling of the wolves.”
“Two very agreeable conditions, certainly,” replied Mary; “but what you observe was actually occurring to my own mind at the very moment.”
The scene was indeed cheerful and lively. The prairie on one side of the stream waved its high grass to the summer breeze; on the other the cows, horses, and sheep were grazing in every direction. The lake in the distance was calm and unruffled; the birds were singing and chirping merrily in the woods; near the house the bright green of the herbage was studded with the soldiers, dressed in white, employed in various ways; the corn waved its yellow ears between the dark stumps of the trees in the cleared land; and the smoke from the chimney of the house mounted straight up in a column to the sky; the grunting of the pigs, and the cackling of the fowls, and the occasional bleating of the calves, responded to by the lowing of the cows, gave life and animation to the picture. At a short distance from the shore the punt was floating on the still waters. John and Malachi were very busy fishing; the dogs were lying down by the palisades, all except Oscar, who, as usual, attended upon his young mistresses; and, under the shade of a large tree, at a little distance from the house, were Mr Campbell and Percival, the former reading while the other was conning over his lesson.
“This looks but little like a wilderness now, Mary, does it?” said Emma.
“No, my dear sister. It is very different from what it was when we first came; but still I should like to have some neighbours.”
“So should I; any society is better than none at all.”
“There I do not agree with you; at the same time, I think we could find pleasure in having about us even those who are not cultivated, provided they were respectable and good.”