Ticonderoga: A Story of Early Frontier Life in the Mohawk Valley

by G. P. R. James

Mr. Prevost fell into a fit of thought, and leaned his head upon his hand, but Woodchuck replied: "Oh, they are her mother's, beyond doubt; they are her mother's. She was quite a lady, every inch of her; you could hear it in the tone of her voice, you could see it in her walk. Her words, too, were those of a lady; and her hand, too, was so small and delicate it could never have seen work. Do you know, Miss Edith, she was wonderfully like you--more like you than Otaitsa. But I'll tell you all about it, just as I heard it from the old squaw. At the time I talk of--that's a good many years ago--eighteen, or nineteen, maybe--Black Eagle was the handsomest man that had ever been seen in the tribes, they say, and the fiercest warrior, too. He was always ready to take part in any war, and whenever fighting was going on he was there. Well, the Delawares had not been quite brought under at that time by the Five Nations, and he went down with his warriors and the Mohawks, to fight against the Mohagans; they were Delawares, too, you know, somewhere on the Monongahela River, just at the corner of Pennsylvania and Virginny. Our people had given some help to the Mohagans, and they were, at that time, just laying the foundations of a fort, which the French got hold of afterward and called Fort, du Quesne. Well, there was an old general officer who thought he would go up and see how the works were going on, and as things were quiet enough just then--though it; was but a calm before a storm--he took his daughter with him, and journeyed away pleasantly enough, through the woods. I dare say, though, it must have been slow work, for as he intended to stay all the summer, the old man took a world of baggage with him; but the third or fourth night after leaving the civilized parts they lodged in an Indian village, when, all in a minute, just as they were going to bed, down comes Black Eagle upon them with his warriors. There was a dreadful fight in the village, nothing but screams, and war-whoops, and rifle shots; and the Mohagans, poor devils, were almost put out that night; for they were taken unawares, and they do say not a man escaped alive out of the wigwam. At the first fire out rushes the old general from the hut, and at the same minute a rifle ball, perhaps from a friend, perhaps from an enemy--no one can tell--goes right through his heart. Black Eagle was collecting scalps all this time, but when he turned round, or came back, or however it might be, there he found the poor young lady, the officer's daughter, crying over her father. Well, he wouldn't suffer them to hurt her, but took her away to the Oneida country with him, and gathered up all her goods and chattels, and her father's, and carried that off, too; but all for her, for it seems he fell in love with her at first sight. What made her first like him, they say, was that he wouldn't let the savages scalp the old man, telling them that the English were allies, and declaring that the ball that killed him did not come from an Oneida rifle. However that may be, the poor girl had no choice but to marry Black Eagle, though the old woman said that, being a great chief's daughter, she made him promise never to have another wife, and, if ever a Christian priest came there, to be married to her according to her own fashion."

While he spoke Mr. Prevost had remained apparently buried in deep and very gloomy thought, but he had heard every word, and his mind had more than once wandered wide away, as was its wont, to collateral things, not only in the present but in the past. When Woodchuck stopped he raised his head and gazed at him for a moment in the face, with a look of earnest and melancholy inquiry. "Did you ever hear her name?" he asked. "Can you tell me her father's name?"

"No," replied Woodchuck. "I had the history almost all from the old squaw, and if she had tried to give me an English name she would have manufactured something, such as never found its way into an English mouth. All she told me was that the father was a great chief among the English, by which I made out that she meant a general."

"Probably it was her father's portrait I saw at the Indian Castle," said Edith. "In Otaitsa's room there was a picture that struck me more than any of the others, except, indeed, the portrait of a lady. It was that of a man in a military dress of antique cut. His hand was stretched out, with his drawn sword in it, and he was looking round with a commanding air, as if telling his soldiers to follow. I marked it particularly at first, because the sun was shining on it, and because the frame was covered with the most beautiful Indian beadwork I ever saw. That of the lady, too, was similarly ornamented; but there was another interested me much--a small pencil drawing of a young man's head, so like Walter that at first I almost fancied dear Otaitsa had been trying to make his portrait from memory."

"Would you remember the old man's face, my child, if you saw it again?" asked Mr. Prevost, gazing earnestly at his daughter.

"I think so," said Edith, a little confused by her father's earnestness; "I am quite sure I should."

"Wait, then, a moment," said Mr. Prevost, "and call for lights, my child."

As he spoke he rose and quitted the room; but he was several minutes gone, and lights were burning in the chamber when he returned. He was burdened with several pictures of small size, which he spread out upon the table, while Edith and Woodchuck both rose to gaze at them.

"There! there!" cried Edith, putting her finger upon one, "there is the head of the old officer, though the attitude is different; and there is the lady, too; but I do not see the portrait of the young man!"

"Edith," said her father, laying his hand affectionately upon hers, and shaking his head sadly, "he is no longer young, but he stands beside you, my child. That is the picture of my father; that, of my mother. Otaitsa must be your cousin. Poor Jessie! We have always thought her dead, although her body was not found with that of her father. Better had she been dead, probably."