During his ride, Gerald had had leisure to reflect on the events of the preceding night, and bitterly did he regret having yielded to a curiosity which had cost the unfortunate Sambo so much. He judged correctly that they had been followed in their nocturnal excursion, and that it was the face of some prying visitant which Sambo's superstitious dread had transformed into a hideous vision of the past. He recalled the insuperable aversion the old man had ever entertained to approach or even make mention of the spot, and greatly did he blame himself for having persisted in offering a violence to his nature, the extent of which had been made so fearfully obvious. It brought no consolation to him to reflect that the spot itself contained nought that should have produced so alarming an effect on a mind properly constituted. He felt that, knowing his weakness as he did, he ought not to have trifled with it, and could not deny to himself, that in enforcing his attendance, with a view to obtain information on several points connected with the past, he had been indirectly the destroyer of his reason. There had been a season when the unhappy sailor would have felt a sorrow even deeper than he did, but Gerald was indeed an altered being—too much rapt in himself to give heed to others.
The painful nature of his reflections, added to the fatigue he had undergone, had given to his countenance a more than usually haggard expression. Henry remarked it and inquired the cause, when his brother, in a few brief sentences, explained all that had occurred during his absence. Full of affection as he was for the old man, and utterly unprepared for such a communication, Henry could not avoid expressing deep vexation that his brother, aware as he was of the peculiar weakness of their aged friend, should have been inconsiderate enough to have drawn him thither. Gerald felt the reproof to be just, and for that very reason grew piqued under it. Pained as he was at the condition of Sambo, Henry was even more distressed at witnessing the apparent apathy of his brother for the fate of one who had not merely saved his life on a recent occasion, but had evinced a devotedness—a love for him—in every circumstance of life, which seldom had had their parallel in the annals of human servitude. It was in vain that he endeavored to follow the example of Gerald, who, having seated himself at the breakfast table, was silently appeasing an appetite such as he had not exhibited since his return. Incapable of swallowing his food, Henry paced up and down the room, violently agitated and sick at heart. It seemed to him as if Sambo had been a sort of connecting link between themselves and the departed parents; and now that he was suddenly and fearfully afflicted, he thought he could see in the vista of futurity a long train of evils that threw their shadows before, and portended the consummation of some unknown, unseen affliction, having its origin in the incomprehensible alienation of his brother's heart from the things of his early love.
While he was yet indulging in these painful thoughts, the firing of a gun from the harbor—the signal for the embarkation of the troops—brought both Gerald and himself to a sense of other considerations. The latter was the first to quit the house. "Henry," he said, with much emotion, "God bless you. It is possible that, as our service lies in different lines, we shall see but little of each other during this expedition. Of one thing, however, be assured—that although I am an unhappy man, I am anything but dead to feeling.—Henry," he continued pressing his hand with warmth, "think not unkindly hereafter of your poor brother Gerald." A long embrace, in which each, although in silence, seemed to blend heart with heart, ensued, and both greatly relieved, as they always were after this generous expansion of their feelings, separated forthwith whither their respective duties summoned them.
[CHAPTER XXIII.]
Seldom has there been witnessed a more romantic or picturesque sight than that presented by a warlike expedition of batteaux moving across one of the American lakes, during a season of profound calm. The uniform and steady pull of the crew, directed in their time by the wild chaunt of the steersman, with whom they ever and anon join in full chorus—the measured plash of the oars into the calm surface of the water—the joyous laugh and rude, but witty, jest of the more youthful and buoyant of the soldiery, from whom, at such moments, although in presence of their officers, the trammels of restraint are partially removed—all these, added to the inspiriting sight of their gay scarlet uniforms, and the dancing of the sunbeams upon their polished arms, have a tendency to call up impressions of a wild interest, tempered only by the recollection that many of those who move gaily on, as if to a festival—bright in hope as though the season of existence were to last for ever—may never more set eye upon the scenes they are fast quitting, with the joyousness produced by the natural thirst of the human heart for adventure, and a love of change.
On the second day of its departure from Malden, the expedition, preceded by the gun-boats, entered the narrow river of the Miami, and, the woods on either shore being scoured by the Indians, gained without opposition the point of debarkation. Batteries having, under great difficulties, been erected on the right bank, immediately opposite to and about six hundred yards from the American fort, which had been recently and hurriedly constructed, a heavy and destructive fire was, on the morning of the third day, opened from them, supported by the gun-boats, one of which, commanded by Gerald Grantham, had advanced so close to the enemy's position as to have diverted upon herself the fire which would else have been directed to the demolition of a British battery, hastily thrown up on the left bank. The daring manifested by the gallant sailor was subject of surprise and admiration at once to friends and foes; and yet, although his boat lay moored within musket shot of the defences, he sustained but trifling loss. The very recklessness and boldness of his advance had been the means of his preservation; for, as almost all the shots from the battery flew over him, it was evident he owed his safety to the difficulty the Americans found in depressing their guns sufficiently to bear advantageously upon the boat, which, if anchored fifty yards beyond, they might have blown out of the water.
The limits of our story will not admit of a further detail of the operations of this siege. The object was foiled, and the expedition was re-embarked and directed against Fort Sandusky, a post of the Americans situated on the river of that name, and running also into Lake Erie.
Here, once more, was the British artillery landed, while, under a heavy fire from the fort, the troops advanced within range, to take possession of an eminence whereon it was intended to erect the batteries. Two days were passed in incessant cannonading, but, as at the Miami, without making the slightest impression. Finding all idea of a practicable breach hopeless, it was at length resolved that an attempt at assault should be made; and, with this view, the troops were, on the afternoon of the second day, ordered to hold themselves in immediate readiness.