And Mr. Keene’s pony, as if sympathizing with his master’s vexation, started off at a sharp, passionate trot, which he has learned, no doubt, under the habitual influence of the spicy temper of his rider.
To find labourers who wanted money, or who would own that they wanted it, was at that time no easy task. Our poorer neighbours have been so little accustomed to value household comforts, that the opportunity to obtain them presents but feeble incitement to continuous industry. However, it happened in this case that Mr. Keene’s star was in the ascendant, and the woods resounded, ere long, under the sturdy strokes of several choppers.
* * * * *
The Ashburns, in the mean time, set themselves busily at work to make due preparations for the expedition which they had planned for the following night. They felt, as does every one who finds a bee-tree in this region, that the prize was their own—that nobody else had the slightest claim to its rich stores; yet the gathering in of the spoils was to be performed, according to the invariable custom where the country is much settled, in the silence of night, and with every precaution of secrecy. This seems inconsistent, yet such is the fact.
The remainder of the “lucky” day and the whole of the succeeding one passed in scooping troughs for the reception of the honey,—tedious work at best, but unusually so in this instance, because several of the family were prostrate with the ague. Ashburn’s anxiety lest some of his customary bad luck should intervene between discovery and possession, made him more impatient and harsh than usual; and the interior of that comfortless cabin would have presented to a chance visitor, who knew not of the golden hopes which cheered its inmates, an aspect of unmitigated wretchedness. Mrs. Ashburn sat almost in the fire, with a tattered hood on her head and the relics of a bed-quilt wrapped about her person; while the emaciated limbs of the baby on her lap,—two years old, yet unweaned,—seemed almost to reach the floor, so preternaturally were they lengthened by the stretches of a four months’ ague. Two of the boys lay in the trundle-bed, which was drawn as near to the fire as possible; and every spare article of clothing that the house afforded was thrown over them, in the vain attempt to warm their shivering frames. “Stop your whimperin’, can’t ye!” said Ashburn, as he hewed away with hatchet and jack-knife, “you’ll be hot enough before long.” And when the fever came his words were more than verified.
Two nights had passed before the preparations were completed. Ashburn and such of his boys as could work had laboured indefatigably at the troughs; and Mrs. Ashburn had thrown away the milk, and the few other stores which cumbered her small supply of household utensils, to free as many as possible for the grand occasion. This third day had been “well day” to most of the invalids, and after the moon had risen to light them through the dense wood, the family set off, in high spirits, on their long, dewy walk. They had passed the causeway and were turning from the highway into the skirts of the forest, when they were accosted by a stranger, a young man in a hunter’s dress, evidently a traveller, and one who knew nothing of the place or its inhabitants, as Mr. Ashburn ascertained, to his entire satisfaction, by the usual number of queries. The stranger, a handsome youth of one or two and twenty, had that frank, joyous air which takes so well with us Wolverines; and after he had fully satisfied our bee-hunter’s curiosity, he seemed disposed to ask some questions in his turn. One of the first of these related to the moving cause of the procession and their voluminous display of containers.
“Why, we’re goin’ straight to a bee-tree that I lit upon two or three days ago, and if you’ve a mind to, you may go ’long, and welcome. It’s a real peeler, I tell ye! There’s a hundred and fifty weight of honey in it, if there’s a pound.”
The young traveller waited no second invitation. His light knapsack being but small incumbrance, he took upon himself the weight of several troughs that seemed too heavy for the weaker members of the expedition. They walked on at a rapid and steady pace for a good half hour, over paths that were none of the smoothest, and only here and there lighted by the moonbeams. The mother and children were but ill fitted for the exertion, but Aladdin, on his midnight way to the wondrous vault of treasure, would as soon have thought of complaining of fatigue.
Who then shall describe the astonishment, the almost breathless rage of Silas Ashburn,—the bitter disappointment of the rest,—when they found, instead of the bee-tree, a great gap in the dense forest, and the bright moon shining on the shattered fragments of the immense oak that had contained their prize? The poor children, fainting with toil now that the stimulus was gone, threw themselves on the ground; and Mrs. Ashburn, seating her wasted form on a huge branch, burst into tears.
“It’s all one!” exclaimed Ashburn, when at length he could find words; “it’s all alike! this is just my luck! It ain’t none of my neighbour’s work, though! They know better than to be so mean! It’s the rich! Them that begrudges the poor man the breath of life!” And he cursed bitterly and with clenched teeth, whoever had robbed him of his right.