CHAPTER II
The information thus received did not disquiet me. After the momentary reflection that it might be awkward to meet a madman, out of bounds, upon the highway, I quickly dismissed the matter from my mind. I had no room for any but pleasant meditations. The fair Susannah was now uppermost in my dreaming fancies, and, reversing the grasp upon my whip, the ivory handle of which, lined with an ounce or two of lead, seemed to me a sufficiently effective weapon for the worst of dangers, I bade my friendly blacksmith farewell, and dashed forward upon the high road. A smart canter soon took me out of the settlement, and, once in the woods, I recommended myself with all the happy facility of youth, to its most pleasant and beguiling imaginings. I suppose I had ridden a mile or more—the story of the bedlamite was gone utterly from my thought—when a sudden turn in the road showed me a person, also mounted, and coming towards me at an easy trot, some twenty-five or thirty yards distant. There was nothing remarkable in his appearance. He was a plain farmer or woodman, clothed in ample homespun, and riding a short heavy chunk of an animal, that had just been taken from the plough. The rider was a spare, long-legged person, probably thirty years or thereabouts. He looked innocent enough, wearing that simple, open-mouthed sort of countenance, the owner of which, we assume, at a glance, will never set any neighbouring stream on fire. He belonged evidently to a class as humble as he was simple,—but I had been brought up in a school which taught me that the claims of poverty were quite as urgent upon courtesy as those of wealth. Accordingly, as we neared each other, I prepared to bestow upon him the usual civil recognition of the highway. What is it Scott says—I am not sure that I quote him rightly—
"When men in distant forests meet,
They pass not as in peaceful street."
And, with the best of good humour, I rounded my lips into a smile, and got ready my salutation. To account somewhat for its effect when uttered, I must premise that my own personal appearance, at this time, was rather wild and impressive. My face was full of laughter and my manners of buoyancy. My hair was very long, and fell in masses upon my shoulder, unrestrained by the cap which I habitually wore, and which, as I was riding under heavy shade trees, was grasped in my hand along with my riding whip. As the stranger drew nigh, the arm was extended, cap and whip lifted in air, and with free, generous lungs, I shouted—"good morning, my friend,—how wags the world with you to-day?"
The effect of this address was prodigious. The fellow gave no answer,—not a word, not a syllable—not the slightest nod of the head,—mais, tout au contraire. But for the dilating of his amazed pupils, and the dropping of the lower jaw, his features might have been chiselled out of stone. They wore an expression amounting to consternation, and I could see that he caught up his bridle with increased alertness, bent himself to the saddle, half drew up his horse, and then, as if suddenly resolved, edged him off, as closely as the woods would allow, to the opposite side of the road. The undergrowth was too thick to allow of his going into the wood at the spot where we encountered, or he certainly would have done so. Somewhat surprised at this, I said something, I cannot now recollect what, the effect of which was even more impressive upon him than my former speech. The heads of our horses were now nearly parallel—the road was an ordinary wagon track, say twelve feet wide—I could have brushed him with my cap as we passed, and, waving it still aloft, he seemed to fancy that such was my intention,—for, inclining his whole body on the off side of his nag, as the Comanche does when his aim is to send an arrow at his enemy beneath his neck—his heels thrown back, though spurless, were made to belabour with the most surprising rapidity the flanks of his drowsy animal. And, not without some effect. The creature dashed first into a trot, then into a canter, and finally into a gallop, which, as I was bound one way and he the other, soon threw a considerable space between us.
"The fellow's mad!" was my reflection and speech, as, wheeling my horse half about, I could see him looking backward, and driving his heels still into the sides of his reluctant hack. The next moment gave me a solution of the matter. The simple countryman had heard of the bedlamite from Hamilton jail. My bare head, the long hair flying in the wind, my buoyancy of manner, and the hearty, and, perhaps, novel form of salutation with which I addressed him, had satisfied him that I was the person. As the thought struck me, I resolved to play the game out, and, with a restless love of levity which has been too frequently my error, I put the whip over my horse's neck, and sent him forward in pursuit. My nag was a fine one, and very soon the space was lessened between me and the chase. As he heard the footfalls behind, the frightened fugitive redoubled his exertions. He laid himself to it, his heels paddling in the sides of his donkey with redoubled industry. And thus I kept him for a good mile, until the first houses of the settlement grew visible in the distance. I then once more turned upon the path to the Owens', laughing merrily at the rare chase, and the undisguised consternation of the countryman. The story afforded ample merriment to my fair friends Emmeline and Susannah. "It was so ridiculous that one of my appearance should be taken for a madman. The silly fellow deserved the scare." On these points we were all perfectly agreed. That night we spent charmingly. The company did not separate till near one o'clock. We had fun and fiddles. I danced by turns with the twins, and more than once with a Miss Gridley, a very pretty girl, who was present. Squire Owens was in the best of humours, and, no ways loth, I was made to stay all night.
CHAPTER III
A new day of delight dawned upon us with the next. Our breakfast made a happy family picture, which I began to think it would be cruel to interrupt. So snugly did I sit beside Emmeline, and so sweetly did Susannah minister at the coffee urn, and so patriarchally did the old man look around upon the circle, that my meditations were all in favour of certain measures for perpetuating the scene. The chief difficulty seemed to be, in the way of a choice between the sisters.
"How happy could I be with either,
Were t'other dear charmer away."
I turned now from one to the other, only to become more bewildered. The lively glance and playful remark of Emmeline, her lovely, smiling visage, and buoyant, unpremeditative air, were triumphant always while I beheld them; but the pensive, earnest look of Susannah, the mellow cadences of her tones, seemed always to sink into my soul, and were certainly remembered longest. Present, Emmeline was irresistible; absent, I thought chiefly of Susannah. Breakfast was fairly over before I came to a decision. We adjourned to the parlour,—and there, with Emmeline at the piano, and Susannah with her Coleridge in hand—her favourite poet—I was quite as much distracted as before. The bravura of the one swept me completely off my feet. And when I pleaded with the other to read me the touching poem of "Genevieve"—-her low, subdued and exquisitely modulated utterance, so touching, so true to the plaintive and seductive sentiment, so harmonious even when broken, so thrilling even when most checked and hushed, was quite as little to be withstood. Like the ass betwixt two bundles of hay, my eyes wandered from one to the other uncertain where to fix. And thus passed the two first hours after breakfast.