It was once my lot, to be a secondary actor, in a case of ‘honorable butchery;’ and one so black in itself, so heart-rending in consequences, that it is graven into my brain as with a stamp of fire. God of Heaven! when I think of it, even at this distance of time—when I see my friend stiff, ghastly, and stretched on the wet sands—when I hear the groans, which I heard there—when I see innocence, beauty, confiding affection, hanging over the yet warm corse, and pouring forth tears, as if crushed from the bottom of a heart loaded with the agony of ages—and then see the same creature, the inmate of a mad-house, and hear the moans and ravings for the dead object—and, with the peculiar characteristic of such insanity, accusing the loved one of coldness, ingratitude, unfaithfulness, and the like,—I say again, ages could not wipe out the recollection.
You are aware, that in the southern states, especially in the extreme south, men are guided more by their passions than at the north,—that there, dueling is little cared for,—that courageous is he who has shot his man,—that those only are cowards, who pale at blood, human blood, blood shed by their own hands. In no part of the south is this custom more prevalent, than at Natchez, on the Mississippi. New Orleans will not compare with it, or would not in the year 1816, the period of my story, and when I was a resident of that place. New Orleans, bad as it is, possessing greater means of indulgence, with its wealth to support theatres, gambling-houses, cock-pits, horse-races, and other such amusements—with its motley assemblage of inhabitants, Spanish, French, English, and Americans amalgamated,—with all these, it is not so bad as Natchez; and for this reason—that there are those, and in great numbers there, belonging to the northern and better regulated states, from whom, an imperceptible indeed, yet nevertheless great influence is sent into that community, and the people with more wickedness perhaps, have more conscience than any other of the extreme southern cities.
Natchez, it will be remembered, is on the eastern side of the Mississippi, and on one of the bends of that magnificent river, withdrawn a little from its banks, and sloping handsomely down to its flowing waters. Above and below the immediate town, are many eligible and pleasant sites for country seats, should that part of the country ever possess wealth and taste enough, to think of building them. But at the period of my story, there was nothing of the kind. Dark pine groves, and impenetrable thicks of beech and sycamore, with their lofty branches intertwined in many a wild convolution, made a high and thick canopy for the wearied traveler; while the beautiful flowers of the region, among which was the splendid magnolia, gave the forest, the freshness and fragrance of a lady’s flower garden. From morn till night, the woods were alive with music, and over all, was that sweet harmonist of nature, the American mocking-bird, with its rising and falling, ever-varying modulations—now screaming like the startled vulture of the cliffs—and now sinking away with a witching alternation of soft, plaintive, heart-moving minstrelsy, sufficient, it would seem, to charm rocks and forest trees,—He who built Thebes, would have thrown away his instrument in despair, could he have heard but one note of this wild-wood melodist.
I said there were no country seats there. I mistake. There was one bright spot, about twelve miles above Natchez, which, though it had small pretensions to the surpassing beauty of some of the fine superstructures on these northern rivers; nevertheless, for that day and place, it was, certainly, an elegant and hospitable mansion. That it was hospitable, many a man, yet living, can testify—for many were the travelers, visiting in that region, who spent days there, and enjoyed the rich hospitality and urbane attentions of its warm-souled, accomplished proprietor. This man, Charles Glenning, was certainly as gentlemanly a person as I ever knew. He was educated at the north—had spent his early days there—but for the sake of business, to which he betook him on leaving College, he went to the south, carrying with him as bright a bud of feminine loveliness, as ever God suffered to bloom in this uncongenial, ugly world. I cannot paint her—there’s no telling how beautiful she was. It wasn’t beauty of feature; neither was it beauty of mind—and yet, it was beauty of a high and ardent cast, which made you feel you were in the presence of a spirit, the moment you came near her. Forehead white as death—yet, neither intellectual nor otherwise,—soft blue eyes, that made you think they were little pieces cut out of the bluest summer sky,—complexion like ivory,—lips like the finest evening tints, in the back ground of one of Claude Lorraine’s landscapes,—and a figure as faultless as ever was hewn from the Pentelican marble, or set a painter a dreaming over his easel.—Imagine these, and you may get a glimpse of the laughing, bright-eyed Isabel Glenning.
Her love for her husband was as strange as her beauty. O! the treasure—the full, proud treasures of such a heart as that! Dive into mines—bring up jewels—fill your dwelling—win sceptres—ride the world like Cæsar or Alexander—and then offer me the pure, deep, devoted, heart’s affection of such a spiritual creature as she was, and I would spurn them all as the dirty commerce of dirtier minds. She lived only for him—she dreamed only for him—he was all. Place her in a palace, in an Esquimaux hut; in a fairyland, in a desert; no matter where—only with him—him she had chosen to live and die with, and her cup was full.
The circumstances which led me to their acquaintance were peculiar, and such as entwined me into their best feelings. They had been married about four summers; and the fruits of their union, was a little, crowing, curly headed boy, sweet as his mother’s beauty. I was hunting on the side of the Mississippi, one warm afternoon, when I observed something floating at a distance, which by means of my dog, was brought to land; and, to my surprise, were presented the lifeless, yet still warm features of this same little fellow. It seemed that playing near the river, he had fallen in, and was near about breathing his last. Taking him in my arms, I hurried home, and just in time to save him. From that hour, they loved me as a brother.
My story now leads me a little from the straight track, I have kept thus far—but ’tis necessary to turn aside a little, for the sake of the dark catastrophe, which brought sorrow and death into this Eden-dwelling I have described.
There was one Nat. Ralle, dwelling about half way between Natchez, and the plantation of my friend. His was one of those dark-browed, malicious countenances, which made one, in spite of himself, think of the devil, whenever he met him. He never spake like other men. If you met him in the woods of a morning, his salutation was in a low, surly tone, which made you doubtful as to its nature; and after he had passed you for forty or fifty yards, you might observe him stopping and looking back, as if he felt himself suspected by every body. This devil—for such he was, and such will he appear before I have done with him—more than once, had been seen prowling about the dwelling of Glenning; and once, being met suddenly, he turned and ran away into the woods, like one of the wild beasts he so much in disposition resembled.
There was a custom, which yet, I believe, exists in the southwestern new settlements, for a man to claim the exclusive privilege of hunting on a certain extent of ground, in the vicinity of his habitation. This right is as much insisted on, in certain parts of those states which I have visited, as are the game laws in England; and every one, every stranger-hunter, observes it, and recognizes the right by quitting the grounds, so soon as informed that an individual holds reasonable claim to them. This Ralle had, in open defiance of this knowledge, and against the reiterated, yet polite admonitions of Glenning, trespassed on his lands; and once shot a tame doe, which Glenning had kept for two or three years, the care of which had devolved on, and was a source of amusement to Isabel—and on that account it seemed a double injury.
Glenning, as cool a man as ever laid claim to the qualities of honor and honesty, at this, rode down to the plantation of Ralle, and mildly, yet earnestly, expostulated with him, on what was esteemed a breach of faith—careful at the same time to express his belief, that the shooting of his tame animal was undesigned, yet requesting, for fear of a similar occurrence, that he would hunt elsewhere in future, which thing he could do without incommoding himself.