One night Arlington put up at a locally celebrated tavern on the border of Tennessee. He found the genial host—an honest gossip called Chin—enjoying a hospitable carouse with half a dozen boon companions soaked full of flip and peach brandy. The jolly topers welcomed the newcomer to share their cups. They imparted much old news, and volunteered many encomiums on the landlord and his inn. They took special pride in Chin's tavern, owing to the undoubted historical fact that the guest-room had been occupied by Louis Philippe one night in the year 1802. On requesting to be shown to bed, the Virginian was conducted by the landlord, candle in hand, to a bare loft, on the floor of which lay a straw tick covered by a blue blanket.
"There's a bed a young gentleman ought to be proud to sleep on," affirmed the host, waving the candle over the couch. "If it's good enough for the son of the Duke of Orleans, it's good enough for me or you, eh? Wouldn't you like an applejack or a stiff metheglin to make you sleep sound? The boys downstairs respect you, sir, for the way you liquored. A young man travellin' can't be too sociable or treat too often. Well, good-night; you're lucky to strike that bed; you don't lay every night under a kiver and onto a tick slep between by the son of the Duke of Orleans."
Chester found the bed conducive to dreams, in which he was happy beyond the happiness of duke or king, dreams of Blennerhassett's island in May, and of wandering with a wingless Yankee angel in that earthly Paradise. Next morning, in payment for lodging and breakfast, he offered a silver dollar.
"That's too much," said Chin. "Here, Joel, chop this coin. I must give you the change in sharp-shanks. Will you have it in quarters or eighths?"
"In whatever form you please."
"Then make it quarters, Joel," directed the landlord, tossing the dollar to a negro, who neatly cut the piece into four equal segments, one of which was handed back to the departing guest.
Arlington proceeded southward toward Natchez, following the road over which Burr had travelled toilsomely nearly two years before. Though warned not to undertake the journey alone, our hero, like James Fitz James, chose to trace a dangerous path only because it was "dangerous known." Road, properly so called, none had yet been opened through the wilderness stretching from Tennessee to lower Louisiana, and spreading eastward from the Mississippi. The route led the traveller along an old trail, over sandy spaces shadowed by melancholy pines, beside stagnant lagoons, across sluggish streams, and into cypress swamps, the lurking-place of reptiles, the dreary haunt of bats and vultures. The road, at best, was an indifferent bridle path, and at worst, a blind labyrinth of seldom trodden ways in the woods. Arlington carried in his saddle-bags a supply of bread and cheese, and he kept ready primed, in holster at his pommel, a brace of big pistols.
On the evening of the second day after entering the piny woods of Mississippi, he came upon a party of Creeks and Cherokees. They were friendly; their chief offered the hospitality of the camp, venison to eat and a buffalo hide to sleep on. These mild savages spoke a few English words, and they had partially adopted the customs of white people. The men wore an upper garment, like a shirt, and, about their loins a girdle of blue cloth a yard and a half long. Their legs were bare, their feet shod with moccasins of stag-skin. They were shorn of all hair except a grotesque tuft on top of the head. To enhance their masculine beauty, they sported nose-rings and painted their faces red, blue or black. The dress of the squaws consisted of a shirt, a short petticoat, and ornamental gaiters. Not one of them suffered a ring in her nose or paint on her cheeks, and all seemed proud of their hair. A dusky beauty, the chief's daughter, insisted on picketing and feeding Arlington's horse. On the next morning, before quitting the camp, the young man gallantly gave her a silk scarf, a present which all the other Indians, from the chief down, envied her.
No adventure of an unpleasant kind befell Chester Arlington until after he had crossed Black River, well on the way to Natchez. One day, in the dusk of evening, he heard a voice from a distance shout after him, "Ho, there!" He looked in the direction from which the shout had been sent, and returned an answering "Hello!" but could see no person, nor could he elicit another cry from the solitude. This unaccountable voice, sounding in the wilderness, had a disagreeable effect on Arlington's nerves, though he was not in the least alarmed by it. His horse, however, tired as the brute was, pricked up its ears, gave a suspicious snort, and moved with quicker pace. Perhaps half an hour passed; the twilight deepened, and the weary traveller looked right and left for a suitable camping spot for the coming night. He checked the horse, rose in his stirrups, turning his head to prospect a green nook near the bridle path, when, crack! whiz! and a bullet grazed his left ear. This was more serious than a lone cry in the wilderness. Horse and rider instantly sought security in flight. The spurs were hardly needed to urge the black stallion forward. A brisk gallop along such ready avenues as Jetty could follow in the darkening woods, rapidly put a safe distance between the traveller and the random highwayman who had shot at him. At any rate, Arlington decided to dismount and take the chances. He tethered the animal, ate a dodger, and slept on his arms.
On the following morning new cause for anxiety arose. The bridle path was not to be found. In galloping away to avoid bullets, Chester had swerved much to the westward, and far from the obscure and crooked "trace." For a whole day he wandered circuitously, in vain search for the beaten course. The more stubbornly he resolved to keep "calm, cool, and collected," the worse confused were his calculations. He experienced sensations unlike any he had ever before felt. It vexed him to confess to himself that his usually clear brain was a muddle. He seemed not only to have missed the way, but had also lost the faculty of self-direction.