CHAPTER II
The mellow glow of September lay upon green hills and purple mountains, sleeping in serene content against a tender sky. Over quiet woods, and gliding river, bordered with ribbons of rich meadows, brooded a sweet peace, as if nature, after a busy and fruitful season, took her well earned rest in mood of conscious thankfulness. The very grapes, hanging in heavy amber clusters below the sloping roof of the low-eaved porch on which I sat, suggested fruition and content, as if they had stored all the sweetness possible within their bursting skins, and now rested thankfully upon their strong stems.
I could see my father salting sheep in the meadow, watered by the spring-run, below the house, and I smiled as presently he sought the shade of a spreading elm, and stretched himself full length upon the ground. The droning of the bees, and the sleepy humming of the flies added to the lazy influence of the fondling fruit-scented breeze; I almost nodded over my bullet molding for a moment, then roused myself and went to work. Saturday was my only holiday, and I could not laze the morning away unless I were content to miss my one chance during the week for an afternoon in the forest.
"Good morning, nephew," spoke suddenly a high, strong voice which I knew to be Aunt Martha's. "Spend you all your spare time polishing firearms, molding bullets, and shooting animals?"
I turned in my chair, and looked up to see my mother's sister, who was as unlike her as one sister could be from another—coming up the sidewalk, and my father leading her pacing mare from the stile, stable-ward. Aunt Martha's erect and well formed shoulders had a square set which gave her a masculine air, and she held her somewhat sharp chin and nose tilted a little upward, as if she felt very sure of her own convictions. Her brown hair was brushed back severely from her square, high brow, and her gray eyes met your gaze steadily with a look that was not unkind, though it was certainly not sympathetic, nor confidence inviting.
"Good morning, Aunt Martha," I answered, in undisturbed, and cheerful tones—for I never allowed Aunt Martha to disconcert or overawe me, as she did her own son, Thomas, and even Uncle Thomas himself—"I'll clear the way for you in a moment," and I began to push back my chair, rifle and implements from the middle of the porch.
"Your time might be better spent, nephew, in my opinion," continued Aunt Martha, as she stood waiting on the step, looking with stern disapproval first at me, and then at the cluttered floor of the porch. "Our lads, it seems to me," (Aunt Martha always accented the me or the my) "are growing up to be a turbulent and bloodthirsty race, with but the most carnal ideas of life. Did we but serve God more entirely, and trust Him more fully, we would depend less upon our own strength and skill, and more upon Him to defend and take care of us. And after all what is man's puny strength against the dangers of this life? It is our all powerful Heavenly Father who must save and protect us."
"True enow, Martha, true enow," broke in the voice of my grandmother, who appeared just then in the front doorway, her ever busy fingers picking up and knitting off the stitches from her shining needles with steady click, "but God has naewhere promised to do His ain work, and man's as weel. He led the children o' Israel to the Promised Land, and then bade them fight for a' they wanted o' it, nor did they get ony more than they could win an' hauld. There's yet need, plenty, for men who can shoot in this colony, and likely to be for mony lang days to come. Let the lad alone, Martha; he's fearless, an' sometimes rash, but neither bloodthirsty nor a brawler," and as my aunt stepped into my mother's room, adjoining, to lay aside her bonnet, I heard my grandmother add in somewhat impatient tones,
"I'm glad enow to ken ye're sae pious, Martha, but dinna get to be fanatical, nor in the way o' going about a' the time with reproof in your een, an' a sairmon on your lips. You but cheapen our holy religion sae, an' harden the young an' the unconverted."