CHAPTER XII.
_A Fight for Life_
The stream of Saints to the Great Basin had become well-nighcontinuous--Saints of all degrees of prosperity, from Parley Pratt, theArcher of Paradise, with his wealth of wives, wagons, and cattle, toBarney Bigler, unblessed with wives or herds, who put his earthly goodson a wheelbarrow, and, to the everlasting glory of God, trundled it fromthe Missouri River to the valley of the Great Salt Lake. Train aftertrain set out for the new Zion with faith that God would drop mannabefore them.
Each train was a little migrating State in itself. And never was thenatural readiness of the American pioneer more luminously displayed. Atevery halt of the wagons a shoemaker would be seen searching for alapstone; a gunsmith would be mending a rifle, and weavers would be attheir wheels or looms. The women early discovered that the joltingwagons would churn their cream to butter; and for bread, very soon afterthe halt was made, the oven hollowed out of the hillside was heated, andthe dough, already raised, was in to bake. One mother in Israel broughtproudly to the Lake a piece of cloth, the wool for which she hadsheared, dyed, spun, and woven during her march.
Nor did the marches ever cease to be fraught with peril and, hardship.There were tempests, droughts, famines, stampedes of the stock, prairiefires, and Indian forays. Hundreds of miles across the plain and throughthe mountains the Indians would trail after them, like sharks in thewake of a ship, tirelessly watching, waiting for the right moment tostampede the stock, to fire the prairie, or to descend upon stragglers.
One by one the trains worked down into the valley, the tired Saintsmaking fresh their covenants by rebaptism as they came. In the waters ofthe River Jordan, Joel Rae made hundreds to be renewed in the Kingdom,swearing them to obey Brigham, the Lord's anointed, in all his orders,spiritual or temporal, and the priesthood or either of them, and allchurch authorities in like manner; to regard this obligation as superiorto all laws of the United States and all earthly laws whatsoever; tocherish enmity against the government of the United States, that theblood of Joseph Smith and the Apostles slain in that generation might beavenged; and to keep the matter of this oath a profound secret then andforever. And from these waters of baptism the purified Saints went totheir inheritances in Zion--took their humble places, and began to sweatand bleed in the upbuilding of the new Jerusalem.
"_I'M_ THE ONE WILL HAVE TO BE CAUGHT"]
From a high, tented wagon in one such train, creaking its rough waydown Emigration Canon, with straining oxen and tired but eager people,there had leaped one late afternoon the girl whose eyes were to call tohim so potently,--incomparable eyes, large and deep, of a velvetygrayness, under black brows splendidly bent. Nor had the eyes alonevoiced that call to his starved senses. He had caught the free, fearlessconfidence of her leap over the wheel, and her graceful abandon as shestood there, finely erect and full-curved, her head with its Greek linesthrown well back, and her strong hands raised to readjust the dusky hairthat tumbled about her head like a storm-cloud.
Men from the train were all about, and others from the settlement, andthese spoke to her, some in serious greeting, some with jesting words.She returned it all in good part without embarrassment,--even the sallyof the winking wag who called out, "Now then, Mara Cavan! Here we are,and a girl like yourself ought to catch an Elder, at the very lowest."
She laughed with easy good-nature, still fumbling in the dusk of blownhair at the back of her head, showing a full-lipped mouth, beautifullylarge, with strong-looking, white teeth. "I'll catch never a one myself,if you please, Nathan Tanner! I'll do no catching at _all_, now! _I'm_the one will have to be caught!"
Her voice was a contralto, with the little hint of roughness that madeit warm and richly golden; that made it fall, indeed, upon the ears ofthe listening Elder like a cathedral chime calling him to forget all andworship--forget all but that he was five and twenty with the hot bloodsurging and crowding and crying out in his veins.
Now, having a little subdued the tossing storm-cloud of hair, she stoodwith one hand upon her hip and the other shading her eyes, lookingintently into the streets of the new settlement. And again there wasbantering jest from the men about, and the ready, careless response fromher, with gestures of an impishly reckless unconcern, of a fullreadiness to give and take in easy good-fellowship. But then, in thevery midst of a light response to one of the bantering men, her grayeyes met for the first time the very living look of the young Elderstanding near. She was at once confused, breaking off her speech with anawkward laugh, and looking down. But, his eyes keeping steadily uponher, she, as if defiantly, returned his look for a fluttering second,trying to make her eyes survey him slowly from head to foot with herlate cool carelessness; but she had to let them fall again, and he sawthe colour come under the clear skin.
He knew by these tokens that he possessed a power over this splendidwoman that none of the other men could wield,--she had lowered her eyesto no other but him--and all the man in him sang exultantly under theknowledge. He greeted her father, the little Seumas Cavan of indomitablespirit, fresh, for all his march of a thousand miles, and he welcomedthem both to Zion. Again and again while he talked to them he caughtquick glances from the wonderful eyes;--glances of interest, ofinquiry,--now of half-hearted defiance, now of wondering submission.
The succeeding months had been a time of struggle with him--a struggleto maintain his character of Elder after the Order of Melchisedek in thefull gaze of those velvety gray eyes, and in the light of her reckless,full-lipped smile; to present to the temptress a shield of austere pietywhich her softest glances should not avail to melt. For something in hermanner told him that she divined all his weakness; that, if sheacknowledged his power over her, she recognised her own power over him,a power equal to and justly balancing the other. Even when he discoursedfrom the pulpit, his glance would fasten upon hers, as if there were butthe one face before him instead of a thousand, and he knew that shemocked him in her heart; knew she divined there was that within himwhich strongly would have had her and himself far away--alone.
Nor was the girl's own mind all of a piece. For, if she flaunted herselfbefore him, as if with an impish resolve to be his undoing, there werestill times when he awed her by his words of fire, and by his high,determined stand in some circle to which she knew she could never mount.That night when he walked with her in the moonlight, she knew he hadtrembled on the edge of the gulf fixed so mysteriously between them. Shehad even felt herself leaning over to draw him down with her own warmarms; and then all at once he had strangely moved away, widening thismysterious gulf that always separated them, leaving her solitary, hurt,and wondering. She could not understand it. Life called through them sostrongly. How could he breast the mighty rush? And why, why must it beso?
During the winter that now came upon them, it became even a greaterwonder to her; for it was a time when all of them were drawn closer in acommon suffering--a time of dark days which she felt they might havelightened for each other, and a time when she knew that more than evershe drew him.
For hardly had the feast of the Harvest Home gone by when food once morebecame scarce. The heaven-sent gulls had, after all, saved but half acrop. Drought and early frost had diminished this; and those who came infrom the East came all too trustingly with empty meal-sacks.
By the beginning of winter there were five thousand people in the valleyto be fed with miraculous loaves and fishes. Half of these were withoutdecent shelter, dwelling under wagon-covers or in flimsy tents, andforced much of the time to be without fuel; for wood had to be hauledthrough the snow from the distant canons, and so was precious stuff. Forthree months the cutting winds came down from the north, and thepitiless winter snows raged about them. An inventory was early taken ofthe food-stuffs, and thereafter rations were issued alike to all,whether rich or poor. Otherwise many of the latter must have perished.It was a time of hard expedients, such as men are content to face onlyfor the love of God. They ranged the hills and benches to dig sego andthistle roots, and in the last d
ays of winter many took the rawhidesfrom their roofs, boiling and eating them. When spring came, theywatched hungrily for the first green vegetation, which they gathered andcooked. Truly it seemed they had stopped in a desert as cruel in its wayas the human foes from whom they had fled.
It was now that the genius of their leader showed. He was no longerBrigham Young, the preacher, but a father in Israel to his starvingchildren. When prayers availed not for a miracle, his indomitable spiritsaved them. Starvation was upon them and nakedness to the blast; yetwhen they desponded or complained, the Lion of the Lord was there tocheck them. He scolded, pleaded, threatened, roared prophecies, andovercame them, silencing every murmur. He made them work, and workedhimself, a daily example before them of tireless energy. He told themwhat to do, and how, both for their material salvation and theirspiritual; when to haul wood, and how to distinguish between false andtrue spirits; how to thatch roofs and in what manner the resurrectionwould occur; how to cook thistle roots to best advantage, and how Godwas man made perfect; he reminded them of the day of wrath, and toldthem mirthful anecdotes to make them laugh. He pictured God's anger uponthe sinful, and encouraged them to dance and to make merry; instructedthem in the mysteries of the Kingdom and instigated theatricalperformances to distract their minds. He was bland and bullying byturns; affable and gruff; jocose and solemn--always what he thoughttheir fainting spirits needed. He was feared and loved--feared first.They learned to dread the iron of his hand and the steel of hisheart--the dauntless spirit of him that left them no longer their ownmasters, yet kept them loving their bondage. Through the dreadful coldand famine, the five thousand of them ceased not to pray nor lost theirfaith--their great faith that they had been especially favoured of Godand were at the last to be saved alone from the wreck of the world.
The efforts of Brigham to put heart into the people were ably secondedby Joel Rae. He was loved like Brigham, but not feared. He preached likeBrigham submission to the divine will as interpreted by the priesthood,but he was more extravagant than Brigham in his promises of blessings instore for them. He never resorted to vagueness in his pictures of whatthe Lord was about to do for them. He was literal and circumstantial toa degree that made Brigham and the older men in authority sometimeswrithe in public and chide him in private. They were appalled at thesweeping victories he promised the Saints over the hated Gentiles at anearly day. They suggested, too, that the Lord might withhold anabundance from them for a few years until He had more thoroughly triedthem. But their counsel seemed only to inflame him to fresh absurdities.In the very days of their greatest scarcity that winter, when almostevery man was dressed in skins, and the daily fare was thistle roots, hedeclared to them at a Sunday service:
"A time of plenty is at hand--of great plenty. I cannot tell you how Iknow these things. I do not know how they come to me. I pray--and theycome to life in my spirit; that is how I have found this fact: in lessthan a year States-goods of all needed kinds will be sold here cheaperthan they can be bought in Eastern cities. You shall have an abundanceat prices that will amaze you."
And the people thrilled to hear him, partaking of his faith, rememberingthe gulls that ate the crickets, and the rain and wind that came to savethe pioneer train from fire. To the leaders such prophesying was merelyreckless, inviting further chastisements from heaven, and calculated tocause a loss of faith in the priesthood.
And yet, wild as it was, they saw this latter prophecy fulfilled; fornow, so soon after the birth of this new empire, while it suffered andgrew weak and bade fair to perish in its cradle of faith, there was madefor it a golden spoon of plenty.
Over across the mountains the year before, on the decayed granitebed-rock of the tail-race at the mill of one Sutter, a man had picked upa few particles of gold, the largest as big as grains of wheat. Thenews of the wonder had spread to the East, and now came frenzied hordesof gold-seekers. The valley of the mountains where the Saints had hopedto hide was directly in their path, and there they stopped their richlyladen trains to rest and to renew their supplies.
The harvest of '49 was bountiful in all the valley; and thus was thewild prophecy of Joel Rae made sober truth. Many of the gold-seekers hadloaded their wagons with merchandise for the mining' camps; but in theirhaste to be at the golden hills, they now sold it at a sacrifice inorder to lighten their loads. The movement across the Sierras became awild race; clothing, provisions, tools, and arms--things most needful tothe half-clad, half-starved community on the shores of the lake--werebartered to them at less than half-price for fresh horses and lightwagons. Where a twenty-five dollar pack-mule was sold for two hundreddollars, a set of joiner's tools that had cost a hundred dollars back inSt. Louis would be bought for twenty-five.
The next year the gain to the Saints was even greater, as the tide ofgold-seekers rose. Early that summer they sold flour to the oncominglegions for a dollar a pound, taking their pay in the supplies they mostneeded on almost their own terms.
Thus was the valley of the mountains a little fattened, and thus wasJoel Rae exalted in the sight of men as one to whom the secrets ofheaven might at any time be unfolded. But the potent hand of Brighamwas still needed to hold the Saints in their place and in their faith.
Many would have joined the rush for sudden riches. A few did so. Brighamissued a mild warning, in which such persons were described as"gainsayers in behalf of Mammon." They were warned, also, that thevalley of the Sacramento was unhealthful, and that, in any event, "thetrue use of gold is for paving streets, covering houses, and makingculinary dishes; and when the Saints shall have preached the gospel,raised grain, and built cities enough, the Lord will open up the way fora supply of gold to the satisfaction of his people."
A few greed-stung Saints persisted in leaving in the face of thisfriendly admonition. Then the Lion of the Lord roared: "Let such menremember that they are not wanted in our midst. Let them leave theircarcasses where they do their work. We want not our burying-groundspolluted with such hypocrites. Let the souls of them go down to hell,poverty-stricken and naked, and lie there until they are burned out likean old pipe!" The defections ceased from that moment, and Zion waspreserved intact. Brigham was satisfied. If he could hold them togetherunder the alluring tales of gold-finds that were brought over themountains, he had no longer any fear that they might fall away undermere physical hardship. And he held them,--the supreme test of his powerover the bodies and minds of his people.
This passing of the gold-seekers was not, however, a blessing withoutdrawbacks. For the Saints had hoped to wax strong unobserved,unmolested, forgotten, in this mountain retreat. But now obscurity couldno longer be their lot. The hated Gentiles had again to be reckonedwith.
First, the United States had expanded on the west to include theirterritory--the fruit of the Mexican War--the poor bleak desert they weremaking to blossom. Next, the government at Washington had sent toconstrue and administer their laws men who were aliens from theCommonwealth of Israel. True, Millard Fillmore had appointed Brighamgovernor of the new Territory--but there were chief justices andassociate justices, secretaries, attorneys, marshals, and Indian agentsfrom the wicked and benighted East; men who frankly disbelieved that thevoice of Brigham was as the voice of God, and who did not hesitate tolet their heresy be known. A stream of these came and went--trouble-mongers who despised and insulted the Saints, and returned toWashington with calumnies on their lips. It was true that Brigham hadcontinued, as was right, to be the only power in the Territory; but thenarrow-minded appointees of the Federal government persisted inmisconstruing this circumstance; refusing to look upon it as the justmark of Heaven's favour, and declaring it to be the arrogance of a merecivil usurper.
Under such provocation Joel Rae longed more than ever to be a Lion ofthe Lord, for those above him in the Church endured too easily, heconsidered, the indignities that were put upon them by theseevil-minded Gentile politicians. He would have rejected them forthwith,as he believed the Lord would have had them do,--nay, as he believed theLord would sooner o
r later punish them for not doing. He would havethrust them into the desert, and called upon the Lord for strength tomeet the storm that would doubtless be raised by such a course. He wasimpatient when the older men cautioned moderation and the petty wiles ofdiplomacy. Yet he was not altogether discouraged; for even they lostpatience at times, and were almost as outspoken as he could have wished.
Even Brigham, on one notable occasion, had thrilled him, when in thetabernacle he had bearded Brocchus and left him white and coweringbefore all the people, trembling for his life,--Brocchus, the unworthyAssociate Justice, who had derided their faith, insulted their prophet,and slandered their women. How he rejoiced in that moment when Brighamfor once lost his temper and let his eyes flash their hate upon thefrightened official.
"But you," Brigham had roared, "standing there white and shaking at thehornets' nest you have stirred up--you are a coward--and that is why youpraise men that are not cowards--why you praise Zachary Taylor!"
Brigham had a little time before declared that Zachary Taylor was deadand in hell, and that he, Brigham, was glad of it.
"President Taylor you can't praise," he had gone on to the graduallywhitening Brocchus. "What was he? A mere soldier with regular armybuttons on--no better to go at the head of troops than a dozen men Icould pick up between Leavenworth and Laramie. As to what you haveintimated about our morals--you miserable cringing coward, you--I won'tnotice it except to make my personal request of every brother andhusband present not to give your back what your impudence deserves. Youtalk of things you have on hearsay since you came among us. I'll talk ofhearsay, then--the hearsay that you are mad and will go home because wecan't make it worth your while to stay. What it would satisfy you to getout of us it wouldn't be hard to tell; but I know it's more than you'llget. We don't want you. You are such a baby-calf that we would have tosugar your soap to coax you to wash yourself on Saturday night. Go hometo your mammy, straightaway, and the sooner the better."
This was the manner, thought Joel Rae, that Federal officials should betreated when they were out of sympathy with Zion--though he thought hemight perhaps have chosen words that would be more dignified had thetask been entrusted to him. He told Brigham his satisfaction with theaddress when the excited congregation had dispersed, and the alarmedBrocchus had gone.
"That is the course we must take, Brother Brigham--do more of it. Unlesswe take our stand now against aggression, the Lord will surely smite usagain with famine and pestilence." And Brigham had answered, in thetones of a man who knows, "Wait just a little!"
But there came famine upon them again; in punishment, declared Joel Rae,for their ungodly temporising with the minions of the United Statesgovernment. In '54 the grasshoppers ate their growing crops. In '55 theycame again with insatiate maws--and on what they left the drought andfrost worked their malignant spells. The following winter great numbersof their cattle and sheep perished on the range in the heavy snows.
The spring of '56 found them again digging roots and resorting to allthe old pitiful makeshifts of famine.
"This," declared Joel Rae, to the starving people, "is a judgment ofHeaven upon us for permitting Gentile aggression. It is meant to clenchinto our minds the God's truth that we must stand by our faith with thearms of war if need be."
"Brother Rae is just a little mite soul-proud," Brigham thereuponconfided to his counsellors, "and I wouldn't wonder if the Lord would beglad to see some of it taken out of him. Anyway, I've got a job for himthat will just about do it."
The Lions of the Lord: A Tale of the Old West Page 14