The Prairie

by James Fenimore Cooper

  CHAPTER IX

  Priscian a little scratch'd; 'Twill serve. --Love's Labour Lost.

  Having made the reader acquainted with the manner in which Ishmael Bushhad disposed of his family, under circumstances that might have provedso embarrassing to most other men, we shall again shift the scene a fewshort miles from the place last described, preserving, however, the dueand natural succession of time. At the very moment that the squatter andhis sons departed in the manner mentioned in the preceding chapter, twomen were intently occupied in a swale that lay along the borders of alittle run, just out of cannon-shot from the encampment, discussingthe merits of a savoury bison's hump, that had been prepared for theirpalates with the utmost attention to the particular merits of thatdescription of food. The choice morsel had been judiciously separatedfrom the adjoining and less worthy parts of the beast, and, enveloped inthe hairy coating provided by nature, it had duly undergone the heatof the customary subterraneous oven, and was now laid before itsproprietors in all the culinary glory of the prairies. So far asrichness, delicacy, and wildness of flavour, and substantial nourishmentwere concerned, the viand might well have claimed a decided superiorityover the meretricious cookery and laboured compounds of the mostrenowned artist; though the service of the dainty was certainly achievedin a manner far from artificial. It would appear that the two fortunatemortals, to whose happy lot it fell to enjoy a meal in which health andappetite lent so keen a relish to the exquisite food of the Americandeserts, were far from being insensible of the advantage they possessed.

  The one, to whose knowledge in the culinary art the other was indebtedfor his banquet, seemed the least disposed of the two to profit by hisown skill. He ate, it is true, and with a relish; but it was always withthe moderation with which age is apt to temper the appetite. No suchrestraint, however, was imposed on the inclination of his companion.In the very flower of his days and in the vigour of manhood, the homagethat he paid to the work of his more aged friend's hands was of the mostprofound and engrossing character. As one delicious morsel succeededanother he rolled his eyes towards his companion, and seemed to expressthat gratitude which he had not speech to utter, in looks of the mostbenignant nature.

  "Cut more into the heart of it, lad," said the trapper, for it was thevenerable inhabitant of those vast wastes, who had served the bee-hunterwith the banquet in question; "cut more into the centre of the piece;there you will find the genuine riches of natur'; and that without needfrom spices, or any of your biting mustard to give it a foreign relish."

  "If I had but a cup of metheglin," said Paul, stopping to perform thenecessary operation of breathing, "I should swear this was the strongestmeal that was ever placed before the mouth of man!"

  "Ay, ay, well you may call it strong!" returned the other, laughingafter his peculiar manner, in pure satisfaction at witnessing theinfinite contentment of his companion; "strong it is, and strong itmakes him who eats it! Here, Hector," tossing the patient hound, who waswatching his eye with a wistful look, a portion of the meat, "you haveneed of strength, my friend, in your old days as well as your master.Now, lad, there is a dog that has eaten and slept wiser and better, ay,and that of richer food, than any king of them all! and why? because hehas used and not abused the gifts of his Maker. He was made a hound, andlike a hound has he feasted. Then did He create men; but they have eatenlike famished wolves! A good and prudent dog has Hector proved, andnever have I found one of his breed false in nose or friendship. Do youknow the difference between the cookery of the wilderness and thatwhich is found in the settlements? No; I see plainly you don't, by yourappetite; then I will tell you. The one follows man, the other natur'.One thinks he can add to the gifts of the Creator, while the other ishumble enough to enjoy them; therein lies the secret."

  "I tell you, trapper," said Paul, who was very little edified by themorality with which his associate saw fit to season their repast, "that,every day while we are in this place, and they are likely to be many, Iwill shoot a buffaloe and you shall cook his hump!"

  "I cannot say that, I cannot say that. The beast is good, take him inwhat part you will, and it was to be food for man that he was fashioned;but I cannot say that I will be a witness and a helper to the waste ofkilling one daily."

  "The devil a bit of waste shall there be, old man. If they all turn outas good as this, I will engage to eat them clean myself, even to thehoofs;--how now, who comes here! some one with a long nose, I willanswer; and one that has led him on a true scent, if he is following thetrail of a dinner."

  The individual who interrupted the conversation, and who had elicitedthe foregoing remark of Paul, was seen advancing along the margin of therun with a deliberate pace, in a direct line for the two revellers.As there was nothing formidable nor hostile in his appearance, thebee-hunter, instead of suspending his operations, rather increased hisefforts, in a manner which would seem to imply that he doubted whetherthe hump would suffice for the proper entertainment of all who were nowlikely to partake of the delicious morsel. With the trapper, however,the case was different. His more tempered appetite was alreadysatisfied, and he faced the new comer with a look of cordiality, thatplainly evinced how very opportune he considered his arrival.

  "Come on, friend," he said, waving his hand, as he observed the strangerto pause a moment, apparently in doubt. "Come on, I say, if hunger beyour guide, it has led you to a fitting place. Here is meat, and thisyouth can give you corn, parch'd till it be whiter than the upland snow;come on, without fear. We are not ravenous beasts, eating of each other,but Christian men, receiving thankfully that which the Lord hath seenfit to give."

  "Venerable hunter," returned the Doctor, for it was no other than thenaturalist on one of his daily exploring expeditions, "I rejoice greatlyat this happy meeting; we are lovers of the same pursuits, and should befriends."

  "Lord, Lord!" said the old man, laughing, without much deference to therules of decorum, in the philosopher's very face, "it is the man whowanted to make me believe that a name could change the natur' of abeast! Come, friend; you are welcome, though your notions are a littleblinded with reading too many books. Sit ye down, and, after eatingof this morsel, tell me, if you can, the name of the creatur' that hasbestowed on you its flesh for a meal?"

  The eyes of Doctor Battius (for we deem it decorous to give the good manthe appellation he most preferred) sufficiently denoted the satisfactionwith which he listened to this proposal. The exercise he had taken, andthe sharpness of the wind, proved excellent stimulants; and Paul himselfhad hardly been in better plight to do credit to the trapper's cookery,than was the lover of nature, when the grateful invitation met hisears. Indulging in a small laugh, which his exertions to repress reducednearly to a simper, he took the indicated seat by the old man's side,and made the customary dispositions to commence his meal without furtherceremony.

  "I should be ashamed of my profession," he said, swallowing a morsel ofthe hump with evident delight, slily endeavouring at the same time todistinguish the peculiarities of the singed and defaced skin, "I oughtto be ashamed of my profession, were there beast, or bird, on thecontinent of America, that I could not tell by some one of the manyevidences which science has enlisted in her cause. This--then--thefood is nutritious and savoury--a mouthful of your corn, friend, if youplease?"

  Paul, who continued eating with increasing industry, looking askaunt notunlike a dog when engaged in the same agreeable pursuit, threw him hispouch, without deeming it at all necessary to suspend his own labours.

  "You were saying, friend, that you have many ways of telling thecreatur'?"--observed the attentive trapper.

  "Many; many and infallible. Now, the animals that are carnivorous areknown by their incisores."

  "Their what?" demanded the trapper.

  "The teeth with which nature has furnished them for defence, and inorder to tear their food. Again--"

  "Look you then for the teeth of this creatur'," interrup
ted thetrapper, who was bent on convincing a man who had presumed to enter intocompetition with himself, in matters pertaining to the wilds, of grossignorance; "turn the piece round and find your inside-overs."

  The Doctor complied, and of course without success; though he profitedby the occasion to take another fruitless glance at the wrinkled hide.

  "Well, friend, do you find the things you need, before you can pronouncethe creatur' a duck or a salmon?"

  "I apprehend the entire animal is not here?"

  "You may well say as much," cried Paul, who was now compelled to pausefrom pure repletion; "I will answer for some pounds of the fellow,weighed by the truest steel-yards west of the Alleghanies. Still you maymake out to keep soul and body together, with what is left," reluctantlyeyeing a piece large enough to feed twenty men, but which he feltcompelled to abandon from satiety; "cut in nigher to the heart, as theold man says, and you will find the riches of the piece."

  "The heart!" exclaimed the Doctor, inwardly delighted to learn there wasa distinct organ to be submitted to his inspection. "Ay, let me see theheart--it will at once determine the character of the animal--certesthis is not the cor--ay, sure enough it is--the animal must be of theorder belluae, from its obese habits!"

  He was interrupted by a long and hearty, but still a noiseless fit ofmerriment, from the trapper, which was considered so ill-timed by theoffended naturalist, as to produce an instant cessation of speech, ifnot a stagnation of ideas.

  "Listen to his beasts' habits and belly orders," said the old man,delighted with the evident embarrassment of his rival; "and then he saysit is not the core! Why, man, you are farther from the truth than youare from the settlements, with all your bookish larning and hard words;which I have, once for all, said cannot be understood by any tribe ornation east of the Rocky Mountains. Beastly habits or no beastly habits,the creatur's are to be seen cropping the prairies by tens of thousands,and the piece in your hand is the core of as juicy a buffaloe-hump asstomach need crave!"

  "My aged companion," said Obed, struggling to keep down a risingirascibility, that he conceived would ill comport with the dignityof his character, "your system is erroneous, from the premises to theconclusion; and your classification so faulty, as utterly to confoundthe distinctions of science. The buffaloe is not gifted with a hump atall; nor is his flesh savoury and wholesome, as I must acknowledge itwould seem the subject before us may well be characterised--"

  "There I'm dead against you, and clearly with the trapper," interruptedPaul Hover. "The man who denies that buffaloe beef is good, should scornto eat it!"[*]

  [*] It is scarcely necessary to tell the reader, that the animal so often alluded to in this book, and which is vulgarly called the buffaloe, is in truth the bison; hence so many contretemps between the men of the prairies and the men of science.

  The Doctor, whose observation of the bee-hunter had hitherto beenexceedingly cursory, stared at the new speaker with a look which denotedsomething like recognition.

  "The principal characteristics of your countenance, friend," he said,"are familiar; either you, or some other specimen of your class, isknown to me."

  "I am the man you met in the woods east of the big river, and whom youtried to persuade to line a yellow hornet to his nest: as if my eye wasnot too true to mistake any other animal for a honey-bee, in a clearday! We tarried together a week, as you may remember; you at your toadsand lizards, and I at my high-holes and hollow trees: and a good job wemade of it between us! I filled my tubs with the sweetest honey I eversent to the settlements, besides housing a dozen hives; and your bag wasnear bursting with a crawling museum. I never was bold enough to putthe question to your face, stranger, but I reckon you are a keeper ofcuriosities?"[*]

  [*] The pursuit of a bee-hunter is not uncommon, on the skirts of American society, though it is a little embellished here. When the bees are seen sucking the flowers, their pursuer contrives to capture one or two. He then chooses a proper spot, and suffering one to escape, the insect invariably takes its flight towards the hive. Changing his ground to a greater or less distance according to circumstances, the bee-hunter then permits another to escape. Having watched the courses of the bees, which is technically called lining, he is enabled to calculate the intersecting angle of the two lines, which is the hive.

  "Ay! that is another of their wanton wickednesses!" exclaimed thetrapper. "They slay the buck, and the moose, and the wild cat, and allthe beasts that range the woods, and stuffing them with worthless rags,and placing eyes of glass into their heads, they set them up to bestared at, and call them the creatur's of the Lord; as if any mortaleffigy could equal the works of his hand!"

  "I know you well," returned the Doctor, on whom the plaint of the oldman produced no visible impression. "I know you," offering his handcordially to Paul; "it was a prolific week, as my herbal and cataloguesshall one day prove. Ay, I remember you well, young man. You are ofthe class, mammalia; order, primates; genus, homo; species, Kentucky."Pausing to smile at his own humour, the naturalist proceeded. "Sinceour separation, I have journeyed far, having entered into a compactum oragreement with a certain man named Ishmael--"

  "Bush!" interrupted the impatient and reckless Paul. "By the Lord,trapper, this is the very blood-letter that Ellen told me of!"

  "Then Nelly has not done me credit for what I trust I deserve," returnedthe single-minded Doctor, "for I am not of the phlebotomising school atall; greatly preferring the practice which purifies the blood instead ofabstracting it."

  "It was a blunder of mine, good stranger; the girl called you a skilfulman."

  "Therein she may have exceeded my merits," Dr. Battius continued,bowing with sufficient meekness. "But Ellen is a good, and a kind, and aspirited girl, too. A kind and a sweet girl I have ever found Nell Wadeto be!"

  "The devil you have!" cried Paul, dropping the morsel he was sucking,from sheer reluctance to abandon the hump, and casting a fierce anddirect look into the very teeth of the unconscious physician. "I reckon,stranger, you have a mind to bag Ellen, too!"

  "The riches of the whole vegetable and animal world united, would nottempt me to harm a hair of her head! I love the child, with what may hecalled amor naturalis--or rather paternus--the affection of a father."

  "Ay--that, indeed, is more befitting the difference in your years,"Paul coolly rejoined, stretching forth his hand to regain the rejectedmorsel. "You would be no better than a drone at your time of day, with ayoung hive to feed and swarm."

  "Yes, there is reason, because there is natur', in what he says,"observed the trapper: "but, friend, you have said you were a dweller inthe camp of one Ishmael Bush?"

  "True; it is in virtue of a compactum--"

  "I know but little of the virtue of packing, though I follow trapping,in my old age, for a livelihood. They tell me that skins are well keptin the new fashion; but it is long since I have left off killing morethan I need for food and garments. I was an eye-witness, myself, of themanner in which the Siouxes broke into your encampment, and drove offthe cattle; stripping the poor man you call Ishmael of his smallesthoofs, counting even the cloven feet."

  "Asinus excepted," muttered the Doctor, who by this time was discussinghis portion of the hump, in utter forgetfulness of all its scientificattributes. "Asinus domesticus Americanus excepted."

  "I am glad to hear that so many of them are saved, though I know notthe value of the animals you name; which is nothing uncommon, seeing howlong it is that I have been out of the settlements. But can you tell me,friend, what the traveller carries under the white cloth, he guards withteeth as sharp as a wolf that quarrels for the carcass the hunter hasleft?"

  "You've heard of it!" exclaimed the other, dropping the morsel he wasconveying to his mouth in manifest surprise.

  "Nay, I have heard nothing; but I have seen the cloth, and had liketo have been bitten for no greater crime than wishing to know what itcovered."

  "Bitten! then, after all, the animal must be carnivor
ous! It is tootranquil for the ursus horridus; if it were the canis latrans, the voicewould betray it. Nor would Nelly Wade be so familiar with any of thegenus ferae. Venerable hunter! the solitary animal confined inthat wagon by day, and in the tent at night, has occasioned me moreperplexity of mind than the whole catalogue of quadrupeds besides: andfor this plain reason; I did not know how to class it."

  "You think it a ravenous beast?"

  "I know it to be a quadruped: your own danger proves it to becarnivorous."

  During this broken explanation, Paul Hover had sat silent andthoughtful, regarding each speaker with deep attention. But, suddenlymoved by the manner of the Doctor, the latter had scarcely time to utterhis positive assertion, before the young man bluntly demanded--

  "And pray, friend, what may you call a quadruped?"

  "A vagary of nature, wherein she has displayed less of her infinitewisdom than is usual. Could rotary levers be substituted for two of thelimbs, agreeably to the improvement in my new order of phalangacrura,which might be rendered into the vernacular as lever-legged, there wouldbe a delightful perfection and harmony in the construction. But, as thequadruped is now formed, I call it a mere vagary of nature; no otherthan a vagary."

  "Harkee, stranger! in Kentucky we are but small dealers in dictionaries.Vagary is as hard a word to turn into English as quadruped."

  "A quadruped is an animal with four legs--a beast."

  "A beast! Do you then reckon that Ishmael Bush travels with a beastcaged in that wagon?"

  "I know it, and lend me your ear--not literally, friend," observing Paulto start and look surprised, "but figuratively, through its functions,and you shall hear. I have already made known that, in virtue of acompactum, I journey with the aforesaid Ishmael Bush; but though I ambound to perform certain duties while the journey lasts, there is nocondition which says that the said journey shall be sempiternum, oreternal. Now, though this region may scarcely be said to be weddedto science, being to all intents a virgin territory as respects theenquirer into natural history, still it is greatly destitute of thetreasures of the vegetable kingdom. I should, therefore, have tarriedsome hundreds of miles more to the eastward, were it not for the inwardpropensity that I feel to have the beast in question inspected andsuitably described and classed. For that matter," he continued, droppinghis voice, like one who imparts an important secret, "I am not withouthopes of persuading Ishmael to let me dissect it."

  "You have seen the creature?"

  "Not with the organs of sight; but with much more infallible instrumentsof vision: the conclusions of reason, and the deductions of scientificpremises. I have watched the habits of the animal, young man; and canfearlessly pronounce, by evidence that would be thrown away on ordinaryobservers, that it is of vast dimensions, inactive, possibly torpid, ofvoracious appetite, and, as it now appears by the direct testimony ofthis venerable hunter, ferocious and carnivorous!"

  "I should be better pleased, stranger," said Paul, on whom the Doctor'sdescription was making a very sensible impression, "to be sure thecreature was a beast at all."

  "As to that, if I wanted evidence of a fact, which is abundantlyapparent by the habits of the animal, I have the word of Ishmaelhimself. A reason can be given for my smallest deductions. I am nottroubled, young man, with a vulgar and idle curiosity, but all myaspirations after knowledge, as I humbly believe, are, first, forthe advancement of learning, and, secondly, for the benefit of myfellow-creatures. I pined greatly in secret to know the contents of thetent, which Ishmael guarded so carefully, and which he had covenantedthat I should swear, (jurare per deos) not to approach nigher thana defined number of cubits, for a definite period of time. Yourjusjurandum, or oath, is a serious matter, and not to be dealt inlightly; but, as my expedition depended on complying, I consented to theact, reserving to myself at all times the power of distant observation.It is now some ten days since Ishmael, pitying the state in which hesaw me, a humble lover of science, imparted the fact that the vehiclecontained a beast, which he was carrying into the prairies as a decoy,by which he intends to entrap others of the same genus, or perhapsspecies. Since then, my task has been reduced simply to watch thehabits of the animal, and to record the results. When we reach a certaindistance where these beasts are said to abound, I am to have the liberalexamination of the specimen."

  Paul continued to listen, in the most profound silence, until theDoctor concluded his singular but characteristic explanation; then theincredulous bee-hunter shook his head, and saw fit to reply, by saying--

  "Stranger, old Ishmael has burrowed you in the very bottom of a hollowtree, where your eyes will be of no more use than the sting of a drone.I, too, know something of that very wagon, and I may say that I havelined the squatter down into a flat lie. Harkee, friend; do you think agirl, like Ellen Wade, would become the companion of a wild beast?"

  "Why not? why not?" repeated the naturalist; "Nelly has a taste,and often listens with pleasure to the treasures that I am sometimescompelled to scatter in this desert. Why should she not study the habitsof any animal, even though it were a rhinoceros?"

  "Softly, softly," returned the equally positive, and, though lessscientific, certainly, on this subject, better instructed bee-hunter;"Ellen is a girl of spirit, and one too that knows her own mind, orI'm much mistaken; but with all her courage and brave looks, she is nobetter than a woman after all. Haven't I often had the girl crying--"

  "You are an acquaintance, then, of Nelly's?"

  "The devil a bit. But I know woman is woman; and all the books inKentucky couldn't make Ellen Wade go into a tent alone with a ravenousbeast!"

  "It seems to me," the trapper calmly observed, "that there is somethingdark and hidden in this matter. I am a witness that the traveller likesnone to look into the tent, and I have a proof more sure than whateither of you can lay claim to, that the wagon does not carry the cageof a beast. Here is Hector, come of a breed with noses as true andfaithful as a hand that is all-powerful has made any of their kind, andhad there been a beast in the place, the hound would long since havetold it to his master."

  "Do you pretend to oppose a dog to a man! brutality to learning!instinct to reason!" exclaimed the Doctor in some heat. "In what manner,pray, can a hound distinguish the habits, species, or even the genus ofan animal, like reasoning, learned, scientific, triumphant man!"

  "In what manner!" coolly repeated the veteran woodsman. "Listen; and ifyou believe that a schoolmaster can make a quicker wit than the Lord,you shall be made to see how much you're mistaken. Do you not hearsomething move in the brake? it has been cracking the twigs these fiveminutes. Now tell me what the creatur' is?"

  "I hope nothing ferocious!" exclaimed the Doctor, who still retained alively impression of his rencounter with the vespertilio horribilis."You have rifles, friends; would it not be prudent to prime them? forthis fowling piece of mine is little to be depended on."

  "There may be reason in what he says," returned the trapper, so farcomplying as to take his piece from the place where it had lain duringthe repast, and raising its muzzle in the air. "Now tell me the name ofthe creatur'?"

  "It exceeds the limits of earthly knowledge! Buffon himself could nottell whether the animal was a quadruped, or of the order, serpens! asheep, or a tiger!"

  "Then was your buffoon a fool to my Hector! Here: pup!--What is it,dog?--Shall we run it down, pup--or shall we let it pass?"

  The hound, which had already manifested to the experienced trapper, bythe tremulous motion of his ears, his consciousness of the proximity ofa strange animal, lifted his head from his fore paws and slightly partedhis lips, as if about to show the remnants of his teeth. But, suddenlyabandoning his hostile purpose, he snuffed the air a moment, gapedheavily, shook himself, and peaceably resumed his recumbent attitude.

  "Now, Doctor," cried the trapper, triumphantly, "I am well convincedthere is neither game nor ravenous beast in the thicket; and that I callsubstantial knowledge to a man who is too old to be a spendthrift of hisstrength, and yet who would
not wish to be a meal for a panther!"

  The dog interrupted his master by a growl, but still kept his headcrouched to the earth.

  "It is a man!" exclaimed the trapper, rising. "It is a man, if I am ajudge of the creatur's ways. There is but little said atwixt the houndand me, but we seldom mistake each other's meaning!"

  Paul Hover sprang to his feet like lightning; and, throwing forward hisrifle, he cried in a voice of menace--

  "Come forward, if a friend; if an enemy, stand ready for the worst!"

  "A friend, a white man, and, I hope, a Christian," returned a voicefrom the thicket; which opened at the same instant, and at the next thespeaker made his appearance.