HOW TWO LITTLE STOCKINGS SAVED FORT SAFETY.
"A story, children; so soon after Christmas, too! Let me think, whatshall it be?"
"O yes, mamma," uttered three children in chorus.
Mrs. Livingston sat looking into the fire that flamed on the broadhearth so long, that Carl said, by way of reminder that time waspassing: "An uncommon story."
Then up spoke Bessie: "Mamma, something, please, out of the real oldtime before much of anybody 'round here was born."
"As long off as the Indians," assisted young Dot.
"Ah yes; that will do, children. I will tell you a story that happenedin this very house almost a hundred years ago. It was told to me by mygrandmother when she was very old."
There was a grand old lady, Mrs. Livingston, at the head of this housethen. She loved her country very much indeed, and was willing to doanything she could to help it, in the time of great trouble, duringthe war for independence. My grandmother was a little girl, not soold as you, Bessie. Her name was Lorinda Grey, and her home was inBoston. The year before, when British soldiers kept close watch to seethat nothing to eat, or wear, or burn, was carried into Boston, Mr.Grey contrived to get his family out of the city, and Lorinda, withher brother Otis, was sent here. Afterward, when Boston was freeagain, the two children were left because the father was too busy tomake the long journey after them.
Altogether, more than a dozen children belonging in some way to theLivingstons had been sent to the old house. The family friends andrelatives gave the place the name "Fort Safety," because it lay faraway from the enemy's ships, and quite out of the line where thesoldiers of either army marched or camped.
The year had been very full of sorrow and care and trouble and hardwork; but when the time for Christmas drew near, this grand old Mrs.Livingston said it should be the happiest Christmas that the old househad ever known. She would make the children happy once, whatever mightcome afterward, and so she set about it quite early in the fall. Oneday the children (there were more than a dozen of them in the house atthe time) found out that the great room at the end of the hall waslocked. They asked Mrs. Livingston many times when it meant, and atlast she told them that one night after they were in bed and asleep,Santa Claus appeared at her door and asked if he might occupy thatroom until the night before Christmas. She told him he might, and hehad locked the door himself, and said "if any child so much as lookedthrough a crack in the door that child would find nothing but chestnutburs in his stocking." Well, the children knew that Santa Claus meantwhat he said, always, so they used to run past the door every day asfast as they could go and keep their eyes the other way, lestsomething should be seen that ought not to. Before the day came everywide chimney in the house was swept bright and clean for Santa Claus.
Aunt Elise, a sweet young lady, lived here then. She was old Mrs.Livingston's daughter, and she told the children that she had seenSanta Claus with her own eyes when he locked the door, and he saidthat every room must be made as fine as fine could be.
After that Tom and Richard and Will and Philip worked away as hard asthey could. They gathered bushels and bushels of ivy, and a mile ortwo of ground-pine, and eight or ten pecks of bitter-sweet, and storedthem all in the corn granary, and waited for the day. Then, when AuntElise set to work to adorn the house, she had twenty-four willinghands to help, beside her own two.
When all was made ready, and it was getting near to night in theafternoon before Christmas, Mrs. Livingston sent a messenger forthree men from the farm. When they were come, she called in threeAfrican servants, and she said to the six men, "Saddle horses and rideaway, each one of you in a different direction, and go to every housewithin five miles of here, and ask: 'Are any children in thishabitation?' Then say that you are sent to fetch the children'sstockings, that Santa Claus wants them, and take special care to bringme _two_ stockings from each child, whose father or brother is awayfighting for his country."
So the six men set forth on their queer errand, after stockings, andthey rode up hill and down, and to the great river's bank, andwherever the message was given at a house door, if a child was withinhearing, off flew a stocking, and sometimes two, as the case might beabout father and brother.
Now, in a deep little dell, about five miles away, there was a small,old brown house, and in it lived Mixie Brownson with her mother andbrother, but this night Mixie was all alone. When one of the sixhorsemen rode up to the door, and without getting down from his horse,thumped away on it with his riding-whip handle, Mixie thought, "Likeas not it is an Indian," but she straightway lifted the wooden latchand opened the door.
"There's one child here, I see," said the black man. "Any more?"
"I'm all alone," trembled forth poor Mixie.
"More's the pity," said the man. "I want one of your stockings; two of'em, if you're a soldier's little girl. I'm taking stockings to SantaClaus."
"O take both mine, then, please," said Mixie with delight, and shedrew off two warm woolen stockings and made them into a little bundle,which he thrust into a bag, and off he rode. Mixie's father was aRoyalist, fighting with the Indians for the British, but then Mrs.Livingston knew nothing about that.
It was nearly midnight when the stockings reached Fort Safety. It wasin this very room that Mrs. Livingston and Aunt Elise received them.Some were sweet and clean, and some were not; some were new and somewere old. So they looked them over, and made two little piles, the oneto be filled, the other to be washed.
About this time Santa Claus came down from his locked-up room, withpack after pack, and began to fill stockings. There were ninety-sevenof them, beside sixteen more that were hung on a line stretched acrossthe fire-place by the children before they went to bed, so as to bevery handy for Santa Claus when he should enter by the chimney.
"What an awful rich lady my fine old Grandmother Livingston must havebeen, to have goodies enough to fill 113 stockings!" said Carl, hisred hair fairly glistening with interest and pride; while Bessie andDot looked eagerly at the fire-place and around the room, to see ifany fragment of a stocking might, by any chance, be about anywhere.
Well, at last the stockings were full. I cannot tell you exactly whatwas in them. I remember that my grandmother said, that in everystocking went, first of all, a nice, pretty pair of new ones, just thesize of the old ones; and next, a pair of mittens to fit handsbelonging with feet that could wear the stockings. I know there wereoranges and some kind of candy, too.
At last the stockings were all hung on a line extending along twosides of the room, and Mrs. Livingston and Aunt Elise locked the room,and being very tired, went to bed. The next morning, bright and early,there was a great pattering of bare feet and a flitting of night-gownsdown the staircase, past the evergreen trees in the hall, and a littlehost of twelve children stood at that door, trying to get in; but itwas all of no use, and they had to march back to bed again.
As for Otis Grey, he was a real Boston boy, full of the spirit of aLiberty Rebel. He dressed himself slyly, slipped down on the greatstair-rail, so as to make no noise, opened softly the hall-door, wentoutside, climbed up, and looked into the room. When he peeped, he wasso frightened at the long line of fat stockings that he made hastedown, and never said a word to anybody, except my grandmother (LorindaGrey, his sister); and they two kept the secret.
Breakfast time came, and not a child of the dozen had heard a wordfrom Santa Claus that morning.
Mrs. Livingston said a very long grace, and after that she said to thechildren: "I have disappointed you this morning, but you will all haveyour stockings as soon as a little company I have invited to spend theday with you, is come."
"Bless me!" whispered Otis Grey to his sister, "are all them stockingsa-coming?"
"Otis," said Mrs. Livingston, "you may leave the table."
Otis obeyed silently, and lost his Christmas breakfast for the time.Mrs. Livingston had strict laws in her house, and punishment alwaysfollowed disobedience.
The morning was long to the children, but it was a
busy time in thewinter kitchen, and even the summer kitchen was alive with cookery;and at just mid-day Philip cried out "Company's come, grandma!"
A dozen or more of the stocking-owners were at the door. In theytrooped, bright and laughing and happy. Before they were fairlyinside, more came, and more, and still more, until full sixty boys andgirls were gathered up and down the great hall and parlors. MixieBrownson came on the last sled-load. Now Mrs. Livingston did not know,even by name, more than one-half of the young folks she had undertakento make happy that day; but that made no manner of difference, andthe children had not the least idea that Santa Claus had theirstockings all hung up in this room, until suddenly the doors wereopened, and there was the great hickory-wood fire, and the sunlightstreaming in, and the stockings, fat and bulging, hanging in rows.Some were red, and some were blue, and some were white, and some weremixed. Grand old Mrs. Livingston stood within the room, her whitecurls shining and her stiff brocade trailing.
"Come in, children," she said, and in they trooped, silent with aweand wonder at the sight they saw. The lady arranged them side by side,in lines, on the two sides of the room where the stockings were not,and then she said:
"Santa Claus, come forth!"
In yonder corner there began a motion in the branches of the evergreentree, and such a Santa Claus as crept forth was never seen before. Hewas bulgy with furs from crown to foot, but he made a low curve overtoward Mrs. Livingston, and then nodded his head about the lines ofchildren.
"Good day to you, this Christmas," he said.
"Wish you Merry Christmas, Santa Claus," said Philip, with a bow.
"Here's business," said Santa Claus. "Stockings, let me see. Whoeverowns the stocking that I take down from the line, will step forwardand take it."
Every single one of the children knew his or her own property, at aglance. Santa Claus had a busy time of it handing down stockings, anda few minutes later he escaped without notice, and was seen no morethat year, in Fort Safety.
After the stockings came dinner, and such a dinner as it was! Whateverthere was not, I remember that it was told to me that there was greatabundance of English plum-pudding. After dinner came games and morehappiness, and after the last game, came time to go home. The sweetclear afternoon suddenly became dark with clouds, and it began to snowsoon after the first load set off. One or two followed, and by thetime the last one was ready to start, Mrs. Livingston looked forth andsaid "not another child should leave her roof that night in such ablinding storm."
Eight little hands clapped their new mittens together in token of joy,but poor little Mixie Brownson began to cry. She had never in her lifebeen away from the brown house.
Tea was served, and Mixie was comforted for a short time. After thatcame games again, until all were weary with play; and Otis Grey beggedMrs. Livingston for a story.
Mixie was tearful still, and she crept shyly to the lady's side andsobbed forth: "I wish you was my grandma and would take me in yourlap."
Mrs. Livingston stooped and kissed Mixie's cheek, then lifted her onher knees and began to tell the children a story. It must have been avery pretty picture that the old, blowing snowstorm looked in uponthat night, in this very room: twenty or more children seated aroundthe fire-circle, with stately Mrs. Livingston and pretty Aunt Elise intheir midst.
Whilst all this was going on within, outside a band of Indians, led bya white man, was approaching Fort Safety to burn it down.
Step by step, the savages crept nearer and nearer, until they werestanding in the very light that streamed out from the Christmaswindows.
The white man who led them was in the service of the English, and knewevery step of the way, and just who lived in the great house.
He ordered them to stand back while he looked in. Creeping closer andcloser, he climbed, as Otis Grey had done, and put his face to thewindow-pane. He saw Mrs. Livingston and Miss Elise, and the greatcircle of eager, interested faces, all looking at the story-teller,and he wiped his eyes in order to get one more good look, for he couldnot believe the story they told to him: that his own poor little Mixiewas in there, sitting in proud Mrs. Livingston's lap, looking happierthan he had ever seen her. He stayed so long, peering in, that thesavages grew impatient. One or two of their chief men crept up and puttheir swarthy faces beside his own.
It so happened that at that moment Aunt Elise glanced toward thewindow. She did not scream, she uttered no word; but she fell from herchair to the floor.
"His own poor little Mixie was there, sitting in proudMrs. Livingston's lap."]
Mixie's father, for it was he who led the savages, saw what washappening within, and ordered the Indians to march away and leave thebig house unhurt. They grunted and grumbled, and refused to go untilthey had been told that the little girl on the lady's knee was hislittle girl.
"He not going to burn his own papoose," explained the Indian chief tohis red men; and then the evil band went groping away through thestorm.
The story to the children was not finished that night, for on thefloor lay pretty Aunt Elise, as white as white could be; and it was along time before she was able to speak. As soon as she could sit up,she wished to get out into the open air.
Mrs. Livingston went with her, and when she was told what had beenseen at the window, they together examined the freshly fallen snow andfound traces of moccasined feet.
With fear and trembling, the two ladies entered the house. Not a wordof what had been seen was spoken to servant or child. Aunt Elise froman upper window kept watch during the time that Mrs. Livingstonreturned thanks to God for the happy day the children had passed, andasked His love and protecting care during the silent hours of sleep.
Then the sleepy, happy throng climbed the wide staircase to the roomsabove, went to bed and slept until morning.
Not a red face approached Fort Safety that night. The two ladies,letting the Christmas fires go down, kept watch from the windows untilthe day dawned.
"I'm so glad," exclaimed Carl, "that my fine, old, greatest ofgrandmothers thought of having that good time at Christmas."
"Dear me!" sighed Bessie, "if she hadn't, we wouldn't have this nicehome to-day."
"Mamma," said Dot, "let's have a good stocking-time next Christmas;just like that one, all but the Indians."
"O, mamma, _will you_?" cried Bessie, jumping with glee.
"Where _would_ we get the soldiers' children, though," questionedCarl.
"Lots of 'em in Russia and Turkey, if we only lived there," observedBessie. "But there's _always_ plenty of children that _want_ a goodtime and never get it, just as much as the soldiers' children did.Will you, mamma?"
"When Christmas comes again, I will try to make just as many littlefolks happy as I can," said Mrs. Livingston.
"And we'll begin _now_," said Carl, "so as to be all ready. I shallsaw all summer, so as to make lots of pretty brackets and things."
"And I s'pose I shall have to dress about five hundred dolls to go'round," sighed Bessie, "there are so many children now-a-days."
A DAY AND A NIGHT IN THE OLD PORTER HOUSE.
Monday morning, July 5th, 1779, was oppressively warm and sultry inthe Naugatuck Valley. Great Hill, that rises so grandly to thenorthward of Union City, and at whose base the red house still nestlesthat was built either by Daniel Porter or his son Thomas before or asearly as 1735, was bathed in the full sunlight, for it was past eightof the clock. Up the hill had just passed a herd of cows owned by Mr.Thomas Porter and driven by his son Ethel, a lad of fourteen, andEthel's sister Polly, aged twelve years.
"It's awful hot to-day!" said Ethel, as he threw himself on the grassat the hill-top--the cows having been duly cared for.
The Old Porter House]
"You'd better not lose time lying here," said Polly. "There'saltogether too much going on uptown to-day, and there's lots to dobefore we go up to celebrate."
"One thing at a time," replied Ethel, "and this is my time to rest. Inever knew a hill to grow so much in one night before."
"Well! you can rest, but I'm going to find out what that fellow isriding his poor horse so fast for this hot morning--somebody must bedying! Just see that line of dust a mile away!" and Polly started downGreat Hill to meet the rider.
The horseman stayed his horse at Fulling Mill Brook to give him adrink, and Polly reached the brook just at the instant the horseburied his nose in the cool stream.
"Do you live near here?" questioned the rider.
"My father, Mr. Thomas Porter, keeps the inn yonder," said Polly.
"I can't stop," said the horseman, "though I've ridden from New Havenwithout breakfast, and I must get up to the Center; but you tell yourfather the _British_ are landing at West Haven. They have more thatforty vessels! The new president was on the tower of the College whenI came by, watching with his spy-glass, and he shouted down that hecould see them, landing."
At that instant, Ethel reached the brook. "What's going on?" hequestioned.
"You're a likely looking boy--you'll do!" said the horseman, with aglance at Ethel, cutting off at the same instant the draught his horsewas enjoying, by a sudden pull at the bridle lines. "You go tell thenews! Get out the militia! Don't lose a minute."
"What news? What for?" asked Ethel, but the rider was flying onward.
"A pretty time we'll have celebrating to-day," said Polly, to herself,dipping the corner of her apron into the brook and wiping her heatedface with it, as she hurried to the house. Meanwhile, her brother wasrunning and shouting after the man who had ridden off in such haste.
As Polly entered the house the big brick oven stood wide open, and itwas filled to the door with a roaring fire. On the long table stoodloaves of bread almost ready for the oven. Her sister Sybil wasputting apple pies on the same table. Sybil was a beautiful girl oftwenty years, much admired and greatly beloved in the region.
"What is Ethel about so long this morning, that I have his work to do,I wonder!" exclaimed Mr. Thomas Porter, as he lifted himself from thecapacious fire-place in which he had been piling birch-wood under thecrane--from which hung in a row three big iron pots.
"It is a pretty hot morning, and the sun is powerful on the hill,father," said Mrs. Mehitable Porter in reply--not seeing Polly, whostood panting and glowing with all the importance of having great newsto tell.
"Father," cried Polly, "where is Truman and the men? Send 'em! send'em everywhere!"
"What's the matter? what's the matter, child?" exclaimed Mr. Porter,while his wife and Sybil stood in alarm.
At that instant Ethel sprang in, crying out, "The militia! Themilitia! They want the militia."
"What for, and _who_ wants the men?" asked his father.
"I don't know. He didn't stop to tell. He said: 'Get out the militia!Don't lose a minute!' and then rode on."
"Father, _I know_," said Polly. "He told _me_. The British ships, morethan forty of them, are landing soldiers at New Haven. PresidentStiles saw them at daybreak from the college tower with hisspy-glass."
Before Polly had ceased to speak, Ethel was off. Within the next tenminutes six horses had set forth from the Porter house--each rider fora special destination.
"I'll give the alarm to the Hopkinses," cried back Polly from herpony, as she disappeared in the direction of Hopkins Hill.
"And I'll stir up Deacon Gideon and all the Hotchkisses from theCaptain over and down," said ten-year-old Stephen, as he mounted.
"You'd better make sure that Sergeant Calkins and Roswell hear thenews. Tell Captain Terrell to get out his Ring-bone company, and don'tforget Captain John and Abraham Lewis, Lieutenant Beebe, and all therest. It isn't much use to go over the river--not much help _we'd_get, however much the British might, on that side," advised Mr.Porter, as the fourth messenger departed.
When the last courier had set forth, leaving only Mr. and Mrs. Porter,Sybil and two servants in the house, Mr. Porter said to his wife: "Ibelieve, mother, that I'll go up town and see what I can do forColonel Baldwin and Phineas." Major Phineas Porter was his brother,who six months earlier had married Melicent, daughter of ColonelBaldwin and widow of Isaac Booth Lewis (the lady whose name has beenchosen for the Waterbury, Connecticut, Chapter of Daughters of theAmerican Revolution).
After Mr. Porter's departure Mrs. Porter said to Sybil, "You rememberhow it was two years ago at the Danbury alarm, how we were leftwithout a crumb in the house and fairly went hungry to bed. I thinkI'd better stir up a few extra loaves of rye bread and make some morecake. You'd better call up Phyllis and Nancy and tell them to let thewashing go and help me."
Phyllis and Nancy were filled with astonishment and awe at the commandto leave the washing and bake, for, during their twenty years' servicein the house, nothing had ever been allowed to stay the progress ofMonday's washing.
Before mid-day another messenger came tearing up the New Haven roadand demanded a fresh horse in order to continue the journey to arousehelp and demand haste. He brought the half-past nine news from NewHaven that fifteen hundred men were marching from West Haven Green tothe bridge, that women and children were escaping to the northward andwestward with all the treasure that they could carry, or bury on theway, because every horse in the town had been taken for the defence.
He had not finished his story, when from the northward the hastilyequipped militia came hurrying down the road. It was reported thatmessengers had been posted from Waterbury Centre to Westbury and toNorthbury; to West Farms and to Farmingbury--all parts of ancientWaterbury--and soon The City, as it was called in 1779, now UnionCity, would be filled with militiamen.
The messenger from New Haven grew impatient for the fresh horse he hadasked for. While he waited on the porch, Cato, son of Phyllis, whoseduty it was to make ready his steed, sought Mrs. Porter in thekitchen.
"Where that New Haven fellow," he asked, "get Massa's horse. He say hecome from New Haven, and he got the horse Ethel went away on."
"Are you sure, Cato?"
"Sure's I know Cato," said the boy, "and the horse he knew me--be afool if he didn't."
Mrs. Porter immediately summoned the rider to her presence and learnedfrom him that about four miles down the road his pony had given outunder haste and heat; that he had met a boy who, pitying itscondition, had offered an exchange of animals, provided the courierwould promise to leave his pony at the Porter Inn and get a freshhorse there.
"Just like Ethel!" said Polly. "He'll dally all day now, while thathorse gets rested and fed, or else he'll go on foot. I wonder if Icouldn't catch him!"
"Polly," said Mrs. Porter, "don't you leave this house to-day withoutmy permission."
Poor Mrs. Porter! Truman, her eldest son, had gone. He was sixteen andhad been a "trained" soldier for more than six months; that, themother expected; but Ethel, only fourteen, and full of daring andboyish zeal! Stephen also, the youngest, and the baby, being but tenyears old--he had not yet returned from "stirring up the Hotchkisses."Had he followed Captain Gideon?
"Ethel is too far ahead," sighed Polly. "I couldn't catch him now,even if mother would let me; but here comes Uncle Phineas in hisregimentals, and Aunt Melicent and Polly and little Melicent, and O!what a crowd! I can't see for the dust! It's better than thecelebration. It's so _real_, so 'strue as you live and breathe andeverything."
Polly ran to the front door. At that day it opened upon a porch thatextended across the house front. This porch was supported by a line ofwhite pillars, and a rail along its front had rings inserted in it towhich a horseman could, after dismounting beneath its shelter, securehis steed. Long ago, this porch was removed and the house itself wastaken from the roadside on the plain below, because of a greatfreshet, and removed to its present location. The history of thatporch, of the men and women who dismounted beneath its shelter, orwho, footsore and weary, mounted its steps, would be the history ofthe country for more than a century, for the men of Waterbury were inevery enterprise in which the colonies were engaged; but this is therecord of a single day in its eventful life, and we must return to theporch, where Polly is welcoming Mrs.
Melicent Porter with the words:"Mother will be so glad you have come, Aunt Melicent, for Ethel hasgone off to New Haven and he's miles ahead of catching, and Stephenhasn't got back yet from 'rousing the Alarm company. Mother wouldn't_say_ a word, but she has got her mouth fixed and I know she's afraidhe's gone, too. I don't know what father will do when he finds itout."
"You go, now," said Mrs. Porter, "and tell your mother that yourfather staid to go to the mill. He will not be here for some time."
While Polly went to the kitchen with the message, Mrs. Melicentalighted from her horse and, assisting her little daughter Melicentfrom the saddle, said: "You are heavier to-day, Milly, than you werewhen I threw you to the bank from my horse when it was floating downthe river. I couldn't do it now."
The instant Major Porter had set little Polly Lewis on the porch Mrs.Porter was beside him, begging that he would look for Ethel and carefor the boy if he found him. The promise was given, and looking welldespite the uncommon heat, the Major, in all the glory of his militaryequipment, set forth.
From that moment all was noise and call and confusion without. Menwent by singly, in groups, in squads, in companies, mounted and onfoot. It is a matter of public record that twelve militia companies,with their respective captains, went from Waterbury alone to assistNew Haven in the day of its peril. It is no marvel that they set offwith speed, for the horrors of the Danbury burning was yet fresh inmemory.
In the long kitchen, as the heated hours went by, the brick oven wasfired again and again until the very stones of the chimney expandedwith glowing heat, and the last swallow forsook its ancient nest indespair. The sun was in the west when Mr. Porter, with a bag of wheaton one side of the saddle and a bag of rye on the other, appeared atthe kitchen entrance and summoned help to unload, but his accustomedhelpers were gone. Even Cato, the reliable, was missing. Phyllis andNancy received the wheat and the rye.
"Mother," said Mr. Porter, "I had to do the grinding myself--couldn'tfind a man to do it, and I knew it couldn't be done here to-day,water's too low. Where are the boys?" he questioned, as he entered andlooked around. When informed, his sole ejaculation was, "I ought tohave known that boys always have gone and always will go aftersoldiers."
"Don't worry, mother," he added to his wife, as she stood lookingwistfully down the road.
There were tears in her eyes as she said: "Not a boy left."
"Why yes, mother, here comes Stephen and Stiles Hotchkiss up the road.My! how tired and hot the boys and the horses do look!" exclaimedPolly.
Stephen waited for no reprimand. He forestalled it by saying: "CaptainHotchkiss let Stiles and me go far enough to _see_ the Britishtroops--way off, ever so far--but we saw 'em, we did, didn't we,Stiles?"
"Come! come!" said Mr. Porter, while the lad's mother stood with herhand on his head. "Stephen, tell us all about it!"
"Captain Hotchkiss said he was a boy once, and if we'd promise him togo home the minute he told us to, he'd take us along. Well! we keptmeeting folks running away from New Haven, with everything on 'em buttheir heads. One woman was lugging a lot of salt pork, 'because shecouldn't bear to have the Britishers eat it all up;' and another womanwas carrying away a lot of candles hanging by a string, and the sunhad melted the last drop of tallow, leaving the wicks dangling againstthe tallow on her dress, but she didn't know it; and mother, wouldyou believe it--Mr. Timothy Atwater told Captain Hotchkiss that hemet a woman whom he knew hurrying out of town with a cat in her arms.When he asked her where her children were, she said, 'Why, at home Isuppose.' 'Well,' said Mr. Atwater, 'hadn't you better leave the catand go back and get them?' And she said, 'Perhaps she had,' and wentback for 'em."
"What became of the cat?" asked Mrs. Melicent Porter.
"Why, Aunt Melicent, how nice!" cried Stephen, running back to theporch and returning with a cat in his arms.
"I've fetched her to you. I _knew_ you loved cats so! Here she is,black as ink, and she stuck to the saddle every step of the way like atrue soldier's cat. I was afraid she'd run away when I took her offthe saddle, and I hid her. You know mother don't like cats aroundunder her feet."
In a minute pussy was on the floor, and the last drop of milk in thehouse was set before her by little Polly Lewis. Little Melicentcooed softly to her, while Stephen and Stiles went on with theirstory,--from which it was learned that the boys had gone within amile of Hotchkisstown (now Westville), where, from a height, theyhad a view of the British troops. The lads were filled withadmiration of the marching, "as though it was all one motion," ofthe "mingling colors of the uniforms worn, as the bright red of theEnglish Foot Guards blended with the graver hues of the dress wornby the German mercenaries," and of "the waving line of glitteringbayonets."
"We didn't see," said Stephen, "but just one flash of musketry,because Stiles's father said we must start that instant for home, andhe told Stiles to stay here until morning, and we haven't had amouthful to eat since breakfast, and its been the hottest day thatever was, and I'm tired to death."
"And the cows are on the hill and nobody here to fetch them down,"sighed Mr. Porter.
"Such a lot of captains waiting to see you, father!" announced Polly."There's Captain Woodruff and Captain Castle and Captain Richards anda Fenn captain and a Garnsey captain. I forget the rest." The captainsinvaded the kitchen itself, declaring that it being Monday in theweek, every householder had been short of provisions for theemergency--that every inn on the way and many a private house had beenunable to provide enough for so many men, and what could they have atthe Porter Inn?
Polly disappeared. Before her father had considered the matter shehad, assisted by her Aunt Melicent and Polly Lewis, seized from thepantry shelves all that they could carry, and going by a rear way, hadhidden on the garret stairs a big roast of veal, one of lamb, andenough bread and pies for family requirements, and still the pantryshelves seemed amply filled. "I'm not going to have Ethel come home inthe night and find nothing left for him I know, and the hungry boysfast asleep and tired out on the kitchen settle will come to liferavenous. Wonder if I hadn't better be missing just now and go fetchthe cows down. Father would have asthma all night if he tried it,"said Polly to her aunt; and up the hill Polly went accompanied bylittle Polly--while Mrs. Porter stood by and saw the fruits of herhard day's work vanish out of sight.
"Pray leave something for your own household," she ventured tointercede at last. "Don't forget that we have four guests of our ownfor the night;" but Mr. Porter, rather proud to show that, howeverremiss others had been, the Porter Inn was prepared for emergencies,had already bidden Nancy and Phyllis fetch forth the last loaf.
"Like one for supper," ventured Nancy, as her master carefullyexamined the empty larder, hoping to find something more. As the lastcaptain from Northbury started on the night journey for New Haven, Mr.Porter faced his wife. "Now Thomas Porter," she said, "you can gohungry to bed, but what can I do for my guests and the children andthe rest of the household?"
Mr. Porter scratched his head--a habit when profoundly in doubt--andsaid: "I must fetch the cows! It's most dark now," and set forth, tofind that Polly had them all safely in the cattle yard.
"I suppose, father," said Polly, "that we've got to live on milkto-night. I thought so when I heard you parleying with the captains.So I thought I'd get the cows down." As Polly entered the house, shesaw a lady and two girls of about her own age, to whom her mother wassaying: "We will give you shelter, gladly, but my husband has just letthe militia you met just below have the last morsel of cooked food inour house, and we've nothing left for ourselves but milk for supper."
"Mother," said Polly, stepping to the front; "we have plenty! I lookedout for you before father got to the pantry. I made journeys to thegarret stairs, several of them, and Aunt Melicent and Polly Lewishelped me. It is all right for the lady to stay."
The lady in question was Mrs. Thankful Punderson and her twindaughters, girls of twelve years, who had escaped from New Haven justas the British troops reached Broadway, and the riot and plunder an
dkilling began. "I hoped," she said, "to reach the house of myhusband's sister, Mrs. Zachariah Thompson, in Westbury, but Anna andThankful are too tired to walk further to-night, and the horse cancarry but two. It is getting late, and I am so thankful to stay."
As Mr. Porter stood on the porch looking down the road for the nextarrival, hoping to learn some later news and perhaps to hear Ethel'scheery call in the distance, Polly said: "Father, will you let me beinnkeeper to-night?"
"Gladly, Polly, with nothing to keep and not a room to spare," was hisreply.
"Then I'll invite you to supper, and mind, if the ministers themselvescome, they can't have a bite to-night, for I'm the keeper."
"I suppose you've made us some hasty pudding while the milking wasgoing on," he said, as Polly, preceding her father for once, wentbefore, and opened the door upon a table abundantly supplied, and laidfor twelve.
At the table Mr. Porter told, for the benefit of Mrs. Melicent Porterand Mrs. Punderson, some of the events, both pathetic and tragic,that had occurred in the old house during his boyhood and youth, andMrs. Melicent Porter told again the events of the day in June--onlya year before--wherein the battle of Monmouth had been fought nearher New Jersey home, and she had spent the day in doing what shecould to relieve the sufferings of men so spent with battle and heatand wounds that they panted to her door with tongues hanging fromtheir mouths; also of her perilous journey from New Jersey toConnecticut on horseback, accompanied by Lieutenant-ColonelBaldwin, her father--during which journey it was, that she hadthrown her daughter Melicent in safety from her horse to the bankof the river they were fording, while the animal, having lost itsfooting, was going down the current.
While these things had been in the telling, Polly had slipped from thetable unnoticed, and had lighted every lamp that could brighten thehouse front and serve to guide to its porch. The last lamp was justalight when Polly's guests began to arrive. She half expectedsoldiers, and refugees came. It seemed to her that every family in NewHaven must be related to every family in Waterbury--so many women andchildren came in to rest themselves before continuing the journey and"to wait until the moon should rise," for the evening was very dark,and oh! the stories that each fresh arrival brought! They filled thegroup that came in to listen with fear and agony. New Haven was verynear to Waterbury in that day. The inhabitants there were closelyconnected with the inhabitants here, and their peril and distress wasa common woe. Little Stiles Hotchkiss cried himself to sleep thatnight, fearing that one of the three Hotchkisses, reported killed,might be his father.
Polly acted well her part. To the children she gave fresh milk; totheir elders she explained that the militia had taken their supplies,while she made place to receive two or three invalids who could go nofurther, by giving up her own room.
"You'll let me lie on the floor in your room, Aunt Melicent, I know,"she said, "for the poor lady is so old and so feeble; I'm most sureshe is a hundred. She came in a chaise and wanted to get up to ParsonLeavenworth's, but she just can't. She can't hold up her head."
It was near midnight when the refugees set forth for the Center, Mr.Porter himself acting as guide. After that time, the sleepy boys andthe entire household having taken themselves to bed, the old house wasleft to the night, with its silence and its chill dampness that alwayscomes up from the river, that goes on "singing to us the same bonnynonsense," despite our cheer or our sorrow. Again, and yet againthrough the night, doors opened and two mothers stepped out in themoonlight to listen, hoping--hoping to hear sound of the coming of theboys, but only the lone cry of the whippoorwill was borne on the air.
"'Pears like," said Phyllis to Mrs. Porter in the morning, "thewhippoorwills had lots to say last night; talked all night so's youcouldn't hear nothing 'tall."
"Phyllis," said Mrs. Porter, "there was nothing else to hear, but weshall know soon."
Polly came down, bringing her checked linen apron full of eggs forbreakfast. "I thought, mother," she said, "that you'd leave yourselfwithout an egg yesterday, so I looked out. Isn't it handy to have themin the house? Haven't heard a single cackle this morning yet, butyesterday was a remarkable day everyway. I believe the hens knew theBritish were coming. Did you ever see such eggs? Wonder if my old ladyis awake yet! Guess I'll carry up some hot water for her and findout."
Polly poured the water deftly from the big iron tea-kettle hangingfrom the crane and hurried away with it, only to return with suchhaste that she tripped on the threshold, broke the pitcher and sentthe water over everything it could reach. "Mother," she said,recovering herself, "Parson Leavenworth will be here to breakfast.He's coming down the road with father. My old lady will feel honored,won't she? I know he's come for her. Phyllis, any more hot water tospare? It's so good to take out wrinkles; she'll miss it, I know."
The sun had not climbed over Great Hill when breakfast was over, andthe last guest of the night had gone. Mrs. Punderson's daughter Annarode behind the Rev. Mark Leavenworth on his horse, Thankful with Mrs.Punderson, the old lady in the chaise, and even Stiles had gallopedaway toward the east, and yet not a traveler on the road had broughttidings from New Haven. The group on the porch watching the departurehad not dispersed when Polly's ears caught a strain floating up theriver valley. She listened. She ran. She clasped her mother in herarms. She kissed her. She whispered in her ear, "I hear him! He'scoming! Ethel is; and Cato is with him!" she cried out, embracingPhyllis in her joy. The two mothers--the one white, the other black;the one free, the other in bonds--went to listen. They stood side byside on the porch; tears fell from their eyes, tears that through allthe years science has failed to distinguish, the one from the other.Ethel's cheery call rang clear and clearer. Cato's wild cadence grewnear and nearer, but when the boys rode up beside the porch, Mrs.Porter was on her knees in the little bed-room off the parlor, andPhyllis was in the kitchen. New England mothers, both of them! Theirsorrows they could bear; their joys they hid from sight.
WATERBURY, CONN., September, 1898.
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Transcriber's Notes
Incorrect quotes and a few obvious typos (hugh/huge, fireams/firearms,and ziz/zig) have been fixed.
Otherwise, the author's original spelling has been preserved; e.g.Yankeys, afright and affright, and the incorrect usage of 'its'.
Passages in italics indicated by _underscores_.
The Only Woman in the Town, and Other Tales of the American Revolution Page 11