"Why, no, I can't--let's hear," was the response of the wagoner, somewhat astounded by the volubility of his new acquaintance.

"Well, then, I'll tell you. He sent me away, to make my fortin, and git my edication, 'mongst them who was 'cute themselves, and maybe that an't the best school for larning a simple boy ever went to. It was sharp edge agin sharp edge. It was the very making of me, so far as I was made."

"Well, now, that is a smart way, I should reckon, to get one's edication. And in this way I suppose you larned how to chop with your little poleaxe. Dogs! but you've made me as smart a looking axle as I ever tacked to my team."

"I tell you, friend, there's nothing like sich an edication. It does everything for a man, and he larns to make everything out of nothing. I could make my bread where these same Indians wouldn't find the skin of a hoe-cake; and in these woods, or in the middle of the sea, t'ant anything for me to say I can always fish up some notion that will sell in the market."

"Well, now, that's wonderful, strannger, and I should like to see how you would do it."

"You can't do nothing, no how, friend, unless you begin at the beginning. You'll have to begin when you're jest a mere boy, and set about getting your edication as I got mine. There's no two ways about it. It won't come to you; you must go to it. When you're put out into the wide world, and have no company and no acquaintance, why, what are you to do? Suppose, now, when your wagon mired down, I had not come to your help, and cut out your wood, and put in the spoke, wouldn't you have had to do it yourself?"

"Yes--to be sure; but then I couldn't have done it in a day. I an't handy at these things."

"Well, that was jest the way with me when I was a boy. I had n.o.body to help me out of the mud--n.o.body to splice my spokes, or a.s.sist me any how, and so I larned to do it myself. And now, would you think it, I'm sometimes glad of a little turn-over, or an accident, jest that I may keep my hand in and not forget to be able to help myself or my neighbors."

"Well, you're a cur'ous person, and I'd like to hear something more about you. But it's high time we should wet our whistles, and it's but dry talking without something to wash a clear way for the slack. So, boys, be up, and fish up the jemmi-john--I hope it hain't been thumped to bits in the rut. If it has, I shall be in a tearing pa.s.sion."

"Well, now, that won't be reasonable, seeing that it's no use, and jest wasting good breath that might bring a fair price in the market."

"What, not get in a pa.s.sion if all the whiskey's gone? That won't do, strannger, and though you have helped me out of the ditch, by, dogs, no man shall prevent me from getting in a pa.s.sion if I choose it."

"Oh, to be sure, friend--you an't up to my idee. I didn't know that it was for the good it did you that you got in a pa.s.sion. I am clear that when a man feels himself better from a pa.s.sion, he oughtn't to be shy in getting into it. Though that wasn't a part of my edication, yet I guess, if such a thing would make me feel more comfortable, I'd get in a pa.s.sion fifty times a day."

"Well, now, strannger, you talk like a man of sense. 'Drot the man, says I, who hain't the courage to get in a pa.s.sion! None but a miserable, shadow-skinning Yankee would refuse to get in a pa.s.sion when his jug of whiskey was left in the road!"

"A-hem--" coughed the dealer in small wares--the speech of the old wagoner grating harshly upon his senses; for if the Yankee be proud of anything, it is of his country--its enterprise, its inst.i.tutions; and of these, perhaps, he has more true and unqualified reason to be pleased and proud than any other one people on the face of the globe. He did not relish well the sitting quietly under the harsh censure of his companion, who seemed to regard the existence of a genuine emotion among the people down east as a manifest absurdity; and was thinking to come out with a defence, in detail, of the pretensions of New England, when, prudence having first taken a survey of the huge limbs of the wagoner, and calling to mind the fierce prejudices of the uneducated southrons generally against all his tribe, suggested the convenient propriety of an evasive reply.

"A-hem--" repeated the Yankee, the _argumentum ad hominem_ still prominent in his eyes--"well, now, I take it, friend, there's no love to spare for the people you speak of down in these parts. They don't seem to smell at all pleasant in this country."

"No, I guess not, strannger, as how should they--a mean, tricky, catchpenny, skulking set--that makes money out of everybody, and hain't the spirit to spend it! I do hate them, now, worse than a polecat!"

"Well, now, friend, that's strange. If you were to travel for a spell, down about Boston or Salem in Ma.s.sachusetts, or at Meriden in Connecticut, you'd hear tell of the Yankees quite different. If you believe what the people say thereabouts, you'd think there was no sich people on the face of the airth."

"That's jist because they don't know anything about them; and it's not because they can't know them neither, for a Yankee is a varmint you can nose anywhere. It must be that none ever travels in those parts--selling their tin-kettles, and their wooden clocks, and all their notions."

"Oh, yes, they do. They make 'em in those parts. I know it by this same reason, that I bought a lot myself from a house in Connecticut, a town called Meriden, where they make almost nothing else but clocks--where they make 'em by steam, and horse-power, and machinery, and will turn you out a hundred or two to a minute."

The pedler had somewhat "overleaped his shoulders," as they phrase it in the West, when his companion drew himself back over the blazing embers, with a look of ill-concealed aversion, exclaiming, as he did so--

"Why, you ain't a Yankee, air you?"

The pedler was a special pleader in one sense of the word, and knew the value of a technical distinction as well as his friend, Lawyer Pippin.

His reply was prompt and professional:--

"Why, no, I ain't a Yankee according to your idee. It's true, I was born among them; but that, you know, don't make a man one on them?"

"No, to be sure not. Every man that's a freeman has a right to choose what country he shall belong to. My dad was born in Ireland, yet he always counted himself a full-blooded American."

The old man found a parallel in his father's nativity, which satisfied himself of the legitimacy of the ground taken by the pedler, and helped the latter out of his difficulty.

"But here's the whiskey standing by us all the time, waiting patiently to be drunk. Here, Nick Snell, boy, take your hands out of your breeches-pocket, and run down with the calabash to the branch. The water is pretty good thar, I reckon; and, strannger, after we've taken a sup, we'll eat a bite, and then lie down. It's high time, I reckon, that we do so."

It was in his progress to the branch that Ralph Colleton came upon this member of the family.

Nick Snell was no genius, and did not readily reply to the pa.s.sing inquiry which was put to him by the youth, who advanced upon the main party while the dialogue between the pedler and the wagoner was in full gust. They started, as if by common consent, to their feet, as his horse's tread smote upon their ears; but, satisfied with the appearance of a single man, and witnessing the jaded condition of his steed, they were content to invite him to partake with them of the rude cheer which the good-woman was now busied in setting before him.

The hoe-cakes and bacon were smoking finely, and the fatigue of the youth engaged his senses, with no unwillingness on their part, to detect a most savory attraction in the a.s.sault which they made upon his sight and nostrils alike. He waited not for a second invitation, but in a few moments--having first stripped his horse, and put the saddle, by direction of the emigrant, into his wagon--he threw himself beside them upon the ground, and joined readily and heartily in the consumption of the goodly edibles which were spread out before them.

They had not been long at this game, when a couple of fine watch-dogs which were in the camp, guarding the baggage, gave the alarm, and the whole party was on the alert, with sharp eye and c.o.c.ked rifle. They commenced a survey, and at some distance could hear the tread of hors.e.m.e.n, seemingly on the approach. The banditti, of which we have already spoken, were well known to the emigrant, and he had already to complain of divers injuries at their hands. It is not, therefore, matter of surprise, that he should place his sentinels, and prepare even for the most audacious attack.

He had scarcely made this disposition of his forces, which exhibited them to the best advantage, when the strangers made their appearance.

They rode cautiously around, without approaching the defences sufficiently nigh to occasion strife, but evidently having for their object originally an attack upon the wayfarer. At length, one of the party, which consisted of six persons, now came forward, and, with a friendly tone of voice, bade them good-evening in a manner which seemed to indicate a desire to be upon a footing of the most amiable sort with them. The old man answered dryly, with some show of sarcastic indifference in his speech--

"Ay, good evening enough, if the moon had not gone down, and if the stars were out, that we might pick out the honest men from the rogues."

"What, are there rogues in these parts, then, old gentleman?" asked the new-comer.

"Why do you ask me?" was the st.u.r.dy reply. "You ought to be able to say, without going farther than your own pockets."

"Why, you are tough to-night, my old buck," was the somewhat crabbed speech of the visiter.

"You'll find me troublesome, too, Mr. Nightwalker: so take good counsel, and be off while you've whole bones, or I'll tumble you now in half a minute from your crittur, and give you a sharp supper of pine-knots."

"Well, that wouldn't be altogether kind on your part, old fellow, and I mightn't be willing to let you; but, as you seem not disposed to be civil, I suppose the best thing I can do is to be off."

"Ay, ay, be off. You get nothing out of us; and we've no shot that we want to throw away. Leave you alone, and Jack Ketch will save us shot."

"Ha, ha!" exclaimed the outlier, in concert, and from the deeper emphasis which he gave it, in chorus to the laughter which followed, among the party, the dry expression of the old man's humor--

"Ha, ha! old boy--you have the swing of it to-night," continued the visiter, as he rode off to his companions; "but, if you don't mind, we shall smoke you before you get into Alabam!"

The robber rejoined his companions, and a sort of council for deliberation was determined upon among them.

"How now, Lambert! you have been at dead fault," was his sudden address, as he returned, to one of the party. "You a.s.sured me that old Snell and his two sons were the whole force that he carried, while I find two stout, able-bodied men besides, all well armed, and ready for the attack. The old woman, too, standing with the gridiron in her fists, is equal of herself to any two men, hand to hand."

Lambert, a short, sly, dogged little personage, endeavored to account for the error, if such it was--"but he was sure, that at starting, there were but three--they must have have had company join them since. Did the lieutenant make out the appearance of the others?"

"I did," said the officer in command, "and, to say truth, they do not seem to be of the old fellow's party. They must have come upon him since the night. But how came you, Lambert, to neglect sawing the axle? You had time enough when it stood in the farmyard last night, and you were about it a full hour. The wagon stands as stoutly on its all-fours as the first day it was built."

"I did that, sir, and did it, I thought, to the very mark. I calculated to leave enough solid to bear them to the night, when in our circuit we should come among them just in time to finish the business. The wood is stronger, perhaps, than I took it to be, but it won't hold out longer than to-morrow, I'm certain, when, if we watch, we can take our way with them."

"Well, I hope so, and we must watch them, for it won't do to let the old fellow escape. He has, I know, a matter of three or four hundred hard dollars in his possession, to buy lands in Mississippi, and it's a pity to let so much good money go out of the state."

"But why may we not set upon them now?" inquired one of the youngest of the party.

"For a very good reason, Briggs--they are armed, ready, and nearly equal in number to ourselves; and though I doubt not we should be able to ride over them, yet I am not willing to leave one or more of us behind.

Besides, if we keep the look-out to-morrow, as we shall, we can settle the business without any such risk."