cut him off fore he s a shock of wheat ; but then
the rebels must die first or last, as they desarve, for
trying to drive off the reg lars. Pretty times we
should have in New- York if they were gone : no
balls, no races, no t eatres, no music, no cast-off
rigimentals, for your lawyers and traders ant gen
teel that way, Mr. Linwood."
" Very true, gin ral. Here s fusion to the
rebels !" and he passed his cup of cider to his
compatriot.
K 3
226 THE LINWOODS.
" Now out on you, you lazy, slavish loons,"
cried Rose ; " can t you see these men are raised
up to fight for freedom for more than themselves ?
If the chain is broken at one end, the links will fall
apart sooner or later. When you see the sun on
the mountain-top, you may be sure it will shine
into the deepest valleys before long."
" I s pose what you mean, Rose, is, that all men
are going to be free. I heard Mr. Herbert say,
when he argied with master, that all men were
born free and equal ; he might as well say, all
men were born white and tall ; don t you say so,
gin ral."
" Be sure, Mr. Linwood, be sure. And I won
der what good their freedom would do em. Free
dom ant horses and char ots, tho horses and
char ots is freedom. Don t you own that, Miss
Rose ?"
" He s a dog that loves his collar," retorted Rose.
" Don t be fronted, Miss Rose. Tell me now,
don t you r ally think it s Cain-like and ongenteel
for a son to fight gainst his begotten father, and
so on ?"
" I would have every man fight on the Lord s
side," replied Rose, " and that s every man for his
own rights."
" La, Miss Rose, then what are them to do
what has not got any ?" Rose apparently disdain
ed a reply to this argument, and the general inter
posed.
THE LINWOODS. 227
" It may be well Mr. Herbert is gone, if he ant
dead and gone ; for by what folks say, if the war
goes on, there won t be too much left for Miss
Isabella."
" Folks say ! " growled Rose, " don t come
here, Mart, with any lies but your own."
" Well, well, Miss Rose, I did not say noting.
I know Miss Isabella is sure to have a grander
fortin nor ever her father had, and that fore long
too Jem Meredith tells me all about it."
" That being the case, Rose," said Jupe, " hand
us on a bit of butter. You are as close as if we
were in a sieged city."
" Butter for you, you old cormorant ! and butter
a dollar a pound ! No, no ; up, Jupe out, out,
Mars let me clear away."
Rose was absolute in her authority. Jupiter
rose, and Mars crawled most unwillingly out at the
door. When there, the drowsy, surfeited animal
was suddenly electrified ; he snuffed, wagged his
tail, barked, and ran in and out again. " What
does all this mean ?" demanded Rose ; and pushing
the door wide open, she espied a figure quietly
seated on the steps, repressing Mars, and whittling
with apparent unconcern. Now Rose, in com
mon with many energetic domestics, had the same
sort of antipathy to beggars that she had to moths
and vermin of every description, considering them
all equally marauders on the domicil.
" W r hat are you doing here, you lazy varmint ?
228 THE LINWOODS.
pretty time of day for a great two-fisted fellow to
be lying over the door, littering the steps this
fashion. Fawning on a beggar, Mars ! shame on
you ! clear out, sir !" and she gave a stroke with
her broom, so equally shared by the man and dog,
that it was not easy to say for which it was de
signed. The dog yelped, the man sprang adroitly
on one side of the step, raised his cap, and looked
Rose in the face.
It was a Gorgon glance to Rose. For an in
stant she was transfixed ; and then recovering her
self-possession, she said, so as to appear to her
auditors within to be replying to a petition :
" Hungry, are you ? well, well, go to the wash-
house, and I ll bring you some victuals the hun
gry must be fed."
" That s what master calls sound doctrine, Rose,"
said Jupiter ; " I hope you won t forget*it before my
supper-time."
" You, you hound, you never fast long enough
to be hungry ; but I ll remember you at supper-time
I ve some fresh pies in the pantry if you ll
take the big kettle to be mended. Now is a good
time Mart will lend you a hand."
Both assented, and thus in a few moments were
disposed of ; and Rose repaired to the wash-house
to embark her whole heart in Herbert s concerns,
provided her mind could be satisfied on some car
dinal points. After she had given vent to the first
burst of joy, something seemed to stick in Rose s
THE LINWOODS. 229
throat she hemmed, coughed, placed and displaced
the moveables about her, and then speaking out
her upright soul, she said, " you ant a deserter ?"
" A deserter, Rose ! I d not look you in the
face if 1 were."
" Nor a spy, Mr. Herbert ?"
"Indeed, I am not, Rose."
" Then," she cried, striking the back of one hand
into the palm of the other, " then we ll go through
fire and water for you ; but Miss Belle and I could
not raise our hands for spy or deserter, though he
were bone of her bone."
These preliminaries settled, nothing was easier
than for Rose to sympathize fully with the impru
dent intensity of Herbert s longings to see his own
family.. Nothing beyond present concealment was
to be thought of till a council could be held with
Isabella. Her injunction was obeyed, and Rose
immediately conducted Herbert to his own apart
ment. On his way thither he caught through a
glass door a glimpse of his mother, who was alone,
employing some stolen moments in knitting for her
son; stolen we say, for well beloved as he was,
she dared not even allude to him in his father s
presence. Mrs. Linwood was thoroughly imbued
with the conjugal orthodoxy, that
" Man was made for God,
Woman for God in him."
She firmly believed that the husband ruled by di-
20
230 THE LINWOODS.
vine right. She loved her son ; but love was not
with her as with Isabella, like the cataract in its nat
ural state, free and resistless ; but like the cataract
subdued by the art of man, controlled by his inven-
tions, and subserving his convenience. Such char
acters, if not interesting, are safe, provided they
fall into good hands. Such as she was, her son
loved her tenderly, and found it hard to resist
flying to her arms ; and he would actually have
done so when he saw her take up the measure-
stocking lying in her lap and kiss it, and Rose said,
" It is yours," but Rose held him back.
Every thing in his apartment had been pre
served, with scrupulous care, just as he had left it,
and all indicated that he was daily remembered.
There was nothing of the vault-like atmesphere
of a deserted room, no dust had accumulated on
the furniture. His books, his writing-materials,
his little toilet affairs, were as if he had left them
an hour before. Herbert had never felt more ten
derly than at this moment, surrounded by the~3
mute witnesses of domestic love, the sacrifice hs
had made to his country. He was destined to fei
it more painfully.
Rose reappeared with the best refreshments of
her larder. " Times are changed, Mr. Herbert,"
she said, " since you used to butter your bread
both sides, and when you dropped it on the car
pet say, The butter side is up, Rosy. 1 If the
war lasts much longer we shall have no buttered
side to our bread."
THE LINWOODS. 231
" How so, Rose ? I thought you lived on the
fat of the land in the city. Heaven knows our
portion is lean enough."
" Oh, Mr. Herbert, it takes a handful of money
now to buy one day s fare ; and money is far from
being plentiful with your father, though I d pull
out my tongue before I d say so to any but your
father s son. There s little coming in from the
rents, when the empty houses of the rebels (as our
people call them) are to be had for nothing, or
next to nothing. They say the commandant does
take the rent for some, and give it to the poor;
which is like trying to cheat the devil by giving a
good name to a bad deed."
" But, Rose, my father has property out of the
city."
" Yes, Mr. Herbert ; but the farms are on what s
called the neutral ground; and the tenants write
that what one side does not take, t other does not
leave ; and so between friends and foes it s all
Miss Isabella and I can do to keep the wheels
agoing. She has persuaded your father to dispose
of all the servants but Jupe and me plague and
no profit were they always, as slaves always are.
There s no telling the twists and turns that she
and your mother makes that your father may see
no difference on the table, where he d feel it most.
If he does, he s sure to curse the rebels ; and that *
a dagger to them."
" Rose, does my father never speak of me ?"
232 THE LINWOODS.
" Never, Mr. Herbert, never."
" Nor my mother ?"
Rose shook her head. " Not in your father s
hearing."
" And mv sister is she afraid to speak my
name ?"
" She ! the Lord forgive you, Mr Herbert.
When did she ever fear to do what was right ?
There s not a day she does not talk of you, though
your mother looks scared, and your father looks
black ; but I mistrust he s pleased. I heard her
read to him out of a newspaper one day how Gen
eral Washington had sent your name in to Con
gress as one of them that had done their duty hand
some at Stony Point or some of them places ; and
she clapped her hands, and put her arms round
his neck, and said, with that voice of hers that s
sweeter than a flute, Are you not proud of him ? "
" My noble sister ! what did he say, Rose ?"
" Never a word with his lips ; but he went out
of the room as if he d been shot, his face speaking
plainer than words."
" Oh, he ll forgive me ! I m sure he will !" ex
claimed Herbert, his ardent feelings kindling at the
first light.
" Don t be too sartin, Mr. Herbert will and
heart are at war ; and will has been master so long
that I mistrust heart is weakest if, indeed," she
added, averting her eye, "you should join the
Reformees "
THE LINWOODS. 233
"Ay, then the fatted calf would be killed for
me ! No, Rose, I had rather die with my father s
curse upon me."
" And better better ! far better, Mr. Herbert :
your father s curse, if you don t desarve it, won t
cut in ; but the curse of conscience is what can t
be borne. I must not stay here longer. If you
get tired sitting alone, you can sleep away the
time. The bed has fresh linen I change it every
month, so it sha n t get an old smell, and put them
in mind how long you ve been gone."
" After all," thought Herbert, as the faithful
creature quitted the room, " I have never suffered
the worst of absence the misery of being forgot
ten !" But every solacing reflection was soon lost
in the anxieties that beset him. A light-hearted,
thoughtless youth, is like the bark that dances over
the waves when skies are cloudless, breezes light
and tides favourable, but wants strength and bal
last for difficult straits and tempestuous weather.
" I have swamped myself completely," thought
Herbert. " Eliot must inevitably leave me in the
city. It was selfish in me to expose him to cen
sure that never occurred to me. Instead of get
ting my father s forgiveness a fond, foolish drea:/
I stand a good chance, if Rose is right, of being-
handed over to the tender mercies of Sir Henry
Clinton. And if I escape hanging here I am lost
with General Washington : imprudence and rash
ness are sins of the first degree with him. Would
20*
234 THE LINWOODS.
to Heaven I could get out of this net as easily as
I ran into it ! I always put the cart before the
horse action before thought."
With such meditations the time passed heavily ;
and Herbert took refuge in Rose s advice, and
hrew himself on the bed within the closely-drawn
curtains.
We hope our sentimental readers will not aban
don him, when we confess that he soon fell into a
profound sleep, from which he did not awaken for
several hours. They must be agitating griefs that
overcome the strong tendencies of a vigorous con
stitution to eating and sleeping. And besides, it
must be remembered in Herbert s favour, that the
preceding night had been one long fatiguing vigil.
Kind nature, pardon us for apologizing for thy gra
cious ministry.
TPTE LINWOObS. 235
CHAPTER XV.
" L habitude de vivre ensemble fit naitre les plus doux senti-
mens qui soient comius des homines." ROUSSEAU.
HERBERT S sleep was troubled with fragments
and startling combinations of his waking thoughts.
At one moment he was at Westbrook, making love
to Bessie, who seemed to be deaf to him, and in
tently reading a letter in Jasper Meredith s hand ;
while Helen Ruthven stood behind her, beckoning
to Herbert with her most seductive smile, which
he fancied he was not to be deluded by. Sud
denly the scene changed he had a rope round his
neck, and was mounting a scaffold, surrounded
by a crowd, where he saw Washington, Eliot, his
father, mother, and Isabella all unconcerned spec
tators. Then, as is often the case, a real sound
shaped the unreal vision. He witnessed his own
funeral obsequies, and heard his father reading the
burial service over him. By degrees, sleep loosen
ed the chain that bound his fancy, and the actual
sounds became distinct. He awoke : a candle was
burning on the table, and he heard his father
in an adjoining apartment, to which it had always
been his habit to retire for his evening devo
tions. He heard him repeat the formula pre
236 THE LINWOODS.
scribed by the church, and then his voice, tremu
lous with the feeling that gushed from his heart,
broke forth in an extempore appeal to Him who
, holds all hearts in the hollow of his hand. He
prayed him to visit with his grace his wandering
son ; and to incline him to turn away from feeding
on husks with swine, and bring him home to his
father s house to his duty to his God. " If it
please thee," he said, " humble thy servant in any
other form send poverty, sickness, desertion, but
restore my only and well-beloved boy ; wipe out
the stain of rebellion from my name. If this may
not be, if still thy servant must go sorrowing for
the departed glory of his house, keep him steadfast
in duty, so that he swerve not, even for his son,
his only son."
The prayer finished, his door was opened, and
he saw his Luher enter without daring himself to
move. Mr. Linwood looked at the candle, glanced
his eye around the room, and then sat down at
the table, saying, as if in explanation, " Belle has
been here." He covered his face with both his
hands, and murmured in a broken voice, " Oh,
Herbert, was it to store up these bitter hours that
I watched over your childhood that I came every
night here, when you were sleeping, to kiss you
and pray over your pillow ? what fools we are !
we knit the love of our children with our very
heart-strings we tend on them we pamper them
THE UNWOODS. 237
we blend our lives with theirs, and then we are
deserted forgotten !"
" Never, never for one moment !" cried Herbert,
who with one spring was at his father s feet. Mr.
Linwood started from him, and then, obeying the
impulse of nature, he received his son s embrace,
and they wept in one another s arms.
The door softly opened. Isabella appeared, and
her face irradiating with most joyful surprise,
she called, "Mamma, mamma; here, in Herbert s
room !" In another instant, Herbert had folded his
mother and sister to his bosom ; and Mr. Linwood
was beginning to recover his self-possession, and to
feel as if he had been betrayed into the surrender
of a post. He walked up and down the room, then
suddenly stopping and laying his hand on Her
bert s shoulder, and surveying him from head to
foot, "I know not, but I fear," he said, "what
this disguise may mean tell me, in one word, do
you return penitent ?"
" I return grieving that I ever offended you, my
dear father, and venturing life and honour to see
you to hear you say that you forgive me."
" Herbert, my son, you know," replied Mr. Lin
wood, his voice faltering with the tenderness against
which he struggled, " that my door and my heart
have always been open to you, provided "
" Oh, no provideds, papa ! Herbert begs your
forgiveness this is enough."
238 THE LINWOODS
" I wish, sir, you would think it was enough,"
sobbed Mrs. Linwood.
" You must think so, papa ; it is the sin and
misery of these unhappy times that divides you.
Give to the winds your political differences, and
leave the war to the camp and the field. Her
bert has always loved and honoured you."
Mr. Linwood felt as if they were dragging him
over a precipice, and he resisted with all his might.
" A pretty way he has taken to show it !" he said,
" let him declare he has abandoned the rebels and
traitors, and their cause, and I will believe it."
Herbert was silent.
" My dear father," said Isabella.
" Nay, Isabella, do not dear father me. I
will not be coaxed out of my right reason. If you
can tell me that your brother abandons and abjures
the miscreants, speak if not, be silent."
" If it were true that he did abandon them, he
would be no son of yours, no brother of mine. If
he were thus restored to us, who could restore him
tc himself? where could he hide him from himself?
Your own soul would spurn a renegado ! think
better of him think better of his friends they
are not all miscreants. There are many noble,
highminded "
"What? what, Isabella ?"
" As deluded as he is."
"A wisely-finished sentence, child. But you
need not undertake to teach me what they are. 1
THE LINWOODS. 239
know them a set of paltry schismatics pet
tifogging attorneys schoolmasters mechanics
shop-keepers bankrupts outlaws smugglers
half-starved, half-bred, ragged sons of Belial; band
ed together, and led on by that quack Catiline, that
despot-in-chief, Washington. * No son of mine if
he abjures them ! I swear to you, Herbert, that
on these terms alone will I ever again receive you
as my son." Again he paused, and after some re
flection, added, "You have an alternative if you
do not choose to avail yourself of Sir Henry s
standing proclamation, and come in and receive
your pardon as a deserter you Kiay join the corps
of Reformees. This opportunity now lost, is lost
for ever. Is my forgiveness worth the price I have
fixed ? speak, Herbert."
" Have I not proved how inexpressibly dear it is
to me ?"
" No faltering, young man ! speak to the point."
" Oh, my dear, dear son," said his mother, " if
you but knew how much we have all suffered for
you, and how happy you can now make us, if you
only will, you would not hesitate, even if the rebel
cause were a good one : you are but as one man to
that, and to us you are all the world."
This argumentum ad hominem (the only argu
ment of weak minds) clouded Herbert s percep
tion. It was a moment of the most painful vacil
lation ; the forgiveness of his father, the minister
ing, indulgent love of his mother, the presence of
240 THE LINWOODS.
his sister, the soft endearments of home, and all its
dear familiar objects, solicited him. He had once
forsaken them, but then he was incited by the
immeasurable expectation of unrebuked youth,
thoughts of high emprise, romantic deeds, and
strange incidents ; but his experience, with few and
slight exceptions, had been a tissue of dangers
without the opportunity of brilliant exploits ; of
fatigue without reward ; and of rough and scanty
fare, which, however well it may tell in the past
life of a hero, has no romantic charm in its actual
details. He continued silent. His father perceiv
ed, or at least hoped, that he wavered.
" Speak," he said, in a voice of earnest entreaty,
" speak, Herbert my dear son, for God s sake,
speak."
" It is right above all things to desire his forgive
ness," thought Herbert, " and it is plain there is but
one way of getting it. I am in a diabolical hobble
if I succeed in getting back to camp, what am I to
expect ? Imprudence is crime with our general ;
and after all, what good have I done the cause ?
and yet"
" Herbert," exclaimed Isabella, and her voice
thrilled through his soul, "is it possible you wa
ver?"
He started as if he were electrified : his eye met
heis, and the evil spirits of doubt and irresolution
were overcome.
"Heaven forgive me!" he said, "I waT-er no
longer."
THE LINWOODS. 241
" Then, by all that is holy," exclaimed Mr. Lin-
wood, flushed with disappointment and rage, " you
shall reap as you sow; it shall never be sakfthat
I sheltered a rebel, though that rebel be my son."
He rang the bell violently ; " Justice shall have its
course why does not Jupe come ! you too to
prove false, Isabella ! I might have known it when
I saw you drinking in the vapouring of that fellow
Lee to-day ;" again he rang the bell : " you may
all desert me, but I ll be true so long as my pulse
beats."
No one replied to him. Mrs. Linwood, sustained
by Herbert s encircling arm, wept aloud. Isabella
knew the tide of her father s passion would have
its ebb as well as flow ; she believed the servants
were in bed, and that before he could obtain a mes
senger to communicate with the proper authority,
which she perceived to be his present intention, his
Brutus resolution would fail. She was however
startled by hearing voices in the lower entry, and
immediately Rose burst opeR the door, crying,
" Fly, Mr. Herbert they are after yo-u !"
The words operated on Mr. Linwood like a
gust of wind on a superincumbent cloud of smoke
His angry emotions passed off, and nature flamed
up bright and irresistible. Every thought, every
feeling but for Herbert s escape and safety, van
ished. " This way, my son," he cried ; " through
your mother s room down the back stairs, and out
the side gate. God help you !" He closed the
VOL. i. L 21
242 THE LINWOODS.
door after Herbert, locked it, and put the key in
his pocket. Isabella advanced into the entry to
meet her brother s pursuers, and procure a delay of
a few moments on what pretext she could. She
was met by two men and an officer, sent by Colo
nel Robertson, the commandant. " Your pardon,
Miss Linwood," said the officer, pushing by her
into the room where her father awaited him.
" How very rude !" exclaimed Mrs. Linwood,
for once in her life speaking first and independently
in her husband s presence ; " how very rude, sir,
to come up stairs into our bedrooms without per
mission." The officer smiled at this pretended def
erence to forms at the moment the poor mother
was pale as death, and shivering with terror. " 1
beg your pardon, madam, and yours, Mr. Linwood
this is the last house in the city in which I
should willingly have performed this duty ; but you,
sir, are aware, that in these times our very best
and most honoured friends are sometimes involved
with our foes."
" No apologies, sir, there s no use in them you
are in search of Mr. Herbert Linwood proceed
my house is subject to your pleasure."
The officer was reiterating his apologies, when
a cry from the side entrance to the yard announced
that the fugitive was taken. Mr. Linwood sunk
into his chair; but instantly rallying, he asked
whither his son was to be conducted.
" I am sorry to say, sir, that I am directed to
lodge him in the Provost."
THE LINWOODS. 243
"In Cunningham s hands! the Lord have
mercy on him, then !"
The officer assured him the young man should
have whatever alleviation it was in his power to
afford him, until Sir Henry s further pleasure should
be known. He then withdrew, and left Mr. Lin-
wood exhausted by a rapid succession of jarring
emotions.
Isabella retired with her mother, and succeeded
in lulling her into a tranquillity which she herself
was far enough from attaining.
The person whom, as it may be remembered,
Linwood met in passing down the lane to his
father s house, was an emissary of Robertson, who
had been sent on a scout for Captain Lee s attend
ant, and who immediately reported to the com
mandant his suspicions. He, anxious, if possible,
not to offend the elder Linwood, had stationed men
in the lane and in Broad-street, to watch for the
young man s egress. They waited till ten in the
evening, and then found it expedient to proceed
to the direct measures which ended in Herbert s
capture.
S44 THE LINWOODS.
CHAPTER XVI.
" Great is thy power, and great thy fame
Far kenn d and noted is thy name !
An tho yon lowin heugh s thy hame,
Thou travels far."
BURNS.
ELIOT LEE returned to his lodgings from Sir
Henry s in no very comfortable frame of mind. It
was his duty, and this duty, like others, had the in
convenient property of inflexibility, to return to
West Point with the despatches without attempt
ing to extricate his friend from the shoals and
quicksands amid which he had so rashly rushed.