a pillar of granite, or a gloriousmemory in the universal heart of man.'
'We're in a strange way, tonight,' said the wife, with tears in hereyes. 'They say it's a sign of something, when folks' minds go awandering so. Hark to the children!'
They listened accordingly. The younger children had been put to bed inanother room, but with an open door between, so that they could be heardtalking busily among themselves. One and all seemed to have caught theinfection from the fireside circle, and were outvying each other in wildwishes, and childish projects of what they would do when they came tobe men and women. At length a little boy, instead of addressing hisbrothers and sisters, called out to his mother.
'I'll tell you what I wish, mother,' cried he. 'I want you and fatherand grandma'm, and all of us, and the stranger too, to start right away,and go and take a drink out of the basin of the Flume!'
Nobody could help laughing at the child's notion of leaving a warmbed, and dragging them from a cheerful fire, to visit the basin of theFlume--a brook, which tumbles over the precipice, deep within the Notch.The boy had hardly spoken when a wagon rattled along the road, andstopped a moment before the door. It appeared to contain two or threemen, who were cheering their hearts with the rough chorus of a song,which resounded, in broken notes, between the cliffs, while the singershesitated whether to continue their journey or put up here for thenight.
'Father,' said the girl, 'they are calling you by name.'
But the good man doubted whether they had really called him, and wasunwilling to show himself too solicitous of gain by inviting people topatronize his house. He therefore did not hurry to the door; and thelash being soon applied, the travellers plunged into the Notch, stillsinging and laughing, though their music and mirth came back drearilyfrom the heart of the mountain.
'There, mother!' cried the boy, again. 'They'd have given us a ride tothe Flume.'
Again they laughed at the child's pertinacious fancy for a night ramble.But it happened that a light cloud passed over the daughter's spirit;she looked gravely into the fire, and drew a breath that was almost asigh. It forced its way, in spite of a little struggle to repress it.Then starting and blushing, she looked quickly round the circle, as ifthey had caught a glimpse into her bosom. The stranger asked what shehad been thinking of.
'Nothing,' answered she, with a downcast smile. 'Only I felt lonesomejust then.'
'Oh, I have always had a gift of feeling what is in other people'shearts,' said he, half seriously. 'Shall I tell the secrets of yours?For I know what to think when a young girl shivers by a warm hearth,and complains of lonesomeness at her mother's side. Shall I put thesefeelings into words?'
'They would not be a girl's feelings any longer if they could be putinto words,' replied the mountain nymph, laughing, but avoiding his eye.
All this was said apart. Perhaps a germ of love was springing in theirhearts, so pure that it might blossom in Paradise, since it could not bematured on earth; for women worship such gentle dignity as his; andthe proud, contemplative, yet kindly soul is oftenest captivated bysimplicity like hers. But while they spoke softly, and he was watchingthe happy sadness, the lightsome shadows, the shy yearnings of amaiden's nature, the wind through the Notch took a deeper and dreariersound. It seemed, as the fanciful stranger said, like the choral strainof the spirits of the blast, who in old Indian times had their dwellingamong these mountains, and made their heights and recesses a sacredregion. There was a wail along the road, as if a funeral were passing.To chase away the gloom, the family threw pine branches on their fire,till the dry leaves crackled and the flame arose, discovering once againa scene of peace and humble happiness. The light hovered about themfondly, and caressed them all. There were the little faces of thechildren, peeping from their bed apart, and here the father's frame ofstrength, the mother's subdued and careful mien, the high-browed youth,the budding girl, and the good old grandam, still knitting in thewarmest place. The aged woman looked up from her task, and, with fingersever busy, was the next to speak.
'Old folks have their notions,' said she, 'as well as young ones. You'vebeen wishing and planning; and letting your heads run on one thing andanother, till you've set my mind a wandering too. Now what should an oldwoman wish for, when she can go but a step or two before she comes toher grave? Children, it will haunt me night and day till I tell you.'
'What is it, mother?' cried the husband and wife at once.
Then the old woman, with an air of mystery which drew the circle closerround the fire, informed them that she had provided her grave-clothessome years before--a nice linen shroud, a cap with a muslin ruff, andeverything of a finer sort than she had worn since her wedding day. Butthis evening an old superstition had strangely recurred to her. It usedto be said, in her younger days, that if anything were amiss with acorpse, if only the ruff were not smooth, or the cap did not set right,the corpse in the coffin and beneath the clods would strive to put upits cold hands and arrange it. The bare thought made her nervous.
'Don't talk so, grandmother!' said the girl, shuddering.
'Now'--continued the old woman, with singular earnestness, yet smilingstrangely at her own folly--'I want one of you, my children--whenyour mother is dressed and in the coffin---I want one of you to holda looking-glass over my face. Who knows but I may take a glimpse atmyself, and see whether all's right?'
'Old and young, we dream of graves and monuments,' murmured the strangeryouth. 'I wonder how mariners feel when the ship is sinking, andthey, unknown and undistinguished, are to be buried together in theocean--that wide and nameless sepulchre?'
For a moment, the old woman's ghastly conception so engrossed the mindsof her hearers that a sound abroad in the night, rising like the roarof a blast, had grown broad, deep, and terrible, before the fatedgroup were conscious of it. The house and all within it trembled; thefoundations of the earth seemed to be shaken, as if this awful soundwere the peal of the last trump. Young and old exchanged one wildglance, and remained an instant, pale, affrighted, without utterance, orpower to move. Then the same shriek burst simultaneously from all theirlips.
'The Slide! The Slide!'
The simplest words must intimate, but not portray, the unutterablehorror of the catastrophe. The victims rushed from their cottage, andsought refuge in what they deemed a safer spot--where, in contemplationof such an emergency, a sort of barrier had been reared. Alas! they hadquitted their security, and fled right into the pathway of destruction.Down came the whole side of the mountain, in a cataract of ruin.Just before it reached the house, the stream broke into twobranches--shivered not a window there, but overwhelmed the wholevicinity, blocked up the road, and annihilated everything in itsdreadful course. Long ere the thunder of the great Slide had ceased toroar among the mountains, the mortal agony had been endured, and thevictims were at peace. Their bodies were never found.
The next morning, the light smoke was seen stealing from the cottagechimney up the mountain side. Within, the fire was yet smouldering onthe hearth, and the chairs in a circle round it, as if the inhabitantshad but gone forth to view the devastation of the Slide, and wouldshortly return, to thank Heaven for their miraculous escape. All hadleft separate tokens, by which those who had known the family were madeto shed a tear for each. Who has not heard their name? (The storyhas been told far and wide, and Will forever be a legend of thesemountains.) Poets have sung their fate.
There were circumstances which led some to suppose that a stranger hadbeen received into the cottage on this awful night, and had shared thecatastrophe of all its inmates. Others denied that there were sufficientgrounds for such a conjecture. Woe for the high-souled youth, with hisdream of Earthly Immortality! His name and person utterly unknown; hishistory, his way of life, his plans, a mystery never to be solved, hisdeath and his existence equally a doubt! Whose was the agony of thatdeath moment?
The Great Stone Face, and Other Tales of the White Mountains Page 6
