The Puddleford Papers: or, Humors of the West

"O! everything that's bad. She don't never say anything that's good 'bout nobody. She's allers talking. There ain't nobody in the settlement she hain't slandered. She even abused old Deacon Snipes' horse – the orful critter!"

"But what did she say about Philista Filkins?" repeated Ike again.

"What do you want me to say she said? I hain't got any doubt she's called her everything she could think on. Didn't she, Philisty?" she continued, turning her head towards the plaintiff.

Philista nodded.

"Did she say she warn't no better than she ought to be?"

"Did she? well, she did, and that very few people were."

"Stop! stop!" exclaimed Ike, "you talk too fast! I guess she didn't say all that."

"She did, for Philista told me so; and she wouldn't lie for the whole race of Beadles."

Squire Longbow thought Eunice had better retire, as she didn't seem to know much about the case.

She said she knew as much about it as anybody; she want "going to be abused, trod upon; and no man was a man that would insult a poor woman;" and bursting into tears of rage, she twitched out of her chair, and went sobbing away.

Philista closed, and Sile stated, in his opening to the court on the part of the defence, that this was a "little the smallest case he ever had seen." His client stood out high and dry; she stood up like Andes looking down on a potato-hill; he didn't propose to offer scarcely any proof; and that little was by way of set-off – tongue against tongue – according to the statute in such case made and provided; he hoped the court would examine the law for himself. (Here Sile unrolled a long account against Philista, measuring some three feet, and held it up to the Squire and jury.) This, he said, was a reg'lar statement of the slanderous words used by Philista Filkins agin Charity Beadle for the last three years, with the damage annexed; everything had been itemized, and kept in tip-top style; all in black and white, just as it happened. Sile was about reading this formidable instrument, when Ike objected.

"That can't be did in this 'ere court!" exclaimed Ike; "the light of civilization has shed itself a little too thick for that. This court might just as well try to swallow a chestnut-burr, or a cat, tail foremost, as to get such a proposition a-down its throat."

Squire Longbow said he'd "never heer'd of such law – yet the question was new to him."

"Laid down in all the law-books of the nineteenth century!" exclaimed Sile, "and never heard on't!"

"Never did."

"Why," continued Sile, "the statute allows set-off where it is of the same natur of the action. This, you see, is slander agin slander."

"True," replied the Squire.

"True, did you say!" exclaimed Ike. "You say the statute does allow slander to be set off; our statute – that statute that I learned by heart before I knew my A B C's – you old bass-wood headed son – " But the Squire stopped Ike just at this time. "We will decide the question first," he said. "The court have made no decision yet."

Squire Longbow was in trouble. He smoked furiously. He examined the statutes, looked over his docket, but he did not seem to get any light. Finally, a lucky thought struck him. He saw old Mr. Brown in the crowd, who had the reputation of having once been a justice in the State of New York. The Squire arose and beckoned to him, and both retired to an adjoining room. After about a half an hour, the Squire returned and took his seat, and delivered his opinion. Here it is: —

"After an examination of all the p'ints both for and agin the 'lowing of the set-off, in which the court didn't leave no stone unturned to get at justice, having ransacked some half a dozen books from eend to eend, and noted down everything that anywise bore on the subject; recollecting, as the court well doz, what the great Story, who's now dead and gone, done and writ 'bout this very thing (for we must be 'lowed to inform this 'sembly that we read Story in our juvenil' years); having done this, and refreshing our minds with the testimony, and keeping in our eye the rights of parties – right-er liberty, and right-er speech, back'ards and for'ards – for I've as good a right to talk agin you, as you have to talk agin me – knowing, as the court doz, how much blood has been shed 'cause folks wern't 'lowed to talk as much as they pleased, making all natur groan, the court is of the opinion that the set-off must be let in; and such is also Squire Brown's opinion, and nobody will contradict that, I know."

"Je-hos-a-phat!" groaned out Ike, drawing one of his very longest breaths. "The great Je-mi-ma Wilkinson! and so that is law, arter all! There's my hat, Squire," Ike continued, as he arose and reached it out to him; "and you shall have my gallusses as soon as I can get at 'em."

The Squire said "the dignity of the court must be preserved."

"Of course it must! of course it must!" replied Ike, who was growing very philosophical over the opinion of the Squire; "there ain't no friction on my gudgeons now; I always gins in to reg'lar opinions, delivered upon consideration; I was just thinking, though, Squire, that as their bill is so much the longest, and as the parties are both here, Charity had better let her tongue loose upon my client, and take out the balance on the spot."

The Squire said "the cause must go on." Sile read his set-off, made up of slanderous words alleged to have been used; damages fifty dollars; and calling Charity herself, upon the principle, as he said, "that it was a book-account, and her books were evidence; and her books having been lost, the paper which he held, and which was a true copy —for he made it out himself– was the next best evidence; all of which Charity would swear to straight along."

The court admitted Charity, and she swore the set-off through, and some fifty dollars more; and she was going on horse-race speed, when Sile stopped her "before," as he told her, "she swore the cause beyond the jurisdiction of a magistrate."

Here the evidence closed. Midnight had set in, and the cause was yet to be summed up.

The court informed Ike and Sile that they were limited to half an hour each.

Ike opened the argument, and such an opening, and such an argument! It will not be expected that I can repeat it. There never lived a man who could. It covered all things mortal and immortal. Genius, and sense, and nonsense; wit, humor, pathos, venom, and vulgarity, were all piled up together, and belched forth upon the jury. He talked about the case, the court, the jury, his client, the history of the world, and Puddleford in particular. "The slander was admitted," he declared, "because the defendant had tried to set off something agin it; and if his client didn't get a judgment, he'd make a rattling among the dry bones of the law, that would rouse the dead of '76!" He was "fifty feet front, and rear to the river;" "had seen great changes en the t'restial globe;" "know'd all the sciences from Neb-u-cud-nezzar down;" "know'd law – 'twas the milk of his existence." As to the court's opinion about the set-off, "his head was chock full of cobwebs or bumble-bees, he didn't know which;" "his judgment warn't hardly safe on a common note er-hand;" "he'd no doubt but that three jist such cases would run him stark mad;" "Natur was sorry she'd ever had anything to do with him; and he'd himself been sorry ever since; and as for ed'cation, he warn't up to the school-marm, for she could read;" "the jury had better give him a verdict if they didn't want the nightmare." And thus he was running on, when his half hour expired, but he could not be stopped – as well stop a tornado. So Sile arose, and commenced his argument for the defendant; and at it both labored, Ike for plaintiff, Sile for defendant, until the court swore a constable, and ordered the jury to retire with him, the argument still going on; and thus the jury left the room, Ike and Sile following them up, laying down the law and the fact; and the last thing I observed just before the door closed, was Ike's arm run through it at us, going through a variety of gestures, his expiring effort in behalf of his client.

After a long deliberation among the jurors, during which almost everything was discussed but the evidence, it was announced by our foreman, on "coming in," that "we could not agree, four on 'em being for fifty dollars for the defendant 'cording to law, and one on 'em for no cause of action (myself), and he stood out, 'cause he was a-feared, or wanted to be pop'lar with somebody."

And thus ended the trial between Filkins and Beadle.

CHAPTER III

Wanderings in the Wilderness. – A Bee-Hunt. – Sunrise. – The Fox-Squirrel. – The Blue-Jay. – The Gopher. – The Partridges. – Wild Geese, Ducks, and Cranes. – Blackbirds and Meadow-Larks. – Venison's Account of the Bees' Domestic Economy. – How Venison found what he was in Search of. – Honey Secured. – After Reflections.

Venison Styles and myself, as I have stated, had now become intimate. Together we scoured the woods and streams, in pursuit of fish and game. There was a kind of rustic poetry about the old man that fascinated my soul. His thoughts and feelings had been drawn from nature, and there was a strange freshness and life about everything he said and did. He was as firm and fiery as a flint; and the sparks struck out of him were as beautiful. Winds and storms, morn's early dawn, the hush of evening, the seasons and all their changes, had become a part of him – they had moulded and kept him. They played upon him like a breeze upon a harp. How could I help loving him?

Before daybreak, one morning in October, Venison, myself, his honey-box, and axes, set out "a bee-hunting," as he called it. It was in the beautiful and inspiring season of Indian summer, a season that lingers long and lovely over the forests of the west. There had been a hard, black frost during the night, and the great red sun rose upon it, shrouded in smoke. We were soon deep in the heart of the wilderness, tramping over the fallen leaves, and pushing forward to where the "bees were thick a-workin'," according to Venison.

As the sun rose higher and higher, the leaves began, all around, to thaw, and detach themselves from the trees, and silently settle to the ground. There stood the yellow walnut, the blood-red maple, side by side with the green pine and the spruce. Ten thousand rainbows were interlaced through the tops of the trees, and now and then a sharp peak shot up its pile of mosaic into the sky.

Not a sound was heard around us till morning's dawn. The tranquillity was oppressive. The mighty wilderness was asleep. Everything felt as fixed and awful as eternity. The vast extent of the wooded waste, reaching thousands of miles beyond, on, and on, and on, filled with mountains, lakes, and streams, lying in solitary grandeur, as unchanged as on the day the Pyramids were finished, overwhelmed the imagination. And then the future arose upon the mind, when all this will be busy with life – when the present will be history, referred to, but not remembered – when the present population of the globe will have been swept from the face of it, and another generation in our place, playing with the toys that so long amused, and which we, at last, left behind us.

But as day dawned, and morning began to throw in her arrows of gold about our feet, the wilderness began to wake up. A fox-squirrel shot out from his bed in a hollow tree, where he had been lodging during the night; and scampering up a tall maple, he sat himself down, threw his tail over his back, and broke forth with his chick-chick-chickaree, chickaree, chickaree! – making the woods ring with his song.

"Look at him," exclaimed Venison; "he's as sassy as ever. If I had my rifle, I'd knock the spots off that check coat of his'n; I'd larn him to chickaree old Venison."

This squirrel, very common in some of the north-western states, is one of the largest and most beautiful of its species. He is dressed in a suit of light-brown check, and may be seen, in warm, sunny days, cantering over the ground, or running through the tree-tops. He is a very careful and a very busy body. I have often watched him, as he sat bolt upright in a hickory, eating nuts, and throwing the shucks on the ground, with all the gravity of a judge. During the fall, he hoards up large quantities of stores. He hulls his beech-nuts, selects the fairest walnuts, picks up, here and there, a few chestnuts, and packs everything away in his castle with the utmost care; and, as Venison says, "the choppers in the winter have stolen bushels on 'em!"

While our squirrel was singing his morning psalm, a crow, just out of his bed, went sailing along above us, with his "caw! caw!" and settled on a tree nearby. "Caw! caw!" he screamed again, looking down curiously at the squirrel, as much as to say, "Who cares for your music!" Then out hurried another squirrel, and another, breaking forth with joy, until the crow, fairly drowned out, spread his wings and soared away. Venison says, "Them crows can smell gunpowder, and that fellow know'd we hadn't any, when he lit so near us."

A blue-jay then commenced a loud call from a distant part of the forest. He is one of the birds that lingers behind, and braves the blasts of winter. He was flitting about in a tree-top, and had just commenced his day's work. How gaudily Nature has dressed this bird! How he shines, during spring and summer! All the shades, and touches, and tinges of blue flow over his gaudy mantle; and how orderly and lavishly they are strown over him. But the blue-jay is a dissolute kind of a fellow, after all – "neither more nor less than a thief," Venison says. His shadowy dress fades with the leaf, and after strutting about during the warmer months, making a great display of his finery, he "runs down," at last, into a confirmed loafer. Groups of them may be seen in the winter, drudging around among the withered bushes, and scolding like so many shrews.

Then out popped the little gopher, that finished piece of stripe and check, that miner, who digs deep in the ground. He, too, had left his mansion, and come to greet the morn. A troop of quail marched along, headed by their chief. Who does not love the quail? She is associated with early childhood and household memories. Her voice rings through the past. We heard it sounding over our better years. What a rich brown suit she wears, cut round with Quaker simplicity! what taste and neatness about it! It was she that long ago went forth with the reapers, and piped for them her sunrise psalm, "More wet! More wet!" and she will stay here with us during the winter, and traverse, with her caravan, all day, the desert wastes of snow. Venison says he "don't never kill a quail – it ain't right – but he don't know why."

The partridges, all around, commenced rolling their drums, and every little while, one would whirr past our heads, and die away in the distance. The whole wood-pecker family began their labor. He who wears a red velvet cap, silk shawl, and white under-clothes, was boring away in a rotten tree, to find his breakfast; and he kept hitching around, and hammering, without regarding or caring for our presence. The rabbit, with ears erect, sat drawn up in a heap, quivering with fear, as he gazed upon us.

At last we reached the bank of the river, and Venison said, "We had better sit down, and take our reck'ning." Here was one of the most beautiful pictures of still life ever painted by Nature. The river wound away like a silver serpent, until it was lost in a bank of Indian summer haze, and it gurgled and dashed through the aisles of the forest, like a dream through the silent realms of sleep. It lay, half sunshine, half shadow, and the shadow was slowly creeping up a tall cliff on the opposite shore, as the day advanced, counting, as it were, the moments as they passed. Afar down it, I was amused as I watched a flock of wild geese. They were about a hundred in number, sleeping upon the water, in a glassy cove, their heads neatly tucked under their wings. An old gander, who had been appointed sentinel, to keep watch and guard, was doing the best he could to perform his duty. He stood upon one leg, and he grew so drowsy, several times, that he nearly toppled over, to his great consternation, and the danger of his charge. But rousing up, and taking two or three pompous strides, and stretching his neck to its utmost, with a very wise look, he satisfied himself that all was right, and that he was not so bad a sentinel, after all.

Near by this sleeping community, where a ripple played over a cluster of rocks, a flock of ducks were performing their ablutions. Now they were diving, now combing out their feathers, now rising and flapping their wings, now playing with each other, when the leader blowing a blast on his trumpet, they rose gracefully from their bath, and forming themselves into a drag, went winnowing up the river to their haunts far away.

A sand-hill crane, hoisted up on his legs of stilts, his clothes gathered up, and pinned behind him, was leisurely wading about, spearing fish for his breakfast. A dozy, stupid-looking kingfisher sat upon a blasted limb just over him, looking as grave as a country justice engaged in the same business. A bald eagle came rushing down the stream like an air-ship, his great wings slowly heaving up and down, as if he had set out upon an all-day's journey. A muskrat ferried himself over from one side to the other, urgent upon business best known to himself. A prairie-wolf came down to the water's edge, gave a bark or two, and taking a drink, turned back the way he came.

How many birds had left the wilderness for other climes! The blackbirds, those saucy gabblers, who spent the summer here, feeding upon wild rice, departed a month ago. I saw their bustle and preparation. They were days and days getting ready for their journey. The whole country around was alive with their noise. They sang, and fretted. They seemed to be out of all kind of patience with everybody and everything – to have a kind of spite against Nature for driving them off. All the trees about the marshes were loaded, and some were singing, some complaining, some scolding; but having finally completed their arrangements, all of a sudden they left. And the meadow-lark, that came so early with her spring song – she who used to sit upon the waving grass, and heave herself to and fro, in so ecstatic and polite a manner, as her melody rose and fell – she, too, is gone.

But about hunting bees. Venison informed me that here was the spot where he should "try 'em – that he didn't know nothin' about his luck;" that "bees were the knowingest critters alive" – that they lived in "the holler trees, all around us." He said "they had queens to govern 'em" – that they had "workers and drones" – that "everything about 'em was done just so, and if any of 'em broke the laws, they just killed 'em, and pitched 'em overboard." This, he said, he had "seed himself; he had seed a reg'lar bee funeral." He "seed, once, four bees tugging at a dead body, drawing it on the back, when they throw'd it out of the hive, and covered it over with dirt." And then they have "wars," he says, and "gin'rals," and "captins," and "sogers," and "go out a-fightin', and a-stealin' honey;" they are very "knowin' critters, and there is no tellin' nothin' about 'em."

Venison took the little box he had brought with him, which was filled with honey, and, opening its lid, placed it on a stump. He then rambled around the woods until he found a lingering flower that had escaped the frost, with a honey-bee upon it. This he picked, bee and all, and placed on the honey. Soon the bee began to work and load himself; and finally he rose in circles, winding high in the air, and suddenly turning a right angle, he shot out of sight.

"Where has he gone?" inquired I.