*** START OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK 50470 ***

    By Elsie Singmaster


    MARTIN LUTHER. THE STORY OF HIS LIFE. With frontispiece.
    THE LONG JOURNEY. Frontispiece in color.
    EMMELINE. Illustrated.
    KATY GAUMER. Illustrated.
    GETTYSBURG. Illustrated.
    WHEN SARAH WENT TO SCHOOL. Illustrated.
    WHEN SARAH SAVED THE DAY. Illustrated.

    HOUGHTON MIFFLIN COMPANY BOSTON AND NEW YORK




[Illustration: CONRAD RUBBED HIS EYES--HE LOOKED AGAIN (p. 52)]




    THE LONG
    JOURNEY

    BY
    ELSIE SINGMASTER

    [Illustration]

    BOSTON AND NEW YORK
    HOUGHTON MIFFLIN COMPANY
    The Riverside Press Cambridge
    1917




    COPYRIGHT, 1917, BY ELSIE SINGMASTER LEWARS

    ALL RIGHTS RESERVED

    _Published February 1917_


    TO
    WILLIAM BLACK LEWARS
    A DESCENDANT
    OF
    JOHN CONRAD WEISER
    AND HIS SON
    CONRAD




CONTENTS


   I. THE GROSS ANSPACH COW      1

  II. DOWN THE RIVER            21

 III. BLACKHEATH                40

  IV. A ROYAL AUDIENCE          60

   V. ACROSS THE SEA            79

  VI. THE PIRATE SHIP           96

 VII. THE HOME ASSIGNED        111

VIII. THE FLIGHT BEGINS        131

  IX. THE DARK FOREST          149

   X. JOURNEY'S END            169




THE LONG JOURNEY




I

THE GROSS ANSPACH COW


On the evening of the twenty-third of June, Conrad Weiser brought
home, as was his custom, the Gross Anspach cow. The fact was, in
itself, not remarkable, since it was Conrad's chief duty to take the
cow to pasture, to guard her all day long, to lead her from one little
patch of green grass to another, to see that she drank from one of
the springs on the hillside, and to feed her now and then a little
of the precious salt which he carried in his pocket. What made this
twenty-third of June remarkable was the fact that this was Conrad's
final journey from the pastures of Gross Anspach to Gross Anspach
village.

Liesel, the property of Conrad's father, John Conrad, was Gross
Anspach's only cow. War and the occupation of a brutal soldiery had
stripped the village of its property, its household goods, its animals,
and, alas! of most of its young men. Gross Anspach had hidden itself in
woods and in holes in the ground, had lived like animals in dens. Upon
the mountainside wolves had devoured children.

What war had left undone, famine and pestilence and fearful cold
had completed. The fruit trees had died, the vines were now merely
stiffened and rattling stalks, and, though it was June, the earth was
bare in many places. There were no young vines to plant, there was no
seed to sow, there were no horses to break the soil with the plough.

Sometimes Conrad had company to the hillside pasture. He was thirteen
years old, a short, sturdy, blue-eyed boy, much older than his years,
as were most of the children in Gross Anspach. Above him in the family
were Catrina, who was married and had two little children of her own,
then Margareta, Magdalena, and Sabina, and below him were George
Frederick, Christopher, Barbara, and John Frederick. They all had blue
eyes and sturdy frames and they were all, except John Frederick, thin.
John Frederick was their darling and the only partaker in the family of
the bounty of Liesel. The fact that John Frederick had no mother seemed
more terrible than the lack of a mother for any of the other eight
children.

When Margareta and Magdalena and Sabina and George Frederick and
Christopher and Barbara and John Frederick accompanied Conrad to
the hillside, they all started soberly, the older girls knitting as
they walked, Christopher and Barbara trotting hand in hand, and John
Frederick riding upon Conrad's back. They had little to say--there was
little to be said. When the prospect broadened, when they were able to
look out over the walls of their own valley across the wide landscape,
then spirits were lightened and tongues were loosed. Then they could
see other valleys and other hills and the desolation of their own no
longer filled their tired eyes. The little children ran about, the
older ones, still working busily, sat and talked.

Their speech was German, the soft and beautiful German of the south.
Sometimes they spoke in whispers and with fearful glances of the
past and its terrors, and of the cruel French. Sometimes the older
girls whispered together of romantic dreams which could never come
true, of true lovers and a happy home for each. But most of all they
talked--amazing to relate--these little Germans of two hundred years
ago--of Indians!

About Indians it was Conrad who had the most to say. Conrad was the
oldest boy; though so much younger than Margareta and Magdalena, he
could read easily while they could not read at all. While Conrad
talked, their thoughts traveled out of their poor valley, down the
great river, through strange cities to a mighty ship upon which they
should sail and sail until they reached a Paradise. Sometimes Conrad
walked up and down before them, his hands clasped behind his back,
sometimes he lay on the ground with his hands under his head. He talked
and talked and let himself be questioned in the lordly manner which
lads assume with their sisters. He carried with him always, buttoned
inside his thin clothes, a little book which he knew by heart.

"Is it cold there?" asked Sabina wistfully. Sabina was the last to
recover from the fearful winter.

Conrad leafed his little book.

"I will read. 'The climate is everywhere subtle and penetrating. During
the winter'--here, Sabina,--'during the winter the sun has great
strength.'"

"I do not know what 'subtle and penetrating' mean. Those great words
are beyond me."

"They mean that the climate is good," explained Conrad, who did not
know exactly either.

"Will we be hungry?" asked Sabina, still more wistfully.

Conrad could hardly turn the leaves fast enough. His eyes sparkled, his
cheeks glowed.

"Now listen, you foolish, frightened Sabina, listen! 'The country
produces all kinds of cereals, together with Indian corn of various
kinds. Peas, kitchen vegetables, pumpkins, melons, roots, hemp, flax,
hops, everything. Peaches and cherries'--Sabina, you have never
eaten peaches or cherries, but I have eaten one of each--'peaches
and cherries grow like weeds.' Here we have nothing, nothing! Our
grandfather was a magistrate, but we are almost beggars. My father
talks to me as he does not talk to you, Margareta and Magdalena and
Sabina and--"

Margareta lifted her blue eyes from her knitting and tossed back her
yellow braids.

"It is not very long since I spanked you well, Conrad," said she.

At this all the children, even Conrad, smiled. Margareta made a little
motion as though she meant to rise and pursue her brother about the
high tableland, Conrad a little motion as though he dared her to a
chase. But the impulse passed, as all playful impulses passed in this
time of distress.

"My father talks to me because I am almost a man," went on Conrad. "He
says that if we have another winter like the one which is past we will
all die as our mother--" Conrad could not complete his sentence. The
children did not cry, their hearts only ceased for a moment to beat as
Conrad's speech faltered. "He says there will not be enough animals and
birds left after that time to establish a new stock. He says that even
if the winter is mild, Gross Anspach cannot all live--even we few that
are left."

"But I am afraid," said little Sabina.

"Afraid of what?"

"Of the river and the great sea."

"Thousands have sailed down the river and many have crossed the sea,
Sabina."

"I am most afraid of these strange red people."

"I am not afraid of them," announced little Christopher. "Not more than
I am afraid of Liesel."

Once more Conrad leafed his little book. It was no wonder that it
scarcely held together.

"They are not bad people. They fish and hunt and plant crops. They go
farther and farther back into the woods as the white people come. I am
no more afraid of them than I am of Christopher."

"But how are we to get there, brother?" asked Magdalena, who spoke
least among a family who spoke little.

Conrad shut his book and tied it in its place under his coat.

"That I do not know," said he impatiently. "But we will all see yet the
river and the great sea and the deep forests and the red people."

"Old Redebach says--" No sooner had John Frederick began to speak than
his lips were covered by the hand of his brother.

"Old Redebach cannot tell the truth. It is not in him. And he is afraid
of everything. Ten times he has told me that Liesel would be carried
off, that he has had a dream and has seen men watching her. Forty times
he has told me that Liesel would die of the cattle plague. There stands
Liesel fat and hearty. It is the schoolmaster who is to be believed in
this matter. He would start to-morrow if he could. I tell you"--Conrad
pointed toward the declining sun--"we are going, we are going, we are
going."

Now, on the twenty-third of June, as Conrad, alone, guided the
obstinate way of Liesel through the dusk, the words of old Redebach
came back to him. Liesel had all the trying defects of a spoiled
and important character; believing herself to be the Queen of Gross
Anspach, she expected her subjects to follow where she led. She
proceeded deliberately into all sorts of black and shadowy places from
which Conrad did not dare to chase her roughly for fear of affecting
the precious store of milk, upon which John Frederick and other Gross
Anspach babies depended.

Conrad recalled now, besides the warnings of old Redebach about present
dangers, certain fearful things which were printed in his little book.
The savages had learned from the whites to be deceitful, they were
frequently drunk, they would not be governed, they used their knives
and hatchets for hideous purposes. They were enormous creatures, who
increased their height by bunches of towering feathers fastened to
their topknots. They stole upon their victims with the quietness of
cats, they--was that a stealthy footstep which Conrad heard now to
the right of his path?--they celebrated their triumph with fearful
cries--what was that strange sound which he heard to his left?

In spite of himself, Conrad hastened the steps of the unruly Liesel
through the twilight.

The Weiser family lived in one of the few houses left in Gross Anspach.
It was not large, but to the villagers who had taken refuge after the
burning of their dwellings in stables and sheds, it seemed like a
palace. From its doorway shone now a faint light, at sight of which
Conrad felt ashamed of his fear. He heard the rattle of Margareta's
milk pail, and felt against his leg the warm, comfortable body of old
Wolf, the Weiser dog.

"You are late," called Margareta, in an excited tone. "I have been
watching and watching and the children have been more than once to the
bottom of the hill."

"What is the matter?" asked Conrad.

"You will hear in good time," answered Margareta in a patronizing way.

"Where is father?"

"In the house."

"If anything had happened he would tell me first," said Conrad. "I do
not believe he has told you anything."

Behind the broad table in the kitchen sat John Conrad. He was the
younger Conrad grown old and gray with anxiety and grief. His clothes
were whole, but mended with amazing invention. His body was still
powerful and the fire of energy flashed from his eyes. As Conrad
entered, he raised a clenched fist and brought it down heavily upon the
table, which, solid as it was, shook under the impact. A stranger might
have thought that he was reproving the little row of children who sat
opposite him on a bench and who watched him with a fixed stare. But
John Conrad was a kind father; his excitement did not find its source
in anger with his children. Nor were the children frightened. Their
stare was one of admiration and awe rather than of fright.

Seeing his father thus, Conrad asked no questions, though a dozen
trembled on his lips. He sat quietly down beside the other children
and lifted John Frederick to his lap.

When Margareta came in from milking, the family had their supper of
black bread and a little weak broth. It was enough to keep life in
their bodies, but not very vigorous life. The children scarcely tasted
what they ate, so excited were they by their father's appearance,
and by the long and solemn prayer with which he prefaced the meal.
Presently Elisabeth Albern came for milk for her Eva, Michael Fuhrmann
for milk for his Balthasar, and George Reimer, the schoolmaster, for
milk for his little sister Salome. For this milk John Conrad took no
pay. He was poor, but his neighbors were far poorer; he regarded Liesel
neither as the annoying creature which Conrad considered her, nor as
the proud princess that she believed herself to be, but as a sacred
trust. If it were not for Liesel half of the poor little Gross Anspach
babies would not survive the summer. Even John Frederick was beginning
to eat the black bread and broth so that younger and more needy babies
might have his share of Liesel's milk.

George Reimer spoke to John Conrad in a way which heightened the
children's excitement.

"I will be here," said he.

The children nudged one another. Their father was the leader in what
poor little affairs Gross Anspach might still be said to have, and he
sometimes assembled his neighbors so that they might encourage and
console one another.

Such a meeting was now at hand. The older girls washed the bowls and
wooden plates and the cooking-pot and put them on the shelf, and
carried a sleepy John Frederick and a protesting Barbara from the
kitchen and laid them firmly and tenderly in their corner of the family
bedroom. When Conrad nodded to little Christopher that he should
follow, the older Weiser bade Christopher stay.

"It is important that all my children who can should remember this
night."

Before long the village men and a few of the women began to assemble.
They came quietly, with only the simplest of greetings, but eye meeting
eye said wonderful things.

"John Conrad Weiser, you are our leader and friend."

"Neighbors, you have been my stay in deep affliction."

A woman with a baby in her arms bade John Conrad look and see how his
namesake was growing.

"If it were not for you he would be gone like his father."

Presently the children, giving up their places on the bench for places
on little stools or on the earthen floor, began to whisper to one
another and to point. From under the thin and ragged coat of George
Reimer, the schoolmaster, projected a flute. George's own flute had
been taken from him by the French soldiers, but in a few days a much
finer one had been found by the roadside, dropped, probably, because
the army could not carry all its own possessions in addition to those
which it had stolen. It might be said that Gross Anspach retained two
valuable articles, John Conrad Weiser's cow and George Reimer's flute.
Behind his father's back, Conrad pretended to play a tune upon the air.
At once the solemn assembly grew a little brighter. Last of all came
Catrina and her husband.

At once John Conrad rose to pray. They still had God, these souls who
had little else, and upon Him John Conrad called, that He might bless
them in _a great endeavor_. At this, in spite of his better knowledge,
Conrad opened his eyes and fixed them upon Margareta until she opened
hers. Conrad clasped his hands tightly, scarcely able to breathe.

"Friends,"--John Conrad had closed his prayer,--"I have asked you to
come here so that I might tell you of an important matter. It is not
necessary that in beginning what I have to say I should remind you of
our miseries and our griefs. You know them as well as I. You know that
this life cannot go on; that, presently, unless we do something for
ourselves, there will be none of us remaining. Our country is desolate.
The soldiers have harried us, the great cold has tortured us, famine
has almost made an end of us. We should not too bitterly sigh and
complain on account of what has come upon us. It may be that thus God
seeks to lead us to another and a better land.

"I need not tell you, either, what land I have in mind. We have spoken
of it, we have seen it in our dreams, we have longed for it with all
our souls. There is fertile soil, there is temperate climate, there
is, above all, thank God! freedom and peace. There is no war there.
There--" John Conrad halted, tried again to speak and failed.

"But we cannot get to that country!" cried the young woman with the
baby in her arms.

There was a long pause. Deep breaths were drawn and a great sigh filled
the little room.

"The way has been opened," announced John Conrad at last. "I and my
family will go to-morrow. Let those who will come with us lift their
hands."

But no hands were lifted. The thought of deliverance was paralyzing.

"Word has come that the gracious Queen of England will send us and
our long-suffering brethren to her colonies in the New World. I have
had a letter from our old neighbor the magistrate of Oberdorf. He is
in London, awaiting the sailing of the ships. He is well cared for;
charitable persons exert themselves for the afflicted people. Probably
by this time he is already far on his way."

"But _to-morrow_, father!" cried Catrina. "Why start to-morrow?"

"As well to-morrow as another day," answered John Conrad. "We have few
possessions and they are easily gathered together. To those of our
friends who will not come with us we could not express our affection
and our farewells in a hundred days. We will go on foot to the river
and make our way to the lowlands and thence to England. It is a long
and perilous journey, but it is not so perilous as to stay. I cannot
advise any one what to do. But for all those who come I will care as
though they were my own."

"But Liesel!" cried the young woman with the baby in her arms. "We will
die without Liesel!"

John Conrad smiled.

"Liesel will stay in Gross Anspach. She will be the perpetual property
of the Gross Anspach babies."

George Reimer spoke next. He sat with his arms folded across his
breast, within them his precious flute. Tears were in his eyes and in
his voice as he said:--

"_I am poor and needy; yet the Lord thinketh upon me._"

The company broke up without music. There were those who must go home
to tell wives or mothers; there were those who wished to talk to John
Conrad in private. There was Catrina, with her husband, weeping and
distressed, who did not dare to trust her babies to the sea. She must
plan with her sisters the bundles which should be packed for each to
carry, the food which must be gathered to last as long as possible. To
her and her husband John Conrad forgave a large debt, and his kindness
and their inability to pay made the parting more heartbreaking. John
Conrad still had a little store of German gulden, long hoarded against
the coming day.

When all was done and the children were asleep, John Conrad took his
oldest son by the hand and led him up the winding street between the
ruined houses to the little Lutheran church which had been saved in
the great destruction. The moon shone quietly upon it and the little
walled-in space behind it. Thither John Conrad led his son, and beside
a new-made grave they paused.

"It is not good to dwell on grief when one lives in the world and has
still the work of half a lifetime," said he solemnly. "But there are
moments when it is right that we should yield ourselves to our sorrow.
The others will come here in the morning, but you and I will then have
no time for shedding tears. Your mother looked into the future. She
begged me to go when the time came, even though I must leave her here."

"My lad,"--John Conrad laid his arm across the boy's shoulders,--"there
are many things I would say to you. You were, as you know, her darling.
But she knew your faults, that you are strong-headed and strong-willed.
As you are of all my children the quickest to learn, so are you the
least obedient and steady, the most impatient and impetuous. Your
mother prayed for you daily. Will you remember her counsels, lad?"

To the yearning voice Conrad could make no answer. Arm in arm father
and son stood for a long time. Then, when the moon had sunk behind the
little church, Conrad felt himself led away.

"Now, my son," admonished John Conrad, "weep no more, but set your face
forward."




II

DOWN THE RIVER


The night of the twenty-third of June is a short night at best. When
one robs its beginning of four or five hours, there is little darkness
left. Bidding his son go to bed, John Conrad spent the night in
vigil. In spite of his reminder that this was not a time for grief,
he went again to the little church. From thence he climbed through
the ruined vineyards to the pastures on the hill where his father and
his grandfather had pastured their sheep and cattle. There he stood
long and looked about him, his mind traveling back to the happiness of
their peaceful lives, spent in sturdy labor and sweetened by the honor
which they had had among their fellows. Here were the roots of his own
life, deep in the soil--would God that he could stay where he had been
born! He was no longer young, responsibility and adversity had made him
old. Those rosy stories of the new land--might they not be as other
travelers' tales, concealing a reality worse than this fearful present
of hunger and fear? Five hundred miles of river, three thousand miles
of sea, and then an unsettled country! The same shapes of fear which
had fascinated and disturbed young Conrad seemed now to await his
father behind every tree and bush.

Suddenly John Conrad heard a soft sound on the summer wind. George
Reimer, as restless as himself, was somewhere about with his dear
flute. John Conrad bent his ear to the direction from which the sound
came. It was a German hymn, "A Mighty Stronghold is Our God." John
Conrad lifted his head and with it his heart. George Reimer would be
with them and George Reimer's flute. Returning to his house, John
Conrad lay down for a little sleep before dawn.

But George Reimer did not go to the new country. Upon the indescribable
confusion of the Weiser house the next morning, he came smiling.

Into sheets and coverlets the Weisers had tied all their movable
possessions, the various articles making curious knobs and projections
on the great bundles. The family spinning-wheel must go--surely no
article was more necessary! This Conrad was to carry on his back. The
few cooking-pots which remained--these must be taken, though all else
were left behind. Wardrobes were small, sheets were few, pillows did
not exist. The feather beds could not be carried--these were given to
the neighbors.

About hovered all Gross Anspach. Each person had brought a little
gift, a tiny trinket saved from the pillaging of the hamlet, a little
bouquet of the few garden flowers which had survived the cruel winter,
a loaf of bread or a package of dried beans for soup. Catrina, a baby
on each arm, wept loudly. Each baby had to be embraced many times by
its departing relatives and each departing relative had to be embraced
by all the village. Under foot, six tiny kittens risked their lives.
Old Redebach, tottering feebly about, quoted warning passages of
Scripture:--

"_As a bird that wandereth from her nest, so is a man that wandereth
from his place._"

On the doorstep sat Wolf, his solemn eyes watching the scene in
amazement. Everywhere was confusion, everywhere was noise.

For a few moments George Reimer watched quietly.

"Neighbors!" cried he. "If you cannot help these friends, stand back!
Here, Conrad, I will tie that bundle. Here, John Frederick, I am to
be your horse as far as the river; see that you behave, or I will run
away. Sabina, I will keep your kittens if I have to catch the mice for
them myself."

With one accord the Weisers turned upon him.

"You are going with us, surely!"

"Only to the river." His eyes sought those of John Conrad. "I cannot
go farther. My little sisters are too young, my father too feeble, my
mother is sick--I can neither take them nor leave them alone."

"God will reward you," said John Conrad. "But it is a sore loss to us."

In the end no one went beyond the river. From weeping Gross Anspach the
Weisers and a dozen accompanying friends separated themselves at seven
o'clock, the Weisers carrying nothing, the burdens on the shoulders
of their neighbors. At the heels of the procession walked Wolf. At
the summit of the first hill all looked back, save Conrad. The little
village lay smiling in the sun; to the pilgrims it seemed like Heaven.

"I cannot go," cried Magdalena.

"Oh, father, let us stay," begged Margareta.

Before John Conrad could answer, a cheerful sound restored the courage
of the pilgrims and George Reimer's gay "Susy, dear Susy" set their
feet moving.

At the village of Oberdorf there was a halt, while greetings were
exchanged, explanations made, and messages written down for friends
already in America. Among those to whom greetings were sent was the
magistrate who must be by this time safely across the sea.

Here the Gross Anspachers, except the schoolmaster, turned back and the
Weisers shouldered their own bundles. It became clear now that there
were more bundles than persons and the fact occasioned much laughter
and readjustment.

At night the Weisers slept by the wayside. The fare on the boat would
draw a large sum from John Conrad's store and not a penny could be
spent for lodging. Lulled by Reimer's flute, they slept comfortably,
and, roused by the same music, were off soon after daylight.

At the river came the most difficult of partings. Here George Reimer
played a last lullaby and a final reveillé. A river boat, the Elspeth,
had anchored near by for the night and upon it the family took passage.
The goods were carried aboard and piled in the center of the deck and
John Conrad and his eight children followed. At once came a protest
from the captain. Old Wolf could not go, and Conrad was commanded to
lead him from the boat. Conrad forgot that he was thirteen years old,
forgot that he was the man of the family next to his father, forgot his
boasted superiority to Margareta and Magdalena and the rest, and threw
his arms round the old dog's neck.

"I cannot leave you! I cannot leave you!"

Then he felt himself lifted up and put aboard the gangplank.

"There, Conrad, there! I will take care of him. I have given your
father something for you. Show yourself brave, dear lad!"

Stumbling, Conrad boarded the boat. He saw the schoolmaster wave his
hand, he saw the green shores slip away, he heard his father's voice.

"Your teacher gave me this for you, Conrad."

"Oh, father!" cried Conrad.

In his hand lay the schoolmaster's flute.

"He said you were to practice diligently and to remember him."

The message made Conrad weep the more. He threw himself down on the
pile of household goods and hid his face.

When he looked up his father sat beside him. In his hand were two
books. He looked at his son anxiously.

"Conrad, we are going among strange people. The first are the
Hollanders, with whom we can make ourselves understood. But of English
we know nothing. Now we will learn as well as we can, I and you. The
schoolmaster gave me an English Bible, in it we will study daily,
comparing it with our own."

"What will we do about the language of the savages?" asked Conrad,
drying his tears. "How will we make ourselves understood by them?"

"There will be time enough for that. It is probable that they compel
them to learn English. The savages are a long way off."

For a few days John Conrad and his son studied diligently. There was
little else to do in the long hours which glided as quietly by as the
stream. The country about them was unbroken and flat; here there went
on a simple life like their own. Everywhere were to be seen in the
brown fields and the dead vineyards the ravages of the fearful winter.

In return for a little help about the boat, the helmsman, who had
served on English ships, did his best to interpret the hardest words
for the students. To the surly captain they dared not speak. Once the
price for the journey was paid into his hand, he seemed to resent even
the sight of his passengers. Frequently he was not sober, and then the
helmsman helped the Weisers to keep out of his way. Unlike the rest
of his race, he could not endure the sound of music and Conrad and his
flute were objects of special dislike. More than once he threatened to
throw both into the river.

When the boat stopped at the city of Speyer for a day and night,
studying and flute-practicing stopped entirely and, urged by the
friendly helmsman, the Weisers went on shore. Now for the first time
the children saw a large town; with eager expectation they stepped on
the wharf. But here, too, was ruin and desolation. The great buildings,
burned by the enemy who had devastated their own village, had not been
restored; the cathedral which towered above the ruins was itself but a
hollow shell. When they reached the next large town of Mannheim, they
did not leave the boat. With increasing longing they looked forward
across the ocean to the Paradise where the enemy had not been.

Daily they were joined by other pilgrims who like themselves looked
forward with aching eyes to the distant country. The newcomers had
each his own story of persecution and famine, of cold and misery. With
them John Conrad talked, gathering from them all the information which
they had about the new country, comforting them as best he could, and
reading to them from Conrad's little book. To the directions they
listened earnestly, hearing over and over again that they must be
patient, quick to hear and slow to speak, that they must be diligent
and thrifty. About the dangers of the sea they talked a great deal and
were relieved to hear that a journey on an inland river was valuable as
preparation for a journey on the ocean. The little book advised also
that those who were about to take a journey by sea should practice on a
swing.

Each day the captain was less and less able to navigate the ship.
Finally the helmsman took command, and while the captain lay in a
stupor, Conrad continued the forbidden flute-playing. Growing careless,
he was caught, and the captain, who could reach neither Conrad nor the
flute, kicked the family spinning-wheel into the river. The loss was
serious and it taught a bitter lesson.

It was the twenty-fourth of June when the travelers left Gross Anspach;
a month later they were still far from the mouth of the river. Each
day passengers clamored on the banks, each day the number of ships in
the river increased, slow packet boats which did not go above Cologne
or Mainz, and faster boats which passed the heavily laden Elspeth
like birds. The river left the broad meadows for a narrow gorge with
precipitous banks upon which stood imposing castles. At sight of the
castles the children were overcome with awe.

"There is Bingen, and its mouse tower, children," said John Conrad.

"Not where the bishop was eaten!" cried Sabina.

"Yes; and about here the treasure of the Niebelungen is buried."

"If we could only find it!" sighed Conrad.

"And there"--the helmsman pointed to ruined walls upon the cliff
side--"there a brave trumpeter defended his master's life. While his
master and others escaped, he blew bravely upon the walls to frighten
the enemy, and when they entered, there was no one left to kill but
him."

The watching of Barbara and John Frederick in their trotting about the
crowded ship grew to be more and more of a task. The first person who
was pushed overboard was made much of, and the man who rescued him was
considered a hero. When many had fallen overboard and had been rescued
the passengers scarcely turned their heads.

As day after day passed and August drew near its close, John Conrad
became more and more anxious.

"It is time we were sailing from England," said he uneasily to Conrad.
"The journey has taken long, food has been higher than I thought, and
we have had to pay tariff a dozen times."

Again and again he took from his pocket the letter of the magistrate of
Oberdorf. Of the chief of his fears he said nothing to Conrad. The good
Queen of England had offered transportation to the distressed Germans;
but had she realized, had any one anticipated that so vast a throng
would take her at her word? The river captains told of weeks and weeks
of such crowding of the lower river. Would there be ships enough to
carry them all to the New World? Would the Queen provide for them until
they could sail?

Presently rumors of trouble increased John Conrad's fears. A passing
boat declared that the Germans were forbidden to enter Rotterdam, the
lowland city at which they would have to take ship for England. The
congestion had become serious. The citizens of Rotterdam announced that
their patience and their resources were exhausted; the Germans could no
longer wait there for English boats; they must return whence they had
come.

At this announcement there was a loud outcry. Like the Weisers, the
other pilgrims had sold or had given away everything except the
property they carried with them; if they returned now, it would be to
greater misery than that which they had left. Go on they must. John
Conrad reminded them of the Lord in whom they trusted. The Queen had
promised and England was rich in resources. The Queen's charity was
not entirely disinterested; she expected the Germans to people her new
colonies. Nor did John Conrad believe that the Hollanders would see
them starve on the way to England. But even as he argued with himself,
his heart misgave him. He had seen persons starve, he had seen men and
women and children struck down by the swords of brutal soldiers. There
was nothing in the world, he believed, too terrible for heartless men
to do.

As they drew nearer to Rotterdam, the anxiety of the helmsman was plain
to be seen.

"I pay no attention to what passers-by say," he told John Conrad. "But
if you see any long, narrow boats, with the flag of Holland flying,
then it will be time to be frightened. They will have the power to make
us turn back."

Each hour the rate of travel became slower and slower. There was
now no current whatever, and for many days the wind did not blow.
Finally, when, at nightfall, the Elspeth came into the harbor, John
Conrad breathed a deep sigh of relief. In the morning the travelers saw
next them at the wharf one of the long boats which the helmsman had
described, and heard that it was to start in an hour to warn all the
pilgrims to return to their homes.

The passengers of the Elspeth were not allowed to enter the city, but
were bidden to wait on the wharf for English ships. Here their quarters
were almost as restricted as they had been on shipboard. In prompt
contradiction of the statement that their patience and their supplies
were exhausted, the kind Hollanders brought food to the guests who had
thrust themselves upon them.

Now the helmsman came to bid his friends good-bye. John Conrad gave him
many blessings and the children cried bitterly and embraced him.

"If he were only going with us, what fine times we should have on the
sea!" said Conrad.

"He seems like our last friend," mourned Margareta. "Everything before
us is strange."

"We thought George Reimer was our last friend," said John Conrad.
"Perhaps we shall find other friends as good."

For four days, the Germans watched for a ship. When at last two English
vessels came into the harbor and they were taken aboard, the Weisers
had little food and less money. When John Conrad heard that no passage
was to be charged, he breathed another sigh of relief.

"The good Queen will keep her promises," said he to his children. "The
worst of our troubles are over."

But within an hour it seemed that the worst of their troubles had only
begun. The channel crossing was rough. From their fellow travelers
there was rising already a cry, which was to grow louder and louder
as the weeks and months went by--"Would that we had suffered those
miseries which we knew rather than tempt those which we did not know!"

When the ship entered the smooth waters of the Thames River, the
Germans began to smile once more. About them were green fields. They
saw pleasant villages and broad stretches of cultivated land and deer
browsing under mighty trees.

"If we might only stay here!" they sighed.

John Conrad shook his head.

"Here we should not find rest."

Once more the Germans disembarked, wondering whether their stay on
shore would be long enough for a closer view of the fine churches and
palaces of London. Of so large a city as this even John Conrad had
never dreamed.

"Shall we see the Queen?" asked Sabina in a whisper of her father.

John Conrad smiled.

"We might see her riding in her chariot."

Then John Conrad grew sober. As they stood crowded together upon the
quay some young lads shouted at them roughly. The ears which expected
only kindness were shocked.

"They say we are taking the bread from their mouths," repeated Conrad.
"They call us 'rascally' Germans."

"There are rude folk everywhere," said John Conrad.

He directed the children to take their bundles and follow a man who
seemed to have authority to conduct them to some place in which they
were to spend the night.

The way thither proved to be long. Again and again it was necessary to
stop to rest or to give time for the short legs of the little children
to catch up. Again and again the heavy burdens were shifted about. They
traveled into the open country--a strange stopping place for those who
were so soon to continue their journey! They passed many men and women
who looked at them curiously. Presently they heard their own German
speech.

"We will have to wait awhile, probably, for ships," said John Conrad to
his son. "Of course we could not expect to go on at once. We--"

John Conrad stopped short and let his bundle slip to the ground. They
had come out upon a great space, which a few months before had been an
open heath. Now, as far as the eye could reach, stretched long lines
of tents. It was no temporary lodging, for here and there small frame
store buildings had been erected and there were long-used, dusty paths
between the tents. Men and women and children were going about, meals
were being prepared, there was everywhere the sound of voices. John
Conrad stood still in amazement.

"What is this?" he asked.

A single sharp voice answered from the doorway of a sutler's shop.

"We are Germans, lured hither by promise of passage to America. Here we
wait. Here we have waited for months. Have you come, oh, fool, to wait
also?"

It was not the rudeness of the answer which startled John Conrad,
nor the discouraging news which it announced, but the voice of the
speaker. For the speaker was none other than his friend the magistrate
of Oberdorf, supposed to be by now upon the high seas or in the new
country.




III

BLACKHEATH


For a long moment Heinrich Albrecht, the magistrate of Oberdorf, and
John Conrad Weiser, his friend, looked at each other. John Conrad was
the first to speak, in a voice trembling with amazement and alarm.

"Have you returned, Heinrich?"

The magistrate burst into a loud laugh. He was a tall, thin man, of a
type to whom inaction is misery.

"I have not been away. Here"--he waved his hand with a wide motion over
Blackheath--"here we lie, idle pensioners. Here we have been since
May, ever encouraged, ever deluded. Here idleness and evil customs are
corrupting our youth. Here we are dying."

Now the full meaning of the crowded Rhine and the warning of the
Hollanders burst upon John Conrad. He looked at his children, at the
young girls, at the little boys, and finally at plump, smiling John
Frederick. He thrust his hand into his almost empty pocket, thinking
of the long journey back to Gross Anspach for which he had no money.
He thought of his high hopes of liberty and peace and independence. He
covered his face with his hands so that his children might not see his
tears.

"I am here, father!" cried Conrad. "I am strong! I can work!"

"They feed us," conceded the magistrate of Oberdorf. "And they have
given us some clothing and these tents. But cold weather will come and
we shall die."

"Cold weather! We should be in the new country by cold weather! You
yourself wrote that you were about to sail, that you would sail on the
next day. There!" John Conrad drew from his bosom the tattered letter.
"I have stayed my soul upon it! I have set out on this journey upon
faith in it!"

"I thought we should start. I was certain we should start. They say
there are no ships. They have begun to send some of us to Ireland."

John Conrad shook his head.

"This whole land is sick. Across the ocean only there is peace."

"I can get a tent for you beside mine," offered Albrecht. "I have a
little influence with those in authority."

Once more the Weisers shouldered their bundles. They crossed the wide
camp, greeted pleasantly here and there, but for the most part stared
at silently and contemptuously. Finally the magistrate acknowledged
grudgingly that the English people had been liberal and kind.

"But they are growing tired. The common people say we are taking the
bread from their mouths."

The farther the Weisers proceeded through the city of tents, the more
astonished they became.

"The poor Germans have washed like the waves of the sea upon these
shores," said Albrecht.

John Conrad shook his head in answer, having no more words with which
to express his astonishment.

The Weisers made themselves as comfortable as possible in the tent
assigned them. They unpacked the bundles which they had expected to
unpack only in the new country, they received a portion of the generous
supply of food which was given out each morning and evening, and
then, like the thousands of their fellow countrymen, they waited, now
hopefully, now almost in despair, for some change in their condition.

But no sign of change appeared. Day after day John Conrad and the
magistrate and the friends whom they made among the more intelligent
and thoughtful of the pilgrims met and talked and looked toward the
Blackheath Road for some messenger from the Queen. The young people
made acquaintance; the children played games and ran races up and down
the streets of the city of tents. Sometimes Conrad listened to his
elders and sometimes he played his flute for the children.

Suddenly the weather changed. The outdoor life which had been pleasant
became more and more difficult to bear. The nights grew cold; the
Germans shivered in their poor clothes. Now, also, another and a more
serious danger threatened them.

The cooking was done over open fires, and the Weisers went daily into
a forest a few miles away to gather sticks for their contribution to
the one nearest to them. One day a young Englishman, with an evil face,
spoke roughly to Margareta, who cowered back. He went nearer to her and
she screamed in terror. For an instant Conrad watched stupidly, then,
suddenly, his heart seemed to expand. He was, as his father had said,
strong-headed and strong-willed.

"Let her be!" he shouted.

The stranger laughed, and approached nearer still. They could not
understand what he said, nor did he have opportunity to continue what
he had begun to say. Before his hand touched the arm of Margareta, he
found himself upon the ground. Conrad was not tall, but he had strong
muscles; now from his safe position on the chest of the enemy he was
able to dictate terms of peace.

"You get up and run as fast as you can down the road," he shouted.
"George Frederick, give me that big stick."

Fortunately the Englishman had no friends at hand. He looked about
wildly, first at the Weisers, then toward the camp, and promptly did as
he was bid. As he went, he shouted a threat.

"Your whole camp is to be wiped out," he yelled from a safe distance.
"Wait and you will see!"

The hearts of the Germans, growing daily more alarmed, were no more
disturbed, meanwhile, than were the hearts of Queen Anne and her
ministers. While the unexpected thousands lay upon Blackheath, minister
consulted with minister, boards of trade met to discuss plans and to
give them up, and to discuss other plans and to adjourn and to meet
again. It was true that Queen Anne desired to settle her colony of New
York, true that the news of her desire had been spread abroad. But she
had not anticipated this great migration, like the locusts of Egypt for
numbers! Ships were lacking to transport them; suitable asylums were
lacking and the Germans themselves, fleeing like helpless children,
were not able to take care of themselves.

Scores of wise and foolish suggestions were offered. The Germans were
to be sent to distant parishes, together with a bounty for each one.
But the parishes did not welcome them; those who were sent returned,
poorer, weaker, more helpless than before. There were hundreds of good
workmen among them, but even the English workman could scarcely earn
his bread. Let them go to Ireland, let them go to Wales, let them
return to Germany.

And still, while the English talked, the Germans came. Finally, Her
Majesty's Council, meeting almost daily, reached a conclusion and
orders were given for the assembling of ships. Action was hastened by
an extraordinary incident in which Conrad and his father had a part.

The heavy frosts had begun and there was not an hour when the Germans
did not ache with the cold. The quantity of food had become smaller,
the quality poorer than at first. But worse than cold or hunger was the
danger from the rising resentment of the Londoners, who demanded that
this great mass of foreigners be removed.

Conrad, left to himself, with little to do, roamed about the city,
staring at its marvels, at strange London Bridge, crowded with shops
and houses which hung over the water, at mighty Saint Paul's Cathedral,
lifting its round dome, still beautifully white and clean, far above
the gabled city roofs, at the other new churches built since the great
fire, and at the soaring monument which commemorated the fire. He even
looked with awe and horror at the sad and terrible spot where had been
buried, in a deep pit, the victims of the great plague.

Conrad's journeys were not always comfortable. English lads taunted
him, gayly dressed young men ordered him out of their path, the bearers
of sedan chairs thrust him rudely against the house walls. But still he
walked about, watching and listening.

Presently he heard terrifying threats. The Londoners determined to
wait no longer to wreak their vengeance upon Blackheath. Conrad hurried
down the long road to make report to his father.

"They mean to attack us with knives, father. They declare they will
have no mercy upon us!"

"They would not dare," answered John Conrad. "We are under the
protection of the Queen."

Nevertheless, John Conrad called together his friends, and together
they drew up a humble petition, praying that the English people
continue to look kindly upon them and to bestow bounty upon them.

But the petition availed nothing. That very night, Conrad, lying in
his corner of the tent near the edge of the camp, heard the sound of
rough voices and heavy steps. Springing up, he looked out the door. On
the heath a large company had gathered, carrying knives and sickles
which gleamed in the moonlight. With a shout Conrad roused his family,
whose cries in turn roused the sleepers in the neighboring tents. The
attacking party was defeated, not so much by the resistance of the
Germans, few of whom had arms, as by a warning that the soldiers were
coming from London. The Germans were not seriously hurt, but the event
was ominous.

Still the days grew shorter, and the dark nights longer, and the air
colder. Hundreds gathered round the fires, and among them John Conrad
counseled further patience and continued courage. Frequently he read
to them from Conrad's little book, at whose directions for life on the
ocean and in the new land there were now bitter smiles and long sighs.
They had ceased to think of the new country with its rich soil, its
mild climate, and its strange, interesting aborigines, except to envy
the Indian his indifference to the comforts of civilization.

Upon the day of the first snow, Conrad went early into the city. He had
earned a penny a few days before by carrying some bales from a ship to
a warehouse, and he hoped to earn more.

Until noon he walked about the streets. Again and again he was cursed
and threatened. The Londoners had not finished with the Germans in
spite of their temporary defeat. At noon he ate the piece of black
bread which he had put into his pocket, and then went into a cold
church to rest. Presently he fell asleep, and when he woke late in the
afternoon the church was almost dark. He was miles away from Blackheath
and he must set out promptly or the dangers of the way would be
doubled. The week before he had been caught in a fog and had spent the
night inside a garden gate on the ground.

Leaving the church, he hurried on as fast as he could. It seemed to him
that another fog was rapidly gathering over the city. His long walks
and the insufficient food had made him weak, but it was better to start
on the homeward journey than to linger. He might fall into evil hands
and never see his father or brothers or sisters again. The words of old
Redebach in far-away Gross Anspach came back to him as he stepped out
from the church door into an open square,--"_As a bird that wandereth
from her nest, so is a man that wandereth from his place._" Perhaps
old Redebach was right!

In the square, sedan chairs moved about, link boys waved their torches
and shouted, rough men jostled him. Presently his tears gathered and
began to fall. He lowered his head and plodded on down the street,
little dreaming that before him waited one of the strangest encounters,
not only in his life, but in the strange history of the world.

Too tired and despairing to remember that traveling with bent head is
unsafe, struggling to keep back his tears, he ceased suddenly to feel
anything. He came full force against one of the new lamp-posts recently
set up, and was thrown backwards.

When he came to himself, he heard but one sound, that of cruel
laughter. The amusement of the onlookers was the last drop in poor
Conrad's cup of grief. As he staggered to his feet, he said to himself
that he wished that the lamp-post had brought him to that death which
was approaching for him and his fellow countrymen.

When the dizziness following his fall had passed and he was ready to
start on once more, he observed that the steps of the passers-by were
unusually hurried and that all led in the same direction. He looked
back to see the object toward which they were hastening. At the sight
which met his eyes he gave a startled cry. He was dreaming or he had
gone mad.

This was England and London, this was the heart of the largest city
in the world. America, the longed-for, with its great forests and its
mighty hunters, lay far across the sea three thousand miles away.
But through the London fog, surrounded by a great crowd above whom
they towered, there came toward Conrad four giant creatures, with
bronze-colored skins, with deer-hide shoes, with headdresses of waving
feathers, and with scarlet blankets. Conrad rubbed his eyes; he looked
again. They came nearer and nearer, they seemed more and more majestic
and terrible.

Then, suddenly, they vanished, as though the earth had swallowed
them. They could not have entered a house since there were no
dwelling-houses here, and the shops were closed. Risking a rebuff as
cruel as that from the lamp-post, Conrad grasped the arm of the man
nearest him and poured out a dozen excited questions.

"These are Indians from the wilds of America," answered the stranger.

"Why are they here? What does it mean? Could I speak to them? Where did
they go?"

The stranger's patience was soon exhausted. After he had explained that
the savages had gone into the theater, he left Conrad to address his
questions to the empty air.

For a moment Conrad stared at the spot from which the Indians had
vanished. If he only had money to pay his way into the theater also!
But he was penniless. The next best thing was to tell his father, as
soon as possible, of this incredible experience. Running heavily, he
crossed London Bridge and started out upon the Blackheath Road, saying
over and over to himself, "The Indians are here! The Indians are here!"

So tired was he and so much confused by the strange sight which he had
seen that it was many hours before he reached his father's tent. He
imagined that the long journey had been made and that he was already in
the forests of the new country. At last an acquaintance, meeting him at
the edge of the camp, led him to John Conrad.

"Here is your boy. He was about to walk straight into a fire."

Fed and warmed, Conrad could only repeat over and over the magic
words, "The Indians are here!" His father thought he was delirious;
the children cried. For a long time after he had fallen into the heavy
sleep of exhaustion, his sisters watched him.

At dawn, when he woke, he found himself stiff and sore and
inexpressibly tired. But his head was clear, and slowly the events
of the day before came back to him. The Indians were real; to-day he
would find them. If they had come from America there would be a way to
return. He would beg them on his knees to take him and his family with
them. Perhaps they had come in their own ships.

Slipping from between his sleeping brothers, he lifted the flap of the
tent and stepped out into the cold morning air. He could not wait for
the family to rise; he would take his share of black bread and be gone.

Then, again, Conrad cried out. Last night he had beheld the strangers
through the medium of a thickening mist and with eyes confused by his
fall. Now he saw them clearly in the bright morning light, here upon
Blackheath before his father's tent! The eagle feathers waved above
their heads; their scarlet mantles wrapped them round; they stole
quietly about on moccasined feet.

For a long moment the Indians looked at Conrad and Conrad looked
back at them. It was as though they measured one another through an
eternity, the tall savages from across three thousand miles of sea and
the little lad from Gross Anspach. The lad's heart throbbed with awe
and wonder. What the savages thought it was difficult to say. They
made to one another strange guttural sounds which evidently served for
speech. It seemed to Conrad that they were about to turn away. It was
as though a heavenly visitor had descended only to depart. Conrad ran
forward and grasped the hand of one of the mighty creatures.

"Oh, take us with you, father and Margareta and Magdalena and the
others and me! Take us with you! We will work and we will learn to
hunt. There is no home for us here. We suffer and die. We--"

There was a commotion at the tent door and Conrad looked round. In the
doorway stood John Conrad, blinking, incredulous.

"I saw them last night, father. I have asked them to take us with
them." Conrad began to make gestures. "Us, with you, far away to the
west!" It was a request easy to make clear.

Again the savages uttered their strange guttural speech. They, in turn,
made motions to John Conrad and his son, that they should come with
them. Not for an instant did John Conrad hesitate. Upon this miraculous
encounter important things might depend.

"Conrad," he began, "while I am gone--"

"Oh, father, take me with you! I beg, take me with you!"

"Run and find Albrecht then, my son, and ask him to look after the
children."

Conrad was gone like the wind. Now the Weiser children and the
neighbors were staring with terrified eyes at the red men. They gave
a little scream when John Frederick toddled forward and fell over the
foot of one of the Indians and then held their breaths while he was
lifted high in the strong arms. John Conrad offered some of his small
supply of black bread and his strange guests grunted their pleased
acceptance. Then John Conrad and his son set out with the Indians to
make the rounds of the camp.

What the savages thought of the assemblage of misery it was hard to
say. They walked briskly so that the two Weisers could scarcely keep
up with them; they pointed now to a sick child, now to some adult who
showed more clearly than the others the effects of cold and anxiety and
hunger. Often they motioned toward the west, a gesture which it seemed
to Conrad had a heavenly significance.

When the circuit of the camp was complete, they made it plain to the
Weisers that they expected them to follow to the city, and father and
son, looking their vague hopes into one another's eyes, obeyed eagerly.

Along the Blackheath Road they went, through Southwark and across
London Bridge--how many times had Conrad traveled the road in despair!
Presently, when, after they had crossed the Thames and were in the
city, a man would have jostled Conrad from his place beside the leader,
the Indian cried out fiercely, and the stranger dropped quickly back
into the long queue of men and boys who had gathered. Now the Indians
motioned to Conrad that he should walk behind the leader and his father
behind him. Thus strangely escorted, the two Germans went through the
streets. Conrad saw in the eyes of the boys whom they passed a look of
envy. The course of fate had changed!

A few times John Conrad spoke to his son.

"Are you afraid?"

"Not I."

"Pray God that this strange way may lead to the new land."

"I will, father."

With heads erect the chiefs went on as though they trod the leafy paths
of their own forests. Presently they came out upon the river-bank once
more, traveled upon it for a short distance, then turned aside. The
crowd about them had changed its character. Here were fine gentlemen
and ladies on foot and in richly decked sedan chairs. A gentleman
came forward with a sharp exclamation and pointed questioningly
at the Weisers. One of the Indians answered by gestures and a few
incomprehensible words, and the gentleman looked as though he were
considering some strange thing. When the Indians walked on without
waiting for his answer, Conrad began to be frightened.

"Where will they take us, father?"

John Conrad's voice trembled.

"They are taking us into the Queen's palace," said he.




IV

A ROYAL AUDIENCE


At the door of St. James's Palace all but a few of the throng which
followed the Indian chiefs and the Weisers were denied entrance.
The finely dressed gentleman who had spoken to the Indians, and who
evidently knew their own language, was allowed to pass under the stone
archway and into the court and thence into the palace itself. The
Indians still led the way, traveling quietly along through intricate
passages and tapestry-hung halls. Courtiers passed them with curious
stares.

Still they kept the two Weisers behind the leader. Presently they
halted in a room where there was a fire blazing on the hearth and where
fine ladies laughed and talked. On the opposite side from the entrance
a thick curtain hung over a doorway. The leading chief walked directly
toward it and there paused, the procession behind him coming to a
stop. A little lady sitting by the fire accepted a challenge from her
companions to salute the strangers, and came across the floor, her high
heels tapping as she walked.

"O great King of Rivers," said she to the foremost Indian, "who are
these your companions?"

The Indian's answer was interpreted by the gayly dressed gentleman who
understood his tongue.

"The King of Rivers says that these are his friends."

"Thank you, Colonel Schuyler. Tell the King of Rivers that his friends
need a red blanket like his own and--"

What else they needed Conrad and his father were not to hear. The
curtain before them was lifted, and from the other side a high, clear
voice announced,--

"The chiefs of the Mohawk Nation!"

Moving as in a dream, their eyes dazzled and their hearts confused,
the two Weisers went on. They found themselves now in a still more
magnificent room. At its far end there was a group of gentlemen
surrounding a lady who sat in a throne-like chair. She was grave of
aspect and there was upon her face the indelible impression of grief.
On her white hands and her neck were sparkling jewels. The gentlemen
about her were wigged and powdered, and wore in their long sleeves
white lace ruffles which almost hid their hands.

So astonished and confused was Conrad that his father had to command
him twice to make obeisance.

"To your knees, boy! To your knees, Conrad! It is the Queen!"

The Indians did not bend, but stood with arms folded under their
scarlet blankets, in their dark, shining eyes a look of friendly regard
for the little lady who was a ruler like themselves. The Queen looked
at the two Germans with curious but kindly astonishment. Neither John
Conrad nor his son was in court array, though the needles of Margareta
and Magdalena kept them fairly neat and whole.

"Good Peter," said Queen Anne, "who are these?"

The stranger who had interpreted for the Indians rose from his knees.

"They are Germans from the camp on Blackheath, dear madam. Your friends
of the Mohawk Nation went early this morning to visit that great
settlement and have brought with them from there these folk, father
and son, to their appointment with the Queen. From this intention they
could not be stayed, but insist that they have a communication of
importance to make concerning these strangers."

The Queen looked smilingly at her Indian friends and then at the two
Germans.

"The condition of those helpless people is on our minds. Let our
friends of the Mohawk Nation speak."

Surely the audience room had never heard a stranger sound than that
which now filled it! The tallest of the chiefs responded, speaking at
length, with many sweeping gestures. Conrad strained his ears--oh,
how longingly!--but could understand nothing. The chief seemed to be
speaking of some spot far away and also of the two Germans. One word
Conrad heard, he was certain, again and again, but he could not retain
its strange sound.

When the Indian had finished, Colonel Schuyler began to translate his
words, imitating also his motions toward the west and his pointing to
the Weisers.

"Your friend the King of Rivers has this to say, O Queen. He and his
companions of the Mohawk Nation have walked about to see the city
where so many hundreds of people live in so small a space. Far to the
south they have visited also the settlement of misery known as the
German camp. The distress of these people is terrible to them. It is
a dreadful thing to them that men should be so crowded together when
there is so much space in the world, so much land for planting corn and
so many wide forests for hunting. The King of Rivers recalls to you the
object of his long and perilous journey across the ocean in an unsteady
ship. He reminds you that he seeks for himself and his allied nations
protection against the growing power of his enemies, both Indian and
French.

"Now he would offer for these poor Germans his country of
Schoharie"--there was the word which Conrad had heard again and
again!--"where there are fine streams for fishing and much land for
planting and hunting. There, when there is no war, men and women are
happiest of all the places on the earth. His people are faithful
people, keeping their word, and aiding and protecting unto death those
in whom they can trust. If you will send these afflicted people to
Schoharie, then together the Indians and the Germans can keep the peace
with the western Indians, and the French will not dare to attack them."

The Indians nodded their heads solemnly as Colonel Schuyler finished.
They had entire confidence in him and trusted him to repeat their words
exactly.

The Queen looked at the two humble figures before her. Their blue eyes
met hers with a great longing.

"Speak!" said she.

John Conrad took a step forward. His English was broken, but none the
less eloquent.

"Oh, Madam, all they say of our misery is true. We are indeed desolate
and afflicted. We have been harried by the sword; we have perished by
cold and starvation. Your enemies the French are our enemies. At the
hands of our own princes we have perished for conscience' sake. We are
of your faith, O Queen!--those of us that are left. The good God in
heaven does not send his creatures into the world to be thus destroyed.
We seek not idleness and repose for our bodies, but labor for our
bodies and repose for our souls. We long as the hart pants after water
brooks for this new country. You have brought us thus far out of our
wilderness; send us now into this new land where there is peace! We
have nothing, nothing. We cannot pay except by our labor in a new
country. We ask bounty as we ask the bounty of Heaven, because we are
helpless. You have already marvelously befriended us. But for you we
should not be living at this day."

The Queen turned to the gentleman who sat nearest to her.

"He speaks well, my lord."

"He speaks from the soul, Madam."

Now the Queen conversed rapidly and in a low tone with Peter
Schuyler--too rapidly for the Weisers to understand. She mentioned one
Hunter of whom they knew nothing, and they waited uneasily, afraid that
their audience was at an end and that nothing had been accomplished.
When the doorkeeper came forward and led them away, leaving their
Indian friends behind, their hearts sank. They made obeisance to the
Queen and went slowly toward the door, not daring to speak. Then they
saw that Colonel Schuyler followed them.

"This day one week at this hour the Queen will see you again. Can you
find your way thither?"

"Oh, yes, my lord!" answered John Conrad.

Outside the two met again curious glances, heard again amused comment.
But they regarded neither, scarcely indeed saw the smiles or heard the
laughter. Hope had once more taken up an abode in their weary hearts.

Daily in the week which followed, Conrad made his way from Blackheath
to St. James's Palace, where he gazed at the stone archway and then
wandered farther hoping to see again the Indians. To the other
Germans the Weisers said nothing of their hopes. The Indians had led
them into the city and had there held conversation with them through
an interpreter,--beyond that fact they did not go. Their fellow
countrymen had been too often cruelly disappointed; until the blessed
possibilities of which the Weisers dreamed had become certainties, they
would say nothing.

Yet hope in their own hearts rose higher and higher. Once more Conrad
read his little book, finding in his new acquaintances proof of all
that was said in praise of the Indian and contradiction of all that was
said in his disparagement. The word "Schoharie" he wrote down and said
over and over in his waking hours and in his dreams at night.

He had formed a friendship with a lad of his own age, Peter Zenger by
name, who, with his ailing father, had suffered as the Weisers had
suffered and who had a similar longing for the new land. From Peter
during this week he held aloof, determined to tell his secret to no one.

Conrad thought a great deal of his father and of the attentive way
in which the Queen and her court had listened to him. His father was
poor and he had miserable clothes, yet he had not trembled. Of all the
Germans no one, not even the magistrate of Oberdorf, who was so certain
of his own powers, could have done so well.

On the morning of the appointment John Conrad and his son waited for an
hour outside the palace gateway. The unkindly feeling of the populace
toward the Germans had increased rather than diminished, and as they
walked up and down many persons spoke roughly to them. But again,
wrapped in their own anxious thoughts, they heard with indifference.

Again the Queen sat in the throne-like chair with her gentlemen about
her, the same gentlemen so far as Conrad could see, except one who
now sat nearest to the Queen and to whom she was speaking when they
entered. They looked in vain for their friends of the Mohawk Nation.

The Queen bade the Weisers sit side by side on a cushioned bench before
her while she continued her conversation with the newcomer whom she
called Hunter. Then she bade John Conrad tell again the story of his
misfortunes and she listened attentively, her eyes fastened upon him.

John Conrad spoke eloquently, though brokenly, once more, and omitted
nothing. When in the midst of his account of persecution and misery,
one of the fine gentlemen would have stopped him, the Queen bade the
story go on.

"It is good for us to hear these things. And your wife,--you say
nothing of her."

Nor did John Conrad say anything. He tried, stammered, halted, tried
again, and failed once more. In a second one of the fine gentlemen,
Lord Marlborough, began to speak in his easy way. The Queen's face was
white, her lips twitched, and she smoothed nervously the black stuff of
which her dress was made. Lord Marlborough talked on and on until the
Queen herself interrupted him.

"We have heard this sad tale before, but never so well told. It is our
intention to do all for these poor Germans that we can. In our colony
of New York we have already settled the first of those who have come to
us. There they dwell in happiness along the banks of Hudson's River and
have made for themselves comfortable villages. It is our intention to
establish others there in a similar way.

"In return we ask certain labors. Our enemies are many. It is necessary
that we maintain for ourselves a large fleet upon the sea. Tar and
pitch we must buy in great quantities from Sweden and Russia--an
enormous and unnecessary expense. In our colony of New York, so says
its Governor Hunter, are thousands of acres of pine trees from which we
could distill, if we had the workmen, our own supplies. Do you think
the Germans could make tar?"

"What others can do, we can do," answered John Conrad. "We are
not below the rest of the world in intelligence, though we are
in possessions. We have among us men of many crafts--husbandmen
and vine-dressers, masons and bakers and carpenters, herdsmen and
blacksmiths and tanners and millers and weavers. Oh, dear lady, if we
were but there!"

"The grapes of the new land are said to be finer than the grapes of
France," said Lord Marlborough. "It would not be amiss if we could draw
from our own stores."

Governor Hunter leaned forward eagerly.

"It will be time to think of wine when Her Majesty's ships are well
caulked," said he impatiently. "The trees must be properly barked
two years before they are cut and burned. There will be no time for
vine-dressing. The project is as sure of success as the rising of the
sun. It cannot fail. Meanwhile, there will be work in other crafts also
as in all new settlements. It is understood that the Germans have here
an opportunity to repay some of the great expense to which we have been
put on their account."

"We would not have it otherwise," cried John Conrad. "We are not
beggars, except as we beg for a chance to earn our bread. Would that
we might begin to-day to pay our great debt!"

The Queen smiled.

"We must have ships, and they are not easy to find in a sufficient
number at present to transport this host. But tell your friends to hold
themselves in readiness."

Now Conrad breathed a long sigh.

"The lad looks at me with a question in his eyes," said the Queen.
"What is it, boy?"

"Will our new home be near these kind Indians?" asked Conrad, trembling.

"Governor Hunter, what of this?"

"There are Indians everywhere in plenty," said he.

Colonel Schuyler rose, and John Conrad, feeling himself dismissed, rose
also.

The Queen stopped them with a lifted hand.

"About these same Indians, good Weiser. Our possessions lie along the
east coast of this great and unexplored country. To the north and to
the west, along the course of a vast river and the shores of large
inland bodies of water, the French have by guile got possession of the
land. Between live tribes of savages, upon whose friendship depends
enormous issues. Give thought to this, you and your friends. These
Indians who are here represent a great nation or confederation of
nations, skilled in the warfare of the forest. It is important that
they continue to be our friends. I am told that they do not regard
lightly deceit of any sort, and that their revenge upon the treacherous
is hideous beyond all describing. Now, fare you well."

Again John Conrad tried to speak his gratitude, but could say no word.
He dropped to his knees once more, then rose and followed Colonel
Schuyler to the door. There Colonel Schuyler put a gold piece into his
hand.

"For you and Magdalena and Margareta and John Frederick and the
others," said he. "The Queen's bounty."

By noon of the next day, the German settlement was ready to take ship.
John Conrad, as he carried his remarkable announcement from tent to
tent and from fire to fire, gave warning that sailing might still be
delayed, that the ships were not yet in the harbor, that only a few
hundreds could be carried on each vessel, and that these hundreds would
be selected according to a method of which they knew nothing.

But the Germans would not hear. They packed their belongings once more
into bundles, and depression gave place to good cheer, solemnity to
hilarity. Some let the fires before their tents go out and all spent
their small remaining sums of money for provisions to take on shipboard.

Alas, bundles were unpacked, fires were relighted, and the food
purchased for the sea eaten on land long before the ships were in
harbor and the Germans on board. Some of the bundles were then packed
once more by other hands. Before the hour for sailing hundreds of
pilgrims, among them the disappointed magistrate of Oberdorf, had come
to the end of their journey. The Blackheath camp had become a camp of
death.

In the weeks which now followed, John Conrad was summoned twice to the
palace, not to see the Queen or to meet his Indian benefactors, but
to have explained to him, as the chief representative of the Germans,
their duties in the new world. Once more the need of the English navy
for tar was made clear and the method for extracting it from the
pine trees carefully explained. Governor Hunter, who talked to John
Conrad at length, was quick of speech and temper, a man who brooked no
opposition and listened to few questions.

To John Conrad was presented a contract for his signature and that of
other Germans, by which they were to promise to perform that which
the Queen required. With happy hearts they promised; with overflowing
gratitude they heard that they were to receive, after their debt to the
Government was paid, twenty-five dollars and forty acres of land.

Finally, as Christmas Day drew near, good news came to Blackheath.
Ships would be provided for all, the first sailing on Christmas Day.
Assigned to the first ship were the Weisers and Conrad's friend Peter
Zenger and his father. The rabble of London gathered at the camp to see
the Germans start, but now their taunts fell on deaf ears. The new
country was just across the sea; peace and plenty were at hand. They
thought with sad regret of those who had started with them, but who
were no longer here to continue the journey.

Though it was winter, the Germans thought little of the storms which
they would meet at sea. They were landsmen who knew nothing of the
fierce power of the ocean. If they remembered the roughness of the
Channel crossing, it was with the consoling reflection that the ocean
was there confined to narrow bounds, like the Rhine where its rapids
were so swift. It was true that Conrad's little book advised various
precautions against illness and misery. But they refused to think of
illness or misery. With their long journey so nearly ended, they could
endure both.

Conrad brought out from its hiding-place George Reimer's flute and
discovered to his delight that Peter Zenger had a drum. Perhaps there
would be other instruments upon the ship and a band could be formed.

To the eyes of Conrad and Peter the ship Lyon looked enormous as
it lay in the harbor, its mighty sails furled. From its sides there
projected four cannon, regarded by the two boys with terror and
delight. A sailor standing on the quay explained that they were to deal
with the French and with pirates.

"Pirates!" repeated Conrad. "What are they?"

"They are freebooters," explained Peter. "I have heard of them. They
attack any one whom they please and kill and rob."

"Are we _sure_ to meet them?" asked Conrad.

"They come out from the shore like wolves," answered the sailor. "But
with these cross dogs we can scare them off."

But whether there were pirates or not, whether there were storms to
meet, or whether they were to sail in a continued calm, the Germans
must now get aboard. On Christmas morning the first four hundred
embarked upon the ship Lyon for another stage of the long journey.




V

ACROSS THE SEA


So welcome had been the sight of the ship, so blessed the prospect of
being able to set out once more, that the Weisers and their friends
had no fault to find with the meager provision which had been made for
them. They trooped joyfully aboard, disposing themselves and their
goods as well as they could. It was true that what seemed to be a
large space shrank amazingly as the passengers found places for the
bundles and boxes which remained in their possession in spite of all
their misfortunes, but of lack of space they made light. Thus crowded
together they would not suffer so dreadfully from the cold as they had
in the open tents of Blackheath. Besides, the journey would soon be
over. Those who had misgivings as the shores of England dropped out of
sight, smiled to see Conrad and Peter gazing longingly from the boat's
prow toward the west.

In comparison with the journey down the Rhine the journey across the
Atlantic is dull to most travelers. There are no interesting waitings
at landings, there are no towering castles, there are no flowery
meadows. But to the children on the ship Lyon there was no moment
without its entertainment. There was, to begin with, the never-ending
motion of the sea; there was, for the first few days, the almost hourly
sight of a distant sail. Presently they began to watch for the spouting
of whales and for the dipping and soaring of creatures which were half
bird, half fish.

The voyage began in a long and unusual calm, so that the older folk
could sit comfortably on the deck in the sunshine and the children
could scamper about at their games. The captain and the crew were kind
and patient, as they needed to be to answer the numberless questions
about the ship and her rudder and her white sails and the wide sea upon
which she traveled. The mate had crossed the Atlantic Ocean four times
and had been many times to Marseilles: to the shivering girls and the
delighted boys he told a hundred tales of storms, of waves covering
the ship, of rigging locked in ice, of flights from pirates and of
battles with the French.

"Shall we meet storms like that?" they asked, terrified, yet eager.

"I've crossed when the sea was like a raging lion," answered the mate,
to please the boys; "and when she was like a smooth pond," he added, to
please the girls.

Presently the mate rigged up a fishing-line with which the boys took
turns. Peter Zenger added an edible dolphin to the ship's food--that
was the first catch. Then, Conrad, feeling a powerful tug at his line,
was convinced that he had caught a whale, and screamed for help.

"It will pull me over," he called. "Come quickly!"

The sailor who came to his aid laughed.

"You could have let go!"

When they hauled in the catch it proved to be a shark, at whose
enormous mouth and hideous teeth the girls screamed. Thereafter they
scarcely looked over the side of the ship.

Among themselves the older folk reviewed again and again their
persecutions, their griefs, and their hopes. To the younger men and
women John Conrad talked long and earnestly.

"If all that we hear is true, children, this new land will be the
finest land in the world. There are fertile fields; there are great
forests and rivers, such as we know nothing of; there are rich ores.
Above all, there are young, eager hearts. I believe that there will
also be new governments, which will, please God, be different from
the old. In this new country every man should have a fair chance. I
am growing old, I shall not have much to do with the affairs of the
new country, but my children may. Let them remember their own history
and be always on the side of the oppressed. You may be divided from
one another. Our new friends may forsake us. You will have griefs and
sorrows like the rest of mankind. You must learn to find companionship
in yourselves and help from above. You must learn to be independent of
others, even of those who love you and whom you love."

Daily Conrad and Peter practiced on their flute and drum. There were,
as they had hoped, other instruments on the ship and a band was
organized which played many lively tunes. Sometimes the boys were
allowed to help with the furling of a sail or the giving out of the
supply of food and water. They were shown by the friendly mate the
ship's store of arms and ammunition, a store which seemed to their
inexperienced eyes sufficient to meet a whole fleet of pirates.

"If they would but come!" sighed Conrad and Peter to themselves.

Presently John Conrad's watchful eyes saw a new expression in the eyes
of his oldest daughter. She sat often by herself, and when she joined
the general company one of the young men, Baer by name, was certain
to put himself as soon as possible by her side. John Conrad sighed,
scolded his son Conrad and Peter Zenger for their constant punning on
the young man's name, and then took his own medicine.

"They must leave me one by one," said he to himself. "Magdalena will
doubtless soon be showing the same signs. Thank God, they can start
together in a land of peace and plenty!"

Through January all went well with the pilgrims. Then Peter Zenger's
father succumbed to the disease with which he had been afflicted. The
end was sudden to no one but Peter, who would not be comforted. To him
John Conrad talked when the solemn burial was completed.

"You believe in God and Heaven, dear child. Your father was worn and
weary and he is at rest until the last day. You are young with life
before you. You have your new country; to it you must devote yourself,
heart and soul. The good God closes all gates sometimes so that we may
see the more plainly the one through which He means we should go."

With the death of Zenger the character of the journey changed. As the
calm of the early part of January had been extraordinary, so now were
the storms. There appeared one morning along the western horizon a low
bank of clouds which the children took at first, in wild enthusiasm,
for land. As the clouds rose higher and higher, the color of the sea
changed to a strange oily gray, and suddenly the ship began to rock
as though the waves were rising like the clouds. Now a great wind
whistled in the rigging with a sound different from any which the
passengers had heard.

"What is it, father?" cried Sabina. "I am afraid."

The Germans looked at one another ominously.

For many days there was no sitting about the deck. No passenger was
allowed, indeed, to leave the hold of the ship. The vessel, which had
come to seem as solid as the earth, was tossed about like a cork. Again
and again waves covered it, again and again with sails closely furled
it fought for its life. The coverings of the hatchways were burst open
and the sea rushed in. Giving themselves up many times for lost, the
passengers tried to be as brave as they could. Those who could keep on
their feet did all that lay in their power for their companions, and
through the intolerable hours they prayed. When, once or twice during
the storm, the captain visited them, they took courage from him.

"Conrad shall still catch a whale," said he in a voice which was
cheerful through all its weary hoarseness. "And Peter shall play his
drum, and the young maidens shall smile upon the young men."

Finally the long storm died away. The passengers were startled to
realize that the Lyon shook and quivered no longer, that silence
had succeeded the dreadful creaking in the timbers and the fearful
whistling in the rigging, and that as the storm abated they had each
one fallen asleep.

Now followed many days of cold, bright weather. Again the travelers
sought the deck and the sunshine. Peter Zenger was able to remind
Conrad one day, with a weak little smile, of the advice given by the
book of directions.

"It would have taken a pretty lively swing to prepare us for such a
shaking," said he.

In a day or two Peter lifted his drum and the band returned to its
practicing. At first they played solemn tunes; then, with returning
color to their cheeks, came fresh cheerfulness and courage. Even the
older folk joined cheerfully in "Susy, dear Susy." The sailors mended
the sails, the girls took out their knitting, and the children played
about on the deck.

But the whole-hearted gayety of the early journey did not return. The
great storm had taken fearful toll, and there were already twenty
passengers less than there had been at the beginning. The crowding of
the ship had become a serious menace to health. There were a few sick
persons at whom the captain looked more anxiously than he had looked at
the angry clouds or the tempestuous sea. Not the least of the dangers
of the long journey were various diseases, contagious and deadly,
which, once started, could scarcely be checked.

Now another terrible peril threatened the ship Lyon. The supply of food
brought by the passengers was entirely exhausted, and that furnished by
the ship was small in quantity and hardly edible. The drinking-water
had become foul, and through a leak in one of the wooden casks a large
quantity had been lost. Passengers and crew watched the sky for a
cloud.

When at last the cloud appeared, it was accompanied again by the
terrible wind and the heaving sea of the great storm. Again the
passengers spent a week in the hold while the ship battled with a
tempest which broke the rudder. Their respect for the captain and the
stanch vessel which carried them grew to admiration and then to awe.

"It is no wonder they call the ship 'she,'" said Conrad feebly. "One
would think it was alive. It is well named 'Lyon,' for it fights for us
like a lion."

Again the passengers returned to the deck, more weak and miserable than
before. The supply of water gathered in the storm sank lower and lower
in the cask, the rations of salt pork and sea biscuit became daily
smaller. Finally a day dawned when the supply of water was gone and the
supply of food so low that starvation and death were imminent. John
Conrad went about from group to group telling of the glories of the
heavenly country to which their passage seemed now but the matter of a
short time.

Then came help. A faint speck appeared upon the horizon. The children,
when they saw it, flew to the captain, who, they discovered, had been
watching it for an hour. It grew larger and larger, not into the shape
of a rain cloud, but into the shape of a vessel. Young Conrad guessed
the nature of the hope in the captain's eager eyes.

"Might they have food and water for us?" The captain shook his head.

"We cannot tell. They may be as badly off as we are."

The ship came closer and closer, flying, they saw joyfully, the pennant
of England. The passengers grew silent and eyes burned and hearts
almost ceased to beat. Presently they were able to hear a shout across
the smooth sea. It was surely a friendly hail, and still the ship came
nearer and nearer. Then the travelers heard, almost unbelieving, the
blessed words:--

"We have potatoes and ground beans and dried venison from Her Majesty's
colony. Do you wish to buy?"

"Yes," shouted the captain: "all you have."

"We have water, also. Do you need any?"

To this replied a hurrah from every throat on the ship Lyon.

"Thank God! Thank God!" cried the poor Germans.

In a short time the water casks were aboard and with them bags of
vegetables and meat. For several hours the ship stood near and the
sailors coming aboard the Lyon showed the Germans how to roast the
potatoes in an open fire on the deck. Never had food tasted so good and
water so delicious. It was a happy promise from the new country.

But the ship which brought this welcome freight brought also bad news.
The freebooters along the coast were unusually active. The captain of
the Lyon must look well to his guns. Everywhere in the ports of the new
country one heard of ships boarded, of treasure taken, and of crew and
passengers murdered The more closely the vessel approached the shores
of America, the greater was the danger.

The Germans looked at one another with despair.

"We have suffered as much as we can bear!" cried some one.

"We have no treasures," said John Conrad to the captain. "Why should
any one molest people so poor as we are?"

"My ship would be a treasure for them," answered the captain. "For that
they would murder every soul on board."

Daily the passengers were assembled and drilled. The crew was only
sufficient to sail the ship; for its defense the passengers would have
to be depended upon. They were instructed in the firing of the cannon
and informed about the methods of pirates in attacking a vessel.

"I have stood them off before," said the captain, uneasily, to John
Conrad. "But I have always had more powder than I have now and a few
trained gunners. If they are once aboard, we shall have to fight like
tigers for our lives. They give no quarter."

Now sabers and pistols were laid ready so that there might be no
confusion when the pirate ship was sighted. The women and children eyed
the weapons fearfully; the men tried to laugh at their alarm. No one
but the very youngest of the children slept the night through.

But no pirate ship appeared. The air grew softer and warmer; all began
to breathe more freely and to look ahead, not for the ship of the dread
enemy, but for the land. Eyes of passengers and crew were weary of the
sea.

"They are afraid of our cross dogs," said Conrad, half wishing, as the
danger faded, for a battle.

"Perhaps some brave captain has swept them from the sea," said Peter.
"That would be a work I should like. I should board their ships as they
have boarded others and then I should give no quarter."

At last, after the captain had declared the danger past, and had
jokingly bidden the boys keep constant eyes upon the west for the
promised land, the sailor on watch gave a loud cry:--

"Ship, ahoy!"

At once the passengers crowded to the prow of the boat. The approaching
ship was a tiny speck, visible only to the sharpest eyes. For a long
time it seemed to remain stationary; then they realized that it was
steadily approaching. Children began to cry and mothers to hold them
closer and closer.

"It is coming very fast, is it not?" said Conrad to the captain.

"Pretty fast."

"It is not necessarily a pirate ship," said John Conrad. "It may be a
friendly ship."

"I believe it brings us good water and more food," said Sabina.

"I am sure that I can see the English flag," said George Frederick.

But the passengers were not allowed to linger long at the prow
speculating about the strange vessel. Suddenly hopes were dashed and
all speculations and prophecies interrupted by a sharp order from
the captain. Women and children were to go below and each man was to
take his place at once at the post assigned him. The ammunition--a
perilously small store--was divided. Conrad and Peter Zenger were the
youngest passengers who were allowed to stay on deck. They had been
included in the drills, but for them there was now neither gun nor
powder. They were given orders to keep out of the way of the crew and
the older men. If any of the defenders fell, they might take their
places. The two boys crouched down close to the mast, not venturing
to go below to put away the drum and flute upon which they had been
playing when the alarm was given.

Nearer and nearer came the strange ship. It was not so large as the
Lyon, and it responded far more quickly to its helm. In the quickening
breeze from the west it advanced with great speed. It floated no
pennant--the wish of the Germans had been father to the thought.

Now a sailor in the masthead of the Lyon sent out a friendly hail.
There was no answer. Again the sailor shouted. Still there was no
reply. The crew of the Lyon could see now plainly armed men upon the
deck of the stranger. The captain spoke in a whisper to the mate.

"We have powder for two rounds. Not enough to keep them off for five
minutes. We--"

The stranger seemed actually to leap ahead, and the captain's eyes
flashed. He raised his hands before his mouth like a trumpet.

"Fire!"

The two cannon which pointed toward the strange ship spit out a long
streak of flame, and the Lyon trembled with a terrific detonation.

When the smoke cleared away, it was plainly to be seen that the pirates
were not frightened by the warning shots. The balls had fallen short,
and the pirate ship sailed on, as though to take quick advantage of the
time required to reload the cannon. It was now so near that the evil
faces could be clearly discerned upon its deck.




VI

THE PIRATE SHIP


It was small wonder that the passengers on the Lyon were almost
paralyzed with terror. They were not soldiers, nor accustomed to taking
the part of soldiers, and they were not fighting upon a battlefield,
distant from their loved ones, but close to them where the danger
threatened alike themselves and all they held dear. The fact made them
at once more courageous and more terrified.

It was known by all that powder was short and that the accuracy of the
next shot would probably decide their fate. Their hands grew more and
more awkward, their cheeks whiter. Conrad and Peter sprang to their
feet, seeing plainly the panic on the faces of the gunners who were
trying to reload the cannon, and upon the faces of the others who
stood, saber or pistol in hand, waiting for what seemed to be certain
destruction. One frightened soul fired his pistol prematurely, another
waved his saber wildly in the air. If the freebooters saw, they must
have anticipated an easy victory.

"If we only had pistols!" cried Peter shrilly.

The captain shouted fierce orders, and still the gunners fumbled at
their task.

Now Conrad ran to the captain's side. A wild plan had suddenly occurred
to him.

"We could play," cried he breathlessly, "Peter and I. There was a
trumpeter on a castle wall who played and played till--"

"Play, then!"

With trembling lips and hands the two boys began. The flute gave forth
a sharp piping, the drum tried to roar as fiercely as the cannon. There
was at first no tune, there was at first, indeed, only a mad discord.
And still the pirate ship came on.

"Louder! Louder! Louder!" The boys did not know whether they had heard
or had imagined the command. They were playing "Susy, dear Susy," and
playing it like a jig. As though its sprightliness steadied them, arms
grew stronger, breath more even. The gunners heard, the infantry
heard, the women and children shivering in the hold heard, and best of
all the evil men on the pirate ship heard. The hands of the gunners
trembled a little less, the hands which held the pistols and sabers
grasped them more firmly, the women and children looked with a tiny bit
of hope into one another's eyes, and the pirates looked at one another
with astonishment.

It may have been that the captain of the pirate ship did not care to
try conclusions with a force which could spare men to play the drum and
flute; it may have been that he could observe that the firing of the
second shot was the matter of only a second or two; or it may have been
that merely the lively defiance of "Susy, dear Susy," discouraged him.
At any rate, he altered the course of his vessel. When the second shot
sailed after him, he had darted out of range.

At first the passengers of the Lyon stared as though a spell had been
put upon them. A moment ago they had been in danger of their lives; now
they were safe while the enemy sailed away. Some laughed aloud, others
wiped their eyes, and a sailor flung open the hatchway and shouted the
good news to the anxious hearts below.

Though the distance between the Lyon and her enemy grew wider and wider
until presently the stranger had vanished over the horizon's edge, the
sailors kept watch until nightfall.

But the passengers gave no thought now to an enemy. They saw, late in
the afternoon, a sailor lowering the sounding-line over the ship's
side. They had watched this process many times. But the earnestness
of the sailor and the eager watching of his companions gave it a new
significance. Into the group at the ship's edge young Conrad forced his
way.

"How much?" said he.

The sailors paid no attention and Conrad concluded to wait. Presently
the line was drawn in and the sailor announced to the captain in a loud
voice,--

"Thirty-five fathoms, sir."

"That is shallow," said Conrad. "Is there any danger?"

The sailors laughed.

"There is danger of seeing land to-morrow," said one.

To this no one made any reply for a long moment. Then another shout
arose like the one which had greeted the arrival of water and food. In
one moment the news had spread: in another, though the captain laughed,
the women were descending to pack boxes and to tie up the bundles in
the hold.

But no one stayed long below the deck. Margareta and Magdalena with
one bundle packed climbed back to look toward the west. John Conrad's
expectation was being realized; there was now a young man by the side
of Magdalena also. The captain laughed at them for watching for land as
he laughed at them for packing.

"To-morrow, my children, not to-day. You may look your eyes out to-day
and you will see nothing, and there will be plenty of time after we see
land for you to pack your clothes."

Nevertheless, the Germans looked and looked, though, as the captain
prophesied, they saw nothing. But they would not leave their place
in the bow. Sitting together, they reviewed the journey and the more
distant past. They spoke of the Fatherland, of those left behind who
might some day follow them, like George Reimer, of those, like the
magistrate of Oberdorf, whom they should never see again, and of
those already on the way in other ships. They spoke also in quiet
voices of those who slept, like the mother of the Weisers, in quiet
graveyards. They spoke of bondage and liberty and of war and peace and
of a strange new freedom, of which there was in the hearts of a few a
dim conception, like the tiny seed of a mighty tree. They spoke with
gratitude of the good Queen and offered a prayer for her, and for other
friends, like the good helmsman on the river boat. They spoke of the
strange red people, and Conrad must find his little book and read once
more of their skill as hunters, of their devotion in friendship and of
their ferocity in war and in revenge. Longest of all they talked of the
King of Rivers and his companions.

"It is my object to find them first of all," said Conrad. "I am sure
they are looking for us to come to the country which they gave us."

Once again must Conrad and Peter and the rest of the band play their
old tunes, grave and gay, mournful and lively; once again must all join
in song. Twilight came and then the starry, summer night, and still the
pilgrims sat gazing toward the west. All night a few kept vigil.

At daylight every one was on deck. The morning dawned in splendor, but
no one turned to watch the rising sun. At last, when the bright rays
illuminated the whole of earth and heaven, they saw through tears the
low shores of the promised land.

But now that land was in sight, the Lyon was not able to get into
the harbor. Already as the passengers watched the shore a storm was
rising. It was not so severe as those which had gone before nor so
long continued, but it was far more alarming since the ship was now
in danger of being cast upon the reefs. It seemed for many days that
the passengers had endured all for naught. It was like being sent
back into mid-ocean to suffer once more all the fearful trials through
which they had lived. Again the captain grew wan and hollow-eyed, again
the travelers lived for days in the hold of the ship, again there was
sickness and death. Some of those who had seen the promised land saw
it no more, nor any earthly land. There was no concealing the fact
that those who were ill had ship fever, which was almost certain, in
the conditions in which the patients had to live, to be fatal. Little
John Frederick, the youngest of the Weisers, about whose health they
had long felt anxiety, grew worse, so that his brothers and sisters
could not look at him without tears. Still the pilgrims were patient
and kind, still they tried not to murmur at this new dispensation of
Providence.

"Courage!" said John Conrad a dozen times a day, to himself, as well as
to his companions. "Many a good enterprise has failed because those who
undertook it could not endure quite to the end."

The pilgrims were to have, alas, need for all the courage and patience
which they could summon. When a long swell succeeded the fierce
beating of the waves and the skies cleared, they sought the deck once
more, and hurried to the prow. There they stared at one another in
amazement and terror. The promised land at which they had looked with
such longing eyes had vanished.

"What has become of it?" asked a bewildered company.

"It is still exactly where it was," answered the captain. "It is we who
have changed our place."

"When shall we see it again?"

The captain reassured them with a cheerfulness which he did not feel.
The ship had been driven far out of its course; it would take many days
to win again a view of the low-lying shores.

It was now June. Unless conditions in the new world were very different
from those in the old, the season for planting was almost passed: and
John Conrad's eagerness to be settled grew to anxiety. Whatever young
Conrad's book might say about the strength of the sun in America, it
was certain that the pilgrims must have a house and some stores of
food and fuel with which to meet the winter. Again they gazed toward
the west until, between the blinding glare of the sun on the smooth sea
and their own tears, they could see no more.

But like all evils in the world the long journey came to an end. The
travelers had given up rising before dawn to watch the first beams of
the sun strike on the western shores, when one bright morning a shout
awoke them.

"Land! Land! Land!" Though it needed but one call to rouse the
sleepers, the sailor called a dozen times, as though the joyful news
could not be too often proclaimed.

The travelers crowded on deck; they saw the shore much nearer at hand
than it had been before, and green instead of a dull, indeterminate
color; they were surrounded by fluttering birds; they sniffed upon the
air a different odor, an odor of land and growing things. Then with one
accord their eyes sought the sky to see if once more a cloud threatened
them.

But there was no cloud even so large as a man's hand, and the
dangerous reefs were passed safely.

"But we are not moving!" cried young Conrad. "What is the matter?"

The captain pointed ahead, and Conrad saw a long rowboat cutting the
water.

"We can't go into the harbor without a pilot," said the captain. "Here
he comes."

Indifferent to the fact that their belongings were, after all their
planning, not ready to be carried to the shore, the passengers hung
over the side of the ship. There was a loud hail from the little boat,
and an answering shout from the captain of the Lyon.

Suddenly Conrad cried out and seized his father by the arm.

"Look! Look!"

"What is it, lad?"

Then John Conrad saw for himself. The rowers were dark-skinned,
black-haired creatures whose great bare bodies gleamed in the sun. The
King of Rivers and his friends had been blanketed, but there was no
mistaking these for any but men of their race.

"They are Indians," said Conrad, in awe.

Now a rope ladder was flung over the side of the ship and the pilot
came aboard. He shook hands with the captain and the mate, and then
lifted from the hands of an Indian who had followed him a roughly woven
basket.

"I always bring something for the birds," said he in a loud voice as he
uncovered it.

For a moment both children and adults could only stare at him dumbly.
He was real, he came from America, and America had begun to seem like
the figment of a dream: his was a new face, and they had seen no new
faces for months.

But when the children looked into his basket, they ran forward. Here
were cherries for mouths which had forgotten the taste of fruit; here
were strawberries for lips which had never touched strawberries. An old
woman began to weep.

"Cherries like those in the gardens of Württemberg, God be thanked!"

John Conrad looked at the pilot a little uneasily.

"We cannot pay," said he.

The pilot popped a strawberry into the mouth of John Frederick.

"Tut, tut," said he, "you are in a land of plenty. To-morrow when I
come to take you in I will bring more."

"To-morrow!" echoed a dozen voices. "Oh, sir, can we not go in to-day?"

The pilot shook his head.

"Not till to-morrow."

"But the storm came before and drove us far away."

"No storm will drive you away now."

With sinking hearts the pilgrims saw the pilot descend again over the
side of the ship and enter his boat and row away.

"I do not believe he will return," said one despairing soul.

But in a few minutes the speaker and every one else on board had
begun to pack. Pots and dishes, pans and kettles, clothes, a few
spinning-wheels, the few treasured books--all were boxed or wrapped
or corded together. The Weisers, remembering gayly that they had once
made nine bundles for eight persons, made careful division of their
belongings.

"The spinning-wheel is not here and dear Wolf is not here, but we have
everything else," said Margareta.

"Including a tame bear," ventured Conrad, knowing that there would be
no boxing of ears to-day.

To the laughing astonishment of the travelers, the pilot was on the
deck in the morning when they came up to greet the sun. He rallied them
upon their laziness and passed out another gift of fruit, and then took
command of the ship. To the keen disappointment of the boys the Indians
did not come on board, but were towed in their rowboat.

Past the low shores of Long Island, nearer and nearer to the village of
New York moved the Lyon, more and more excited grew the pilgrims.

"I can see houses!"

"And smoke rising from chimneys!"

"And men walking about!"

"There is a wharf with people on it!"

"We are here at last, at last!"

Some one started a hymn and a single stanza was sung. Then voices
failed.

John Conrad stood silently, his older children close to him and little
John Frederick in his arms. With them was Peter Zenger, his arm round
Conrad's neck. John Conrad saw the house and the people and the strange
shore, and the certainty of impending change swept over him. These--his
boys and girls--what would befall them? They were his now, but the new
land must divide them from him. Each must do his work. Already the
sound of voices drifted to him from this alien shore. He longed to put
into one sentence all his love and hope. With brimming eyes he looked
at his little flock for whom he had made the long journey, for whom he
had forgotten sadness and heartache.

"Children," he said. "Margareta and Magdalena and Sabina and Conrad--"
John Conrad's voice faltered. In a moment he began once more with a new
message. "Children,--George and Christopher and Barbara and little John
and dear Peter,--here is now your Fatherland."




VII

THE HOME ASSIGNED


Close together the Weisers stepped from the gangplank of the Lyon.
Their question as to what they were to do was soon solved by their
prompt shepherding from the wharf into small boats by the officers of
the port.

"Where do we go?" asked John Conrad in astonishment.

"There has been ship fever on the Lyon," answered some one. "You go to
Nuttall's Island."

Like millions to follow them, the Germans soon gazed from Nuttall's
Island across the bay. They were given little houses to live in, and
as the magistrate of Oberdorf had greeted them on Blackheath, they
greeted presently their friends from the other ships. There were happy
reunions, there were stories of death and danger by sea, there was the
common hope of better things.

When the cool winds of September began to blow and they were still
waiting to be released from what seemed like captivity, the Germans
became impatient and then frightened. They wished to set to work so
that they might the sooner finish their task of tar-making and begin
to labor on their own account. During the long journey boys and girls
had grown up; like Conrad, other boys longed for adventure, and
like Margareta, other young women wished to begin the establishment
of a home. Among the Germans there was suddenly a new spirit of
independence. Here was not the goal for which they had striven.

"The Governor has not completed his arrangements," said John Conrad to
his impatient countrymen.

"Then let us go to that Schoharie which the Indians gave us." Conrad
spoke for all the younger Germans.

"We are bound to make tar," reminded John Conrad, who looked at his son
in amazement.

Presently came Governor Hunter, who had crossed the ocean in one of
the last ships of the fleet. His visit, so eagerly expected, had a
sorrowful outcome. From one end of the settlement to the other he
walked and at the cabin of John Conrad he paused.

"You are to go soon to Livingston Manor to begin your work. You are the
man who was in the Queen's audience room. I depend upon you to be a
good influence among your fellows." His bright gaze traveled from child
to child. "You have a large family."

Before John Conrad could answer, young Conrad stepped from the doorway,
disregarding his father's frown.

"Oh, sir, I wish we might go to Schoharie!"

Governor Hunter looked at him coldly.

"You will go where I send you."

When the Governor had gone, his agent announced a startling command
which he had left. Among the Germans were too many children. In New
York and on Long Island were farmers and merchants who needed help. To
them the orphans and some other young lads must be apprenticed.

"Not our children!" cried Magdalena.

John Conrad shook his head ominously. He had counted his children over
before he left the ship,--was separation to come so soon? That evening
he admonished gentle Christopher and grave George Frederick tenderly
and solemnly.

"We must submit to the Governor's will," said he. "My little lads know
what is right. To do right is all that is required of them."

The next day boats anchored at Nuttall's Island and from them
stepped English and Dutch farmers and their wives. Upon the heads of
Christopher and George Frederick were laid a pair of plump hands.

"These I would like," said a kind voice.

The eager eyes of the Weiser family gazed through tears.

"Both together?" asked John Conrad thickly.

"Both together," answered the farmer's wife. "We have a good farm and
no children." When she saw that little Christopher cried, she put her
hand into the deep pocket in the skirt of her husband's coat and drew
out a bar of maple sugar, the only candy of the colonies. "I put
something in my pocket for my new children." Then she sat down on the
rough bench before the little door. "The boats will not go back for a
long time to come. In the mean time we will talk."

Now more tears were shed, but they were not bitter tears. The English
of the Weisers was broken, but it sufficed to relate the sad history
of Gross Anspach, the kindness of George Reimer, the cruel cold on
Blackheath, and the dangers of the sea. When the time for parting came,
the Weisers trooped to the boats. Peter Zenger was to go also, with a
brisk printer, Bradford by name. Hands were waved until they could wave
no longer; then the Weisers turned back to their little hut.

"Two are gone," said John Conrad, bewildered. "My dear children! My
dear children!" Then poor John Conrad burst once more into tears.

When in November twelve hundred of the four thousand Germans who had
left Blackheath ascended the Hudson River, there was another grievous
parting. Margareta's young man had found work in New York, but until
he earned a little he and Margareta could not marry. One of the
Weisers, at least, looked back instead of forward as the heavily laden
boats made their slow way up the stream. Conrad wished to stay also and
find work, but neither the Governor's agent nor his father would give
him permission. The agent, Cast by name, was sharp of tongue, and with
him the young men had begun to dispute. Others like Conrad were strong
of will and hot of temper. In the long period of waiting, gratitude to
the English had somewhat faded.

The arrival at the new home was dreary. Upon the stretch of forest
in which the settlement was to be made there was only the agent's
comfortable log house. It was late afternoon when the pilgrims were put
ashore. At sight of the unimproved and repellent spot they looked at
one another in dismay.

"Is it for this that we have come so far?"

John Conrad began again his old work of encouragement.

"At last we have work to do. By night we must have some sort of
shelter."

The next day substantial houses of logs began to rise among the tall
pine trees. John Conrad's suspicions about his second daughter proved
to be true. Quiet Magdalena and the young man upon whom she had smiled
announced that they, too, would build a house.

Then, when houses were built and logs were burning in the great
chimneys, the Germans waited idly. Tar-making was not to begin, it
seemed, until spring. Again John Conrad counseled patience.

"We are here, we cannot get away and, moreover, we have given our word.
We are fed and clothed. In the spring things will be better. We cannot
expect everything at once."

Young Conrad answered sharply.

"The men say that this land will never be good farming land, father.
After the pine trees are cut, we shall have nothing. I would find that
Schoharie which the Indians gave us. There is our home."

John Conrad shook his head.

"We must have patience," said he.

Slowly the winter passed. In the cold of January little John Frederick,
so loved and cherished, died, and was the first of the colony to be
buried in the new land.

"Now," said John Conrad, "it is our land, indeed."

In April Magdalena was married by a clergyman who came from the older
German settlement across the river. The wedding was merry: even
Margareta, who had heard but once from her lover, put anxiety away and
smiled and danced the old-fashioned dances of Gross Anspach weddings.
When Magdalena had gone to the little log house with her husband, John
Conrad sat before his door.

"She has done well. Now of nine, only four are left me."

Once during the winter Conrad saw an Indian. The tall figure crossed
the end of a little glade and as fast as he could Conrad pursued it.
But the Indian had vanished; there was neither sound nor motion in the
still forest. Gradually, their lands taken from them, themselves often
ill-treated, the Indians were withdrawing from the neighborhood of the
settlements.

In great excitement Conrad hurried to his father.

"Father, I have seen an Indian. Let us ask him to guide us to
Schoharie!"

"We are not permitted to go."

"Let us go without permission. I can fight, father."

Again John Conrad regarded his son with astonishment.

"We have come for peace, not for war. God knows we have suffered enough
from war! Let me hear no more of such madness, Conrad, and sit no more
with the young men, but with your sisters."

In the early spring tools were given out for the cutting of the pine
trees and slashes were made in the tough bark so that the sap might
gather. In two years the trees would be felled and burned in kilns.

In the early summer came a new command. Over the great continent evil
forces were astir. Like the bent bow, the line of the French and their
allied Indians stretched from Montreal to New Orleans, its curve
including the Mississippi; like the string within stretched the English
line. There was conflict at Montreal where the Five Nations were true
to their English alliance, and thither the Germans were to go in three
companies. At once they forgot their wrongs and willingly they started,
John Conrad in command of a company.

The Germans gave the Queen little help, not because they were not
willing and able, but because the short campaign was almost over. They
marched back as they had come, congratulating themselves upon the pay
they would receive for military service. At last they could buy a few
spinning-wheels and perhaps a horse and cow.

But the Governor's agent laughed.

"Does a man pay extra to his servants?"

"You did not give us our due food while they were away!" cried young
Conrad.

The agent shook his fist.

"Return your arms and get back to your work!"

When the arms were returned, a dozen guns were lacking. The older
Germans were clearly puzzled, but the guns could not be found.

In a week the Governor came again to visit his colony. His shoulders
were bent and his countenance had changed. The good Queen was dead and
the support promised for his cherished enterprise of tar-making came
slowly from her successor. To the Governor appealed now the leading
men of the settlement. Perhaps it was the cruel contrast between his
magnificence and their rags which made him at first willing to listen
and to conciliate.

As John Conrad had talked bravely and simply to the Queen, so he spoke
to the Governor. The oldest of the settlers shared by this time the
discontent of the young men.

"It is almost a year since we came and we have done nothing for
ourselves. Even if we can make tar, we are not advanced because this
land is not farming land. We beg to be allowed to go to that country
which the Indians gave us, where we can have permanent homes. Is there
no pine there?"

The Governor made no answer.

"And we would have pay for our service as soldiers. We are very poor,
as you can see, and soldiering was not in our bargain."

The Governor smiled as his agent had smiled.

"You will serve yourself and your friends best by counseling
obedience," said he. "You cannot go away."

When the Governor had gone, his agent walked down the street of the
settlement. In his path stood young Conrad, who forgot once more his
father's admonitions.

"The Germans have guns, sir," said Conrad.

Cast returned at once to his house. In a moment his servant was riding
rapidly along the river-bank to intercept the Governor at the next
settlement, twenty miles away.

"I am charged with a message to Your Honor," he cried breathlessly at
sight of the Governor. "The German people are armed. Our lives are not
safe."

The Governor sailed up the river once more. When he reached Livingston
Manor, it was dark and the Germans knew nothing of his coming nor of
the prompt departure of the agent's servant through the forest to the
north. The next afternoon they were called together. To their amazement
the Governor appeared. In a stern voice he read a contract to them.

"But that is not our contract," protested a mystified John Conrad.
"We--"

The Governor waved them from his presence.

"It is your contract. Think over your situation and return to-morrow."

That evening the older Germans talked earnestly in the Weiser house.
They agreed to ask again that they be permitted to leave and that they
be paid. But to resist they were helpless. Resistance, moreover, was
wrong.

For a while Conrad listened; then he joined a score of young men who
waited for him outside in the shadow.

"It is all for peace," said he. "I believe that Governor Hunter means
to entrap them."

Quietly the young men slipped into the darker woods. Into a little
cave high above the river, Conrad crept on hands and knees. One by one
he passed out a dozen guns. Though the leader of the enterprise was the
youngest of all, his friends looked at him with admiration. In their
admiration Conrad forgot his own somewhat troublesome conscience.

In the morning, John Conrad and his friends visited the Governor. They
had, they said, considered their situation, and they were not satisfied.

The Governor looked over their heads in the direction of Albany.

"We do not wish to be undutiful," explained John Conrad. "What we ask
is only justice. We did not promise to stay forever in a barren land."
John Conrad's voice trembled as it had trembled in Gross Anspach when
he spoke of the country which they had seen in their dreams. "We wish
to go to Schoharie."

"Whether or not you 'wish to go to Schoharie,'" the Governor mocked
them like a child, "you are to stay here." Now the Governor stamped
his foot. "Here is your land, here you are to live and die!"

The agent could not resist a temptation to add a word.

"You should be shot for your impertinence!"

Then the agent gave a wild scream. The punishment which he proposed so
angrily seemed likely to be carried into effect upon himself. Upon the
little house he saw an armed host approaching. Waiting for sound of
strife, the young men had come to the defense of their elders.

"They will murder us!" screamed the agent.

Young Conrad stepped inside the door.

"We ask only--" Then Conrad paused. Neither the Governor nor the agent
was listening to what he was saying. Even the eyes of his father, which
had looked upon him with horrified amazement, were turned away. From
the young men behind him came a loud warning to run, and he turned
his head. Among the trees was a gleam of red and a glitter of steel.
The agent's servant had made a swift trip to the British garrison at
Albany.

"Captain, collect these guns," commanded the Governor. Then he turned
to young Conrad. "Another stirring-up of rebellion and you will pay the
penalty of a rebel."

Now the Germans gave up their arms and went back to their work. Some
of the trees were said to be fit for felling and a few kilns were
constructed. In these the pine knots were first to be burned. To the
task of gathering them the little children were appointed and Conrad
was made their superintendent. The work was humiliating and he obeyed
unwillingly. His father had said nothing to him of his rebellion, but
he knew that it was constantly in John Conrad's mind. The presence
of the red-coated soldiers, who treated the whole settlement like
dangerous criminals, was, John Conrad may have thought, reproach enough.

Now another winter came and passed, a winter of idleness and discontent
for Conrad, of sadness for Margareta, and of great physical suffering
for all. The miserable substitutes for woolen clothes, the poor food,
the bitter cold weakened their bodies and depressed their minds. No
longer could Conrad enliven the camp with music, since his dear flute
had to be exchanged for food. The Governor's agent now played upon it,
but he played no German tunes. Barbara and Sabina grew as pale and thin
as their older sister, whose hopes of seeing her lover had almost died.
Once more as on shipboard John Conrad thought and spoke of the beauties
of the heavenly country.

Presently John Conrad was served with an astonishing notice. The
Germans might go! Hearts leaped; there were cries of joy. Then the hand
which held the order began to tremble.

"We may go south or east, but not north or west. To Schoharie we dare
not go. It is my opinion that this business of tar-making has failed.
It cannot be that they will turn us adrift and yet forbid us that which
is ours. God in heaven help us!"

To the confused and terrified settlement came another fearful threat.
No longer, said the Governor, would he feed women or children who had
no men to repay him in labor. A few single men married at once their
young countrywomen who were without support. Among them was John Conrad.

The summer passed in uncertainty. In September another notice came.
The business of tar-making was for the present ended. The Germans
would receive no more food, but must shift for themselves. With cruel
thoroughness they were now abandoned.

"And we dare not go to Schoharie!" they cried. "Last week Kniskern
tried to get away and the soldiers brought him back. We--"

Then upon the frightened assembly rushed young Conrad.

"The soldiers are gone!"

With one accord the council adjourned, running to the upper end of the
settlement. The camp-ground was deserted.

Now it was proposed that the settlement should start as a body with the
dawn. At this poor Margareta burst into tears. In the wilderness her
young man could never find her. It had been some small comfort to feel
that at least he knew where she was.

But Margareta was to have a little longer to watch and wait. Once more
the dissuading voice of John Conrad warned his companions.

"My friends! We do not know where this land is. A few chosen men must
make their way thither in the two rude boats owned by the settlers, and
consult with the Indians and return. At Albany we might find a guide.
It is the only way."

For hours the council sat in the Weiser house. It was agreed that seven
men should start in the morning. Conrad sat listening, his eyes looking
through the log walls, across the blue river, his heart longing to
see once more those great warriors, his friends. When the council had
adjourned, he caught his father by the arm.

"Oh, father, let me go, too!"

"We dare not take more than are necessary, lad."

"I will be wise and patient, father."

"You have yet to prove yourself to be so, Conrad." John Conrad looked
gravely into the beseeching eyes. "Your time of responsibility will
come, lad; see that you are ready for it."




VIII

THE FLIGHT BEGINS


Though Conrad was not allowed to go to Schoharie with his father and
the other deputies, he was allowed to see them on their way. The
evening following the council at which their plans were made, the moon
rose late, a fact which suited their purposes.

"We can slip away in the darkness, and still have the moon to light our
journey," said John Conrad. "It may be that they are watching us. There
will be two boats, and these must be brought back, since we may find a
shorter path through the forest when we return."

Conrad's blue eyes lifted to his father's in appeal.

"Let me go with you and bring the boats back. I can row well and I will
be very careful."

John Conrad consulted with his friends. When they said "yes," Conrad
rushed to get ready.

The journey to Albany consumed three days. Here and there, where the
banks of the river were low, the travelers saw fine farms which they
longed to possess. They did not dare to stop, however, to inspect the
land, since it seemed to them that they could hear on every breeze the
sound of pursuers, bidding them return to the slavery which was worse
than death. There were no villages and they passed but few boats. If
they were hailed, Conrad answered in the best English he could muster.

Albany was only a small settlement, but here was stationed the garrison
of soldiers from which the company had been sent to subdue the Germans,
and therefore recognition and arrest were easily possible. The two
boats were beached late in the afternoon below the town, and here the
deputies hid until nightfall.

When darkness came Conrad, rowing one boat and towing the other,
dropped quietly downstream with the current. In a thick wood to which
his father had pointed him on the upward journey, he stayed alone
during the warm September night. He was tired, but it was a long
time before he could go to sleep. He heard a gentle wind moving the
treetops; he heard a twig snap near by, as though some wild creature
were coming closer and closer with sinister intent. Several times he
sprang to his feet. When the dim landscape appeared unchanged and
without living inhabitants, he lay down once more.

Still he could not sleep. His thoughts traveled to Livingston Manor
with its cruel disappointments, to the long ocean journey, to
Blackheath, even to Gross Anspach. What vague, splendid dreams he had
had of the future and of the new land! He had dreamed of becoming
rich and powerful and important, and all he had succeeded in doing
was gathering a few pine knots! Remembering that childish service, he
laughed bitterly. If his father had given him his way he might have
done better, but his father would not believe that he was a man. Then,
before more dreary thoughts came to depress him, he fell asleep, his
head pillowed on his arm, his weary body finding the hard ground a
downy bed.

Early in the morning he continued his journey down the river, his
eyes watching carefully for enemies. But no emissaries of an angry
Governor came to meet him. The Germans were, it was plainly evident,
wholly abandoned to their misery. Past the tall cliffs, past the open
farmlands, where some day would be pleasant villages and towns, he
floated. He was hungry, but he had been hungry many times; he was
tired, but he did not mind weariness.

At the settlement he found all as it had been. The soldiers had not
returned and the agent had vanished. A hundred plans were being made
for the journey into the wilderness. A few families announced that they
would not go. The Governor would not forsake them utterly; if he did,
they would rather seek for help among their fellow countrymen across
the river than trust themselves to the forest.

In Albany, the deputies sought out quietly the German families whom
they knew and from their houses were able to make inquiries. That
there was an Indian settlement of Schoharie was certain. There were at
that time in Albany several Mohawk Indians from the neighborhood of
Schenectady, another Indian village, who could answer questions. With
one, whom the English called John Meyndert, the deputies talked before
the day was over. With grunts and nods he promised to be their guide
and interpreter, and in his canoe and the canoe of another Indian they
traveled to Schenectady, where, after a night's rest, they started
across a line of rough hills toward the southwest.

Of the beauties of the September woods the seven deputies saw nothing.
With eyes fixed upon the man in front, each man walked doggedly and
stubbornly on, determined not to yield to the fatigue which the rapid
pace produced. Soft of tread and sure of foot John Meyndert stalked
ahead as silent as the tree trunks among which he moved. An occasional
"Ugh" when the slipping foot of one of the travelers threatened an
ugly fall, or a shake of the head when some one pointed to a fruit or
berry which looked as though it were edible, formed his share of the
conversation.

At last, at noon of a pleasant day, Meyndert halted his long stride and
pointed downward. They had reached and crossed a rough elevation whose
loose stones made it almost impossible to climb. Now, wearily, the
deputies lifted their eyes toward Meyndert and followed his pointing
finger.

It was John Conrad who cried out first.

"Oh, see!"

In a second the last of the party had come out on the little shelf of
rock to which Meyndert had led them. Peter Kniskern pointed with a
shaking hand.

"Schoharie?"

The Indian answered with a grin.

Then, for a long time, no one spoke a word, and no one moved except to
wipe from his eyes the tears of which middle age had learned not to be
ashamed.

The smiling valley lay before them, threaded through its broad plain
with the river now in flood. Here where they stood the banks rose
precipitously; yonder there was a more gradual ascent; but on every
side the broad valley was sheltered. The travelers looked their fill,
then one by one gave judgment in slow sentences.

"Those are rich and fertile meadows."

"See this fine spring below us!"

"How quickly would fruit trees grow and vineyards cover the hillsides!"

"It is like"--the voice sank to a whisper--"it is like the valleys of
Germany!"

As they descended the steep hill, Meyndert pointed out the Indian
village at the far end of the valley. It was a time of year when
food was abundant and the villages were comfortable. As the visitors
approached, children dashed for cover in the neat wigwams set on each
side of a narrow street, and women, busy with baking or weaving, looked
up in amazement. Toward the tallest of the wigwams, Meyndert led his
company. In its doorway sat two Indians smoking, at sight of whom he
called a loud "Ho!" For a while the three talked together while the
Germans waited, aware from Meyndert's gestures that he was telling
their errand. Presently, in response to a shout, several Indian women
brought bearskins and deerskins from the wigwam and spread them down
under a great tree. Thither the Germans were led, and there they and
the three Indians sat down.

At once Meyndert pointed to one of his hosts, enormous of body and
painted with snakes and arrows. He called him, as nearly as the Germans
could understand, "Quagnant." Quagnant came, so Meyndert indicated by
broken sentences and gestures, from a valley beyond. He was a chief
over the Indians in this valley as well as his own. He delivered now a
long speech, whose meaning Meyndert made fairly clear. He spoke very
formally and solemnly after the manner of the Indian people. He and his
friends would be glad to have the strangers come among them. He had
heard of the wonderful journey of the King of Rivers and other great
chiefs who were overlords in the Five Nations, but he did not know
what had befallen them or whether they had returned, since they lived
far, far to the west. He was sorry that these new brethren had been so
afflicted. Here they might have, if they wished, a peaceful haven. His
people would help them with food and skins and show them how to build
their houses.

Having finished his speech to the happy Germans, Quagnant commanded
that a feast be made. Together all ate solemnly of Indian bread and
smoked meat, and took great whiffs from a long pipe lighted and passed
by Quagnant. Then, supplied with food for the journey and with light
hearts, the Germans started for Schenectady.

From Schenectady to Albany the Indians took the travelers in their
canoes, then the Germans set out on foot, keeping as near the river
as possible. They had traveled for a day when they heard a shout, and
looking down saw two rowboats, one containing a passenger, the other
towed. With an answering shout they descended the rocky bank to the
shore.

"I have been watching and watching," cried Conrad. "Have you been to
Schoharie? What did you find? Did you see our friends?"

When a score of questions had tumbled out one after the other, the
deputies began to answer. Schoharie was beautiful and fertile beyond
all their dreams. The Indians were not only willing to let them have
the land, but offered to help them. They had seen nothing of the King
of Rivers, but had heard of him.

"They have houses of bark in which they seem to be comfortable, but
better houses can easily be made."

"They are satisfied with what they have; therefore Fate has no power
over them. If their property is destroyed, they have a great storehouse
to draw from for more."

"They made a feast for us and gave us food."

Conrad's blue eyes sought his father's.

"When will we start?"

For an instant John Conrad rowed in silence. His plans would not suit
Conrad, the lad who was so young and who thought himself so old, who
felt that so little time was still his, and who had a lifetime before
him.

"Some will start at once, Conrad. But we will stay in Schenectady until
the winter is over. There I have made arrangements with John Meyndert
to keep us, and there we will try to earn a little."

Conrad made no answer. He had already seen himself the first of the
pilgrims to burst into the quiet valley.

"We shall find peace at last," went on John Conrad. "This Quagnant said
no one should molest us, that the land is ours."

In a few days twenty families started for Schoharie. It was late
October and already there had been sharp frost. The journey must be
made slowly, since there were little children and ailing women in the
party. A few had boats for the first part of the way and the others
walked along the river-bank, the rustling leaves beneath their feet
giving warning of the winter which was rapidly approaching. Hope
minimized the dangers and smoothed the rough path.

A little later the Weisers started for Schenectady. Magdalena, like
Catrina in Gross Anspach, feared the journey for her baby, and with her
husband crossed the river to the older German settlement on the other
side. Like Catrina, she wept bitterly.

When bundles had been packed by a silent, pale Margareta, when John
Conrad had already lifted his pack to his shoulder, Fate, which had
played the Weisers many cruel tricks, became suddenly friendly. A
rowboat grounded on the little beach and a young man sprang out and
hailed John Conrad, who stared at him without answering. But the young
man did not wait for John Conrad's slow mental processes; he hurried
toward the pale girl who gazed as though she saw a ghost. A single
joyful "Margareta!" made clear to the settlement that Margareta's
prayers had been answered.

Now the starting must be delayed another day. Across the river rowed
Conrad to bring Magdalena and her husband and the preacher back with
him; about the reunited lovers sat all the Germans. Young Baer had a
good place and he had built a little house. He had written many times,
though no letter had come from Margareta.

"It was the wicked agent who kept the letters," said Margareta. "God be
thanked we are free from him!"

Best of all, young Baer had seen Christopher and George Frederick who
lived not far away.

"They are well cared for and happy, and they look for their sister.
Peter Zenger, who lives near by, watches for her also."

At this all the tender-hearted Germans wept once more. The parting from
Margareta was lightened by the expectation that they would meet again.
Once more the star of hope shone brightly.

In the lodge of John Meyndert the Weisers settled themselves in
November. It was not clean, but they could endure discomfort a little
longer. The chief difficulty was the drunkenness of Meyndert, who had
learned the white man's evil habit.

From Meyndert John Conrad and his son tried, in the long, idle hours,
to learn the Indian language. They hunted eagerly for work in the
settlement, but there was no work to be had. With thankfulness John
Conrad accepted the offer of an Englishwoman to take Sabina into
service. The Indian lodge was not a suitable home for either her
or little Barbara. At restless, unhappy Conrad his father looked
uneasily. Even the village of Schenectady offered mischief to idle
hands.

"You could teach the little children, lad," said he.

"I want a man's work," answered Conrad sullenly.

Then, as in the London fog, Conrad had a strange experience.

There was fog, also, here by the Mohawk River, by which he walked
early one November morning. Again he went with head bent, kicking the
leaves and pebbles before him. Again he felt that stubborn head strike
an obstacle and himself fly backward. When, in amazement, he picked
himself up, he was confounded. There was no obstacle before him. There
was neither tree nor rock. Puzzled and alarmed, he turned toward the
settlement. Presently he looked back. By this time the mist had lifted,
and behind him he saw a gigantic Indian. Conrad stopped as though his
feet were weighted and the great body, wrapped in a bright new blanket,
bore down upon him. The Indian grunted his queer "Ho, Ho," and
motioned Conrad to lead the way. That he had no unkindly intention was
made clear by the smile which his little trick brought to his face.

At the first flat rock to which they came he bade Conrad sit down. He
drew from the bundle which he carried on his shoulders a loaf of Indian
bread and broke off a large piece.

"Eat," said he in the Mohawk language. "Who are you?"

"I am John Conrad Weiser's son Conrad," answered Conrad, thankful for
each moment spent in learning the rudiments of John Meyndert's language.

"To Weiser we gave a gift. Why does he not come to take it?" This was
the meaning of the next sentence as nearly as Conrad could guess.

"He will come in the springtime."

"And you?" The Indian looked earnestly into Conrad's blue eyes, as
though astonished at their vivid color.

"Oh, _yes_!" cried Conrad.

The Indian said no more, but rose and walked toward the settlement,
motioning Conrad to follow. His long stride soon left Conrad far behind
and Conrad started to run, to find a grinning Indian waiting for him
behind a tree, or calling to him from the rear. Presently, when the
Indian's ruse brought them face to face, Conrad pointed to himself.

"I am Conrad," said he. "Who are you?"

"Quagnant," was the answer.

He it was who had given the Germans their hearty welcome!

When they entered the settlement, Conrad would have liked to follow the
chief as he went from Indian house to Indian house, but he did not dare.

To Meyndert's lodge Quagnant came late in the afternoon, and there
sat himself down on a pile of deerskins near the fire. He had come,
he said, to hold a conversation with the white chief. At a sign from
her husband, John Meyndert's squaw rose and went away, beckoning John
Conrad's family to follow. For an instant Conrad thought that he was to
remain. Then Quagnant, hitherto so kind, pointed to him, and Meyndert
bade him go also. Offended, Conrad did not return till hunger drove
him back after dark.

Then the family, except John Conrad, were asleep; as Conrad lifted
the curtain of skins which hung across the door, his father rose from
beside the dying fire and led him outside. In the starlight he walked
up and down with his hand on his boy's shoulder.

"Conrad, I have an offer to set before you. I have kept you with me,
both because I could not find any opening for you and because I could
not bear to let you go. This Indian Quagnant has asked me to let you
go with him to his village, there 'to learn to be a man,' as he puts
it. He means that they will teach you how to hunt and trap and how to
make a home in the wilderness. Would you like to enter on this strange
apprenticeship?"

Conrad's full heart breathed a great sigh.

"Yes, father."

"You cannot come back until spring. The training in Indian ways may be
very irksome."

"Not as irksome as idleness."

For an hour father and son talked, entering once more upon the future
with a tender recalling of the past. Then they went to bed.

In the misty morning Conrad started away, a little bundle on his back.
He kissed the sleeping Barbara, he put both arms about his father's
neck, then he followed the tall Indian who walked before him, silent,
mysterious, his tall figure dim in the fog.

They crossed the wet meadow and walked for an hour by the stream-side,
then Quagnant turned into the forest. They ascended a rocky hill, they
followed a narrow valley, they climbed another hill. When the sun was
high in the sky, they ate a lunch of corn bread and dried fish from
Quagnant's pack. Then, already footsore and stiff, Conrad followed
doggedly the long stride which led farther and farther into the
wilderness.




IX

THE DARK FOREST


At nightfall the travelers camped in the shelter of a huge boulder.
Quagnant made a fire by rubbing two sticks together; then he spread the
embers about and started other fires close to the face of the rock.
When they had burned themselves out, he bade Conrad lie down on the
warmed ground. Faintly aware that Quagnant went on with some other
device for making him comfortable, Conrad slept.

In the morning he found that he lay in a tent formed by the boughs of
evergreens and that he was still comfortably warm. Quagnant had shot
a bird which he was roasting over the fire. When it was eaten and the
fire was tramped out, Quagnant shouldered his pack. He looked up at the
sky, shook his head, and started briskly away.

Until noon Quagnant led the way across rough hills and through narrow
valleys. While they ate their lunch, the snow began to fall and
Quagnant grunted his annoyance. Soon the rocks were slippery and the
trail hard to find. There were other hills and other valleys and
another exhausted sleep at night.

On the third day, Conrad was certain that he could not rise. Quagnant
helped him up and many times in the morning slackened his pace or
stopped entirely. In the afternoon he stopped short and bade Conrad
look ahead. They had come round the shoulder of a hill and were looking
into a broad valley. Here there had been no snow and the meadows were
green. Through the center of the valley ran a stream, broad and full
and smoothly flowing.

"I see people!" cried Conrad. "They are building houses!"

Suddenly Conrad's heart throbbed against his side.

"Schoharie!" he cried. "Is this Schoharie?"

Quagnant grinned.

"Schoharie," he repeated.

Conrad tried to wave his hand, but could make only a feeble motion. He
began to talk in a queer, uncertain way, and Quagnant, looking at him
uneasily, took him by the arm, and presently lifted him to his back.
On he went until at dusk he stepped into a path worn into a deep rut.
Ahead were lights and the sound of voices.

When Conrad was allowed to slip from the broad back to a soft pile
of deerskins, he felt that all the comforts he had ever known were
combined in one delicious sensation. That Schoharie lay far behind
him he did not know: that the faces about him were dark, the voices
strange,--all were matters of indifference. He felt the rim of a warm
cup against his lips, then he fell asleep.

The sun had been long in the sky when he woke. He was in an oblong
house of bark. Through a hole in the roof the sun streamed upon the
ashes of a fire. On the walls hung guns and bows and arrows and strange
long spears and about were piles of furs, on one of which lay a little
case of bark from which there issued the scream of a hungry baby.

At once a young woman lifted the curtain at the door. Before taking
her baby, she looked at Conrad, and finding him awake, nodded and
smiled. In a moment she brought a wooden bowl filled with broth. Conrad
drained the bowl and lay back once more.

When, late in the afternoon, he lifted the curtain, he found himself in
a village of bark houses. At the far end of the single street children
were playing, and from the ashes of a fire a woman was taking a loaf of
Indian bread. She gave a little call and at once other women appeared
and the children came closer.

"Where is Quagnant?" asked Conrad.

The women imitated the sighting of a gun and pointed to their mouths.
The children, dressed in little coats and leggings of leather, pointed
with amazement to Conrad's fair skin and then at their own dark cheeks.
Finally one came close to him.

"Eyes-like-the-Sky," said he, and his companions repeated the strange
name.

It was repeated again when the hunters returned with deer meat, and
there seemed to be general satisfaction with the discernment of the
little boy whose own name was Young Deer.

At once the women prepared the feast. Portions of the meat were set
aside to be smoked; the rest was divided into slices and broiled. There
was no seasoning and the Indian bread was coarse, but the meal was
better than many which the guest had eaten.

For a few days Conrad watched the play of the children, who showed
him haunts of beaver and woodchuck, and taught him to make and spin
a heart-shaped top of wood. With them he played Blind Man's Buff, in
which the bandage across his eyes was his own dullness of vision which
could not see the little figure lying among the leaves. He watched also
the women braiding their baskets and grinding earth into the paint for
the faces and bodies of their husbands.

In the evening he sat with the Indians in Quagnant's house. At first
their speech was a strange jargon, but gradually the sounds stayed in
his mind and were associated with the objects to which they belonged.
The comfortable nights in the chief's wigwam and the good food put
color into his cheeks and flesh on his thin body.

But idleness and luxury did not long endure. He had come to look upon
the deerskins which served him for a bed as his own. One night, when he
wished to lie down, they were gone. He asked for them and was laughed
at.

"You have no deerskin," said Quagnant.

In the morning Quagnant gave him a gun and led the way into the forest.
Three days later when they returned, Quagnant had two deerskins and
Conrad none. Again he slept on the ground and again he went with
Quagnant into the forest. On the third journey he shot a buck.

For one night after the skin was dressed, he slept upon it in the
chief's house. At the next nightfall he found himself and his bed
thrust outside. The Indians laughed at his astonishment and every laugh
said, "Make a house for yourself!"

With the advice and aid of the children, Conrad built himself a wigwam.
At once Quagnant demolished it.

"Wind come--house gone. Eyes-like-the-Sky can do better."

When his house was finished to Quagnant's satisfaction, Conrad had a
few days of peace. Then for a day he was allowed no food; then for two
days; then for three. He was taken to a distant point in the forest and
required to find his way home. One bitter day he was dropped into a
deep, icy pond in a near-by stream.

As he understood more of the language, he listened earnestly to the
talk of the older Indians. Through all ran the consciousness of
danger,--distant, perhaps, but real. Sometimes messengers from other
tribes appeared suddenly in the village. Painted, armed, terrible, they
talked always of the bow and the string, the long line of the French
whom they called Onotio, and the shorter line of English whom they
called Onas.

"Upon Onas Onotio will make war. When we walk in the forest we hear it
shouted by the trees. We will all ally ourselves with Onas."

When there came to the village those who would exterminate all
pale-faces, Quagnant hurried Conrad out of the way. In January five
great chiefs came to visit Quagnant. Conrad gazed at them earnestly,
hoping to see the King of Rivers. They looked back at him scowling and
muttering, and Conrad retreated to his wigwam.

The chiefs went to Quagnant's house, and before them the women placed
broiled venison and wild turkey. Afterwards long pipes were solemnly
smoked. Then Quagnant gave a command to Little Squaw into whose eyes
came a frightened look. Quagnant saw her hesitate.

"Go!" he shouted.

Hidden away in the cache of Quagnant, where there was now little
else, there were a few black bottles, paid to him in return for many
beautiful skins carried to Schenectady. Little Squaw fetched them as
she was bidden.

In the middle of the night Conrad heard the sound of carousing and
looked out. The fire-water had done its evil work, and the Indians
sought some victim upon whom to spend their madness. There was a flash
of steel and past Conrad's head flew a sharp axe. Other weapons flashed
in the moonlight. Terrified, without blanket or other extra covering,
Conrad fled into the forest.

Two days later in a blinding snowstorm he ventured to return. Whether
Quagnant remembered his behavior it was difficult to tell. His visitors
had gone, and he sat, sullen and miserable, beside the fire in the
wigwam, making no answer to the complaints of Little Squaw.

"The cache is almost empty," said she. "All the summer I labored and
now you have given large presents to the Oneidas. I saw them go heavily
laden. Now we will have a great storm when no hunting can be done."

The first day of the snowstorm Conrad spent in repairing the damage to
his wigwam. He thought of his father and his brothers and sisters, and
wondered once more, in deep depression, to what goal his wanderings
would bring him. At nightfall he ate the last of his food.

It was still dark when he woke in the morning; at least no light came
through the chinks of the wigwam or through the opening at the top.
Stiff and sore, he turned and slept. When he woke again, he sprang up
and went to lift the curtain at the door. To his amazement he looked
into darkness. When he thrust out his hand he discovered that it was
not night which surrounded him, but a wall of snow, higher than the
wigwam.

He was not at first alarmed. He had heard more than one story of
imprisonment for days while the great snows fell. The snow was porous,
and the wigwams, thus blanketed, were warm. He had, it was true, no
food, but he could go without food for a day or two. He was still not
thoroughly rested and he would sleep.

He was wakened by what sounded like the report of a gun. His heart
failed. Perhaps Quagnant's friends had come back and were prepared to
finish the work which they had threatened! Again there came the sharp
explosion. Now Conrad remembered the cold nights of the great frost in
Gross Anspach when the trees had cracked like pistols. The snow must
have ceased to fall and rescue would soon come.

In the morning his mind was not clear. He heard a whistling sound in
the top of the wigwam and saw a pale light filtering in. Deep drifts
must be forming.

"It will be best to stay here," said he heavily.

As the hours passed he fell into a stupor. The wind died, the light
of sunset showed for a few minutes in a yellow haze at the top of the
wigwam, and once more through the long night the trees cracked like
pistols.

Quagnant and his squaw and their large brood got comfortably through
the three days of imprisonment. Quagnant grew mild and peaceable; he
told stories to the children and obeyed his wife. But when she ordered
him to go and dig Conrad out, he sent several young Indians in his
place. The recollection of the flying hatchet disturbed him.

"I will drink no more fire-water," he promised himself solemnly.

Run-as-the-Wind and Turkey Feather and Young Deer all worked diligently
with the hoes which they borrowed from their mothers. As they
approached the door of the wigwam they cried,--

"Eyes-like-the-Sky! Wake up! Wake up!"

When there was no answer they worked faster.

"Perhaps Eyes-like-the-Sky had no food!"

"A bear might have devoured him as he slept!"

"He is brave; he would kill the bear."

When they had reached the door of the wigwam and still Conrad did not
answer, the rescuing party grew very quiet. Little Squaw was the first
to thrust her head through the hole which the boys made.

"He lies here like the snow itself! Quick! some hot broth from
Quagnant's kettle!"

With a wooden spoon she forced a few drops through Conrad's lips, then
a little more. Then she sent Turkey Feather to Quagnant.

"Tell Quagnant a good bed is to be made by the fire. Tell him Little
Squaw sends him this and this." And Little Squaw picked up the hatchets
of Quagnant and his friends.

That night the Mohawk village feasted again. Relieved by the ending of
the storm and the restoration of Conrad, the squaws forgot the alarming
emptiness of each family cache.

The snow thawed little by little. When a crust formed, it was not thick
enough to bear the weight of the hunters. Food grew more scarce and the
usual two meals a day dwindled to one. Another heavy snow made hunting
impossible. More sullen grew the warriors, more angry the squaws, more
miserable the little children.

After the second great snow a crust formed and Quagnant started at
once into the forest, taking Conrad with him. The two crossed the hill
which lay toward the west and followed the next valley to the north.
It was bitterly cold; insufficiently clad and weak from lack of food,
Conrad trudged along, his heart heavy, his mind dull. To him now the
new country was a trap in which all the Germans would be finally lost.
Quagnant did not speak except to give sullen orders. At nightfall the
two camped supperless and without shelter. There was now no warming of
a bed, since the wood lay deep under the snow.

When the two took up their weary journey, it seemed to Conrad that
Quagnant tried deliberately to court death. He climbed another western
hill, and his voice became more gruff. Was it possible that he meant to
lead Conrad far away and desert him? Then there would be one less mouth
in the Indian village.

The sun was high when they came to the top of the hill. Another valley
lay before them with a swift, dark stream flowing through its center.
Another hill rose opposite. Conrad wondered drearily whether his numb
feet must climb that also.

"I wish that the end would come soon," said he bitterly. "I wish--"

Walking heedlessly as he had walked on the Schenectady meadow, Conrad
came with a thump into the same obstacle. Before him Quagnant had
stopped rigid. Terrified, Conrad looked up. Quagnant was staring down
into the valley, where along the stream beside a deep pool a small herd
of deer nibbled the green laurel leaves. They were almost motionless
and they were within easy shot.

Quagnant pulled the trigger and a deer dropped. His comrades lifted
their heads, but before they could dash away in terror another fell.
The flight of the remainder soon ended. Before them the stream plunged
over a precipice; on both sides the icy walls rose steeply. A third and
a fourth fell before Quagnant's accurate shots. There was a glow on his
dark cheeks, a fire in his black eyes. He took a step to one side and
pulled the trigger again.

Then, in spite of the silence to which he had been trained, Quagnant
gave a fierce yell. He had gone a little too near the edge of the steep
slope. His feet slipped as the gun recoiled and he slid, making frantic
efforts to regain his footing.

But his efforts were vain. With increasing speed he coasted down the
hillside, his course leading straight toward the rocky wall which
dropped abruptly for at least fifty feet. It was as though an insect
should slip down the side of a cup with sure drowning in the bottom.
Then, near the brink of the pool, a bush caught the pack on his
shoulders and held him suspended.

Now Quagnant was silent. The deer thongs which bound the pack were
strong, but his body was heavy. He could see below him the black pool.
In its icy water he might keep himself afloat for a few seconds, but
to climb out would be impossible. Across the stream he could see the
bodies of the slain deer, food for all his people, and he could hear
the snow crust breaking as the others made their escape. Conrad, far
above him in safety, he could not see.

Quagnant shut his eyes and listened to the gurgle of the water and
looked into his poor Indian soul. The logic of the case was simple.
He could not move without help, and Conrad would not help him. He had
abused the pale-face and the pale-face would certainly desert him. Even
if there were mercy in his heart, Conrad could not come down the hill
without risking his life nor return to the village for help before
Quagnant would die of cold.

Then Quagnant heard above the gurgle of the water a strange sound as
though some one were following his wild flight. There was the sound
of sliding feet, then silence, then again the sound of sliding feet.
Presently began a sharp chip, chip, as though the ice were being struck
with a hatchet. Quagnant, with eyes still closed, began to address the
Great Spirit.

"I pray that I may not be cut off from my present life, Great and Good
Spirit."

Nearer and nearer came the sound of chipping; higher and higher rose
the hopes of Quagnant. It would be fearful, indeed, to slip over the
precipice with rescue at hand! But was it rescue? Quagnant remembered
again with sickening pain the sharp hatchet hurled at Conrad. It was
that very hatchet which Conrad held in his hand!

Now Quagnant could feel each stroke on the ice. They were near his
head--he gave himself up. They had passed his head and were even with
his waist--he dared to breathe again. When the chipping had sounded for
a long time beside his foot, he felt a hand touch his foot and move it
to a hole in the ice in which it could find support. Thus aided, he
was able to lift his arms and draw himself up beside the little bush.
Near by, supporting himself by a tree, sat Conrad.

With immobile countenance and without even his customary grunt,
Quagnant climbed the mountain in the tracks which Conrad had made.
After he had rested for a few minutes and had ceased to tremble, he
walked along the ridge until he found an easy descent to the stream
and to the carcases of the deer. He did not speak until he had dressed
a portion of the meat with his long knife and cooked it over a little
fire of driftwood which had been carried high on the bank where it had
been protected by thick laurel and hemlock shrubbery. This he would not
touch until Conrad had eaten. Then at last he spoke.

"A cloud had come between us, Conrad, and the skies were dark. It is
past now forever and the skies are clear."

Hiding in the stream, away from the sharp claws of panther or wildcat,
the meat which they could not carry, the two set out for home. The
next day the hunters brought in, not only Quagnant's kill, but three
more deer. That evening Conrad was invited to the feast of the grown
men and was given a long pipe. He did not like the strong tobacco, but
he did his best to smoke, aware that he had been paid a great honor.
At him Quagnant looked solemnly, both during the feast and afterwards
when they sat together by the fire. In Quagnant's mind was taking shape
a strange plan, at once brilliant and cunning. If Conrad could have
looked into the chief's mind and could have seen there, slowly forming,
the last episode in his strange apprenticeship, he might well have been
terrified. The meeting in the London fog was about to bear its fruit.

At last the sullen winter was past and the trees began to bud and the
meadows to grow green. The women prepared their little patches of
ground for maize and potatoes, old canoes were mended and new canoes
were built, the young men began to court and the maidens to grow more
shy. When Conrad spoke of joining his father, who must be by this time
in Schoharie, Quagnant shook his head.

"You have been with us through the cruel winter: you cannot leave when
the Great Spirit is making all things beautiful."

Now dark forms glided through the forest once more, as though there
were perpetual patrol in its dim aisles. Messengers came to the
village, messengers were sent away. The Mohawks spoke of their country
as the Long House whose back was at the Hudson River and whose door was
Niagara. In the spring weather all the inhabitants were astir.

One morning, at dawn, Conrad felt a touch on his shoulder and sprang up
as he had been trained. Quagnant stood before him, enormous in the pale
light. In his hand he held a new suit of doeskin and a bowl of the red
paint with which his tribe painted stars and turtles on their cheeks.
With a few strokes he decorated Conrad's tanned face. Together they ate
and upon the shoulder of each Little Squaw fastened a pack of food and
a blanket.

"Where are we going?" asked Conrad.

Quagnant made no answer except to motion Conrad to follow him through
the village. There, with his long stride, Quagnant took up the trail
toward the southwest.




X

JOURNEY'S END


It would be difficult to tell which fared the worse during the long
winter, the Germans who had forced their way to the Schoharie Valley in
November, or those who remained, like John Conrad, in the settlements.
All were poor, all were ill-clad, all were insufficiently fed. The
cruel winter continued the weeding-out of the weak. At Schoharie the
Indians helped the newcomers according to their promise, and what food
and furs they could spare they gave cheerfully.

In March, John Conrad and all those who had remained started to
Schoharie. There were indications of an early spring, and it was
important that crops should be sown. From Conrad nothing had been heard
and his father grew daily more anxious. Sabina, like Margareta and
Magdalena, had found a mate, and Barbara had taken her place with the
kind Englishwoman.

No sooner had the journey begun than the last of the winter's storms
was upon the little party. Little children died and grown persons
suffered cruelly. Joined with their friends at Schoharie in the valley
of their dreams, the pilgrims waited, with what patience they could
summon, for spring.

When, finally, the snow had melted for the last time and the meadows
were growing green and the willows were yellow along the river, the
hearts of the Germans rested at last. The lovely valley was lovelier
than their dreams. Log houses were built, farms were laid out, and with
their poor tools they prepared to create a German valley which should
bloom like the rose.

Still no word of Conrad was to be had. He was in the village of
Quagnant to the west--that the Indians knew, but they could tell no
more. His father grew more and more anxious and unhappy. As he worked
the soil, he lifted his head to watch; when his day's work was done, he
walked into the forest toward the west.

Meanwhile, as Conrad followed the long stride of Quagnant through
the budding forest, he remembered the weary journey in November from
Schenectady to the Indian village. Then he had nearly perished with
exhaustion; now he walked without weariness. Quagnant remembered also
and commented approvingly.

"Eyes-like-the-Sky does not stumble or faint. He is a true Indian."

"This is a smooth trail."

In Indian fashion Quagnant made a comparison.

"That was a smooth trail, but to Eyes-like-the-Sky it was unfamiliar.
The heart of the Indian seemed also strange to you, but now it is
plain."

As the two sat by a little camp-fire in the cool evenings, Quagnant
looked solemnly at Conrad. They had now many companions; tall chiefs
wrapped in blankets and stalking solemnly, young men heavily armed and
thickly painted. The strangers stared at Conrad in amazement, their
keen eyes piercing the thick layer of paint with which his cheeks were
covered. When Conrad glanced back at them, they looked at his eyes
and shook their heads. They talked with Quagnant of the Long House,
of distant enemies whom they called the Lenape, and of other matters
which Conrad did not understand. It was clearly evident that Conrad's
presence startled and shocked them.

Presently Quagnant grew communicative. One evening when he and Conrad
camped alone, he told him something of the affairs of the Indians.

"The Five Nations are at peace, but they will not always be at peace.
Many important things are coming to pass, Conrad."

It was in the middle of a bright May morning that Quagnant and his
companion reached the end of their journey. The trail led over the last
stream, through the last wood and thence to a great hill, upon whose
side lay a large Indian village. Here it was that the hundreds of small
human streams had converged; here the savages were gathered, it seemed
to Conrad, in an innumerable host. At sight of them, his heart throbbed
and his skin pricked with fright. Quagnant's face was hideous, and
here Quagnant was repeated hundreds of times. Quagnant's great body,
crowned with its bristling eagle feathers, was a bit terrifying even to
Conrad, and here was Quagnant's fierce strength multiplied by a great
army. There were Indians wrapped in blankets, Indians without covering,
Indians with hideous nose-rings, and here and there shamans or medicine
men with masks of animals, as though the very beasts of the forest had
come to join the council.

When strength returned to Conrad's frightened heart, he breathed a
frantic prayer to be allowed to escape. For such a scene as this no
experience of his life had prepared him. But he dared not show a sign
of fear; he must walk on behind Quagnant, up the street of the village
between the gigantic creatures and before the black, beady, piercing
eyes. As Quagnant approached, he was hailed with many a loud "Ho, Ho."
The sound which followed him was different,--a low, disapproving murmur.

Straight up the great hill led the feet of Quagnant; close to him
followed Conrad. At the summit of the hill the forest trees had been
cut in a wide circle and the ground had been beaten like a hard floor.
About the rim of the circle were placed tree-stumps and logs; in the
middle burned a fire, round which crouched shamans, more hideous than
the warriors. Beside them lay their drums of tightly stretched skin and
their rattles of turtle shell or gourd. They sat motionless, their eyes
upon the fire.

Quagnant bade Conrad sit down at the edge of the woods, and himself
sat beside him. One by one Indians came to speak to him, to Conrad
a consoling sign of his importance. Longest of all he spoke with an
Oneida chief named Shikellamy. What they said Conrad could not hear,
but he could see that Shikellamy looked upon him kindly.

"He has a great heart and a wise mind," said Quagnant as the chief went
away. "In council he makes our way clear."

At noon the shamans beat their drums and shook their rattles, and at
once, breaking off conversation with one another or with the squaws
of the village, the Indians approached the council fire. Certain
ones, Quagnant and Shikellamy among them, took seats together on the
tree-stumps; the others sat on logs or on the ground. Outside the
circle stood scores of young men. Presently the shamans ceased to beat
their drums and shake their rattles and crouched again about the fire.

Now followed a period of complete silence. The chiefs did not move; the
young warriors seemed scarcely to breathe; even from the village came
no sound of speech and no cry of child.

Shikellamy was the first to rise. He spoke in a deep voice and was
listened to with breathless attention.

"Brothers of the Long House, it is now many years since the great tree
was planted under whose young roots we buried our hatchets. Many moons
have risen and waned since we wove our wampum into one belt. Many
feasts have been eaten since the undying flame of our council fire was
lighted, and since Mohawk, Seneca, Onondaga, Oneida, and Cayuga became
brothers. The great tree will continue to grow, the sun and moon to
rise and the council fire to send out into the forest its clear light.
Our hatchets, buried in the ground, will rust before they are dug up.

"We are now at peace with all men, and strangers seek our favor. Our
enemies fear us and we fear no one.

"But, brothers of the Long House, there are matters to be considered.
Claims have been laid against us. Our young men, in the heat of anger
and inflamed by drink, have done here and there a little injury. The
tears of those whom they injured must be wiped away with presents. Each
wrong must be considered and we must make recompense without grudging.

"These matters are, however, small. Our brother Onotio has something to
say to us. Our brother Onas has also something to say to us. Between
Onotio on the one side and Onas on the other, there is undying hatred,
whose cause is shut off from our eyes. We cannot remain friends both to
Onotio and to Onas, who draw nearer and nearer to one another through
the forests. Soon the two black clouds will meet, and the grass on the
warpath will be trodden down.

"It is for the consideration of these matters that the council is
assembled."

When Shikellamy had finished a loud uproar was made by the medicine
men. They rose and faced the east, then prostrated themselves again and
again. The Great Spirit was being invoked.

Now with astonishing order the various businesses of which Shikellamy
had spoken were presented to the council and settled. The young Indians
who had quarreled with their neighbors were admonished and fined.
Young Eagle was to send five deerskins to dry the tears of the warrior
whose son he had injured; Short Arm was to send three blankets to the
widow of the man whom he had killed. Against these decisions there was
no protest. The code which the young men had disobeyed was clearly
understood and its penalties accepted without argument.

When the relations of the allied nations to the French and English came
to be spoken of, there was a change in the spirit of the meeting. Now
all whispering ceased; every one sat motionless, listening with knitted
brows and bright, eager eyes. The council was informed minutely of the
affairs of the English colonies to the east and the French settlements
to the west. Conrad listened as eagerly as the rest, his terror lost in
amazement.

"I am a swift runner," said Short Arm. "I went in three days to
Harris's Ferry. The children of Brother Onas are creeping, creeping
to the west and to the north. They are coming into the Long House.
They are grazing their cattle where our deer have grazed. They are our
enemies."

"The pale-faces are in Schoharie," said a dark-faced, hideously painted
old chief. As he spoke he pointed at Conrad. "Not only are they given
lands, but they are taken into our wigwams. They are our enemies."

From some one came a sneering laugh. Now Conrad was sure of what would
be his fate. Then, on the opposite side of the council fire, a tall
figure rose. Conrad's lips parted; he was about to cry out; then he
held his lips closely shut with his hand.

"It is the King of Rivers! It is the King of Rivers!"

"This talk about the children of Onas is nonsense. The children of
Onotio are more hateful. They come into the Long House from the north.
They think nothing of their promises. They have allied themselves with
our enemies; they are our enemies. There are no two words about them."

Now Quagnant rose, and standing with folded arms looked about until
he had met every piercing eye. Last of all he sought the wide blue
ones at the edge of the forest. Like the other Indians, Quagnant spoke
eloquently.

"Brothers, we are of the extended lodge. The Long House is no mere hut
like the dwelling of the Catawbas. We have made our enemies to flutter
like frightened young birds. At the Catawbas and the Lenape we laugh.

"Now strangers seek to live with us in the Long House,--a great people,
pale of face, with new customs and long guns. Some are our friends,
some are our enemies. They have brought us good things and bad things.
With the guns they have brought we have become powerful, but with the
fire-water they have brought we have become mad.

"We cannot tell which among these pale-faces are our friends. Their
words are not ours and their faces are not ours. They give little in
exchange for much. Our furs are to them no more valuable than a few
beads, our hunting-grounds no more than a few hatchets."

"It is a good day's journey from the Susquehanna to the Black
Mountain," cried a voice. "This they have taken for a piece of bright
cloth and a glass in which to see one's face!"

"Their traders lie to us!" cried another.

The hideously painted old chief rose.

"Year by year their ships come. They overrun our land, given by the
Great Spirit. They enter at the front of the Long House to shove us out
at the back; at the back, to push us out at the front. I counsel death
to all!"

A great trembling seized upon Conrad. Then he saw that Quagnant still
stood, motionless, waiting to continue his speech. Quagnant would not
forget the icy bank and the deep pool!

"Brothers," said Quagnant, "let us be orderly in council, not like
chattering birds. The words of Quagnant were not finished."

At once silence was restored.

"The various brothers have spoken," went on Quagnant. "Many have spoken
without thought. They desire war, without reflecting that the pale-face
has long guns also, without reflecting that ships will bring new
pale-faces. There is a pale-face to whom I have put many questions; he
tells me that they are across the sea like the leaves of the forest. To
talk of making war upon all is child's talk.

"What we should do, brothers of the Long House, is to enter into
understanding with the pale-face, so that we may say, 'To this river
the land is yours, beyond is ours.' Then our mind will be clear to
them, then messengers can go to and fro and--"

"They will not listen!" cried the old warrior. "They have laughed our
messengers in the face."

Quagnant waited again until the old warrior had been frowned at by half
the assemblage. Quagnant approached now the carefully planned climax of
his address.

"The pale-faces will not listen to us, it is true. They do not
understand us. But they will listen to another pale-face. I have had in
my wigwam a young pale-face. I have watched his behavior. He has done
things which will move the hearts of the brothers of the Long House
when I tell them. I will tell them at length. We have made of him an
Indian. He speaks our words. He--"

Now the fierce old warrior would not be stayed. He sprang to his feet,
hatchet in hand.

"He may well speak our words when he sits at our councils! Such a thing
has never been heard of in the Long House. Let him go away and go
quickly."

Shikellamy crossed the open space toward Quagnant.

"Let the young braves take him away," said he.

At once Conrad found himself surrounded. Down the hillside he was led
and to the far end of a long meadow through which flowed a stream.

There, when the curiosity of the young Indians about what was going on
in the council could be no longer resisted, he was left alone. He could
hear on the rising wind the sound of many voices and now a single voice
raised in impassioned speech. About him the shades of the spring night
were falling and a cold breath from the water chilled him through.
Hungry and tired, he sat with his hands clasped round his knees and
his cheek bent upon them. The forest seemed to press upon him. A more
terrible oppression came from the thought of the savage creatures on
the hillside, gathered from the wilderness, debating now whether to
deal with the whites in peace or to exterminate them with knife and
flame.

He thought of his father's dreams of a great country where there should
be liberty and peace. With honesty and at the same time with firmness
must these children of the wilderness be met or dreams and their
dreamers would perish in a night.

Presently a dark form stole toward him across the meadow. He heard a
strange singing unlike the voice of man or animal. He saw strange forms
approach; with faces masked and bodies wrapped in skins of deer and
panther and bear. He moved to the nearest tree and stood with his back
against it. He thought now no more of his father's dreams, or of God's
purpose of which his father talked, but prayed in his pious German way
that he might meet his death bravely.

He found himself taken by the hand and led up the hill, the strange
forms following after. Through the Indian village where the women
stared from firelit doorways, and where over great fires meat was
cooking, to the center of the council he was taken, and there he was
placed alone beside the council fire. About sat the chiefs, behind
them in the shadowy circle the young men. Conrad stood still, his eyes
seeking Quagnant. If death should come, he hoped its messenger would be
a swift knife. The medicine men were behind him; it would be by their
hands that the blow would be struck.

Shikellamy was the first to speak. Upon his magnificent body the
firelight danced. His immobile face told nothing of his heart, but it
seemed to Conrad that his voice was kind.

"We have listened to the story of our brother Quagnant," said he. "We
believe that you are honest and true. We believe that you speak our
words. In order that we may bind ourselves to you and you to us"--now
Conrad's heart stood still--"in order that we may bind ourselves to
you and you to us, we make you a member of the Five Nations. We give
you our heart and you give us your heart. He who is our friend is
your friend. He who is our enemy is your enemy. We invite you to the
extended lodge, we bid you come to our feasts. We will give you in
token deerskins to make you clothes and shoes."

Now there was a long pause. The rising wind moaned in the pine trees,
the fire leaped. Shikellamy crossed to the council fire and held out
his great hand.

"We give you also in token a new name. 'Eyes-like-the-Sky' you are to
the children, but among men you are, 'He-holds-our-fate.'"

Now the King of Rivers came forward. A true Indian, he gave no sign
that he recollected the camp of Blackheath and the strange encounter
which reached now its stranger consummation.

"We are to see dark sights," said he. "I see wars, with Indians
creeping upon pale-faces and pale-faces upon Indians. I hear cries to
the Great Spirit. See that you, who are now our Tongue, are true to us.
Then the English will conquer the French and the land will have peace.
Between the Indian and the English is a bond. You are that bond."

Now Shikellamy spoke again.

"You will have a great name while you live, and after you die your
Indian brothers will visit the place where you lie. Your children will
say with pride, 'I am of the great He-holds-our-fate, his blood is
mine, I have his brave heart.' Will you be true to your brothers?"

"I will be true to my brothers."

Then, at the side of a beckoning Quagnant, Conrad sat down.

"You have done well," said Quagnant. "Now the feast begins."

Conrad made no answer. He saw the Long House, enormous, mysterious; he
saw the little fringe of white faces between it and the sea. He saw the
hopes and fears of the dwellers in the Long House and the hopes and
fears of the strangers. Both were in his own heart.

       *       *       *       *       *

In June, John Conrad's eager, anxious eyes were satisfied. He still
walked each evening into the forest. There on a fallen tree he sat and
looked toward the west. One clear evening, he saw coming toward him an
erect, alert young Indian and sprang up to make the same eager inquiry
with which he greeted all Indians. Then he stood still. The Indian was
clad in doeskin, his hair was long, his feet were moccasined--but his
eyes were blue!

"My son!" cried John Conrad.

Hand in hand the two sat down on the fallen tree.

"How are my brothers and sisters?" asked Conrad.

"I have heard no ill news of them. Sabina is married, and Barbara has
taken her place with a kind mistress in Schenectady. Of all my dear
children you are left me, Conrad. What has befallen you?"

Conrad talked steadily and quietly. He was different; his eyes were
steady, his figure erect, his voice deep. He told of the strange life,
of the harsh training, of the bitter suffering from hunger and cold.

When he described the council, John Conrad shivered.

"A thousand times I wished I had not let you go!" Then in the gathering
dusk his eyes sought his son's face. "What are you going to do now,
Conrad?"

Conrad turned and smiled into the anxious eyes.

"I am going to help you and I am going to teach the children their
letters. Father,"--Conrad looked back into the darkening woods,--"the
life among the Indians seems already like a dream; but there they are
waiting, a fearful menace to us all. Suppose that I should some day be
the one to keep the peace! Perhaps God has saved me for that through
much danger and perversity."

John Conrad breathed a long sigh. He did not look into the future, but
into the past.

"Your mother and I could not give our children riches and honor," said
he slowly. "We tried to give them faith in God and willingness to do
their simple duty. If you have learned those lessons from us or in the
forest among the Indians, you are at last a man. Your mother--"

But John Conrad could not finish, needed not to finish. The hand within
his tightened and an arm was thrown across his bent shoulders. Together
the two sat silently, as they had stood long ago in Gross Anspach in
the moonlight by the little church. Their thoughts traveled together
from sister to sister and brother to brother, and finally back once
more across the sea. Then, at last, John Conrad spoke.

"It has been a long journey and a weary one," said he, "but my
children will have a better chance than I in the world. There may be
other journeys before me, but tonight my heart is at rest."


THE END




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"'David Penstephen' is as searching a study of the influence of
environment upon character as one can find--a story that grows ever
more intensely interesting as it proceeds. One of the notable novels of
the year."--_New York Tribune._

"Far ahead of anything Mr. Pryce has yet done--even
'Christopher.'"--_New York Times._


$1.35 _net_.

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PENELOPE'S POSTSCRIPTS

  By Kate Douglas Wiggin
  _Author of "Rebecca," "The Birds' Christmas Carol," etc._

The experiences of the ever-fascinating Penelope in Vienna,
Switzerland, Wales, Devon, and at home.


"In their delightfully humorous way, with their capital touches of
character-drawing, Penelope's travel books will enchant readers to-day
as much as they delighted those who read them more than a decade
ago."--_New York Tribune._

"In its lightness of touch, its gayety and humor, it reveals the
qualities that have endeared Mrs. Wiggin's work to such a host of
readers."--_New York World._

"Age cannot destroy, nor familiarity lessen, Penelope's power to
charm. In these, her 'postscripts,' that power is as potent as
ever."--_Philadelphia Press._

"All the charm of the author's previous books is present in this
one."--_New Orleans Times-Picayune._


With frontispiece. $1.00 _net_.

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  COMPANY                        NEW YORK

       *       *       *       *       *

Transcriber's Notes

Obvious typographical errors have been silently corrected, all other
spelling, punctuation and accents are as in he original.

Italics are represented thus _italic_.






End of the Project Gutenberg EBook of The Long Journey, by Elsie Singmaster

*** END OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK 50470 ***