Home as Found, James Fenimore Cooper [bookreader txt] 📗

him into the boat, but we sat and conversed for near two

minutes; he in the water, and I in the skiff."

 

"Conversed!" exclaimed Eve, "and with a fish, too! What could the

animal have to say!"

 

"Why, young lady, a fish can talk as well as one of ourselves; the

only difficulty is to understand what he says. I have heard the old

settlers affirm, that the Leather-stocking used to talk for hours at

a time, with the animals of the forest."

 

"You knew the Leather-stocking, commodore?"

 

"No, young lady, I am sorry to say I never had the pleasure of

looking on him even. He _was_ a great man! They may talk of their

Jeffersons and Jacksons, but I set down Washington and Natty Bumppo

as the two only really great men of my time."

 

"What do you think of Bonaparte, commodore?" inquired Paul.

 

"Well, sir, Bonaparte had some strong points about him, I do really

believe. But he could have been nothing to the Leather-stocking, in

the woods! It's no great matter, young gentleman, to be a great man

among your inhabitants of cities--what I call umbrella people. Why,

Natty was almost as great with the spear as with the rifle; though I

never heard that he got a sight of the sogdollager."

 

"We shall meet again this summer, commodore," said John Effingham;

"the ladies wish to hear the echoes, and we must leave you."

 

"All very natural, Mr. John," returned the commodore, laughing, and

again flourishing his hand in his own peculiar manner. "The women all

love to hear the echoes, for they are not satisfied with what they

have once said, but they like to hear it over again. I never knew a

lady come on the Otsego, but one of the first things she did was to

get paddled to the Speaking Rocks, to have a chat with herself. They

come out in such numbers, sometimes, and then all talk at once, in a

way quite to confuse the echo. I suppose you have heard, young lady,

the opinion people have now got concerning these voices."

 

"I cannot say I have ever heard more than that they are some of the

most perfect echoes known;" answered Eve, turning her body, so as to

face the old man, as the skiff of the party passed that of the

veteran fisherman.

 

"Some people maintain that there is no echo at all, and that the

sounds we hear come from the spirit of the Leather-stocking, which

keeps about its old haunts, and repeats every thing we say, in

mockery of our invasion of the woods. I do not say this notion is

true, or that it is my own; but we all know that Natty _did_ dislike

to see a new settler arrive in the mountains, and that he loved a

tree as a muskrat loves water. They show a pine up here on the side

of the Vision, which he notched at every new-comer, until reaching

seventeen, his honest old heart could go no farther, and he gave the

matter up in despair."

 

"This is so poetical, commodore, it is a pity it cannot be true. I

like this explanation of the 'Speaking Rocks,' much better than that

implied by the name of 'Fairy Spring.'"

 

"You are quite right, young lady," called out the fisherman, as the

boats separated still farther; "there never was any fairy known in

Otsego; but the time has been when we could boast of a Natty Bumppo."

 

Here the commodore flourished his hand again, and Eve nodded her

adieus. The skiff of the party continued to pull slowly along the

fringed shore, occasionally sheering more into the lake, to avoid

some overhanging and nearly horizontal tree, and then returning so

closely to the land, as barely to clear the pebbles of the narrow

strand with the oar.

 

Eve thought she had never beheld a more wild or beautifully

variegated foliage, than that which the whole leafy mountainside

presented. More than half of the forest of tall, solemn pines, that

had veiled the earth when the country was first settled, had already

disappeared; but, agreeably to one of the mysterious laws by which

nature is governed, a rich second growth, that included nearly every

variety of American wood, had shot up in their places. The rich

Rembrandt-like hemlocks, in particular, were perfectly beautiful,

contrasting admirably with the livelier tints of the various

deciduous trees. Here and there, some flowering shrub rendered the

picture gay, while masses of the rich chestnut, in blossom, lay in

clouds of natural glory among the dark tops of the pines.

 

The gentlemen pulled the light skiff fully a mile under this

overhanging foliage, occasionally frightening some migratory bird

from a branch, or a water-fowl from the narrow strand. At length,

John Effingham desired them to cease rowing, and managing the skiff

for a minute or two with the paddle which he had used in steering, he

desired the whole party to look up, announcing to them that they were

beneath the 'Silent Pine.'

 

A common exclamation of pleasure succeeded the upward glance; for it

is seldom that a tree is seen to more advantage than that which

immediately attracted every eye. The pine stood on the bank, with its

roots embedded in the earth, a few feet higher than the level of the

lake, but in such a situation as to bring the distance above the

water into the apparent height of the tree. Like all of its kind that

grows in the dense forests of America, its increase, for a thousand

years, had been upward; and it now stood in solitary glory, a

memorial of what the mountains which were yet so rich in vegetation

had really been in their days of nature and pride. For near a hundred

feet above the eye, the even round trunk was branchless, and then

commenced the dark-green masses of foliage, which clung around the

stem like smoke ascending in wreaths. The tall column-like tree had

inclined to wards the light when struggling among its fellows, and it

now so far overhung the lake, that its summit may have been some ten

or fifteen feet without the base. A gentle, graceful curve added to

the effect of this variation from the perpendicular, and infused

enough of the fearful into the grand, to render the picture sublime.

Although there was not a breath of wind on the lake, the currents

were strong enough above the forest to move this lofty object, and it

was just possible to detect a slight, graceful yielding of the very

uppermost boughs to the passing air.

 

"This pine is ill-named," cried Sir George Templemore, "for it is the

most eloquent tree eye of mine has ever looked on!"

 

"It is, indeed, eloquent," answered Eve; "one hears it speak even now

of the fierce storms that have whistled round its tops--of the

seasons that have passed since it extricated that verdant cap from

the throng of sisters that grew beneath it, and of all that has

passed on the Otsego, when this limpid lake lay, like a gem embedded

in the forest. When the Conqueror first landed in England, this tree

stood on the spot where it now stands! Here, then, is at last, an

American antiquity!"

 

"A true and regulated taste, Miss Effingham," said Paul, "has pointed

out to you one of the real charms of the country. Were we to think

less of the artificial, and more of our natural excellencies, we

should render ourselves less liable to criticism."

 

Eve was never inattentive when Paul spoke; and her colour heightened,

as he paid this compliment to her taste, but still her soft blue eye

was riveted on the pine.

 

"Silent it may be, in one respect, but it is, indeed, all eloquence

in another," she resumed, with a fervour that was not lessened by

Paul's remark. "That crest of verdure, which resembles a plume of

feathers, speaks of a thousand things to the imagination."

 

"I have never known a person of any poetry, who came under this

tree," said John Effingham, "that did not fall into this very train

of thought. I once brought a man celebrated for his genius here, and,

after gazing for a minute or two at the high, green tuft that tops

the tree, he exclaimed, 'that mass of green waved there in the fierce

light when Columbus first ventured into the unknown sea.' It is,

indeed, eloquent; for it tells the same glowing tale to all who

approach it--a tale fraught with feeling and recollections."

 

"And yet its silence is, after all, its eloquence," added Paul; "and

the name is not so misplaced as one might at first think."

 

"It probably obtained its name from some fancied contrast to the

garrulous rocks that lie up yonder, half concealed by the forest. If

you will ply the oars, gentlemen, we will now hold a little communion

with the spirit of the Leather-stocking."

 

The young men complied; and in about five minutes, the skiff was off

in the lake, at the distance of fifty rods from the shore, where the

whole mountainside came at one glance into the view. Here they lay on

their oars, and John Effingham called out to the rocks a "good

morning," in a clear distinct voice. The mocking sounds were thrown

back again, with a closeness of resemblance that actually startled

the novice. Then followed other calls and other repetitions of the

echoes, which did not lose the minutest intonation of the voice.

 

"This actually surpasses the celebrated echoes of the Rhine," cried

the delighted Eve; "for, though those do give the strains of the

bugle so clearly, I do not think they answer to the voice with so

much fidelity."

 

"You are very right, Eve," replied her kinsman, "for I can recall no

place where so perfect and accurate an echo is to be heard as at

these speaking rocks. By increasing our distance to half a mile, and

using a bugle, as I well know, from actual experiment, we should get

back entire passages of an air. The interval between the sound and

the echo, too, would be distinct, and would give time for an

undivided attention. Whatever may be said of the 'pine,' these rocks

are most aptly named; and if the spirit of Leather-stocking has any

concern with the matter, he is a mocking spirit."

 

John Effingham now looked at his watch, and then he explained to the

party a pleasure he had in store for them. On a sort of small, public

promenade, that lay at the point where the river flowed out of the

lake, stood a rude shell of a building that was called the "gun-

house." Here, a speaking picture of the entire security of the

country, from foes within as well as from foes without, were kept two

or three pieces of field artillery, with doors so open that any one

might enter the building, and even use the guns at will, although

they properly belonged to the organized corps of the state.

 

One of these guns had been sent a short distance down the valley; and

John Effingham informed his companions that they might look

momentarily for its reports to arouse the echoes of the mountains. He

was still speaking when the gun was fired, its muzzle being turned

eastward. The sound first reached the side of the Vision, abreast of

the village, whence the reverberations reissued, and rolled along the

range, from cave to cave, and cliff to cliff, and wood to wood, until

they were lost, like distant thunder, two or three leagues to the

northward. The experiment was thrice repeated, and always with the

same magnificent effect, the western hills actually echoing the

echoes of the eastern mountains, like the dying strains of some

falling music.

 

"Such a locality would be a treasure in the vicinity of a melo-

dramatic theatre," said Paul, laughing, "for certainly, no artificial

thunder I have ever heard has equalled this. This sheet of water

might even receive a gondola."

 

"And yet, I fear one accustomed to the boundless horizon of the

ocean, might in time weary of it," answered John Effingham,

significantly.

 

Paul made no answer; and the party rowed away in silence.

 

"Yonder is the spot where we have so long been accustomed to resort

for Pic-Nics," said Eve, pointing out a lovely place, that was

beautifully shaded by old oaks, and on which stood a rude house that

was much dilapidated, and indeed injured, by the hands of man. John

Effingham smiled, as his cousin showed the place to her companions,

promising them an early and a nearer view of its beauties.

 

"By the way, Miss Effingham," he said, "I suppose you flatter

yourself with being the heiress of that desirable retreat?"

 

"It is very natural that, at some day, though I trust a very distant

one, I should succeed to that which belongs to my dear father."

 

"Both natural and legal, my fair cousin; but you are yet to learn

that there is a power that threatens to rise