CHAPTER X.
B. RANDOLPH TO V. CHEVILLERE.
"Savannah, 18--.
"DEAR FRIEND,
"After despatching my last letter, not knowing exactly what else to do with myself in the present state of affairs, I set out on horseback, telling the family that I wished to see a little more of Carolina, but inwardly resolved to follow the horse's nose wherever he might lead, and continue thus to ride and thus to be led until I might gather up my scattered thoughts and determine what course to pursue.
"I will not deny, that on the second day in the afternoon, about three o'clock (truth is always precise, you know), I discovered in one corner of the storehouse of my thoughts a secret design to try 'Bell' by a leave-taking, absence, and reappearance. If you had been upon the ground to charge me with the intention, I should no doubt have sworn upon a stack of Testaments that it was not so; and I could have done so honestly. You have looked inwards too often not to know, that in wandering through the dreary passages of one's own mind, we blunder by accident upon many obscure motives, which, if boldly charged with them before we set out on such a pilgrimage, we should stoutly deny.
"When the horses were brought up on the gravelled road, and all things in readiness for my departure, I cast a furtive glance at that too-knowing and too-beautiful little brunette, who calls you cousin, to see how she was about to feel on the solemn occasion. Her looks were perfectly inexplicable. I have thought of them ever since, but for my life I cannot say in what feelings they had their origin. There was neither sorrow, joy, love, hatred, revenge, hope, despair, nor any other definable emotion. There was a scarcely perceptible smile, a slight shutting of the corner of one eye, and a mock solemnity of the other unruly features, as if one was winking to the other rebels as much as to say, 'wait till he's out of hearing, and we will have a rare laugh at his expense.' It was just such a look as would make a man say, 'Zounds and fury, madam, you'll never see me again; farewell, for ever;' and then be laughed at for his pains.
"But what sort of a look was it? It was a very knowing look, I am sure of that. She looked as if she read all the inward workings of my moral machinery. It was a serio-comic look; produced, no doubt, by the idea that she was scanning me thoroughly, while I imagined that I could see just as clearly through her. In other words, as I have somewhere else beautifully expressed it, she thought me 'pretty considerable much of an ass,' and I am pretty considerable much of her opinion, at least before ladies. It is somewhat singular that this tendency to display my weak side should have developed itself at the very time when I most desired to appear to advantage.
"At last the parting moment came. I had bidden your mother farewell in the breakfast-room, and then proceeded to the front door, where stood Virginia Bell.
"'I think it very doubtful,' said I, 'whether I shall be enabled to take your aunt's house in my route home.'
"'You are not going to run away with cousin's favourite horse, are you?' said she.
"By the Great Mogul! in my earnestness to invent a pathetic lie, I forgot to arrange the consistency of the plot.
"'True, true!' said I, stammering; 'then I must indeed run my head into danger again!' saying which I sprang upon your horse, and rode like a country doctor who has no practice. By-the-by, that was nearer to an avowal than I have ever come yet; your joyous, fun-loving creatures are the most difficult to address in the world.
"Oh! if I only had such a one in love with me, what a race I would lead her! I would punish the whole class of unapproachable little mischievous misses! I would make her ogle me at church; hang on my arm to the theatre; sigh by the fire-side, and weep when she went to bed; I would almost break her heart before I would take the least pity upon her.
"I am curious to know what sort of wives these same little romps make. Do they romp it through life, or do they settle down into your miserable, sad, melancholy drones, who greet their husbands when they come home with a sigh, or inexpressible look, that drives more men to the bottle than all the good wine and good company in the world?
"You ask me, at least I know you would ask me, what I saw, or what occurred on the road to the place from which this letter is dated. I will tell you what I have not seen since I entered this land of nullification. I have not seen a clear limpid river that could be forded on horseback. Your water-courses are dark, deep, still, and gloomy. The foliage on their banks is superlatively rich and abundant, but it is occasionally interspersed with a species of natural beauties which I don't admire, namely, little alligators; by-the-by, I never see alligators, lizards, or tadpoles, that I do not think of those weary days when we read together Ovid's Metamorphoses.
"Of a southern swamp I had no proper conception. I thought they were black, dismal holes, covered with old black logs, and black snakes, and frogs, and vapours; instead of which, they bear a nearer resemblance, in the summer, to a princely (or _Prince's_) botanical garden. The very perfume upon the olfactories is far more delightful than the greatest assemblage of artificial odours. Then there are the rich and variegated flowers of all hues, sizes, and colours, set amid the deep green of the rich shrubbery. The soil of which these swamps are composed is as black as tar, and pretty much of the same consistence.
"I observe, as I travel farther south, that bread is seldom seen upon the table. What is called here _small homminy_ is used in its place, at breakfast, dinner, and supper.
"I saw no ploughs in your fields. Horses seemed to be used only for carriages, racing, and for the private use of gentlemen and ladies. I saw no brick houses; your mother's and that of Col. S. being the only two I saw in the whole state. I saw many private mansions very tastefully built and ornamented; some of them were splendid, but mostly built of wood and painted white.
"After three days pretty constant riding after my horse's nose, he brought me to the banks of the Savannah, at a little miserable-looking town, or village, called Purysburg. Here I found a steamboat just about to depart for Savannah. I immediately engaged passage for myself, servant, and two horses (one of which is yours; confound him, I say, for betraying me). I amused myself by shooting at the alligators, as we glided along the water, and had kept up the sport some time, when a mellow distant sound came along the surface of the water, like an exquisitely played Kent bugle. It was decidedly the most enchanting music I ever heard, and seemed nearer and nearer until it appeared to rise from under the very bow of the boat. You will be surprised when I tell you that it was made through a straight wooden tube, about five feet long. The musician was a tall, ebony-coloured old African, who stood up in one of your singular-looking batteaux, amid half-a-dozen other negroes, who seemed to be at their luncheon. It looked much like a boat on the Niger; indeed, I found my imagination carrying me into such distant regions, that I instinctively bit my lip to see whether I was awake or dreaming.
"The city of Savannah became distinctly visible at a distance of about seven miles. A brilliant city indeed it is. You cannot imagine any thing finer than the view from the river. It is situated on a high bluff, and commands an extensive view up and down the stream. In the latter direction, on a clear day, you can see, without glasses, the lighthouse on the island of Tybee.
"By-the-by, I have been down among those islands; they are all inhabited, and by a class of men as much like our real old-fashioned Virginia gentlemen as can well be imagined. This city is nobly built, and is laid out on a magnificent scale, having a public square, containing a grove of pride of India trees, in the centre of every four squares, and a row of the same along each side of every street.
"Talk of Philadel
phia, and New-York, and Boston, and Richmond, and New-Haven--Savannah outstrips them all, both in artificial and natural beauty. It seems the residence of the prince of the world and his nobility.
"Yours, most truly,
"B. RANDOLPH."