"I"ll take the advice, then. Get the traps ready; I"ll pack the saddle-bags and set out."
If any one had asked me why I was in such haste to reach Austin, my answer would have been, "To join the expedition;" and if interrogated, "With what object then?" I should have been utterly dumbfoundered.
Little as I knew of its intentions, they must all have been above the range of my ability and means to partic.i.p.ate in. True, I had a horse and a rifle; but there was the end of my worldly possessions, not to say that my t.i.tle, even to these, admitted of litigation. A kind of vague notion possessed me that, once up with the expedition, I should find my place "somewhere,"--a very Irish idea of a responsible situation. I trusted to the "making myself generally useful" category for employment, and to a ready-wittedness never cramped nor restrained by the petty prejudices of a conscience.
The love of enterprise and adventure is conspicuous among the springs of action in Irish life, occasionally developing a Wellesley or a Captain Rock. Peninsular glories and predial outrage have just the same one origin,--a love of distinction, and a craving desire for the enjoyment of that most fascinating of all excitements,--whatever perils life.
Without this element, pleasure soon palls; without the cracked skulls and fractured "femurs," fox-hunting would be mere galloping; a review might vie with a battle, if they fire blank cartridge in both! Who "d climb the Peter Bot, or cross the "pet.i.t mulets" of Mont Blanc, if it were not that a false step or a totter would send him down a thousand fathoms into the deep gorge below. This playing hide-and-seek with Death seems to have a great charm, and is very possibly the attraction some folks feel in playing invalid, and pa.s.sing their lives amid black draughts and blue lotions!
I shrewdly suspect this luxury of tempting peril distinguishes man from the whole of the other animal creation; and if we were to examine it a little, we should see that it opens the way to many of his highest aspirings and most n.o.ble enterprises. Now, let not the gentle reader ask, "Does Mr. Cregan include horse-stealing in the list of these heroic darings?" Believe me, he does not; he rather regarded the act of appropriation in the present case in the light some n.o.ble lords did when voting away church property,--"a hard necessity, but preferable to being mulct oneself!" With many a thought like this, I rode out into the now silent town, and took my way towards Austin.
It is a strange thing to find oneself in a foreign land, thousands of miles from home, alone, and at night; the sense of isolation is almost overwhelming. So long as daylight lasts, the stir of the busy world and the business of life ward off these thoughts,--the novelty of the scene even combats them; but when night has closed in, and we see above us the stars that we have known in other lands, the self-same moon by whose light we wandered years ago, and then look around and mark the features of a new world, with objects which tell of another hemisphere; and then think that we are there alone, without tie or link to all around us, the sensation is thrilling in its intensity.
Every one of us--the least imaginative, even--will a.s.sociate the strangeness of a foreign scene with something of that adventure of which he has read in his childhood; and we people vacancy, as we go, with images to suit the spot in our own country. The little pathway along the river side suggests the lovers" walk at sunset as surely as the dark grove speaks of a woodman"s hut or a gypsy camp. But abroad, the scene evokes different dwellers: the Sierra suggests the brigand; the thick jungle, the jaguar or the rattlesnake; the heavy plash in the muddy river is the sound of the cayman; and the dull roar, like wind within a cavern, is the cry of the hungry lion. The presence around us of objects of which we have read long ago, but never expected to see, is highly exciting; it is like taking our place among the characters of a story, and investing us with an interest to ourselves, as the hero of some unwrought history.
This is the most fascinating of all castle-building, since we have a spot for an edifice,--a territory actually given to us.
I thought long upon this theme, and wondered to what I was yet destined,--whether to some condition of real eminence, or to move on among that vulgar herd who are the spectators of life, but never its conspicuous actors. I really believe this ign.o.ble course was more distasteful to me from its flatness and insipidity than from its mere humility. It seemed so devoid of all interest, so tame and so monotonous, I would have chosen peril and vicissitude any day in preference. About midnight I reached Croft"s Gulley, where, after knocking for some time, a very sulky old negro admitted me into a stable while I baited my mare. The house was shut up for the night; and even had I sought refreshment, I could not have obtained it.
After a brief halt, I again resumed the road, which led through a close pine forest, and, however much praised, was anything but a good surface to travel on. Charcoal, however, made light of such difficulties, and picked her steps over holes and stumps with the caution of a trapper, detecting with a rare instinct the safe ground, and never venturing on spots where any difficulty or danger existed. I left her to herself, and it was curious to see that whenever a short interval of better footway intervened, she would, as if to "make play," as the jockeys call it, strike out in a long swinging canter, "pulling up" to the walk the moment the uneven surface admonished her to caution.
As day broke, the road improved so that I was able to push along at a better pace, and by breakfast-time I found myself at a low, poor-looking log-house called "Brazos." A picture representing Texas as a young child receiving some admirable counsel from a very matronly lady with thirteen stars on her petticoat, flaunted over the door, with the motto, "Filial Affection, and Candy Flip at all hours."
A large, dull-eyed man, in a flannel pea-jacket and loose trousers to match, was seated in a rocking-chair at the door, smoking an enormous cigar, a little charmed circle of expectoration seeming to defend him from the a.s.saults of the vulgar. A huge can of cider stood beside him, and a piece of Indian corn bread. He eyed me with the coolest unconcern as I dismounted, nor did he show the slightest sign of welcome.
"This is an inn, I believe, friend?" said I, saluting him.
"I take it to be a hotel," said he, in a voice very like a yawn.
"And the landlord, where is he?"
"Where he ought to be,--at his own door, a smokin" his own rearin"."
"Is there an ostler to be found? I want to refresh my horse, and get some breakfast for myself too."
"There an"t none."
"No help?"
"Never was."
"That"s singular, I fancy."
"No, it an"t."
"Why, what do travellers do with their cattle, then?"
"There bean"t none."
"No cattle?"
"No travellers."
[Ill.u.s.tration: 330-299]
"No travellers! and this the high road between two considerable towns!"
"It an"t."
"Why, surely this is the road to Austin?"
"It an"t."
"Then this is not Brazos?"
"It be Upper Brazos."
"There are two of them, then; and the other, I suppose, is on the Austin road?"
He nodded.
"What a piece of business!" sighed I; "and how far have I come astray?"
"A good bit."
"A mile or two?"
"Twenty."
"Will you be kind enough to be a little more communicative, and just say where this road leads to; if I can join the Austin road without turning back again; and where?"
Had I propounded any one of these queries, it is just possible I might have had an answer; but, in my zeal, I outwitted myself. I drew my check for too large an amount, and consequently was refused payment altogether.
"Well," said I, after a long and vain wait for an answer, "what am I to do with my horse? There is a stable, I hope?"
"There an"t," said he, with a grunt.
"So that I can"t bait my beast?"
"No!"
"Bad enough! Can I have something to eat myself,--a cup of coffee--?"
A rude burst of laughter stopped me, and the flannel man actually shook with the drollery of his own thoughts. "It bean"t Astor House, I reckon!" said he, wiping his eyes.
"Not very like it, certainly," said I, smiling.
"What o" that? Who says it ought to be like it?" said he, and his fishy eyes flared up, and his yellow cheeks grew orange with anger. "I an"t very like old Hickory, I s"pose! and maybe I don"t want to be! I"m a free Texan! I an"t a n.i.g.g.e.r nor a blue-nose! I an"t one of your old country slaves, that black King George"s boots, and ask leave to pay his taxes! I an"t."
"And I," said I, a.s.suming an imitation of his tone, for experiment"s sake, "I am no lazy, rocking-chair, whittling, tobacco-chewing Texan!