In two years he considered himself sufficiently well established to send to Philadelphia for his betrothed. This lady, Miss Elizabeth Shewell, came out to England under the care of his father, and in the same year, 1765, West was married to her in London. She was a lady of great amiability of character, and by the English was often spoken of as the Philadelphia beauty.
Soon after his arrival in England he produced a large painting on a subject from Tacitus, "Agrippina Landing with the Ashes of Germanicus."
It was a decided success. George the Third was deeply impressed with it, and congratulated West warmly upon its merits. At the same time the king gave him a commission for a painting,--the subject to be "The Death of Regulus,"--and thus began the friendship between the monarch and the artist, which lasted for nearly forty years. He was a hard worker, and during his long life his pictures followed each other in rapid succession. They are estimated by a writer in Blackwood"s Magazine at three thousand in number. Mr. Dunlap says that they would cover a wall ten feet high and a quarter of a mile long if arranged side by side on a flat surface. The most famous are his "Death of Wolfe;" "Regulus, a Prisoner to the Carthaginians;" "The Battle of La Hogue;" "The Death of Bayard;" "Hamilcar Swearing the Infant Hannibal at the Altar;" "The Departure of Regulus;" "Agrippina Landing with the Ashes of Germanicus;" "Christ Healing the Sick;" "Death on the Pale Horse;" "The Descent of the Holy Ghost on the Saviour in the Jordan;" "The Crucifixion;" and "Christ Rejected."
The picture which brought him most prominently before the public, and which placed his popularity beyond dispute, was "The Death of Wolfe at Quebec." It was fashionable at this time to treat nothing but subjects from ancient history, and when West announced his intention of painting a picture of contemporary history his friends warned him that he was incurring a serious risk. Nevertheless he finished his "Death of Wolfe,"
and it was exhibited in the National Gallery. The public "acknowledged its excellence at once, but the lovers of old art--called cla.s.sical--complained of the barbarism of boots, b.u.t.tons, and blunderbusses, and cried out for naked warriors, with bows, bucklers, and battering rams." Lord Grosvenor was much pleased with the picture, and finally purchased it, though he did so with hesitation, daunted to some extent by the fierce storm of opposition with which the critics received it. Sir Joshua Reynolds, then the President of the Royal Academy, and the Archbishop of York, called on West and protested against his barbarous innovation, but he declared to them that "the event to be commemorated happened in the year 1759, in a region of the world unknown to Greeks and Romans, and at a period of the world when no warrior who wore cla.s.sic costume existed. The same rule which gives law to the historian should rule the painter." When the king saw the picture he was delighted both with it and West"s originality, and declared that he was sorry Lord Grosvenor had been before him in purchasing it. This was the inauguration of a new era in British art, and Sir Joshua Reynolds was obliged to declare, "West has conquered. I foresee that this picture will not only become one of the most popular, but will occasion a revolution in art." This frank avowal was as honorable to Sir Joshua as to West.
West painted for George the Third a number of subjects taken from the early history of England, and received from the same monarch a commission for a series of paintings ill.u.s.trating the progress of revealed religion, with which the king designed to ornament the chapel at Windsor Castle. Of these twenty-eight were finished when the Prince of Wales, afterward George the Fourth, came into power as Prince Regent, and the commission was withdrawn. The artist then began a series of grand religious subjects, upon which he was still engaged when death called him to rest from all his labors. Of those which were completed, "Death on the Pale Horse" and "Christ Healing the Sick" are the best known in this country.
In 1792, upon the death of Sir Joshua Reynolds, West was made President of the Royal Academy. The king wished to confer upon him the honor of knighthood, but he declined it, alleging that he was not wealthy enough to support the dignity of the position. In consequence of dissensions in the Academy, West resigned his presidency in 1802. The post was filled for a year by James Wyatt, the architect, and at the close of that time West was re-elected by every ballot but one--that of Fuseli, who voted for Mrs. Lloyd, a member of the Academy, declaring that he considered "one old woman as good as another." West continued in this office until his death.
The close of his life was blessed with ample means, and, as he was in the full possession of all his faculties and covered with art"s supremest honors, it may be regarded as the happiest portion of his career. His house was always open to Americans visiting England, and few things pleased him more than to listen to news from his native village.
He was a kind and judicious friend to young artists, especially to those of his own country studying in England, and took a lively pleasure in their success. Leigh Hunt, whose mother was a relative of West, has left us the following description of him:
"The appearance of West was so gentlemanly that the moment he changed his gown for a coat he seemed to be full dressed. The simplicity and self-possession of the young Quaker, not having time enough to grow stiff--for he went early to Rome--took up, I suppose, with more ease than most would have done, the urbanities of his new position. Yet this man, so well bred, and so indisputably clever in his art, whatever might be the amount of his genius, had received a homely or careless education, and p.r.o.nounced some of his words with a puritanical barbarism; he would talk of his art all day. There were strong suspicions of his leaning to his native side in politics, and he could not restrain his enthusiasm for Bonaparte. How he managed these matters with the higher powers in England I can not say."
Possessed originally of a sound and vigorous const.i.tution, which he had not weakened by any species of dissipation, West lived to a good old age, and died in London on the 11th of March, 1820, in his eighty-second year. He was buried in St. Paul"s Cathedral, by the side of Sir Joshua Reynolds, and under the same great dome which covers the tombs of Nelson and Wellington.
CHAPTER XXVIII.
JOHN ROGERS.
There is scarcely a family of means and taste in the country but is the possessor of one or more of Rogers"s groups in plaster. You see them in every art or book-store window, and they are constantly finding new admirers, and rendering the name of the talented sculptor more and more a household word.
JOHN ROGERS, to whom the world is indebted for this new branch of art, was born at Salem, Ma.s.sachusetts, on the 30th of October, 1829. His ancestors were among the original settlers of the colony, and have resided in Salem for generations. His father, a merchant of moderate means and good reputation, was anxious to train his son to some regular and profitable business. As the basis of this, he gave the boy a good education in the common schools of the town, and in 1845, when he was sixteen years old, placed him in a dry-goods store in Boston to learn the business. He remained there for two years.
He gave early evidence of his artistic genius, and when a mere child had shown a taste and talent for drawing which increased with his years, and made him eager to become an artist. His parents, however, were desirous of seeing him rich rather than famous, and did all in their power to discourage him from making choice of a vocation which they considered but little better than vagabondage. They magnified the difficulties and trials of an artist"s career, and so far succeeded in their efforts that he entirely abandoned his wish to make art a means of livelihood. He was not willing to forsake it altogether, however--he was too true an artist at heart for that--but contented himself for the time with continuing his efforts, merely as a means of personal enjoyment.
In 1847, feeling satisfied that he was not suited to a mercantile life, Mr. Rogers gave up his clerkship in Boston, and obtained a place in the corps of engineers engaged in the construction of the Cochituate Water Works. Here he had a fine opportunity for cultivating his talent for drawing, but the constant labor which he underwent so injured his eyes that he was compelled to give up his position. His physician advised him to make an ocean voyage for the purpose of re-establishing his health.
Acting upon this advice, he made a short visit to Spain, and returned home very much improved by the voyage and the rest his eyes had enjoyed.
In 1848, soon after his return to this country, he entered a machine shop in Manchester, New Hampshire, to learn the trade of a machinist. He worked at this trade for a period of seven years, applying himself to it with great diligence and determination, and acquiring much mechanical skill and a thorough knowledge of the trade. He rose steadily through the various grades of his new calling--from the bench of the apprentice to the post of draughtsman in the designing department.
During this period he devoted himself enthusiastically to his art. Soon after his return from Spain, he had observed a young man modeling a figure in clay, and by closely observing him had learned the process, which until then was unknown to him. The labor of the youth pleased him very much, and the more because he saw in it a new means of artistic expression. He at once procured some clay, and, taking it to his room, commenced to practice upon the lesson which he had just received. From this time forward he continued his art labors, giving to them all the leisure time he could spare from his duties in the shop, where he was compelled to work from five A.M. until seven P.M. He would go to his room after supper, and by the light of a tallow candle work late into the night, modeling figures in clay, and bringing new fancies into shape. He says that frequently, although exhausted by his severe labor at the shop, he would be unable to sleep until he had molded into clay the idea which possessed his mind. These night studies, superadded to his daily duties, proved very trying to him. Yet he persevered, encouraged by his success with his figures. He endeavored to persuade some of his relatives to aid him in securing a better education as an artist, such as would have enabled him to abandon the machine shop; but they turned a deaf ear to him, and he was thus compelled to continue his daily task, which, under these circ.u.mstances, naturally grew more and more irksome.
In 1856, he was enabled to better his condition for a short time. He was offered the place of manager of a railroad machine-shop at Hannibal, Missouri, and promptly accepted it. In six months, however, he was out of employment, the panic of 1857 having caused the machine-shop to suspend operations. Having a little money in hand, which he had saved from his wages, he resolved to visit Europe, and study the works of the great masters in his art, and, if he could, to take lessons in sculpture from some competent teacher in the Old World. He went to Paris and Rome, remaining in those cities for a period of eight months, and endeavoring to share the enthusiasm for the great works around him which the artist world manifested. At the end of that time he came home convinced that cla.s.sic art had no attractions for him, and was almost ready to declare that he had none of the true inspiration of an artist.
He did not stop long in the East upon his return. Going West at once, he obtained a situation in the office of the Surveyor of the city of Chicago. In this position he worked hard and faithfully, and his employers soon found that in him they had obtained a prize.
Meantime, although so much disheartened by his failure to accomplish any thing in Europe, he did not abandon his art studies, but continued to model figures in clay, and shortly after his arrival in Chicago, gave one of his groups to some ladies of that city, to be sold at a fair in behalf of some benevolent purpose. This was the "Checker Players," and was the first of his efforts ever submitted to the public. Its success was immediate. It proved one of the most attractive features of the fair, and the newspapers p.r.o.nounced it one of the most satisfactory evidences of native genius ever seen in Chicago. Mr. Rogers was much pleased with its success, and soon followed it with "The Town Pump," one of his most popular compositions.
The popularity which these efforts attained, opened John Rogers"s eyes to a correct perception of his true mission in life. He was not capable of accomplishing any thing in cla.s.sic art, but here was a field in which a renown, unique and brilliant, might be won, and in which he might endear himself to thousands of hearts in the great world in which he lived. Both fame and wealth seemed opening up before him. He did not hesitate long, but resolved to follow the leadings of his genius. Having heard that a new process of flexible molds had been invented, by which the most intricate designs could be cast with ease, he came to New York in 1859, bringing with him his "Checker Players" and "Town Pump," and the model of a new group on which he was then engaged. Seeking an Italian familiar with the new process, he engaged him to cast his figures in plaster by means of it, and from him he learned how to practice the new method himself.
He now put forth his "Slave Auction," which he had modeled in Chicago and brought to New York with him. The antislavery excitement was then at its height, and this effort aroused the sympathy and won Mr. Rogers the support of the greater part of the people of the Northern States. There was a large demand for the group, and Mr. Rogers soon found himself obliged to employ a.s.sistance to fill the orders which kept crowding in upon him. By selecting a subject which was of the deepest interest to the people of the country, he had thus attracted attention to his merits, and he felt sure that by keeping the people supplied with works ill.u.s.trative of the topics of the day, he would win the success to which he aspired.
He now ventured to establish himself permanently in New York, and, renting the garret of a Broadway building, set up his studio in it, and issued this modest card: "John Rogers, Artist, Designs and Executes Groups of Figures in Composition at his Studio, 599 Broadway." The success of his works had been so marked as to induce him to believe that he would have no difficulty in establishing a permanent business, and he set to work with enthusiasm. In quick succession he produced his "Fairy"s Whisper" and "Air Castles," the latter of which is the only commission he has ever executed. The war began soon after, and supplied him with an abundance of popular subjects. These war subjects attracted universal attention, and sold as rapidly as he could supply them. A New York journal thus describes the "sensation" which they created in that city:
"All day, and every day, week in and week out, there is an ever-changing crowd of men, women, and children standing stationary amid the ever-surging tides of Broadway, before the windows of Williams & Stevens, gazing with eager interest upon the statuettes and groups of John Rogers, the sculptor. These works appeal to a deep popular sentiment. They are not pretentious displays of G.o.ds, G.o.ddesses, ideal characters, or stupendous, world-compelling heroes. They are ill.u.s.trations of American domestic and especially of American military life--not of our great generals or our bold admirals, or the men whose praises fill all the newspapers, but of the common soldier of the Union; not of the common soldier, either, in what might be called his high heroic moods and moments, when, with waving sword and flaming eye, he dashes upon the enemy"s works, but of the soldier in the ordinary moments and usual occupations of every-day camp life. For the last year or more Mr. Rogers has been at work mainly on groups of this latter cla.s.s and character. Thus he has given us "The Returned Volunteer, or How the Fort was Taken," being a group of three gathered in a blacksmith"s shop, the characters consisting of the blacksmith himself, standing with his right foot on the anvil block, and his big hammer in his hands, listening eagerly, with his little girl, to a soldier who sits close by on his haunches, narrating "how the fort was taken," We have also another group of three, "The Picket Guard," spiritedly sketched, as in eager, close, and nervous search for the enemy; the "Sharpshooters," another group of three, or rather of two men and a scarecrow, ill.u.s.trating a curious practice in our army of deceiving the enemy; the "Town Pump," a scene in which a soldier, uniformed and accoutered, is slaking his thirst and holding blessed converse beside the pump with a pretty girl who has come for a pail of water; the "Union Refugees," a pathetic and n.o.ble group, consisting of a stalwart and sad-faced East Tennesseean or Virginian, who accompanied by his wife, who leans her head upon his bosom, and by his little boy, who looks up eagerly into his face, has started off from home with only his gun upon his shoulder and his powder-horn by his side, to escape the tyranny of the rebels; "The Camp Fire, or Making Friends with the Cook," in which a hungry soldier, seated upon an inverted basket, is reading a newspaper to an "intelligent contraband," who is stirring the contents of a huge and ebullient pot hung over the fire; "Wounded to the Rear, or One More Shot," in which a soldier is represented as dressing his wounded leg, while his companion, with his left arm in a sling, is trying to load his gun to take another shot at the enemy, at whom he looks defiantly; "Mail Day," which tells its own story of a speculative soldier, seated on a stone and racking his poor brains to find some ideas to transcribe upon the paper which he holds upon his knee, to be sent perchance to her he loves; "The Country Postmaster, or News from the Army," which, though a scene from civil life, tells of the anxiety of the soldier"s wife or sweetheart to get tidings from the brave volunteer who is periling his life on the battle-field; "The Wounded Scout, or a Friend in the Swamp,"
representing a soldier, torn, and bleeding, and far gone, rescued and raised up by a faithful and kind-hearted negro--which we think is one of the best, if not the very best, of Mr. Rogers"s works; and lastly, a group called "The Home Guard, or Midnight on the Border," in which a heroic woman, accompanied by a little girl, is represented as stepping out, pistol in hand, to confront the a.s.sailants of her humble home."
In 1862 Mr. Rogers removed his studio to the corner of Fifth Avenue and Twenty-sixth Street, where he still remains. He has followed up the earlier productions named above with "The Bushwhacker," a scene representing a Tennessee loyalist d.o.g.g.i.ng the footsteps of the Southern army; "Taking the Oath and Drawing Rations," the best and certainly the most popular of his works,--a group of four, representing a Southern lady with her little boy, compelled to take the oath of allegiance in order to obtain rations for her family. A negro boy, bearing a basket for his mistress, leans on the barrel watching the proceeding with the most intense interest. The woman"s face is wonderful, and it expresses eloquently the struggle in her breast between her devotion to the South and her love for the boy before her, and the officer tendering the oath almost speaks the sympathy which her suffering has awakened in him. The other works of our artist are "Uncle Ned"s School," "The Charity Patient," "The School Examination," "The Council of War," "The Courtship in Sleepy Hollow," "The Fugitive"s Story," "Challenging the Union Vote,"
and "Rip Van Winkle."
The process by which these exquisite groups are produced is exceedingly simple, but is one requiring considerable skill and delicacy of manipulation, and although the casting could readily be done by competent a.s.sistants, Mr. Rogers conscientiously gives his personal attention to every detail of the process. The artist takes a ma.s.s of wet clay of the desired consistency and size, and fashions it roughly with his hands to something like the proper shape. "It is sometimes necessary to make a little frame of wire upon which to lay the clay, to hold it in its proper place, the wire being easily made to take any form. The rough figure is then finished with the molding stick, which is simply a stick of pine with a little spoon of box-wood attached to each end, one spoon being more delicate than the other. With this instrument the artist works upon the clay with surprising ease. The way in which the works are reproduced is as follows: When the clay model is complete, a single plaster cast is taken for a pattern, and is finished with the most scrupulous care by Mr. Rogers himself. This cast is used as a pattern for making whatever number of molds may be needed to supply the demand for any particular group or statue. The molds are made of glue softened with water, so as to be about as limber as India-rubber. This is poured over the pattern while in a warm and liquid condition; it is, therefore, necessary to surround the pattern with a stiff case to hold the glue in place. This case is made of plaster, and is built up by hand around the pattern. When the glue has become sufficiently hard, it is cut by a thin sharp knife and pulled off the pattern. The parts are put together and bound by cord, making a perfect glue mold. The plaster of Paris is then poured into the mold inverted. A number of crooked pieces of wire are also placed in the mold to strengthen the figure. In about twenty minutes the plaster sets so as to allow the case to be opened, and the glue mold to be pulled off. To his proficiency in the mechanical part of his art Mr. Rogers attributes a considerable measure of his success, as it enables him to execute with facility every suggestion of his imagination, and to secure the perfect reproduction of his works by those to whom he intrusts that labor."
By placing his works at popular prices, ranging from $10 to $25 each, Mr. Rogers has insured the largest sale and greatest popularity for them, and has thus become a national benefactor. It is now within the power of every person of moderate means to possess one or more of his exquisite groups, and in this way the artist has not only secured to himself a sure means of wealth, but has done much to encourage and foster a popular love for, and appreciation of, the art of which he is so bright an ornament.
It was a bold venture to depart so entirely from all the precedents of art, but the result has vindicated both the artist"s genius and his quick appreciation of the intelligence of his countrymen. "We can not enter into the feelings of ancient Greece," says a popular journal, in summing up his efforts, "and our artists who spend their time in attempting to reproduce that ancient art are only imitators. Their works interest only a small cla.s.s of connoisseurs, and that interest is an antiquarian interest. It is not a vital, living interest, such as a Greek felt in his own work. It is not the natural, healthful, artistic feeling, the feeling for the beauty of realities, except in so far as it represents the feeling for the eternal attributes of beautiful form. It is an effort on the part of our artists to impose the forms and features of another age upon this one,--a task as impossible in art as in society, religion, and national politics."
Mr. Rogers is now in his forty-first year, and of all our American artists is, perhaps, the one best known to the ma.s.ses, and the most popular. He is of medium height, carries himself erectly, and is quick and energetic in his movements. His face is frank, manly, and open, and the expression, though firm and resolute,--as that of a man who has fought so hard for success must be,--is winning and genial. He is a gentleman of great cultivation of mind, and is said by his friends to be one of the most entertaining of companions. In 1865 he married a daughter of Mr. C.S. Francis, of New York, and his fondness for domestic life leads him to pa.s.s his leisure hours chiefly by his own fireside.
[Ill.u.s.tration: HIRAM POWERS.]
CHAPTER XXIX.
HIRAM POWERS.
Hiram Powers was born in Woodstock, Vermont, on the 29th of July, 1805.
He was the eighth in a family of nine children, and was the son of a farmer who found it hard to provide his little household with the necessaries of life. He grew up as most New England boys do, sound and vigorous in health, pa.s.sing the winters in attendance upon the district schools, and the summers in working on the farm. "The only distinctive trait exhibited by the child was mechanical ingenuity; he excelled in caricature, was an adept in constructiveness, having made countless wagons, windmills, and weapons for his comrades, attaining the height of juvenile reputation as the inventor of what he called a "patent fuse.""
The Powers family lived just over the river, opposite the village, and all joined heartily in the effort to keep the wolf from the doors. Mr.
Powers, Sen., was induced to become security for one of his friends, and, as frequently happens, lost all he had in consequence. Following close upon this disaster came a dreadful famine in the State, caused by an almost total failure of the crops. "I recollect," says Mr. Powers, "we cut down the trees, and fed our few cows on the browse. We lived so long wholly on milk and potatoes, that we got almost to loathe them.
There were seven of us children, five at home, and it was hard work to feed us."
One of the sons had managed to secure an education at Dartmouth College, and had removed to Cincinnati, where he was at this time editing a newspaper. Thither his father, discouraged by the famine, determined to follow him. Accordingly, placing his household goods and his family in three wagons, and being joined by another family, he set out on the long journey to the West. This was in 1819, when young Hiram was fourteen years old. It cost him a sharp struggle to leave his old home, and as they climbed the hills beyond Woodstock he lingered behind with his mother to take a last view of the place. They crossed the State, and pa.s.sing through western New York came to the vicinity of Niagara Falls.
They were near enough to the great cataract to hear its solemn roar sounding high above the silent woods. The boy was eager to visit it, but the distance was too great to the falls, and he was forced to relinquish this pleasure. Continuing their journey westward, they reached the Ohio River, down which stream they floated on a flatboat until they came to Cincinnati, then a city of fourteen thousand inhabitants.
Through the a.s.sistance of his eldest son, the editor, Mr. Powers was enabled to secure a farm not far from Cincinnati, and removing his family to it, began the task of clearing and cultivating it.
Unfortunately for the new-comers, the farm was located on the edge of a pestilential marsh, the poisonous exhalations of which soon brought the whole family down with the ague. Mr. Powers the elder died from this disease, and Hiram was ill and disabled from it for a whole year. The family was broken up and scattered, and our hero, incapable of performing hard work so soon after his sickness, obtained a place in a produce store in Cincinnati, his duty being to watch the princ.i.p.al road by which the farmers" wagons, laden with grain and corn whisky, came into the city, and to inform the men in charge of them that they could obtain better prices for their produce from his employers than from any other merchants in the city. It was also a part of his duty to help to roll the barrels from the wagons to the store. He made a very good "drummer," and gave satisfaction to his employers, but as the concern soon broke up, he was again without employment.
His brother, the editor, now came to his a.s.sistance, and made a bargain with the landlord of a hotel in the city to establish a reading-room at his hotel. The landlord was to provide the room and obtain a few paying subscribers; the editor was to stock it with his exchange newspapers, and Hiram was to be put in charge of it and receive what could be made by it. The reading-room was established, but as the landlord failed to comply with his agreement, Powers was forced to abandon the undertaking.
[Ill.u.s.tration: POWERS" DISTRUST OF THE HUNTERS.]
"About that time," said he, in relating his early life to the Rev. Dr.
Bellows, some years ago, "looking around anxiously for the means of living, I fell in with a worthy man, a clock-maker and organ-builder, who was willing to employ me to collect bad debts in the country. He put me on an old horse which had one very bad fault. He was afflicted with what the Western people called the "swaleys," and could not go downhill.
I frequently had to dismount and back him down, as the only way of getting along. The road often lay through forests and clearings, in mire, and among the roots of the beeches, with which my poor beast was constantly struggling. I would sometimes emerge from a dark wood, five miles through, perhaps, and find myself near a clearing where the farmer"s house I was seeking lay, half a mile off the road. Picking up a stout club to defend myself against the inevitable dog, which, in the absence of men-folks, guarded every log-house, I plodded across the plowed field, soon to be met by the ferocious beast, who, not seeing a stranger more than once a month, was always furious and dangerous. Out would come, at length, the poor woman, too curious to see who it was that broke up her monotonous solitude, to call off the dog, who generally grew fiercer as he felt his backer near him, and it was commonly with a feeling as of a bare escape of my life that I finally got into the house. It was sad enough, too, often to find sickness and death in those fever-stricken abodes--a wan mother nursing one dying child, with perhaps another dead in the house. My business, too, was not the most welcome. I came to dun a delinquent debtor, who had perhaps been inveigled by some peddler of our goods into an imprudent purchase, for a payment which it was inconvenient or impossible to make. There, in the corner, hung the wooden clock, the payment for which I was after, ticking off the last minutes of the sick child--the only ornament of the poor cabin. It was very painful to urge my business under such circ.u.mstances. However, I succeeded, by kindness, in getting more money than I expected from our debtors, who would always pay when they could.
I recollect, one night, almost bewailing my success. I had reached the entrance of a forest, at least nine miles through, and finding a little tavern there, concluded it was prudent to put up and wait till morning.
There were two rough-looking fellows around, hunters, with rifles in their hands, whose appearance did not please me, and I fancied they looked at each other significantly when the landlord took off my saddle-bags and weighted them, feeling the hundred dollars of silver I had collected. I was put into the attic, reached by a ladder, and, barricading the trap-door as well as I could, went to sleep with one eye open. Nothing, however, occurred, and in the morning I found my wild-looking men up as early as I, and was not a little disturbed when they proposed to keep me company across the forest. Afraid to show any suspicion, I consented, and then went and looked at the little flint-pistol I carried, formidable only to sparrows, but which was my only defense.