The Abilene reflector. [volume] (Abilene, Kan.) 1883-1888, 1885-02-19
NATHANIEL TOWNSEND.
How He Saved the Old Powder
House from the Red Coats.

How He Saved the Ola FOWoer
House from the Red Goats.
A few months ago an effort was made by
two students of Colonial history to fix with
accuracy the precise place where General
Putnam took his traditional plunge down
The steep precipice in the town of Green
wich. An aged man whose early years
had been spent with those who witnessed
the incursions of the British into the town,
r7ome of whom professed actually to have
seen the irascible patriot spur his horse
over the jagged and appalling declivity,
was a welcome though voluntary guide for
these investigators. This veteran, as he
stood on the brink of the precipice, the
wind tossing his long white locks, excitedly
denounced the tradition as myth, and
asserted that General Putnam disappeared
from the astonished red-coats, not by
plunging down the steep rock, but by dash
Ing into bride path made obscure by the
thick underground of bushes and the inter-
locking OF branches. He led the students
10 the spot where traces of the old path
were yet to be seen, and, suddenly stop
ping by the followed and ragged stump of
of an oak of large circumference, Seld
The very day that old Put escaped, and he
did a. braver thing than that which people
say the General did, Then he told the
story as he had it from one who knew it:
A hut flanked the bride path through the
woods that skirted the HOrseneck Hill. By
all accounts, so skilfully had its builder
Joined the chestnut logs, and so artfully
had he arranged the rough clapboards
which covered it, that it was pleasant to
look upon, rather than such an unslghtly
object as solitary cabin in the woods is
apt to be. A patriot of repute, whose
farmhouse stood on the level plain that
stretched back from the brow of the preci-
pice, had suffered the builder and occupant
there to live rent free, exacting only in re-
turn such assistance as the tenant could
give upon the farm. He had chosen the
spot, because, by reason of a natural open
ing between the trees, vista of the rich
green valley below, of the river beyond,
and of the blue waters of the Sound, and
far away the seeming meeting of the misty
Long Island hills with the horizon, could be
obtained. Here lived Nathaniel Townsend,
and he was won't on fine days, just as the
sun began to tinge the water of the Sound
away to the east, to sit by the door of his
cabin to enjoy the sight.
He thus sat perhaps an hour after sun
rise on a morning in June, HIS, and he was
mending a small net. He seemed, however,
to be listening as he piled his great bone
needle, and when he lifted his face from
his work he glanced anXiouslY down the
path. At last his fingers stopped with the
twine half drawn through the loop, and he
listened.
sYes, tits she,' he said, and he cast his
net down and went inside. In an instant
he returned to the door, having bunch OF
wild flowers with him. The dew of the
morning still seemed to be upon them, for
the tender blue violets were unwilted, and
the pink azalea blossoms were unfaded,
and the sprig of laurel fresh as when
plucked. He cast his eyes down the path,
awaiting the coming of some one around
the bend.
Soon there appeared a young girl, who
came tripping along with as much light
ness of step as the narrow, briery path
permitted. Her dress, though of the
coarse, home-spun linsey woolsey of that
time, hung so gracefully upon her slender,
lithesome figure, the white and ribbed
calash that fell back and down almost upon
her neck revealing her brown hair all dis
ordered by her wrestling with the bushes
that intertwined over some parts of the
path, her cheeks blooming by reason of her
exercise in the morning air, and her blue
ewes, that but half allowed a look of recog-
milton to go from them to Nathaniel as she
passed-all these combined to make pic
ture that to him was fairer and more fasci-
mating than the most gorgeous sunrise that
he had ever seen.
a look of sorrow fitted for a moment
over his rugged face as she tripped by with
no smile for him, scarcely a token that she
knew he was there. He had less hold OF
her thoughts, he saw, than the tree tina;
she passed, far less than the scarlet tana-
ger that she frightened, for upon that she
stopped to look.
As she watched this brilliant-colored
bird, Nathaniel made bold to approach her
but it was with amazing shyneSs and con-
fusion that this broad-shouldered, stern
visaged young man called her by name.
Mistress Rose" said he, and so timidly
that she scarcely heard him.
80, it's you, is it," said Mistress Rose
Bush, with an indifference that she could
not know most grievously panied him.
"Yes, l saw you when you went below
'That is not strange. / passed youI
house."
''I wouldn't do it, Mistress Rose" h,
said.
''Do what:" she asked, now for the frs
time looking at him.
81 suppose you went by this short cut OF
some errand to your uncle below.
wouldn't. There be rumorS of another ad
vance of the British, and it might happeI
at any time that YOU would find yoursal
a prisoner. Go by the highway, or, i
there be need of haste, come to me and
viii gladly do your errand for you. 1t i
SaIe enough 1Or you 10 come the snort QIS
tance between my house and yours, though
the way is rough"
She loSked at him with a half f-amuSet
expression, glancing once at his feet AM
then she said: "If there be need of haste
,lo you think you could so more quickl,
than l."
His face showed that she had paine
him. so she quickly added: swell, ther
Nathaniel, you mean well enough. Tn
next hasty errand that have I'll intrust t
YOU"
'And you shall see how quickly it will
done, in spite-in spite of my misfortune,
he said. Then be added; II presume yo
were at the ball last EVENING""
"Her face frightened at the recollectio
that he stirred. Indeed was. and Gen
eral Putnam did lead me in the minuet, an
/ did dance with one of his aids, hand
some officer, Nathaniel, and with man
Others. could be happy if there were
ball every night"
Sand did many seek your favors in th
dancer"
'.Of course. More partners could l hay
had than would have been enough for
dozen dances more"
ssOf course-of course. 1 knew it, Al
glad it makes me, Mistress Rose"