Atlanta semi-weekly journal. (Atlanta, Ga.) 1898-1920, 1902-10-27

was now keenly alive
These things were not known;
Who / was.
who sent money for my support and
education.
How became SCARED.
What man had placed me among the
Indians.
For the future bound myself with
! three laws:
To leave alone the puzzle of my past.
To study with all my might ana
strength.
When I was grown and educated, to
come back to my adopted people, the
Iroquois, draw them to some place where
they could thrive, and by training and
education make them an empire, and my
self their leader. e'
The pale skins loathing of the red race
had not then entered my imagination. l
said in conclusion: ru..
Indians have taken care of me; they
shall be my brothers.
vi.
The zigzag track of the boat represent
ed a rift widening between me and my
past. 1 sat up and took the oars, feeling
older and stronger.
II was primitive man, riding between the
highlands, uncumbered, free to grasp what
was before him.
De Chaumont did not believe in and was
Indifferent to the waif whom his position
Of great seigneur obliged him to protect.
What did 1 care? had been hidden among
the Indians by kindred or guardians hui
name enough not to leave me destitute.
They should not trouble my thoughts, and
neither-I told myself like an INDIAN
should the I-naginings of women.
A boy minds no labor in following his
caprices. The long starlit pull / reckoned
as nothing; and slipped to my room when
daylight was beginning to surprise the
dancers.
1t was so easy to avoid people in the
spaciousaess of De Chaumonts manor
that did not again see the young Bona
parte nor any Of the guests except Crogh-
an hey slept all the following day. and
the third day separated. Croghan found
my room before leaving with his party.
and we talked as we'll as we could, and
shook hands at parting.
The impressions Of that first year stay
in my mind as I have heard the impress
sions of childhood remain. 1t was perhaps
a kind of brief childhood, swift in it's
changes, and INNING parallel with the
development of youth.
Ny measure being sent to New York by
De Chaunont, had a complete new outfit
in clothes; coat, waistcoat and small
clothes, neclxwear, ruffies and shirts,
buckle shoes. stockings of mild yarn for
cold weather and thread stockings. Like
most of the things for which we yearn,
when ] got them I did not like them as
we'll as the Indian garments they obliged
me to shed.
Skenedonk came to geo me nearly every
day, and sat still as long as he could
while toiled at books. did not tell him
how nearly / had disgraced us both by
running secretly away to camp So was
able to go back and pay visits with dig
nifty and be taken seriously. instead of
encountering the ridicule that falls upon
retreat.
NY father was neither pleased nor dis
pleased. He paid my accounts exactly. be-
fore the camp broke up for the winter.
making Slxenedonk his agent. My mother
Marinne offered me food as she would
have offered 1t to Count de Chaumont, and
ate it. sitting on a mat as a guest. Our
children, particularly the elder ones. look
ed me over with gravity, and refrained
from saying anything about my clothes.
Our Iroquois went north before snow
few, and the cabins stood empty, leaves
drifting through freholes in the bark
thatch.
There have been students greedy for
knowledge. I seemed hollow with the
fasting of a lifetime. My master at first
tried TO bind me to times: he had never
encountered so boundless an appetite. AS
soon as 1 woke In the morning l reached
for a book. and as days became darker,
for finder to light a candle. 1 studied in
| cessantly, dashing out at Intervals to lake
or woods, and returning after wild &C
tivity with increased zest to the printed
world. My mind appeared to resume a fac
ulty IL had suspended, and to resume with
incredible over. Magnetized by books. /
cared for nothing else. That first winter
gained hold on English and Latin, on
French reading, mathematics, geography
and history. My master was an Oxford
man, and when reused from dwadling, a
scholar He grew -oolishly pround and
fond of what he called my prooigious adj
vance.
/ field, and DR.. Chantry was permitted to
turn me loose in 1t. so that the books were
almost like my own. carried them around
hid in my breast; my coat skirts were
! weighted with books. There were Plut-
| arch's Lives in the old French of Amyot,
over which I laboreds a French transla-
! ton of Homer; Corneille's tragedies;
Rochefoucauld; Montaigne's essays, in ten
! volumes; Thomson's poems, and Chester
| fields letters in English; the life of Pc
| trarch three volumes of Montesquieus
works, and Bible, which found greatly
to my taste. 1t was a wide and catholic
| taste.
De Chaumont spent nearly all that au-
tumn and winter in Castorland, where he
| was building his new manor and founding
| his settlement called lie Rayville. AS soon
] as 1 became a member of his household
| his patriarchial kindness was extended to
me, though he regarded me simply as an
! ambitious half-breed.
| The strong place which he had built for
his first holding in the wilderness thus
grew into a clustered school for me. 1t
! has vanished from the spot where 1t Stood
| but 1 shall forever see it between lake
| and forest.
| Annabel de Chaumont openly hated the
| isolation of the place, and was happy only
| when she could fill it with guests. But
| Madame de Terrier evidently loved II, re-
| manning there with Paul and Ernestine
! Sometimes 1 did not see her for days to-
gether. But Mademoiselle dc Chaumont
| before her departure to ner Baltimore con-
vent for the winter, amused herself with
| my education. She brought me an old book
| of etiquette in which the young gentle
men were admonished not to lick their
| fingers or crack bones with their teeth al
| table. Nobody else being at hand, she be-
| fooled with DR.. Chantry and me, and
saw for the first time, with surprise, an
old mans infatuation with poppet.
1t was this foolishness of her brother $
which Miss Chantry could not forgive DE
! Chaumonts daughter. She was incessant
I in her condemnation, yet Enthusiastically
| ford "a her English way Of the creature
| she condemned. Annabel loved to drag my
| poor master I'm fiowery chains before his
-TrA4 r.N