For Love of Country.

by Cyrus Townsend Brady.

PREFACE

Since the action of this story falls during the periods, and the book deals with personages and incidents, which are usually treated of in the more serious pages of history, it is proper that some brief word of explanation should be written by which I might confirm some of the romantic happenings hereafter related, which to the casual reader may appear to draw too heavily upon his credulity for acceptance.

The action between the Randolph and the Yarmouth really happened, the smaller ship did engage the greater for the indicated purpose, much as I have told it; and if I have ventured to subst.i.tute another name for that of the gallant sailor and daring hero, Captain Nicholas Biddle, who commanded the little Randolph, and lost his life, on that occasion, I trust this paragraph may be considered as making ample amends. The remarkable fight between those two ships is worthy of more extended notice than has. .h.i.therto been given it, in any but the larger tones (and not even in some of those) of the time. As far as my information permits me to say, there never was a more heroic battle on the seas.

Again, it is evident to students of history that the character of Washington has not been properly understood hitherto, by the very people who revere his name, though the excellent books of Messrs. Ford, Wilson, Lodge, Fiske, and others are doing much to destroy the popular canonization which made of the man a saint; in defence of my characterization of him I am able to say that the incidents and anecdotes and most of the conversations in which he appears are absolutely historical.

If I have dwelt too long and too circ.u.mstantially upon the Trenton and Princeton campaigns for a book so light in character as is this one, it may be set down to an ardent admiration for Washington as man and soldier, and a design again to exhibit him as he was at one of the most critical and brilliant points of his career. Furthermore, I find that the school and other histories commonly accessible to ordinary people are not sufficiently awake to the importance and brilliancy of the campaign, and I cherish the hope that this book may serve, in some measure, to establish its value.

I have freely used all the histories and narratives to which I had access, without hesitation; and if I have antic.i.p.ated a distinguished arrival, or hastened the departure of a ship, or altered the date of a naval battle, or changed its scene, I plead the example of the distinguished masters of fiction, to warrant me.

In closing I cannot refrain from thanking those who have so kindly a.s.sisted me with advice and correction during the writing of this story and the reading of the proof, especially the Rev. A. J. P. McClure.

C. T. B.

PHILADELPHIA, PENNA., _November_, 1897.

BOOK I

THE EVENTS OF A NIGHT

For Love of Country

CHAPTER I

_Katharine Yields her Independence_

If Seymour could have voiced his thought, he would have said that the earth itself did not afford a fairer picture than that which lay within the level radius of his vision, and which had imprinted itself so powerfully upon his impressionable and youthful heart. It was not the scenery of Virginia either, the landscape on the Potomac, of which he would have spoken so enthusiastically, though even that were a thing not to be disdained by such a lover of the beautiful as Seymour had shown himself to be,--the dry brown hills rising in swelling slopes from the edge of the wide quiet river; the bare and leafless trees upon their crests, now scarce veiling the comfortable old white house, which in the summer they quite concealed beneath their ma.s.ses of foliage; and all the world lying dreamy and calm and still, in the motionless haze of one of those rare seasons in November which so suggests departed days that men name it summer again. For all that he then saw in nature was but a setting for a woman; even the sun itself, low in the west, robbed of its glory, and faded into a dull red ball seeking to hide its head, but served to throw into high relief the n.o.ble and beautiful face of the girl upon whom he gazed,--the girl who was sun and life and light and world for him.

The most confirmed misogynist would have found it difficult to challenge her claim to beauty; and yet it would require a more severe critic or a sterner a.n.a.lyst than a lover would be likely to prove, to say in just what point could be found that which would justify the claim. Was it in the ma.s.s of light wavy brown hair, springing from a low point on her forehead and gently rippling back, which she wore plaited and tied with a ribbon and dest.i.tute of powder? How sweetly simple it looked to him after the bepowdered and betowered misses of the town with whom he was most acquainted! Was it in the broad low brow, or the brown, almost black eyes which laughed beneath it; or the very fair complexion, which seemed to him a strangely delightful and unusual combination? Or was it in the perfection of a faultless, if somewhat slender and still undeveloped figure, half concealed by the vivid "Cardinal" cloak she wore, which one little hand held loosely together about her, while the other dabbled in the water by her side?

Be this as it may, the whole impression she produced was one which charmed and fascinated to the last degree, and Mistress Katharine Wilton's sway among the young men of the colony was-well-nigh undisputed. A toast and a belle in half Virginia, Seymour was not the first, nor was he destined to be the last, of her adorers.

The strong, steady, practised stroke, denoting the accomplished oarsman, with which he had urged the little boat through the water, had given way to an idle and purposeless drift. He longed to cast himself down before the little feet, in their smart high-heeled buckled shoes and clocked stockings, which peeped out at him from under her embroidered camlet petticoat in such a maliciously coquettish manner; he longed to kneel down there in the skiff, at the imminent risk of spoiling his own gay attire, and declare the pa.s.sion which consumed him; but something--he did not know what it was, and she did not tell him--constrained him, and he sat still, and felt himself as far away as if she had been in the stars.

In his way he was quite as good to look at as the young maiden; tall, blond, stalwart, blue-eyed, pleasant-featured, with the frank engaging air which seems to belong to those who go down to the sea in ships, Lieutenant John Seymour Seymour was an excellent specimen of that hardy, daring, gallant cla.s.s of men who in this war and in the next were to shed such imperishable l.u.s.tre upon American arms by their exploits in the naval service. Born of an old and distinguished Philadelphia family, so proud of its name that in his instance they had doubled it, the usual bluntness and roughness of the sea were tempered by this gentle birth and breeding, and by frequent attrition with men and women of the politest society of the largest and most important city of the colonies. Offering his services as soon as the news of Lexington precipitated the conflict with the mother country, he had already made his name known among that gallant band of seamen among whom Jones, Biddle, Dale, and Conyngham were pre-eminent.

The delicious silence which he had been unwilling to break, since it permitted him to gaze undisturbed upon his fair shipmate, was terminated at last by that lady herself.

She looked up from the water with which she had been playing, and then appearing to notice for the first time his steady ardent gaze, she laughed lightly and said,--

"Well, sir, it grows late. When you have finished contemplating the scenery, perhaps you will turn the boat, and take me home; then you can feast your eyes upon something more attractive."

"And what is that, pray?" he asked.

"Your supper, sir. You must be very anxious for it by this time, and really you know you look quite hungry. We have been out so long; but I will have pity on you, and detain you no longer here. Turn the boat around, Lieutenant Seymour, and put me on sh.o.r.e at once. I will stand between no man and his dinner."

"Hungry? Yes, I am, but not for dinner,--for you, Mistress Katharine,"

he replied.

"Oh, what a horrid appet.i.te! I don't feel safe in the boat with you.

Are you very hungry?"

"Really, Miss Wilton, I am not jesting at all," he said with immense dignity.

"Oh! oh! He is in earnest. Shall I scream? No use; we are a mile from the house, at least."

"Oh, Miss Wilton--Katharine," he replied desperately, "I am devoured by my--"

"Lieutenant Seymour!" She drew herself up with great hauteur, letting the cloak drop about her waist.

"Madam!"

"Only my friends call me Katharine."

"And am I not, may I not be, one of your friends?"

"Well, yes--I suppose so; but you are so young."

"I am just twenty-seven, madam, and you, I suppose, are--"

"Never be ungallant enough to suppose a young lady's age. You may do those things in Philadelphia, if you like, but 't is not the custom here. Besides, I mean too young a friend; you have not known me long enough, that is."

"Long enough! I have known you ever since Tuesday of last week."

"And this is Friday,--just ten days, ten long days!" she replied triumphantly.

"Long days!" he cried. "Very short ones, for me."

"Long or short, sir, do you think you can know me in that period? Is it possible I am so easily fathomed?" she went on, smiling.

Now it is ill making love in a rowboat at best, and when one is in earnest and the other jests it is well-nigh impossible; so to these remarks Lieutenant Seymour made no further answer, save viciously to ply the oars and drive the boat rapidly toward the landing.

Miss Katharine gazed vacantly about the familiar river upon whose banks she had been born and bred, and, finally noticing the sun had gone down, closing the short day, she once more drew her cloak closely about her and resumed the neglected conversation.

"Won't you please stop looking at me in that manner, and won't you please row harder, or is your strength all centred in your gaze?"

"I am rowing as fast as I can, Miss Wilton, especially with this--"