Chapter 9. An Illustration Of The Sublime And Beautiful.

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_ CHAPTER IX. AN ILLUSTRATION OF THE SUBLIME AND BEAUTIFUL.

"Who can speak broader than he who has no house to put his head in?"--Shakspeare.

"With darkness circled, and an ambient cloud."

Nearly a year elapsed after his release from the old don-jon, before I was enabled again to rejoice in a meeting with my friend Wheelwright; and our interview happened on this wise: Passing by, or rather crossing, the foot of Courtland-street, one bright morning in May, I observed a group of laborers occupied in placing some articles of heavy iron-machinery on board of an Albany sloop--the General Trotter, I believe, commanded by Capt. Keeler--a veteran navigator of the Hudson. And whom should I discover among these men, giving directions with an authoritative air, and actually bending his own back to the work, but the veritable Doctor Daniel Wheelwright! It was indeed no less a personage. From the previous character and habits of my friend, the reader may judge of my surprise at beholding him thus engaged--laboring, too, as though his work was made easy by the good will with which he was performing it. Having exchanged salutations, mingled with expressions of surprise at finding him thus employed, and inquired upon what new enterprise he was bent--

"Why havn't you hearn?" was his response.

"No," was the laconic reply.

"What? not of the launch of the 'Lady-of-the-Lake,' on Lake George?"

"Ah--let me see--yes: I think I have seen a paragraph respecting it, in the Sandy Hill newspaper. But pray what have you to do with that?"

"To do with it? Why every thing. I am the agent of the concern. I have made up the company, and built the boat. The engine has gone up the river, and I am now shipping the last of the machinery.--[Come, bear a hand there, boys--what are you about?] Have you ever been to Lake George? If you want to see a touch of the grand and glorious, I guess you'll find it there. The hills is sublime; and the lake so clear that you can see the stars in it when it's cloudy."

"Indeed! And you then are to be wedded to the Lady-of-the-Lake?"

"And a beautiful thing she is, too. We shall have all the travel of the grand tower through the lake to Montreal, and mean to have the boat ready to take the first travellers from the Springs after the fourth of July."

"And you are really looking up in the world again?"

"To be sure I be. I always told you that the world owed me a living, and I believe I have at last struck upon the right track to find it. [Come, bear a hand there, boys--Why don't you take hold of that shackle-bar, Tom?"]

Saying which he applied his own shoulder to a huge cog-wheel, with the alacrity, if not the power, of another Hercules.

I was alike surprised and gratified with this apparent change in the Doctor's circumstances, as also at the unwonted industry and energy he was now putting forth. It seemed as though by some rare chance, my esteemed and hitherto unfortunate friend had at length become associated in an enterprise for which he might be found very competent, and which might one day prove valuable--at least to him, if not to the stockholders. He was moreover taking hold of the work himself like one who had at last been taught by the "sweet uses of adversity," that a man is not always certain of obtaining a living by his wits, unless the labors of his own hands are superadded. Fashionable travelling during the summer months, was even then extensive; it was increasing from year to year--and was sure to continue increasing, with the augmentation of the national wealth and population. The unsurpassed attractions of that region--the lake--its bright waters--its enchanting islands--its course of winding beauty--and its stupendous mountains--glorious in their height, their wildness, and their desolation,--would soon become more generally known, and must inevitably command the attention of all travellers of taste, whenever it should appear that its surface might be traversed by a steamboat in a few hours, from the ruins of Fort William Henry at one extremity, to those of Ticonderoga at the other. Wishing the Doctor a good morning, therefore, and all possible success in his new undertaking,--in which he was evidently sustained by the strongest hope and the most undoubting confidence,--we parted for that time--not, however, without a promise on the part of my friend, proffered of his own accord,--as had been the case at sundry times before,--that he would shortly remit the amount of several small advances which it had fortunately been from time to time in my power to make, for the purpose of occasionally rescuing him from his oft-returning pecuniary tribulations.

The machinery all arrived safe, and in good condition, at the head of the lake, and the boat was actually completed, under the charge of Dr. Wheelwright. The good people of the little borough of Caldwell rejoiced in the brightening prospects of their village, and actually began to calculate how soon they might be able to repaint their houses, and substitute nine by seven window glass for the old hats and petticoats which, in the progress of their poverty, had been stuffed into the broken casements.

Arrangements were making for the first trip down the lake, and among the fairy islands apparently floating like emeralds upon its bosom; and but a few days more were to elapse before all things were to be in readiness. Meantime, however, before the captain and crew had been shipped, and in order that accident might not happen to the fair Lady-of-the-Lake, or danger come nigh her, Mr. Wheelwright slept on board himself, like a prudent guardian of the property confided to his charge.

The last memorable night on which he thus slept on board, was remarkably clear and beautiful. All was silent and sublime among the lofty mountains in which the peaceful lake lay deeply embosomed. A grateful coolness pervaded the atmosphere, and no sounds disturbed the general repose, after the night-hawk and whip-poor-will had ceased their vesper-melodies, save the distant hootings of the owl on the mountain-side, or the occasional crash of a dried limb of a tree, over which the prowling wolf, or perchance some heavier tenant of the forest, was bounding. The stars hung pendent and sparkling like diamonds from a canopy of "living sapphires," and were reflected back with vivid brilliance from the dark surface of the waters.

A poet could not have gone to bed on such a night, and amid such a scene of gloomy grandeur as this. But the agent of the Lady-of-the-Lake was not distinguished for enthusiasm of that sort, and he turned into his berth--having no oyster-supper to eat--at a very early hour, and betook himself to dreaming--not "of antres vast and desarts idle,"--or of what is sublime and glorious in creation,--but of piston-rods and safety-valves--pence and passengers. But his repose was disturbed in a manner alike unexpected and unwelcome; by a catastrophe, too, which had well-nigh deprived the world of the farther services of Mr. Wheelwright, and his biographer of the pleasing duty of extending these memoirs beyond the present chapter. In plain terms, at about half-past twelve o'clock he was awakened by a choking sensation, and sprang upon his feet, already half suffocated by smoke. The awful truth of the cause was literally flashing around him upon all sides. The Lady-of-the-Lake--the first of the fair upon whom he had ever in fact bestowed his affections--was not only on fire, but the flames had already made such progress in the work of destruction as at once to preclude the hope of extinguishing them. From the cabin windows, the appearance rendered it certain that the whole structure was wrapped in a sheet of flame. In the next instant, the fire burst through the dividing partition of the cabins, obliging our hero to fly in his night-gown, with his inexpressibles under his arm. Thus, coatless and bootless, he leaped on shore, when delay a second longer would have effectually prevented his ever recounting the tale.

What a moment, and what a spectacle for a lover of the "sublime and beautiful!" Could Burke have visited such a scene of mingled magnificence, and grandeur, and terror, what a vivid illustration would he not have added to his inimitable treatise upon that subject! Let the reader picture the scene to himself. There, at the dark hour of midnight, among the ruins of Fort William Henry and Fort George, stood Daniel Wheelwright, alone, like Marius amid the ruins of Carthage,--in puris naturalibus; as the insurgent Shays fled on horseback, and in a snow-storm, from the face of General Lincoln--and looking for all the world like a forked radish, as Shakspeare says of Justice Shallow. But albeit ludicrous in his own plight and position, there was nothing of that character in the scene around him, or in his own contemplations. The fire raged with amazing fury and power,--stimulated to madness as it were, by the pitch, and tar, and dried timbers, and other combustible materials used in the constriction of the boat. The lurid flames ascended to a great height,--the smoke rolled upward in majestic volumes, while the light, red as the flames of AEtna, streamed across the lake, gilding the crumbling battlements of the old fort, flushing the face of the waters, and tinging the mountain sides to their very crests. The night-bird screamed with terror, and the beasts of prey fled in wild affright into the deep and visible darkness beyond.

This is truly a gloomy place for a lone person to stand in of a dark night--particularly if he has a touch of superstition. There have been fierce conflicts on this spot--sieges, and battles, and fearful massacres. Here have the Briton, and the Gaul, and the painted savage, mingled in the dread fight,--steed rushing upon steed, hands clenched in hands with grappling vigor, while the climbing fire, and the clashing steel, and eyes flashing with maddened fury, and the appalling war-whoop of the Indian, have all combined in adding terror to "the rough frowns of war." Here "hath mailed Mars sat on his altar up to his ears in blood," smiling grimly at the music of echoing cannons, the shrill trump, and all the rude din of arms, until, like the waters of Egypt, the lake became red as the crimson flowers that blossom upon its margin.[1] And if at "the witching hour of night," the unquiet ghosts of murdered sinners do stalk forth to re-visit earth by the pale glimpses of the moon, the slaughter of Fort William Henry might have furnished a goodly number of shadowy companions for the hero of a tale which is no fiction. But I am not aware that any of them came forth to add to the troubles of that memorable night, or divert his mind from what must then have been the absorbing subject of his contemplations. Still, if they had had any desire of mustering for a midnight review, or for a goblin-dance, they lost the best opportunity, probably, that will again occur for ages;--since another such illumination of the beautiful esplanade in front of the old fortress where the massacre took place, and where the skeleton platoons would of course have mustered, will never again be presented--at least not until another Doctor Wheelwright shall build and watch over the fortunes of another Lady-of-the-Lake.

In the course of an hour, the beautiful vessel was burned to the water's edge; when the weight of the massive iron machinery, rendered white and malleable by the intenseness of the heat, carried down the hull to the bottom, and the waters closed over it, sissing and boiling for a moment, as when a stream of lava runs burning into the embrace of the ocean. The illumination being thus extinguished, darkness once more brooded over the mountains, the face of the deep, and the fortunes of Mr. Daniel Wheelwright--of whom, for the present, we must take leave, even while thus he stands, as Sir John Moore lies under the walls of Corunna--"alone in his glory"--surveying

"----The circling canopy
Of night's extended shade."

[1] The Lobelia Cardinalis, commonly called the Indian Eye-Bright. It is a beautiful blossom, and is frequently met with in this region. The writer has seen large clusters of it blooming upon the margin of the "Bloody Pond," in this neighborhood--so called from the circumstance, of the slain being thrown into this pond, after the defeat of Baron Dieskau, by Sir William Johnson. The ancients would have constructed a beautiful legend from this incident, and sanctified the sanguinary flower.

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Read next: Chapter 10. How He Again Changes His Circumstances

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