Silas Strong

“ Socky and Sue walked ahead. Master and Edith and her father followed. Then came the boat-jumper with Sinth and all that remained of Silas Strong in it; then the buckboard that carried Harris and old Mrs. Dunmore and the servants. Slowly they made their way towards the sown land.
"What ye cryin' fer?" a stranger asked the children as he passed them.
"Our Uncle Silas died," was the all-sufficient reply of Socky.
Soon they could hear the roar of the saws.
"Look!" said Dunmore to his daughter, as they came in sight of the mill chimney. "There's the edge of the great world." ”

“ When a girl of eighteen she had taught in the log school-house. Since the death of her mother the care of the little home had fallen upon her. She was a well-fed, cheerful, and comely creature with a genius for housekeeping.
June had come, and Silas was getting ready to go into camp. There was no longer any peace for him in the clearing. The odor of the forest and the sight of the new leaves gave him no rest. Had he not heard in his dreams the splash of leaping trout, and deer playing in the lily-pads? ”

“ Silas carried a heavy pack, a coon in a big cage, and led a fox. When he came to soft places he set the cage down and tethered the fox, and, taking Sinth in his arms, carried her as one would carry a baby. Having gained better footing, he would let Sinth down upon a log or a mossy rock to rest and return for his treasures. After two or three hours of travel the complaining "Mis' Strong" would appear.
"Seems so ye take pleasure wearin' me out on these here trails," she would say. "Why don't ye walk a little faster?" ”

“ And so I will, Maud, and to me you shall come—my guest, mind—I should be so delighted; and really if Silas is under a cloud, it has been his own doing, and I don't see that it is your business to fight his battle. He can't live very long. The suspicion, whatever it is dies with him, and what could poor dear Austin prove by his will but what everybody knew quite well before—his own strong belief in Silas's innocence? ”

“ He proudly put the cage in her hands.
"Much obliged to you, Sile," said she, laughing.
"S-Strong's ahead!" he stammered, cheerfully.
This indicated that in his fight with the powers of evil Strong felt as if he had at least temporary advantage. When, perhaps, after a moment of anger it seemed that the Evil One had got the upper hold on him, he was wont to exclaim, "Satan's ahead!" But the historian is glad to say that those occasions were, in the main, rare and painful.
"Strong will never give in," said Annette, with laughter. ”

“ A smile overspread the man's face.
The children, quick to see their opportunity, approached him on either side. Sue put her arms around the neck of her father and kissed him.
"Tell us a story about Uncle Silas," she pleaded.
"Uncle Silas!" he exclaimed. "We're all going to see him in a few days."
The children were mute with surprise. Sue's little doll dropped from her hands to the floor. Her face changed color and she turned quickly, with a loud cry, and drummed on the table so that the dishes rattled. ”

“ Strong up in the woods—an excellent woman—made money and wasted it and went far to the bad. Good fellow, drink, poker, and so on down the hill! His wife died leaving two children—blue-eyed little people with curly, flaxen hair—a boy of four a girl of nearly three years. The boy's full name was John Socksmith Gordon—reduced in familiar parlance to Socky. The girl was baptized Susan Bradbury Gordon, but was called Sue.
Their Uncle Silas Strong came to the funeral of their mother. ”

“ Silas answered.
He raised the boy in his arms and kissed him. "W-we're both f-fools," he said, huskily.
"You ain't exac'ly fools, but yer both childern," said Sinth, wiping her eyes.
"Well, you know the Bible says we must become as a little child," said Master. "After all, money is only a measure of value, and one thing it does with absolute precision—a man's money measures the depth of his heart."
XXXII STRONG left camp with his pack and rifle and two bear-traps. ”

“ I thought if Silas took a rest, a month say, he would be able to come back and pull through the winter. I thought for that month, I might get your Walter.”
“Is he strong enough?”
“He has a good deal of strength for one of his years, and every day he will be a–gainin’. Jest look at him! I have watched him a good deal. He is a good oarsman too. They say he pulled fustrate at the race. Then I thought he might like the money, and also that you might spare him, as work at the saw–mill is slack, and I knew you didn’t have to be there so much, and could be more at the store. ”

“ Silas!” replied the knight, impatiently, “prithee keep to thy divinity, thy strong hold upon Zion; thence none that faces thee can draw thee without being bitten to the bone. Leave poetry to me.”
“With all my heart,” quoth Master Silas, “I will never ask a belt from her, until I see she can afford to give a shirt. She has promised a belt, indeed,—not one, however, that doth much improve the wind,—to this lad here, and will keep her word; but she was forced to borrow the pattern from a Carthusian friar, and somehow it slips above the shoulder.”
“I am by no means sure of that,” quoth Sir Thomas. ”

“ I wondered what old grudge could make my cousin judge Uncle Silas always so hardly—I could not suppose it was justice. I had seen my hero indeed lately so disrespectfully handled before my eyes, that he had, as idols will, lost something of his sacredness. But as an article of faith, I still cultivated my trust in his divinity, and dismissed every intruding doubt with an exorcism, as a suggestion of the evil one. But I wronged Lady Knollys in suspecting her of pique, or malice, or anything more than that tendency to take strong views which some persons attribute to my sex. ”

“ They could feel the heat on their faces. Black smoke had begun to roll over the heights around them.
"It'll go up the valley in an hour an' cut Silas off," Sinth whimpered as they went on.
"He must have crossed the valley before now," the young man assured her.
The woman ran ahead and called, loudly, "Silas! Silas!" She continued calling as they hurried on through thickening smoke. They halted for a word at Leonard's Trail, which left the main thoroughfare to Rainbow, and, going down the east side of the ridge, fared away some ten miles over hill and dale to the open country. ”

“ And so with a rush of feet and a rattle of pots and pans and a sliding of griddles and a banging of iron doors "Mis' Strong" wore off her temper at hard work.
The Emperor used to smile at this variety of noise and call it "f-f-female profanity," a phrase not wholly inapt. When the "sport" had finished his dinner, and she and her brother sat side by side at the table, she was plain Sinth again, with a look of sickliness and resignation. She ate freely—but would never confess her appetite—and so leisurely that Strong often had most of the dishes washed before she had finished eating. ”

“ But Silas always refused to go, not doubting that his friend's inventions were true, so it happened that Tug made out rather strong cases against his enemies.
"I can stand up with the most of them," he said, with an ill humor to which hunger lent a zest; "and them that beat me, I can disgrace with their poor relations. Show me the man that can't be beat if you go at him right, and you may hang me with a thread. ”

“ Another burly woodsman had lifted little Sue in his arms.
"I'm goin' down the trail to wait fer Silas," said Sinth, brokenly.
She put out her hand to take the satchel.
"We'll carry it an' the childern too," said the woodsman, whose voice, which had been harsh and profane, now had a touch of gentleness. They made their way down the trail in silence.
"He better try t' be a statesman," said one of the escort. "He ain't fit t' be a bullcook."
They passed a second gang with horses and a big jumper bearing supplies for the camp. The Emperor had surrendered; the green hills were taken. ”

“ For, Silas Wegg felt it to be quite out of the question that he could lay his head upon his pillow in peace, without first hovering over Mr Boffin's house in the superior character of its Evil Genius. Power (unless it be the power of intellect or virtue) has ever the greatest attraction for the lowest natures; and the mere defiance of the unconscious house-front, with his power to strip the roof off the inhabiting family like the roof of a house of cards, was a treat which had a charm for Silas Wegg. ”

“ With a disappointed face, Silas mentally consigned this parrot to regions more than tropical, and, seeming for the time to have lost his power of assuming an interest in the woes of Mr Venus, fell to tightening his wooden leg as a preparation for departure: its gymnastic performances of that evening having severely tried its constitution.
After Silas had left the shop, hat-box in hand, and had left Mr Venus to lower himself to oblivion-point with the requisite weight of tea, it greatly preyed on his ingenuous mind that he had taken this artist into partnership at all. ”

“ And when the sunshine grew strong and lasting, so that the buttercups were thick in the meadows, Silas might be seen in the sunny mid-day, or in the late afternoon when the shadows were lengthening under the hedgerows, strolling out with uncovered head to carry Eppie beyond the Stone-pits to where the flowers grew, till they reached some favourite bank where he could sit down, while Eppie toddled to pluck the flowers, and make remarks to the winged things that murmured happily above the bright petals, calling "Dad-dad's" attention continually by bringing him the flowers. ”

“ Soon the elder Migley began to feel the need of information. He passed his rod to the Emperor.
"Show me how ye do it," said he.
Strong paddled to a large, flat rock which rose, mid-stream, a little above water. He climbed upon it and sat down lazily.
Nature had taught him, as she teaches all who bear heavy burdens, to conserve his strength. He had none to waste in the support of dignity. When he sat down his weight was braced with hand, foot, and elbow so as to rest his heart and muscles. ”

“ They were the heralds of the great king of which Strong had complained that night he laid his heart bare and whose name was Business—a king who ruled not with the sword, but with flattery and temptation and artful devices. The Emperor knew that they were the men who had bought his stronghold; that they were come to shove the frontier of their king far beyond the Lost River country; that axes and saws and dams and flooded flats and whirling wheels and naked hill-sides would soon follow them.
"How are you, Mr. Strong?" said the elder Migley, who, by his son, was familiarly called "Pop." ”

“ Every day Master went to Birch Cove and wandered through the deer trails. Every graceful thing in the still woods reminded him of her beauty and every bird-song had the music of her voice in it. He began to think of her as the embodied spirit of the woodland. She was like Strong himself, but Strong was the great pine-tree while she was like the young, white birches.
One bright morning—it was nearly a month after Strong had returned from Buckhom—-Sinth put on her best clothes and started for the camp of Dunmore alone. The Emperor had gone away with some fishermen and Master with the children. ”

“ Before going to bed that night he made this entry in his memorandum-book:
"Strong won't do he'll have to be tore down an' built over."
XVI THE Migleys had engaged Strong to take them out of the woods next day. They were going to the Fourth-of-July celebration at Hillsborough. Master was going also, be orator of the day. Strong, hearing the talk of the others, had "got to wishin'," as Sinth put it, and had finally concluded to go on to Hillsborough and witness the celebration. So Master had sent for his guide to come and stay at Lost River camp until the return of Silas. ”

“ Silas said nothing, but entered the house and took a drink of water. Cynthia snapped:
"If I wanted t' marry Net Roice I'd marry 'er an' not be dilly-dallyin' all my life."
Cynthia was now fifty years of age, and regarded with a stern eye every act of man which bore any suggestion of dilly-dallying.
"Ain't g-good'nough," he stammered, calmly.
"You're fool 'nough," she declared, with a twang of ill-nature.
"S-supper, Mis' Strong," said he, stirring the fire. ”

“ It must be added that his meditations led him to one remarkable conclusion—namely, that all women were angels. His parents had left him nothing save a maiden sister named Cynthia, and characterized by some as "a reg'lar human panther."
"Wherever Sile is they's panthers," said a guide once, in the little store at Pitkin.
"Don't make no dif'er'nce whuther he's t' home er in the woods," said another, solemnly.
That was when God owned the wilderness and kept there a goodly number of his big cats, four of which had fallen before the rifle of Strong. ”

“ Strong went on. "It's the logs g-goin' over Rainbow Falls. They've been stole off the state l-lands. Th-that's business, too. Business is king o' this c-country. He t-takes everything he can l-lay his hands on. He'd t-try t' 'grab heaven if he could g-git over the f-fence an' b-back agin."
"I am not here to discuss that," said the stranger, rising to go.
"Had s-supper?" Silas asked.
"I've a lunch in the canoe, thank you. The moon is up, an' I'm going to push on to Copper Falls. Migley will be waiting for me. We shall camp there for a day or two at Cedar Spring. Good-night." ”