Chapter 11

O wo! O woful, woful, woful day!
Most lamentable day; most woful day,
That ever, ever, I did yet behold!
O day! O day! O day! O hateful day!
Never was seen so black a day as this;
O woful day! O woful day!
--SHAKESPEARE.

The family at the Locusts had slept, or watched, through all the
disturbances at the cottage of Birch, in perfect ignorance of their
occurrence. The attacks of the Skinners were always made with so much
privacy as to exclude the sufferers, not only from succor, but
frequently, through a dread of future depredations, from the
commiseration of their neighbors also. Additional duties had drawn the
ladies from their pillows at an hour somewhat earlier than usual; and
Captain Lawton, notwithstanding the sufferings of his body, had risen in
compliance with a rule from which he never departed, of sleeping but six
hours at a time. This was one of the few points, in which the care of
the human frame was involved, on which the trooper and the surgeon of
horse were ever known to agree. The doctor had watched, during the
night, by the side of the bed of Captain Singleton, without once closing
his eyes. Occasionally he would pay a visit to the wounded Englishman,
who, being more hurt in the spirit than in the flesh, tolerated the
interruptions with a very ill grace; and once, for an instant, he
ventured to steal softly to the bed of his obstinate comrade, and was
near succeeding in obtaining a touch of his pulse, when a terrible oath,
sworn by the trooper in a dream, startled the prudent surgeon, and
warned him of a trite saying in the corps, "that Captain Lawton always
slept with one eye open." This group had assembled in one of the parlors
as the sun made its appearance over the eastern hill, dispersing the
columns of fog which had enveloped the lowland.

Miss Peyton was looking from a window in the direction of the tenement
of the peddler, and was expressing a kind anxiety after the welfare of
the sick man, when the person of Katy suddenly emerged from the dense
covering of an earthly cloud, whose mists were scattering before the
cheering rays of the sun, and was seen making hasty steps towards the
Locusts. There was that in the air of the housekeeper which bespoke
distress of an unusual nature, and the kind-hearted mistress of the
Locusts opened the door of the room, with the benevolent intention of
soothing a grief that seemed so overwhelming. A nearer view of the
disturbed features of the visitor confirmed Miss Peyton in her belief;
and, with the shock that gentle feelings ever experience at a sudden and
endless separation from even the meanest of their associates, she said
hastily,--

"Katy, is he gone?"

"No, ma'am," replied the