Chapter 3

"This is most strange: your father's in some passion
That works him strongly."

Tempest.

A few hours made a great change in the occupations of the different
members of our simple and secluded family. The kine had yielded their
nightly tribute; the oxen had been released from the yoke, and were now
secure beneath their sheds; the sheep were in their folds, safe from the
assaults of the prowling wolf; and care had been taken to see that every
thing possessing life was gathered within the particular defences that
were provided for its security and comfort. But while all this caution was
used in behalf of living things, the utmost indifference prevailed on the
subject of that species of movable property, which, elsewhere, would have
been guarded with, at least, an equal jealousy. The homely fabrics of the
looms of Ruth lay on their bleaching-ground, to drink in the night-dew;
and plows, harrows, carts, saddles, and other similar articles, were left
in situations so exposed, as to prove that the hand of man had occupations
so numerous and so urgent, as to render it inconvenient to bestow labor
where it was not considered absolutely necessary.

Content himself was the last to quit the fields and the out-buildings.
When he reached the postern in the palisadoes, he stopped to call to those
above him, in order to learn if any yet lingered without the wooden
barriers. The answer being in the negative, he entered, and drawing-to the
small but heavy gate, he secured it with bar, bolt, and lock, carefully
and jealously, with his own hand. As this was no more than a nightly and
necessary precaution, the affairs of the family received no interruption.
The meal of the hour was soon ended; and conversation, with those light
toils which are peculiar to the long evenings of the fall and winter in
families on the frontier, succeeded as fitting employments to close the
business of a laborious and well-spent day.

Notwithstanding the entire simplicity which marked the opinions and usages
of the colonists at that period, and the great equality of condition which
even to this hour distinguishes the particular community of which we
write, choice and inclination drew some natural distinctions in the
ordinary intercourse of the inmates of the Heathcote family. A fire so
bright and cheerful blazed on an enormous hearth in a sort of upper
kitchen, as to render candles or torches unnecessary. Around it were
seated six or seven hardy and athletic young men, some drawing coarse
tools carefully through the curvatures of ox-bows, others scraping down
the helves of axes, or perhaps fashioning sticks of birch into homely but
convenient brooms. A demure, side-looking young woman kept her great wheel
in motion; while one