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KATY OF CATOCTIN.

CHAPTER I.

MOUNTAINEERS.

"MARYLAND is only a rim of shore, a shell of mountain, but all

gold!"

So said Lloyd Quantrell, the gunner, looking down from the South Mountain upon Middletown or Catoctin Valley, an October Saturday in the year 1859.

The mellow light of afternoon touched or bathed the hundred farms, the bridges, barns, hamlets, stacks, corn-rows, brown woods, streams and stone walls, and with a fruity smell, as of cider-presses, seemed to come up the tone of bells ringing the Marylanders home from the labors of the week.

He saw the red and white spires of Middletown in the lap of the valley like its babe, and thought he saw, beyond its Catoctin Mountain knees, the father Frederick, the good old burgher, holding his devout fingers up, like index boards at the junction of his many pike roads.

Then fancy spread other terraces of Maryland, farther and farther on, like descending steps of gold and marble, beyond the hills of Sugarloaf and Linganore, to where Potomac and Patapsco blended their cascades and ocean-tides at the shrines of Washington and Baltimore.

Lloyd Quantrell's dog put his nose in the air silently, looking also downward, as if he scented, with the pheasants of the mountain, the sea-fowl of the Chesapeake.

A train of cars was crossing the mouth of Catoctin Valley from the dark chasm of Harper's Ferry, as the dog started back along

the mountain-top, "pointing" for a bird; and when Lloyd had followed and fired at and missed the bird, he saw another view in the west, all flooded with the sunset—the plateau between the Antietam and Potomac, stretching in woodland or crystal to the North Mountain and the Conococheague.

Here, amid equal abundance, a wilder paradise extended, as if nature's ruggedness had somewhat delayed the gardener hands of

man.

Beneath Quantrell's eye, to the left, a short, bold mountain intruded, which had begun a race with the South Mountain for the Pennsylvania line, but stopped in sight of the white clusters of settlement toward Hagerstown, discouraged at their beauty and multitude, like Balaam's stride arrested by the Hebrew camps.

Between this, Elk Ridge (or Maryland Heights) Mountain, and his own, and in the narrow peninsula beyond, where the Potomac begged a passage to the Shenandoah, a few wild farms found lodgment, as if poor, fugitive, and hermit men had clung there to a funnel, and now their white log and plaster houses and decayed black barns, in the midst of small mountain orchards, sent up to Quantrell light spirals of smoke, or flame of burning brushwood, or bells of milch-cows tinkling in alder-copses.

Where these wild homes and startled spurs of mountain halted, the basin of the great Cumberland Valley fell away indistinctly, and Keedysville lay in the foreground, like a bunch of the American flag.

The colors in the landscape were gold, purple, chrome, and all varieties of autumnal blue and gray, and, as if they were mixed in a cup, the young Baltimore sportsman drank them in and pined to understand the delight: for the love of scenery yearns to become an

art.

In all this patriotic prospect there was no responsive heart, and Lloyd Quantrell was still unbeloved.

New pulses had beat of late in him, and, like the hair upon his lip, sentiment had begun to grow: the idea of woman followed him about-of no one woman but of womankind, and in this glowing Eden of his native State the scenery seemed to lack a sympathetic spirit to reach up her white arms from the vale and cry: "Come down, my love, appointed for me; and I will make thy soul at rest, to enjoy every prospect, which, lonely, thou never canst !"

Beautiful, detached time of life! when, like a mote of the

Italian poplar's pollen blowing in the air to find the female cup, the souls of two young, destined people, yet unknown, solicit each other in the world.

The crude, destructive instincts of the young man were expressed aloud in his emotion between savagery and art:

"What would I do if all this was mine, on both sides of the mountain?" Lloyd Quantrell said. "Let me see! Why, I would clean out the whole region, like a Norman king, and make it a hunting park. All the wild beasts once here should return again—none but native American beasts, you bet! I would let them make their dens and shelters in these towns. The people would have to gogo West, I suppose—and then these stone, brick, and timber villages would decay, and we should have real American ruins in a few years. Too many Dutch are in this up-country for me! Instead of a lot of Dutchmen going to Baltimore market, we should have hunters sending down deer and bear. I would bring the buffaloes back from the West-for they used to herd here too, in the early day-and let them make dust, like an army, as they galloped before my hunters. The wolf should howl again, to make the mountains romantic. I would have grizzlies hug each other, panthers sneak away and prowl nearer again, and foxes should be protected, so that every day would be a morning chase. My castle I would put on the South Mountain, right here where I stand.”

He stopped, thinking what would a castle be without a lady. But in a minute his mind ran along with the vision:

"I think," he resumed, "that I would not disturb the Dutch beauties, for I would need a few vassals, and, to reconcile these and give me society, I might marry one of them. Yes, she should be the rosiest of all. I would educate her and make her my baroness; Baroness of the Blue Ridge."

As his thoughts, like the predatory hawk, flew back to a domestic nest and mate, Lloyd basked a moment in the soft, languorous vision of a settlement in life, till the dog whined and pointed, and, looking where it indicated, the gunner saw, in the edge of the woods, a few steps distant, a strange, primitive old man, accompanied by two young companions, watching him.

The apparition was more lean than tall, and dressed in dark woolens, cut almost Quaker fashion, and his waistcoat was buttoned nearly up to a leather stock around the tough whip-cords in his throat, which were revealed when he took his bushy gray beard

in one hand and drew it aside, looking meantime at young Quantrell with a pair of severe, gray-blue eyes.

The intruder's hair was brushed straight up from a rather low, receding forehead. He had a hawkish nose, and the beard which encircled his face, and would have fallen low upon his breast, stood outward at his chin like autumn brush against a rock.

"If this is your land, you don't mind my gunning on it?" spoke Quantrell.

"It is not my land, sir," answered the man, not finishing his searching look.

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'Then I don't see why you look at me so hard, friend, unless I have stolen something."

“Are you from Virginia?” asked the man.

“No, I am from Maryland—from Baltimore."

“You have been walking around this country three days!” "There's no law against that, old man. I have been shooting, what little there is, and picking a few fish out of the brooks. Have you been following me all the time?"

"I have seen you around my dwelling, sir, on two occasions, yesterday and the day before," continued the mountaineer, "and you are here still."

"Upon my word, friend, I don't see why I shouldn't pass your dwelling every day of my holiday here, particularly as I don't know where it is!"

An idea crossed Lloyd Quantrell's mind that there might be robbers in these mountains, and he gave a glance at the two other

men.

They were young fellows, and, in appearance, were so nearly the same, that observing one, answered for both; of good height, spare-faced and sunburned, sallow, worn thin, and with long, dark hair and beards; mere rustics to look at, with some passing alertness of curiosity now, but too docile and gentle to retain a predatory purpose.

This time Lloyd Quantrell guessed that they might be an old preacher and his two sons, of Mennonite, or Dunker, or some mountain Dutch sect. But the nasal tone of the old man, and his bold, grave address, made Lloyd think again that he had seen such men bringing horses to Baltimore market from Ohio and the West.

The only sign of offensive warfare they possessed was a kind of spear of steel, like a broad, double-edged knife-blade, with a cross

piece or guard below, and carried upon a wooden pole by one of the younger persons.

"What have you there, my friend?" asked Quantrell, walking over freshly. "It looks like what we called at school 'a gig,' to spear suckers and pike."

"I calkelate you hit it right the first time," said the possessor, smiling agreeably.

"We live over beyond the Short Mountain there," explained the other young man; "down on the river road to the ferry. Since we've been here, so few well-dressed strangers have gone past, that father was a little surprised at you—that's all.”

"Then we are all Marylanders," exclaimed Quantrell, "and I'm glad of that, because I have been lonesome for somebody to drink with me. Here's a flask of old Needwood whisky, I know I can recommend! Age before beauty, pop!"

He extended the flask to the old man and winked at the boys. "It's something I never drank, sir, in my life," spoke the firm old man, shaking his head.

Lloyd then turned to the boys.

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'We're not accustomed to it, friend," said the elder of these, "but don't let us interfere with you."

Quantrell drank, and liked it so well that he drank twice, and then, laying down his gun and calling in his dog, he felt familiar and companionable with all men. He produced cigars and a fuse, and offered his cigar-case to the party.

"We're unfortunate," said the younger of the sons; "neither father nor we boys smoke, or use tobacco.”

"Sit down, anyway," said the young man from the city; "there's the habit of talk, that is common to all. What is your name ?— Smith will do; anything to begin on.”

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You're a good guesser. Smith is what it is," spoke the old man, taking off his wool hat and stretching himself on the rocks and grass. "Isaac Smith—and yours?"

"Quantrell, of Baltimore."

"Ah!" exclaimed Mr. Smith, "that is the name of one of the slave-dealers there!"

"Yes," said Lloyd, reddening a little, "that's unfortunately an uncle of mine. He's managed, by the notoriety of the business, to have me identified pretty generally. It's a business I shouldn't go into-because it's not a gentleman's.”

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