More than thirty years since a very near and dear relative of the
writer, an elder sister and a second mother, was killed by a fall from
a horse in a ride among the very mountains mentioned in this tale.
Few of her sex and years were more extensively known or more
universally beloved than the admirable woman who thus fell a victim to
the chances of the wilderness.
“I do not forget thy kindness,” said Marmaduke, “nor that we are of
one blood.”

“But, my dear father,” cried the wondering Elizabeth, “was there
actual suffering? Where were the beautiful and fertile vales of the
Mohawk? Could they not furnish food for your wants?”

“It was a season of scarcity; the necessities of life commanded a high
price in Europe, and were greedily sought after by the speculators.
The emigrants from the East to the West invariably passed along the
valley of the Mohawk, and swept away the means of subsistence like a
swarm of locusts, Nor were the people on the Flats in a much better
condition. They were in want themselves, but they spared the little
excess of provisions that nature did not absolutely require, with the
justice of the German character. There was no grinding of the poor.
The word speculator was then unknown to them. I have seen many a
stout man, bending under the load of the bag of meal which he was
carrying from the mills of the Mohawk, through the rugged passes of
these mountains, to feed his half-famished children, with a heart so
light, as he approached his hut, that the thirty miles he had passed
seemed nothing. Remember, my child, it was in our very infancy; we
had neither mills, nor grain, nor roads, nor often clearings; we had
nothing of increase but the mouths that were to be fed: for even at
that inauspicious moment the restless spirit of emigration was not