A poet may be a good companion, but, so far as I know, he is everthe worst of fathers. Even as grandfather he is too near, for onepoet can lay a streak of poverty over three generations. Doubt notI know whereof I speak, dear reader, for my mother's f... Read more

A poet may be a good companion, but, so far as I know, he is everthe worst of fathers. Even as grandfather he is too near, for onepoet can lay a streak of poverty over three generations. Doubt notI know whereof I speak, dear reader, for my mother's father was apoet--a French poet, too, whose lines had crossed the Atlantic longbefore that summer of 1770 when he came to Montreal. He diedthere, leaving only debts and those who had great need of a betterlegacy--my mother and grandmother.As to my father, he had none of that fatal folly in him. He was amountaineer of Vermont--a man of steely sinews that took well tothe grip of a sword. He cut his way to fame in the Northern armywhen the British came first to give us battle, and a bloody way itwas. I have now a faded letter from Ethan Allen, grim old warrior,in which he calls my father the best swordsman that ever straddleda horse. He was a gallous chap in his youth, so said mygrandmother, with a great love of good clothes and gunpowder. Hewent to Montreal, as a boy, to be educated; took lessons infencing, fought a duel, ran away from school, and came home withlittle learning and a wife. Punished by disinheritance, he took afarm, and left the plough to go into battle.I wonder often that my mother could put up with the stress andhardship of his life, for she had had gentle breeding, of which Iknew little until I was grown to manhood, when I came to know alsowhat a woman will do for the love of her heart. I remember wellthose tales of knights and ladies she used to tell me as we sattogether of an evening, and also those adventures of her ownknight, my good father, in the war with the British. My love ofarms and of a just quarrel began then.After the war came hard times. My father had not prosperedhandsomely, when, near the end of the summer of 1803, he sold hisfarm, and we all started West, over rough trails and roadways.There were seven of us, bound for the valley of the St.Lawrence--my father and mother, my two sisters, my grandmother,D'ri, the hired man, and myself, then a sturdy boy of ten. We hadan ox-team and -cart that carried our provision, the sacred featherbeds of my mother, and some few other things. Less