Chapter One.

Interesting? My life? Well, let me see. I suppose some people would call it so, for now I come to think of it I did go through a good deal; what with the fighting with the Spaniards, and the Indians, and the fire, and the floods, and the wild beasts, and such-like adventures. Yes; it never seemed to occur to me before, you know, me—George Bruton, son of Captain Bruton of the King’s army, who went out with the General to help colonise Georgia, as they called the country after his Majesty King George the Second, and went through perils and dangers such as no one but English gentlemen and their brave followers would dare and overcome.

You’ll find it all in your histories; how the General had leave to take so many followers, and carve out for themselves land and estates in the beautiful new country.

My father was one of the party. He went, for he was sick at heart and despondent. He had married a sweet English lady—my mother—and when I was about six years old she died; and after growing more and more unhappy for a couple of years, his friends told him that if he did not seek active life of some kind, he would die too, and leave me an orphan indeed.

That frightened him so that he raised himself up from his despondent state, readily embraced the opportunity offered by the General’s expedition, sold his house in the country to which he had retired on leaving the army, and was going out to the southern part of North America with me only. But Sarah would not hear of parting from me, and begged my father to take her to be my attendant and his servant, just as on the same day Morgan Johns, our gardener, had volunteered to go with his master. Not that he was exactly a gardener, though he was full of gardening knowledge, and was a gardener’s son; for he had been in my father’s company in the old regiment, and when my father left it, followed him down and settled quite into a domestic life.

Well, as Morgan Johns volunteered to go with the expedition, and said nothing would suit him better than gardening in a new country, and doing a bit of fighting if it was wanted, and as our Sarah had volunteered too, it fell out quite as a matter of course, that one day as my father was seated in his room writing letters, and making his final preparations for his venturesome journey, and while I was seated there looking at the pictures in a book, Morgan and Sarah came in dressed in their best clothes, and stood both of them looking very red in the face.

“Well?” said my father, in the cold, stern way in which he generally spoke then; “what is it?”

“Tell him, Sarah,” I heard Morgan whisper, for I had gone up to put my hand in hers.

“For shame!” she said; “it’s you who ought.”

“Now look you,” said Morgan, who was a Welshman, and spoke very Welshy sometimes, “didn’t you just go and promise to help and obey? And the first thing I tells you to do you kicks.”

“I am very busy,” said my father. “If you two want a holiday, say so.”

“Holiday, sir? Not us,” said Morgan, in a hesitating way. “We don’t want no holiday, sir, only we felt like as it was our dooty to tell you what—”

“To tell me what?”

“Yes, sir; seeing as we were going out to a savage country, where you’ve got to do everything yourself before you can have it, and as there’d be no parsons and churches, we thought we’d get it done decent and ’spectable here first.”

“My good fellow, what do you mean?” said my father.

“Why, what I’ve been telling of you, sir. Sarah says—”

“I did not, Morgan, and I shouldn’t have thought of such a thing. It was all your doing.”

“Steady in the ranks, my lass. Be fair. I’ll own to half of it, but you know you were just as bad as me.”

“I was not, sir, indeed,” cried Sarah, beginning to sob. “He deluded me into it, and almost forced me to say yes.”

“Man’s dooty,” said Morgan, dryly.

“What!” cried my father, smiling; “have you two gone and been married?”

“Stop there, sir, please, begging your pardon,” said Morgan; “I declare to gootness, you couldn’t make a better guess than that.”

“I beg your pardon, sir,” said Sarah, who was very red in the face before, but scarlet now; and as I sit down and write all this, as an old man, everything comes back to me as vividly as if it were only yesterday—for though I have forgotten plenty of my later life, all this is as fresh as can be—“I beg your pardon, sir, but as you know all the years I have been in your service, and with my own dear angel of a mistress—Heaven bless her!”

“Amen,” said my father, and, stern soldier as he was, I saw the tears stand thick in his eyes, for poor Sarah broke down and began to sob, while Morgan turned his face and began to blow his nose like a trumpet out of tune.

“I—I beg your pardon for crying, sir, and it’s very weak, I own,” continued Sarah, after a few minutes’ interval, during which I hurriedly put my arm round her, and she dabbed down and kissed me, leaving my face very wet; “but you know I never meant to be married, but when Morgan comes to me and talks about what I was thinking about—how you and that poor darling motherless boy was to get on in foreign abroad, all amongst wild beasts and savages, and no one to make a drop o’ gruel if you had colds, or to make your beds, or sew on a button, and your poor stockings all in holes big enough to break any decent woman’s heart, and to Master George’s head—”

“I can wash my own head well enough now, Sarah,” I said.

“Yes, my dear; but I don’t believe you’d do it as well as I could, and you know I never let the soap get in your eyes. And when, sir, Morgan comes to me, and he asks me if I’d got the heart to let you both go out into the wilderness like that without a soul to look after you, and tells me as it was my dooty to marry him, and go out and look after the housekeeping for you both, while he did the garden, what could I say?”

Poor Sarah paused quite out of breath.

“Say?” said my father, smiling, but looking very much moved. “You could only say yes, like the good, true-hearted woman you are.”

“Oh, sir!” exclaimed Sarah.

“You have both relieved me of a great deal of care and anxiety by your faithful, friendly conduct,” continued my father, “for it will make what I am going to seek in the wilderness quite a home at once. It is not the wilderness you think, for I know on very good authority that the place where we are going is a very beautiful and fertile country.”

“Can’t come up to Wales,” said Morgan, shaking his head.

“Perhaps not,” said my father, smiling; “but very beautiful all the same. I ought to warn you both, though, while there is time to draw back, that the land is entirely new.”

“What, wasn’t it made with the rest of the world, sir?” said Morgan, staring.

“Yes, of course,” said my father; “but I mean it has never been inhabited more than by a few Indians, who passed through it when hunting. No houses; not so much as a road.”

“Then there won’t be no taverns, Sarah,” said Morgan, giving her a nudge.

“And a very good thing too,” she replied.

“So that,” continued my father, “I shall have to help cut down the trees to build my own house, make my own furniture, and fence in the estate—in short, do everything.”

“Well, I don’t see nothing to grumble at in that, sir, so long as there’s plenty of wood,” said Morgan.

“There’ll be too much wood, my man,” said my father, smiling, “and we shall have to ply the axe hard to clear our way.”

“Any stone or slate, sir?”

“Plenty of stone, but no slate that I am aware of.”

“No,” cried Morgan, triumphantly. “I knew there’d be no slate. That proves as it won’t come up to Wales. There isn’t such a country for slate anywhere as Wales. Well, sir, but even if there’s no slate, we can make shift. First thing we do as soon as we get out, will be for me to rig the missus up a bit of a kitchen, and we shall take a few pots and pans in a box.”

“Oh, I shall go well provided with necessaries,” said my father.

“Then pray don’t forget a frying-pan, sir. It’s wonderful what the missus here can do with a frying-pan.”

“Do be quiet, Morgan Johns,” said Sarah.

“Shan’t,” he growled. “I’m a-telling of the truth. It’s wonderful, sir, that it is. Give her a frying-pan and a bit o’ fire, and we shan’t never hurt for a bit o’ well-cooked victuals.”

“But—” began my father, when Morgan rushed in again.

“Washin’, sir, I forgot all about the washing. We shall want a tub and a line. Trees ’ll do for tying up to, and you’ll see we shall none of us ever want for clean clothes.”

“Do be quiet, Morgan.”

“I shan’t, Sarah. It’s only fair as the master should know what you can do, look you.”

“But I wish you people to think seriously now, while there is yet time,” said my father.

“Seriously, sir? Oh yes, we’ve been thinking of it seriously enough, and—I say, missus, do try and do without flat-irons; they’re very heavy kind o’ traps for a man to take in his kit.”

“Come, come,” said my father; “you had better think better of it, and not embrace such a rough life.”

“We have thought better on it, sir, and the very best too. We’re coming, and if you won’t take us, we’ll come without. And look you, sir, of course you’ll take some guns, and swords, and powder and shot.”

“Of course.”

“Then don’t forget some tools: spades, and hoes, and seeds, and some carpenter’s things and nails. You can’t think what a deal can be done with a hammer, a saw, and a few nails.”

“Then you mean to come?”

“Mean to come, sir?” cried Morgan, in astonishment. “Why we got married o’ purpose; didn’t we, Sarah?”

“Oh yes, sir; that’s the very truth.”

“And we shall be obliged to go now.”

I did not see where the obligation came in, but I supposed it was all right.

“Then I can only say thank you heartily,” cried my father, warmly; “and for my part, I’ll do my duty by you both.”

“Of course we know that, don’t we, Sarah? Or else we shouldn’t go.”

“My dear master!” said Sarah, and she bent forward and kissed his hand before clapping her handkerchief to her eyes, and rushing out of the room.

“She’ll be all right, sir, soon,” whispered Morgan. “And look you, I’ll begin getting together all sorts of little tackle, sir, as I think ’ll be useful out yonder. Knives and string, and—look you, Master George, strikes me as a few hooks and lines wouldn’t be amiss. A few good fish in a frying-pan, cooked as Sarah can cook ’em, arn’t to be sneezed at now and then.”

He gave us both a sharp nod, and hastily followed his wife, while I stayed to pester my father with endless questions about our new home.

Chapter Two.

The month which followed was one scene of excitement to me. We went into lodgings in Bristol, and my father seemed to be always busy making purchases, or seeing the different gentlemen who were going out with us in the same ship.

I recollect many of their faces. There was the General, a firm, kindly-looking man, who always seemed to me as if he could not possibly be a soldier, he was too quiet. Then there was Colonel Preston, a handsome, florid gentleman, ten years older than my father, and I heard that his wife, two sons and daughter were to be of the party.

In a misty kind of way, too, I can recollect that the gentlemen who came and had long talks with my father, used to chat about the plantations in Virginia and Carolina, and about a charter from the King, and that the place we were going to was to be called Georgia, because the King’s name was the same as mine.

Then, too, there was a great deal of talk about the enemy; and as I used to sit and listen, I understood that the Spaniards were the enemy, and that they lived in Florida. But every one laughed; and my father, I remember, said gravely—

“I do not fear anything that the Spaniards can do to hinder us, gentlemen, I am more disposed to dread the climate.”

A great deal that followed has now, at this time of writing, become confused and mixed up; but I can remember the cheering from the wharves as our ship floated away with the tide, people talking about us as adventurers, and that soon after it came on to blow, and my next recollections are of being in a dark cabin lit by a lantern, which swung to and fro, threatening sometimes to hit the smoky ceiling. I did not pay much heed to it though, for I was too ill, and the only consolation I had was that of seeing Sarah’s motherly face by the dim light, and hearing her kindly, comforting words.

Then, after a very stormy voyage, we seemed, as I recollect it, to have glided slowly out of winter into summer, and we were off a land of glorious sunshine at the mouth of a river, up which we sailed.

I know there was a great deal done afterwards in the way of formal taking possession in the name of the King, and I can recollect being delighted with the show that was made, and at seeing my father and the other gentlemen wearing gay clothes and sashes and plumes, and with swords buckled on. Even Morgan partook of the change, and I well recall how he came to me just before he landed, in a kind of grenadier uniform, with sword and musket and belts, drawing himself up very stiff and proud-looking as he let down the butt-end of his firelock with a loud bang upon the deck.

“Do I look all right and soldierly, Master George?” he whispered, after a glance round to see that he was not overheard.

“Yes,” I said, “you look fine. Is your gun loaded?”

“Not yet, my lad.”

“Pull out your sword and let’s look at it.”

“By and by, my lad,” he said; “but tell me; I do look all right, don’t I?”

“Yes. Why?”

“Because Sarah’s got a nasty fit on this mornin’. Don’t tell her I told you; but she said I looked fit to be laughed at, and that there’d be no fighting for me: Indians would all run away.”

“Oh, never mind what she says,” I cried. “I wish I was big enough for a soldier.”

“Wait a bit, boy, you’ll grow,” he said, as he busily tightened a well-whitened belt. “You see it’s so long since I’ve been soldiering, that I’m a bit out of practice.”

There was no enemy, Indian or Spaniard, to oppose us, and before long the land had been roughly surveyed and portioned out, my father, as an officer of good standing, being one of the earliest to choose; and in a very short time we were preparing to go out on the beautiful little estate that had become his, for the most part forest-land, with a patch or two of rich, easily-drained marsh on both sides of a little stream which ran, not far away, into the great river up which we had sailed, and upon which, just below us, was to be formed the new city.

Then time glided on, and as I recall everything I can, I have recollections of the gentlemen of the expedition, and common men, soldiers and others, coming with their swords and guns to our place, and all working hard together, after setting sentries and scouts to give warning of danger, and cutting down trees, and using saws, and helping to roughly build a little wooden house, and put up a fence for us.

Then, after getting our things in shelter, my father and Morgan joined in helping to build and clear for some one else; and so on, week after week, all working together to begin the settlement, till we were all provided with rough huts and shelters for the valuable stores and ammunition brought out. After which people began to shift for themselves, to try and improve the rough places first built.

Chapter Three.

With a new place, every touch makes a difference; and when some of those touches are given by the hand of a gardener, nature begins to help.

It was so at our Georgia home. Every bit of time my father or Morgan could find to spare, they were digging, or trimming, or planting, till Sarah would set to and grumble to me because they would not come in to their meals.

“I wouldn’t care, sir,” she would say, “only the supper’s getting spoiled.”

“But the home made more beautiful,” replied my father; and then I have heard him say as he glanced through the window at flower and tree flourishing wonderfully in that beautiful climate, “If my poor wife had lived to see all this!”

Early and late worked Morgan, battling with the wild vines and beautiful growths that seemed to be always trying to make the garden we were redeeming from the wilderness come back to its former state. But he found time to gratify me, and he would screw up his dry Welsh face and beckon to me sometimes to bring a stick and hunt out squirrel, coon, or some ugly little alligator, which he knew to be hiding under the roots of a tree in some pool. Then, as much to please me as for use, a punt was bought from the owners of a brig which had sailed across from Bristol to make her last voyage, being condemned to breaking up at our infant port.

The boat, however, was nearly new, and came into my father’s hands complete, with mast, sail, ropes, and oars; and it was not long before I gained the mastery over all that it was necessary to learn in the management.

Morgan’s fishing-tackle came into use, and after a little instruction and help from the Welshman, I began to wage war upon the fish in our stream and in the river, catching, beside, ugly little reptiles of the tortoise or turtle family—strange objects to be hauled up from muddy depths at one end of a line, but some of them very good eating all the same.

The little settlement throve as the time went on, and though the Indians were supposed to be threatening, and to look with very little favour upon the settlement so near their hunting-grounds, all remained peaceful, and we had nothing but haughty overbearing words from our Spanish neighbours.

To a man the officers and gentlemen who had come out turned their attention to agriculture, and many were the experiments tried, and successfully too. At one estate cotton was growing; at another, where there was a lot of rich low land easily flooded, great crops of rice were raised. Here, as I walked round with my father, we passed broad fields of sugar-cane, and farther on the great crinkled-leaved Indian corn flourished wonderfully, with its flower tassels, and beautiful green and then orange-buff ears of hard, sweet, flinty corn.

Then came long talks about the want of more help, and one of the settlers braved public opinion, and every one began to talk about how shocking it was for an English gentleman to purchase slaves. But before many months had passed there was hardly a settler without slave labour, the principal exception being my father.

It is hard to paint a picture in words, but I should like those who read this to understand what my home was like when I was about twelve years old, a great strong healthy boy, with cheeks burned brown by the sun.

Our place began with one low erection, divided by a rough partition into two—our room and the Morgans’; most of our meals being eaten in the big rustic porch contrived by Morgan in what he called his spare time, and over which ran wildly the most beautiful passion-flower I had ever seen.

But then as wood was abundant, and a saw-pit had been erected, a more pretentious one-floored cottage residence was planned to join on to the first building, which before long was entirely devoted to the servants; and we soon had a very charming little home with shingle roof, over which beautiful creepers literally rioted, and hung down in festoons from our windows.