The beauty of the Blakes' surroundings was such as one does not often meet with at this time, though it was common enough before the forests that lined the great river were disturbed by the hand of man. On every side the farm was bordered about by tangled shrubbery and overhanging trees, and now, it being autumn, they were tinged with a thousand shades of color, not one remaining steadfast, but shifting with the varying light, revealing some new beauty with each changing reflection of the sun. On one side, upon a ridge of sand, oaks with gnarled and rugged sides lifted their giant forms, and about the other borders boxwood and ash, mingled with maple and elm, grew in picturesque confusion. Near by, on the very edges of the farm, elders and a thousand vagrant bushes struggled to outdo each other in growth and show of beauty. Farther out, in the stubble of the field, fat weeds, green as in midsummer, uplifted their heads defiantly, as if shouting to the passer-by, "See! after all, nothing comes of thrift." In the meadow, and in homely confusion, wild sunflowers and rosin-weeds projected their stems high in the air, and upon these meadowlarks and bobolinks sat and sang the day through.
To one side of the farm, and along an old and abandoned highway, grasses and flowers spread quite across the sunken road, and on both its sides bushes crowded forward in confusion and such precipitancy of haste that in many places one could scarce make headway. Above this scramble of green the trees spread their limbs, and the sky peering down between their slender branches looked like a glimpse of some far-off summer sea.
Among other things, Mrs. Blake never tired of speaking of the great chief Black Hawk, and more particularly of his wife, whom she regarded with tender love. Black Hawk she thought a kingly man, and it was vastly to his honor, she maintained, woman-like and truly, that he had taken to himself but one wife, remaining faithful throughout to her whom he had won in his youth.
"Were you greatly harassed by the war?" I asked her one day.
"No, for at the commencement Black Hawk sent an Indian runner to us to say we would not be molested; nor were we."
"How did he happen to do that?" I asked, surprised.