"I am delighted to meet you, sir," he said to Winthrop. "I esteem it a fortunate occurrence, most fortunate, which brought me to East Angels this evening to pay my respects to Mistress Thorne, thus obtaining for myself, in addition, the pleasure of your acquaintance. Mistress Thorne having mentioned to me that you were making a little tour of the place with Miss Garda, I offered to bear you company during a portion, at least, of your progress, for Miss Garda, though possessing an intelligence delicately keen, may not (being feminine) remember to present you with the statistics, the--as I may say--historical items, which would naturally be interesting to a northerner of discrimination." The Doctor had a fine voice; his words were borne along on it like stately ships on the current of a broad river.
"Do not praise me too highly," said the possessor of the delicate intelligence, from her block. "I could never live up to it, you know."
"Miss Thorne has said many interesting things," answered Winthrop, "but she has not as yet, I think, favored me with anything historical; her attention has perhaps been turned rather more to the agricultural side."
"Agricultural?" said Kirby, bringing to bear upon Winthrop a bright left eye.
"He is making sport of me," explained Garda, laughing.
"Pooh! pooh!" said the Doctor, raising himself a little, first on his toes, then on his heels, thus giving to his plump person a slightly balancing motion to and fro. "A little more seriousness, Garda, my child; a little more seriousness." Then, with his hands behind him, he turned to Winthrop to present, in his full tones, one of the historical items of which he had spoken. "These walls, Mr. Winthrop, whose shattered ruins now rise before you, once formed part of a large sugar-mill, which was destroyed by the Indians during the Seminole war. This province, sir, has had a vast deal of trouble with her Indians--a vast deal. The nature of the country has afforded them every protection, and clogged pursuit with monstrous difficulties, which, I may add, have never been in the least appreciated by those unfamiliar with the ground. The records of our army--I speak, sir, of the old army," said the Doctor, after a moment's pause, making his little explanation with a courteous wave of the hand, which dismissed, as between himself and the guest of Mistress Thorne, all question as to the army which was newer--"these records, sir, are full of stories of the most harassing campaigns, made up and down this peninsula by our soldiers, in pursuit--vain pursuit--of a slippery, creeping, red-skinned, damnable foe. Canebrake, swamp, hammock; hammock, swamp, canebrake; ague, sunstroke, everglade; fever, scalping, ambuscade; and massacre--massacre--massacre!--such, sir, are the terms that succeed each other endlessly on those old pages; words that represent, I venture to say, more bravery, more heroic and unrequited endurance, than formed part of many a campaign that shines out to-day brilliantly on history's lying scroll. Yet who knows anything of them? I ask you, who?" The Doctor's fine voice was finer still in indignation.