Page:The Gift, a Christmas and New Year's Present for 1842.djvu/100

94 wants are imaginary. I have more than I need. I can procure abundance of game and fish; the rest comes from the settlements not far distant.'

'You have shown a true love for study in thus secluding yourself for the sake of its pursuits. Do you never visit the city?'

'I have not done so once,' he replied, 'in the many years I have lived here.'

'Our Pennsylvania forests,' I observed, after a pause, 'can boast few scholars; do you not sometimes wish for congenial society?'

The brief negative with which he answered me, and the cloud that came over his face, warned me that my curiosity was displeasing and not likely to be gratified. So after receiving his instructions as to my road, I parted from him. A brisk ride of three hours brought me to a small settlement—if a clump of log houses could be so called—at the head of Tuscarora Valley. I alighted at the tavern, at the door of which hung a most inhuman portrait of General Washington; and while discussing a substantial breakfast of venison steaks, hot coffee, and buckwheat cakes, I could not refrain from relating my adventure of the night, and asking if aught was known of the solitary stranger.

'Oh, my dear young sir!' cried the landlady, who sat by the fire in her clean cap and chintz apron—for the rare occurrence of a gentleman guest called for her special attendance—'have you never heard of our Blue Mountain Hermit?' and quietly refilling my cup of coffee, she commenced a story, which, omitting her somewhat tedious recapitulations, I will repeat as briefly as possible.

The hut I had observed not far from the cave, was once inhabited by an old man and his daughter. Various stories had been in circulation respecting him among the honest settlers, but it was generally understood that he had been