There was, until not long ago, a notable cavern at the foot of a rocky cliff about a mile below the town of Port Deposit. It was of small compass, yet sufficiently spacious to furnish some rude shelter against the weather to one who might seek refuge within its solitary chamber. It opened upon the river just where a small brook comes brattling down the bank, along the base of a hill of some magnitude that yet retains the stately name of Mount Ararat. The visitor of this cavern might approach it by a boat from the river, or by a rugged path along the margin of the brook and across the ledges of the rock. This rough shelter went by the name of Talbot's Cave down to a very recent period, and would still go by that name, if it were yet in existence. But it happened, not many years since, that Port Deposit was awakened to a sudden notion of the value of the granite of the cliff, and, as commerce is a most ruthless contemner of all romance, and never hesitates between a speculation of profit and a speculation of history, Talbot's Cave soon began to figure conspicuously in the Price Current, and in a very little while disappeared, like a witch from the stage, in blasts of sulphur fire and rumbling thunder, under the management of those effective scene-shifters, the quarrymen. A government contract, more potent than the necromancy of the famed wizard Michael Scott, lifted this massive rock from its base, and, flying with it full two hundred miles, buried it fathoms below the surface of the Atlantic, at the Rip Raps, near Hampton Roads; and thus it happens that I cannot vouch the ocular proof of the Cave to certify the legend I am about to relate.
The tradition attached to this spot had nothing but a misty and spectral outline. It was indefinite in the date, uncertain as to persons, mysterious as to the event,–just such a tradition as to whet the edge of one's curiosity and to leave it hopeless of gratification. I may relate it in a few words.
Once upon a time, somewhere between one and two hundred years ago, there was a man by the name of Talbot, a kinsman of Lord Baltimore, who had committed some crime, for which he fled and became an outlaw and was pursued by the authorities of the Province. To escape these, he took refuge in the wilderness on the Susquehanna, where he found this cave, and used it for concealment and defence for some time,–how long, the tradition does not say. This region was then inhabited by a fierce tribe of Indians, who are described on Captain John Smith's map as the "Sasquesahannocks," and who were friendly to the outlaw and supplied him with provisions. To these details was added another, which threw an additional interest over the story,–that Talbot had a pair of beautiful English hawks, such as were most prized in the sport of falconry, and that these were the companions of his exile, and were trained by him to pursue and strike the wild duck that abounded, then as now, on this part of the river; and he thus found amusement to beguile his solitude, as well as sustenance in a luxurious article of food, which is yet the pride of gastronomic science, and the envy of bons vivants throughout this continent.
These hawks my aged friend had often himself seen, in his own boyish days, sweeping round the cliffs and over the broad expanse of the Susquehanna. They were easily distinguished, he said, by the residents of that district, by their peculiar size and plumage, being of a breed not known to our native ornithology, and both being males. For many years, it was affirmed,–long after the outlaw had vanished from the scene,–these gallant old rovers of the river still pursued their accustomed game, a solitary pair, without kindred or acquaintance in our woods. They had survived their master,–no one could tell how long,–but had not abandoned the haunts of his exile. They still for many a year saw the wilderness beneath their daily flight giving place to arable fields, and learned to exchange their wary guard against the Indian's arrow for a sharper watch of the Anglo-Saxon rifle. Up to the last of their appearance the country-people spoke of them as Talbot's hawks.
This is a summary of the story, as it was told to me. No inquiry brought me any addition to these morsels of narrative. Who this Talbot was,–what was his crime,–how long he lived in this cave, and at what era,–were questions upon which the oracle of my tradition was dumb.
Such a story would naturally take hold of the fancy of a lover of romance, and kindle his zeal for an enterprise to learn something more about it; and I may reasonably suppose that this short sketch has already stirred the bosoms of the novel-reading portion, at least, of my readers with a desire that I should tell them what, in my later researches, I have found to explain this legend of the Cave. Even the outline I have given is suggestive of inferences to furnish quite a plausible chapter of history.
First, it is clear, from the narrative, that Talbot was a gentleman of rank in the old Province,–for he was kinsman to the Lord Proprietary; and there is one of the oldest counties of Maryland that bears the name of his family,– perhaps called so in honor of himself. Then he kept his hawks, which showed him to be a man of condition, and fond of the noble sport which figures so gracefully in the annals of Chivalry.
Secondly, this hawking carries the period of the story back to the time of one of the early Lords Baltimore; for falconry was not common in the eighteenth century: and yet the date could not have been much earlier than that century, because the hawks had been seen by old persons of the last generation somewhere about the period of our Revolution; and this bird does not live much over a hundred years. So we fix a date not far from sixteen hundred and eighty for Talbot's sojourn on the river.
Thirdly, the crime for which he was outlawed could scarcely have been a mean felony, perpetrated for gain, but more likely some act of passion,–a homicide, probably, provoked by a quarrel, and enacted in hot blood. This Talbot was too well conditioned for a sordid crime; and his flight to the wilderness and his abode there would seem to infer a man of strong purpose and self-reliance.
And, lastly, as he must have had friends and confederates on the frontier, to aid him in his concealment, and to screen him from the pursuit of the government officers, and, moreover, had made himself acceptable to the Indians, to whose power he had committed himself, we may conclude that he possessed some winning points of character; and I therefore assume him to have been of a brave, frank, and generous nature, capable of attracting partisans and enlisting the sympathies and service of bold men for his personal defence.
So, with the help of a little obvious speculation, founded upon the circumstantial evidence, we weave the network of quite a natural story of Talbot; and our meagre tradition takes on the form, and something of the substance, of an intelligible incident.
CHAPTER II.
STRANGE REVELATIONS
At this point I leave the hero of my narrative for a while, in order that I may open another chapter.
Many years elapsed, during which the tradition remained in this unsatisfactory state, and I had given up all hope of further elucidation of it, when an accidental discovery brought me once more upon the track of inquiry.
There was published in the city of Baltimore, in the year 1808, a book whose title was certainly as little adapted to awaken the attention of one in quest of a picturesque legend as a treatise on Algebra. It was called "The Landholder's Assistant," and was intended, as its name imported, to assist that lucky portion of mankind who possessed the soil of Maryland in their pursuit of knowledge touching the mysteries of patents, warrants, surveys, and such like learning, necessary to getting land or keeping what they had. The character and style of this book, in its exterior aspect, were as unpromising as it's title. It was printed by Messrs. Dobbin & Murphy, on rather dark paper, in a muddy type,– such as no Mr. Dobbin nor Mr. Murphy of this day would allow to bear his imprimatur,–though in 1808, I doubt not, it was considered a very creditable piece of Baltimore typography. This unpretending volume was compiled by Chancellor Kilty. It is a very instructive book, containing much curious matter, is worthy of better adornment in the form of its presentation to the world, and ought to have a title more suggestive of its antiquarian lore. I should call it "Fossil Remains of Old Maryland Law, with Notes by an Antiquary."
It fell into my hands by a purchase at auction, some twenty years after I had abandoned the Legend of the Cave and the Hawks as a hopeless quest. In running over its contents, I found that a Colonel George Talbot was once the Surveyor- General of Maryland; and in two short marginal notes (the substance of which I afterwards found in Chalmers's "Annals") it was said that "he was noted in the Province for the murder committed by him on Christopher Rousby, Collector of the Customs,"–the second note adding that this