“Why, sure!” said the colonel, “someone told me so, and thar’s a strong family likeness.”

“There should be,” said the youth, “since our fathers were twin brothers, and resembled each other in all particulars, in body, in mind, and, as I may say, in fortune.  They were alike in their lives, alike also in their deaths:  they fell together, struck down by the same cannon-ball, at the bombardment of Norfolk, seven years ago.”

“May I never see a scalp,” said the Kentuckian, warmly grasping the young man’s hand, “if I don’t honour you the more for boasting such a father and such uncles!  You come of the true stock, captain, thar’s no denying; and my brave old major’s estates have fallen into the right hands; for, if thar’s any believing the news the last band of emigrants brought of you h’yar, thar war no braver officer in Lee’s corps, nor in the whole Virginnee line, than young Captain Forrester.”

“Here,” said Roland, looking as if what he said cost him a painful effort, “lies the second error,—­your considering me, as you manifestly do, the heir of your old major, my uncle Roland,—­which I am not.”

“Lord!” said the worthy Bruce, “he was the richest man in Prince-George, and he had thousands of fat acres in the Valley, the best in all Fincastle, as I know very well, for I war a Fincastle man myself; and thar war my old friend Braxley,—­he war a lieutenant under the major at Braddock’s, and afterwards his steward, and manager, and lawyer-like,—­who used to come over the Ridge to see after them.  But I see how it is; he left all to the young lady?”

“Not an acre,” said Roland.

“What!” said the Kentuckian:  “he left no children of his own.  Who then is the heir?”

“Your old friend, as you call him, Richard Braxley.  And hence you see,” continued the youth, as if desirous to change the conversation, “that I come to Kentucky, an adventurer and fortune-hunter, like other emigrants, to locate lands under proclamation-warrants and bounty-grants, to fell trees, raise corn, shoot bisons and Indians, and, in general, do any thing else that can be required of a good Virginian or good Kentuckian.”

It was evidently the captain’s wish now to leave altogether the subject on which he had thought it incumbent to acquaint his host with so much; but the worthy Bruce was not so easily satisfied; and not conceiving there was any peculiar impropriety in indulging curiosity in matters relating to his old major, however distasteful that curiosity might prove to his guest, he succeeded in drawing from the reluctant young man many more particulars of his story; which, as they have an important connection with the events it is our object to narrate, we must be pardoned for briefly noticing.