Whispers of War by Kit Pearson

Author:Kit Pearson [Pearson, Kit]
Language: eng
Format: epub
ISBN: 9781443119924
Publisher: Scholastic Canada
Published: 2002-08-15T04:00:00+00:00

August 1812

11 August 1812

Dear Constance,

I have been very ill with ague, which I get every summer. It is such a frustrating disease. One day I am feverish, then think I am better, then I am feverish again. I have been free of fever for a week, however, so I think it is over. I am very weak but am able to sit up during the day and can write to you.

Mama tended me, giving me constant sips of bark steeped in brandy. It always seems to cure me. At my worst I was so hot I could scarcely bear it. One night, Mama said, I did not know where I was but constantly cried for Hamilton.

On the days I felt better she sat by my bedside and told me stories about her girlhood in South Carolina. She had a Negro slave called Nan, of whom she was very fond. There are some slaves in Upper Canada who came here with their families, but their children are free at age five and twenty and their grandchildren free at birth.

I asked Mama if she thought that slavery was wrong.

She said that was a complex question. Her family was always kind to their slaves, yet she admits it is cruel to force people to work without pay.

It seems that the older I get the more complex questions there are. Sometimes I wish I were younger and did not have to think about such issues.

As I got better Mama read to me from a book she borrowed from Mrs. Adams before the war, which Mrs. Adams’s aunt had sent her from England. It is a novel called Sense and Sensibility. At first I thought there was too much about love in it, but soon I became completely engrossed. The people in it are so amusing and seem so real.

Maria and Tabitha came up to listen also, and I do believe it was wanting to know what happened next that got me through my illness. We only have the first two volumes, however, and I long to know the rest. The book has no named author, but is by “a lady.” Whoever she is, I am full of wonder that she can write a story that seems so alive.

I wonder if I will ever love someone? I cannot imagine it, but it seems to be the major preoccupation of almost every adult I know. Perhaps I will not be able to escape it.

12 August 1812

Dear Constance,

Today I was able to go downstairs. I was overjoyed to see Mouse again, whom Mama did not allow in my bedroom when I was ill.

She is beginning to be weaned. I showed her how to lap milk by dipping my finger in it and encouraging her to lick it.

My legs are wobbly but my appetite is improving. I ate a large piece of rabbit pie for dinner.

Later

I forgot to tell you that while I was ill there was a letter from Papa. We have had a victory! It happened at Fort Michilimackinac on July 17.

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