Freckles
Gene Stratton-Porter
eBook
(, Nov. 10, 2019)
Freckles is a 1904 novel written by the American writer and naturalist Gene Stratton-Porter. It is primarily set in the Limberlost Swamp area of Indiana, with brief scenes set in Chicago. The title character also appears briefly in Porter's A Girl of the Limberlost. The novel is marked by its frequent, detailed, and loving descriptions of the flora and fauna of the wilderness through the eyes of its innocent protagonist.The hero is an adult orphan, just under twenty years of age, with bright red hair and a freckled complexion. His right hand is missing at the wrist, and has been since before he can remember. Raised since infancy in a Chicago orphanage, he speaks with a slight Irish accent, "scarcely definite enough to be called a brogue."Exhausted after days of walking and looking like a hobo, he applies for a job with the Grand Rapids lumber company, guarding timber in the Limberlost Swamp. McLean, part owner, organizer and field manager of the large company, and enthralled with the Limberlost, is impressed by the boy's polite assertiveness and hires him despite his youth and disability. He gives his name only as "Freckles", insisting that he has no name of his own. He claims the name given him in the orphanage (which we never learn) "is no more my name than it is yours". Freckles asks McLean to choose a name for him to put down on the books. McLean gives Freckles the name of his own father, James Ross McLean.Freckles' duty is to twice a day walk the perimeter of the lumber company's land, a seven-mile trek through lonely swampland, and to be on the watch for those who aim to steal the expensive timber. McLean's chief worry is Black Jack Carter, who has sworn to smuggle several priceless trees out of the swamp. Freckles' weapons are limited to a revolver and a stout stick which he carries at all times and uses to test the wire that marks the company's boundaries. At night Freckles boards with Duncan, head teamster for the lumber company, and Duncan's wife, who becomes a mother figure to Freckles.Initially terrified of the wilderness after a lifetime in an urban environment, Freckles first conquers his fears, aided by exploration of the Limberlost during its barrenness in the severe winter, and feeds the fickle birds ("my chickens" he calls them) that had once frightened him. With the return of spring and the terror of its inhabitants gone, he develops an interest in the wildlife of the swamp. He is touched by the beauty he sees, and both frustration at his ignorance and curiosity about all he sees lead him, with McLean's help, to purchase several books on natural history. McLean is touched by Freckles' love of nature and urges him to collect specimens, although he warns him against ever killing a bird.Freckles creates a "room" in the swamp, where he has transplanted the most unusual plant specimens he can find. After a year in the swamp, his hard work and faithfulness lead McLean to bet skeptics a thousand dollars (the value of a single tree among the most valuable) that they can't show him a fresh stump from a tree stolen under Freckles' watch, a wager that threatens to become a self-fulfilling prophecy. Freckles gets an opportunity to prove his capabilities as a guard when Wessner, a recently fired lumberman, comes upon Freckles on his rounds and offers him five hundred dollars to look the other way while Black Jack’s gang of thieves steals a prime tree next to the trail. After initially playing dumb to gain information, Freckles puts his gun and stick aside and fights Wessner using only his one fist. He wins, although severely pummeled, and drives Wessner from the swamp. McLean finds him and takes him back to the Duncans over his protests. The boy warns him about the imperiled tree and McLean arranges to have his own crew remove it immediately.