i{ui5n»{?iiMi;HM?J'MiUi)5iin;)t»;'fi!iiin 
 
Book U^^ 
 
 Copyright N^_ 
 
 COPYRIGHT DEPOSnv 
 
The Companion Series. 
 
 Under the Crown 
 
 AMERICAN HISTORY. 
 • 
 
 SELECTIONS 
 From The Youth's CompanioHo 
 
 1909. 
 
 PERRY MASON COMPANY, 
 
 Boston, Mass. 
 

 Copyright 1909. 
 By PERRY MASON COMPANY, 
 
 Boston, Mass. 
 
 SEP 13.: 
 
 2'A9 
 AW9 
 
CONTENTS. 
 
 Page 
 
 THE DISCOVERY 
 THE HUGUENOTS IN FLORIDA 
 RATCLIFFE'S CONSPIRACY . 
 HUDSON'S DISCOVERIES 
 THE FIRST YANKEES . 
 THE FIRST HOME IN BOSTON 
 STEVENSEN AND VAN HORNE 
 MARQUETTE'S DISCOVERY . 
 
 DIANTHE AND THE WITCH 
 THE REGICIDES 
 THE PURITAN PARSON 
 THE WESLEYS IN GEORGIA 
 COLONIAL MERRYMAKING . 
 WASHINGTON AT BEL VOIR 
 THE RESCUE 
 
 
 James Parton 
 
 3 
 
 
 Max Owen 
 
 9 
 
 
 Ellen Mackubin 
 
 17 
 
 
 Max Owen 
 
 33 
 
 
 James Parton 
 
 37 
 
 
 Charles Adams 
 
 43 
 
 
 Martin M. Foss 
 
 49 
 
 Hezekiah Butterworth 
 
 62 
 
 Helen Kane 
 
 67 
 
 . Rebecca Harding Davis 
 
 82 
 
 . Manley H. Pike 
 
 88 
 
 Walter Leon Sawyer 
 
 97 
 
 James Parton 
 
 104 
 
 Mrs. Burton Harrison 
 
 110 
 
 
 . Ellen Mackubin 
 
 116 
 
 TWO HISTORIC LANDMARKS 
 ELIZABETHS CHOICE . 
 THE CATAMOUNT TAVERN 
 THE MIDDLE PLANTATION . 
 THE LITTLE REBEL; . 
 
 POLLY CALLENDAr! ., 
 
 WARREN'S LAST SPEECH . 
 
 Clarence P. Elmery 131 
 
 ,M. E. M. Davis 136 
 
 ." Benson J. Lossing 150 
 
 $enson J. Lossing 156 
 
 . ! Nora Perry 165 
 
 Margaret Fenderson 174 
 
 James Parton 184 
 
THE FIRST COMERS. 
 
HE TOOK FORMAL POSSESSION. 
 
THE DISCOVERY. 
 
 THE fascinating book which led to the dis- 
 covery of America was the "Travels of Marco 
 Polo," describing Asia about the year 1300. 
 This deeply impressed the imaginative and 
 religious mind of Columbus, and furnished him 
 with an irresistible argument when he asked the 
 assistance of Queen Isabella of Spain. 
 
 When he spoke to King Ferdinand on the 
 subject, no doubt he dwelt upon the spices, the 
 rubies and the gold, and of the king, whose 
 palaco roof was made of the precious metal; 
 but when he spoke to the queen, a devoted and 
 enthusiastic Catholic, we may be sure that he 
 laid the greatest stress upon the story in Marco 
 Polo, of the great emperor who had asked the 
 Pope to send him a hundred Christian priests. 
 We may be quite certain that this was the argu- 
 ment which induced the queen to favor the 
 expedition and offer her jewels to promote it. 
 
 I do not doubt that Columbus himself fully 
 appreciated the rubies and the gold described 
 by Marco Polo. At the same time, the avowed 
 object of the expedition was to convey a knowl- 
 edge of the Christian religion to the " Prince 
 
THE DISCOVER¥. 
 
 who is called the Grand Khan, who sent to 
 Rome to entreat for doctors of our Holy Faith." 
 This was the object stated by Columbus him- 
 self in the first pages of his diary, which began 
 
 thus : " In nomine D. N. 
 Jesu Christi!" (In the 
 name of our Lord Jesus 
 Christ.) 
 
 The expedition, there- 
 fore, had a religious 
 character, and Colum- 
 bus regarded himself in 
 the light, not of a mis- 
 sionary indeed, but as 
 the forerunner of mis- 
 sionaries, and the pre- 
 parer of the way for them. 
 I wonder he did not have 
 a priest with him. He did not, however, although 
 he carried a notary to take possession of any 
 lands he might discover, in the name of the 
 King and Queen of Spain. 
 
 The admiral offered a reward to whosoever 
 should discover land. On the nineteenth day 
 of the voyage a voice from one of the vessels, 
 the Pinta, was heard crying, " Land, land, seiior! 
 I claim my reward ! " 
 
 SANTA MARIA. 
 
THE DISCOVERY. 5 
 
 It was Martin Alonzo Pinzon who uttered the 
 joyful cry, pointing at the same time toward the 
 southwest at a low-lying bank of mist which 
 had deceived him. 
 
 Columbus, too, was deceived, and threw him- 
 self upon his knees to offer thanks. All the 
 crews of the two vessels in advance knelt also, 
 while Pinzon, the sailors and the admiral united 
 in chanting, "Gloria in Excelsis Deo." 
 
 The anxious voyagers soon discovered their 
 mistake, and their spirits sank within them. A 
 second time they were cheered by signs of land. 
 Besides a quantity of fresh weeds, they saw fish 
 which they recognized to be of a kind that live 
 near rocky ledges. They saw also a branch of 
 thorn with berries on it, and picked up a reed, 
 a board, and, most thrilling of all, a carved staff. 
 
 Again the crew broke into joyous thanks- 
 giving, and when the evening came the crews 
 of all the ships sang with peculiar fervor the 
 vesper hymn to the Virgin, an act which they 
 never omitted during the whole voyage. 
 
 When this hymn had been sung with feelings 
 which we can but faintly imagine, the admiral 
 stood forth and preached a brief but impressive 
 thanksgiving sermon. The ofificial history of 
 the expedition mentions that he dwelt particularly 
 
THE DISCOVERV» 
 
 upon the circumstances that they had been 
 continually cheered with fresh signs of land, 
 which had increased in frequency and signifi- 
 cance the farther they had gone, and the more 
 they needed solace and encouragement. 
 
 He thought it probable that they would reach 
 land that very night, and promised whosoever 
 
 should see it first a 
 velvet doublet in ad- 
 dition to the pension 
 promised by their king 
 and queen. 
 
 That very evening, 
 soon after twilight had 
 darkened into the trop- 
 ical night, Columbus 
 himself saw a light 
 glimmering afar off, 
 and at two o clock 
 the next morning a gun from the Pinta an- 
 nounced that land had been descried. 
 
 On Friday morning, October 12, 1492, Colum- 
 bus saw before him, at a distance of a mile, 
 a beautiful level island, covered with trees like 
 an orchard and full of people, who were seen 
 running out of the woods down to the shore, 
 gazing at the ships in wonder. 
 
THE DISCOVERY. 
 
 Soon the boats were manned, armed and made 
 ready. The admiral, clad in scarlet and holding 
 the royal standard of Spain, stepped into his own 
 boat and led the way to the shore, followed by 
 a boat from each of the other vessels, all showing 
 a special banner emblazoned with a green cross 
 and the initials of the Spanish sovereigns. 
 
 The chronicle of the discovery informs us 
 that as the voyagers approached the shores of 
 the New World they were all charmed with 
 the purity of the air and the beauty of the scene. 
 As soon as Columbus landed he sank upon his 
 knees and kissed the soil, shedding tears of joy. 
 
 As the crews of the other boats came on 
 shore, they all knelt beside and behind the 
 admiral and joined him in a Latin prayer, which 
 had been previously composed for the occasion, 
 and which, by order of Ferdinand and Isabella, 
 was adopted as the form of thanksgiving for 
 all future jdiscoverers. It was used by Pizarro, 
 Cortez and Balboa. 
 
 " Lord God eternal and omnipotent! By thy 
 sacred word thou didst create heaven, earth and 
 sea. Blessed and glorified be thy name; thy 
 majesty be praised ! Grant aid to thine humble 
 servant, that thy sacred name may be known 
 and lauded in this other part of the world." 
 
8 THE DISCOVERY. 
 
 Having recited this prayer, Columbus rose 
 to his feet, and all the company gathered round 
 him. He drew his sword, and unfolded the 
 royal standard to the breeze. Then, in the 
 immediate presence of the captains of the vessels 
 and the notary of the expedition, the sailors who 
 had landed standing near, he took formal pos- 
 session of the new found land and gave it the 
 name of San Salvador. When this had been 
 done, he required all present to take the oath of 
 obedience to him as representing the sovereigns 
 and wielding their power. 
 
 During these ceremonies the great crowd of 
 dusky natives stood transfixed with wonder. 
 They were amaz.ed at the whiteness of the 
 Spaniards, at their shining armor, their gor- 
 geous banner, their splendid garments, and 
 particularly the scarlet dress of their chief and 
 his majestic demeanor. They little thought that 
 the coming of these strange men meant misery, 
 bondage, and swift extinction to their race. 
 
 Columbus, on his part, never knew that the 
 land he had found was no part of the regions 
 described by Marco Polo. He had discovered 
 a continent, and died without suspecting it. 
 
 James Parton. 
 
THE HUGUENOTS IN FLORIDA. 
 
 THE efforts of the three great powers, Spain, 
 France and England, to hold possession of 
 the flowery peninsula mark very interesting 
 events in the history of Florida. It must be 
 admitted that Spain had the right of discovery, 
 and proved her claim by actual though not con- 
 tinuous possession for a longer time than both 
 the other nations. 
 
 It was on Palm Sunday, March 27, 15 12, that 
 three small vessels under the command of the 
 tough old Spanish explorer, Juan Ponce de Leon, 
 arrived off the coast of the then unknown land. 
 They had sailed three weeks before from Porto 
 Rico, making a pleasant voyage with favorable 
 winds, but no sooner had they come in sight of 
 the strange coast than a storm arose, which kept 
 them for several days beating up and down, 
 unable to cast anchor. 
 
 It was not till April 8th that Ponce de Leon 
 went ashore and took possession of the land in 
 the name of the King and Queen of Spain. He 
 found a beautiful country filled with flowers and 
 blossoming vines, but he did not find the hoped- 
 for rocks and streams abounding in gold. 
 
10 THE HUGUENOTS IN FLORIDA. 
 
 He searched for the fabled Fountain of Youth, 
 but of all the springs in the new land, which the 
 grizzled old Ponce de Leon went about anxiously 
 tasting, none made him younger by a single year. 
 
 He learned from the Indians that the country 
 was called Cautio. He renamed it Florida 
 because he had first seen it on Pascua Florida, 
 the Flowery Passover. In June he sailed away, 
 a sadly disappointed man. 
 
 Nine years later, in 152 1, he sailed once more 
 for Florida, with the intention of exploring and 
 subjugating it. Soon after landing^ he was 
 attacked by a large number of Indians; many 
 of his men were killed, and he was wounded by 
 an arrow. He was carried back to his ship, and 
 gave orders to make for Cuba, where he died 
 a few days after his arrival. 
 
 Florida was again invaded in 1528 by Narvaez, 
 who expected to conquer another Mexico or 
 Peru, but met disappointment and failure. 
 With the same high hopes of finding gold, 
 De Soto in 1539 began his explorations which 
 ended with the discovery of the Mississippi and 
 the burial of the ambitious commander of the 
 romantic expedition in its waters. 
 
 The explorations in 1523 from the Carolinas to 
 Florida by Verrazano in the interest of the French 
 
THE HUGUENOTS IN FLORIDA. 11 
 
 government gave France a claim to this region, 
 which they named New France, but in which no 
 attempt at colonization was made for forty years. 
 
 The French Huguenots, under their leader, 
 Gaspard de Coligni, Admiral of France, fitted 
 out the first expedition to found an empire in 
 this so-called New France. 
 
 On February i8, 1562, two ships, commanded 
 by Capt. Jean Ribaut and Rene Laudonniere, 
 distinguished French officers of marine, set sail 
 from Dieppe. After a tempestuous voyage, 
 they reached the coast of Florida and entered 
 the St. John, which they called the River of 
 May, from having discovered it on the first 
 day of that month. 
 
 As usual with the explorers of that day, they 
 set up a column at the mouth of the river, 
 engraved with the arms of France, in token that 
 they took formal possession of the country 
 in the name of the French sovereign. They 
 built Fort Charles at Port Royal, and then 
 returned to France. 
 
 On April 22, 1564, Laudonniere returned to 
 Florida, with three vessels containing emigrants, 
 provisions and arms for the little colony, and 
 built Fort Caroline, near the mouth of the St. 
 John. The following year Ribaut also returned 
 
12 
 
 THE HUGUENOTS IN FLORIDA. 
 
 to Florida, with a large fleet, to relieve Laudon- 
 niere of his command. 
 
 On August 14, 1565, the vessels arrived off 
 the coast of Florida, and meeting some Indians 
 there, he asked them where the new colony. Fort 
 
 Caroline, was situated. 
 They told him they had 
 heard there were white 
 men fifty miles toward 
 the north. The vessels 
 sailed until they reached 
 the St. John, and taking 
 two of the smallest ships, 
 Captain Ribaut followed 
 the stream until they 
 reached Fort Caroline. 
 Laudonniere met them at the bank. "At 
 last, God be praised! " he cried. ''We thought 
 you had abandoned us, and we are starving. 
 Yes, actually starving. The Indians will not 
 bring us food, and we were too few to venture 
 in those hostile woods to seek it. I will return 
 to France immediately. I can bear a great deal, 
 but the limit has been reached." 
 
 ''But," asked Captain Ribaut, "we found the 
 Indians friendly and obliging when we first 
 came. Why will they not now bring provisions?" 
 
 MEETING SOME INDIANS THERE. 
 
THE HUGUENOTS IN FLORIDA. 13 
 
 Laudonniere shrugged his shoulders. *'Ah, 
 well, you see, our men have made enemies; 
 they were hard to control. They made forays, 
 brought prisoners to the fort, and, to speak 
 frankly, they have acted like fools, and worse. 
 If you had not come when you did, you would 
 not have found us here, and our scalps would 
 have decorated the wigwams." 
 
 Captain Ribaut shook his head. He knew 
 well the danger of awakening the hostility of 
 the savages. " It is bad," he said, "for we shall 
 have two enemies. Philip of Spain is sending 
 out a fleet under Don Pedro Menendez de 
 Aviles, to drive us from Florida if he can. We 
 are ordered to resist him to the death." 
 
 Menendez reached the coast of Florida, his 
 fieet badly storm-beaten. Ribaut demanded his 
 business. He was told that war was declared 
 between Spain and France, and that they were 
 there as enemies. 
 
 The French considered it more prudent to 
 retreat a short distance, until their preparations 
 could be made, and the Spaniards pursued them 
 only to the mouth of the river they called 
 Dauphin. Jean Ribaut, returning to Fort 
 Caroline, took on board nearly all the able-bodied 
 men, much against the will of Laudonniere, 
 
14 THE HUGUENOTS IN FLORIDA. 
 
 who was left with invalids, women, and a small 
 number of troops. Ribaut intended to attack 
 the Spaniards, and in one decisive engagement 
 drive them from Florida. 
 
 But Menendez, who had gained a foothold, 
 and commenced building Fort Marion, had his 
 spies among the Indians, and knew that Captain 
 Ribaut had taken all the available forces from 
 Fort Caroline. Taking Indian guides, with a 
 strong force he made his way through marsh 
 and morass, and in the midst of a terrible storm 
 swooped down on the fort, and took it after a 
 short resistance. 
 
 A survivor wrote, "I escaped, God knows 
 how, and ran to the thick woods. I stopped at 
 some little distance, and hiding behind the trees, 
 looked down at the inner court of the fort where 
 the massacre was going on. It was so horrible 
 that I covered my eyes with my hands, and ran 
 on headlong, knowing not and caring not where 
 I was going, if I could only get away from that 
 spot. Suddenly in front of me I heard groans 
 and cries, and came upon some of our men who 
 had also escaped. We knelt down and prayed 
 God to help us. 
 
 "We made for the seacoast, as well as we 
 could shape our course. We came to rivers, 
 
THE HUGUENOTS IN FLORIDA. 
 
 15 
 
 which we crossed, sometimes by swimming, 
 sometimes by the aid of fallen trees. At last, 
 when exhausted, and ready to lie down and die, 
 we came to a vast sea-marsh, and one of our 
 men, climbing a high tree, saw not only the sea, 
 but the vessel of 
 Captain Maillard, 
 which he signaled, 
 and they sent boats 
 after us. 
 
 *' More dead than 
 alive, we were taken 
 on board, and there 
 we found the Sieur 
 Laudonniere, who had also escaped. Soon 
 the Pearl sailed up to us, and Capt. Jean Ribaut 
 told how his vessels had been dispersed and 
 wrecked by the hurricane, during which the 
 fort had been taken. But he said he would 
 never leave the coast while there was a chance 
 of any of our men escaping; that it was his 
 duty to stay and give them aid. But Captain 
 Maillard sailed for France, taking us with him." 
 
 Captain Ribaut, who would not desert his 
 post of duty, was again tempest-tossed, and his 
 remaining vessels were driven ashore. The 
 
 French wandered about, half 
 
 starving, 
 
 and 
 
16 THE HUGUENOTS IN FLORIDA. 
 
 knowing well that the Indians, whom the sol- 
 diers at the fort had angered, would take the 
 first chance to revenge themselves. 
 
 A body of Spaniards came upon them. They 
 were too weak to resist, and gave up their arms 
 upon a solemn promise from Vallemande, the 
 commanding ofificer, that they should be treated 
 as prisoners of war. 
 
 Ribaut, honorable and truthful himself, believed 
 the Spaniard. They were marched on, and as 
 he was in front, he did not see that his thirty 
 men had their hands tied behind their backs. 
 
 As they entered the fort, the massacre began. 
 Captain Ribaut himself was first to fall ; then 
 the others were stricken down, one by one. In 
 all, nine hundred Huguenots were murdered 
 on the banks of the St. John. 
 
 There have been few such scenes in American 
 history, and the tragedy has been but little 
 noted. The lovely Floridian river retains no 
 token of this massacre. While we remember 
 the bloodshed of that fatal day, we do not forget 
 the heroic self-sacrifice of brave Jean Ribaut, 
 who gave up his life upon the bare chance of 
 saving some fugitive from a cruel death. 
 
 Max Owen. 
 
RATCLIFFE'S CONSPIRACY. 
 
 ON a blustering winter morning in 1608 
 Edmund Culpepper paced to and fro before 
 the gateway of the stockade surrounding a 
 huddle of cabins which called itself *'The Vir- 
 ginia Company's Colony of Jamestown." 
 
 With his musket under his arm he awaited 
 the relief, who would send him to a breakfast 
 for which he was none the less hungry because he 
 feared this morning's rations would be scantier 
 than his scanty supper of corn-meal porridge. 
 
 He did not worry about warlike intruders, for 
 only last week Powhatan, who ruled all the 
 Virginia Indians, had smoked a "peace-pipe" 
 with John Smith, who, by energy and prudence, 
 had become the admitted leader of the colony. 
 
 In that winter of 1608 the story was not two 
 months old of how Powhatan's dearest child 
 had risked her own life to save Smith, then a 
 prisoner in her father's tent, and how Smith's 
 wisdom and courage had so won upon the 
 Indian king that he was permitted to return to 
 the colony with gifts of food and tobacco, and 
 promises of friendship. 
 
18 RATCLIFFE'S CONSPIRACY. 
 
 All winter this friendship had proved the 
 single hopeful element in the condition of the 
 despondent, half-starved English, among whom 
 hardly forty survived from three times that 
 number of '* gentlemen adventurers." 
 
 Discontent was held in check only by the new 
 governor's energy and his dauntless assurances 
 that Newport, their first leader, would presently 
 return from England with reenforcements and 
 provisions for beginning an era of prosperity. 
 
 Culpepper believed in Smith's assurances as 
 heartily as the captain himself. "No sluggard 
 he!" the lad thought, admiringly, as Smith 
 appeared on the rampart. " Tis a marvel he 
 keeps his temper with those drones who would 
 rather idle in their chimney-corners, groaning 
 that Newport hath forsaken us, than work upon 
 the quarters we promised to have ready before 
 the Constant brings us a crowd of newcomers!" 
 
 Then the thrill of hero-worship vanished 
 before a thrill of hunger quite as keen ! " Petti- 
 place, at last! " he exclaimed aloud, as the relief 
 approached. "Are the bacon and eggs yet 
 more excellent than their wont, Master Petti- 
 place, that you have lingered with them?" 
 
 "Thou wilt need to draw thy belt a hole 
 closer, for the porridge is scantier than ever! 
 
RATCLIFFE'S CONSPIRACy. 19 
 
 But worse than short rations, there's like to be 
 trouble with Ratcliffe and his faction." 
 
 " Has anything happened?" 
 
 ''This! When Captain Smith bade Ratcliffe 
 take the working shift at once to the quarters 
 building for Newport's arrival, Ratcliffe answered 
 sullenly that there need be no haste to prepare 
 for a most doubtful event. To which Smith 
 exclaimed that Ratcliffe's duty was not to ques- 
 tion, but to obey the orders of his superiors; 
 and Ratcliffe muttered that a superior whom his 
 own vote had helped to make could be easily 
 unmade. Whereupon Smith, with his hand on 
 his sword, demanded him to repeat that mutter- 
 ing aloud, which Ratcliffe shirked, smiling falsely. 
 
 '* * Empty stomachs and short tempers go ever 
 together,' he declared. ' Get your Indian friends 
 to fill the one, and I promise to sweeten the 
 other.' Then Smith cried out that the English 
 were wont to earn their meat, not beg it, and 
 that he feared Master Ratcliffe must be sickening 
 of the fever thus to fail in spirit. So he left us, 
 some ashamed of their discontent, but many 
 gathering about Ratcliffe before I finished scra- 
 ping my porringer." 
 
 Edmund looked wistfully toward the forest 
 as Pettiplace paused. Then he shouted a 
 
20 
 
 RATCLIFFE'S CONSPIRACY. 
 
 "view-halloo" which brought the homesick ad- 
 venturers rushing from the common - house, 
 while Smith himself ran down from the rampart. 
 
 "Hast gone mad?" 
 Smith began. 
 
 But Edmund confront- 
 ed him unabashed. 
 "Doth not a view-halloo 
 announce the sight of 
 the game?" he asked, 
 triumphantly. "Andean 
 your excellency deny 
 that a deer cometh this 
 way as fast as four legs 
 not its own can bring it ?" 
 A laugh, ending in a 
 shout of welcome, broke 
 from every throat in the 
 hungry crowd, while 
 Smith stepped forward 
 briskly. An Indian girl about thirteen years 
 old emerged from the forest, followed by two 
 tall Indian youths, carrying a huge buck, slung 
 between them. 
 
 "Uncover, gentlemen!" Smith commanded. 
 Then he bent to kiss the brown hand Pocahontas 
 held out to him. "My princess hath ever a 
 
 CAPT. JOHN SMITH. 
 
RATCLIFFE'S CONSPIRACY. 21 
 
 new gift for her slave!" he exclaimed, in fash- 
 ionable court language, which for motives both 
 chivalrous and politic, he adopted toward this 
 child of the Indian king. 
 
 *'Nay, not my slave, but my friend," Poca- 
 hontas answered, in the careful English she was 
 learning. "You have told me that in England 
 a princess maketh friends of the great warriors, 
 and I love the English ways." 
 
 "For which love of yours we English are 
 devoutly thankful," Smith replied, gravely, and 
 standing aside, permitted the greetings, half- 
 ceremonious, half-joking, with which the others 
 gathered about this little Indian maid. 
 
 Not until Edmund returned did Smith inter- 
 rupt Pocahontas's pleasure in the gay flattery. 
 "The princess bids you dine with her at noon 
 in the common-house ! " Smith exclaimed, at 
 last. " Until then, Master Ratcliffe will take 
 his party to work on the new quarters, and 
 Master Porter will lead his company to repair 
 the break in the fort rampart." 
 
 "What will Captain Smith do?" 
 
 The taunting voice was clearly audible, though 
 nobody seemed to have spoken. 
 
 "Captain Smith will oversee both works, as 
 suits the duty of the governor of this colony 
 
22 RATCLIFFE'S CONSPIRACY. 
 
 in the absence of Captain Newport," Smith 
 answered, with a flashing glance which vainly 
 sought the owner of the voice. 
 
 Everybody dispersed without further question, 
 and Smith was presently alone with Edmund 
 and Pocahontas. ''Ned, thou shalt lead our 
 princess to the sunny path between the river 
 and the willows, where the wind bloweth 
 not!" he exclaimed, gaily. "And there, young 
 coxcomb, thou shalt amuse her with stories of 
 court pageants and Queen Anne's finery." 
 
 "Will you not tell me stories, too?" she 
 begged, with her hand still lingering in his clasp. 
 
 "I am a rough soldier, with no such pretty 
 tales for the telling, and with much pressing 
 business," he said, gendy. "Yet will I follow 
 later, for that reading lesson we have missed 
 these eight days." 
 
 " My Uncle Opecanchanough persuaded my 
 father that you taught me magic from the book 
 about your God. They forbade me to come 
 here ; but to-day they sent me freely." 
 
 Smith, who carried his Bible wherever he 
 carried his sword, had begun the instruction of 
 Pocahontas in Christianity, afterward completed 
 by her English husband. But her words brought 
 more immediate anxiety than her conversion. 
 
RATCLIFFE'S CONSPIRACY. 
 
 23 
 
 COPYRIGH 
 
 905, JAMESTOWN OFFICIAL PHOTO CO. 
 
 *'Thy Uncle Opecanchanough is sure to mean 
 unfriendliness to us English, whether he urgeth 
 thy father to let thee come hither or to restrain 
 thee," he said, thoughtfully ; and waving his hand 
 in farewell, he turned 
 through the gateway. 
 
 The two scrambled 
 down the steep bank 
 to a narrow, sandy 
 path beside the river. 
 
 " It is not of thy 
 king's court I would 
 hear," Pocahontas 
 smiled. "Last week 
 thou didst tell me thy 
 sisters were little 
 maids like me." 
 
 *' Nan is of thine 
 age, and a pretty little 
 minx, who can dance 
 a minuet — " 
 
 " I can dance, too," 
 
 TOWER OF THE lAMESTOWN CHURCH. 
 
 Pocahontas broke in. " And I also am beautiful." 
 Edmund laughed yet more heartily. "Nan 
 calls herself fair, I doubt not, but she would 
 never say so, even to her dearest friend." 
 
 "Why should she not say so if it be the truth ? " 
 
24 RATCLIFFE'S CONSPIRACY. 
 
 " My lady mother hath taught her that a maid 
 must leave to others the praise of her beauty." 
 
 *'Then I will never call myself beautiful again. 
 Tell me something more wherein I am unlike thy 
 sisters, for I desire to be as English as they are." 
 
 ''That thou couldst not be, nor must thou 
 desire it," he protested. "Nan turns faint for 
 a cut finger, and though Bess helps my mother 
 visit the sick, she would never dare risk her life 
 to save a stranger, as thou didst, or to walk 
 through miles of snow-drift to feed starving men, 
 as thou hast done many times this winter." 
 
 ''Hush!" whispered Pocahontas. The soft- 
 ness his praise had brought to her eyes vanished 
 as she grasped his arm. "One of my people 
 cometh; I hear a moccasin tread." 
 
 Screened by the drooping branches of huge 
 willows, they recognized the stern features of 
 Opecanchanough, Powhatan's brother, who had 
 opposed the sparing of Smith's life, and was 
 ever, as Smith had just declared, the persistent 
 enemy of the English settlers. 
 
 The next moment the boy's heart sank. For, 
 creeping as if he feared a spying gaze at each 
 step, Ratcliffe drew near, and Opecanchanough 
 received him in a manner which showed the 
 meeting to be prearranged. 
 
RATCLIFFE'S CONSPIRACY. 25 
 
 The Indian spoke first in his own language, 
 loudly enough to reach the listeners; but 
 Edmund, who understood only a few words, 
 waited impatiently to gather his meaning from 
 Ratcliffe's reply, as that worthy had publicly 
 scorned Smith's advice that the colonists should 
 learn the speech of their neighbors. 
 
 The reply, however, was uttered in fairly 
 fluent Indian, and the two or three English 
 phrases used sent the color from the boy's 
 cheeks. With clenched fists he listened motion- 
 less. Only his troubled eyes left Ratcliffe's 
 cringing smiles and Opecanchanough's stolid 
 calm for the dark face of Pocahontas. 
 
 "What evil do they mean us?" Edmund 
 murmured, as, each in his own direction, Indian 
 and Englishman passed out of sight. 
 
 "Quiet!" she whispered. "My uncle hath 
 the ears of a squirrel." Nor would she heed his 
 mute impatience for several minutes. 
 
 "They spoke often the name of the Good 
 Speed, your single ship at anchor yonder," she 
 said, at last. " Did not that tell — " 
 
 " Doth Ratcliffe mean to barter our only ship 
 to your people?" 
 
 "Nay, that would harm himself as much as it 
 would harm his countrymen," she answered. 
 
26 RATCLIFFE'S CONSPIRACY. 
 
 "Come ! We must run. We must find Captain 
 Smith. This east wind may change at any 
 moment ; and my uncle told Ratcliffe that stores 
 of corn-meal and tobacco await the Good Speed 
 at the point where the river reacheth the sea — " 
 
 *' But Ratcliffe?" Edmund interrupted, as 
 they ran toward the settlement. 
 
 " Ratcliffe promised that himself, Wingfield, 
 and twenty more would board the Good Speed 
 the next night the west wind bloweth, overpower 
 the few sailors who guard it, and after taking 
 up the stores my uncle hath provided, sail forth 
 for England, leaving Captain Smith and a dozen 
 loyal to him in Jamestown." 
 
 " To be butchered whenever Opecanchanough 
 and his tribe pleaseth!" Edmund broke out, 
 furiously, wrenching his hand from her hold. 
 
 "You have enough English traitors to make 
 an end of the honest men among you ! " she cried. 
 Then her eyes softened. "Poor Ned ! It is bitter 
 to be betrayed. I, too, dread my uncle's schemes. 
 For in the women's lodge they whisper that 
 he meaneth to be king when Powhatan dieth, 
 instead of my little brother Nantauquas, and 
 that he will destroy all whom Powhatan loved." 
 
 Hastening forward, they saw John Smith 
 striding toward them. Quickly, in her own 
 
RATCLIFFE'S CONSPIRACY. 27 
 
 language, Pocahontas told him the plot. He 
 kissed her hand gravely when she paused. 
 
 ''Without thee, princess, not an Englishman 
 would be left alive in Virginia to meet Newport ! 
 But thou shalt see John Smith outwit the 
 enemies of this colony. They cannot sail until 
 this east wind changes, but we can balk them 
 at once ; only my princess must help me again." 
 
 An hour later the colonists were summoned 
 by a merry blowing of horns to the common- 
 house, whence came an odor of roast venison. 
 
 Except the sentries on the fort whom Smith 
 chose from his devoted friends, all were promptly 
 seated before the rough tables, where they were 
 bountifully served with meat and corn bread. 
 
 At the upper end of one table Smith placed 
 Pocahontas on his right; and hungry as Edmund 
 was, he looked at them oftener than at his plate. 
 But neither man nor maid showed interest in 
 anything beyond their dinner. 
 
 When the meal ended. Captain Smith arose. 
 
 "This is the banquet of the Princess Poca- 
 hontas, who desireth to bestow yet another 
 pleasure upon us in proof of her friendship and 
 the king her father's good-will," he said, smiling. 
 " She hath comforted our bodies. She will now 
 delight our spirits. She will dance for us." 
 
RATCLIFFE'S CONSPIRACY. 29 
 
 Pocahontas smiled gravely, and began to 
 dance, while the two Indian serving lads who 
 had come with her began a harsh chant, which 
 quickened gradually, and to which her steps 
 kept pace. It was then that Edmund's heart 
 fluttered as one and another of Smith's trustiest 
 friends noiselessly left the room without disturb- 
 ing the lazy enjoyment of their companions, 
 except Ratcliffe, who once half-rose, but meeting 
 Smith's questioning gaze, sat down again. 
 
 With a wild grace learned of deer or panther, 
 or other forest creatures, Pocahontas whirled 
 and bounded, swiftly, smoothly, vehemently, 
 until the musicians' chant grew breathless, and 
 her delicate face was pinched with exhaustion. 
 Yet she did not falter until the report of a 
 distant musket rang sharply. Then she dropped 
 upon a bench, and every man sprang to his feet. 
 
 "Newport!" was the general cry, although 
 Ratcliffe and Wingfield made for the door. 
 Smith stood smiling triumphandy. " Culpepper 
 and Pettiplace, allow none of these gentlemen 
 to leave this house!" he commanded. "That 
 musket was not fired by Newport's orders, but 
 by mine. It means not that the ship Co7istant 
 hath arrived, but that the ship Good Speed will 
 not sail by the next west wind. It means that 
 
30 RATCLIFFE'S CONSPIRACY. 
 
 however John Smith and those who trust him 
 may die, it will not be like starved rats in a trap 
 set by an Indian villain and an English traitor! 
 Master Ratcliffe, I demand your sword, in the 
 name of King James and the Virginia Company." 
 
 Instantly the room was in tumult. Some 
 rallied wnth bared weapons about Ratcliffe, but 
 most shouted self-exculpation or clamored for 
 further explanation. Smith, sturdy and erect, 
 dominated the tumult. 
 
 "That is more seemly, gentlemen!" he 
 exclaimed, when other voices quieted so that 
 his could be heard. "A plot hath been discov- 
 ered whereby a portion of this company, led by 
 Master Ratcliffe, agreed to seize the colony's 
 remaining ship, and with the next west wind 
 sail for England, leaving the few of us who 
 should keep our vow of abiding Newport's 
 return to be massacred by our Indian enemies. 
 Thanks be to God and the Princess Pocahontas, 
 word came to rne of this plot in season to baffle 
 it. The Good Speed is now garrisoned by ten 
 men, who have directed its two culverins upon 
 this town, and who will assuredly destroy any 
 rowboat approaching the ship without my signal. 
 You will do well, gendemen, to be ruled peace- 
 fully in this matter by me." 
 
RATCLIFFE'S CONSPIRACY. 31 
 
 The Jamestown colonists had faced alternatives 
 of life and death so often that they came promptly 
 to a decision. Swords were sheathed, hats 
 were doffed, and not a voice was lifted in protest, 
 while Ratcliffe sullenly surrendered his weapon 
 to Pettiplace, hating his own party just then 
 more even than he hated Smith, who was 
 leading Pocahontas in stately fashion through 
 the dividing crowd, out upon the empty street. 
 
 There they halted, and Smith glanced up at 
 the fast-scudding clouds. "See, child! Thou 
 wast barely in time, for the wind hath left the 
 east. It will blow from the west to-night." 
 
 "Think you, captain, those turncoats will stay 
 quiet?" asked Edmund, who had followed 
 anxiously from the common-house. 
 
 Smith smiled exultantly. "The Good Speed's 
 culverins, pointed this way by my command, 
 will control some. The shame honest men feel 
 when found in the society of rogues will control 
 others. And we may safely await Newport, 
 whom may God send us soon ! " 
 
 He turned to Pocahontas. " Meanwhile our 
 princess must hasten homeward, or she will not 
 be permitted to come to us again." 
 
 "I shall come no more, whether I haste or 
 tarry," she answered. "My father bade me be 
 
32 RATCLIFFE'S CONSPIRACY. 
 
 in the woman's lodge by noon, and he forgives 
 not disobedience." 
 
 "If you fear his wrath, stay with us!" Smith 
 exclaimed. "There are enough loyal English- 
 men in Jamestown to protect their benefactress." 
 
 "Nay, my father will not hurt me, not even 
 though Opecanchanough persuade him that I 
 love the strangers better than mine own people." 
 
 She paused abruptly, waving her hand toward 
 the river. "What is that — like a white cloud 
 above the seaward point?" she cried. 
 
 Smith's glance and Edmund's followed hers — 
 and a great shout broke from them. 
 
 "A ship ! Newport's ship ! God be thanked, 
 those sails are English cut!" 
 
 For an instant every sense of man and boy 
 was absorbed in watching the fuller appearing 
 of the sails, which brought safety to the colony. 
 
 When they remembered Pocahontas, her slight 
 figure was swiftly vanishing into the forest. 
 
 Nor did she return to Jamestown until two 
 years later, when she was brought there a pris- 
 oner, but tenderly welcomed, to find, as she 
 deserved, the love and happiness of her life. 
 
 Ellen Mackubin. 
 
HUDSON'S DISCOVERIES. 
 
 nPHE name of Hudson is connected with the 
 ■* largest river in New York; it belongs also 
 to the bay and strait of the British possessions. 
 The river and the bay are far apart, and yet the 
 extent of the coast between them gives us a 
 limited idea of how much of the globe Hudson 
 explored. The country along the Hudson River 
 belonged to the Dutch ; that about Hudson 
 Bay was, from the first, English. 
 
 Hudson's first voyage, of which he left a 
 journal, was undertaken, he tells us, at the 
 charge of "certain worshipfull Merchants of 
 London," in 1607. Its purpose was to discover 
 a passage by the north pole to Japan and China. 
 
 The second expedition was made from London, 
 in 1608, but this time Hudson gave his attention 
 particularly to the passage by the northeast, 
 advancing as far as Nova Zembla. 
 
 Early in January, 1609, Hudson entered into 
 an agreement with the Dutch East India Com- 
 pany, by which he agreed to search for a passage 
 to the north of Nova Zembla. 
 
 On April 4, 1609, he set sail from Amsterdam. 
 
34 HUDSON'S DISCOVERIES. 
 
 His vessel was the Half Moon, a yacht of about 
 eighty tons' burden, and manned by a motley 
 crew of Dutch and English. He passed the 
 North Cape on May 5th, and in the course of a 
 few days came to the edge of the ice which 
 encompassed Nova Zembla. 
 
 Although the orders given to Hudson required 
 that he should search for a passage only by way 
 of the northeast, yet on May 14th, with the 
 consent of his officers and men, he shaped his 
 course toward the coast of America. On July 
 1 2th he first saw the American shores, and on 
 the 1 8th he anchored in a safe harbor, probably 
 Penobscot Bay, on the coast of Maine. 
 
 From this point he sailed southward until he 
 was opposite the entrance to James River, where 
 the English had settled two years before. Sat- 
 isfied that there was no passage through the 
 continent south of that point, he turned toward 
 the north, and examined the coast with care. 
 
 On August 28th he discovered Delaware Bay, 
 and a few days later, September 3d, he anchored 
 inside of Sandy Hook. The discovery of the 
 North River followed, and Hudson sailed up this 
 river, between the Palisades and the beautiful 
 banks of forest-clad hills, seeing occasional 
 fields of corn and Indian wigwams. 
 
HUDSON'S DISCOVERIES. 
 
 35 
 
 At first the Indians looked on the Half Moon 
 with terror, but seeing human beings on board, 
 they approached in their canoes, and soon were 
 engaged in a friendly barter of food and furs 
 for knives, axes, 
 cloth and shoes. 
 It was not long 
 before a quarrel 
 arose between the 
 natives and the 
 sailors in which 
 one of Hudson's 
 men was killed. 
 
 Hudson con- 
 tinued his explor- 
 ation, sailing up 
 the river as far as 
 the place where 
 Albany now stands. There he found the chan- 
 nel contracting, instead of widening out into the 
 great western ocean, as he had hoped. 
 
 His small boats returned from further search, 
 and reported that it was only an inland river. 
 So back went Hudson, past the Palisades and 
 the narrow island that is now covered by the 
 great city, back to Holland, and gave to the 
 Dutch a claim to all the region about the newly 
 
 HALF -MOON. 
 
36 HUDSON'S DISCOVERIES. 
 
 discovered river. They named the country 
 New Netherlands, and engaged in profitable 
 trade for furs with the Indians. They located 
 the headquarters of their trading company on 
 Manhattan Island, which they later bought for 
 twenty-four dollars, and on which there grew 
 up an enterprising colony which they called 
 New Amsterdam. 
 
 In April, 1610, Hudson sailed under English 
 auspices in search of a northeast passage. On 
 this voyage he discovered the strait and the 
 bay which have since borne his name. The 
 following winter he spent on the shores of 
 Hudson Bay. The suffering from the want 
 of food was great, and his crew in the spring 
 showed a natural impatience of longer delay. 
 In a mutinous outbreak they put their com- 
 mander, with his son and several sick sailors, 
 into a frail boat; and on Midsummer day, 
 161 1, they cut him adrift in the midst of the 
 arctic waters. No further trace of the great 
 navigator was ever found. 
 
 Max Owen. 
 
THE FIRST YANKEES. 
 
 ON a morning in April, 1621, all the Yankees 
 in the world were gathered upon a hill, 
 watching a small vessel as she stood out to sea, 
 and slowly faded into the eastern horizon. 
 
 The little ship was the Mayflower, going 
 home without a cargo, to the sore disappoint- 
 ment of the merchants who had sent her across 
 the sea. The company watching her was the 
 Plymouth Colony, left by her on a desolate shore 
 to live, if they could ; to die, if they must. 
 
 It seems absurd to call these people Pilgrim 
 Fathers, this wan and sickly band of twenty 
 men, eight women, and twenty-three children, 
 including two babies still in their mothers' arms. 
 
 I call them Yankees, because, in getting out 
 of their difificulties, they showed all the charac- 
 teristic Yankee traits. 
 
 Their ship was gone. The nearest white 
 settlement was on the James River in Virginia. 
 They owed a great deal of money to merchants 
 in England. They did not own the barren land 
 on which their cabins were built. They did not 
 possess a horse, an ox, a cow, or a pig, and 
 what provisions they had left were bad or stale. 
 
38 THE FIRST YANKEES. 
 
 During the winter nearly half their number 
 had died from exposure and bad food, and on 
 this April day of the Mayflower s sailing there 
 was scarcely one among them who had recovered 
 the full measure of his strength. Their capital 
 consisted of a supply of farming tools, a quantity 
 of Engrlish seeds, and ten bushels of Indian corn 
 which they had found hidden in the earth. 
 
 In all probability not a man among them had 
 ever before seen an ear of Indian corn, and had 
 not the least idea of the mode of cultivating it. 
 If they had put it into the ground as they did 
 their peas and other English seeds, they would 
 have had no harvest, as the soil there is not 
 much better than the sand of Cape Cod. 
 
 It was an Indian who gave them the informa- 
 tion, without which they must have perished. 
 There were no Indians in their immediate neigh- 
 borhood ; but owing to their skilful management 
 and dignified urbanity, they had completely won 
 the affections of their Indian visitors, one of 
 whom, named Squanto, a knowing, handy fellow, 
 had been born and reared on that very spot. 
 
 He knew all the ledges along the coast where 
 codfish and haddock congregate, the places 
 where lobsters abound, and where clams could 
 be abundantly dug. He knew the value of 
 
THE FIRST YANKEES. 39 
 
 beaver skins and otter skins. Above all, he 
 knew the art and mystery of raising Indian 
 corn in that sandy soil. He told them how to 
 plant the corn in hills and rows, and showed 
 them the Indian way of fertilizing the sand. 
 
 There is a rapid stream of fresh water empty- 
 ing into Plymouth harbor, into which every 
 
 ^S 
 
 -_ 
 
 
 
 ^^SftiLi ' 
 
 
 ^- 
 
 -- 1 .- 
 
 ^^m 
 
 ^Ipr, ^« 
 
 ^Hi 
 
 
 
 ttL^ 
 
 11 
 
 1 
 
 1 
 
 WATCHING A S.MALL VESSEL. 
 
 spring prodigious numbers of small, fat fish 
 enter from the ocean to deposit their eggs. Two 
 or three of these fish, which are called alewives, 
 put into each hill of corn, gave a luxuriant crop. 
 Squanto showed them the Indian mode of 
 catching these fish, and assisted them to plant 
 twenty acres with their precious store of seed. 
 
40 THE FIRST YANKEES. 
 
 By the end of the planting season they had a 
 little farm of twenty-six acres all nicely planted 
 — six acres of English barley and peas, and 
 twenty acres of maize. 
 
 In catching these precious fish the Pilgrims 
 very soon showed that they were genuine 
 Yankees. They converted that little river into 
 a Yankee fish-trap, which would have been 
 worthy of a patent if the patent- office had then 
 been ready for business. 
 
 They observed that the fish come in with the 
 tide, deposit their spawn, and go out with the 
 tide. By constructing two small dams and some 
 simple trap-doors, they fixed their river in such a 
 way that ten or fifteen thousand fish could get in 
 very easily ; but, on the turn of the tide, the trap- 
 doors shut, the water escaped without difficulty, 
 but the poor fish were left high and dry, to be 
 raked and heaped upon the bank all ready for 
 use. Every man was permitted to carry off a 
 quantity proportioned to the land he cultivated. 
 
 The first harvest came round. The peas were 
 a perfect failure, probably because they were 
 planted too late. The sun parched and killed 
 the blossoms, and the crop was not worth gath- 
 ering. The barley was pretty good, or, as they 
 said, "indifferent good." But the Indian corn 
 
THE FIRST YANKEES. 
 
 41 
 
 yielded such a bountiful increase that each per- 
 son could be allowed about a peck of meal a 
 week. Seven good houses had been built for 
 dwellings, and four more for storage. 
 
 During that autumn food was superabundant, 
 and they had a truly glorious Thanksgiving 
 feast, which lasted three days, and entertained the 
 chief Massasoit and 
 ninety of his people. 
 
 Wild fowl w^ere 
 so abundant at that 
 season that four 
 men in one day 
 killed nearly enough 
 to supply the col- 
 ony for a week. 
 Excellent health 
 prevailed. They 
 were well sheltered from the inclemency of the 
 weather ; bright fires were burning ; and they wrote 
 home such cheering accounts that newcomers 
 arrived faster than food could be grown for them. 
 
 During the two summers following they had 
 long periods of partial famine. The second 
 summer they planted nearly sixty acres with 
 corn, but the crop was scanty, partly through 
 the weakness of the men from scarcity of food. 
 
 SHELLING INDIAN CORN. 
 
42 THE FIRST YANKEES. 
 
 The third summer the crop of corn was so 
 abundant that they had some to sell, and from 
 that time to the present all good Yankees have 
 had enough to eat. In 1624, when they imported 
 cattle, the colony consisted of one hundred and 
 eighty people, who lived in thirty-two cabins. 
 
 They now began to sell corn to the fishermen 
 along the coast; they let the Indians know that 
 they had a good bushel of corn ready for every 
 beaver-skin that might be brought in. Every 
 vessel that went home to England carried beaver- 
 skins packed in hogsheads, which yielded a 
 surprising profit. 
 
 In twenty-one years after their first arrival, the 
 Plymouth Yankees had paid all their English debt, 
 acquired a right to their lands, and were in all 
 respects an independent, prosperous community. 
 
 The original Yankees were successful in busi- 
 ness, because they were brave, just, intelligent 
 and humane. Every step of their genuine 
 progress can be traced to their superior qualities 
 as human beings. They had the courage to 
 try hard things ; they used their minds in doing 
 them, and they took just care of the rights and 
 feelings of those who helped them. 
 
 James Parton. 
 
THE FIRST HOME IN BOSTON. 
 
 THERE is a certain atmosphere of mystery 
 about the first homemaker of Boston. He 
 was a pale, rather tall, spare young man, of 
 English birth, always dressed in a suit of worn 
 black, and his name was William Blackstone, or 
 Blaxton. He had been a student at Cambridge 
 University, and had intended to become an 
 Episcopal clergyman. He was a naturalist by 
 instinct, addicted to experiments in mechanics, 
 and withal a remarkably fearless soul. But we 
 do not certainly know for what reason he came 
 to America to live alone here, nor what resources 
 he brought with him. Some have conjectured 
 that his was a case of unrequited affection, 
 while we have his own statement that disagree- 
 ments with the bishops of the Church of England 
 were at least partly the cause of his seclusion in 
 New England. 
 
 It has been supposed that he came in the 
 ship with Robert Gorges. It is known that he 
 arrived in America as early as 1623, and that 
 by 1626, perhaps a year earlier, he was estab- 
 lished in Shawmut with his books and his goods ; 
 
44 THE FIRST HOME IN BOSTON. 
 
 and that he cleared land for a garden and orchard 
 just below the present Louisburg Square. 
 
 There was then a fine, copious spring of 
 water hereabouts. Blackstone's little farm is 
 believed to have been a little below it, nearer 
 the Charles River, and possibly extending round 
 to the present Common. 
 
 William Blackstone had been living there 
 alone at his little place on the side of the hill 
 for at least four years when Winthrop and his 
 company of Puritans came, long enough to have 
 a garden in a good state of cultivation and fruit- 
 trees near to bearing. 
 
 It would seem that he must have had assist- 
 ance from the Indians to uproot the large stumps 
 from his clearing. These he placed upright, 
 joined closely together, for a fence round his 
 garden and house, to keep out bears, deer and 
 wolves, the first stump fence in New England. 
 
 It was a wild, lonely little home, but quiet 
 and peaceful, and far remote from that busy 
 world which had somehow so deeply wounded 
 the heart of William Blackstone. He prized its 
 quiet; he loved its solitude; he designed to live 
 and die here alone, cultivating his little plantation 
 in the wilderness. 
 
 Then one day in July, 1630, the young recluse, 
 
WILL POINT OUT A BETTER LOCATION. 
 
46 THE FIRST HOME IN BOSTON. 
 
 wandering about over his hill, heard the sounds 
 of shouting and the crash of falling trees. On 
 ascending to the top of the hill, he saw a ship 
 at anchor off what is now Charlestown. Boat- 
 loads of people were disembarking, axmen were 
 at work on shore, fires were kindled, and tempo- 
 rary sheds, too, were in process of erection. 
 
 It was John Winthrop and his colony of 
 Puritans, landing at Charlestown, which they 
 had chosen as the site of their future city. 
 
 Very often throughout that summer of 1630 
 Blackstone, from his hilltop, marked the labors 
 of the new settlers. With his longer experience 
 of the locality he saw that they had made a 
 mistake. There was no good water over there ; 
 the situation was low and unhealthy. 
 
 His elevated, healthier Shawmut, with its fine 
 springs of water, was by far the better site 
 for a settlement. Yet why should he give up 
 his now productive farm and garden to the 
 newcomers ? His quiet life would be at an end ; 
 they would throng the place and overrun it. 
 
 This lonely young reader of books was not 
 lacking in hospitality nor deficient in humane 
 instincts ; and day by day, as he ascended 
 the hill to watch the progress of the settlers, 
 his heart went out to them, all the more when he 
 
THE FIRST HOME IN BOSTON. 47 
 
 understood that numbers of them were dying and 
 that there was much lamentation and mourning. 
 
 Hence it came about that one morning in 
 August, as Governor Winthrop was walking in 
 anxious converse with Mr. Isaac Johnson, the 
 pair took heed of an Indian canoe coming down 
 the Charles River toward their landing-place. 
 
 It was not an Indian, however, who stepped 
 ashore, but a tall, spare 3'oung white man in 
 a worn suit of black, who addressed them most 
 courteously, gave them the name of William 
 Blackstone, and informed them that he lived 
 at Trimountain, on the other side of the bay. 
 
 '' I have seen, good sirs," quoth he, " that you 
 have much sickness in your company. The site 
 which you have chosen is unhealthy and the 
 waters foul. If you may desire to go with me 
 across the bay yonder, I will point out to you a 
 better location, one which you are welcome to 
 share with me." 
 
 Governor Winthrop invited the young stranger 
 to accompany him to his house, and there ques- 
 tioned him at great length. 
 
 The next day the governor, with Sir Richard 
 Saltonstall and four other of the settlers, crossed 
 over to Shawmut, to return Blackstone's visit 
 and inspect the locality. The removal of the 
 
48 THE FIRST HOME IN BOSTON. 
 
 colony from Charlestown followed in due course 
 a few days later. 
 
 Our young hermit settler may therefore be 
 said to have done the first honors of future 
 Boston ; for it is to this hospitable invitation to 
 share his home and lands with him that Boston 
 owes its settlement by the Puritans. 
 
 Four years after Winthrop and his company 
 of Puritans had come to Shawmut by Black- 
 stone's invitation, and settled there, the first 
 settler sold them his land, except a garden-plot 
 of six acres, for the sum of thirty pounds, or 
 about a hundred and fifty dollars. 
 
 This tract of real estate is now worth at least 
 fifty millions of dollars — a striking commentary 
 on the change in values which has taken place 
 since 1634. 
 
 Charles Adams. 
 
STEVENSEN AND VAN HORNE. 
 
 'T^HE canoe trip which Diedrich Stevensen 
 -*■ and Jan Van Home took in May of 1653 
 was ahvays regarded b}' them as the first voyage 
 of the great fleet which in later years was known 
 in all the important ports of the world. 
 
 It was only Jan's foolhardy desire to run Hell 
 Gate in a canoe, Jan's desire and Diedrich's 
 assent against the dictates of his sounder judg- 
 ment, that led to the unexpected adventure. 
 
 As they rounded the point which makes the 
 westerly end of Flushing Bay, there, lying at 
 anchor, was a Dutch bark, its ornamented bow 
 and stern towering high above the waist. 
 
 They both saw that the Indians in canoes 
 about the ship and the bustle on board meant 
 but one thing — smuggling. The boys wished 
 to slip away, but they were so close now that 
 even as they turned their canoe, a boat came 
 from under the stern and pulled toward them. 
 They drove their canoe toward the baixk, strain- 
 ing every muscle to escape. 
 
 But there were four men in the boat, so that 
 
50 STEVENSEN AND VAN HORNE. 
 
 paddle as best they could, the race was quickly 
 over, and the two boys were dragged roughly 
 into the big boat. 
 
 A sailor smashed their frail canoe with an 
 oar, and their hearts sank. What would they 
 do now ? Captain Nielsen would surely go 
 east ; for he had announced that he would put 
 in at New Haven for further cargo. 
 
 When they had clambered through one of the 
 big ports, which opened in the high sides like 
 doors, they were led to the captain. Diedrich 
 gazed at him stolidly, Jan furtively, half-afraid 
 yet defiant. 
 
 " What are you doing here ? " 
 
 Diedrich answered, telling the captain of their 
 trip. Jan thought the captain's eyes twinkled, 
 but he was worried by the captain's threat. 
 
 "You lying rascals! You are spies! You 
 think I am smuggling! I'll show you — I'll 
 smuggle you ! Mate ! Hans ! " he called out 
 sharply. "Tie a heavy weight to their feet and 
 see how they swim ! " 
 
 Even if Jan and Diedrich were not sure of the 
 joke, the mate and Hans must have been ; for 
 although they led the boys to the waist, and 
 handled them roughly, they soon went about 
 their business, and Jan and Diedrich gazed 
 
STEVENSEN AND VAN IIORNE. 51 
 
 gloomily at the Indians, bringing furs aboard, 
 and at the bustling crew. 
 
 Now smuggling in New Amsterdam was 
 unlike smuggling to-day, for in this country 
 there can be a duty only on goods brought in, 
 but the West India Company required payment 
 on goods taken out. 
 
 Peter Stuyvesant, the most famous of all the 
 West India Company's governors, was in charge 
 of New Amsterdam at this time. He was an 
 irascible, loose-jawed, profane old man, who 
 literally ruled New Amsterdam with his hot 
 temper, his rough oaths and his wooden leg. 
 
 Captain Nielsen knew as well as the lads that 
 Governor Peter was in a high state of anger 
 over smuggling, and that any man caught at it 
 would suffer. That was why Jan and Diedrich 
 were especially gloomy over their prospects. 
 
 "We can jump at New Haven," Jan whis- 
 pered, as the boys stood watching the loading. 
 
 "It isn't likely that he will put in at New 
 Haven at all, at least now that he is getting a 
 full cargo," Diedrich answered. 
 
 Jan was silent for a time, but he had a defiant 
 light in his eyes which showed the desperate 
 plans he was turning over in his mind. What- 
 ever shape these may have taken, they were 
 
52 
 
 STEVENSEN AND VAN HORNE. 
 
 thwarted by an unexpected event ; for the rising 
 easterly wind made it impossible for Captain 
 Nielsen to sail through the Sound that night, 
 with no lighthouses to guide his course, and 
 beating is very slow work in a square rigger. 
 
 Instead, he conceived the simple plan of 
 running back through Hell Gate, passing the 
 
 town after dark, and 
 going through the 
 Narrows and out to 
 sea by Sandy Hook, 
 which is to-day the 
 course of the great 
 transatlantic steamers 
 Even if he were seen, 
 J the very daring of the 
 scheme would prevent 
 suspicion. 
 
 So, as soon as his 
 trading with the In- 
 dians was over, he 
 crowded on full sail, 
 
 DRIVING BEFORE THE HEAVY WIND. 
 
 and driving before the heavy wind, plunged 
 boldly through Hell Gate. 
 
 The strength of the gale and the speed of his 
 craft made this course safer than the wild waters 
 seemed to promise, but to Diedrich and Jan 
 
STEVENSEN AND VAN HORNE. 53 
 
 there was a terror in the spray which broke 
 even over the high sides of the Steadfast. 
 
 The sun had set, and the darkness of the 
 night was relieved only by the faint light of a 
 mist-covered moon. The rugged shore on both 
 sides slipped rapidly by. 
 
 When they were well toward the city, where 
 the channel led them close to Allerton's ware- 
 house, Diedrich and Jan found themselves alone 
 on the high poop-deck, with Captain Nielsen at 
 the tiller. To him the boys, in so far as he 
 thought of them, were only troublesome. He 
 may have intended to drop them as soon as 
 occasion permitted ; for he could hardly use 
 them in his crew, and he certainly was too 
 thrifty to take them as passengers. Yet to drop 
 them, to let them tell their story, meant to 
 prevent his return to New Amsterdam. 
 
 Jan, seeing that they were left alone, and the 
 crew all forward or below, whispered to Died- 
 rich: "We pass very close to the shore down 
 by Allerton's. Shall we jump overboard and 
 make a try for it? The captain will never dare 
 stop for us." 
 
 "All right," said Diedrich., "You go first and 
 I'll follow." Then as the Steadfast bore close 
 to the shore, Jan, climbing up the rail, prepared 
 
54 STEVENSEN AND VAN HORNE. 
 
 to jump. Diedrich started to follow, but the 
 outline of Jan's body against the sky-line caught 
 Captain Nielsen's eye. 
 
 With a quick bound he grabbed Jan by the 
 ankle just as the lad was crouching for the 
 spring. Jan lost his balance and fell outward 
 but the captain held on to him and drew him 
 back to the deck. Diedrich hung back in the 
 shadow of the rail, and then, when he saw that 
 Jan was firmly held, darted for the tiller. 
 
 The ship was not twenty yards from shallow 
 water, driving along at a fast clip. It was the 
 work of but an instant to throw the heavy tiller 
 hard over, so that the boat shot for the shore. 
 The captain felt the swerve of his craft. He 
 glanced back, saw Diedrich in the dim light, 
 and made a spring for him. 
 
 But Diedrich was ready. He threw a heavy 
 thole-pin, which struck the captain full in the 
 face with enough force to check his rush, and 
 then he shouted to Jan : " Overboard, quick! " 
 
 Jan clambered to the rail and jumped into 
 the tide. Diedrich heard the splash as he struck 
 the water, heard the rush of heavy boots 
 along the deck as the crew came aft, and saw 
 the captain recover himself and run toward him. 
 
 But all the time the Steadfast was shooting 
 
STEVENSEN AND VAN HORNE. 
 
 55 
 
 
 
 TERDA.M \ 
 
 for the shore, and just as the captain was nearly 
 upon him, she grounded with a rough, grating 
 sound, and then stopped with a jerk. 
 
 Diedrich, dropping the tiller, was first to 
 recover. He darted down the poop, to where 
 the high rail dipped to the waist, and springing 
 to the edge, dived overboard. He came up 
 quickly and struck out for the shore. He 
 had hardly gone ten 
 feet when the cap- 
 tain and three of his 
 men went overboard 
 together. 
 
 It was a short swim, 
 and Diedrich and Jan, accustomed to the water, 
 were better swimmers than their pursuers. The 
 boys reached the shallow water first, and splashed 
 quickly through to the bank. 
 
 Gaining the shore, Jan, who was ahead, led 
 the way toward the scattered houses near by. 
 They heard the rushing steps of the men behind 
 and the cursing of Captain Nielsen. 
 
 ''Quick, Diedrich! To the tavern! If we 
 try to hide here they'll get us, sure." 
 
 So they ran through the streets, the sailors in 
 close pursuit. But as they came to the more 
 thickly settled parts, the men dropped back, and 
 
56 STEVENSEN AND VAN HORNE. 
 
 Diedrich and Jan rushed on safely to the Harberg 
 or Great Tavern, the social center of New 
 Amsterdam. 
 
 It was to this tavern that practically all the 
 freeholders in the town, with their wives, resorted 
 every evening for social gossip. The building 
 was shortly afterward converted into the Stadt 
 Huys, or State House, and stood where now 
 is Coenties Slip on Pearl Street, and a tablet on 
 a gloomy warehouse marks its site. 
 
 To these gatherings of the social Dutch 
 settlers came the captains from foreign ports ; 
 the governor, who was more boisterous than 
 irascible when off duty; Jacob Steendam, the 
 first real poet of this continent ; and dozens of 
 other notables. 
 
 Governor Stuyvesant was talking loudly and 
 emphatically to a roomful of men and women when 
 Jan burst through the door. He had just said 
 that the next smuggler he caught would be hung 
 by his toes from the arms of a windmill in a gale. 
 
 Jan tried to speak, but he was so excited that 
 he only irritated the governor, who shouted at 
 him in plain Dutch : " Get out of here, you impu- 
 dent young brat! Don't you see that I am talking?" 
 
 But Diedrich came forward. 
 
 ''There is a smuggler aground down by 
 
THE GOVERNOR GAZEU WITH STAKING EYES. 
 
58 STEVENSEN AND VAN HORNE. 
 
 Allerton's," he asserted. " They took us aboard 
 from our canoe because they were afraid we 
 would inform you, and then they ran aground." 
 
 The governor gazed at the boys with staring 
 eyes. His suspicious old soul smelled a joke. 
 But Jan's excitement was too real and Diedrich's 
 statement too earnest to leave much doubt. 
 
 " We shall see ! We shall see!" he shouted. 
 *' If you are telling the truth, you won't be sorry, 
 but if you are lying," — and he stamped his 
 ornamented wooden leg, — "I'll fix you both!" 
 
 With a party of soldiers and a curious crowd 
 of citizens at his heels, the governor led the 
 way to the river, with Jan and Diedrich by his 
 side. When they reached the waterside, the 
 captain and his men were laboring with all their 
 strength to move their vessel. But she was 
 hard aground, and a falling tide was making 
 her more solid every minute. 
 
 Captain Nielsen's courage never failed him 
 in emergencies, and he immediately assumed the 
 semblance of innocence. When the governor, 
 with many oaths, ordered him ashore, he came 
 as if he were a much-abused man. 
 
 He told the governor that a couple of rascally 
 boys, whom he had picked up from their frail 
 canoe, had run his boat ashore, and that he 
 
STEVENSEN AND VAN HORNE. 
 
 59 
 
 OLD PRINT. 
 
 would have them punished if there was any 
 justice in Holland or the New Netherlands. 
 
 "Oh, there's justice enough!" roared the 
 governor. "And if what they tell me of smug- 
 gling is true, you will find it before another 
 sunset, you and your drunken sailors." 
 
 Captain Nielsen scoffed disgustedly: "Didn't 
 I register every item of my cargo this afternoon 
 when you were at 
 the dock? How 
 can I be smug- 
 gling when I paid 
 my duties?" 
 
 /'He took a lot 
 of furs from the 
 Indians' canoes 
 up in Flushing 
 Bay," put in Jan. 
 
 I haven't a 
 
 THE PALISADE 
 
 NOW WALL STREET. 
 
 fur aboard which I haven't paid duty on ! " 
 shouted Captain Nielsen. 
 
 " We shall see ! We shall see ! " said Governor 
 Stuyvesant. " Bring a boat! " 
 
 There was a long delay ; then the boys heard 
 the governor storming roughly, and Jan's quick 
 ears heard rambling curses about "two lying 
 whelps of boys," which made him tremble. 
 
60 STEVENSEN AND VAN HORNE. 
 
 Peter Stuyvesant came ashore in a passion. 
 He stumped over the rocks to where the boys 
 stood, and threatened them with his staff. 
 
 Indeed, it would have gone hard with them, if 
 at just that moment Jacob Steendam, the poet, 
 standing close by the waterside, had not spied 
 a floating object, and pulling it ashore, found it 
 to be a bale of furs not even soaked through. 
 
 He bore them to the governor. " I think, sir, 
 the boys are telling the truth. I just fished this 
 out of the water, and it hasn't been there long. 
 No doubt we can find more if we look for them." 
 
 The governor, angrier than ever now, went 
 back to the boat, and with his men searched 
 about in the dark, picking up a number of other 
 bales, and missing many which were discovered 
 about the harbor the next day. 
 
 When he came back he spoke almost kindly 
 to the boys. ''You have done well, boys, and 
 I will not forget you." 
 
 Captain Nielsen and his men did not hang 
 by their toes, but they were sent to Holland 
 and imprisoned for many years. The governor, 
 when he heard the next day that the Steadfast 
 did not run aground through accident, broke 
 into a loud laugh. "The little rascals!" he 
 shouted. '' Send them to me ! " 
 
STEVENSEN AND VAN HORNE. 61 
 
 Jan and Diedrich were brought before him. 
 
 '* I said I would not forget you boys, and I 
 will not. I have to take the smuggled furs and 
 the ship for the company, but you can have all 
 the rest of the cargo." 
 
 The boys went away in high spirits. Jan had 
 many schemes, but Diedrich's sounder judgment 
 prevailed, and it was not very many years before 
 these two founded the house of Stevensen & 
 Van Home, Exporters, with the money they 
 received for these furs. 
 
 From a little beginning they developed a 
 great business house, whose ships were known 
 in every port, of the world, even long after they 
 were dead. 
 
 The first modest shop occupied by these lads 
 was located among the sparse Dutch cottages 
 along the way they ran from the furious captain 
 to the Harberg, where now stand immense 
 business buildings, where princely merchants 
 with modern methods command the commerce 
 of a continent in the same spirit of enterprise 
 begun by Stevensen and Van Home. 
 
 Martin M. Foss. 
 
MARQUETTE'S DISCOVERY. 
 
 THE discovery of the Mississippi by De Soto, 
 and the burial of that cavalier in its depths 
 at night, are very poetic and picturesque events 
 of our history. But the northern discovery of 
 the great river by Marquette and Joliet, if less 
 dramatic, is wonderfully attractive in historical 
 incidents and coloring. 
 
 Cast your eye over the map of the Great 
 Lakes and the Mississippi Valley, and you may 
 see at a glance the route of the Jesuit father, 
 Marquette, from the Canadian north to Green 
 Bay, and thence to the Wisconsin River. 
 
 It was early summer when Marquette launched 
 his canoes on the Wisconsin. On June 17, 
 1673, beyond the blooming bluffs a great tide 
 met the Wisconsin at a place where is now the 
 city of Prairie du Chien. The canoe of Marquette 
 drifted down the greater stream, and the pilot- 
 missionary found himself on the Mississippi. 
 
 It has been asserted that La Salle saw the 
 Mississippi before Marquette; but La Salle him- 
 self, in whose enterprise both Marquette and 
 Joliet were engaged, never asserted a title to 
 the discovery. 
 
MARQUETTE'S DISCOVERY. 
 
 63 
 
 As Marquette passed down the great river that 
 opened to him, his eye was suddenly arrested by 
 the effigies of two dragons on the high bluffs, 
 or rocks, at a point near where the city of Alton 
 now stands. Each effigy, he says, "was as 
 big as a calf." They were colored green and 
 
 
 
 HIS EYE WAS SUDDENLY ARRESTED. 
 
 red, had scales, and the tails were wound round 
 their bodies and ended like fishes. 
 
 Marquette was, to use his own language, filled 
 with terror at the sight. He believed that the 
 evil one was the lord of the wilderness, despite 
 the sunshine, the song-birds and flowers, and 
 that this dark dominion was to disappear before 
 the coming of the Cross. 
 
 Marquette made a sketch of the two dragons 
 
64 MARQUETTE'S DISCOVERY. 
 
 of the Mississippi. It was preserved by the 
 French intendants of Canada, and copies of it 
 are yet to be seen. 
 
 The Dragon Rocks have crumbled. In i860 
 the pictures had disappeared, and about that 
 date efforts were made to restore them. But 
 the hammers of science have wholly changed 
 the appearance of the place, which for some 
 two hundred years was known, and appeared on 
 old maps, as Castle Rocks. 
 
 Marquette passed the mounds where St. Louis 
 now stands, and the mouths of the three rivers, 
 the Missouri, the Illinois and the Ohio. The 
 summer deepened ; the world grew more bright 
 and entrancing. He returned, but worn out 
 with the hardships of his voyage, soon after died. 
 
 Thus France, through her discoveries and by 
 colonization, laid claim to the country from the 
 St. Lawrence to the Gulf of Mexico, and from 
 the Allegheny to the Rocky Mountains. Canada 
 was ceded to England ; the Louisiana Purchase 
 gave the Mississippi Valley and the Northwest 
 Territory to the United States. 
 
 Hezekiah Butterworth. 
 
IN COLONIAL DAYS. 
 
THEY SEIZED HER BY ^E WRISTS. 
 
DIANTHE AND THE WITCH. 
 
 /■N 
 
 AY, Giles; no need to tell 
 
 me thou'rt going to Wenham 
 
 Lake to fish!" the old woman 
 
 said, angrily. "No good'll ever 
 
 come to thee there. I know how 
 
 she holds thee with spells — " 
 
 "Mother, mother," Giles cried, "I know it 
 
 likes thee not that I go to Dorothy Wayne ; but 
 
 such talk is dangerous! As thou holdst me 
 
 dear, say naught of spells to any gossip of thine." 
 
 It was the year 1692, the time of the terrible 
 
 witchcraft delusion. Giles bent affectionately 
 
 and coaxingly over his mother for a farewell 
 
 caress, which she gave eagerly, throwing her 
 
 arms about his neck and holding him back. 
 
 Then she watched him go across the porch, and 
 
 down under the trees of the fragrant woodland. 
 
 Her face worked strangely, and gradually grew 
 
 hard. She set her wheel in the corner, took down 
 
 her red cloak from the press, and went across 
 
 the fields to Master Parris's house in Salem town. 
 
 The minister surmised her errand. "You are 
 
 come at a good time, Dame Margery. Know 
 
 you aught of your son's whereabouts?" 
 
 "Alas, do I!" Margery answered bitterly. 
 
68 DIANTHE AND THE WITCH. 
 
 "He is gone to Wenham Lake; and much I 
 fear me no good spell draws him there." 
 
 " I feared it, I feared it! Much has come to 
 our ears concerning the unholy spells and 
 charms of Dorothy Wayne. I trust he has not 
 been misled by them." 
 
 A wave of hot anger flamed over Dame 
 Margery's face. " He is bewitched, and he 
 heeds naught from me! Master Parris, on his 
 coat, Monday morn, when I brushed it, was a 
 long golden hair. I tried to brush it off, and it 
 clung and curled about my hands." 
 
 In a carefully guarded voice, the minister 
 said, "Why did you not think to burn it?" 
 
 "I did, but the evil thing would not burn! 
 A sudden wind whirled it up chimney." 
 
 The minister's face grew very grave, but his 
 tone was one of carefully repressed eagerness. 
 He watched the woman narrowly. 
 
 "I fear me that young man has been foully 
 dealt with. I know how it lies on your heart, 
 dame, but have no fear for him. She shall be 
 entreated, and the mischief stopped." 
 
 Again Margery grew pale. "I know naught," 
 she said. " I've seen naught — " 
 
 Master Parris leaned toward her, laying a 
 hand on her wrist. "Ann Putnam hath seen 
 
DIANTHE AND THE WITCH. 69 
 
 her in the moonlight, with loosened hair and 
 waving arms, singing a charm round a dried-up 
 well. Elizabeth Hubbard saw her mutter spells 
 that drew swarms of wild bees to her hive. 
 And Goodman True saw her wile fish to the 
 shore to feed from her hands." 
 
 A terrified look had come into Dame Margery's 
 face, and he touched again the chord which had 
 worked for his purpose: ''Moreover, in the 
 meeting, look how she draws all the young 
 men's eyes. Hast seen the mole on her chin?" 
 
 Dame Margery started. " 'Tis Satan's sign 
 and seal!" she cried, in a low, horrified tone. 
 
 ''And verily do I fear this son of thine is in 
 her power, but even now godly men are working 
 for his salvation." 
 
 That same evening two stern-faced men rode 
 slowly along the shore of Wenham Lake. Sud- 
 denly one of the two reined in his horse and 
 pointed to a woman on the shore. 
 
 Her hands were upraised to bind a trailing 
 vine about an oak branch, and she was so 
 absorbed in the happy thoughts which sung 
 themseh^es into a familiar psalm-tune that she 
 did not notice the quiet approach of the men, 
 who now stood close behind her. As she 
 lowered her arms, they seized her by the wrists. 
 
70 DIANTHE AND THE WITCH. 
 
 The girl turned with a startled cry ; but seeing 
 only the well-known faces of Marshal Herrick 
 and Robert Neal, she said, with a little laugh, 
 '*Good even to you, Master Herrick! Master 
 Neal, you nigh frighted me." Then as they 
 stood silent, '' Loose my hands now, pray you. 
 I ne'er knew you to tease before." 
 
 The men, grim and unsmiling, answered 
 never a word to Dorothy's speech. They stood, 
 looking silently at each other. And then Her- 
 rick, drawing from his pocket a cord, began to 
 tie it about the girl's wrists. 
 
 " What would you ? " she cried. " Surely this 
 is an unseemly jest, and a long one. Loose 
 me, masters; my mother waits me." 
 
 Then Herrick spoke quite harshly: "She will 
 find other ministering. The service of a witch 
 cannot be profitable, even to bodily comfort." 
 
 A cry of anguish escaped from the girl. '*I 
 must go ! " and with a look of wild appeal she 
 faced the men. '' She is blind! " 
 
 "Thou must come with us," Herrick made 
 answer, "into Salem town, forthwith;" and paying 
 no heed to her desperate struggles, they dragged 
 Dorothy Wayne to the horses, fastened the cord, 
 which bound her cruelly chafed wrists, to the 
 saddle-bow, and compelled her to walk into Salem. 
 
DIANTHE AND THE WITCH. 71 
 
 Arrived at the house of Jonathan Corwin, the 
 magistrate, where she was to be had in safe- 
 keeping for the night, they half-led, half-dragged 
 her up the garret stairs, fastened the door with 
 a strong iron bolt, and left her until the next 
 day, when her trial was to take place in the 
 meeting-house. 
 
 As Dorothy was led into the house, a child, 
 looking from an upper window, had caught 
 sight of her face in the light of the open door, 
 and with a glad cry had darted down the stairs 
 — to find no one! 
 
 Presently the child's father with Herrick and 
 Neal appeared from the door leading to the 
 garret. Master Corwin was evidently ill-pleased 
 to see the little face eagerly waiting for him. 
 
 Before the child could speak he put his hand 
 on her shoulder, and led her toward the door. 
 
 "What dost here, Dianthe?" he said, a little 
 sternly. "Maids of thy years should be asleep 
 at this hour." 
 
 "Nay, father," she said. "I was nigh there 
 when I heard a horse's tramp, and looked from 
 the window to see who came. Then I saw 
 Dorothy, and ran down. Where is she?" 
 
 The father's face hardened. " Get thee to bed, 
 child. To-morrow will be time enow to talk of her." 
 
72 DIANTHE AND THE WITCH. 
 
 "Nay, nay," said Dianthe, with a little wilful 
 air, which at other times her father thought 
 vastly bewitching, **I must know now! Sure, 
 she looked not well. What aileth her, father? 
 And why must I not see her?" 
 
 The father's voice grew stern as he said, "The 
 woman Dorothy Wayne is prisoner here, to be 
 brought before the court to-morrow and tried 
 for witchcraft. My daughter hath no part nor 
 lot with such." 
 
 With an indignant movement the child slipped 
 from his arm and confronted him. " Who saith 
 that, father?" 
 
 " Many," he answered, gravely. " Her specter 
 hath haunted the parsonage and sorely afflicted 
 litde Elizabeth. She hath bewitched many. 
 Dame Margery Howe came to the minister's 
 only this morning, sore troubled because of the 
 bewitchment of her son — " 
 
 "They lie, father, they lie!" cried the girl, 
 her small frame dilating with passionate protest. 
 "The sweetest, kindest — O father!" 
 
 "She hath bewitched thee, too," said Corwin, 
 sadly. Then he put his two hands on her 
 shoulders and his voice grew fierce with the 
 terrible fanaticism of the day: "Child, child, 
 think of the power these emissaries of Satan 
 
DIANTHE AND THE WITCH. 
 
 73 
 
 have over us! See how they multiply apace! 
 They must be stamped out ! The land must 
 be delivered! If Dorothy Wayne confess and 
 repent, well ; if not — " He frowned gloomily. 
 
 THE JUDGE COKWIN HOUSE, SALEM. 
 
 Dianthe caught her breath in a sudden, gasp- 
 ing sob. ''Father! Father! You will not let 
 them hurt her! I love her! Father," — clinging 
 passionately about his neck, — "you will not!" 
 
 Her father put the clinging arms away, not 
 ungently, as he said, "The Lord's work must 
 be done, daughter. This hand may not spare 
 when the Lord commandeth to slay." 
 
74 DIANTHE AND THE WITCH. 
 
 Dianthe's lips parted for another appeal, but 
 a quick change came over her face. That 
 curious likeness to her father became more 
 pronounced; a sudden light filled her eyes, and 
 she turned to leave the room. 
 
 When Dorothy heard the heavy bolt pushed 
 into the socket, she sank upon the floor, over- 
 whelmed with terror. Then starting up with 
 the feeling that she must escape, she groped 
 with outstretched hands toward the square of 
 light made by the window. 
 
 Leaning out, she could dimly see the sloping 
 roof, and knew that somewhere, far below, was 
 the ground, the blessed ground, which she dared 
 not try to reach. She tried to pray, but mock- 
 ing faces peered at her out of the gloom. She 
 began to wonder if she could have committed 
 some secret sin, which had placed her in league 
 with the Powers of Evil. 
 
 The horror grew, until the bats, circling over 
 her head, seemed to the poor girl busy fiends, 
 haunting and pursuing her; and she threw up 
 her arms to ward them off, shrieking aloud, till 
 
DIANTHE AND THE WITCH. 75 
 
 a merciful lethargy fell upon her, and she 
 crouched in the stupor of exhaustion. 
 
 Meanwhile, in the room below, her little 
 friend, with eyes alight with determination, 
 bided her time. When the house was quite 
 still, she slipped softly down the stairs, carrying 
 her shoes in her hand, slid back the bolt of the 
 kitchen door, and stood outside in the dim light 
 of a waning moon, alone in the night. 
 
 Everything was strange to her startled senses, 
 every rustle in the grass, every moan of the wind 
 in the pines, the hoot of a distant owl, all seemed 
 the sign of some enemy of her Dorothy, waiting 
 to defeat her purpose. 
 
 A neighbor's dog howled, and Dianthe ran 
 till she fell, sure that Stubb was pursuing her, 
 and would attack, although in the daylight they 
 were good friends. She lay still a moment, 
 listening for the swift patter of his feet, but he 
 did not come; and just beyond was Dame 
 Margery's cottage. 
 
 She caught her breath, wondering what she 
 could say if she roused the dame. Then finding 
 a pebble, she threw it deftly against the window. 
 A stir within made her heart throb with fear, 
 but it was the face of Giles which peered from 
 the window ; and she called softly, " Hist, Giles ! " 
 
76 DIANTHE AND THE WITCH. 
 
 In a few breathless words she told him of 
 Dorothy's arrest and danger, and in an incred- 
 ibly short time Giles, with Dianthe on a pillion 
 behind him, was speeding over the road she 
 had so bravely travelled alone. 
 
 Just below the house he tethered his horse 
 to a tree, and the two advanced cautiously 
 under the garret window. 
 
 "See, it's not very high," Dianthe whispered. 
 "You can easily catch her." 
 
 Dorothy's stupor was suddenly pierced by a 
 clear, low whistle. She listened, bewildered. 
 She had heard that whistle in the morning ; she 
 must have been dreaming, and she was again 
 sinking into that merciful lethargy when the 
 whistle came again, soft and clear. This time she 
 knew she was awake, and sprang to the window. 
 
 Below her, in the half-light, she could dimly 
 see two figures, and Dianthe's voice called softly 
 to her: "Don't be afraid, Dorothy, dear! Just 
 slide down, and Giles will catch thee. Quick ! " 
 she urged, as Dorothy hesitated. "I did it a 
 year agone but for fun." 
 
 Dorothy felt life and hope coming back with 
 a sudden rush. She set her feet outside the 
 narrow ledge, held an instant to the window- 
 frame, and then let herself go. 
 
DIANTHE AND THE WITCH. 77 
 
 One frightful instant she felt as if falling 
 through immeasurable space; then she stood 
 safe on the ground, with Dianthe's arms about 
 her neck, and Dianthe's eager voice whispering 
 to her: "Quick, quick, before the dawn!" 
 
 The child saw them safely mounted and pacing 
 softly away ; waited, until at a safe distance the 
 hoof-beats changed to a swift gallop ; then she 
 stole into the house, softly drew the bolt in its 
 place, and, once more safe in her own room, 
 dropped on the floor, a shivering, crouching 
 little figure, shaken with a storm of stified sobs. 
 
 
 SIGNATURES OF THE WITCHCRAFT JUDGES. 
 
 The meeting-house was packed. The magis- 
 trates, John Hathorne and Jonathan Corwin, 
 were sitting there. Elizabeth Carey was to be 
 tried, and then the Witch of Wenham; and 
 every hour piled up the evidence against them. 
 
 On the outskirts of the crowd Dame Margery, 
 with furtive anxiety, studied the faces of 
 her neighbors. Early that morning she had 
 
78 DIANTHE AND THE WITCH. 
 
 discovered that Giles was not in his chamber, and 
 later that his horse was missing from the stall, 
 and she guiltily suspected some connection 
 between that unusual circumstance and her visit 
 to the minister. 
 
 What with her exacting love for her son, her 
 jealousy, her terror lest Giles had learned of 
 that visit, and her tormenting ignorance of his 
 whereabouts, she was having a sorry time of it. 
 Her neighbors had no leisure to bestow upon 
 her, and her distress was unheeded in the 
 absorbing events of the day. 
 
 Elizabeth Carey was brought in, a woman of 
 noble presence. Her accusers were girls of 
 nine and eleven years. 
 
 The excited crowd listened in credulous horror 
 while Ann Putnam told how Mistress Carey had 
 stuck pins in her, and Elizabeth Parris and 
 Abigail Williams had had the colic, and been 
 made dumb when she had appeared to them at 
 divers times, and in divers forms. And who 
 could doubt, when the mere glance of the 
 prisoner was enough to throw the children on 
 the floor, writhing in convulsions? 
 
 Then the solemn examination began, to be 
 interrupted by John Hathorne with a solemn 
 adjuration to the prisoner to confess. If she 
 
DIANTHE AND THE WITCH. 79 
 
 would confess, mercy should be shown her, but 
 there was but one law for an unrepentant witch. 
 
 Mistress Carey said she had nothing to con- 
 fess, and could not soil her lips with a lie. The 
 examiners groaned, and called the witnesses. 
 One had lost a cow after some words with the 
 accused. Another could not pass her house 
 without his wagon breaking down, and after 
 working in her garden he had had a paralyzed 
 arm. And many had seen her appear in the 
 form of a cow or a dog, and then vanish with 
 demoniac laughter. 
 
 The crowd listened in breathless silence, and 
 craned curious necks to see, while the witnesses 
 against the quiet, kindly woman, who stood 
 with bound hands in the prisoner's box, swore 
 to and signed the deposition. 
 
 Mistress Carey was remanded to prison, to 
 await the day of her execution, which never 
 came; for as the old Salem Town Chronicle 
 tells it, " Her husband did, unholily, not having 
 the fear of God before his eyes, and doubtless 
 helped by her own wicked arts, steal her away 
 from the righteous retribution of her misdeeds, 
 and flee with her to a distant part of the country." 
 
 At the close of Elizabeth Carey's trial a 
 deputation was sent to bring Dorothy Wayne 
 
80 DIANTHE AND THE WITCH. 
 
 from Master Corwin's house. Returning almost 
 immediately, with looks of consternation, the 
 men reported the garret, in which Master 
 Corwin himself had seen her bestowed, to be 
 empty, although the bolt had been fastened with 
 a padlock, the key to which had never left 
 him, even for a moment. No other egress was 
 possible without wings — or the broomstick, 
 which she had undoubtedly used. 
 
 A thrill of horror swept through the crowd. 
 A witch like that, and at large! What might 
 she not do in vengeance! 
 
 But Margery Howe drew a great breath of 
 relief. Her face, which had grown deadly pale 
 while the messengers were gone, regained its 
 color ; and disregarding the general excitement, 
 she slipped away home, self-convicted, yet exult- 
 ant. She knew that wherever Giles and his 
 horse were, there was Dorothy Wayne. And 
 then Margery Howe dropped on her knees, and 
 prayed for the safety of the girl she had hated. 
 
 A pursuit was organized. Mounted on the 
 fastest horses in the town, they searched every 
 road leading from Salem for the next four days. 
 At last, baffled and weary, they gave it up ; and 
 no semblance of Dorothy Wayne was seen in 
 Salem township again, save that some declared 
 
DIANTHE AND THE WITCH. 81 
 
 that her shape had been seen flitting by the 
 shores of Wenham water, and hovering about 
 the deserted cottage, from which her bHnd 
 mother had also disappeared. 
 
 At sunset of that memorable day a tired 
 horse, panting under his double burden, stopped 
 at the door of a hospitable farmhouse in Berwick, 
 and a peaceful-faced matron, in Friend's dress, 
 came out to receive the weary fugitives. 
 
 "Come right in!" said the cordial voice 
 of the matron. "Thee shall have supper first, 
 and tell thy story afterwards." 
 
 A few years later Dianthe, advanced to the 
 dignity of long kirdes and a coif, sat on the 
 vine-shaded porch of that same hospitable house, 
 with her arms folded in Dorothy's lap. Out in 
 the sunny field Giles tossed great masses of 
 fragrant hay up into the cart, and at the other 
 end of the porch Friend Deborah sat reading to 
 Dorothy's blind mother. 
 
 "Nay, 'twas not I, Dorothy, dear," the girl 
 was saying; "it was Giles." 
 
 And Dorothy, touching tenderly the dark 
 hair, answered, " Nay, but I owe it all to the 
 brave heart of my little Di." 
 
 Helen Kane. 
 
THE REGICIDES. 
 
 ONE of the greatest tragedies recorded in 
 the history of England, the execution of 
 Charles I, had its miserable sequel and ending 
 in a quiet New England village. 
 
 Of the judges who sentenced the king to 
 death, the most austere were Edward Whalley 
 and his son-in-law, William Goffe. Whalley 
 was a cousin to Cromwell, and held a high place 
 in the Commonwealth. Goffe was a member of 
 Parliament, and a general in Cromwell's army. 
 
 Both men fied when Charles II returned to 
 England. In 1660 they came openly to Boston, 
 and were received cordially by the Puritan author- 
 ities. They lived comfortably in Cambridge for 
 about six months, went to church and to public 
 meetings, and received visits. 
 
 News was then brought from England that 
 seven of the regicides were condemned to death. 
 Whalley and Goffe, who were of the number, 
 took alarm and tied to New Haven, where they 
 stayed in hiding until a royal mandate was 
 received by the colonies, ordering their arrest. 
 
 Loyal young men traversed the country from 
 
THE REGICIDES. 83 
 
 Boston to South Carolina, summoning all good 
 subjects, in the king's name, to aid in bringing 
 these murderers to the gallows. 
 
 The two judges, in mortal terror, left New 
 Haven at night, and took refuge in a mill at 
 Hatchet Harbor, where they lay hid among the 
 sacks of grain. A farmer, named Richard Sperry, 
 then brought them to a cave in a wild part of the 
 forest, the existence of which was known only 
 to himself. Here they lived for several months, 
 with no more comforts than the beasts of prey. 
 
 Sperry's son Joe, when an old man, told that 
 his father used to give him every day a basket 
 of food to carry into the woods, and to leave on 
 a certain stump. The next day the empty 
 platters were ready for him. 
 
 When the Indians discovered their cave in 
 the spring, the judges fled to Milford, many 
 miles distant, hiding in the woods by day and 
 journeying by night. 
 
 At Milford they were hidden by a man named 
 Tomkins in his cellar for two years. A vener- 
 able president of Yale College, who had collected 
 the facts concerning these men, states that they 
 did not even venture once into the garden or 
 orchard during these years, so constant was the 
 danger of discovery. 
 
84 THE REGICIDES. 
 
 At the end of this time they were taken into 
 the house of a Puritan minister named Russell, 
 at Hadley. A secret chamber was built for 
 them, and there they remained for more than 
 sixteen years, not even the children of the family 
 knowing of the presence in their home of these 
 hunted, miserable men. 
 
 Traditions of the old families of Hadley and 
 New Haven give us glimpses of the dreadful 
 solitude and the narrow escapes of the fugitives. 
 
 Once, before they reached Hadley, they were 
 pursued by a body of armed men across a bridge. 
 Taking refuge behind a large sycamore, they 
 fired on their pursuers from both sides of it. 
 The men held a council, and resolved to go back 
 to town for arms. When they came back the 
 regicides had disappeared, and the woods were 
 searched for them in vain. They were all the 
 time under the bridge, up to their necks in water. 
 The feet of their pursuers tramped all night just 
 over their heads. 
 
 After several years had passed, the report 
 that Whalley and Goffe had died in Jamaica 
 reached the country. On hearing it the poor 
 prisoners, we are told, thanked God. They never 
 ventured, however, to leave their secret chamber, 
 although the men in this country were dead 
 
THE REGICIDES. 
 
 85 
 
 who had known and pursued them. To be 
 discovered they knew meant certain death. 
 
 There is a legend that Goffe, a soldier of hotter 
 blood than his companion, twice ventured out of 
 the secret chamber. The I ndians attacked Hadley , 
 
 AN AGED MAN 
 LED THEM TO BATTLE. 
 
 and the people ran hither and thither in wild 
 dismay, when, it is said, " an aged man in strange 
 garments, with long gray beard," appeared 
 among them, marshaled, and led them to battle. 
 When the enemy was routed he disappeared. 
 
86 THE REGICIDES. 
 
 Another time an English gentleman, becoming 
 straitened for money while in America, advertised 
 that he would give an exhibition of sword-play, 
 and challenged all comers to combat. Nobody 
 in the town could use a sword. But while he 
 stood on the stage, flourishing his weapon, a 
 farmer in a huge, many-caped coat advanced 
 from the audience, bearing a cheese for a shield 
 and a broom dripping with mud as a weapon. 
 
 He began to fight, received the sword-thrusts 
 in his cheese, and occasionally daubed the face 
 and laced doublet of his antagonist with the 
 muddy broom. At last, throwing away the 
 shield, he set at work in earnest, using the broom 
 as a sword, and so rapid and fierce was his attack 
 that in a few moments his adversary was dis- 
 armed and his weapon sent spinning in the air. 
 The Englishman stared in consternation, and is 
 reported to have said, "You are either the devil 
 or William Goffe!" 
 
 Goffe, it appears, had taught this brother ofificer 
 to fence, and seeing his challenge, could not 
 resist the temptation to have a bout with him. 
 
 After this extraordinary victory he hurried 
 through the crowd into the night and vanished^ 
 never again to appear in the sight of men. 
 
 Whalley died in extreme old age and was 
 
THE REGICIDES. 87 
 
 secretly buried by the minister in his cellar. 
 Goffe died a few years later. There was a 
 legend among the old people of Hadley, that 
 when they were children, a mysterious nameless 
 grave lay across the boundari.o*. of two lots, and 
 it was darkly whispered that the body of a crim- 
 inal was hidden below, which if discovered by the 
 English governor would be horribly dealt with. 
 
 There can be little doubt that this unfortunate 
 body was that of Goffe. Its burial in the grounds 
 of two landlords was supposed to be of some 
 protection to it. 
 
 Goffe's diary in cipher was sent to a Boston 
 library. There it lay unread for nearly a century. 
 It was deciphered at last, and the story of the 
 hiding-place of the two judges in the Russell 
 house for the first time revealed. 
 
 Rebecca Harding Davis. 
 
THE PURITAN PARSON. 
 
 TT was meeting-time in Hansfield, Massachusetts 
 ^ Bay Colony, on a Sunday morning in June, 
 1676. The fifty or sixty log buildings which 
 made up the settlement stood silent as so many 
 tombs among the stumps of the half-cleared 
 field, for every soul in the place was in the 
 meeting-house on the hill, except Abner True. 
 
 Abner True, whose father was a deacon and 
 tithing-man, and counted second only to the 
 minister himself in rigid piety, was actually play- 
 ing truant from meeting; and this in a village 
 which looked upon Plymouth and Weymouth as 
 dangerously worldly towns, relaxed in morals 
 and manners by overmuch prosperity. 
 
 But Abner had worked from sun to sun every 
 day of the last week, and knew he must do the 
 same every day of the next week and the week 
 after that, and every week of the long summer. 
 
 It seemed to him too hard that on this one 
 day of rest he should be obliged to sit upon a 
 backless plank bench all the forenoon. Abner 
 felt sure that the sermon would not be a short 
 one this day, and the more he thought of it the 
 
THE PURITAN PARSON. 89 
 
 more he dreaded it, until he became wilHng to 
 incur any punishment for the sake of escaping 
 that long discourse. 
 
 So when Deacon Amos, with his wife and 
 younger children, were ready for meeting, no 
 Abner could be found. Hidden in the little 
 haymow of the rough barn, he saw the family 
 depart, his father marching ahead, equipped 
 with musket, bandoleer and powder-horn; for 
 King Philip and his Indians were at war against 
 the whites, and no man throughout the colony 
 went to field or church without his arms. 
 
 Similar groups, similarly accoutered, paced 
 solemnly along toward the rude sanctuary upon 
 the hill, until Abner, seeing that all Hansfield 
 had passed, felt that he was safe for the present, 
 and lay down upon the soft hay to prepare for 
 the sound nap he had so longed for. But 
 between his guilty consciousness of what he 
 had done and his dread of what Deacon Amos 
 would do, Abner could not manage to sleep. 
 
 The time went on, when he heard a sound 
 that wakened him quite, and he sprang up to 
 listen. A swishing in the tall grass, and a snap 
 of a twig alarmed him. He grabbed his gun 
 and peered through a crack in the barn ; then he 
 rushed headlong out of the back door up the 
 
90 
 
 THE PURITAN PARSON. 
 
 meeting-house hill to warn the worshipers of 
 the coming danger. 
 
 In the meeting-house Parson Pladley had 
 turned his big hour-glass twice, and now the 
 sands of the third hour were almost spent. 
 
 The heavy door was flung open and shut 
 again with a loud bang that startled every mem- 
 ber of the congregation. A boy, staggering, and 
 
 streaming with per- 
 spiration, ran up the 
 broad aisle and fell 
 exhausted at the foot 
 of the pulpit. Every 
 man stretched out his 
 hand to the musket 
 that stood beside 
 him ; but no one rose, 
 no one said a word 
 or uttered an excla- 
 
 THE MEETING-HOUSE ON THE HILL, 
 
 mation. Whatever 
 the danger was, this was God's house, and in it 
 none but God's servant should raise a voice or 
 venture upon any action unless he permitted. 
 
 The minister descended from his place, leaned 
 over the panting Abner and caught the few words 
 the boy had strength to whisper : *' Savages steal- 
 ing up — to take us unaware!" 
 
THE PURITAN PARSON. 91 
 
 The minister returned to the pulpit. '' Kindle 
 your matches, brethren," said he, in a voice of 
 perfect tranquillity. The ring of flint and steel 
 sounded all over the house. 
 
 '' Make ready your guns," continued the min- 
 ister, taking up a heavy musket, and blowing 
 the match, or fuse, by which it was discharged. 
 "Musketeers, to your stations. Ye that have 
 but swords or pikes, sit fast." 
 
 The congregation obeyed these orders as 
 calmly as they had been given. Twenty-five 
 men, headed by Deacon True, silently ranged 
 themselves at the loopholes which were pierced 
 in the door and along the walls. 
 
 Parson Pladley looked at the hour-glass, which 
 still continued to run, and quietly resumed his 
 duty of preaching his sermon. 
 
 On the benches the listeners kept their com- 
 posed countenances turned upon the preacher, 
 whose words sounded through the house : "And 
 even as aforetime the heathen did furiously 
 rage, and did compass the children of the cove- 
 nant with spear and with javelin round about — " 
 
 A high-pitched, thrilling screech filled the air 
 without, and now rose above the minister's voice. 
 There came quick, sharp patterings on the roof 
 and walls like hailstones. 
 
92 THE PURITAN PARSON. 
 
 Enoch Brett fell backward from his loophole, 
 hit by an arrow. Another man rose from his 
 seat, picked up the gun which Brett had dropped, 
 and took the vacant station. 
 
 A dozen muskets answered the storm of mis- 
 siles. Their fire seemed to check the advance of 
 the Indians, inasmuch as the war-cry grew fainter 
 and the pattering of the arrows diminished. 
 
 Parson Pladley had not interrupted his sermon, 
 although his voice had been drowned by the 
 noise of the assault and defense. 
 
 All the men who could act were at their posts ; 
 why should he not continue to the end? His 
 sense of duty told him that he ought not to 
 cease his holy office before the appointed time, 
 except under compulsion, in which he must 
 recognize the hand of God. 
 
 His hearers understood this as well as if he 
 had declared his determination in so many 
 words. They did their part by listening with 
 steady attention. 
 
 Again the cries grew louder and arrow- flights 
 thicker. The guns replied, but this time the 
 attack was not repulsed. A ponderous thump- 
 ing on the door, which shook the whole build- 
 ing, told that some kind of battering-ram was 
 employed to break It down. 
 
THE PURITAN PARSON. 
 
 93 
 
 Only a pinch or two of sand remained in the 
 hour-glass. Still it was not quite empty, and 
 the Puritan Parson preached on. 
 
 Crash ! The door was half off its hinges. The 
 firearms men crowded behind It, and delivered 
 a volley that appeared for a 
 minute to clear the passage. 
 The parson's lips could be seen 
 to move, although 
 his voice was not 
 heard in the din. 
 
 A renewed yell 
 and the crashing 
 blows once more 
 beat upon the 
 door. No shots 
 answered thistime, 
 for the muskets 
 were empty. 
 
 An arrow whis- 
 tled across the 
 church and stuck 
 quivering in the pulpit. Round the edges of 
 the shattered door hatchets and clubs were 
 brandished in the faces of the defenders, 
 who dashed them aside with the butts of their 
 guns. The women began to scream. 
 
94 THE PURITAN PARSON. 
 
 The last sand ran out of the hour-glass. Par- 
 son Pladley bowed his head and said, "Amen!" 
 And all the congregation answered in tones of 
 solemn reverence, *'Amen!" 
 
 Up sprang the hitherto motionless listeners, 
 women to the rear, men to the front ; and from 
 the pulpit the old minister, with sword and gun, 
 led the way to the aid of the others, who were 
 beginning to give ground before the mass of 
 hideously painted figures who were forcing their 
 way through the entrance. 
 
 Then came out another side of the Puritan 
 character. The fierce energy, almost joy, with 
 which the colonists fought was as surprising as 
 the stony self-control they had shown but a 
 moment before. Ahead of them all, Parson 
 Pladley swung his mighty sword with cries 
 which betrayed the old horse-soldier of Crom- 
 well and Harrison, for such he had been ; and 
 of those who followed him, more than one had 
 stood in the ranks of the pikemen who met the 
 charges of Prince Rupert's Cavaliers. 
 
 As if he remembered this, the minister lifted 
 up his strong voice in a stern psalm which had 
 thundered over the battle-fields of Naseby and 
 Marston Moor, the war-song of David the king, 
 rejoicing over his victory: "I have pursued 
 
THE PURITAN PARSON. 95 
 
 mine enemies and overtaken them ; neither did 
 I turn again till they were consumed ; for Thou 
 hast girded me with strength unto the battle." 
 
 The Indians were like wolves combating lions. 
 They shrank, wavered, and were pressed back 
 to the door, through it, and outside of it. Then, 
 by one last rush, they were broken, scattered 
 and dispersed. They ran in every direction for 
 the shelter of the woods ; many of them fell by 
 the way under the pikes and swords of their 
 pursuers. Hansfield was saved. 
 
 Within the meeting-house, dim with powder- 
 smoke and heaped with broken benches, arrows 
 and the wounded men, the congregation gathered 
 round its minister, who, blackened and bloody, 
 with gown torn to shreds and a great slash 
 across his forehead, once more raised up his 
 voice, this time in the glorious strains of one of 
 their triumphant hymns. 
 
 All joined in it, even the wounded, who could 
 scarcely lift their heads from the ground, and 
 the dying, who sang their last breaths away in 
 the grateful chorus of thanksgiving for the safety 
 of those they loved more than life. 
 
 When the injured had been cared for, and 
 there was once more time for ordinary matters, 
 the parson called Abner True to him. 
 
96 THE PURITAN PARSON. 
 
 "Son Abner, thou didst well so cunningly to 
 avoid those ruthless savages, and privily warn 
 us betimes. For this thou meritest reward." 
 
 Abner looked up astonished. "And this shall 
 be thy reward, that for thy wilful tarrying away 
 from the sanctuary thou shalt receive no disci- 
 pline from the church." 
 
 " But my father will — " stammered the boy. 
 
 " Of a surety he will," placidly replied the 
 minister, "and I trust it may do thee good." 
 
 "Come with me, Abner," said Deacon Amos. 
 
 Manlev H. Pike. 
 
THE WESLEYS IN GEORGIA. 
 
 THE good ship Simmonds, dropping down 
 from Gravesend on an October day in the 
 year 1735, carried an uncommon cargo, as well 
 as a large one. It consisted mainly of human 
 beings, English, Irish, Scots and Germans. 
 Conspicuous on the crowded deck was James 
 Edward Oglethorpe, chief of the ''Trustees for 
 Settling and Establishing the Colony of Georgia." 
 Attending him, and watching the odd scene 
 with eager interest, were two young men, small 
 in stature and spare of frame, yet for all that 
 wearing somewhat of the aspect of authority. 
 They were John and Charles Wesley. 
 
 Probably no pioneers were ever inspired with 
 motives purer than those that guided the founders 
 of Georgia. British statesmen could find more 
 than one reason to approve a setdement south 
 of the Carolinas, a project which meant the rais- 
 ing of another bulwark against the Spaniards. 
 But the British philanthropists who, in 1732, 
 procured letters patent from George II, had no 
 end in view in the colony they named for him, 
 
98 THE WESLEYS IN GEORGIA. 
 
 except to provide a refuge for insolvent debtors 
 and persecuted Protestants, to whom the Old 
 World had proved unkind. 
 
 Early in 1733 the first settlers arrived, and 
 Oglethorpe established them at the spot where 
 Savannah now stands. A fort was built, a treaty 
 was made with the Creek Indians, houses were 
 erected, farms laid out and gardens planted. 
 Later a settlement (Frederica) was made on 
 St. Simon's Island, about sixty miles south, at 
 the mouth of the Altamaha River, where was the 
 outermost line of defense against the Spaniards. 
 By the time the Wesleys set sail, the infant 
 colony should have been well on its feet. 
 
 It was decided that John Wesley should 
 minister to the colonists at Savannah, and that 
 Charles Wesley should be stationed at Frederica, 
 whither went most of those who came over 
 in the ship with the Wesleys. 
 
 John records that he found seven hundred 
 parishioners, who seemed to be well-disposed. 
 At Frederica there were fewer people; but too 
 many, considering the kind. The younger 
 brother's difificulties began at once. 
 
 Hardly had he reached the settlement when 
 he was busy trying to reconcile two termagants 
 who had fallen out on shipboard. They would 
 
THE WESLEYS IN GEORGIA. 
 
 99 
 
 not be friends. Soon they had the whole com- 
 munity by the ears. The one thing both factions 
 seem to have agreed upon was that a frank and 
 courageous Christian minister would be very 
 much in their way; and they undertook to 
 embroil him with General Oglethorpe. 
 
 On the third day after Wesley landed at 
 Frederica, Oglethorpe snubbed and insulted him. 
 On the eighth day 
 Wesley's life was 
 attempted by some 
 unknown enemy, 
 who shot at him 
 while he was at 
 prayer in the 
 woods. 
 
 A few days later, 
 however, Charles 
 Wesley and his 
 patron came to an 
 understanding, 
 thanks chiefly to a 
 confession made by one of the malcontent 
 women; and thenceforth Oglethorpe and his 
 secretary abode in perfect confidence. But the 
 young man's health was sadly shaken by priva- 
 tion and mental, strain, and in July he gladly 
 
 CHARLES WESLEY. 
 
100 
 
 THE WESLEYS IN GEORGIA. 
 
 embraced the opportunity to return to England, 
 carrying despatches from Oglethorpe to the 
 trustees of Georgia and the board of trade. 
 
 The vessel in which he embarked from Charles- 
 ton was a leaky, ill-found craft, and it became 
 necessary to touch at Boston to refit. 
 
 In Boston Charles remained six weeks, sur- 
 feited with hospitality, and strongly urged to set 
 
 up his rest there. 
 He sailed in an- 
 other ship inOcto- 
 tober, and reached 
 England Decem- 
 ber 3, 1736. 
 
 Meanwhile 
 troubles were 
 thickening round 
 John Wesley in his 
 turn. Before leav- 
 ing America 
 Charles had writ- 
 ten him a letter 
 expressing an uncomplimentary opinion of two 
 persons, whom he designated by Greek words. 
 John dropped the letter. The person who 
 picked it up read it, asked John whom the 
 Greek words meant, and John, as open and 
 
 JOHN WESLEY. 
 
THE WESLEYS IN GEORGIA. 101 
 
 unsuspicious a man as ever lived, artlessly told 
 him. Of course the busybody spread the tale, 
 and since Charles Wesley was safely out of the 
 way, the whole force of the storm fell upon the 
 elder brother. 
 
 His sorest trials came, however, through a 
 Mrs. Williamson, whom he had earlier desired 
 to marry. Unfortunately, she was inclined to 
 be frivolous, while Mr. Wesley was strict, a born 
 organizer and disciplinarian. Soon circumstances 
 forced the clergyman to reprove Mrs. Williamson 
 and exclude her from the communion. Magis- 
 trate Causton, her uncle, took up her quarrel, 
 purposing to punish him through the courts; 
 although for what he had done Mr. Wesley 
 maintained he was answerable to the ecclesias- 
 tical authorities only, if to any. 
 
 With acrimony his enemies pursued, with 
 firmness he defended himself. Six times he 
 demanded a trial on the only charge on which 
 he admitted the Savannah court had a right to 
 try him, that of defaming Mrs. Williamson. But 
 Causton and his party, having a poor case, 
 thought it safer to avoid issue, and kept on 
 abusing him, to tire him out. At last he did 
 give notice of his intention to sail for England, 
 and then he was told he must sign a bond to 
 
102 
 
 THE WESLEYS IN GEORGIA. 
 
 appear for trial when called upon, and another 
 bond to cover possible damages. 
 
 '' I shall sign neither one nor the other," he 
 answered. Then the magistrates forbade him 
 to leave the province. 
 
 He went, notwithstanding, openly, and at the 
 time he had announced. This was on December 
 2, 1737. He sailed 
 from Charleston 
 twenty days later, and 
 arrived in England 
 February i, 1738. It 
 is interesting to note 
 that on the day after 
 he landed at Deal 
 another famous 
 preacher, George Whitefield, sailed thence, 
 bound for Oglethorpe's colony. 
 
 At a later day Mr. Wesley summed up his 
 labors at Savannah in the saying that he had 
 preached the gospel not as he ought, but as he 
 was able. Moreover, Mr. Whitefield wrote that 
 he found some serious persons, the fruits of Mr. 
 Wesley's ministry. Neither utterance seems to 
 sound the note of success. 
 
 Yet John Wesley ate little, slept less, and left 
 not a moment unemployed. Of a Sunday he 
 
 JOHN WESLEY S TEAPOT. 
 
THE WESLEYS IN GEORGIA. 103 
 
 took part in eight different services. Of a 
 week-day, when there was absolutely nothing 
 to be done for somebody else, he worked with 
 his hands in his garden. For one whole year 
 the expenses of himself and a student companion 
 amounted to less than forty-five pounds. During 
 several months of his second year in America 
 he had not a shilling in his pocket. Perhaps it 
 was just as well, too. If he had had money he 
 would have given it away. 
 
 That such energy and abnegation yielded so 
 slight results was explained long afterward by 
 one of his intimate friends: "Mr. Wesley in 
 Georgia was high and deep, but not broad. 
 His scrupulous exactness in things which 
 seemed to others to be of little importance 
 attracted notice, and mada him seem whimsical. 
 This lessened the dignity of his character in 
 their opinion and weakened his influence." 
 
 Could these strong and saintly men have 
 looked forward to the six million American 
 Methodists of the present day, how light would 
 their toils and sufferings have seemed ! 
 
 Walter Leon Sawyer. 
 
COLONIAL MERRYMAKING. 
 
 BY the year 1700 there were many planters 
 in Virginia who had good horses, and 
 indulged in those athletic and equestrian sports 
 which their ancestors had indulged in from time 
 immemorial in old England. The Virginians 
 were Church of England people, who kept the 
 saints' days, and kept them in the merry old style. 
 
 Let us consider Saint Andrew's day, about the 
 year 1740, in Hanover County. Two or three 
 Sundays before the great day a list of the games 
 to be played and the prizes to be offered would 
 be posted up on the church door. 
 
 Early in the day horsemen begin to arrive at 
 the appointed field. There were scarcely any 
 vehicles then in Virginia. All classes rode on 
 horseback. 
 
 In a spacious abandoned field a rude plat- 
 form has been constructed, upon which are 
 seated the starters, the judges, and a few of the 
 magnates of the county. 
 
 The horn sounds. The sportsmen are ready 
 to begin. The starter and the judges are in 
 
COLONIAL MERRYMAKING. 105 
 
 their places, and a purse containing five pounds 
 is produced, and suspended in view of the crowd. 
 Twenty horses, mounted by young men, and 
 possibly, in some few cases, by a favorite colored 
 jockey, are grouped ready for the race, to begin 
 the day's sports. They are to gallop three miles, 
 round a prescribed circuit, hastily indicated by 
 
 THE HORSE-RACE. 
 
 stakes or other familiar objects. There were few 
 fences at that day to obstruct the progress of 
 man or beast. 
 
 At the signal the twenty horses bound away on 
 the course, and ten or twelve minutes after, the 
 winner comes panting in to receive the prize 
 and the plaudits of the crowd. 
 
 Perhaps the next entertainment would be an 
 exhibition of cudgeling, a favorite sport with 
 our brawny and hard-headed ancestors. 
 
 The game of cudgeling was something like 
 
106 
 
 COLONIAL MERRYMAKING. 
 
 short-Stick fencing, the object being to give 
 resounding raps upon the antagonist's head. 
 After a series of cautious movements, the players 
 would warm up to their work and deliver rattling 
 blows with great rapidity, each good hit being 
 rewarded by the vociferous applause of the 
 
 onlookers gathered in 
 a compact ring about 
 them. 
 
 A beaver hat of the 
 old-fashioned cocked 
 style is brought for- 
 ward as the prize of the 
 victorious cudgeler. 
 A good beaver hat 
 
 THE GAME OF CUDGELING. 
 
 was a costly article 
 in those days, worth as much as fifteen dollars. 
 
 The horn sounds again to summon the gallant 
 fiddlers of Hanover to a trial of their skill, the 
 prize being a new violin, brought from London 
 by the last ship. 
 
 It is proposed that a violin be played for by 
 twenty fiddlers, no person to have the liberty of 
 playing unless he bring a fiddle with him. 
 
 After the prize is won, the fiddlers are all to 
 play together, each a different tune, and are to 
 be treated by the company. 
 
COLONIAL MERRYMAKING. 
 
 107 
 
 Next, the boys are to have a turn. Twelve 
 boys, twelve years of age, run a race of one 
 hundred and twenty yards, the winner of which 
 receives a new hat worth twelve shillings. 
 
 At the public diversions in Virginia the song- 
 singers of a county often competed for a prize, 
 
 GIRLS, ROSY, BLUSHING AND EXPECTANT. 
 
 such as a new song-book, or something of the 
 kind, each singer in turn singing his best song 
 to the company. 
 
 Then might follow a wrestling- match for a 
 prize of silver buckles, or a dancing-match for 
 a pair of elegant shoes. 
 
 The entertainments sometimes concluded with 
 a diversion that excited extraordinary interest 
 among the young men. A pair of silk stockings 
 was exhibited on the platform, to be given to 
 the prettiest girl in the field. 
 
108 COLONIAL MERRYMAKING. 
 
 We can fancy the bevy of rosy girls, all drawn 
 up in a line before the judges' stand, blushing 
 and expectant, and the judges descending to the 
 field to scrutinize more closely the charms of 
 the competing damsels. 
 
 At the close of the exercises a repast was 
 served upon the field, not indeed for the whole 
 crowd, but, as the program expressed it, "for 
 the subscribers and their wives, and such of them 
 as are not so happy as to have wives may treat 
 any other lady." 
 
 It was in some such simple and innocent way 
 as this that the people of the Southern colonies 
 amused themselves on days of festivity two 
 hundred years ago. 
 
 As time went on and wealth increased, the 
 class of men of leisure became more numerous, 
 and the coach-and-six appeared. Fox-hunting 
 became fashionable. Col. George Washington 
 was an ardent fox-hunter. Often he would be 
 out three times a week, and sometimes chased a 
 fox all day, only to lose him at last. 
 
 We see also in the diary of Washington how 
 regularly he and his wife attended the grand 
 balls given every winter at Alexandria. 
 
 Of the Northern colonies, Pennsylvania was by 
 far the wealthiest at the middle of the eighteenth 
 
COLONIAL MERRYMAKING. 109 
 
 century. The jolly diversions of Virginia were 
 not in favor in the Quaker commonwealth, 
 where social gatherings appear to have been 
 the chief pleasures. 
 
 An old chronicler reports that the wedding 
 feasts of Philadelphia were enormous. The 
 house of the bride's parents would be filled 
 with company to dine, all of whom would be 
 invited to stay to tea and to a late supper in the 
 evening. For two days punch was dealt out to 
 all callers, and every gentleman, even if as 
 many as a hundred a day called, had the privi- 
 lege of kissing the bride. 
 
 In New England, besides the rustic corn- 
 huskings, quilting -bees and house -raisings, 
 there was really but one festival which can be 
 looked back upon with pleasure and approval, 
 namely. Thanksgiving, which has been truly 
 styled the Puritan. Christmas. 
 
 This was observed in the eighteenth century 
 very much as it is in this, by the return of absent 
 members of the family to their home, by feasting 
 and unbounded merriment. 
 
 James Parton. 
 
WASHINGTON AT BELVOIR. 
 
 LJ OW may one better appeal for interest in the 
 ^ ^ long-deserted and half-forgotten Virginia 
 home, situated some four miles below Mount 
 Vernon on a noble bluff overhanging the Poto- 
 mac River, and now overgrown by trees and 
 vines, than by quoting the words of Washington 
 himself concerning it: "The happiest moments 
 of my life had been spent there." 
 
 The first owner and founder of Belvoir was 
 William Fairfax, a Yorkshireman, cadet of the 
 house of fighting Fairfaxes. He came to Vir- 
 ginia as collector of the king's customs, and 
 agent for the immense estates of his first cousin, 
 the sixth Lord Fairfax of Green way Court. He 
 became president of the Virginia Council, was 
 for that reason called ''colonel," and ended his 
 life on the Virginia hillside where he now lies. 
 
 It was to the household of this accomplished 
 and kindly gentleman that the schoolboy 
 George, recendy a pupil of Mr. Williams's 
 school at Wakefield, was introduced by his 
 brother Lawrence, whom he had come to 
 visit at Mount Vernon. 
 
 Now such a '' visit " might last three days, three 
 
WASHINGTON AT BELVOIR. Ill 
 
 weeks, or if sufficiently enjoyable, three months, 
 without stretching the welcome of one's hosts. 
 
 George's brother Lawrence had married 
 Colonel Fairfax's charming daughter Anne, who 
 made things most agreeable at Mount Vernon. 
 There was a perpetual ex- 
 change of dinings and tea- 
 drinkings between Mount 
 Vernon and Belvoir. At 
 stated intervals all the gentle- 
 men of the county met at 
 one place or the other for a 
 fox-hunt breakfast. 
 
 The colonel, Lawrence's ^^orge Washington. 
 
 r 1 » 1 -I • ^'"ST PORTRAIT BY C. W. PEALE. 
 
 lather - m - law, took an im- 
 mense fancy to young George, whom he early 
 began to entertain and instruct in the art of 
 war by recitals of his own adventures. And 
 last, perhaps not least, there were always some 
 nice girls stopping at Belvoir ! 
 
 What wonder that George's visit to Lawrence 
 and Anne extended indefinitely; that Mount 
 Vernon and Belvoir both became homes to him ! 
 
 We may safely picture him at this time of life 
 as shy, awkward, somewhat gawky, presenting 
 few suggestions of the '' imperial man," as Lowell 
 calls him, he afterward became. 
 
J12 WASHINGTON AT BELVOIR. 
 
 His clothes were homespun, and no doubt he 
 carried in the pocket of his country-made suit 
 that historic penknife one may see in the Masonic 
 Lodge of Alexandria. It was presented to him 
 by his mother when he was twelve years old, 
 and was carried constantly for fifty-six years. 
 
 The State Department at Washington contains 
 a great number of letters passing between Col. 
 William Fairfax and Washington. All of these 
 show on the old soldier's part a keen and 
 fatherly interest in the younger one's career, 
 and are responded to by Washington with almost 
 filial respect and affection. 
 
 But it was the oldest of the Belvoir boys, 
 George William Fairfax, with whom Washington 
 formed one of the closest friendships of his 
 life. This young man, some years older than 
 Washington, was handsome, dashing and ac- 
 complished, and like his brothers, had been 
 educated in England. Together the two Georges 
 spent many of the happy hours of youth. 
 
 When old Lord Fairfax of Greenway Court 
 gave Washington, at sixteen, his first chance to 
 earn money by surveying my lord's lands in the 
 pathless wilderness of what is now West Virginia, 
 George Fairfax offered to accompany his friend. 
 
 Together they rode through Ashly's Gap in 
 
WASHINGTON AT BELVOIR. 
 
 113 
 
 the Blue Ridge mountains, and roamed and 
 camped for weeks in happy fellowship, a descrip- 
 tion of which adventure may be read in full in 
 Irving's life of Washington. 
 
 The two Georges in their youth did not spend 
 all their days in sport and travel. Side by side 
 
 BELVOIR ON THE POTOMAC. 
 
 they went into the political contests of the 
 county. There is a story current in Alexandria 
 of how, on one occasion, Washington backed 
 up Fairfax in a hot contest for a seat in the 
 House of Burgesses against Mr. Payne, after- 
 ward a colonel in the Continental army. 
 
 Payne took violent offense, and attacking 
 Washington suddenly, took him off his guard 
 
114 WASHINGTON AT BELVOIR. 
 
 and knocked him down. This occurred in the 
 market-place of Alexandria, and the next day, 
 while the town was ringing with talk of the 
 challenge to fight a duel, which Washington, 
 according to the custom of the day, must inevi- 
 tably send Payne, the assailant received, instead 
 of a challenge to fight, a note from Washington 
 so full of magnanimity and forbearance as to 
 make Payne forever after his devoted friend and 
 champion. Colonel Payne was, in fact, one of 
 those appointed at the funeral of Washington to 
 carry his body to the tomb. 
 
 Perhaps the most interesting phase of the 
 friendship of the two Georges was that during 
 the oncoming of the Revolutionary War, while 
 Washington was slowly but surely taking his 
 place as one of the guiding spirits of the move- 
 ment toward disruption from the mother country, 
 George Fairfax was as steadfastly holding to 
 his conviction that such a movement was wrong 
 and mischievous. 
 
 In spite of this burning difference, their rela- 
 tions did not alter. They discussed the question 
 personally and by letter, from every standpoint, 
 each listening respectfully to the other' s views, and 
 each ending as firm as before in his own opinion. 
 
 It was to George Fairfax that Washington 
 
WASHINGTON AT BELVOIR. 
 
 115 
 
 gave utterance to that noble cry of feeling about 
 
 the coming conflict: 
 
 "Unhappy it is to reflect that a brother's 
 
 sword has been sheathed in a brother's breast, 
 
 and that the once happy and peaceful plains of 
 
 America are to be either drenched with blood 
 
 or inhabited by slaves. Sad alternative! But 
 
 can a virtuous man 
 
 hesitate in his choice?" 
 George Fairfax sailed 
 
 finally for England, 
 
 passing the famous " tea 
 ships" coming into 
 Boston harbor, and in 
 England the conscien- 
 tious Tory thereafter 
 lived and died. 
 
 During his absence 
 at this time Washington George wiluam fmrfax. 
 
 charged himself with 
 
 the care of Belvoir, and the various affairs 
 relating to his friend's Virginia estate. Fairfax's 
 death was a blow to him, and their correspond- 
 ence up to that moment shows no diminution 
 of a lifelong confidence and love. 
 
 Mrs. Burton Harrison. 
 
THE RESCUE. 
 
 IT was that disastrous July, 1755, in which the 
 colonies of Virginia and Maryland passed 
 through one of the most cruel periods of their 
 history. General Braddock's advance-guard had 
 marched blindly into the ambush on the banks 
 of the Monongahela contrived for them by an 
 enemy ignorantly despised ; and it was twelve 
 hours since Colonel Dunbar, yielding to the 
 panic, had ordered a retreat. 
 
 Slowly the routed army trailed along the rough 
 road they had made a week ago. The Indians 
 and their French allies hung about the retreat, 
 following through the close-growing underbrush. 
 
 To provide transport for the many wounded, 
 Dunbar had abandoned ammunition and provi- 
 sions. But the wagons thus secured were so 
 crowded, the July heat and the feverish thirst 
 were so unendurable, that the sturdiest sufferers 
 became delirious. 
 
 The guarding of these wounded had been 
 assigned to the unhurt survivors of the advance- 
 guard, who surrounded the wagons ; and among 
 them marched a boy of sixteen. 
 
THE RESCUE. 117 
 
 Nicholas had not a scratch after the horrors 
 of that battle, but when the hot afternoon 
 waned into a yet hotter twilight, and the excite- 
 ment of danger dulled with the ceasing of the 
 occasional shots, he grew so tired that defeat, 
 dishonor, death appeared less dreadful than his 
 intolerable longing for sleep. 
 
 A young officer marching beside him, tall, 
 stalwart and handsome, cheered him from time 
 to time, and once in a hard scramble up a hill, 
 crying, ''Here, comrade, a hand!" shouldered 
 the weary boy's musket, put his arm about 
 Nicholas's waist, and helped him over the rough 
 places. Nicholas answered with a grateful look 
 and word. This was the man of all the company 
 that in his boyish way he most admired. That 
 his admiration was well-founded he learned with 
 pride in after years. The young officer was 
 George Washington. 
 
 Had Washington remained by the boy's side, 
 Nicholas would probably have escaped the com- 
 plications that ensued; but the young officer 
 soon went forward to urge on another detach- 
 ment in the weary retreat. 
 
 A few moments later a figure scrambled over 
 the back of the wagon just ahead of Nicholas, 
 staggered, and fled into the underbrush, 
 
118 THE RESCUE. 
 
 At sight of that blood-stained runaway, 
 Nicholas halted abruptly, for he could not let 
 Lawrence Fairfax, his employer's son, wounded 
 and raving, rush upon certain destruction. 
 
 "I must bring that fellow back! He is a 
 neighbor at home ! " he shouted, and made off 
 into the forest. ''Til overtake him quickly," he 
 assured himself. ''He cannot go far!" But 
 when he came upon Lawrence's senseless body, 
 he asked himself an anxious question. 
 
 Lawrence was taller and heavier than he. 
 To carry him would be impossible. If this faint 
 lasted long, as seemed likely, would not the 
 Indians find them? Nicholas stared round 
 nervously, his hands clenched, his heart beating 
 fast at the sound of muttering voices, which proved 
 to be only the murmur of a stream close by. 
 
 He bent over the white face in sympathy, for 
 he, too, was thirsty, and he guessed what tor- 
 ment had forced the delirious youth desper- 
 ately to seek relief. A few steps and he was 
 beside the stream, swallowing delicious drafts. 
 But he was quickly with Lawrence again, pouring 
 water from his wide felt hat on the white face, 
 and pressing his drenched handkerchief on the^ 
 close-shut lips of the unconscious youth. 
 
 Slow work it was reviving him, yet at last 
 
THE RESCUE. 
 
 119 
 
 Lawrence's eyes stared up with recognition in 
 them. " What is it, Nick ? Did Ladybird throw 
 me? I must be sore hurt to make thee look so 
 gently on me." 
 
 With a dozen words Nicholas brought him to 
 remembrance of the incidents just passed. 
 
 BRADDOCK S DEFEAT. 
 
 FROM THE PAINTING 
 
 "Thou hast risked thy life for me!" he mur- 
 mured, struggling to his elbow. " We must start 
 after Dunbar at once, or we shall lose him." 
 
 This was quite Nicholas's opinion, but it was 
 an opinion not easy to put into action. For 
 although Lawrence got to his feet and stumbled 
 a few yards, he collapsed then, slipping through 
 Nicholas's hold to the ground. 
 
120 THE RESCUE. 
 
 " I'm too shaky to stand! " he gasped. *' Go 
 on, Nick. I'm thankful to thee, but I'll not be 
 responsible for thy scalping." 
 
 *'I shall not leave thee," Nicholas said. ''I 
 dare say if thou canst sleep for an hour we may 
 overtake the rear-guard at the first halt." 
 
 "What of the Indians?" Lawrence asked. 
 
 '* Likely the Indians are tired as well as we," 
 said Nicholas. " Perchance they will take this 
 night for a good rest." 
 
 '' Nick," Lawrence murmured, *' I have not 
 deserved that thou — " His voice failed, his 
 eyes closed, and he fainted again. 
 
 Of the night which followed Nicholas would 
 never willingly speak. It seemed years long in 
 the passing, and crowded with fears and fatigues. 
 But all that night there was neither sight nor 
 sound of Indians, and at last, toward dawn, both 
 boys slept so profoundly that the noon sunshine 
 woke them by glinting in their eyes. 
 
 Luckily, they were used to the rough tramps, 
 and they set out hopefully to seek Dunbar's 
 forces. Patiently they tacked in many direc- 
 tions, but the road remained lost to them in the 
 bewildering mazes of the forest. Glad enough 
 they were at the end of two hours to cross the 
 course of their stream once more. 
 
THE RESCUE. 121 
 
 Lawrence, who was feverish and exhausted, 
 refused to go farther from its cool waters. He 
 lay tossing and muttering home names. 
 
 At last, as twilight darkened about them, it 
 was Lawrence who roused Nicholas. 
 
 " It is cooler. We must go on ! " 
 
 ''Whither shall we go?" asked Nicholas. 
 
 "Wherever our friendly stream may lead us," 
 said Lawrence; ''for we shall never overtake 
 Dunbar now, and we may find some settler." 
 
 They had not wandered a mile, however, 
 when they stumbled upon a trail, but recently 
 broken into wagon ruts. Ten minutes more 
 and they came to a clearing, which surrounded 
 a large corn-field and a log cabin. 
 
 Lawrence flung his arms about Nicholas. 
 "Thou art saved?" he gasped. "Tell my 
 mother that I — " 
 
 Nicholas laid him, limp and senseless, on the 
 ground, and dashed across the clearing. The 
 cabin was fast closed, but that proved occupa- 
 tion rather than desertion in those times of con- 
 stant danger. 
 
 A flash from a loophole beside the door and 
 a bullet whizzing close to his head sent Nicholas 
 dodging to his knees. 
 
 "Help!" he shouted. "Spare your shot! 
 
122 THE RESCUE. 
 
 We are two Virginians from Braddock's army!" 
 
 Silence followed. Nicholas, crouching below 
 the level of the loophole, dared not rise or draw 
 nearer the cabin. 
 
 *' Help ! " he cried again. " My comrade has 
 swooned from his wound — and may die while 
 you delay ! " 
 
 A woman's voice answered him after a moment. 
 *'Lay down your musket and approach!" 
 
 Nicholas stood up and stepped close to the 
 loophole. Then the woman spoke again : " You 
 are a lad — and your companion?" 
 
 ''So sore wounded he could not hurt you 
 were he a giant. But we are both soldiers from 
 the troops which passed not far away last night." 
 
 The door was flung open. A young woman, 
 stern and care-worn in her comeliness, stood 
 upon the threshold with a musket in one hand, 
 the other thrusting back a tiny child. 
 
 ''You are too young to be very wicked, and 
 the danger which threatens us threatens you," 
 she said, slowly. "We are the 'widow and the 
 fatherless,' who share with you such shelter as 
 we have, for so long or so short a time as the 
 Lord God decides." 
 
 Then the two stepped swiftly to the side of 
 Lawrence, lying long and still in the moonlight. 
 
THE RESCUE. 123 
 
 ''We will get him to bed," the woman said; 
 and the next instant she was carrying the greater 
 share of his weight, although Nicholas did his 
 exhausted utmost to aid. 
 
 Inside the cabin a large room, with a wide 
 chimney in the midst, was dimly shown by the 
 light of a single guttering candle, and Lawrence 
 was laid on a bed at the farther side of it. 
 
 " Refresh yourself with milk and corn bread 
 from the cupboard, while I tend your comrade," 
 she bade Nicholas. 
 
 When he returned at last to the bedside, 
 Lawrence, revived, rebandaged, and clad in a 
 clean shirt, smiled complete contentment at 
 sight of him. 
 
 "We have found an angel to care for me," he 
 murmured. " But to praise Mistress Mowbray's 
 care is no slur to thine. He would have been 
 close to Cumberland with Dunbar's troops by 
 this time, but he stayed to defend me when I 
 ran mad in the forest," he added to their hostess. 
 
 " He may have to defend more than you, sir, 
 presently," she said, gravely. "An Indian skulked 
 about the clearing just after sunset. So please 
 you sleep, and let him sleep while there is quiet." 
 
 The tired boy slept so soundly that five hours 
 later a vigorous shaking was required to rouse him. 
 
A NAKED SAVAGE SPRANG INTO THE ROOM. 
 
THE RESCUE. 125 
 
 *' Indians!" he cried, feeling for his musket. 
 
 *'Aye, Indians outside," said Mrs. Mowbray. 
 
 " I'm ready," said Nicholas, quietly. 
 
 " Take this loophole by the back door. I'll take 
 the front. There are half a dozen on this side, 
 along the edge of the clearing. What see you ?" 
 
 Nicholas at first saw nothing, but as his eyes 
 grew used to the dim dawn he perceived creeping 
 figures close to the cabin. His answer was to 
 aim deliberately and fire. 
 
 "I doubt I did not kill him!" he grumbled. 
 "Can you shoot straight, mistress?" 
 
 Her musket answered promptly, and through 
 the yells which followed she announced calmly 
 that they had one enemy the less. 
 
 But the savages were equally good marksmen, 
 and provided with the best weapons of that 
 generation by their French allies. 
 
 A ball struck the frame of Nicholas's loophole. 
 A second flew through the other loophole, tear- 
 ing Mistress Mowbray's cap, and a third hit the 
 wall above a trundle-bed, where the elder child 
 sat up with a scream of fright. 
 
 "Thou art not hurt, my sweet!" his mother 
 cried, deserting her post to fondle him and drag 
 the bed into a more sheltered position. " Lie 
 still, as thy mammy bids thee." 
 
126 THE RESCUE. 
 
 ** Stay with your children, mistress. I will 
 defend your loophole!" Lawrence exclaimed, 
 awake at last and springing from the bed. 
 
 ''Your hand is not steady and we have no 
 powder or ball to spare," she answered firmly, 
 as she took down two more muskets from the 
 chimney. ''These are ready for use, and you 
 shall reload the others while we empty them." 
 
 A curious sound of scrambling made itself 
 heard at a side of the cabin invisible from either 
 loophole ; and the woman guessed its meaning. 
 *'They are climbing to the roof by the lean-to, 
 where the beasts are stalled !" she cried. 'They 
 will come upon us by the chimney, for there is 
 no fire in it." 
 
 "There shall be a fire before they reach it!" 
 Lawrence declared, giving her a reloaded 
 musket. He dragged two huge feather mat- 
 tresses from the bed, slashed them open, and 
 flinging them upon the wide hearth, touched a 
 fiaring candle to their contents in a dozen 
 places, whence at each touch smoke and fiame 
 rushed up the chimney. 
 
 None too soon ! For as the blaze gathered 
 its first fierceness a naked savage, already half- 
 down the chimney, pushed through the flames, 
 and sprang spluttering into the room. 
 
THE RESCUE. 127 
 
 *' Back to your loopholes !" Lawrence shouted, 
 as Nicholas and Mistress Mowbray ran to his 
 help; and snatching up a log, he felled the 
 dazed Indian at a blow. 
 
 The feather beds burned furiously, and their 
 suffocating smoke blocked the chimney as 
 effectively as their flames, which Lawrence fed 
 presently with the mattress on which Nicholas 
 had slept, and the pallet from the trundle-bed 
 whence Mistress Mowbray caught her children. 
 Then he added logs from the wood-pile. 
 
 During ten minutes more, while the fire raged, 
 the defenders listened to the trampling of heavy 
 feet on the roof, and to yells of baffled fury. 
 
 Then Nicholas, at his loophole, shouted, 
 "They are going!" 
 
 Shouting and shooting a futile defiance when 
 they reached the edge of the clearing, they 
 vanished — leaving a great stillness. 
 
 Then Lawrence sank down beside the chim- 
 ney, his shirt drenched with blood from his 
 wound. The bandages had been loosened by 
 his exertions. Deftly Mistress Mowbray cared 
 for him, while Nicholas moved from one loop- 
 hole to the other. 
 
 Two -hours later Nicholas, a bucket in one 
 hand, his musket in the other, had gone to the 
 
128 THE RESCUE. 
 
 Stream. There he heard cautious footsteps 
 through the underbrush. 
 
 Then an anxious white face peered from the 
 thicket. Shouting, " A friend ! " Nicholas sprang 
 to meet the newcomer, the neighbor whose help 
 had been promised to Mistress Mowbray when 
 her corn-field was ready to harvest. 
 
 This man, Jacob Brown, with his family and 
 that of a near-by settler, had started for Fort 
 Cumberland, intending to seek Mistress Mow- 
 bray on the road. 
 
 Within a half-hour they were all off together. 
 Mistress Mowbray and her babies crowded with 
 the other women and children into one wagon, 
 before which rode Lawrence and one of the 
 settlers, while Brown, Nicholas, and a couple of 
 boys younger than himself brought up the rear. 
 
 Nicholas and Lawrence and their companions 
 made their way without further adventure. At 
 Fort Cumberland the two lads were welcomed 
 by their comrades of Dunbar's troops as if risen 
 from the dead. 
 
 Ellen Mackubin. 
 
THE COLONIES ALERT. 
 
lldi' 
 
 m:mAL. . .„ ,,iiiliii ;ir J.MJ:,,,:,,.,, / '„■ ii^5\/„,^i 
 
 GLANCING AT UOROTHY's UPTURNED LISTENING FACE. 
 
TWO HISTORIC LANDMARKS. 
 
 THE tourist, travelling along the northern 
 shore of Portsmouth harbor in the electric 
 car that runs to York, passes through one of 
 the most ancient parishes in the country. At a 
 sharp bend in the road, facing the waters of 
 the lower harbor, stands the Kittery Congre- 
 gational Meeting - House, the oldest church 
 building in Maine. 
 
 Here worshiped Sir William Pepperrell, the 
 hero of Louisburg, and the only American ever 
 knighted by the English crown. Whoever 
 attends the communion service in this church 
 receives the Lord's Supper from a service that 
 has been in use since Pepperrell' s day. Upon 
 the big two-handled silver cups are inscribed 
 these words : 
 
 The Gift of the 
 
 Hon'ble Wm. Pepperrell Esqr. 
 
 To the First Church of Christ in Kittery, 
 
 1733- 
 
 '' Hon'ble Wm. Pepperrell Esqr." was the 
 
 father of the baronet. The gift was made in 
 
 the form of a bequest to the parish. 
 
 About a hundred feet to the rear of the 
 
132 
 
 TWO HISTORIC LANDMARKS. 
 
 church building is the ancient parsonage, built 
 in 1729. During a visit in Portsmouth, George 
 Washington one day dropped down the harbor 
 to Kittery Point, made his way up across the 
 parish green to this very house, and called upon 
 Dr. Benjamin Stevens, a graduate of Harvard, the 
 faithful minister for forty years at Kittery Point. 
 Within this old house is an interesting old 
 library. Many of the books were Pepperrell's. 
 Volume after volume contains the Pepperrell 
 coat of arms and the baronet's 
 autograph. Sir William be- 
 queathed the collection to 
 Doctor Stevens. 
 
 At that time there was no 
 library like it for miles around. 
 For a time the books were 
 kept alternately at Kittery and 
 York, and were used as a 
 circulating library; 
 but they gradually fell 
 o0l^^' into disuse, and at last 
 '// were left permanently 
 
 in the Kittery Point parish, where they logically 
 belong. They are simply heirlooms and curi- 
 osities now. On the fly-leaf of one of the 
 bulkiest of the volumes is the name Joshua 
 
TWO HISTORIC LANDMARKS. 
 
 133 
 
 Moody. This is of particular interest, because 
 it is the autograph of the first minister of the 
 first church in Portsmouth, New Hampshire. In 
 1684 Mr. Moody was honored by an invitation 
 to the presidency of 
 Harvard College, but 
 declined the call. 
 Eight years afterward, 
 in 1692, he was im- 
 prisoned by command 
 of the lieutenant- 
 governor, and later 
 banished from the 
 
 provmce. 
 
 THE KITTERV MEETING-HOUSE. 
 
 The twelfth name in the first column of the 
 signers of the Declaration of Independence 
 is that of William Whipple. In his public life 
 as a patriot and a distinguished citizen, Mr. 
 Whipple hailed from New Hampshire. He was 
 a merchant in Portsmouth; a member of the 
 New Hampshire Provincial Congress ; one of 
 New Hampshire's representatives in the memo- 
 rable Continental Congress of 1776 ; a brigadier- 
 general of New Hampshire troops; and after 
 the Revolution a judge of the Superior Court 
 in the Granite State. 
 
134 TWO HISTORIC LANDMARKS. 
 
 He was born in Kittery, Maine, January 14, 
 
 1730, in a dwelling even then of historical note. 
 
 In earlier days it had been a garrison-house, 
 
 many times unsuccessfully attacked by the 
 
 Indians. It is in a sightly location on the edge 
 
 of the water, close by a 
 
 portion of the harbor known 
 
 as Whipple Cove. The front 
 
 of the house looks as it did 
 
 in General Whipple's time. 
 
 The room in which he was 
 
 born is a sunny chamber, 
 
 with great hewn timbers in 
 
 the corners and overhead. 
 
 ^/T^^yy^-^U The neatly painted floor is 
 
 made of boards almost two 
 
 feet wide. Over the bed in the room is a 
 
 patchwork comforter made of bits from the 
 
 dresses of famous American women. One piece, 
 
 a shade of buff, came from a gown of Lady 
 
 Washington. 
 
 Although the Whipple furniture disappeared 
 long ago, many antiquities have replaced it. 
 Comb -back chairs, old mahogany tables, an 
 ancient melodeon and other time-honored things 
 are seen on all sides. 
 
 William Whipple early followed the sea, going 
 
TWO HISTORIC LANDMARKS. 
 
 135 
 
 out from Kittery and becoming captain of a 
 merchantman before he was twenty-one years 
 old. He traded in the West Indies, and made 
 voyages to Africa for slaves. Some of these he 
 kept in the Kittery household. One, named 
 Dustin, was buried on the Whipple farm by the 
 side of a tiny body of water, which has since 
 been known as Dustin Pond. 
 
 Prince, another negro brought from Africa, 
 was for long years a faithful servant in the 
 general's home. According to tradition, he 
 attended his master on the expedition against 
 Burgoyne. When 
 Prince was told 
 that he would be 
 expected to be- 
 have courageous- 
 ly and fight 
 bravely, should 
 the soldiers be 
 called into action, 
 he replied, "Sir, I have no inducement to 
 fight ; but if I had my liberty, I would endeavor 
 to defend it to the last drop of my blood." 
 General Whipple immediately freed the slave. 
 
 Clarence P. Emery. 
 
 THE BIRTHPLACE OF WM. WHIPPI 
 
ELIZABETH'S CHOICE. 
 
 T^HE parish of St. Andrew, like other loyal 
 -*■ parishes in the province of South Carolina, 
 was in a flutter of pleasant anticipation on the 
 afternoon of November 9, 1753. Preparations 
 were everywhere in hand for the celebration, on 
 the morrow, of the birthday of His Majesty, 
 George II, King of England and of the North 
 American colonies. 
 
 At Charlton Manor, an added note of excite- 
 ment lay in the fact that on the morrow, also, 
 young Christopher, the only son of Squire 
 Christopher Charlton, would attain his majority. 
 
 All day a swarm of negro servants, under the 
 direction of Mistress Elizabeth Charlton, had 
 been busy hanging garlands of evergreen, 
 goldenrod and autumn leaves upon the walls, 
 waxing and polishing the floors of the great 
 hall, decking the dozen or more guest-chambers, 
 and furbishing silver, brass and pewter, against 
 Master Kit's birthday ball, to which the whole 
 countryside was bidden. 
 
 A little before sunset Mistress Elizabeth came 
 out upon the white - pillared front piazza of 
 the manor house, a stately building with wide 
 
ELIZABETH'S CHOICE. 137 
 
 galleries, dormered roofs and square chimneys, 
 which stood on slightly rising ground that 
 sloped gently down to the Ashley River. 
 
 The girl could see, across the house yard with 
 its embowering trees and vine-hung summer- 
 houses, the wide stream and the great deer park 
 beyond it, flanked with apple and peach orchards. 
 As she stood looking about her a hand plucked 
 at her dress. 
 
 '' Vulcan ! " she cried. '' What do you want ? " 
 
 The intruder, a ten-year-old boy, black and 
 solemn, hung his head as he replied, '' Hit's 
 mammy agin, liT miss. She tuk bad wid fever." 
 
 Betty immediately started along the familiar 
 way to the quarters. It was the duty of every 
 mistress of a plantation to look personally after 
 sick slaves, carrying medicines, unguents and 
 brews, oftentimes to take upon herself literally 
 the offices of both surgeon and nurse. 
 
 The girl's pretty face grew sober as she stepped 
 into the whitewashed cabin and approached the 
 bed whereon Vulcan's mother lay stretched, with 
 closed eyes and tossing arms. 
 
 "Juno?" she queried, gently. 
 
 The woman, tall and majestic-looking, sat up, 
 her ebon face lighting with pleasure. 
 
 "LiT miss!" she breathed, in an ecstasy. 
 
138 ELIZABETH'S CHOICE. 
 
 Then a torrent of words poured from her 
 parched lips. Betty, listening intelligently, put 
 the uncouth jargon into English to herself. 
 
 "Little mistress," said Juno, "I want to buy 
 my freedom. Old marster is a good marster. 
 He takes care of his black people. They do 
 not mind being slaves, those others. What 
 were they but slaves in Africa ? Some of them 
 were even my own slaves ! But I am not like 
 them. I have not the heart of a slave. I have 
 a good home, but I am proud. I want to be 
 free once more before I die. I am not afraid to 
 work. I will work from sunrise to sunset for 
 old marster; and I will work to buy myself and 
 my boy. It will take a long time, but I will not 
 die until I can die free. A princess should not 
 be a slave, little mistress. But I, the Princess 
 Matsoo-la, have been a slave for ten years. 
 You know! " 
 
 Yes, Elizabeth knew. Her own eyes over- 
 flowed as she went back to the orreat house. 
 There the state coach, drawn by four gray 
 horses, waited at the front piazza. The squire, 
 bound for a rout at a neighboring plantation, 
 had his foot already on the carriage step. He 
 greeted his pretty daughter affectionately. 
 
 ''And mind, Betty," he concluded, "you are to 
 
ELIZABETH'S CHOiCE. 139 
 
 keep these roses fresh for Kit's ball." He tapped 
 her cheek with a gay forefinger and turned to go. 
 
 '' Papa," she clutched at his lace ruffles, "wait, 
 please! I — I want to speak to you." 
 
 ''Well, minx, what bauble is it? Brooch? 
 Bracelet? Belt-buckle — " 
 
 "Papa," she broke in, desperately, "I — I — 
 Juno wants to buy her freedom — " 
 
 " Elizabeth!" Ah, now Betty knew the squire 
 was angry! "I have forbidden you to speak 
 to me of Juno. Attend you to your own affairs, 
 girl, and I will attend to mine." He stepped 
 into the coach, and was driven rapidly away. 
 
 " O dear! " sobbed Mistress Elizabeth, feeling 
 very unlike the lady of a manor. But her tears 
 were checked by the appearance of Mr. Hugh 
 Posthlewaite, her brother's tutor. 
 
 " Mistress Elizabeth," the old gentleman began 
 with courtly deliberation, " Master Christopher 
 hath broken his arm and desires your pres- 
 ence — " But Betty was half-way up the stair. 
 
 " 'Tis a trifle and the bones are set," said Kit. 
 " Twas not the fault of Juniper Third. I 
 deserved the tumble I got for being off my 
 guard when he shied. Don't go a-crying, sis. 
 I shall be able to drink the royal health to-morrow 
 night, and shall step the minuet without tripping ! 
 
140 
 
 ELIZABETH'S CHOICE. 
 
 But, O Betty," he groaned, " 'tis my bridle 
 arm, and — and knocks Juniper out of the race! " 
 "Kit!" ejaculated Betty, horrified. 
 "Father has not heard yet; his heart is set 
 on Juniper Third winning the cup ! " 
 
 "Is there no one — " 
 
 "Not a soul in St. 
 
 Andrew's parish could 
 
 ride Juniper — except 
 
 Francis Marion — " 
 
 "The plowboy!" 
 sniffed Mr. Posthlewaite. 
 " Plowboy or no, 
 Francis Marion is the 
 finest gentleman I know, 
 after my father — saving 
 your presence, Mr. 
 Posthlewaite. But he has 
 entered his mare Cherokee for the race," con- 
 cluded the lad, and lapsed into brooding silence. 
 "Cup or no cup, you will be sailing for 
 England on the Well Wisher next week. Lucky 
 Kit ! " and Betty sighed, for England, that unseen, 
 far-away, wonderful home of her father's people, 
 was the goal of her sleeping and waking dreams. 
 The St. Andrew's race-course presented an 
 animated spectacle the next afternoon. There 
 
 GEN. FRANCIS MARION. 
 
ELIZABETH'S CHOICE. 141 
 
 had been during the morning many contests, 
 for the royal birthday had brought together 
 wresders, boxers, runners, fiddlers, dancers and 
 ballad-singers from all over the parish. Now 
 the huge crowd swarmed from the eating-booths 
 to see the gentleman's race. 
 
 A pang darted through Kit Charlton's heart 
 as he saw the horses coming up from the sheds. 
 Suddenly his keen eye detected among them the 
 graceful, upthrown head of Juniper Third. His 
 own body-servant, Jerry, was leading the beauti- 
 ful, silken-coated bay. The squire had also 
 seen. He sprang up, roaring, '*What do you 
 mean, you black rascal! Take that horse 
 home instantly, or I'll — " 
 
 " Stay where you are, Jerry! " The interrup- 
 tion came from Mistress Elizabeth Charlton, 
 who stepped forth from a bevy of young women. 
 '' If you please. Squire Charlton," she continued, 
 lifting a rosy face to the astonished judges, 
 " I am going to ride Juniper Third." 
 
 Kit started forward; the squire stared down 
 at his daughter with a frown, which changed 
 presently to a broad grin. He slapped his knee 
 with a delighted hand. "The girl can do it! 
 Bring in Juniper Third for the cup, Betty, and 
 you shall have anything you ask for." 
 
142 ELIZABETH'S CHOICE. 
 
 There were six entries for the race — four of 
 the gentlemen riders boasting the bluest blood 
 of the province in their veins. But whose blood 
 was bluer than Betty's own ? When the fifth 
 rider drew his horse, a dainty, slender-limbed 
 black mare, alongside Juniper Third, Betty cried 
 gaily, ''A fair field and no favor, Mr. Marion!" 
 
 For the fifth rider was that Francis Marion of 
 whom Mr. Posthlewaite had spoken so contemp- 
 tuously. The man to be one day so famous 
 in the Indian and Revolutionary wars of his 
 country, the " Swamp Fox" of future history, was 
 at this time just turned twenty-one. His rather 
 delicate face, with its open brow, sensitive mouth 
 and deep, luminous eyes, was of a winsomeness 
 which has passed into a proverb — '' perfect ideal 
 of a true knight and Christian gentleman." 
 
 " Have a care. Mistress Elizabeth," he urged. 
 "Juniper has a wayward temper." 
 
 ''Don't ride, Betty!" implored Kit, pressing 
 to the edge of the track. 
 
 Betty's answer to both was a firmer grasp on her 
 bridle-rein, for just then the signal was given. 
 
 Squire Charlton stood up, wondering what 
 madness had possessed him to permit a thing 
 so beyond reason, and praying that Betty might 
 come to no harm. Kit, mounted on a shed, 
 
ELIZABETH'S CHOICE. 143 
 
 followed with sparkling eyes her cap and feather 
 whirling round the track. 
 
 He saw Juniper draw ahead of all competitors 
 except Marion's Cherokee. He cheered lustily. 
 But all at once he gasped. The whitewashed 
 post at the three-quarter turn, where Juniper had 
 shied the day before ! If he should shy again ! 
 
 But alarm had not caught him only ; Marion, 
 leading the race by a full length, had seen the 
 post ahead, staring white. 
 
 Quick as thought he dropped back and seized 
 Betty's bridle just as the flying animal stiffened 
 for a sidewise spring. Juniper was steadied under 
 his powerful grasp, then, released, leaped on 
 reassured. Betty, gazing straight ahead, re- 
 mained unconscious alike of danger and of the 
 steadying hand. 
 
 Thus, say the old Carolina chronicles, Francis 
 Marion saved a life and lost a race. For the 
 slender nose of Juniper Third shot under the 
 rope, neck and shoulders ahead of Cherokee. 
 
 A wild burst of applause greeted the winner 
 of the race as she flew on, then turned and drew 
 bridle in front of the judges' stand. 
 
 The squire, relieved of self-reproach, shouted 
 his throat hoarse in triumph, and when Betty, 
 dropping from- the saddle, stood courtesying 
 
144 ELIZABETH'S CHOICE. 
 
 before him he took the parish to witness that 
 the girl should have anything she wanted, short 
 of Charlton Manor itself! 
 
 "You will choose to-night after the royal 
 health," he said, looking fondly down at her. 
 
 ''And you will choose England," said Marion. 
 
 "England? Yes, oh, yes!" she cried. 
 
 " I feared Juniper might shy where I got my 
 tumble," said Kit, still thinking of the risk. 
 
 "Why, no!" Betty returned, not knowing un- 
 til long afterward why Juniper did not shy. 
 
 The state dinner over that night, the guests 
 assembled in the great hall. Here was a bril- 
 liant throng — county magnates, city dignita- 
 ries, for many of these had driven over from 
 Charleston, stately dames, powdered gallants and 
 gay spinsters. The immense hall was lighted 
 by innumerable candles made from the wax 
 berry. At one end of the room the squire 
 was seated in an armchair in semiroyal state. 
 He held aloft the great Charlton drinking-horn 
 handed down from a remote ancestor. Serving- 
 men, passing in and out among the guests with 
 tankard and decanter, had charged all goblets. 
 
 The squire rose, and in a loud voice gave 
 "His Majesty, the King!" which was drunk in 
 
ELIZABETH'S CHOICE. 145 
 
 a respectful silence. "The health of His Excel- 
 lency, the Governor of South Carolina," pro- 
 ceeded the squire, loyally. 
 
 " Ladies and gentlemen," said Colonel Ludwell 
 of the Royal Dragoons, " I give you the health of 
 Master Christopher Charlton, born by good luck 
 on the forty-ninth anni- 
 versary of his blessed 
 majesty." 
 
 Thereupon there was 
 a rousing cheer for Kit, 
 very brave and hand- 
 some in his silk coat, 
 flowered waistcoat, pow- 
 der, ribbons and lace. 
 
 The squire reseated 
 himself, and beckoned 
 with his hand to Betty, 
 who stood at the lower king george n. 
 
 end of the hall, surrounded by an eager circle. 
 Her blue eyes were shining, but her mouth 
 quivered as she stepped forward and bent low 
 before her father ; she opened her lips to speak, 
 but the squire forestalled her. 
 
 " No need to ask, my little jockey," he laughed. 
 "I know right well what 'tis you long for." 
 
 He took a folded paper from his breast pocket 
 
146 ELIZABETH'S CHOICE. 
 
 and handed it to her. She unfolded the official- 
 looking document mechanically. It was, as she 
 expected, a playfully worded 
 
 Leave of Absence for Mistress Elizabeth Charlton for 
 One Year from Charlton Manor ; said Year to be spent in 
 England. In Token of the Winning of a Cup by Riding 
 Juniper Third. And for faithful service on said Manor. 
 (Signed) Christopher Charlton. 
 
 The girl's eyes filled as she read, her lips 
 trembled, the color forsook her cheek. 
 
 "Your honor," she said, refolding the paper, 
 "if I might choose — " 
 
 "What!" interrupted the squire, vexed and 
 amazed. " Do you mean to say — " 
 
 "If I might choose," repeated Betty, in a 
 steady voice. 
 
 The squire reached out for the paper, and 
 tore it into bits. "You can choose, of course, 
 for my word is passed. But whatever you 
 choose, you get that and that only." 
 
 "I know, your honor," said Betty, and her 
 head went up proudly, like to the squire's own. 
 
 "Well ? " said the squire. The guests pressed 
 forward, curious to hear. 
 
 "I will have," said Betty, "the freedom of 
 the slave woman, Juno." 
 
 Absolute silence reigned in the great hall. 
 
you ARE A QOOD CHILD, ELIZABETH. 
 
148 ELIZABETH'S CHOICE. 
 
 The girl, from under her long- lashes, stole a 
 glance around. On the faces of most of those 
 present she read surprise or incredulity; some 
 expressed amusement, two or three indulgent 
 contempt. Kit's frightened eyes were fastened 
 on his father's face. But one pair of luminous 
 eyes, from an obscure corner, shone approval 
 and strengthened her courage. 
 
 As for the squire, his face had gone from 
 crimson to purple; his lips tightened as if to 
 keep back the rage that surged up, demanding 
 speech. But his brow gradually cleared, his 
 eyes softened ; he turned to Mr. Posthlewaite, 
 who stood near, and said in a loud tone : 
 
 "You will see that notice is given at once to 
 the governor and council of my intention to 
 manumit my slave woman called Juno — " 
 
 " O father ! " cried Betty. 
 
 ''And her son, known as Vulcan." 
 
 Betty sank involuntarily on her knees. Her 
 father lifted her gently. " You are a good 
 child, Elizabeth," he said, solemnly, laying his 
 hand on her shoulder. 
 
 There was a great clapping of hands, provoked 
 more, it must be confessed, by the girl's wonder- 
 ful beauty, than by her act of self-sacrifice. 
 
 The fiddlers were tuning for the minuet; and 
 
ELIZABETH'S CHOICE. 149 
 
 Mistress Elizabeth, though besieged with in- 
 vitations for the opening dance, walked smiling 
 away to where a certain plowboy was standing. 
 
 "The minuet, I believe, is Mr. Marion's," she 
 said, adding in a low tone, " though he hath not 
 asked for it." 
 
 Marion's dress, less glittering than some, was 
 yet well-chosen and becoming, and the pair, 
 taking their places, made not an ill match for 
 Kit and his partner. 
 
 "So, Mistress Elizabeth," said Marion, in one 
 of the pauses of the stately minuet, "you have 
 lost England ! " 
 
 "I have Juno's freedom," Betty returned. 
 
 "But dearly bought!" he suggested, when, 
 after a turn, they paused again. 
 
 "Nay, Master Francis!" She courtesied to 
 the music. " Look at me well. Master Francis! 
 You see the happiest girl in the Carolinas." 
 
 "And I, Mistress Elizabeth," he bent his 
 powdered head to a slow, soft strain of the 
 dance, "I," — he blushed and trembled, he who 
 later trembled before neither Indian nor Redcoat, 
 but his voice was steady, — "I am the proudest 
 man in his majesty's colonies!" 
 
 M. E. M. Davis. 
 
THE CATAMOUNT TAVERN. 
 
 TN the year 187 1 one of the most notable 
 * buildings connected with the early history of 
 Vermont was burned in the village of Bennington. 
 
 It was the famous Catamount Tavern House, 
 a wooden edifice erected more than a hundred 
 years before its day of doom by Capt. Stephen 
 Fay, one of the most enterprising and public- 
 spirited of the early settlers in the New Hamp- 
 shire Grants, as Vermont was called before the 
 Revolution. 
 
 This edifice was built for a house of enter- 
 tainment for travellers, and for the immigrants 
 who fiocked into the region from New England. 
 
 It was about forty feet square, two stories in 
 height, with a large hall, called council-room, 
 for the use of the people in public gatherings, 
 law courts, dancing assemblies, and meetings of 
 committees for consultation, public and private. 
 
 Such meetings were frequent there during 
 the later period of the famous quarrel of twenty- 
 six years' duration between the authorities of 
 New York and the settlers on the Grants. 
 
 The controversy arose in this wise : By virtue 
 of the charter granted to the Duke of York in 
 
THE CATAMOUNT TAVERN. 151 
 
 1664, the province of New York claimed terri- 
 torial jurisdiction eastward to the Connecticut 
 River. Families from New Hampshire settled 
 in the region between that river and Lake 
 Champlain. In 1752 the Governor of New 
 Hampshire began to issue grants to these and 
 other settlers who came afterward. The New 
 Yorkers perceived that the domain was filling 
 with a sturdy, enterprising population, and 
 asserted their legal right to the territory. 
 
 New York had relinquished its claim to terri- 
 tory so far eastward as the Connecticut River 
 in Massachusetts and Connecticut, and New 
 Hampshire urged its claim to have a western 
 extent equal to that of the other two provinces, 
 and continued to issue grants to settlers. 
 
 The controversy grew warmer and warmer, 
 and in 1764 the government of New York 
 procured a royal decree giving it territorial 
 jurisdiction to the Connecticut River. 
 
 The issue of land-grants by New Hampshire 
 now ceased, and the settlers acquiesced; but 
 when the authorities of New York proclaimed 
 that the land-titles of the immigrants on the 
 Grants were void, and proceeded to dispossess 
 the dwellers and dispose of their homes to 
 speculators, stubborn resistance was manifested. 
 
152 
 
 THE CATAMOUNT TAVERN. 
 
 Sheriffs and their assistants who came to seize 
 and sell the property of the settlers, which had 
 been paid for and improved, met resolute armed 
 defenders of their rights and were driven off. 
 
 ABOVE A JEERING CROWD. 
 
 Committees of safety assumed judicial powers 
 and tried and punished intruders from without 
 and offenders within. For several years the 
 Grants bore the aspects of civil war, excepting 
 that of actual carnage. 
 
THE CATAMOUNT TAVERN. 153 
 
 It was while this quarrel was hotly raging that 
 Captain Fay built his tavern. He was a zealous 
 supporter of the oppressed settlers. In front of 
 his house he erected a tall sign-post; and twenty- 
 five feet from the ground he hung upon it a 
 large sign, which was surmounted by the stuffed 
 skin of a catamount or wildcat. Its fierce 
 visage, showing its teeth, was turned toward 
 New York, at which it grinned perpetual 
 defiance. This gave the name to the tavern. 
 
 Ethan Allen, the stalwart champion of right 
 and justice, with a big heart and honest purpose, 
 had come from Connecticut a few years before 
 this tavern was built, and cast his lot among the 
 settlers in the Grants. He espoused their cause, 
 and soon became their trusted leader in sharp 
 contests with the hated Yorkers. He trained 
 a band of young setders and called them Green 
 Mountain Boys. They became conspicuous in 
 our nadonal history. 
 
 When the Catamount Tavern was built, Allen 
 made it his home and the headquarters of his 
 administration as a virtual dictator during sdr- 
 ring political periods. Out of the council-room 
 went orders for the assembling of his forces, 
 civil and military. Before him as chairman of a 
 committee of safety offenders were brought, 
 
154 
 
 THE C\TAMOUNT TAVERN. 
 
 tried, condemned and received sentences from 
 his lips, sometimes of banishment from the 
 territory, sometimes of imprisonment, and fre- 
 quently scourging with the "twigs of the wilder- 
 ness." A prominent doctor who made himself 
 obnoxious by persistent sympathy with the 
 
 Yorkers suffered 
 only the indignity 
 of being suspend- 
 ed in an armchair 
 for two hours from 
 the tavern sign, 
 above a jeering 
 crowd. 
 
 When Try on 
 was royal gover- 
 nor of New York 
 in 1777, he offered 
 twenty pounds each for the arrest of Ethan 
 Allen, Remember Baker and Robert Cochran, 
 because of their "riotous conduct in opposing 
 the measures of the New York government." 
 
 These three "outlaws" and their friends had 
 a jolly time of it at the Catamount Tavern over 
 the matter, and out from the council-room went 
 a counter proclamation, offering fifteen pounds 
 for the arrest of James Duane and ten pounds 
 
 THE COUNCIL-KOOM. 
 
THE CATAMOUNT TAVERN. 155 
 
 for John Kemp, New York land speculators, 
 styling them "the common disturbers of the 
 public peace." The rewards were to be paid 
 on the delivery of the culprits at "Landlord 
 Fay's at Bennington." It was signed by Ethan 
 Allen, Remember Baker and Robert Cochran. 
 
 The breaking out of the war for independence 
 suspended the intercolonial quarrel. Allen was 
 appointed colonel of local forces. He was 
 sojourning at the Catamount Tavern in the 
 spring of 1775, when all New England was 
 aroused by the tocsin sounded at Lexington. 
 He had espoused the cause of the patriots, and 
 his loyal Green Mountain Boys had increased 
 in numbers to a large multitude. 
 
 From the council-room of the Catamount, 
 after a consultation with a committee, Allen 
 issued an order on May 3d, mustering the 
 Green Mountain Boys at Bennington to make 
 an attempt to capture the British forts Ticon- 
 deroga and Crown Point, on Lake Champlain. 
 Allen led them on that expedition, which resulted 
 in the surrender of the former stronghold to the 
 Americans, on his demand in the name of the 
 " Great Jehovah and the Continental Congress." 
 
 Benson J. Lossing. 
 
THE MIDDLE PLANTATION. 
 
 WILLIAMSBURG, the oldest incorporated 
 town in Virginia, was settled in 1632, and 
 was known as "The Middle Plantation," being 
 half-way between the James and York rivers. 
 It became the capital of Virginia in 1678. 
 
 Toward the close of the seventeenth century 
 a college was established by a charter, by the 
 joint sovereigns, William and Mary, with en- 
 dowments of twenty thousand acres of land 
 and the receipts from certain customs duties. 
 
 At the beginning of the eighteenth century 
 the colonial governor laid out a city there and 
 gave it the title of Williamsburg. It lies on 
 a ridge at the head springs of two creeks, one of 
 which flows into the James and the other into 
 the York River. Each is navigable to within 
 a mile of the town. A capitol and a palace 
 for the governor were built, and a church was 
 erected, the finest then in America. 
 
 Population increased rapidly. It became a 
 market- town, the residence of opulent planters. 
 *' Here," wrote Rev. Owen Jones, a Welsh ances- 
 tor of Martha Washington, "dwell several good 
 
THE MIDDLE PLANTATION. 
 
 157 
 
 families. They live in the same neat manner, 
 dress after the same modes, and behave them- 
 selves exactly as the gentry of London; most 
 families of note having a coach, chariot, or chaise." 
 
 r WILLIAMSBURG. 
 
 The city was the residence of the colonial 
 viceregal court, and during the sessions of the 
 legislature it became a theater of great social 
 enjoyment and gaiety. To that court and society 
 the pretty, bright and amiable Martha Dandridge, 
 afterward Martha Washington, was introduced 
 at the age of fifteen years. 
 
 The transient visitors at the capital, especially 
 
158 THE MIDDLE PLANTATION. 
 
 those who caused the periodical overflow at the 
 annual sessions of the legislature, required a 
 public house of entertainment. At about 1710, 
 when Spotiswood was governor, a spacious inn 
 was built, at his suggestion and with his aid. 
 
 It was named in honor of the famous knight 
 and courtier of Queen Elizabeth's reign, Sir 
 Walter Raleigh, the Raleigh Tavern. It was 
 constructed of wood, in the form of an L. Like 
 nearly every other edifice in that little city, it stood 
 alone, with gardens between it and its neighbors. 
 
 The Raleigh Tavern was a story and a half 
 high, the upper portion lighted by numerous dor- 
 mer windows that pierced a sloping roof. Over 
 the front porch was a leaden bust of Raleigh. 
 In the portion of the building which extended 
 back from the street was a large apartment 
 called the Apollo room. It was lighted by six 
 large windows, and was handsomely wainscoted. 
 At the period of the Revolution, a large square 
 lantern made of iron and glass, and furnished 
 with candles, was suspended from the center of 
 the ceiling, while at intervals round the sides of 
 the room were several candelabra with small 
 mirrors for reflections. 
 
 The Apollo room was devoted to public 
 gatherings of every kind. During the gay season 
 
THE MIDDLE PLANTATION. 159 
 
 it was used as an assembly-room for dancing, 
 and in it might be seen the most eminent repre- 
 sentatives of titles, wealth and beauty of the 
 colonial society of the Old Dominion, especially 
 during the long administration of Governor Sir 
 William Gooch (172 7- 1749). 
 
 Then the viceregal court of Virginia was the 
 most brilliant on the continent ; for much of the 
 stately etiquette and conventional formality of 
 the cavalier element still prevailed at the capital, 
 and the great landholders vied with each other 
 in their display of equipages, dress and retinues. 
 
 When the Stamp Act and other oppressive 
 measures were put in operation by the British 
 ministry, the English-American colonists were 
 aroused to persistent opposition, and the voices 
 of Patrick Henry and other patriots were sound- 
 ing an alarm in the legislative hall of the old 
 Capitol near the Raleigh Tavern. 
 
 Almost daily conferences were held in the 
 Apollo room, at which measures were devised 
 that, in a quiet way, often effected more salutary 
 results than the most eloquent declamations. 
 
 It was in that room that young Thomas 
 Jefferson and two or three others prepared 
 those counter - resolutions and addresses in 
 opposition to those of the British Parliament, 
 
160 
 
 THE MIDDLE PLANTATION. 
 
 in the spring of 1769. They were promptly 
 adopted by the Virginia House of Burgesses or 
 Assembly, and produced a crisis. 
 
 This act caused the royal governor to dissolve 
 the Assembly. The members met the next day 
 in the Apollo room, formed themselves into a 
 Voluntary Convention, drew up articles of 
 
 THE RALEIGH TAVERN. 
 
 Opposition against the use of any merchandise 
 imported from Great Britain, signed and rec- 
 ommended them, and then repaired to their 
 respective districts. 
 
 They were all reelected except those who had 
 declined to countenance the proceedings of the 
 majority. This was incipient rebellion ; and 
 similar acts in that room from time to time 
 afterward made the Raleigh Tavern to Virginia, 
 relatively, what Faneuil Hall is to Massachusetts. 
 
THE MIDDLE PLANTATION. 161 
 
 Virginia kept pace with Massachusetts in the 
 adoption of revolutionary measures. Her voice 
 was always quick to express sympathy with that 
 generous sister in her struggles against inflic- 
 tions of British power during the hot ten years' 
 quarrel between the Americans and the imperial 
 government, before they came to blows. 
 
 When, in the spring of 1773, the Virginia 
 Assembly received copies of an address issued 
 by the Assembly of Massachusetts, in which the 
 sore grievances of that province were set forth, 
 they promptly declared their concurrence 
 with their New England brethren. Peyton 
 Randolph, Thomas Jefferson, Richard Henry 
 Lee and others urged immediate and bold action. 
 
 A committee of correspondence was nominated 
 the same evening, at a private conference held 
 by the members at the Raleigh Tavern, when 
 strong resolutions were drawn up. 
 
 They were presented to the Assembly the 
 next day and adopted, and the committee was 
 appointed, with instructions to obtain trustworthy 
 intelligence of all such acts of Parliament or the 
 ministry as might affect the rights of the 
 colonies. The committee was also authorized to 
 open a correspondence and communication 
 with similar committees of the other colonies. 
 
162 THE MIDDLE PLANTATION. 
 
 The royal governor of Virginia at that time 
 was Lord Dunmore, a Scotch nobleman. When 
 he heard of the proceedings of the Assembly 
 he hastened to their chamber. At that moment 
 they were about to adopt other resolutions 
 equally unsubmissive to royal rule, when the 
 governor, with a loud voice, and haughty de- 
 meanor, proclaimed the Assembly dissolved. 
 
 The next day the committee of correspondence 
 met at the Raleigh Tavern and despatched to 
 the Speakers of the several provincial Assemblies 
 a circular letter containing patriotic resolutions. 
 Cordial responses came back. 
 
 So, through documents sent out from the 
 Raleigh Tavern, was formed the first sound link 
 of the chain that united a confederacy which 
 gave birth to a great nation. 
 
 When, in the early summer of 1774, the British 
 government declared its intention to punish the 
 inhabitants of Boston for the destruction of tea 
 in their harbor, by closing that port to commerce, 
 the Virginia Assembly passed strong resolutions 
 of condolence, and appointed a day to be 
 observed as a fast. The offended governor, by 
 verbal proclamation, dissolved the Assembly. 
 
 Eighty-nine of the members, among whom 
 was George Washington, met in the Apollo 
 
THE MIDDLE PLANTATION. 
 
 163 
 
 room on the following day, organized themselves 
 into a Provincial Convention, prepared an address 
 to their constituents, in which they declared that 
 an attack upon one colony was an attack upon 
 all, and recommended the assembling of repre- 
 sentatives of all the colonies. 
 
 THE APOLLO ROOM. 
 
 This recommendation was immediately sent 
 forth by couriers despatched from the Raleigh 
 Tavern. It was heartily commended by all 
 the colonies excepting Georgia. 
 
 Twenty-five of the members of the convention 
 remained at Williamsburg to participate in the 
 religious observances of the appointed fast-day. 
 They issued a circular to all the burgesses, or 
 members of the Assembly, recommending a 
 meeting of the whole body at the Raleigh 
 Tavern, on the first day of August next ensuing. 
 
164 THE MIDDLE PLANTATION. 
 
 Eighty of the members who formed the con- 
 vention in the Raleigh were present at the 
 appointed time. They adopted resolutions to 
 import no more slaves, nor British goods, nor 
 tea ; and resolved that if their grievances were 
 not speedily redressed, to export no more tobacco. 
 
 They recommended the cultivation of other 
 articles of husbandry ; the improvement of the 
 breed of sheep, and the multiplying of their 
 numbers. On August 5th they chose delegates 
 to represent Virginia in the Continental Congress 
 which was to meet at Philadelphia on September 
 5th. They then adjourned, after each had 
 pledged himself to do all in his power to effect 
 the results contemplated in their proceedings. 
 
 During the war that soon broke out the 
 Raleigh Tavern and its Apollo room were fre- 
 quently the meeting-place of civil and military 
 officials of Virginia when they were at the 
 capital, and there the final arrangements for 
 the Siege of Yorktown were made by Washing- 
 ton and Rochambeau, in September, 1781. 
 
 Benson J. Lossing. 
 
THE LITTLE REBEL 
 
 DOROTHY was going to her first party. 
 Dressed in her fine white musHn, with silk 
 fan and red merino cloak, she stood listening to 
 her father's earnest words. 
 
 He was a Boston gentleman who from the 
 first ranged himself with those who protested 
 against the exactions of the British crown. 
 His acquaintance was largely with the aristoc- 
 racy of the country, who were mostly Tories. 
 
 And now his daughter was going to the 
 birthday party of her dear friend, the daughter 
 of the king-loving Robert Jennifer, and he feared 
 that she would be tempted to assent to the 
 royal sentiments expressed among the gaieties 
 of the evening. 
 
 He tried not to be too serious in his last 
 words of caution: ''Well, Dorothy, don't let 
 these king-loving folk make you disloyal to the 
 cause of liberty and justice." 
 
 ' ' Never fear, father. No king-loving folk could 
 make me disloyal," answered Dorothy, laughing 
 brightly, not thinking how soon the test would 
 come, nor how severe would be the strain. 
 
 The sounds of the harp and viol proclaimed 
 
166 THE LITTLE REBEL. 
 
 that the dancers were in full swing when Dorothy 
 
 alighted at the Jennifers' door, but a cordial 
 
 greeting from her hostess, and a pleasant and 
 
 admiring nod here and there from one and 
 
 another of the guests, put her at ease, and very 
 
 soon she found herself tripping the light or 
 
 stately measures with the best of them. 
 
 In those days dancing was not the only 
 
 amusement that young people indulged in at an 
 
 evening party. Frolicsome games were greatly 
 
 the fashion, and after a contra-dance little Betty 
 
 Jennifer proposed that they should play ''King 
 
 George's Troops." It is a pretty game, with its 
 
 procession that passes along under the arch of 
 
 two of the company's clasped and lifted hands, 
 
 these two singing : 
 
 " Open the gates as high as the sky, 
 To let King George's troops pass by." 
 
 There is a forfeit to pay by those whom the 
 keepers of the gate succeed in catching with a 
 sudden downward swoop of the hands as they 
 pass under, and great amusement ensues when 
 some captive is set to performing some droll 
 penance or ridiculous task. 
 
 Dorothy had played the game hundreds of 
 times, and was very expert in eluding the most 
 wary of keepers. Her dexterity was soon 
 
THE LITTLE REBEL. 
 
 167 
 
 apparent to the people about her, especially to 
 Carroll Jennifer and Jervis Langton, who were 
 the gate-keepers on this occasion. 
 
 At last a heedless misstep on the part of the 
 
 TRIPPING THE STATELY MEASURES. 
 
 one who preceded Dorothy brought an instant 
 delay, of which the gate-keepers took advantage. 
 Dorothy had seen the misstep, and bending 
 
168 THE LITTLE REBEL. 
 
 low, Sprang forward with renewed celerity. But 
 the sharpened wits of the gate-keepers made 
 them more than a match for her, and swoop ! 
 there she was, caught and held fast! 
 
 There was a general shout of victory, then a 
 general rushing forward to see this hard-won 
 captive and know her forfeit-fate. 
 
 '*Ah, my little soldier! " cried Carroll Jennifer, 
 with a gay laugh. "You see that when King 
 George's officers stand at the gate, they stand 
 there to win. All his troops must obey his 
 commanding officers." 
 
 Suddenly across Dorothy's mind flashed her 
 father's last words, and she wanted to cry out, 
 "I'm not one of King George's loyal troops! 
 I'm a rebel! " 
 
 But the feeling of shyness came over her, and 
 she thought, " How foolish for me to say a thing 
 of that kind in the midst of a play like this ! " 
 
 Somebody else, however, was not held back 
 by this shyness, for a voice cried, "Ah! but 
 Mistress Dorothy has been taught to flout at 
 King George and his officers, and even though 
 she be one of his soldiers, I dare say she is in 
 secret a little rebel, who has been planning and 
 plotting to escape you." 
 
 Carroll Jennifer had just returned from a long 
 
THE LITTLE REBEL. 169 
 
 visit abroad, and did not know about the loyalty 
 of his family's friends. He saw that the pretty 
 captive was blushing with a troubled distress, 
 and he came to her rescue. Looking down with 
 the sweetest of kind smiles on his winning face, 
 he exclaimed, "Mistress Dorothy couldn't be a 
 rebel in my father's house! " 
 
 The bright color fled from Dorothy's cheeks 
 and she felt for the moment like a little traitor 
 for being where she was. Then Jervis Langton 
 took up Carroll's words, and went on in such 
 a glowing and eloquent fashion about keeping 
 faith, and being true to one's old home, and 
 the king being father of his subjects, that Dorothy 
 was quite bewildered. 
 
 She was made to feel that these king-loving 
 folk had a high, enthusiastic sense of king and 
 country, and what they owed to both. 
 
 Carroll Jennifer, glancing at Dorothy's up- 
 turned listening face, recalled his duty as host, 
 and breaking in upon the talk, said smilingly: 
 
 *' But the forfeit, Mistress Dorothy, let us see 
 to that. Ah, by the king's realm, I have it! 
 You shall repeat after me the renunciation of 
 all rebellious thoughts, and swear from this 
 night forth to be loyal to the king and his crown. 
 
 "Now repeat after me: I renounce from this 
 
170 THE LITTLE REBEL. 
 
 night forth," he paused, glancing at Dorothy 
 with smiling invitation. 
 
 Dorothy heard again her father, saying, 
 '' Don't let these king-loving folk make you 
 disloyal to the cause of liberty and justice." 
 
 She looked up into the kind, admiring eyes 
 that were bent upon her, and round the splendid 
 room at the faces that were now full of pleasant 
 looks for her, but she must not delay ; she must 
 take her place where she belonged. With her 
 color deepening, her voice faltering, she repeated, 
 " ' I renounce from this night forth — ' " 
 
 '' All seditious and rebellious thoughts — " 
 
 '' 'All seditious and rebellious thoughts — ' " 
 
 *' Against his most gracious majesty. King 
 George the Third — " 
 
 " 'Against — * " Dorothy paused, a mist passed 
 before her eyes, a shudder of horror thrilled 
 her; then with a sudden uplifting of her head, 
 and a new emphasis to her voice, she cried : 
 
 "Against, not his most gracious majesty, King 
 George the Third, but his sorely tried and 
 oppressed people, who are weighed down with 
 the burden of his unjust taxes." 
 
 " Dorothy, Dorothy, how dare you under 
 Master Jennifer's loyal roof! Are you not 
 ashamed?" cried out Judith Myles. 
 
THE LITTLE REBEL. 171 
 
 Carroll Jennifer looked from one to another 
 with an awakening- sense of the true situation. 
 
 "Mistress Dorothy," he presently exclaimed, 
 *' have these rebels and malcontents frightened 
 you into this?" 
 
 "No — no, I have only been frighted by 
 my own poor spirit just now, into disloyalty to 
 the cause of liberty and justice," she replied. 
 
 ''There is but one cause, and that is the 
 crown's, and but one disloyalty, and that is to 
 the king ! " cried Jervis Langton. 
 
 The clamor of voices arose on every hand. 
 It was a storm of Tory talk — vehement protest 
 and assertion and declaration. In the center of 
 it stood Dorothy. She had ceased turning red 
 and white. With her head slightly bent, her 
 arms drooping and her hands clasped together, 
 she looked like a wind-blown lily, bruised and 
 beaten, but not overthrown. 
 
 All at once Carroll Jennifer seemed to realize 
 Dorothy's defenseless position. He could not 
 defend her avowed principles, but she was his 
 guest, and he was a gentleman ; so he put up 
 his hand with a, " Come, come, we have had 
 enough of this discussion to-night." A nod to 
 the musicians, and the strains of the harp and 
 violin broke in upon the clamor of tongues. 
 
172 THE LITTLE REBEL. 
 
 At another signal a door was thrown open, 
 and beyond could be seen a bountifully spread 
 supper-table, gay with lights, and the shine of 
 silver and glass. Young Mr. Jennifer bowed 
 low, as was the fashion of the time, before 
 Dorothy, with his finest manners, and said, with 
 airy grace: ''Will my enemy consent to let 
 a wicked Tory serve her ? " 
 
 Dorothy shrank back with so dismayed a face 
 that both Carroll and his sister Cynthia felt 
 touched with pity. 
 
 "We have been making too much of this," 
 said Cynthia, in an undertone to her brother. 
 " She is a child, after all, who has been showing 
 off a little, and does not know the full meaning 
 of what she has said." 
 
 "No, no," cried Dorothy, "I did not say what 
 I did to show off! I spoke because I wanted to 
 be true and honest. I was ashamed at first of — 
 of my friends — of our cause — I was afraid to 
 speak at first — and then, I was ashamed of my 
 cowardice. Oh, I know what I say! You must 
 not take me for what I am not ! I am a litde 
 rebel to the king's cause. I believe in the 
 people's rights, and not in the crown's, and 
 I ought not to have come here, I ought not 
 to have come ! " 
 
THE LITTLE REBEL. 173 
 
 The clear voice faltered and fell, and the next 
 moment poor Dorothy burst into tears. 
 
 Then it was that a new voice was heard, a 
 deeper, older voice. It was low-toned, yet very 
 distinct, and there was an odd thrill, a sort of 
 quiver of emotion to it, as it said: 
 
 '' Come, Mistress Dorothy, rebel or no rebel, 
 you have shown a courage that we may all doH 
 our hats to. I only hope that every king's 
 soldier may prove his truth and loyalty to the 
 king's cause as bravely if he should be beset by 
 temptation. And you, my fine Tories," turning 
 to the young men of the company, " I hope that 
 you will always be able to give your meed of 
 admiration and respect to such kind of courage, 
 wherever you find it. 
 
 "Come, Mistress Dorothy, let us go and be 
 served with some of these dainties that are pre- 
 pared for us ; and we will see if a Tory sillibub 
 will not take away the taste of those tears. You 
 are a litde rebel and mine enemy, for I am one 
 of the king's stanchest defenders and hope to 
 conquer all rebels, but I am proud to have such 
 a rebel for my guest to-night, I assure you," 
 and Mr. Jennifer bent down his powdered head 
 in a fine obeisance as he offered Dorothy his arm. 
 
 Nora Perry. 
 
POLLY CALLENDAR. 
 
 PREVIOUS to the outbreak of the Revolution 
 ^ the Callendars were Royalists, and General 
 Gage's young British officers, one of whom was 
 related to the Callendars, frequently rode out 
 from Boston to call at the hospitable country 
 house. It was Polly Callendar whom they went 
 to see ; her beauty and vivacious wit were the 
 theme of many toasts. And up to the evening 
 of this story Polly was as disdainful of the 
 minutemen as was her mother. 
 
 At about noon of that day Madam Callendar 
 was summoned to the bedside of Elizabeth 
 Ballard, a kinswoman living near Natick. She 
 had left her brick oven full of the week's baking, 
 and had set a large brass kettle, filled with 
 redwood dye, on the crane in the great fireplace. 
 
 Numerous skeins and hanks of woolen yarn, 
 spun during the previous winter, were immersed 
 in it, and the last warning from Polly's mother 
 was: "Redwood must never be hurried, Polly. 
 Stir often, lass. Press the hanks down hard 
 with your clothes-stick, and then drop in a little 
 of this powdered alum to set the scarlet." 
 
POLLY CALLENDAR. 175 
 
 So through the long, foggy afternoon it was 
 Polly Callendar's homely task to watch the oven 
 and tend the scarlet kettle. But with evening 
 came an unexpected diversion. A knock was 
 heard at the outer door; and when old 'Rastus, 
 the negro servant, had 
 opened it, a tall young 
 man, in provincial garb, 
 inquired how far it was 
 
 TV 1 1 y^J&^l^^^^ HOW FAR ? 
 
 to Boston and what 
 was the road. Learning that the distance was 
 still considerable, he entreated hospitality, saying 
 that having ridden since dawn, he was both 
 tired and wet. Polly at first demurred, but in 
 the end, persuaded somewhat by his respectful 
 manners and handsome face, she sent 'Rastus 
 to stable the horse. 
 
 She spread a plentiful supper before the way- 
 farer ; and then, because his appearance pleased 
 her, she brewed for him some of her mother's 
 cherished tea, and poured it into one of the 
 delicate china teacups that had come from 
 England. 
 
 But the young man ate in silence, notwith- 
 standing these attentions. Truth to say, he was 
 ill at ease. He was on his way to join the 
 minutemen, and he was bringing with him a 
 
176 POLLY CALLENDAR. 
 
 hundred pounds that had been contributed by 
 the patriot committee of his native town. He 
 feared that in some way the redcoats had been 
 given a hint of his mission. Mounted men had 
 stared hard at him that day, and he had thought 
 it wise to avoid a troop patrolling the roads. 
 And now, despite the quality of his supper, he 
 paused to listen anxiously w^henever horses' 
 hoofs or voices were heard without. Polly, 
 noticing his uneasiness and marking his blue, 
 colonial homespun, drew her own inferences. 
 
 Of a sudden the young man took note of the 
 kettle and its scarlet contents. ''That is a bright 
 dye which you have there, mistress," he re- 
 marked. ''Are you fond of so high a color?" 
 
 "In good truth, sir, and why not?" replied 
 Polly. " Have you fault to find with it?" 
 
 " I would be a churl if I did," answered the 
 guest, gallantly, "since it is scarcely more pink 
 than the cheeks of my fair hostess. The red- 
 coats must feel flattered at your preference." 
 
 "And is it not the hue that all loyal subjects 
 should prefer ? " queried Polly, demurely. 
 
 "Nay, but I will not gainsay you, mistress," 
 replied the young man. "And yet it is a color 
 soon to fade under our American sun." 
 
 "But not from the hearts of the king's loyal 
 
POLLY CALLENDAR. 177 
 
 subjects," retorted Polly. "This is no rebel 
 household, sir. My kinsmen, who were here 
 but yesterday, wear the scarlet and are the 
 king's loyal servants." And saying this she 
 observed that her guest winced. 
 
 " Beyond doubt he is one of the patriots," 
 she thought. ''But such a handsome youth! 
 Moreover, he is most courteous, and his ways 
 are more gentle than those of Cousin Charles." 
 
 As for the stranger, his heart sank afresh. 
 "I will pay for my supper and get on," he 
 thought. "I shall be safer abroad in the dark- 
 ness than here." As he rose to take leave the 
 tramp of horses was again heard ; and this time 
 they pulled up before the house door. 
 
 "My kinsmen, it is very like," said Polly, 
 smiling. " They wear sharp swords, sir." 
 Then, as she noted the hunted look which the 
 young man cast about the room, her manner 
 changed. " Is it that you would not like to 
 meet them, sir?" she asked, in a low tone. 
 
 As she spoke there came an imperative rap at 
 the door, and a cry of, "Open in the king's name! " 
 
 "For heaven's sake show me a way out!" 
 cried the stranger. "It is less that I fear their 
 swords, but I am on a mission of importance." 
 
 "Open, madam! Open, Polly! It is I, 
 
178 POLLY CALLENDAR. 
 
 your cousin Charles; and they say there is a 
 rascally rebel here ! " cried the voice outside. 
 " But we have the house surrounded." 
 
 Polly had turned toward a rear door, but 
 hearing these last words, darted to the center of 
 the room again. For an instant she was at a 
 loss. Then her eyes fell on the door of her 
 mother's storeroom, a closet beside the large 
 chimney, which it was Madam Callendar's 
 practice to keep locked; but in the haste of 
 departing, she had forgotten to take the key. 
 
 "Here, sir," Polly whispered. "Quick, be 
 quick! " and she unlocked the door, half-pushed 
 the man within, and hastily turning the key again, 
 put it in her pocket. 
 
 " Open ! " cried the voices outside. " Open in 
 the king's name!" and the raps were repeated. 
 
 "Coming, good sirs, coming!" cried Polly. 
 Then her eye fell on the young patriot's great- 
 coat, lying across a back of the chair. If seen, 
 that would betray all. She snatched it up and 
 plunged it into the great kettle of scarlet dye. 
 Then, throwing the door open and courtesying 
 low, as was the custom of those days, she cried, 
 " Good evening. Cousin Charles ! Welcome, 
 good gentlemen ; my mother has gone to 
 Natick; nevertheless, you are right welcome." 
 
POLLY CALLENDAR. 179 
 
 "Aye!" grumbled the young ofificer. "After 
 my knuckles are skinned with knocking. But 
 prithee, Polly, have you seen naught of this 
 insolent knave? " 
 
 " Indeed, Cousin Charles, this is but a sorry 
 jest ! " exclaimed Polly Callendar. " Since when 
 has my family been aught but loyal to the king ? " 
 
 '' True," assented the Briton. " Yet the rascal 
 may be lurking about." 
 
 ''Enter, then, and see for yourselves!" cried 
 Polly. " My mother would earnestly desire you 
 to purge her house of rebels ! " 
 
 They came noisily in, peered into nooks and 
 corners, and presently ascended to the attic. 
 
 "Do not forget the cellar ! " cried Polly, gaily, 
 opening the door and handing her cousin a 
 lighted candle. "Perchance the knave is 
 hiding in some bin or box." 
 
 The quest there proved as fruitless as in the 
 chambers ; but one of the party noted the closed 
 door by the chimney and tried it. "Why 
 locked ? " he exclaimed. "The key, fair mistress ! " 
 
 " For that you will do well to ask my mother," 
 replied Polly, carelessly. "The closet is my 
 mother's keeping-room; and it is ever her 
 custom to carry the key in her pocket." 
 
 "True," remarked her cousin, who knew the 
 
180 POLLY CALLENDAR. 
 
 ways of the household. ''The rogue will hardly 
 have got into madam's keeping-room. Doubtless 
 he has slipped away." 
 
 "If ever he were here!" flashed back Polly. 
 '' But beyond doubt, good cousin and gentlemen, 
 you must be hungry after your hard ride. Will 
 you not partake of our cheer?" 
 
 Nothing loath, the young redcoats gathered 
 about the supper-table, where for an hour or 
 more Polly maintained the reputation of the 
 house for loyalty and good entertainment. In 
 truth, the soldiers were slow to depart, and 
 would hardly have gone by nine o'clock had not 
 Polly adroitly reminded her kinsman that the 
 knave they were pursuing would surely get 
 clear away. Thereupon they took leave and 
 rode off with much laughter. 
 
 But fearful lest they might return, Polly waited 
 long, listening, and not until old 'Rastus had 
 come in to bar the outer door for the night and 
 close the shutters, would she release her prisoner. 
 
 "Come forth, sir!" she at last commanded, 
 with assumed austerity. "What have we here? 
 A rebel, I fear me, from all I am told." 
 
 " But one profoundly grateful to his preserver," 
 replied the young man ; and to old 'Rastus's great 
 astonishment, he took Mistress Polly's hand and 
 
POLLY CALLENDAR. 
 
 181 
 
 gallantly kissed the tips of her fingers, albeit 
 they were tinged with scarlet from her dye. 
 
 '* Methinks, sir, it but ill becomes me to accept 
 such thanks from one who confesses his dis- 
 loyalty to King George," Polly replied, still with 
 seeming severity, 
 " and whose 
 name I do not 
 even know. But 
 since you are 
 here, prithee take 
 seat before the 
 fire. For of ne- 
 cessity, sir, I have 
 made a good 
 Royalist of you, 
 so far as your 
 greatcoat covers 
 you. See! " And 
 with the clothes- 
 stick she lifted it 
 out of the kettle. 
 '' Not Cousin Charles's own is a brighter scarlet ! " 
 
 The stranger burst into a hearty laugh. " Good 
 faith, I had not thought to wear a scarlet coat ! " 
 
 "Yet, sir, it may stand you in good stead, as 
 you ride into Boston to-morrow," replied Polly. 
 
 DON IT, SIR. 
 
182 POLLY CALLENDAR. 
 
 ''And now let us powder a little alum in the 
 mortar to set the hue. I would not have thy 
 loyalty wash out, sir, in the first shower that 
 falls on you." 
 
 As a consequence, one young patriot found 
 himself powdering alum to dye his own coat 
 scarlet. And midnight came and passed, as he 
 and Polly sat in front of the great brass kettle, 
 and old 'Rastus nodded in the corner. 
 
 Beyond doubt they became better acquainted 
 in this time ; and Polly certainly learned the 
 stranger's name, for as the tall old clock in the 
 corner struck one, she said, "It is now time to 
 wring thy coat, John Fenderson." 
 
 When wrung it had still to be dried ; and Polly 
 put it for an hour into the warm brick oven. 
 
 Somewhat puckered from the dye, the garment 
 still required pressing out ; and to heat an iron 
 and accomplish this occupied yet another hour. 
 The old clock struck three. 
 
 ''Truly, John Fenderson, making a king's 
 man of thee has been a long task ! " exclaimed 
 Polly, as at last she held up the scarlet coat for 
 inspection. "Don it, sir! I would even desire 
 to mark the effect." And what John Fenderson 
 would not have done at the king's command, he 
 appears now to have done without hesitation at 
 
POLLY CALLENDAR. 183 
 
 Polly Callendar's request. For between these 
 two young people the grievous differences of 
 Tory and Patriot had already been dispelled. 
 
 *'Good luck, John Fenderson, in thy brave 
 coat," said Polly at four o'clock, as the young 
 man took leave, after she had given him break- 
 fast. " May the color hold — but if it fades! " 
 
 " I shall come back to you," said John. 
 
 "Ah, but it will grieve me when I hear that 
 thou art to be hanged for a rebel ! " cried Polly. 
 
 '' Nay, Mistress Polly, I should have but to 
 send for thee to teach me how to dye ! " replied 
 John Fenderson. 
 
 So he rode away, and had cause to be thank- 
 ful for the disguise the coat offered him ; for 
 while riding through Newton he was hailed by 
 three redcoats, two of whom raised their mus- 
 kets; but the third held them back, saying, 
 " Nay, by his coat he must be one of our men." 
 
 There is much reason to believe that Mistress 
 Polly's loyalty to King George was ever after- 
 ward open to question. At any rate, the records 
 of John Fenderson's native town show that he 
 married in 1779, and that the bride's name was 
 Polly Callendar. 
 
 Margaret Fenderson. 
 
WARREN'S LAST SPEECH. 
 
 On September 30, 1768, a British fleet and 
 army entered Boston harbor for the pur- 
 pose of enforcing the King of England's authority. 
 This act was the king's appeal to arms, and the 
 colonies so regarded and accepted it. 
 
 From that day there was war. It was a kind 
 of war only possible to men capable of awaiting 
 their time, habituated to self-control, accustomed 
 to think before acting, and to act according to 
 their thought. 
 
 The selectmen of Boston refused to provide 
 quarters for the soldiers, and they were the 
 more unwilling, as there was room for them in 
 the castle on an island in the harbor. Notwith- 
 standing this refusal, at noon on October ist, a 
 cold day for the season, the English troops, 
 armed and equipped for conflict, each man carry- 
 ing sixteen ball charges, were rowed in great 
 state to the shore, from which they marched to 
 the Common, with drums, fifes and flags. 
 
 One of the regiments encamped there for the 
 night. But there were no tents for the other, 
 and their commander asked the selectmen to 
 provide a temporary shelter for the men. 
 
WARREN'S LAST SPEECH. 
 
 185 
 
 The evening was colder than the day, and 
 the soldiers, debilitated from their voyage, were 
 evidently suffering from it. The people took 
 pity on them, and the selectmen, after some 
 delay, consented, for humanity's sake alone, to 
 let them remain for the night in Faneuil Hall. 
 
 At first the boys of Boston were much pleased 
 to view the daily drills and parades of the 
 soldiers ; which, to many an observant country- 
 man who came to town with produce, were a 
 
 ROWED IN GREAT STATE TO THE SHORE. 
 
 valuable object-lesson in the art of war. The 
 presence in Boston for seven years of regiments 
 of regular troops, exercising and camping, famil- 
 iarized great numbers of the future soldiers of 
 the Revolution with the details of military 
 
186 WARREN'S LAST SPEECH. 
 
 discipline. But during the whole period there 
 never ceased to be hostility and contention 
 between the troops and the people. 
 
 These soldiers were, after all, human beings. 
 Finding themselves objects of general contempt 
 and derision, in a land which furnished remote 
 and abundant hiding-places, they began to 
 desert in alarming numbers. Three or four of 
 them disappeared each day. During the first 
 two weeks forty deserted, and not a man in the 
 city appeared willing to betray them. 
 
 The feeling between the troops and the people 
 daily grew more bitter. The royal government 
 was tactless and insolent. The press of the 
 town retorted with stinging satire. Passers on 
 the street were rudely jostled by the soldiers. 
 Bayonets were occasionally drawn and used. 
 
 On March 5, 1770, when the British soldiers 
 had been in Boston seventeen months, occurred 
 the bloody affair which has ever since been 
 called the Boston Massacre. A file of the 
 troops, exasperated by the taunts, the snowballs 
 and menacing cries of a great crowd of men and 
 boys, opened fire upon them, killing three, 
 mortally wounding two, and injuring seven 
 others, nearly all of whom were innocent spec- 
 tators of the scene. 
 
WARREN'S LAST SPEECH. 
 
 187 
 
 The wrath of the people, as the news of this 
 affair spread through the town and the adjacent 
 counties, was something akin to frenzy; but 
 even in that critical hour the leaders of the 
 people retained their self-command, and knew 
 
 how to behave with 
 dignity, wisdom and 
 rectitude. They pro- 
 vided a vent for the 
 passion of the crisis in 
 a singularly impressive 
 public funeral of the 
 victims, in which the 
 whole mass of the 
 patriotic citizens took 
 part, marching six 
 abreast to the grave. 
 An immense public meeting was held. Samuel 
 Adams conveyed to the royal government its 
 respectful and most reasonable request for the 
 Immediate removal of the troops from the town. 
 One regiment had already gone. He demanded 
 the instant removal of every man who wore the 
 king's uniform. 
 
 "The troops," replied the governor, "are not 
 subject to my authority. I have no power to 
 remove them." 
 
 THE BOSTON MASSACRE. 
 
188 
 
 WARREN'S LAST SPEECH. 
 
 *' If," said Adams, '' you have power to remove 
 one regiment, you have power to remove both. 
 It is at your peril if you refuse. The meeting 
 is composed of three thousajid people. They 
 are become impatient. A thousand men are 
 already arrived from the neighborhood, and the 
 whole country is in motion. 
 Night is approaching. An im- 
 mediate answer is expected, 
 and a direct answer is de- 
 manded." 
 
 The government yielded. 
 The troops were removed, and 
 the Revolution was postponed 
 for five years. But every 
 year, on the anniversary of the 
 massacre, memorial services 
 were held of the most im- 
 pressive character, and an 
 oration was delivered by a 
 distinguished member of the 
 DR. JOSEPH WARREN. popukr party. 
 
 These celebrations increased in Interest and 
 in fervency every year until 1775, when Dr. 
 Joseph Warren, for the second time, was the 
 orator of the day. It was feared that the armed 
 conflict could not be long delayed, and Doctor 
 
WARREN'S LAST SPEECH. 189 
 
 Warren asked the privilege of delivering the 
 oration. He wished the opportunity to declare 
 once more that the people of America had fully 
 resolved to fight rather than submit to lawless 
 rule. He desired to impress it upon the English 
 people that the unexampled patience which the 
 men of New England had shown had in it no 
 alloy of cowardice. He sought the duty also 
 because there was thought to be danger in the 
 performance of it. 
 
 Some of the British officers had agreed to 
 attend the Old South Church, where the meeting 
 was to be held, and if anything offensive was said, 
 they were to make an assault upon the speaker 
 and break up the meeting. The story has long 
 been current that a young ensign had agreed to 
 give the signal by throwing an Ggg at the orator. 
 But on his way to church the gallant youth had a 
 fall. The egg was broken, his knee was put out 
 of joint, and he was ignominiously carried home. 
 
 The meeting was appointed for half past 
 eleven, and long before that hour the church 
 was crowded. The pulpit, as usual on these 
 occasions, was draped in black. In the pulpit 
 were several of the well-known and trusted 
 leaders, Samuel Adams and John Hancock 
 among the rest. 
 
190 WARREN'S LAST SPEECH. 
 
 Samuel Adams, who presided, observing a 
 number of British officers standing in the aisles, 
 and being resolved to deprive them of all pretext 
 for disorder, requested the occupants of the 
 front pews to leave them, which they did. He 
 then politely invited the officers to take the 
 vacant places. About forty of them came for- 
 ward, some of whom took seats in the pews, 
 and the rest sat upon the pulpit stairs. 
 
 After quiet was restored, there was profound 
 silence in the assembly ; so that the noise of the 
 doctor's chaise driving up and stopping at an 
 apothecary's shop opposite the church was heard 
 within. 
 
 The orator descended from this vehicle and 
 entered the shop, followed by his servant carry- 
 ing a bundle, which contained the gown of black 
 silk in which public speakers at that day fre- 
 quently arrayed themselves. 
 
 There was such a crowd about the door that 
 he went to the rear of the building, where, 
 ascending by a ladder, he entered through a 
 window behind the pulpit. The silence was 
 broken only when he came to the front and 
 began his oration with the well-known words, 
 "My ever-honored fellow citizens." 
 
 The speech was pathetic and forcible in a 
 
WARREN'S LAST SPEECH. 
 
 191 
 
 high degree. The orator laid down the principle 
 that freedom is the natural right of every man, 
 and that no man can be justly deprived of the 
 fruits of his toil except by his own consent, 
 given by himself or 
 by his legal repre- 
 sentatives. He 
 stated modestly and 
 plainly the resolve of 
 America to maintain 
 this right even at 
 the cost of war. 
 
 The orator spoke 
 of the tender and 
 enthusiastic affection 
 which the colonists 
 had formerly felt for 
 the mother country. 
 So far from envying 
 the wealth and great- 
 
 EVEN AT THE COST OF WAR. 
 
 ness of Great Britain, 
 the people of the colonies, he said, exulted in 
 them, and their delight was to relate to their 
 children the glorious deeds which had been 
 done by Englishmen in former ages. Nothing 
 was so astonishing to the people of America as 
 that it should be '' the arms of George, our 
 
192 WARREN'S LAST SPEECH. 
 
 rightful king, that had been employed to shed 
 the blood which freely would have Howed at his 
 command when justice or honor of the crown 
 had called his subjects to the field." But even 
 against Britain the people of America would 
 defend the natural rights of man! 
 
 The British officers behaved tolerably well 
 during the delivery of this oration, but when the 
 usual motion was made to appoint an orator for 
 the following year they began to hiss. This 
 irritated the assembly, and for a time there was 
 much confusion. Order was at length restored, 
 however, and the business of the meeting was 
 concluded. 
 
 There was no occasion for an orator the next 
 year. Forty-four days after this meeting Gen- 
 eral Gage spared the people of Boston the 
 responsibility of "precipitating a crisis" by order- 
 ing a movement of troops which issued in the 
 Battle of Lexington. 
 
 James Parton. 
 
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 fluence directly the conduct and issues of daily life. 
 
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 201 Columbus Avenue. BOSTON, MASS. 
 
THE YOUTH'S COMPANION 
 IN EDUCATION. 
 
 The special character of The Youth's Companion 
 admirably adapts it for use in Schools and Academies, 
 as a Supplementary Reader and as the Instructors' 
 Help in furnishing the latest information in Science, 
 Art and the Current History of the World. 
 
 In every department of education, from the Kinder- 
 garten to the College, the wise instructor is constantly 
 seeking illustrations to brighten and vivify the topics 
 he is teaching. By its great variety of short articles, 
 all carefully verified. The Companion peculiarly serves 
 the educator. 
 
 It gives practical aid in ethics and social customs 
 concerning the happiness of the home, and acquaints 
 its readers with the best living writers. It supplies 
 fresh reading-matter every week, and awakens ambition 
 by presenting high and healthy ideals. 
 
 Its use in schools has been so extensive that the 
 publishers make a Special School Rate of three cents 
 a copy for any number of papers sent to one address 
 for any length of time. The average amount of reading 
 thus given each week for three cents equals the con- 
 tents of an ordinary book of 175 pages. 
 
 Educators who wish choice Selections from The 
 Companion, bound in convenient and permanent form, 
 will be pleased with the books named on the following 
 pages. 
 
THE COMPANION SERIES, 
 
 UNDER THE CROTVN : 
 
 Stories and Articles descriptive of Early American 
 History. Containing Nos. 34, 35 and 36. 
 
 OUR NATIONAL GOVERNMENT: 
 
 The Executive, Legislative and Judicial Divisions. Con- 
 taining Nos. 27, 28 and 29. 
 
 OUR COUNTRY EAST: 
 
 The Earliest Settled Sections of the United States. 
 Containing Nos. 14, 15, 16 and 17. 
 
 OUR COUNTRY "WEST : 
 
 America West of the Mississippi River, including 
 Alaska. Containing Nos. 10, 11, 12 and 13. 
 
 GREATER AMERICA: 
 
 Porto Rico, Philippines, Hawaii, Samoa and Guam. 
 Containing Nos. 21, 22 and 23. 
 
 BY LAND AND SEA: 
 
 Travel in Europe, Asia and the Tropics of America. 
 
 Containing Nos. 2, 3, 4 and 5. 
 
 TALKS ABOUT ANIMALS: 
 
 Birds, Insects, Wild Animals and Fishes. Containing 
 Nos. 6, 7, 8 and 9. 
 
 PURPOSE AND SUCCESS: 
 
 Stories of Bright Achievement. Containing Nos. i, 18, 
 19 and 20. 
 
 DARING DEEDS: 
 
 Stories of Courage, Heroism and Faithfulness. Con- 
 taining Nos. 24, 25 and 26. 
 
 HEROIC ADVENTURES: 
 
 Stories of Brave Deeds in Face of Danger. Containing 
 
 Nos. 30, 31 and 32. 
 Boil ad in Strong Liaea. Illustrated. Price SO cents each. 
 
 The Companion Classics: 
 
 Arthur Henry Hallam, by Hon. William Ewart Gladstone. 
 
 A Boy Sixty Years Ago, by Hon. George F. Hoar. 
 Famous Americans, by Hon. Justin McCarthy. 
 
 Recollections of Gladstone, by Rt. Hon. James Bryce. 
 Paper Covers. Price 10 cents each. 
 
THE COMPANION LffiRARY. 
 
 Selections from The Youth's Cotnpaaioa, 64 pages each, 
 with maay pictures, bound in stiff paper covers. 
 
 1 . Stories of Purpose : Bravery, Tact and Fidelity. 
 
 2. Glimpses of Europe : Travel and Description. 
 3. The American Tropics : Mexico to the Equator. 
 
 4. SIcetciies of the Orient : Scenes in Asia. 
 5. Old Ocean : Winds, Currents and Perils. 
 6. Life in the Sea : Fish and Fishing. 
 7. Bits of Bird Life : Habits, Nests and Eggs. 
 
 8. Our Little Neighbors : Insects, Small Animals. 
 9. At Home in the Forest : Wild Animals. 
 
 10. In Alaska: Animals and Resources. 
 11. Among the Rockies : Scenery and Travel. 
 
 12. In the Southwest : Semi-Tropical Regions. 
 13. On the Plains : Pioneers and Ranchmen. 
 
 14. The Great Lake Country : A Land of Progress. 
 IS. On the Gulf: The States, Florida to Texas. 
 
 16. Along the Atlantic : New York to Georgia. 
 17. In New England : The Home of the Puritans. 
 
 18. Stories of Success : Skill, Courage, Perseverance. 
 19. Stories of Kindness : Examples for Rich and Poor. 
 20. Student Stories: Life in School and College. 
 21. In Porto Rico: The People, Customs, Progress. 
 
 22. In the Philippines : Possession and Experiences. 
 23. Mid=>Ocean America : Hawaii, Samoa, Pacific Islands. 
 
 24. Bravest Deeds: Stories of Heroism. 
 25. Sheer Pluck : Facing Danger with a Purpose. 
 
 26. Fearless in Duty : Acts of Courage. 
 27. Our President : Executive Life and Duties. 
 
 28. Our National Senate : Routine of Legislation. 
 29. Our Congressmen : Responsibilities of Lawmakers. 
 
 30. Heroes of History : True Stories of Bravery. 
 31. Saved by Stratagem : Stories of Adroit Manceuver. 
 
 32. The Brink of Peril : Heroic Escapes from Danger. 
 33. Children's Festivals: What Little Folks Can Do. 
 34. The First Comers: Early American History. 
 35. In Colonial Days : Struggles of Early Settlers. 
 36. The Colonies Alert : Gaining Confidence. 
 Price 10 cents each, post-paid. 
 
 PERRY MASON COMPANY, Publishers, 
 201 Columbus Avenue. BOSTON, MASS. 
 
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