صور الصفحة
PDF
النشر الإلكتروني

most like to talk about?

4. What books has he?

Which one does he take down to read? 5. What reference is there to the sufferings of the Colonists? 6. What is John Alden doing? 7. What does the Captain ask him to do? 8. How does he like the task?

the Captain not do it himself?

9. Why will

II. 1. What time of the year is it? 2. What offering does John Alden take to Priscilla ? 3. What do they talk about at first? 4. How does he deliver the Captain's message? 5. How does she receive it? 6. Why does she resent it? 7. How does he plead his friend's cause? What does he say in defense of him and in praise of him? 8. What does all this wasted eloquence lead her to say?

III. Between this part and what has gone before there is the story of John Alden's trouble about how he should act, of the sailing of the Mayflower, of the Captain's expedition against the Indians and the false report of his death, and of John Alden's now really "speaking for himself." You should get the poem from the library or at home, and read the whole of it.

1. How is the sun described? 2. What time of year is it now? 3. The " Wedding of Ruth": where would you find this? 4. Who appears just at the end of the ceremony? 5. What do they all think

at first? 6. How does the Captain now act?

Do you like him better?

7. What does he mean by "gathering cherries in Kent at the season of Christmas"? 8. Describe the final scene of the wedding, the procession

to their new home.

For Study with the Glossary: I. Doublet and hose, Cordovan, cutlass, corselet, sword of Damascus, Arabic, azure-eyed, arcabucero, Flemish morasses, arsenal, inkhorn, Commentaries of Cæsar, belligerent, epistles, treacherous, ponderous, reluctant.

II. Tranquil, verdure, exhalation, phantom, mayflower, Luther, carded wool, abashed, embellish, avowal, pedigree, family arms, argent, wattled gules, placable.

III. Highpriest, resplendent, pomegranates, sanction, laudable, benedictions, sombre, betrothal, atoning, adage, transfigured distaff, abyss.

THE GRAY CHAMPION

There was once a time when New England groaned under the actual pressure of heavier wrongs than those threatened ones which brought on the Revolution. James II, the bigoted successor of Charles the Voluptuous, had annulled the charters of all the colonies, and sent a harsh and un- 5 principled soldier to take away our liberties and endanger our religion. The administration of Sir Edmund Andros lacked scarcely a single characteristic of tyranny: a Governor and Council, holding office from the King, and wholly independent of the country; laws made and 10 taxes levied without concurrence of the people, immediate or by their representatives; the rights of private citizens violated, and the titles of all landed property declared void; the voice of complaint stifled by restrictions on the press; and, finally, disaffection overawed by 15 the first band of mercenary troops that ever marched on our free soil. For two years our ancestors were kept in sullen submission by that filial love which had invariably secured their allegiance to the mother country, whether its head chanced to be a Parliament, Protector, or Popish 20 Monarch. Till these evil times, however, such allegiance had been merely nominal, and the colonists had ruled themselves, enjoying far more freedom than is even yet the privilege of the native subjects of Great Britain.

At length a rumor reached our shores that the Prince 25 of Orange had ventured on an enterprise the success of

which would be the triumph of civil and religious rights and the salvation of New England. It was but a doubtful whisper; it might be false, or the attempt might fail; and, in either case, the man that stirred against King 5 James would lose his head. Still, the intelligence produced a marked effect. The people smiled mysteriously in the streets, and threw bold glances at their oppressors; while, far and wide, there was a subdued and silent agitation, as if the slightest signal would rouse the whole land 10 from its sluggish despondency. Aware of their danger, the rulers resolved to avert it by an imposing display of strength, and perhaps to confirm their despotism by yet harsher measures. One afternoon in April, 1689, Sir Edmund Andros and his favorite councilors, being warm 15 with wine, assembled the redcoats of the Governor's Guard, and made their appearance in the streets of Boston. The sun was near setting when the march commenced.

The roll of the drum, at that unquiet crisis, seemed to go through the streets, less as the martial music of 20 the soldiers, than as a muster-call to the inhabitants themselves. A multitude, by various avenues, assembled in King Street, which was destined to be the scene, nearly a century afterwards, of another encounter between the troops of Britain and a people struggling 25 against her tyranny. Though more than sixty years had elapsed since the Pilgrims came, this crowd of their descendants still showed the strong and somber features of their character, perhaps more strikingly in such a stern emergency than on happier occasions. There were

the sober garb, the general severity of mien, the gloomy but undismayed expression, the Scriptural forms of speech, and the confidence in Heaven's blessing on a righteous cause, which would have marked a band of the original Puritans, when threatened by some peril of the wilder-5 ness. Indeed, it was not yet time for the old spirit to be extinct; since there were men in the street, that day, who had worshiped there beneath the trees, before a house was reared to the God for whom they had become exiles. Old soldiers of the Parliament were here, too, 10 smiling grimly at the thought, that their aged arms might strike another blow against the house of Stuart. Here, also, were the veterans of King Philip's war, who had burned villages and slaughtered young and old, with pious fierceness, while the godly souls throughout the 15 land were helping them with prayer. Several ministers were scattered among the crowd, which, unlike all other mobs, regarded them with such reverence, as if there were sanctity in their very garments. These holy men exerted their influence to quiet the people, but not to 20 disperse them. Meantime, the purpose of the Governor, in disturbing the peace of the town, at a period when the slightest commotion might throw the country into a ferment, was almost the universal subject of inquiry, and variously explained.

"Satan will strike his master-stroke presently," cried some, "because he knoweth that his time is short. All our godly pastors are to be dragged to prison! We shall see them at a Smithfield fire in King Street!"

25

Hereupon the people of each parish gathered closer round their minister, who looked calmly upwards and assumed a more apostolic dignity, as well befitted a candidate for the highest honor of his profession, the 5 crown of martyrdom. It was actually fancied, at that period, that New England might have a John Rogers of her own, to take the place of that worthy in the Primer.

"We are to be massacred, man and male child!” cried 10 others.

Neither was this rumor wholly discredited, although the wiser class believed the Governor's object somewhat less atrocious. His predecessor under the old charter, Bradstreet, a venerable companion of the first settlers, 15 was known to be in town. There were grounds for conjecturing that Sir Edmund Andros intended, at once, to strike terror, by a parade of military force, and to confound the opposite faction by possession himself of their chief.

20 "Stand firm for the old charter, Governor!" shouted the crowd, seizing upon the idea. "The good old Governor Bradstreet!"

While this cry was at the loudest, the people were surprised by the well-known figure of Governor Bradstreet 25 himself, a patriarch of nearly ninety, who appeared on the elevated steps of a door, and, with characteristic mildness, besought them to submit to the constituted authorities.

"My children," concluded this venerable person "do nothing rashly. Cry not aloud, but pray for the welfare

« السابقةمتابعة »