Nooks and Corners of the New England Coast Part 35

[Ill.u.s.tration: WATSON'S HOUSE, CLARK'S ISLAND.]

It is only a little way from the landing-place at Clark's Island to the venerable Watson mansion, seen embowered among trees as we approached.[206] The parent house was removed from its first situation, rather nearer the water than it now stands, and has incorporated with itself newer additions, till it is quite lost in the transformation it has undergone. The island is a charming spot, and the house a substantial, hospitable one. I did not like it the less because it was old, and seemed to carry me something nearer to the Pilgrims than any of the white band of houses I saw across the bay. Ducks, turkeys, geese, and fowls lived in good-fellowship together in the barn-yard, where were piled unseaworthy boats; and store of old lumber-drifts the sea had provided against the winter. The jaw-bone of a whale, that Mr. Watson said he had found stranded on the beach, and brought home on his back, lay bleaching in the front yard. I may have looked a trifle incredulous, for the hale old gentleman, turned, I should say, of three-score, drew himself up as if he would say, "Sir, I can do it again."

[Ill.u.s.tration: ELECTION ROCK, CLARK'S ISLAND.]

After showing us his family portraits, ancient furniture, and other heir-looms, our host told us how Sir Edmund Andros had tried to dispossess his ancestors. My companion and myself then took the path leading to Election Rock, that owes its name, doubtless, to some local event. It is a large boulder, about twelve feet high, on the highest point of the island. Two of its faces are precipitous, while the western side offers an easy ascent. At the instance of the Pilgrim Society, the following words, from "Mourt's Relation," have been graven on its face:

"On the Sabboth Day wee rested.

20 December, 1620."

As is well known to all who have followed the fortunes of the little band of eighteen--and who has not followed them in their toilsome progress in search of a haven of rest?--their shallop, after narrowly escaping wreck among the shoals of Saquish, gained a safe anchorage under the shelter of one of the then existing islands. It is probable that when they rounded Saquish Head they found themselves in smoother water.

The gale had carried away their mast and sail. Their pilot proved not only ignorant of the place into which he was steering, but a coward when the pinch came. They were on the point of beaching the shallop in a cove full of breakers, when one of the sailors bid them about with her, if they were men, or else they would be all lost. So that the fortunes of the infant colony hung, at this critical moment, on the presence of mind of a nameless mariner.

Cold, hungry, and wet to the skin, they remained all night in a situation which none but the roughest campaigner would know how rightly to estimate. The Indians had met them, at Eastham, with such determined hostility that they expected no better reception here. Their arms were wet and unserviceable. As usual, present discomfort triumphed over their fears, for many were so much exhausted that they could no longer endure their misery on board the shallop. Some of them gained the sh.o.r.e, where with great difficulty they lighted a fire of the wet wood they were able to collect. The remainder of the party were glad to join them before midnight; for the wind shifted to north-west, and it began to freeze.

They had little idea where they were, having come upon the land in the dark. It was not until day-break that they knew it to be an island.

Surely, these were times to try the souls of men, and to wring the selfishness out of them.

This night bivouac, this vigil of the Pilgrims around their blazing camp-fire, the flames painting their bronzed faces, and sending a grateful warmth into benumbed bodies, was a subject worthy the pencil of Rembrandt. I doubt that they dared lay their armor aside or shut their eyes the live-long night. I believe they were glad of the dawn of a bright and glorious December day.[207] They dried their buff coats, cleansed their arms of rust, and felt themselves once more men fit for action. Then they shouldered their muskets and reconnoitred the island.

Probably the eighteen stood on the summit of this rock.

I found Clark's Island to possess a charm exceeding any so-called restoration or monumental inscription--the charm of an undisturbed state. No doubt much of the original forest has disappeared, and Boston has yet to return the cedar gate-posts so carefully noted by every succeeding chronicler of the Old Colony. A few scrubby originals of this variety yet, however, remain; and the eastern side of the island is not dest.i.tute of trees. The air was sweet and wholesome, the sea-breeze invigorating. In the quietude of the isle the student may open his history, and read on page and scene the story of a hundred English hearts sorely tried, but triumphing at last.

History has not told us how the eighteen adventurous Pilgrims pa.s.sed their first Sabbath on Clark's Island. One writer says very simply "wee rested;" and his language re-appears on the tablet of imperishable rock.

Bradford says, on the "last day of ye weeke they prepared ther to keepe ye Sabbath." If ever they had need of rest it was on this day; and if ever they had reason to give thanks for their "manifold deliverances,"

now was the occasion. They would hardly have stirred on any enterprise without their Bible; and probably one having the imprint of Geneva, with figured verses, was now produced. Bradford, yet ignorant of his wife's death, may have prayed, and Winslow exhorted, as both admit they often did in the church. Master Carver may have struck the key-note of the Hundredth Psalm, "the grand old Puritan anthem;" and even Miles Standish and the "saylers" three, may have joined in the forest hymnal.[208]

Hood, in his "History of Music in New England," speaking of the early part of the eighteenth century, says: "Singing psalms, at that day, had not become an amus.e.m.e.nt among the people. It was used, as it ever ought to be, only as a devotional act. So great was the reverence in which their psalm-tunes were held, that the people put off their hats, as they would in prayer, whenever they heard one sung, though not a word was uttered."

On leaving Clark's Island we steered for Captain's Hill. By this time the water had become much roughened, or, to borrow a word from the boatmen's vocabulary, "choppy;" I should have called it hilly. Our attempt to land at Duxbury was met with great kicking, bouncing, and squabbling on the part of the boat, which seemed to like the chafing of the wharf as little as we did the idea of a return to Plymouth against wind and tide. Quiet perseverance, however, prevailed, and, after clambering up the piles, we stood upon the wharf. A short walk by the cart-way, built to fetch stone from the pier to the monument, brought us to the brow of the hill.

Captain's Hill, named from Captain Miles Standish, its early possessor, is on a peninsula jutting out between Duxbury and Plymouth bays. Its surface is smooth, with few trees, except those belonging to the farm-houses near its base. The soil, that is elsewhere in Duxbury sandy and unproductive, is here rather fertile, which accounts for its having become the seat of the puissant Captain Standish. The monument, already mentioned as in progress, had advanced as high as the foundations. As originally planned, it was to be built of stones contributed by each of the New England States, and by the several counties and military organizations of Ma.s.sachusetts.

Standish, about 1632, settled upon this peninsula, building his house on a little rising ground south-east of the hill near the sh.o.r.e. All traces that are left of it will be found on the point of land opposite Mr.

Stephen M. Allen's house. The cellar excavation was still visible when I visited it, with some of the foundation-stones lying loosely about.

Except a clump of young trees that had become rooted in the hollows, the point is bare, and looks anything but a desirable site for a homestead.

Plymouth is in full view, as is also the harbor's open mouth. The s.p.a.ce between the headland on which the house stood and Captain's Hill was at one time either an arm of the sea, or else in great gales the water broke over the level, forming a sort of lagoon. Mr. Winsor, in his "History of Duxbury," says the sea, according to the traditions of the place, once flowed between Standish's house and the hill. The ground about the house, he adds, has been turned up in years past, the search being rewarded by the recovery of several relics of the old inhabitant.[209] The house is said to have been burned, but so long ago that even the date has been quite forgotten. On this same neck Elder Brewster is believed to have lived, but the situation of his dwelling is at best doubtful.

The earliest reference I have seen to the tradition of John Alden "popping the question" to Priscilla Mullins for his friend, Miles Standish, is in "Alden's Epitaphs," printed in 1814. No mention is there of the snow-white bull,

"Led by a cord that was tied to an iron ring in its nostrils, Covered with crimson cloth, and a cushion placed for a saddle."

John Alden's marriage took place, it is supposed, in 1621. The first cattle brought to Plymouth were a bull, a heifer, and "three or four jades," sent by Mr. Sherley, of the Merchant's a.s.sociation, in 1624.

They were consigned to Winslow and Allerton, to be sold. The tradition of the emba.s.sy of Alden, and of the incomparably arch rejoinder of Priscilla, "Prythee, John, why don't you speak for yourself?" was firmly believed in the family of Alden, where, along with that of the young cooper having first stepped on the ever-famous rock, it had pa.s.sed from the mouth of one generation to another, without gainsaying.

I am not of those who experience a thrill of joy at destroying the illusions of long-h.o.a.rded family traditions. What of romance has been interwoven with the singularly austere lives of the Puritans, gracious reader, let us cherish and protect. The province of the Dryasdust of to-day is to bewilder, to deny the existence of facts that have pa.s.sed without challenge for centuries. The farther he is from the event, the nearer he accounts himself to truth. Historic accuracy becomes another name for historic anarchy. Nothing is settled. The grand old characters he strips of their hard-earned fame can not confront him. Would they might! Columbus, Tell, Pocahontas, are impostors: Ireson's Ride and Standish's Courtship are rudely handled. His tactics would destroy the Christian religion. Without doubt mere historic truth is better written in prose, but by all means let us put a stop to the slaughter of all the first-born of New England poesy. Let us have Puritan lovers and sweethearts while we may. "What is your authority?" asked a visitor of the guide who was relating the story of a ruined castle. "We have tradition, and if you have any thing better we will be glad of it."

The position of Standish in the colony was in a degree anomalous, for he was neither a church member nor a devout man. But the Pilgrims, who knew on occasion how to smite with the sword, did not put too trifling an estimate upon the value of the little iron man. He seems to have deserved, as he certainly received, their confidence, as well in those affairs arising out of religious disorders among them as in those of a purely military character. When wanted, they knew where he was to be found.

After his fruitless emba.s.sy to England, Standish seems to have turned his sword into a pruning-hook, leading a life of rural simplicity, perhaps of comparative ease. He had, as the times went, a goodly estate.

There is little doubt he was something "splenetic and rash," or that the elders feared he would bring them into trouble by his impetuous temper.

He was of a race of soldiers.[210] Hubbard calls him a little chimney soon fired. Lyford speaks of him as looking like a silly boy, and in utter contempt. The Pilgrims managed his infirmities with address, and he served them faithfully as soldier and magistrate. It is pa.s.sing strange a man of such consequence as he should sleep in an unknown grave.

Near the foot of Captain's Hill is an old gambrel-roofed house, with the date of 1666 on the chimney. At the entrance the stairs part on each side of an immense chimney-stack. The timbers, rough-hewn and exposed to view, are bolted with tree-nails. One fire-place would have contained a Yule-log from any tree in the primeval forest. The hearth was in breadth like a side-walk. On the doors were wooden latches, or bobbins, with the latch-string out, as we read in nursery tales. The front of the house was covered with climbing vines, and, taken altogether, as it stood out against the dark background of the hill, was as picturesque an object as I have seen in many a day.[211]

I would like to walk with you two miles farther on, and visit the old Alden homestead, the third that has been inhabited by the family since pilgrim John built by the margin of Eagle Tree Pond. This old house, erected by Colonel Alden, grandson of the first-comer of the name, is still in the same family, and would well repay a visit; but time and tide wait for us.

Farther on I have rambled over ancient Careswell, the seat of the Winslows, a family with a continuous stream of history, from Edward, the governor, who became one of Cromwell's Americans, and died in his service (you may see his letters in the ponderous folios of Thurloe), down to the winner in the sea-fight between the _Kearsarge_ and _Alabama_. Beyond is the mansion Daniel Webster inhabited in his lifetime, and the hill where, among the ancient graves, he lies entombed. Here, in Kingston, General John Thomas, of the Revolution, lived.

[Ill.u.s.tration: CHURCH'S SWORD.]

Another military chieftain, little less renowned than Standish, was Colonel Benjamin Church, the famous Indian fighter. He was Plymouth-born, but lived some time in Duxbury. In turning over the pages of Philip's and King William's wars, we meet him often enough, and always giving a good account of himself. One act of the Plymouth authorities during Philip's war deserves eternal infamy. It drew from Church the whole-hearted denunciation of a brave man.

During that war Dartmouth was destroyed. The Dartmouth Indians had not been concerned in this outrage, and after much persuasion were induced to surrender themselves to the Plymouth forces. They were conducted to Plymouth. The Government ordered all of them to be sold as slaves, and they were transported out of the country, to the number of one hundred and sixty.[212]

I despaired of being able to match this act of treachery with any contemporaneous history. But here is a fragment that somewhat approaches it in villainy. In 1684 the King of France wrote M. de la Barre, Governor of New France, to seize as many of the Iroquois as possible, and send them to France, where they were to serve in the galleys, in order to diminish the tribe, which was warlike, and waged war against the French. Many of them were actually in the galleys of Ma.r.s.eilles.[213]

The balance is still in our favor. In 1755 we expatriated the entire French population of Acadia. Mr. Longfellow tells the story graphically in "Evangeline." John Winslow, of Marshfield, was the instrument chosen by the home government for the work. It was conducted with savage barbarity. Families were separated, wives from husbands, children from parents. They were parceled out like cattle among the English settlements. Their aggregate number was nearly two thousand persons, thenceforth without home or country. One of these outcasts, describing his lot, said, "It was the hardest that had happened since our Saviour was upon earth." The story is true.

Our little boat worked her way gallantly back to Plymouth. Though thoroughly wet with the spray she had flung from her bows, I was not ill-pleased with the expedition. Figuratively speaking, my knapsack was packed, my staff and wallet waiting my grasp. With the iron horse that stood panting at the door I made in two hours the journey that Winthrop, Endicott, and Winslow took two days to accomplish. Certainly I found Plymouth much changed. The Pilgrims would hardly recognize it, though now, as in centuries before their coming,

"The waves that brought them o'er Still roll in the bay, and throw their spray, As they break along the sh.o.r.e."

[Ill.u.s.tration]

FOOTNOTES:

[193] These trees are said to have been planted in 1783, by Thomas Davis.

[194] Wife of Samuel Fuller. She gave the church the lot of ground on which the parsonage stood.--_Allen._

[195] See Appendix to Bradford's History.

[196] In 1741, when it was proposed to build a wharf near the rock, it was pointed out as the identical landing-place of the Pilgrims by Elder Thomas Faunce, who, having been born in 1646, had received the fact from the original settlers.

[197] This party consisted of eighteen persons--viz., Miles Standish, John Carver, William Bradford, Edward Winslow, John Tilley, Edward Tilley, John Howland, Richard Warren, Steven Hopkins, and Edward Doten.

Besides these were two seamen, John Alderton and Thomas English. Of the ship's company were Clark and Coppin, two of the master's mates, the master-gunner, and three sailors. This little band of discoverers left the ship at anchor at Cape Cod Harbor on the 16th of December. Mourt calls Alderton and English "two of our seamen," in distinction from the ship's company proper, they having been sent over by the undertakers, in the service of the plantation.

[198] On her return voyage the _Fortune_ was seized by a French man-of-war, Captain Frontenan de Pennart, who took Thomas Barton, master, and the rest prisoners to the Isle of Rhe, plundering the vessel of beaver worth five hundred pounds, belonging to the Pilgrims. The vessel and crew were discharged after a brief detention.--"British Archives."

[199] First spelled Swansea, and named from Swansea, in South Wales.

[200] Squanto was one of the Indians kidnaped by Hunt, and the last surviving native inhabitant of Plymouth. He had lived in London with John Slany, merchant, treasurer of the Newfoundland Company.

[201] Winsor, "History of Duxbury," p. 26, note.

[202] See _ante_, also "Ma.s.sachusetts Historical Collections," vol. ii., p. 5. First light-house erected 1763; burned 1801.