KEEPING CHRISTMAS.
And now began a new epoch in the life of the colony. The passengers of
the Fortune, thirty-five in number, although nominally of the same
belief and manners as the Mayflower Pilgrims, were in effect a new
element which, in spite of the generous efforts of the new-comers, did
not readily assimilate with the sober and restrained tone natural to men
who had suffered and struggled and conquered at such terrible loss to
themselves, as had the first comers.
A score of gay young fellows upon whom life sat so lightly that they
cared not how they periled it, was no doubt a valuable acquisition to
the fighting force of the colony, and almost upon the day of their
arrival the Captain enrolled, divided, and began to train them, forming
four companies of twelve men each, for some of the larger boys of the
Mayflower were now enlisted, and this force of fifty men was at least
once in every week led over to the Training Green across the brook, and
there inspected, manoeuvred, marched and counter-marched, disciplined
in prompt obedience and rapid movement; until the birds of the air who
watched from the neighboring forest should have carried a warning to
their co-aborigines, the Narragansetts, the Neponsets, the Namaskets,
and the Manomets, not yet convinced, spite of the late warning, that the
white man was their Fate against which it was but bitter defeat to
struggle. The training over, each company in turn escorted the captain
to his own quarters, and fired a salute of honor as he dismissed them.
"'T is not for mine own glory, Will, as thou who knowest me will
believe," said Standish, while the governor and he smoking a placid pipe
on the evening of the first training, discussed the events of the day.
"But in matters military even more than civil, it needs that one man
should be at the head, and command the respectful observance as well as
the obedience of those under his command. It is not Myles Standish whom
the soldiers of Plymouth salute as he enters this poor hut, but the
Captain of the Colony's forces."
"Ay, ay, Myles, I know thy humility," replied Bradford with his smile of
gentle subtlety. The captain shot an inquiring glance out of his
red-brown eyes, and in turn laughed a little uncomfortably.
"Nay now, thou 'rt laughing at me, Will. I claim no great meed of
humility to be sure, and yet thou knowest lad, that if I could serve
this emprise better by carrying a musket in the ranks"--
"Nay now, old friend, may not I smile at some jest between myself and my
pipe, but thou must tack more meaning to it than Brewster says hung on
Lord Burleigh's nod? And yet in sober sadness, Myles, 't is marvel to me
how thou, born to a great name and to such observance as awaits the
children of wealthy houses, and then, when hardly more than a boy,
placed in authority such as appertaineth to an English army officer in
time of war, how thou hast failed to become more arrogant and peremptory
than thou art. And as for a musket in the ranks, what were that to such
offices as not yet a year agone I saw thee fill around the beds of the
sick and dying in our first great plague? When had we a tenderer nurse,
a more patient watcher? What office was too loathly for thee, what
tendence too tiring?"--
"Will, an' thou holdst not thy tongue I'll leave thee to thyself."
"Thou 'lt never be so rude in thine own house, Myles. Such manners would
ill befit a Standish of Standish."
"Come now, Governor, do you disapprove of the salute, or of any other of
my military ordonnances?"
"I disapprove of naught, old comrade, but of a certain want of patience
beneath a friend's jest which I have sometimes marked, and haply it is I
who am at fault to try thee so; but Myles, there's enow to make the
governor of this colony sorry and sober, and thou shouldst not grudge
him a moment of merriment even at thine own cost."
"Nor do I, as well thou knowest, Will. 'T is only that I am as ever a
hot-headed fool and ill deserve a friend like thee. And now what thinkst
thou of Master Cushman's errand, and the chidings of those London
traders that we sent them not a cargo by the Mayflower? We who had much
ado to dig the graves of half our company and to find food for the rest,
to be rated like laggard servants because we laded not that old hulk
with merchandise for their benefit."
"Ay, Master Weston's letter was somewhat hard to bear, albeit we should
excuse much to his ignorance of our surroundings," said Bradford
placably, although the color rose to his cheek at thought of the
injustice he and his friends had suffered. "I have writ a reply,"
continued he, laying down his pipe and drawing a roll of paper from the
pocket of his leathern jerkin, "and am fain to have your mind upon it,
for I would not be over bitter, and yet was shrewdly wounded that John
Carver lying in his honored grave should be so rudely attacked. Shall I
read it?"
"Ay, an' thou wilt, though I'm more than half in mind to take passage by
the Fortune, and give Master Weston and the rest a reply after mine own
fashion."
"What, and leave the train band to its own destruction! But here you
have my poor script:--
"To the worshipful Master Thos: Weston:
"Sir,--Your large letter written to Mr. Carver and dated the 16th of
July 1621 I have received the 20th of Nov'br, wherein you lay many
heavy imputations upon him and us all. Touching him he is departed this
life, and now is at rest in the Lord from all those troubles and
incumbrances with which we are yet to strive. He needs not my apology;
for his care and pains were so great for the common good both ours and
yours, as that therewith it is thought, he oppressed himself and
shortened his days of whose loss we cannot sufficiently complain. At
great charges in this Adventure I confess you have been, and many
losses you may sustain; but the loss of his and many other honest and
industrious mens lives cannot be valued at any price. Of the one there
may be hope of recovery, but the other no recompence can make good."
"Oh, you're too mild, Bradford," burst out the captain as the reader
paused and looked up for approval. "You should bombard him with red-hot
shot, hurl a flight of grape, a volley of canister into his midst--nay
then, but I'll go myself and with a blow of my gauntlet across Master
Weston's ears"--
"Captain--Captain Standish! Master Warren hath sent me to warn your
worship that some of the new-comers are building a bonfire in the Town
Square, and sprinkling the pile with powder"--
"There, Myles, thou seest how well we can spare thee! Wouldst leave me
at the mercy of these rough companions who"--
But already the captain armed with a stout stick was half way down the
hill, and, smiling quaintly to himself Bradford relighted his pipe and
went home to finish his letter.
A week later the Fortune sailed on her return voyage carrying Cushman,
who left his son Thomas under Bradford's care until he should come
again, not knowing that his next voyage should be across the shoreless
sea whence no bark hath yet returned. Under his charge traveled Desire
Minter, loudly proclaiming her joy at returning to regions "where a body
might at least look for decent victual," and Humility Cooper, Elizabeth
Tilley's little cousin. The two seamen, Trevor and Ely, also returned,
their year of service having expired; but in spite of the dearth of
provision, already imminent owing to the unprovided condition of the
new-comers, not one of the Pilgrims embraced this opportunity of escape.
Besides her passengers, the Fortune carried valuable freight consigned
to Weston as agent of the Adventurers. The best room was given to
sassafras root, of which the colonists had gathered great store, and
with much rejoicing, for being just then the panacea of both French and
English physicians, it was worth something like forty dollars of our
present money per pound. Besides the sassafras were several hogsheads of
beaver skins, also very valuable at that time, and the rest of the hold
was filled with clapboards and other finished lumber, the whole cargo
worth at least twenty-five hundred dollars. The most precious thing on
board that little vessel however, if we except human life, was a
manuscript journal written by William Bradford and Edward Winslow, and
sent home to their friend George Morton in London, who, finding it too
good to be kept to himself, had it printed the very same year by "John
Bellamy at his shop at the Two Greyhounds, near the Royal Exchange,
London," and as he did not give the names of its authors, nor bestow any
distinctive title upon it, it came to be called "Mourt's Relation," and
was the first book ever printed about that insignificant knot of
emigrants in whom we now glory as the Forefathers of New England. But
alas for human hopes, alas for the honest rejoicings of the Pilgrims in
their goodly cargo, just before the Fortune sighted the English coast
she was captured by a French cruiser and carried into Isle Dieu. Two
weeks later the vessel, crew, and passengers were released, but the
sassafras, the beaver skins, and the lumber went to heal and warm and
house Frenchmen instead of Englishmen, and Thomas Weston's pockets still
cried out with their emptiness. Happily for the world, however, the
Frenchmen did not appreciate the "Relation," and it went peacefully on
in Robert Cushman's mails, and reached good George Morton's hands.
About a week after the sailing of the Fortune came Christmas Day, and
Bradford doing on his clothing for a good day at lumbering allowed
himself a half regretful memory of the sports and revelings with which
he and the other youth of Austerfield had been wont to observe the
Feast; but presently remembering his new beliefs, the Separatist leader
murmured something about "rags of Popery," and went down to his
breakfast.
"Call the men together, Howland," ordered he in some displeasure as
leaving his house axe in hand he found only his older comrades awaiting
him. "Where are the new-comers? I see none of them."
"An' it please you, Governor, Hicks and the rest of them say it goeth
against their conscience to work on Christmas Day," reported Howland
with a grim smile.
For a moment Bradford frowned, but as he caught the gay glint of
Standish's eyes his own softened, and after a brief pause he answered
temperately,--
"We will force no man's conscience. Tell Robert Hicks and the rest that
I excuse them until they be better informed."
At noon the wood-choppers returned to the village weary and hungry, for
already had the entire company been placed upon half rations of food, so
to continue until another cargo should arrive, or the next year's crop
be ripe. Well for their endurance that they could not foresee that no
farther cargo of provisions should ever arrive for them, from those who
had undertaken to support them, and that the next year's crop should
prove a failure. But now as they wearily toiled up the hill from the
brookside, eager for the hour of rest and the scanty meal they were
learning to value so highly, sounds of loud revelry and boisterous mirth
fell upon their ears, sounds alien to their mood, their necessities, and
on this day to their principles.
"Those runagates are holding Christmas revels in spite of you,
Governor," remarked Standish half jeeringly; while Hopkins, whose humor
just now was not far removed from mutiny, muttered that if godless men
were to play, he saw not why good Christians should be forced to work,
call it Christmas Day or any other.
"You are right, Hopkins, although somewhat discourteous in your
rectitude," replied Bradford, and hasting forward he came in sight of
the Town Square, where some fifteen or twenty of the Fortune passengers
were amusing themselves at "stool-ball," a kind of cricket, at pitching
the bar, wrestling, hopping-matches, and various other old English
sports, many of which had been encouraged and even led by the governor
in the late week of Thanksgiving. But now advancing into the midst, his
air of serene authority as much as his uplifted hand imposing silence
upon the merry rebels, who dropped their various implements, and tried
in vain to appear at ease, Bradford looking from one to another quietly
said,--
"I told you this morning that if you made the keeping of Christmas Day
matter of conscience, I should leave you alone until you were better
informed; now, however, I warn you that it goeth against my conscience
as governor of this colony to let idle men play while others work, and
if indeed you find matter of devotion in the day ye shall keep it
quietly and soberly in your housen. There shall be neither reveling nor
gaming in the streets, and that I promise you. Let whosoever owneth
these toys take them away and store them out of sight; and remember,
men, that the Apostle saith, 'If a man will not work neither shall he
eat.'"
Silently and shamefacedly the revelers collected bats and balls, cricket
stools, bars, poles, and iron weights, carrying them each man to his own
house, and in the afternoon the chopping party was augmented by nearly
every one of the new-comers.