A DAUGHTER OF THE PILGRIMS
It was past midsummer――the shadow of change was in the year. The birds
were gathering in flocks in the rowened meadows, and the woods were
displaying their purple grapes and first red leaves.
Rochambeau had been receiving the hospitalities of the Governor, and
had also received lessons in the new school of liberty from Faith
Robinson Trumbull, the wife of the Governor. The hero of Minden had
come to see this grand woman, and wished to make her a present before
he marched on to join the army of Washington against Clinton, with his
six thousand heroes.
What should his present to this noble woman be?
He had among his effects a scarlet cloak. It was suitable for a
woman or for a man. It covered the whole form, and made the wearer
conspicuous, for it was made of fine fabric, and represented the habit
of the battle-field.
He took the cloak out of his treasures one evening and came down into
the public room of the forest inn, where some of the French officers
of the regiment of _Auvergne sans tache_ were seated in a merry mood
before the newly kindled fire.
He held up the scarlet cloak. “Here,” said he, “is a garment to be worn
after the war for liberty is over. A field-marshal might wear it after
the day of victory. This war will soon end; I am going to present this
cloak to one of the most patriotic souls that I have ever met. Who do
you think it is?”
“The Governor,” said an officer, a colonel; “Washington’s own ‘Brother
Jonathan.’ He has made himself poor by the war, but has been the
inspiration of every battle-field, so they say. Well, you do well to
honor the rustic Governor. The world is richer for him. That is a good
thought, General. You honor the soldiers of _Auvergne sans tache_.”
The General, the hero of Lafeldt, held up the cloak before the cooling
summer fire. A soldier turned a burning stick with iron tongs, and
flames with sparks like a little volcano shot up and threw a red gleam
on the scarlet cloak with its gold thread.
“You have made a wrong guess, Colonel,” said Rochambeau. “This cloak is
for Madam Faith Trumbull, who has the blood of Robinson of Leyden in
her veins, and who is the very spirit of liberty.”
Immediately the officers leaped to their feet.
“Cheers!” said the Colonel. “Cheers for Madam Faith――may she soon wear
the cloak――after the war!”
The soldiers of _Auvergne sans tache_ were chivalrous, and they swung
their arms in wheel-like circles and cheered for the wife of the
self-forgetful Governor.
In the midst of this enthusiastic outpouring of feeling the Governor
himself appeared in the reception-room of the forest inn with madam,
smiling and stately, on his arm.
“You came at a happy moment, Governor,” said Rochambeau. “I am showing
my men this scarlet cloak.”
“It is a fine garment,” said the Governor. “It were worthy of a
field-marshal of France.”
“Would it be worthy of the wife of a marshal of a regiment of _Auvergne
sans tache_?” asked the courtly Frenchman.
“It would,” said the Governor in a New England tone.
“Then it would be worthy of _your_ wife, Governor.”
Rochambeau approached Madam Faith. “Will you allow me, madam, to honor
you, if it be an honor, with the scarlet cloak? I wish you to wear it
in memory of the soldiers of Auvergne, and of your humble servant,
until you shall find some one who is more worthy of it――and I do not
believe, madam, if you will allow me to say it, that any heart truer
than yours to the principles of liberty and to all mankind beats in
these provinces.”
He placed the scarlet cloak over her shoulders, and the officers
shouted for madam, for the Governor, for Rochambeau, and for the
soldiers of the banner of _Auvergne sans tache_.
How noble, indeed, Madam Faith looked as she stood there in the scarlet
cloak, its gold threads glimmering in the first firelight!
Her face glowed. She tried to speak, but could only say: “My heart is
full, General. But any soldier who sleeps to-night on the battle-field
is nobler than I――my heart would cover him with this cloak.”
The officers shouted enthusiastically: “Auvergne!”
The Governor stood off from his wife and her dazzling garment.
“You do look real pretty, Faith――wear it in memory of the French――wear
it to church――your wearing it will honor the cause, and be a service to
liberty. I wish Washington could see you now.”
“I will wear it,” said Madam Faith. “My heart thanks you!” she said to
Rochambeau. She began to retreat from the room, her face almost as red
as the cloak, and her eyes bright with tears. “I thank you in the name
of Liberty!” She moved farther away and out of the door.
“Going, Faith?” asked the Governor.
There came back a voice――“God bless you!”――the scarlet cloak had gone.
She thought that it was unworthy of her to remain where she would
secure homage, when the Connecticut soldiers had had scarcely clothes
to wear in their march against Clinton in the midst of the poverty that
had befallen the colonies during the war.
She became greatly distressed. In her enthusiasm for the French
deliverers she had promised to wear the cloak until some one more
worthy of it could be found, some one who needed it more.
She took off the garment in her own room and sat down. She thought
of the past. She saw in her vision her godly ancestor, Robinson,
addressing the Pilgrim Fathers for the last time.
“Go ye into the wilderness,” he had said, “and new light shall break
out from the word. I will follow you.”
She saw in fancy the Mayflower sail away, lifting new horizons. She saw
the many Pilgrims’ graves amid the May flowers after the first winter
at Plymouth.
She rose and put on the cloak and stood before the glass.
“I can not wear it,” she said. “I must wear only the clothes made with
my own hands, in times like these.”
She looked into the glass again.
“But my promise?” she asked. “I must keep that――I must be worthy of the
confidence that these soldiers of liberty have given me. I must honor
Rochambeau and the soldiers of the land of Pascal. How shall I do it?
I will wear it once and then seek some one more worthy to wear it; he
will not be hard to find.”
Governor Trumbull had become famous for his Fast-Day and Thanksgiving
proclamations. His words in these documents had the fire of an ancient
prophet.
This year his proclamation sang and rang. He called upon the people
to assemble in their meeting-house, and to bring with them everything
that they could spare that could be made useful to the soldiers on the
battle-field and be laid upon the altar of sacrifice.
Madam Faith heard his message as the pastor read it from the tall
pulpit under the sounding-board.
She thought of the scarlet cloak. She must wear it to the church on
that great day to honor Rochambeau and the soldiers of Auvergne. But of
what use could her garment be to the soldiers in the stress of war?
It was a bright mid-autumn day. The people were gathering on the
harvest-laden plateau on Lebanon Hill. The church on the high green,
founded some eighty years before, opened its doors to the sun. The
yeomen gathered on its steps and looked down on the orchards and
harvest fields. The men of the great farms assembled in groups about
the inn and talked of the fortunes of the war. They were rugged men in
homespun dress, with the purpose of the time in their faces. The women,
too, were in homespun.
While groups of people were gathering here and there the door of the
Governor’s plain house opened, and in it appeared Madam Faith in her
scarlet cloak. All eyes were turned upon her. She stepped out on to the
green. She did not look like the true daughter of the Pilgrims that she
was! The gay and glittering garment did not become the serious purpose
in her face.
She waited outside the door, and was soon joined by the Governor. The
two approached the church under the gaze of many eyes, and entered
the building, which is to-day in appearance much as it was then, and
the people followed them. The chair in which Governor Trumbull sat in
church is still to be seen in the old Trumbull house. A colored picture
of the church as it then appeared, with its high pulpit, sounding-board
and galleries, may be seen in Stuart’s “Life of Trumbull.”
A silence fell upon the assembly. The people felt that the crisis of
the war had passed with the coming of Rochambeau, but the manner of the
issue was yet doubtful.
The minister arose――“Be still, and know that I am the Lord.”
“God is the refuge of His saints,
Though storms of sharp distress invade;
Before they utter their complaints
Behold Him present with their aid!”
The stanza, or a like one, was sung in a firm tone, such as only
times like these could inspire. The heroic quality sank into tuneful
reverence with the lines:
“There is a stream whose gentle flow
Supplies the city of our God,”
or a like paraphrase. A long prayer followed; the hour-glass was
turned――silence in the full pews!
The sermon followed in the silence. Then the minister made an appeal
which went to every heart.
“The nation stands waiting the Divine will. We have given to the cause
our sons, our harvests, the increase of our flocks. We have sent of our
substance, our best, to every northern battle-field. We have seen our
men go forth, and they come not back. We have seen our cattle driven
away, and our cribs and cellars left empty; we have heard our Governor
called a ‘brother’ by the noble Washington, and the glorious regiment
of France’s honor has sung amid these cedars the songs of Auvergne.
“But the trumpets of the northern winds are sounding, and our army
faces winter again, cloakless and some of them shoeless, in tatters. We
are making new garments for the soldiers, but we have no red stripes to
put upon them; we may not honor the noblest soldier in the world with
any uniform, or insignia of his calling. He goes forth in homespun,
and in homespun he faces the glittering foe, and falls. His honor is
in himself, and not in his garments. He courageously goes down to the
chambers of silence without stripe or star.”
At the words _red stripes_, all eyes, as by one impulse, turned to the
scarlet cloak. It would furnish the ornament of dignity and honor to a
score of uniforms.
“Women of Lebanon, you have with willing hands laid much on the altar
of liberty. Under the pulpit stands a rail that guards holy things. I
appeal to you once more――I hope that it may be for the last time――to
spare all you can for the help and comfort of the soldier. Come up to
the altar one by one and put your offerings inside of the rail, and I
will lift my hands over your sacrifices in prayer and benediction.”
Silence. A few women began to remove the rings from their fingers and
ears. One woman was seen to loosen her Rob Roy shawl. Two Indian girls
removed strings of wampum from their necks. But no one rose. All seemed
waiting.
The Governor sat in his chair, and beside him his good wife in the red
Rochambeau cloak. They were in the middle aisle.
Madam Trumbull was thinking. Could she offer the scarlet garment to the
cause without implying a want of gratitude toward the noble Rochambeau?
Would she not _honor_ Rochambeau by offering the gift to the camp and
battle-field?
“Stripes on the soldiers’ garments are inspirations,” she may have
whispered to her husband. “I am going to give my cloak――it shall
follow Rochambeau――I am going to make it live and march――_he_ shall see
it again in the lines that dare death. Shall I go to the altar?”
“Yes, go. Send your cloak to Rochambeau again. Let it move on the
march. You will honor the regiment of Auvergne――_Auvergne sans tache_.”
She rose, almost trembling. Every eye was fixed upon her. Madam Faith
was held in more than common esteem, not only because she was the wife
of the Governor, but also because she was a descendant of the _Prophet_
of the Pilgrims of Leyden and Plymouth.
She stood by the Governor’s chair, unfastening the red garment. The
people saw what she was about to do. Some of them bowed their heads;
some wept.
The pastor spoke: “I would that the Pilgrim, John Robinson, were here
to-day!”
Madam Faith removed the cloak and laid it over her arm. She bent her
face on the floor, and slowly walked toward the rail that guarded the
sacred things of the simple altar.
The pastor lifted his hands.
“Pray ye all for the principle of the right, for the cause of the
soldier of liberty.”
She laid the scarlet cloak on the altar, and turned to the people and
lifted her eyes to God.
[Illustration: Madam Faith Trumbull contributing her scarlet cloak to
the soldiers of the Revolution.]
She looked like a divinity as she stood forth there that day, like a
spirit that had come forth from the Mayflower.
That Thanksgiving was long remembered in Lebanon. That cloak was turned
into stripes on soldiers’ uniforms and made history, and some of the
uniforms bearing them are yet to be seen.
To Dennis and Peter was entrusted the sending of the new uniforms with
the red stripes to the army gathering around Yorktown. The faithful
Irishman and the lad rode away from the alarm-post in the cedars amid
the cheers of the people. What news would they bring back when they
should return?
It was an anxious time in the cedars. In the evenings the people
gathered about the war office and at the Alden Inn. A stage-driver,
who was a natural story-teller, used to relate curious stories at
the latter place, on the red settle there, and in these silent days
of moment the people hugged the fire to hear him: it was their only
amusement.
One evening a country elder, who had done a noble work in his day,
stopped at the tavern. This event brought the Governor over to the
place, and the elder was asked to relate a story of his parish on the
red settle. He had a sense of humor as keen as Peters, who was still
telling strange tales in England of the people that he had found in the
“new parts.”
Let us give you one of the parson’s queer stories: it pictures the
times.
THE COURTING STICK
Asenath Short――I seem to see her now (said the elder). One day she said
to her husband:
“Kalub, now look here; we’ve got near upon everything so far as this
world’s goods go――spinnin’ wheels and hatchels, and looms and a
mahogany table, and even a board to be used to lay us out on when
the final time shall come. The last thing that you bought was a
dinner-horn, and then I put away the conch shell from the Indies along
with the cradle and the baby chair. But, Kalub, there’s one thing more
that we will have to have. The families down at Longmeadow have all
got them; they save fire and fuel, and they enable the young folks and
their elders all to talk together at the same time, respectfully in the
same room, and when the young folks have a word to say to each other in
private it encourages them. Now I’m kind o’ sociable-like myself, and I
like to encourage young people; that’s why I wanted you to buy a spinet
for Mandy. I don’t like to see young folks go apart by themselves,
especially in winter; there is no need of extra lights or fires, if one
only has one of _them_ things.”
“One of them things? Massy sakes alive, what is it, Asenath?”
“Why, haven’t you never seen one, Kalub? It is a courtin’ stick. They
didn’t used to have such things when we were young. A courtin’ stick is
like Aaron’s rod that budded.”
“A courtin’ stick! Conquiddles! Do I hear my ears? There don’t need to
be any machinery for courtin’ in this world no more than there does to
make the avens bloom, or the corn cockles to come up in the corn. What
is a courtin’ stick, Asenath?”
“Well, Kalub, a courtin’ stick is a long, hollow wooden tube, with
a funnel at each end――one funnel to cover the mouth of the one
that speaks, and one to cover the ear of the one that listens. By
that stick――it is all so proper and handy when it works well and
steady――young people can talk in the same room, and not disturb the old
people or set the work folks and the boys to titterin’ as they used
to do when we were young. It was discovered here in the Connecticut
Valley, which has always been a place of providences. Just as I said,
it is a savin’ of fire and lights in the winter-time, and it suggests
the right relations among families of property. It is a sort of
guide-post to life.
“Kalub, don’t you want that I should show you one?”
“Where did you get it, Asenath?”
“Asahel made it for me. I told him how to make it, but when I came to
explain to him what it was for his face fell, and he turned red and he
said, ‘Hyppogriffo!’ I wonder where he got that word――‘hyppogriffo!’ It
has a pagan sound; Asahel, he mistrusted.”
“Mistrusted what, Asenath?”
“Well, I haven’t told you quite all. When the head of a family knows
that a certain young man is comin’ to visit him at a certain time and
hangs up a courtin’ stick over the mantel-tree shelf, or the dresser,
it is a sign to the visitor he is welcome.”
“But there is no need of a sign like that, Asenath.”
Asenath rose, went into the spare bed-room, a place of the mahogany
bureau, the mourning piece, valences and esconces, and brought out a
remarkable looking tube, which seemed to have leather ears at each end,
and which was some dozen feet long.
“Moses!” said Caleb, “and all the patriarchs!” he added. “Let’s you
and me try it. There, you put it up to your ear and let me speak. Is
the result satisfyin’?”
Asenath assured him that the experiment was quite satisfactory.
“Well, well,” said Caleb. “Now I will go on shellin’ corn and think
matters over; it may be all right if the elder says it is.”
For a few minutes there was a rain of corn into the basket, when
Caleb started up and said, “Cracky!” He put his hand into one pocket
after another, then went up to the peg board and took down his fur
overcoat and felt of the pockets in it. He came back to the place of
the corn-shelling doubtfully, and began to trot, as it were, around the
basket, still putting his hand into one pocket after another.
“Lost anything, Kalub?” asked Asenath.
“Yes, the stage-driver gave me a parcel directed to Asahel, in the
care of Amanda, and I don’t know what I did with it. I meant to have
told you about it, but you set me all into confusion over that there
courtin’ stick.”
We know not how many old New England homesteads may have a courting
stick among their heirlooms, but imagine that they are few. Such a
stick used to be shown to the curious in the Longmeadow neighborhood
of Springfield, Mass., and we think it may be seen there still. It was
especially associated with the manners and customs of the Connecticut
Valley towns, and it left behind it some pleasing legends in such
pastoral villages as Northampton, Hadley, and Hatfield. It was a
promising object-lesson in the domestic life of the worldly wise, and
could have been hardly unwelcome to marmlet maidens and rustic beaux.
Caleb Short continued his shelling corn for a time, but he worked
slowly. He at last turned around and looked at his wife, who was sewing
rags for a to-be-braided mat.
“Well, what is it now, Kalub?” asked the latter.
“Asahel.”
“Yes――I know――I’ve been thinkin’ much about him of late. He came to us
as a bound boy after his folks were dead, and we’ve done well by him,
now haven’t we, Kalub? I’ve set store by him, but――I might as well
speak it out, he’s too sociable with our Mandy now that they have grown
up. It stands to reason that he can never marry Mandy.”
“Why not, Asenath?”
“Why not? How would you like to have people say that our Amanda had
married her father’s hired man? How would it look on our family tree?”
Asenath glanced up to a fruitful picture on the wall.
“Asahel is a true-hearted boy,” said Caleb. “Since our own son has
taken to evil ways, who will we have to depend upon in our old age but
Asahel, unless Mandy should marry?”
“O Kalub, think what a wife I’ve been to you and listen to me.
Mandy _is_ going to marry. I am going to invite Myron Smith here on
Thanksgiving, and to hang up the courtin’ stick over the dresser,
so that he will see it plain. That stick is goin’ to jine the two
farms. It is a yard-stick――there, now, there! I always was great on
calculation; Abraham was, and so was Jacob; it’s scriptural. You would
have never proposed to me if I hadn’t encouraged you, and only think
what a wife I’ve been to you! Just like two wives.”
“But Asahel Bow is a thrifty boy. He is sensible and savin’, and he is
feelin’.”
“Kalub, Kalub Short, now that will do. Who was his father? Who but old
Seth Bow? Everybody knows what he was, and blood will tell. Just think
of what that man did!”
“What, Asenath?”
“Why, you know that he undertook to preach, and he thought that if
he opened his mouth the Lord would fill it. And he opened his mouth,
and stood with it open for nearly ten minutes, and he couldn’t speak
a word. He was a laughing-stock, and he never went to meetin’ much
after that, only to evenin’ meetin’s in the schoolhouse――candle-light
meetin’s.”
“Yes, Asenath, that is all true. But Seth Bow was an honest man. Just
hear how he used to talk to me. He used to say to me――I often think
of it――he used to say: ‘Caleb Short, I’ve lost my standin’ among the
people, but I haven’t lost my faith in God, and there is a law that
makes up for things. I couldn’t preach, but Asahel is goin’ to preach.
He’s inherited the germ of intention from me, and one day that will be
something to be thankful for, come Thanksgiving days. I will preach
through Asahel yet. I tell you, Caleb, there is a law that makes up
for things. No good intention was ever lost. One must do right, and
then believe that all that happens to him is for his good. That is the
way the Book of Job reads, and I have faith, faith, faith! You may all
laugh at me, but Asahel will one day be glad that his old father wanted
to preach, and tried, even if he did fail. The right intention of the
father is fulfilled in the son, and I tell you there’s a law that makes
up for things, and so I can sing Thanksgiving Psalms with the rest of
um, if I don’t dare to open my mouth in doin’ it.’ Asenath, I look upon
Asahel as a boy that is blessed in the intention of his father. The
right intentions of a boy live in the man, and the gov’nin’ purpose
of the man lives in his boys or those whom he influences, and I tell
you, Asenath, there’s nothing better to be considered on Thanksgiving
days than the good intentions of the folks of the past that live in us.
There are no harvests in the world ekul to those. You wait and see.”
At this point of the story, the clergyman said:
“That is good old Connecticut doctrine, Brother Jonathan.”
The story-teller continued:
The weather-door slowly opened, and the tall form of a young man
appeared.
“Asahel,” said Asenath, “we were just speakin’ of you and your folks,
and now I want to have a talk with you. Take off your frock, and don’t
be standing there like a swamp crane, but sit down on the uniped
here close by me, as you used to do when you was a small boy. I set
store by you, and you just think what a mother I’ve been to you since
your own mother was laid away in the juniper lot! But I am a proper
plain-speakin’ woman, as your own mother was――she that answered the
minister back in meetin’ time when the good old elder said that your
father was a hypocrit.”
Presently the weather-door opened, and Amanda appeared and sat down on
the same uniped with Asahel.
The good woman continued:
“You two have been cowslippin’ together, and sassafrassin’ together,
and a-huntin’ turkeys’ nests and wild honey, and pickin’ Indian pipe
and all. Now, that was all right when you were children. But, Asahel,
you and Amanda have come to the pastur’ bars of life, and you must
part, and you, Asahel, must be content to become just one of our hired
men and sit at the table with the other hired men, on Thanksgivin’ days
the same as on all other days, and not stand in the way of any one.
And, Amandy Short, do you see that?”
Asenath held up the courting stick.
“Do you know what that is?”
“It is just a hollow stick. I’ve seen sticks before. What does all this
mean?”
“You’ve seen sticks before, have you, Amanda? And you have experienced
’em, too, for I have been a faithful mother to you――as good as two. But
this is the stick that must unite some farm to ours, and I am goin’
to hang it up over the dresser, and when the right young man comes,
Amanda, I want you to take it down and put it up to your ear, so,
and it may be that you will hear somethin’ useful, somethin’ to your
advantage and ourn. I hope that I made myself clearly understood.”
She did. The two young people had not been left in any darkness at
all in regard to her solution of their social equation. Asahel stepped
into the middle of the great kitchen floor. His face was as fixed as an
image, and the veins were mapped on his forehead.
He bent his eyes on Asenath for a moment and then his soul flowed out
to the tone of the accompaniment of honor.
“Mrs. Short, you were good to me as a boy, and I will never do a thing
against your will in your family affairs. My father prayed that I
might have the ability to fulfil what he was unable to do in life. To
inherit such a purpose from such a father is something to be grateful
for, and now that I am disappointed in my expectation of Amanda I shall
devote all that I am to my father’s purpose in me. I am going to be a
minister.”
“You be, hey? But where is the money comin’ from?”
“Mrs. Short, it is to come out of these two fists.”
Poor tender-hearted Caleb, he shelled corn as never before during this
painful scene. Suddenly he looked up and about for relief. His eye fell
upon the courting stick.
“Here,” said he to Amanda, who was crying, “just let us try this new
comical machine, and see how it works. Mandy, let’s you and I have a
little talk together. I’ll put the thing up to my mouth, so, and you
just listen at the other end of it. There――I’m going to say something.
Ready now, Mandy? Did you hear that?”
“Yes, father, I heard it just as plain as though you spoke it into my
ear.”
“_You_ didn’t hear anything in particular, did you, Asenath?”
“No, only a sound far away and mysterious like.”
“Curis, ain’t it, how that thing will convey sound in that way? I
should think that some invention might come out of it some day. Now,
Amanda, you just put your ear up to the funnel and listen again.
Mandy,” he continued through the tube, “if your heart is sot on Asahel,
do you stand by him, and wait; time makes changes pleasantly.” He put
aside the tube. “There, now, do you hear?”
“You didn’t hear, mother, did you?” said Caleb to Asenath, glancing
aside.
“No, Kalub.”
“This is a great invention. It works well. Now let me just have a word
with Asahel.”
Amanda conveyed one end of the tube to Asahel’s ear.
“Asahel.” He took his mouth from the tube. “Did you hear?”
“You didn’t hear anything, did you?” he said, looking toward Asenath.
“No, Kalub.”
“Now, Asahel, you listen again,” said Caleb, putting his mouth to the
tube. “If your heart is sot on Mandy, you just hang on, and wait. Time
will be a friend to you, and I will. There, now, did you hear, Asahel?”
“You didn’t hear anything, did you?” asked Caleb of Asenath again with
a shake.
“I don’t know,” said Asenath, “it seems to me as though the hands are
the hands of Esau, but that the voice is the voice of Jacob.”
“Show! Well, now, Amanda, you and Asahel talk now with each other.
Here’s the tube.”
“Asahel Bow,” said Amanda, through the tube, “I believe in you through
and through.”
“Amen!” said Asahel, speaking outside of the tube. “Amen whenever your
mother shall say Amen, and never until then. There is no need of any
courting stick for me.”
At this point of family history Caleb leaped around.
“I know what I did with it――I do now!”
“Did with what, Kalub?” asked Asenath.
“That letter for Asahel――it is right under my bandanna in my hat!”
Caleb went to his hat and handed the lost letter to Asahel.
The latter looked at it and said, “England!” He read it with staring
eyes and whitening face, and handed it to Mrs. Short, who elevated her
spectacles again.
“That old case in chancery is decided,” said he, “and I am to get my
father’s share of the confiscated property. I may have yet to wait for
it, though. My great-grandfather was Bow of Bow. He was accused of
resisting the Act of Uniformity, and his property was withheld.”
Asenath lifted her brows.
“Bow of Bow,” she repeated. “He was a brave man, I suppose. Resisted
the Act of Uniformity? How much did he leave?”
“An estate estimated at £20,000.”
“Heavens be praised!” said the suddenly impressible Asenath. She added:
“I always knew that you had good blood in you, and was an honest man,
Asahel, just like your father; nobody could ever turn him from the
right, no more than you could the side of a house; no Act of Uniformity
could ever shape the course of old Seth Bow. And you are a capable man,
Asahel; your poor father had limitations and circumstances to contend
with, but you are capable of doing all that he meant to do. I always
did think a deal of your father, and I think considerable of your
grandfather now. I always was just like a mother to you, now wasn’t I,
Asahel, good as two or more ordinary stepmothers and the like?
“‘Bow of Bow,’ ‘Bow of Bow,’” continued Asenath. “Well, I have prayed
that Amanda might marry well, and your part of £20,000 would be just
about twenty times the value of the Smith farm, as I see it. That farm
isn’t anything but a bush pastur’, anyhow.
“‘Bow of Bow,’ what a sort of grand sound that has! ‘Bow of Bow.’ I
once had an uncle that was a stevedore, an English stevedore, or a
cavalier, or something of the kind, but he didn’t leave any estate like
Bow of Bow. I think he uniformed in the time of the Uniformity.
“Asahel, you just put that there courtin’ stick up to your ear once
more and let me say a word, now that I have new light and understand
things better.”
Asahel obeyed. There came a response that could be heard outside of the
hollow tube: “Amen!” A murmurous sound followed which was understood
only by Asahel. “You will overlook my imperfections now, won’t you,
Asahel? Pride is a deceitful thing, and it got the better of me. I
only meant well for Amandy, same as you do. I’m sorry for what I said,
Asahel. Marry Mandy, and I’ll be a mother to you as I always have been.
As good as two common mothers, or more, same as I have always been to
Kalub.”
“And I am Asahel. Have my father’s intentions been fulfilled in me?”
“Yes, elder,” said the Governor. “They have!” shouted all. “That is
a tale that makes me pray to become all I can,” said a taverner from
Boston.
“The purpose of life is growth,” said the Governor. “Growth is
revelation. Grow, grow, and past intentions will be fulfilled in you.”
He crossed Lebanon green in the moonlight.
Lebanon, the place that had been filled with life, with hasty orders
to couriers, as “Fly!” “Haste!” was silent now. What would be the next
news to come by the green?