Fixed to the opposite wall was a shelf of books, | and among them Prominent three, distinguished, alike for bulk and for binding

Bariffe's Artillery Guide, and the Commentaries of Cæsar,

Out of the Latin translated by Arthur Goldinge of London,

And, as if guarded by these, between them was standing the Bible,

Musing a moment before them. Miles Standish paused, as if doubtful

Which of the three he should choose for his consolation and comfort,

Whether the wars of the Hebrews, the famous campaigns of the Romans,

Or the Artillery practice, designed for belligerent Christians.

Finally down from its shelf he dragged the ponderous Roman,

Seated himself at the window, and opened the book, and in silence

Turned o'er the well-worn leaves, where thumbmarks thick on the margin

Like the trample of feet, proclaimed the battle was hottest.

All was silent again; the Captain continued his reading.

Nothing was heard in the room but the hurrying pen of the stripling

Writing epistles important to go next day by the May-Flower,

Filled with the name and the fame of the Puritan maiden Priscilla ;

pen of the stripling,

Busy writing epistles important, to go by the May-Flower,

Ready to sail on the morrow, or next day at latest, God willing!

Homeward bound with the tidings of all that terrible winter,

Letters written by Alden, and full of the name of Priscilla,

Full of the name and fame of the Puritan maiden Priscilla!

II.

LOVE AND FRIENDSHIP.

NOTHING was heard in the room but the hurrying pen of the stripling,

Or an occasional sigh from the labouring heart of the Captain,

Reading the marvellous words and achievements of Julius Cæsar.

After awhile he exclaimed, as he smote with his hand, palm downwards,

Heavily on the page: "A wonderful man was this Cæsar!

You are a writer, and I am a fighter, but here is a fellow

Who can both write and fight, and in both was equally skilful!" Straightway answered and spake John Alden, the comely, the youthful:

"Yes, he was equally skilled, as you say, with his pen and his weapons.

Somewhere have I read, but where I forget, he conld dictate

Seven letters at once, at the same time writing his memoirs."

"Truly," continued the Captain, not heeding or hearing the other,

"Truly a wonderful man was Caius Julius Cæsar!

Better be first, he said, in a little Iberian village,

Than be second in Rome, and I think he was right when he said it.

Twice was he married before he was twenty, and many times after;

Battles five hundred he fought, and a thousand citics he conquered;

He, too, fought in Flanders, as he himself has recorded;

Finally he was stabbed by his friend, the orator Brutus!

Now, do you know what he did on a certain occasion in Flanders,

of Priscilla,

Till the treacherous pen, to which he confided the secret,

Strove to betray it by singing and shouting the name of Priscilla!

Finally closing his book, with a bang of the ponderous cover,

Sudden and loud as the sound of a soldier

grounding his musket,

Thus to the young man spake Miles Standish the Captain of Plymouth:

"When you have finished your work, I have something important to tell you.

Be not however in haste; I can wait; I shall not be impatient!"

Straightway Alden replied, as he folded the last of his letters, Pushing his papers aside, and giving respectful attention:

"Speak; for whenever you speak, I am always ready to listen,

Always ready to hear whatever pertains to Miles Standish."

Thereupon answered the Captain, embarrassed, and culling his phrases:

"Tis not good for a man to be alone say the Scriptures.

This I have said before, and again and again I repeat it;

Every hour in the day I think it, and feel it, and say it.

Since Rose Standish died, my life has been weary and dreary:

Sick at heart have I been, beyond the healing of friendship.

Oft in my lonely hours have I thought of the maiden Priscilla.

She is alone in the world; her father and mother and brother

Died in the winter together; I saw her going and coming,

Now to the grave of the dead, and now to the bed of the dying,

Patient, courageous, and strong, and said to myself, that if ever

There were angels on earth as there are angels in heaven,

Two have I seen and known; and the angel whose name is Priscilla

Holds in my desolate life the place which the other abandoned.

Long have I cherished the thought, but never have dared to reveal it.

Being a coward in this,, though valiant enough for the most part.

Go to the damsel Priscilla, the loveliest maiden of Plymouth,

Say that a blunt old Captain, a man not of words but of actions,

Offers his hand and his heart, the hand and heart of a soldier.

Not in these words, you know, but this in short is my meaning:

I am a maker of war, and not a maker of phrases.

You, who are bred as a scholar, can say it in elegant language.

Such as you read in your books of the pleadings and wooings of lovers,

Such as you think best adapted to win the heart of a maiden."

When he had spoken, John Alden, the fair

haired taciturn stripling,

All aghast at his words, surprised, embarrassed, bewildered,

Trying to mask his dismay by treating the subject with lightness,

Trying to smile, and yet feeling his heart stand still in his bosom,

Just as a time-piece stops in a house that is stricken by lightning,

Thus made answer and spake, or rather stam

mered than answered:

"Such a message as that, I am sure I should

mangle and mar it;

If you would have it well done,-I am only repeating your maxim,

You must do it yourself, you must not leave it to others!"

But with the air of a man whom nothing can turn from his purpose,

Gravely shaking his head, made answer the Captain of Plymouth:

"Truly the maxim is good, and I do not mean to gainsay it;

"But we must use it discreetly, and not waste

powder for nothing.

Now, as I said before,

phrases.

was never a maker of

I can march up to a fortress and summon the place to surrender,

But march up to a woman with such a proposal,

I dare not.

I'm not afraid of bullets, nor shot from the mouth of a cannon,

But of a thundering No!' point-blank from the mouth of a woman,

That I confess I'm afraid of, nor am I ashamed to confess it;

So you must grant my request, for you are an elegant scholar,

Having the graces of speech, and skill in the turning of phrases.'

Taking the hand of his friend, who still was reluctant and doubtful,

Holding it long in his own, and pressing it kindly, he added:

"Though I have spoken thus lightly, yet deep is the feeling that prompts me; Surely you cannot refuse what I ask in the name of our friendship!"

Then made answer John Alden: "The name of

friendship is sacred;

What you demand in that name, I have not the power to deny you!"

So the strong will prevailed, subduing and moulding the gentler,

Friendship prevailed over love, and Alden went on his errand.

Music that Luther sang to the sacred words of the Psalmist,

Full of the breath of the Lord, consoling and comforting many.

Then, as he opened the door, he beheld the form of the maiden

Seated beside her wheel, and the carded wool like a snow-drift

Piled at her knee, her white hands feeding the ravenous spindle,

While with her foot on the treadle she guided, the wheel in its motion.

Open wide on her lap lay the well-worn psalmbook of Ainsworth,

Printed in Amsterdam, the words and the music together,

Rough-hewn, angular notes, like stones in the wall of a churchyard,

Darkened and overhung by the running vine of the verses.

Such was the book from whose pages she sang the old Puritan anthem.

She, the Puritan girl, in the solitude of the forest,

Making the humble house and the modest apparel of home-spun

Beautiful with her beauty, and rich with the wealth of her being!

Over him rushed, like a wind that is keen and cold and relentless,

Thoughts of what might have been, and the weight and woe of his errand;

All the dreams that had faded, and all the hopes that had vanished,

All his life henceforth a dreary and tonantless mansion,

Haunted by vain regrets, and pallid, sorrowful

faces.

Still he said to himself, and almost fiercely he said it,

"Let not him that putteth his hand to the plough look backwards;

Though the ploughshare cut through the flowers of life to its fountains,

Though it pass o'er the graves of the dead and the hearths of the living,

It is the will of the Lord; and his mercy endureth for ever!"

So he entered the house: and the hum of the wheel and the singing

Suddenly ceased, for Priscilla, aroused by his step on the threshold,

Rose as he entered, and gave him her hand, in signal of welcome,

Saying, "I knew it was you when I heard your step in the passage;

For I was thinking of you, as I sat there singing and spinning."

Awkward and dumb with delight, that a thought of him had been mingled

Thus in the sacred psalin, that came from the heart of the inaiden,

Silent before her he stood, and gave her the flowers for an answer,

Finding no words for his thoughts. He remembered that day in the winter. After the first great snow, when he broke a path from the village,

Reeling and plunging along through the drifts that encumbered the doorway, Stamping the snow from his feet as he entered the house, and Priscilla

Laughed at his snowy locks, and gave him a seat by the fireside,

Grateful and pleased to know he had thought of her in the snow-storin.

Had he but spoken then! perhaps not in valu had he spoken:

Now it was all too late; the golden moment had vanished!

So he stood there abashed, and gave flowers for an answer.

her the

Then they sat down and talked of the birds and the beautiful Spring-time, Talked of their friends at home, and the MayFlower that sailed on the morrow. "I have been thinking all day," said gently the Puritan maiden,

"Dreaming all night, and thinking all day, of the hedge-rows of England,

They are in blossom now, and the country is all like a garden;

Thinking of lanes and fields, and the song of the lark and the linnet,

Seeing the village street, and familiar faces of neighbours

Going about as of old, and stopping to gossip together,

And, at the end of the street, the village church, with ivy

Climbing the old gray tower, and the quiet graves in the churchyard.

Kind are the people I live with, and dear to me my religion:

Still my heart is so sad, that I wish myself back in old England.

You will say it is wrong, but I cannot help it: I almost

Wish myself back in old England, I feel so lonely and wretched.' 19

Thereupon answered the youth:-"Indeed 1 do not condemn you;

Stouter hearts than a woman's have quailed in Yours is tender and trusting, and needs a this terrible winter. stronger to lean on;

So I have come to you now, with an offer and Made by a good man and true, Miles Standish proffer of marriage the Captain of Plymouth!"

Thus he delivered his message, the dexterous writer of letters.

Did he not embellish the theine, nor array It in beautiful phrases,

But came straight to the point, and blurted it out like a schoolboy:

Even the Captain himself could hardly have said it more bluntly.

Mute with amazement and sorrow, Priscilla the Puritan maiden Looked into Alden's face, her eyes dilated with Feeling his words like a blow, that stunned her wonder, Till at length she exclaimed, interrupting the and rendered her speechless;

ominous silence:

"If the great Captain of Plymouth is so very Why does he not come himself, and take the eager to wed me,

trouble to woo me?

If I am not worth the wooing, I surely am not

worth the winning!"

before he is married,

Would he be likely to find it, or make it, after the wedding?

That is the way with you men; you don't understand us, you cannot.

When you have made up your minds, after Choosing, selecting, rejecting, comparing one thinking of this one and that one, Then you make known your desire, with abrupt with another, And sudden avowal,

And are offended and hurt, and indignant perhaps, that a woman

Does not respond at once to a love that she never suspected,

Does not attain at a bound the height to which you have been climbing.

This is not right nor just: för surely a woman's affection

Is not a thing to be asked for, and had for only the asking.

When one is truly in love, one not only says it, but shows it.

Had he but waited awhile, had he only showed that he loved me,

Even this Captam of yours-who knows?-at last might have won me,

Old and rough as he is; but now it never can happen."

Still John Alden went on, unheeding the words of Priscilla,

Urging the suit of his friend, explaining, persuading, expanding:

Spoke of his courage and skill, and of all his battles in Flanders,

How with the people of God he had chosen to suffer affliction,

How, in return for his zeal, they made him Cap

tain of Plymouth;

He was a gentleman born, could trace his pedigree plamly

Back to Hugh Standish of Duxbury Hall, in Lancashire, England,

Who was the son of Ralph, and the grandson of

Thurston de Standish:

Heir unto vast estates, of which he was basely defrauded,

Still bore the family arms, and had for his crest a cock argent,

Combed and watted gules, and all the rest of the blazon.

He was a man of honour, of noble and generous nature:

Though he was rough he was kindly; she knew how during the winter

He had attended the sick, with a hand as gentle as woman's:

Somewhat hasty and hot, he could not deny it, and headstrong.

Stern as a soldier might be, but hearty, and placable always,

Not to be laughed at and scorned, because he was little of stature;

For he was great of heart, inagnaniinous, courtly.

courageous;

Any woman in Plymouth, nay any woman in England,

Might be happy and proud to be called the wife of Miles Standish:

But as he warmed and glowed, in his simple and eloquent language,

Quite forgetful of self and full of the praise of his rival,

Archly the maiden smiled. and, with eyes overrunning with laughter,

Said, in a tremulous voice, "Why don't you speak for yourself, John?"

IV.

JOHN ALDEN.

INTO the open air John Alden, perplexed and bewildered,

Rushed like a man insane, and wandered alone by the sea-side;

Paced up and down the sands, and bared his head to the east-wind,

Cooling his heated brow, and the fire and fever within him.

Slowly as out of the heavens, with apocalyptical splendours,

Sank the city of God, in the vision of John the Apostle,

So, with its cloudy walls of chrysolite, jasper, and sapphire,

Sank the broad red sun, and over its turrets uplifted

Glimmered the golden reed of the angel who measured the city.

"Welcome, O wind of the East!" he exclaim d in his wild exultation.

Welcome, O wind of th East, from the caves of the misty Atlantic!

Blowing o'er fields of dulse, and measureless meadows of en-grass,

Blowing o'er rocky wastes, and the grottos and gardens of ocean!

Lay thy cold, most hand on my burning forehead, and wrap me

Close in thy garments of mist, to allay the fever within me!'

Like an awakened conscience the sea was moaning and tossing,

of the sea-shore.

Beating remorseful and loud the mutable sands Fierce in his soul was the struggle and tumult of passions contending;

Love triumphant and crowned, and friendship wounded and bleeding,

Passionate cries of desire, and importunate pleadings of duty!

"Is it my fault," he said, "that the maiden has chosen between us?

Is it my fault that he failed,-my fault that I am the victor?"

Then within him there thundered a voice, like the voice of the Prophet:

"It hath displeased the Lord!" and he thought of David's transgression,

Bathsheba's beautiful face, and his friend in the front of the battle!

Shame and confusion of guilt, and abasement and self-condemnation,

Overwhelmed him at once; and he cried in the

deepest contrition:

"It hath displeased the Lord! It is the temptation of Satan!"

Then, uplifting his head, he looked at the sea, and beheld there

Dimly the shadowy form of the May-Flower Rocked on the rising tide, and ready to sail on

riding at anchor,

the morrow;

Heard the voices of men through the mist, the rattle of cordage

Thrown on the deck, the shouts of the mate, and the sailors' "Ay, ay, Sir!"

Clear and distinct, but not loud, in the dripping air of the twilight.

Still for a moment he stood, and listened, and stared at the vessel,

Then went hurriedly on, as one who, seeing a phantom,

Stops, then quickens his pace, and follows the beckoning shadow.

"Yes, it is plain to me now," he murmured; "the hand of the Lord is

Leading me out of the land of darkness, the bondage of error,

Through the sea, that shall lift the walls of its

Thus, as he spake, he turned, in the strength of his strong resolution, Leaving behind him the shore, and hurried along in the twilight,

Through the congenial gloom of the forest silent and sombre,

Till he beheld the lights in the seven houses of Plymouth,

Shining like seven stars in the dusk and mist of the evening

Soon he entered his door, and found the redoubtable Captam

Sitting alone, and absorbed in the martial pages of Cæsar,

Fighting some great campaign in Hamault or Brabant or Flanders.

"Long have you been on your errand," he said, with a cheery demeanour,

Even as one who is waiting an answer, and

fears not the issue.

"Not far off is the house, although the woods are between us;

But you have lingered so long, that while you were going and coming

I have fought ten battles and sacked and demolished a city.

Come, sit down, and in order relate to me all that has happened."

Then John Alden spake, and related the wondrous adventure,

Took from the nail on the wall his sword with its scabbard of iron,

Buckled the belt round his waist, and, frowning fiercely, departed.

Alden was left alone. He heard the clank of the scabbard

Growing fainter and fainter, and dying away in the distance.

Then he arose from his seat, and looked forth into the darkness,

Felt the cool air blow on his cheek, that was hot with the insult,

Lifted his eyes to the heavens, and, folding his hands as in childhood.

Prayed in the silence of night to the Father who seeth in secret

Meanwhile the choleric Captain strode wrath-ful away to the council,

Found it already assembled, impatiently waiting his coming;

Men in the middle of life, austere and grave in deportment,

Only one of them old, the hill that was nearest to heaven,

Covered with snow, but erect, the excellentElder of Plymouth.

God has sifted three kingdoms to find the wheat for this planting,

Then had sifted the wheat, as the living seed of a nation;

pened:

How he had seen Priscilla, and how he had sped in his courtship,

Only smoothing a little, and softening down her refusal.

But when he came at length to the words Priscilla had spoken,

Words so tender and cruel: "Why don't you speak for yourself, John?"

Up leaped the Captain of Plymouth, and stamped on the floor till his armour Clanged on the wall, where it hung, with a sound of sinister omen.

All his pent-up wrath burst forth in a sudden

explosion.

Even as a hand-grenade, that scatters destruction around it.

Wildly he shouted, and loud: "John Alden! you have betrayed me!

Me, Miles Standish, your friend! have supplanted, defrauded, betrayed me!

One of my ancestors run his sword through the heart of Wat Tyler;

Who shall prevent me from running my own through the heart of a traitor? Yours is the greater treason, for yours is a treason to friendship!

You, who lived under my roof, whom I cherished and loved as a brother;

Yon, who have fed at my board, and drunk at my cup, to whose keeping

I have intrusted my honour, my thoughts the most sacred and secret,

You too, Brutus! ah, woe to the name of friendship hereafter!

Brutus was Cæsar's friend, and you were mine, but henceforward

say the chronicles old, and such is the faith

of the people!

Near them was standing an Indian, in attitude stern and defiant,

Naked down to the waist, and grim and ferocious in aspect:

While on the table before them was lying unopened a Bible,

Ponderous, bound in leather, brass-studded, printed in Holland.

And beside it outstretched the skin of a rattlesnake glittered,

Filled, like a quiver, with arrows; a signal and challenge for warfare,

Brought by the Indian, and speaking with. arrowy tongues of defiance. This Miles Standish beheld, as he entered, and heard them debating

What were an answer befitting the hostile message and menace,

Talking of this and of that, contriving, suggesting, objecting;

One voice only for peace, and that the voice of the Elder,

Judging it wise and well that some at least were converted,

Rather than any were slain, for this was bu Christian behaviour!

Then outspake Miles Standish, the stalwart Captain of Plymouth,

Muttering deep in his throat, for his voice was husky with anger:

What! do you mean to make war with milk and the water of roses?

Is it to shoot red squirrels, you have your howitzer planted

There on the roof of the church, or is it to shoot red devils?

Se cake the Captain of Plymouth, and strode bout in the chamber,

Chat. g and choking with rage: like cords were the veins on his temples.

Batin the midst of his anger a man appeared at

savage

Must be the tongue of fire that speaks from the mouth of the cannon!"

Thereupon answered and said the excellent Elder of Plymouth,

Somewhat amazed and alarmed at this irreverent language:

Not so thought Saint Paul, nor yet the other Apostles;

Not from the cannon's mouth were the tongues of fire they spake with!"

But unheeded fell this mild rebuke on the Captain.