| |
| SO the strong will prevailed, and Alden went on his errand, | |
| Out of the street of the village, and into the paths of the forest, | |
| Into the tranquil woods, where bluebirds and robins were building | |
| Towns in the populous trees, with hanging gardens of verdure, | |
| Peaceful, aerial cities of joy and affection and freedom. | 5 |
| All around him was calm, but within him commotion and conflict, | |
| Love contending with friendship, and self with each generous impulse. | |
| To and fro in his breast his thoughts were heaving and dashing, | |
| As in a foundering ship, with every roll of the vessel, | |
| Washes the bitter sea, the merciless surge of the ocean! | 10 |
| “Must I relinquish it all,” he cried with a wild lamentation,— | |
| “Must I relinquish it all, the joy, the hope, the illusion? | |
| Was it for this I have loved, and waited, and worshipped in silence? | |
| Was it for this I have followed the flying feet and the shadow | |
| Over the wintry sea, to the desolate shores of New England? | 15 |
| Truly the heart is deceitful, and out of its depths of corruption | |
| Rise, like an exhalation, the misty phantoms of passion; | |
| Angels of light they seem, but are only delusions of Satan. | |
| All is clear to me now; I feel it, I see it distinctly! | |
| This is the hand of the Lord; it is laid upon me in anger, | 20 |
| For I have followed too much the heart’s desires and devices, | |
| Worshipping Astaroth blindly, and impious idols of Baal. | |
| This is the cross I must bear; the sin and the swift retribution.” | |
| |
| So through the Plymouth woods John Alden went on his errand; | |
| Crossing the brook at the ford, where it brawled over pebble and shallow, | 25 |
| Gathering still, as he went, the May-flowers blooming around him, | |
| Fragrant, filling the air with a strange and wonderful sweetness, | |
| Children lost in the woods, and covered with leaves in their slumber. | |
| “Puritan flowers,” he said, “and the type of Puritan maidens, | |
| Modest and simple and sweet, the very type of Priscilla! | 30 |
| So I will take them to her; to Priscilla the Mayflower of Plymouth, | |
| Modest and simple and sweet, as a parting gift will I take them; | |
| Breathing their silent farewells, as they fade and wither and perish, | |
| Soon to be thrown away as is the heart of the giver.” | |
| So through the Plymouth woods John Alden went on his errand; | 35 |
| Came to an open space, and saw the disk of the ocean, | |
| Sailless, sombre and cold with the comfortless breath of the east-wind; | |
| Saw the new-built house, and people at work in a meadow; | |
| Heard, as he drew near the door, the musical voice of Priscilla | |
| Singing the hundredth Psalm, the grand old Puritan anthem, | 40 |
| 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, | 45 |
| While with her foot on the treadle she guided the wheel in its motion. | |
| Open wide on her lap lay the well-worn psalm-book 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. | 50 |
| 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 homespun | |
| 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, | 55 |
| 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 tenantless mansion, | |
| Haunted by vain regrets, and pallid, sorrowful faces. | |
| Still he said to himself, and almost fiercely he said it, | 60 |
| “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 forever!” | |
| |
| So he entered the house: and the hum of the wheel and the singing | 65 |
| 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 | 70 |
| Thus in the sacred psalm, that came from the heart of the maiden, | |
| Silent before her he stood, and gave her the flowers for an answer, | |
| Finding no words for his thought. 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, | 75 |
| 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-storm. | |
| Had he but spoken then! perhaps not in vain had he spoken; | |
| Now it was all too late; the golden moment had vanished! | 80 |
| So he stood there abashed, and gave her the flowers for an answer. | |
| |
| 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,— | 85 |
| 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 neighbors | |
| Going about as of old, and stopping to gossip together, | |
| And, at the end of the street, the village church, with the ivy | 90 |
| 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.” | 95 |
| |
| Thereupon answered the youth: “Indeed I do not condemn you; | |
| Stouter hearts than a woman’s have quailed in this terrible winter. | |
| Yours is tender and trusting, and needs a stronger to lean on; | |
| So I have come to you now, with an offer and proffer of marriage | |
| Made by a good man and true, Miles Standish the Captain of Plymouth!” | 100 |
| |
| Thus he delivered his message, the dexterous writer of letters,— | |
| Did not embellish the theme, nor array it in beautiful phrases, | |
| But came straight to the point, and blurted it out like a school-boy; | |
| Even the Captain himself could hardly have said it more bluntly. | |
| Mute with amazement and sorrow, Priscilla the Puritan maiden | 105 |
| Looked into Alden’s face, her eyes dilated with wonder, | |
| Feeling his words like a blow, that stunned her and rendered her speechless; | |
| Till at length she exclaimed, interrupting the ominous silence: | |
| “If the great Captain of Plymouth is so very eager to wed me, | |
| Why does he not come himself, and take the trouble to woo me? | 110 |
| If I am not worth the wooing, I surely am not worth the winning!” | |
| Then John Alden began explaining and smoothing the matter, | |
| Making it worse as he went, by saying the Captain was busy,— | |
| Had no time for such things—such things! the words grating harshly | |
| Fell on the ear of Priscilla; and swift as a flash she made answer: | 115 |
| “Has he no time for such things, as you call it, 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 thinking of this one and that one, | |
| Choosing, selecting, rejecting, comparing one with another, | 120 |
| Then you make known your desire, with abrupt 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: for surely a woman’s affection | 125 |
| 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 Captain of yours—who knows?—at last might have won me, | |
| Old and rough as he is; but now it never can happen.” | 130 |
| |
| 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 had made him Captain of Plymouth; | 135 |
| He was a gentleman born, could trace his pedigree plainly | |
| 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, | 140 |
| Combed and wattled gules, and all the rest of the blazon. | |
| He was a man of honor, 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, | 145 |
| 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, magnanimous, courtly, courageous; | |
| Any woman in Plymouth, nay, any woman in England, | |
| Might be happy and proud to be called the wife of Miles Standish! | 150 |
| |
| 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?” | |
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