Twice-Told Tales (8 page)

"The troubles of life have come hastily on this young couple,"
observed Endicott. "We will see how they comport themselves under
their present trials ere we burden them with greater. If among the
spoil there be any garments of a more decent fashion, let them be put
upon this May-lord and his Lady instead of their glistening vanities.
Look to it, some of you."

"And shall not the youth's hair be cut?" asked Peter Palfrey, looking
with abhorrence at the lovelock and long glossy curls of the young
man.

"Crop it forthwith, and that in the true pumpkin-shell fashion,"
answered the captain. "Then bring them along with us, but more gently
than their fellows. There be qualities in the youth which may make him
valiant to fight and sober to toil and pious to pray, and in the
maiden that may fit her to become a mother in our Israel, bringing up
babes in better nurture than her own hath been.—Nor think ye, young
ones, that they are the happiest, even in our lifetime of a moment,
who misspend it in dancing round a Maypole."

And Endicott, the severest Puritan of all who laid the rock-foundation
of New England, lifted the wreath of roses from the ruin of the
Maypole and threw it with his own gauntleted hand over the heads of
the Lord and Lady of the May. It was a deed of prophecy. As the moral
gloom of the world overpowers all systematic gayety, even so was their
home of wild mirth made desolate amid the sad forest. They returned to
it no more. But as their flowery garland was wreathed of the brightest
roses that had grown there, so in the tie that united them were
intertwined all the purest and best of their early joys. They went
heavenward supporting each other along the difficult path which it was
their lot to tread, and never wasted one regretful thought on the
vanities of Merry Mount.

In the course of the year 1656 several of the people called
Quakers—led, as they professed, by the inward movement of the
spirit—made their appearance in New England. Their reputation as
holders of mystic and pernicious principles having spread before them,
the Puritans early endeavored to banish and to prevent the further
intrusion of the rising sect. But the measures by which it was
intended to purge the land of heresy, though more than sufficiently
vigorous, were entirely unsuccessful. The Quakers, esteeming
persecution as a divine call to the post of danger, laid claim to a
holy courage unknown to the Puritans themselves, who had shunned the
cross by providing for the peaceable exercise of their religion in a
distant wilderness. Though it was the singular fact that every nation
of the earth rejected the wandering enthusiasts who practised peace
toward all men, the place of greatest uneasiness and peril, and
therefore in their eyes the most eligible, was the province of
Massachusetts Bay.

The fines, imprisonments and stripes liberally distributed by our
pious forefathers, the popular antipathy, so strong that it endured
nearly a hundred years after actual persecution had ceased, were
attractions as powerful for the Quakers as peace, honor and reward
would have been for the worldly-minded. Every European vessel brought
new cargoes of the sect, eager to testify against the oppression which
they hoped to share; and when shipmasters were restrained by heavy
fines from affording them passage, they made long and circuitous
journeys through the Indian country, and appeared in the province as
if conveyed by a supernatural power. Their enthusiasm, heightened
almost to madness by the treatment which they received, produced
actions contrary to the rules of decency as well as of rational
religion, and presented a singular contrast to the calm and staid
deportment of their sectarian successors of the present day. The
command of the Spirit, inaudible except to the soul and not to be
controverted on grounds of human wisdom, was made a plea for most
indecorous exhibitions which, abstractedly considered, well deserved
the moderate chastisement of the rod. These extravagances, and the
persecution which was at once their cause and consequence, continued
to increase, till in the year 1659 the government of Massachusetts Bay
indulged two members of the Quaker sect with the crown of martyrdom.

An indelible stain of blood is upon the hands of all who consented to
this act, but a large share of the awful responsibility must rest upon
the person then at the head of the government. He was a man of narrow
mind and imperfect education, and his uncompromising bigotry was made
hot and mischievous by violent and hasty passions; he exerted his
influence indecorously and unjustifiably to compass the death of the
enthusiasts, and his whole conduct in respect to them was marked by
brutal cruelty. The Quakers, whose revengeful feelings were not less
deep because they were inactive, remembered this man and his
associates in after-times. The historian of the sect affirms that by
the wrath of Heaven a blight fell upon the land in the vicinity of the
"bloody town" of Boston, so that no wheat would grow there; and he
takes his stand, as it were, among the graves of the ancient
persecutors, and triumphantly recounts the judgments that overtook
them in old age or at the parting-hour. He tells us that they died
suddenly and violently and in madness, but nothing can exceed the
bitter mockery with which he records the loathsome disease and "death
by rottenness" of the fierce and cruel governor.

On the evening of the autumn day that had witnessed the martyrdom of
two men of the Quaker persuasion, a Puritan settler was returning from
the metropolis to the neighboring country-town in which he resided.
The air was cool, the sky clear, and the lingering twilight was made
brighter by the rays of a young moon which had now nearly reached the
verge of the horizon. The traveller, a man of middle age, wrapped in a
gray frieze cloak, quickened his pace when he had reached the
outskirts of the town, for a gloomy extent of nearly four miles lay
between him and his home. The low straw-thatched houses were scattered
at considerable intervals along the road, and, the country having been
settled but about thirty years, the tracts of original forest still
bore no small proportion to the cultivated ground. The autumn wind
wandered among the branches, whirling away the leaves from all except
the pine trees and moaning as if it lamented the desolation of which
it was the instrument. The road had penetrated the mass of woods that
lay nearest to the town, and was just emerging into an open space,
when the traveller's ears were saluted by a sound more mournful than
even that of the wind. It was like the wailing of some one in
distress, and it seemed to proceed from beneath a tall and lonely fir
tree in the centre of a cleared but unenclosed and uncultivated field.
The Puritan could not but remember that this was the very spot which
had been made accursed a few hours before by the execution of the
Quakers, whose bodies had been thrown together into one hasty grave
beneath the tree on which they suffered. He struggled, however,
against the superstitious fears which belonged to the age, and
compelled himself to pause and listen.

"The voice is most likely mortal, nor have I cause to tremble if it be
otherwise," thought he, straining his eyes through the dim moonlight.
"Methinks it is like the wailing of a child—some infant, it may be,
which has strayed from its mother and chanced upon this place of
death. For the ease of mine own conscience I must search this matter
out." He therefore left the path and walked somewhat fearfully across
the field. Though now so desolate, its soil was pressed down and
trampled by the thousand footsteps of those who had witnessed the
spectacle of that day, all of whom had now retired, leaving the dead
to their loneliness.

The traveller at length reached the fir tree, which from the middle
upward was covered with living branches, although a scaffold had been
erected beneath, and other preparations made for the work of death.
Under this unhappy tree—which in after-times was believed to drop
poison with its dew—sat the one solitary mourner for innocent blood.
It was a slender and light-clad little boy who leaned his face upon a
hillock of fresh-turned and half-frozen earth and wailed bitterly, yet
in a suppressed tone, as if his grief might receive the punishment of
crime. The Puritan, whose approach had been unperceived, laid his hand
upon the child's shoulder and addressed him compassionately.

"You have chosen a dreary lodging, my poor boy, and no wonder that you
weep," said he. "But dry your eyes and tell me where your mother
dwells; I promise you, if the journey be not too far, I will leave you
in her arms tonight."

The boy had hushed his wailing at once, and turned his face upward to
the stranger. It was a pale, bright-eyed countenance, certainly not
more than six years old, but sorrow, fear and want had destroyed much
of its infantile expression. The Puritan, seeing the boy's frightened
gaze and feeling that he trembled under his hand, endeavored to
reassure him:

"Nay, if I intended to do you harm, little lad, the readiest way were
to leave you here. What! you do not fear to sit beneath the gallows on
a new-made grave, and yet you tremble at a friend's touch? Take heart,
child, and tell me what is your name and where is your home."

"Friend," replied the little boy, in a sweet though faltering voice,
"they call me Ilbrahim, and my home is here."

The pale, spiritual face, the eyes that seemed to mingle with the
moonlight, the sweet, airy voice and the outlandish name almost made
the Puritan believe that the boy was in truth a being which had sprung
up out of the grave on which he sat; but perceiving that the
apparition stood the test of a short mental prayer, and remembering
that the arm which he had touched was lifelike, he adopted a more
rational supposition. "The poor child is stricken in his intellect,"
thought he, "but verily his words are fearful in a place like this."
He then spoke soothingly, intending to humor the boy's fantasy:

"Your home will scarce be comfortable, Ilbrahim, this cold autumn
night, and I fear you are ill-provided with food. I am hastening to a
warm supper and bed; and if you will go with me, you shall share
them."

"I thank thee, friend, but, though I be hungry and shivering with
cold, thou wilt not give me food nor lodging," replied the boy, in the
quiet tone which despair had taught him even so young. "My father was
of the people whom all men hate; they have laid him under this heap of
earth, and here is my home."

The Puritan, who had laid hold of little Ilbrahim's hand, relinquished
it as if he were touching a loathsome reptile. But he possessed a
compassionate heart which not even religious prejudice could harden
into stone. "God forbid that I should leave this child to perish,
though he comes of the accursed sect," said he to himself. "Do we not
all spring from an evil root? Are we not all in darkness till the
light doth shine upon us? He shall not perish, neither in body nor, if
prayer and instruction may avail for him, in soul." He then spoke
aloud and kindly to Ilbrahim, who had again hid his face in the cold
earth of the grave:

"Was every door in the land shut against you, my child, that you have
wandered to this unhallowed spot?"

"They drove me forth from the prison when they took my father thence,"
said the boy, "and I stood afar off watching the crowd of people; and
when they were gone, I came hither, and found only this grave. I knew
that my father was sleeping here, and I said, 'This shall be my
home.'"

"No, child, no, not while I have a roof over my head or a morsel to
share with you," exclaimed the Puritan, whose sympathies were now
fully excited. "Rise up and come with me, and fear not any harm."

The boy wept afresh, and clung to the heap of earth as if the cold
heart beneath it were warmer to him than any in a living breast. The
traveller, however, continued to entreat him tenderly, and, seeming to
acquire some degree of confidence, he at length arose; but his slender
limbs tottered with weakness, his little head grew dizzy, and he
leaned against the tree of death for support.

"My poor boy, are you so feeble?" said the Puritan. "When did you
taste food last?"

"I ate of bread and water with my father in the prison," replied
Ilbrahim, "but they brought him none neither yesterday nor to-day,
saying that he had eaten enough to bear him to his journey's end.
Trouble not thyself for my hunger, kind friend, for I have lacked food
many times ere now."

The traveller took the child in his arms and wrapped his cloak about
him, while his heart stirred with shame and anger against the
gratuitous cruelty of the instruments in this persecution. In the
awakened warmth of his feelings he resolved that at whatever risk he
would not forsake the poor little defenceless being whom Heaven had
confided to his care. With this determination he left the accursed
field and resumed the homeward path from which the wailing of the boy
had called him. The light and motionless burden scarcely impeded his
progress, and he soon beheld the fire-rays from the windows of the
cottage which he, a native of a distant clime, had built in the
Western wilderness. It was surrounded by a considerable extent of
cultivated ground, and the dwelling was situated in the nook of a
wood-covered hill, whither it seemed to have crept for protection.

"Look up, child," said the Puritan to Ilbrahim, whose faint head had
sunk upon his shoulder; "there is our home."

At the word "home" a thrill passed through the child's frame, but he
continued silent. A few moments brought them to the cottage door, at
which the owner knocked; for at that early period, when savages were
wandering everywhere among the settlers, bolt and bar were
indispensable to the security of a dwelling. The summons was answered
by a bond-servant, a coarse-clad and dull-featured piece of humanity,
who, after ascertaining that his master was the applicant, undid the
door and held a flaring pine-knot torch to light him in. Farther back
in the passageway the red blaze discovered a matronly woman, but no
little crowd of children came bounding forth to greet their father's
return.