A Mayflower Maid

Front matter

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PAGE

John Gorges Is Honored by His Great Relative 30

Sir Ferdinando Sendeth a Last Message 37

Dame Dance Findeth a New Maid . . 51

The Speedwell Abandoneth the Adventure 61

The Courtship of Myles Standish . . 228

CONTENTS

CHAPTER PAGE

XXI Treachery 253

XXII Dame Brewster Giveth Myles Unwelcome News 265

XXIII The Little Captain 272

XXIV Myles Speaketh for Himself . . . 280

LIST OF ILLUSTRATIONS

Priscilla and John Alden Frontispiece

PACING PAGE

He changed his mind and tiptoed from the room . 10

The arrival of Captain Standish 78

She 11 take him, be he cooper or captain . . . .162

I "» t

CHAPTER I

THE Mayflower is the greater vessel. I would that we were assigned to it instead of the Speedwell* "

The girl spoke timorously. It was evident that she held the voyage ahead of her in dread.

" Would that I were going on either ! " her friend exclaimed. " You are a favorite of fortune, Barbary."

" You call me so," Barbara Gorges returned, with some show of spirit, " but in truth I see no good hap in this wild adventure. We Puritans worship here in the Netherlands as God wills. Why may we not rest content with this freedom ? "

" Because we be husbandmen for the most part. Here we must learn trades or starve. Moreover we have no surety that our freedom will continue, for the English may not suffer us to abide in peace for long."

Barbara shuddered, and stood for a moment gazing out of the cottage window ; but she saw not the clean streets nor the neat row of Dutch houses before her.

Her thoughts went back to the days of her early childhood when her parents, fleeing the wrath of King James the First, left their native land with others of a band of Puritans. These simple people had sacrificed their fortunes, given up their homes and quitted England in order that they might worship God according to their consciences. But ere they reached the hospitable Low Lands they were forced to bear the ridicule and persecution of their enemies, and the little maid in the arms of her frail mother had never been able to rid herself of the horror and torment of those fearful days.

" Dost remember what befell when we left England ?" she asked the girl beside her. "I sometimes think 't was that made a craven of me. Babe though I was, I screamed with the others when the horsemen charged down upon us on the heath at the mouth of the Humber, cutting us off from the boats."

"They harmed ye not," Charity Towle insisted. " Why, then, nourish a fearful remembrance of them? "

" I know not," Barbara acknowledged. " I was too small to reason ; but 't is said fear is infectious. My mother and the other females, separated from their protectors, thought they heard death calling to them."

" And were they not proud to be martyrs for their faith? " Charity's tone betrayed her astonishment

Barbara shook her head.

" They were wives and mothers," she replied. " Indeed 'twas not for themselves they feared, but for their children and their husbands."

"Yet even the British Magistrates could find no crime in the wish of a woman to cleave to her husband," Charity rejoined complacently. " Nor could they send back to their homes those who had no homes to go to."

" Aye, they set us free," Barbara nodded, " and, in the end, we won through to Amsterdam. But those days of dread have left their mark upon me. No one in all Leyden is so fearful as I am. I fly from my own shadow and, verily, I know not how I will endure t * to live in the strange land to which we go, filled as it is with tigers, lions, dragons, venomous serpents, and wild Indians, more deadly than all the other perils."

" You 've been talking to Peregrine," Charity re-

* plied. ' " I shall box that boy's ears for this, the next

time I can lay hands on him. He is naughty, and

jealous that you go before we do. His tales are all

windy lies, made up out of his wicked head."

"Nay it is riot so," Barbara returned earnestly. " Your brother had it all from an honest seaman at Delfes Haven, who had, already, many times made the voyage to Hudsons River. Indeed he showed Peregrine the mark on his arm where, a sfcrpent having stung him, he was miraculously healed by a dragon, which breathed flames upon the wound and so burnt out the poison, leaving behind a picture of itself to testify to his truth."

" A miraculous healing indeed ! " returned Charity contemptuously. " I know not which is the greater babe, Peregrine or you, to swallow such tales and open your mouths for more. Forget your fears, or, better yet, pray to be delivered from them." She rose to

go.

"I do ! In truth I do ! I pray till I 'm quite cold

and stiff, yet it doth no manner of good."

" These brick floors are chilling to the knees," Charity agreed, gravely.

" And hard ! " Barbara put in. " Yet I think it not right to use a cushion — ."

" A cushion ! " Charity interrupted, genuinely shocked. " Indeed not ! That would be a sinful indulgence."

Abashed at having even hinted at so base a luxury Barbara accompanied her friend to the door, where Charity paused for a moment

" Have you told your father of your dread of this voyage? " she asked.

Barbara shook her head.

" I dare not," she said, briefly. " I fear him more than lions and tigers ! "

"Aye, in truth he is a stern man," Charity spoke musingly. " But „ I cannot think he would constrain you were you to ask leave to remain here."

" You do not know him," Barbara said. " Even my gentle mother feared him, though she begged me, ere she died, not to judge him too harshly. She explained that he was not always thus, but that his nature had been soured by mistreatment at the hands of our kinsman, Sir Ferdinando Gorges, who is Governor of Portsmouth. Thou knowest, Charity, that in England we were a family of importance, with a goodly fortune to satisfy all our desires; but, fearing he would be attainted for his faith, my father entrusted his patrimony to Sir Ferdinando, who will not give it up; and my father doth brood upon this injury."

" 'T will bring him no nearer its recovery to have thee unhappy in thy mind," Charity insisted.

" Nay, tempt me not to ask for what I know I cannot gain," Barbara protested. " For me there is no escape. I must go to North Virginia with the others. The more I shrink from it, the greater will he conceive the need of my soul for the discipline."

" Haply it is so," Charity agreed, for such a line of reasoning was quite familiar; " though, were I you, I would beg Mr. Robinson's opinion in the matter ere I gave up hope."

Barbara shook her head more emphatically than ever.

" My father would ne'er believe that even our good minister knew the requirements of my nature better than he doth," she replied. " Moreover, I myself hold it to be a duty to go with him in my mother's stead, to make a home for him in the Jerusalem of the New World. Yet I cannot still my fears that the Speedwell is a very little boat for such a great adventure."

" There is no doubt she is seaworthy," Charity comforted the girl. " There was some difficulty in finding fit boats; but those having the matter in hand would never accept aught but the best. Rest assured of that!"

"You are a true friend, Charity, thus to hearten me," Barbara spoke gratefully. " Yet I fear there is none Hying, who can give me what I lack. Coward I am, and coward I shall die ! "

" Talk not of death," said Charity, snapping her fingers to ward off evil spirits, an action which, had any of her elders chanced to see her, would have brought her swift chastisement for daring to hold to a Popish superstition. " 'T is a wonderful new life you are going to find across the main. I would I were leaving this Babylon with you."

" I would that you were! " Barbara agreed, as the two friends parted; Charity to hasten home through the pebbled streets of Ley den; Barbara to set about the preparation of her father's dinner.

John Gorges soon came in and sat himself down at the table in the best of humors. He hurried through his grace before meat and then filled his wooden bowl generously with savory stew from the trencher set in the middle of the table.

" Food tastes good after the fast ! My heart rejoiceth that our delivery from the house of bondage is near," he exclaimed, a moment later.

" Have King James and his Ministers acceded to our petition for freedom to serve the Lord in the wilderness ? " Barbara asked timidly.

" Not they ! " replied her father, with his mouth full. " His heart is as hard as was the heart of Pharaoh of Egypt, but, like the Israelites, we go forth trusting in the Lord our God. Tomorrow we go to Delfes Haven and our passage of the sea begins ! "

" Tomorrow ! " cried Barbara, unable to conceal the terror in her voice.

Her father stopped eating and regarded her sternly.

" I have been one of the most forward in urging this undertaking," he said, his tone hardening. " Let there be no f aint-heartedness in my own household, for I will not countenance it ! " He rapped sharply on the table and Barbara, who had drooped her head at his harsh words, was constrained to look him in the eyes.

" You hear me, girl," he went on. " I will not be put to shame by you. I have not been blind to your mopish ways and your lack of good-will; but I am still master here. An you lack zeal in our Cause, see that your speech bewrayeth you not, for I am no patient man to be made a mock of before our congregation."

" I had no thought to shame thee," Barbara returned meekly. " I would that I had inherited thy dauntless spirit; but, as thou well knowest, I am as timid as a mouse."

Her father grunted and spoke half to himself.

" I know not why I should be afflicted with a puling maid when I need a lusty son at my side."

" Leave me behind, then ! " cried Barbara, plucking up a little courage. " I can go out to service. I would not be a drag upon you an you want me not."

Her father looked upon her much as he would have looked upon a tame cat which had turned and scratched him, but strange to say he was pleased by her resentment.

" Now that is the first sign of a proper pride that io A MAYFLOWER MAID

ever you showed ! " He exclaimed approvingly. " Belike there *s metal in you somewhere . . . You go with me," he went on, after an instant's pause. " 'T is the Lord's will that you are what you are, I have no right to rebel from the cross laid upon me. Nor ever again let me hear talk of your going into service. You are well-born and some day I mean to come to grips with my cousin Fernando who hath despoiled me."

He pushed back his chair, having made a hasty though a hearty meal as he talked.

"You have set ready the utensils and clothing I commanded ? "

Barbara, not able to speak for the lump in her throat, nodded her head and pointed to the pile.

" Good ! " her father said. " We will victual at South Hampton, and there can supply any deficiencies we may feel ; but I have taken the best advice in this matter and think we will find no lack of aught that is needful."

With a curt nod he left the room and the house. Barbara, who had not eaten a mouthful, looked at the food before her with loathing. As she had known all along, it was useless to rebel. Indeed, such was her nature, that had her father signified his intention of leaving her behind, she straightway would have been overwhelmed by fears of what would become of her, cast among strangers.

She pushed the bowl away and, laying her arms on the table, buried her face in them.

She was not weeping, although her attitude was

He changed his mind and tiptoed from the n

A TIMOROUS MAID n

mournful in the extreme; but she was so deep in thought that she did not hear a knock on the door. An instant later a man entered, stepping lightly within the room. He was short and muscular, quick and lithe in all his movements, and in his bearing there was a certain hint of gaiety.

He glanced at the bowed figure at the table and the smile on his rather boyish face slowly faded, giving place to a look of sympathetic understanding. He opened his lips to speak; then, on a sudden, changed his mind and tiptoed out of the house, closing the door softly behind him.

A moment later a sharper blow upon the knocker brought Barbara to her senses and she hurried to admit the stranger.

" I am Myles Standish, late officer of His Majesty's Army," the man announced in a hearty voice. " Canst tell me where I may find Master John Gorges ?"

" My father hath just set forth," Barbara replied. " I know not whither."

" Now that 's too bad," Standish returned, " for I have business with him, and counted upon talking it over whilst we ate."

Barbara had heard of Myles Standish and knew, that while he was not a member of the congregation, he yet was looked upon as well-affected and a desirable addition to their party should he decide to join it. So her hesitation was only momentary ere she said :

" At least I can see that you go not hungry from our door. I pray you be seated while I hot-up the stew. I am my own maid-servant, so you will hold me excused if I leave you for a moment."

Standish accepted her invitation and seated himself at the table, while Barbara hurried to the kitchen to return ere long, with the smoking stew. She set down the trencher, cut bread from the loaf and filled a mug with good home-brewed beer ; then a little uncertain as to her duties as hostess, was about to leave him to his own devices with the stew, when he stopped her, pointing to her empty bowl.

" But you have not eaten/' he said gravely. " Do not let me drive you from your meat. An you will not join me I must take myself off." He half rose from his chair as he spoke.

"I — I was not hungered," the girl faltered, yet she seated herself and allowed the visitor to help her to a little of the stew.

" You have doubtless heard that we sail on the morrow ? " Standish began, eyeing her keenly as he spoke. He guessed the reason for the despair to which he had been an involuntary witness, and sought to allay it.

Barbara nodded her head.

" But I knew not that you were to go with the company," she returned, feeling the need to say something.

" Yes, the adventure is to my liking," he replied. " 'T is my wife, poor girl, who is in tears over it. She feareth everything! If whales do not swallow us, like Jonah, then the cannibals will."

" Oh ! " cried Barbara, clasping her hands in despair.

■q

"Then, 'tis true that it is a land of cannibals?"

Her terror was so manifest that Standish pitied her.

" Nothing of the sort, child/' he said, with much assurance. " I Ve seen $ome of these Indians in England. They seem a gentle, timid folk enough. If dealt with fairly/I fear no trouble with them."

" What do you fear, then ? " Barbara asked, determined to know the worst of this expedition.

Standish smiled and took a long pull at the mug.

" In truth I know not," he answered frankly. " 'T is my way to face my enemies boldly and have them by the throat ere they have time to intimidate me."

" But you could not seize the throat of a fire-breathing dragon ! " faltered the girl.

A peal of laughter interrupted her.

" Now that is a mad tale to fright a maid, withal," Standish said. " The dragon is a fabulous beast, my dear. Do not worry your young head with such inventions. You are like my Rose, too ready to believe each witless rumor. I vow I cannot see the pleasure some find in affrighting the innocent ! " he added,, half angrily.

" Doth it not shame you," Barbara asked, " that your wife should have such fears? I am greatly put to it to conceal my timorousness, for my father holds that my half-heartedness is a disgrace to him."

Standish shrugged his shoulders after the foreign manner.

"I married a woman, not a man-at-arms," he returned. "I hold a certain timidity becoming in a i 4 A MAYFLOWER MAID

female. Fret not yourself about such fears, my child. Haply you brood too much upon your own weakness and thus magnify it in your mind."

" Alack/' sighed Barbara, " I am so pitiful a coward that the sudden clapping-to of a door maketh me to start like a hare. I fear the dark. I shudder at the slimy slithering of a snake and the sight of blood sends mine trickling through my veins like melted snow. And to cap all, I dread my father's just contempt of my poltroonery."

Myles Standish having eaten rose to go.

" I have ever found that he that goeth half-way to meet trouble is sure to find it; while he who standeth his ground and fronts the whole world boldly is little like to be meddled with." He spoke a trifle gruffly, having, in truth, a great pity for the girl before him, who seemed over-tender for the rough life ahead of her. " Were I your father I should be well-content with my daughter, and so I shall tell him when I see him."

" You could not be my father ! You are too young," Barbara smiled at the idea, picturing in her mind this alert young man against her stern and forbidding father.

"I am older than I look, mayhap," Standish answered, with a twinkle in his bright eyes, " but you, I take it, have seen scarce a dozen years."

" I 'm fourteen," Barbara replied indignantly, whereat Standish concealed a smile as he thanked her for her entertainment and took his leave.

The girl watched through the window as he strode away. In the up-standing, rugged figure there was a promise of strength and power that greatly comforted Barbara.

" He could not be my father," she murmured, shaking her head, " but were he my elder brother, haply he might hearten me till I ceased to shiver for very shame at my craven fears."

Chapter II

THE short time before their departure passed quickly. There were tfiany last things to be done, and Barbara had few opportunities to let her thoughts dwell upon the imaginary terrors she anticipated. Not all the congregation at Leyden could be accommodated on the vessels engaged for this first voyage. It was planned that the Speedwell, a small craft, was to sail from Delfes Haven with a contingent from the Low Lands and at Southampton would meet the Mayflower carrying a company from London.

The two boats had quarters for scarce half of those in Holland alone and therefore it had been determined that the Reverend Master John Robinson, their pious minister, should remain behind to come later with the rest of his flock, and that this first adventure should be led by their wise teacher and ruling elder, Master William Brewster. Thus it came about that there were many farewells to be said and, on the eve of their departure, the prospective travelers were entertained and feasted at Master Robinson's large house on the Klock-Steeg. Psalms were sung and Barbara was in a measure comforted, for so many tears were shed that

her weeping passed unnoted and she escaped her father's chiding which was what she dreaded most in the world.

At Delfes Haven, whither nearly the entire congregation fared by canal, another feast was spread in honor of the departing Pilgrims. Master Robinson blessed them and with fervent words asked protection from on high for the enterprise. But it was with heavy hearts and tear-filled eyes that the final goodbys were said.

Charity Towle took Barbara in her arms at the last.

" I cannot speak from abundance of sorrow to part," she murmured.

They kissed, and in a sort of daze Barbara boarded the Speedwell with her shipmates.

With the others the girl stood at the waistboards until the tide called them away. Only after the sails had been hoisted and the little vessel was in motion did she realize that she had been too overcome with emotion to remember to stuff her fingers in her ears when a volley of small shot was loosed in honor of their departure, and too filled with woe to cringe at the report of the three pieces of ship's ordnance that answered the salute from the shore.

But, ere Southampton was reached, where they were to meet their consort the Mayflower, Barbara's fears revived. She, in common with most of the passengers, suffered greatly from seasickness, due not only to the motion of their small craft but also to the overcrowded condition in which they found themselves. Moreover, the arrangements for their provisions were most inadequate ; the bread-room, in especial, being so poorly arranged that they lost much of their supplies through the depredations of rats ; and these discomforts at the very start of what they knew would be a long and tedious voyage served to depress their spirits, already shaken by secret thoughts of vague terrors.

John Gorges, a shrewd and capable man, noted these things with an appraising eye. Possibly he repented of his resolve to take his little daughter with him upon this doubtful pilgrimage, for he spoke with her in a more kindly manner.

" Lose not thy courage, daughter," he said. " At Southampton we shall meet our greater vessel and many of our company will be transferred to her.

"That will indeed give us more breathing space," cried Barbara.

"Aye, and those who scorned advice before will listen now to reason," her father went on. " I warned them that our number was too great ; but they heeded me not."

When Southampton was reached there was a mighty bustling among those who must go ashore. Even the short voyage from Delfes Haven had been long enough to prove how many forgotten things were necessary to their mere existence, and none was more eager to land than John Gorges.

" I go to meet the agents of our cousin, Sir Fernando ? " he confided to Barbara. " I cannot rid myself of the belief that the man will yet treat me with justice."

" Oh, he must," Barbara said hopefully. She was sure that if this matter of their patrimony were once adjusted, her father would regain the more kindly spirit he was wont to show in earlier days.

" I would that I could meet him face to face/' John Gorges muttered under his breath. " I 'se warrant he would hear a word of truth he sore needs ! But it cannot be. It cannot be ! "

While her father was ashore, Barbara came up on the deck of the Speedwell to escape the foul air below, and found a place for herself in the bows. From here she could look at the Mayflower, anchored not far away, and to her it seemed a great vessel as she compared it with the tiny craft upon which she stood.

" Upon so large a ship I should not fear at all," she thought, and was rather envious of those who were preparing to transfer their belongings to the other craft. But John Gorges and his daughter had been told off to remain aboard the Speedwell and she had no hope that her unspoken desire would be gratified.

Ere she expected him Barbara's father returned, and as she noted the black humor portrayed on his forbidding countenance her heart sank. He came to her and looked down at her with so lowering a brow that for a moment she wondered what fault she had unwittingly committed. But, when he spoke, she saw that his thoughts were far away from her.

" ' Put not thy faith in princes/ " he quoted sardonically. " T is a true saying ; but I know another saw that I have this day proved false. ' Blood is a it thicker than water/ Thou hast heard it, child ?"

" Aye, father, many times," she answered, all trembling.

" It is a lie ! " he burst out.

" Was your mission fruitless? " Barbara asked timidly.

" He hath sent no instructions to his agents/' John Gorges told her bitterly. " I despatched a message long since, telling Fernando that our last stop would be here and begging him to forward the money I left in his keeping. It seems he is not so rich that he hath failed to covet my small patrimony."

But is there naught you can do, father ? " Nay, an we go upon this voyage we leave our all behind us," he answered. " My daughter, should aught befall me, thou must trust to the aid of our brethren in the faith and to the mercy of God, for I do solemnly warn thee that thy kinsfolk thou canst not trust!"

" What mean you, father ? " Barbara asked, frightened at the strangeness of his manner."

" I mean that I have been robbed by our nearest kin," he answered angrily. " Mayhap it is a lesson sent that I may learn to content myself with such treasures as we lay up for ourselves in Heaven."

He turned on his heel and left her under the spell of his bitterness, and all the while they lay at anchor John Gorges stayed apart, gazing upon the land with eyes filled with hatred. Alone he brooded upon his wrongs, scarce speaking to his fellows upon the ship, silent, morose, with but scant courtesy and scanter speech for those who now came eagerly for advice.

It was with a sigh of relief that Barbara bade good-by to Southampton. She was not so good a sailor that she yearned for the open sea, yet she felt that so long as they remained under the shadow of that town her father could not shake off the wrathful thoughts occasioned by the injury he had suffered, and she feared for his reason.

The Mayflower and her consort, passing Spithead and the Solent with favoring winds, drew away from the land. A week's time had been lost unnecessarily, they had been forced to sell butter and provisions because of bickerings that had moved one of the underwriters of their enterprise to withhold promised supplies; but the long voyage was at last accounted as really begun.

Already, as she was young and in good health, Barbara found herself growing accustomed to the motion of the Speedwell. Seasickness no longer troubled her and, being of a kindly spirit, she set about to aid those who were still laid low by looking after their children, helping in the preparation of their meals and doing any small tasks that came to her hand. She was happy in her usefulness, and told herself that, after all, life among such friendly neighbors would be better than exile with the Dutch, whose very language her father had never encouraged her to learn.

Indeed the English Puritans, although bent upon breaking away from the Established Church, kept to themselves nor ever wished to be other than English. During their whole residence in the Low Countries they had been intent upon preserving their place as a separate people and well deserved the name " Separatists," which was often applied to their congregations. At Leyden they had mingled as little as possible with the town-folk. Being tillers of the soil they were not at home with the busy Hollanders, whose chief interest lay in trading and manufacture, so this Promised Land in the new country across the deep drew them like a magnet, and they looked forward eagerly to the broad acres that would one day be theirs to till.