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Roll thyself up like a fist, to threaten and daunt me; I heed not

Either your warning or menace, or any omen of evil!

There is no land so sacred, no air so pure and so whole

some,

As is the air she breathes, and the soil that is pressed by her footsteps.

Here for her sake will I stay, and like an invisible pres

ence

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Hover around her forever, protecting, supporting her weak

ness;

Yes! as my foot was the first that stepped on this rock at the landing,

So, with the blessing of God, shall it be the last at the leaving!"

Meanwhile the Master alert, but with dignified air and

important,

Scanning with watchful eye the tide and the wind and the

weather,

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Walked about on the sands, and the people crowded around

him

Saying a few last words, and enforcing his careful remembrance.

Then, taking each by the hand, as if he were grasping a

tiller,

Into the boat he sprang, and in haste shoved off to his

vessel,

Glad in his heart to get rid of all this worry and flurry, 595 Glad to be gone from a land of sand and sickness and

sorrow,

Short allowance of victual, and plenty of nothing but Gospel! Lost in the sound of the oars was the last farewell of the

Pilgrims.

O strong hearts and true! not one went back in the Mayflower!

No, not one looked back, who had set his hand to this ploughing!1

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Soon were heard on board the shouts and songs of the

sailors

Heaving the windlass round, and hoisting the ponderous anchor.

Then the yards were braced, and all sails set to the westwind,

Blowing steady and strong; and the Mayflower sailed from the harbor,

Rounded the point of the Gurnet, and leaving far to the

southward

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Island and cape of sand, and the Field of the First En

counter,2

Took the wind on her quarter, and stood for the open

Atlantic,

Borne on the send of the sea, and the swelling hearts of the Pilgrims.

Long in silence they watched the receding sail of the

vessel,

Much endeared to them all, as something living and hu

man;

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Then, as if filled with the spirit, and wrapt in a vision prophetic,

1 Compare Luke, ix. 62.

2 Before making their final landing the Pilgrims anchored off Cape Cod until they could find a suitable place to start the settlement. While on this search, a party of men had their first skirmish with the Indians.

Baring his hoary head, the excellent Elder of Plymouth Said, "Let us pray!" and they prayed, and thanked the Lord and took courage.1

Mournfully sobbed the waves at the base of the rock, and above them

Bowed and whispered the wheat on the hill of death, and their kindred

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Seemed to awake in their graves, and to join in the prayer

that they uttered.

Sun-illumined and white, on the eastern verge of the ocean Gleamed the departing sail, like a marble slab in a grave

yard;

Buried beneath it lay forever all hope of escaping.

Lo! as they turned to depart, they saw the form of an

Indian,

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Watching them from the hill; but while they spake with each other,

Pointing with outstretched hands, and saying, "Look!" he had vanished.

So they returned to their homes; but Alden lingered a little, Musing alone on the shore, and watching the wash of the billows

Round the base of the rock, and the sparkle and flash of the sunshine,

Like the spirit of God, moving visibly over the waters.2

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VI

PRISCILLA

Thus for a while he stood, and mused by the shore of the

ocean,

Thinking of many things, and most of all of Priscilla;

1 Compare Acts, xxviii. 15.

• Compare Genesis, i. 2.

And as if thought had the power to draw to itself, like the

loadstone,

Whatsoever it touches, by subtile laws of its nature,

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Lo! as he turned to depart, Priscilla was standing beside him.

"Are you so much offended, you will not speak to me?" said she.

"Am I so much to blame, that yesterday, when you were pleading

Warmly the cause of another, my heart, impulsive and wayward,

Pleaded your own, and spake out, forgetful perhaps of

decorum?

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Certainly you can forgive me for speaking so frankly, for

saying

What I ought not to have said, yet now I can never unsay

it;

For there are moments in life, when the heart is so full of

emotion,

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That if by chance it be shaken, or into its depths like a pebble
Drops some careless word, it overflows, and its secret,
Spilt on the ground like water, can never be gathered to-

gether.

Yesterday I was shocked, when I heard you speak of Miles

Standish,

Praising his virtues, transforming his very defects into virtues,

Praising his courage and strength, and even his fighting in Flanders,

As if by fighting alone you could win the heart of a

woman,

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Quite overlooking yourself and the rest, in exalting your

hero.

Therefore I spake as I did, by an irresistible impulse.

You will forgive me, I hope, for the sake of the friendship between us,

Which is too true and too sacred to be so easily broken!" Thereupon answered John Alden, the scholar, the friend of Miles Standish:

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"I was not angry with you, with myself alone I was

angry,

Seeing how badly I managed the matter I had in my keep

ing."

"No!" interrupted the maiden, with answer prompt and decisive;

"No; you were angry with me, for speaking so frankly and

freely.

It was wrong, I acknowledge; for it is the fate of a

woman

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Long to be patient and silent, to wait like a ghost that is speechless,

Till some questioning voice dissolves the spell of its silence.
Hence is the inner life of so many suffering women
Sunless and silent and deep, like subterranean rivers
Running through caverns of darkness, unheard, unseen,

and unfruitful,

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Chafing their channels of stone, with endless and profitless

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Thereupon answered John Alden, the young man, the lover of women:

"Heaven forbid it, Priscilla; and truly they seem to me always

More like the beautiful rivers that watered the garden of

Eden,

More like the river Euphrates, through deserts of Havilah

flowing,

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Filling the land with delight, and memories sweet of the

garden!"

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