Unknown - "The World English Bible (WEB): Lamentations"

Sir Francis Bacon - "Valerius Terminus: of the Interpretation of Nature"

John H. Bechtel - "Slips of Speech"

Unknown - "Human Genome Project, Y Chromosome"

To Have and To Hold:

M >> Mary Johnston >> To Have and To Hold:




"Have I ever refused it, my captain?"

"Not yet. Take your hand from that pillion and hold it up; then say
after me these words: 'This lady is my mistress, my master's wife,
to be by me reverenced as such. Her face is not for my eyes nor her
hand for my lips. If I keep not myself clean of all offense toward
her, may God approve that which my master shall do!' "

The blood rushed to his face. I watched his fingers slowly
loosening their grasp.

"Tardy obedience is of the house of mutiny," I said sternly. " Will
you, sirrah, or will you not?"

He raised his hand and repeated the words.

"Now hold her as before," I ordered, and, straightening myself in
the saddle, rode on, with my eyes once more on the path before
me.

A mile further on, Mistress Percy stirred and raised her head from
my shoulder. " Not at Jamestown yet?" she sighed, as yet but half
awake. "Oh, the endless trees! I dreamed I was hawking at
Windsor, and then suddenly I was here in this forest, a bird, happy
because I was free; and then a falcon came swooping down upon
me, - it had me in its talons, and I changed to myself again, and it
changed to - What am I saying? I am talking in my sleep. Who is
that singing?"

In fact, from the woods in front of us, and not a bowshot away,
rang out a powerful voice: -

"'In the merry month of May,

In a morn by break of day,

With a troop of damsels playing

Forth I went, forsooth, a-maying;' " and presently, the trees
thinning in front of us, we came upon a little open glade and upon
the singer. He lay on his back, on the soft turf beneath an oak, with
his hands clasped behind his head and his eyes upturned to the
blue sky showing between leaf and branch. On one knee crossed
above the other sat a squirrel with a nut in its paws, and half a
dozen others scampered here and there over his great body, like so
many frolicsome kittens. At a little distance grazed an old horse,
gray and gaunt, springhalt and spavined, with ribs like Death's
own. Its saddle and bridle adorned a limb of the oak.

The song went cheerfully on: -

" 'Much ado there was, God wot:

would love and she would not;

said, "Never man was true."

He said, "None was false to you." ' "

"Give you good-day, reverend sir!" I called. " Art conning next
Sunday's hymn?"

Nothing abashed, Master Jeremy Sparrow gently shook off the
squirrels, and getting to his feet advanced to meet us.

"A toy," he declared, with a wave of his hand, "a trifle, a silly old
song that came into my mind unawares, the leaves being so green
and the sky so blue. Had you come a little earlier or a little later,
you would have heard the ninetieth psalm. Give you good-day
madam. I must have sung for that the very queen of May was
coming by."

"Art on your way to Jamestown?" I demanded. "Come ride with us.
Diccon, saddle his reverence's horse."

"Saddle him an thou wilt, friend," said Master Sparrow, " for he
and I have idled long enough, but I fear I cannot keep pace with
this fair company. I and the horse are footing it together."

"He is not long for this world," I remarked, eyeing his ill-favored
steed, "but neither are we far from Jamestown. He'll last that far."

Master Sparrow shook his head, with a rueful countenance. "I
bought him from one of the French vignerons below Westover," he
said. "The fellow was astride the poor creature, beating him with a
club because he could not go. I laid Monsieur Crapaud in the dust,
after which we compounded, he for my purse, I for the animal;
since when the poor beast and I have tramped it together, for I
could not in conscience ride him. Have you read me ’sop his
fables, Captain Percy?"

"I remember the man, the boy, and the ass," I replied. "The ass
came to grief in the end. Put thy scruples in thy pocket, man, and
mount thy pale horse."

"Not I!" he said, with a smile. " 'T is a thousand pities, Captain
Percy, that a small, mean, and squeamish spirit like mine should
be cased like a very Guy of Warwick. Now, if I were slight of
body, or even if I were no heavier than your servant there" -

"Oh!" I said. "Diccon, give his reverence the mare, and do you
mount his horse and bring him slowly on to town. If he will not
carry you, you can lead him in."

Sunshine revisited the countenance of Master Jeremy Sparrow; he
swung his great body into the saddle, gathered up the reins, and
made the mare to caracole across the path for very joy.

"Have a care of the poor brute, friend!" he cried genially to
Diccon, whose looks were of the sulkiest. "Bring him gently on,
and leave him at Master Bucke's, near to the church."

"What do you do at Jamestown?" I asked, as we passed from out
the glade into the gloom of a pine wood. "I was told that you were
gone to Henricus, to help Master Thorpe convert the Indians."

"Ay," he answered, "I did go. I had a call, - I was sure I had a call. I
thought of myself as a very apostle to the Gentiles. I went from
Henricus one day's journey into the wilderness, with none but an
Indian lad for interpreter, and coming to an Indian village gathered
its inhabitants about me, and sitting down upon a hillock read and
expounded to them the Sermon on the Mount. I was much edified
by the solemnity of their demeanor and the earnestness of their
attention, and had conceived great hopes for their spiritual welfare,
when, the reading and exhortation being finished, one of their old
men arose and made me a long speech, which I could not well
understand, but took to be one of grateful welcome to myself and
my tidings of peace and good will. He then desired me to tarry
with them, and to be present at some entertainment or other, the
nature of which I could not make out. I tarried; and toward evening
they conducted me with much ceremony to an open space in the
midst of the village. There I found planted in the ground a thick
stake, and around it a ring of flaming brushwood. To the stake was
fastened an Indian warrior, captured, so my interpreter informed
me, from some hostile tribe above the falls. His arms and ankles
were secured to the stake by means of thongs passed through
incisions in the flesh; his body was stuck over with countless pine
splinters, each burning like a miniature torch; and on his shaven
crown was tied a thin plate of copper heaped with red-hot coals. A
little to one side appeared another stake and another circle of
brushwood: the one with nothing tied to it as yet, and the other still
unlit. My friend, I did not tarry to see it lit. I tore a branch from an
oak, and I became as Samson with the jaw bone of the ass. I fell
upon and smote those Philistines. Their wretched victim was
beyond all human help, but I dearly avenged him upon his
enemies. And they had their pains for naught when they planted
that second stake and laid the brush for their hell fire. At last I
dropped into the stream upon which their damnable village was
situate, and got safely away. Next day I went to George Thorpe and
resigned my ministry, telling him that we were nowhere
commanded to preach to devils; when the Company was ready to
send shot and steel amongst them, they might count upon me.
After which I came down the river to Jamestown, where I found
worthy Master Bucke well-nigh despaired of with the fever.
Finally he was taken up river for change of air, and, for lack of
worthier substitute, the Governor and Captain West constrained
me to remain and minister to the shepherdless flock. Where will
you lodge, good sir?"

"I do not know," I said. "The town will be full, and the guest house
is not yet finished."

"Why not come to me?" he asked. "There are none in the minister's
house but me and Goodwife Allen who keeps it. There are five fair
large rooms and a goodly garden, though the trees do too much
shadow the house. If you will come and let the sunshine in," - a
bow and smile for madam, - "I shall be your debtor."

His plea pleased me well. Except the Governor's and Captain
West's, the minister's house was the best in the town. It was retired,
too, being set in its own grounds, and not upon the street, and I
desired privacy. Goodwife Allen was stolid and incurious.
Moreover, I liked Master Jeremy Sparrow.

I accepted his hospitality and gave him thanks. He waved them
away, and fell to complimenting Mistress Percy, who was pleased
to be gracious to us both. Well content for the moment with the
world and ourselves, we fared on through the alternating sunshine
and shade, and were happy with the careless inhabitants of the
forest. Oversoon we came to the peninsula, and crossed the neck
of land. Before us lay the town: to the outer eye a poor and mean
village, indeed, but to the inner the stronghold and capital of our
race in the western world, the germ from which might spring
stately cities, the newborn babe which might in time equal its
parent in stature, strength, and comeliness. So I and a few besides,
both in Virginia and at home, viewed the mean houses, the poor
church and rude fort, and loved the spot which had witnessed
much suffering and small joy, but which held within it the future,
which was even now a bit in the mouth of Spain, a thing in itself
outweighing all the toil and anguish of our planting. But there
were others who saw only the meanness of the place, its almost
defenselessness, its fluxes and fevers, the fewness of its
inhabitants and the number of its graves. Finding no gold and no
earthly paradise, and that in the sweat of their brow they must eat
their bread, they straightway fell into the dumps, and either died
out of sheer perversity, or went yelping home to the Company with
all manner of dismal tales, - which tales, through my Lord
Warwick's good offices, never failed to reach the sacred ears of
his Majesty, and to bring the colony and the Company into
disfavor.

We came to the palisade, and found the gates wide open and the
warder gone.

"Where be the people?" marveled Master Sparrow, as we rode
through into the street. In truth, where were the people? On either
side of the street the doors of the houses stood open, but no person
looked out from them or loitered on the doorsteps; the square was
empty; there were no women at the well, no children underfoot, no
gaping crowd before gaol and pillory, no guard before the
Governor's house, - not a soul, high or low, to be seen.

"Have they all migrated?" cried Sparrow. "Are they gone to
Croatan?"

"They have left one to tell the tale, then," I said, "for here he
comes running."



CHAPTER VII IN WHICH WE PREPARE TO FIGHT THE SPANIARD


A MAN came panting down the street. " Captain Ralph Percy!" he
cried. "My master said it was your horse coming across the neck.
The Governor commands your attendance at once, sir."

"Where is the Governor? Where are all the people?" I demanded.

"At the fort. They are all at the fort or on the bank below. Oh, sirs,
a woeful day for us all!"

"A woeful day!" I exclaimed. "What's the matter?"

The man, whom I recognized as one of the commander's servants,
a fellow with the soul of a French valet de chambre, was wild with
terror.

"They are at the guns!" he quavered. "Alackaday! what can a few
sakers and demiculverins do against them?"

"Against whom?" I cried.

"They are giving out pikes and cutlasses! Woe's me, the sight of
naked steel hath ever made me sick!"

I drew my dagger, and flashed it before him. "Does 't make you
sick?" I asked. "You shall be sicker yet, if you do not speak to
some purpose."

The fellow shrank back, his eyeballs starting from his head.

"It's a tall ship," he gasped, "a very big ship! It hath ten culverins,
beside fowlers and murderers, sabers, falcons, and bases!"

I took him by the collar and shook him off his feet.

"There are priests on board!" he managed to say as I set him down.
"This time to-morrrow we'll all be on the rack! And next week the
galleys will have us!"

"It's the Spaniard at last," I said. "Come on!"

When we reached the river bank before the fort, it was to find
confusion worse confounded. The gates of the palisade were open,
and through them streamed Councilors, Burgesses, and officers,
while the bank itself was thronged with the generality. Ancient
planters, Smith's men, Dale's men, tenants and servants, women
and children, including the little eyases we imported the year
before, negroes, Paspaheghs, French vignerons, Dutch sawmill
men, Italian glassworkers, - all seethed to and fro, all talked at
once, and all looked down the river. Out of the babel of voices
these words came to us over and over: "The Spaniard!" "The
Inquisition!" "The galleys!" They were the words oftenest heard at
that time, when strange sails hove in sight.

But where was the Spaniard? On the river, hugging the shore, were
many small craft, barges, shallops, sloops, and pinnaces, and
beyond them the masts of the Truelove, the Due Return, and the
Tiger, then in port; on these three, of which the largest, the Due
Return, was of but eighty tons burthen, the mariners were running
about and the masters bawling orders. But there was no other ship,
no bark, galleon, or man-of-war, with three tiers of grinning
ordnance, and the hated yellow flag flaunting above.

I sprang from my horse, and, leaving it and Mistress Percy in
Sparrow's charge, hastened up to the fort. As I passed through the
palisade I heard my name called, and turning waited for Master
Pory to come up. He was panting and puffing, his jovial face very
red.

"I was across the neck of land when I heard the news," he said. "I
ran all the way, and am somewhat scant of breath. Here's the devil
to pay!"

"It looks another mare's-nest," I replied. "We have cried 'Spaniard!'
pretty often."

"But this time the wolf's here," he answered. "Davies sent a
horseman at a gallop from Algernon with the tidings. He passed
the ship, and it was a very great one. We may thank this dead calm
that it did not catch us unawares."

Within the palisade was noise enough, but more order than
without. On the half-moons commanding the river, gunners were
busy about our sakers, falcons, and three culverins. In one place,
West, the commander, was giving out brigandines, jacks, skulls,
muskets, halberds, swords, and longbows; in another, his wife,
who was a very Mary Ambree, supervised the boiling of a great
caldron of pitch. Each loophole in palisade and fort had already its
marksman. Through the west port came a horde of reluctant
invaders, - cattle, swine, and poultry, - driven in by yelling boys.

I made my way through the press to where I saw the Governor,
surrounded by Councilors and Burgesses, sitting on a keg of
powder, and issuing orders at the top of his voice. "Ha, Captain
Percy!" he cried, as I came up. "You are in good time, man! You've
served your apprenticeship at the wars. You must teach us how to
beat the dons."

"To Englishmen, that comes by nature, sir," I said. "Art sure we are
to have the pleasure?"

"Not a doubt of it this time," he answered. "The ship slipped in
past the Point last night. Davies signaled her to stop, and then sent
a ball over her; but she kept on. True, it was too dark to make out
much; but if she were friendly, why did she not stop for castle
duties? Moreover, they say she was of at least five hundred tons,
and no ship of that size hath ever visited these waters. There was
no wind, and they sent a man on at once, hoping to outstrip the
enemy and warn us. The man changed horses at Basse's Choice,
and passed the ship about dawn. All he could tell for the mist was
that it was a very great ship, with three tiers of guns."

"The flag?"

"She carried none."

"Humph!" I said. "It hath a suspicious look. At least we do well to
be ready. We'll give them a warm welcome."

"There are those here who counsel surrender," continued the
Governor. "There's one, at least, who wants the Tiger sent
downstream with a white flag and my sword."

"Where?" I cried. "He's no Englishman, I warrant!"

"As much an Englishman as thou, sir!" called out a gentleman
whom I had encountered before, to wit, Master Edward Sharpless.
"It's well enough for swingebuckler captains, Low Country
fire-eaters, to talk of holding out againt a Spanish man-of-war with
twice our number of fighting men, and enough ordnance to batter
the town out of existence. Wise men know when the odds are too
heavy!"

"It's well enough for lily-livered, goose-fleshed lawyers to hold
their tongues when men and soldiers talk," I retorted. "We are not
making indentures to the devil, and so have no need of such
gentry."

There was a roar of laughter from the captains and gunners, but
terror of the Spaniard had made Master Edward Sharpless bold to
all besides.

"They will wipe us off the face of the earth!" he lamented. "There
won't be an Englishman left in America! they'll come close in upon
us! they'll batter down the fort with their culverins; they'll turn all
their swivels, sakers, and falcons upon us; they'll throw into our
midst stinkpots and grenades; they'll mow us down with chain
shot! Their gunners never miss!" His voice rose to a scream, and
he shook as with an ague. "Are you mad? It's Spain that's to be
fought! Spain the rich! Spain the powerful! Spain the lord of the
New World!"

"It's England that fights!" I cried. "For very shame, hold thy
tongue!"

"If we surrender at once, they'll let us go!" he whined. "We can
take the small boats and get to the Bermudas. they'll let us go."

"Into the galleys," muttered West.

The craven tried another feint. "Think of the women and children!"

"We do," I said sternly. "Silence, fool!"

The Governor, a brave and honest man, rose from the keg of
powder. "All this is foreign to the matter, Master Sharpless. I think
our duty is clear, be the odds what they may. This is our post, and
we will hold it or die beside it. We are few in number, but we are
England in America, and I think we will remain here. This is the
King's fifth kingdom, and we will keep it for him. We will trust in
the Lord and fight it out."

"Amen," I said, and "Amen," said the ring of Councilors and
Burgesses and the armed men beyond.

The hum of voices now rose into excited cries, and the watchman
stationed atop the big culverin called out, "Sail ho!" With one
accord we turned our faces downstream. There was the ship,
undoubtedly. Moreover, a strong breeze had sprung up, blowing
from the sea, filling her white sails, and rapidly lessening the
distance between us. As yet we could only tell that she was indeed
a large ship with all sail set.

Through the gates of the palisade now came, pellmell, the crowd
without. In ten minutes' time the women were in line ready to load
the muskets, the children sheltered as best they might be, the men
in ranks, the gunners at their guns, and the flag up. I had run it up
with my own hand, and as I stood beneath the folds Master
Sparrow and my wife came to my side.

"The women are over there," I said to the latter, "where you had
best betake yourself."

"I prefer to stay here," she answered. "I am not afraid." Her color
was high, and she held her head up. " My father fought the
Armada," she said.

"Get me a sword from that man who is giving them out."

From his coign of vantage the watch now called out: "She's a long
ship, - five hundred tons, anyhow! Lord! the metal that she carries!
She's rasedecked!"

"Then she's Spanish, sure enough!" cried the Governor.

From the crowd of servants, felons, and foreigners rose a great
clamor, and presently we made out Sharpless perched on a cask in
their midst and wildly gesticulating.

"The Tiger, the Truelove, and the Due Return have swung across
channel!" announced the watch. "They 've trained their guns on the
Spaniard!"

The Englishmen cheered, but the bastard crew about Sharpless
groaned. Extreme fear had made the lawyer shameless. "What
guns have those boats?" he screamed. "Two falcons apiece and a
handful of muskets, and they go out against a man-of-war! She'll
trample them underfoot! She'll sink them with a shot apiece! The
Tiger is forty tons, and the Truelove is sixty. You 're all mad!"

"Sometimes quality beats quantity," said West.

"Didst ever hear of the Content?" sang out a gunner.

"Or of the Merchant Royal?" cried another.

"Or of the Revenge?" quoth Master Jeremy Sparrow. "Go hang
thyself, coward, or, if you choose, swim out to the Spaniard, and
shift from thy wet doublet and hose into a sanbenito. Let the don
come, shoot if he can, and land if he will! We'll singe his beard in
Virginia as we did at Cales!

'The great St. Philip, the pride of the Spaniards,

Was burnt to the bottom and sunk in the sea.

the St. Andrew and eke the St. Matthew

We took in fight manfully and brought away.'

And so we'll do with this one, my masters! We'll sink her, or we'll
take her and send her against her own galleons and galleasses!

'Dub-a-dub, dub-a-dub, thus strike their drums,

Tantara, tantara, the Englishman comes!' "

His great voice and great presence seized and held the attention of
all. Over his doublet of rusty black he had clapped a yet rustier
back and breast; on his bushy hair rode a headpiece many sizes too
small; by his side was an old broadsword, and over his shoulder a
pike. Suddenly, from gay hardihood his countenance changed to an
expression more befitting his calling. "Our cause is just, my
masters!" he cried. "We stand here not for England alone; we stand
for the love of law, for the love of liberty, for the fear of God, who
will not desert his servants and his cause, nor give over to
Anti-Christ this virgin world. This plantation is the leaven which is
to leaven the whole lump, and surely he will hide it in the hollow
of his hand and in the shadow of his wing. God of battles, hear us!
God of England, God of America, aid the children of the one, the
saviors of the other!"

He had dropped the pike to raise his clasped hands to the blue
heavens, but now he lifted it again, threw back his shoulders, and
flung up his head. He laid his hand on the flagstaff, and looked up
to the banner streaming in the breeze. "It looks well so high against
the blue, does n't it, friends?" he cried genially. "Suppose we keep
it there forever and a day!"

A cheer arose, so loud that it silenced, if it did not convince, the
craven few. As for Master Edward Sharpless, he disappeared
behind the line of women.

The great ship came steadily on, her white sails growing larger and
larger, moment by moment, her tiers of guns more distinct and
menacing, her whole aspect more defiant. Her waist seemed
packed with men. But no streamers, no flag.

A puff of smoke floated up from the deck of the Tiger, and a ball
from one of her two tiny falcons passed through the stranger's
rigging. A cheer for the brave little cockboat arose from the
English. "David and his pebble!" exclaimed Master Jeremy
Sparrow. "Now for Goliath's twenty-pounders!"

But no flame and thunder issued from the guns aboard the
stranger. Instead, from her deck there came to us what sounded
mightily like a roar of laughter. Suddenly, from each masthead and
yard shot out streamers of red and blue, up from the poop rose and
flaunted in the wind the crosses of St. George and St. Andrew, and
with a crash trumpet, drum, and fife rushed into

"Here's to jolly good ale and old!"

"By the Lord, she's English!" shouted the Governor.

On she came, banners flying, music playing, and inextinguishable
laughter rising from her decks. The Tiger, the Truelove, and the
Due Return sent no more hailstones against her; they turned and
resolved themselves into her consort. The watch, a grim old sea
dog that had come in with Dale, swung himself down from his
post, and came toward the Governor at a run. "I know her now,
sir!" he shouted. "I was at the winning of Cales, and she's the Santa
Teresa, that we took and sent home to the Queen. She was Spanish
once, sir, but she's English now."

The gates were flung open, and the excited people poured out
again upon the river bank. I found myself beside the Governor,
whose honest countenance wore an expression of profound
bewilderment.

"What d' ye make of her, Percy?" he said. "The Company does n't
send servants, felons, 'prentices, or maids in such craft; no, nor
officers or governors, either. It's the King's ship, sure enough, but
what is she doing here? - that 's the question. What does she want,
and whom does she bring?"

"We'll soon know," I answered, "for there goes her anchor."

Five minutes later a boat was lowered from the ship, and came
swiftly toward us. The boat had four rowers, and in the stern sat a
tall man, black-bearded, high-colored, and magnificently dressed.
It touched the sand some two hundred feet from the spot where
Governor, Councilors, officers, and a sprinkling of other sorts
stood staring at it, and at the great ship beyond. The man in the
stern leaped out, looked around him, and then walked toward us.
As he walked slowly, we had leisure to note the richness of his
doublet and cloak, - the one slashed, the other lined with scarlet
taffeta, - the arrogance of his mien and gait, and the superb
full-blooded beauty of his face.

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