The Young Ship Builders of Elm Island 10

The Young Ship Builders of Elm Island 10

“She had a shawl that had been her grandmother’s; a beautiful one

it was; came from foreign parts, and cost a sight in its day; but

having been worn for so many years, you know, it would naturally get

soiled. She had been wanting to wash it for a great many years, had

often threatened to, and indeed more than once set a time to do it;

but when the time came her heart failed her; even after the water was

hot, she was afraid to put it into the tub, for fear it would fade. I

think she would have done it once, but her darter Patience, who knew

it would fall to her when the old lady was done with it, discouraged

her. At last, one spring, just about this time of year (she lived, you

know, with her son Richard), she determined that, come what might,

she _would_ wash it. One morning she said to her granddarter, ‘Lois

Ann Prindle, do you go straight down to Aunt Olive Cobb’s and Peggy

Sylvester’s, over to Mrs. Joe Ransom’s, and the widder Tucker’s,

give my compliments, and ask them to come over and take a cup of tea

(_green_ tea, mind) with me this afternoon.’ They all came; and when

tea was over, she said, ‘You know, neighbors, I am an old parson, and

can’t, in the course of nature, expect to live many years. I do want

to see this shawl washed before I’m taken away; but our Patience has

always discouraged me; but she’s gone to Cape Porpoise to stay a

month, and I’m determined to have it in the tub before she comes back;

that is, if you think it will do; and I want you to pass your judgment

on’t.’”

 

“The old lady meant to have plenty of advice,” said Sally.

 

“That was so that Patience couldn’t put all the blame on her, in case

it faded,” replied Ben.

 

“The shawl was brought out,” said Mrs. Hadlock, “and laid across their

knees, when judgment was passed on it; every one but the widow Tucker

thought it would wash, and if it was their shawl, they should wash it;

but she said, ‘she knew it wouldn’t wash, for the Wildridge family,

in old York, had jest such a shawl, and they washed it, and it faded

dreadfully; but there,’ said she, looking out of the window, ‘comes

black Luce, Flour’s wife; she is a great washer and ironer, and knows

more about it than all of us.’ Luce was called in, and said, ‘if they

put a beef’s gall in the water, it would set the color, and it wouldn’t

fade a mite.’ ‘Then I’ll wash it, I declare to man I will, for Enoch

Paine’s going to kill an ox this week, and our Patience won’t be home

till long arter that.’

 

“Aunt Betty procured her beef’s gall, got her water hot, and put it in.

 

“‘Here it goes,’ said she, ‘hit or miss,’ dropping the shawl into the

tub. She washed and spread it out on the grass to dry, and every two

or three minutes ran out to look at it. At length it began to dry at

the edges, and she saw it wasn’t going to fade one mite. Down went her

flatirons to the fire. ‘Lois Ann, run right down to the neighbors you

went to before, tell them the shawl is drying beautifully. I am going

to iron it, and want them to come up and take tea to-night, and see it.

Tell Luce to come, too, and arter we’ve done, she shall have as good a

cup of green tea as ever she had in her life.’”

 

“She was a good old soul,” said Ben; “she didn’t forget old Luce.”

 

“Not she; but, as I was saying, she got her table out, and irons hot;

but just as she opened the door to bring in the shawl, she saw a

fish-hawk rising from the ground with it in his claws. Almost beside

herself, she screamed for Richard, who came running from the field; but

long enough before he could load the gun, the hawk was out of sight

behind a high hill back of the house; and when I heard Sally screaming

for Ben, it brought it right up.”

 

“Why couldn’t they have followed, seen where he went to, and cut the

tree down?” asked Charlie.

 

“Because, child, it was all thick woods. You couldn’t see, only right

up in the air, without climbing a tall tree, and before they could do

that he was out of sight.”

 

“Did the women come?”

 

“Yes; but instead of rejoicing with the poor old lady, they did their

best to console her. She didn’t live but a week after that. Some

thought the loss of the shawl, and thinking what Patience would say

when she came, shortened her days; but I don’t. She was very old, and

had been very feeble all the winter before.”

 

“Did they ever find it?”

 

“Yes; some men, who were clearing land two miles off, cut down a tree,

the next summer, that had a fish-hawk’s nest on it; and there was the

shawl, all rotten and covered with the lice that are always on young

fish-hawks.”

 

“The hawk is welcome to the yarn, mother.”

 

“That’s right, Sally; that is spoken like a child of mine, and a good,

thoughtful girl. If the Lord had told you, two years ago, that he would

give you all he has sent you in that time, by the way of the Ark, if

you would give a couple of skeins of yarn to a fish-hawk, you would

have been very glad to have done it. These are all his creatures, and

he careth for them, and feeds them all. The robins, in their nests,

open their little mouths for God to feed them. The scripture says, ‘He

feedeth the ravens, and not even a sparrow is forgotten before God.’”

 

 

 

 

CHAPTER VI.

 

PARSON GOODHUE AND THE WILD GANDER.

 

 

DURING the last year Sally had woven cloth for curtains to her best

bed, and also for the windows of the rooms, when they should be

finished; but for the last two or three weeks she and Sally Merrithew

had been very busily employed bleaching the linen, making the curtains,

and scouring the woodwork, which had been soiled in the putting up. It

was not the fashion to paint in those days--everything was scoured.

 

The cause of this extraordinary industry was at length revealed by

Sally herself, who said to Ben, “Now that the house is done, I’ve got

good help, the baby is well, and mother is here, I think we ought to

have a meeting. I’m afraid we shall get to be just like the heathen,

for we can’t get to meeting but once or twice in the winter, and not

a great deal in the summer. I want Parson Goodhue to come on to the

island, preach a lecture, and make us a real good visit. He’s our old

minister that we have known and loved ever since we were children, and

we haven’t seen him since we were married, except in the pulpit.”

 

“Nothing would suit me better, and I think we’d better have it right

off, before Joe goes away with the schooner; then we can bring him on

and take him back in her, while she’s sweet and clean.”

 

“Yes, and we can have Joe and Henry Griffin to sing, and Uncle Isaac

to lift the tune. Your father will come, and bring the girls. They

are first-rate singers; so is Fred Williams; and we can have as good

singing as they do in the meeting-house on Lord’s day.”

 

“I’ll go off to-night, and if he can come, we’ll have the meeting next

week.”

 

Notwithstanding Ben differed so much from the minister in respect to

temperance, it produced not the least alienation of feeling. Ben,

though very firm in his opinions, had not a particle of bitterness in

his composition. On the other hand, he was much attached to the pastor,

who was a very devoted man, and greatly beloved and respected by his

people, although he thought him in an error respecting that matter,

still his ideas were in harmony with the almost universal sentiments

and practice of the age in which he lived. He was a good man, by no

means a free liver, and sought what he supposed to be the good of his

people with all his heart. Wedded to this pernicious habit by early

usage, and the example of those he had been accustomed to revere as

models of all that was great and good, he failed to perceive its fatal

tendency, although the proofs were daily accumulating before his eyes,

and also that the distinction between the use and abuse, which he and

Captain Rhines strongly insisted upon, was, in the great majority of

cases, a distinction without a difference.

 

It was determined, in family conclave, that the lecture should be at

four o’clock, after which all were to sit down to a meat supper, the

meats having been roasted beforehand, and served up cold, with hot tea

and coffee.

 

“This will be the first time Mr. Goodhue was ever here, Sally,” said

Ben, “and the first time, I expect, in his life, that he was ever

invited anywhere to eat and not offered spirit. We’ve got turkeys,

ducks, and chickens, enough of everything. We’ll let him and all the

rest know that it is not for the sake of saving that we don’t put

spirit on the table; and you know what Bradish set out to say at the

husking, if Joe Griffin hadn’t knocked the wind out of him.”

 

Seats were made in the parlor, kitchen, and porch for the audience;

but the spare room, which was most elaborately finished, where Uncle

Isaac had displayed his utmost skill in carved and panel-work, and

in which was the buffet, was carefully prepared for the reception of

the minister. There were curtains to the best bed and windows, which

Sally had woven and bleached as white as snow; the bed-ticks were

also woven by her, and filled with the feathers of wild geese she had

picked herself. The sheets and pillow-cases were scented with orange

balm. On the mantel-piece were some beautiful shells and coral, which

Ben had brought home from sea; the secretary, also, which his father

had given him, inlaid with various kinds of wood, was in this room.

As to the remaining furniture, it was of the homeliest kind, as Ben

had not purchased any since his means had increased. The looking-glass

was six inches by eight in size, and the chairs were bottomed with ash

splints. In those old times, instead of painting or carpeting floors,

they kept them white by scouring and covering with sand. It was the

custom of housewives, on important occasions, to cover the floor with

sand, and then, with the point of a hemlock broom, make marks in the

sand resembling the backbone of a herring. Sometimes they deposited

the sand in little heaps, like pepper on the surface of a ham, and

representing various figures; but Sally Merrithew went far beyond this.

She covered the floor of the minister’s room with the finest of sand,

and then, with her fingers, made the exact impress of a little child’s

naked foot in different places; also the representation of star-fish,

diamonds, horses, oxen, and various other things. This was a vast

deal of work to bestow upon a thing that was destroyed the moment you

stepped on it; but it looked very pretty when you first opened the

door, and that was enough for Sally. If Parson Goodhue only looked at

it once, she was more than satisfied.

 

Clocks were not common then, and time was kept by hour and minute

glasses; and there would not have been any other time-keeper on Elm

Island had not Ben’s profession as a sailor put him in the way of

having a watch; but whenever he took his watch with him, Sally resorted

to the hour glass, and the sun-mark in the window.

 

When the day arrived, Ben and Charlie went over in the Perseverance, as

she was now ready for sea, and returned with Joe and his crew, Captain

Rhines and his girls, Uncle Isaac, the Hadlocks, and others, among

whom was Fred Williams. The most important personage of all was Parson

Goodhue. The saucy little craft, her sails limed and snow-white, her

decks white as a holy-stone and sand could make them, her masts scraped

and slushed, with a little yellow ochre in the grease, her hull,

mastheads, and spars gayly painted, and rigging fresh tarred, seemed,

as she flung the foam from her bows and shot into the little harbor, proud of her burden.