Dungeon Rock; or, the pirate's cave, at Lynn

BOSTON: C. M. A. Twitchell, Printer, 50 Bromfield St., Boston. 1885.
Copyright by MRS. S. P. AMES. 1885.
To Mrs. Hannah Lucinda Marble, widow of the late Excavator, and at the present time the person most interested in this romantic spot, I dedicate this book.
S. P. A.
Dungeon Rock is as yet only half known. More than “two hundred years ago,” when first the foot of civilization pressed the unturned sod of New England’s rock-bound soil, a man, past the prime of life, having lost his place in England, determined on seeking a new name in a new country. Accordingly, he embarked with his only earthly treasures, his wife and the family coat of arms, and, after a dangerous voyage, reached Plymouth Rock, only to encounter more dangers. And there, in that lonely home, away from all that makes life desirable to childhood, did the little William first see the light of day, and began the battle of living without love. None but those who have experienced it can tell how deep and terrible is the sternness of a disappointed man.
Ben Wallace—for this was the adventurer’s name—had acquired a morbid hate for everything bright and beautiful, and lived, like most of New England’s early settlers, for the stern realities of life, expecting nothing but hardships, and therefore seeking nothing. No wonder, then, that the aristocratic blood of English ancestry, coursing through the child’s veins, rose against the injustice of being a dependent where he should have been a pride; and, even in his baby days, when the garden was his play-ground, the unrooted stumps his rocking-horses, and the strips of painted basket material, which he now and then received from the Indian children in the neighborhood, represented to his childish gaze the flags and banners of ancient heraldry, which his mother pointed out to him upon the coat of arms,—even then he defied his father’s commands, and turned from his stern reproofs to whisper the childish longings of his own heart to the birds and the dancing stream. “I hate it,” he said passionately, when he had arrived at the age of fourteen; “I hate the strong fence that keeps me from finding other people’s homes! I hate to be confined to work that I detest, just for the sake of getting food from day to day. I will not do it. The world shall know that William Wallace was not born for no purpose. I will help some one, if it is savages and wild beasts.”