That night a whip-poor-will—the bird believed throughout Narragansett to be the harbinger of death—perched on the lilac-bush under the window of the chamber where once again slept Unfortunate Hannah; and throughout the long dark hours sounded gloomily in the father’s ears the sad, ominous cry of “Whip-poor-will! Whip-poor-will!” The following day poor Hannah died.
Again did four strong men bear on their shoulders the form of the once beautiful girl, as they passed under the branches of the sweet-scented lilac to the grave near the old house where still is shown the headstone that marks the last resting-place of Unfortunate Hannah Robinson.
NARRAGANSETT WEAVERS
During the first years of this century there could be found in every English town, village, and hamlet many hand-looms and many weavers who on these looms wove for their neighbors and for small cloth-jobbers strong homespun woollen stuffs, rag-carpets, woollen sheets, cotton and wool bed-spreads, flannels, coarse linen and tow, heavy cotton cloth and fine table and bed linen. These hand-looms lingered in use till about 1840. So universal was then the extinction of hand-weaving through the vast growth of power-loom manufacture and of spinning by steam-spindle, and so sudden and complete the destruction and vanishing of all the old-time implements and machines, that when, ten years ago, under the stimulus of Ruskin’s fiery appeal for the revivifying of hand-spinning and hand-weaving, these household arts were again started in Westmoreland, but a single linen-loom could be found for the work.
In the American colonies hand-weaving was also a universal industrial art. In no part of the country has the industry lingered longer than in old Narragansett. In many old New England towns single hand-looms can be found, some in running order, and with owners capable of running them to make rag-carpets. Others are still standing, cobwebbed and dusty, in attic lofts, lean-to chambers, woodsheds, or barns, with no one to set the piece or fill the shuttles. In Narragansett I know a score of old looms in good running order, though, save in one instance, set only for weaving rag-carpets; in many cases the owners, who do not make weaving a trade, will not “start them up” for weaving less than a hundred yards of carpeting. This is a long strip for a room in a cottage or farm-house, so neighbors frequently join together in ordering these carpets, and in company send vast rolls of the filling, which is made of inch-wide strips of cloth of all colors and materials sewed in long strips. Within a few years these old hand-looms have been used for weaving rag-portières made of silk strips.
Weaving was a very respectable occupation. It is told that the regicide Judge Whalley lived to great old age in Narragansett—one hundred and three years—and earned his living by weaving. The son of the Congregational minister at Narragansett, Dr. Torrey, was a weaver. The province was full of weavers. Miss Hazard gives the names of many in her “College Tom.” With all the spinning-jennies for spinning a vast supply of thread and yarn, there were no power-looms in Narragansett till 1812. Hand-looms made up all the yarn and thread that were produced. The prince of Narragansett weavers was Martin Read. In 1761 he was baptized in St. Paul’s Church as “Martin Read, an adult, the Parish Clerk.” He was a devoted lover of the church and was sexton for many years. He led the singing, and it is said that under his leadership the Venite was first chanted in America. During the troubled and rector-less days of the Revolution, he helped the parish work along by reading morning-prayers and the funeral-service for the dead.
He was apprenticed, an orphan, at seven years of age to a diaper-weaver, and served till he was of age, with one term only of schooling; but he was ambitious and read eagerly instructive books, especially on weaving and kindred arts. He married the daughter of an Irish weaver, and soon had journeymen and apprentices, whom he taught to sing as they wove; and when they did not sing the men whistled the airs, and with singing and whistling the work speeded.
This singing at the loom was not a peculiarity of Martin Read’s. We know the exclamation of Falstaff: “I would I were a weaver, I could sing Psalms and all manner of songs.” Nares says weavers were generally good singers, and that as they sat at their work they practised part-singing. Many of the weavers in Queen Elizabeth’s day were Flemish Calvinists and therefore given to psalm-singing, hence Falstaff’s reference.
One weaver, named James Maxwell, wrote some “Weaver’s Meditations” in rhyme in 1756. The frontispiece of his book—his portrait at his loom—is thus inscribed:
“Lo, how ’twixt heaven and earth I swing,