For one month this fright and commotion and expense had existed; and at last wholly alone were left the two contemptible malcontents and instigators of it all. Mr. and Mrs. Bosomworth thereafter ate very humble pie; he begged sorely and cried tearfully to be forgiven; and he wailed so deeply and promised so broadly that at last the two were publicly pardoned.
Yet, after all, they had their own way; for they soon went to London and cut an infinitely fine figure there. Mary was the top of the mode, and there Bosomworth managed to get for his wife lands and coin to the amount of about a hundred thousand dollars.
The prosperous twain returned to America in triumph, and built a curious and large house on an island they had acquired; in it the Empress did not long reign; at her death the Rev. Mr. Bosomworth married his chambermaid.
Such is the sorry tale of the Indian squaw and the English parson, a tale the more despicable because, though she had been reared in English ways, baptized in the English faith, had been the friend of English men and women, and married three English husbands; yet when fifty years old she returned at vicious suggestion with promptitude and fierceness to violent savage ways, to incite a massacre of her friends. And that suggestion came not from her barbarian kin, but from an English gentleman—a Christian priest.
CHAPTER IV
A VAIN PURITAN GRANDMOTHER
“Things farre-fetched and deare-bought are good for Ladies.”
—“Arte of English Poesie,” G. PUTTENHAM, 1589.
“I honour a Woman that can honour herself with her Attire. A good Text deserves a Fair Margent.”
—“The Simple Cobbler of Agawam,” J. WARD, 1713.