Though not a popular type of New England beauty, there was a something about Mrs. Wright a certain expression so subtle as to escape definition, which gave her presence a strong personal magnetism, while her dignity and a marked grace of manner gave her an individuality which proclaimed her a queen among women. She was a woman of high ideals. "I fear not," she said, in a letter to her sister, "the wolves whose dismal howls echo and re-echo every night through the forest; I fear not the savages who walk into our home with as little ceremony as though it were their own; I fear not sickness nor death in this wilderness so far from medical aid. One thing only I fear, that I may fail in my duty to my husband, my children and my neighbors."
Her husband's "worldliness," her sons' lack of interest in religious matters and their tendency to adopt the language and expressions of the low and the vicious, afforded matter for constant reproof, rebuke and exhortation. Her efforts to develop in her children the highest ideals of Christian manhood and womanhood were not fully appreciated by the Chief, who was too feudal in his views of woman to understand a life like hers. The phenomenon of a woman superior to himself in mind and soul had never ceased to be a matter of perplexity to him. Her ideals were beyond his comprehension. He had not arrived at the conclusion that a wife should be allowed free scope for the exercise of her own individuality. Her position in the home was one of utter subjection and servitude. She was permitted to have no will but his, no plans but his, and to have no ideas but his. At the marriage ceremony "they two were made one," and that one was her lord and master.
Mrs. Wright's interest was not confined to her own family circle, for, notwithstanding the constant pressure of home duties, she had "a heart at leisure from itself to soothe and sympathize," and to the Indians and early settlers in their loneliness, their sorrows and sufferings, she was a mother, and more than a mother, for she was the only physician, the only clergyman, the only teacher that the little colony possessed for the first few years of its struggling existence. Her medical book and case of medicines, a gift from Dr. Green, of Woburn, brought relief to many sufferers. Her library, consisting of such volumes as "The Pilgrim's Progress," Baxter's "Saints' Rest," Young's "Night Thoughts," Hervey's "Meditations Among the Tombs," did much to enlighten, if not to cheer, darkened souls, while from the newest Boston school-books she trained the youth of the settlement in the elementary principles of the arts and sciences.
Such was the woman whom Machecawa sought in his hour of extremity.
All night long the noble chieftain of his people sat by the bedside with downcast eyes. The wind, having spent its force and fury, moaned and sobbed round the house; the flickering light from the hearth cast strange, weird shadows upon the wall when Newitchewagan opened her large dark eyes, gently stroked the little black head on her bosom, and with one affectionate look at him who had been her companion in hardships, heaved a deep sigh and was gone.
Machecawa, without uttering a word, hastily left the Wigwam, and in a short time returned with his face blackened and with several squaws, who tore their hair, scattered ashes on their heads, and raised their voices in wailing. They arranged to have the burial service take place in the evening, and it was well for the inmates of the Wigwam that it was not deferred for several days, for the wailing continued without cessation until all that was left of Newitchewagan was wrapped in birch bark and securely tied with a cord of deerskin, like a parcel, when it was borne by four young braves and laid upon a raised platform of boughs, between two fires which had been kindled a little distance from the Wigwam.
The Indians then squatted cross-legged in a large circle round the fires. Machecawa and his motherless children were seated close to the bier, their faces blackened, their hair and clothing torn and in disorder. The awful stillness was at length broken by old O'Jawescawa, who left his seat and, approaching the grief-stricken husband, said:
"O Machecawa, my brother, it is not well that you grieve. If Newitchewagan had lived she would many times have been hungry and cold and weary; but in the happy hunting-ground, whither she has gone, there is neither hunger nor cold nor weariness. Therefore you should be glad." He then drew his hunting-knife from his belt, and, slashing it through the birch-bark wrappings, cried:
"O Kitche Manitou! These places do I cut that our sister's spirit may come and go as she wills it, that she may visit us sometimes, that she may see our brother Machecawa when he is very sad."