“Robert Walden.”
“Thank ye, Mr. Walden. So ye took the road through Cambridge instead of Charlestown.”
“I let Jenny pick the road. That through Charlestown would have been nearer, but I should have to cross the ferry. My father usually comes this way.”[2]
“Mighty fine mare, Mr. Walden; ye can see she’s a knowing critter. She’s got the right kind of an ear; she knows what she’s about.”
They were at the narrowest part of the peninsula, and Mr. Bushwick told about the barricade built by the first settlers at that point to protect the town from the Indians, and pointed to a large elm-tree which they could see quite a distance ahead.
“That is the Liberty Tree,”[3] he said.
“Why do you call it the Liberty Tree?”
“Because it is where the Sons of Liberty meet. It is a mighty fine tree, and, as near as we can make out, is more than one hundred years old. We hang the Pope there on Guy Fawkes’ day, and traitors to liberty on other days.”
“I have heard you have jolly good times on Gunpowder Plot days.”
“You may believe we do. You would have laughed if you’d been here Gunpowder day seven years ago this coming November, when the Pope, Admiral Byng, Nancy Dawson,[4] and the Devil, all were found hanging on the old elm.”