The boys were alert to find out what the evil might be.
"As magistrates," replied Williams, "we control undue pride and levity of behavior. We oblige the women to wear their sleeves to their wrists and close their gowns about their throats. Our men must now overcome this sinful habit of wearing the hair long."
Gibbons picked up his oars, remarking, "We will enforce the law after we have met the governor and deputies, as is planned." He pushed off his boat, and Williams walked thoughtfully away, while the boys agreed that the Court was a power.
For several days the matter remained in Jonathan's mind. He noticed as never before the trig little cuffs about his mother's wrists, and the narrow collar that enclosed her throat. He was so troubled by the long hair that swept his father's shoulders that, at last, one afternoon he talked the matter over with his mother as she sat by the open door. They both knew Roger Low to be a determined man and slow to accept new customs.
Little Mary was playing with her dolls under the spreading lilac bushes. She glanced at the two as they talked earnestly together and caught bits of the conversation, but continued with her play. After an early tea Jonathan and his mother wandered down by the river, while Roger Low, the father, weary with a hard day's work, settled himself in his big chair and soon dropped to sleep.
Little Mary had put her dolls to bed and, feeling much alone, snuggled close to her sleeping father. Looking at the long locks as they hung from his bent head, she recalled the afternoon's conversation.
"His hair is too long," she thought. "Jonathan says it is not right to wear long hair."
Stepping to the shelf she took down the scissors and quickly gave a delicious snip to her father's thick locks. Another snip-snap and more hair fell. The sleeping man roused a little, but finding only his little Mary playing about him, nodded off again. His head this time fell in a more favorable position for Mary to continue the clipping, which she did most thoroughly.
It was dark when her mother returned and passed her sleeping husband to put Mary to bed.
Just what happened in that home the next day I cannot tell you, but Roger Low appeared to the towns-people with closely cut hair, an astonishing example, just as the proclamation of the magistrates was announced.