“Would thee like me to tell a story?” asked Friend Morris, with a hand on Lydia’s Quaker cap,—“a story my grandmother used to tell me, of a little Quaker girl who lived a long time ago?”
“Are there Indians in it?” demanded Sammy, admiring, with head on one side, his deerskin leggings stretched before him.
Friend Morris nodded, and every one settled back comfortably to hear the story she had to tell.
[CHAPTER V—The Story of Little Gwen]
“It was a long time ago,” began Friend Morris, “when a little Welsh girl named Gwen set sail from England, with her father and mother and a company of Friends, to cross the Atlantic Ocean and make a new home for themselves in America. When they were perhaps halfway across, Gwen had a new little brother, and as he was born on the ocean he was given the name ‘Seaborn.’
“Travel was slow in those days, and it seemed a long time to little Gwen before the ship reached land, and she could run and jump as much as she pleased on the solid ground, as she could not do on the crowded ship’s deck. But even then their travels were not over, for Gwen’s father, with a few other men and their families, pushed on into the woods where they meant to settle and build their homes.”
“Were there Indians in the woods?” asked Sammy eagerly.
“Yes, plenty of them, but all friendly to the Quakers,” answered Friend Morris. “I’m sorry for thee, Sammy, but there won’t be a single fight in this story.”
“Never mind,” said Sammy generously, “I’ll like to hear it just the same.”
“What kind of a house did Gwen have in the woods?” asked Mary Ellen, anxious to hear the story.