“Nay, we all came in the boat, down Bluefish River and so round. You see there’s so many of us,—John and Jo and Betty and David and Jonathan and Sally and Ruth and Molly; for I could not leave the babies at home without keeping Betty and Sally to mind them, and that was not to be thought of, says my Betty, who aye has her own way.”
“And marvelous that she should, seeing she comes of so weak a mother.”
“Oh, she takes after her father, poor child, and he would ever be aping the ways of his captain.”
Doubtless the captain would soon have provided himself with a retort, but Barbara laid a hand upon his arm.
“While you two are changing your merry quips and cranks, the supper waits,” said she. “Surely, Myles, you will wash your hands and straighten your hair; and Priscilla, is’t not time for you to put the last touch to the whips and syllabub?”
“True enough, Barbara, and lo, I’m gone!” cried Priscilla, and disappeared into the great cool dairy with its northern exposure, where the milk of the red cow and the two young daughters now added to her was manufactured by Barbara into not only butter, but all sorts of dainty confections. On this occasion, however, Priscilla Alden had as of old been summoned to help the housewife, and lend not only her hands but her incomparable culinary skill to the work of providing entertainment for the two or three score persons who had gathered to celebrate the birthday of their town. With most of these, or at least with the heads of the families, we are already acquainted, but in the seventeen years since the landing of the Mayflower many who were then children have grown to maturity and married; as for instance, Love Brewster, who has been for three years husband of Sarah, daughter of that William Collier the only man among the London Adventurers who proved his faith in the Pilgrims by coming to live among them. See him as he stands talking with Elder Brewster, his four fair daughters all within sight: Sarah Brewster, Elizabeth Southworth, Rebecca Cole, and Mary, whose sweet face and ample dowry have already comforted Thomas Prence for the loss of his first wife, gentle Patience Brewster.
So many of our friends are here collected that we may not mention half their names: Henry Samson, the little boy passenger of the Mayflower, with his bride, and his later come brother Abraham, soon to marry the daughter of Lieutenant Nash; the Howlands, not only stanch John and Elizabeth Tilley his wife, but John and Jabez their sons, and pretty Desire, fast friend of Betty Alden and Lora Standish. And here are some new-comers, the Pabodies, settled near John Alden on Bluefish River, but already owning land in The Nook, where the father promises to build a house for the first of his sons who shall marry. Three of the lads are here to-day, and William, a fine, manly young fellow of seventeen years, hangs around the group of laughing girls, and watches Betty Alden with all his eyes.
But we must not linger with the guests, although each one seems like a friend, nor may we pause to enumerate the dainties spread in graceful profusion upon the tables set between the house and the edge of the bluff; suffice it to say that Barbara has delegated to Priscilla Alden the part of caterer, and well has she sustained her reputation, using the abundant material placed at her service to the very best advantage, and winning from each of her assistants the very best service they knew how to render. Nor does the banquet fail to receive ample justice at the hands of the banqueters, beginning with those dignitaries seated in state at a table covered with Barbara’s best napery, and provided with all the magnificence of silver, pewter, and china that she has been able to muster, not only from her own stores, but those of her neighbors. Here on either hand of the captain sit Elder Brewster and Ralph Partridge, with Winslow at the other end of the table, flanked by William Collier and Timothy Hatherley; at another table preside John Alden and John Howland, with Thomas Prence, William Bassett, and Jonathan Brewster, already a leading man in the colony: and at these two tables are seated nearly all the heads of families soon to be enrolled as the freemen of Duxbury, while their wives and younger children cluster around a third table, headed by Barbara and Priscilla, and the young people enjoy themselves amazingly at their own board, as remote as possible from that of the elders, their fun a little chastened by the presence of those young matrons Mistress Prence and Mistress Love Brewster, themselves no more than girls.
And so was Duxbury’s birthday celebrated, and still the honest mirth and neighborly kindliness went on, until the sun dropped behind Captain’s Hill, and the red cow lowed at the bars of her pasture hard by.
Then, after a little silence that made itself felt, Elder Brewster rose in his place and said,—