Historic Girlhoods, Part One

by Rupert Sargent Holland

"We've waited a month," put in Priscilla. "I guess we can wait a few days more to land."

John Alden moved away to examine his matchlock gun for the hundredth time, and the two girls, who were close friends, tried to wait as patiently as they could while the Mayflower drew in towards shore. They went down to the cabin for their simple dinner and then returned on deck. Now the land stretched before them in a clear line, a low, barren shore that looked of little promise. The chill November day made the country seem most inhospitable, and many on board were already homesick for the green fields and flowering meadows of England. Mary Chilton and Priscilla Mullins moved about among the women and children, cheering them with their own hopefulness.

By nightfall the Mayflower had rounded a point of the coast and come into a small land-locked harbor, where it seemed as if a thousand vessels might find safe anchorage. Here the shores appeared more promising, and many eager eyes strained through the dusk to see what the site of their future home might be like. It was too dark to send explorers ashore, so the Mayflower dropped anchor, and the Pilgrims prepared to go to bed. Before they slept they gathered in the cabin and with bent heads listened to John Carver give thanks to God that they had been brought safely across the sea and in sight of their promised land.

Next day Priscilla and Mary watched Captain Miles Standish and a score of men lower the shallop and set out towards shore. John Alden smiled up at the girls as they hung over the rail, and they waved their kerchiefs to him and to the ruddy-faced Captain Standish who stood up in the bow to direct the shallop's course. Then they had to wait as patiently as they could to learn what the explorers might report.

Standish's party spent two days exploring the land about the harbor, which formed the tip of what we now call Cape Cod. They found that the land was fertile, as was shown by the fact that the Indians had cleared much of the ground for planting and had left a magazine of corn. They caught a distant glimpse of a few Indians, but the latter fled as soon as they saw Captain Standish's men.

When the explorers returned to the Mayflower and made their report the leaders of the Pilgrims were in two minds as to whether to settle on this shore or to seek another site farther to the west. Those who wanted to settle here spoke of the good harbor for ships, the fact that the Indians had already tilled the soil, and the chances that they might find good whale fishing off the coast. They added that they were tired with the long sea voyage and unfit to go further, and that with winter almost at hand exploration would be very difficult. But the others objected that it would be unwise to settle permanently without having looked a little farther to the west, and the larger number of the leaders agreed with this view. Therefore on the next day the shallop was sent out again with eighteen men on board to explore more of the coast. Eight men stayed on the shallop while the rest landed and went along the shore. Their journey lasted three days, and on the third morning the land party had just started to eat breakfast by their camp-fire when suddenly they heard a series of wild war-cries, and a shower of arrows struck all about them. At the same time Indians in ambush on the beach sent their arrows at the men in the small boat. Captain Standish and his men seized their muskets and in a moment more the Indians were flying before the fire that leaped from the muzzles. Not one of the Pilgrims was wounded, and soon they were on their way along the shore again, this time more careful to keep a watch for the hidden redmen. Presently they embarked in the shallop and sailed across the bay, reaching a place nearly opposite the point of Cape Cod. Here they found fertile land, a good supply of water, and a protected harbor. It seemed the ideal spot for which they had been looking, and they decided to make their new home here. The Indian name of this place, Accomac, had already been changed to Plymouth, which it happened was also the name of the English seaport from which the Pilgrims had finally set sail.

The people on board the Mayflower eagerly hailed the returning explorers. They were growing impatient at being kept on the ship when the land stretched invitingly before them. Priscilla and Mary, with the rest, heard Captain Standish tell of the place he had discovered, and shortly afterward they themselves saw it from the vessel's deck. Now all was excitement. The different families made ready to leave the ship which had been their home for nearly seven weeks and set up their household goods on shore. In the first boat load went Priscilla and Mary Chilton, and Mary was the first woman to set foot on Plymouth soil. The two girls looked about them, at the long beach, the cleared corn land, and the high hill beyond with its commanding view over the wide bay. Priscilla turned to her father. "How strange that this should be our home!" said she. "And yet I feel almost a love for it already."

"I pray you may, my daughter," he answered, "for it is like to be the only home any of us are henceforth to know."

If it had taken courage to face the perils of the sea it took scarcely less to face those of the new land. It was already December and growing more and more cold with each day. Their store of provisions was almost gone, and there could be no harvest here until spring. Some of the women and children were sick, and none knew how the Indians might look upon their coming. But the little band of Pilgrims set to work with stout hearts, determined to carry out the purpose on which they had started. They chose John Carver Governor and Miles Standish Captain of their troops, and set to work to build log houses for the winter's shelter.

Priscilla was strong and she helped her father in his work during that long hard winter. There was plenty for all to do, but many had not the strength to accomplish what was needed. There was a great deal of illness and very little good food. The weather made it almost impossible for the men to hunt or to find wild fruits, and they had neglected to bring fishing-tackle with them. Their provisions were eked out with shellfish, but it was hard to gather these in the cold water. Other colonies in the new world had already been forced to give up their homes in fear of starvation, but this band held on, although half their number died, and at one time there were only seven who were not sick. Fortunately the Indians gave them little trouble. One day one of them walked into the village and spent the night there, showing friendliness, although Captain Standish watched him closely, having little faith in his pretensions. A day or two later he returned bringing five others, and then there came another named Tis quantum, who had once been taken as a prisoner to London, and who understood something of the strange white people and their ways. With his aid a treaty was made with Massasoit, the chief of the Indians in that part of the country, and each side agreed to live in harmony and concord with the other. Many of the Indians already had a superstitious fear of the men from across the sea, not only on account of their wonderful "fire-tubes" but for another reason. Some Indians had a few years before captured a French trading-ship, and killed all the crew but five, whom they kept as prisoners. One of these had warned the redmen that the God of the white people would not let these wrongs go without some punishment, and very soon afterward pestilence had broken out on the coast and killed many of the Indians who lived there. Those who survived recalled the Frenchman's words and believed that pestilence was a weapon like the "fire-tube" which the white men kept in their camps to use against their enemies. Therefore they were very careful how they treated these new arrivals who had settled at Accomac.