WICCÓNSAT.

A LEGEND OF ST. MARY’S.

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BY MRS. MARY M. FORD.

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On the eastern bank of a small river, which enters the Potomac a few miles above its confluence with the waters of the Chesapeake Bay, are still to be seen vestiges of the earliest settlement in Maryland; once the village of Youcómaco, but quietly yielded by the natives to the white colonists, who there built a town, calling it St. Mary’s. Subsequent events led to its desertion for a more advantageous location, and the ravages of time have left little to tell of its former state. It has faded away, unnoticed and unsung, yet its name is still seen on the older maps of our country. The river, which once bore the appellation of St. George’s, is now called St. Mary’s, but whether in memory of the deserted town, or not, is uncertain.

Ruins are happily so scarce in our young and thriving republic, that the simple legend which gives a name to my story, may awaken some interest among those, to whose imaginations the solitary remains of the past seem to speak in the breathings of the winds that sweep over their ruins. The circumstances which led to its narration, by one who had heard it in the mother country, and in whose family its memory had been handed down, were as follows:—