“The good man and his wife were not long in removing the poor Indian woman and the child to the house, and, for some time, the poor creature did not appear to know what was passing around her; but after having taken some hot drink she seemed to revive, and cried out, ‘Me baby! me flower!’ and she looked wildly round for the child. Mrs. Gray laid it on the mat beside her, and the little one sat up and twisted its little fingers in her wet black hair, and then nestled close to the Indian woman’s bosom till she slept. Mrs. Gray then carefully removed the child, and fed it with some warm milk. The poor little thing, as if conscious of her kindness, looked up in her face and softly repeated, ‘Mamma—mamma.’ The imperfect words went to the heart of Rebecca; and she again resolved that, as the Lord had cast the little stranger upon her protection, she would be unto it a mother.
“Mr. and Mrs. Gray hoped to learn something of the child when the Indian woman should be restored, but they were disappointed; for she arose at the dawn of day, and stealing softly to the bedside of Mrs. Gray, and taking the child from beside its new mother, she appeared about to carry it away; but Mrs. Gray, as she awoke, observing her, cried out, ‘Give me back the babe! give her to me!’
“The Indian woman fixed her piercing black eyes upon the face of Rebecca for several minutes, then closing them, she appeared to be reasoning with herself; for, upon lifting them again, she said, solemnly, ‘The God of the white man calleth for his child. The rose cannot bloom in the desert. The lily springeth not in the wilderness.’
“Thus saying, she chanted a kind of prayer in the Indian tongue, and folding the babe an instant to her bosom, she replaced it beside Mrs. Gray; and before any one could speak or prevent her, she had thrown open the door and passed swiftly from the cottage.
“‘Rise, Simon Gray!’ said the kind-hearted Rebecca, ‘rise and follow the poor creature, and persuade her to stay till the storm is past, and offer her food.’ But though the good man made all possible haste in dressing, the woman had reached the summit of a high hill which lay toward the Bay colony ere he got into the street; and soon she was lost in the distance and the thick falling snow, which was still beating down with great violence.”
“Did she freeze to death, grandmother?” asked Helen.
“Did she never return?” inquired Henry.
“You’ll both get answered when grandmother has finished her story,” said George Gray, with a shrewd look to his cousins.
“Yes, all in good time, children,” said Mrs. Gray, as she resumed. “They could not possibly find out how the Indian woman came by the child, or, for certainty, who she was; yet by her calling herself Namoina, they supposed she must be a woman who was called by her tribe cunning, and revered as a prophetess, though the white people knew that the poor creature was at times crazy; for she had seen her husband and child bleed, both in one day; the first fell and died while defending his home; the other was inhumanly murdered by wretches who deserved not the name of men! And so poor Namoina, or, as the white people called her, Rachel, went crazy.
“Mrs. Gray found, by a medal that hung round the infant’s neck, that her name was Mary Wallace; and Mary Wallace she was called. She appeared to be about a year old. She was a fine, healthy child, and soon grew nicely, and Mr. and Mrs. Gray were very fond of her; and William called her his little sister, and taught her to walk, and gave her more than half of all the nice things he had—(they did not have sugarplums and candy then, but children were better off without them, and a great deal more healthy)—and he would tell her pretty stories, and drag her in his little wagon; and he loved her dearly. She was a sweet-tempered and lovely child, and very seldom did any thing to displease her parents; and when she did she would grieve very much, and she never could be happy till she was forgiven. When she was twelve years old, there was not a fairer or lovelier child in the whole Providence Plantations, than Mary Wallace. Her eyes were bright and blue; her long, light brown hair fell in beautiful curls upon her shoulders, and her voice had such a sweet and happy tone, and her countenance such an amiable expression, that the young loved her without envy, and the old never passed her without a blessing. The lark did not rise earlier than Mary Wallace. The first thing in the morning she would be seen with a basket on her arm, tripping lightly over the grass, with her little white feet scattering the dew, and singing sweetly and merrily as the birds themselves. No one in the Plantations had not felt her kindness; she always had an arm for the aged—some little delicacy for the sick—tears for the suffering—songs and smiles for the happy—and bread, and beer, and pity, even for the poor Indian. In short, the good people of the Plantations believed, that, by a special mercy of Divine Providence, she had been sent among them. She was of great assistance to her parents. They believed that they could not do without her. In the spring she helped plant the corn and beans—weeded the vegetable beds in the garden—and, through all the warm season, she drove home the cows at night—fed the sheep and pigs—and took care of the hens, ducks, geese, and their little ones. In the summer she gathered berries and laid in herbs for winter. In autumn she helped harvest the corn—gathered the dry beans and peas, and did a great many other useful things; and in the winter she sat, for the most part, by the fireside, knitting stockings for the family, and mending her own and William’s clothes—or she read the Bible, of a long Sabbath evening, to her father and mother: she was never idle.