Narrative Poems, part 4, Mable Martin etc

Project Gutenberg EBook, Mabel Martin and Others, by Whittier From
Volume I., The Works of Whittier: Narrative and Legendary Poems #8
in our series by John Greenleaf Whittier
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Title: Narrative and Legendary Poems: Mabel Martin, A Harvest Idyl
From Volume I., The Works of Whittier
Author: John Greenleaf Whittier
Release Date: Dec, 2005 [EBook #9563]
[Yes, we are more than one
year ahead of schedule]
[This file was first posted on October 2,
2003]
Edition: 10
Language: English

Character set encoding: ASCII
0. START OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK, MABEL
MARTIN, ETC. ***
This eBook was produced by David Widger [[email protected]
]
NARRATIVE AND LEGENDARY
POEMS
B Y
JOHN GREENLEAF WHITTIER
CONTENTS:
MABEL MARTIN: A HARVEST IDYL
PROEM
I. THE RIVER VALLEY
II. THE HUSKING
III.
THE WITCH'S DAUGHTER
IV. THE CHAMPION
V. IN
THE SHADOW
VI. THE BETROTHAL
THE PROPHECY OF SAMUEL SEWALL
THE RED RIVER
VOYAGEUR
THE PREACHER
THE TRUCE OF
PISCATAQUA
MY PLAYMATE
COBBLER KEEZAR'S
VISION
AMY WENTWORTH
THE COUNTESS
MABEL MARTIN.
A HARVEST IDYL.
Susanna Martin, an aged woman of Amesbury, Mass., was tried and
executed for the alleged crime of witchcraft. Her home was in what is
now known as Pleasant Valley on the Merrimac, a little above the old
Ferry way, where, tradition says, an attempt was made to assassinate
Sir Edmund Andros on his way to Falmouth (afterward Portland) and
Pemaquid, which was frustrated by a warning timely given. Goody
Martin was the only woman hanged on the north side of the Merrimac
during the dreadful delusion. The aged wife of Judge Bradbury who
lived on the other side of the Powow River was imprisoned and would

have been put to death but for the collapse of the hideous persecution.
The substance of the poem which follows was published under the
name of The Witch's Daughter, in The National Era in 1857. In 1875
my publishers desired to issue it with illustrations, and I then enlarged
it and otherwise altered it to its present form. The principal addition
was in the verses which constitute Part I.
PROEM.
I CALL the old time back: I bring my lay
in tender
memory of the summer day
When, where our native river lapsed
away,
We dreamed it over, while the thrushes made
Songs of their own, and
the great pine-trees laid
On warm noonlights the masses of their
shade.
And she was with us, living o'er again
Her life in ours, despite of
years and pain,--
The Autumn's brightness after latter rain.
Beautiful in her holy peace as one
Who stands, at evening, when the
work is done,
Glorified in the setting of the sun!
Her memory makes our common landscape seem
Fairer than any of
which painters dream;
Lights the brown hills and sings in every
stream;
For she whose speech was always truth's pure gold
Heard, not
unpleased, its simple legends told,
And loved with us the beautiful
and old.
I. THE RIVER VALLEY.
Across the level tableland,
A grassy,
rarely trodden way,
With thinnest skirt of birchen spray
And stunted growth of cedar, leads
To where you see the dull plain
fall
Sheer off, steep-slanted, ploughed by all

The seasons' rainfalls. On its brink
The over-leaning harebells swing,

With roots half bare the pine-trees cling;
And, through the shadow looking west,
You see the wavering river
flow
Along a vale, that far below
Holds to the sun, the sheltering hills
And glimmering water-line
between,
Broad fields of corn and meadows green,
And fruit-bent orchards grouped around
The low brown roofs and
painted eaves,
And chimney-tops half hid in leaves.
No warmer valley hides behind
Yon wind-scourged sand-dunes, cold
and bleak;
No fairer river comes to seek
The wave-sung welcome of the sea,
Or mark the northmost border
line
Of sun-loved growths of nut and vine.
Here, ground-fast in their native fields,
Untempted by the city's gain,

The quiet farmer