The Real America in Romance, Volume 6 | Page 3

it was

a wild rosebush covered with fragrant flowers.
It was still an early hour, for the morning dew sparkled in the deeper
recesses of the grand old forest, and the moisture of dawn yet lingered
on the air. Strange as it may seem, that instrument was regarded with
careless indifference, even by the gentler sex of this period.
Meagre and cold was the sympathy which a transgressor might expect
from the assembly at the pond. The women mingled freely with the
crowd and appeared to take a peculiar interest in the punishment about
to be inflicted. The age had not so much refinement, that any sense of
impropriety kept the wearers of petticoats and farthingales from
elbowing their way through the densest throngs to witness the
executions. Those wives and maidens of English birth and breeding
were morally and materially of coarser fibre than their fair descendants,
who would swoon at the thought of torture and punishment. They were
not all hard-featured amazons in that throng, for, mingled with the stout,
broad-shouldered dames, were maids naturally shy, timid and beautiful.
The ruddy cheeks and ruby lips indicated health, and the brawny arms
of many women bore evidence of physical toil.
The cavaliers were jesting and laughing, while the Puritans were silent,
or conversing in low, measured tones on the purpose of the assembly.
There was enough of gloom and solemnity in the one party to prove
that the execution was not to be a farce, and enough merriment in the
other to convince a beholder that the punishment was not capital. A
young cavalier, all silk and lace, with heavy riding-boots, galloped up
to the scene and, dismounting, handed the rein to a negro slave, who
had run himself out of breath to keep up with his master, and hastened
down to the water.
"Good morrow, Roger!" said the new-comer to a young man of about
twenty-five years of age, like himself a gentleman of ease.
"Good morrow, Hugh," Roger answered.
"What gala scene have they prepared for our amusement?" asked Hugh,

his dark gray eyes twinkling with merriment. "I trow it is one that you
and I need never fear."
"The magistrates have adjudged Ann Linkon to be ducked."
"Marry! what hath she done?"
"Divers offences, all petty, but aggravating in themselves. She is not
only a common scold, but a babbling woman, who often hath slandered
and scandalized her neighbors, for which her poor husband is often
brought into chargeable and vexatious suits and cast in great damages."
Hugh gave utterance to a genuine cavalier-like laugh, and, striking his
boot-top with his riding-whip, returned:
"Marry! but she will make a merry sight soaring through the air like a
fisher-bird to be plunged beneath the water."
"It will be a goodly sight, Hugh, and one I knew you would wish to see;
therefore I sent for you."
"You have my thanks; but where is the culprit?"
"They have not arrived with her yet. Did you come from Greenspring
Manor this morn?"
"Yes."
"How is Sir William Berkeley?"
"He is well, and still lives in the hope of seeing the king restored to his
throne."
"Hath he invited our wandering prince to Virginia?"
"Sh--! speak not so loud," said Hugh in an undertone. "There are some
of those Puritans, the cursed Roundheads, near, and it would mean
death to Sir William if it were known that he but breathed such
thoughts."

The two young men walked a little apart from the others and sat down
upon the green, mossy banks, where they might converse uninterrupted
and still be near enough to witness the ducking when the officers
arrived with the victim.
"Keep a still tongue in your head, Roger," said Hugh when they were
seated. "Greenspring Manor is beset with spies, and the Roundheads
long for some pretext to hang Sir William for his devotion to our king;
but Sir William says that the commonwealth will end with Cromwell
and the son of our murdered king will be restored."
"The rule of the Roundheads is mild."
"Mild, bah!" interrupted Hugh, in contempt. "They are men without
force, groundlings, the common trash from the earth with whom the
best do not mingle."
"But they permit the people to send royalists to the House of
Burgesses."
"That they do; yet there they must mingle with leet-men and indented
slaves whose terms have expired," and Hugh heaved a sigh and dug his
boot heel into the ground, adding, "It was not a merry day for old
England when they struck off the king's head."
While the young royalists were discussing politics and awaiting the
arrival of the guard with Ann Linkon, the women were not all silent.
"Good wives," said a hard-featured dame of fifty, "I will tell you a
piece of my mind. It