The Romance of Old New England Rooftrees | Page 8

and will recollect with pleasure his
description of Agnes's ride to Roxbury in the collector's coach. This old
mansion is now called the Governor Eustis House, and there are those
still living who remember when Madam Eustis lived there. This grand
dame wore a majestic turban, and the tradition still lingers of madame's
pet toad, decked on gala days with a blue ribbon. Now the old house is
sadly dilapidated; it is shorn of its piazzas, the sign "To Let" hangs

often in the windows, and the cupola is adorned with well-filled
clothes-lines. Partitions have cut the house into tenements; one runs
through the hall, but the grand old staircase and the smaller one are still
there, and the marble floor, too, lends dignity to the back hall. A few of
the carved balusters are missing, carried away by relic hunters. In this
house, which was the residence of Governors Shirley and Eustis,
Washington, Hamilton, Burr, Franklin, and other notables were
entertained. The old place is now entirely surrounded by modern
dwelling-houses, and the pilgrim who searches for it must leave the
Mount Pleasant electric car at Shirley Street.
Yet, though Agnes as a maid was received by the most aristocratic
people of Boston, the ladies of the leading families refused to
countenance her when she became a fine young woman whom Sir
Harry Frankland loved but cared not to marry. That her protector had
not meant at first to wrong the girl he had befriended seems fairly
certain, but many circumstances, such as the death of Agnes's father
and Frankland's own sudden elevation to the baronetcy, may be held to
have conspired to force them into the situation for which Agnes was to
pay by many a day of tears and Sir Harry by many a night of bitter
self-reproach.
For Frankland was far from being a libertine. And that he sincerely
loved the beautiful maid of Marblehead is certain. He has come down
to us as one of the most knightly men of his time, a gentleman and a
scholar, who was also a sincere follower of the Church of England and
its teachings. Both in manner and person he is said to have greatly
resembled the Earl of Chesterfield, and his diary as well as his portrait
show him to have been at once sensitive and virile; quite the man,
indeed, very effectually to fascinate the low-born beauty he had taught
to love him.
The indignation of the ladies in town toward Frankland and his ward
made the baronet prefer at this stage of the story rural Hopkinton to
censorious Boston. Reverend Roger Price, known to us as rector of
King's Chapel, had already land and a mission church in this village,
and so, when Boston frowned too pointedly, Frankland purchased four

hundred odd acres of him, and there built, in 1751, a commodious
mansion-house. The following year he and Agnes took up their abode
on the place. Here Frankland passed his days, contentedly pursuing his
horticultural fad, angling, hunting, overseeing his dozen slaves, and
reading with his intelligent companion the latest works of Richardson,
Steele, Swift, Addison, and Pope, sent over in big boxes from England.
The country about Hopkinton was then as to-day a wonder of hill and
valley, meadow and stream, while only a dozen miles or so from
Frankland Hall was the famous Wayside Inn. That Sir Harry's Arcady
never came to bore him was, perhaps, due to this last fact. Whenever
guests were desired the men from Boston could easily ride out to the
inn and canter over to the Hall, to enjoy the good wines and the bright
talk the place afforded. Then the village rector was always to be
counted on for companionship and breezy chat. It is significant that Sir
Harry carefully observed all the forms of his religion, and treated
Agnes with the respect due a wife, though he still continued to neglect
the one duty which would have made her really happy.
A lawsuit called the two to England in 1754. At Frankland's mother's
home, where the eager son hastened to bring his beloved one, Agnes
was once more subjected to martyrdom and social ostracism. As
quickly as they could get away, therefore, the young people journeyed
to Lisbon, a place conspicuous, even in that day of moral laxity, for its
tolerance of the alliance libre. Henry Fielding (who died in the town)
has photographically described for all times its gay, sensuous life. Into
this unwholesome atmosphere, quite new to her, though she was neither
maid nor wife, it was that the sweet Agnes was thrust by Frankland.
Very soon he was to perceive the mistake of this, as well as of several
other phases of his selfishness.
On All Saint's Day morning, 1755, when the whole populace, from