Part 8

Miles Standish was not by nature like the men who had crossed the sea with him to find a home. He was a soldier first and foremost, a man who had quarreled with his family in England and gone forth to seek his fortune with his sword. He had been in many battles, he had married, and at last, hearing of the Pilgrims' plans to sail for America he had decided to throw in his lot with theirs. They had made him their captain and he had proved himself a good one, and he had become one of the leading men, and one of the most popular in Plymouth. But the weather was too severe for his fair English wife Rose, and she had died soon after they landed. A year later he found that he had lost his adventurous soldier's heart to the pretty Priscilla Mullins.

Captain Standish knew that he was readier with sword and musket than with the words to win a young girl's love. He was much perplexed as to what he should do until he thought of his friend John Alden, who was quick of wit, and ready of tongue and pen, and who had before now written many a letter for the Captain. So he went to John Alden and begged him in the name of their friendship to call upon Mr. Mullins and ask him if he would give his daughter's hand to the Captain, and if he agreed then to plead his cause with Priscilla.

John and Priscilla had been brought up together and were close friends, and when the Captain made his request of John the youth discovered that he himself was in love with Priscilla. But he felt in honor bound to do what the Captain asked of him, and so, with a heavy heart he went to the Mullins house. Priscilla's father listened while John asked if Miles Standish might have his consent to marry his daughter, and at the end willingly agreed. Then John went to the room where the girl sat at her spinning-wheel, and even as he entered his foot faltered and he turned very pale. With his eyes bent on the floor and his voice hesitating he told her that he came from Captain Standish to ask if she would marry him. Priscilla was astonished; the Captain was older than she and had been so busy that she had seen little of him. John Alden had been her comrade and she cared more for him than she had ever dared admit to herself. He looked so pale and distressed as he stood there before her that she wondered what might be the cause. Then the reason flashed upon her. With downcast eyes and a voice that was only a whisper she spoke to him. "Why don't you speak for yourself, John?" was what he heard her say.

John wondered if he could have understood aright. Then she looked up at him and he knew that it was him she loved and that she had no room for Standish in her heart. So, still trembling, he asked her to marry him instead of Standish, and she said she would. But even in his joy John feared that he had proved a traitor to his friend.

Dark days followed for the lovers. John had to give his message to the Captain, and it was no easy telling. For days he carried with him the feeling of treachery, and he spent many nights walking on the shore, distrustful of himself and of the love that had come to him in such fashion. Priscilla was scarcely happier, for the same thought was with her, and she knew it was she who had put the words into John Alden's mouth. Then came news that Captain Standish had been sent on an expedition against the Indians, and both Priscilla and John feared that in a moment of rashness over his disappointment he might expose himself recklessly in battle, and so the colony lose its best guardian and captain.

But Miles Standish was no coward and he set out on his expedition determined to fight when he must but not to run into needless dangers. A three days' march brought him to the Indian encampment, but it seemed as peaceful as the town that he had left. Women were at work in the fields and about the tents, but there were no braves in sight. After a short détour he discovered them, their bodies covered with war paint, seated about a fire, handing a smoking pipe from one to another. One of them caught the glint of sun on the Captain's armor and spoke to the others, and then two rose and came towards Standish. They spoke peacefully, saying that they wanted to be friends with the white men, and would like to trade skins and corn for knives and muskets and the mysterious powder the white men used in their "fire-tubes." Standish offered them blankets but refused to give them arms or powder. Then their manner changed very quickly, and pointing to the knives at their belts they began to tell the white men what they would do to their settlement unless they would come to terms. In the meantime the wary Captain had noted how the other Indians had left the fire and were creeping up towards him on all sides, fixing arrows to their bowstrings as they came, but pretending that they were only going back to their tents. He waited, like a tiger ready to spring, while the chief worked himself up into a passion with his threats. Suddenly the chief drew his knife and raised it high, giving the war-cry. At the same instant Standish sprang forward, and before the Indian's knife could fall he had plunged his own into the redman's breast. The chief fell, and instantly a storm of arrows swept about Standish and his men and the braves leaped forward, crying their wild war-whoops. The white men turned back to back, and, leveling their muskets, sent a deadly fire at the advancing braves. The latter, always frightened at this mysterious sight and sound, turned and fled, leaving their chief, Wattawamat, dead in front of Standish. Then the Captain cut off the head of the Indian and carried it back with him to Plymouth, where it was stuck on a pike from the roof of the fort as a warning to other warring redmen. Such acts were part of the customs of those times, and the elders of Plymouth approved of the Captain's deed, but one elder, named John Robinson, who was the religious leader of them all, cried out as he passed the fort, "Oh, that he had converted some before he killed any!"

If Miles Standish had flared up in anger when John Alden first told him the result of his suit of Priscilla that anger dropped as quickly as it rose. The Captain had many other matters to think about, what with the constant fear of attack from restless Indians, and he was away from Plymouth almost as much as he was there. So the lovers lost the feeling that they had not been fair to him, and let it be known through Plymouth that they were to marry.

Meanwhile the Pilgrim village was prospering. Food was plentiful, for the first harvest had been good, and the hunters had brought in deer and the fishing-boats returned well-laden from the sea. Therefore the Governor ordered a day of thanksgiving late in the autumn, and when that day came the people went to the fortress-church on the hill and gave thanks to God that He had allowed them to endure and prosper in their new home. Later in the day they feasted, and never had Plymouth seen such a plentiful repast. Word of the feast had been sent to some of the neighboring Indians and ninety of them came and sat about the board with the white men. That was the beginning of our Thanksgiving Day.

John Alden was busy building a new house for his bride. He could build better now than the settlers had been able to do when they faced that first winter. He chose his ground with care, and built a substantial home, covering the roof with rushes, and filling the latticed windows with panes of oiled paper, which let the light come through but not the wind or rain. He dug a well and planted an orchard at the rear of the house, and when the place was finished it was one of the finest in Plymouth. In the spring Priscilla and John were married, their wedding being one of the earliest in the colony, and Priscilla being the first of the girls who had sailed on the _Mayflower_ to change her name.

History does not tell us a great deal about this girl of the Pilgrims, but we do know how much courage and faith and constancy was required of the first settlers of New England. We picture Priscilla as the daughter of such people, devout, simple, and from force of the rude life about her growing more and more self-reliant from the day when Mary Chilton and she first set foot on Plymouth Rock. History does not tell us of Priscilla's wooing, but the romantic story has been so wonderfully put in poetry by Longfellow that when we hear Priscilla Alden mentioned we think first of all of "The Courtship of Miles Standish." It is a story which ought to be true, if it is not.

We know that Captain Standish and John Alden were friends at a later time, for when the Captain married his second wife he built his house over on Duxbury Hill, near where John Alden's stood, and his son married the daughter of John and Priscilla. So the blunt, brave Captain did not die of a broken heart.

Such is the story of this girl of the Pilgrims and of the brave days when the foundation stones of our land were being laid.

IX

Catherine the Great

The Girl of Stettin: 1729-1796

"Come with me," whispered a small boy to a little girl who was standing, looking rather lonely, in one of the long corridors of a house in the North German town of Eutin.

"Come along," he added, still in a whisper, and tiptoed down the hall. The girl followed and saw him stop at a doorway and peep into the room beyond. Apparently satisfied he entered, and she, her curiosity roused, went into the room after him.

It was a bare apartment, with walls once white but now gray, small barred windows, a ceiling supported by rough timbers, and a wooden floor, uneven and uncarpeted. On a bench at one end stood a large round tub of water and from pegs in the wall hung caps and coats. It was the place where the few soldiers who were supposed to guard the house lounged when off duty, and used as a dressing-room. It was unoccupied now, and the boy, still on tiptoe, ran across the bare floor to the tub of water.

Pulling some paper from his pocket the boy tore it into many pieces and dropped three or four of them into the water. Then taking a stick that lay on a bench he began to poke the papers. The girl stood beside him. "See, Figchen," he whispered, "those are boats, sailing on the great Baltic Sea. This one's heavy laden, see how she rocks. That's her port over on the other side. Here comes a storm," and he stirred the water with his stick and sent the paper boats tossing to the rim.

"That's not much of a pond, Peter," said the girl disdainfully. "We've one in Stettin twice that big with live fish in it, and when we want to have a storm we throw a stone into it."

But the little boy was too busy with his boats to listen to her. He threw the rest of the papers into the tub and leaned so far over its edge that he could see his fat cheeks and blue eyes mirrored in it.

"Look, Figchen, look," he cried excitedly, "there's a whole war-fleet going over to the other side."

The girl, forgetting her disdain, bent over the rim and began to blow down at the water.

Before they knew it there were quick steps on the floor behind them and a man had seized Peter by the collar and jerked him back from the tub. "Didn't I tell you not to go near that water again?" the man demanded, his face and voice showing his anger. "What do you think you are? You're a soldier, and a soldier's first duty is to obey orders. For this you go to your room and do without dinner to-day."

The little boy stood with his back to the wall, looking much frightened. "Oh, Herr Brummer----" he began.

"Not a word," ordered the man. "You've heard what I've said."

The girl had looked on in amazement. Now she took a step forward. "You're a simpleton, Peter Ulric," she said. "Afraid of your tutor. Why don't you send him away?"

Herr Brummer turned as if he had noticed the girl for the first time. He bowed, smiling sarcastically. "Ach so; it is the Princess Sophia of Zerbst who speaks? And you would advise Prince Peter of Holstein to disobey his tutor?"

The girl's eyes met the man's defiantly. "I would," she answered. "At home, in Stettin----"

"Well, we're not in Stettin," broke in the man, turning back. "Go to your room, boy, and stay there till I come for you. And if I find you playing here again I'll make you kneel on dried peas till you can't stand up."

The boy, used to being treated in such fashion, went out of the guard-room, his face surly and white.

"As for you," said Herr Brummer to the girl, "the sooner you go home the better. You'll find Peter Ulric a dull playmate." With that he turned on his heel and followed the little Prince of Holstein, and heir to the thrones of Russia and Sweden, from the room.

Figchen, which was the nickname given to the Princess Sophia of Zerbst, waited a moment and then went out into the garden at the rear of the house. She was used to being left to her own devices, but in her home town she could go out into the city squares and play with other children, and here in Eutin she had been forbidden to leave the house and its garden. She wished she were at home again, and could not understand why her mother was so fond of traveling about to visit her relations. She thought this particular court of Holstein the dullest of them all, and little Peter Ulric the stupidest boy she had ever met. He was stupid, there was no doubt of that, but no one had ever cared enough about him to try and make him more intelligent.

Children of rank had a dull time at the courts of the little German duchies in those days. The Princess Figchen was better off than Peter Ulric because she was a girl and did not have to be moulded into a soldier, but she had little enough fun. Her father was very fond of her, but he was a general in the army of Frederick the Great of Prussia, and away from home most of the time. Her mother was vain and capricious. The family were poor and only used the left wing of their palace at Stettin. Here Figchen had three rooms, and her bedroom was close to the bell-tower of the church, so that she was wakened early every morning by a deafening peal of bells. She played in the streets with the town children, none of whom called her "Your Highness," and the children's mothers treated her just like any other little girl.

Most of her time, however, she spent with her governess and teachers. French was the fashion then and children were taught the language, the manners, and the gallantry of Paris. The Princess was bright but wilful, if she was interested she would learn quickly, if she was not the teachers might storm and she would only laugh at them. Her governess told her that her chin was too sharp, and that by sticking it out she was always knocking against everybody she came across. Figchen laughed and stuck her chin farther out. But in her own way she was fond of her French governess and read a good many French books with her.

Even though Figchen did like the girls of her own town better than those she met elsewhere, her mother, who was restless and eager for excitement, found Stettin very dull, and was continually traveling. She had relatives in all the little German cities, and liked to visit them at Hamburg, Brunswick, or Berlin, and hear the latest gossip. So Figchen met most of the Grand Dukes and Duchesses of her time, and was presented at Berlin to the powerful young Frederick the Great, who was just beginning his remarkable career. This visiting also gave her mother a chance to see the young Princes who might be eligible for her daughter's hand, for it was the first concern of a young German Princess to find a husband who would some day wear a crown. But Figchen herself was not interested in these boys with long titles to their names. Most of them seemed very stupid to her, much like Peter Ulric of Holstein, taught to be a soldier instead of being taught to be a gentleman.

Then, suddenly, when this little Princess of Zerbst was twelve years old, strange events occurred in Europe. To the northwest of her home lay the mighty country of Russia, still almost savage, but of enormous size and of unknown strength. Only a short time before Peter the Great had been Czar of Russia and had built up a great Empire that overshadowed the little German duchies that lay along its borders. One of Peter's daughters had married the Duke of Holstein, and been the mother of the small Peter Ulric. Another was the Princess Elizabeth, who had not married. Peter the Czar had a half-brother Ivan, and Ivan's granddaughter was ruling as regent in Russia for her little son named Ivan. Then on December 9, 1741, the Princess Elizabeth, filled with her great father's ambition, suddenly seized the throne, and threw the regent and the little Czar Ivan into prison. The child's reign ended, and the unscrupulous woman took the crown as the Empress Elizabeth. She was strong and could hold it and that was all that counted in Russia then. The Empress looked about for an heir and her eyes lighted on Peter Ulric, the son of her sister. The regent in prison had always called him "the little devil," because she was afraid he might some day set aside her own Ivan. "The little devil" disappeared from his home and reappeared at St. Petersburg, and all the world learned that Elizabeth had proclaimed him the Grand Duke Peter, her adopted son and heir to the crown she wore. Figchen heard the news and wondered how such a stupid boy could ever be Czar of Russia.

The Empress Elizabeth, like a fairy godmother, waved her wand again, and this time it rested on Figchen herself. The Empress ordered the little girl's portrait sent to her, despatched presents to her and to her father and mother, and finally invited the Princess of Zerbst to visit her in Moscow and to bring her daughter with her. The ambitious mother knew what that meant. The Empress meant to marry Figchen to the Grand Duke Peter. That was a more dazzling destiny than she had ever dreamed of.

Mother and daughter started out for Moscow. They were poor and did not need many boxes to carry their wardrobe. Traveling was hard, and, it being January, the cold was so bitter they had to wear masks to protect their faces. There were no hotels and they had to stay at posting-houses, poor shacks where the landlord's family and his animals often slept under the same roof. There was no snow but the four carriages in which the Princess and her suite traveled were so heavy they required twenty-four horses to pull them. Sledges were fastened to the backs of the carriages to be used later, and these made their progress slower.

But when they crossed the frontier to Russia everything changed. Troops met them, with flags flying and drums beating. Gallant officers joined them and paid them compliments. Castles opened to them and the ladies, shining with diamonds and silks, quite overwhelmed the simple German Princess and her daughter. When they reached St. Petersburg ladies of the court were ready to stock their wardrobes with magnificent toilettes. The travelers were glad of that, for they knew their own clothes would look shabby enough in the presence of an Empress who was said to have 15,000 silk dresses and no less than 5,000 pairs of shoes.

When they left St. Petersburg on their way to Moscow the Princess and Figchen traveled in a magnificent sleigh, built like a great couch with curtains of scarlet and gold, and lined inside with sable. The ladies reclined on what was really a feather bed, with coverings of satin and fur, and supported on springs so that the sleigh could pass over the roughest road without disturbing the passengers inside. Here they lay and looked out through the windows at the snowy barren country all about them. Figchen was impressed. Used as she was to the simplicity of the little German duchy, she could not help wondering at so much extravagance and luxury, or thrilling at the sight of the great Cossack soldiers and the Imperial grenadiers who rode as her escort. So she began to realize the might of this great northern country.

The Empress Elizabeth welcomed them warmly at her palace in Moscow, and at once Figchen found herself surrounded by fawning courtiers, ambitious women, and all the pomp and ceremony of a court. Generals and statesmen struggled to kiss her hand, ladies to compliment her on her complexion, for they all knew now that the little German maiden was to marry their Grand Duke Peter. She knew it now also, but although she remembered how stupid and timid he had seemed at Eutin, she made no objection, because her eyes were dazzled with the wonders of this new life.

Peter Ulric had not improved since Figchen had last seen him. Herr Brummer's iron hand no longer held him in check, and he had run absolutely wild. His health was ruined, he was dissipated beyond belief, cowardly, and as ignorant as his poorest soldier. He kissed Figchen's hand, and said he was glad to see her, and then left her, to drink himself stupid with vodka. The marriage promised to be about as tragic as it well could be. But Figchen had more interesting things to think about than Peter Ulric. She had to study a new religion, so that she might enter the Russian Church, she had to have prepared a great trousseau, and she had to try and learn in a short time some of the things she had refused to learn at Stettin. Then she fell ill, and was sick for days, while her mother and the Russian doctors struggled as to the best way to cure her. The doctors advised blood-letting but the Princess was very much opposed to it. They agreed to refer the matter to the Empress, and found that she had gone on a five days' visit to a distant convent where she had shut herself up in one of her strange spasms of religion. Finally she appeared and ordered the blood-letting. Poor Figchen suffered, but recovered. When she regained consciousness she found herself in the arms of the Empress, and in her hand a gift of a diamond necklace and a pair of earrings worth 20,000 roubles. Figchen began to realize that the Empress Elizabeth was a very singular person.

As soon as she was well again she finished making ready to enter the Russian Church, and in June, 1744, when she was fifteen, she made her new vows. She was a handsome girl, and her youth, beauty, and modest manner made a charming picture as she entered the imperial chapel. She wore what was called an "Adrienne" robe of red cloth of Tours, laced with cords of silver, and about her unpowdered hair was bound a simple white fillet. Her voice did not tremble and she did not forget a word of the long Russian creed. Then the new name of Catherine was added to her other names and it was announced that henceforth that would be her official title. The next day she was betrothed to Peter Ulric.

Peter's health was so bad that the wedding had to be put off from one date to another, but finally, in August, 1745, when Peter was seventeen, and Catherine sixteen, they were married with the greatest pomp and ceremony. Figchen became a Grand Duchess and wife to the next Czar of Russia, and her mother went home to Stettin and left the girl, surrounded by her own court, to fight her own battles.