But before the doctor was laid to rest in his nameless grave on Burying Hill, Betty Alden, full of delight, and yet soberly attentive to her mother’s last charges, both as to her own conduct and her care of her father’s foot, was on her way to Boston, where she saw many new faces and made many new friends. Of one of these, a girl of her own age named Christian Garrett, there is more to tell, for so close was the friendship springing up between herself and Betty, and so good and commendable a little maid did Christian prove herself, that John Alden, on parting with Richard Garrett, the father, cordially invited him to visit Plymouth at some near date and bring his little girl to visit Betty, and this he promised to do. Why the luckless man should have selected mid-winter for this expedition no man now can say, but so he did, and in spite of urgent warnings sailed from what is now Long Wharf upon a bitter-cold morning, with a north wind catching the crests off the waves, and hurling them in needlepoints of ice in the teeth of the doomed company whom Richard Garrett had persuaded to accompany him. One of these, named Henry Harwood, was a passenger, and the other three were Garrett’s hired servants. As the day wore on, the wind freshened, working round to the northwest, so that arriving toward night off the Gurnet the exhausted men thought best to anchor until morning. The killock, a rude anchor consisting simply of a stone bound in a network of rope, was thrown over in twenty fathoms of water, and not resting upon the bottom the stone soon worked out of the rope, and left the boat to drive. No lighthouse upon the Gurnet, no beacon upon the beach, then protected the mariner of Plymouth Bay, and as the horror of thick darkness fell upon the scene, and the boat flew before the wind which now came laden with sleet, freezing as it fell, Garrett exclaimed,-- “Now may the Lord have mercy upon our sinful souls, and forgive me that has brought my motherless child here to die!” “And more than that, Richard Garrett, you that have involved us in the same disaster,” replied Harwood angrily. “Do you suppose, man, I would have adventured with you and paid my two shilling for a passage, had I known what manner of shallop this is, and nothing but a stone and a rope for killock?” “Peace, man!” retorted Garrett sternly. “How dare you go before your Judge with revilings in your mouth! Get you to your prayers, or be silent.” “Father, the water freezes around my feet!” moaned Christian, nestling close to his side in the darkness. “My poor little maid! Here, sit on my knees and I’ll lap thee in my cloak!” “Nay, thou’lt take it from thyself, daddy,” remonstrated the child; but the father had his way, and all through that cruel night sheltered the little maid upon his knees and under his cloak, while his own feet first ached bitterly, and then grew numb, and then died.