Brenda's Ward: A Sequel to 'Amy in Acadia'Reed, Helen Leah
General
Brenda's Ward: A Sequel to 'Amy in Acadia'
Reed, Helen Leah
Boston (Mass.) -- Juvenile fiction; Young women -- Juvenile fiction
"Accordingly four hundred men of Portsmouth marched out to Fort William
and Mary, and required the Captain in command and his five men to
surrender. Then they took the powder to a safer hiding-place, and later
it was sent down to Boston, where it is said to have been used in the
Battle of Bunker Hill. That other little tower is called the Walbach
Tower, for Col. Walbach who commanded the fort in the War of 1812.
There's a funny story about the building of this tower. Any one can see
that it probably isn't true, although a poem has been written on the
subject. The story is simply that the people of Portsmouth, alarmed by
the sight of some British ships in the harbor, came over here in the
night and worked like bees, men, women, and children, laying stones
until this tower was built. There isn't an atom of proof that this is
true."
"But it's a pretty story," said Martine.
After luncheon, Clare gave Martine the choice of two walks--to Odiorne's
Point, called the "Plymouth Rock of New Hampshire," as the first
settlement was made there, or to Little Harbor.
Martine promptly chose the latter, because she was anxious to see the
old Wentworth house. To their disappointment, when the girls reached it,
the three found the old house closed; but the grounds were open to them
and the curious exterior amused Martine, reminding her, as she said, of
half a dozen small houses piled and twisted together to make one large
one.
"This is the house where Martha Hilton was married," explained Clare. "I
am sorry we cannot go inside. The rooms with their polished floors and
old-time furniture are really fascinating. Cousin Mary--I hope you will
meet her some time in Portsmouth--says that Benning Wentworth, in spite
of being Governor, was a plain man, and son of a plain farmer, so that
his marriage with Martha Hilton was not such a tremendous mesalliance."
"Oh, I remember that poem," cried Angelina, "how the Governor married
the servant maid. It's by Longfellow, and the story's something like
Agnes Surriage. The minister didn't want to marry them. I can say some
of it, and she recited dramatically:
"'This is the lady, do you hesitate?
Then I command you, as Chief Magistrate.
The Rector read the service loud and clear.
Dearly beloved, we are gathered here--
And so on to the end. At his command
On the fourth finger of her fair left hand,
The governor placed the ring, and that was all.
Martha was Lady Wentworth of the Hall.'
"So I'm glad to see this hall," she added, after Clare and Martine had
sufficiently praised her recitation,--"and there's one thing more that
I'd like to see,--the island in the harbor, where they kept the Spanish
prisoners two years ago. You know I used to think I must be partly
Spanish myself, I had so much sympathy for Cervera and all his men. I'm
sorry they didn't stay here longer. It would be so pleasant to go to the
island and console them."
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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