I have always been glad that it was my far-away grandfather, John Hoar, who left his Concord home, and risked his life as ambassador to the Indians to rescue one of these poor “captivated” English wives, Mrs. Mary Rowlandson, after her many and heart-rending “savage removes.” I am proud of his “very forward spirit” which made him dare attempt this bold rescue, as I am proud of his humanity and his intelligent desire to treat the red men as human beings, furnishing about sixty of them with a home and decent civilizing employment. I picture him “stoutly not afraid,” as he entered the camp, and met the poor captive, and treated successfully with her savage and avaricious master, and then I see him tenderly leading her, ragged, half-starved, and exhausted, through the lonely forests home--home to the “doleful solemn sight” of despoiled Lancaster. And I am proud, too, of the noble “Boston gentlewomen” who raised twenty pounds as a ransom for Mary Rowlandson, “the price of her redemption,” and tenderly welcomed her to their homes and hearts, so warmly that she could write of them as “pitiful, tender-hearted, and compassionate Christians,” whose love was so bountiful that she could not declare it. If any one to-day marvels that English wives did not “much desire the new and doleful land,” let them read this graphic and thrilling story of the _Captivity, Removes, and Restauration of Mary Rowlandson_, and he will marvel that the ships were not crowded with disheartened settlers returning to their “faire English homes.”