New England -- Description and travel -- Juvenile fiction
"Thank you so _very_ much," said Alice gratefully as the gates were
again locked up, "that picture will be fine to take to school ’cause I’m
studying American history."
"Then you want to notice that hill," said one workman, pointing to a
hill close by. It wasn’t such a very high hill but the sides were steep
and grass covered and it was close to the shore. "That is the hill you
will read about," continued the man. "After that hard winter when so
many of the Pilgrims died, the bodies of the dead were buried there and
the Pilgrims planted corn over the top, so the Indians would not guess
it was a cemetery and find out how very many had died. You must walk up
that hill," he advised Alice, "so you can tell your class about it when
you get back."
"We certainly will," replied Alice gratefully, "and thank you for
telling us about it."
They crossed the street and climbed the wooden stairway up the hill. On
the top was an inn where a sign announced that luncheon was served, but
the girls didn’t care for anything so modern. Fortunately Mrs. Merrill
had had the hotel put up a fine luncheon for them, so they wouldn’t have
to waste time eating indoors. As it was now nearly noon and the girls
were very hungry, she suggested that they sit on some benches halfway up
the hill and eat now, where they could enjoy seeing Plymouth, the ocean
and the historic hill.
That seemed a splendid idea, and the girls agreed that never had fried
chicken and sandwiches tasted as good as on Plymouth Hill.
"I do feel awfully selfish though," Mary Jane said as she polished off a
drumstick, "to have such a good lunch at the very same place where folks
died ’cause they didn’t have enough to eat."
"I don’t feel so selfish as I do thirsty," said Alice. "Now if I only
had a drink—"
"No doubt we can find one," replied Mrs. Merrill. "If you’ve eaten all
you wish, we can put the papers and scraps in that trash basket over
there and walk on. Surely we’ll find a drink soon."
They walked along the street, passing many an old curiosity shop where
Alice would have loved to linger and price old candlesticks and bellows
and chairs and all the curious wares she could see through the window;
only she was so thirsty that a drink seemed more interesting than
curiosities just then.
Turning to the left they went up a steep grade to another street and
there, right in plain sight, was a beautiful drinking fountain. Without
stopping to read the inscription she and Mary Jane had a good drink.
Then Alice read aloud the tablet that said this water was piped up the
hill from the very spring where the Pilgrim fathers first got their
water.
"I think we’re doing a lot of interesting things to-day," said Mary Jane
happily. "We stood on Plymouth Rock and we ate lunch where the Pilgrims
didn’t have anything to eat, and now we’re drinking out of their own
spring! Now what do we do next?"
"I think we’d better walk up these steps to the old cemetery," said Mrs.
Merrill.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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