Myths and Legends of Our Own Land — CompleteSkinner, Charles M. (Charles Montgomery)
General
Myths and Legends of Our Own Land — Complete
Skinner, Charles M. (Charles Montgomery)
Folklore -- United States
The minister felt a strange lifting in his heart. He fell on his knees
before the little house and offered up a prayer. Long he staid in that
place, preaching gentle doctrines and ministering to the men and women of
that lonely village, and when the fisherman apostle, Thomas Potter, died
he left the church to Murray, who, in turn, bequeathed it, “free, for the
use of all Christian people.”
ON AND NEAR THE DELAWARE
THE PHANTOM DRAGOON
The height that rises a mile or so to the south of Newark, Delaware, is
called Iron Hill, because it is rich in hematite ore, but about the time
of General Howe's advance to the Brandywine it might well have won its
name because of the panoply of war--the sullen guns, the flashing swords,
and glistening bayonets--that appeared among the British tents pitched on
it. After the red-coats had established camp here the American outposts
were advanced and one of the pickets was stationed at Welsh Tract Church.
On his first tour of duty the sentry was thrown into great alarm by the
appearance of a figure robed from head to foot in white, that rode a
horse at a charging gait within ten feet of his face. When guard was
relieved the soldier begged that he might never be assigned to that post
again. His nerves were strong in the presence of an enemy in the
flesh--but an enemy out of the grave! Ugh! He would desert rather than
encounter that shape again. His request was granted. The sentry who
succeeded him was startled, in the small hours, by a rush of hoofs and
the flash of a pallid form. He fired at it, and thought that he heard the
sound of a mocking laugh come back.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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