Right proper it was that a nation saw fit to meet here, to do honor to the memory of those free and nobleminded souls who braved the dangers of the mighty Atlantic. Long, severe winters were endured when they had but a scanty amount of food and faced unknown dangers from hostile Indian foes. Uncomplainingly did they endure all of these, rather than submit to tyranny and oppression. Heroic characters they were, with their strong principles and high ideals, to found a great nation. What an epic story of splendid achievement, heroic deeds, and noble sacrifice those Pilgrim Fathers have chronicled upon the illustrious pages of our country's history! The time is July in place of December, the month in which the Pilgrims arrived. In many respects the place of that first landing has been greatly altered. The waterfront contains rough wharves and is lined with storehouses and factories. Plymouth Rock itself will rest beneath a beautiful granite canopy and seems an incredible distance from the sea, and one wonders how they managed to bridge such a distance to get to shore. Yet if you rely somewhat upon your imagination, you may visualize the place in all its rugged impressiveness, much the same as when the Pilgrims beheld it. Nature seems quickly to obliterate the footprints of man, especially along the sea, and you may wander along Plymouth beach in the weird twilight and listen to the sullen boom of the breakers on the cliff, and see and hear as did they. The sea has beaten for centuries against the great boulders, yet the stones have been but slightly changed. The coast is still "rock-ribbed and ancient as the sun," and the great granite boulders gleam white in the level rays of the descending sun, looking like great emeralds as the silvery crests of the breakers fall upon them. The evening sky was thickly overcast with clouds as we made our way down to the shore. The wind blew the dark cloud masses out to sea, and as we watched the surf curried by the rocks into foam and heard the wind moaning and wailing among the tossing branches of the trees on shore, we seemed to catch the spirit of that time as if "it had been that Friday night, three centuries before, when the shallop of the Pilgrims came by this very place lashed by the tempestuous sea, their mast broken in three pieces and their sail lost in the dusky welter of the angry surf." The sky became darker, and more menacing appeared the waves as the time drew near for the pageant to begin. A kind of weird twilight reigned o'er land and sea. No light was visible save that from the beacon-tower, which sent a fitful gleam o'er the angry waves; all else was dark, primal, spectral, as was that eventful night which these present-day pilgrims were now gathered to commemorate. The gale dashed salt spray and raindrops spitefully into our faces, yet it dampened neither our spirits nor those of the performers.