"For the dead man to cook and eat on his journey to the happy hunting grounds, which the salvages place in the room of heaven," said Hopkins sanctimoniously. Beneath these lay another mat, and beneath this a crypt carefully bedded with dry white sand, upon which lay two packages carefully sewn up in sailcloth, the one more than six feet in length, the other barely three. "The body of a man and child," said Bradford softly, as he helped to raise them from their pure white cell and lay them upon the earth. "Open them with care, friends," said Standish uncovering his head. "It is some white man buried in such honor as they had knowledge of by those who loved him." The many folds of canvas removed, there lay a strange sight before the Pilgrims' eyes. Inclosed in a great quantity of fine red powder, emitting a pungent but agreeable odor, lay the skeleton of a man, fleshless, except upon the skull, where clung the skin and a mass of beautiful hair, yellow as gold, and curling closely as if in life. "Is the flesh turned to this red powder?" asked Alden fingering it dubiously. "Dost know, Hopkins?" asked Standish, but the veteran shook his head. "I have seen naught like this in all my life," confessed he. "See, here is a parcel at his feet done up in another bit of the old sail." "Shall I open it, Captain?" asked Alden eagerly. "Ay, an' thou wilt." "'T is clothes. A sailor's jerkin and breeches, a knife, a sail needle threaded with somewhat like a bowstring"-- "A deer's sinew. They still use it as our women do linen thread," said Hopkins taking it in his hand. "And some bits of wrought iron," continued Alden turning them over. "Ay, ay, ay, the poor fellow's chiefest treasures in his exile among the salvages," said Bradford gently. "And still he was finding some comfort, you may well be sure," suggested Hopkins. "For it was a savage woman who laid him thus carefully to his rest, and yon package be sure is the bones of her child." "Belike. Open it, John," said Standish briefly, and in effect the smaller package contained the same red and pungent powder encasing the bones of a little child, his head covered with a thinner thatch of the father's yellow curls, and the wrists, ankles, and neck surrounded with strings of fine white beads. Beside it lay a little bow and arrows ornamented with all the loving elaboration of Indian art. "A boy, and his mother's darling, be she red or white, savage or Christian," said Bradford softly, as his thoughts flew to the baby boy left in Holland under charge of his wife Dorothy's parents. "Yes," replied Standish gently. "Cover them reverently, and lay them in their grave again. God send comfort to that poor woman's heart." "Certes they are no salvages," said Hopkins positively. "Never saw I yellow hair on any but a white man's head, nor do red men wear breeches." "Ay, he was a white man, but, as I opine, a Frenchman," declared Winslow thoughtfully.