Page:Barbour--Metipoms Hostage.djvu/17

Rh Lindall’s head but scantily escaped the rough-hewn beams. The furnishings would to-day be rude and scanty, but in the year  1675 they were considered proper and sufficient. In fact Nathan Lindall’s dwelling was rather better furnished than most of its kind. The table and the two benches flanking it had been fashioned in Boston by the best  cabinet-maker in the Colony. The four chairs were comfortable and sightly, the  chest of drawers was finely carved and had  come over from England, and the few articles that were of home manufacture were  well and strongly made. Six windows, guarded by heavy shutters, gave light to the  room, and one end was almost entirely taken  up by the wide chimney-place. At the other end a steep flight of steps led to the room  above, no more than an attic under the high  sloping roof.

David had lived in the house seven years, and he was now sixteen, a tall, well-made  boy with pleasing countenance and ways  which, for having dwelt so long on the edge  of the wilderness, were older than his age  warranted. His father had taken up his grant of one hundred acres in 1668, removing from  the Plymouth Colony after the death of his