Page:The Granite Monthly Volume 9.djvu/106

90 test—such flighty conduct was unseemingly in the long forestick. The huge back-log blazed up, and threw weird shadows out into the large, square room: these shadows flickered, and then ran out long on the wide beams supporting the low ceiling, as if trying to attract the attention of the sad girl by the window; but she heeded them not.

Soon the door opened from the hall; and Peter, with many a grunt and grimace, laid a large pile of wood on the brick hearth. He glanced at Susanna, but, with instinctive kindness, turned away. Peter knew that John Pendexter had been there and gone, and all the servants loved Susanna very much.

He gathered up the charred ends of the forestick, raked over the coals, and laid the wood on in a skilful manner. Finally Susanna turned around. Many times had she smiled at the funny face old Peter made when he blew the coals; but to-night her heart was too sore for her to see any thing comical in the pursing-up of the monstrous lips, or the distended appearance of his eyes; the white ashes powdered his crisp wool unheeded by Susanna this woeful night.

When Dr. Carwin came in from a long ride in the country on Sorrel, he rubbed his hands before the new fire, and said, "Come, Susanna, let us have supper: old Mollie has it ready." During the meal he never spoke of John, but talked of his patients; and after they had finished, and Susanna had pushed back her plate unused, her grandfather asked her to help him about some herbs. He talked of every thing but John, and Susanna felt that her grandfather was thoughtless for once; but, when she took her candlestick for bed, the old doctor kissed her, and said, "God bless you, my poor child!" and led her out to the wide staircase.

In this same spring of 1776, Gen. Washington contemplated the expulsion of the British army from Boston. He decided to fortify Dorchester Heights, which commanded the harbor and British shipping. The army fortified itself so quietly and expeditiously, that the British knew nothing of the matter until the small band of two thousand men had taken possession of the Heights. John Pendexter worked faithfully at this time, and felt his labors well paid, when, on the 17th of March, the British began to evacuate Boston, under command of Lord William Howe. When the rear guard of the British troops were leaving one side of the city, Gen. Washington, with his joyous soldiers, marched in on the other. The inhabitants hailed these troops with gratitude; for sixteen months Boston had been the headquarters of the British army, and the people had suffered at the hand of an insolent soldiery. John Pendexter wrote a letter to Susanna, describing the forlorn condition of the town. Many of the Royalists had fled with the British army. Churches had been stripped of pews and benches to supply' the soldiers' fires; stores had been rifled to clothe them, and houses pillaged at their will. John's description of the joy of the people when Gen. Washington came among them caused Mrs. Pendexter and Susanna to weep. How proud they were of John! How brave he appeared to them! But a nameless dread crept into the heart of each, when they thought of the battles yet to come.

In the following June, Richard Henry Lee of Virginia rose in the Continental Congress, and made a motion to