"It's true! She is a hussy!"
Plunging down, down, down, until ducking-stool and occupant were completely buried beneath the water, sank the victim, and on the air came a gurgling sound: "She's a hussy!" The sheriff's assistants gave the rope a sudden pull, and in an instant the choking, strangling creature soared up in the air, gasping for breath with the water running in streams from her garments. She made several efforts to speak, but in vain. Her mouth, nostrils, eyes and ears were full of water, and she could only gasp. Poor Ann Linkon was humiliated and crushed. A ducking was a light punishment, yet the disgrace which attached to it was sufficient to break the spirit of one possessing any pride. The sheriff turned to his assistants and said:
"Put her on shore."
The people gave way, and the stool swung round on the pivot and was lowered to the sands. The sport was over, and the cavaliers began to jest and laugh over the scene, which, to them, had been one of amusement. Hugh and Roger once more retired to talk of politics, and the Dame Woodley, turning to Sarah Drummond, asked if she thought public morals had been improved by such a disgraceful scene. But few expressions of sympathy were offered to the coughing, shivering, dripping woman, who sat silently in the chair upon the sands. She was meek enough now when the guards came to unbuckle the straps and free her. Even after she was released, she sat in the chair, strangling, coughing and shivering.
John Stevens made his way through the crowd and, going up to the woman, who seemed almost lifeless, began:
"Dame Linkon, I am most truly sorry that this has been done--"
At sound of his voice, the half-inanimate form seemed suddenly inspired with life and vigor, and, bounding to her feet with a shriek of rage, she dealt him a blow with her open hand on the side of his head, which made him see more stars than can usually be discerned on the clearest night. He staggered and, but for the sheriff, would have fallen.
CHAPTER II.
SEEKING BETTER FORTUNE.
On peace and rest my mind was bent,
And fool I was I married;
But never honest man's intent
As cursedly miscarried.
--BURNS.
In Virginia's colonial days, no man was better known than John Smith Stevens. His father was one of the original founders of Jamestown and, it was said, had felled the first tree to build the city. John Smith was his first born, and was named in honor of Captain John Smith, a personal friend.
John Smith Stevens was born about the year 1625, the same year that Governor Wyat defeated the Indians. He was four years of age when John Harvey became colonial governor in 1629, and a year later, 1630, Sir George Calvert came to Jamestown on his way to colonize Maryland under the charter of Lord Baltimore. He was old enough to remember the stormy days in the assembly, when, on the "28th of April, 1635, Sir John Harvey thrust out of his government, and Captain John West acts as Governer till the king's pleasure is known." He never knew exactly why Sir John Harvey was thrust out; but he heard some one say he was interfering with the liberties of the people.
He knew that the king replaced him, however. Then the people said that all Virginia was divided into eight Shires: James City, Henrico, Charles City, Elizabeth City, Warwick River, Warrosquoyake, Charles River, and Accawmacke, and that a lieutenant was appointed over each to protect them against the Indians. John Stevens remembered when William Claybourne, the famous rebel of colonial Virginia, tried to urge the people, against the will of the king, to drive the colonists out of Maryland, which they claimed as a part of their domain.
Claybourne established a colony at Kent Island, from whence a burgess was sent. Leonard Calvert was governor of Maryland, and a misunderstanding arose between him and Claybourne on Kent Island. Claybourne must go, for the island was part of Maryland, although the right of his lordship's patent was yet undetermined in England. Claybourne resisted. He declared that he was on Virginia territory by the king's patent, and was the owner of Kent Island, and that he meant to stay there. He would also sail to and fro in his trading ship, the Longtail, to traffic with the Indians. If he were attacked he would defend himself. He soon had an opportunity to make good his boasts. Leonard Calvert seized the Longtail, and Claybourne sent a swift pinnace with fourteen fighting men to recapture her. This was in the year 1634, when John Stevens was nine years of age; but the affair was the talk of the time, and consequently was indelibly stamped on his young mind. Two Maryland pinnaces went to meet Claybourne, and a desperate fight occurred on the Potomac River. A volley of musket-balls was poured into Claybourne's pinnace, and three of his men fell dead. Calvert captured the pinnace; but Claybourne escaped. He was driven from Kent Island and escaped to Virginia; but Sir John Harvey refused to surrender him, and John Stevens saw the rebel when he embarked for England, where he made a strong fight before the throne for Kent Island. Although he seemed for a while about to triumph, the lords commissioners of plantations finally decided against his claims, thus dispelling the rosy dreams of Claybourne.
In 1642, there came to Virginia as governor of the colony Sir William Berkeley, then almost forty years of age, when John Stevens was only seventeen. Berkeley was a man of charming manners, proverbially polite, and he delighted the Virginians, who had a weakness for courtliness. He belonged to an ancient English family, and believed in monarchy as a devotee believes in his saint, "and he brought to the little capital at Jamestown all the graces, amenities, and well-bred ways which at that time were characteristic of the cavaliers. He was a cavalier of the cavaliers, taking the word to signify an adherent of monarchy and the established church," and thoroughly hated anything resembling republicanism. For his king and church, this smiling gentleman, with his easy and friendly air, was going to fight like a tiger or a ruffian. Under his glove of velvet was a hand of iron, which would fall inexorably alike on the New England Puritans and the followers of Bacon. With the courage of his convictions, he was ready to deal out banishment for the dissenters; shot and the halter for rebels. He lived on his estate of about a thousand acres at Greenspring, not far from Jamestown. "Here he had plate, servants, carriages, seventy horses, fifteen hundred apple trees, besides apricots, peaches, pears, quinces and mellicottons. When, in the stormy times, the poor cavaliers flocked to Virginia to find a place of refuge, he entertained them after a royal fashion in this Greenspring Manor house. As to the Virginians, they were always welcome, so that they did not belong to the independents, haters of the church and king."
From the very first, John Stevens did not like Governor Berkeley and in a short time learned that he was a tyrant. Berkeley issued his proclamation against the Puritan pastors, prohibiting their teaching or preaching publicly or privately.
John Smith Stevens participated in the Indian war in 1644, and saw Opechancanough, at this time almost a hundred years of age, captured and brought to Jamestown, where he requested his captors to hold open his eyes, that he might see and upbraid Sir William Berkeley for making a public exhibition of him. A short hour afterward the aged chieftain was treacherously wounded by his guard.
In the year 1648, John Stevens married Dorothe Collier, the daughter of a clergyman of the church of England. This naturally united him to the cavalier or church party, while his mother, brother and sister were Puritans. Sometimes John thought he had the best wife living, at others he was almost persuaded that she was intolerable. She was a beautiful brunette, with great dark eyes which smiled when the sky was fair, but in which appeared the lustre of a tigress when enraged. Love in its full strength and beauty seldom dwells in the heart of both husband and wife through all the
