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In Grandfather’s younger days, there used to be a wax figure of him in one of the Boston museums, representing a solemn, dark-visaged person, in a minister’s black gown, and with a black-letter volume before him. "It is difficult, my children," observed Grandfather, "to make you understand such a character as Cotton Mather’s, in whom there was so much good, and yet so many failings and frailties.
And, when Grandfather’s meditations had grown very profound indeed, he fancied that he heard a sound over his head, as if somebody were preparing to speak. "Hem!" it said, in a dry, husky tone. "H-e-m! Hem!"
He was the chief person in the plantation, and had the only comfortable house which the new comers had beheld since they left England. So now, children, you must imagine Grandfather’s chair in the midst of a new scene. Suppose it a hot summer’s day, and the lattice-windows of a chamber in Mr. Endicott’s house thrown wide open.
While the angry mob in King Street were shouting his name, Lieutenant-Governor Hutchinson sat quietly in Grandfather’s chair, unsuspicious of the evil that was about to fall upon his head. His beloved family were in the room with him. He had thrown off his embroidered coat and powdered wig, and had on a loose flowing gown and purple velvet cap.
In order to make the children sensible of the pitiable condition of these men, Grandfather singled out Peter Oliver, chief justice of Massachusetts under the crown, and imagined him walking through the streets of Boston, on the morning before he left it forever. This effort of Grandfather’s fancy may be called—
So far as his eyes were concerned, he was already an old man, and needed a pair of spectacles almost as much as his own grandfather did. And now, alas! the time was come, when even grandfather’s spectacles could not have assisted Edward to read. After a few bitter tears, which only pained his eyes the more, the poor boy submitted to the surgeon’s orders.
"Ah! but if a sword had been drawn for her," said Laurence, "it would have taken away all the beauty of her death." It seemed as if hardly any of the preceding stories had thrown such an interest around Grandfather’s chair, as did the fact, that the poor, persecuted, wandering Quaker woman had rested in it for a moment.
Then the holy apostolic form of Eliot would have sanctified it. Then would have arisen, like the shade of departed Puritanism, the venerable dignity of the white-bearded Governor Bradstreet. Lastly, on the gorgeous crimson cushion of Grandfather’s chair, would have shone the purple and golden magnificence of Sir William Phips.
"Grandfather," said little Alice, looking fearfully into his face, "your voice sounds as though you were going to tell us something awful!" Little Alice, by her last remark, proved herself a good judge of what was expressed by the tones of Grandfather’s voice.
With every puff of the wind, the fire leaped upward from the hearth, laughing and rejoicing at the shrieks of the wintry storm. Meanwhile, Grandfather’s chair stood in its customary place by the fireside. The bright blaze gleamed upon the fantastic figures of its oaken back, and shone through the open-work, so that a complete pattern was thrown upon the opposite side of the room.
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