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[268] path before her. Shrinking back with terror, she uttered a faint scream. ‘Mary Edmands!’ said the stranger, ‘do not fear me.’ A thousand thoughts wildly chased each other through the mind of the astonished girl. That familiar voice—that knowledge of her name—that tall and well-remembered form! She leaned eagerly forward, and looked into the stranger's face. A straggling gleam of moonshine fell across its dark features of manly beauty. ‘Richard Martin! can it be possible!’ ‘Yea, Mary,’ answered the other, ‘I have followed thee to the new world, in that love which neither sea nor land can abate. For many weary months I have waited earnestly for such a meeting as this, and, in that time, I have been in many and grievous perils by the flood and the wilderness, and by the heathen Indians and more heathen persecutors among my own people. But I may not tarry, nor delay to tell my errand. Mary, thou knowest my love; wilt thou be my wife?’ Mary hesitated. ‘I ask thee again, if thou wilt share the fortunes of one who hath loved thee ever since thou wast but a child, playing under the cottage trees in old Haverhill, and who hath sacrificed his worldly estate, and perilled his soul's salvation for thy sake. Mary, dear Mary, for of a truth thou art very dear to me; wilt thou go with me and be my wife?’ The tones of Richard Martin, usually harsh and forbidding, now fell soft and musical on the ear of
Boston and New York, Houghton, Mifflin and company, 1888-89.
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