be only part of that endless caravan of ghosts that has been crossing
the world since the beginning; they never can be anything but ghosts to
us. If only to find a human interest in them, one would rather they had
been devoured by inhuman cannibals than not. But a baby and a boy and an
aged man!

All that afternoon, through the dingy windows of the old building, I
could see the snow falling soft and steadily, covering the countless
roofs of the city, and fancying the multitude of comfortable happy homes
which these white roofs hid, and the sweet-tempered, gracious women
there, with their children close about their knees. I thought I would
like to bring this little live baby back to the others, with its strange,
pathetic story, out of the buried years where it has been hidden with
dead people so long, and give it a place and home among us all again.

I only premise that I have left the facts of the history unaltered, even
in the names; and that I believe them to be, in every particular, true.

On the 22d of August, 1696, this baby, a puny, fretful boy, was carried
down the street of Port Royal, Jamaica, and on board the "barkentine"
Reformation, bound for Pennsylvania; a Province which, as you remember,
Du Chastellux, a hundred years later, described as a most savage country
which he was compelled to cross on his way to the burgh of Philadelphia,
on its border. To this savage country our baby was bound. He had by way
of body-guard his mother, a gentle Quaker lady; his father, Jonathan
Dickenson, a wealthy planter, on his way to increase his wealth in
Penn's new settlement; three negro men, four negro women, and an Indian
named Venus, all slaves of the said Dickenson; the captain, his boy,
seven seamen, and two passengers. Besides this defence, the baby's ship
was escorted by thirteen sail of merchantmen under convoy of an armed
frigate. For these were the days when, to the righteous man, terror
walked abroad, in the light and the darkness. The green, quiet coasts
were but the lurking-places of savages, and the green, restless seas
more treacherous with pirates. Kidd had not yet buried his treasure, but
was prowling up and down the eastern seas, gathering it from every
luckless vessel that fell in his way. The captain, Kirle, debarred from
fighting by cowardice, and the Quaker Dickenson, forbidden by principle,
appear to have set out upon their perilous journey, resolved to defend
themselves by suspicion, pure and simple