ry one was
most absorbed in gazing over the side, and the interest was momentarily
increasing, it was observed with consternation that the vessel was
adrift and the anchor-cable hanging limp from the bow. Then in the
ship's dimmed and ancient log we find this quaint note:

"In time it was discouvered yt ye troblesome passenger hadde gone downe
and got ye anchor, and toke ye same and solde it to ye dam sauvages from
ye interior, saying yt he hadde founde it, ye sonne of a ghun!"

Yet this ancestor had good and noble instincts, and it is with pride
that we call to mind the fact that he was the first white person who
ever interested himself in the work of elevating and civilizing our
Indians. He built a commodious jail and put up a gallows, and to
his dying day he claimed with satisfaction that he had had a more
restraining and elevating influence on the Indians than any other
reformer that ever labored among them. At this point the chronicle
becomes less frank and chatty, and closes abruptly by saying that the
old voyager went to see his gallows perform on the first white man ever
hanged in America, and while there received injuries which terminated in
his death.

The great-grandson of the "Reformer" flourished in sixteen hundred and
something, and was known in our annals as "the old Admiral," though in
history he had other titles. He was long in command of fleets of swift
vessels, well armed and manned, and did great service in hurrying up
merchantmen. Vessels which he followed and kept his eagle eye on, always
made good fair time across the ocean. But if a ship still loitered
in spite of all he could do, his indignation would grow till he could
contain himself no longer--and then he would take that ship home where
he lived and keep it there carefully, expecting the owners to come for
it, but they never did. And he would try to get the idleness and sloth
out of the sailors of that ship by compelling them to take invigorating
exercise and a bath. He called it "walking a plank." All the pupils
liked it. At any rate, they never found any fault with it after trying
it. When the owners were late coming for their ships, the Admiral always
burned them, so that the insurance money should not be lost. At last
this fine old tar was cut down in the fullness of his years and honors.
And to her dying day, his poor heart-broken widow believed that if
he had been cut down fifteen minutes sooner he might have been
resuscitated.

Ch