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Page 22
Charley, whose fancy had been greatly taken by the adventurous
disposition of Sir William Phips, was eager to know how he had acted,
and what happened to him while he held the office of governor. But
Grandfather had made up his mind to tell no more stories for the
present.
"Possibly, one of these days, I may go on with the adventures of the
chair," said he. "But its history becomes very obscure just at this
point; and I must search into some old books and manuscripts, before
proceeding further. Besides, it is now a good time to pause in our
narrative; because the new charter, which Sir William Phips brought over
from England, formed a very important epoch in the history of the
province."
"Really, Grandfather," observed Laurence, "this seems to be the most
remarkable chair in the world. Its history cannot be told without
intertwining it with the lives of distinguished men, and the great
events that have befallen the country."
"True, Laurence," replied Grandfather, smiling, "We must write a book,
with some such title as this,--MEMOIRS OF MY OWN TIMES, BY GRANDFATHER'S
CHAIR."
"That would be beautiful!" exclaimed Laurence, clapping his hands.
"But, after all," continued Grandfather, "any other old chair, if it
possessed memory, and a hand to write its recollections, could record
stranger stories than any that I have told you. From generation to
generation, a chair sits familiarly in the midst of human interests, and
is witness to the most secret and confidential intercourse, that mortal
man can hold with his fellow. The human heart may best be read in the
fireside chair. And as to external events, Grief and Joy keep a
continual vicissitude around it and within it. Now we see the glad face
and glowing form of Joy, sitting merrily in the old chair, and throwing
a warm fire-light radiance over all the household. Now, while we thought
not of it, the dark clad mourner, Grief, has stolen into the place of
Joy, but not to retain it long. The imagination can hardly grasp so wide
a subject, as is embraced in the experience of a family chair."
"It makes my breath flutter,--my heart thrill,--to think of it," said
Laurence. "Yes; a family chair must have a deeper history than a Chair
of State."
"O, yes!" cried Clara, expressing a woman's feeling on the point in
question, "The history of a country is not nearly so interesting as that
of a single family would be."
"But the history of a country is more easily told," said Grandfather.
"So, if we proceed with our narrative of the chair, I shall still
confine myself to its connection with public events."
Good old Grandfather now rose and quitted the room, while the children
remained gazing at the chair. Laurence, so vivid was his conception of
past times, would hardly have deemed it strange, if its former
occupants, one after another, had resumed the seat which they had each
left vacant, such a dim length of years ago.
First, the gentle and lovely lady Arbella would have been seen in the
old chair, almost sinking out of its arms, for very weakness; then Roger
Williams, in his cloak and band, earnest, energetic, and benevolent;
then the figure of Anne Hutchinson, with the like gesture as when she
presided at the assemblages of women; then the dark, intellectual face
of Vane, "young in years, but in sage counsel old." Next would have
appeared the successive governors, Winthrop, Dudley, Bellingham, and
Endicott, who sat in the chair, while it was a Chair of State. Then its
ample seat would have been pressed by the comfortable, rotund
corporation of the honest mint-master. Then the half-frenzied shape of
Mary Dyer, the persecuted Quaker woman, clad in sackcloth and ashes,
would have 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.
But, all these, with the other historic personages, in the midst of whom
the chair had so often stood, had passed, both in substance and shadow,
from the scene of ages. Yet here stood the chair, with the old Lincoln
coat of arms, and the oaken flowers and foliage, and the fierce lion's
head at the summit, the whole, apparently, in as perfect preservation as
when it had first been placed in the Earl of Lincoln's Hall. And what
vast changes of society and of nations had been wrought by sudden
convulsions or by slow degrees, since that era!
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