CHAPTER III
DARDEN'S AUDREY
It was May Day in Virginia, in the year 1727. In England there were George the First, by the grace of God of Great Britain, France, and Ireland King and Defender of the Faith; my Lord of Orkney, Governor in chief of Virginia; and William Gooch, newly appointed Lieutenant Governor. In Virginia there were Colonel Robert Carter, President of the Council and Governor pro tem.; the Council itself; and Mistress Martha Jaquelin.
By virtue of her good looks and sprightliness, the position of her father in the community, and the fact that this 1st of May was one and the same with her sixteenth birthday, young Mistress Jaquelin was May Queen in Jamestown. And because her father was a worthy gentleman and a gay one, with French blood in his veins and Virginia hospitality in his heart, he had made a feast for divers of his acquaintances, and, moreover, had provided, in a grassy meadow down by the water side, a noble and seasonable entertainment for them, and for the handful of townsfolk, and for all chance comers.
Meadow and woodland and marsh, ploughed earth and blossoming orchards, lay warm in the sunshine. Even the ruined town, fallen from her estate, and become but as a handmaid to her younger sister, put a good face upon her melancholy fortunes. Honeysuckle and ivy embraced and hid crumbling walls, broken foundations, mounds of brick and rubbish, all the untouched memorials of the last burning of the place. Grass grew in the street, and the silent square was strewn with the gold of the buttercups. The houses that yet stood and were lived in might have been counted on the fingers of one hand, with the thumb for the church. But in their gardens the flowers bloomed gayly, and the sycamores and mulberries in the churchyard were haunts of song. The dead below had music, and violets in the blowing grass, and the undertone of the river. Perhaps they liked the peace of the town that was dead as they were dead; that, like them, had seen of the travail of life, and now, with shut eyes and folded hands, knew that it was vanity.
But the Jaquelin house was built to the eastward of the churchyard and the ruins of the town, and, facing the sparkling river, squarely turned its back upon the quiet desolation at the upper end of the island and upon the text from Ecclesiastes.
In the level meadow, around a Maypole gay with garlands and with fluttering ribbons, the grass had been closely mown, for there were to be foot-races and wrestling bouts for the amusement of the guests. Beneath a spreading tree a dozen fiddlers put their instruments in tune, while behind the open windows of a small, ruinous house, dwelt in by the sexton, a rustic choir was trying over "The Beggar's Daughter of Bednall Green." Young men and maidens of the meaner sort, drawn from the surrounding country, from small plantation, store and ordinary, mill and ferry, clad in their holiday best and prone to laughter, strayed here and there, or, walking up and down the river bank, where it commanded a view of both the landing and the road, watched for the coming of the gentlefolk. Children, too, were not lacking, but rolled amidst the buttercups or caught at the ribbons flying from the Maypole, while aged folk sat in the sun, and a procession of wide-lipped negroes, carrying benches and chairs, advanced to the shaven green and put the seats in order about the sylvan stage. It was but nine of the clock, and the shadow of the Maypole was long upon the grass. Along the slightly rising ground behind the meadow stretched an apple orchard in full bloom, and between that line of rose and snow and the lapping of the tide upon the yellow sands lay, for the length of a spring day, the kingdom of all content.
The shadow of the Maypole was not much shrunken when the guests of the house of Jaquelin began to arrive. First to come, and from farthest away, was Mr. Richard Ambler, of Yorktown, who had ridden from that place to Williamsburgh the afternoon before, and had that morning used the planter's pace to Jamestown—his industry being due to the fact that he was courting the May Queen's elder sister. Following him came five Lees in a chariot, then a delegation of Burwells, then two Digges in a chaise. A Bland and a Bassett and a Randolph came on horseback, while a barge brought up river a bevy of blooming Carters, a white-sailed sloop from Warwick landed a dozen Carys, great and small, and two periaguas, filled with Harrisons, Aliens, and Cockes, shot over from the Surrey shore.
From a stand at one end of the grassy stage, trumpet and drum proclaimed that the company had gathered beneath the sycamores before the house, and was about to enter the meadow. Shrill-voiced mothers warned their children from the Maypole, the fiddlers ceased their twanging, and Pretty Bessee, her name cut in twain, died upon the air. The throng of humble folk—largely made up of contestants for the prizes of the day, and of their friends and kindred—scurried to its appointed place, and with the issuing from the house gates of the May Queen and her court the festivities commenced.
An hour later, in the midst of a bout at quarterstaff between the Jamestown blacksmith and the miller from Princess Creek, a coach and four, accompanied by a horseman, crossed the neck, rolled through the street, and, entering the meadow, drew up a hundred feet from the ring of spectators.
The eyes of the commonalty still hung upon every motion of the blacksmith and the miller, but by the people of quality the cudgelers were for the moment quite forgot. The head of the house of Jaquelin hurried over the grass to the coach door. "Ha, Colonel Byrd! When we heard that you were staying overnight at Green Spring, we hoped that, being so near, you would come to our merrymaking. Mistress Evelyn, I kiss your hands. Though we can't give you the diversions of Spring Garden, yet such as we have are at your feet. Mr. Marmaduke Haward, your servant, sir! Virginia has missed you these ten years and more. We were heartily glad to hear, t'other day, that the Golden Rose had brought you home."
As he spoke the worthy gentleman strove to open the coach door; but the horseman, to whom the latter part of his speech was addressed, and who had now dismounted, was beforehand with him. The door swung open, and a young lady, of a delicate and pensive beauty, placed one hand upon the deferential arm of Mr. Marmaduke Haward and descended from the painted coach to the flower-enameled sward. The women amongst the assembled guests fluttered and whispered; for this was youth, beauty, wealth, London, and the Court, all drawn in the person of Mistress Evelyn Byrd, bred since childhood in the politest society of England, newly returned with her father to his estate of Westover in Virginia, and, from her garlanded gypsy hat to the point of her silken shoe, suggestive of the rainbow world of mode.
Her father—alert, vivacious, handsome, with finely cut lips that were quick to smile, and dark eyes that smiled when the lips were still—followed her to the earth, shook out his ruffles, and extended his gold snuffbox to his good friend Mr. Jaquelin. The gentleman who had ridden beside the coach threw the reins of his horse to one of the negroes who had come running from the Jaquelin stables, and, together with their host, the three walked across the strip of grass to the row of expectant gentry. Down went the town-bred lady until the skirt of her blue-green gown lay in folds upon the buttercups; down went the ladies opposite in curtsies as profound, if less exquisitely graceful. Off came the hats of the gentlemen; the bows were of the lowest; snuffboxes were drawn out, handkerchiefs of fine holland flourished; the welcoming speeches were hearty and not unpolished.
It was a society less provincial than that of more than one shire that was nearer to London by a thousand leagues. It dwelt upon the banks of the Chesapeake and of great rivers; ships dropped their anchors before its very doors. Now and again the planter followed his tobacco aboard. The sands did not then run so swiftly through the hourglass; if the voyage to England was long, why, so was life! The planters went, sold their tobacco—Sweet-scented, E. Dees, Oronoko, Cowpen, Non-burning—talked with their agents, visited their English kindred; saw the town, the opera, and the play—perhaps, afar off, the King; and returned to Virginia and their plantations with the last but one novelty in ideas, manner, and dress. Of their sons not a few were educated in English schools, while their wives and daughters, if for the most part they saw the enchanted