A PILGRIM MAID
A Story of Plymouth Colony in 1620
"Constance opened the door, stepping back to let thebride precede her"
A PILGRIM MAID
A Story of Plymouth Colony in 1620
BY
MARION AMES TAGGART
AUTHOR OF
"CAPTAIN SYLVIA," "THE DAUGHTERS OF THE LITTLE GREY HOUSE," "THE LITTLE GREY HOUSE," "HOLLYHOCK HOUSE," ETC.
ILLUSTRATED BY THE DONALDSONS
DOUBLEDAY, PAGE & COMPANY
GARDEN CITY NEW YORK LONDON
1920
COPYRIGHT, 1920, BY DOUBLEDAY, PAGE & COMPANY ALL RIGHTS RESERVED, INCLUDING THAT OF TRANSLATION INTO FOREIGN LANGUAGES, INCLUDING THE SCANDINAVIAN
DEDICATED
TO
YOU, MY DEAR
WHO SO WELL KNOW WHY
PREFACE
This story is like those we hear of our neighboursto-day: it is a mixture of fact and fancy.
The aim in telling it has been to present PlymouthColony as it was in its first three years of existence;to keep to possibilities, even while inventing incidents.
Actual events have been transferred from a laterto an earlier year when they could be made useful,to bring them within the story's compass, and todevelop it.
For instance, John Billington was lost for five daysand died early, but not as early as in the story.Stephen Hopkins was fined for allowing his servantsto play shovelboard, but this did not happen tillsome time later than 1622. Stephen Hopkins wastwice married; records show that there was dissension;that the second wife tried to get an inheritancefor her own children, to the injury of the son anddaughter of the first wife. Facts of this sort areused, enlarged upon, construed to cause, or alteredto suit, certain results.
But there is fidelity to the general trend of events,above all to the spirit of Plymouth in its beginnings.As far as may be, the people who have been transferredinto the story act in accordance with what isknown of the actual bearers of these names.
There was a Maid of Plymouth, Constance Hopkins,who came in the Mayflower, with her fatherStephen; her stepmother, Eliza; her brother, Giles,and her little half-sister and brother, Damaris andOceanus, and to whom the Anne, in 1623, broughther husband, Honourable Nicholas Snowe, afterwardone of the founders of Eastham, Massachusetts.
Undoubtedly the real Constance Hopkins wassweeter than the story can make her, as a livinggirl must be sweeter than one created of paper andink. Yet it is hoped that this Plymouth Maid,Constance, of the story, may also find friends.