il night, and was so
much recovered on the following morning as to be able to converse
composedly with her kind friends. The fever had passed away; and the
sense of restored happiness, joined to youth and a naturally good
constitution, had a rapid effect in renovating her strength and
spirits, and recalling a faint bloom to her cheek.
Before the Indian set out on his return to Seacomb, she insisted on
seeing him, and herself delivering to him a letter to Roger, in which
she had carefully avoided all mention of her illness. She made
numerous inquiries of him relative to her husband's health and present
situation; and charged him to convey her packet safely, and tell his
employer that he had seen her and his child well and happy. She could
say this with truth; for so rapidly had she recovered, that the
inexperienced eye of the Indian could detect no remaining indisposition
in the slight and graceful form of the interesting pale-face, or any
trace of disease in the bright eye that smiled so kindly upon him.
He departed with the friends of Williams, and earnestly did his wife
wish that it had been possible for her to accompany them, and join her
husband at once. But this could not be; and she could only endeavor to
regain her strength, so as to be able to proceed to Plymouth, as soon
as the promised vessel arrived. In due time it came: and bidding her
kind and devoted friends an affectionate farewell, Edith and her child
embarked, with all the little property that remained to her, and soon
found herself once more beneath the peaceful roof of her parents.
Until she arrived at Plymouth, she was not aware of the fresh trial
that had befallen her husband, in being compelled to abandon his
settlement at Seacomb, and remove into the Narragansett district. This
change was distressing to her, as it net only placed the lines of her
future habitation at a greater distance from her parents and friends at
New Plymouth, but also removed it further from all civilized life, and
into a district inhabited by a tribe whom she had learnt to dread from
her childhood, as the rivals and foes of the friendly Wampanoges.
Still these considerations did not, in any measure, abate her eagerness
to fellow Roger, and take her part in all his toils and anxieties. The
winter had passed away, and, though far from genial, the weather was
more tolerable for travelling; and Edith resolved to set out.
All the arguments and entreaties of Helen and Rodo
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