Which done, and the amazed population at hand,
gaping at the spectacle of the wife of their commander (then
absent from home) pilloried before them, she gave command,
through the crier, that they should take their fill of gazing,
whispering, and nudging then and there, forever and a day, and
then should go about their business and give her leave to mind her
own.
That day was gone, but men still dropped their work to see a
woman pass, still cheered when a farthingale appeared over a
ship's side, and at church still devoted their eyes to other service
than staring at the minister. In our short but crowded history few
things had made a greater stir than the coming in of Sir Edwyn's
maids. They were married now, but they were still the observed of
all observers; to be pointed out to strangers, run after by children,
gaped at by the vulgar, bowed to with broad smiles by Burgess,
Councilor, and commander, and openly contemned by those dames
who had attained to a husband in somewhat more regular fashion.
Of the ninety who had arrived two weeks before, the greater
number had found husbands in the town itself or in the
neighboring hundreds, so that in the crowd that had gathered to
withstand the Spaniard, and had stayed to welcome the King's
favorite, there were farthingales not a few.
But there were none like the woman whose hand I had kissed in
the courting meadow.
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