Now have I reached the utmost limits of the town , where the last lamp struggles feebly with the darkness like the farthest star that stands sentinel on the borders of uncreated space . It is strange what sensations of sublimity may spring from a very humble source . Such are suggested by this hollow roar of a subterranean cataract where the mighty stream of a kennel precipitates itself beneath an iron grate and is seen no more on earth . Listen a while to its voice of mystery , and Fancy will magnify it till you start and smile at the illusion . And now another sound -- the rumbling of wheels as the mail-coach , outward bound , rolls heavily off the pavements and splashes through the mud and water of the road . All night long the poor passengers will be tossed to and fro between drowsy watch and troubled sleep , and will dream of their own quiet beds and awake to find themselves still jolting onward . Happier my lot , who will straightway hie me to my familiar room and toast myself comfortably before the fire , musing and fitfully dozing and fancying a strangeness in such sights as all may see . But first let me gaze at this solitary figure who comes hitherward with a tin lantern which throws the circular pattern of its punched holes on the ground about him . He passes fearlessly into the unknown gloom , whither I will not follow him . This figure shall supply me with a moral wherewith , for lack of a more appropriate one , I may wind up my sketch . He fears not to tread the dreary path before him , because his lantern , which was kindled at the fireside of his home , will light him back to that same fireside again . And thus we , night-wanderers through a stormy and dismal world , if we bear the lamp of Faith enkindled at a celestial fire , it will surely lead us home to that heaven whence its radiance was borrowed . ENDICOTT AND THE RED CROSS . At noon of an autumnal day more than two centuries ago the English colors were displayed by the standard bearer of the Salem train-band , which had mustered for martial exercise under the orders of John Endicott . It was a period when the religious exiles were accustomed often to buckle on their armor and practise the handling of their weapons of war . Since the first settlement of New England its prospects had never been so dismal . The dissensions between Charles I. and his subjects were then , and for several years afterward , confined to the floor of Parliament . The measures of the king and ministry were rendered more tyrannically violent by an opposition which had not yet acquired sufficient confidence in its own strength to resist royal injustice with the sword . The bigoted and haughty primate Laud , archbishop of Canterbury , controlled the religious affairs of the realm , and was consequently invested with powers which might have wrought the utter ruin of the two Puritan colonies , Plymouth and Massachusetts . There is evidence on record that our forefathers perceived their danger , but were resolved that their infant country should not fall without a struggle , even beneath the giant strength of the king 's right arm .
Such was the aspect of the times when the folds of the XXXXX banner with the red cross in its field were flung out over a company of Puritans .
England English I. Laud Massachusetts Plymouth cataract night-wanderers noon war