`` What means this blaze of light ? What does old Esther 's joy portend ? '' whispered a spectator . `` It is frightful to , see her gliding about the chambers and rejoicing there without a soul to bear her company . '' `` It is as if she were making merry in a tomb , '' said another . `` Pshaw ! It is no such mystery , '' observed an old man , after some brief exercise of memory . `` Mistress Dudley is keeping jubilee for the king of England 's birthday . '' Then the people laughed aloud , and would have thrown mud against the blazing transparency of the king 's crown and initials , only that they pitied the poor old dame who was so dismally triumphant amid the wreck and ruin of the system to which she appertained . Oftentimes it was her custom to climb the weary staircase that wound upward to the cupola , and thence strain her dimmed eyesight seaward and countryward , watching for a British fleet or for the march of a grand procession with the king 's banner floating over it . The passengers in the street below would discern her anxious visage and send up a shout : `` When the golden Indian on the province-house shall shoot his arrow , and when the cock on the Old South spire shall crow , then look for a royal governor again ! '' for this had grown a by-word through the town . And at last , after long , long years , old Esther Dudley knew -- or perchance she only dreamed -- that a royal governor was on the eve of returning to the province-house to receive the heavy key which Sir William Howe had committed to her charge . Now , it was the fact that intelligence bearing some faint analogy to Esther 's version of it was current among the townspeople . She set the mansion in the best order that her means allowed , and , arraying herself in silks and tarnished gold , stood long before the blurred mirror to admire her own magnificence . As she gazed the gray and withered lady moved her ashen lips , murmuring half aloud , talking to shapes that she saw within the mirror , to shadows of her own fantasies , to the household friends of memory , and bidding them rejoice with her and come forth to meet the governor . And while absorbed in this communion Mistress Dudley heard the tramp of many footsteps in the street , and , looking out at the window , beheld what she construed as the royal governor 's arrival . `` Oh , happy day ! Oh , blessed , blessed hour ! '' she exclaimed .
`` Let me but bid him welcome within the portal , and my task in the XXXXX and on earth is done . ''
British Dudley Esther countryward cupola day hour province-house seaward silks