While Dermer is engaged
in conversation, a group of sailors pass near the water's edge,
where they drop their burdens. They gaze out on the water as if
looking for a boat. Tisquantum goes past Dermer and Samoset and
stands looking off across the harbor, deep in gloomy thought.
>From out there, as darkness closes about the lonely figure on
the shore, there is borne to our ears by the night wind the
distant sound of voices chanting early sixteenth century music.
The music continues while the various characters appear, and
finally grows fainter until it can no longer be heard. A young
boy appears on the left as if on his way to his morning labor.
He is driving a horse that is hitched to a crude plow. There
enters from the right a group of seven men and five women, who
wear the costumes of religious pilgrims. They have the staff,
the script, and the water bottle. Two of the number have been to
Rome, for they wear the palm; two others show that they have
been to Compostella, for they wear the shell; while two others
have the bottle and bell, proving that they have been to
Canterbury.
The next scene represented the Fleet Prison on the night of
April 5, 1593. Two heaps of straw are seen, on which a man in
Puritan garb is seated, writing rapidly. By the other heap sits
a man on a stool, who is correcting some written pages. Both men
wear chains. A woman stands by the second man with some papers.
She seems to be waiting for the other sheets which the man is
writing. As he passes the last to her she hides them all in the
bosom of her dress.
The next scene represents the Opposition, 7603. The lights are
suddenly turned, on revealing a flurry of children and young
people across the field, from left to right, and the sound of
gay music from the point toward which the children are running.
The field fills rapidly with some hundreds of people - men, women
and children, of all types and kinds. From the right to the
triumphant march, King James enters in royal progress.
Space forbids us to relate the various scenes portrayed upon
this wonderfully well-illuminated field. No one who witnessed
this wonderful production can ever forget the solemn
impressiveness of its closing scenes. A voice is heard coming
from the rock, "As one candle may light a thousand, so the
lights here kindled have shone to many, yea! in some sort, to
our whole nation."
As Bradford gazes out in the distance, the lights now
penetrating more deeply reveal in turn, George Washington and
Abraham Lincoln. The clear voice of Washington repeats these
significant words:
