Explore "When a Witch is Young" by Philip Verrill Mighels on Textopian. Read with annotations and highlights.
AGAINST his long journey across the Atlantic, David Donner made preparations that consumed no small amount of time. A sufficient quantity of money had been subscribed by the patriots who were so concerned for the charter, but this was one of the least important details of Donner's contemplated venture. As a matter of fact, the Puritans had acquired the arts of procrastination patiently and laboriously, for this had proved their most efficient weapon of defense, in those days of struggling against the Stuart dynasty, and therefore the cream of the putting-off science permeated the very being of David Donner. He nursed his preparations till they grew and flourished.
Two ships bound for England sailed without him. He was quite calm as he contemplated further events of a like nature. At length his fellow-citizens, eager to have him at his work, expostulated with him, mildly. His answer astounded them all. He said he had reasons for believing that Edward Randolph was beginning to feel inclined toward more kindliness of spirit with regard to the Colony and the men who had built it there in the wilderness. Randolph had made overtures of friendship to him. He appeared to be a more agreeable person than any one of them had heretofore believed.