Many a time, no doubt, he was procurer for both royal brothers, Charles
and James, making his tavern their stew, with Betty Killigrew, or Lucy
Walters, or Katy Peg, or even Anne Hyde, the mother of a queen--of her
who was the Princess Anne, godmother of our worshipful town here. I have
not read in vain," concluded Meshach, "because my noble townsmen drove
me to my cell!"
The next portrait was clothed in military uniform, with a higher type of
manhood, shrewd and vigilant, but magisterial. "That should be
Major-general John Custis," thought Milburn, looking at it, "son of John
the tapster, and a marrying, shifty fellow, who first began greatness as
a salt-boiler on these ocean islands, till his father's friend, Charles
II., in a merry mood, made Henry Bennet, the king's bastard son's
father-in-law, Earl of Arlington and lessee of Virginia. All the
province for forty shillings a year rent! Those were pure, economical
times, indeed, around the court. So salt-boiler John flunkeyed to
Arlington's overseers, named his farm 'Arlington,' hunted and informed
upon the followers of the Puritan rebel Bacon, then turned and fawned
upon King William, too. His grandchildren, all well provided for, spread
around this bay. So much for politics in a merchant's hands!"
The tone of Meshach's comment had somewhat raised his courage, and a
sense of pleasurable interest in the warm room and genial surroundings
led him to pass the time, which was of considerable length, quite
contentedly, till Judge Custis was ready.
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