It was small wonder that the passengers on the Lyon were almost paralyzed with terror. They were not soldiers, nor accustomed to taking the part of soldiers, and they were not fighting upon a battlefield, distant from their loved ones, but close to them where the danger threatened alike themselves and all they held dear. The fact made them at once more courageous and more terrified.

It was known by all that powder was short and that the accuracy of the next shot would probably decide their fate. Their hands grew more and more awkward, their cheeks whiter. Conrad and Peter sprang to their feet, seeing plainly the panic on the faces of the gunners who were trying to reload the cannon, and upon the faces of the others who stood, saber or pistol in hand, waiting for what seemed to be certain destruction. One frightened soul fired his pistol prematurely, another waved his saber wildly in the air. If the freebooters saw, they must have anticipated an easy victory.

"If we only had pistols!" cried Peter shrilly.

The captain shouted fierce orders, and still the gunners fumbled at their task.

Now Conrad ran to the captain's side. A wild plan had suddenly occurred to him.

"We could play," cried he breathlessly, "Peter and I. There was a trumpeter on a castle wall who played and played till—"

"Play, then!"

With trembling lips and hands the two boys began. The flute gave forth a sharp piping, the drum tried to roar as fiercely as the cannon. There was at first no tune, there was at first, indeed, only a mad discord. And still the pirate ship came on.

"Louder! Louder! Louder!" The boys did not know whether they had heard or had imagined the command. They were playing "Susy, dear Susy," and playing it like a jig. As though its sprightliness steadied them, arms grew stronger, breath more even. The gunners heard, the infantry heard, the women and children shivering in the hold heard, and best of all the evil men on the pirate ship heard. The hands of the gunners trembled a little less, the hands which held the pistols and sabers grasped them more firmly, the women and children looked with a tiny bit of hope into one another's eyes, and the pirates looked at one another with astonishment.

It may have been that the captain of the pirate ship did not care to try conclusions with a force which could spare men to play the drum and flute; it may have been that he could observe that the firing of the second shot was the matter of only a second or two; or it may have been that merely the lively defiance of "Susy, dear Susy," discouraged him. At any rate, he altered the course of his vessel. When the second shot sailed after him, he had darted out of range.

At first the passengers of the Lyon stared as though a spell had been put upon them. A moment ago they had been in danger of their lives; now they were safe while the enemy sailed away. Some laughed aloud, others wiped their eyes, and a sailor flung open the hatchway and shouted the good news to the anxious hearts below.

Though the distance between the Lyon and her enemy grew wider and wider until presently the stranger had vanished over the horizon's edge, the sailors kept watch until nightfall.

But the passengers gave no thought now to an enemy. They saw, late in the afternoon, a sailor lowering the sounding-line over the ship's side. They had watched this process many times. But the earnestness of the sailor and the eager watching of his companions gave it a new significance. Into the group at the ship's edge young Conrad forced his way.

"How much?" said he.

The sailors paid no attention and Conrad concluded to wait. Presently the line was drawn in and the sailor announced to the captain in a loud voice,—

"Thirty-five fathoms, sir."

"That is shallow," said Conrad. "Is there any danger?"

The sailors laughed.

"There is danger of seeing land to-morrow," said one.

To this no one made any reply for a long moment. Then another shout arose like the one which had greeted the arrival of water and food. In one moment the news had spread: in another, though the captain laughed, the women were descending to pack boxes and to tie up the bundles in the hold.

But no one stayed long below the deck. Margareta and Magdalena with one bundle packed climbed back to look toward the west. John Conrad's expectation was being realized; there was now a young man by the side of Magdalena also. The captain laughed at them for watching for land as he laughed at them for packing.

"To-morrow, my children, not to-day. You may look your eyes out to-day and you will see nothing, and there will be plenty of time after we see land for you to pack your clothes."

Nevertheless, the Germans looked and looked, though, as the captain prophesied, they saw nothing. But they would not leave their place in the bow. Sitting together, they reviewed the journey and the more distant past. They spoke of the Fatherland, of those left behind who might some day follow them, like George Reimer, of those, like the magistrate of Oberdorf, whom they should never see again, and of those already on the way in other ships. They spoke also in quiet voices of those who slept, like the mother of the Weisers, in quiet graveyards. They spoke of bondage and liberty and of war and peace and of a strange new freedom, of which there was in the hearts of a few a dim conception, like the tiny seed of a mighty tree. They spoke with gratitude of the good Queen and offered a prayer for her, and for other friends, like the good helmsman on the river boat. They spoke of the strange red people, and Conrad must find his little book and read once more of their skill as hunters, of their devotion in friendship and of their ferocity in war and in revenge. Longest of all they talked of the King of Rivers and his companions.

"It is my object to find them first of all," said Conrad. "I am sure they are looking for us to come to the country which they gave us."

Once again must Conrad and Peter and the rest of the band play their old tunes, grave and gay, mournful and lively; once again must all join in song. Twilight came and then the starry, summer night, and still the pilgrims sat gazing toward the west. All night a few kept vigil.

At daylight every one was on deck. The morning dawned in splendor, but no one turned to watch the rising sun. At last, when the bright rays illuminated the whole of earth and heaven, they saw through tears the low shores of the promised land.

But now that land was in sight, the Lyon was not able to get into the harbor. Already as the passengers watched the shore a storm was rising. It was not so severe as those which had gone before nor so long continued, but it was far more alarming since the ship was now in danger of being cast upon the reefs. It seemed for many days that the passengers had endured all for naught. It was like being sent back into mid-ocean to suffer once more all the fearful trials through which they had lived. Again the captain grew wan and hollow-eyed, again the travelers lived for days in the hold of the ship, again there was sickness and death. Some of those who had seen the promised land saw it no more, nor any earthly land. There was no concealing the fact that those who were ill had ship fever, which was almost certain, in the conditions in which the patients had to live, to be fatal. Little John Frederick, the youngest of the Weisers, about whose health they had long felt anxiety, grew worse, so that his brothers and sisters could not look at him without tears. Still the pilgrims were patient and kind, still they tried not to murmur at this new dispensation of Providence.

"Courage!" said John Conrad a dozen times a day, to himself, as well as to his companions. "Many a good enterprise has failed because those who undertook it could not endure quite to the end."

The pilgrims were to have, alas, need for all the courage and patience which they could summon. When a long swell succeeded the fierce beating of the waves and the skies cleared, they sought the deck once more, and hurried to the prow. There they stared at one another in amazement and terror. The promised land at which they had looked with such longing eyes had vanished.

"What has become of it?" asked a bewildered company.

"It is still exactly where it was," answered the captain. "It is we who have changed our place."

"When shall we see it again?"

The captain reassured them with a cheerfulness which he did not feel. The ship had been driven far out of its course; it would take many days to win again a view of the low-lying shores.

It was now June. Unless conditions in the new world were very different from those in the old, the season for planting was almost passed: and John Conrad's eagerness to be settled grew to anxiety. Whatever young Conrad's book might say about the strength of the sun in America, it was certain that the pilgrims must have a house and some stores of food and fuel with which to meet the winter. Again they gazed toward the west until, between the blinding glare of the sun on the smooth sea and their own tears, they could see no more.

But like all evils in the world the long journey came to an end. The travelers had given up rising before dawn to watch the first beams of the sun strike on the western shores, when one bright morning a shout awoke them.

"Land! Land! Land!" Though it needed but one call to rouse the sleepers, the sailor called a dozen times, as though the joyful news could not be too often proclaimed.

The travelers crowded on deck; they saw the shore much nearer at hand than it had been before, and green instead of a dull, indeterminate color; they were surrounded by fluttering birds; they sniffed upon the air a different odor, an odor of land and growing things. Then with one accord their eyes sought the sky to see if once more a cloud threatened them.

But there was no cloud even so large as a man's hand, and the dangerous reefs were passed safely.

"But we are not moving!" cried young Conrad. "What is the matter?"

The captain pointed ahead, and Conrad saw a long rowboat cutting the water.

"We can't go into the harbor without a pilot," said the captain. "Here he comes."

Indifferent to the fact that their belongings were, after all their planning, not ready to be carried to the shore, the passengers hung over the side of the ship. There was a loud hail from the little boat, and an answering shout from the captain of the Lyon.

Suddenly Conrad cried out and seized his father by the arm.

"Look! Look!"

"What is it, lad?"

Then John Conrad saw for himself. The rowers were dark-skinned, black-haired creatures whose great bare bodies gleamed in the sun. The King of Rivers and his friends had been blanketed, but there was no mistaking these for any but men of their race.

"They are Indians," said Conrad, in awe.

Now a rope ladder was flung over the side of the ship and the pilot came aboard. He shook hands with the captain and the mate, and then lifted from the hands of an Indian who had followed him a roughly woven basket.

"I always bring something for the birds," said he in a loud voice as he uncovered it.

For a moment both children and adults could only stare at him dumbly. He was real, he came from America, and America had begun to seem like the figment of a dream: his was a new face, and they had seen no new faces for months.

But when the children looked into his basket, they ran forward. Here were cherries for mouths which had forgotten the taste of fruit; here were strawberries for lips which had never touched strawberries. An old woman began to weep.

"Cherries like those in the gardens of WÜrttemberg, God be thanked!"

John Conrad looked at the pilot a little uneasily.

"We cannot pay," said he.

The pilot popped a strawberry into the mouth of John Frederick.

"Tut, tut," said he, "you are in a land of plenty. To-morrow when I come to take you in I will bring more."

"To-morrow!" echoed a dozen voices. "Oh, sir, can we not go in to-day?"

The pilot shook his head.

"Not till to-morrow."

"But the storm came before and drove us far away."

"No storm will drive you away now."

With sinking hearts the pilgrims saw the pilot descend again over the side of the ship and enter his boat and row away.

"I do not believe he will return," said one despairing soul.

But in a few minutes the speaker and every one else on board had begun to pack. Pots and dishes, pans and kettles, clothes, a few spinning-wheels, the few treasured books—all were boxed or wrapped or corded together. The Weisers, remembering gayly that they had once made nine bundles for eight persons, made careful division of their belongings.

"The spinning-wheel is not here and dear Wolf is not here, but we have everything else," said Margareta.

"Including a tame bear," ventured Conrad, knowing that there would be no boxing of ears to-day.

To the laughing astonishment of the travelers, the pilot was on the deck in the morning when they came up to greet the sun. He rallied them upon their laziness and passed out another gift of fruit, and then took command of the ship. To the keen disappointment of the boys the Indians did not come on board, but were towed in their rowboat.

Past the low shores of Long Island, nearer and nearer to the village of New York moved the Lyon, more and more excited grew the pilgrims.

"I can see houses!"

"And smoke rising from chimneys!"

"And men walking about!"

"There is a wharf with people on it!"

"We are here at last, at last!"

Some one started a hymn and a single stanza was sung. Then voices failed.

John Conrad stood silently, his older children close to him and little John Frederick in his arms. With them was Peter Zenger, his arm round Conrad's neck. John Conrad saw the house and the people and the strange shore, and the certainty of impending change swept over him. These—his boys and girls—what would befall them? They were his now, but the new land must divide them from him. Each must do his work. Already the sound of voices drifted to him from this alien shore. He longed to put into one sentence all his love and hope. With brimming eyes he looked at his little flock for whom he had made the long journey, for whom he had forgotten sadness and heartache.

"Children," he said. "Margareta and Magdalena and Sabina and Conrad—" John Conrad's voice faltered. In a moment he began once more with a new message. "Children,—George and Christopher and Barbara and little John and dear Peter,—here is now your Fatherland."