"Now many memories make solicitous
The delicate love lines of her mouth, till, lit
With quivering fire, the words take wing from it;
As here between our kisses we sit thus
Speaking of things remembered, and so sit
Speechless while things forgotten call to us."
Joanna's wedding occurred at the beginning of the winter and the winter
festivities. But, amid all the dining and dancing and skating, there was
a political anxiety and excitement that leavened strongly every social
and domestic event. The first Colonial Congress had passed the three
resolutions which proved to be the key-note of resistance and of
liberty. Joris had emphatically indorsed its action. The odious Stamp
Act was to be met by the refusal of American merchants either to import
English goods, or to sell them upon commission, until it was repealed.
Homespun became fashionable. During the first three months of the year,
it was a kind of disgrace to wear silk or satin or broadcloth; and a
great fair was opened for the sale of articles of home manufacture. The
Government kept its hand upon the sword. The people were divided into
two parties, bitterly antagonistic to each other. The "Sons of Liberty"
were keeping guard over the pole which symbolized their determination;
the British soldiery were swaggering and boasting and openly insulting
patriots on the streets; and the "New York Gazette," in flaming
articles, was stimulating to the utmost the spirit of resistance to
tyranny.
And these great public interests had in every family their special
modifications. Joris was among the two hundred New York merchants who
put their names to the resolutions of the October Congress; Bram was a
conspicuous member of the "Sons of Liberty;" but Batavius, though
conscientiously with the people's party, was very sensible of the
annoyance and expense it put him to. Only a part of his house was
finished, but the building of the rest was in progress; and many things
were needed for its elegant completion, which were only to be bought
from Tory importers, and which had been therefore nearly doubled in
value. When liberty interfered with the private interests of Batavius,
he had his doubts as to whether it was liberty. Often Bram's overt
disloyalty irritated him beyond endurance. For, since he had joined the
ranks of married men and householders, Batavius felt that unmarried men
ought to wait for the opinions and leadership of those who had
responsibilities.
Joanna talked precisely as Batavius talked. All of his enunciations met
with her "Amen." There are women who are incapable of but one
affection,--that one which affects them in especial,--and Joanna was of
this order. "My husband" was perpetually on her tongue. She looked upon
her position as a wife and housekeeper as unique. Other woman might
have, during the past six thousand years, held these positions in an
indifferent kind of way; but only she had ever comprehended and properly
fulfilled the duties they involved. Madam Van Heemskirk smiled a little
when Joanna gave her advices about her house and her duties, when she
disapproved of her father's political attitude, when she looked injured
by Bram's imprudence.