The Story of a Pioneer
- Pages
- about 313
- Category
- History
- Language
- English
- Reading time
- 5.8 h at 250 wpm
From the opening
They cut a path through tangled underwood
Of old traditions, out to broader ways.
They lived to here their work called brave and good,
But oh! the thorns before the crown of bays.
The world gives lashes to its Pioneers
Until the goal is reached--then deafening cheers.
DR. SHAW'S COTTAGE, THE HAVEN, AT WIANNO, CAPE
COD--THE FIRST HOME SHE BUILT
My father's ancestors were the Shaws of Rothiemurchus, in Scotland,
and the ruins of their castle may still be seen on the island of
Loch-an-Eilan, in the northern Highlands. It was never the picturesque
castle of song and story, this home of the fighting Shaws, but an
austere fortress, probably built in Roman times; and even to-day the
crumbling walls which alone are left of it show traces of the relentless
assaults upon them. Of these the last and the most successful were made
in the seventeenth century by the Grants and Rob Roy; and it was into
the hands of the Grants that the Shaw fortress finally fell, about 1700,
after almost a hundred years of ceaseless warfare.
It gives me no pleasure to read the grisly details of their struggles,
but I confess to a certain satisfaction in the knowledge that my
ancestors made a good showing in the defense of what was theirs. Beyond
doubt they were brave fighters and strong men. There were other sides to
their natures, however, which the high lights of history throw up
less appealingly. As an instance, we have in the family chronicles the
blood-stained page of Allen Shaw, the oldest son of the last Lady Shaw
who lived in the fortress. It appears that when the father of this
young man died, about 1560, his mother married again, to the intense
disapproval of her son.
A short sample. Read the whole book
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