Excerpt from The Pilgrims of the Rock: An Oration, Delivered in the First Congregational Church, Before the Society of the Sons of New England of Philadelphia, at Their Second Anniversary, on the 22d December, 1845
It was the evening of the Christian Sabbath; all Nature seemed to have rested from even the work of praise, and to have stood in silent beauty, musing its adoration.
The posthumous splendour of the retiring sun was gorgeously stretched along the western sky; and in the east the snow on the lofty headland seemed, to liquefy in the retiring light which the shadows of evening had chased slowly up its sides; here and there around, jutting points of land were tinged with the hues of the western sky, or lofty isolated hills lifted themselves up from the plain in solitary grandeur, while embosomed by these was a broad bay, whose beautiful waters were mirroring the gush of the Northern Aurora, or reflecting the first lustre of the stars that were struggling into visible existence through the fading glory that lingered in the vault above.
On the outer edge of this beautiful sheet of water, under the lee of one of the many islands which then dotted its surface, lay a small shallop, the appendage of some larger mercantile vessel; its appointments were meagre at best, but a recent storm had swept away its masts and sails and rudder, and the little barque lay a sheer hulk, scarcely affording shelter from the piercing cold of a December night; yet, up from that almost wrecked shallop went notes of joy and thankfulness for deliverance, and prayers for the safety of those whom the worshippers had left a little behind; prayers for the safety of their companion pilgrims; for the comfort of the aged, the preservation of the wise, and the support of the weak.
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