Heartbreak Hill

: TALES OF PURITAN LAND
: Myths And Legends Of Our Own Land

The name of Heartbreak Hill pertains, in the earliest records of Ipswich,

to an eminence in the middle of that town on which there was a large

Indian settlement, called Agawam, before the white men settled there and

drove the inhabitants out. Ere the English colony had been firmly planted

a sailor straying ashore came among the simple natives of Agawam, and

finding their ways full of novelty he lived with them for a time. When he
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found means to return to England he took with him the love of a maiden of

the tribe, but the girl herself he left behind, comforting her on his

departure with an assurance that before many moons he would return.

Months went by and extended into years, and every day the girl climbed

Heartbreak Hill to look seaward for some token of her lover. At last a

ship was seen trying to make harbor, with a furious gale running her

close to shore, where breakers were lashing the rocks and sand. The girl

kept her station until the vessel, becoming unmanageable, was hurled

against the shore and smashed into a thousand pieces. As its timbers went

tossing away on the frothing billows a white, despairing face was lifted

to hers for an instant; then it sank and was seen nevermore--her lover's

face. The dusky Ariadne wasted fast from that day, and she lies buried

beside the ledge that was her watch-tower.



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