Themes
Key
LitCharts assigns a color and icon to each theme in Hope Leslie, which you can use to track the themes throughout the work.
Religious Conflict and Tolerance
Interracial Relationships
Violence and Historical Memory
Women’s Roles
The Puritan Heritage
Summary
Analysis
Governor Winthrop was not a “needy adventurer”; he owns a wealthy estate in England and is friends with many well-connected people. He is known as a paternal, well-tempered man; though forbidding in his looks, he is gracious and courteous to others. Madam Winthrop is a model Puritan wife—she is obedient to her husband but dignified and respected in her role.
Governor and Madam Winthrop are the model Puritan couple—prosperous, hospitable, and orthodox. Even though Sedgwick clearly rejects aspects of Puritan thought and society, she still treads carefully in her portrayals of historical figures, accentuating their goodness instead of their flaws.
Themes
At dinner that night, a side-table is set for guests. The main guest is Miantunnomoh, chief of the Narragansetts, attended by two counselors and an interpreter. As these men enter, Hope notices that Everell looks pale. Everell admits that he has not seen any American Indians for years, and their appearance reminds him of his mother’s death.
Miantunnomoh, or Miantonomoh, was a historical figure. The Narragansetts were allied with the English, but they criticized English methods of warfare and eventually rebelled against them. Miantunnomoh was later killed by a Mohegan rival.
Themes
After grace has been said and everyone else is seated, the American Indian guests remain standing. The interpreter explains that they expect their English hosts to treat them as they would treat English guests in their own homes. Winthrop, who has “urgent state reasons” not to antagonize Miantunnomoh, asks for forgiveness and, despite Madam Winthrop’s disapproving look, rearranges the table.
This scene appears to have been based on an account in Winthrop’s History of New England, in which Miantunnomoh, when a guest in the Governor’s home, refused to be seated separately.
Themes
Everell and Hope try to lighten the mood at the table by discussing how much conditions in the colonies have improved. When Hope asks Master Cradock a question, he awkwardly jerks to attention, bumping the elbow of a hovering servant and thereby causing gravy to spill all over himself. While everyone is distracted with this, Sir Philip Gardiner tries to pay Hope a flirtatious compliment, which startles her, and when he declines to try a piece of venison, Hope jokes that if he only eats fish, they’ll suspect him of being a “Romanist.” Sir Philip blushes faintly.
Master Cradock’s bumbling provides comic relief amid the social awkwardness—but there is more to come. Sir Philip behaves in a strangely forward, gallant manner for a Puritan, which even unsettles Hope. This, combined with his discomfort over Hope’s teasing reference to Catholicism (which was viewed as idolatrous in the Colony), combine to cast further mystery over Sir Philip’s identity.
Themes
Literary Devices
Get the entire Hope Leslie LitChart as a printable PDF.
Attention turns to Esther, as everyone notices how little she has eaten and how pale she looks. Intending to cheer her, Everell asks if he could have the honor of toasting Esther. At this, Hope, Mr. Fletcher, and Governor Winthrop scold Everell in unison. When Everell asks, “What have I done now?” the Governor explains that the custom of drinking to someone has been discontinued at his table for a decade, and that the colony outlawed it several years ago.
Everell’s time in England has softened the hard edges of his New England Puritanism, and he’s not used to the customs of pious Boston households—making him an awkward guest, to the shared horror of the Governor, his father, and even Hope.
Themes
Everell claims drinking toasts is an innocent custom, but Governor Winthrop replies that “vanity” is never innocent. Love should never be feigned, so Everell’s “empty compliment” is worthless. Esther and Everell blush and stammer in response. The meal ends without any further attempts at conversation, and the American Indian guests leave rather coldly.
Governor Winthrop’s point is that a toast is a gesture of sincere esteem, which shouldn’t be made in a teasing or lighthearted manner.
Themes
Governor Winthrop retires to his study with his friend Mr. Fletcher. Winthrop hands Fletcher a letter from his brother-in-law, Downing (Esther’s father). The letter praises Everell’s gifts and talents, though Everell is not quite as purely Puritan as could be wished. To remedy that, he should marry a good Puritan girl—namely Esther—as soon as possible. However, Downing warns, the Fletchers intend that Everell should marry Hope. Hope, however, is “wanting in grace” and not a suitable mate.
After the rather disastrous dinner, Governor Winthrop is not impressed with Everell, and for the sake of his Puritan colony, he wants to see Everell marry a suitably orthodox girl. Mr. Fletcher, however, has long cherished the idea of Everell marrying Hope—a kind of union between his son and the daughter of his youthful love, Alice.
Themes
Mr. Fletcher is “stung” by this letter and, finishing it, begins to cry. Finally, he pulls himself together and admits to Winthrop that it has been his dream to see “these children of two saints in heaven united.” Hope is the image of her mother and has brought Mr. Fletcher comfort, perhaps binding him too much to earthly affections.
Mr. Fletcher takes it personally that both his son and his adoptive daughter are seen as being insufficiently desirable mates, his dream of their union being crushed before his eyes.
Themes
Governor Winthrop sympathizes with Fletcher but argues that Everell and Esther seem to have affection for one another, and that Hope would want them to be happy. Anyway, he adds, Hope “hath not […] that passiveness, that, next to godliness, is a woman’s best virtue.” Mr. Fletcher retorts that “a property of soulless matter” can hardly be a virtue.
Mr. Fletcher openly rejects Winthrop’s claim about the feminine ideal—he argues, in other words, that “passiveness” is not a really human quality, much less a virtue to be desired in a wife.
Themes
Governor Winthrop reminds Mr. Fletcher of Hope’s “lawlessness” in the situation with Nelema and suggests that “the modest authority of a husband” is just what she needs. Perhaps the educated and orthodox William Hubbard would do. Mr. Fletcher points out that Hope “inclineth not to bookish men.”
William Hubbard was a Puritan colonist whose historical work, Narrative of the Indian Wars in New-England (1677), Sedgwick drew upon (and some of whose accounts she challenges) in writing Hope Leslie.
Themes
Then the Governor suggests Sir Philip Gardiner as a potential match—he may be old, but he is of good family and a pious convert to Puritanism. Mr. Fletcher is unconvinced and leaves, once more overcome with emotion. The narrator observes that the men occupy themselves too much with “superfluous trials,” but that readers should focus more on “the bright halo that encircled the pilgrims’ head” than on their faults.
The fact that Winthrop and Fletcher spend so much time debating young people’s marriages, the narrator suggests, points to a Puritan blind spot—trying to control the future of the colony by meddling in essentially private matters. Yet Sedgwick declines to critique the Puritans too harshly, either.
Themes
