[1607-1614 A.D.]

the members of a colonial council, to the coast of South Virginia; and in the following spring, after many obstacles encountered, and amidst jealousies and dissensions, a settlement was effected, as we have seen, upon the peninsula of Jamestown, of which but the ruins at present remain.

Nearly at the same time a similar enterprise was projected by the Plymouth Company, under more discouraging circumstances, owing to its poverty, and on May 31st, 1607, two ships-the Gift of God and the Mary and John-with a few over a hundred landsmen, were despatched under Raleigh Gilbert, a nephew of Sir Walter Raleigh, and George Popham, the brother of the chief justice; but the result was the unfortunate colony at Sagadahoc.' The fate of this attempt, with the doleful reports of the inhospitableness of the climate circulated by the emigrants to cover their cowardice checked for a season the ardour of the company; though Sir Ferdinando Gorges, and Sir Francis Popham, the son of the chief justice-the former of whom was never dismayed-continued sending vessels to the coast, and spent large sums in efforts at colonisation.

Meanwhile, under the auspices of the Dutch, discoveries were made by Henry Hudson, Hendrick Christiaensen, Adrian Block, and others, at the charge of prominent merchants of Amsterdam, who derived great profits from the furs brought home by the vessels in their employ. Explorations were vigorously prosecuted around "Manhattan" by Block, in the Restless; and the discovery of the island which bears his name, and the three famous rivers, the Housatonic, the Thames, and the Connecticut, with Long Island and Rhode Island are said to have been the fruits of his energetic enterprise. Even the shores of Massachusetts as far as Nahant were visited by this navigator, and names were given to places discovered by Gosnold and others. It should be noticed that the territory embraced in the Dutch charter of 1614 was claimed by England, and was included in the patent to the Virginia Company; the settlements of the Dutch were ever regarded as intrusions; the controversies growing out of these claims disturbed for a long time the peace of the colonies; nor were they permanently adjusted until after the reduction of New Netherlands in 1664.

JOHN SMITH'S EXPLORATIONS (1614 A.D.)

A new era in the annals of New England begins with the voyages of Captain John Smith, president of the colonial council of South Virginia. Furnished, principally at the charge of four private gentlemen, with an outfit of two vessels and a company of forty-nine men and boys, he sailed from London March 3rd, 1614, and in a few weeks arrived at Monhegan, where he immediately entered upon the chief business of his voyage: to take whales, and make trials of a mine of gold and copper." But "whale fishing" proved a costly conclusion"; the "gold mine" was a chimera of the brain of "the master"; and fish and furs became the last resort. "Of dry fish," says Smith," we made about forty-thousand, of corfish about seven thousand "; 2 whilst the sailors fished, Captain Smith and a few others ranged the coast in an open boat, in the most attractive season of the year, making noted discoveries, and purchasing, "for trifles, near eleven hundred beaver skins, one ['This was at the mouth of the Kennebec river, which Weymouth had explored in 1605, not far from Pemaquid peninsula. Popham built a fort and a "town" at Sabino, but both were abandoned after his death.]

In his Pathway he says 60,000; but in his Generall Historie and his Description of New England he says 40,000.

It is 11,000 in the Generall Historie, and 1,100 in the other works.

[1615-1616 A.D.] hundred martens, and near as many otters"-valued in all at £1,500. "With these furs, the train, and corfish," he returned to England, and within six months "arrived safe back"-the other ship remaining for a season to "fit herself for Spain with the dry fish."

In this remarkable voyage the coast was explored "from Penobscot to Cape Cod," within which bounds, he says, "I have seen at least forty several habitations upon the sea coast, and sounded about twenty-five excellent good harbours, in many whereof there is anchorage for five hundred sails of ships of any burden, in some of them for five thousand;1 and more than two hundred isles overgrown with good timber of divers sorts of woods." Of the coast of Massachusetts he says: "Who can but approve this a most excellent place, both for health and fertility? And of all the four parts of the world that I have yet seen, not inhabited, could I but have means to transport a colony, I would rather live here than anywhere. And if it did not maintain itself, were we but once indifferently well fitted, let us starve." Indeed, the Massachusetts country, to him, was "the paradise of all those parts.'

But though Smith acted honourably as principal of this expedition, his companion Hunt, whom he left behind, vilely copied the example of Weymouth, and enticing to his vessel upwards of twenty of the natives under pretence of trade, he confined them in the hold, and sailed for Malaga, where part of them, at least, were sold as slaves. "This barbarous act," says Mather, "was the unhappy occasion of the loss of many a man's estate and life, which the barbarians did from thence seek to destroy; and the English, in consequence of this treachery, were constrained for a time to suspend their trade, and abandon their project of a settlement in New England."

The prosperous pecuniary issue of the first voyage of Smith awakened in his mind an earnest desire to visit again the delightful regions which his pen has described; and imparting his views to Sir Ferdinando Gorges, a man of kindred enthusiasm, and to Doctor Sutcliffe, dean of Exeter, he was, after some delay, furnished with two ships, with which he set out on his second voyage (March, 1615); but, as if an inexorable fate relentlessly pursued the persevering Gorges, the largest ship was disabled ere Smith had sailed two hundred leagues, and he was forced to return. The smaller vessel, commanded by Captain Thomas Dermer, after a successful voyage of five months, returned in safety. The dauntless Smith, gathering fresh courage from the consciousness of difficulties, renewed his attempt (June 24th, 1615); but misfortune followed misfortune, until it seemed as if everything was arrayed to defeat his plans. He was first attacked by brutal pirates; then taken prisoner by four French men-of-war, stripped of everything, and detained three months, when he succeeded in escaping "far beyond all men's reason or his expectation."

Forced by these reverses, and by the discouragement of his employers, to relinquish for a time his plans of colonisation, the restless spirit of this resolute man could not be content to remain inactive; and publishing to the world his Description of New England in 1616, he traversed the kingdom to awaken an interest in establishing permanent settlements in these parts. But the only result of his earnest labours was a promise that "twenty saile of ships should be furnished him the next year; and "in regard of my paines, charge, and former losses, the westerne commissioners in behalf of themselues and the rest of the company, and them hereafter that should be ioyned to them, It is 5,000 in the Description of New England, but 1,000 in his other works.

It is 200 in the Generall Historie and the Description of New England, and 300 in the Pathway.

[1619 A.D.]

contracted with me by articles indented vnder our hands, to be admirall of that country during my life, and in the renewing of their letters-patent so to be nominated.""

DERMER'S VOYAGE (1619 A.D.)

Contemporary events, however, unlooked for by the Plymouth Council, were preparing New England for successful colonisation. First of all a war broke out among the aborigines, which resulted in the destruction of thousands of the Indians, with the Great Bashaba at their head; and to war succeeded pestilence which completed the work of depopulation. This singular disease, says Gorges, i "the greatest that ever the memory of father to son took notice of," spread far and wide, and was exceedingly fatal. It raged, at intervals, for more than two years, and extended, in its wasting effects, from the borders of the Tarratines southward to the Narragansetts. The people "died in heaps, insomuch that the living were in no wise able to bury the dead"; the wigwams were filled with putrefying corpses; young men and children, the very seeds of increase," and whole families and tribes perished; and even seven years after the bones of the unburied lay bleaching upon the ground at and around their former habitations.

The nature of this epidemic has never been determined. It has been called the “small pox," and the "yellow fever." But whatever was its character, all were not equally affected by its ravages, for the Penobscots and the Narragansetts suffered but little. Nor does it seem to have troubled the few English residents of the country.

Learning that Captain Dermer, the companion of Smith in the voyage of 1615, was then at Newfoundland, through the persuasion of Gorges Captain Edward Rocroft was sent to those parts in 1618 in a vessel of two hundred tons, with orders to join Dermer in exploring the coasts of New England. His men conspired to rob and slay him; but putting the mutineers ashore at "Sawaguatock," he sailed to Virginia, where he had lived some years before, and in another quarrel he was killed, and his bark was sunk during a storm. Dermer, learning his fate by a ship from Virginia, sent his own vessel to England, laden with fish and furs, and embarked in an open pinnace of five tons (May 26th, 1619), taking with him Tisquantum or Squanto - the subsequent friend and interpreter of the Pilgrims—and "searching every harbour, and compassing every cape-land," he arrived at length in the neighbourhood of what is now Plymouth. Returning to the northward the ensuing spring for the prosecution of his discoveries, in the vicinity of Cape Cod he was beset by the natives, and received a large number of wounds of which he subsequently died. This journey of 1619, as preceding by a year the settlement of Plymouth, and as taken in the territory so often alluded to by the Pilgrims is exceedingly interesting. It was an important addition to the knowledge of the country, and prepared the way, by its friendly termination, for the hospitable reception of the Plymouth colonists by the generous Massasoit and his brother Quadequina, whom all will recognise as the two savage kings alluded to in the narrative.

THE GREAT PATENT FOR NEW ENGLAND

Eighteen years had now elapsed since the discovery of Massachusetts by the enterprising Gosnold, and as yet no colony was planted upon its territory.

h

1 Prince and Holmes quote Purchas' as authority for a voyage undertaken by Smith in 1617; but we find no notice of such a voyage in Smith's own writings,

[1620 A.D.] The settlements to the north were more successful; and in Canada and Newfoundland colonies were established, and children had been born. To the south, also, the Dutch had thrown up slight bulwarks at New Netherlands, and were conducting a lucrative trade in furs. But the indefatigable Gorges was not easily baffled. Application was made to the king for a charter. His majesty, who was at this time highly offended with the members of the London Council for their bold defiance of his arbitrary will, readily sanctioned their request for a patent. But two years elapsed before it could be obtained.

November 3rd, 1620, the Great Patent for New England passed the seals. In this memorable document, the principal foundation of all subsequent grants of territory in New England, his majesty conveyed to forty of his subjects among whom were the most powerful and wealthy of his nobility all that part of America extending from the 40th to the 48th degree of North latitude, and between these parallels from the Atlantic to the Pacific: a body of land embracing the Acadia of the French, and the New Netherlands of the Dutch, and covering nearly the whole of the present inhabited British possessions in North America, all New England, the state of New York, half of New Jersey, nearly all of Pennsylvania, and the vast country to the west -comprising, and at the time believed to comprise, more than a million of square miles, and capable of sustaining more than two hundred million of inhabitants.1

The company established by this grant was to be known as "the council established at Plymouth, in the county of Devon, for the planting, ruling, ordering, and governing of New England in America." Absolute property in the soil, unlimited jurisdiction, the regulation of trade, sole powers of legislation, the administration of justice, and the appointment of all officers were among the privileges conceded by his majesty. Subordinate patents, vesting property in the soil, could be granted by this council, but it could not confer powers of government without the authority and consent of the king. In other respects its powers were complete. The lands and islands, the rivers and harbours, the mines and fisheries were all under its control. None, without leave, could buy a skin, catch a fish, or build a hut. It was a commercial monopoly, exclusive and despotica corporation potent for evil or for good.

2

At the very moment this charter was granted, as if to prove that without its aid more could be accomplished than under its sanction, a solitary bark the forlorn Mayflower-was wending its way wearily across the Atlantic, bearing in its bosom a resolute band of one hundred men, women, and children, who were to become the founders of a wide-spread republic, and to plant the seeds of a thriving nation, whose destiny, yet unfolding, futurity alone can fully reveal.

THE PURITANS AND THE SEPARATISTS IN ENGLAND

To appreciate the circumstances which led to the settlement of Plymouth in 1620, and to the establishment of the Massachusetts colony a few years

1 Douglass says this patent was designedly extended much north and south, to include and keep up the English claims to New Netherlands in possession of the Dutch, to the southward, and to L'Acadie, since called Nova Scotia, then in possession of the French, to the northward."

This fact is worthy of notice, and should ever be borne in mind in investigating the history of New England. We are aware it has been asserted that the council could confer by grant powers similar to its own; but this was denied by the crown lawyers, and must therefore be considered as doubtful,

[1567-1572 A.D.]

later, it is necessary to be acquainted with the history of religion during the preceding hundred years. [This can be found traced in its various phases in the earlier volumes, especially in our history of England, where the rise of Puritanism and its protest against ritualism have been described in much detail.]

It must not be forgotten, however, in defining the position of Puritanism in the reign of Elizabeth, that the controversies which convulsed the kingdom were not wholly confined to the tippet and the surplice, the square cap and the liturgy. The Puritans were the harbingers of a political as well as of a moral revolution. Doubtless the ultimate tendency of their views was to republicanism rather than to monarchy. They would yield, in religion, nothing arbitrarily to the temporal sovereign. It was their motto that, in church matters God's word was the guide. And though they cannot be properly accused of open disloyalty, it must at the same time be acknowledged that their loyalty did not extend so far as to approbate the doctrine of passive obedience. And because the church and the state were considered one and inseparable, and the unity of the former was deemed the safety of the latter, non-conformity was persecuted on the plea of necessity.

This is the true secret of the opposition of the English church to Puritanism and independency. This church had virtually assumed its own infallibility. It had driven down the stakes which were never more to be removed. It had interwoven the hierarchy with the whole temporal constitution of the realm. And the test of loyalty was undeviating conformity to the canons of the church, and implicit obedience to the mandates of the crown. The church was yet in its infancy, surrounded by subtle foes. The state was trembling upon the verge of revolution. And the instinct of self-preservation prompted persecution of all who refused to put forth their hands to aid in supporting the ark of the Lord and the supremacy of the crown.

If this, however, was the policy of the government of England, it was the natural result of such a policy to beget, on the part of the Puritans, an attachment equally strong to the peculiarities of their religious system; and upon their removal to America, the same principle of self-defense prompted the caution which was used in laying the foundations of their infant commonwealth, to guard it with jealous watchfulness against the aggressions and encroachments of Episcopacy, which they had learned to mistrust, and to build up a community exclusively of their own faith, as in England nonconformity was neither tolerated nor allowed. Puritanism, notwithstanding its errors and its early excesses, contained the seminal principles of true religious toleration; and as experience enlightened the judgment of the professors of that faith, and as circumstances sanctioned the adoption of a more liberal policy, measures were promptly taken to initiate so desirable a reform, and the world is now reaping the fruits of Puritan iconoclasm and asceticism.

The Puritans, though as a body they made no strenuous objections to the lawfulness of ecclesiastical government, when they found that persecution continued to oppose them, that reform was hopeless, and that rule or ruin was the motto of the day, sent forth a party of stern, intrepid, and uncompromising spirits, who, unawed, but baited into an almost savage stubbornness and hostility, refused longer to commune with a church many of whose ceremonies were reprobated, and whose government had become odious, intolerant, and oppressive.

A few separate congregations were formed so early as 1567; in 1570 Cartwright entered the field; and in 1572 the "first born of all presbyteries" was established at Wandworth in Surrey. But it was not until nine years after,