name of the Governor and Company of Assembly of all the freemen and stoc' Massachusetts Bay, in New England. The holders, to be held quarterly. The righ affairs of the company and the colony were of Englishmen were secured to the co to be managed by a governor, deputy-gov- nists, but the management of the local gov gion. The company was organized under The court could not agree whether all the the charter by the appointment of Matthew Cradock governor, and Timothy Goffe deputy-governor-two wealthy London merchants. The executive administration of the colony was intrusted to John Endicott, assisted by twelve councillors seven to be named by the company, two to be selected by the old planters, and these nine to select three more. The settlement was called "London's Plantation." Every stockholder who should emigrate to America at his own cost was to receive fifty acres of land for each member of his family, and the same or each indentured servant he carried with him. The charter and the government were soon transferred from England to Massachusetts, and a large emigration ensued in 1629–30. ensigns should be laid aside, as many would not follow them with the cross visible. The commissioners of military affairs ordered all the ensigns to be put away. Nothing more was done in the matter then. Two years later there was more trouble about the colors. Henry Vane was elected governor (1636), and fifteen ships in the harbor having arrived with passengers, the seamen commemorated his election by a volley of great guns. But, the ensigns being “laid away,” the fort in Boston could not acknowledge the compliment by displaying colors. The English sailors accused the colonists of treason, and the ship-masters requested the governor to spread the King's colors at the fort, because the question of their loyalty might be raised in England. The magistrates were all persuaded that the cross in the colors was idolatrous, and the governor dissimulated by pretending that he had no colors. The ship-masters offered to lend him theirs, and this was accepted as a compromise with the consciences of the authorities, they arguing that, as the fort was the King's, the colors might be displayed there at his peril. Late in 1634, while Dudley was governor, John Endicott, incited by Roger Williams, caused the red cross of St. George to be cut out of the military standard of England used at Salem, because he regarded it as a "relic of Anti-Christ," it having been given by the pope to a former king of England as an ensign of victory. He had so worked upon the minds of many citizens of Salem that they refused to follow the standard with the cross upon it. At about that time the British government, jealous of the independent spirit manifested in Massachusetts, watched its development with great vigilance, and the enemies of the colony pointed to this mutilation of the standard as evidence of disloyalty to the crown. It was simply loyalty to bigotry. The whole aspect of the act was theological, not political; but the royalists chose to interpret it otherwise, and it was one of the reasons for tyrannical action towards the colony when orders were issued to the authorities of Massachusetts to produce their charter before the privy council in England. At a Court of Assistants at Boston complaint was made of the mutilation of the standard, for trouble with the home government was anticipated. The ensign-bearer was summoned thority of the wisdom and justice of those before the court. Afterwards the assistants met at the governor's house to advise about the defacing, and it was agreed to write to England about the matter. Endicott was, after three months' longer deliberation, called to answer for the act. At the request of the General Court, the REV. JOHN COTTON (q. r.) drew up the first code of laws of Massachusetts. They were taken entirely from the Old Testament. It was found that they were not adapted to a state of society so different from that of the Hebrews in the time of Moses, and Rev. Nathaniel Ward, who was familiar with the Roman as well as the Jewish laws, drew up a code which was substituted for Cotton's in 1641. The first article of this code provided that the rights of person and property vested in the citizen should be inviolate, except by express law, or, in default of that, by the Word of God." Governor Winthrop did not approve of Mr. Ward's adaptation of Greek and Roman laws. He thought it better that the laws should be taken from the Scriptures rather than "on the au heathen commonwealths." The "Body of Liberties compiled by Mr. Ward was really the first constitution of Massachusetts Bay. In 1651 Roger Williams and John Clarke were appointed agents to seek in England a confirmation of the Rhode who gave evidence of repentance and Island charter. Before their departure, faith; and that only such visible believers Mr. Clarke, with Mr. Crandall and Obadiah Holmes, delegates from the Baptist Church in Newport, visited an aged Baptist brother in Lynn, Mass., who was too feeble to attend public worship. On a Sunday morning they ventured to give constituted the Church of Christ on the earth. The ministers evaded the trial. Some of Clarke's friends paid his fine, and he was released. Crandall, fined $25, was released at the same time; but Holmes, a recent convert to Anabaptism, and lately was excommunicated, who was fined $150, had more of the martyr spirit. As he left the bar the pastor (John Wilson) struck him and cursed him because he said, "I bless God I am counted worthy to suffer for the name of Jesus." Some friends offered to pay Holmes's fine, but he declined it, and was taken to the public whipping post, where he scourged with a three-corded whip, with which a stout man gave him thirty stripes most vigorously," the man spitting on his hands three times." When led away, Holmes said to the magistrates, "You have struck me with roses," and prayed the punishment might not be laid to their charge. Two sympathizing friends came up to the bleeding victim of bigotry and intolerance, and, shaking hands with him, said, " Blessed be God." They were arrested for tempt of authority," fined 40s. each, and imprisoned. Holmes returned to Newport, and lived to old age. THE PROVINCE HOUSE, RESIDENCE OF THE ROYAL GOVERNORS OF MASSACHUSETTS. a public exhortation at the house of the brother. For this they were arrested, and carried by force in the afternoon to hear the regular Congregational preacher (Thomas Cobbett, author of "a large, nervous, and golden discourse" against the Baptists). The next day they were sent to Boston, where Clarke was sentenced to pay a fine of $100, or be whipped. One charge against him was that he neglected to take off his hat when he was forced into the Congregational meeting-house at Lynn. In a sermon just before Clarke's trial, John Cotton declared that to deny the efficacy of infant baptism was "to overthrow all," and was "soul murder" -a capital offence. So Endicott held in passing sentence upon the prisoner. He charged Clarke with preaching to the weak and ignorant, and bade him " try and dispute with our ministers." Clarke accepted the challenge, and sent word to the Massachusetts ministers that he would prove to them that the ordinance of baptism-that is, dipping in water -was to be administered only to those con Not long afterwards Sir Richard Saltonstall, one of the founders of the Massachusetts colony, wrote from England to Cotton and Wilson, ministers in Boston, saying: "It doth not a little grieve my spirit to hear what sad things are reported daily of your tyranny and persecution in New England, as that you fine, whip, and imprison men for their consciences. First you compel such to come into your assemblies as you know will not join you in your worship, and when they show their dislike thereof, or witness against it, then you stir up your magistrates to punish them for such as you conceive their public offences. Truly, friends, this your practice of compelling any, in matters of worship, to do that whereof they are not fully persuaded is to make them sin, for so the apostle (Rom. xiv., 23) tells us; and many are made hypocrites thereby, conforming in their outward man for fear of punishment. . . . These rigid ways have laid you very low in the hearts of the saints." King Charles I. now began to interfere with the political independence of the colony. He demanded the surrender of the charter to the crown; the order was evaded, and, by erecting fortifications and drilling troops, the colonists prepared to resist it. During the civil war the colony was quiet, but on the restoration of the Stuarts in 1660 (see CHARLES II.) the government of England claimed supreme jurisdiction in Massachusetts. A commissioner was sent to England in 1662, and obtained a confirmation of the charter and a conditional promise of amnesty for offenders during the late troubles between royalty and the people. Charles II. de setts, and a concession of the elective franchise to every man having a competent estate. There was a diversity of sentiment in the colony respecting these demands, some acquiescing, some opposing; and in 1664 commissioners arrived in Boston to investigate the affairs of the colony. The colonial authorities published an order prohibiting any complaints to be made to the commissioners, and addressed a remonstrance to the King. The commissioners, unable to do anything, finally withdrew. The King reproved Massachusetts, and ordered the governor and others to appear before him. They refused to go, and much trouble was expected. A more serious trouble awaited them. The colony was severely scourged by KING PHILIP'S WAR (q. v.) in 1675-76. The Indians destroyed manded the repeal of all laws contrary to a dozen towns, 6,000 houses, and 600 of his authority, the taking of an oath of the inhabitants, in their homes or in the allegiance, the administration of justice little army. Of the men, one in twenty in the King's name, the complete toleration had fallen, and of the families, one in of the Church of England in Massachu- twenty was homeless; and the cost of the war was over $500,000-enormous at that sachusetts purchased the title to the latter time. The royal pretensions to rule the colony were renewed after the war, though England had not furnished a man or a farthing to carry it on, but these were spurned. In 1680 a committee of the privy council, at the suit of the heirs of Gorges, denied the right of Massachusetts to New Hampshire and Maine. Mas (see MAINE), and the former became an independent province (see NEW HAMPSHIRE). In 1684 the high court of chancery in England gave judgment in favor of the crown against the Governor and Company of Massachusetts, and the charter was declared forfeited. Joseph Dudley was appointed royal governor, the General Assembly, or Court, was dissolved, and a |